#going from talking about bugs | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

ms-scarletwings · 8 months

Text

New (Cursed AF) Invader Zim Headcanon:

Barring the potential for major acute blood loss, Irkens can actually survive a full decapitation.

And I brought substance to make the case with.

Cockroaches, one of the most infamously durable of real life animals, can live for several days, sometimes even weeks without their head. And for the most part, they still even act like normal roaches- crawling about, reacting to touch, standing around, etc. it seems the only reason this eventually catches up to the critter is because no mouth = no way to keep bringing necessary food and water into the body. If that were bypassed, however, it stands to reason the little zombie could thrive just as much as a headed roach.

Almost disturbingly, the head itself can actually last a surprising amount of time solo as well. Experiments with decapitated roaches show that after body separation, roach heads can still move their antennae for hours before succumbing- much longer even if kept refrigerated and supplied with nutrients.

One of the neat things about roach bodies that makes such a feat possible is how their nervous system is set up- simplified ref against what yours looks like below

Now, anyone who has ever said a roach can survive for a while without its brain is not being entirely accurate. Functionally, they actually have two sort-of brains: the main point of nerve centralization is contained in the head, which for the most part is a primary brain responsible for movement coordination, certain technical functions, interpreting stimuli that comes in from the antennae, and more. The second main point of interest in this system is a series of nerve clusters running down the insect’s abdomen known as ganglia (singular: ganglion). These bundles of neurons are not exactly brains in their own right, but they do function as an extended CNS that handles the control over the digestive tract, reacting to stimuli, leg movement, and other more basic bodily functions. These can operate the body on a primitive level after the loss of the main brain, up until thirst/starvation begins to run the wind out of the sails.

You know what sort of creature actually DOES have two entire complete brains? One up top, and an auxiliary backup a little further down?

If you were nodding along and saying “irkens!” Then you would be correct! One peanut and five more days in the bunker for you 🥜 ~

As is obvious to anyone familiar with the show, the PAK is an essential cybernetic addition to Irken biology, holding their gear as well as an entire digital backup of their personality and memories. While it serves many functions to the user, the first and foremost priority of one is to protect the existence of the meaty entity it needs in to carry itself around.

To that end we’ve seen some autonomous acts from time to time with Zim’s close calls. If you recall “Plague of Babies”, he… kind of died for a moment there, caught up in a wave of GIR’s lethally amplified stupidity. In response, his PAK appears to resuscitate him with a quick jolt. The would-be events of “10 Minutes to Doom” emphasize the necessity of the PAK for any Irken’s survival beyond several minutes, which directly implies PAKs facilitate a major biological process their natural bodies are no longer capable of alone. Personally, I think it might be something either neurological or related to respiration, on a hunch.

Well, whatever it is, they are toast without it in swift manner, and the PAK doesn’t prefer to be without its other piece anymore than the body does. Dib’s revelation about the technology described their relationship with its body like that of driver and car, but I think he’s missing something. The PAK is actually more than capable of carrying itself around without the body… at least for a time.

When I think about those things, a little dilemma pops up in my head concerning how they.. well, how they’re powered. It is never explained or demonstrated that they are given time off of the body in order to charge; however, irkens are probably advanced enough to have some smaller and sci-fi wildly potent and small energy source up their sleeves, but actually, that wouldn’t quite make sense here. Because Irken bodies still produce their energy the same way every other lifeform in the known galaxy does, with food. Lots of food, actually. They can mow through snacks at about the same rate as Augustus Gloop. PAKs don’t need to produce their own independent energy source, they just need to efficiently make use of what this organism is already evolutionarily fine tuned to do naturally. Now that’s smart engineering.

And so, like any respectable auxiliary life support feature, they hold some of that energy in a reserve for those crisis moments like in “Plague of Babies”, and also in a deleted scene made for “Abduction”!

Fun trivia fact, but originally that episode was supposed to feature a sequence where Zim nearly game overs again. He takes a gnarly hit and a literal plunge through open flames that knocks him out in a free fall.

Despite his incapacitated state, the PAK extends its spider legs in order to catch a walkway railing, both saving his life and proceeding to keep carrying his limp body to a safer location, until of of course, he comes to about a moment later and carries on.

And neither of these are the only times it’s sprung into action the moment it detects something has gone horribly wrong. When accidentally detached from its own host, an emergency response will be triggered within the PAK in an attempt to reattach with its body. Failing that, it attaches instead to… well, whatever it can find.

In “10 minutes to Doom”, this was unfortunately Dib, an incompatible match (or maybe it just picked an improper attachment site), and in the comics… things got interesting at a point or two.

So, I already know what happens when you separate an Irken from their spinal brain, but what about the cranial one?

Because, they actually don’t seem on the same level of urgent necessity? Now that I think about it?

The time machine kerfuffle and the brain eating parasite escape were both events this guy evidently survived, albeit not comfortably or ideally until the problem was fixed (I have to assume in part with GIR’s or the Computer’s help). Now that I think about it Zim’s incredibly fortunate that most of these more serious mishaps happened inside of his base. But it’s theory time.

So, we do this, to a hypothetical green bug bastard

For fun let’s say, hypothetically again, like the hardy earth roach, he blood clots quickly.

Well, first and foremost, that higher up nervous system blackout is probably going to cue the PAK in to begin the following protocol:

1. Activate an emergency response to quickly access the situation.

2. Immediately scurry the body the hell away from whatever manner of threat just shaved a little too much off the top, engaging in all possible defensive measures if necessary.

3. Devote the entirety of its remaining backup power (of which it would have much more stored within the headless body than if it were itself detached) into making a beeline for the coordinates of the nearest Irken source of assistance. On the homeworld, or any fully colonized planet, this would be a cut and dry matter of finding the nearest theoretical space clinic or whatever those freaks have (maybe those dbz regeneration tanks? Idk that would be cool wouldn’t it?). For the lone invader… home base is the next best alternative, being a secured location with plenty of resources and advanced technology at the ready. I would bet my own head that situations like this are a huge highlight to the prime value of a personal SIR companion.

Now, best case scenario for what this help looks like depends on whether we can save and bring the head along too. Reattachment and repair at that point should be a pretty simple matter at the tech level we are working with, afterall. But that’s again, the ideal case scenario. Could they just… regrow the head eventually? We don’t really have a clear answer on what the limits and capabilities of what the Irken healing factor is, but I want to at least guess that having a personal lab and assistant on hand is going to help. Bare minimum, a solution can get worked out to supply the body with needed blood sugars again to buy more time.

The PAK itself retains a pretty much perfect digital backup of its body’s memories, experiences, and identity, so it’s not like information has been permanently been lost with primary brain damage. Replacing the primary brain entirely might be as easy as backing up your iPhone and downloading everything into some shiny new hardware. Hell, it may not even need be Irken hardware!

Do you know the real disturbing things from “Dark Harvest” NOBODY brings up are???

Why the fuck was an instantaneous organ-swapping device already just something Zim was carrying around in his toolset?

And

Zim’s morphology was horrifically receptive to those dozens of xenographs.

Those human organs were actually beating, pulsing, absolutely redundant and unnecessary in his body, but completely still functional and healthy in the name of selling his act to the school nurse. He didn’t just clumsily cram a bunch of offal into himself, he competently integrated them into his biology and somehow wasn’t suffering like… the tons of complications you’d expect from trying a stunt like that.

And in the comics, there’s this other fella I just adore for how skrangly he looks, and believe it or not, his actual fucking name is Skrang.

He’s a smart guy, though. Don’t be fooled. And I mean like, a smart guy. And it’s all thanks to a little help from a little upgrade he’s been fitted with :)

So, I hope you take all the implications I’ve been building here and make what you will of them. I genuinely think an Irken has a decent chance of making it out of a beheading alive to seek sadistic vengeance another day. Do I think ZIM could do such a thing? Tbh, I think he’d have to rely on GIR to come in clutch, and we may know that’s a complete roll of the dice in any case.

Wow, this got morbid, but, par for the course really.

#invader zim #iz headcanons #iz analysis #irkens #cool bug facts #cockroaches #iz skrang #scarlet talks about things #long post #anyway now I just want the hypothetical where dib reacts to this scenario #cause that would mess me up for a long time #like just picture a fight with your nemesis gone HORRIBLY wrong from some accident #and then dude just shows up the next day in class like… fine but pretty pissed off about the whole thing #and then he jumps over the desk and strangles you when you make bad puns about the whole ordeal #comedy/horror GOLD #HELP ME THIS WAS SUPPOSED TO BE A SHORT POST BTW #NOT ANOTHER GD ESSAY #oh boy here i go hyperfixating again

141 notes · View notes

carnivalcarriondiscarded · 5 months

Note

Hey, so for the Human Au, how do think Julie would go about her life? Considering her personality in the website, I would think that he takes up different part-time jobs, but mainly likes working at the community center, mainly for the summer/after school programs where they can come up with and host fun activities for the kids!

no yeah that's pretty much what i was thinking! she bounces from job to job - she probably has a roster of seasonal ones that she rotates between. Julie really does seem like an every-gal yk? doing just one thing all the time would be soooo boring

i like the idea of summer / after school programs a lot actually! since canon Julie is big on games and fun, i'm sure she'd be a great choice for those sorts of things. i bet she works a seasonal summer camp in their county!

#also it would be a cute frank-julie bestie thing #cause frank is a university professor #so then julie being in the education system as a camp counselor / school programs person whatever brains not braining rn #I Just Think It Would Be Sweet! and Fitting!#part of me wants to change Frank from university professor to like a uhhh elementary school teacher #but nah. but lets just say the local schools will have field trips and uh. idk a 'bug day'#yk how kindergartens and elementary schools would sometimes have a giant snake brought in or whatever #well i imagine that in this au frank keeps insects as 'pets'#(not pets as in companion animal but. he has a lot of arthropod tanks in his house lol)#so maybe a couple times a year he gets to interact with kids and julie's probably there too!#ohhhh maybe sometimes he'll go to the summer camp for like. education day or whatever #to talk about insects and animal safety or somethn #he's out there with a tarantula chilling on his head...#most of the kids are disinterested but one or two are so Intrigued and its. adorable. anyway this is about julie #rambles from the bog #wh modern human au #i like to think that both julie and barnaby have seasonal jobs at the county fair #it just lasts a few weeks but they have a good time! barnaby can put his clowning degree to Use!#but im having a great time picturing julie coming up with games and stuff and putting it to good use!#i bet she'd be great at finding compromises and solutions to those Schoolyard Problems yk #i said schoolyard problems and flashbacked to the multiple bad injuries at my elementary. & the seizure in hs...#hm. i saw a lot of serious shit. anyhow not the point #i bet julie is that one guy where whenever someone brings up an odd job she's like 'yeah ive done that'#slingin ice cream? catering? florist delivery? doughnut baker? budtender? running bingo night? Yes To It All!#i bet that in a way... howdy is jealous...

33 notes · View notes

charmac · 19 days

Note

i don't think people hcing charlie as transfem are trying to dismiss the transmasc charlie hc! i think it's more of a projection thing for a lot of people, since i know at least a few of the main people who enjoy the headcanon are transfem themselves!! i don't think you have much to worry about in terms of people dismissing the tmasc or other genderqueer charlie hc anyways, since it's already much more popular! i think you're perhaps being a bit too critical.

I've literally never said anything like this at all, I think you've either misinterpreted something else I've said or have the wrong blog.

All of my Charlie gender-based posts or reblogs I've stated/tagged that I think any interpretation of Charlie's gender can make sense, be it transmasculine, transfeminine, nonbinary, agender, whatever you want.

I am one of the ~3 blogs that has access to The Bathroom Problem script and who posted and pointed out that you can make out/slightly hear the Joyce cuts in the episode itself. I would not have excitedly shared that for open-interpretation if I was "worried" people are "dismissing" transmasc Charlie headcanons. (Which, again, I've literally never said, but in any case, I believe it's valid for anyone to dismiss a headcanon they don't agree with, fandom is a sandbox.)

What I personally don't care for are genderbends and, almost by extension, analysis/meta on canon scenes that rename/re-gender the characters with no basis (or, one that comes off wrong). Both topics I've literally never publicly spoken out against here, nor have I said anything bad/negative to everyone who personally enjoys these things, so there is no way for me to possibly be "too critical" in that regard. I keep most of my opinions to myself and my close mutuals, almost exactly for what you're saying: I personally don't want to harsh or dismiss anyone's headcanons.

I have never said, and have never meant to imply, that anyone interpreting Charlie as transfem is attempting to dismiss anyone else's headcanon (which again would be a non issue to me anyway).

#if youre coming here from a certain twitter post #which #mind you was a 3 deep reply to one specific mutual. aka not a public criticism #i believe you are incorrectly interpreting what my issue is #bc it is not about 'headcanon erasure'#and i did not post about it on this blog. never intended to. because im not trying to be critical or dismissive. im venting to mutuals #if youre saying i cant personally have an issue with something idk what to tell you lol. ok?#and if youre one of my mutuals who ive like #personally ranted to about these various things #idk that would be very random and kinda weird to come into my askbox on anon about this #my dms are always open to chat i like having critical and opposing conversations #anyway im not trying to win the charlie gender headcanon war i literally dgaf #i dont even talk about transmasc charlie much at all? so idk where that idea comes from #like im pretty seated in him being amab i just enjoy other peoples transmasc interpretations #im way too rooted in canon in actuality to care much about all this!#hence. why canon misinterpretation bugs me *personally*#ok im going to the back office to get drunk #ask

15 notes · View notes

dailykugisaki · 5 months

Text

Day fourty-one | id in alt

Kugisaki looks so wack Everytime she's not paying attention, she's thinking of shopping, meaning a friend or a third more sinister and bad thing.

#dailykugisaki #jjk #kugisaki nobara #itadori yuji #nanami kento #A LIL OF HIM BC I VANT DRAW HIM #trust before i slapped on itadori i was trying my fucking hardesy to draw him and it just wasn't fucking clicking #hes cool but i low-key think i cant draw suits #pink ass drink #idk Kugisaki made me sad earlier because i thought about how she and her grandma got into a fight before she left her own it was WILD to fi #nd that how in twitter q&a posts and the wiki #also i coulf go on forever about nobara #because gege cant fucking build up a character that has no ties to the major clans or the bug bads apparently #Kugisaki was expirienced but like ts never talked upon on what she did to learn that early #she was legit building herself from thw ground up in a group of fucking prodigies!!! she is the fucking WORLD #Kugisaki should've been expanded upon because she is like she doesn't have inherited powerful techniques #she could've been exquisite and im always pissed about it #Bucket slightly rants in the tags

35 notes · View notes

desicowgirl · 4 days

Text

Had dinner with my parents tonight which means…new ammi-ji and baba lore just dropped 🌟

Apparently back in Pakistan when my mom was a nurse and my dad was a medical intern they would have competitions between one another on who could insert IVs onto difficult patients when they were working in the same unit. The gleam in both of their eyes when they were telling me stories about those days was so adorable. My dad was telling me about how when my nani was a patient at the hospital (before my parents married) he would visit her an insane amount of times, bring her flowers, and just go and charm her 😭 and my nani ATE IT UUUUPPP 🙂‍↕️ hearing my parents talk about things like this makes me smile so big that my cheeks start to hurt.

#my parents are such love bugs #they have gone from exchanging love notes in their hospital charts #to going on weekly dates to Costco 😭 and they love it #mashAllah #talking about my dad yesterday made me miss my parents so I made sure to make it to dinner with them tonight #am soooo glad I did #my dad was definitely suspicious as to why I was asking questions about his Pakistan days 😭#bea speaks #my life #a family documentary

10 notes · View notes

the-final-sif · 2 years

Text

Also, just as a general comment on the whole Dream situation on one of the takes I kept seeing; y'all know that snapchat is like, an actual platform people use to talk to each other, right? It's not like, a creepy platform only used by predators. Right? Like. I've never had a snapchat account, and literally all throughout college I'd get offered people's snapchats and have to say I didn't have it and ask for their phone number instead. My like 45 year old boss uses snapchat to talk with her like 20 year old kids. I once had to write an actual email to another human being to tell them no, they could not put down their snapchat handle as an emergency contact method for their club paperwork.

Idk I had to actually check with other people in the discord to make sure I wasn't insane, and no, other people reported the same thing. Snapchat is a normal platform people use to talk to others. But for some reason, I kept seeing that take that somehow giving a snapchat was inherently predatory and that threw me for one hell of a loop. I'm really just not sure where that idea came from.

#dreamwastaken #dream discourse #discourse #this is def more of a personal opinion but it's been bugging me since I got that anon awhile back and I want to throw this out there #sif speaks #like again I am remaining in my camp of waiting on words from lawyers #but I did want to address this because that take was weird as hell to me #and made me question whether snapchat was really just like a niche platform everyone else at my college used for some reason #also had one person for that club try to put down a discord handle #the snapchat person was understanding #the discord handle person tried to argue with me that their phone number was too personal #and I was like #dude if you end up lost in the middle of nowhere we need to be able to call you on a real actual phone not see if you have discord on #alright back to me talking about defamation laws b/c legal cases make my brain go burr

145 notes · View notes

ratcandy · 1 month

Text

whirligig beetles are so fucking weird WHY are your eyes like that girliepop!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

there's FOUR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! what the FUCK, BABE!!!! The predaceous diving beetles are water bugs too and you don't see THEM rocking the two eye on top two eye on bottom design. you weird little freak

#i know it's because whirligig beetles hang out on the surface of the water and predaceous diving beetles are . diving beetles #but bear with me I caught a whirligig beetle a while back and just now looked at the head under a microscope to make sure it was a #whirligig beetle and got caught OFF GUARD by how FREAKY the eyes looked!!!!#like we were TOLD ''oh yeah you can easily differentiate whirligig beetles from diving beetles and water scavengers because they #got 'four' eyes going on'' but I was like Surely it won't be that noticeable #IT WAS NOTICEABLE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!#and why are you called Gryinidae what are you GRYINNING about. not talking about how silly of a name whirligig is.#ok that was my entomology talk for the day.#clamtalk #bugs #bugposting

8 notes · View notes

wizardnuke · 8 months

Text

apropos of absolutely nothing. i am not a witchy person i am never really going to be. but. but. if crystals are "magic" or give "good vibes" or whatever it's because they're Of The Earth. you know what's better than getting some cheap quartz at a boho store. finding a really fucking cool rock. or a stick. i think if physical items have the sort of power people believe they do then it would come from literally anything that nature makes and you have to love that thing at least a little bit. anyway don't steal from parks and don't put rocks up your vagina.

#i wholeheartedly believe that carrying around a piece of bark you found on the side of the road is a thousand times more likely to #manifest good things for you than the $8 shiny perfect rock that was imported from a child slave labor mine #was talking about this with my pagan/witchy bf like. finding and loving and working with a cool stick is probably going to give better #results than Buying Rocks. anyway my no-fun psych perspective on it is that a lot of practices involving this focus heavily on staying #present and in tune with nature/your surroundings. and that's really good for you no matter what you believe in #and it is going to make you happy and it is going to help you in every aspect of your life. do things with intention #thank a bug. put ur hands in the dirt. u are part of a very big n very unknown world n i do believe there's more to it than whats visible #i find it very hard to believe that certain items do certain things but yall do you. i see where you're coming from and im kissing u

26 notes · View notes

cinna-bunnie · 8 months

Text

so like..

is the idea that as a compromise to only having to toggle off tumblr live once a month, you now have this permanent tumblr live icon regardless of ur setting choice stuck to the bottom in the middle of everything in the hopes that i click on it accidentally anyways even though it's clear i don't want it or? where is the NO 100% STOP GIVING ME THIS SHIT I DON'T ACCEPT YOUR POLICIES AND LITERALLY COULD NOT CARE LESS ABOUT TUMBLR LIVE AND WILL NEVER BE INTERESTED IN THIS TYPE OF FEATURE OR FORMAT.

@zingring @photomatt @humans idk how many feedback requests people have to cut tumblr for "no" to just be a valid response here. ppl aren't dumb and see u inching over the line trying to force this on them despite the snooze choice.

what, are there so many ppl snoozing and such a low adoption rate that you know you need to trick users into using it so you can "make number go up" or? 🙄

#snoozing tumblr live for a month but perpetually having a big centered button that will take you there immediately at all #times while also inherently meaning that you've accepted the privacy policies and TOS for using a third party service #tumblr is so fucking annoying is2g i should just pester my mutuals repeatedly about getting onto cohost and being active instead #of talking to a fucking brick wall because obviously NO ONE at tumblr gives a shit that NO ONE wants to use their shitty third #party live stream feature. for the millionth time leave me alooooone #my patience and grace for this site is almost entirely spent y'all ngl (⁠´⁠-⁠﹏⁠-⁠`⁠；⁠) tumblr is like one or two annoying updates away from #me bugging y'all to get on cohost. was hoping there'd be a few more good updates before we got back to the annoying enraging ones.#like.. seeing if ppl r mutuals or followers on mobile? 👍 snoozing going from 7 to 30 days? 👍 live being there despite snoozing? 👎🔫#I'm STILL not over this whole twitter UI too in the browser too. tumblr's trying sooo hard to be a blogging platform in a twitter trenchcoat #u ARE a blogging platform and are functionally different than a typical social media site in multiple key ways. why r u downgrading urself #it's bc matt thinks elon's sooooo cute and wants to kiss him so bad he'd do anything to get his attention #even crash the popularity of his site and burn his good grace he had w the platforms community.#y'all rich mf need some hobbies i swear to god (⁠´⁠-⁠﹏⁠-⁠`⁠；⁠) y'all get bored or divorced n start tryna fix shit that ain't broken. pests.#now it's everyone else's problem too 🙄

24 notes · View notes

itissadbutitsmy-artblog · 1 year

Photo

all the lyrics are good and stupid emo hehe

But it's the pain (pain) that I will leave behind, The guilty, they will suffer, but the rest of us can die The pain (pain) that I will give to you, The guilty, they would shiver if they knew what I could do :)

textless version under the cut ;)

#me ohhhh im so normal about wizard city (FDRAWS F U C K I N G THIS???)#its lyrics from shoreline by nomy #shouldnt have given me a little man who died with little boots on. it did something to my brain #adventure time #digital #distant lands #spader #peppermint #peppermint butler #spader. close your mouth youre going to inhale a bug. good lord.#It's hard to live when you are getting older / But it's easier to die when you are young!#im posting this outside my queue cuz i. want u to lok at it :) i was in the wc tag last night like ohhh i miss these guys #(<-- doesnt tag posts as wizard city) i wonder why the wc tag is so empty :'(#will i ever get tired of drawing spader as a weird little ghost. no. will i ever stop talking in the tags when i draw digitally. also no

40 notes · View notes

secret-bug-pain-blog · 5 months

Text

[THURSDAY]

Buried Alive - Outlived Family - "Not growing old was fun at first, but then everyone around me started dying."

Hi! Hello! We're here, Late To The Event. Technically, we have plans for all these days! We only remembered this event was ongoing halfway through the week, and by then... well, you know how it is. Technically, this isn't fully compliant with the prompt, but it's close enough that we figure it counts, since outliving his entire family was actually slightly less impactful than outliving his husband for our boy.

Fic below the cut, and @species-whump-weekly we sincerely hope this isn't too late to count.

You have been asleep for long enough that you aren't even sure if he'll still be alive.

His swarm finds you before you find them.

Marina gasps when she sees you. She's years older, now - wings worn at the edges, shell thin and flimsy, aged far beyond the young butterfly you saw her as last.

She looks older than you ever have been. She looks older than you suspect you ever will be.

Her father, your friend – your paramour, your years-long companion – isn’t with her. You fear, for a moment, you’ve stumbled upon them too late. You nearly cringe away from the migration them and there, fearful of discovering yet another thing that’s slipped away while you hibernated.

But you don’t have the heart to walk away.

He’s been waiting for you.

He is old, and frail, and dying. You can taste the creeping end in his veins from the moment you step foot into the tent. His shell is pitted with age, now, cracked and chinked in places, brittle enough that you fear taking his hand will hurt him. Time has weathered him, his wings transparent and paper-thin around him, and you… you stay the same, looking just as young as the day you first met him on the stolen life of those who unearthed your grave.

“I knew you’d come back,” he tells you. “You wouldn’t die that easily.”

You hold his frail, trembling claw in both of yours. You aren’t sure how he can say that so confidently. He has always had more faith in you than you have in yourself.

He invites you to drain him.

You hesitate, at first. Every instinct you have picked up over your long, long life is screaming for you to run. To survive, to keep your secret- he knows, and it's against everything you've ever learned to remain, to let him speak, to not preserve your life-

He knows. But maybe he's known for a long, long time.

You take his offer. You take his life.

You know what it is that killed him the moment you bite. The magic of the wastes, the low hum that seeps into your bones, the constant background noise that sometimes threatens to tear you apart - it gathers within him, down to the deepest parts of his shell. There are lumps of flesh in his heart, his lungs, full of the same mind-jarring, skull-shattering buzz.

He has the wasteland sickness.

You think that, perhaps, he has had the wasteland sickness for a long time.

You drain him until he is dry, until every last flicker of the wasteland sickness is gone from his body, until he is stiff and his flesh holds the texture of jerky, and you let your fangs linger on his shrivelled veins until you can't bear to remain anymore.

You are sick, the next day.

And the day after that, and the day after that.

The buzz is in your bones, now - too close, too loud, rattling through your shell like a twisted beast. You have the wasteland sickness, stolen from his dying body, and it is trying to take you the way it took him.

You do not die.

You don't know if it's a blessing or a curse, anymore.

It is energy. It is vitality, the buzzing, throbbing pulse beyond the heart of a beast on a scale you cannot comprehend.

It is life force, and you can stomach it just the same.

A week passes. Two weeks. The symptoms slow, as you digest it. It becomes your life, your energy, it bends to keep you alive, it becomes you, while you lie weak and dizzy and throwing up blood.

It becomes you. You become it, in turn.

It is the last pulse of your husband, and you refuse to waste it.

You stumble out of the tent two weeks later, exhausted and bearing injuries you cannot see with your naked eyes. You are tired, and hurt, and you have burnt through most of the life you had, but you are alive.

His body is still waiting for you.

#species whump weekly #monsieur scarlet #whump #my posts #writing #my writing #nonhuman whumpee #character death #bug fables #walks up a week late to the week long event. hey everyone whats up #we are going to make you feel sad about a vampire and you will have no choice in the matter #our vampire is very nontraditional but he is still a vampire unless youre gonna exclude a LOT of classic vamps from the category #life force draining ant guy who is kinda sorta immortal and heavily nomadic #his husband here is a monarch butterfly and will be unfamiliar to everyone because we havent talked about him yet #if you are in the bug fables tag looking at this: hi. we're doing crimes to guys for event purposes again #nothing new for us but you may enjoy this later

12 notes · View notes