Athasian

## Description

The Athasians are a humaniod species from Athasia. They are of a slim build, generally medium to dark skinned and around 4 and a half to five and a half feet tall.

What to say about the Athasians?  It seems rather unnecessary.  Athasians are everywhere in the Confederacy.  It's not as if someone could mistake the graceful agile Athasians for any other species.  Well, no Confederacy member could.  At that first grand meeting between the Confederacy and Sovereignty, the Sovereignty members thought that Athasians were just another type of Terran, but being aliens, Terrans are allowed their minor ignorances even if said ignorances are laughably stupid.  Imagine glimpsing the veins under an Athasians' dark skin and thinking there was iron in that blood instead of copper.  And where's the wisdom in keeping "wisdom teeth"?  Goosebumps, whatever they are, can't be worth carting around a bunch of now-pointless organs.  (Where would Athasians even store them?)  And *Nelmoors*.  The Terrans looked so confused at the concept of a neutral sex though Terrans do know about *Prees* and *Yejume*.  (Even if the Omnish words are male and female.)  But to their credit, the Sovereignty got on board pretty quickly with the concept and using they and how common *Prees*-*Yejume*-*Nelmoor* family units are so maybe there's hope for the Sovereignty yet.

The Athasians civilized early and have been capable of spaceflight for centuries.  As such, they've made it their personal business to look out for all the other species and ensure their progress runs smoothly.  Realizing that knowledge can be as dangerous as it is beneficial, the Athasians are reluctant to share theirs with any culture that hasn't proved themselves capable.  What does get out is thoroughly vetted beforehand, and the Athasian keep a close eye on developing technologies, especially when it comes to the Enorians.  The Athasians' natural aptitude as ambassadors and mediators led to the birth of not just the Confederacy, but the energy-blade-wielding peacekeeping organization known as the Guardians.

The Athasians have access to some of the most advanced technology in existence, even better in many cases than what the Enorians have developed.  The computers on Athasia are downright intuitive.  An Athasian can simply request something, and the result is there so quickly, it was as if the computer was just waiting to deliver it.  And that's when an Athasian has to look up something. Their basic education level is so advanced that it's common for Athasian to just inexplicably know all manner of obscure things.  Its government prides itself on being a pure democracy-- every citizen's opinion is taken into account on every matter.  Athasia seems an impossibly wonderful place of peace and understanding.

The Athasians have a reputation as collectors.  Their museums, zoos, and aquariums are some of the best stocked in the universe with pieces and creatures acquired from every culture and planet the Athasians have come across.  On a smaller scale, most Athasians have something like a cabinet of curiosity in their homes, though the collections often lean towards more mundane things like coins or rocks or interesting trinkets.  With travel and trade being so easy in the Confederacy, many Athasians visit other planets specifically to collect keepsakes from the location.  It's been joked that the Confederacy is merely the Athasians' attempt to collect all the planets.