A Young Miruverm's Journey

An egg clutch drifts, buoyed by the currents of Atmos’s endless sea. Each translucent sphere contains a tiny, writhing shape, barely formed yet full of potential. As the days pass, the eggs begin to hatch, releasing hundreds of juvenalifer miruverms into the water. Blind and feeble, their soft bodies pulsate with instinctive motion. They undulate clumsily through the vast, blue expanse, propelled by tiny contractions and the rhythmic expulsion of water from lateral pores near their necks.

From the moment of birth, miruverms are vulnerable. The open ocean teems with life-plankton flows in the currents, pipants pulse aimlessly, and predatory nekton cruise through the depths.  For now, the tiny verm simply drifts, unseeing, unknowing, utterly at the mercy of the world around him.

The young miruverm-one among many-spends his early days among the ocean’s planktonic masses. He feeds on drifting microbial cyanophytes, tiny pipants, and whatever organic debris he can filter from the water. His body, still soft and translucent, grows stronger by the day, though danger lurks everywhere.

Predators prowl the open ocean. Segniverms flow through the water, snapping up anything smaller than themselves. Larger veloverms glide like shadowy specters, their countershaded bodies making them nearly invisible to the near-blind juvenalifers. 

As the days pass, the young miruverm’s vision sharpens. His lower eyes develop first, giving him a limited view of his surroundings, and soon after, his upper eyes begin to grow, giving him a better sense of depth and movement. He is no longer blind, no longer entirely helpless. But he is still small, still vulnerable. He must find shelter.

One day, while drifting aimlessly in the currents, the miruverm and a handful of his siblings encounter something vast-a floating celophyte, its thousands of tendrils undulating lazily beneath its broad, starlit surface. For a fragile young creature, this plant-like behemoth is salvation.

He kicks his tiny body forward, his mouth muscles clenching as he clamps onto one of the celophytes’s thick, swaying hairs. He hauls himself up, tucking himself within the tangled, shadowed world beneath its massive form.

This drifting colossus is not just a shelter; it is an entire ecosystem. Tiny scavengers pick at biofilms along its surface, while small nektonic creatures hover around its edges, taking shelter from larger hunters. The young miruverm finds himself a niche, hiding among the tendrils, feeding on passing detritus, and learning to navigate his new world.

Weeks pass. The once-translucent miruverm is now sturdier, his movements more deliberate. He is no longer just a drifting larva-he is a survivor. However, something stirs within him. He cannot stay among the celophyte forever. He has grown too large, and his body now craves solid ground. He must descend.

One night, as the ocean darkens, he lets go. The currents carry him downward, deeper and deeper, until at last, his body touches the benthic floor for the first time. Here, among the towering lithoflora and swaying cyanophyte forests, he will live as a virifer-his second stage of life.

The benthic world is a labyrinth of towering lithoflora and magtrogs, sprawling cyanophyte meadows, and lurking predators. The miruverm, having now firmly matured into his virifer stage, scuttles across the seafloor. He scavenges among the detritus, probing through the sediment for scraps of organic matter.

He is not alone. Other virifer miruverms roam the seabed, competing for the best scavenging grounds and engaging in brief, ritualized battles, testing their strength. Some form loose groups, working together to evade predators and scavenge more effectively, but trust is fleeting in the deep. And there are threats everywhere.

Velicatiplods prowl the seafloor, their pincers snapping at anything small enough to catch. Swift, streamlined veloverms strike from above, their powerful tails sending them darting through the water like living spears. Trichotostrogs, camouflaged as swaying cyanophytes, extend their delicate hairs-waiting for an unwary creature to fall within their gaping maw.

Despite the dangers, the miruverm grows stronger. He learns how to dig a burrow, and how to defend it. He learns when to stand his ground and when to flee into the darkness.

One day, he encounters another virifer miruverm-a rival, perhaps, or just another survivor like himself. They circle one another, bodies rippling with tension. A brief clash ensues, their segmented forms pushing and twisting, testing one another’s strength. It is not a fight to the death, merely a ritual-a display of dominance, a negotiation of territory. Today, the miruverm holds his own. He is no longer a drifting hatchling or a fragile juvenalifer.

He is a fighter. A survivor. A miruverm.