The year is somewhere in the 2300s on an alternate Earth, where both technology and society have advanced significantly. Things aren’t perfect by any means, but large-scale conflict is at an all time global low. Science has continued progressing, and while things may not look hugely different from our Earth at a glance, there are quite a few huge discoveries that have fundamentally altered life in this reality.
Undoubtedly, the biggest of these is the fact that humanity is no longer alone.
In 2062, strange energy signatures began radiating from small rifts that appeared simultaneously across the planet, heralding the single biggest change our world has gone through.
It took several decades, but eventually the first refugees from another dimension manifested in our plane of existence – helikind.
Helikind is a species of extradimensional entities who came to Earth, fleeing some unknown catastrophe in their home dimension. In their natural state, they are beings of pure energy and have no physical form. However, to exist in this reality, significant changes had to be made.
The first entities to cross the rifts (a process known as “transiting”) are referred to as Conduits. Even though Conduits are helicoids in the strictest sense, in practically every way that matters, they are their own completely distinct class.
Conduits are composed of a seemingly haphazard mix of metal and any organic material that was near their rift at the moment they formed. They’re massive living antennae that receive signals from their home realm and translate them into language and images – and, more importantly, they receive and transit helicoids. They are sentient and aware, but their minds are so completely alien and their power so immense that they’re functionally demigods, though it could easily be argued they are minor gods, full stop.
Conduits build physical forms for transiting helicoids from any material available to them, resulting in a species that is truly biomechanical. All helicoids are a perfect blend of organic and inorganic parts, requiring both to live. They bend the laws of reality to accomplish this otherwise impossible feat, though it isn’t something they can consciously control. It’s just a part of how their bodies function.
However, the process of transiting across dimensions and having your entire state of being fundamentally altered is extremely taxing, and all helicoids who arrive on Earth in this manner cannot remember their home. It exists as a vague impression, something never truly forgotten, lingering at the edge of consciousness.
At the most basic level, helikind is a species of sapient, intelligent, biomechanical creatures. Their physical forms may have astronomical variety, but when it comes down to it, they’re just people. They have largely the same needs and desires that humans do, and adapted to their new home very quickly.
The main thing that stands out about helikind is that their physical appearances are wildly variable. It may seem absurd that a fully aquatic, limbless, oarfish-like creature and something that closely resembles a very large lizardbug are the same species, but if you know what to look for, it’s clear that they are.
Helicoids will (nearly) always have the following:
In addition to these more basic attributes, all of helikind share some universal features that are unique to their species.
Helicoids are a perfect, harmonious blend of organic and inorganic parts. They require both to function, and are created or hatch with their mechanical parts already present. These grow, heal, and age with the helicoid in a similar manner to their biological components.
Their bones, teeth, and claws are always made of metal, and most helicoids have a pretty even split of bio and mech. For the most part, horns, shells, and any other hard structure will also be made of metal. Mechanical parts will frequently bleed when damaged, and will always leak flux.
As a result of their mixed physiology, helicoid healing and recovery is exceptionally strange and technically impossible in Earth’s dimension. As long as a helicoid is getting enough metals and minerals in their diet – they can, indeed, chew and digest practically any metal – their mechanical parts will heal in much the same way that an Earth organism would.
Additionally, helicoid mouths are rarely suited to human modes of speech, lacking the fine control necessary to form words in the way we do. Instead, they will either have a “synthetic” voicebox that acts like a speaker, or a kind of limited sound manipulation. Frequently, they have both at the same time.
Helicoids also usually have vocal chords of some kind and can make a variety of growls, screams, roars, and howls. Even if they lack these structures, they can still mimic these noises with their speech components.
While helicoid anatomy is impossible in our reality, this is where their extradimensional origins come in. Every helicoid has a structure called a core somewhere in their torso, and this core contains an alien energy known as flux.
Flux is posited to be very similar to the energy that helicoids are composed of in their home plane. Due to its alien properties, it distorts the laws of physics in a very specific, controlled way when contained in a core. It’s what allows for true biomechanical physiology, in a way that simply cannot be achieved otherwise.
Damage to a helicoid’s core is nearly always a critical, life-threatening injury. If the flow of flux gets interrupted, a helicoid’s body will rapidly begin malfunctioning as the reality-altering effects fade and Earth physics take hold. It isn’t uncommon for a helicoid whose core has been destroyed to literally fall apart.
It’s unknown if helicoids generate flux themselves through some internal process, or if they’re channelling it directly from their home.
Flux is very poorly understood, and flux studies are a huge area of ongoing research.
In addition to its necessary role in keeping their bodies running, flux can also be used as a last-ditch defence measure. By consciously overriding their flux channels’ usual pathing, a helicoid can muster a temporary burst of concentrated flux from their mouth. This usually takes the appearance of fire, plasma, or a jet of gas.
This makeshift breath weapon is moderately harmful to inorganics, and highly destructive to biological material. The exact effects seem to vary just as much as helicoids themselves, but usually it will cause severe burns and extensive nerve damage. It also hurts the helicoid in the process, usually burning their mouth quite severely.
If a helicoid is pushed to use their flux this way, they’re truly desperate.
Sometimes, an individual will have so much flux that their core cannot properly regulate it. In these cases, they will develop some kind of vent structure in order to release the excess flux. When expelled in this manner, flux is usually unpleasant to be around, but not directly harmful. This usually looks like exhaust clouds, though like everything with helicoids, the exact appearance varies a lot.
Excessive flux production doesn’t seem to have a direct impact on the helicoid, positive or negative.
Every helicoid has an extension from the front of their snout. This is known as the amplifier, amp, receiver, or, colloquially, the snoot. For the most part, it’s very similar in appearance to a goblin shark’s nose, though they’re typically not as wide.
Functionally, the amp acts as a receiver for signals from their home. Low gen individuals always have a passive, unconscious sense of where rifts and Conduits are relative to themselves, while higher generation helicoids usually have to stop and think about it.
Because of this sense, helicoids are almost instantly aware of any rift or Conduit activity near them. In the days of active transits, this enabled them to find and locate first gen helicoids who had just been created. Nowadays, it’s just become part of how they navigate.
Amps are largely made of cartilage, and are extremely sensitive to any type of touch. Touching an unfamiliar helicoid’s amp is roughly on par with grabbing a human’s crotch.
Don’t.
Generations are very important to how any given helicoid both looks and functions, due to the manner in which helikind arrived on Earth. The first helicoids to be directly given a physical form by Conduits are referred to as “first generation” (often colloquially known as g1s, gen ones, or first gens). These individuals were unstable, to put it mildly. Across the board, first generation helicoids are highly unpredictable when it comes to health and physical stability.
Depending what wave the first generation individual is from, this instability can be even more pronounced. First wave g1s are, as the name implies, the first helicoids ever created. And, as a result of the circumstances in which they were made, they had by far the most issues of any wave. The Conduits were forced to act very quickly, in addition to working with an entirely alien set of physical laws. The Conduits did their absolute best, but the first wave ended up being a kind of prototype transit.
The Conduits learned with each wave, creating more and more stable individuals each time. However, g1s will always have some inherent unpredictability compared to hatched helicoids. The longer the species spend in this reality, the more they acclimate and adapt, resulting in massive improvements to health as the generations increase.
In general, low generation individuals (counted as roughly from generation one to about five) will have extremely variable lifespans, issues with the compatibility of their bio and mech parts, a tendency to spontaneously fall apart, flux leaks, autoimmune disorders, and many, many other issues. All of this is worse in earlier waves.
With help, a fair number of first gens were able to have a decent quality of life, though practically none are left in the present day. Those that do remain are almost universally revered by other helicoids, as they remember the most about their home and the Helix, and have survived everything despite the monumental odds stacked against them.
All helicoids hatch or transit in their primary form – that is, the typically quadrupedal form they’re known for. However, thanks to their bizarre creation and the time the Conduits spent on Earth observing and learning about humanity, helikind have the ability to shift to a more bipedal form, in order to integrate more easily into human society.
While every individual has a secondary form, shifting is a learned skill that takes a significant amount of time and practice to master. It also requires active and dedicated effort to push further – if a helicoid doesn’t bother to learn how to shift their legs from digitigrade to plantigrade, their secondary form will only ever be digitigrade. As a result, many helicoids don’t bother to find their secondary’s full extent and instead opt to work with whatever is good enough.
Helicoid children (often called helikids) typically begin unconsciously shifting in a limited capacity around age five or six, though some begin much earlier. With regular practice, most can attain a respectable shift in their mid teens.
Some modern helicoids don’t even bother to shift at all, because society has adapted to accommodate Earth’s new inhabitants. Generally, though, shifting is a valuable skill and you can find classes for it in most elementary schools.
The primary form is nonetheless what most of helikind finds most comfortable. If there’s no need for a bipedal stance, most helicoids will switch to primary.
In addition to what any given individual has learned to shift, secondary forms vary by helicoid in how humanlike they can ever be. For example, some helicoids will never be able to attain a fully upright stance, no matter how much they practise.
To date, no helicoid is able to appear fully human. They will always retain some features of their primary form, most notably visible mechanical parts. In some very rare cases, some of their mech components may be covered by a layer of skin that isn’t present in their primary.
In general, the secondary will retain any ears, horns, spines, manes, additional limbs, gills, eye type, and claws the helicoid may have.
Tails are nearly always present in the secondary – tailless secondaries are very uncommon to see. They will always keep their markings and colouration as well, though some marks may appear distorted or shifted on the secondary. Vents are also consistent between forms.
It’s a fairly even split between those who can alter their head shape to a more human profile and those who cannot. If they can do this, they may or may not go down to one pair of eyes, and the pair of eyes that remains visible is always consistent. They may also grow hair on their head if they don’t already have a mane.
The amp will *always* be present somehow, and frequently looks utterly ridiculous on a human head shape. Because of this, even those helicoids who are able to appear more human rarely do, due to how stupid it looks. Most commonly, secondary-shifted helicoids will have a more anthro head and neck arrangement.
The difference between primary and secondary is a spectrum, and as a result, shifting can be halted at any point. It can also be applied asymmetrically. Many individuals will adjust their shift over the course of the day, depending what they need to do or how they feel.
Shifting is, like nearly all of helicoid anatomy and physiology, a massive mystery. They will frequently lose a huge percentage of their mass in the transformation, and there is no clear explanation as to where this matter goes. Possibly even more baffling is the fact that they’re able to recall it at will in order to return to primary.
The best theories suggest that helicoids are able to access a kind of dimension-state between Earth and their home – not quite in either, and not quite a proper place, in the way we think about space. Whatever the case, the rapid loss and regain of matter seems to have no impact whatsoever on helicoids; they do it as naturally as picking a pen up.
This has been the absolute barest minimum needed to get you up to speed on helikind and their quirks. There’s much more – possibly too much more – that you can peruse at your leisure.
Take your time, there’s no rush!