TEHIRY

written june 2019

Tehiry are an intelligent, technologically advanced alien race, in a symbiotic relationship with a vine-like species of plants native to the tehiris' original home. It lays in a nice, relatively warm climate, with plenty of fresh water and pretty flora and prey. These forests may feel like something out of a fairytale, but there are even bigger, stranger, and dangerous creatures than the tehiry hiding in them. Hence the symbiosis. A two-way exchange of energy and nutrients, appropriate lighting and protection from easily scared herbivores for the plants, and camouflage for tehiry. Also, more interesting mating displays!

The name tehiry comes from their names for the two types/sexes they come in - tehi and tiri. Tehiri is the singular, tehiry the plural from their native language, and tehiris a valid alternate plural. The plurals of tehi and tiri are tehy or tehis, and tiry or tiris. Didn't decide on a name for the symbiotic vines yet!

Tehiry mostly resemble earth snakes. Very big earth snakes. They're normally arond 6 meters in length, though they can grow larger. However, unlike snakes, tehiris do have limbs. Four of them, asymetrically arranged about a meter apart from eachother, starting about a meter from the head. They have generally the same anatomy as the tail. The underside of a tehiri's entire body is covered in rough skin that lets them hold on to vertical surfaces, as well as grip objects with their limbs more easily. The rest of tehiris' bodies are covered in thicker and more scale-like skin. They're a light orange with subtle patterns, white undersides, and black line markings at the edge, around their eyes, and at the edges of plates on their bellies. Their undersides also have several wider spaces between the plates, usually one or two between each limb, to let the vines wrap all the way around their bodies.

Their mouths start right in front of their eyes, and are also somewhat snake-like. They do have very long and dexterous tongues, though. They breathe through patches of much thinner skin, also in front of their eyes, above the mouth. Tehiris' eyes have clearly visible black markings around them, and an extremely limited range of movement. Tehiry can barely twitch their actual eyes! They look around by moving their pupils, or, more specifically, closing and opening certain parts of their horizontally stretched line-pupils. They are adapted to having two pupils on both edges to watch for dangers, but can see just fine with just one in any location on the line. They can also move their eyes independently, since their field of vision doesn't reach the front of their snout, and thus has no area in common. That also means it's a sign of trust for a tehiri to let something or someone stay in their blind spot.

The side a tehiri's first limb is on is determined by their type/sex - left for tehy, right for tiry. This means you could translate their sexes as "lefty" and "righty", which is pretty ridiculous. Being the same type does not stop two tehiry from being able to produce offspring, though in that case it will always be the same type as their parents, while the offspring of a different-type pair has an equal chance of being either. Because of this, tehiry traditionally pair with the opposite type. (Though, they have no concept of love that's related directly to reproduction (also no gender..!); tehiry aren't limited to one partner or one type, or expected to mate with their partners, and can freely breed with individuals that aren't their partners. Tehiri partnership is something between the human concepts of being very close friends and a relationship.)

Tehiry prey on insects and small creatures (which often also eat insects), and are regularly hunted by the huge predators resembling some kind of animal mixed with sundews.