Due to cosmic shenanigans, at least one version of Earth got contaminated with Tenzali's onoidj technology. This caused a lot of people (and other lifeforms) to become inorganic onoidj liches. Mitra was lucky and turned into a regular lich but her brother Sasha became a mindless shapeshifting monster. Luckily Mitra eventually learned how to rectify broken transformations, that is, she downloaded schematics and software so she could shapeshift the necessary machinery with her own body.