#assimilator

Gorm the Dissolver (Arkanian Assimilator Cyborg)

The following worldbuilding and characters are from my wip, Assimilator.

The Arateth Five are the survivors of the famed Arateth Factory Siege, also commonly called the Arateth Incident.

The Arateth Factory Siege

The Arateth Factory Siege was a botched attempt by the government of Ensova System 13 to capture a high-ranking member of the infamous Red Giant crime syndicate. The operation was just one of many in the long conflict between the Red Giants and the local Ensova governments. Ten highly skilled mercenaries were hired to intercept and capture a high-ranking Red Giant Captain. They were told that the Captain would be arriving at an abandoned factory on the mostly-desolate planetoid of Arateth under the impression that he would be signing off on a weapons deal with a representative of another crime group.

It is unknown whether the Red Giants intercepted their communications, had someone inside System 13’s command, or had even fed the mercenaries the information in the first place (Which is not unlikely; most of the mercenaries sent had performed before in the Red Giant campaign, with Riksin, Kaven, Tiveros, and Seval in particular having dealt significant damage).

Regardless, rather than intercept the Red Giant Captain, the mercenaries were themselves ambushed by numerous Red Giant members. Five of them were killed in the initial attack before the remaining mercenaries managed to flee into the abandoned factory and seal its enormous blast doors. After a period of understandable panic, the remaining mercenaries resolved to fortify the factory and hope to either hold it until reinforcements arrived, or, much more unlikely, exhaust the Red Giant ranks until they retreated.

They estimated that it would take about two days for the Red Giants to breach the doors, and used that time to turn the factory into a veritable death trap: they set up numerous traps, sniper nests, and stockpiles, using both what they had brought and materials found in the factory itself.

Two days passed, and the Red Giants breached the doors. They were met with a labyrinth of misdirection and death.

The mercenaries spent the next five days picking away at the Giants’ numbers, playing to their individual skills and using every dirty trick imaginable. It was a long and grueling affair, but the five eventually managed to exhaust the Red Giants forces enough that they pulled back and retreated.

The mercenaries managed to steal one of the ships left by the Giants after they retreated, and eventually got it running. They were able to reestablish communications with System 13, and were intercepted and picked up by a patrol. 

Aftermath

The siege received widespread media attention, and the surviving mercenaries attained legendary status. One of the reporters covering the incident referred to the group as the “Arateth Five”, and the name stuck. They were paid the agreed-upon amount, plus an extravagant bonus. They insisted that the pay that would have gone to the mercenaries killed by the Giants instead go to the fallen mercenaries' families.

The five developed a friendship and kept in contact with each other after the incident.

The Arateth Five

Kaven Aramos/”Red Gale”

SEE HIS CHARACTER BIO

Riksin

Riksin is a female Garravask. Like Kaven, she started as a Grey Horde soldier. She served as infantry for some time before joining a special forces unit and eventually being selected to join the legendary Group 86, also known as the Red Blades. The Red Blades are possibly the most efficient group in the entire Conglomerate military, having never failed a mission in their operational history and only having lost five soldiers in action since their inception. She served as a Red Blade for eight years before leaving the military to pursue mercenary work.

Riksin is the physically largest and strongest of the original ten mercenaries, and is possibly their most competent overall.

Following the Arateth Incident, Riksin was one of the mercenaries hired to retrieve several of the Earth Assimilators.

Tiveros

Tiveros is a male Temrha. He is talented in strategy, and planned most of the traps and strategies used by the Five during the Siege.

Despite specializing in planning and strategy, Tiveros is a skilled combatant and is proficient with a variety of weapons and gear.

Tiveros and Seval entered a relationship about six months after  the Siege, marrying a year later. The two still work as mercenaries, and are a devastating team.

Seval

Seval is a female Temrha. She is the best marksman of the group behind Hevan, and is also their most skilled engineer. During time leading up to the siege, she set up their numerous sniper nests while Tiveros and Hevan worked on optimizing their weapons and gear for the coming waves. She and Hevan spent most of the siege in these sniper positions, calling out large threats and picking off any Red Giants who came too close.

Seval and Tiveros entered a relationship about six months after the Siege, marrying a year later.

Hevan

Hevan is a female Ensova. She is the most talented marksman of the Five. She served as part of Ensova High Command’s military as a sniper before becoming a mercenary, and is a crack shot.

During the Siege, she helped optimize the Five’s various weapons, then served as a sniper, calling out threats, activating traps from a distance, and picking off any Red Giants that came too close.

Hevan is married to a Garravask named Hiskra. After the factory siege, Hevan retired from mercenary work, and now lives happily with her wife.

Assimilator is one of my newest stories, and is science fiction. I am posting this revised version of the original summary because I have somewhat revamped and added much more to the story since I first posted it.

Premise

The story of Assimilator begins when a college student named Sarah falls asleep as a human, and wakes up as an alien. As the story progresses, she discovers that she is a central part of an experiment known as the Assimilator Project, and learns more about the project and the species that created it while trying to evade both Ensova task forces and hired mercenaries.

Characters

Sarah

Sarah is a member of the Ensova species and one of the eponymous Assimilators of the Assimilator Project. Twenty-two years before the story starts, she was dropped off on Earth so that the Ensova could learn more about humanity. She was found as an “infant” and later adopted at the age of two. The story begins when she wakes up and notices that she’s rather...different than when she fell asleep. She is the protagonist of Assimilator.

The Assimilator Prime Scientist (Enzore Calsaven)

Enzore Calsaven was the Prime Scientist of the the now-defunct Assimilator project, and as such was in charge of coordinating it and allocating its resources. He is now in charge of tying up the project’s loose ends, a feat harder than it seems given that he needs to recover several dozen Assimilators, many of whom are surrounded by the people they are assimilating, and none of whom are aware of their actual species. After the loose ends are tied up, he is to be tried and will likely spend the rest of his life in prison.

The Red Wind

The Red Wind (real name unknown) is an skilled Garravask mercenary who has been hired by an Ensova government to retrieve Earth’s Assimilators.

World Information

The Ensova

The Ensova are a sapient, spacefaring species. They have colonized a total of thirty-eight worlds besides their own. Generally, they are a peaceful species.

The Ensova are notable for their significant shape-changing abilities. They cannot change themselves genetically without heavy technological augmentation, but they can change the shapes of their limbs dramatically.

In their default form, the Ensova are bipedal beings that stand between eight and ten feet tall. They have long, thick necks, bodies, and tails, two arms that end in four boneless tendrils each, and two legs with a digitigrade structure. They also possess two strong, dextrous tentacle-arms sprouting from their upper-middle back,  They have been compared to bipedal lizards. Both males and females of the species have extravagant bioluminescent crests along their heads, backs, and tails. Males of the species tend to be more brightly colored and possess slightly larger crests. This is the only real physical difference between males and females of the species besides reproductive organs. Ensova crests are quite emotive, flaring out when the Ensova in question is agitated or retracting when they are soothed or intimidated.

The Ensova reproduce by laying eggs, which hatch after about four months.

The Assimilator Project

The Assimilator project was an clandestine project that was intended to be a way to understand other sapient species prior to initiating an official first contact. It was led by Prime Scientist Enzore Calsaven, and took place in five phases:

Phase 1

An Ensova grub would have their species’ natural abilities augmented by technology to the point that they are capable of becoming a member of another species down to the genetic level.

Phase 2

Following augmentation, the Assimilator would be induced to change into a member of the species that the Prime Scientist chooses, then left on the world in question. They were generally left in places that ensured that they would be quickly discovered.

Phase 3

The Assimilator would be monitored through a series of implanted sensors and discreet cameras as they grew and matured, to figure out how the other species developed and interacted with others at all stages of life.

Phase 4

The Assimilator would be discreetly picked up by a member of the project or a mercenary hired by it.

Phase 5

The Assimilator would be debriefed about life on their assigned world.

Project Status

DEFUNCT. The Assimilator Project has been shut down following an anonymous whistleblower making the project public knowledge. Its members are to be tried for numerous and severe ethical violations. The Assimilators are to be retrieved from their respective worlds by a mix of task forces and hired mercenaries.

In addition to the ethical violations, the project was found to have the opposite purpose of that which was intended. The Assimilators reacted predictably badly to being abducted by extraterrestrials and finding out that they were not a member of the species they believed they were. Additionally, instead of providing a deeper understanding of the society they were implanted in, the species that discovered the Assimilators either during the project or after developed a deep distrust of the Ensova.

The following are several species present in the universe of Assimilator.

The Ensova

The Ensova are a sapient, space-faring species who have currently colonized a total of 38 worlds in 20 systems. They are led by a conglomerate composed of national, planetary, and system-wide governments, known simply as Ensova High Command.

The Ensova are large beings that vaguely resemble bipedal salamanders. They usually stand between seven and ten feet tall, and possess thick necks, bodies, and tails. They are seven-limbed, with two arms, two legs, a long, thick tail, and two tentacles sprouting from their upper-middle back. They possess two large, brightly-colored eyes with slitted pupils. Their mouths contain three jaws: a top jaw and two bottom jaws that open down and to the side. They will occasionally hold their bottom jaws together and use them similarly to human jaws.

One of the species’ most prominent features is their large crest, present on both males and females. The crest tends to be larger and more vibrant on males, which is believed to have helped in attracting mates. Ensova crests are very emotive, flaring out when the Ensova in question is happy, proud, or agitated, and retracting when they are soothed, intimidated, or feel vulnerable. Aside from crest and scale coloration, there is no dimorphism between male and female Ensova. Ensova reproduce sexually, and lay eggs that hatch after about four months. They celebrate the anniversary of their hatching in a similar manner to human birthdays.

The Ensova are notable due to their significant natural shapeshifting abilities: they are capable of drastically changing the shapes of their limbs for a variety of purposes. Common examples include turning the hands or back tentacles into blades, hammer-like masses, scissors, and a variety of other tools, or restructuring their legs to allow for different modes or speeds of locomotion. Recently, augmentations strengthening these abilities have emerged, most prominently in the Assimilator Project. Most of said augmentations are not presently available to the public, and indeed have only relatively recently become public knowledge.

The Garravask 

The Garravask are a bipedal reptilian species. They are currently spread over 36 worlds in 19 systems. The majority (roughly three-quarters) of their governments are members of a union known as the Conglomerate.

Garravask speech is comprised of growls and snarls (or at least sounds that evoke such to a human), and can seem harsh and grating to other species. It is difficult for them to speak human languages, but not impossible.

The Garravask stand between seven and nine feet tall. They are bipedal, and possess two arms and a tail.

Garravask possess very little sexual dimorphism, telling males and females apart by scent. They reproduce sexually and lay eggs, which hatch after about six months.

The Garravask have a peaceful and mutually beneficial relationship with both the Ensova and Temrha species and intermingle with them freely, though the tensions between them and the Ensova have grown somewhat since the revelation of the Assimilator project.

The Temrha

The Temrha are a superficially arthropodal species. They share approximately the same average height as humans. They are bipedal and six-limbed, with two arms, two legs, and vestigial wings. These wings do not allow them to fly, but are useful for emoting, acting similarly to Ensova crests. They are covered in semi-rigid chitin, which comes in a wide variety of colors. The species possesses two large eyes and excellent vision. Their faces terminate in toothless beaks.

Male and female Temrha exhibit little sexual dimorphism and tell eachother apart by smell. They reproduce sexually, and their eggs hatch after about four months.

The Temrha have no homeworld of their own, as their home planet was rendered uninhabitable by a devastating asteroid strike. About 6.5 billion of the original population of 26 billion were able to escape in a fleet of ships, and wandered the universe for the next fifteen years. Eventually, their transmissions were picked up by the Garravask Conglomerate, who established communications with the fleet and welcomed them into Garravask space. After First Contact and preliminary negotiations, the Temrha were invited to settle in Garravask space, an opportunity which they accepted.

Ivissi is a major character in Assimilator.

Ivissi is a 25-year-old Ensova scientist. She was sent to retrieve Sarah and two other Earth Assimilators alongside the Garravask mercenary The Red Gale following the Assimilator Project’s becoming defunct. She was picked due to specializing in the same technology used by the Assimilator Project to transform the Assimilators into humans (or, more specifically, to give the Assimilators the ability to transform into humans), though she never worked on the project herself. She acts as a consultant, helps identify the Assimilators, and handles the tech relating to the Assimilators and their abilities. Generally, she will not accompany the Red Gale on missions, remaining on their ship and relaying information.

Ivissi is rather shy and can be somewhat timid. This did not mix well initially with The Red Gale’s frankly intimidating reputation and presence, but the latter’s friendliness fortunately cleared this up for the most part, and the two established a friendship.

Ivissi does have moral issues with capturing the Assimilators, as does the Red Gale, but in the eyes of High Command, the several dozen Assimilators’ feelings are not worth sharply increasing tensions between the various Assimilator worlds and the Ensova before First Contact is even established.  

Ivissi is not a skilled combatant by any measure. This is shown when one of the Earth Assimilators (who, it should be noted, had only recently discovered his ability and was thus unfamiliar with his own Ensova physiology) managed to disarm her and hold her hostage with her own weapon. She is, however, a very quick thinker, and has on multiple occasions come up with on-the-spot plans that averted significant crises.