Of all the planets colonized by the Earth, the fourth one circiling Epsilon Pheta was probably the strangest.
There was nothing strange about the planet itself. It had a very Earthlike environment with plenty of fertile soil and natural resources-especially Quantilithium crystals which were highly valued as a source of power throughout the known worlds. What was strange about Epsilon Pheta was the people who colonized it.
The Epsilon Phetans were clowns. Literally.
At first, it started out they simply dressed like clowns, with makeup, wigs, and false noses whenever they showed their faces in public. But later they used genetic engineering techniques, used on other colonies to adapt humans to the environments of their new homes, to alter their bodies. Children would be born looking normal enough but soon began showing coloration on their faces and hair turning strange unnatural colors. As they hit puberty their noses plumped out, their feet started growing to enoromous size, and nearly half the young men were partially bald by the time they reached adulthood.Their behavior was affected too; they moved with exaggerrated expressions, talked with goofy voices, and punctuated their speech with chuckles or giggles-although they could be serious when they had to be.
Their society was organized around the old clown hierchy system too. The administrators and gentetic scientists were pierrots, with white skin, normal sized noses and feet, and simple, elegant 'makeup' on their faces. Below them were the whitefaces whoe shared their white skin, but had more exagerrated features, bulbous noses, and enormous feet. They made up the lower level beaurocrats, accountants, clerks, doctors, lawyers, and other proffessions.
Next on the ladder were the augustes, with pink or orange skin and white only around the eyes or mouth. They made up the teachers, construction workers, mechanics, and other less esteemed but respecable professions.
And at the very bottom were the hobos, who did most of the dirty, lowly professions like janitors, garbagemen, or for their women the bag ladies cocktail waittress's, cafeteria attendents, or the more beatiful, prostitutes. All this made for a very rigid caste system that made social advancement extremelly dificult, although not impossible, and intermarriage between classes was strictly forbidden.
Despite the strangenes of Epsilon Pheta, ther were those who came to visit, eith for plesure or business reasons. And those who did had to go through a 'processining' system that would temporallily make them clowns like the Epsilon Phetans-although many came to like it so much that they decided to stay, and had the condition made permanent.
And there were also those with no choice. For the Quantilithium crystals that made Epsilon Pheta so prosperous were mined by convicts and political dissident from all across colonized space. These forced laborers were turned into hobos and bag ladies-ones with black round noses and white muzzles turned down in sad expressions. For although the mines were more humanely run than most other forced labor camps, the lot of it's workers was still a sad one.