Drell
From FABT
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| Biographical information | |
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Homeworld: |
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Status: |
Active |
| Physical information | |
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Height: |
7' (male) |
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Skin color: |
Lime green |
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Hair color: |
No hair |
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Eye color: |
Black |
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Lifespan: |
130 (pre and post-Kepral's Syndrome) |
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Distinctions: |
No hair. Dual-eyes, two sets of eyelids. Bipedal. Capable of biotics. Straight legs. Straight back. Dextro-amino chirality. Two hearts. Four lungs. Skin excretes mild venom. Eidetic memory. |
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Types: |
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| Political and military information | |
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Affiliation: |
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Nomenclature: |
Lenta Augustia |
- "My people had a chance for greatness, but that potential is long gone. Now we just try to make our mark on the galaxy. We owe the hanar much and more for saving our species, and that's a debt that can never be repaid, but there are times where I must wonder what the final hours of those left behind on Rakhana must have been like as our world just fell apart. It haunts me."
- — A drell historian.
Drell (Latin: Lenta Augustia, literally meaning "lithe trouble") are a sentient/sapient organic bipedal species native to their homeworld of Rakhana and of the reptilian classification. Having never achieved interstellar travel due to out-of-control industrial pollution and rampant overpopulation leading to a global cataclysm, the drell were only saved from extinction by the actions of the Hanar Primacy in 1980 CE, who made first contact with the drell's Rakhanan League around the time that drell society was beginning to descend into chaos. With time being of the essence, the Hanar Primacy immediately committed to an evacuation effort, and by 1990 CE, had managed to evacuate 400,000 drell: the Primacy were unable to save more, as the Rakhanan League at this point had disintegrated and a mixture of civil wars and climate catastrophes had overtaken the planet and all consolidated drell government was long gone, forcing them to leave the vast majority of drell behind: by 2050 CE, reports confirmed Rakhana was lifeless, only minor pockets of survivors living in primitive conditions continuing to exist, and by 2100 CE, these too died as Rakhana's atmosphere became uninhabitable. The new drell homeworld became Kahje, the hanar homeworld, and through the Compact worked to integrate themselves into hanar society, becoming citizens of the Primacy and treated as equals to the hanar, even serving in their military as their own special branch, the Drell Auxiliary Corps. However, having evolved on an arid, desert world, the drell's bodies were not evolved to handle the humid, aquatic climate of Kahje, and overtime this lead to the development of a genetic condition known as Kepral's Syndrome, a respiratory condition that made it difficult for a drell's blood to produce oxygen, eventually concluding in their death, which drastically shortened drell life expectancies and lifespans from 130 to 80, but this was eventually "cured" in 2400 CE thanks to the centuries of efforts from the Primacy's best genetics experts through the Drell Bioengineering and Kepral Treatment program, which finally allowed the drell's blood to properly produce oxygen properly, effectively wiping out the disease.
Having joined the galactic community in 1980 CE, but only becoming active participants by 1994 CE, the drell joined fairly late in the asari cycle, being the latest species to join the community prior to the arrival of humanity under two centuries later. The drell are devoted to helping their hanar saviors and most serve under the Compact gratefully and happily, although those that view it as predatory and manipulative are called Anti-Compactists, serving as a minority in drell society: as the hanar lack the physical capabilities of the other species, they rely on the drell to make up the difference, utilizing their agility and flexibility to their advantage as hitmen, assassins, soldiers, assistants and more: drell are known to produce the best assassins in the galaxy, their body possessing many natural traits that make them especially adept at the task, and the most famous assassin of all, Thane Krios, was a drell. Their skin produces a venom that is mild enough to be served in drinks, but can cause hallucinations upon oral contact: however, the most obvious advantage the drell possess is like none other in the galaxy, and that is an extremely enhanced, near perfect, eidetic memory. Due to evolving in a desert environment where resources were scarce and one needed to remember the location of all of them to survive, the drell developed a photographic memory of unparalleled excellence, able to remember, in crystal clear detail, every single detail of a memory, even if it was decades ago. Their memory recollection is so perfect that drell can "slip into memories" involuntarily, a process they refer to as solipsism, where an event, taste, smell or sound can trigger a drell to relapse into a memory: while this can be good memories, it can also be bad, and the drell suffer the worst as a result than any other species when it comes to PTSD. The drell are also a deeply spiritual people and the population is mostly split into four groups of religious belief: an extreme minority practice the religions of other species, a larger minority are atheistic or agnostic, a small percentage of the population still practice the old religion, and the majority have adopted the religion of the Primacy.
By 2900 CE, the drell have largely recovered from their species' brush with extinction. They continue to live on Kahje, and they have settled at least three worlds that they call their own, governed under the Primacy but ruled by a drell-only government. While the topic of terraforming Rakhana to become livable again is bounced back and forth in academic circles every now and then, most drell are adamantly against it, especially as Rakhana, shortly after the cataclysm, was listed as a grave site by the Citadel Council, and the drell mostly side with this motion, viewing Rakhana as a memorial and not one to be disturbed. As such, terraforming plans are not currently on the table and are unlikely to ever take off, although numerous hanar space stations were set up in orbit over the planet to monitor its ecology, and by 3000 CE, reports said it was showing the earliest signs of recovery, with small microscopic organisms beginning to show up in large numbers.