The storm had damaged the subspace
antenna (it later ripped it off completely)
and so only a garbled distress message
reached the Moneyspider. Snobol was
already a long way from Venturi but Parl
Kiopta, the Moneyspider's Human co-
pilot, volunteered to attempt a rescue by
manually piloting a shuttle down to
Jetsom. Most of the crew volunteered to
go with Parl, but the Vrusk captain, Akizk
Kass, chose only three; the astrogator's
Vrusk assistant Tak-Arbork, the Dralasite
Beta team leader Nimbrus Hool and one
of the Beta team technicians, a Human
called Midge Arma.

Parl's plan was a dangerous one, since
the shuttle was designed to be able to
reach Jetsom at Snobol's closest app-
roach and so could carry barely enough
fuel for the longer trip. All went well until
the shuttle reached Venturi's atmos-
phere; the shuttle's ice shield was struck
by lightning from the storm and shattered.
Unprotected, the shuttle burned up, killing
all on board.

This left Captain Akizk in a desperate
situation. With only six crew remaining
(including himself), he dared not risk
another rescue mission. The fate of the
Venturi Project hung in the balance.

THE ADVENTURE

Starting

The start is described in BETA SECTION
- THE OFFER (page 6). It begins with the
characters as passengers on a small
freighter which is passing through the
Belnafaer system en route to its final
destination. The ship will experience a
breakdown, and stop off at Snobol to
make repairs.

At first, the characters will not be allowed
to leave the ship, but then Captain Akizk
will invite them aboard the Moneyspider.
He will explain to them about the Venturi
Project and as much as he knows about
the tragedy on Jetsom. Then he will offer
to pay them well if they will go down to
Venturi and discover the cause of the
disaster. He will offer extra rewards for
rescuing any survivors, repairing Jetsom
and bringing back the stores of partly-
refined bio-chemicals.
 

This part of the adventure is described in
GAMMA SECTION - JETSOM PLAT-
FORM (page 8). The infection by the
Matrix has made Jetsom a dangerous
place. After they arrive, the characters
must overcome the dangers, gain some
idea of the nature of the Matrix, and learn
how to destroy it. This will require them to
explore the platform in search of infor-
mation and to gain control of its life-
support systems.

Return to the Moneyspider

This part of the adventure is described in
DELTA SECTION - SNOBOL & MONEY-
SPIDER (page 18). By the time the
characters return to the Moneyspider, the
Matrix there will have mutated from its
original form into a far more sinister one.
This new form of the Matrix has not only
infected the computers and ordinary
robots, but also Baralou Ap-Reaverchan,
the ship's astrogator, a very sophisticated
anthropomorphic Yazirian cybot. Working
through the computers and robots, Bar-
alou will subtly attempt to kill off the
characters and crew. The characters
must survive the attempts on their lives
and then track down their source.

USING THE MODULE

Pull-Out Section

The middle eight pages of this module
(numbered I-VIII) contain information
which the referee may need at many
points during the course of the adventure,
and it is intended that these pages should
be removed from the rest of the module
booklet (numbered 1-24) for ease of
reference.

They can only be read easily once
detached, and it is suggested that you
remove these pages now.

Abbreviations

Statistics for NPC's and robots encount-
ered in this adventure have been abb-
reviated as follows

ATT - Attack rating; BODY/LEVEL -
Body type/robot level; DEX - Dexterity;
DM - Damage;  IM - Initiative modifier;
INT - Intuition; LDR - Leadership;  LOG

Conditions inside areas of Jetsom, Snobol
and Moneyspider have been summarized
by the following abbreviations:

Envt - Environment; G - Gravity; O - 
Oxygen level; P - Pressure; R - Radiation
level; Std - Standard; T - Temperature

Other abbreviations are:

AD =  STAR FRONTIERS Alpha Dawn
game;  KH  =  STAR FRONTIERS Knight
Hawks game

DAY