#the stuff I know about the circulatory system comes from my understanding of high school biology

[its-rat-time-babey]

Because Hornet is a mix between a spider, which have almost no muscles and instead use a complex system of hydraulics made using the spider’s blood pressure to move around, and have a very specific circulatory system alongside that, and a wyrm, which have an absolute ton of extremely tough and complex muscles that are specifically made for moving the wrym’s massive body around as efficiently as possible and also have a specific circulatory system made for that, Hornet has the most fucked up circulatory system you’ve even seen.

Hornet’s circulatory system and muscular system is a weird mix between the Spider hydraulics circulatory system and the Wrym muscular systems (which are just regular muscles systems but with like 3 times the power). Hornet will move her arm and two things happen. First, her blood pressure in that arm will spike heavily, which is the result of the spider circulatory system trying to use Hornet’s nonexistent hydraulics system (made even more powerful by Hornet’s Wyrmlike heart, which is stronger than most spider hearts because wyrm muscles). As that’s happening, her actual arm muscles move her arm normally, but they’re suddenly a lot stronger than before because Hornet’s spider circulatory system has just accidentally delivered a shitload of extra blood and oxygen to that specific arm.

After Hornet stops moving her arm, her spider brain goes “alright, we’re done moving, lets lower the pressure in those hydraulics now”, lowers Hornet’s blood pressure and balances it out with the rest of her body, returning everything to normal. Even though it doesn’t have to do any of that at all because Hornet doesn’t have any spider hydraulics, so it’s increasing and decreasing her blood pressure for nothing.

This weird circulatory system has some upsides and some downsides. On one hand, Hornet is a lot stronger than she looks because the second she starts doing something physical, her muscles automatically receive extra bloodflow, making the task easier. But on the other hand, Hornet is prone to sudden spikes of high and low blood pressure because her circulatory system either messed something up, couldn’t properly balance out her blood pressure or just felt like being a dick today.

It also means that Hornet has a hard time retaining heat because the second she starts moving around in almost any way, blood starts being directed away from what her body has deemed “less important areas”, and towards whatever muscles she’s using. You know how you get cold feet when you’re scared because you’re body starts pumping more blood to the arm and leg muscles and less to the hands and feet? Hornet has an almost full body version of that at all times.