HEXAPODs

HEXAPOD
A brown snake-like alien. It is tall and slender, it's torso longer than a human's and its tail longer than the rest of its body. It has six green dots on its neck, as well as another set of the dots on its torso and tail tip. It has green antennae, and a teal-green circle of skin beneath its jaw and attached to its fin-like ears. It has small vestigial wings on its torso, one is extended to show the flashy markings along the insides.
Average Lifespan 120 Years E
Average Height 6-10 ft / 1.8-3 m
Preferred Temperature 80°F / 26°C
Diet Nectarivore

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Biology
Display Structures
Diet
Reproduction
Gallery

Hexapods, frequently shortened to just "hex", were the first sapient extraterrestrial life form encountered by humans. After Voyager 2 made its way to their star system, they sent a vessel to investigate the source, eventually coming aross humanity and meeting them. First contact was tense, but went by peacefully. Being each other's first alien encountered, humans and hex are the closest of all sophont's and are officially united through the HHA.

Hex are private and asocial when compared to humans, being a species that lives in small groups of 2-5 partners rather than large groups like humans do. As a species, they find crowds and large open spaces to be overwhelming and uncomfortable, preferring to be alone in cramped underground spaces.

Biology

Hexapods have long, snake-like bodies with a peach fuzz texture on their skin. Similar to humans, they walk on their two hind legs and can hold and manipulate objects with their arms. Their primary sensory organs are all located on or around the head, the ears and nostrols being on the neck. Their joints are highly flexible and allow them to fit into a variety of poses that are useful for traversing the cramped terrain of their cave homes.

Hex can have a variety of markings and colors, but they still have some limitations in their appearance. Typically, they have a dark colored body with even darker markings on top. The markings are usually only one color. They can have stripes, spots, rings, etc. Skin pigment conditions may result in deviations from this.

They are capable of bioluminescence and can conciously control their glow using chemical reactions. Their antennae, dots, and genitals are all capable of glowing.

Their hands are symmetrical, with two fingers in the middle and one thumb on each side of the hand.

Hexapod blood is green. The oxygen carrier in their blood is hemoglobin, just like humans. But because their blood is full of the pile pigment biliverdin, their blood, muscles, and even bones are all lime green. This is why thin-skinned body parts such as the mouth and gular skin are a teal-ish green.

They speak through their tongues, which are long tubes that sort of function like a partially inverted throat. There's no other hole in the mouth, everything happens through the opening in the tongue.

Display Structures

Perhaps the most striking aspect of the hexapod is their elaborate display structures, which are used to impress potential mates. Since all hexapods are dual-sexed and can have multiple romantic partners, it is incredible important to make onself physically impressive. Not only are there a lot of others to choose from, but you also have multiple people to impress rather than just one!

A headshot of a hex. Their four antennae are highlighted in blue. There are two large antennae on top of their head, and two smaller ones sprouting from their chin.
A hexapod's flags
highlighted with blue.

Flags

A pair of bioluminescent antennae-like structures, two on top of the head and two at the chin. These are used in nonverbal communication and certain movements function like facial expressions would in humans.

The flags are tough and rooted into the head with strong muscles. A plucked flag will begin to regrow immediately, and a broken flag will eventually fall off on its own.

A hex's gular skin highlighted in blue. It is deflated on the left, and inflated on the right.
A hexapod's gular skin, highlighted.
Left: Deflated, as is typical. Right: Inflated.

Gular Skin

Between a hexapod's nostrils and ears are symmetrical pouches of stretchy skin that can inflate like balloons. Air is taken in through the mouth, and a flap within the throat moves to block access to the lungs and open up access to the inside of the gular skin, filling it rapidly.

Socially, use of the gular skin is much more particular than other display structures. Inflating one's gular skin can either be extremely flirty, or extremely rude.

Glow Dots

The bright bioluminescent spots along a hexapod's neck, torso, and tail are called glow dots. These are flashed during mating dances, The first twelve are seen as highlighting body shape. The last six on the tail are considered to simply enhance tail movements. Outside of displays, lighting them up can be used to emphasize one's point when speaking. It's like if you could italicize spoken words.

Wings

Looking up at a hexapod's lower back showing how their wings attach to their backs.
A hex's wings as seen from behind. Note how they connect a bit behind where the thigh begins.

Hexapods have a pair of small bat-like wings near their hips. The wing shoulder attaches towards the back of the torso, and the lower membrane connected right above the hips. They can not fly at all! They can't even glide! They wings are used only for display and for caring for hatchlings. And for regaining balance when one slips...








Diet

Hex feed primarily on liquids, using their tongues as straws. They will drink nectar, sap, fruit juice, honey, etc.

Reproduction

Hexapods have only one sex, with all members of the species have the same reproductive organs and abilities. More information coming soon.

They are oviparous, laying clutches of 1-4 eggs after a gravid period of around 24 hours. They do not nest, and rather carry their eggs with them in their wings. The eggs are light and sticky, and can be hidden in the folds of the wings easily. This is crucial to the development of the hatchling, as their ears form very rapidly and they are capable of listening to the world outside of their egg. Hearing adults speaking aids in their understanding of language.

Hatchlings can walk and run from the moment they hatch. Great importance is placed on allowing them the independence to go about on their own and explore their community. At this point, who their biological parents are does not matter. First time parents may be sentimental and place extra care on their own hatchlings, but otherwise they are raised communally, with everyone in the area being expected to care for them. If you visit an area with hexapods, do not be surprised if random children approach you and inform you that they want some of your drink.

Hex do not develop their display features until around 18-19 years old. Until then, their antennae are all solid red and their gular skin, glowing dots, and wing colors are undeveloped. It's speculated that hatchling antennae are red so that they can signal for an adult's protection when in danger, without alerting any night-time predators that can't see red light. Adult hex can have warm-colored antennae, but never solid red.

A human stooped over holding many baby hexapods in their arms. The hatchlings are all squirming their way out of the human's grasp.

Gallery
The insides of a hexapod's mouth. It is teal green. There are no teeth, just gums and a long, tube-like tongue. The tongue has an opening at the tip of it. There is no throat hole, the tongue just merges into the back of the throat.
A hexapod's mouth. They drink, breathe, and speak out of the hole in the tip.
Assorted doodles on black paper, drawn with white colored pencil. The top three are busts of hex doing various expressions. From right to left: Upset and swearing. Looking forward and mildly uncomfortable. Looking to our right with an offended expression. Beneath those is a detailed drawing of a hex's eye up close. The iris is round, but the pupil is a beaded slit. Next to that is a hex smiling and looking left. Beneath that is a drawing of a hex with more of its neck showing facing right. Then there is a drawing done with red pencil of the top half of a hex that's laying on the floor. Then there's a close-up headshot of a hex with it's mouth open with the text POG next to it, in refernece to the pogchamp emote on Twitch. Beneath those is a simply fullbody doodle of a hex with its hands on its hips. Next to that is a small scene of a muscular hex holding a drink as seen from behind, smugly looking to the camera as another hex approached is flirtatiously.
Assorted doodles on black paper, including me figuring out the final version of what hex eyes look like up close.
Three hex seen from the back, showcasing their various markings. One is brown with jagged dark brown rings. The middle is red with darker red vertical stripes down its body. The last is blue with deep blue tiger-like stripes.
Three adult hex seen from behind, showcasing just a few of the many markings and colors that they can possess.




















Concept Art

Plus other general outdated art.

This section of the gallery is organized oldest to newest.

A hexapod squatting next to a sitting human. The hex is dark purple with a pink-to-orange-to-yellow-to-green gradient going down their limbs. They have a pair of human-like arms, but another smaller pair right beneath it. Plus, they have a pair of small mantis-like arms right above the waistband of their underwear. Their thick tail is dark purple. Their eyes are green and they have a single orange-to-green gradient horn on their head. Their gular skin is bright pink.
July 12, 2022 - The original concept art, back when Spiral was simply a sci-fi themed alternate universe for two old characters of mine. Those characters later became Aroo and Damian, and I consider this to be it's own seperate universe.
A collection of various sketches of early hexapod. The first is a colored fullbody showing a dark green reptile-like figure. It's proportions are similar to modern hexapods, but it has four eyes, ears, and a cassowary-like crest on its head. It stands with a hunched forward posture. This figure too has an extra pair of smaller arms. It's tail is much shorter, but also much thicker than a modern hex. There are cyan, yellow, and magenta stripes on the undersides of its arms. To this figure's right are two side views showing a typical hex and an albino hex. They have pronounced nose ridges and much larger wings. Otherwise, they are quite similar to modern hex. In the bottom left there are many uncolored sketches. There's a front view marking out joint locations, a foot and hand view showing how similar they are, a profile view of a head that has it's parts labeled, and a full-body showing very different anatomy. The arm is massive and this concept as a barrel-chest. It still has the small mantis limbs on the groin. There is a diagram showing that this concept hadone-way respiration, where exhaled air came out of a nostril in the back. Then, there are two headshots. One is a hex with an open mouth sticking out its forked tongue between sharp teeth. Below that is a light green colored skull.
July 13-15, 2022 - A collection of sketches further fleshing out the idea of turning this into a species. You can tell that I pretty quickly found the general idea I wanted to work with, but needed to do a lot of fine-tuning to turn it into the hex we know today.
Two hexapods interacting. The individual closer to the camera is facing away from it, they are blue and are avoiding eye contact by looking at the floor. The taller individual in front of the blue one is dark gray-ish maroon. They are looking down at the blue one's face and showing off the markings on their wing.
August 1, 2022 - Because hex are winged reptile-like creatures, I used some Smaugust prompts for inspiration with developing them. For "rivals," I drew a social interaction with one individual showing submissive body language to a more domineering business rival.
A magenta hex with dark blue markings and aqua details wearing a gray tank top sitting at a table and talking with a green dragon who is taking a tip through a straw using its tongue.
August 2, 2022 - Hex originally were to share a world with sapient dragons. Following the prompt "eating," this is showing a hex having a meal with a dragon. Note how the dragon also has a straw tongue and an extra pair of eyes, showing that the species were related.























A blue hex with patchy aqua markings and orange details jumping back and screeching at the sight of a small green animal beneath its table.
August 7, 2022 - Following "dyschromnia," "venomous," and "under," I drew a small venomous pest animal native to the hex homeworld. This individual has a skin pigment condition that gives them bright markings across their skin.
The silhouettes of a dragon and a hex looking up at the night sky.
August 7, 2022 - For "stars," I drew a hex and a dragon looking up at the stars together. In this image, they are viewing a different arm of the milky way galaxy. A cropped version of this is still currently used as the header for all of the site's pages.
Watercolor drawings of many hex bust shots.
September 5, 2022 - Assorted watercolor drawings figuring out how their heads and faces look.
An anime-style hex. Their skin is green and they are wearing a brown poncho and green pants that come above their wings.
September 26, 2022 - A cartoon-y anime-styled hexapod.























An anatomical diagram showing a cross-section of human and hex throat anatomy. One can see that the tongue is hollow and goes all the way down the throat, and the nostrils in the gular skin connect to the throat.
November 30, 2022 - A diagram showing old hexapodal throat anatomy compared to a human's. Remember that everything in this section is outdated. Old but accurate art would be in the main gallery.
A baby hexapod held in the hands of an adult hex. Both are colored in solid gray. The baby is leaned onto its back and is glancing at something beyond the screen.
December 21, 2022 - Baby hexapod held in an adult's hands.