u/GuessimaGuardian

In Tlaloc’s primitive oceans, being weird isn’t just a way of life. It’s the way to succeed. Shells, spikes and all sorts of sharp edges are abundant in these waters.

Being soft and squishy sounds like a death sentence then.

In the distance, a blot of ocean gets darker. Most creatures can hardly tell between yellow and blue though, and this blob is nothing more than a feature their eyesight is too poor to notice.

Its tendrils spread out, tiny light sensitive clusters know when to pull up and close in on moving shadows. These tubes slither across the sea floor, stretching upwards of 20x their original length, being little more than elastic sleeves over basic sea water.

One minute, you’re sucking on sea snow. The next, a 9 inch blade is adding your blood cells to the adrift debris.

Thundershivs are neither ferocious nor intimidating. In fact, you’ll probably never see one.

One reason is that they are almost entirely translucent, but the more prevalent reason is that they hunt from as far away as they possibly can.

This are heavy, slow predators that have the agility of a hot air balloon. It’s no secret why they hunt as they do.

This pentaradial medusiod-squids grow rather large compared to most things of their era. Maybe it’s because they need the excess range, or maybe it’s because one bad storm and smaller life gets shredded against the towering zoids that form biological metroplexes.

Thundershivs don’t have to deal with most of that though. That’s the benefit of turning predation into a remote career.

Most competitors know enough to leave them alone. Bright dazzling displays scare off brutish interceptors but if that doesn’t work, these same spears they use as weapons can just as easily become tools of defence. A paralytic toxin allows them to introduce any of their casualties to the screeching demise of a 5 pronged hydraulic beak.

I’ve been following a set of odd tracks on the coast since the morning. Looked like a horseshoe but about 9 feet wide.

It would lead into the water every now and then but return to the beach after a few kilometres. Boy did I find something weird on the other end of the trail.

Suliiba are like if nothosaurs turned into seals. Long thick neck, big blubbery belly and a fat tail that ends in some floppy fins. This one was about 30 feet long and man was it noisy.

I was bored, and my shoes hadn’t dried yet, so I followed it into the water. Initially I figured it was a carnivore, but it was happy to eat just about anything.

Jampins, a sort of starfish turned tesseract got scooped up and crushed, but then it went on to graze on sea slices for like 20 minutes. Can’t blame them, giant clam shaped marine fruit that taste like pineapple sounds better than crunchy ocean cube but by the time it was done, it had probably eaten more than my body weight. Its stomach was huge, almost a fluid when it heaved itself up on land.

We had a nice few minutes sunbathing, but then the real world came back into being.

It didn’t even run up, it just walked over, held the Suliiba’s neck down with one hand and snapped the body free from its head. The Suliiba didn’t even have time to react, it was just suddenly in two pieces.

What’s worse is that the neck tried to slither and bite back, but it ran out of energy after the first try.

Rhovivohr don’t show up too often. I’m betting they’re a dying breed. It’s a shame, an 8 tonne predator decorated with dorsal plates, scary eyes and a nice shiny blue blanket of scales. Most heavy exosagoni have fled east, the new supercontinent forming up isn’t doing great for the wildlife. This shallow bit of sea is going to dry up too, soon. When it does, I’ve got a feeling a lot of cool things are going to disappear.

Well, since I had the opportunity, I did a little sketch of the whole scene. Of course I was sure to do it before it became horribly nightmarish, but I think it lets you know what I had to witness.

For what it’s worth, now I have something new to follow for a few days. I’m not too sure what to expect on this half of the continent so at least I wont be completely lost.

Woulda been better with the guy attached but sometimes we should be more specific, right?

On human starships like E.V.E. Nazareth, robotic friends are actually very uncommon. May be because human robots are notoriously frustrating to interact with, or it may be that the ship usually has stuff handled. Out of all CAS systems, humans spend the most on their fleet, and you’d bet that a top of the line vessel like Nazareth really wouldn’t need the extra help.

Well.

While Mankind Skyward (the Department of Human Space Affairs) can manage the equipment the ship is deployed with, they cannot stop crew members from bringing personal items.

Seems like one of the Skivi engineers figured she’d bring along some of her homeworld’s favourite inventions. Nida.

So named because all you have to say is “I need a,” and they are all over it. Usually that’s something helpful like a wrench or cup of coffee. On a skivi ship, all the little tunnels and conduits are too dense for heavy toolboxes, so it makes sense.

On a human vessel, not so much sense.

Well, the engineer just let them roam free, and it didn’t take very long for things to go out of control.

If you’d asked me, I woulda guessed the cyborg war machines woulda caused more issues. Maybe I’m just a pessimist, though.

I do wonder how it got the hand off.

——————

Honestly, I like the comic format. It’s hard to convey a sense of a world through a single image, and this project doesn’t really have the 8-hour-drawing vibe. These little humour bites are fun though, so if people like them, I’ll probably keep them going.

There are so many stories to tell for this universe, so feel free to ask questions. Im sure some of them will have funny answers.

The world is reshaping. The two supercontinents are forming up for the last time in the Phanerozoic. Mtemba, a landmass which will occupy almost 44% of the planet’s surface, is almost complete, and the signs are everywhere.

Jungles which used to stand 300 feet tall have dried out and collapsed. Deserts have flooded with poisonous water, and islands have been scooped from the sea floor and deposited on top of beaches.

Only the most robust animals have made any ground towards convergence site. Or they had until now.

Foxhunts are the largest terrestrial predators of the last 60 million years, and at 3 metres tall, 8 metres long and upwards of 14,000 Kgs, the last place they should be is the land where the sky does a sort of left-turn and doesn’t even meet the sea.

So why did they bother?

Well. A while back, they picked up an unlikely ally. The Wherhu, a human sized biped that has a sense of smell unlike any animal to ever come before it. It told them there was something interesting this way, and it was right.

Foxhunts, like all Mesapsids, have an abysmal sense of smell. This is usually covered by their phenomenal eye sight and hearing, but eyes can’t see over the horizon, and they certainly can’t see what takes three and half days of walking to get to.

This pair, a male and female, are both quite young. No more than 14 years old, they carry a pair of cubs, one in each of their chest-pouches. Being relatively new parents, it’s understandable that they went a bit overboard on preparation.

See, when mesapsids are expecting, they gorge on food like a bear preparing for hibernation. This is because at about 80% of the gestation period, the female expels her entire uterus (called an exoterus) and the male and female take turns guarding it and hunting for food.

In most Mesapsids, that means climbing a tree and sticking the gooey organ to the canopy where it’s safe from most predators.

Based on the foxhunt’s size, you can see the issue with that.

Foxhunts will instead bury their exoterus, maybe even abandon it. The glue that’s present in other species is here a disgusting slime, and the only life that find any interest in the scent are too small to chew through the leathery bag holding the young inside.

The point of all this is that it lets the parents focus on raising young for a few weeks, or until they are old enough to move under their own power.

This is where we return to this specific pair.

Foxhunts predate on only the largest animals of their continent. Tetrapentapode Ochapsids like Narrators who stand more than 60 feet tall.

When they buried their exoterus, these two killed and ate 5 narrator cows in the span of 2 days. That’s roughly 88 tonnes of meat and bone a day (about 30 tonnes of prime meat and organs). Having eaten their collective weight, they spent the next week and a half lying on the ground too full to much other than move their cubs to nursing positions and back into their pouches.

The only reason they chose to stand up when they did was because their jungle caught on fire.

That led them on a long road, 400-kilometres long. In the jungles, the wherhu’s kin lead large predators to meals every day, so when they found him and he started pointing, they figured he knew what he was doing.

On the way, there was a good sign that he was in fact right about the interesting smell. Something new. A type of animal that hasn’t existed on this half of the planet for more than 100 million years.

Silversongs, a kind of epidexi, flying overhead. These metamorphic vertebrates never touch the ground after emerging as adults, not even to lay their eggs.

Large enough to be worth swatting out of the sky, the Foxhunt pair have been chirping to each other all day. If there are new things about, maybe there are new tasty things to find out here.

Whatever the Wherhu smelled, it says they’re getting closer. It used to dip its nose up once or twice an hour. Now it’s got its nose up, redirecting them every ten minutes.

Human Resources meetings do get quite exhausting. In fairness, three 5 hour meetings every time a new species is discovered does get boring as hell, but even then, you’d have to imagine. Some things are universal.

“No touching” is a pretty basic rule of thumb on all starships. Sure some species like it. Some species really like it. Some species though…

This little comic gets passed around during cadet training. “Don’t be a Touchy Tyler”

In fact, most atrocities come with an alliterative name. “Loud Leroy”, “Smelly Simone”, “Grumpy Gus”

Setting off your coworkers may very often not be intentional, but there are many steps we take to avoid unnecessary provocation. We all know that even though they might need help reaching the top shelf, it’s not acceptable to give skivi crew members a boost. We also know that even though their spiked pelt may seem frightening, it’s impolite to hug the wall as soko crew pass by.

Remember, while we may find it difficult to adjust with all the species, we are asking them to come and work on starships designed for humans. No matter how alien they may be, it’s important to recognize that we are just as strange, with just as many “Do”s and “Don’t”s.

Now go out there and make the galaxy a better place! We are all rooting for you!

What I long for is an orbital stratagem that can get rid of the heavy swarms. It may be super overpowered to clear out heavies with a single pop, but if you ask me, it should also be one of the earliest developments of the war. The laser is fun, but the cool down and usage limit is crazy to me so I figured we could try something that is kinda similar, but not identical or downscaled.

Bot drop summons 3 tanks, 20 heavily armoured units and a vox engine? Let’s at least clear the area of minions so our sons and daughters can send uninterrupted freedom to the super-heavy.

The Orbital Tesla Strike shoots a massive pin connected by a wire to the super destroyer. It then electrifies the wire to a degree that instantly boils biological matter and super-heats mechanical components. Usually, this presents in a single arc travelling from minor points until it reaches the largest conductive point. Tiny units like Leapers, Raiders and Voteless have inconsistent reactivity to the arc, but heavy enemies like Chargers, Devastators and Fleshmobs work well as either targets or jumping points. Super heavy enemies like Impalers, Bile Titans, Factory Striders, Vox Engines and Harvesters are significantly harder to destroy with this stratagem, though not impossible. — Using this stratagem on enemy encampments has various ranges of usefulness. On bug nests, no effect against bug holes. On bot camps, the arc may choose to target fabricators so long as no heavy units stand closer to the pin. On illuminate ships, the arcs will reflect off the shields, creating hazardous exclusion zones until the shields deplete, while not damaging the ships themselves.

Note: if the pin directly hits a heavy or superheavy starter, exclusively the contact will be affected.

Shielded units react differently to this stratagem. Instead of taking damage, the shield completely absorbs the arc and is burned out. This includes the Helldiver’s shield pack, directional shield and shield generator. If the pin directly collides with a shielded unit, it will instead conduct through the shield, using it as a new anchor for arcs to emit from— though only for 1 second.

Please Note: It is considered undemocratic to destroy the functionality of Helldiver equipment, though cases against this can be made.

Helldivers are recommended to run away from the call in location and avoid it for the duration of effect. Additionally, avoid the area between the call in location and the Super Destroyer deploying this stratagem. The short duration is a result of the wire connecting to the pin melting under the extreme electrical charge. Molten steel raining from the wire’s disintegration is highly dangerous.