Pyxie

The Flying Pox, Twinkerbelles, Shifting Horrors

Identification and Field Marks
Damn hard to spot, due to their small size, great speed and annoying ability to change shape, these members of the What-the-Devil-was-that family are rarely found in their "natural" form. Their "natural" shape is rumored to be roughly Ghyllian in shape, but with small, transparent wings and standing roughly 2 nanits tall. Their over-all color is blueish with hints of pink showing through, while their eyes are deepest indigo. Or, they are the quadrupeds the size of Aelfants, which are sea-green and have enormous ears the color of fresh blood. Or, they are dun-colored legless reptiles the size of an Ickle. It really sort of depends on who you talk to, actually. It's the funny thing about shape-shifters.

Similar Species
Another funny thing about shape-shifting beasties is that they all seem to be quite a bit like everything else. Personally, I think they're just being flighty, but other so-called scholars seem to think that it's a by-product of their shifting ability that makes them rather like everything else.

Habitat
Well, who can say, really? I mean, think about it. If we can't tell the little blighters from anything else, how can we say where they live? We know that they at least live anywhere you can find either an Ickle, a Pachyderm, or where Fefferberry wine might be served.

Habits
Oh, boy, do Pyxies have habits! Most of them quite bad. Not only are they known to suck up all the available Fefferberry wine, but afterwards they've been known to try and copulate with almost anything. Though they have not been seen there in recent years, Pyxies are famous for crashing the annual Planting Calends Gala and looting the Fefferberry wine contest. Other reprehensible habits include: splakking in public, undoing Equestrian Beetle toilet training, and random, destructive raking.

Young and Breeding
Pyxie breeding is very interesting, indeed. Or, at least we think it is, if in fact, we have been watching Pyxies and not something else breeding. We do have it on good authority that a drunken Pyxie mated with a Pachyderm to produce the first Aelfant. It is something of a debate, however, whether all Aelfants are produced by Pyxie/Pachyderm mating. It is believed that Pyxies actually shape-shift into some other species to reproduce, leaving their young to be cared for by the host animal like a cuckoo. Upon "maturity", the Pyxie shape-shifts into something else and toddles off in search of Fefferberry wine and a good "donor" for the next generation of Pyxies. Frighteningly enough, we do not know of a more randy species than the Pyxie, unless, of course, it is the Ghyllian.

Economic Importance
Pyxies would have you believe that they are vital to the economy of Ghyll. And, considering their prodigious reproductive capabilities, that may indeed be so! Who can say how many beasties running about out there are simply unawakened Pyxies? Since we don't really know how long they take to "mature", if you can call it that, we don't know how many there really are, do we? How many poor, hapless travelers are out there riding what they assume to be a simple Equestrian Beetle, only to find out at the worst possible moment that they've been riding an unripened Pyxie all along?

Of course, we do know there have been years that Pyxie consumption of Fefferberry wine has been all that kept the industry afloat. So, they have that going for them.

Citations: Calends Gala, Pachyderm, Splak.

--Doctor Phineas Crank 15:28, 23 Jan 2005 (EST)