Furby
Furby is a deadly and highly contagious illness in Crundle, similar in conversational weight to the bubonic plague. It is caused by a bodily infestation of tiny mammavian parasites, whose eggs grow in tumor-like cysts within the body and/or on the skin. When the eggs reach maturity, they hatch rather violently, and the newborn furbies devour their victim alive before spreading out in search of new hosts.
Transmission & Vectors
Fortunately, the disease is not contact-transmissible. The source of a furby infection is, in fact, much more sinister. Adult furbies are independently mobile, ambulating terrestrially to find a host for their young. Host selection appears to be largely random, though furbies prefer larger hosts.
Causes
When a host is selected, a furby will teleport its eggs into the host, where the roe will embed themselves in places of rich blood flow and begin to grow. Once the eggs are developed, they will hatch into the larval stage, which begin to devour the host from the inside out. When the only thing left is the skeleton, the larval furbies will burrow into the bones and pupate, emerging 3.3 weeks later as adults.
Symptoms
Initial symptoms of furby are similar to that of a tapeworm infestation: fatigue and constant hunger, accompanied by a fever. However, the egg cysts grow rapidly in size, causing many physiological issues by displacing other tissues. Late-stage furby is invariably lethal, due to the fact that the larval parasites literally eat the host alive from the inside. Limbs are usually lost first, followed by the hollowing of the abdominal cavity. The nervous system is left intact, as it isn’t nutritional to the parasites, resulting in [REDACTED]. In addition, the psionic powers of the larval furbies begin to manifest at this time, frequently driving the host to insanity due to elder secrets leaking out of the furbopsychic network and into the brain. Patients are frequently terminated before the hatching stage, as an act of kindness.
Treatment
If caught in the earlier stage, furby can be treated variously by either ingesting an angry platoon of Gesundermites or, more commonly, blunt force (a favored remedy of Rowfister).
Type
Parasitic
Cycle
Short-term
Rarity
Uncommon
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