I'm busy writing part 2 of Beating the Heat, and I'm starting to do “real” writer-type stuff that I swore I'd never do because I'm not a writer and this isn't a writing project, like outlining plots and writing character profiles. So here's what I have on the Dewfall's healer.

Like other natives of Hearthside, Sunshine has larger ears than the average yinrih. This is an adaptation to cope with the sweltering heat of the day side of the planet where most people live. One of her sets of bandpass membranes (secondary eyelids that filter incoming light) is a rich glossy blue rather than the metallic specular appearance expected of other yinrih. This is the other physical characteristic that sets Hearthsiders apart.

Like all yinrih healers, she takes drugs to keep herself hairless in order to maintain medical hygiene. Yinrih otherwise have an undercoat and dander that sheds constantly. Her bare skin is a little darker than similarly pigmented human skin thanks to yinrih blood being maroon. Her paws and muzzle are covered in black splotches. The balding drugs remove all fur, but leave the whiskers, which are very important tactile sense organs. When not taking the drugs, her fur is red like Tod's, but she lacks Tod's black ears. She's about 55 lbs. Humans often compare her to a Xoloitzcuintle.

She's very friendly and talkative. She likes to go for walks around the apartment complex where her host Sarah lives, as well as the surrounding neighborhood, stopping passers-by to ask innocently insensitive questions about human biology in general and their personal medical histories in particular.

While out and about, she typically wears a shear, flowing garment common to Hearthsider healers that covers her entire head, body, and tail save the paws and muzzle. This is meant to protect her naked skin from the sun.

She tends to be overconfident at first, jumping head first into something only to realize she's in over her ears and needs help. Nevertheless, she's a master when in her own element. She has to be in order to be chosen as an interstellar missionary.

Her “job” as a missionary is to catalog as much info as possible about human biology and health. She regularly reports her findings back to Wayfarers' Haven, where the town healer, who was also the mistress of novices of the healers' college Sunshine attended, organizes and publishes her findings to the wider yinrih medical community.

Like the other missionaries and Wayfarers generally, Sunshine is very excited to finally meet other sophonts, and wants to help us humans in whatever way she can. However, she's still pretty naive and ignorant of human anatomy and medicine, as can be seen from my last story.