Suddenly, he found himself in standing in the middle of a bustling street, and as the harsh light faded he could make out people of all shapes and sizes moving around. The crowds parted slightly at his arrival at first, then proceeded on as normal, the sight of a new arrival common enough to not warrant a second glance. It was only when a woman screamed that people actually paid attention, and backed up quickly. Seeing their stares heading his way, he looked down wondering if that damn computer had dropped him down stark naked, but whatever he’d been expecting, it wasn’t what he saw.

His mottled greyish skin, if you could call it that, hung off his frame in thick rolls, overlapping on each other like scales, giving him the illusion of being thicker than he was. He quickly reached to his chest to see if it was real, only to find his hands suffering from the same condition, the skin hard and scaly as he touched it. Before he could do anything more, the startled onlookers had collected themselves.

“Kill it!” One shouted.

“What even is it?”

“Doesn’t matter! It’s a monster and it’s surrounded! Dibs on it’s drops!”

Dave held up his arms in defence and tried to say something to them, only to find all he could do was let out a moaning gurgle, before the raised weapons of the crowd started falling down on him. The pain was realistic, if muted, and he cried out as the blades bit into him, before something came down hard on his skull, and everything went black.

You have died

As you are below level 10, will you not receive any penalties. All carried items have dropped on your body. Your body will disintegrate in 3 hours.

Respawn time: 12 hours

What the hell had just happened?

He was floating in an empty space once again, tinted grey this time, bodiless once again. If he’d at least had that, he could try to figure out what the computer had screwed up. He’d told it to make him something that could sing, and what did it do? He’d been dropped as some half baked mistake that couldn’t even talk.

It felt like forever as he was left to float aimlessly in the void, stewing on his emotions, but after only an hour, everything around him snapped into focus. He squinted at the sudden light, and looked around at his new surroundings. He was standing on a tropical beach, a bright blue sky overhead dotted with fluffy white clouds and faint breeze that filled the air with the smell of the sea. The waves of crystal clear water gently lapped at the sands, but the space in front of him held Daves attention. Right where the sand met grass under a pair of palm trees was a large square of carpet, containing a wide desk, two chairs and a small filing cabinet.

“Mr Andel? If you’d care to take a seat?”

Turning sharply, he found a man in a pale tailored suit walking past him gesturing for him to take a seat. Finding that he’d regained his strange body again, and with no real understanding of the situation, he did as he was told, stumbling slightly as his legs felt like they were made entirely out of knees.

Taking a seat behind the desk, the man kicked off a pair of sandals and stretched his arms.

“When they told us initially that we wouldn’t get a real office to save on budget we were annoyed, but I've got to admit, I like this better.” He said with a smile, but that soon fell from his face.

“To begin Mr Andel you have my deepest sympathies regarding your accident. I'm sure you’ve been told your survival is a miracle a million times already, though I have to wonder why the miracle didn’t stop the car first instead.”

Dave was confused, not knowing exactly who this person was or how they knew who he was.

“My name is Barry Livingstone, I'm one of the leads working on the expanse, and specifically I've taken charge of the medical suspension program. And to answer your next question, I can hear your thoughts here, since everything here is just thoughts.”

Dave hesitated before deciding to just roll with it. So how do you know me then?

“Well, like I said I'm in charge of the medical program were running, the one your hospital is a part of. As such I have access to a certain amount of medical records regarding participants, but for you specifically... I'm not sure if you’re aware of this, but you made the news for quite some time. A couple of groups had latched on to your accident as a sign that the government ignored laws and kickbacks kept being brought up... it was a whole thing for quite a while, with you being used as a rallying point, though sadly I don't think either side actually cared much for your wellbeing.”

That’s... why am I here? And where is here anyway?

“Right, let’s get back to it. Now, in The Expanse, when you die you’re automatically logged out for twelve hours. But in your condition you can’t actually do that, so we need to find you an alternative, otherwise you’d be sitting in nothing until you respawned. Is there anything you’d like to do? Listen to some music, browse the net, spend some time at the beach? I can recommend that last one.”

Why did I die in the first place?! What did your system screw up!? Dave thought furiously slamming his hand down on the desk.

Barry winced. “Please don't shout mentally, it’s very loud and uncomfortable.”

Reaching over, he pulled a folder out of the cabinet beside him.

“Now we get to the main concern, and why I'm here myself, rather than a more junior programmer.”

To apologise for your computers mistake?

The man opened his mouth to speak, then hesitated with a wince. “Sorry, a few things just connected for me. I was going to say have been watching the news, but now I can see where the problems occurred. The expanse uses the most advanced AI system ever created, and has more computing power at its disposal than a lot of smaller countries. It’s at a point where it, and to a lesser degree the fragments it uses to control figures in game, are sapient. The real kind that is causing us law suits about using as characters in a video game.”

That’s impressive I guess, but how did that cause this? Dave said holding up a sagging arm.

“Well, we’ve got more access on our side of things, but the place where players have the most direct contact with the AI is in the character creation section, so they can find something that will match them. And the fragment in charge didn’t exactly think highly of your behaviour.”

So, what, you’re saying I was rude, so it melted me and got me killed? Can you fix this so I can start properly then?

“You’re not melted, just sort of...wobbly. Kind of gross in my opinion, but I believe that’s the point. You see, we did a bit of messing about in the alpha and beta of the game, and one of the things we often did were various competitions and challenges, and the winners could choose to have a monster player character.”

So I’m a monster?

“A monster player.” He said, stressing the word. “They were created so people could play as things that we’d normally set up as enemies. Some people just really want to pretend to be a vampire, you know? Anyway, most of them changed back to normal characters after the excitement wore off, but there still a few hundred about. And while we don't offer them out anymore, they aren’t actually locked, so it was within Sasha’s power to give you one.”

Sasha?

Barry coughed. “We name a few of the AI fragments we interact with often. Sasha’s the one you dealt with.”

So it... “she”, dropped me in as this, knowing I’d get killed. Great. Can you put me back to normal now? I came to this game to sing, but I can’t even speak in this body.

The programmer sighed, running his hand through his hair. “Yes, no and not quite. Spawning in a spot like that was wrong and I’ve already given Sasha a talking to about it, so I’ll be giving you something to make up for it. As to changing your character, there’s a minimum 3 month gap between creating characters. It’s to stop people just renewing them repeatedly to try to get luck bonuses or trigger certain events. And we’ve locked that rule all the way to the top I'm afraid, it’s just not worth the headache of having a bunch of rich kids screaming to have special treatment.”

So you’re saying I’m going to be stuck like this for months? Silent and saggy? Emotion starting to leak through his thoughts.

Barry chuckled. “Heh. Stuck, yes, but the rest of it? If you’d gone through the tutorials or really any of the other things, you’d have learned a bit about that body of yours. Here,” he said, passing him a sheet that turned into a small screen. “This is the stuff about your race that you should probably read.”

Mockerman

The mockerman is a distant offshoot of the mimic species that has evolved to be an active hunter rather than patiently waiting to ambush. Preferring dense, urban environments, the mockerman has great control over its physiology, manipulating their baggy mottled hide to take the appearance of other sapient races. Within this skin their organs and bones are highly mobile, allowing them to even copy the internal structures, as well as make room for large amounts of food, of which they need to eat a minimum of a third of their weight each day. Due to their unique physiological makeup, the mockerman diet consists solely of other sapient creatures, and while able to consume other food to maintain their disguise, they are unable to absorb any nutrients from it. One of the most notable features of the mockerman are their vocal chords, which can be manipulated to create and replicate almost any sound, and is used to lure unwary prey to their death.

Racial Abilities

Liquid core: Penalties to strength, stamina, constitution, dexterity

Body Shaping - 1: Able to take forms of sapients. Higher levels can allow you to change further, such as size, gender and additional limbs and features.

Mockers Voice - 1: Able to make most sounds a human could make. Higher levels will allow for a wider range of sounds.

Mockers Hunger: Can only survive by eating sapients (player or npc). Must eat one third of own mass each day or begin to starve. Starving will lead to loss of body shaping abilities.

Monstrous Nature: You count as a monster for the purpose of game rules when attacked by other players in your base form. Npc’s will also treat you this way.

What are the other stats? Health and things? Doesn’t the game have those? Dave asked curiously as he read.

Barry grinned. “It does indeed, more numbers stats and calculations than you can poke a stick at.”

Then where are they?

“Hidden. You want to see them, you’ll need to work on the identify skill. Same goes for items, enemies, damage, your health, the works really.”

Then how will you know if your stuff is good, or if the enemies are dying?

“The same way they did in the past, by looking at it. There are skills that can help you spot a better piece of weaponry or armour, but you’ll learn to spot it without skills after a while. As for combat? We spoke about it a lot during press conferences, but I guess you wouldn’t have seen those. All damage and combat is proportional, so you stab something, it will be treated as if you stabbed it. Swing an axe into someone’s leg and your likely to take it off, cut someone’s...” he hesitated. “...throat, and you’ll probably kill them. No standing there taking a million arrows, you get hit, you get hurt. Of course, armour, stats and skills can change things, but in general we’ve tried to keep things as realistic as possible. But enough about the general stuff, what do you think of your own race?”

It looks like a lot of downsides, but am I really reading this right? I have to... eat people? Dave thought, feeling faint.

“Not really a pleasant thought is it? I'm not the one who made them so don't blame me, but as you can see you won’t be left mute if you don't want to be.”

How do I use it? He asked eagerly, other thoughts thrown away for a chance to sing.

Barry checked a nonexistent watch. “I’ve still got a few hours before my next meeting, how about I load up a few of those tutorials and we take your silent and saggy self for a spin? I'm honestly kind of curious how it’ll go myself.”