Hello all, Ric here with another Star Trek not-bestiary, this time on an extra galactic
species known simply as Ten-C. I don’t really think this one belongs in a bestiary as this
species is far more than a simple creature, it’s just that we don’t know a huge amount
about them and their culture, so this format will suffice for now.
The species goes by the Starfleet moniker, unknown species 10-C as they were just that,
a complete unknown, even to a 32nd century Federation.
This was quite simply because they were extra galactic in origin, if only just, so let’s
star there.
They reside just beyond the border of the Milky Way galaxy, which is one of the only
observable galaxies with a barrier of negative energy around it, making traversing into and
out of the Milky Way directly a dangerous feat.
Beyond this is the void of space in between galaxies, a mostly unremarkable empty zone,
but there are the occasional stars or planets.
In real life, I don’t believe any have been discovered, yet it is very likely they exist.
Around one of these lonely stars, 30 lightyears into the void, was a planetary system consisting
of at least one inhabited gas giant, with a solid core.
This was their native environment, which should be the first clue as to how different they
are from humanoid life.
They were a class 2 civilization on the Kardashev scale, meaning that they had utilised their
entire solar system for energy, building a series of Dyson rings around their star.
They also seemingly had the ability to recreate planets of identical scale, mass and composition
to their homeworld, however it’s not established exactly when they developed this level of
technology.
Around a millennia before they were encountered, their planet was rendered uninhabitable by
meteor impacts and they were forced to exodus to other worlds.
They subsequently established a protective hyperfield around their system to protect
them for further incidents.
This was 1.5 AU in diameter and acted to block all ingoing and outgoing readings and communications.
From within this cage, they created a wormhole device to scour beyond the galactic barrier,
inside the Milky Way using a gravitational anomaly to break apart planets for deposits
of boronite.
Boronite is a material that can be refined to produce great levels of energy and even
the Omega Molecule and was in turn used to power the hyperfield.
Whatever technology composed the hyperfield’s surface seems to be also used to create other
structures, such as transportation, containment and defensive orbs that could dampen the power
system of any ship within them.
Additionally, these spheres had sensors within, that allowed them to scan, mimic and react
to environments.
So as a species, they had the ability to manipulate artificial wormholes, generate colossal structures
and terraform planets.
10-C themselves were colossal creatures in their own right, resembling some form of jellyfish-like
creature, yet they had hollow bones within.
Presumably, they constructed and operated their technology through their tentacle-limbs,
although by the time of 3190, their devices seemed to operate at their whim, or automatically.
They could float among the layers of their gas giant homes quite comfortably and shared
a hive mind connection that spanned their entire species.
Their perception of themselves however was speculated to be less individualistic and
more of a collection, although not a single consciousness, like the Borg hive mind.
They raised their young in nurseries within their habitable zones, solid structures of
rock with hollows and chambers within large enough to house many of the adult populous.
They communicated with one another in a very alien fashion too.
They released a collection of hydrocarbon compounds that generated emotions when exposed
to biology, even the vastly different humanoid form.
These hydrocarbons could persist beyond their death and retained their emotional residue.
However, this was simply the emotional inflection of their voice, as it were and was supplemented
by a display of lighting emitted from bioluminescent areas on their…
face?
I’m calling that a face.
The lighting pattern and order indicated the way the emotions were to be interpreted and
translated complex sentences and ideas in seconds.
Although the form they used to commune with Starfleet was a very basic version of their
language, dumbed down for our convenience, and was still a major hurdle in establishing
communication.
They did however also produce audible noises while generating these lights, but it is unknown
if this was part of their communication, although they did possess auditory systems too.
Because of all this, they had trouble perceiving humanoid life as a truly sentient higher lifeform
because of how different it was from them, even when they had a chance to examine Starfleet
technology for themselves, they were unsure how to proceed.
Their forms are so vastly different from ours, while their way of talking is incompatible
without machine translation.
They inhabit an environment that most life in the galaxy would perish in and have a way
of perceiving one another that we cannot comprehend.
All these differences were deliberately done to create a species that was so vastly different
from the familiar, to create such a challenge in finding understanding, a true test of Starfleet’s
mantra to “seek out new life and new civilizations”.
10-C is among some of the strangest species encountered so far, akin to the cosmozoans
like the Star Jellies, but with an existence perhaps only understandable by collective
minds like the Great Link of the Founders.
Their level of technology is super advanced, which does raise the question why, have they
not investigate the Milky Way before?
We know that after the destruction of their original home, they retreated behind an artificial
barrier, only operating through a wormhole, so it could quite simply be that they were
no longer prepared to risk anything.
For the longest time, they would have been considering themselves the only life they
knew off, being as they were, located in the void with nothing else around them save the
Galactic barrier.
However, now they are aware that they are no longer alone, and fortunately for all life
in the Milky Way, they are a compassionate species, open to understanding.
Thanks for watching this video on this now-known species, Ten-C, I’ve been Ric, thanks again
and goodbye!