This post is a work in progress, a story-boarding effort describing the origins and history of the space pirate cat race; giving insight into the motives and ambition of such intrepid peril-ridden characters. One immediately wonders just how a race of cat like beings became motivated and capable of space piracy as a noble social cause. The answer lies within the story presented below…

Planet Catastro Phi

Catastro Phi, the home planet of the space pirate cat race.

A long time ago, in a distant part of the galaxy, there was a planet. This planet was habitable for life, and fostered biology similar to Earth’s. There was one major difference, the most advanced mammalian species was something very much like the cats we are familiar with. This wasn’t particularly interesting in terms of what was going on throughout the galaxy, as a lot of worlds seed from introduction of foreign species, and there are a lot of places which have life similar to Earths. What was interesting was what happened to them that forever changed their history and civilization, and sent them on an arc unlike anything in the galaxy.

The Beginning…

Before the Great Nip’s Arrival

Let’s start with the planet, it was a normal habitable world, with a radius and mass and internal dynamics very similar to earth with some exception for a slightly larger radius, a slightly higher axial rotation speed and a slightly larger mass. It is also positioned 1.1 AU from it’s similar star. So basically, it is slightly larger with shorter days. It has a biology similar to the ones we are familiar with, as do a lot of planets in the galaxy as it turns out, because apparently fungal organisms spores do in fact travel through space and germinate in workable environments. The pan-spermia theory of how life spreads through the universe turned out to be correct. Specifically, some world originally evolved fungi and since then every world its spores have traveled to have developed similar biological kingdoms, such as plant and animal kingdoms.

Behold Catastro Phi

Early Life and Culture of the Denizens of Catastro Phi

Life was harsh and brutal, forcing the cats to band together in tribes. They were often nomadic, migrating to follow various herds of micealo or birdalope; the indigenous wildebeasts of this alien planet. Small groups would live in caves, and exhibited clever intelligence; inventing various technologies like fire or the wheel.

Much like the early prehistory of earth, lots of natural phenomena were explained in mystical terms, the foreshadowing whispers of societal development visited evening discussions and of course the more base drives such as attaining power and dominion over nature and their fellows guided the course of the day. These were the murmurings in the consciousness of this alien catlike species, dreams and visions; the subjects of epic tales.

See, these cats liked their stories, far far more than the practice of storytelling has been esteemed in our world. There was something alive, primal and transcendent in the collective consciousness of these beings, as if the great prime source itself had nestled away some glimmering cosmic dream in the weaving of these creatures fates. To properly appreciate the degree to which these cats loved their yarns, let me give you an analogy.

Imagine the greatest fish-that-got-away story you have heard in your lifetime. Now imagine the roaring crowd and high volume energy of an audience responding to the lead guitar solo of the hit song on an album tour concert, or the response from the fans at a Super Bowl game winning touchdown, or perhaps the steely sway of spirit that great leaders have had in their immortal speeches. Now combine the fish story with the crowd responses and you can get some idea of just how much these cats loved their yarns, the longer and more fantastic the better!

This young race of impetuous felines was very much into stories about things bigger than life. The heavens above them proved fertile grounds for such visionary dreams; stories about what lie above the sky and who, if anyone, might live up there was a popular trope for much of their history.

They didn’t know it, but they were not alone in their neck of the galaxy.

When these cats would tell their tales, it was often a celebration by the whole tribe at the same time. Such was the energy of these yarn-spinning events that outright partying would take place as well as a feast from that day’s hunt. It was not uncommon for groups of spellbound cats to be found around a fire burning catnip, telling grand tales that stretched the imagination and inspired the deeds of the tribal hunters and sages. Young kittens were welcome members of the storyteller’s audience, as their imaginations were known to be vast and unbridled; fertile ground for the development of myths and legends.

As such they had many legends, ranging from tales of from whence the world came to be, legends of heroes from past ages, to stories about things that may only yet come to pass.

One example is the legend of the frost cat warrior Ni’ Darune, who fights the fire dragon living in the far North; their ongoing battle giving rise to the Aurora Borealis and the surreal sounds that accompany it. There is some evidence for the existence of a warrior of the same name, apparently the prince of a rare long-lived bloodline who embarked on some epic quest for the secret of the arctic and the source of the Northern Lights. However the history is so ancient it is very hard to tell what secrets are hidden within the truth of this story.

Then there is the legend of Kaldune the Archmage; a mysterious figure possessing supernatural mystical powers and knowledge surpassing all other sages. He is rumored to stalk the mists of the deep wood and tales of his adventures have come from many intrepid travelers throughout the centuries. Some believe he may have mastered alchemy and become effectively immune to the passage of time, working some trans-karmic mission for the fate of cat-kind.

There were many tales of great heroes, from the fantastic stories of legend, to the tangible sagas of great hunters and mystic sages who lived during the history of the cat people. As time went on, these stories accumulated into vast lore covering every aspect of knowledge and fiction, philosophy and mysticism. So great were the volume and impact of these story loving cat’s literature, that when some young kitten undertook the path of the sage, they were held in great esteem as the profession was considered quite important and noble.

See the painting of a sage cat from a feudal geographical and historical region:

Some sages also looked to the stars, their stories wove over time into what we would call astronomy, but in their view it has mystical and astrological elements as well as celestial motion mechanics.

Then there is the great sage Gregor Felinidus, an astronomer by practice; sage by profession. For Gregor, the stories about the great realm beyond the heavens lead to a fascination with the night sky of Catastro Phi. He was the quintessential celestial mechanic of this planet, achieving discoveries akin to Galileo, Copernicus and Kepler combined; all the while weaving them seamlessly into the tapestry of lore curated by the sages.

Gregor studied the night sky, and made many discoveries analogous to the mechanics discovered here on Earth, however there were important discrepancies. You see, Catastro Phi was located in the Catastro System which was right along the periphery of a galactic black-market cargo hyperspace route fraternized by the Jezago Syndicate. The syndicate is an unsavory association of pirates and smugglers, traffickers of illegal and black-market goods according to the galactic federation at large. For their customers and suppliers they perform a vital and indispensable role in actual galactic commerce. Thus when Gregor surveyed the night sky, he saw what looked like comets a lot more often than we do on Earth, because what he thought were celestial objects where in fact spaceships, traveling tangential to orbits comets take, in order to transfer from the main hyperspace route to the hidden smuggler’s route by inconspicuously mimicking a transient Catastro System comet.

So Gregor was actually observing the hyperspace taxiing traffic travelling through the Catastro System to and from the smuggling route.

The Jezago were a loosely organized gang of smugglers and traffickers, of various alien races. Hot shot space pilots trying to make a small fortune overnight would sometimes bid work from the Jezago Syndicate. They hauled illicit cargo of various kinds, including exotic substances sought after throughout the galaxy. Generally, as a group, the syndicate consisted of the outcasts, rebels, mavericks and gangsters of the galaxy.

Around the time that Gregor was studying the heavens, one particularly troublesome character from the syndicate happened to be operating in the Casastro corridor, one Drakkhenius Veracito; hauling a strange and unsual cargo. His story would soon become entwined with the fates of all those felines residing on Casastro Phi, but at the moment he was worried only about two things.

1. Getting his cargo to his rendezvous in time for the closing manifest
2. The sinking feeling that his luck had run out with his bookie

Drakkhenius was a space pirate and smuggler by trade, working out a fairly generous living as an affiliate of the Jezago Syndicate. His species was a bipedal amphibious race with some Draconian ancestry; renowned for producing some of the best space pilots that have ever graced the galaxy. Not unlike the Catastroans, his people shared a great love for myths and folklore, although the character of such lore had a more adventurous and thrilling style in the telling than the cat folk had managed to develop yet.

As such, Drakkhenius lusted for thrill, wealth and glory and rather enjoyed his occupation as a space pirate and smuggler. He found running cargo for the Syndicate rewarding in experience and recompense, but also found trouble. His thirst for thrills got him into trouble when combined with his penchant for gambling, a personal defect he is working on he swears it.

The only problem was that he owed on a bad bet and his bookie had one individual under his employ that really made ‘ol Drakkhenius worry.

The feared dark bounty hunter known only as the “Black Squid“… a mysterious character of galactic lore and legend, with credit for deeds unmatched by any soldier of fortune. He was of an unknown extra-galactic alien race, ancient and powerful; his ship is unique to our galaxy. The technology used in it’s construction is completely alien from anything being used by the known federation races, some exotic amalgam of matter and a dark something form the tech’s basis. Something like a galactic boogie man, only orders of magnitude more terrible and, for the unfortunate; all too real.

His ship alone is worthy of spectacle, made from the same exotic intergalactic tech he employs personally, the Black Squid’s ship is basically a predatory celestial entity when considered as a combat operator. One striking fact about it is that the ship has tentacles of mysterious capability for forced boarding of any class of space-faring vessel. Like the hunter, the ship has no identifying mark or banner under which it flies; and the syndicate has given it a nick name: “Yerfuct“.

Unfortunately for Drakkhenius, his bookie had already found out that the cargo he was hauling was a high-value xeno-gmo botanical organism developed in secret by a massive galactic corporation; something based on proto-galactic alien genetic material so mysterious even the high science of the galactic federation could not fully decode its strange information. It had been deemed so dangerous that any further research involving it had been banned; but the allure of power untold lured some of the corporate elites to experiment with hybridizing it into a reproducible organism.

As the fates would have it, that botanical vessel was “Nepeta Cataria“; or as it is commonly known, catnip.

This DNA had been found drifting in the plasma the nearest to the galactic core any of the federation’s races probes ever achieved and returned. The high-strangeness of a molecule existing freely in such high torsion plasma is inconceivable, baffling the greatest minds to have contemplated its stubborn factual existence. Obviously this is not normal matter we are dealing with; but for all physical purposes it interfaces with biology as if it were some simple genetic material containing biological information.

His bookie found that out, and even if he had no debt; he would have been hit. The very nature of the cargo was what had drawn the Black Squid out of the mists of legend into the three dimensional troubles of today for Drakkhenius. There were hands in this that non of these players were even aware of…

This product had been created in order to foster research of the proto-galactic DNA; however it was discovered to vastly accelerate the development of higher traits and emergent properties in any race which consumed it. It also had a killer buzz, and glowed a distinct purple light.

This was the reason that Drakkhenius found himself in the following situation:

He was flying over Castastro Phi hauling likely the most precious black market good in the entire galaxy at that moment in time, and while down below Gregor was observing his passage; and the Black Squid had fired a void-plasma missile which was locking on to his ship at that very moment.

Normally, or as normal as dealing with the Black Squid got; such void ordnance amounts to inevitable consequences on par with death and taxes. However, Drakkhenius had been sampling the Purple Nip; and it’s effects were as rumored. Every neuron in his system was activated with proto-galactic DNA and the unknown effects of nepetalactone analogs unique to this organism. Subjectively, he felt like a super-hero with reflexes and cognition to match; interfacing with ship systems and flying like an octopus who had mastered multi-dimensional consciousness.

Which is why, for the first time ever in the Black Squid’s long career, he missed. Only grazing the engine of Drakkhenius craft as a result of his nip-enhanced piloting…

With his engine damaged, and the Black Squid intending his demise; Drakkhenius used every ounce of his skill and nip performance enhancement to pilot the crashing ship down to the surface of Catastro Phi.

Gregor watched through the telescope as a shooting star took a sharp angle detour toward the surface of the planet. In all his observations, he had never witnessed a meteor change course in the sky. It was always a slow arcing curve toward the planet, or sometimes a more direct orthogonal path toward the planet surface. This was highly unusual, and curiosity would not let the matter rest in his mind. He had to follow the object to it’s impact and investigate.

The Black Squid, apparently satisfied with his work; flew past the wreck site from his position high in orbit, and began the process of landing on the planet, however; as he entered the planet’s atmosphere, a strange electrical effect manifested around his ship. This aberration of planetary atmospheric discharge played hell with his navigation systems and he entered a crash trajectory as well, with a terminus in the far north arctic region.

Klaxons blaring and smoke beginning to the fill the interior of his ship, he navigated the damaged vessel into a tangential trajectory to foster impact survival, crashing through trees and leaving a smoldering path behind him.

The Great Nippening