A moment of searing pain. Then I'm fine. Wait… I'm not breathing. Why aren't I… I'm not breathing, but I'm fine? How is that possible? I take a moment to take stock… my eyes are closed. I can feel my fingers… they move… my toes… same. I take a breath… okay, I can breathe, that's good… I open my eyes to a metal ceiling… huh, it's not a metal I've seen before… must be painted or some alloy... wait... hullmetal? How do I know that.... I find I'm ying down, so I sit up… and feel a pulling at my chest. I look down…

  What? I shouldn't have cleavage. And I shouldn't be naked. Where's my….

  “Ah, you're awake, good.” That's the GM's voice… Ferdinand. I look for him… he hasn't changed, he's standing between… wait… two twenty foot tall bipedal robots, strapped down as cargo? There's a pstic locker at my feet… I'm on a cot…and there's three other women looking around, all naked, a little pale but well-shaped… hmm… of course, I CAN'T bed them properly right now… oddly, that doesn't cool my jets much.

  “All right, so your gear should be in the lockers at your feet…” the GM marches on until one of the girls screams.

  Oh, that was me.

  He pauses, “What seems to be the problem, David?”

  One of the other girls answers before I do, “I'm not supposed to be a girl! Or naked! WHERE ARE WE?!” Curiously, she's shaking her hands vigorously, rather than speaking aloud, but I somehow know sign nguage now?

  So that's Brett, then… I can kind of see the resembnce… same color hair… she could easily be his sister, just from the face. Not built like a linebacker anymore, though.

  Ferdinand answers calmly, “We're on your ship. Everything is as I said, as you agreed, collectively. The girl thing… ah, yes, David interrupted when I was expining the complications. We didn't have enough remaining Exception to just magically make you all reappear in the event of your deaths, plus there would be the question of where in the cosmos you'd return, and so the ‘all women’ thing is required to handle rebirthing you when you die… whoever is left standing will rapidly grow pregnant, and give birth to the fallen, who will in turn rapidly grow into whatever new form she selected during the ‘rerolling’ stage. Missing equipment will re-manifest as the old loses cohesion wherever it ended up, the whole process takes maybe eight hours… why are you upset? I was being quite up-front about everything.”

  As Brett and I just sort of sit there in shock, Alice… huh, she's rgely recognizably herself, just a bit paler… steps in, “Context. You were at a gaming store, putting your recruiting poster among those from people who were setting up for games of ‘let's pretend’ with complex rules.”

  Charlene is also recognizable, and picks up where her other half left off, “So while it seems true enough that you said nothing false and were making no attempt to leave out relevant information, the context within which you presented the truth misled us all. Because of the context, we were expecting to sit down for a few hours talking, rolling dice, and moving game pieces around a table, not…” she spins in pce, waving her arms around, her chest swinging a little longer than the rest of her. She pauses, then continues: “Is that about right, ‘boys’?”

  Brett and I just nod as Alice Iicks her lips.

  “Oh. Oh dear. Umm…” Ferdinand does that silent speech again for a bit.

  “Who's on the other end of the call?” Brett signs and frowns… it just makes her look pouty and cute.

  The game master gives a distracted, “the Big Boss,” as he seems to be listening to a voice only he can hear.

  “That silent speech isn't English,” Alice supplies, “I can normally read lips.”

  “…it's my native tongue, the name wouldn't mean anything to you…” the suited man still seems quite distracted.

  While he's apparently getting an earful, I get up and check the pstic locker at my feet… two second skins, a survival knife, an industrial backpack, clothing, lighter, hygiene kit, spare com unit, and on and on… my thousand credits of starting gear, with the change in UPBs so I can build whatever I find I need… provided it's a first level item and I have enough. I look and see that the GM is still talking to the mysterious sponsor, so I go ahead and get dressed in a second skin (it's low profile armor) and some clothing, consider for a moment, and summon a minion… it takes a minute to do, but it sts twenty four hours, so that's not a big deal.

  I have to admit, it's weird just knowing how to do this… oh, I get it: Brett went with an Oath of Silence from Spheres, and we all coordinated with him to know the signed version of Common, and we know what our characters would... huh… very weird.

  “We can do MAGIC?!?!” Brett’s eyes are very wide as she signs, “...I might be okay with this.”

  As I finish having my summoned minion dress up in the armor I provided for her (yes, my summoned minion is a girl… I like picturing women, what can I say?) Ferdinand seems to finish up. Huh… now that I'm paying attention… he doesn't have a shadow?

  “All right… so…” he sighs and breaks my chain of thought, “...we only had the one block of Exception to apply, and… can't get more. There are two ways out of this for you. One, you put Garret down for good; at that point, we'll have the resources to untangle you from the immortality patch individually, and send you home as gently as you desire, assuming you still wish to leave at that time. You'll return in your prior bodies, at the table in the gaming shop, finding only seconds have passed. Two,” he takes a deep breath, “you all kill yourselves in rapid succession. We won't get the invested Exception back, but we can't be the good guys if we're svers, no matter how much it costs us to avoid it. But… you're not fully committed to this reality. If you can't live here, you won't, and your native reality will pick you back up; you'll wake up as you were in the same pce we took you about a day ter by that reality's time… probably minus anything you were wearing or carrying, I don't imagine the staff would leave all your clothes and such just lying around.”

  What? “Ah… let me get this straight: To go home now, I need to die?”

  He shakes his head, “No.” Oh, good, “You all need to die.” Ugh. “If even one of you survives, the rebirth cuse kicks in, you'll have new bodies here, and this reality's grip on you won't permit your home reality to recim you.”

  “I don't want to die,” Charlene speaks up, “No matter how temporarily. I also really don't like the idea of waking up naked in public. So I guess that means I'm voting we go after Mr. Garibaldi.”

  “I like the idea of having magic…” Brett signs and casts a cantrip, namely Telepathic Message, to speak in our minds, “Ah, that's better. So strange just having magic like this… I'm willing to give this a shot.” She checks her footlocker, and starts getting dressed as well… looks like she went with a Second Skin armor as well… I suppose it is the best of the first level options.

  “Likewise,” Alice unpacks her biped mech suit, nods, looks at everyone else, and adds, “We don't HAVE to get dressed… we could have some fun first… women's bodies can feel amazing when your partner knows how they work….”

  “I am not quite ready for a group…” I consider, “...although I think I would welcome that in a more one on one setting.” Alice is hot, no two ways about it. I totally want to get into her pants… maybe this has some advantages. “And… yeah, I don't want to die either, so… let's go get the BBEG.”

  As Ferdinand frowns, Charlene fills him in, “Big Bad Evil Girl, or Big Bad Evil Guy, depending on the context.”

  Alice smiles at me… such a warm smile… “All right, I'll take you up on that raincheck,” she licks her lips and gets dressed, putting on her clothes and her robot suit, then taking the time to mount her weapons on it… one ranged, one melee, “You came out very nicely, I can't wait to find out how you taste.” She also puts on her backpack, and loads everything up… lots of minor items in there.

  Once we're all dressed, I shift into my weapon form, having my summoned biped wield me, and practice having it speak for me: My survival strategy is ‘let everyone think I'm the loot’. “So…” I have my minion walk over to Ferdinand, “Tour of the ship?”

  “Yeah, sure. Umm… can you get the door?” He points at the button on the side of a door, “We're in the cargo bay now.”

  Brett frowns again… oh, she looks so cute when she pouts… but I think she's reacting to the statement… “Why don't you?” she keeps up the telepathy spell.

  “I… umm… essentially... I don't exist anymore,” the man answers, “I did the ritual, and paid the price. I can be seen and heard by you four, and I can see and hear what you know about when I'm with you, but I can't touch anything, I can't be seen or heard by anyone else, I can't scout for you, and when the st of you passes on from this reality…” Ferdinand takes a breath, “...I finish dying.”

  All four of us stop cold at that. It takes a full minute before anyone speaks up, and it's Alice who goes first, “and you were willing to just… let us go, without telling us this?”

  He closes his eyes and takes another breath, “I. Will. Not. Be. Like. Him.” He looks straight in Alice's eyes, “The cost doesn't matter, morality is absolute.” He fills his lungs again, and smiles, “...but you all decided to stay for your own reasons. I'm not going to manipute you.”

  “So you're an advisor only now,” my minion reys for me, “How does that work?”

  He shrugs, “I can only be in one pce at a time. While one or more of you is rerolling, I'm with you in the… ‘waiting room’. If one of you wishes to speak with me and I'm not otherwise occupied, I will be there, wherever you are. If none of you want me around, I'm stuck in the ‘waiting room’.” He considers, “I suppose I can pass messages if you're widely separated, although I can't just go to you, you need to actively want me to come… but otherwise... yes, I'm strictly an advisor now.”

  I have my minion hit the button for the door, “On to happier topics… let's see the technological wonder that is a starship?”

  “Sure…” he takes us through the ship. It's not crowded (the ship is ninety feet long), but the facilities are minimal (as an example, there's a single bathroom with one each of shower, toilet, sink, and mirror; no tub). There's a mess hall (not that any of us need to eat) that amounts to a table and a few chairs in a room, plus a counter, some cabinets, and drawers. Engineering has a power core (a tiny little nuclear reactor…), the bridge has four identical workstations (chairs with desks and four small data pads mounted on adjustable arms) and a big screen in front. Everything is either bare metal (the basic structure of the ship), that same pstic-like material our footlockers were made from, or data pads mounted in pce. The seats aren't very comfortable.

  One thing seems missing… “No bedrooms?” Alice beats me to it.

  “No,” our ghost shrugs, “You went with ‘common’ quarters. You can set your cots up wherever, but there's no specific pce for them.”

  “We can fix that next level, right?” Charlene actually seems worried… ah, no bedrooms means no beds, and she and Alice do seem to have rather high libidos.

  “Oh yes, easily,” the game master nods, “the ship, like your equipment, is ultimately a projection from the four of you. Once you all collect enough spilled life force to level up, we can spend a few hours in the ‘waiting room’ and upgrade everything.”

  “When we kill enough people, you mean,” Brett narrows his eyes.

  “That's not the only way to get it,” the ghost chuckles. “People that are sufficiently grateful give it off and yet live, animals and some robots have it, and a tiny amount is lost by most living creatures during day to day activities, which you can collect if there's enough of them about… but yes, killing people is the simplest and fastest route.”

  “So we're just supposed to murder people to power up?” I'm with Charlene on this one.

  “Not at all,” Ferdinand ughs, “the universe is a very dangerous pce. There will be a lot of people trying to murder you or those around you for various reasons, and good riddance to them. Lethal force in self defense or defense of others will get the job done, whether you go looking or not… well, as long as you don't try to hide out forever on a remote asteroid or something.”

  Hmmm... “I think I can work with that,” I have my minion nod.

  “So, about the guy you traded your life to try to sy…” Brett considers, “Why are we after him, and what are we up against?”

  The dead guy nods, “Ah, yes….”