AForms

Subspecies
See also: Assemblers

Assemblers create a variety of subtypes of Assembler Forms, or AForms.

• Assembler Lord: A human-assembler hybrid.
• Bloats: Cocoon-like structures for growing other AForms and protecting them as they grow.
• Bursters: These take on the appearance of a human being, while actually carrying one or more AForms inside (e.g., a pack of leapers, a specialized Hunter-Killer).
• Clones: These take on the appearance of a human being, while actually carrying one or more AForms inside (e.g., a pack of leapers, a specialized Hunter-Killer).
• Clowns: Small quadrupeds that create distracting noises and lights; may emit telekinetic fields that interfere with telepathy and/or electromagnetic transmissions.
• Editors: Substrate parasites inside a living host; will reshape the host.
• Ghosts: These are evolved intruders, after being inserted into circuitry. Lacking instructions, ghosts instinctually expand throughout circuitry, passively monitoring the device to learn its function. Ghosts have nominal neural field transceivers, to receive instructions from gray matter, and eventually to coordinate control of the circuitry.
• Gray Matter: Concentrated centers of reasoning and consciousness; often carried and maintained by swarms of AForms.
• Gremlins: Evolved intruders, after being inserted into circuitry.
• Hunter-Killers: Large, fast-moving humanoids with natural armor and weapons.
• Infectors: Modified wisps; resemble mosquitoes; inject editors.
• Intruders: These are specialized substrate packets, capable of limited surface movement using cilia and electromagnetism. Intruders are typically inserted into machinery or circuitry by an AForm. After successful intrusion, the packet substrate uses the husk to evolve into gremlins (in machinery) or ghosts (in circuitry).
• Leapers: Small, fast-moving quadrupeds designed to infect new hosts with editors.
• Substrate: This is pure assembler material. Substrate is primarily nano-machinery and variable protein compounds, using intermolecular forces to form microscopic puffballs (in open air) or clots (in liquid). Substrate disperses like a blood-born pathogen, with a much higher chance of infection via fluid exchange. In open air, substrate has a limited lifespan, before trace reactive gases or solar radiation destroy the protein compounds. In its puffball form, substrate can enter flesh through open sores or mucus membrane. After initial infection and reproduction, substrate is capable of forming wisps (released in open air, often through the lungs), editors (in any soft tissue), and intruders (especially at extremities, like fingers and toes).
• Webbers: These microscopic spider-like AForms move by crawling, and can scale almost any surface. Webbers weave the all-important web-skins of large AForms. Webbers usually don’t include neural field transceivers, relying on gray matter to coordinate their efforts. Lacking instructions, webbers instinctually weave webs wherever there are none.
• Wisps: These microscopic wasp-like AForms move by floating on air currents and flapping tiny wings. Wisps have nominal neural field transceivers. A small swarm of wisps generates a sufficiently-powerful neural field to conduct a systematic search for a suitable location for a nest. Wisps are useful throughout the lifetime of a nest, serving as perimeter sentries or providing roving AForms with additional sensory information.