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Come up with a disease

"The Urzmach were terrifying foes, for a host of reasons. But when you hear of their atrocities, the first thing you'll hear isn't how they devoured their injured captives, or how they converted countless worlds into biomatter. No, you hear of the Uruz."

The Uruz plague is not considered one of the worst diseases in the multiverse because of its fatality rate, or its virulence. countless other diseases are far worse in this regard. What sets the Uruz apart from all others is its sheer brutality. This water and blood-borne psuedo-prion was an engineered bioweapon created by the Urzmach to "spread their gift of blessed purity" to the "not-Urzmach". Over the course of several days, the Uruz plague will painfully convert infected lifeforms into Urzmach, with a 20% success rate.

Stage 1 of infection is formatting. the Uruz will "format" to better assimilate the newly-infected organism. This stage typically lasts about five to seven hours, and is the only stage in which it can be cured. Symptoms will begin to appear, including intense cramps and migraines, burst capillaries in the eyes, and diarrhea.

Stage 2 is the initial mental alteration. The infected will begin to display increased levels of aggression and extreme hunger. furthermore, infected will find themselves unable to sleep, normally or chemically-induced. Diarrhea will subside, but cramps and migraines will grow worse. this stage lasts about a day (24-25 hours).

Stage 3 is when the first visible changes start appearing. bone and muscle growth begins, and over the course of 95 to 120 hours, the first part of the transformation to Urzmach begins. The changes vary from species to species, but typically the ribcage will expand, plantigrade legs will have the bones in the foot fuse and lengthen, and skulls will lengthen forwards, teeth and jaws first. Infected will find the already unbearable pain growing worse, and that they are unable to black out. Due to what we know of the Urzmach, it is hypothesized that this deliberate on the part of the Urzmach, as pain is seen as a holy sensation in their culture. It is at this stage complications will usually arise, often in the form of bones or muscle growing too fast. If amongst Urzmach (captive or defector), complications of this nature are seen as a deliberate rejection of their "gift" and they will proceed to devour the infected.

Stage 4 is the secondary mental alteration. Prior to this stage, the infected is still themselves, mentally. Once stage 4 comes, however, the infected will quickly begin to loose memories, and their behavior will become increasingly feral. Another dramatic increase in levels of aggression and extreme hunger will occur, and at this point the now pseudo-Urzmach will attempt to eat all non-Urzmach biological matter it can find. If the infected cannot eat at least its own weight in biomatter, it will likely perish at the end of this stage, in approximately 42-43 hours.

Stage 5 is when the final physical and mental changes appear. Over the course of 48 to 72 hours, the infected organism will rapidly shed its hair, and quickly regrow a new layer of hair all over its body, now with the dark brown Urzmach pigmentation. Nails and claws will begin to grow and harden, Teeth grow sharp, eyes flush solid red, all while spasming due to what brain scans have revealed to be the result of every nerve in the body broadcasting a massive, continuous pain signal. While this is occurring, the brain of the infected will restructure itself to think as an Urzmach thinks. By the end of this stage, the infected is now physically, genetically, and mentally Urzmach. The infected will now demonstrate behavior identical to all other Urzmach, trying to kill or convert non-Urzmach lifeforms.
 
The disease is a retrovirus, waterborn, with other potential vectors in the form of infected food items and mosquitoes.

Upon entering the subject's body, the virus propagates quickly through the digestive system and into the bloodstream. It begins by calcifying skeletal muscles and tendons, leading to tightness and a sore feeling as well as a lack of general mobility. The disease progresses slowly, causing further stiffness over time, until the subject can no longer move- but the soft muscular tissue, organs and the like, are not calcified. However, the brain is temporarily altered so that it releases a compound which sends the subject into a torpor, leaving them in a hibernation through the rest of the conversion process.

At this point, the disease begins breaking down the bones of the subject, and begins the lengthy process of converting the subject's skin. The process is slow and arduous, beginning with a thickening of hair and slow rashes and scabby rashes appearing. Over time, the hairs become thin spine-like horns, and the skin a hard chitinous shell, a new exoskeleton. New skeletal muscles are formed, linking the exoskeleton so that it works- And then the subject's brain stops releasing the hibernation compound.

The subject is now completely converted into an insect-like biped.

The process of conversion is slow and, if caught early, reversible. Typically, however, the disease is not caught until the mid to late stages, after the slow progression of stiffening muscles has gone beyond what can be reversed, and the only option left is to let it happen.

Unfortunately, while no mental changes occur, the subjects- Colliquially known simply as 'Buggers'- are typically not welcomed back into society, and are thus relegated to the edges where they form their own cliques and gangs... With the unfortunate effect that most Buggers are immediately assumed to be criminals and gang members.

A few smaller third world countries have been almost completely converted, and are far more welcoming to their new bretheren. This leads to the odd position of established, well off individuals- Scientists, business leaders, and politicians- Abandoning their former countries to join these countries, leading to them progressing rapidly to more modern standards...
 
Blake Hannon said:
Airborne virus. Gets into your body and infects your germline tissues before replicating itself and making its way back into the lungs to be exhaled. Randomly steals genes from the cells it infects and replaces them with others from previous hosts. Your children will look nothing like you, because I am a fucking troll.
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Sounds like a multi-species version of Xicree's idea from another thread.

Xicree said:
Trojan Horse Organelle

Sometimes it is the smallest of things which have the biggest impacts upon the entire ecosystem... The Trojan Horse is a parasitic lifeform which penetrates the cells of host creatures and taps into their Mitochondrial analogues to feed on the energy there as well as reproduce. While in a cell the Trojan Horse essentially opens up the genetic floodgates seeking any and all genetic material and filtering through them for sequences which can allow it to utilize them, fitting them together within the host cell and essentially building around itself an enhanced version of the host's cells essentially utilizing the host cell as not just simple replicatory machinery but as a kind of homebase form which it can build up further defenses.
Though its initial addition to the biosphere had resulted in catastrophic cancerous growths across multiple species, eventually the ecosystem settled into a holding pattern with the invasive little bug and incorporated it into their own cellular structures creating systems of genetic exchange and change which push far beyond the boundaries of traditional sexual reproductive paradigms... For each creature is now able to take samplings of genetic information from what ever they eat, their bodies taking the useful sequences, installing them and then growing out these features. And while this process has become much more stable in it's application from those turbulent times of the 'organelle's first rise... the world has never been the same again.


Consequences: A select part of the Biosphere is no longer classifiable by Physical nor genetic traits, those which incorporated the organelle are now outside of the usual realm of Darwinian selection processes... because now a new factor has arisen... You are after all, what you eat.
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Adrian Tullberg's Unusual Plague.
"Captain, there's reports of a new virus circulating around the Federation - computer projections estimate that every ship in Starfleet is infected."

Picard shifted sharply at this. "How, Data? And what are the symptoms?"

"The pathogen is not lethal - that's how they passed it through the transporter buffers via LCARS, hidden in a biofilter update program. It causes the left pectoral to become extremely susceptable to pain stimuli."

Picard was about to ask what was the point of creating and filtering such a virus when his comm-badge chirped. He automatically tapped it to respond.

And automatically was incapable of speaking due to the lancing pain in his left nipple.

He looked up at Data through the tears in his eyes.

"We're in trouble."
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And this people ks what happens when you read too much SCP.
Article:
Article:
People are dying from Contaminated Food, sold here and in many other restaurants of the global fast food corporation known as [NAME EXPUNGED], and not simply from the usual causes. Tainted meat has never been new, whether it be due to pests like rodents or flies, improper hygiene or incorrect cooking, just about every bit of Food has had some potential to be dangerous. But now, a new Contaminant is to be feared about being added to your food.

Memes.

And not the kind you see online, with pictures and funny captions. These are ideas, concepsts, things that shape how you are and think. And, as an anonymous tip has been able to how us, they are the reason for this virulent plague. This is a kot more dangerous then some meat from e. Coli in it; this is a thing that will not only kill you bit it will humiliate you. Make you into something horrible, a parody of yourself.

It's a lot worse then what they say.

It's a fuckin' Black Plague, but with Burgers instead of Rats. And the results are, yeah, as horrifying as you think.
Source: "No, Cat can NOT has Cheezburger!" from [REDACTED] News, by [NAME EXPUNGED], ██/██/20██


[the following paragraphs were deleted for the sake of brevity, with the content ranging from amateur pictures of Infected mid-feeding and upon death, to supposed interviews with employees and the anonymous tip, and uncredidable theorization on where the Memetic Virius originated.

Research into the origin of the Virus and why/how it was released is, at the writing of this report, ongoing.]
Source: FILE: BAD MEAT

Simply put, yes, this is a Disease... In a sense. Because, at the end of the day, this is a Virus. But not the typical one, where someone might cough on you and you become infected. Oh no, this is worse. Because this is a Memetic Virus. Like any Virus, it has a method of Transmission, and that Transmission delends on the host. And these Hosts are Concepts; Fast-Food Chains, Organizations of any creedo, Celebrities, Politicians, Video Games and Movies, anything that sticks into the public mindset it shall infect in some regard.

And then, once it finds a Host, Bodies will start to drop. As you can see above, this Memetic Virus (The Cheeseburger strain) attached itself to a Fast Food chain, and then all at once every restaraunt across the globe became infected with it. After that, the process of infection is simple.

A person will come into the restaurant, as usual, and eat something. Whatever this thing is may vary; a combo meal, a large double quarter pounder with fries, a breakfast sandwich, whatever. If they come to this restaraunt and eat SOMETHING that has both processed meat and dairy in it, they become infected eith this 'disease'. And then, the lifepsna drops from years and decades to, at best, a week.

On average? 48 hours.

The symptoms of this disease, skimped over as they were in the article above (which as you can guess did not come from your average newspaper report), include:
  • Impossibly rapid obesity and increases in muscle mass/testosterone
  • Impossibly increased metabolism, so all food that is chewed, swallowed and digested at a rapid pace, but no nutritional value whatsoever is gained, only physical (i.e you will gain the weight if eating as much as you are, but nothing else—somehow). Body becomes malnourished despite the rate of consumption
  • Average body temperate increases to Feverish proportions and rapidly increased heart rates, and increased activity of the adrenal glands and bodily oils
  • Dementia and a completely oblivious nature to the relaloty around them—to an infected, if it's not food (or whatever the particular thing the strain is fixated on), it does not exist in their eyes. And yes, it does have to be recognized to the average individual as Food—although they will be aggressive to attackers or anyone who tries to stop them from eating, they will not resort to cannibalism (tackling and grabbing the chewed up food of someone else, maybe, but they're not gonna eat you—they'll just take the food out of your mouth and tear into it)
  • Diarrhea and Nausea, sometimes fatally so
  • Salivia begins to froth at the lips
  • Unnatural cravings for particular food (processed and raw meats or deepfried items most notably, although some also show a craving for certain diary products, like cheese or milk). They will not care for whatever condition the food is in, just so long as it is there and could be consumed. Bodily harm won't even deter them from eating
Inevtiably, as the human body becomes pointlessly gluttonous and obese and eventually, whether to cardiac induced stress, the stomach lining giving out and releasing bodily acids into the thorax region, impossible weight gain, excessive bowel movements/vomitting or any other possible natural sideffects of this.

The Virus will typically last for however long the Host does—for example, when the Restaraunta mentioned above go out of business, the strain will die and enter a dormant state. From there, it becomes responsible for someone else to deal with the horrible metaphysical pox, to fine tune this disease of reality nd have it find a new host to latch onto and deliver ironically punishing symptomns unto (for example and to continue off the food motif, if the virus were to be attached to a highly prestiguous and expensive restaurant (which would have a similar method of infection), the infected would become increasingly niche and ciritical of their food choices and how to eat it, to the point where their salival glands will just stop working entirely and they'll try to forcibly seallow whatever they're eating, either dislocating their jaw with their efforts, choking or just straight uo starving as their choice in food is simply impossible).

Hope that was disgusting! :V
 
But GhostKaiju, everyone knows that the real secret of the memes virus is that as a mild infection grows dank, it infests your mind and draws you further into the lair of the memes, which slowly causes a disassociation between the infected and society as a whole, eventually leading to those infected with memes falling into the dark and lonely corners of the internet, never to be seen by mortal man again.

Some say that, when one ventures into the Deep Web, they can hear the sobbing laughter of those unfortunate souls who will never return.

And a few frantic meme posters realize only too late

That the one laughing

Is them
 
Tankette said:
A disease? How about one that breaks down your bones and turns you into a literal meat sack?
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SCP-1332?

....

Clown Virus. Physical symptoms include skin turning pallid, swelling of the lips, cheeks, nose and feet and the hair growing in nonhuman colors. Mental symptoms cause infected victims to translate any actions they try to take into "clown-ified" equivalents. So they'll be trying to organize a quarantine, hampered by being incredibly clumsy and as soon as two clowns bump into each other, they start throwing pies at each other.

The body fluids (including sweat and saliva) of victims will spread the infection. Skin contact or contact with something an infected victim touched recently is also infectious.
 
Bassoe said:
So they'll be trying to organize a quarantine, hampered by being incredibly clumsy and as soon as two clowns bump into each other, they start throwing pies at each other.
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Issue:
Unless the virus includes space-time fuckery or other reality warping, the infected would have to be carrying pies in order to get into a pie fight.

Not a pie. Multiple pies. Each.

How many people do you know who have stockpiles of pies to fight with?
 
Sterilization Plague;

The Sterilization plague is a viral disease that directly attacks gametes. It can be spread as an STD or from coughing (coughing in a hand, not washing and touching someone else generally is a way you can infect someone with this) and is not instantly obvious in the effects it causes. It doesn't display symptoms beyond some coughing. It's not even a terminal illness. It is a air-born illness that only targets gametes (sperm or eggs, it's meant to be a terrorist weapon) Basically, it breeds from sperm and egg cells instead of red blood cells. However, if it spreads at the level of a pandemic (and it spreads surprisingly fast for how overspecialized it can be) it can in the long term cause rapid population decline since the sterilization plague can render people sterile, especially females whose egg cells can't be replaced nearly at the rate sperm can.

(It's probably not possible since gametes are rare and this leads to overspecialization... The general idea even if my medical knowledge is at a 3rd grade level is basically a disease that sterilizes people instead of killing them directly. Gametes are so important to the perpetuation of a species that a disease which directly attacked gametes seems like it would be pretty nasty.)

...

I think I know what field to read up on in my free time for the foreseeable future. I should have more ideas than this for diseases.
 
Shoggoth Plague: Caused by infection by an amoebic organism with retroviral symbionts. It infects its victim and begins spreading throughout their body, consuming their tissues while its symbionts scavenge the genetic material of the host.

In stage one, the victim feels flulike symptoms; aches, pains, clogged nasal passages, etc. While curable at this point the symptoms are likely to be dismissed as "just the flu".

In stage two the victim's body will beginning to feel oddly soft and they will become too weak to move far. However the infection at this stage releases chemicals that cause euphoria, leaving him or her too happy to actually seek help. A cure is still possible at this stage if someone else goes for help, although with a long term convalescence and a likelihood of permanent debilitation.

In stage three a cure is no longer possible. The victim's skin becomes semi-translucent and jellylike, and their body begins slumping off their bones. Their liquefying flesh will digest and consume any organic material it is touching, adding to their mass. The bones themselves soon begin to break down and be absorbed.

In stage four their transformation is complete and the victim regains metal clarity. The victim is now an amorphous mass of red-black jelly, with none of their human tissue left. Even their brain is actually only an imitation, a copy of the original that was reproduced even as it was consumed. While amorphous in their base state, they have the ability to create temporary, distorted copies of various human body parts such as eyes and mouths, for purposes such as speech and utilizing various human senses.

Over time they will typically grow much larger than their original human mass. As well they will begin to gain nonhuman abilities and mental qualities as they consume nonhuman species. While technically immortal in this state, they will eventually be mentally quite alien to their former human self, and in that sense be "dead" to their old self.
 
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Raptor Reaper

A bioweapon used by a marauding alien species known to humanity as "raptors."

The reaper is an airborne retrovirus, typically released into the atmosphere over or near a human colony site in a shell disguised as a natural meteor. When it detects certain genetic markers unique to humanity, it inserts itself and begins replicating at breakneck speeds, consuming so much of the host's biological energy that the first sign of infection is a mixture of low energy and increased appetite. Within hours, the host's cells begin producing metallic nodules that rupture their own membranes and cause internal hemorrhaging throughout the entire body, with death typically occurring either due to tissue necrosis, or suffocation from so many broken capillaries in the lungs.

While the colony is reeling from the outbreak, the raptors begin their conventional bombardment of remaining active military sites, and then land in major cities to enslave the survivors. The humans they have the most interest in are scientists, technicians, and engineers; high value individuals most likely to be sheltered from the airborne pathogen and thus left alive by the time the invaders set foot on the planet's surface.

The raptors' bizarre choice for a pathogen is actually a product of their own technological limitations. The reaper was not originally designed as a weapon at all, but a treatment to help the raptor soldier-caste develop their bio-mechanical armor once they grow to their full size. The virus was crudely adapted by the decadent descendents of the once-great raptor civilization to target human cells, where it creates metallic tumors at random due to not being designed for us.
 
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PANDEMIC

Known by many names such as "Sudden Death", "The Invisible Plague" or simply as "Pandemic", this virus is widely suspected to be a highly-developed bioweapon due to its blatantly unnatural behaviour and quirks tailored to maximise difficulty of containment. Spreading primarily through minor symptoms (such as coughing, sweating and sneezing) suspiciously mild for such a potent viral strain, the Pandemic virus actively mimicks a whole variety of low-level "garden" illnesses during its incubation stage and endeavours to spread as much as possible through multiple infection vectors while remaining as innocuous as possible. Detection of the Pandemic virus is only distinguishable from other minor illnesses at this stage via bloodwork, but such intensive measures are usually deemed unwarranted by the infected due to cost and effort concerns.

Highly adaptable to changing environments, the virus has been noted to thrive in differing temperature zones on either end of the habitable temperature range for humans, as well as shockingly high cross-compatability with most forms of livestock and pest animals. Laboratory testing with secured samples of the Pandemic strain has shown it to be capable of surviving in air and bodies of water for extended periods of time, with the cells spontaneously developing potent bacterial shells to protect against the environment and entering a dormant state until entering an acceptable host body.

Again, as is the trend with the Pandemic virus, these displaced cells are all but indistinguishable from regular microscopic debris as this stage.

When the Pandemic virus infects a host body, the virus cells undergoes a series of rapid mutations to disguise itself as "local" cells of various types, gradually working its way throughout the body and eventually infesting the various systems over a period of several days. With the body's own immune system now recognising the infected carrier cells as "healthy", the virus then enforces subtle changes to the sweat glands to begin production and emission of a certain series of pheromones, with each colony of Pandemic cells emitting their own distinct variant. When host bodies come into contact with pheremones from other carriers, Pandemic cells in the skin's pores and respiratory system are capable of recognising the pheromone particles and communicating with the rest of the viruses within the host, which then undergo simultaneous mutations to compel the host body to begin emitting a composite pheromone containing elements of both the original strain and the foreign strain received.

When a currently unidentified set of criteria is fulfilled (theorised to be when the cells come into contact with a pheromone strain of sufficient complexity), the Pandemic virus spontaneously progresses into its active stage. In this stage, the virus begins to cannibalise host cells and even fellow viral cells in a bout of rapid mutation seemingly designed to be as deadly as possible. Under the control of the Pandemic colony, the host's body swiftly begins to exhibit a large variety of harmful symptoms as the virus seemingly executed a "kill-code" on vital bodily functions, resulting in total organ and neural failure in a matter of scant hours. Retrieved footage of infected areas during stage progression of the virus has shown victims undergoing sudden projectile vomiting, bowel voiding and rampant haemorrhaging of the lungs out of the blue, with the subjects falling unconscious minutes later and expiring within the hour.

With its two-stage lifecycle of maximised undetectability and sudden lethality, the Pandemic virus has been officially classified as a Weapon of Mass Destruction by the UN. Entire townships and residential districts have been recorded to have undergone sudden, mass casualties all at once as the Pandemic infection in the area progresses, sparking off mass exoduses from the neighbouring regions that further proliferate the virus. Furthermore, individuals hailing from infected areas have fallen victim to an increasing occurrences of panic-borne lynchings and witch-hunts, further polarising international communities and ramping up global tensions between infected and non-infected countries. This is not helped by the sheer difficulty of detecting and neutralising the virus during its incubation stage, which in practice ensures that a country in which the virus has successfully infiltrated stays infected.

Experts are speculating the effects the Pandemic virus will have on international politics in the days to come, with the well-publicised cancellation of the UN Emergency Summit held in Madagascar last week due to Pandemic concerns. With the EU's closure of refugee aid camps along its borders and China's accusations of the Pandemic virus being a runaway Western creation, time will tell what the future holds for humanity.

TL;DR:
 
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Arawak said:
Sterilization Plague;

The Sterilization plague is a viral disease that directly attacks gametes. It can be spread as an STD or from coughing (coughing in a hand, not washing and touching someone else generally is a way you can infect someone with this) and is not instantly obvious in the effects it causes. It doesn't display symptoms beyond some coughing. It's not even a terminal illness. It is a air-born illness that only targets gametes (sperm or eggs, it's meant to be a terrorist weapon) Basically, it breeds from sperm and egg cells instead of red blood cells. However, if it spreads at the level of a pandemic (and it spreads surprisingly fast for how overspecialized it can be) it can in the long term cause rapid population decline since the sterilization plague can render people sterile, especially females whose egg cells can't be replaced nearly at the rate sperm can.

(It's probably not possible since gametes are rare and this leads to overspecialization... The general idea even if my medical knowledge is at a 3rd grade level is basically a disease that sterilizes people instead of killing them directly. Gametes are so important to the perpetuation of a species that a disease which directly attacked gametes seems like it would be pretty nasty.)

...

I think I know what field to read up on in my free time for the foreseeable future. I should have more ideas than this for diseases.
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I used something kind of like this - an infertility plague - in a story where I wanted to put pressure on a traditional warrior culture to force them to interact with a sciency culture that could help with their reproductive issues. Though, mine was not a virus.
 
The Black Blood Plague: also known as the black gods bane,
one of the most slow acting and basic diseases of unknown progenitors.

the black blood plague is known vastly for its inability to be cured, even by the most powerful of multiversal deities and gods, in more scientific societies it is even more notorious due to its symbiotic nature, and lack of symptoms outside the changes throughout its various stages.

infection can occur purely through any form of contact with the black blood the plague is known for, even machines can be infected.

while energy beings will be.......violently consumed and then explode after the energy is converted into black blood matter, the biggest of which being after the consumption of a creator class god.

the plague is known for strangely only targeting sentience and completely ignores non sentient life or machines.

the creators of this disease are entirely unknown, however carbon dateing for the oldest sample lists the disease as over 10 billion years old

said sample was collected in a mere million year old fantasy universe and is deemed simply fantasy universe fuckery for how it appeared before the universe had formed.

Stage 1: mere hours after initial infection the infected will have their blood quickly turn pitch black, and often sluggish, said black blood is known to eliminate nerve and muscle restrictions on the infecteds body regardless of species causing issues similar to leprosy. in the case the species has no blood a set of vein systems will be forcibly created onto the infected for example on a sentient machine.

Stage 2: at stage two after a full day of infection the infecteds immune system regardless of species will be taken over by the infection, changing and mutating to heavily speed up and strengthen said immune system, only for the immune system under the control of the infection to actually assist in spreading the disease while also keeping other diseases out.

Stage 3: at stage three a full week of infection the black blood will begin to rapidly heal any injuries and damages, including cancers, however in turn replacing the damaged areas with a synthetic material made up from the black blood itself only changed to fit the damaged areas purpose. this combined with damages from the lack of strength restriction causes a mass spread of the infection from ever growing damages.

Stage 4: at stage four a 2nd week of infection the black blood will consume and replace the heart or hearts of the infected, replacing them with a stronger version of the infecteds heart pushing black blood in higher quality and speed throughout the body.

Stage 5: at stage five after 32 days of infection the infection will spread to the muscles throughout the body, consuming and replacing them regardless if they are damaged or not, in turn once again replacing them with a more powerful version of the infected species muscle system.

Stage 6: after 60 days the infection at stage 6 will spread to the eyes consuming and replacing the entire sight system of the infected species if they have any with a black blood substitute, said substitute will allow the infect to perceive any and all forms of light. the infected will also now cry black blood.

Stage 7: half a year into infection the infected will begin to form cysts on the surface of the body, easily popping to any sharp contact, said cysts will be direct connections to the blood system causing splashes of blood after popping only to be quickly covered up with a new cyst.

Stage 8: a full year after initial infection the black blood will consume any form of bone structure, replacing it with a sort of biological metal, said metal is not black blood and can actually be extracted from the infected safely, unlike other injuries however the black blood will not replace the biometal bones. this metal is consistently made regardless of species instead of making a improved form of the infected subjects biology, this biometal is as strong titanium, and is as light as Aerographite, however the flexibility is known to differ based on the species is created inside of.

Stage 9: a mere day after the full year of infection the disease will suddenly consume the nerve system of the infected, or creating one if their is none, said nerve system is over a dozen times as sensitive as a humans, in any form of signal for example pain or pleasure.

Stage 10: a full two years into infection the black blood will suddenly spike in activity and consume the infected in their entirety leaving behind only a fleshy husk that acts similar to a super powered zombie with its strength and fast healing., only dieing will the full cellular destruction of the infected.
if the subject should somehow die stage 10 will automatically occur.
 
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Bassoe said:
Clown Virus
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On second thought, Rixshaw on deviantart already did this.
Rixshaw said:
It's not a very pleasant process.

A person with a Space Clown patch attached to them won't initially feel any adverse effects (Stage one). Soon, at stage two, they'll absentmindedly pick up objects to juggle, start buying balloons, and laugh a little too hard at jokes, among other activities. Abilities such as juggling and making balloon animals manifest even if the infected subject has no prior experience doing so. By stage three they'll begin showing signs of actual infection. Coughing up confetti and removing ropes of multicolored handkerchiefs from their mouths is not uncommon. By this stage any balloon the infected subject inflates with their breath will be lighter than air and float.

At stage four, physiological changes occur. Limbs and extremities morph to become more clownish, and the teeth begin to enlarge and sharpen. The infected's language is mostly made up of laughter by this point. By stage five, a full metamorphosis begins, as the body rearranges itself to create rubbery clown musculature and structure. Mental faculties are no longer human. The transformation is complete by stage six.

After being exposed to an Outer Mime's striped liquid, a person would feel a bit dizzy, but otherwise appear fine (Stage A). Soon, such an individual will prefer low levels of noise or possibly have a desire for absolute silence, with louder noises bothering them immensely. They'll also become mute. Over time the subject will become less and less tolerant to almost all sounds, which usually results in seclusion (Stage B). Abnormal growth of limbs will stretch out the body of the subject (Stage C), and having located a spot with as little ambient noise as possible, the subject will pantomime an invisible box around them until they're confined to the smallest amount of space possible (Stage D). An actual cube appears around them, growing more opaque over time (Stage E). Later, a fully fledged Space Mime will break out of the box (Stage F).

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basefan said:
I make a disease that only effects other diseases and can survive in the human body without harming it.
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You literally have that in you right now; mostly viruses that infest bacteria in your gut, in your lungs, and on your skin.



Leila Hann said:
Airborne virus. Gets into your body and infects your germline tissues before replicating itself and making its way back into the lungs to be exhaled. Randomly steals genes from the cells it infects and replaces them with others from previous hosts. Your children will look nothing like you, because I am a fucking troll.
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Viruses do this all the time, except the transmitted genes are usually completely non-functional (in eukaryotes).
(A well-known exception is a couple species of wasp that got bacterial poisons added to their stinger somehow and kept them, because friggin' of course wasps could do that).

Anyway this whole mechanism makes sequencing bacterial genes just super-complicated, because rather than a disease, it's actually providing a huge value to the affected organism, accommodating this might actually be how "sexual reproduction" evolved.



Arawak said:
Sterilization Plague;

The Sterilization plague is a viral disease that directly attacks gametes. It can be spread as an STD or from coughing (coughing in a hand, not washing and touching someone else generally is a way you can infect someone with this) and is not instantly obvious in the effects it causes. It doesn't display symptoms beyond some coughing. It's not even a terminal illness. It is a air-born illness that only targets gametes (sperm or eggs, it's meant to be a terrorist weapon) Basically, it breeds from sperm and egg cells instead of red blood cells. However, if it spreads at the level of a pandemic (and it spreads surprisingly fast for how overspecialized it can be) it can in the long term cause rapid population decline since the sterilization plague can render people sterile, especially females whose egg cells can't be replaced nearly at the rate sperm can.

(It's probably not possible since gametes are rare and this leads to overspecialization... The general idea even if my medical knowledge is at a 3rd grade level is basically a disease that sterilizes people instead of killing them directly. Gametes are so important to the perpetuation of a species that a disease which directly attacked gametes seems like it would be pretty nasty.)

...

I think I know what field to read up on in my free time for the foreseeable future. I should have more ideas than this for diseases.
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This is being actively engineered today, except we're aiming it at mosquitoes instead of other humans.

because fuck mosquitoes
 
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Let's go a bit odd:



Cybernetic plague: Pestilentia Immortalis

One of the relics of the old Yahkso and Yarrim empires. This engineered plasmodium-like disease is meant to bring immortality to the masses, by means of converting flesh to machine.

The initial infection is fairly low key, the disease is spread through direct contact and enters the body through the mucous membranes. For the first day or so thereafter it will spread throughout the body in the same manner as malaria and many viral diseases: Infecting cells and using them as factories to produce more of itself to infect new cells, until the host cell is exhausted.

After a certain point however, this changes. With each cycle of reproduction, the disease produces hormones as well as copies of itself. Once these hormones reach a critical level, it signals reproduction to stop, putting a check on how fast the disease can spread within the body.

The infection thus remains low key for several months as every cell in the body becomes host to the plasmodia. During this phase, the host is mildly infectious, and extended contact has a chance of spreading the disease.

Once the disease reaches the pituitary gland, it sends out a burst of a second type of hormone, which entirely stops the reproduction phase and causes the plasmodium within cells to instead switch over to acting as new organelles. The protazoa do divide and continue to spread, but only as the hosts cells do, meaning that further infection within the body will now take place over years and decades.

At this point, the new organelles start altering the body's mineral cycles, while the infection within the brain works on creating a craving for mineral rich foods. Particularly hard hit individuals can even take to eating metal and metal ores, and the disease provides methods for processing them. As a side effect, the host becomes immune to nearly all forms of mineral and metal toxicity at this point.

Here new tissues and organs start to grow, and any excess mineral in the body is deposited into them, as the deposits grow into mechanical structures that coexist with and supplement the body's organic tissues. This can include such objects as inline rotors within the circulatory system to supplement the heart, the capacity to metabolize electricity, or new skin mineralization to form a tough armored hide.

During this second stage, the host is almost completely non-infectious, with the disease only spreading during cell division. A parent may transmit the disease to an unborn embryo or fetus, but otherwise the transmission is largely impossible. Even those plasmodia that do find new hosts are still in the slow growth mode and, excepting cancer, won't spread throughout the body with the rapidity necessary to take over.

After several decades, the second stage moves to the third stage after the construction of a series of bio-mechanical computers along the brain and spinal cord. These act to coordinate growth and, importantly, synchronize with the host's mind, allowing the host to direct the evolution of the disease from this point forwards.

From here on out, the progression of Pestilentia Immortalis depends on the precise preferences of the host but there are a few archetypes of progression.

Frequently the host will chose not to drastically alter themselves. Some alterations, like steel skin, are almost unavoidable as they occur during the second stage but by and large the host will instead choose to keep their alterations internal, with perhaps a few aesthetic changes to their exterior. These hosts tend to keep cybernetically augmented muscle and bone, increasing their intelligence via adding mechanical computation, supplementing or improving internal organs, or the occasionally addition of extra limbs for personal or aesthetic reasons.

For those who choose this route the body undergoes slow changes lasting several centuries, slowly replacing failing organs with mechanical counterparts until the body looks much as it originally did but is almost entirely machine.

Other individuals, especially members of more transhuman subsects of the Yahkso religions will instead seek to take the disease to it's "true form", transforming their bodies in emulation of the coral-like rephaim they worship. For these individuals, they will often move their minds on to the mechanical computing as quickly as they are comfortable with, gorge on metals and minerals, and then cocoon themselves, emerging transformed into biomechanical beings that bear very little resemblance to their original forms.

The end result of this transformation almost always has many of the giger-bontanical, semi-skeletal, and marine aesthetics of the rephaim.

In either case, by the end state the host's biological flesh is heavily altered, existing almost entirely as a supplement to process, construct, and maintain the mechanical material. Much like the animals that build coral.

Infection during the third stage is controlled by the individual. Some will spread the disease sparingly or not at all while others will make themselves as infectious as possible. A not infrequent choice is to only infect kin, or those who ask for it. The one noteworthy exception is during the cocoon state of those who choose to transform, which is massively infectious and is the only time the disease can spread through indirect contact.

Due to the need for a mineral supply in order to build machine parts, the Pestilentia Immortalis only reliably reaches the third stage in industrialized societies, or in biospheres with massive mineral and metal contents. The infection can spread to animals, and some plants, but aside from sea life on industrialized and polluted worlds, they rarely collect enough of the right minerals to reach the third stage. Those that do almost invariably choose to transform.
 
Zombie / Vampire Mind Control Virus

This virus is contracted by being bitten by an infected individual. After a short incubation period (usually an hour or so), during which the virus makes its way to the brain, the victim gradually loses their free will, and their mind is instead controlled by a hive mind, powered by a network of infected brains communicating telepathically with each other. The more other infected individuals are close by, and the closer they are, the stronger the network, and the greater the hive mind's control over the infected individual.

If only one individual is infected, or an infected individual is very far from other infected individuals, then the hive mind is very weak. In this case, the infected individual will mindlessly attempt to spread the virus by biting any other human they can. They will be totally incapable of "passing" for a normal human being, lacking the ability to talk or even to walk normally. Instead, they will shamble around like George Romero style zombies.

If the infection is not contained, and spreads to a few more people in the same area, then the infected start to get more dangerous. Firstly they stop shuffling and instead start to walk, making them appear to be normal at a distance. The first effects of their telepathic hive mind appear, with one infected individual always being able to recognise another, and refrain from attacking them.

A few more infected individuals, and the network strengthens again. The infected are now able not only to walk, but also to run. At this stage, there is also documented proof that the infected are able to exchange information telepathically. If one infected individual sees a target, then all of the nearby infected will begin moving towards it, even if they themselves are not able to see the target yet. However, at this stage, their attacks are not at all tactically sophisticated.

In larger groups, the infected gain the ability to move in more complex ways e.g. swimming (even if they could not swim pre-infection), opening doors and climbing ladders (develops slightly later than the other abilities). The first tactics begin to emerge. Groups of infected at this stage are known to silently surround a house, before one attacks through the front door and chases the occupants out the back, to be caught by another group waiting in ambush for them.

In the next stage, the infected begin to use basic tools and traps. They pick up logs and use them to smash in doors. They use metal bars to improve their odds in hand to hand combat (though at this stage they do not use firearms). They lay tripwires and dig pit traps. They plan attacks, studying the movements and behaviours of the uninfected in order to work out the best way to attack. They start to copy animal cries and human words (though at this stage without any real understanding of their meaning). For example, if they observe that one human calling "Help!" will draw other humans to that location, then they may copy that call in order to lure humans into an ambush.

Once the group of infected reach a critical mass (roughly the population of a small country town, in an area that size), then their behaviour shifts dramatically, going from the "zombie" stage to the "vampire" stage. In very short order, the strength of the telepathic network passes a threshold where the hive mind is now intelligent enough to access the previous memories of the infected. At this point, the hive mind switches to a very different strategy. The infected attempt to blend into society and slowly expand their numbers by surreptitiously biting people.

There have been many cases where panicked reports of "zombie" outbreaks have been received from isolated towns, only for investigators to arrive and find everything seemingly normal, with the inhabitants strenuously denying that anything happened at all. They will work together to fabricate stories to cover-up any deaths that occurred during the zombie stage. The investigators then either leave fooled about what took place, or are lured, bitten and then sent on to spread the outbreak further.

In one way or another, the infected will work together to elevate some of their number into positions of power within society, in order to increase the opportunities to spread the virus. They usually succeed in doing this, because unlike the uninfected where each individual has (at least to some extent), their own individual goals, the infected are under the control of a unified hive mind with a single goal. However, in order to avoid attracting attention to themselves, each infected individual will pretend to be the same individual as they once were.

The biggest weakness of such a hive mind is that it loses control over an individual the further away they go from the cluster of other infected individuals. First, they will go through a "robot" stage where they can execute a simple preprogrammed sequence of commands (e.g. go to this place, hide in a certain place until night, bite the first person you see). However, once they encounter an unexpected situation, they will revert to the zombie stage. Their exact intelligence level will depend on how many infected people are around them (either those that travelled with them, or newly infected). But in any case they will go around trying to bite everyone in an uncontrolled and highly conspicuous fashion.
 
Vindictus said:
-insectile conversion virus-
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Sounds like Kafkas Nightmare by Mavros-Thanatos. Specifically the bits about the human endoskeleton becoming the new exoskeleton.


The Phoenixian said:
The end result of this transformation almost always has many of the giger-bontanical, semi-skeletal, and marine aesthetics of the rephaim.
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I'm imagining something like Dkaz's Incarna as the end result. But not right away. The human skin molting off the newly biomechanical skeleton doesn't happen quickly or on one piece. More like what happened to Brundle, but with sleekly inhuman machinery underneath the necrotic flesh instead of cancer/insect body horror.

 
Bluenoser

This disease is spread thru sexual contact during a particularly scandalous and embarrassing sexual act. The disease is untreatable and has no ill effect besides turning the victim's nose blue a few hours after infection.

This STD, like many others, will have its first outbreak in Glace Bay, Nova Scotia.
 
A virus that begins with a simple a cough
Stage 1: cough- 1/17 days
Stage 2- exhaustion/increases mucus production, possible fever-2/5 days
Stage 3- smallpox like pox will appear in clumps across your skin, palesness, inflamation of throat, dryness, insomnia, fever-6/18 Days
Stage 4-Pox slowly let out puss, insomnia and inflamation die down. Fever will continue, possibly to even greater heights but ussually dieing down. Hair may fall out, vomiting, diarrhea.crusting eyes and continued production if mucus-2/3 days
Stage 5- symptoms will slowly subside, eyes continuw to crust and mucus will in throat will become clogged, causing a constant weeze. Extreme hunger and thirst, pus will ussually continue for a small while, extreme exhaustion. Patient will spend around 18 hours sleeping and will spend the reat of the time eating, deinking, or reatong. Most fatal stage as if needs are not well met the body will go into shock.-14/21 days
Recovery- Pus will stop leeking after infection has run its coyrse, although the pox will continuw to fall off for the next 6 months, the mucus will clear up, the patient will then eventually recover.

Death rate:
Stage 1: <1%
Stage 2: 2%
Stage 3: 11%
Stage 4: 32%
Stage 5: 41%
survival: 14%
 
Doe Plague: This plague is artificial, the result of a partially failed attempt at creating a synthetic regenerative capability for humans using engineered microorganisms. It worked fine for the original test subject, known only as John Doe for reasons of confidentiality. Unfortunately the microorganisms developed the ability to infect others and proved highly contagious.

When they infect a victim, they will do what they were designed to and try to heal the infected person of all damage...including the "damage" of not being identical to Mr Doe. The result is a plague that converts its victims to identical copies of a single man, and "repairs" any attempt to reverse the alterations even using surgery. This is especially traumatic for the half of the victims who were originally female.
 
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