The Hepplewhite Crash Site.

The Wrecked Spaceship



A. Entry Lock. The inner hatch is locked. Any tampering will activate a recording that says, "Only authorized Hepplewhite, Inc., employees are allowed past this point. Please enter your security code." The door has a level 1 security lock. It must either be opened by a technician or blown open with explosives.

B. The Cockpit. A short ladder leads up to the cockpit. The body of a human pilot is strapped into the seat. All of the instruments are scorched and ruined, but beneath the pilot's seat is a black box labeled "Flight Record" that seems undamaged. If the characters play the tape, they will hear a yazirian saying, "There's been an explosion! Dierba is dead. I'm sealing off the engine compartment. Has anyone seen Rinny?" There is a fire extinguisher on the wall and an odd, slimy trail on the floor.

C & D. Wrecked Cabins. The room to starboard is caved in and contains nothing of value. A black trail of slime covers the plastic floor in the port side room. There is a child's toy on one of the bunks. The crash weakended the floor, so anyone walking into the room must make a RS check or fall through the floor, taking 1d5+2 points of damage.

E. Storage. All three storage lockers on the right are open and empty. There is a fire extinguisher on the wall and many black slime trails on the floor.

F. Rear Hatch. If the characters open this hatch, they will find dangling wires that are throwing sparks. Touching the wires will cause 2d10 points of damageand stun the characters for 1d10 minutes. To enter this area, characters must use an insulated tool to move the wires out of the way. Two doors leading down to the cargo area are blown open. A ladder leads up to the engine pods, and the hatch is badly scorched. An access panel in the port wall is open. More slime trails criss-cross the floor.

G. Engine Pod. The body of a dead yazirian is slumped in a control chair.  The engines are cracked, and acid and oil are collecting in pools on the floor. There is a 10% chance each minute that a fire will start in this compartment. If a fire starts, characters will realize that the ship will explode in 2 minutes (20 turns). The fire extinguishers in the ship will not stop the fire, but each turn the fire is sprayed delays the explosion for one turn. The characters using the extinguisher takes 1 point of damage per turn.

H. Cargo Hold. Nothing is left here but wreckage and slime on the floor. The slime was left by a small omnivore, a slime bug, that is hiding in the wreckage (Move Slow; IM/RS 6/55; STA 35; ATT 55; Dm 2d10). It looks like a flat bug with razor sharg claws. Characters move at half speed in slime.

Any character with Demolitions skill can find enough evidence in the hold to prove that a bomb was planted in the cargo hold. Otherwise, the players must figure this out themselves.

I. Service Passage. The characters can hear the sound of crying from this passage, but wreckage blocks the the crawlway. A fire extinguisher will cool the wreckage so characters can get past.

J. Wheel Well. A small yazirian child, Rinny, is trapped in this landing wheel well. He is crying and scared, but unhurt.

Q? Q is labeled on the map 3 times in three different locations? Why?

A Simple Insurance Investigation

Player Background

You had been looking into a job listing for mercenaries but that listing seems to be closed or filled; the only open listing left on the net is a simple insurance investigation. Its not very glamorous but money is money and the offer seems to pay well: 60 Credits/day with first class skills certification and bonus for a demolitions expert? What's up with that? Maybe somebody detonated a bomb. You figure why not money is money and it beats unskilled labor postings at 20 credits a day.

You arrive at the CDC corporate enclave. CDC is big in insurance and your not surprised to land in the office of an insurance adjuster.

"Thank you for arriving promptly. A shuttle that CDC holds the policy on went down a couple days ago. An emergency beacon from it was only detected today and the area where the beacon is signaling form was overflown from orbit but there was no visual of the lost ship. The troubling issue with this ship is the last broadcast from it:"

The insurance adjuster lays a file table computer on the table and activates a recording, "There's been an explosion! Dierba is dead. I'm sealing off the engine compartment. Has anyone...." and the recording ends in static.

We also know that the owners were planning to sell the Hepplewhite Dream and purchase an interstellar craft so we're concerned with insurance fraud and that is where your come in. You will fly out to the area of the emergency beacon, locate the ship, determine the cause of the crash, rescue any survivors, recover any casualties and collect and preserve any evidence you find before reporting back here."

"CDC will provide an air car to fly you and it will return after 20 hours. You will also have a 300 Credit advance for supplies and will be paid for two days work with bonuses for successful investigation. You have an hour to obtain supplies before the rented air car and pilot are here. Any of you demolitions certified? If not we have an scanners keyed to dected the presence of explosive material."

A Simple Insurance Investigation (referee background)

The players missed on an a classic mercenary contract offered by Bio-Gen Inc., however this contract would have been less money (as low as 20 credits/day for a projectile sharpshooter) although it provided for more money for equipment and military hardware. Sucessful PER checks with NPCs while stocking up on supplies with the credit advance can reveal this.

The PCs can obtain the Stats on the Hepplewhite Dream from CDC if they ask:
[Insert KHs stats]

To obtain a crew and cargo manifest they will need to consult with Hepplewhite Cargo LLC. The company is currently being held together by a human secretary who tells everyone to call her Auntie Mae and somehow everyone wants to do just that. She's frantic to learn the fate of the Hepplewhite crew as the company is small and all employees are family.

Crew:
Pilot: Hanson White
Astrogator: Carsic Hepple 
Purser: Gallen Hepple
Engineer: Diebra Sensa

Passenger: Rinny Sensa

Cargo Manifest
28 cannisters of samples from Bio-gen destined for Bio-gen headquarters Gran Quivera, Prengular. 

Rumor Table
If PCs do any inquiring around they can each learn one rumor: roll on table.

[Insert Rumor table]