Mambird

The dominant intelligent species of the planet Ethelmuhrmen. Biologically they share similar traits of both New Caledonian chickens and Earth beavers, and are a class II civilization having achieved interplanetary travel years ago. They practice a religion based upon the belief in The Cosmic Chicken and her consort, The Universal Rooster, of which The Cosmic Chicken is universally believed to be the actual power in the cosmos. The language, mostly clucks, chirps, and whistles is called Cluckuatl (cluck-wah-tul).

The Cosmic Chicken

The primary deity of the Mambird religion, Fowlism, The Cosmic Chicken is a very large space hen laying square planets around suns, which warm and crack, or “hatch” allowing the planet’s proto-species onto the surface. The religion has had one great schism, splitting the church into Earnie’s Orthodox Church Of The Cosmic Chicken, and The Reformed Church Of The Chicken, with the former being the original universal church founded by the prophet Earnie The Intolerably Longwinded to correct a period of apostasy.

The main difference between the two organizations being the interpretation of the existence of the Hen. To reformers, she is a perfected yet not actually extant personification of the great creative and merciful nature of enlightened beings everywhere. A shining example to be emulated for the good of all. To the orthodox, she’s an actual giant space chicken laying square planets before sauntering off and not looking back. Most Mambirds are Orthodox.

A typical expression of belief and thanks is Ahen.

The founding scriptures and documents of the church were written by Earnie in antiquity and are Ye Oldest Pamphlet Of The Chicken, which recounts the struggles of Hozmam in the Chipper Insurrection against Frito Pringlus I and his progeny during the Age Of Apostasy, when Mambird civilization almost crumbled. This telling is slightly different from contemporary historical texts, and is believed by the orthodox to have been delivered in a vision. Ye Next Pamphlet Of The Chicken involves Earnie himself, and his own persecution and redemption, bringing Mambirds back to the steadying influence of the Hen under the embrace of her heat lamp. Societal deviance fueled by chip-weed was blamed for the Insurrection.

Ethelmuhrmen

The home planet of the Mambirds, and is square, as well as hollow. It resides approximately 167 lightyears from New Caledonia, towards the constellation Scorpio in the Coopcron cluster. The star’s name to New Caledonians is “That weird shaped one, next to the pretty one”. The Mambird name for the star is unpronounceable to most other species.

The planet’s primary export is “chip-weed extract”, known as potato chips elsewhere in the galaxy. They are a known hallucinogen to Mambirds and are almost illegal to possess, manufacture, distribute, import, or purchase on Ethelmuhrmen, having played a large part in both the War Of The Sides and the Chippers Insurrection of Frito Pringlus I previously. Before being so heavily controlled, the status of cash crop had already been established and the planet grew rich on it’s production. It is almost exclusively produced for interplanetary export, though some does get smuggled into illicit chip-dens on the planet, especially on Side 2. Most production has started to be moved off world to other settlements within Mambird space. The simultaneous economic dependency and social aversion to chip-weed is a topic of much ethical debate among the population.

Ethelmuhrmen has gained notoriety in most civilized circles of the galaxy as a “very odd little place”.