To avoid confusion, I've started to put together a list of terms used in the story.

Hopefully this helps explain some of the words used that are common to Ai's and Felix's world but not ours!

This will be a growing list and I plan to find another home for it at a later date.

*

blood hunter (see also leecher)  - / a person who hunts hBP blood and trades in the red market (n.b. blood hunting is illegal except for a few who have a granted Establishment license)

bios or bond - / short for 'symbiotic relationship'

com - / an older mobile communications device, commonly used Outside / uses radio signals instead of newer light wave transmissions

damper - / a device to prevent sound waves from travelling within a certain range, portable or industrial sized

elect - a descendent of one of the founding families of Eden

ESTAS - / a global establishment for the symbiosis, transformation, and advancement of all species

EVe or evolved - / sapiens with the evolved blood type enabling them to share energy psychically with vipers, acquiring viper-like strengths and abilities in return

geminae - / the name given to the pair when an evolved sapien and viper form a permanent mutualistic symbiotic relationship

high blood potential or hBP - / the measure of potential bonding receptors in the blood of evolved sapiens enabling them to share energy psychically with vipers

human - / a common term used mostly to refer to sapiens, from the old English word 'humaine' meaning to have compassion or benevolence / although technically any species grouped into the genus Homo can be classified as 'human', it is not really used to refer to vipers and hybrids because of its original meaning

hybrid -/ viper cross-breed / the name for the sterile offspring of two different 'human' species - sapiens and vipers / physically bigger and stronger than either parent species / assimilates energy only from blood, usually they prefer sapien blood

leecher (see also blood hunter) - / a person who specialises in extracting every drop of blood from a living person

mets - / short for 'metropole-levation', a large or busy city with elevated areas and levels, as high as it is wide

outsider - / someone who lives Outside, beyond the protected walled cities

sapien (see also human) - / the common name for Homo sapiens / one of two species of 'human' grouped into the genus Homo not yet extinct / a species of 'human' adapted to take energy from their environment (e.g. food, water, sunlight, etc.)

vamp - / a contemptuous label or insult for any blood drinker / a old-world term used indiscriminately to refer to either hybrids or vipers, mainly by Outsiders

viper (see also visicarii) - / the common name for Homo viperens / one of two species of 'human' grouped into the genus Homo not yet extinct / a species of 'human' adapted to take energy directly from others either via blood or psychic connection

visicarii (see also viper) - / the preferred name (plural) vipers use for their own kind / meaning 'those-who-cut-life' in latin