Hibernation shell

"Your body's defense in creating that protective hibernation shell probably saved your life."
"It almost ended my life, too"

―Elping Tsoo and Ghal Tarpfen

Ghal Tarpfen in a state of biostasis within a hibernation shell her body had extruded after being infected by the Blight.

A hibernation shell, also known as a hibernation layer, was a bulbous, partially-translucent, and shell-like biological cocoon made of dried, peeling, and hardened skin, which the body of a Mon Calamari could engage in order to undergo protective stasis during times of severe drought, stress, or illness. The shell obfuscated the identity of individual within, and muffled their words. Before to the development of weather controls considered modern during the High Republic Era, some Mon Calamari would, on rare occasions of historic drought, go into biostasis within a hibernation shell in the mud of exposed seabeds. In 228 BBY, Ghal Tarpfen extruded a hibernation shell when she was tortured and infected by the Blight whilst in Nihil captivity. She only emerged from the shell, very near death, after the crew of the Republic Defense Coalition Longbeam Aurora III rescued her, pulling the hardened skin off in order to save her life.

Description

"Why does she look like this? Did the Nihil do this to her?"
"I don't think so. The Mon Calamari are an amphibious species, and sometimes amphibians can undergo a sort of state of hibernation or stasis in time of severe drought. In this case, perhaps stress or illness."

―Joss Adren and Elping Tsoo, on Ghal Tarpfen and her hibernation shell

Like some other amphibian species, the Mon Calamari could enter a sort of stasis in times of severe drought. The Galactic Republic Defense Coalition corporal and science officer Elping Tsoo theorized that they could also do so when suffering from stress or illness, when he was hypothesizing about the condition of Ghal Tarpfen, who he'd just helped rescue from the torturous captivity of the Nihil and who had been infected by the Blight.

To protect themselves and facilitate their biostasis, the bodies of Mon Calamari would extrude a "hibernation shell" — a bulbous yet restrictive shell-like structure of hardened skin tissue that varied in opacity. When cracked, a clear, gooey substance would ooze out. The body of a Mon Calamari within a hibernation shell resembled a very dry, desiccated, and unhatched tadpole, with their limbs frozen in place by the layer of thickened, peeling, and dried skin. The shrunken, hardened, and ill-fitting shell appeared like armor too small for the wearer's torso, limiting their breathing to a wheeze.

The species of the individual within the shell could be hard to initially identify, though the distinctive barbels hanging off the Mon Calamari's face helped, and those who knew the individual within the hibernation shell could recognize them, albeit with a degree of uncertainty. The shell muffled and garbled its inhabitant's words, making them hard to hear, but they could be understood when the listener concentrated.

History

Historic hibernation

"Mon Calamari, on rare occasions in time of historic drought, prior to the development of modern environmental controls, have gone into suspended animation in the mud of exposed seabeds."

―C-06N

Before the advent of then-modern weather control technologies in the High Republic Era, the Mon Calamari of Mon Cala could infrequently go into a state of biostasis within hibernation shells, cocooned in the wet mud of the seafloor, when the oceans of their homeworld receded during severe droughts. Though technology had negated the need for such an ability by the time the Blight began to spread across the galaxy in 228 BBY, the species retained the capacity, and the protocol droid C-06N was aware of this history, but had no data about the safety of breaking the shell.

Blighted biostasis

"The second it began to affect my hand and foot, my body shut down. That's how you found me, I guess."

―Ghal Tarpfen tells the crew of the Aurie about her body's reaction to infection by the Blight

C-06N looks on at a Chagrain prisoner killed by the Blight aboard Nihil Prison Transport 7X-533

After being kidnapped from Starlight Beacon by the Nihil in 230 BBY, the Galactic Republic space station's Chief and Head of Security, Mon Calamari woman Ghal Tarpfen, came to be imprisoned on the marauder group's Prison Transport 7X-533. There her captors tired to get information about the Republic Defense Coalition and Jedi out of her, torturing her by denying her water until her skin bled and peeled painfully, giving her injections, and threatening to murder her loved ones. At some point in 228 BBY, the prison ship became infected with the Blight, with captives and crew alike succumbing and crumbling to dust, and even the wiring and walls being infected. As casualties grew, ship was left with just a skeleton crew and Tarpfen became the only surviving prisoner, with the vessel's Nihil commanders desperately messaging for help.

Though their fellow pirates ignored them, a cell of Defense Coalition operatives comprising of Captains Joss and Pikka Adren, Lieutenant Visma Tarko, Corporal Elping Tsoo, and Tarkin family protocol droid C-06N heard the message and decided to investigate the Nihil transport and rescue their comrade if possible. Donning evac suits, they boarded to find the crumbling grayish-white forms of numerous prisoners and crew, all killed by the Blight, before hearing a strange, wheezing sound and coming across a body curled up like a desiccated tadpole inside an tight ill-fitting layer of dried skin: Ghal Tarpfen, in a hibernation shell. Though Tsoo stuggled to even identify the encased individual's species, Joss realized with shock it was Tarpfen before him, and the away party, comprising of all bar Pikka, hurried to return the critically ill Mon Calamari back to medical room aboard their Longbeam-class corvette Aurora III.

Tarpfen muttered a muffled warning about the Stormwall as her vital signs grew weaker, before going quiet, her yellow eyes unblinking under the tissue surrounding her head. Joss asked if the Nihil had caused her state, and Tsoo replied that the translucent shell-like casing covering her was a trait of some amphibious species who could hibernate during drought, further theorizing the biostasis could be brought on by stress or illness. At that point, Tarpfen, who had experience all three in droves, stopped breathing, to the alarm of all present, and, without a medical droid, Joss ordered C-06N to plug into the ship's inter-species algorithm for medical emergencies. Advised to check the patient's breathing, Tarko, seeing though the hardened shell that Tarpfen's chest was no longer moving, helplessly exclaimed as such, and though Joss replied that perhaps the stasis meant breathing wasn't required, Tsoo confirmed she had no pulse either when asked by C-06N. Tsoo and Joss exchanged a flurry of ideas, and when the latter proposed breaking the shell, Tsoo worried that it would kill Tarpfen, to which the former asked if there was a better idea.

As Tarko vicariously felt trouble breathing, C-06N informed the assembled personnel of the history of Mon Calamari going into suspended animation during historic droughts, cocooned in the wed mud, but Joss felt the situations were dissimilar. Joss and Tsoo continued to argue as Tarko stared at the dying woman before them through the hibernation shell's translucent tissue, suddenly shooting out her hand and grabbing a lip of dried skin above the torso, pulling with all her might. Tsoo, alarmed, reached out to stop her, but she held him off, prying open a thick shellac of skin with a crack. Joss joined in, and the crack extended around Tarpfen's chest and up her face, with a clear, gooey substance oozing from it. Tarpfen gasped for air and Tsoo ordered the others to put the shell pieces in a containment bag and not to touch her Blighted feet and toes. Together, they freed her from the hibernation shell, collecting the pieces as Tsoo rinsed fluid over her and collected the liquid in another bag. Finally, they amputated and cauterized Tarpfen's infected digits, bandaging them carefully as her breathing and heart rate returned to normal levels. Utterly spent, Tarpfen wheezed out appreciation for having her life saved, and promptly lost consciousness.

When she came to some time later, Tarpfen felt tender and sore, especially at the tips of her amputated appendages, but also delightfully free from the hibernation shell, with her insides no longer feeling like syrup and skin feeling much more hydrated. On a moniter in the escape pod she was isolated in, Tarpfen communicated first with Tarko, whose promotion she'd had a hand in, and then the other three human members of the crew, with Tsoo telling her that the hibernation shell probably saved her life, to which she replied that it also almost killed her. Pikka inquired as to what had occurred on the Nihil prison transport, and Tarpfen explained the mysterious appearance of the Blight, and how, as the rest of the ship's inhabitants succumbed around her, she went into stasis upon being infected on her hands and feet. She then told them of how she'd come to be on the transport in the first place, remembering the torture she'd endured, before repeating her earlier warning that the Nihil were planning something with the Stormwall. This prompted the listeners to rush to the communications decryptor they'd recovered, hearing Nihil celebrations, just as Nihil ships appeared on the scanner in a formation suggesting they were there for a purpose other than re-capturing Tarpfen.

Behind the scenes

Jake Lunt Davies' cover image for "Tales from the Occlusion Zone: Family Ties" depicts Ghal Tarpfen in her hibernation shell.

A hibernation shell first appeared, albeit unidentified, around Ghal Tarpfen in "Tales from the Occlusion Zone: Pathogen," an installment of the Tales from the Occlusion Zone series of High Republic short stories, written by Lydia Kang and published in the 225th issue of Insider on April 30, 2024. The next issue, "Tales from the Occlusion Zone: Family Ties," also by Kang, and published in Star Wars Insider 226 on June 25, 2024, identified Tarpfen's protective layer as a hibernation shell, though the Mon Calamari thought of it to herself as a hibernation "layer" instead. The short story's cover image, illustrated by Jake Lunt Davies, depicts Tarpfen inside her hibernation shell upon a hover gurney in the Aurora III's medical room, with Joss Adren, Visma Tarko, Elping Tsoo, and C-06N in evac suits surrounding her.

Appearances

• "Tales from the Occlusion Zone: Pathogen" — Star Wars Insider 225 (First appearance)
• "Tales from the Occlusion Zone: Family Ties" — Star Wars Insider 226 (First identified as hibernation shell)