The Folk, also known as Runa in their language, were the Human residents of the planet Nest.[1]
Society[]
The Runa lived entirely underground. They used machines, and new ones were made for them by the Yachachiyruna. Their language was called the Runa Simi, or "folk talking". The leader of the Runa was called the Huapaya. The people were tall and well-nourished looking. Their speech was a fair-sounding Stark, but with an accent that made it hard for Lusitanians to understand them. It was as if some consonants were said so far back in their throats that the sounds could barely escape. A lot of words seemed to use only "ee" and "ah" and "oo" as their only vowels, even when other vowels were required. The accent was likely inherited from Quechua or Aymara, or both. A certain individual among the Folk wore an elaborate headdress.[1]
The walls of their undergound dwellings were smooth but did not seem to be made of metal, and were likely plastic. The walls were straight and smooth, the ceiling complete and solid, and the floor was not stone.[1]
History[]
Origin[]
In 87 BX when the Formics invaded the Sol System, the Quispe crew of the Ark witnessed the defeat of the onslaught of the Formic Scout Ship, but also saw a larger fleet amassing outside of the system, and decided that they could not help humanity in the Second Formic War. The Mother of the crew assembled the crew in the cargo bay and asked the crew if they would go with her to find another world and save humanity from extinction. The Ark was capable of this voyage, especially after they took possession of a habitat module from an abandoned trading post in The Belt. It was already growing enough food crops to sustain ten times their population, and it had plenty of room for the birds free to soar and fly, to nest and breed.[1]
Within the first ten years of the flight, a certain group of people called themselves the Engineers, because they were the ones who made repairs and invented new machinery on the inside and outside of the ship. They were constantly leaving the parts of the ship that rotated to create gravity, and spent most of their time in weightless space. The engineers saw how dangerous it was to have regular human shape, so they asked Mother if they could explore ways to modify their genes so that their children would be better suited to the labor. Mother said yes, and the Engineers joined with the scientists of the crew, and while they could still access communications with Earth, they learned all they could about genes and how to modify them. As they were in contact with Earth, they knew of the miraculous victory of Mazer Rackham, but also had friends in the International Fleet to know that the public story was a lie, and that Mazer Rackham had figured out that all the Formic ships acted from one point of view, and which ship contained that point of view. He violated his orders and launched a missile and it destroyed the Hive Queen ship. Mother gave the crew a choice to return to Earth, but because they knew the Formics would return to avenge their Queen they decided to continue their voyage.[1]
When the children of the Engineers were born, they had the modifications to work better with four hands. The normal people, known as Runa or the Folk, had to watch their children to try to keep them from imitating the Engineers, because they could get injured or die imitating them. During the voyage, the Keas and the Ravens that the Mother brought with her began to breed themselves for intelligence, and became capable of understanding and reproducing human speech.[1]
After around 200 years of voyaging, the Ark arrived on a habitable world, and it was named Nest and settled by the Runa, the Yachachiyruna, the Keas and the Ravens. They also encountered the intelligently-designed Recorder virus but did not think much of it.[1]
In the second century of the colony around 313 AX, some humans were so furious with the mischief of the Keas that they started making traps and caging them where they could do no harm to humans' projects. When the Ravens saw it, they declared a relentless guerrilla war against the village of humans. The humans could do nothing without constant bombardment and tearing. Everything they built the bids broke or weakened, and the birds pecked at their faces, tearing their ears. The birds never blinded any of them, as they wanted it to be a war whose scars might heal. To avoid them, many of the villagers took refuge underground. The Ravens opened the cages and set the Keas free, forging an alliance between the birds. Thus, the humans of Nest retreated fully underground and decided to live separately from the birds. However, they bore a deep resentment against the birds. Every few centuries, some group of humans would seek to take back the surface, with slogans like, 'We made them smart, now make them obedient."[1]
In 3160 AX, the Yachachi Ruqyaq designed a weapon that was a combination of ultrasound and infrasound for riot control to keep the peace underground.[1]
Children of the Mind[]
In 3180 AX, an unidentified spacecraft entered orbit around Nest, and could teleport instantly. The Yachachiyruna and the Runa sent a transmission of the Recorder virus to the craft as a way to ask them if they were the ones who sent the virus to them. Soon after they sent a ship into orbit to intercept the Box, but the Box teleported away.[2]
The Last Shadow[]
The beings who were in the Box spacecraft in orbit eventually landed on Nest a few months later, and they turned out to be humans from the planet Lusitania who had discovered a method of instantaneous travel. They met with the Keas and the Ravens first, as they were on the surface, and eventually encountered the Yachachiyruna. During this time, the Folk determined that they were a threat and decided to take action. Soon after, Thulium Delphiki, a girl from Lusitania, arrived among the Folk. They acted kind to her, but began to release a virus that contained two micro-organisms, one of them that attacked the red blood cells, and the other that encased the nerve cells in the limbs and face. It caused blinding headache, sparks dancing like comets across ones' vision, congestion that made one short of breath, and violent diarrhea, as well as blisters on the face. They gave a message to the Yachachi Ruqyaq, to invite the humans from Lusitania to a banquet that night with the Folk, but it was a trap.[1]
That night, the rest of the human group studying Nest arrived. After they were welcomed and seated, Brussels Delphiki noticed the blisters on Thulium's face and alerted the group. A few Folk moved to try to intercept Jane, and some of what looked to be the Folk's highest officers looked cheerful, as if they had already won a war that wasn't supposed to start. However, Jane managed to Detour the group back to Lusitania.[1]
Soon after, the Folk decided to turn against the other species of Nest and retake the planet. They used the same riot control weapon designed by Ruqyaq to kill hundreds of Keas and Ravens, but large portions of them were teleported away by the Lusitanians. However, the Lusitanians vowed to never return, and the Folk likely exterminated the remaining Yachachi, Keas, and Ravens, and retook the surface of Nest.[1]