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thicctails · 2 months

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Incomplete Merformers guide, because goddamn it I put too much effort into researching biology for a fake species to let it go to waste

a readmore bc its very long

Earth Mers

Biology

-Eyes have nictitating membrane, aka a second eyelid

-A facultative bipedal, prototherian, catadromous species

-Facultative Bipedal: they usually walk on all fours, but can switch to walking upright.

-Prototherian: egg laying mammals. Both males and females possess mammary glands, but lack nipples.

-Catadromous: lives most of their lives in freshwater, only travelling to saltwater bodies to mate and reproduce.

-Mers possess two sets of gills, one on their neck, and one on their torso. These gills help provide enough oxygen to a Mer’s large, complex body. They are extremely sensitive, and even non-fatal wounds inflicted in areas with gills may leave the Mer unable to move due to pain.

-The loss of one part of a set of gills is a survivable injury, provided that a Mer has a pod that can support them, as strenuous activities like hunting will no longer be possible. However, the loss of a set of gills is fatal, as the Mer will no longer be able to get enough oxygen unless they remain strictly on land, which would cause its own set of problems.

-Mers are covered in small, thin, semi-reflective scales. They become paler and softer on certain parts of the body, such as the face, the front of the neck, the chest, the belly, and the underside of limbs. Mer scales come in every colour and pattern, and are a good indicator of health and age.

-Pups will have darker, less reflective scales, which helps them hide from any potential predators.

-Juveniles have more colourful scales, and any patterns or markings they have will begin to appear.

-Adults’ scales have reached peak vibrance and reflectiveness, and any patterns or markings will have fully appeared by this point.

-Elder Mer scales begin to lose their brightness, and may begin to flake off.

-Signs of illness in Mers can manifest in random scale discolouration or rapid/over scale shedding.

-Mers possess long, curved canines. Their unique shape helps Mers to hold onto their prey, as it is harder for the prey animal to pull themselves free without causing more damage to themselves.

-Their wide mouths allow them to take bigger bites of larger prey, or swallow smaller prey whole.

-A Mer’s facial structure, while human in appearance from a distance or in situations with low visibility, is actually quite different. They have snouts that can range in length, and almost feline-like noses. This allows them to peek above the surface of water without revealing themselves fully.

-Mers have diamond-shaped pupils. These pupils constrict into almost non-visible lines when they bask, which allows them to keep their eyes open to look for potential danger without causing any damage to their sight.

-Mers have unique vocal cords, utilising a syrinx and vestibular folds to produce sounds. They communicate verbally through chirps, hoots, croons, trills, calls, songs, growls and roars, although much of Mer communication is through body language, tail and fin movement, and facial expressions.

-They cannot produce sounds like humans do, but Mers can learn to mimic human speech like certain species of birds. The noise will sound noticeably off without years of proper vocal training, and unless a Mer spends time observing human conversation, they will often not understand the meaning of the sound they are copying.

-Mers communicate using certain frequencies. If a Mer is born with any abnormalities in their vocal cords, they may be unable to vocally communicate with others.

Eggs and Pups

-Both male and female Mers can feed pups, but only females can produce and carry eggs. Mer gestation is typically 16 months long, and often only produces 1-2 viable eggs.

-Mer eggs resemble shark eggs, being pouch-like in shape. The foetus and yolk is visible until the very end of the development phase, when the egg’s shell becomes brittle and opaque, allowing the pup to break free much easier.

-Pups are born with limited sight and hearing. They rely fully on their parents or caretakers for the first two years of life before they develop fine motor skills and have acquired basic swimming skills.

-Mers return to their pools to lay their eggs, as pups need to be able to easily access oxygen while their gills finish developing, and this can be difficult given the rough and unpredictable nature of the ocean.

-Eggs can only be out of water if they are kept moist, and Mers will do everything possible to not remove their eggs from the water, as they are delicate and sensitive to their environment.

Pods and Pools

-Mers live in pods. Pods can have anywhere between 2 to 100+ members, and are an essential part of Mer life and culture.

-Pods can be made of blood relatives, mates, inlaws, friends, ect. Mers that do not know each other but that have been separated from their pods for any reason may form temporary pods for the sake of survival.

-Pods have their own pools that they return to to rear their young. Multi-generational, family controlled pod pools are called Ancestral Pools, while pools controlled by multiple, unrelated pods are called Communal Pools.

-These pools are typically shallow, and are often near waterfalls or streams to insure that the water does not become stagnant. Mers will usually live around these pools for most of their lives, and being forced to relocate can be an extremely traumatic experience.

-Human influence on the environment has driven Mers closer towards extinction, as these pools are essential for raising pups. Adult mers can survive in rivers or oceans, but pups lack the skills and strength to adapt and survive in these environments.

-Some mers adapted to this rising problem in interesting ways. Mers that moved into darker, underwater caves or bayous developed larger eyes, long whiskers, and bigger, more sensitive head fins to help them navigate in dark spaces with more obstacles. Others developed stronger magic, and used it to disguise themselves as humans.

-Human disguised mers spend years observing human populations and learning how to act and speak like humans, as Mers do not communicate in the same ways. This is a high risk - high reward decision, as these mers can own property and create their own secure pools, but they also run the risk of being discovered, either through a slip up from themselves, or from a human somehow stumbling upon an undisguised pup. Pups have high sensitivity to magic, and cannot control their own, which means that they cannot be disguised or disguise themselves.

-Most, however, simply try to find suitable pockets of deep forests or secluded beaches, tucking themselves away from humanity.

-Raising a pup or pups alone is highly risky, because this means that the parent will need to leave their vulnerable young alone to go hunt. Unfortunately, human activity has made returning to either Ancestral or Communal pools difficult or impossible, and expectant Mers may be forced to search for any water body to lay their eggs. If the water is stagnant or polluted, the pup inside the egg will die, as Mer eggs are extremely sensitive, and absorb oxygen through the soft exterior.

Sexual Dimorphism

- Mers have very little in the way of sexual dimorphism. The main visible difference between female and male mers is their chest fins. Females have larger, more rigid chest fins. Pods usually have a matriarchal system of leadership, and the most dominant female will have the largest, stiffest, and most vibrant chest fin. Males have smaller, softer, multi-layer chest fins, usually used for courtship. A male’s chest fin can rapidly change colour, usually going from a dull colour to a vivid colour, and they can be ruffled, not unlike the feathers of a bird.

Culture

-Mers are highly intelligent, and although their civilizations are not as advanced as humans (mostly because of humans) they have still developed multiple different cultures based on geographical location and adaptations.

#merformers #mermaids #mermaid biology #transformers

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she-posts-nerdy-stuff · 14 days

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Don't Go Blindly Into the Dark

Summary:

To hide that he can't read, Jan Van Eck has been forcing his son to pretend he's blind since he was eight years old. Wylan is now attending Ketterdam University, and meeting Jesper Fahey may very well be about to change his life. But is he safe to tell Jesper the truth? And what will Jesper say if he does?

Jesper is struggling to weigh up his life in the Barrel and his life at the University of Ketterdam, and there's a good chance that his growing debt is about to make the decision for him. He hasn't attended class consecutively for months, but maybe that will change when his newest project includes partnering up with Wylan Van Eck. But can he really leave the Barrel behind him? And how long can he keep up the pretence of who he thinks Wylan wants him to be?

Tags: @justalunaticfangirl @lunarthecorvus

If anyone else would like to be tagged let me know :)

Content warnings for this chapter: death, descriptions of dead bodies, blood, wounds, murder, implied violence, weapons

AO3 link

NOTE: Hello, it's in fact the day after I thought I had shared this and I just opened my laptop to realise this was still open on here as a draft - I posted it on ao3 and was fully convinced I'd put it on here too but apparently not. So sorry about that, but here it is now!! <33

Chapter 26 - Nina

Nina got just about the fright of her life when she walked into Inej’s bedroom at the Slat.

She’d left Kaz’s office at the Crow Club walking in tandem with him as he crossed out onto the main floor and they found themselves greeted by an onslaught of shouting and flashing colours; the Makker’s wheels clunked loudly as they spun, people were laughing as though they’d been told the sound of it was the only thing they’d be able to leave behind when they died and they wanted to make sure it counted, counters and cards and heavens knew what else clattered and cluttered in every direction. Nina sighed. She was on the second day of her suspension and already not enjoying her sudden and unfortunately necessary proximity to the Crow Club and the Slat. She usually steered clear unless she was needed for a job; Kaz had labelled her a son for it but she didn’t much care what Kaz Brekker thought of her.

“Where did you stay last night?” he asked, stopping near the bar.

“Anika’s,”

She’d been on shift all night, so she’d let Nina use her room at the Slat - not that she’d slept particularly well. Anika wasn’t working tonight though, so Nina was going to have to find someone else’s bed to steal.

“Inej was meant to be working tonight,” said Kaz, “but I assume-”

“Not gonna happen. Give a couple of days,”

“But she’ll be alright?”

Nina narrowed her eyes. What was he planning now?

“For what?”

Kaz’s dark eyes fixed on Nina for a moment, flat and angry, a shark’s glare.

“For her,”

Nina restrained the need to raise an eyebrow.

“She should be,”

And apparently that was the end of the conversation, because Kaz unturned around and walked away. Nina rolled her eyes at his back, then spun on her heel and wound her way through the crowd towards the doors. It was almost impressive that the crowds here managed to be just as colourful as those on West Stave, despite their lack of costumes or capes or masks. They were perhaps even brighter, not confined to the red cape of Mr Crimson or the blue veil of the Lost Bride, the horns of the Grey Imp or the orange mask of the Madman.

Almost as soon as Nina stepped outside she was nearly knocked from her feet by Jesper striding back past her towards the Club, and when she called after him he either didn’t hear her or neglected to reply. Probably the latter. She stood and watched the door that had closed behind him for a moment, biting her lip, wondering if he was alright and where Wylan had gone. Still, the baby merch was under Dregs’ protection - word would spread quickly that Kaz wanted it that way and no-one was going to argue, and no matter what questions they might want to ask about it she doubted anyone would get answers - and Jesper was, well, Jesper. He would play, he would drink, he would either track Wylan down and apologise or pretend the entire thing had never happened, and he would accept help from no-one in no form whatsoever during the process. Part of her wanted to try to offer anyway, but the rest of her was pointing out that they would only argue, she would only leave him feeling more alone. And anyway, she needed to get back to Inej.

The crowds thinned quickly as Nina slipped down the street and across the canal, then followed it briefly South before veering off through the crooked little streets towards the Slat. Ketterdam, or at least this part of the Barrel, looked like it should belong in a picture book or a children’s story; there were always some kind of smog-soaked, grey, unhappy little streets that pretty little children lived in before they found out they were secretly royal or fairies or some other nonsense, and every inch of the road curling in front of Nina could have been a watercolour painting tucked neatly between the pages of any one of them. This could have even been one of the many streets where Sankta Anastasia bled. That option might fit the atmosphere around here better. The entire story was actually shockingly Kerch, Nina had always thought.

There was still gossip flying around about the Leopard when she stepped over the threshold of the Slat. Nina had heard some girl had vanished from the Sweet Shoppe this morning as well; someone with some sort of gemstone name - sounded very fake. That concerned Nina; it would be quite the coincidence for them both to go missing so close to each other.

“Amethyst ran though,” said a boy whose name Nina couldn’t quite place, though she knew she’d seen him around before, “That’s what they’re saying, anyway,”

Yes, Amethyst, that was her name. Or her pseudonym, at least.

He was sitting cross-legged on one of the tables with three others lounging on chairs around him. Layla, one of the servers from the Crow Club who Nina had seen with this boy on several occasions, was leaning forward from her chair to rest her head against his knee, and he was running his fingers through the hair above her ear.

“Right,” she said, briefly lifting her chin to look up at him, “‘Cause Rollins would absolutely love the publicity of oopsies, let my girl get kidnapped not two weeks after a kidnapping with the exact same pattern happened down the street,”

“Not sure he’d really care, Layle,” said one of her friends.

“‘Bout blaming her, ‘stead of him isn’t it?” said the other, “Or just blaming anyone. I’m getting a drink, who wants one?”

They all started talking, and the girl stuck two choice fingers up.

“Get ‘em yourselves then,”

They all laughed, clamouring over one another and pretending to throw something at the friend sauntering away. The other friend bounded to their feet and hurried after her, whilst Layla climbed up onto the table and leant against her boy’s shoulder, proceeding to whisper something that made him pink right up to his ears.

“Layla,”

She giggled, leaning backwards, and promptly toppled off the table. The boy gasped and jumped forwards; he managed to catch her hands in midair but too late to stop her thunking into the floorboards. She lay there for a moment, still giggling, her light brown hair splayed around her like a spilled inkpot, and her arms in the air where she was holding his hands. He was almost lying on his stomach for how far he’d leaned across the table, and after she arched her back slightly so she was just close enough to him to say something Nina couldn’t quite hear she gave him a sharp tug so he fell straight off the table and on top of her. Both of them laughed loudly, and she could see him threading his fingers through her hair as they rolled over and he gently invited her closer. Their foreheads touched, their lips met, and Nina suddenly realised that she had dug her own nails so deep into her palm that she had left herself with crescent moon indents where her fingers lay in her fists. She turned away.

When had she become someone who couldn’t watch others being happy?

The girl she used to be would have smiled.

She had made her choice, there was nobody else to blame for that, and no matter how hard she was trying to undo it she knew that she would make it again. She had saved Matthias’ life. She had ruined both their lives, but at least they were both still living.

Or they were at least surviving, anyway.

Layla and whatever her boy was called were still laughing as they clambered to their feet and he pressed her firmly into a chair, kissing her on her forehead and telling her to keep both feet planted on the floor.

“I’d quite like it if you’re not deathly injured when I return with our drinks, you know,” he grinned, “It would be a dreadful waste of money if I’d bought two and you weren’t here to drink yours,”

“Don’t be silly,” she swatted his shoulder, “You’d just have to drink both,”

Nina swallowed tightly, and slipped upstairs.

It took several attempts at knocking on Inej’s door to get a response. At first Nina wondered if she was still asleep and if that was the case then if she should just leave her to rest, but then she was pretty sure she heard footsteps of shuffling or something and so she knocked again, a little harder this time.

“Inej?” she called, when there was still no response.

Nothing. Now she was starting to get concerned. She knocked again.

“Inej, are you alright?”

No response.

“Okay, Inej if you don’t reply I’m gonna come in just to make sure you’re alright, if you don’t want me to then tell me now - or give me some kind of signal, maybe?”

Not a single sound, bar the ever-present choruses throughout the rest of the house. Nina fidgeted, fingers tensing over the door handle.

“Inej?” she waited a moment longer, but still there was no reply, “Okay, I’m coming in,”

Her fingers slipped slightly on the handle but she pushed the door slowly open and it clattered loud enough to make her teeth hurt as it thwacked against the chair Nina had brought into the room the previous day. Nina had kept the chair nearer the window, but Inej must have moved it for something because now its back was tangled in the door knob and both of them were stuck. Nina squeezed herself through the gap she’d managed to create, and very nearly screamed as she stumbled straight into a very limp body.

Her heart leapt as she nearly tripped over the stranger’s pale, outstretched arm, the skin on her bare forearm tattooed with a hand, the first two fingers cut off at the knuckle. Black Tips. Someone from the Black Tips had broken into Inej’s room? Oh Saints. Oh Saints. Oh Saints. She was probably a few years older than Nina, her face almost peaceful. Her other hand had been neatly laid over the knife wound in her chest as though by covering it up you could pretend it didn’t exist. Her eyes had been closed and by the looks of things the knife she was holding had been laid there for her because it was pressed flat between her torso and the palm that had been moved into place. Nina knew that she was dead but she reached out briefly with her power anyway, just in case, and felt no heartbeat, no breathing, no impulses. The blade in the woman’s hand glittered in the light coming through the open window, and as Nina tried very hard to focus on that and not anything else she realised with a start that it was the knife she’d pulled out of Inej’s leg just yesterday; the rose etched at its base full cleaned of blood and glimmering like new metal. This was Liesbeth Stoevelaar, then? Or it had been, anyway.

Liesbeth Stoevelaar was dead, and the Wraith was nowhere to be seen.

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random-vore-blog · 10 months

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Return of the prince

The sea was super cold, and unforgiving. The waters roared with fury and slammed against the rocks that surrounded his small unconscious form. Tanjiro Kamado, a very well respected young lad, had crashed his ship into rocks, managing to cause a wreckage of his beloved ship. The waves rolled in, but his small unconscious form was on one of the rocks, legs unfortunate to get soaked by the salty water. A massive shark fin emerged from the water, yellow and light yellow with some white on the tip of the fin was almost impossible to miss.

A Short Fin Mako shark.

The fin swam around where Tanjiro's body was, slow. It wasn't long until the shark fin stopped swimming, disappearing under the water before a head emerged, scales scattered everywhere on the head. It was a Leviathan, not an overgrown or giant shark. Its hair was long and somewhat curly, a dark shade of grey that was nearly pitch black, yellow-golden eyes and weirdly coloured veins that were near the surface of its forehead and under its eyes, a smile plastered on its face.

It looked down at the unconscious sailor, eyes zeroed on the poor kid like a predator waiting to pounce on its prey. Its smile widened before placing both hands on each side from the rock the boy laid on unconsciously. Its clawed hands, from the tip of its fingers to its elbows, were eagle like. Its talons dug into the hard surface.

" My! What a pleasant surprise!"

It spoke, voice sounding like something from a fantasy world, it was definitely male. He brought his large head closer to the unconscious Kamado boy, inspecting him for any injuries. He was laying on his stomach, and his back seemed fine. That was, until he spotted the Hanafuda earrings. His eyes widened, smile faltering but it returned again but with more joy behind it.

" Oh... it seems that I have found you, Tanjiro. Master will be so happy to finally have you in his hand."

He gently turned the boy, which caused him to stir. His face scrunched up as he was gaining consciousness, fingers twitching. When Tanjiro woke up, the first thing he did was groan in pain and quickly put a hand on his shoulder, back turned to face Urogi. This was something that made him frown.

" U-gh... w-what... what happened?"

He heard the boy grunt, using his hand to hold his head in pain, to which Urogi found very worrisome. He said nothing, letting out a breathe that caused the small lad to turn around quickly, using one hand to feel for- what he assumed- to be his nichirin blade. The fear in his eyes grew when he didn't seem to find his weapon. Urogi leaned closer, lips inches away from the boy.

" Don't fear me, Young guppy. I bring no harm."

He spoke, four canine fangs clicking when he closed his mouth. He gave the poor boy the friendliest smile he could muster, trying to ease Tanjiro's nerves as much as possible. It didn't seem to work.

" D-don't c-c-come ne-nea-r me!"

The young boy said, scooting away with his body fully turned to face him, which gave Urogi a clear view of the boy's shoulder. It was not a pretty sight. His shoulder was, quite literally, busted open to the point that you could see the bone that attached his arm to the skeleton. How he didn't bleed out from the wounds was a miracle, or he crashed into the rocks recently. The possibility was huge.

" Look, Young guppy. If you aren't treated immediately, your wound could cause you to die of bloodloss or get infected and also lead you to your death."

He spoke gently, looking at the small human that Muzan had searched for, the one being he has been looking for, for more than 1000 years.

He saw the boy shift uncomfortably, knowing that he was speaking the awful truth. He needed Tanjiro's trust, before he could safely carry him to Muzan. If he didn't get the poor lad to M-

" Look, Young guppy, I am only trying to help you. Please, just trust me."

He said, voice desperate and reassuring. He didn't want to fail his Master and soon to be Master. Hopefully his kindness would be enough for the boy to trust him.

" I promise to not hurt you."

" O-oka-y..."

His eyes widened slightly, tail wagging underneath the dark waters in excitement. His eyes softened and he gently smiled a small kind smile.

" I am glad to hear that, Young guppy."

He said, before adjusting his position to be more comfortable than his previous position.

" Please don't be frightened for what I am about to do. I promise that it is safe."

---

The boy was confused, before he was frightened when he opened his maw, saliva dripping from the roof of his mouth. He started to panic, the cavernous maw of the Leviathan enveloping his smaller and more fragile body with ease. He felt the tongue lick his injury, causing it to burn and make him yell in pain.

" P-please d-do-n't-"

He choked, starting to sob and shake in fear. He heard and felt the Leviathan hum, almost as if it was purring in delight. Was this a trick? Was it going to finish him off after all?

He felt himself being maneuvered by the pink appendage near the back of its throat, causing him to start to panic even more and start to try to crawl away. It was fruitless, as he was pulled into the dark tube. The walls were gentle as it pulled him down, as if the creature knew how fragile his body was. He had tried to speak, but the saliva in the tube kept getting into his mouth.

A single swallow pulled him deeper, and it was all it took to send him down, into the inevitable organ that would bre-

He was gently deposited into the organ when his legs touched the sphincter to which the muscle allowed him to enter said organ. He slipped into a pool of something, and it didn't smell acidic.

" W-whe-where... is t-th-this? H-how am I not being eaten by this?"

He muttered, still fearful and shivering. It was a traumatizing experience. He heard a low rumble come from all around him, sending vibrations around the organ.

" How are you doing, Young guppy? Is everything alright in there?"

He flinched at the loud, yet, muffled voice that surrounded him. Why was it worried about him? Why did it ask if he was alright? Was it pla-

" ..."

" *Sigh* You must be so scared... such a traumatizing experience for you- but I promise that you are safe!"

" I-it's a-alri-alright..."

" I am glad. Rest now, you need it. Let me take care of you."

He felt his shoulder tingle, and the pain was gone. He turned to look at his shoulder, only to see that there was no deep wound anymore. He felt his eyes grow heavy and, without realizing it, he had fallen unconscious.

---

He gently and slowly lifted himself from where the boy was previously. He didn't want to wake up the poor child, he would have gone all the way to Sekido so that his head could be ripped off. As gently and as slowly as he could, he submerged himself under the dark and mysterious waters. He waited until he could swim without waking up the very tired child.

He began to swim to a deeper area of the ocean, making the ride not too bumpy for his little passenger inside his crop. He swam towards where he picked up Aizetsu's scent, and saw his brother.

" Aizetsu? What are you doing?"

He asked joyfully, smile plastered on his face.

" Found a poor victim of the storm..."

His brother said, webbed hand equipped with sharp nails- which were actually claws- placed on his chest. He decided to spill the news.

" I found him. The one Master has been looking for."

He saw his brother's eyes widen slightly, a small smile etched its way onto his face- despite it looking like a sad smile.

" Master will be proud."

" I agree."

He looked down at his chest, placing a taloned hand gently onto his chest where the kid was.

" Our little prince has returned."

( This is some lore in my Leviathian demon slayer AU! I hope you enjoyed this chapter, and you are free to ask my au anything! Dares are also an exception!)

#safe vore #demon slayer #demon slayer vore #soft vore #urogi vore #leviathan demon slayer au

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skyllareich · 1 year

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It took billions of years for life to colonise the sea, but only millions to then reach land. Skyllareich, however, had a headstart. The Ophidocarids would make the first step to land, fusing chitin into a cartilaginous skeleton, giving them increased durability, if at the cost of flexibilty. The next step would be made by an inhabitant of esturine envoirments along the edges of the sea. The Pinkfin shark, an metre-long fish so named for the colouration around the edges of it’s fins, has a key adaptation to amphibiousness.

As with any organism that dwells near it’s predators, some form of protection is needed to survive. Many creatures will take some form of speed, camouflage, or toxins. A much rarer solution, is to go where there predators cannot. Living much like a seal, the Pinkfin shark is a mesopredator of crustaceans and algae, itself preyed upon by larger sharks and snakes. The real connection to seals delves deeper. While predators are confined to the sea, the prey is not. While it has no fully-functioning way to breath, it can extend it’s time by diffusing oxygen from the surrounding air via it’s skin. An issue arises when the thin skin required for diffusion can be injured by the abrasion on the front of its pectoral fins. The solution, is to use a much less fragile medium: chitin.

Both the unrefined movement and high gravity makes the method for terrestrial locomotion unusual, functioning around “pulling” and “pushing” fins. The pectoral fins are the first two out of the water, and thus used to pull the rest of the body forwards. The rear two limbs and unusual tail, once on land, serve to form a small star of fins that act like a platform to push off from, after which the pectorals take control again. Another adaptation is a set of muscles behing the eye, allowing for the eyes to be drawn back into there sockets, gifting them the ability to keep there eyes moist without returning to the water. While it may not be perfectly adapted to life on land, it will serve as a key stepping stone for future adaptations.

#speculative evolution #spec evo #speculative zoology #speculative biology

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cmlbcommish · 1 year

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CMLB: Nagomi Seraph, Management, 3

In the not-so-distant past…

Nagomi and Parker together are considered a bit of an enigma.

They’re a strange team, the woman who has enough money to start her own splorts league and has the most deadpan of stares and the colour palette to match the vibe, paired with a boy who’s family and origins are so prolific it doesn’t really matter who he is as a person and dresses like a book nerd. Everyone knows what Nagomi is like, and nobody cares about Parker past his family status.

They make a good team, in all honesty.

They're in the Commissioner's office in the Sharks stadium, filling out some paperwork for one of their newest players. The room is damp and a little cold, but Parker has enough leftover restless energy that he refuses to sit down, so he hands Nagomi papers to sign, while highlighting everything he deems important.

Parker has gradually found himself in the role as her co-commissioner by this point, because sitting still and doing nothing at home makes him antsy and herself or Eli can't always be around, what with the season starting up soon, he spends a lot of his time with her while she's doing Commissioner Business to stave off his own boredom and also he's very good at doing paperwork for some reason, hence why she now lets him help and take responsibility for half of her workload, instead of her coming home to him having done something ridiculous like organized all her spices by colour palette and somehow twisted his ankle in the process.

Today’s paperwork is just as boring as all the other paperworks. You’d think by owning her own league she would be able to decide how much paperwork she would like to do but nope, she forgot about how ‘legal people’ function, and is forced to make sure everything is in order legally.

Paperwork is so goddamn boring that Nagomi starts Thinking. About her league, and about Parker and how he hates being called Parker.

She catches the way he flinches whenever someone refers to him, notices the way his body tenses up, the way his eyes grow distant. He is good at hiding it from ordinary people, but Nagomi isn’t ordinary people.. She doesn’t know exactly why he would have this reaction, but she can hazard a guess, with the guess relating to why the current commissioner of the ILB is ‘Parker MacMillan IIIII’

Part of the conundrum of being known for your name being ‘Parker MacMillan’, is that everyone knows about Parker MacMillan 3, 4, and 5. The naming scheme implying there was a 2 and a 1 but no information on either of them leaves a lot to the imagination.

Her Parker is not fond of this connection, so she starts making up nicknames in her head, funny or cutesy little things like 'Parks' or 'Pmac' or 'Milly'. She honestly doesn't know if he would prefer to change his name entirely, so she never actively calls him any of these, just observes.

Once they finish the paperwork, Nagomi gives a sigh of relief and stretches her arms behind her head with a yawn, the wings on her head flapping restlessly and shifting a few of the paper stacks.

Parker finishes organizing everything, including the shifted papers. His body seems to realize that he has pushed past his limit, he lets out a small gasp before his muscles seize and his knees buckle and he falls hard to the floor, though he manages to keep himself from fully falling by catching his left arm on the edge of Nagomi's desk.

Nagomi makes a squawking sound, quickly jumping out of her chair, kneeling beside Parker, she wraps an arm around his back, and slowly leverages him to sit on the floor, instead of trying to stand again like he was trying to do.

“Easy, Parks, easy…” Nagomi soothes, she squeezes his shoulder reassuringly as he lets out a pained noise.

But wait, she used a nickname, Fuck. Hopefully he doesn’t notice.

“I'm always good for taking a break on the floor, you know how I feel about you overdoing it.” This one is a bit of a pointed jab, Nagomi still has no idea how Parker can manage to ignore his pain til it makes him collapse, though she also tends to go into a similar hyper focused state. They're both very bad at this 'health' thing. Nagomi considers herself lucky she has no lasting injuries from carrying out the family business for so many years.

Parker lets out a shaky sigh through gritted teeth, and Nagomi can see him flexing his toes through his shoes. The little watch that he wears lets them both know that he's in a significant amount of pain, based on the fact that it starts beeping out his heart rate, which it only does when it's elevated or slowing down.

Parker swats at his watch, rolling his head across his shoulders and attempting to breathe deep and even, but it seems he's shocked his system to the point where it's not going to be as easy a fix as breathing deep.

They gradually maneuver Parker over to a couch where he can lay down. Take the pressure off his legs for a while. Nagomi flits around, grabbing a blanket, dimming the lights, fetching some water, all that good stuff.

Parker sighs from the couch, "Stop hovering." he mutters, "I'll be good in a minute."

“Yeah, bullshit. I’m gonna call your bluff. Take some pain meds and take a nap for a while.” Nagomi rolls her eyes, taking a small pill out of the bottle, she makes sure he takes it with water and sits on the floor next to him.

Eventually he stops breathing so hard, the beeping of his watch quiets down and eventually he falls asleep.

Nagomi sighs, shifting up to a kneel as she looks over his sleeping form. His face is still slightly pinched even in sleep, the gray stitches on his face making him look even more pained somehow, even though he had told Nagomi that they don’t hurt him.

She gently pats his hair a few times, fondly. The sort of emotion only certain people are allowed to see her have.

“I wish I knew how to help you, but I still can’t figure you out., not really.” Nagomi mutters. After a little bit of staring wistfully at Parker, she resumes her original position sitting on the floor.

They stay there for an hour or so before Parker wakes up. He looks around dazedly for a bit until he spots Nagomi. Despite her protests, he manages to plunk himself on the floor next to her.

“How long was I out?” He asks, and Nagomi hates how often he has to ask that.

“Bout an hour or so? Not like it matters, we were done for the day anyway.” She shrugs.

“Ugh” Parker wrinkles his nose. “Now I’m not gonna be tired later.” Nagomi snorts.

“It’s fine dude, we gotta get home before we worry about something as menial as sleeping tonight.” She stands up and stretches, but when she looks back, Parker is staring at the floor and worrying his bottom lip.

“Something wrong?” She tilts her head.

“I don’t know if I can… Walk, right now.” Parker whispers. He’s still avoiding her gaze.

Nagomi nods. “Don’t worry about it, I’ll go get the chair.” and she promptly turns on her heel and heads out of the room.

When she gets back, wheelchair in tow, Parker has apparently been attempting to stand up, using the couch as leverage. Nagomi rushes to his side. “I thought you said you couldn’t walk, dumbass!” She uses his attempt to ease him into the wheelchair.

Parker covers his face with his hands and lets out a huge sigh. Nagomi kneels in front of him and looks at him questioningly. “Is… something wrong?” She tries. She doesn’t want him to force him, but it seems like something else is in play here.

“...You shouldn’t have to take care of me like this.” He starts, and she is about to protest when he continues on. “If my body would work like it's supposed to, I wouldn’t have all these problems!”

Nagomi can tell he’s frustrated, that's usually the reason he covers his face in a situation like this. He doesn’t like people to see his emotions. She takes a deep breath.

“I don’t mind having to care for you, and I’ll tell you over and over until you believe it.” Nagomi says, in a very no nonsense way. Parker uncovers his face a little and looks at her, his eyes are a little teary, but she isn’t sure if it's from emotions or pain.

She rests a hand on his knee. “Both myself and Eli, we don’t mind. I promise you Parker.” and there's the tiny flinch at his name. Now is not the time to get into that can of worms however.

Nagomi stands up. “Let's go home, okay?” Parker sighs, but nods. “Ten minutes, right?”

She grins, “Ten minutes.”

#CMLB stories #Nagomi Seraph #Parker MacMillan.1 #Blaseball #Fanteam #i am NOT sorry about my parker.1 brain #deal with it #this one kind of insinuates a specific period of time adjacent to ILB happenings that this league could have been started #im curious if people can pin down the approximate ILB season this is in

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1greenameba · 2 years

Text

Ok how much of an overlap between octopus fans and bee fans is there ?

I feel like both are really awsome and intelligent creatures for really different reasons :

Octopy are these colour changing alien predators without bones , 3 hearts , 9 brains , green blood , have one half of their body covered in suction cups , the ability to regrow lost arms and the ability to edit their rna to adapt to cold enviroments , that at the same time are really smart and capable in acquariums of getting out of their tank and going whenever they wish , mimicking other animals for defence and trickery , using coconut shells as a form of defence and there is video of one eating a shark

Bees on the other hand are these flying venomous animals that are fully unionized and build extremely organized societies with democracy they eat only nectar and pollen and use hormonal therapy to choose the future of the colony , have invented both a waterproof building material wich can work very well as fuel for us humans , and a food with no known expiration date , they change work as they age , and we domesticated them ...

Idk i feel there is a world in wich the question isn't "are you a dog person or a cat person?" but rather "are you a bee person or an octopus person?"

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circusclownsam · 1 month

Text

Young Justice OC (prob short, sorry)

general info

first name ; Min-Ya

last name ; Choi

nicknames ; Minnie, prefers that name only

birth date ; 3/9

age ; 18 - 20s

race ; asian

species ; meta-human

ethnicity ; korean - australian

voice ; mid-pitch, noticeable australian accent

Physical appearance

height ; 158cm, 5’2

weight ; average thickness

eye colour ; dark blue

hair colour ; chocolate brown

hair length ; thigh length

hair texture ; 2c

skin tone ; warm tan

body shape ; hourglass, small waist, d cup size

face claim ; https://pin.it/XEZu4Pt1q

scarring? ; arms, inner thighs and back. doesn’t care enough to hide them, doesn’t speak of how/where she got them.

piercings?: one on each earlobe

other features ; dark freckles (cheeks, nose, shoulders), elf-like ears, slit pupils (ie; cats)

outfit(s)

main attire ;

: https://pin.it/7qNGwKabC

: https://pin.it/BpLwoLqHG

: https://pin.it/4qy27VaE7

: https://pin.it/1mWM5nB4x

: https://pin.it/6LsVptJme

: https://pin.it/2sZnEzL0L

: https://pin.it/144XqIDIb (clear backings)

: https://pin.it/4lkjZ9XId

: https://pin.it/6BDkzflpI

: https://pin.it/7D7lIouIJ

: https://pin.it/14r5oLb5j

: https://pin.it/6zyZeFbbz

sleep attire ;

: https://pin.it/6HHpa1NO0

: https://pin.it/2eHJL7pGy

: https://pin.it/223OF0ukV

workout attire ;

: https://pin.it/6trvw4H3O

: https://pin.it/14FEOPhmO

: https://pin.it/6MCG0eIpQ

: https://pin.it/45IH1grmt

: https://pin.it/Ulox9zlyW

: https://pin.it/4d7X1vcCk

personality (might be short, sorry)

basic desc; introverted, rather cold and sarcastic to those she does not know well, much like some of her teammates; she prefers keeping secrets, especially when it’s related to her father and the abuse she suffered at his hands. despite her hard shell, she can become quite caring and kind once she fully trusts someone, she’s very patient- usually takes a while for her to get angry or annoyed, hard shell or not; she’s insanely protective over her sister and team, willing to risk her life for them. she can be quite humorous though it’s rare. (more in traits)

positive traits ; kind, caring, honest, humorous, selfless, protective, patient, flirtatious

negative traits ; cold, sarcastic, anti-social/secluded, secretive(to an extent), blunt

interests ; studying spells, cooking for the team and her sister, reading in her alone time, working out privately, cuddling with wolf

disinterests ; the reach, klarion, her parents, being poked and prodded at, pods/labs, being experimented on.

hobbies ; studying spells, painting, drawing and occasionally the guitar

habits ; scratching at her scars when anxious and or having a flashback, picking at her nails, neatening things

favourites ; lions, great white sharks, bubble tea, most horror books, tyrannosaurus rex.

non-favourites ; chocolate cake, Brussel sprout, romance books/movies.

power / hero information

hero title ; fluctuates between ‘the witch’ and ‘demoness’

alignment ; hero, despite her power

mentor ; mostly self-taught, occasionally black canary

power origin ; unknown

power ; black magic

in-depth desc ; possession, telepathy, portal summoning, shape shifting, hallucination/illusion, telekinesis, floatation/flight, density shifting, necromancy (to an extent), object enchantment, blood manipulation. (idk much abt black magic LMAO)

transportation ; motorcycle, mostly. occasionally portals.

talents ; gymnastics, spell work, hand-to-hand combat.

team alignment(s) ; young justice / justice league.

relations

father ; robert kingly

age ; unknown

status ; unknown, disappeared around her 16th birthday

relationship ; weren’t close, very abusive towards minnie.

resides in ; unknown

mother ; lin choi

age ; 55

status ; deceased, died via drug overdose

relationship ; not close, very neglectful and often distant

resides in ; gotham cemetery (per her will)

sister ; katie choi

age ; 16

status ; alive, in her custody

relationship ; very close, rarely argue.

resides in ; her farm in happy harbour

other relatives ; both sisters are estranged with their other relatives

friends ; dick grayson, wally west, superboy, m’gann, artemis, aqualad

enemies ; most villains, basically.

potential love interests ; dick grayson

living arrangements

birth country ; seoul, south korea.

past residency ; sydeny, australia.

current residence ; mount justice. her farm in happy harbour (s3)

owned residences ; a farm in happy harbour, beach house in sydeny (used primarily for vacations)

(will add more, probably)

#circusclownsam OCs #young justice

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squid-slenderman · 1 month

Text

I am Squid. He/they/it. 13'10", thanks for asking. Magic anons are fine. I came from the ocean. And that is my home.

I eat meat. I prefer seafood. But I certainly don't mind a good steak.

Collect my fish. (I'm hungry.) Also, collect all this darn trash. You land dwellers made it, not me. And it's not quite fair for me to have to deal with it.

A squid (pl.: squid) is a mollusc with an elongated soft body, large eyes, eight arms, and two tentacles in the superorder Decapodiformes, though many other molluscs within the broader Neocoleoidea are also called squid despite not strictly fitting these criteria. Like all other cephalopods, squid have a distinct head, bilateral symmetry, and a mantle. They are mainly soft-bodied, like octopuses, but have a small internal skeleton in the form of a rod-like gladius or pen, made of chitin.

Squid diverged from other cephalopods during the Jurassic and occupy a similar role to teleost fish as open water predators of similar size and behaviour. They play an important role in the open water food web. The two long tentacles are used to grab prey and the eight arms to hold and control it. The beak then cuts the food into suitable size chunks for swallowing. Squid are rapid swimmers, moving by jet propulsion, and largely locate their prey by sight. They are among the most intelligent of invertebrates, with groups of Humboldt squid having been observed hunting cooperatively. They are preyed on by sharks, other fish, sea birds, seals and cetaceans, particularly sperm whales.

Squid can change colour for camouflage and signalling. Some species are bioluminescent, using their light for counter-illumination camouflage, while many species can eject a cloud of ink to distract predators.

Squid are used for human consumption with commercial fisheries in Japan, the Mediterranean, the southwestern Atlantic, the eastern Pacific and elsewhere. They are used in cuisines around the world, often known as "calamari". Squid have featured in literature since classical times, especially in tales of giant squid and sea monsters.

Squid are members of the class Cephalopoda, subclass Coleoidea. The squid orders Myopsida and Oegopsida are in the superorder Decapodiformes (from the Greek for "ten-legged"). Two other orders of decapodiform cephalopods are also called squid, although they are taxonomically distinct from squids and differ recognizably in their gross anatomical features. They are the bobtail squid of order Sepiolida and the ram's horn squid of the monotypic order Spirulida. The vampire squid (Vampyroteuthis infernalis), however, is more closely related to the octopus than to any squid.[2]

The cladogram, not fully resolved, is based on Sanchez et al., 2018.[2] Their molecular phylogeny used mitochondrial and nuclear DNA marker sequences; they comment that a robust phylogeny "has proven very challenging to obtain". If it is accepted that Sepiidae cuttlefish are a kind of squid, then the squids, excluding the vampire squid, form a clade as illustrated.[2] Orders are shown in boldface; all the families not included in those orders are in the paraphyletic order "Oegopsida", except Sepiadariidae and Sepiidae that are in the paraphyletic order "Sepiida",

Crown coleoids (the common ancestor of octopuses and squid) diverged in the late Paleozoic (Mississippian), according to fossils of Syllipsimopodi, an early relative of vampire squids and octopuses.[3] True squid diverged during the Jurassic, but many squid families appeared in or after the Cretaceous.[4] Both the coleoids and the teleost fish were involved in much adaptive radiation at this time, and the two modern groups resemble each other in size, ecology, habitat, morphology and behaviour, however some fish moved into fresh water while the coleoids remained in marine environments.[5]

The ancestral coleoid was probably nautiloid-like with a strait septate shell that became immersed in the mantle and was used for buoyancy control. Four lines diverged from this, Spirulida (with one living member), the cuttlefishes, the squids and the octopuses. Squid have differentiated from the ancestral mollusc such that the body plan has been condensed antero-posteriorly and extended dorso-ventrally. What may have been the foot of the ancestor is modified into a complex set of appendages around the mouth. The sense organs are highly developed and include advanced eyes similar to those of vertebrates.[5]

The ancestral shell has been lost, with only an internal gladius, or pen, remaining. The pen, made of a chitin-like material,[5][6] is a feather-shaped internal structure that supports the squid's mantle and serves as a site for muscle attachment. The cuttlebone or sepion of the Sepiidae is calcareous and appears to have evolved afresh in the Tertiary.[7]

Squid are soft-bodied molluscs whose forms evolved to adopt an active predatory lifestyle. The head and foot of the squid are at one end of a long body, and this end is functionally anterior, leading the animal as it moves through the water. A set of eight arms and two distinctive tentacles surround the mouth; each appendage takes the form of a muscular hydrostat and is flexible and prehensile, usually bearing disc-like suckers.[5]

The suckers may lie directly on the arm or be stalked. Their rims are stiffened with chitin and may contain minute toothlike denticles. These features, as well as strong musculature, and a small ganglion beneath each sucker to allow individual control, provide a very powerful adhesion to grip prey. Hooks are present on the arms and tentacles in some species, but their function is unclear.[8] The two tentacles are much longer than the arms and are retractile. Suckers are limited to the spatulate tip of the tentacle, known as the manus.[5]

In the mature male, the outer half of one of the left arms is hectocotylised – and ends in a copulatory pad rather than suckers. This is used for depositing a spermatophore inside the mantle cavity of a female. A ventral part of the foot has been converted into a funnel through which water exits the mantle cavity.[5]

The main body mass is enclosed in the mantle, which has a swimming fin along each side. These fins are not the main source of locomotion in most species. The mantle wall is heavily muscled and internal. The visceral mass, which is covered by a thin, membranous epidermis, forms a cone-shaped posterior region known as the "visceral hump". The mollusc shell is reduced to an internal, longitudinal chitinous "pen" in the functionally dorsal part of the animal; the pen acts to stiffen the squid and provides attachments for muscles.[5]

On the functionally ventral part of the body is an opening to the mantle cavity, which contains the gills (ctenidia) and openings from the excretory, digestive and reproductive systems. An inhalant siphon behind the funnel draws water into the mantle cavity via a valve. The squid uses the funnel for locomotion via precise jet propulsion.[9] In this form of locomotion, water is sucked into the mantle cavity and expelled out of the funnel in a fast, strong jet. The direction of travel is varied by the orientation of the funnel.[5] Squid are strong swimmers and certain species can "fly" for short distances out of the water.[10]

Squid make use of different kinds of camouflage, namely active camouflage for background matching (in shallow water) and counter-illumination. This helps to protect them from their predators and allows them to approach their prey.[11][12]

The skin is covered in controllable chromatophores of different colours, enabling the squid to match its coloration to its surroundings.[11][13] The play of colours may in addition distract prey from the squid's approaching tentacles.[14] The skin also contains light reflectors called iridophores and leucophores that, when activated, in milliseconds create changeable skin patterns of polarized light.[15][16] Such skin camouflage may serve various functions, such as communication with nearby squid, prey detection, navigation, and orientation during hunting or seeking shelter.[15] Neural control of the iridophores enabling rapid changes in skin iridescence appears to be regulated by a cholinergic process affecting reflectin proteins.[16]

Some mesopelagic squid such as the firefly squid (Watasenia scintillans) and the midwater squid (Abralia veranyi) use counter-illumination camouflage, generating light to match the downwelling light from the ocean surface.[12][17][18] This creates the effect of countershading, making the underside lighter than the upperside.[12]

Counter-illumination is also used by the Hawaiian bobtail squid (Euprymna scolopes), which has symbiotic bacteria (Aliivibrio fischeri) that produce light to help the squid avoid nocturnal predators.[19] This light shines through the squid's skin on its underside and is generated by a large and complex two-lobed light organ inside the squid's mantle cavity. From there, it escapes downwards, some of it travelling directly, some coming off a reflector at the top of the organ (dorsal side). Below there is a kind of iris, which has branches (diverticula) of its ink sac, with a lens below that; both the reflector and lens are derived from mesoderm. The squid controls light production by changing the shape of its iris or adjusting the strength of yellow filters on its underside, which presumably change the balance of wavelengths emitted.[17] Light production shows a correlation with intensity of down-welling light, but it is about one third as bright; the squid can track repeated changes in brightness. Because the Hawaiian bobtail squid hides in sand during the day to avoid predators, it does not use counter-illumination during daylight hours.[17]

Squid distract attacking predators by ejecting a cloud of ink, giving themselves an opportunity to escape.[20][21] The ink gland and its associated ink sac empties into the rectum close to the anus, allowing the squid to rapidly discharge black ink into the mantle cavity and surrounding water.[8] The ink is a suspension of melanin particles and quickly disperses to form a dark cloud that obscures the escape manoeuvres of the squid. Predatory fish may also be deterred by the alkaloid nature of the discharge which may interfere with their chemoreceptors.[5]

Cephalopods have the most highly developed nervous systems among invertebrates. Squids have a complex brain in the form of a nerve ring encircling the oesophagus, enclosed in a cartilaginous cranium. Paired cerebral ganglia above the oesophagus receive sensory information from the eyes and statocysts, and further ganglia below control the muscles of the mouth, foot, mantle and viscera. Giant axons up to 1 mm (0.04 in) in diameter convey nerve messages with great rapidity to the circular muscles of the mantle wall, allowing a synchronous, powerful contraction and maximum speed in the jet propulsion system.[5]

The paired eyes, on either side of the head, are housed in capsules fused to the cranium. Their structure is very similar to that of a fish eye, with a globular lens that has a depth of focus from 3 cm (1.2 in) to infinity. The image is focused by changing the position of the lens, as in a camera or telescope, rather than changing the shape of the lens, as in the human eye. Squid adjust to changes in light intensity by expanding and contracting the slit-shaped pupil.[5] Deep sea squids in the family Histioteuthidae have eyes of two different types and orientation. The large left eye is tubular in shape and looks upwards, presumably searching for the silhouettes of animals higher in the water column. The normally-shaped right eye points forwards and downwards to detect prey.[22]

The statocysts are involved in maintaining balance and are analogous to the inner ear of fish. They are housed in cartilaginous capsules on either side of the cranium. They provide the squid with information on its body position in relation to gravity, its orientation, acceleration and rotation, and are able to perceive incoming vibrations. Without the statocysts, the squid cannot maintain equilibrium.[5] Squid appear to have limited hearing,[23] but the head and arms bear lines of hair-cells that are weakly sensitive to water movements and changes in pressure, and are analogous in function to the lateral line system of fish.[5]

The sexes are separate in squid, with a single gonad in the posterior part of the body. Fertilisation is external and usually takes place in the mantle cavity of the female. The male has a testis from which sperm pass into a single gonoduct where they are rolled together into a long bundle, or spermatophore. The gonoduct is elongated into a "penis" that extends into the mantle cavity and through which spermatophores are ejected. In shallow water species, the penis is short, and the spermatophore is removed from the mantle cavity by a tentacle of the male, which is specially adapted for the purpose and known as a hectocotylus, and placed inside the mantle cavity of the female during mating.[5]

The female has a large translucent ovary, situated towards the posterior of the visceral mass. From here, eggs travel along the gonocoel, where there are a pair of white nidamental glands, which lie anterior to the gills. Also present are red-spotted accessory nidamental glands containing symbiotic bacteria; both organs are associated with nutrient manufacture and forming shells for the eggs. The gonocoel enters the mantle cavity at the gonopore, and in some species, receptacles for storing spermatophores are located nearby, in the mantle wall.[5]

In shallow-water species of the continental shelf and epipelagic or mesopelagic zones, it is frequently one or both of arm pair IV of males that are modified into hectocotyli.[24] However, most deep-sea squid lack hectocotyl arms and have longer penises; Ancistrocheiridae and Cranchiinae are exceptions.[25] Giant squid of the genus Architeuthis are unusual in that they possess both a large penis and modified arm tips, although whether the latter are used for spermatophore transfer is uncertain.[25] Penis elongation has been observed in the deep-water species Onykia ingens; when erect, the penis may be as long as the mantle, head, and arms combined.[25][26] As such, deep-water squid have the greatest known penis length relative to body size of all mobile animals, second in the entire animal kingdom only to certain sessile barnacles.[25]

Like all cephalopods, squids are predators and have complex digestive systems. The mouth is equipped with a sharp, horny beak mainly made of chitin and cross-linked proteins,[27] which is used to kill and tear prey into manageable pieces. The beak is very robust, but does not contain minerals, unlike the teeth and jaws of many other organisms; the cross-linked proteins are histidine- and glycine-rich and give the beak a stiffness and hardness greater than most equivalent synthetic organic materials.[28] The stomachs of captured whales often have indigestible squid beaks inside. The mouth contains the radula, the rough tongue common to all molluscs except bivalvia, which is equipped with multiple rows of teeth.[5] In some species, toxic saliva helps to control large prey; when subdued, the food can be torn in pieces by the beak, moved to the oesophagus by the radula, and swallowed.[29]

The food bolus is moved along the gut by waves of muscular contractions (peristalsis). The long oesophagus leads to a muscular stomach roughly in the middle of the visceral mass. The digestive gland, which is equivalent to a vertebrate liver, diverticulates here, as does the pancreas, and both of these empty into the caecum, a pouch-shaped sac where most of the absorption of nutrients takes place.[5] Indigestible food can be passed directly from the stomach to the rectum where it joins the flow from the caecum and is voided through the anus into the mantle cavity.[5] Cephalopods are short-lived, and in mature squid, priority is given to reproduction;[30] the female Onychoteuthis banksii for example, sheds its feeding tentacles on reaching maturity, and becomes flaccid and weak after spawning.[31][32]

The squid mantle cavity is a seawater-filled sac containing three hearts and other organs supporting circulation, respiration, and excretion.[33] Squid have a main systemic heart that pumps blood around the body as part of the general circulatory system, and two branchial hearts. The systemic heart consists of three chambers, a lower ventricle and two upper atria, all of which can contract to propel the blood. The branchial hearts pump blood specifically to the gills for oxygenation, before returning it to the systemic heart.[33] The blood contains the copper-rich protein hemocyanin, which is used for oxygen transport at low ocean temperatures and low oxygen concentrations, and makes the oxygenated blood a deep, blue color.[33] As systemic blood returns via two vena cavae to the branchial hearts, excretion of urine, carbon dioxide, and waste solutes occurs through outpockets (called nephridial appendages) in the vena cavae walls that enable gas exchange and excretion via the mantle cavity seawater.[33]

Unlike nautiloids and cuttlefish which have gas-filled chambers inside their shells which provide buoyancy, and octopuses which live near and rest on the seabed and do not require to be buoyant, many squid have a fluid-filled receptacle, equivalent to the swim bladder of a fish, in the coelom or connective tissue. This reservoir acts as a chemical buoyancy chamber, with the heavy metallic cations typical of seawater replaced by low molecular-weight ammonium ions, a product of excretion. The small difference in density provides a small contribution to buoyancy per unit volume, so the mechanism requires a large buoyancy chamber to be effective. Since the chamber is filled with liquid, it has the advantage over a swim bladder of not changing significantly in volume with pressure. Glass squids in the family Cranchiidae for example, have an enormous transparent coelom containing ammonium ions and occupying about two-thirds the volume of the animal, allowing it to float at the required depth. About half of the 28 families of squid use this mechanism to solve their buoyancy issues.[5] The family Bathyteuthidae get their buoyancy from an oily substance found in their liver and around their mantle and head.[34]

The majority of squid are no more than 60 cm (24 in) long, although the giant squid may reach 13 m (43 ft).[35] The smallest species are probably the benthic pygmy squids Idiosepius, which grow to a mantle length of 10 to 18 mm (0.4 to 0.7 in), and have short bodies and stubby arms.[36]

In 1978, sharp, curved claws on the suction cups of squid tentacles cut up the rubber coating on the hull of the USS Stein. The size suggested the largest squid known at the time.[37]

In 2003, a large specimen of an abundant[38] but poorly understood species, Mesonychoteuthis hamiltoni (the colossal squid), was discovered. This species may grow to 10 m (33 ft) in length, making it the largest invertebrate.[39] In February 2007, a New Zealand fishing vessel caught the largest squid ever documented, weighing 495 kg (1,091 lb) and measuring around 10 m (33 ft) off the coast of Antarctica.[40] Dissection showed that the eyes, used to detect prey in the deep Southern Ocean, exceeded the size of footballs; these may be among the largest eyes ever to exist in the animal kingdom.[41]

The eggs of squid are large for a mollusc, containing a large amount of yolk to nourish the embryo as it develops directly, without an intervening veliger larval stage. The embryo grows as a disc of cells on top of the yolk. During the gastrulation stage, the margins of the disc grow to surround the yolk, forming a yolk sac, which eventually forms part of the animal's gut. The dorsal side of the disc grows upwards and forms the embryo, with a shell gland on its dorsal surface, gills, mantle and eyes. The arms and funnel develop as part of the foot on the ventral side of the disc. The arms later migrate upwards, coming to form a ring around the funnel and mouth. The yolk is gradually absorbed as the embryo grows. Some juvenile squid live higher in the water column than do adults. Squids tend to be short-lived; Loligo for example lives from one to three years according to species, typically dying soon after spawning.[5]

In a well-studied bioluminescent species, the Hawaiian bobtail squid, a special light organ in the squid's mantle is rapidly colonized with Aliivibrio fischeri bacteria within hours of hatching. This light-organ colonization requires this particular bacterial species for a symbiotic relationship; no colonization occurs in the absence of A. fischeri.[19] Colonization occurs in a horizontal manner, such that the hosts acquires its bacterial partners from the environment. The symbiosis is obligate for the squid, but facultative for the bacteria. Once the bacteria enter the squid, they colonize interior epithelial cells in the light organ, living in crypts with complex microvilli protrusions. The bacteria also interact with hemocytes, macrophage-like blood cells that migrate between epithelial cells, but the mechanism and function of this process is not well understood. Bioluminescence reaches its highest levels during the early evening hours and bottoms out before dawn; this occurs because at the end of each day, the contents of the squid's crypts are expelled into the surrounding environment.[42] Approximately 95% of the bacteria are voided each morning before the bacterial population builds up again by nightfall.[17]

Squid can move about in several different ways. Slow movement is achieved by a gentle undulation of the muscular lateral fins on either side of the trunk which drives the animal forward. A more common means of locomotion providing sustained movement is achieved using jetting, during which contraction of the muscular wall of the mantle cavity provides jet propulsion.[5]

Slow jetting is used for ordinary locomotion, and ventilation of the gills is achieved at the same time. The circular muscles in the mantle wall contract; this causes the inhalant valve to close, the exhalant valve to open and the mantle edge to lock tightly around the head. Water is forced out through the funnel which is pointed in the opposite direction to the required direction of travel. The inhalant phase is initiated by the relaxation of the circular muscles causes them to stretch, the connective tissue in the mantle wall recoils elastically, the mantle cavity expands causing the inhalant valve to open, the exhalant valve to close and water to flow into the cavity. This cycle of exhalation and inhalation is repeated to provide continuous locomotion.[5]

Fast jetting is an escape response. In this form of locomotion, radial muscles in the mantle wall are involved as well as circular ones, making it possible to hyper-inflate the mantle cavity with a larger volume of water than during slow jetting. On contraction, water flows out with great force, the funnel always being pointed anteriorly, and travel is backwards. During this means of locomotion, some squid exit the water in a similar way to flying fish, gliding through the air for up to 50 m (160 ft), and occasionally ending up on the decks of ships.[5]

Squid are carnivores, and, with their strong arms and suckers, can overwhelm relatively large animals efficiently. Prey is identified by sight or by touch, grabbed by the tentacles which can be shot out with great rapidity, brought back to within reach of the arms, and held by the hooks and suckers on their surface.[43] In some species, the squid's saliva contains toxins which act to subdue the prey. These are injected into its bloodstream when the prey is bitten, along with vasodilators and chemicals to stimulate the heart, and quickly circulate to all parts of its body.[5] The deep sea squid Taningia danae has been filmed releasing blinding flashes of light from large photophores on its arms to illuminate and disorientate potential prey.[44]

Although squid can catch large prey, the mouth is relatively small, and the food must be cut into pieces by the chitinous beak with its powerful muscles before being swallowed. The radula is located in the buccal cavity and has multiple rows of tiny teeth that draw the food backwards and grind it in pieces.[5] The deep sea squid Mastigoteuthis has the whole length of its whip-like tentacles covered with tiny suckers; it probably catches small organisms in the same way that flypaper traps flies. The tentacles of some bathypelagic squids bear photophores which may bring food within its reach by attracting prey.[43]

Squid are among the most intelligent invertebrates. For example, groups of Humboldt squid hunt cooperatively, spiralling up through the water at night and coordinating their vertical and horizontal movements while foraging.[45]

Courtship in squid takes place in the open water and involves the male selecting a female, the female responding, and the transfer by the male of spermatophores to the female. In many instances, the male may display to identify himself to the female and drive off any potential competitors.[46] Elaborate changes in body patterning take place in some species in both agonistic and courtship behaviour. The Caribbean reef squid (Sepioteuthis sepioidea), for example, employs a complex array of colour changes during courtship and social interactions and has a range of about 16 body patterns in its repertoire.[47]

The pair adopt a head-to-head position, and "jaw locking" may take place, in a similar manner to that adopted by some cichlid fish.[48] The heterodactylus of the male is used to transfer the spermatophore and deposit it in the female's mantle cavity in the position appropriate for the species; this may be adjacent to the gonopore or in a seminal receptacle.[5]

The sperm may be used immediately or may be stored. As the eggs pass down the oviduct, they are wrapped in a gelatinous coating, before continuing to the mantle cavity, where they are fertilised. In Loligo, further coatings are added by the nidimental glands in the walls of the cavity and the eggs leave through a funnel formed by the arms. The female attaches them to the substrate in strings or groups, the coating layers swelling and hardening after contact with sea water. Loligo sometimes forms breeding aggregations which may create a "community pile" of egg strings. Some pelagic and deep sea squid do not attach their egg masses, which float freely.[5]

Squid mostly have an annual life cycle, growing fast and dying soon after spawning. The diet changes as they grow but mostly consists of large zooplankton and small nekton. In Antarctica for example, krill is the main constituent of the diet, with other food items being amphipods, other small crustaceans, and large arrow worms. Fish are also eaten, and some squid are cannibalistic.[49]

As well as occupying a key role in the food chain, squid are an important prey for predators including sharks, sea birds, seals and whales. Juvenile squid provide part of the diet for worms and small fish. When researchers studied the contents of the stomachs of elephant seals in South Georgia, they found 96% squid by weight.[50] In a single day, a sperm whale can eat 700 to 800 squid,[50] and a Risso's dolphin entangled in a net in the Mediterranean was found to have eaten angel clubhook squid, umbrella squid, reverse jewel squid and European flying squid, all identifiable from their indigestible beaks.[51] Ornithoteuthis volatilis, a common squid from the tropical Indo-Pacific, is predated by yellowfin tuna, longnose lancetfish, common dolphinfish and swordfish, the tiger shark, the scalloped hammerhead shark and the smooth hammerhead shark. Sperm whales also hunt this species extensively as does the brown fur seal.[52] In the Southern Ocean, penguins and wandering albatrosses are major predators of Gonatus antarcticus.[53]

Giant squid have featured as monsters of the deep since classical times. Giant squid were described by Aristotle (4th century BC) in his History of Animals[54] and Pliny the Elder (1st century AD) in his Natural History.[55][56] The Gorgon of Greek mythology may have been inspired by squid or octopus, the animal itself representing the severed head of Medusa, the beak as the protruding tongue and fangs, and its tentacles as the snakes.[57] The six-headed sea monster of the Odyssey, Scylla, may have had a similar origin. The Nordic legend of the kraken may also have derived from sightings of large cephalopods.[58]

In literature, H. G. Wells' short story "The Sea Raiders" featured a man-eating squid species Haploteuthis ferox.[59] The science fiction writer Jules Verne told a tale of a kraken-like monster in his 1870 novel Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea.[58]

Squid form a major food resource and are used in cuisines around the world, notably in Japan where it is eaten as ika sōmen, sliced into vermicelli-like strips; as sashimi; and as tempura.[60] Three species of Loligo are used in large quantities, L. vulgaris in the Mediterranean (known as Calamar in Spanish, Calamaro in Italian); L. forbesii in the Northeast Atlantic; and L. pealei on the American East Coast.[60] Among the Ommastrephidae, Todarodes pacificus is the main commercial species, harvested in large quantities across the North Pacific in Canada, Japan and China.[60]

In English-speaking countries, squid as food is often called calamari, adopted from Italian into English in the 17th century.[61] Squid are found abundantly in certain areas, and provide large catches for fisheries. The body can be stuffed whole, cut into flat pieces, or sliced into rings. The arms, tentacles, and ink are also edible; the only parts not eaten are the beak and gladius (pen). Squid is a good food source for zinc and manganese, and high in copper,[62] selenium, vitamin B12, and riboflavin.[63]

According to the FAO, the cephalopod catch for 2002 was 3,173,272 tonnes (6.995867×109 lb). Of this, 2,189,206 tonnes, or 75.8 percent, was squid.[64] The following table lists squid species fishery catches that exceeded 10,000 tonnes (22,000,000 lb) in 2002.

Prototype chromatophores that mimic the squid's adaptive camouflage have been made by Bristol University researchers using an electroactive dielectric elastomer, a flexible "smart" material that changes its colour and texture in response to electrical signals. The researchers state that their goal is to create an artificial skin that provides rapid active camouflage.[65]

The squid giant axon inspired Otto Schmitt to develop a comparator circuit with hysteresis now called the Schmitt trigger, replicating the axon's propagation of nerve impulses.[66]

(Did I just paste the entire Wikipedia article on squids here? Yes. Do I know why? No.)

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wyattupton81 · 3 months

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resourcesofcolor · 5 months

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The Creation of Palau. (A Legend from Palau)

In the long ago, before the time of people, the sea was empty. Empty. Spirits under the sea and spirits above the sea were lonely. They longed to share life. Ucheleanged, the greatest of gods, felt their longing. “Now! The world is ready. Now!" Uchcleanged travelled across the ocean. “Here!" The great god pointed to the darkest part of the sea. From deep within this black unknown, a volcano erupted. Higher and higher the volcano rose, spewing out molten rock (symbolizing the creation of land masses and/or the "big bang"). Slowly it broke through the sea's surface, raining hot lava and forming a mountain. This mountain grew wider and taller until the mountain became an island. Although this mountain was bare, it was not barren.

On this mountain's peak, a strange event happened. The power of the sea touched the power of the sky. Afterwards, at that very place, sat a giant clam. The clam just sat. Its huge rippled jaws remained shut. Not moving. Not speaking. But growing.Day after day, the clam continued to grow. Its shell spread long and far. Its sweet, soft middle bulged bigger and bigger, pregnant with life. But the clam could not give birth.The sea spirits whispered their worries. They sent huge waves across the ocean, whipping them higher and higher. The great Clam rocked as the island trembled. Still, the birthing did not happen. The spirits screamed out their alarm, sending the sea crashing against the clam. The clam’s giant jaws still did not open.The most powerful of the gods, Ucheleanged, pointed at the darkness beneath the sea. Winds swirled. Waves peaked, curled, and plummeted. Thunder roared. Typhoon winds smashed against the giant clam. Still, the birthing did not begin. Ucheleanged again pointed to the darkness deep beneath the ocean. An enormous current coiled like a giant serpent. Faster and faster it coiled, gathering power to prepare for a mighty strike.

Ucheleanged roared! A monstrous stream of water rolled up from the sea and then across the land. A wall of ocean crashed against the clam. The mother clam, Latmikaik, shuddered. And then her giant lips began to open.The power in the water now tore again through the clam’s body. Her shell split fully apart. Her mouth now gaped open. All forms of life spewed out-out into the waters and onto the land. Terns and swifts flew up toward the heavens. They called to the others. “Come. Come out. Be born."The rest followed. The ghost crabs hurried into dark shadows. Snakes and sea eels slithered to dry holes and wet. Fruit bats stretched black wings as they hung upside down on branches, warming themselves in the sunlight. Crocodiles snapped at slow-moving lobsters. Dugongs nudged shy babes toward quiet lagoon waters. Sharks dashed into deep sea caves. Clouds of colour divided into two groups of animals. Birds and butterflies flew upward. Reef fish and creatures of the tide pools crawled back to the sea. The ocean laughed with life. The earth fluttered with colour. But the clam mother, Latmikaik, was not finished.

This ancient sea goddess, clam mother (an iteration of the Cosmic Ocean or Primordial Waters), shuddered. Once again her jaws opened. One more animal, a human child, crawled out. This giant baby was perhaps female (Chuab) or perhaps male (Uab) (symbolizing the duality of humanity, and therefore the necessity that the gender does not matter; they are one and the same, two as one). The tale is told both ways. But always the story tells how this selfish child brought both disaster and creation to Angaur, the world's first island. This child's appetite was monstrous. Ravenously, the child ate and ate. The child cared about nothing else but eating. "More, more, more! Bring more food. Hurry! More, more, more."The child quickly grew into a towering giant. As the giant grew, its appetite increased. Soon there was nothing left to eat. Nothing for the giant. Nothing for the people. Every breadfruit and coconut had been devoured. The sea waters were empty. Even the smallest reef fish had been netted and swallowed. But the giant demanded. "Bring food! If you have nothing else, bring me your children. I am hungry. I must eat!”At first, the people of Angaur whimpered in fear.

But then as their children began disappearing one after another, they whispered. “The lagoon is empty. The jungle has no banana nor breadfruit. Every coconut is gone. We must save our children."The people waited until the giant was sleeping. Quickly they stacked coconut stalks around the slumbering body and then lit the wood.

The giant awoke confused and in pain. He jumped to his feet, but already the burning flames formed a blazing wall that allowed no escape, He stared at the people. For the first time, he saw their fear and anguish. For the first time, he understood how cruel and selfish he had been.

“It is right that I die! I have taken with thoughtless greed. Now I must give back," (symbolizing the ego-death, the end of the worldly ideologies and materialism that fostered the greed within uab; the death of the self in order for humanity and the universe to live in harmony again, healed from the chaos caused by chaub/uab's greed). The giant spoke no more. His enormous body trembled. Slowly he toppled down, down, down. Flesh and bones shattered into hundreds of pieces, flying in all directions. Each piece became new land.The giant’s flesh and bones became the many islands of Palau. (it is only through selflessness and pure love that the giant was able to become a part of the world, which humanity loves for its sacrifice, and has always loved; feeding and feeding the child in a misguided, corrupted love that only favored desire and hunger for the material world).

Each place kept the characteristics of the part of the body from which it had come. Airai was formed from the bead. People from Airai are known for their wit and wisdom. Ngaraard is where the stomach landed. Here the people are famous for their good cooking and great appetites. Aimeliik is a part of the big island of Babeldaub, where the land is wet and moist. It rains every day. Aimeliik is where the giant’s penis (or the vagina of the giantess) landed. Water regularly flows at Aimeliik.You might wonder about the people of Angaur. After the fire had burned to ashes, the people searched through the coals. There they found a part of the body. The giant's feet had stayed on Angaur. The brave people of Angaur to this day are known for their swiftness-and their courage!

#indigenous.#queeresources.#oceana.#micronesia.#art.#writing.

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theferricfox · 7 months

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[[A/N: Wow, it's time for another Adventures of Arla series: my self-indulgent original short story series that no one knows about!

I don't know why, but I had an urge to write some horror-ish stuff. I'm not good at it by any means, but I did want to write it, so here you go, you lucky one person who will read this! (That person is me.)]]

Content warnings: brief implication of military-related PTSD and SI/SA; vomiting; body horror.

OF ASH AND FLAME

This wasn’t the first town that Arla had walked into that had a weird vibe to it, but the way her footsteps seemed to echo on the dirt road left her feeling on edge. Far from abandoned, the little town was positively bustling, but the people seemed more like lifeless automata than flesh and blood humans. She was reminded of the stories she heard as a kid of the wars fought when the balloons didn’t patrol the skies and there was still life in the salted waters of the oceans. In those stories, hordes of lifeless machines stood side-by-side, gunning each other down from across land stripped bare just for the purpose of the battle. In those days, the No Man’s Land between the sides wasn’t seeded with mines and blasted out fox holes like in the early days of war, but with the bodies of the unfortunate, squishy lifeforms that had the poor luck to be in the area designated for war.

Her father had shown her an old video of one such battle from some thirty or so years before she was born. It was an old digital file, corrupted by age and years of encrypting and decrypting, but she still saw those empty, hollow masks on top of humanoid figures, marching into lines and standing still, waiting for whatever counted as death for those never alive to begin with.

‘With the introduction of the Warrior Class Drone, Ma and Pa Civilian will never have to wonder if Little Johnny is coming home! Now, he fights for his Country from the comfort of Centre Command, far from the action!’

Her father had told her that Maroun Tech’s Warrior Class Drone had been adopted quickly, under the banner of saving countless soldier’s lives. What the adverts like the one he showed her didn’t talk about was how neural uplinks with the soldiers operating the Drones had made them feel hundreds of deaths over the course of a term of service. Most of them would ultimately choose a true death over the phantom pain haunting their dreams for the rest of their lives.

Here in this town, the faces of the people, so blank and unseeing, reminded her of that video. Arla thought it wasn’t that they were Empty, like the people in some of the towns in the former tropical regions that she’d heard of, but that they didn’t see the world. Not that she was skilled in that kind of analysis, but she did know that she felt a spark of life in the town somewhere, the Flame beckoning her southward like a whisper. There was some life here, real life, but she just didn't see it in the streets.

Arla checked into a hotel in the centre of town, and the person greeting her at the front desk leaned forward and inhaled deeply near her arm. The action seemed to trigger something in the clerk, because they grinned widely - shark-toothed her father would have called it - and offered her the premier suite at a discounted price. When Arla balked at the sudden generosity, the clerk waved her off, commenting that they simply didn’t get many visitors in the town and they didn’t want such a lovely room to go to waste. She had an unsettling feeling that rejecting the generosity would have unfavourable consequences, so she forced a smile and accepted the key, placing her chip on the countertop.

The room itself was indeed lovely. The bed was wide and soft, the linens fresh and luxurious. A sitting room with a coffee station overlooked what was probably once a park on the eastern part of town, and the fridge was fully stocked with water and liquor, much to her surprise. The bathroom was spacious, with fluffy, copper-coloured towels and robe, the shower walls a deep charcoal grey. For a room that was supposedly used so infrequently, it was spotlessly clean and comfortable, as though it was just tended to earlier in the morning. Perhaps it was, though it seemed strange that a hotel that saw few customers would tend to their twenty-something rooms daily with little hope of the beds being slept in on a given day.

Arla’s plans had her in this town for just under a week as long as she could get her task done quickly enough. She supposed she should be grateful for such a nice room to use in that time, but the taste in the air left her increasingly unsettled.

Still, she unpacked her bag, slipping her clothes into the bureau and pulling out a small metallic ball from her pocket. The ball shone in the light of the sun as a few lingering morning rays slipped through the east-facing windows, rocking gently on the bedsheets as the internal mechanisms started to activate. A soft whirring filled the room as the ball unfurled into something resembling an insect. Arla looked at the construct with a smile.

“Tickle my thistle,” she said to it. The little device shook as though throwing water from its body and jumped to the windowsill. Arla opened the window and let it out, watching briefly as it skittered onto the outer wall and out of sight as the camouflage mechanism activated.

Arla set the rest of her things in place and walked to the bathroom, letting down her hair and examining the soft crust of dust on her face. The ride here hadn’t been long; just three hours by bus after her stay in Jell’s spare room. Still, the dust got everywhere, even with the windows closed and filters on the fans. It had a way of creeping into all the little places, like the confluence of so many insects on a tree after a mudstorm.

She stripped down, her clothes folded and carefully placed on the sink counter-top, and turned on the shower. The spout sputtered loudly, sounding near to a Coalie’s cough, before water began to shoot from the copper-coloured shower head. Arla figured there had been air in the pipes, a sign of the room’s disuse, but when she stepped into the shower, she found a tarry black sludge on the floor near the drain. Bending down to look at the pile carefully, she found the mass to smell somewhat like smoldering embers tainted with putrid meat.

Arla fought the urge to gag as she scooped up the sludge with a towel and dumped it into the toilet, quickly flushing it away. She then scrubbed the floor of the shower with the towel, the water turned to full heat and a generous glob of soap poured on top of where it had sat, before she discarded the towel into the hamper under the sink. She washed her hands in the sink several times, wincing as the water burned her hands somewhat, before she finally stepped into the shower.

Arla didn’t want to spend too much time thinking about what that sludge was or where it came from; she was just grateful that the water coming from the showerhead was clean and didn’t smell anything like that horrific stuff. Still, she stood straddling the area where it had slapped onto the shower floor, a deep-seated feeling in the back of her mind telling her that it was in her best interest to avoid contact with the material as much as possible. She scrubbed her scalp and her skin, feeling the dust slough off her skin with a sense of relief. After, she stood under the spray of hot water for a long time, eyes closed, her nerves finally settling.

Getting out of the shower, she wrapped the robe around herself and tied down the unruly curls of her hair underneath a towel and stepped out into the main room of the suite. The afternoon sun lit the room, highlighting the deep charcoal of the walls, dark wood of the furniture, and stark white of the bedsheets. The contrast of the room design compared to other hotels Arla had stayed in before was somewhat startling, but this was an old town; a very old town. Perhaps this was just part of local design, or some unruly architect had put more personal flare into the building than most.

Sitting on the bed, Arla squeezed her hair through the towel, staring out the window as the bustle of people continued in the street. It was still so odd how a town so small could be so busy. The last recorded population size was only five hundred or so people, and the town itself took up so little land. And yet, it seemed almost as though every single person living in the town was walking the street, carrying boxes or bags, glancing at a book or paper, or staring blankly ahead. Almost no one talked to each other on the street, and even those whose lips Arla could see moving didn’t appear to be holding a conversation so much as talking to themselves.

Moving closer to the window, Arla looked down into the street and watched a man with a newsboy cap and trim beard. He walked down the main street, approaching the hotel, a cup in his hand. When he neared the door of the hotel, he turned around on his heel and continued the way he had come, back up the main street. When he neared the local grocery, he turned again and headed back towards the hotel.

The sight made something in Arla’s chest tighten, and the Flame within her seemed to be tugging her southward again, the sensation a tight rope wrapped around her ribcage. She turned away from the window and pulled the curtains shut, blocking all light from the room aside from the small bedside lamp that she had turned on earlier.

Better to have a nap and try to forget the eerie sight than to venture into the town just yet.

Laying down on the plush sheets, Arla sighed and stared at the ceiling. The soft linens caressed her skin, easing her into a sense of relief. Rolling over and clutching a pillow to her chest, she thought she smelled something like lavender and charcoal before she fell into a heavy sleep.

She woke to the stench of putrid meat. Opening her eyes, she stifled a gag to see the bathroom covered in the sludge that had fallen from the showerhead. It oozed from the shower, the sink, the toilet, even the walls, throbbing and slithering in her direction. Within her, the Flame swelled and contracted in time with the grotesque pile growing before her eyes.

She retched, bile crawling up her throat as the smell filled the room, seeping into her pores and tainting her blood. She reached for the robe, discarded on the other side of the bed, and found it to be slimy, a horrid amalgam of flesh and rust and blood slipping through her fingertips as it melted into the linen.

Arla climbed to her feet, her toes digging into the plush mattress as she walked to the edge and jumped over the seeping sludge of putrescence to what remained of clean floor. The heel of her foot touched the black throbbing mass, and she felt an horrific burning in her leg, bringing her to her knees as she cried out. As if responding to the contact with her flesh, the sludge shifted, moving quickly to cover her body, creeping up inch by inch at a staggering pace, her skin burning as it was engulfed. The Flame surged, seeming to join the sludge as it burned her alive, skin and bone melting into ash. She cried out as her chest was enveloped, heat crushing her lungs as she desperately reached into the room for a saviour that would never come.

***

Arla sat up in the bed, a cold sweat drenching her skin as she frantically looked around the room. It was as spotless as it had ever been, the encroaching sludge a simple, if horrific, dream.

Arla dressed quickly and went downstairs, deciding that it was time for dinner. Perhaps an empty stomach had fueled her feverish nightmare after her strange observations of the townspeople. An irrational thought, really, but one needs to hold onto hope.

In the hotel's lobby, a jaunty tune played on an old radio, but no one seemed to be manning the bar. Arla walked to the clerk's desk and rang the bell, offering a friendly smile as the clerk emerged from a rear room.

"Do you have dinner service in your restaurant tonight?" Arla asked.

"Oh, of course." The clerk grinned, the same broad-toothed smile from earlier. "But not until after service."

"You mean a church service?" Arla asked.

"That's right. It's mandatory attendance, and it's going to start in just about ten minutes. I was just about to head over myself. Why don't I escort you?"

Arla maintained her smile as best she could, even as the hair on the back of her neck stood on end.

"Oh, no, thank you. I'm not acquainted enough with the town's faith to attend, I'm sure. If you'll just tell me when the dinner service will be available, I'll come back downstairs then."

"Oh, darlin'..." The clerk tsked at Arla as two men grabbed her arms from behind. "Didn't you hear me say it's mandatory?"

Arla was marched into the dusty street and southward, the clerk leading the way as the two men held her arms tightly. As they walked, the Flame tugged at her, urging her onwards. She felt on the edge of a trance, tottering on a dangerous precipice of lucidity as her vision tunneled the closer she got to the church.

She tried to focus on what the hotel clerk was saying, but some esoteric force deep within her seemed to team up with the Flame to stop her ears and pull her forward, towards the church, even as her legs grew weak in its shadow. She had a vague sense of being carried, but couldn't tell if it was the men holding her arms or something else.

Reaching the church doors, Arla felt an overwhelming pressure both surrounding her and pushing out from within. She approached the altar, climbing atop the podium. The Flame surged, the birth and death of the universe cycling through her body, killing and birthing her anew, a heartbeat pulse shaking the walls of the church as the congregation cried out in awe.

"She does not Burn!" someone shouted.

"She is the one who will Smolder, turning the world to Ash so we will rise as the Phoenix does!"

She watched from outside herself as someone approached her, some congregant with eyes full of tears, a gleeful smile on their face. They reached out, a trembling hand coming within just a few inches before their skin burst into Flames, their soft moan as they became one of the Burned, slowly turning to Charcoal whilst the room watched in awe.

Arla felt herself become nauseated as the Burned moaned softly on the floor, a quiet writhing that reminded her of the day she inherited the Flame. To her horror, the Ash rose into the air and was sucked into her nostrils, down her throat to settle in her lungs. She wanted to cough, but detached as she was from her body, she could only watch as person after person came to her, reaching out for the Flame within her only to Burn and be subsumed by her.

Her lungs felt like she was drowning in Ash, the dust turning to the hideous sludge from her hotel room. After what seemed like ages, but must have been only as long as ten Burnings, the Flame within her pulsed violently, shaking the walls again. The congregation collapsed and Arla fell with them, slumped over the podium as her vision went black.

***

Arla awoke in her hotel room as the sun started to peek through the curtains. She groaned, cursing herself for not closing the curtains all the way, and sat up, rubbing her eyes. A tittering at the window caught her attention, and she opened it to allow the small construct back in, where it sat upon her console for a long moment, humming, before rolling back into a ball.

Arla shut the window again, watching the town start to wake up. People walked into the diner for breakfast, children took to the streets on their way to school, and conversations in the street floated up to the glass of her room. She watched curiously as one man, with a newsboy cap and trim beard walked from the grocery to the hotel and back again. Every time he approached the hotel, he appeared to be looking up at Arla, holding her gaze, though she knew he could not have seen her at the window.

She put her bags back together and stepped into the bathroom to brush her teeth. Before she got the toothbrush into her mouth, she retched, and rushed over to the toilet just before she vomited. To her disgust, what came out of her mouth was a foul-smelling black sludge. She quickly flushed it away, returning to the task of brushing her teeth to rid herself of the taste of charcoal and putrid meat.

Arla walked downstairs to check out, finding the clerk sitting behind the desk, reading an old book. They grinned at her, in a way her father might have likened to a 'Cheshire cat,' as they took her room key.

"Leaving already?" The clerk asked as they finalized the charges.

"Yes," Arla said, unnerved by their smile. "I'm afraid I've been called back to work."

"A shame," the clerk tsked. "We've enjoyed having you here."

Arla hummed in response, signing the document placed before her and waving as she walked out.

"Thank you for everything."

***

Riding the bus out of town, heading south, Arla watched the landscape pass by. An old church in the distance, marked only by a crumbling, burned-out spire, caught her eye. Within her, the Flame seemed to tug in the direction of that old building.

Arla turned her attention away from the building, a small cough of dust escaping her mouth.

#adventures of arla #ferricfox writes #short story

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