So, I've got a race that is unnamed and lives in an airship above earth (Tynx's airship). And they have no name, and in this next story they probably will need one, as I'm writing all about them.

And I need a good, reasonable explanation for why the unnamed race and humans don't get along. At all. (For instance: A woman on the airship adopted a human, knowing that if she was found out, she and the baby would probably die.) I'm open to suggestions! These people have not been developed well, and I can use anything ya'll have!

First example that pops to mind:
(this is how I figure things like this out. I figure out what other people have done that's similar, find the reasons for that situation, and then twist them to fit a different situation. Idea digging. ) [end ramble]

what pops to mind is the BBC series; Merlin. (who recommended that? Come forward!!!)

Uther hates magic. He thinks magic is evil. He has anyone even suspected of even talking to a sorcerer or a variation thereof, executed. He kills a lot of innocent people this way. His ward, Morgana, in one episode, shelters a Druid boy that Uther is looking for. She knows that if he's found she and the boy will be executed. Her position might save her, but that's a big if. So it's a similar situation.

Short equation: the ruler of race B (humans) hates the religion/beliefs/cobha of race A.

(In the series magic is often something you are born with. Morgana eventually realizes she has magic, she's scared, frightened, has grown up believing it to be evil and doesn't know what to do. That's just to justify my Idea Mine here.)

So there's one idea for you.

As far as names go, we need something to build off of. What are some names of some characters? What is this race like? How are they different from humans? Maybe it's a racist thing. Like take our modern racist problem (blacks and whites) and magnify it. Maybe one race is considered by the other to be inferior "sub-human". You need something deeper than politics to make it that widespread; something bred into their very culture.

Is it a one way situation or do both races feel that way about each other? I read another book, "White Midnight" where Race A were farmers, cultured, civilized, etc, and they were constantly raided by the Dalradians (race B, an american indian type race.) The Dalradians would rape women, and if a child was born, it was considered an abomination and sent into the wilderness to die. However, the Dalradians didn't mind taking in a half blooded child as one of their own. One girl in the story defies all tradition and marries a Dalradian. Her father kills her husband and locked her in a room by herself to give birth, not allowing her to have any attendants, in case the child had blue eyes, and everyone learned the truth. (Dalradians had blue eyes, the homelanders had brown eyes.) There's never even any reason given why the two races hate each other so.

Hope that helped some.

Ooh... interesting ideas... decadent chocolate cake... mmm....

I guess it's a mixture of both genres, maybe. The unnamed race will have a larger knowledge of technology than humans, anyway.

It's kind of a two-sided hatred. The unnamed race hate the humans, and the humans hate the unnamed race. There are some that don't, but whoever those people are are too scared to let their stand be known (most of the time, anyway).



Um, kind of like open war, but neither side has declared war, only because the humans have no idea how to get up to the multiple airships floating around in space (save for one time when it was found out that a human had spent his life in the airship, but that didn't get very far).

As to the example. The main character was that child adopted by a woman from the unnamed race. The woman was accompanied by the queen of the airship, and was warned vaguely what would happen (I don't recall writing what exactly would happen, but I think I had that in mind, more or less. The unnamed race would have killed them since they would be living in the airship.

As to names. The queen's name is Faeli. The MC's adopted mother is Mylia, and a friend of the MC is Roukar (I... think that's how I spell it). Of course, this is more or less when I was into Japanesey-ish names and whatnot. So far, I don't really have a clear or good idea of what they're like. I have determined how they tell their kind from humans (since they're really, really similar): whenever one of the unnamed race turns nineteen, they undergo a slight change: The eye color of males receives an odd brightness in the rightl light, and the eyes of females slant ever so slightly.

So far, that's about all I have. There's a 'master' airship, which is absolutely massive and can house the other smaller airships if need be. Thank you both for the ideas!

Maybe it's a hatred that has gone back so far that no one can remember why. It hasn't actually erupted in war, but everyone's afraid it will, so race A is afraid of race B launching an attack, smuggling in spies, and stuff like that. That would be a political reason, if you'd like that instead of a cultural one.

So I guess my new question is, what kind of reason do you want for them to hate each other? Cultural? Social? Political? Religious? Unknown?

Names: Faeli, Mylia, Rukour... those are all really pretty by the way. Anything particular you want in a name or just some made up group of syllables that sounds right?

Um.. I don't really know. I'm just looking for a reason (if there is any that's remembered, like you said) that would be 'reasonable'. Like, something that makes absolutely no sense whatsoever.

Thanks. Maybe... a mixture of different words from another language, but all mean 'unknown', or something like that? Since they started out as having an unknown name, and humans barely know anything about them.

You mean, a reason that's unreasonable?

Ooh, names meaning unknown. That's cool, and much simpler. It could even be English then, couldn't it? Since the humans named them? Imagine you're a human and these airships appear... I'll see if I can think of anything. At least now I know what I'm looking for.

Every time I see this thread I think of a 'race' between two airships or something.

As to names, I'd definitely suggest something related to the airships. But since the humans named them, you can use an English/human word.

eruheran

I realized that too when I looked at it once. But the fact that it's under People, Races, and Tribes helps, right?

Yeah. But they also have their own language... maybe someone from earth somehow (knowingly or not) interacted with one of the unnamed people and found out their name. Maybe screwed it up a bit.

I started typing words like 'mystery', 'unknown', and so on backwards, and it's quite amusing. Something like that might work, too.