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Chapter: Chapter 7: Antlers

  • Septemberdale asked: Idrisah, how, if at all, do Avians count on their hands? I heard it's pretty similar to binary. Idrisah: Avians use lots of different body-counting methods.The two most common in Tiiliitian culture are knuckle counting and ternary. Knuckle counting is pretty much the same as it is for humans— counting the bones of each finger. Avians do this by pointing to each finger bone with the opposite finger. Ternary finger counting goes up to 8 on one hand (the typical number base for avians) but doesn't use binary, as the name implies. Instead of two digit morphemes there are three: lowered, raised, and crooked. Which means, essentially, this system uses base 3 to count in base 8 on a hand with two digits. Isn't that delightful?

    RttS Reader Questions 36

    Oct 21, 2025

  • xXGundamfan0087Xx asked: Killian, according your long life labor skills with mechanics and vast experience on the field of technology, could you agree on the viability of humanoid robots of particularly giant size? Killian: Ah, gigaweight upright walkers…. A beautiful dream that’s a royal pain in the ass to actually design… In battle mech competitions, gigaheavy walker mechs tend to be quadrupeds or dino-bipeds. Weight goes up exponentially with bot size, and the biggest bot classes often can't get back up after getting knocked down. Going gigaweight on top heavy designs with fiddly balancing like upright walkers just results in unimpressive, short, and expensive slap fights. There are some lighter upright walker competition classes in battle robot competitions, but they’re generally smaller than the average typ. The scale is less impressive, sure, but the fights are MUCH longer, and, in my opinion… waaay more exciting. Honestly, I prefer the good old fashioned tank types. Pete Pounder is my all time champ for Martian Mech Madness. Can’t go wrong with low center of gravity and a big fucking hammer!

    RttS Reader Questions 35

    Oct 18, 2025

  • Paroxysmall asked: Idrisah, Gillie, have either of you had pets before? Gillie: (ASL) My daddy is a ball python breeder, if that counts? I've never really been a pet person. Snakes and reptiles are neat though. Idrisah: Oh, I had SO many pets as a kid. It makes me cringe now, but I was constantly begging my mom to buy me these trendy GMO pets that barely live a year. The companies producing them never bother to give them better longevity, because they just want people to buy replacements. It's ghoulish. I remember having glowfrogs, neoraptors, minidragons, toppies, domestic bats, castle ants, weekers... The worst was pocket dogs. Those things had a deathwish. One escaped the cage and strangled itself in my bug net, the other somehow chewed its way into the top of its water bottle and drowned. My mom never got me anything as large as a typ cat, buuut... there was one exception... On one of our family trips to Earth, my uncle trapped this feral catfish dragon. They're really invasive in South Asia, so it's illegal to release them. I named her Dibi, befriended her with bits of fried fish, and begged for days for my parents to let me keep it. She lived with us in Nexus Jovia for 11 years. I still miss her...

    RttS Reader Questions 34

    Oct 16, 2025

  • Anonymous asked: Adam so, how come you're having trouble with finding a job as a pilot? Is it just too competitive of a landscape? Adam: Corporate types only want suck ups, I guess. They’ll ask you to waste your time doing the dumbest shit and then blow up when you question them on it. It's just a powerplay. Petty middle managers get mad about not REALLY being in charge, then take it out on their minions.

    RttS Reader Questions 33

    Oct 14, 2025

  • Threethousandonehundredtwentysecond asked: Talita, do you plan on ever having children? if you did, would you adopt or have a litter physically? Talita: Me?? No! FUCK no. I don't have any of my shit together enough for ANY kid. But— Are you joking?? "Hey Talita, you're a messed up cultural orphan with a ridiculous cost of living. Ever thought about going out of your way to get knocked up and give birth to SIX MORE of you?" Are you INSANE!?

    RttS Reader Questions 32

    Oct 11, 2025

  • Anonymous asked: Gillie, is trying to lip-read Talita any harder than a human speaker? Gillie: I’ve never been a good lip reader. People talk FAST and mouth shapes for speech are really ambiguous. Image: Gillie squints at a human speaking a word and thinks "PAY? BIE? MAY? PAID? PIE? MADE?" Gillie: But I’m even worse with Talita. Not because she’s an alien. Because she doesn’t point her mouth at me!! Image: Gillie frowns at Talita, who is talking to her with her trunk pointed at her neck.

    RttS Reader Questions 31

    Oct 09, 2025

  • Anonymous asked: Bip, what do the symbols on the antler velvet blanket mean? Bip: This blanket is mostly demographic and travel record keeping. For instance, these are pupations, these are marriages, these are departures, these are deaths.  Image: PUPATIONS, MARRIAGES, DEPARTURES, DEATHS Bip: There are not usually personalized symbols for individuals other than matriarchs. Other “name” symbols on the record refer to clans and locations. Image: MATRIARCHS, CLANS, LOCATIONS

    RttS Reader Questions 30

    Oct 07, 2025

  • Auto asked: Hey Bip! I'd like to know more about your electrowetting displays. Other than displaying your avatar on them, what else do you and your crew use them for? Bip: Mostly they're used to customize living spaces, making walls any color or pattern the occupant likes. They can also be used as an "infinite screen,"though their resolution is not high enough to be a perfect replacement for an OLED display. It's also part of my vessel emergency systems. Alerts flash the color of the entire wall and display text information to inform and assist occupants. Wall text: STELLAR FLARE. PROCEED TO FLOOR 4 SHELTER IMMEDIATELY.

    RttS Reader Questions 29

    Oct 04, 2025

  • Adrienne asked: Talita, Cheevwut, and Ohwitiil: Do you also see "faces" easily in objects the way humans do (ex: an electrical socket looks like a gasping guy) or is that not really a thing for non-human sophonts? Talita: Two dots and a "mouth" has always looked like a face to me. I guess centaur faces aren't that different in layout than a human's? Or my brain's been pickled by human media. I dunno, I'm not a psychologist… Image: American electrical outlet. Cheevwut: Oh yeah, it's different for us. Ohwitiil: Yes, this only looks like a human if you think about it for a while... it's missing so many features, and the "eyes" are so tall… Image: Speech bubble icon with ellipses. Cheevwut: What I always get tripped up by is stuff with three dots in a row. The "busy typing" symbol in human text chat programs has always looked like a little dude to me. Ohwitiil: It does feel like being watched. When I first started using English chat programs, I thought it meant the other user was looking at your message.

    RttS Reader Questions 28

    Oct 02, 2025

  • Anonymous asked: Dr. Henriques, do you provide medical aid for all the sophonts on Ixion? What's the extent of medical care you offer, e.g. can the med team do surgeries on planet? Dr. Henriques: Oh, heavens, no. I’m just one of the team. I am the only returning employee xenophysician, though. We get a lot of exomedicine students here, who will stay for a season to get field experience. Often it's avians training in human or centaur medicine! We have a fully equipped medical team, surgical bot, and facilities and can handle the vast majority of procedures no problem.  The main issue is supplies… in the past we’ve had temps not tell us their medication needs before arrival, then they're shocked when we don’t have the prescription drug on hand... Image: Three humans in scrubs are labelled "Human Medicine." Three avians in scrubs are labelled "Avian Medicine." Dr. Henriques and two avians are labelled "Exo Medicine."

    RttS Reader Questions 27

    Sep 30, 2025

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