User blog comment:Arbington/ME3 Theories/@comment-899316-20100704025222

The Reapers exist not to kill organic life, but to harvest it. That's how they increase their numbers, by using organic beings to create more Reapers.Thus, a single organic being, in my example Illusive Man, could in theory become a Reaper. Not necassarily a full-blown cuttlefish-shaped spacefaring Reaper, but a Reaper nonetheless. Sure, he'd be smaller, and still human-shaped, but he'd be a Reaper, and thus capable of trying to take over the Reaper fleet.