Physical Description

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Grey skin with dotted scarification across his body in patterns. Flames shoot from behind the back of his crested head. Sometimes flames sprout from his "vents." When his crests are closed, it emits smoke instead. His teeth are visible on the sides of his jaw and he has no lips. Flames, eyes, vents, tips of toes and tips of fingers are closest to a bright icy blue and teal in hue. Anything inside his body is also this color. This includes the entirety of the inside of his mouth, organs blood and tears; just varying hues of said blues.

Speech

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Slight lilt when speaking English with odd pronunciation and adds unnecessary words. Eloquent when speaking in his native tongue. Fluent in English and his Mahanian dialect.

Mental & Emotional

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Focused. Tries to prevent himself from feeling the guilt around his wife and all those that have died since the beginning of the spread of the disease but sometimes it gets hard.

Beliefs

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Unlike the majority of his race, he is a non-believer in the Gods of Mahan. Not exactly an atheist, just agnostic. However, this is already extremely looked down upon and can be a cause for persecution.

Daily Life/Health

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His time is almost completely eaten up by his research involving the disease that plagues his people. However, when he has removed himself from it temporarily, he continues expanding his research on known and unknown doctorial knowledge.

Powers/Abilities

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Advanced Xenobiolist/Astrobiologist. Skilled fisherman. Advanced writer in non-fiction.

Background/Story

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Born in a small village on an island cluster outside of one of Tele's 8 continents, Sia was the only child of a single mother. Before having him, she was a nurse/medical assistant for a much larger city inland. She gave that up for her child, moving to her parent's home. He grew up with access to the open ocean, volcanic vents and the fantastical greenery his location offered. Sia also grew with his mother's knowledge and love for her people tucked away in his chest. She did a lot of her medical work free in the village while maintaining a lower paying job as a fisherman. Although his people didn't eat "soft foods," there was payment to be had for transporting it to the others on their world that needed to. Sia joined her as he grew older, learning as much as he could. Seeing what was past his island barriers facinated him like nothing else. Though his empathy was a good driving factor into him eventually becoming a doctor, it was mostly the youthful need to go beyond what you know. With his mother's blessings, he took off for higher education on the main continent.

He studied what was needed to become a general doctor for his people but took the most courses and interest in Xenobiology. His people didn't usually have as many health concerns as other races due to their unique biology and to spend time helping other species meant further exploration; eventually even off-planet. After graduating, he spent some time back home with his family before looking for work. Though it wasn't what he was looking for, he found an opening at a hospital on the mainland. Sia would spend many, many years here. He had time to further advance his own studies, always taking available courses to sate his thirst for the knowledge of everything off-planet. Now, Dr. Baas, he paid off his grandparent's home and tried to get his mother to return to work, which she did. Although she had to take exams again and update old coursework, she got hired on to the same hospital her son worked at thanks to his connections. Sia spent many more years working hand in hand with his mother here. Although this life was nice, he yearned for more outside his current reach and opted for job applications that would lead him outside of his own atmosphere. Eventually, he was hired onto a satellite that specialized in helping astro-emergency situations. It was a tough job, far from home but it was exactly what he was looking for.

These were some of his favorite decades. Never before had he got to have hands on experience with other races. Sia wrote many papers on the best ways to handle alien health and surgical situations, becoming known for hsi wide experience in many species. Most would specialize in several but he preferred to not limit himself. Again, his species had unique advantages, including their rather long lifespan and inability to become infected with bacterium or virus. Sia even wrote a book books that journeled his life living in these situations and the events that unfolded and planned on writing another. His personal endeavors were halted when he met his future wife when visiting his family. Tuala, was also there visiting family and both would later joke that they had never run into each other even though the village was quite small and each visited often. They started officially dating after a little while even though his job was very remote from her. They made the relationship work for the time being until he could pull enough strings to have her move up to live with him on the satellite. To do this, they'd have to be wed. Sia wanted to have Tuala's hand anyway but this just expedited the question. They married and started their life together. During their years with each other, Dr. Baas moved several times to other satellite locations and a couple of times to other planets, helping in aiding catastrophic alien incidents. In the middle of aiding one of these species, he first received news of the "disease" that started affecting his people.

The illness had spread quickly and was already responsible for many fatalities. It moved rapidly between the Avae, doctors being unsure if it was spread via touch, inhalation or another way. Once a person was infected, it was expected that they'd die within several weeks. Physicians were unsure how exactly the disease was continuing on under the extreme temperatures inside their bodies as they were thought to be completely immune to all strains of bacteria or virus. All they were sure of was once infected, the person would essentially overheat. The natural heat inside their bodies would become so intense that the infected individual would burn from the inside out. Organs would begin to shut down then "melt," taking all "soft" tissue with it until nothing was left except the extreme hardened layers of the endoskeleton. What was left was a husk, smoke pouring from open areas where soft tissue once was like eye sockets and vents, after the final moments of internal incineration. By the time he had arrived back home, thousands had contracted the illness and hundreds had died. His small village was seemingly unharmed but the mainland was a mess. The governments put up barriers to try and control the spread and for a time it worked. Sia quickly began his relief efforts, joining the huge team of other like-minded individuals who were trying to decern the cause. While he took up the dangerous position on the mainland, he left Tuala at home with her parents. However, those of his village were struck with the disease several years into efforts to control it. His wife was among the infected. Though he came back as quickly as he could, his grandparents and her parents had become infected as well as they tried to aid the village. His mother was left spared due to her anal practises of wearing safety equipment, learned from her medical experience.

Knowing that these last few years they'd found basically no answers, he came home to try and help his family. Tuala succumbed with all the others who were infected in his village. Those moments will forever be burned into his memory and need not explaining as one can only imagine, already knowing what the disease was capable of. Dr. Baas was not allowed to perform autopsies on most deceased as their religious beliefs prevented it so he opted to autopsy his own wife. He was deemed abhorrent by the village survivors, who wanted nothing to do with him. The Avae hold several religions but the most prominent is the Way of the Klihn. It goes back centuries upon centuries and the foundation of their society is built upon its ideas, deeply rooted into every branch of their world, including law. The religion focuses on an afterlife that is far beneath the surface of the planet, held warmly in their planet's center. Their deceased must be immediatley buried within their day cycle for fear of their "flame" escaping and being unable to enter this realm. Any opening of the body is a release of this flame and is considered a murder of their second, eternal life. A family can agree to an autopsy but most would not condone it. If an autopsy is done without or against a family's consent, prison time and title strips can and will be as punishment. Without much choice, Dr. Baas watched as what he once loved burned away and all he could do was promise to save his race from bacterial genocide.

He then began searching for outside help in conducting further research. It was clear his people were woefully ill-equipped to handle this situation. He accompanied several political leaders into hearings for other worlds, asking for help in research but most please went unheard or led to dead ends. Sia spent years working with as many people as possible, attempting to at least slow the disease's effects. He heard of a research vessel in Vigil space that had connections, access to another system entirely and a Commander with a heart of gold. After finally being able to make contact with the ship, he was welcomed aboard.

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Though he hasn't been able to make any headway on his people's illness, he has sparked a romance with the ship's Commander. He pursued it personally to help with the lonliness of his ordeal and hopes that it turns into something more serious as he continues to work.

Trivia

• The dots on his body are scarification marks done by a village shaman/leader. This practise is a traditional rite of passage for Avae coming into adulthood, involved in the Way of the Klihn. Although he or his mother have never been religious, it was just culture standard. It can be compared to human male circumcision; still done today even without religious reasoning.
• His people live on average about 2,000 years, which would make him middle-aged.

Stats

Personality

Extremely adventerous. A rare soul that would risk everything in the pursuit of knowledge in hopes of sharing his finds with everyone else. Empathetic, kind and endearing. Sometimes funny but not in a quick witted way. Highly intelligent but you'll find he bumbles about often and this is easy to laugh at but he's more likely to laugh with you than to become upset. Not especially quiet or at all loud. He'll be heard if he needs to be but doesn't have an issue falling into the background. Sometimes morally grey in the face of decisions. He'll do almost anything if the pros outway the cons for the vast majority of people. He's capable of making those hard choices.

So I find words I never thought to speak, in streets I never thought I should revisit, when I left my body on a distant shore. - T.S. Eliot