Physiology, Hiver

From SOTS

Despite appearances, Hivers are not insects in the physical sense. They are much larger than any Terran insect, ranging from 40 to 250 kilograms in mass and 90 to 450 centimetres in height. They do have six limbs but the upper four are equipped with opposable digits. Most Hivers have a pair of wings on the dorsal surface of their bodies but these are vestigial and useless for flight.

A Hiver's body is partially covered with chitin but the shell is not an exo-skeleton. Hivers have an interior skeleton, a full array of internal organs and a circulatory system similar to that of a terrestrial bird or mammal. The chitin is not used for tissue support; it is adapted to serve as armor. Some scientists speculate that the bright colours and patterns of a Hiver's body also convey a great deal of social information to other Hivers.

Growth

The early stages of infancy and nurturing are six months to a year—this can be accelerated, but only at the expense of the child's emotional and cognitive development. Full physical maturation is usually achieved by age 8 in workers and warriors, and during ages 12-16 in princes or a princesses. Cognitive development is ongoing through the Hiver's life, so long as no damage or suppression occurs.

Lifespan

Hiver lifespan varies by caste. The average worker, barring accident, injury or mistreatment, could live up to 60–70 years. A warrior is generally not designed for longevity and can live up to 50+ if given a life of ease, peace and safety—this rarely happens of course, and average lifespan for a Hiver warrior is much lower with very few members of the caste living past 35.

Princes can have a comfortable lifespan of 300+ years and a princess can live up to 400. A queen in full maturity can live a healthy and productive span of 1,000 or so.

Fighting a Hiver

I'm not sure which is the more impressive accomplishment; being able to kill a Hiver with your bare hands or being sufficiently conversant with Hiver language and culture to be able to taunt one verbally! Personally, I (Arinn Dembo) think that anyone with that kind of linguistic acumen would be entirely wasted in a hand-to-hand arena bout; that's a skillset which would be of much more use to SolForce military intelligence behind the lines.

As to Hiver organs; they have a full cardiovascular system and there are various ways to attack it. Blunt force trauma to the carapace simply isn't the best. To do enough thoracic damage to stop a Hiver, you need to rend or destroy a lot of tissue. Warriors are worse than workers in this respect; they are more likely to have redundant organs, blood that coagulates more quickly, etc. This is why SolForce marines call their 50 caliber explosive ammunition "bugbusters"; they've learned from experience to use a round that penetrates deeply and then tumbles and/or explodes.

Returning to the hand-to-hand duel, a Human with sufficient skill would be best advised to seek a weapon of convenience against his opponent. Just because the two combatants go into the fight empty-handed doesn't mean that a smart monkey has to stay empty-handed. The most obvious available weapon might even be a part of the Hiver's own body. If you could somehow find the leverage and strength to break one of its arms off at the elbow joint, you would find yourself armed with a formidable cutting blade and a spike. Not to mention having a parry-bar strong enough to withstand the strikes of the remaining three arms...and there is a certain satisfaction involved in killing your opponent with his own severed limb.

A Hiver with a severed head is dead. Its brain is too complex to allow it to continue moving for any length of time without its central processor. A Hiver warrior may keep charging blindly forward or spasm wildly with severe brain damage, but it will drop like a ton of bricks if the head is completely removed. Hiver are not a simple enough organism to do without the entire brain; there are too many autonomic functions which cannot continue if the spinal cords are severed.