Celeridente hooverii - Razor Jaws

**Common Name:** Celeridente hooverii (Razor Jaws)

**First Described By:** Dr. Bob Smith

**Clade:** Planacorporia

**Habitat:** Ocean, from coastal through epipelagic zone. Sometimes found in the mesopelagic zone. Most commonly found in Plagam Maris area.

**Size:** 8 meters (adult male)

**Diet:** Obligate carnivore

**Reproduction:** Sexual, ovoviviparous

## Etymology, discovery and naming

   Dr. Bob Smith first described the genus Celeridente during the third fourth field research trip of the second expedition to Wallace II. When the sonar of the research ship H.M.S. Mischief began probing, the creatures returned the signal. The captain sent down a remotely operated vehicle and caught the first glimpses of members of the species hunting. The species was given the scientific name Celeridente hooverii, with Celeridente being Latin for "Swift Tooth" and hooverii coming from a famous manufacturer of vacuum cleaners. In total, eleven distinctive species of the same genus have been identified to date.

Their common name of "Razor Jaws" came when the crew of the Mischief recorded one shearing the tail off a 17-meter spear whale with a single bite.

## Terminology

Adult males of genus Celeridente are known as bulls. Females are known as cows. Young of either gender are called calves. A social group is called a school.

## Taxonomy, origins and evolution

**Taxonomy**

Initial dissections showed the characteristic body plan of Planacorporia, albeit extensively adapted to a marine environment.

**Evolution**

DNA sequencing showed that Celeridente had diverged from extant members of Saburramhabitatoria currently inhabiting Occidentis about 60 million years ago. It is believed that they descended from an extinct lineage and returned to the water approximately 30 to 45 million years ago. Insufficient transitional fossil forms have been discovered to be definitive, but most scientists believe they descended from a member of Turpiscarnifex.

## Description

**Anatomy**

At first glance, the anatomy of Celeridente appears different from the land-based members of Planacorporia. Upon closer examination, almost every feature was based on adaptations of already existing organs, from their shark-like flattened and streamlined form to their blow hole.

The two proboscises had atrophied and moved to the top of the head. Sphincters had evolved to seal off the ocean water, but they had the same two lung and four heart system. Skin covered their claws, giving them boat oar sized paddles. They developed a keratin and ligament dorsal fin. The same powerful tail that drove their leaping back legs powered a large homoceral caudal fin. The skutes of their ancestral armor evolved into an analog of the caudal keel of fast swimming fish on Earth.

Razor jaws fly through the water like a canard arrangement airplane. Their powerful tails provide the thrust. Their massive rear legs act as ailerons, controlling bank angle and roll. Their dorsal fins are powerfully muscled and control yaw. Their front limbs act as canards, setting the pitch.

In many ways, their Planacorporian ancestors pre-adapted them to return to the water. The unidirectional planacorporian cardiopulmonary system allowed them to recharge their oxygen almost 50% faster when they surfaced, giving them a tremendous advantage when pursuing fast prey. They also have complete separation of their sense of smell, eating, and respiration.

**Dimensions**

Adult males of C. hooverii typically grow to eight meters and weigh about seven tons. Females are smaller, generally ranging from five to seven meters and average around five tons.

**General morphology**

*Dermal denticles*

All Planacorporians have a complex dermal corset made of flexible collagenous fibers and arranged as a helical network surrounding their body. This pre-adapted the ancestors of Celeridente to return to an aquatic lifestyle. Their armor works as an outer skeleton, providing attachment for their swimming muscles and thus saving energy. Their dermal teeth give them hydrodynamic advantages as they reduce turbulence when swimming.

Their denticles are usually colored in blue, grey, black and cream colors. Their coloration generally follows the same "dark on top and light on the bottom" pattern as deep-water aquatic creatures anywhere, but the individual patterns of stripes, spots and swirls varies tremendously. Their individual traits aids observing naturalists.

*Dentition*

Their dental formula consisting of five premaxillary, at least 22 maxillary and 29 dentary teeth. Their teeth are very large, and the roots extend about three times as far into the jaw as the visible tooth. The front teeth are conical in form and recurved backwards so nothing that was hooked could escape. The cheek teeth are recurved back too, but they are serrated and blade like. Two pairs of crushing and grinding molar teeth finish out the set.

Razor jaws are polyphyodonts; they are able to replace each of their teeth up to 50 times in their lifespan. Next to each full-grown tooth, there is a small replacement tooth and an odontogenic stem cell in the dental lamina in standby that can be activated if required.

Their jaws form a natural four bar linkage. Anatomical analysis has shown that they have a bite force of 100,000 newtons. Amazingly, these their meter and a half long jaws can open in less than a twelth of a second and can close in half of that.

*Sexual characteristics*

All males in genus Celeridente are considerably larger than females. They have proportionally larger dorsal and genital fins. Their genitals, however, are retained within a genital flap.

*Vocalization*

Like cetaceans on Earth, Celeridente produce a series of sounds for the purpose of echolocation. This sense isn't as well developed, as they lack the sound focusing melon. Like many land based Planacorporians, they also can produce two different calls at the same time. The meaning of their complex vocalizations is a matter of ongoing research and considerable academic debate.

*Senses*

Typical to Planacorporians, the vision of all members of genus Furromora is not acute. Their compound eyes do allow them to see in nearly 360 degrees around them at once and to track motion exceptionally well, but not distinctly.

Razor jaws an excellent sense of smell, sensing the environment around them with large scent receptors on either side of their head. The large degree of separation allows them to smell in stereo underwater, allowing them to quickly locate prey. With amazingly acute hearing, they have developed echolocation, although they lack the focusing melon of cetaceans on Earth. They do vary the frequency of their sonar pings, aiding them in identifying what they are detecting. Interestingly, individuals of genus Celeridente all have an individual rhythm to their pings. This instinct is thought to have evolved so they will always know the position of each member of their school.

All members of genus Celeridente have inherited the ability to locate prey by their neural electrical activity from their planacorporian ancestors. They have expanded this ability by developing a network under their denticles that covers most of their body. They can quickly locate prey and can sense predators trying to sneak up on them.

## Behavior

**Mating, reproduction, and development**

Female razor jaws begin to mature at around the age of 10 and reach peak fertility around 20, experiencing periods of polyestrous cycling separated by non-cycling periods of three to 16 months. Females can often breed until age 40, followed by a rapid decrease in fertility. Curiously, they can live for decades after they have finished breeding. The lifespans of wild females average 60 years with an observed maximum of 80 years.

To avoid inbreeding, males mate with females from other schools. Gestation time is approximately 4/5 of one Wallace II year or approximately one Earth year. Mothers usually calve a single offspring about once every five years. According to observations in several regions, all male and female school members participate in the care of the young.
Males sexually mature at the age of 15, but do not typically reproduce until age 21. Wild males live around 40 years on average, with a maximum of about 60 years observed.

**Hunting and feeding behaviors**

Razor jaws are well known for their social cooperation and hunting strategies. They are also not picky eaters, and have been observed hunting over 90 different species.

Small marine dispeculate like beakfish, crestfin, or macaas aren’t even a bite-size snack for razor jaws, which makes chasing down individual marine dispeculate not worth the effort. Working together, they use a combination of air bubbles and belly flashes to herd schools of marine dispeculate into a tight ball near the surface of the water. This churning “bait ball” resembles a rotating carousel, which may have given this method its name: “carousel feeding”. The razor jaws slap the ball with their tails, stunning the marine dispeculates, which makes them easier to gulp down by the mouthful. This is assisted by suction feeding. The species name "hooverii" comes from their ability to open its mouth so fast that their dinner is drawn in to their mouths by the resulting vacuum.

Razor jaws don’t limit themselves to eating animals smaller than themselves. They frequently hunt marine creatures their size such as delgutitotherium, giant sawbills, ambush otters, quinqueoculis and panzercaris. They’ve been observed attacking much larger dispeculids such as 14 meter long nepirr or even 17 meter spear whales. They tend to single out young or weak individuals when hunting large prey. The attack follows a familiar pattern: the razor jaws attack from behind and underneath, taking turns ramming their prey and using their namesake jaws to shear off the pelvic, pectoral and caudal fins, if not the tail itself. After their quarry weakens from shock and blood loss, the razor jaws strip the most nutritious bits and leave the rest of the carcass for scavengers.

**Intelligence**

Razor jaws have the second-heaviest brains among animals on Wallace II. They can be trained in captivity and are often described as intelligent, although defining and measuring "intelligence" is difficult in a species whose environment and behavioral strategies are very different from those of humans. People who have interacted closely with razor jaws offer numerous anecdotes demonstrating their curiosity, playfulness, and ability to solve problems.

The complex and stable vocal and behavioral cultures of sympatric groups of razor jaws appear to have no parallel on Wallace II and represent an independent evolution of cultural faculties. Their use of dialects and the passing of other learned behaviors from generation to generation have been described as a form of animal culture.