Twinkle Twinkle, Little Star... (Patreon)

Once there was a hunter.  The greatest hunter.  He slew brigands and monsters alike.  Felled might dragons and creatures of the seas with his bare hooves.  None could escape him.  All feared and respected him.  But there was a beast he could not slay: time.  And so he lamented to the skies, 'Oh stars, what is the point of all my strength and power if it shall all be stolen by that thief, Time!?  Grant me some of your immortality, so that I may persist and aid my tribe and my people.'  and from the stars fell a stone, and within that stone was a metal he had never seen before.  Silver, but untarnished by air or flame.  And so he placed it in his heart.  And so he lived forever.  And so the Starkatteri were born.

The Starkatteri have always been a tribe apart.  Where most shamans spoke to spirits of the earth, the Starkatteri sought power from the stars.  The first proto-Starkatteri were navigators.  Then astrologists.  Then astronomers.  In the stars they found direction, time, seasons, and the future.  And because anyone could look at the stars and, with patience, study their ways, it seemed like the Starkatteri were a tribe of shamans with strange, eldrich connections to distant beings.  Other clans came with offerings to know when it would be safest to leave on the migration.  When would the snows melt and clear the passes?  When would it be time to stop for the winter.  These questions were life and death, and all too often the Starkatteri had the answers needed.

For a price.

Early on, earlier than even the Logos, Starkatteri knew the power of information, the fear of the unknown, and employed both.  Their science was veiled in mysticism.  They also were unashamed to steal knowledge from other tribes.  When a Mendi predicted a healthy birth through examination, a Starkatteri would wrap that prediction in prophesy and augury.  Thus, the Starkatteri maintained their power over the ignorant and fortified their own egos.  The earliest Starkatteri demanded tribute in the form of food, treasure, and mates that caught their interest.  And because of their power and knowledge, many aquesed.

Thus were the Starkatteri the perfect fools for the Eater of Souls to exploit.  When the first Atoli sailors reached the crater that is Hoofington, their Starkatteri navigators were tantalized by star metal fragments that sung when struck.  In those harmonics were visions of the past and future that only the Starkatteri were fit to unravel.  Thus did more come.  Thus did they use their treasure and knowledge to lure in other tribes for the purpose of erecting a great city to bridge the earth and stars.

The work was arduous, and many perished.  More than could be replaced.  And so the Starkatteri used their sorcery to craft peerless blades of star metal and sent out armies to bring back slaves to continue the great escavation.  And over it was built a great temple to honor the stars and the treasure deep below.  And all that was needed was a star.  One star, given as sacrifice.  The starkatteri employed all their knowledge, all their treasure, all their influence with the spirits above to ensnare one and deliver it to the great prize below.

But one doubted.  One questioned.  One asked why.  And in that critical moment, one flawed the summoning.  The star did not arrive bound and ready for slaughter.  It escaped, and in its fury the city was laid low and the remnants buried deep within the earth.  The starkatteri sought survival in soul jars, creating black books that were the repositories of their tainted lore.  And thus, one changed the world forever.

The Starkatteri were cursed and reviled, and the Empire was established so that no tribe could ever consume all tribes.  The Starkatteri were cast out.  The One Tribe.  It was forbidden for them to be wiped out, as that would be hypocrisy.  After all, they had once tried to do the same.  So Justice would be for the Starkatteri to suffer.  Their treasures were stripped from them.  Their knowledge ignored.  Their power, broken.

Or so many would believe.  While the Starkatteri fell, they did not fall as far as the other Tribes hoped or pretended they did.  While many Starkatteri died to deprevation and exposure, many quite easily carved out niches in zebra society and cultivated an entire ecosystem in which they could survive.

While Starkatteri are a tribe, they are a tribe related by curse alone.  Starkatteri are exceptional individualists, thriving on their own in situations other zebras could not.  While to outsiders Starkatteri are all the same, in reality the commonalities are imposed by outsiders than any inherent culture of the tribe.  Still, some trends emerge and persist.

The first is the presentation of the occult.  Many Starkatteri pretend they are shamans, oracles, or sorcerers.  Many are, unafraid to explore and foster strange and dark powers, but many others are simple charlatans and deceivers.  They employ fear of their tribe to get desperate or superstitious to believe in them.  Starkatteri understand the importance of dramatics and the workings of psychology, and are not bothered by exploiting both.  Since the curse placed upon their faces can not be hidden, why not use it?

This leads to the second trait of the tribe: exceptionalism.  While tribes have traditions and laws, the Starkatteri are often exempt from them.  While this is often a detriment, like the refusal of hospitality, it is also an asset.  Starkatteri frequently are held to a lower standard.  A theif is serious, but a Starkatteri thief is expected.  Starkatteri actually were exempt from taxation for generations under the idea their taxes were 'tainted'.  Starkatteri were the first moneylenders in the empire, because only they would have the audacity to lend money with the expectation of being repaid at interest (a concept that for a long time was seen akin to giving someone food, then eating their excrement).

The third trait is the taboo.  Forbidden things have allure, and the Starkatteri were utterly shameless about exploiting them.  It is said no depravity is beyond a Starkatteri, and this is largely true.  Necessity required the Starkatteri to discard most of their scruples and morals to get what they needed to survive, and so they learned to cater to the vices and shames of others to the point that it's expected of the tribe as a whole.  Starkatteri learn young how to get others to give them what they want, how to be parasitic, and how to control situations to their advantage.  Ironic, given the Carnelian tribe exists, that most prostitution is done by Starkatteri.  Indeed, so unbothered is the tribe by prostitution that it's a mark of pride Starkatteri can sell something another tribe will give away for free.

As a result, the Starkatteri, against many purges, pogroms, and persecution, thrived for generations.  Life was rarely stable, but a Starkatteri could go from living in a ditch to being the secret lover of a king to being the leader of a cult seeking enlightenment.  For a starkatteri, manipulation is mandated, because a mistake could lead to disaster.  Many Starkatteri suffer from a variety of mental illnesses: depression, anxiety, narcissism, and sociopathy.  

A Starkatteri family is a mother and her children.  Marriage between Starkatteri is almost unheard of.  Some children are the result of rape, but most are the result of affairs or prostitution.  Starkatteri mothers are rarely nurturing, teaching their children early on that life is unfair and how to exploit a bad situation.  Many children leave on their own as soon as they feel secure enough to do so, but others are simply abandoned to find their own way.  Starkatteri children may become the wards of other tribes (occasionally removed by force) to be raised to be 'redeemed' Starkatteri.  A few children are sold into slavery or prostitution, something not even the Orah would tolerate.

As a result, Starkatteri are found everywhere, but individualistically.  A business has a silent Starkatteri partner.  A husband has a Starkatteri mistress.  A wealthy child keeps a Starkatteri foal to keep the monsters under the bed away.  A starkatteri is happy to be that 'friends with benefits' so long as the benefit keeps coming.  With no unifying location or stable place to live, the Starkatteri roam everywhere and while villainy is generally assumed, it's expected.  They're the perfect villain to every story, to the point that its cliche, and thus rejected as too obvious by most storytellers.

Starkatteri employ decoration, using stars to ward away the superstitious.  They tend to dress either mysteriously or provocatively.  Starkatteri tend towards the thin side due to missed meals and their high energy lifestyles.  Starkatteri fashion tends towards the provocative, moving on when other tribes adopt their styles.  One thing Starkatteri don't want to do is to be accused of 'infiltrating' other tribes.  If they hide, they tend to cover up with cloaks and veils.

Starkatteri proditor are rare, called Skakalagados, or 'evil hunters', who range from renegade shaman hunters to criminal investigators.  Taking the red means rejecting the tribe's rejection, marking them as outsiders among outsiders.  Skakalagados rarely last long, as they are frequently targeted and torn down by malevolent Starkatteri.  A few proditors, however, take the red to try to settle in a domestic lifestyle.  By taking the red, they attempt to convince other tribes that they are not a threat, repenting, and open to love and new relationships.  Generally they fare poorly as well, either mistaken for Skakalagados, or targeted by zebra who believe they are insincere proditor.  

Needless to say, the Starkatteri were not bothered by Nightmare Moon.  Had she emerged in the Zebralands, they may have flocked to her aid, but the Long Night did not bother the tribe in the slightest.  In fact, many used the opportunity to reform the image of the tribe.  They augured that the sun would return (a safe prediction given the natural order and if they were wrong, everyone would probably be dead anyway) and claimed to conduct rituals to bring back the sun.  When the first Empire collapsed, the Starkatteri made sure they had their hooves in the door for the second Empire.

Starkatteri are early adopters, keenly interested in the new and potentially dangerous.  They aren't danger seekers by any stretch of the imagination, but also aren't afraid of risks.  This lead to the cursed tribe being the underpinning for most of the economic development of the second empire.  Starkatteri would start businesses, show they were profitable, and then other tribes would follow and 'muscle out' the Starkatteri, who by then had already sold and move on to something else.  The Starkatteri were also shameless about setting up pyramid schemes and cults, seeing members of other tribes as deserving it for being dumb enough to join.

That's not to say all Starkatteri are sociopaths!  Many were happy to carve out a life for themselves as 'that mare' colts went to to learn how sex worked, or that zebra who would always loan you money when you really needed it!  For many Starkatteri, a spouse of another tribe was always keenly sought after, and if marriage wasn't possible, then a mistress or consort.  Such unions though were often more risky than crime, because legitimacy was the one thing Starkatteri could not be granted.

The greatest roadblock to Starkatteri was the lack of legal protection.  Yes, defacto protections existed, but a marriage to a Starkatteri did not count as marriage.  An assault on a Starkatteri wasn't a crime.  Burning a Starkatteri business was illegal only if the Starkatteri rented the building.  And while locals definitely found ways to try to discourage crimes against Starkatteri, such abuses were commonplace and occasionally encouraged.  Some Starkatteri even made lives as professional scapegoats for local leaders, taking bribes to distract from scandals.  "They were Starkatteri" was a common, very successful defense to accusations.  Any justice to be had was always 'off the books', with midnight reprisals or the ever useful curse.

But by the end of the second empire, the Starkatteri were getting worn by 'the game'.  They sought some formal protections, and the only leverage they had was their vote for Caesar.  In typical elections, the twelve tribes would vote, and then the Starkatteri would vote.  If the Starkatteri vote led to a tie, the delegates would break up and vote again.  Occasionally, getting the Starkatteri vote would make the candidate lose votes in following rounds.  And of course bribes were offered, often to vote for someone else.  Bribes were honestly so common they were expected.

The vote for the Last Caesar was exceptional only in that it was a four way tie in the first round and that when the Starkatteri cast their vote, the candidate accepted it.  Normally, a Caesar always wanted a plurality, but in this rare case, the Caesar took the vote and won on a technicality.  Several weeks later, he proclaimed that the law would cover ALL Starkatteri.

The result was the Night of Bloody Stars.  As news of the new legal status spread, mobs hunted down and lynched tens of thousands of Starkatteri.  The murder was unprecedented, and caught many Starkatteri by surprise.  While a few savvy zebras escaped or augured warnings, most were not ready for the backlash that struck the tribe for daring to ask for legal equality.  The violence was so terrible, that many zebras sheltered Starkatteri.  Some that did died alongside them if they were discovered.

While the Last Caesar's legal system tried to exercise justice, the reality was there were simply too many crimes to ever try.  The result was a farcisal trial in which a handful were charged, proudly proclaimed themselves as murderers, and were pronounced as not guilty by the jury.  The only convictions were for zebras of other tribes killed in the course of the night.  It would be a sign of troubles to come.

Many Starkatteri saw the Third Empire as their chance.  They had a Caesar who was publicly supportive.  They could demonstrate themselves as legitimate members of society.  However, many saw this as their chance to profit, using their new legal status to exploit the system.  However many Starkatteri stood up to be recognized as decent people worth legal protection, there were just as many pushing angry mobs.  Starkatteri enrolled their children in schools, only for their children to be subject to extreme bullying.  Many who tried to stand up for their rights were repressed by it.

Ironically, the pronouncement caused an explosion in black market goods as well.  Where as before the Starkatteri had a lock on most vices, now they were open to all.  A number of syndicates opened, many ironically by Starkatteri, to cater to those illegal desires. 

However, there was one business that pushed back.  Four Stars was an import-export company that did business all around the world and was one of the few openly lead by a Starkatteri.  In the chaos that followed, Four Stars was protected by many of their holdings abroad, and Four Stars used their assets to hire lawyers to aggressively and strategically sue communities that failed to protect Starkatteri.  Many of the lawyers were ponies and griffons unconcerned by the taboo, and Four Stars even opened a law school to get the lawyers they needed.  The lawsuits worked, forcing communities to at least go through the motions of enforcing the law fairly.

This helped cement Four Star's future in the Empire.  As one of the largest businesses, Four Stars was instrumental in the trade between Equestria and the Empire.  In the run up to the last war, Four Stars tried to ease tensions via back channels and failed.  However, when the war broke out, Four Stars leveraged its position to keep operations open in Equestria and the Empire.  They worked with Flim and Flam's many, many shell companies to keep goods flowing, and were employed by the MoA and Goldenblood as a means of intelligence.  The zebras used the company as a point of infiltration and espionage.

Ironically, those Starkatteri who did fight for the Empire tended towards fanaticism.  They so craved legitimacy that no sacrifice was too much.  Many Starkatteri worked in comfort houses that Carnillians would not, reconnaissance, infiltration, and occasionally in fighting roles.  Starkatteri soldiers were seen as expendable, but tended towards exceptionalism.  Starkatteri units often succeeded through guile or unconventional tactics than overwhelming numbers or fire support.  One squad of Starkatteri called 'the rainbow brigade' painted their hides bright colors to fool the enemy into thinking they were friendlies.  the ploy worked until the squad was annhilated by a zebra artillery strike.

In the end, it was all for naught.  The Day of Doom wasn't a surprise to the Starkatteri, who were used to looking ahead and seeing disaster coming.  However, not even they could escape megaspells nor the bloodbath that followed.  Many, many Starkatteri were blamed by zebras and the proto-legions and no one cared about death curses that may follow.  For a few decades, the Starkatteri were one of the twelve.  Then, they were once again just the one.

Ironically, the Starkatteri were able to adapt to new realities as they always have.  Their unscrupulousness, ruthlessness, and risk taking allowed many to find shelter in communities and organizations that valued their intelligence.  Some even preferred the life over legal protections, though many suffered anyway.  The years that followed were very much like the years that preceded, and Starkatteri can be found anywhere, doing almost anything imaginable, simply to get by and survive.

And that the one tribe is very good at doing.