[duketod]

[glitchedgirly]

See the thing about Stratt putting all media ever in the Hail Mary is that it isn’t just for lolz or to keep the crew entertained, it always struck me as something deeply sad. Because even if all the crew survived, there was no way they could consume all possible media ever, language barriers alone would present a problem. And even then, they had a job to do and focus on first (which could have theoretically taken decades of work to figure out) so they wouldn’t have much use for The Great Gatsby or a week’s worth of poorly written amateur Guatemalan experimental opera. Let us remember that Stratt is practical and true utilitarian Instead, I think it was another part of the Hail Mary. If the scientists failed, if the Earth died, then what? Everything would have been completely lost. Art, music, film, history. Destroyed. Without a single living soul to remember it by. It would be as if all of humanity had never existed.

But if it survived? If other alien civilizations discovered traces of humanity? Then the memory of mankind could live on and be remembered. What better way to do that than to send everything (literally everything, the art, the music, the science, the history) out as far as humanly possible so that it might connect with someone else in the universe? It would be a long shot, a Hail Mary, but it was the best chance that humanity had to be remembered

[tequila-sunsett]

she was a history major

[obieridian]

"Do you know what I studied in college? What my undergraduate degree was in? History. I was a history major."

"I don't care about morality, I care about saving humanity."

Oh, Eva Stratt. How I love you and your complexities.

[obieridian]

I like to believe that Rocky and a group of Eridian Biologist's figured out how to extend Grace's lifespan because they worked so hard to get him to Erid and they all love him so much they do not want to let him go due to humanity's short lifespan

[lutheban]

Eridian speculative biology time!

Erid is a very big planet, very very very big planet, twice the size of earth in fact- and divided by oceans, perfect conditions for populations to remain and develop separately and for long enough to create diferent species. So, unlike us, Eridians are a Polytypic genus: there's more than one species of sapient eridian, All of them sharing a common ancestor in the form of a small, 5 legged ambush-hunter land carnivore, all share common traits taking only slightly different evolutionary paths

Divers- get their name from living in semi-flooded caves, their high small vents allow them to be partially submerged without drowning and their long arms allow them to grip things easily underwater, similar to a sea-horse tail

Climbers- similarly, they get their name from their living enviroment, living in very high caves, their long thin arms allow them to grip and climb very steep rock walls, kinda like goats in a way

Drills and Stompers get their name from the shape of their arms, they both developed closer to the surface compared to the others, their arms are like that for dealing with sandstorms, while Drills "drill" themselfs in place, Stompers use their body weight to keep themselfs down

Blocks are very similar to Stompers, but they live in caves much deeper down, so they're quite compact

Common traits between all species: all Eridians can thrum, all Eridians organize in "colonies" like ants or termites (tho the specifics of how each colony works varies), all Eridians are True Carnivores(can only eat meat) and all Eridians are unisex

In theory any one eridian can procreate with any other eridian, between the 5 species there are 4 fertile hybrids and 3 infertile hybrids posible

note: tho each species has a more broad vague shared culture between themselves, none of them are a monolith, all of them have vastly different culture, language, texture, practices and even phenotypes between different colonies around the world

note 2: the fact humans are a monotypic species (there is only one in our genus) is really fucking weird to them

[autumngracy]

Saw this twitter post and instantly started looking for pictures of Stratt to use it with