Factions/Infocritters

Talib Litston, fresh out of University with a doctorate in biology with a minor in oneirotronics, wasn't sure what to do with his life. Eventually he settled on experimenting with animal brains, editing and reprogramming them like a hacker would a computer, developing techniques to be applied consistently, and, as head of the [Other Places/Litston Technologies]? start-up, tweaking the construction model so creatures could be mass-produced.

But Litston and his co-workers—a motley crew of fellow tinkerers, really—started to go astray. They developed a synaptic radio-wave sender/receiver, and folded in an encryption scheme. Hey, why not? Then they set up a client-server system for sending and retrieving information. Hey, why not? They also made sure each one was wholly asexual, so messy mating cycles wouldn't come back to haunt them. Hey, why not?

When Litston Technologies's first mass-produced intelligent animal companions/toys went into distribution (not sale; this was far post-scarcity), their emergent obsession with data-gathering and asking questions (the eternal favourite: "What's on your mind today?") quickly earned them the nickname "infocritters". Beyond that, Litston's slapdash hacking tended to cause eccentric character traits to develop: traits which tend to be unique to each model, and which have only become stronger as the feedback loop between critters and server has continued.

Known infocritters

Known models of Litstion infocritters are all based on small mammals with little, if any, physical modification. There may be others as well.

• Squizzle:
  • Model: SKR5 (Sciurus carolinensis, albino)
  • Owner: None known; possibly a Puzzlebox representative; currently most loyal to Mel
• Chester:
  • Model: N16R-PS (Mustela nigripes)
  • Owner: Runa (although he forgets it frequently, not that it minds)
• Xa:
  • Model: MT2 (Manis tricuspis)
  • Owner: "a little girl from Charm ... [who] sent it off to explore for itself"
• Corasyn:
  • Model: FR3N-0(beta) (Mustela frenata, magenta)
  • Owner: Dr. Cornelius Moffatt, current location/status unknown