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cheesycatz · 1 year

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(Wormton AU) More worm ramblings from the depths of my mind ⬇️⬇️⬇️👇⬇️⬇️⬇️

(updated May 18, 2024)

Exoskeleton

An exoskeleton, a hard and protective outer layer that acts as a skeleton for certain invertebrates, is a shared feature among malworms. For the email worm genus, larvae have a softer epidermis that hardens into a proper exoskeleton once they reach adulthood. Because the exoskeleton becomes very tough, it needs to be molted, or shed, as part of the regular growth and healing process, allowing a new, larger exoskeleton to grow as the old one is discarded. Malworms do not molt their exoskeletons until adulthood, as they grow so fast (about 1 in/2.5 cm a day) in their larval stage that they'd have to molt several times a day just to keep up, which would be an exhausting endeavor and a waste of energy. Adults molt less frequently as they grow older and their growth slows down. A young adult might molt every three months, while a fully grown adult molts about once a year. As an exception, malworms may prematurely molt in response to extreme wounds, ensuring that the regrown portions are protected. A BIGSHOT malworm's usual fur coloration consists of black and yellow-white, but it becomes paler close to molting, also gaining a blue tint. Because the malworm's fur is part of its exoskeleton and shed all at once, the new fur underneath appears almost completely blue-white until the exoskeleton hardens, after which it will return to normal coloration. While waiting for the new exoskeleton to harden, the malworm's body, including its teeth, remains soft and flexible, leaving it unable to chew food without damaging its teeth. Its nestmate(s) will chew and regurgitate food for it until its exoskeleton hardens enough in two days. At this point, the malworm eats as much as it can, either to repair wounds or simply grow larger before its skeleton completely hardens. The malworm also eats its previous exoskeleton, recycling the nutrients and allowing the new skeleton to reach its full strength after about a week.

Worm culture

The inner workings of malworm culture aren't well known by the general darkner population. Malworms have no names or roles: the only distinction is between adults and hatchlings. Each adult malworm has equal say, regardless of its age. Every adult plays the same role of providing food, nest materials, and assistance for their nestmates. If an individual member needs to be identified for any reason, they will rely on the member's scent rather than a name. Since every malworm is an asexually-reproduced genetic copy of each other, they don't have any gender differences or roles, and are considered agender by default. They don't experience romantic or sexual attraction, although they can become platonically attached to what are called nestmates. A nestmate is another malworm that's something between a close friend and a family member. Nestmates live in the same nest, hence the name, but malworms aren't required to live in the same nest to form a connection. Nestmates enjoy sleeping together, grooming, sharing and bringing food for each other, as well as giving gifts. Malworms enjoy physical affection, and show it by rubbing against each other, even sleeping together in big tangled piles. Nestmates will care for nest members whose exoskeletons have not hardened after a molt yet. This mostly entails chewing and regurgitating food for the nest member while waiting the few days for its teeth to harden so that it can feed itself again. Nestmates are not to be confused with hatchmates, which are malworms that emerged from the same egg, which consist of anywhere from 6 to 18 siblings on average. Malworm larvae, referred to as hatchlings, are highly valued, and are kept well fed so that they can reach adulthood as fast as possible. A "parent" malworm will stalk the host it infected during the hatchlings' gestation period and take them to its nest once they finish eating their host's body. Although a hatchling has enough instincts to survive on its own, its quality of life and chance of survival is greatly improved by being around adults of its species. Adults will teach survival skills to hatchlings, such as leaving crippled prey in the nest for the hatchlings to practice hunting. BIGSHOT malworms specifically train their hatchlings' auditory mimicry abilities, and teach them the meaning of relevant English words/phrases so that they can better lure their future victims. Hatchlings like to cling to the underside of adults, which can be an upsetting sight to any onlooker that happens to witness a dozen or so suddenly crawl off of an adult. Once they reach adulthood, some hatchlings will find or build a different nest. Others will build a new nest connected to a preexisting one, eventually forming super-nests that can hold over a hundred individuals and completely cover several buildings or, in extreme cases, entire sections of a city. Although malworms may seem sweet towards each other, they are very much not towards any darkner outside of their species. Hatchlings instinctively avoid any moving thing that doesn't smell like a malworm, and adults will hiss at anyone that gets close, and attack any that try to touch them. And if someone even stuck a finger in a nest, they'd probably leave with one less arm. Malworms are designed to and prefer to hunt sapient programs, and seem to enjoy "playing with their food," despite being just as intelligent as the people they prey on. As is often included in news article titles, malworms are cannibals. They do not actively kill each other for food under normal circumstances, but they will eat the bodies of deceased members in place of a funeral.

Language:

The Malworm family of darkners does have their own language, but it's pretty simplistic, lacking the complicated rules and tone variations a language like English has. If you were to translate malworm language, it would sound closer to "caveman speak" than actual sentences. Malworms use a variety of sounds to communicate. Most common are chirps and chitters (variations of Spamton's in-game text sounds and laughs), but malworms are capable of creating a variety of sounds, even more so with malworm species that use auditory mimicry. Malworms have specific chirps meant to convey emotions, but the rest of their words do not change in tone. Strangely, malworm voices often sound like heavily compressed audio. A select few sounds are understood enough to attribute meaning to them:

- "Laughter" (Spamton's in-game laugh sound effect): This stuttering, high pitched chittering is a sound that malworms make in excitement, not unlike a laugh.

- "Pipis:" a term malworms use to describe their small, blue eggs.

- "Kromer:" for whatever reason, malworms have gained a small understanding of what money is, and use this term to describe it. Malworms don't seem to know that money is used to purchase goods and services, but they do know that it is valuable, and will actively steal it to either eat or fill their nests.

- "Hissing:" a sound malworms make by vibrating segments of their exoskeleton together, producing a loud sound akin to a hissing cockroach or rattlesnake. It's used as a sign of aggression, and is meant to warn other darkners to back away. Malworms will also quietly hiss as a show of frustration.

- "Growling:" Malworms sometimes generate a strange, deep sound akin to a growl that rises and falls in volume with their breath. It's seemly meant to show that a malworm is content, and appears to be just a snore more than anything else.

Malworm Senses (As Compared to Human Senses)

Sight: Malworms have large, compound eyes that grant them a wide field of vision. Their vision is slightly worse than a human, and, on account of their compound eyes, it's slightly pixelated, making it difficult for them to read things from a distance. However, malworms have incredible night vision, and are capable of seeing a pitch black room as well as if it was fully lit. Malworms see the same visual light spectrum (colors) as humans do.

Hearing: Malworms have about the same hearing capabilities of a human, but they don't have an external ear structure, instead having holes hidden on the sides of their heads, similar to that of birds.

Smell: Specialized hairs covering the long noses of malworms give them a sense of smell. Although their sense of smell is pretty good overall, Malworms are better at detecting certain smells over others. While they can detect the unique chemical scent of each and every malworm, they can't tell two darkners of the same species apart by smell alone. They despise strong artificial scents, such as perfumes and soaps.

Touch: Malworms use their hairs in order to feel their environment. Think of their fur as though it's made up of thousands of fingers. Their feet and legs, being just bare exoskeleton, can only feel temperature and pressure. As such, malworms will use their nose to feel an object rather than using their feet.

Taste: Malworms have a proboscis rather than a tongue, so their taste buds are actually located on the roof of their mouths. They like the taste of raw organs, blood, and flesh, don't mind the taste of polyethylene plastic, and weirdly enjoy plain sugar despite their normally carnivorous diet.

Body behavior

Malworms mostly rely on body language in order to show different emotions, since their exoskeleton prevents the use of facial muscles and their language doesn't use different tones to convey meaning. Below are the common behaviors of the BIGSHOT malworm:

- Hair: A Malworm's hair can indicate certain things. It can be a sign of anger or fear, where the malworm is trying to appear bigger by sticking out its hairs. Since malworms rely on their hair to feel touch, they may also puff out their hairs in order to better feel their environment.

- Eyelids: Malworms have compound eyes and do not need to blink, so they use their eyelids for other things. A malworm keeps its eyes fully open by default. Half closed eyes are a sign that a malworm is comfortable with its surroundings and feels as if it is in no danger. Malworms squint when they need to better focus on something, or as a show of confusion. Malworms fully close their eyelids when being exposed to very bright light, with their eyelids acting like built-in sunglasses. They may also fully close their eyes when under extreme stress in order to reduce sensory input.

- Mouth/teeth: the muscles inside of a malworm's jaws allow them to fold the teeth inwards, allowing them to properly close their mouths. Malworms keep their mouths completely closed in a neutral state. In a show of curiosity, excitement, or sometimes as a warning, malworms will keep their mouth closed, but leave their unfolded teeth on display in an award-losing grin. A malworm leaving its mouth open with its teeth on full display is a sign of danger, and means the malworm is prepared to attack. Unless it's just yawning, of course. The only time malworms have their mouth open and teeth folded in is when they're trying to pick something up without damaging it.

- Legs: Malworms normally keep any legs they're not actively using tucked close to their underside, but will leave their legs and claws flared outward as another threat display if necessary.

- Body/tail: Malworms rarely keep their bodies completely straight. They usually have their tails curled in some way by default, and tend to have their body hunched upwards when walking on four legs rather than twelve.

- Vibrating: One of their stranger behaviors, malworms are known to shake violently in a way that makes them look as though they're vibrating. This can be a sign of anticipation or excitement.

- Proboscis: The BIGSHOT malworm's proboscus is long and slender, and might be mistaken for a weird pointy blue tongue as first. If a malworm's proboscis starts to extend outside of its mouth, it's about to stab whatever living thing is currently within its line of sight.

[NOTE: MPS suggests that any darkner who recalls being stabbed in a malworm encounter or passing out after following a disembodied voice reports immediately to the nearest Cyber hospital to be tested for infection]

A malworm's mood can usually be determined by analyzing its different body behaviors, but here's an easy to remember guide:

If you approach a malworm and you are a malworm, it will be very friendly towards you.

If you approach a malworm and you are NOT a malworm, it will be very aggressive towards you.

Observed behavior in Cyber City

As Cyber City's BIGSHOT malworm invasion progressed, the malworms' behavior drastically changed. A few months in, when their invasion was at its peak, darkners were regularly quarantining and staying in groups or near antiviruses when going outside, crippling the malworms' food source. The ones that weren't part of the hundreds getting killed by antiviruses were starving to death, and the ones that were left were eating the corpses of the ones that starved. Nests became rarer and rarer, likely due to the fact that their nests got burnt when found. The malworms became more solitary, leaving hatchlings to fend for themselves unless another malworm happened to find them. Stress caused adults to either neglect feeding hatchlings or neglect feeding themselves, and even act aggressive towards nestmates. They started to seldom use their fancy voice mimicry, as antiviruses were programmed to pick up on the sound. Wild maice and tasques were temporarily captured in order to further strain the malworms' food source, and prevent them from infecting more hosts. By the time the malworm population was in the single digits, they would start eating out of the trash, just trying to find anything edible. Due to their elusiveness, the malworms were seldom seen by the general public, and Cyber City's PR team made sure information on them was scarce. After all, letting diplomats know that a malworm infestation killed about 10% of your population wouldn't be a good look. Most darkners that lived through the invasion didn't know what the malworms that attacked their city actually looked like. Information about it was out there, but you'd have to dig to find it.

BIGSHOT Malworm Research

Researchers did their best to learn more about the BIGSHOT malworm species, but it was difficult to research creatures that avoid any positive interaction with other darkners. They could assume generic things about the species based on more docile members of the malworm family, but anything species-specific that wasn't about how they looked, killed, and infected hosts was impossible to figure out. Research was done on the infection process and parasitic stage of the malworm's life cycle, but attempting to raise hatchlings in a sterile lab setting was a disaster. The hatchlings would shy away from researchers and bite straight through their latex gloves when pushed, and would constantly scream once their vocal chords fully developed. By the time they started chewing a hole through their plastic enclosure, the researchers had enough, and the project was terminated. Thankfully, the Queen's free pool made exposing of the "biological material" rather easy. A lot of the research labs' funding was dedicated towards killing malworms faster. The most effective solution was tiny, compact tracking chips. The chips were placed into small pieces of meat that were placed on the ground, which were monitored in order to make sure a malworm would eat it. The malworm, usually a juvenile hatchling, would be tracked back to its nest, which would then be lit ablaze in a controlled fire in order to kill its occupants.

There was only one attempt to monitor an adult specimen made in Cyber City. A few adults had previously been captured in order to test different killing methods, but this specimen was captured specifically for observation. Unfortunately, it was difficult to document anything the specimen when it acted like a writhing ball of teeth and claws that refused to do anything but sleep, eat, attempt to escape, and threaten researchers. The most information they got out of the specimen was an autopsy report and LiveLeak video from when it breached containment before it was neutralized. Overall, the only reliable information available about the BIGSHOT malworm species was how violent and manipulative they were, which was vague enough that it applied to the majority of malworm species, as well as information on the infection process and parasitic phase of their lives.

I am planning to create an actual story here between Wormton and the addisons, the worm lore is for world building not procrastination I swear

——end worm lore pt 2——

#spamton #spamton fanart #wormton au #cheesycatz art posts #cheesycatz text posts #if you get second hand embarassment from yourself is that just regular embarassment #everytime I add a new piece of trauma to his tragic backstory I further question how he's still alive

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