Darkner Biology: Zappers!
Feel free to use them! My headcanons! Part two of my TV World Darkner biology series. Part one, Part two: You are here, Part three.
Sensor = Light on the top of the Zapper's head.
So Zappers I tend to base their animal for general inspiration as being various protective animals like dogs alongside predators with a slant towards slugs, snakes and other such things. Long animals, with a focus on ones known for loyalty, protection, strength and duty.
Zappers in terms of their bodily construction compared to their general animal inspirations is a mechanical being with pliable and soft plastic coverings on their body. It grows thicker near the extremity of their limbs and belly and acts as the protective layer over their inner mechanics, a seam running along the side of the plastic like toy manufacturing. This plastic covering is able to be taken off though careful touch to pry it open on the seam to access mechanics for maintenance and the like. Their joints are like rock'em sock'em robots and the like. With simplified and slightly cartoony hydraulics.
Their necks are quite heavy in this plastic, making their heads like joycon sticks. With Zappers with especially heavy plastic there, it can be something similar to a dewlap on a well fed bunny or a scruff of an animal with loose skin. Buttons are either on their chest or their sides. Internally, They're machinery, wiring and the like with blood vessels and small amounts of meat cushioning their most vital parts, yes this means a Zapper can be comfortably pudgy if they both have more meat and plastic.
Their visor acts as both their mouth and their eye, emoting and providing sight. Opening like a hanger door or a sliding window. Their actual voice comes through speakers on their chest, though that isn't always the case. The sensor on their head granting general spatial awareness. Zappers can communicate long distances through their sensors in the top of the head through the signals sent. And this also lets them bounce their signals and teleport.
Their foot can function as both a tail and a foot. Which method of transportation preferred depending on the length and width of it.
Zappers have three fingers in total, with their fingers being broad and rectangular with visible joints amongst the thick plastic. Their forearms are similar to humans, with the back of it with patterning often. Their retractable claws are usually made of metal with a thin plastic coating and pretty blunt on average. Other materials claws can be made of are glass, plastic completely or epoxy. Very rarely a Zapper has no claws at all. An Zapper's hand is built for a secure, strong grip, and is able to lock in place much akin to a bird, holding onto things even when unfocused or asleep.
Depending on who owned them in the lightworld and factors such as manufacturing, in order of rareness, they can either have rubbery skin, scaling, mechanical outsides, gel like skin, short seal-like fur or longer fuzz and fluff. This is a fluid movement and combinations of these kinds are possible alongside exceptions, such as finding a Zapper with short fur on their belly and scales everywhere else. And this can shift depending on the Dark World. Most Zappers in TV World have rubbery skin with a smatter of mechanical ones. Zappers are naturally built to be hardy and last long, enduring best they can.
Depending on the Dark World, it can change how their lights/sensors pattern and flash, and a portion of their bodies are built differently.
In TV World the Zappers are often stronger than the average, and tend more towards having heavier plastic on them in general, thus being softer. Their lights flash in nonsensical sequences and their sensors are similar to nightlights in how they illuminate things, and for some Zappers, like a projector even, with a simple pattern in the light. Most able to teleport with ease, changing the channels so to say.
Card Castle Zappers have overlapping layers of plastic on their back, with the layers looking like cards, game pieces, and other similar things. Their lights flash in defined pattern and for their sensor it's like mellow fire in a fireplace. They tend to be quicker at reacting with being better at taking blows but have worse sensory capabilities.
Cyber City Zappers often are more mechanical, with simple LEDs lights lining their form on their sides. These LEDs can be more simple or more complex in terms of size, shape and design. Their sensors and lights tend towards neon and blinking. These guys tend to be good at making connections.
Dark Sanctuary Zappers often are the most serpentine of all Zappers, their claws often being made of glass. Uniquely, they have transparent parts on their body and you can see into their insides like glass frogs. Their sensors project light with wave-like patterns and their lights are always in the same sequence. Fast moving.
Cattenheimer Zappers tend to have sharper claws, to extreme levels for some, being needle-like. And when their visor is open it is shaped to have fangs rather than the flat surface Zappers usually have. Rubber tends towards being denser and more on their necks. Often Their sensors are like lava lamps or salt lamps with being the best at projecting specific things and even able to change color slightly. Overall they're more keen in their senses and better at detecting and picking up magic. Their magic skills likely higher as well.
Damage to Zappers is usually easy to repair unless it hits the battery case or their flesh. Plastic remolded, metal repaired. An Zapper's batteries are in their back with a path connecting it to their head, visor and thus mouth. Damage to a battery can leave the Zapper in a coma or lead to battery acid leakage into the rest of them. Causing hurt.
But the worse in terms of effects rather than total damage itself is getting the sensor damaged or changed. It is quite like Pippins loading as an example. Damage to the sensor can cause dizziness, confusion and memory issues in a Zapper, akin to head trauma. And it is long lasting and lingering even after being healed.
And, Zappers can get their sensors replaced, a new one inputted. If their sensor is replaced wrong, where if the replacement of their sensor is done improperly or with one that doesn't fit it can cause both health issues of the physical and mental kind, such as struggling to tell where others are, difficulty navigating, and long lasting effects of sensor damage. But a new sensor can also boost damage output, ability to use magic, and the like.
Their blood is battery acid, and it is where their magic flows through naturally through them as a conduit.