Star Kings
The Star Kings are an asexual alien species whose highly successful strategy is to evolve at a furious rate to become like their most successful competitors. According to Kirth Gersen, their development on their homeworld, which they call "Ghnarumen" (Lambda Grus III), was profoundly influenced by the artificial introduction of Neanderthal men in prehistory. In the ensuing millennia, Neanderthals proved to be the fittest species, so the Star Kings grew first to resemble them, then to outcompete and eventually exterminate them from Ghnarumen. Thus, when the Star Kings later came in contact with spacefaring humanity, they immediately began to imitate homo sapiens, driven by their age-old instinct to excel and outdo.
Their temperament and motivations are far different from those of humans, but the most highly evolved (that is, the most human) are able to venture into human society without notice. However, Malagate is an atypical Star King. A notorious criminal with an outstanding reputation for callousness, he himself states shortly before his death that his career is not one that his kind would respect or endorse.
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Famous quotes containing the words star and/or kings:
“And tell so readily, he knoweth well
How ev’ry star by proper name to call?”
—Bible: Hebrew Psalm CXLVII (Paraphrased by The Countess of Pembroke)
“Whenever there’s a big war coming on, you should rope off a big field. And on the big day, you should take all the kings and their cabinets and their generals, put ‘em in the center dressed in their underpants and let them fight it out with clubs. The best country wins.”
—Maxwell Anderson (1888–1959)