He's changed a lot since then. However, certain things remain constant, even when he's supposed to be in a human universe.
He's got blue skin. He's extremely tall. He's got two-toned hair. He has spines on his arms. He can't wear shoes. He's madly in love with Rue. He's got lots of other children than with her.
But other than that, more often than not, anything goes. Below are some of the other specifics. Enjoy.
Exotic Type B (mutated humanoid, Earth 2400's) Dawnlight Chronicles Version
Standing over 6'5" (and growing slowly), weighs around 240 with very little fat. Lean diver's frame, fairly bouyant even without body fat - possibly his bones are more airy.
Features: Blue skin, ranging from a bright sky blue to "tan" into a darker cobalt. This skin is not colored with melanin, but rather with a different and thicker substance more typical of paint than organic cells. This makes his skin hold heat very well, though his body temperature is about 7 degrees higher than other human subjects. A very vibrantly "wrong" looking person. One gets used to the colors. His hair is two-toned, and in fact two-textures, the top is swept back with a darker translucent blue color and is the texture of a cat's whiskers only much thicker and bendable. The back of his head and down to the nape of his neck grows a fluffy, curly white more like downy feathers. He usually keeps this in a tail when he's at work but he loves to wear it long and let it get into his face. He has dark blue eyebrows, and dark blue eye lashes, but other than that he has no further body hair whatsoever. (This may or may not be true according to certain artists!) On his forearms are four long (5" to 9") tines of bone, translucent blue (the same color as his bones otherwise). They are used for defense, and respond to his emotions by rising out from his skin, usually they lay flat. Shard's teeth are white, but only because he had them professionally bleached.
Shard's eyes are vibrantly blue, and the whites are in fact a shade of pale sky blue as well. They are also slightly reflective, giving him excellent night vision, as well as making him look even more like a cat than he really should. This mutation was inherited from his grandfather. Shard's hands only have three fingers and a thumb, his feet similarly have only four digits. This is his own personal mutation from his parents generation - they have five.
His face is lined and long, with a long, narrow and somewhat pointed nose. He has a squint rather like Clint Eastwood on his face most times, but can break into an impish grin or a fierce snarl at will. No, his face won't break. Shard's voice is deep and quiet but he often barks out commands like a pro military would. He has a soft, almost hesitant singing voice. His vocabulary is large and mainly goes unused in his typical locales - he is only somewhat apt to break into anachronistic speech patterns having learned them from Archeria on the west coast.
Shard's history is long and complex. Born Aern, to Zheen and Thiire Kshau June 14 2441, somewhere near the Utah Enclave. His mother did not know that he was the 8th of his father's children. At age 7, three days before his birthday actually, he ran away from home as the family were making their way across the midwest desert. He did not see his parents again for more than 35 years.
During his flight across the country, he encountered the Desert Raiders at Eden's Gate, and became close friends with Etan Merris, a high-powered telepath. While he was with them, also, he gained his name of Cyan. He learned more survival skills from this group as well as how to hate a motorcycle. He left them around age 11 and headed west.
Upon reaching just-shy of the coast, he was mauled severely by a larger creature than he ought to have been hunting. With the blood loss and wounds to his skull, he also lost his memories of anything before that point. He knew he had a name, just couldn't remember it. He knew he was a hunter and a good one, he just didn't know where he'd been to be hunting. He knew that there were people in his mind that missed him, but he couldn't place the names or faces.
Archeria rescued him from the creature, patched him up, and gave him his new name, Shard.
This time traveling east and north, Shard found the city of Northstar (where Montreal used to be) and met up with his most serious companions - Skie Blackstone and Reid Taljorra. Between the two of them, he learned how to kill, appropriate, be a strong arm, and generally became a thug for a decade.
He hadn't known at the time, but Archeria followed him about a year later. Annoyed, Shard finally took off south again, for a part time gig running food, items and information back and forth between Northstar and the Underground. The Underground was where he met and fell in love at first wtih Triia, and then later on, Rue.
Shard's enemies are numerous - the Knight sisters Mallory and Vallory were one pair of girls that Reid had to have for his cybernetic army. Reich, another assassin, is another Northstar inhabitant with one too many jobs stolen (or so he thought) by Shard.
Everything changed the year Shard turned 40. He met Rue, reporter at large, while she was filming at the Underground for a Dawnlight news segment. Neither of them knew it, and still don't, but Etan planted the seeds of wild lust between the pair, knowing that Shard's latent telepathic ability, combined with Rue's extremely clear brain waves would produce another generation of telepaths and empaths - which he is bent on using to rule what's left of the world.
Shard has had his memories erased more times than he could really forgive, by Etan. But he considers himself lucky that he did meet Rue - their children Shatter Celeste and Ruben Aern are proof of that. They had one further child, Oni Ailea, who died before her second birthday. All their children's names are commemorations of their deceased relatives or friends.
Aern does not change his name in this universe, and he is 10" taller (he's one of the tallest men on the planet, by the way).
Very little about Aern is the same on Zekira as other worlds. He is a charming, almost bouncy person here. He uses his psionics with animals (latent in the above setting except with speaking to Archie's cat Tosse, who spoke back) to train, ride and breed Steeds on Zekira.
He is one of the worlds first Genrehoppers.
However, Aern's inability to manage money has almost gotten him into trouble, never more so when he wants to raise a Slave or get a Bond out of their situation. His son with Vanya (spliced, of course) Aevan is even reamarkably worse at this than he is.
Not surprisingly, Aern Kshau is among the Hyperfertile men that many Breeders fancy could add to their stock. However his obvious spine mutations are not always prized by "normal" Breeders and he's often found that his own nose can lead him to the best mates he's had. He has sired many children naturally, rarely needing any assistance by Breeders anyway - but when his genes are desired he knows where to donate.
His children include (but might not be limited to) Zhadar Von, Ainyah, Shatter Marad, Ruben, Zuska, Ksai, Tran and Naera, Raeta, Aevan, and Shard. Shatter and Aevan have provided him with the most entertainment value, one because she's "Who Better's Daughter" (Mirage) and Aevan and he can go to the beach with Vanya and look more like brothers than anything else. Ruh Jhii (View her here) is Shard's mother, here. Odd, ain't it?
Game Stats
INT 70
EDU 75
STR 81*
HEA 75*
AGI 92
REA 84*
APP 75*
CHA 70
SOC 65
AGG 71
SAN 56
COU 60
Power Rank 1, GP 16
POWERS
Minor - Animal Empathy, Animal Telepathy, Rapid Healing
Major - Dreamwalking, Enhanced Score (twice * above)
Special - (Genrehopping, latent/explored only in my universes)
No one knows where Aern came from, but we do know that once he arrived to Carramba High, someone in the Mad Science department went and cloned him. Ruben isn't quite his entire opposite, however they don't get along AT ALL. Aern appears to be about 16, and though Ruben is only about 2 years old in reality he looks a little more mature or perhaps frayed. They're both around 6'3" already, and won't stop growing until they kill each other off.
Their Teenagers on Hol (Or, Teenagers from Outer Space/HOL individually) stats are...
BOTH:
Near Human, Male, Junior, Feels like a Nut
Homeworld: Dawnlight (Alternate Earth)
Totem: Unknown (made before Hol came along)
Aern first/Ruben second
Smarts/Greymatta: 4/4
Bod/Feets: 5/6
RWP: 1/0 - Aern gets along with the adults on campus, Ruben doesn't
Luck/Nuts: 2/1
Drive: 6/6
Looks: 6/6
Cool/Mouth: 5/5
Bonk/Meat: 4/5
Traits/Bent for Aern: Curious, Witty, Mega-Ego, Feminist
Traits/Bent for Ruben: Huge Ego - complete with disdainful snort, Tense, Evil
Powers for Aern: Anti-Rumple (learned from Skie, is never seen with a hair out of place), Standdown (can calm down any situation and look at it sensibly even through stress), Talk To Anything In Its Native Tongue, Human power: Gang - he's got one.
Powers for Ruben: Macho (like that's a surprise?), Gang - he's got a different one, Insta-Skill (works like Aern's language, but he can take any skill and perform it perfectly - ONCE)
Knacks for Aern: Attempt Anything Once (see where Ruben's power comes from?), Attract Babes of Either Sex, Use Eyebrows to Convey Deep Inner Meaning
Knacks for Ruben: Intimidate You With Cold, Hard Stare; Attract The Wrong Kind Of People
Skills for Aern: Dream Walking
Skills for Ruben: Nightmares
Clusters for Aern: Cook Incredibly Well, Fix Any Vehicle, Natural Weaponry Use
Clusters for Ruben: Fire Any Weapon, Fix Vehicles, Natural Weaponry Use
Aern's Quote: "I hope it's not a disease..." **
Ruben's Quote: "Ahh, **** you..."
** - from "Dawnlight Chronicles", when informed that someone he didn't want to sleep with had "got him something".
Class Schedule for Aern: (period, class, instructor) For Ruben:
1 - Earth Languages, Prescott 1 - Earth/Alien Literature, Leland
2 - Math, Just Math, Smith 2 - Fun With Physics 103a, M Vale
3 - Locals Only History, Prescott 3 - Current Affairs, Talshoy
4 - Fun With Physics 103a, M Vale 4 - Math, Just Math, Smith
5 - English 503, Leland 5 - Galactic Geography, Huntington
6 - Martial Arts, Phoenix 6 - Martial Arts, Phoenix
7 - Autobody and Paint, Krueger 7 - Interpersonal Relations, Rubio
8 - Advanced Sushi Tech, Herring 8 - Home Ech!onomics, D'ouberville
It should be noted that Aern owns a '57 blue and white hardtop Chevy, and apparently the Beach House. Ruben does not. View Rue!
The main difference of course is that under "normal" view he is tan skinned and not blue, nor does he have those long spines on his arms. But when the Protectorate moves to the Nexus/Alskyr, he becomes "himself" again.
He likes it that way.
The ****ese version combines many features which we've seen before on Aerns in other universes: the ability to speak to animals (or at least get them to behave), along with a leadership ability which he's great at, and the spreading of joy (read: children) across the world.
It's hard to say whose kids are whose when dealing with this version, because he's based more on the Zekiran reality than on Dawnlight. He's got lots of them. Now that he knows how to teleport between times, too, he's a distinct threat to the gene pool!
We see him here with his hatchling Jeremoth - in his "tan" phase.
Then, below, how he looks "now".
View RUE!
Shard Dropped his Fork.
The second time was when he learned that Mallory and Vallory were in the city after him. Any times after that he did it on purpose for effect. Don't you feel good to know that now?