Dr. Kara Stern (Scientist) - Intraspecies Opinion

Dr. Kara Stern enjoys her life. She adores her caretaker and loves her place of residence, both of which enable her to pursue her interests. She lives in the offices of Sermos University, where bountiful knowledge and scientific equipment are at her claw-tips. There she resides alongside four other Paralogos: Aster, Theia, Vela, and Celeste. However, apart from her caretaker, she doesn’t see them as family; they are more akin to roommates and work colleagues. Kara treats them amicably but keeps them at arm’s length and doesn’t consider any of them as her friends.

Kara first bonded to Dr. Aliya Ramirez when she was still an undergraduate. Kara enjoyed the benefits of being an “only child” for a while, until the human took up employment at the university. The office she inherited held a bookshelf being kept by Celeste, but the little dinosaur made herself so scarce that Kara still felt she was the only Paralogos living there. It wasn’t until Vela came along that Kara had to learn how to share her caretaker with the others. They play nicely now, but they didn’t raise her like Dr. Ramirez did, so she will never see them as family.

Aster would agree. A bright yellow and orange Paralogos who towers over the rest, he’s bossy and in-your-face, demanding attention and priority over all else. He and Kara clash constantly, since she is the only Paralogos under Dr. Ramirez that will not bend to his will. She doesn’t outright hate him, but she does find his attitude irritating. Aster, in turn, gets immensely frustrated that Kara prefers to follow her own agenda. He can’t argue that any of her work is bad or useless, but he really doesn’t understand why she bothers studying topics outside of astronomy. Like a rogue planet without a star, he says, Kara sticks out from the rest of them.

If Theia knew Kara didn’t consider her as a friend, she’d likely be quite sad. Kara actually doesn’t mind the little purple Paralogos with the planet-patterned tail, whose personality is much more agreeable than her Sun-focused brother. She’s curious, eager, and, best of all, open-minded. Theia clearly exhibits potential to be a great scientist. Kara would consider taking her under an apprenticeship, but Aster is too overprotective to allow anything of the sort. Thankfully Kara still manages a bit of one-on-one time with the younger Paralogos later some nights, since Aster maintains an early bedtime. This is where she learned Theia can be a bit on the clingy side, a trait that the independent scientist Paralogos doesn’t love. Kara would prefer a research partner that wouldn’t need their hand held all the time.

As mentioned earlier, Celeste resided in the astronomy department head office when Dr. Ramirez and Kara moved in. She bonded with Dr. Ramirez, but Kara hardly spent any time with the shy little dinosaur. Celeste is entirely nocturnal and quite shy, preferring to keep to herself and watch from afar. She warmed up to Kara eventually, too, and the scientist Paralogos found herself not minding the new audience to her experiments. Celeste always stays out of the way and keeps any opinions and critiques to herself, although sometimes Kara has to coax it out of her. Like any good scientist, she values peer review feedback, after all. Out of all of her roommates, Celeste is the one Kara finds herself seeking out intentionally, lest she never spend any time with the smallest Paralogos in the group.

Once Vela showed up, Celeste almost never leaves her side, much to Kara’s dismay. Vela manages to turn everything into a celebration and Kara finds her unrelenting enthusiasm to be exhausting at times. Although the nebula-themed dinosaur is a great pick-me-up when she needs it, Kara gets a bit irritated when Vela tries to spin everything in a positive light. She feels like she cannot express negative emotions around Vela, else they be pushed aside to “look on the bright side”. Vela doesn’t do this maliciously, of course, but Kara still feels one-sided friction around her and will subconsciously avoid her when feeling socially overwhelmed.

Beyond her roommates, there is one Paralogos that Kara spends a lot of time with. An eclectic Paralogos with advanced cybernetics, Aeon is the only Paralogos Kara would call a good friend. Being a music-affiliated Paralogos, they are an excellent listener for Kara to bounce ideas off of. She also enjoys helping them with their cybernetics and tinkers with their hardware when needed. Between all of her lectures, conferences, and experiments, Kara always finds time to spend with her friend Aeon in her busy schedule.

Should Kara have it her way, however, she’d prefer to live alone with her caretaker. She finds she relates more to humans than Paralogos, even those she lives with.