Creature
Description:
Enormous, Playful Amoebas
At rest, the average quellian resembles a lump of semi-transparent dough floating in a membranous sac of clear jelly, or an amoeba measuring up to a half-meter across. When active, however, quellians look more like a terrestrial jellyfish or bizarre squid, a wriggling mass of innumerable tendrils that can be as thin as a whisker or as thick as a fist. Extruding these tendrils from their membranes, quellians use their tendrils to communicate, manipulate objects, and locomote (through most often by rolling like a tumbleweed, but quellians have been known to climb, walk, brachiate, swim, and even glide on occasion).
Insatiably Curious (and Practically Indestructible)
Behaviorally, quellians are known for their inexhaustible curiosity, commonly squeezing themselves into any machine or Wonder that can hold them, even active devices or those with interiors that would be inimical to most forms of life (because of radiation, toxicity, extreme temperatures, or simply sharp moving parts). Luckily, quellians are practically indestructible—not only are their membranes essentially impervious to physical stresses, but so long as the doughy material that makes up their “brain” survives, they can gradually regenerate the rest of their physiology without issue.
Quirks:
Communicating With Quellians is...Difficult
For a period of time, the question of quellian sapience divided researchers. Although it was clear that the creatures communicate amongst themselves by the gel-like medium that makes up most of their bodies (either directly, by merging merging their tendrils, or asynchronously/at a distance, by extruding thought-spiders—bubbles of jelly capable of autonomously seeking out and merging with other quellians), and are capable of responding to spoken speech with written responses, said responses always consist of bursts of dozens and dozens of simultaneous declarations, interrogations, and exclamations.
As these messages were composed of an eclectic variety of lexemes, syntaxes, and idioms from numerous languages, this behavior was thought merely to be mimicry—quellians had never written researchers more than one burst-message in a given session—but eventually, a specialist named Hedracaum Harton cracked the code, proving not only that quellians are sapient, but that the reason they don’t communicate with most sophonts is because we bored them. It was a well-known fact before that point that quellians seem to express their internal emotional states by the arrangement of their tendrils (much the same way that a human’s face or Jadder’s odor does so), but quellians are blind, rendering their emotions hidden so long as no other quellian is currently touching them.
What allowed Hedracaum Harton to break through the communication barrier was a question about tendril-expressions, one which caused an epiphany in the quellian that answered the question. While Slow People (their name for non-quellian sophonts) are very boring to talk to, they can perceive emotions in a completely unthought-of way! As more and more quellians learned this fact, their willingness to communicate with Slow People increased tremendously. Despite this fact, there are some concepts quellians have trouble grasping besides sight.
More “Curious Borrowers” Than “Greedy Thieves”
For example, quellians have no concept of personal property, and seem to divide the world into “things I’m touching” and “things I’m no touching.” This fact—combined with their inability to understand “danger,” as well as their near-infinite curiosity—means they often cause mischief by getting inside objects they shouldn’t (engines, machines, reactors, Wonders, and so forth), or by taking things they shouldn’t (clocks, tools, datacubes, weapons).
Although they don’t mean any harm by these actions—and in fact, seem incapable of understanding that anyone would be upset about them at all—it’s almost impossible to keep quellians to keep their tendrils to themselves (especially since they can fit through any crevice their doughy “brain” can squeeze into). As such, when there are machines, Wonders, and objects that should not be interfered with willy-nilly, (such as the air filtration systems of an undersea colony or the gravitic engines that keep an aerial city aloft), non-quellian communities are advised to either A) Prevent quellian entry entirely through the use of forcefields or other Wondrous means, or B) Keep the quellians occupied by allowing them to play with/explore/investigate items, objects, and places where their presence does not pose a danger.
All in all, however, it’s a good bet that if you’ve “lost” something, you can’t find it anywhere, and there are quellians nearby, you should check with them to see if they have it.
Adventure Hooks:
Q: Where Does a Stubborn Quellian Sit? [A: Anywhere It Wants]
To better feed their people, the Voivode of the Amber Pool has recently purchased an 8th-Age brilliant cornucopia. On trying to activate it, however, the Voivode’s engineers discovered a nest of quellians inside. The quellians (like all of their kind) aren’t violent, but they have steadfastly refused to vacate the device, and have prevented all methods of extracting them reasons they will not explain. As the cornucopia won’t work with them inside it, the Voivode is offering patents of nobility and a small tract of land to whoever can solve the issue without harming the creatures or the Wonder.
Playful Critters, or Playing Dumb?
A newcomer to town bears an odd, unbridled hatred towards quellians, spreading rumors that their playfulness is but a facade that hides murderous intent. According to the story he’s told at the local pub, quellians slaughtered his people, and he’s supposedly learned of a device that can utterly wipe out their species, he just needs funds and somebody to help him acquire the object in question. While many of the locals find the nearby quellian nest to be a bit of a bother, few are willing to support genocide, so the stranger hasn’t had much luck so far, but if the PCs hang around for a while, they will notice something odd is going on.
While quellians are pacifistic by nature, something odd whenever to any who get within a few meters of the newcomer. Their brain dough begins to pulse with dark red and charcoal stripes, and the liquid grace of their tendrils change to sharp, aggressive jerks. What’s more, anyone capable of interpreting quellian tendril-expressions will see that affected creatures are expressing an emotion over and over at this man: hate.
Is the newcomer right? Are quellians really as dangerous as he says? Or is it the quellians that have something to fear from him?
The Kaqal Job
Down on their luck, the PCs take a job that seems like easy money. All they have to do is bring a Wonder to the village of Kaqal, activate it, guard it for the next ten days, deactivate it, and come back for their reward. But the day after activating the device, something very odd begins to happen to the quellians that live nearby—their jelly seems to be crystallizing. With each day that passes, more and more quellians are affected, and it isn’t long before one shatters to pieces completely. The people of Kaqal have long lived in peace with the quellians, and many of the villagers try to figure out a way to help the poor creatures.
The PCs don’t know for sure that the Wonder they’re guarding is responsible (after all, correlation =/= causation), but the evidence is pretty strong. On the other hand, their contract was pretty specific—if they don’t run the device for ten days straight, they won’t get their reward. (And their patron is not someone it’d be wise to cross.) Do they wait things out, save the quellians, or try to find another option?
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