Zap Flies
You hear a loud electronic buzzing, almost as if a runaway lawn mower mated to a taser gun is rampaging through the slimy cattails and weeds towards you before a swarm of huge flies erupt from the low scrub in front of you, electricity dancing between their mandibles.
Full Description
Often found in thick swamps or near pools of stagnant water, Zap flies are the bane of any explorer. These basket ball sized flies seek out living prey as opposed to the carrion feeding practices of their smaller cousins.
Once the odor of a living creature is detected by their sensitive pheromone receivers these insects assault in an aggressive swarm of a half dozen or more, using an electric shock generated between their mandibles to subdue prey instead of biting.
Once the prey is unconscious the flies then seek out any exposed flesh, using powerful secretive acids and abrasive discs on the ends of their probisbis to dissolve patches of flesh into a loose slurry they eagerly ingest.
Victims that survive such an attack often have horrible circular sores across their bodies that often become horrendously infected with a vile runny pus, and eventually heal to hideous scars, providing the victim surives such wasting sickness.
Additional Information
During mating season, the flies inject their larvae directly into the eyes and bodily orifices of the unconscious host, rendering it deaf and blind, so even if it survives this violation it will quickly weaken, making it all the easier for the larvae to hatch and devour the helpless victim from the inside out.
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? Responses (8)
I've never encountered a submission quite like this before. Nasty creatures.
Indeed, very nasty.
Pretty nasty critters.
If these are for a fantasy campaign, the description is a little too modern - Tasers, etc.
Basketball sized - the main body or the sphere including the wings? Either case these bugs are huge!
They were designed more for a post apocalypse or space faring campaign actually, hence the runaway lawnmower reference in the description. (I almost added in a bit about shotguns and flamers being the preferred weapon of choice to counter these pests but figured that pigeon holed them a bit too much as far as high tech/low tech versatility)
As for size, that includes the wing span.
If you got one of these when it was a maggot, could you tame it and make it your pet?
Cheka... your weird. :)
Im not sure what does this for me. If there were not elecricity shooting, small cat sized insects that agressively feed on living flesh... then I may have talked into liking them. As it is though.... the feed portion is ok, the laying of larva is ok... the fact that they leave scars and wounds tend to get infected is even ok... Something about the direction this sub came from and went just did me wrong.
I don't have any issues with this being for a post aapocalyptic setting, on the contrary they seem more fitted to something a tad more modern and even sci-fi. Its just something in the way they were described, or lack of a lot of description perhaps, is what made me not take this and enjoy it.
I didn't go into a whole lot of description since they are for general appearances simply an enlarged common creature so a lengthy description would have been redundant.
I'm not sure if you could tame it as a pet since like most insects, as soon as it becomes hungry it immediately goes in search of food. Anyone attempting to tame one would therefore need to keep a readily available supply of food near by. (And once it pupated the food supply would then have to be living for the insect to show any interest.)
Although; I suppose in a post apocalypse setting a sufficiently vile and crazed person could raise one or more of the creatures by feeding it scraps of meat then after pupation allowing to to feed upon a slave, or even their own body when food was scarce.
I linked this to Insects (and Spiders and other creepy crawlies) for you. I thing this is a simple solid submission. As a stand alone it's not terribly original, but as a part of a codex it's very useful. Solid.
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