Assyliads

Inom is no stranger to public nudity and casual eroticism. Most species are, generally, happy enough to accept this liberation from the structure of their old lives.
Others rapidly find there are problems with this. Nothing as severe as, say, discovering they need their space suits to breathe on Inom, or bursting into flames on contact with Inom's richly-oxygenated atmosphere, but take the assyliads, for instance, whose gelatinous flesh already made intimacy with their own species very difficult (or very easy) in the spring and summer. They soon found that, in the oft-hot-and-humid jungles of Inom, their membranes will graciously accept any and all detritus off the ground into their form. Small indigestibles like that are very difficult to pluck from their flesh.
That and their matter does many things when introduced to the flesh of other beings. It can turn a friendly hug into an accidental absorption-- to possibly disastrous results if already digesting a meal. Moreover, though assylalyds are inherently amorphous and typically more than capable of altering their shapes, any intimate contact with a sapient being may leave a mark-- the assylalyd will adopt the features of her acquaintance.
Their response to these problems is why the assylalyds are nicknamed the "hazmat women" in English. Similar names are bestowed in Inom's other tongues.

Basic Information

Anatomy

Being rather amorphous, an examination of assyliad anatomy tends to divide cleanly into two parts: that which is consistent between all assyliads (tissue, organs) and that which the species instinctively assumes when not consciously assuming any other shape.
Every assyliad is composed of two silicon-based structural tissues: membrane and plasm; informally referred to as skin and flesh, respectively. Both are transparent, but the plasm is moreso. Membrane obviously works to keep filth and dangers out and keep plasm in. However, assyliads can relax their membranes to let material in, usually food. The plasm, meanwhile, suspends the assyliad's organs and shuttles nutrients wherever they need to go. Plasm also handles the digestion of food; it's a dilatant fluid, thickening with force, such as from, say, struggling prey. It's like a finger trap. Of course, digestion is semi-voluntary on the assyliad's part. An assyliad chooses when to start digesting, but can only stop when her body has been unable to extract any nutrients from whatever's inside her for a while. The non-Newtonian quality of plasm is also why assyliads instinctively, upon the membrane being severely damaged, repeatedly smack the open wound against the nearest hard surface or simply squeeze incredibly tightly. They can stop when, after several minutes to half an hour, a super-thin layer of membrane has covered the wound. The assyliad will then have to take pains not to re-burst this injury over the next couple days to weeks as the membrane thickens back to its normal state. As the membrane becomes less solid in hot, wet conditions, the time it takes to heal depends greatly on the season.
The membrane is full of tiny organs, sensory bulbs and knitters, from the moment the assyliad splits off from her mother. The bulbs are basic sensory organs that can do near anything human skin can. The knitters are membrane-healers, producing more membrane and more of themselves wherever a wound is created.
Initially, most assyliads possess only one teardrop-shaped clump of internal organs, known as the core. The core contains the nucleus, the pituitary gland, and the electroreptor cluster by default. The nucleus is more or less a brain, while the pituitary gland is only somewhat analogous to the organ of the same name in merfolk. The pituitary gland serves the same purpose though a different means; it turns nutrients into plasm and stops producing plasm when the assyliad reaches a certain size. The electroreceptor cluster enables two assyliads in physical contact with each other to transmit messages through the plasm, as well as sending signals from nucleus to mebrane/organs detached from the core.
Being amorphous, an assyliad can train her body to assume any shape (formally, "pattern") she can conceive of, so long as it's not bigger than her and she's willing to put in the effort to commit the pattern to mebrane-memory. Often a framework or creature's skeleton is used as an aid. The Eastern Estyllian pattern, popularized in guess-where, is what the assyliads of Inom hold to be their traditional pattern.
The EE pattern is quite simple and plain compared to the other fashions of Estyl. It has one skirt-shaped leg with a number of pods around the edges which it uses to ambulate, sort of like Earthly insects of far more legs than are necessary. From the breastless torso extend two arms on either side, each tipped with four finger-shaped polyps. Another polyp is formed like a humanoid's head to house the core, and it is fashionable to place sensory organs here as well.
Patterns based off of other sapient species are also very popular on Inom, using either their bones or wooden skeletons as an aid in adopting the pattern. Similarly, they will often grow facsimiles of external organs, such as breasts or hair, or functional analogues, like teeth or nails.

Biological Traits

Assyliads can look wildly different. They can reflect any color under the sun and even some outside of the human visual spectrum. They can possess any number of limbs and organs; they don't even have to resemble an animal. Their bodies can shrink smaller than fingers and they can form amalgams larger than houses. They're mostly around human-sized, though.

Genetics and Reproduction

Assyliads reproduce sexually, despite the many similarities they share to single-celled life. Traditionally, the process hardly falls in line with human standards of eroticism. There is no hardcoded bearer/sire binary or bearer-intersex-sire array among assyliads. Instead, one assyliad will grow a proboscis wherever convenient and use this to inject her own plasm into whoever will carry the developing child. The shape and position of the proboscis vary wildly, depending on whether the designated "bearer" develops her own point of entry or if the "sire" intends to keep the proboscis when not in use.
The mixture of plasms begins the creation of a new core, first forming the nucleus, then the pituitary gland, then the electroreceptor cluster. Once the pituitary gland is established, it begins to contribute in its own small way to the plasmic mass of the child-lump. During this process, it is inadvisable to try and relocate the forming child elsewhere within the body, as before the pituitary gland develops, the core can be accidentally torn apart, while afterwards, too much of the mass of the lump now belongs to the child and the mother risks damaging her own membrane. Of note is that the color of an assyliad's body is determined while the pituitary gland is forming, influenced by the dyes in the mother's diet and the lights which it is exposed to.
Once the electroreceptor cluster is developed, the mother and child can begin communicating, which is crucial for the child's mental development. A child whose mother does not communicate before parting will not be able to communicate with those who maintain membrane-to-membrane contact. Such feral assyliads usually either stagnate and perish or pursue development in their own way, often growing into very dangerous and hungry beasts.
Because all that's necessary for reproduction is a mixing of plasms within the membrane, it's not unusual for assyliad survivors of violent conflicts to awaken pregnant in the field hospital, often in a less-than-ideal part of the body.

Growth Rate & Stages

Assyliads grow as fast as they're fed. Rather than their developing innards following a schedule and putting their bodies into nutrient-debt if they must, their organs are developed whenever there's leftovers from that which is invested in maintaining healthy size.
Some assyliads, when grown as large as they'll naturally get, decide to merge with another assyliad and create an amalgam-- the combined sapiences and often mass of two or more assyliads in one body. This process does not produce offspring because a core is introduced to the body before a new one can start forming.
Other than plasm color, one's status as an amalgam or a "single", as those not part of an amalgam are called, is among the few meaningful ways one can distinguish assyliads. Splitting an assyliad off the amalgam with fewer than one fatality ranges from very difficult to impossible, depending on available medical technology, time spent as part of the amalgam, and how organs have combined-- joining an amalgam is typically a permanent thing, so young and impressionable assyliads had better consider how well they can tolerate their partner(s). Back on Estyl, there are amalgams the size of mansions.

Ecology and Habitats

The assyliads are no strangers to dead worlds. The sapient species that Estyl originally bore perished in nuclear fire. The slime molds took over, eating the organic remains of the ancient Estyllians. The weather, the radiation, the pollution-- these forged the assyliads into adaptible and sapient beings.
Inom is nothing like Estyl. Inom is a dead world, yes, but only in that the original dominant species is nowhere to be found. Yes, an assyliad can ingest twice as much radiation as a human safely can and not get sick. Yes, an assyliad can survive for weeks without food or water at only cost to her size. Yes, an assyliad can sterilize a landfill in the name of satiation. These are not threats to assyliads' continued existence on Inom. The radiation one receives on Inom is lower than on Earth. Food and water are as plentiful as dirt. Toxins, whenever encountered (rarely), are seldom the primary concern. Instead, the assyliads must deal with warmongering sapients who have an incredibly hard time even comprehending assyliad physiology and psychology. Instead, the assyliads must deal with their own rapidly-swelling numbers and all the factions and bands their young are splitting off into. Instead, the assyliads must deal with the troubling recognition that they are sharing Anicoja with species that very nearly came close to destroying their own planets-- sometimes more than once, demonstrating a clear inability to learn lessons-- and which are rapidly reapproaching the level of technology that allowed them to nearly reproduce Estyl in the first place.

Dietary Needs and Habits

Assyliads can digest pretty much any organic matter humans can, and then some. They can't break down wood or bone, but they'll burn through gristle, cartilage, grass, leaves, and more. Doesn't even matter if it's spoiled, which typically means that most of the food assyliads keep stored is allowed to spoil.

Biological Cycle

In the spring and summer, or really any time it gets warm and wet, assyliads' membranes become more difficult to keep completely solid, causing them to absorb dirt and debris into their soles by accident, accidentally merge into amalgams, or eat things they didn't mean to eat.

Additional Information

Geographic Origin and Distribution

They hail from the planet Estyl.
The largest assyliads settlements on Anicoja are located in the northwestern corners of the continent.

Average Intelligence

They used to be dumb blobs of goo but now they're space-farers, so...

Perception and Sensory Capabilities

A baby assyliad can only perceive the world through the sensory bulbs inherited from her mother's mebrane and her electroreptors until developing more sensory organs-- senses of pressure, temperature, friction, texture, sharpness, softness, as well as an electrical transmission link to any other assyliad in physical contact.
As an assyliad grows, her mother(s) will teach her how to form more sensory organs-- photoreceptors, chemoreceptors, auditory receptors, and so on. Assyliads can have any number of these receptors, based on what they deem necessary. And then, to parallel their senses, they are taught how to produce organs capable of creating such signals-- bioluminescent sacs, ballooning cavities, whistling reeds... vocal cords to replicate the tongue of any other species of Inom.

Symbiotic and Parasitic organisms

They can assume patterns convenient for the use of other species, if that's the line of work they wish to go down. The infamous example is of an assyliad shrunken down into a super-customizeable vibrator.

Civilization and Culture

Major Organizations

The entirety of Estyl and many surrounding planets belong to their kind, and on Inom they own numerous mini-states in the mountains surrounding their crash-site city of Tay Buly.

Average Technological Level

Most assyliad inventions are reverse-engineered from the ancient Estyllian civilization.

History

They began as the slime that grew in dead Estyl's middens. Over time and influenced by dwindling landfills and gamma radiation, they developed into more and more ambulant things. As they encountered hazards in both their food sources and environments, they got smarter and sturdier. It took far longer than most beings need, but the assyliads eventually achieved sapience.
As they progressed from hives to queendoms to states, Estyl grew cleaner. Toxins were scrubbed from the soil and water. Radiation died down as it was bound to do in time. Nature's ravaged genes sloughed off that which was doomed and what remained thrived. Estyl would never resemble its specific former glory, but the assyliads could make it into something far more utopic.
Inom's assyliads were but simple planetary surveyors, seeking minerals that could no longer be found in natural form on their planet and potential new homes. They sure found something! Thanks to the original Anicojan assyliads, the species is represented on Inom by bright and curious scientific minds.

Interspecies Relations and Assumptions

The other species of Inom are very interesting! None even remotely resemble the assyliads! The other species of Inom induce loneliness! None even remotely resemble the assyliads!

Scientific Name

Estyllian suited jelliform woman

Origin/Ancestry

Single, Amalgam

Lifespan

Infinity, as long as not killed

Conservation Status

Like most other sapient species on the surface of Inom, they're not at high risk of losing their continued existence on Inom. Though generally isolationist and keeping to Tay Buly, there's still many diaspora assyliads living in Thriving, for instance.