Redback Roamer

Artwork

Height:
8'

Weight:
1,500lbs

The **Redback Roamer** (*Summamontium rubrum*) is an original species created and designed by TheAgent41. The Redback Roamer inhabits the *The Hole* universe, an original universe created by TheAgent41.

## Appearance and Anatomy

The redback roamer is a carnitube distantly related to the ocean-dwelling sea tube. Stretching approximately twelve and a feet feet in height and reaching a maximum height of eight feet, the redback roamer is a large omnivorous organized that primarily inhabits flat arid environments like shrublands and deserts. The general consensus about Achlys biologists is that the common ancestor of the redback and the sea tube was a terrestrial organism and that the sea tube's ancestors migrated into the oceans.

The redback roamer is named for its bright red skin, which grows darker near the underbelly. Much of the redback's mass is gelatinous flesh used to protect the central tube-shaped body, which is visibly similar to that of the sea tube. Whereas the sea tube lies in such a way that both of its inner cavity openings are facing in a horizontal direction, the redback's body is curved in a way similar to an upside-down U or an archway. The main body is, of course, obscured from view by the excess flesh that causes the redback to resemble a large fleshy mound.

Unlike the sessile sea tube, the redback roamer is fully mobile, constantly on the move with no specific destination in mind. Redback roamers are capable of moving very slowly via the numerous fleshy lobes that encircle its underbelly. Redback roamers are incredibly slow, moving at approximately five miles per hour at the fastest.

The redback's mouth is located on the underbelly towards the front end of the creature. The front and back ends of the roamer can be distinguished by the size of their humps; the rear end is always the end with the tallest hump. This mouth is constantly employing powerful suction techniques to vacuum up microscopic bits of food from the ground below it, essentially making the redback a living vacuum cleaner. Consumed food then travels through the redback's one-way digestive system, a stark contrast to the sea tube's very simple pitcher plant-like digestive system. Fecal matter is excreted through the rear inner cavity opening on the underbelly of the body's rear end.

## Ecology

### Behavior and Intelligence

Redback roamers are largely solitary creatures. At first, it was assumed that they traveled in herds due to the first redback discovery being of a large group. It was then discovered that this was simply a large group of individuals that just so happened to be in the same location.

Unlike the sea tube, which has a very simple nerve net like that of a planarian, the redback roamer has what could be called an actual brain. This brain is donut-shaped and wraps around the esophagus. The redback roamer has no sensory organs of any kind. Because of this, the redback largely reacts reflexively to external stimuli and is incapable of identifying its surroundings in any meaningful way. This is usually not a problem due to the flat and empty environments in which it lives, but in the event that a redback roamer hits and gets stuck on a tree or large rock, there is not much it can do to free itself.

### Diet

Redback roamers are opportunistic bottom feeders, perpetually sucking up skin flakes, bits of fecal matter from other species, and microscopic organisms in the sand or soil over which it passes. Their large sizes would at first glance indicate that they require a large quantity of food each day, but their metabolisms are so slow that they can survive on a measly ten pounds of food a day, a useful adaptation for a creature that spends its life slowly drifting through a barren desert wasteland.

### Reproduction

Redback roamers are an asexually reproducing species, one of the few carnevites known to reproduce in this manner. While paleological evidence suggests that their recent ancestors were capable of sexual reproduction, modern redback roamers have lost this ability, primarily due to the difficulty in finding a mate. Approximately, every 50 years or so, redback roamers will begin to undergo a process visually similar to cellular mitosis, similar to the sexually reproducing sea tube. During this "fracturing process", the larger of the roamer's two humps (i.e. the hump located toward the rear end) will begin to separate from the rest of the body, eventually falling off completely. Over the course of two or three days, this large fleshy mass will develop its own inner cavity, mouth and anal openings, internal organs, and locomotive lobes, eventually becoming a new redback roamer that is almost a genetic copy of its parent.

Through experimentation with living specimens, it has also been determined that manually slicing off a large enough portion of the roamer's body will also result in the eventual creation of a new individual. As long as the central "tube" body within the gelatinous body covering remains unharmed, the sliced-off piece will become a new roamer and the original will regrow its hump. However, it has been shown that this only works with individuals who are at least 30 or so years of age.

## Trivia

* The scientific name *Summamontium rubrum* loosely translates from Latin as "red traveling mountain."

## Gallery

Artwork