Vampy here (Vampyroteuthis infernalis, which means “Vampire squid from Hell” in Latin) is a relict, the last surviving member of the order Vampyroteuthis. It lives in the deep ocean, and, like many deep sea species, is ugly enough to scare the stupid out of you. Also like many deep-sea predators, it has light-producing cells it can use to stun and confuse prey. This is what that kind of sparkling looks like.
Like all good vampires, it’s a blue-blood: It uses hemocyanin instead of the hemoglobin we use, making its blood more efficient at binding oxygen. This allows it to survive low oxygen conditions that would kill most cephalopods.
It also has a heck of an evasion strategy:
My god, it vomits stars! I’d love to see anyone from Twilight do that.
This is in an animal that’s a foot long, maximum, counting the arms, emphasizing the fact it lives in the dark places in our world we’re just barely able to explore, and we know practically nothing about. For all we know, there could be other kinds of vampire squids out there, just waiting for us to go deep enough long enough to find them.
It does, which makes that one of the wrongest things I’ve ever read on this message board. You’re precisely the kind of deranged pervert I look for in a community.
