Shapeshifter

Metahumans whose bodies can be altered at will.

Basics

• Taxonomic Order: Metahumans

• Taxonomic Family: Polymorphics

• Alignment: Paradoxical

• Energy: Flux

• Lifespan: 70-120 years

• Diet: High-protein mortal diet

• Habitat: Tropical rain forests

Origins

Humans who evolved near a source of flux, which made their physical forms unstable.

Description

Shapeshifters are average-sized metahumans who can alter their bodies.

Shapeshifting

The entire body of a shapeshifter is infused with the energy flux, a paradoxical power that causes things to change. They have an innate, instinctive ability to control their bodies and alter their forms. Because their powers are rooted in their bodies, they cannot alter their mass; if they make themselves taller, they must lose mass elsewhere, for instance. Changing the color of their skin, hair, or eyes is simple. Changing the color of their blood is even possible. If they lengthen their hair or create more blood, it is at the expense of other parts of themselves. They can alter their muscles in shape, and in some ways can strengthen them by doing so, but they cannot add muscle mass without sacrificing something else. Cosmetic dermal changes are the easiest.

If they create a new organ or feature, it will take away from another part of themselves; for instance, if they give themselves a third eye or arm, they will need to get the mass for that from another body part. However, they can create new parts that function, so long as that part can exist without greatly altering the energies within themselves. For instance, they can grow a working third eye, but it will not have supernatural powers beyond being a working third eye.

Because their shifting is bodily, they can heal themselves through it. This can be as simple as closing a wound or re-connecting bones, or as complicated as shifting cancer cells into other kinds of cells. This requires knowledge on their part of how things need to be within them. Wounds and bones are relatively easy; cancer and other diseases are much more difficult. Because wounds and injuries can make it difficult to concentrate, focus, or otherwise do things, it is not always easy to heal serious wounds via shifting. Shifting significant changes takes time, and it is likely that a large, mortal wound will bleed out a shapeshifter before they can fix it.

The more complex a body part is, the harder it is to safely shift. It is easy to change the shape of the brain or the heart, but it is very difficult to do so without dying or causing permanent damage. However, extremely skilled and knowledgeable shapeshifters can shift complex organs to get different effects (altering the brain to improve serotonin reuptake, correcting heart murmurs, removing clots from blood vessels, slowing the release of hormones).

Certain shifts, such as elongation of limbs, are used commonly in very brief bursts, while others, such as altering one’s internal organs may be done for a long-term effect.

Procreation

Shapeshifters procreate sexually with each other, other metahumans, or humans, and in these cases, the species of the child follows that of the mother. Since shapeshifters can alter their own biology, they can be of any gender and be either parent within their lifetimes. They can also alter their own biology to be able to reproduce asexually, essentially impregnating themselves. This is rare, as it is not a common cultural practice, but it has happened. It effectively creates a clone of the shapeshifter.

Powers

Besides their shapeshifting powers, shapeshifters have the ability to intuit changes to the environment around them, such as upcoming weather.

Weaknesses

Being bound into a single shape or form, especially by gebvel or shavev mashkalran, will cause them intense trauma.

Nations

There are three nations of shapeshifters:

• Banafi: undersea shapeshifters living amongst the Ysians off the coasts of Mahad.

• Fanoese: the original nation in northeastern Dabusen in a small island country.

• Myddonme: subterranean shapeshifters who adapted to the darkness, living in the Hypogaeum.

Culture

In southeastern Dabusen, in the deep rain forests, certain tribes learned to use flux to alter themselves. At first, they simply used it for survival, but eventually it became an integrated part of their culture. Isolated as they were deep in the forests, they diverged evolutionarily from humans into their own separate species. Most of this species remained in the rain forests and built a nation. The earliest nation of the shapeshifters was called, among them, Fano. Fano has been long since conquered and subsumed into multiple countries in the area, but the Fanoese remain a distinct nation among many there.

Amongst the Fanoese, there is no concept of a perfect or ideal body, of any kind of body image. Bodies are malleable and fluid, and how a person shapes their body tells you about them, but never the whole story. The different tribes of the Fanoese who still have their own communities have customs about what kind of body they take at what stages of their lives, but those integrated into broader society are more individualized. The more remote tribes in the deep forests recognize each other by the different shapes they take - those who have webbed hands and feet, those who have glider-like skin flaps, those with curly hair and yellow eyes, those who have camouflaged skin, etc. Those in cities do have some family traditions about different shapes they might take, but these are less rigid.

When a Fanoese child is born, their bodies are in constant flux. Their birthing parent will literally mold them into a human-like shape and try to hold them in it long enough for their lungs to take a breath. After a few days, they do not need to apply constant pressure to keep the baby in a solid form. Shapeshifters begin to walk within weeks. As children, custom and habit have not taken hold, and their bodily alterations are rapid, whimsical, imaginative, and impulsive. This is generally encouraged by the rest of the tribe or family, but they watch closely to make sure no dangerous alterations take place. Up until a child is seven years old or so, their birthing parent can physically force them into different shapes, internally and externally.

Once the birthing parent no longer has the ability to alter their child's form, the child begins lessons in control and custom of shape. In tribes, the elders do this. In broader society, the birthing parent is usually the one to do it. After a few years of learning, the child is initiated into the tribes' traditional basic forms. At around age 12, they undertake another ceremony in which they take on a more complex variation of that form. At around age 18, they have a final ceremony in which they take on a variation of the traditional form unique to themself. In broader society, children are encouraged to explore forms until they settle on one, sometime in their teenage years. Traditionally, these families celebrate the "final" form when the child is 16 and a half years old, regardless of when it happens, as they have taken on the broader societal way of viewing time.

As they have such complex bodies, shapeshifters need more protein than most metahumans. In their own tribes, this is addressed by having lots of livestock (usually pigs and oxen) and skilled hunters. In broader society, they just buy more meat or keep more livestock than average families as well. They are known for making hot chicken curries, salmon soup, pork mince, pork ribs, oxtail soup, spiced flank steak, dried spicy pork or ox, and whole roast pig or oxen.

Their music and art reflects their own bodily fluidity. They create jewelry that can move with them. They rarely paint themselves as distinct figures, using more abstract forms instead. They make music that is designed to connect to other pieces of music in their culture, such that among their tribes, they think of all songs as one song. Poetry is preferred to prose, and their poems are often brief odes to one another or to historical figures. This reflects their language, which is economical and metaphorical.

Among their tribes, their leaders are hereditary chiefs. The chiefs are chosen from one of the families who control the most livestock. These families also choose the elders who advise the chief from the eldest among them. Next in rank in the tribes are the warrior and hunter families, and then the rest of the tribe. The rest of the tribe has a more communal approach to their roles, as most of them will have caretaking, cooking, cleaning, and crafting skills. Occasionally, a shapeshifter in the tribe will show special aptitude for an esoteric skill or artform, and they will be elevated by the chief to focus on their craft exclusively.

The Fanoese do not recognize time as split into years, months, weeks, days. Instead, they see it as one long strand of ever-changing time. They measure things by the risings and settings of the suns and moons, but their reference points are usually relatively short. Anything longer than a few years previous by broader societal standards is just "the past."

National Cultures

The other two shapeshifter cultures are very different:

• Banafi: a group of shapeshifters split off and became a separate nation living underwater, using their powers to keep gills. They live amongst the ysians in a country off the coast of Mahad and blend into their culture.

• Myddonme: subterranean shapeshifters who adapted to the darkness, living in the Hypogaeum, they live amongst the dongxue and adapt to their culture.

Esoterica

Shapeshifters are being of flux and their greatest users of it. They also use all other wieldable paradoxical powers. They also commonly use most poioumenonic powers, mijjit, emotional resonance, b’qar, kakraohy, nzwara murazvo, prasinofos, ikehua lyua pele, conflueverant, and menab’e. They sometimes use infernal or celestial powers within other societies, but rarely within their own.

Religion

The Fanoese worship Kan Ppian Aepng Fang, the Ever-Sifting Cloud, who represents change as a concept called khoeny pian. They believe that the energies of change (flux) are sacred, and that without them, the world would die (which is true). They see change as a generative and destructive force, as a source of hope and a source of disaster. They understand that it simply is, and that understanding how things will change is a very complex process that requires deep wisdom. They have a meditative approach to prayer and faith, and among their tribes, there are hmxphi, or wise folk, who spend years meditating. These wise folk then guide the tribe in all spiritual matters, giving advice, making predictions, and speaking to the spirits and gods (who are seen as ambiguous forces) on behalf of the tribe. Most members of the tribe honor the khoeny pian, but they do not make it a major part of their lives. They seek out the hmxphi only when faced with deep uncertainties or major changes.

In broader societies, shapeshifters tend to view their conceptual religion as something to keep secret, or they adapt to local religious practices.

Gender

Because their bodies are so malleable, the idea of matching gender to biology has never been relevant to them. In their own tribes, there are no genders or pronouns; people are simply people. In broader society, the Fanoese are taught from an early age that whatever gender they feel they are, it is important to pick a form that matches expectations for that gender in the societies they are in. If that society does not have a gender that fits them, they are encouraged to pick one that is close so that they do not get ostracized. Some rebel and find ways to be themselves, while others conform.

Within their own tribes, there are ceremonies similar to marriage, but these commitments are never intended to be lifelong. There is an assumption of fluidity of relationships. In broader society, they conform to gender and social norms of that society by choosing a body that presents as a gender opposite of their intended if it is verboten to have a same-sex relationship. Otherwise, they simply do not worry about it.

Because they have such control over their bodies, shapeshifters view sexual intercourse as something sacred and complex, and it is encouraged in their own tribes. It is not viewed as something forbidden or taboo except in cases of incest or involving children or a lack of consent. It is done openly or privately, and in the course of it, their bodies are known to distort and reshape for the pleasure and interest of those involved. In broader society, they again conform to societal norms, sharing their bodily fluidity with their partners only if they trust them or if they are other shapeshifters.

Economy

Shapeshifters live in tribes shifting between matriarchal, communal economies and a basic slave-based one.

Military

Every tribe has its own warriors and hunters who use the powers of flux to alter their bodies to be effective at fighting or hunting.

Language

Fanoese is an ever-adaptable language that started in northeastern Dabusen. As such, it is a mixture of Javanese, Thai, Lao, Khmer, Vietnamese, Myanmar, Bengali, and Indonesian, with a few original words mixed in.

Trade

Shapeshifter tribes only do a little trading amongst each other.

Occupations

Some common occupations include

• Hmxphi: wise folk who guide the tribes in religious matters.

Outside View

In almost every country outside their own tribes, the Fanoese and other shapeshifters are oppressed. Save for in a few post-class or pre-class societies, shapeshifters are viewed as untrustworthy, thieves and spies, and perverts. They are subject to violence, especially rape, in the worst societies, and most countries will seek to conscript them into being spies or agents for the powerful because of their powers. As such, many shapeshifters try to hide who they are.

Those who live near their tribes view the tribes as strange and shrewd traders, but do not have as strong a negative attitude, especially since they live so remotely few ever interact with them save those who go out of their way for the superior oxen and pig.

Notables

• Ponehcan Pyaungglellhkyinn, the Changing Form, Shapeshifter Manifest

• Klaus Reidelene, Tara'hinain Spy

• Davan Asher, Warden of Fortunes

• Kaleidesene, Prismatic Shifter

• Ban Phlasa Btau R, the First Alteror

Estimated Populations

• Banafi: 50,000

• Fanoese: 5 million

• Myddonme: 10,000

• Other: 25,000

Sample Stats

PRO 8
ATH 8
STR 8
AWA 8
WIL 8
PRS 9
STH 9