i'll probably be back in the morning with more [takes drag of metaphorical cigarette]

 The myrmekes are a collection of species all under the same name. They live on formicidia, a large planet seeded with genetically modified ants by rogue elgavan biologists in an experiment to see if those particular modifications would make them more likely to become sophonts. There are many groups of myrmekes, each one based off and descended from a particular species of ant.

anatomy & physiology

Myrmekes are, basically, ant furries. Their life cycles, however, are slightly more complex than a real ant.

They start out as larvae. The young myrmekes pupates for the first time after a few months, growing into a stage analogous to childhood. At about twenty years old, they go through their second - adult - pupation. It's only clear after the second pupation what caste the given myrmekes will be, and it's not known if the outcome can be influenced or not.

They are generally divided into four biological castes. the practice of defining social roles by caste is rare; most modern myrmekes even consider it a form of abuse 

Workers are your average myrmekes - they just look like an older version of the children. Soldiers are bigger, stronger, and bulkier, with clawlike extensions of their endoskeletons on the ends of their fingers and sometimes spikes.

Drones are the male reproductive caste, they’re generally frail and sickly looking; you can kinda tell just by looking at them that they die a few months after adult pupation or after having sex. At least they get to have wings.

Queens, the female reproductive caste, start out as being bigger and bulkier than your average worker, but only to the point that they could still pass for one if you hid their wings.

Some species have castes other than these. For example, weaver myrmekes have a spellcaster caste.

Queen myrmekes undergo a third pupation, triggered if they get pregnant. Their bodies change to be oriented towards producing an endless stream of eggs - they can still move around, but cant really hold a job or do much outside of the house. A queen myrmekes also loses their wings during third pupation; the wings and the muscles used to move them are reduced to a slurry the queen is intended to vomit into the mouths of their first grubs. Sex and pregnancy are lifelong commitments for a queen myrmekes, though they can usually easily choose not to undertake them. Queens can live for up to five times as long as a worker or soldier, regardless of whether they undergo 3rd pupation.

A queen’s mind is not affected by 3rd pupation - they retain sapience and full cognitive capabilities

workers and soldiers live about 200 years, while queens live for 1000

The majority of queens do not undergo third pupation, if they did that would lead to massive overpopulation that formicidia and its colonies cannot handle. It's possible to reverse a third pupation, but it takes a lot of complex magic and intensive surgery.

Like real ants, every myrmekes is an individual. They do not have a hive mind

myrmekes have six limbs, four of which are arms

A single queen can produce tens of thousands of eggs over their lifespan. They do not control how many eggs they produce

Myrmekes are aromantic - in a species where one partner dies after reproduction, it's evolutionarily disadvantageous to be emotionally attached to them. Being ants; the proto-myrmekes started out aromantic, and any branches that developed romantic attraction quickly died off.

If the ant type a myrmekes species is based off has a special ability (eg spitting formic acid), the myrmekes species will too.

Society & Culture

On formicidia, myrmekes don’t assign pronouns by gender, but rather by caste. Children are referred to with a separate pronoun.

In space, where western human style pronouns are standard thanks to the elgavans, most myrmekes go by neutral pronouns or whatever those around them default to.

colonies are kind of like a combination between a big family home and a city-state. In most colonies you can leave and go to a city with other adult myrmekes or go to space at any time.

formicidia does have an overarching government, although it has difficulty exerting control over colonies. It has the most sway in cities - multi-species affairs run by said government.

“Myrmekes” is both the singular and plural form of the word. One myrmekes is still called a myrmekes, many myrmekes are still called myrmekes.

Myrmekes colonies are absolutely capable of being abusive, though in that case its a million times worse because your abusive family is basically also the government you live under. 

One of the worst forms of abuse in myrmekes society happens very, very rarely in colonies where the current laying queen is not the leader of the colony. When the current queen is close to death, the leader(s) of the colony will pick out a relatively young virgin queen from the colony who they think would be best to replace them. This can often entail the new queen being kidnapped from a city or space. They then force a drone to rape and impregnate the new queen, trapping them as an egg-laying machine for the rest of their life.

Outside of that specific scenario, rape is practically unheard of - queen-on-drone rape is the same thing as murder and thus carries penalties that will get in the way of the general goal of myrmekes sex, and drone-on-queen rape is suicide.

Myrmekes language is primarily sound based, but pheromones are also a big part of it, often providing tone and tense.

Being descended from detritivores, myrmekes can eat rotting food and enjoy the taste of it. although they also enjoy fresh foods, a lot of myrmekes dishes are partially or fully rotten.

Make no mistake, the process of rot-cooking is structured enough that it’s just that - another form of cooking. Specific combinations of bacteria and/or mold are used to achieve different tastes and textures, and food that was intended to be eaten fresh but rotted is generally not considered edible.

Similarly to how humans domesticated yeast, most of the bacteria and mold used in myrmekes rot-cooking are distinct enough from their wild relatives to be considered domesticated.

Myrmekes names involve a lot of r and k/c sounds. There's usually some vowels or at least an l in there, but the bulk of the name should be made of r and k/c sounds.

The myrmekes’ most popular pet are domestic mites; a former brood parasite species that was forced to adapt into a symbiotic companion as the myrmekes got smarter. It fills roughly the same niche as dogs, with a variety of breeds for varying purposes; including companionship

At some point, myrmekes used nonviable eggs as currency, but after multiple incidents where viable eggs were used by accident, they mostly switched to metal balls roughly the shape of myrmekes eggs. some particularly old colonies still use eggs, though 

Larvae are raised by the colony government until first pupation, at which point they are given to a volunteer to be raised. Note that the volunteers are biologically their siblings or aunts/uncles/parsibs.

There is ongoing research into extending drone lifespans

Religion

Myrmekes religion, of course, varies between species and colony. However, the most popular one is a faith that holds that there are five deities, each with a negative domain and a positive one

Rrllak - death/justice

Krla - madness/life

Rrark - misfortune/knowledge

Kirrl - war/loyalty

Rrlekr - lies/nature

It’s believed that these deities have traits of all four castes, but that Krla was cast out of the domain of the deities and became a thrice-pupated queen. Their eggs are said to have become the myrmekes.

Another religion holds that the myrmekes were once casteless like their deity, but were split into castes after rebelling against their deity. It is believed not that a single savior is coming, but that the myrmekes must collectively return to their pre-rebellion state to be restored to grace.

if it's on your computer, nobody is going to see it except you. if someone is creeping around on your computer, they deserve to get porn jumpscared

and who tf jerks off on a shared computer? that's just weird