Spri'lek

"They have suffered much, and sacrificed more, that they might live. I doubt that the scars will ever heal."

- Shakvail

The Spri’lek, meaning “spiral lekku” were a species of near-Twi’leks that were found primarily in the remote Nylath system. They physically resembled s in almost all ways, save for their lekku, which rather than hanging free, joined together, coiling about each other behind the head. Originating due to mutation, the species became true breeding through the machinations of Emana Jermin during the. Following rebellion in 1,754 BBY they took Nylath as their own, and settled there. Though most Spri’leks desired only quiet, peaceful lives, they were considered highly appealing beings, and suffered under the burden of slaving, leaving to a grim bargain with the Desilijic Hutt Clan.

Biology and Appearance
Spri’leks were essentially Twi’leks when it came to the majority of their physiology, and evidenced the characteristics of that species, including high variation in skin tones (though Spri’leks did not display the rare ‘red’ skin tone of the Lethan Twi’lek race), claw-like nails, gender-differentiated ear development, and lack of body hair. They also shared the slender and shapely physique for which Twi’leks were known, and most outside species considered them equally attractive.

The principal difference was in the Lekku, or. While Twi’lek brain tails swpet back and hung free down the back, those of Spri’leks pulled together at roughly the base of the skull, and thereafter entwined, wrapping about each other until reaching a single, united terminal point. This joined form lacked the flexibility of Twi’lek lekku, and as a result Spri’leks did not develop a visual method of communication based on their movements.

As they contained neural tissue a Spri’lek’s lekku could not be separated without causing immense neurological damage, usually reducing the subject of such surgery to a permanent vegetative state.

Society and Culture
Spri’lek psychology evidenced many similarities to that of Twi’leks, but divergence in this theater was greater than any physical differences. Survival was paramount among Spri’leks who were willing to sacrifice almost anything to achieve it. They preferred to avoid confrontation, and were unlikely to stand on pride or principle, attempting to evaluate the costs and benefits of their actions in order to minimize loss. Due to their artificial and enslaved origins they had little tradition or perception of strength as a species, and could be intimidated fairly easily.

As they had universally originated as slaves, Spri’leks were an egalitarian people, with a communitarian lifestyle and culture. They rejected slavery among themselves, such as on Nylath, even though many Spri’leks were forced into bondage elsewhere in the galaxy. Their society was conservative and tradition-focused, growing slowly and taking few risks. They were universally democratic in their political methods.

Spri’lek clothing was generally simple, consisting primarily of long, durable robes and gowns made of thick fabric to ward of Nylath’s perpetual chill, worn tight to allow for field labor. They favored brightly colored dyes and stenciling to provide variation to their garments. Beyond Nylath, most Spri’leks dressed in traditional Twi’lek garments, either because slave masters forced them to, or as a method of fitting and avoiding attention. Seasoned Spri’lek travelers often sported specialized headdresses that hid their nature from casual observers.

Spri’lek settlements were arrayed in large circles, as a traditional defensive measure. Their dwellings were usually of heavy brick and gently curved. To ward against Nylath’s rare but powerful windstorms they did not build above three to four stories.

Generally tolerant of other species, save those with a reputation for slaving, Spri’leks got on poorly with their Twi’lek forebears. Most Twi’leks considered Spri’leks to be deformed or at best disabled, while Spri’leks returned the favor by considering Twi’leks hopelessly bigoted. Violence between members of the two species was not uncommon, and Spri’leks kept in joint slave pens with Twi’leks were often brutally bullied and ostracized by their more numerous cousins.

Government
Spri’lek society was democratic, and favored a representative model. Nylath was governed by an elected Council of Elders, but the planet’s populace was so widely dispersed that most political power dissolved to the local level, to mayors and city councils. These positions were usually filled by the elderly, out of a combination of respect and an inability to continue agricultural labor into advanced age. Major decisions affecting the whole populace in a major way were generally put to popular referendum.

Spri’lek politics was generally almost unscrupulously clean, with any accusation of fraud or chicanery taken very seriously. The mass of the population was extremely accepting of democratic decisions, with protests almost never occurring.

In the handful of Spri’lek settlements beyond Nylath, such as a tiny community on, the residents popularly elected a local leader to speak for them, even if this was unofficial, and participated in whatever democratic system was available rather passively.

Spri’lek Names
Spri’lek society did not have clans, with inidividuals identifying via place of residence, if at all. As a result the combined nomenclature system common on Ryloth was not used among Spri’leks. They considered this a welcome break with the past and adopted family names in the human fashion. These names were initially chosen during the Spri’lek Rebellion against their Sith Masters, and most were taken from pieces of the names of heroes fallen in those battles, or of ships used during the escape.

Origins
In a sense, there have been Spri’leks as long as their have been Twi’leks. The developmental mutation that results in the twining of the lekku, known as Spiral Syndrome has been noted by xenoanthropologists in Twi’lek prehistory. The mutation is, however, very rare, occurring at a rate of roughly 1 in 15,000 births. Such children were long considered accursed and prior to contact with the outside galaxy those born with this mutation were usually left to die of exposure or, as technology advanced, selectively aborted.

After Ryloth and the Twi’leks joined the Republic, this practice was condemned, and Spiral Syndrome births were allowed to live, though they were heavily ostracized by Twi’lek society and most lived as outcasts. The Hutts took notice of these rare individuals and, prizing them as exotic specimens, generally enslaved them all, often bidding spectacular amounts.

There was no true Spri’lek species at this time, for the mutation’s influence on the lekku affected neural development. A Sprial Syndrome Twi’lek could not produce viable offspring with a non-mutant Twi’lek, and mating of two Spiral Syndrome individuals produced only horribly deformed fully vegetative monstrosities such that even the Hutts quickly abandoned experimentation.

Emana Jermin, by contrast, was willing to push ahead regardless of how many malformed bodies and brutalized slaves were required. A practitioner of and a cousin of Sith Lord Nevath Jermin she was tasked with the management and improvement of his slaves. Emana considered Twi’leks a nearly ideal slave species, save for their ability to communicate non-verbally, which had the potential to foment rebellion. Following a chance encounter with a Spriral Syndrome child, she became obsessed with replacing all Twi’lek slaves with this variant form.

The subsequent program of experimentation resulted in hundreds of thousands of lost lives, and an equal number of disabling injuries. The precise details are not recorded, Emana’s notes were destroyed in her cousin’s downfall, but she managed to succeed. From 1,785 BBY to 1,755 BBY the laboratories and slave pens of Nevath Jermin’s dominion produced almost a quarter of a million true-breeding Spiral Syndrome Twi’leks, which were renamed Spri’leks by their overseers.

Though it was often muttered, especially among Twi’leks, that the Spri’leks were dark side monsters and should not be allowed to exist, later investigation, including studies by the Jedi Order, revealed that this was not the case. Emana’s achievement apparently rested on pure genetic manipulation alone.

Liberation
The initial population of Spri’lek slaves labored for their Sith overlords, handling all sorts of tasks. Emana’s minions forced Twi’lek slaves to train the new species in everything they did, part of a general plan to replace them once numbers grew sufficiently. Powerless beneath the yoke of the Sith, it would be outside events that intervened.

In 1,754 BBY Nevath Jermin suffered a series of military setbacks that forced him to seriously deplete home garrisons throughout his territory, sowing the seeds of widespread outright rebellion. The Spri’leks, seeing a chance to escape their suffering for the first time, joined this effort, forming the Spri’lek Freedom Front. A charismatic young man, Teli’ral, took the reins of this uprising, gathering together a large group of Spri’leks for a successful attack on the auxiliary spaceport of Nevath’s capital,.

Seizing a fleet of transports, freighters, and small capital ships, the Spri’leks dashed across the territory, freeing every major cache of their brethren, and fighting Nevath’s forces. The Sith Lord’s position continued to collapse, under heavy pressure from his rivals, and Teli’ral convinced the Spri’leks that they must find a new home where they would be safe.

With access to only the navigational information found in their stolen vessels, they were forced to pick from among Sith holdings. Few were even aware that the Galactic Republic existed. After a period of intense deliberation, these freed slaves chose a remote, marginally habitable planet with nothing more than a token garrison called Nylath.

During the later portion of 1,752 BBY the Spri’lek Freedom Front made a rapid assault upon Nylath, overwhelming its tiny garrison of isolated frontier outposts using high altitude bombardment. The garrison commander sued for peace after three days. An agreement was reached whereby the planet would be abandoned to the Spri’leks. Every soldier and resident packed up into transports and left. Their outposts where swiftly plundered, and then abandoned, declared taboo by the victors.

Life on Nylath
Though many Spri’leks wished to declare Teli’ral their new king, the youth refused the posting, choosing instead to return to the stars, hoping to find any more survivors. A loose representative Council of Elders was put in place instead, but its power quickly became limited by distance as the Spri’leks dispersed across the wide steppes of their new home.

Teli’ral never returned, he died in a Sith ambush later that year. A similar fate awaited Nevath Jermin and his Emana, the former executed by rivals in 1,751 BBY, the later killed during a bombardment of Siskeen. Within that chaos the Spri’leks were largely forgotten, and the galaxy at large barely realized they existed at all. Though the chaos of the wars limited development of their society, few had time for an isolated planet with no real military value, and the Spri’leks enjoyed centuries of peace.

The end of the would ironically prove to be the end of peace for the Spri’leks. Regular contact with the greater galaxy resumed following a pirate raid in 980 BBY, and the Hutts were delighted to discover that the true-breeding population of valuable slaves existed. Extensive raiding began almost immediately.

In the following decade over three million Spri’leks would be taken forcibly into bondage, and twice that number slain attempting to resist. At the time, that was roughly ten percent of the total population of Spri’leks in the whole galaxy. Lacking the strength to fight on their own, and unable to convince a distant Republic to provide assistance, they eventually turned to another solution.

The Desilijic Hutt Clan, seeking to control the market for this exotic slave species, sent an ambassador, Koluma the Hutt to Nylath in 968 BBY. She negotiated a bargain whereby the planet would provide one hundred slaves per year to the Hutts, seventy-five women, and twenty-five men, age twenty. In return, the Hutts would insure the market was controlled and slave raiding stopped. This motion was put to popular referendum, and passed by a four-to-one margin later that year. The agreement would remain in place until the death of in 4 ABY.

While the Spri’leks of Nylath would obtain greater protection from slavery when they joined the in 9 ABY, by that time slave breeding operations for the species had been established at several locations in the galaxy. Small Spri’lek communities had also been established on severally highly populous planets, mostly in the Core Worlds, giving the species a galactic presence, even if they remained largely unknown.

Spri’leks were officially introduced to the galaxy by the Shakvail in 24 ABY, who filed an official study on the species for the first time while undertaking an expedition there.

Spri'leks in the Galaxy
The overwhelming majority of the galaxy's Spri'leks lived on Nylath and never left the planet. Most were engaged in cereal agriculture and had no involvement in larger galactic affairs. The few hundred thousand or so members of the species found offworld were primarily slaves, usually as isolated individuals in the keeping of various criminal overlords. Roughly a dozen small communities existed on populous worlds, including Coruscant, of a few hundred or thousand individuals, and the youth of these groups occasionally undertook adventurous journeys, but the overall Spri'lek contribution to galactic events was negligible.

Behind the Scenes
The Spri’lek species was created in January, 2012 by Mechalich, initially for use in the novella Shakvail: Beginnings as part of the final chapter. They have yet to appear in any other works.

Appearances

 * Shakvail: Beginnings