Flesh Environments, General
In the course of their adventures, Our Heroes may discover themselves in the midst of a place composed of flesh.
In a science fiction setting, there needs to be a fairly realistic reason for the various anatomical structures encountered. In the realms of horror and fantasy there is much greater leeway.
SEE Leviathans for a list of "smaller" creatures whose innards may be explored.
SEE various entries for specific examples;
Barnacle Hill living hills and mountain ranges
Colossal Larvae of the Gods, which are world-sized larvae floating in orbit around ill-omened stars
Sea Palace Jellies, surprisingly sturdy sturdy, inhabitable transparent jelly-reefs
Jellyfish Islands of seas, skies, and the vast atmospheres of gas giants
Topiary, Architectural, present a vegetable parallel to environments of meat-flesh.
Mountain of Flesh
This is a living nightmare. Here, a portion of the very flesh of some bizarre being, of a nature never meant to be comprehended by mortal minds, has protruded in to our reality.
Within, priests execute unholy rituals meant to appease their living god. While the vast being it likely utterly unaware of their presence, those living within the Mountain of Flesh do have an effect upon it. The Mountain gradually shapes itself to fit their visions of what the environment should be. Unfortunately, this includes the most horrific fears of their subconscious minds.
Strata of Flesh
This is a geologic stratum where the bones of Earth Herself are indeed bone, and not stone, where Her flesh is indeed flesh and not soil. Here, her nerves are not veins of metal-bearing ore but actual nerves, and Her blood not coursing subterranean rivers of water or magma but vessels and canals of blood and lymph.
Flesh-scapes
This began as a normal world, or at least a normal sea basin. Life developed in the warm, shallow waters, but it failed to differentiate in to separate organisms. Instead, the whole of the seas coagulated in to one vast flesh. Oceans of flesh extended root-like structures into the earth, seeking nutrients and even developing a taste for geothermal energy.
Alternatively, a once bucolic landscape or perhaps a civilized and populace realm was long ago overwhelmed by the vast spawn of some distant flesh-scape, the Mother of Mountains.
Crude flesh-scapes include the Sea of Spam and the Oozing Ocean, but while some "oceans of flesh" remain somewhat gelatinous, other flesh-scapes are well solidified. The upper surface may be a flat plain, rippled "hill country" or even be heaped up to form vast and rugged mountains, perhaps supported by colossal skeletal structures.
The surface of a flesh landscape will be suited to its environment. If there is no rival life, as where the flesh covers a whole planet or the exposed parts of the planet are lifeless, the surface may indeed by raw, exposed meat with nothing but a sun-blocking membrane to cover it. Other "meat-scapes" must needs be covered by some sort of protective integument, whether hide or scale or hill-sized plates of horn. Additional organs or limbs may be visible, concealed, or absent.
Often, the surface is obscured but a covering layer of other material, including other organisms. These may totally cover the flesh, or be intermingled with its own surface organs. The flesh-scape may slumber under a blanket of prairie or woodlands, swamp or desert; a normal-seeming lake may pool over the flesh, obscuring it.
Carnivorous Flesh-Scapes
Some flesh-scapes do not need to feed. They receive all they need from geothermic energy and their mineral-hunting roots. Others seek to ensnare what prey they can. These carnivorous flesh-scapes are usually smaller, as larger ones would soon run out of prey. Typically, carnivorous flesh-scapes use tentacles or long multi-jointed limbs to catch their prey. Some shoot strands of sticky silk.
Curiously, as dangerous as the exposed outer surface of a carnivorous flesh-scape may be, it is reasonable safe once one is inside, or at least as safe as any such bizarre environment could be expected to be. Apparently, flesh-scapes generally rely upon their symbionts to keep their innards safe. A flesh-scape usually has such a vast bulk, and can absorb such tremendous amounts of crude damage, that its internal energies are focused against its true enemies; microscopic infection.
Common Features in a Flesh Environment
Raw meat
Living meat left exposed is vulnerable. Therefore, the meat is often protected by armor or by symbionts. The armor may be plates of horn- or scale-like material several feet thick. Other areas are left raw, tender as an un-shelled abalone. Wise inhabitants know better that to molest the vast being they live inside.
Symbionts - cohabitating organisms within the Flesh
Ordinary bodies, from plants to people, are assisted by a vast and diverse collection of microbial symbionts, distinct helpers ranging from gut flora to white blood cells. The Flesh environment will both birth its own assistants and "adopt" more common creatures - including both Folk and base beasts - which evidence a willingness to assist it. The Flesh may have some degree of non-conscious empathy, and is able to tell which of the organisms within it to ignore - and which to be wary of. See also Tenant Tamer psychotropic pheromones that create feelings of loyalty to the Flesh.
Canals, for lymph and other liquids
While most fluids and semi-solids flow through the Flesh in veins and pulmonary pumping tubes, some liquids are exposed to the air while flowing through canals.
Lymph flows through open canals to increase its surface area, and so enhance its ability to catch and purge undesirable particles. There are many varieties of lymph, including some able to dissolve anything that falls in to them.
Portals
Valves are common structures, used to control movement within the Flesh. These serve to control the flow of air and water and other materials within the vast mass. They also guide the tenants. Portals are often developed to suppress excess traffic in over-used areas. Specific types of portals often have particular "tricks" to trigger their opening or closing; while known to the local tenants, these may prove frustrating to strangers. Portals may be shell-doors or sphincters, gelatinous curtain-membranes or beak-like irises, entire chambers that collapse in on themselves to seal the way or sliding plates of horn, or other forms yet stranger.
Tenant Tamer
Throughout the interior of the Flesh are areas suffused with complex psychotropic pheromone compounds known collectively as tenant tamers. These imbue the breathers or drinkers with an aversion to harming the structure of the reef. The more one absorbs of these compounds, the more protective one becomes of the Flesh. Tenant tamers may be concentrated in Conversion Chambers, where strangers are converted to serve the Flesh.
Weapons and Tool Restrictions
Those traveling within the Flesh will soon discover that battles bring a whole new set of concerns. The Flesh doesn't care what the organisms within it do to each other, but the Flesh does care when it is itself injured. Blasts of magical lightening or bolts from laser blasters will burn the Flesh; the Flesh will respond defensively - and massively. Injured chambers may collapse on themselves, to crush whatever hurt them. Nearby, birthing organs may start pumping out a horde of white blood cell analogs to hunt down and destroy the vandals. Soon enough, Our Heroes will learn to avoid harming the Flesh itself. Further, they will discover that the smoke of torches might be tolerated in a wide open space but in a smaller closed space smoke triggers coughing - or attack. Harsh-soled footwear is fine in most places - the Flesh is adapted to having the organisms within it traipsing about - but over delicate surfaces harsh soles trigger a harsh response.