TEXT: M i n d j a m m e r
  TM
  BLUE
  ADVENTURE IN THE RUINS OF AN ALIEN WORLD
  A MINDJAMMER SCENARIO
  by John Snead & Sarah Newton
  T
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  Inferior Garden World / United World
  Jessila III, commonly referred to simply 
  as “Jessila”, is a cool dry garden world 
  with three large continents separated 
  by narrow seas. The world is in a 
  mild ice age; approximately a fifth 
  of the planetary surface is covered in 
  kilometre-thick ice sheets. The world 
  underwent some terraforming early its 
  history, but now its human population 
  has instead been genurgically 
  adapted, and now comprises six 
  discrete phenotypes or *phenes*. 
  Jessila has been inhabited for 7000 
  standard years. Its oldest settlement 
  is Gathering City (pop 15 million), the 
  site of a space elevator, and its largest 
  city is Avinna, home to the world’s 
  main space port. Jessila also hosts an 
  orbital loop known as the Arch, which 
  connects the Gathering space elevator 
  with a twin at Drulia’s Triumph on the 
  continent of Farland.
  Jessila is today governed by a System 
  Council in a political system known as 
  the Voluntariat.
  High Concept: Rediscovered Human 
  World in an Ancient Alien Star 
  System.
  Aspects: Yellow-white F-class Main 
  Sequence Star; Ancient Human 
  Civilisation; Partly Terraformed; 
  Population of Genurgically Adapted 
  Phenes; T-Analogue Biosphere.
  PLANETARY TYPE: INFERIOR 
  GARDEN WORLD
  Planetary Age: Mature (+0).
  Orbit: Outer Habitable Zone (+1): 
  1.8AU.
  Year Length: 854d.
  Size: Standard (+1): 11700km.
  Density: Standard (+0).
  Surface Gravity: Standard (+0): 0.9G.
  Day Length: Standard (+0): 23h.
  Atmospheric Pressure: Standard 
  (+0): 1.1 Old Earth.
  Surface Temperature: Cool (-1) 10°C.
  Surface Liquid: Average (+0): 50% 
  water.
  Seasonality: Low Standard (-1).
  Satellites: 1 planetoid (+1) (Metler).
  Habitability: Agreeable (+3).
  Planetary Bodies: 6 (3 gas giants).
  CIVILISATION TYPE: UNITED WORLD
  Designation: Commonality Aligned 
  (+0).
  Population: High Standard (+1): 900 
  million human phenes (10% amphies, 
  20% arboes, 20% drylanders, 20% 
  glacers, 5% quatics, 25% standers); 
  minority population of 30,000 Blues.
  Government Type: Representative 
  (-2).
  Societal Dev: Widespread Unintrusive 
  Collective (+4).
  Openness: Equivocal (-1).
  Control Index: Property (-2).
  Trade Index: Low Moderate (-1).
  Embargo: No Embargo.
  Tech Level: T7 (+2): First Age of Space.
  Starport: Avinna, C-class starport 
  (+3); Gathering City, C-class starport 
  (+3).
  Mindscape: Global (-1).
  Culture: Fringe World culture in Stage 
  2: Normalisation.
  1 hex = 800km
  JESSILA (JESSILA III)
  Gathering
  Lauress
  T r a n s f a r l i a n  O c e a n
  Lauress
  FarLand
  Harmony
  GLimmer
  s i lv e r f l e c k  O c e a n
  Drulia’s 
  Triumph
  Avinna
  Mirror of the 
  City of Glass
  Mirror of the 
  Forbidden City
  
  TM
  THE ROLEPLAYING GAME
  BLUE
  ADVENTURE IN THE RUINS OF AN ALIEN WORLD
  A MINDJAMMER SCENARIO
  by John Snead & Sarah Newton
  s a r a h  n e w t o n s
  
  Credits
  Mindjammer: Blue written and developed by John Snead 
  and Sarah Newton
  Jessila system and setting material by John Snead
  Jessila rules material, Transparency campaign and 
  additional writing by Sarah Newton
  Cover Art by Jason Juta
  Layout and Graphic Design by Jason Juta
  Interior Art by Jason Juta, Eric Lofgren and Marc Gillespie
  Graphic Design Elements by Josephe Vandel and Paul 
  Bourne
  Cartography by Jason Juta and Sarah Newton
  Edited by Sarah Newton
  Art Direction by Jason Juta
  Proofreading by Sarah Newton and John Snead
  Produced by Chris McWilliam and Sarah Newton
  Enquiries: info@mindjammerpress.com
  Mindjammer Press Ltd is a private limited company, reg. 
  no. 8222890. Our registered office is at 35 Altham Grove, 
  Harlow, Essex, CM20 2PQ, UK.
  © 2016 Mindjammer Press Ltd. All Rights Reserved. 
  Mindjammer™ is a trademark of Mindjammer Press Ltd.
  ISBN (ebook): 978-1-911380-09-2.
  ISBN (physical version): 978-1-911380-08-5.
  First paperback edition printed in the UK
  Product Code: MUH042206
  Published by Mindjammer Press Ltd, 35 Altham Grove, 
  Harlow, Essex, CM20 2PQ
  Distributed by Modiphius Entertainment Ltd, 35 Harwood 
  Road, London, SW6 4PQ
  Publicity and Promotion by Modiphius Entertainment. 
  For publicity and promotion details contact pr@modiphius.
  com
  Fate Core System by Leonard Balsera, Brian Engard, Jeremy 
  Keller, Ryan Macklin, Mike Olson
  Fate™ is a trademark of Evil Hat Productions, LLC. The 
  Powered by Fate logo is © Evil Hat Productions, LLC, and is 
  used with permission.
  The Fate Core font is © Evil Hat Productions, LLC, and 
  is used with permission. The Four Actions icons were 
  designed by Jeremy Keller.
  Find out more about Mindjammer and other Mindjammer 
  Press games and fiction at www.mindjammerpress.com & 
  www.facebook.com/mindjammerpress
  DEDICATION BY JOHN SNEAD — To Andre Norton and 
  Arthur C. Clarke, two amazing authors who taught me to 
  dream and wonder about other worlds and the beings 
  that inhabit them; and to my partners Becca and AJ for 
  unending support and love.
  
  3
  Contents
  1: Introduction
  2: History of the Jessila Colony
  3: Jessilan Culture and Society
  4: The World of Jessila 
  5: The Planet Blue 
  6: Other Worlds of the Jessilan System
  Adventure: Transparency
  Episode 1: Blue Murder
  Scene 1: The Hermetic Killer
  Scene 2: Too Blue for You
  Scene 3: Out on the Bridge
  Scene 4: The Rejectionist
  Episode 2: The Blue Field Device
  Scene 1: The Device Chamber
  Scene 2: A Moment of Transparency
  Scene 3: The Device Awakens
  Scene 4: The Barrier Flickers
  Scene 5: The Link Portals
  Episode 3: The Promise
  Scene 1: The Theft of the Promise
  Scene 2: Talking to the Schismatics
  Scene 3: Intrigue at Endurance Station
  Scene 4: Retrieving the Promise
  Episode 4: The Brightening
  Plot Stress
  Scene 1: The Brightening Begins
  Scene 2: Getting Into the Vault
  Scene 3: Exploring the Sapphire Vault
  Scene 4: Against a Background of Evacuation
  Scene 5: Stopping the Brightening
  Epilogue: Transparency Achieved?
  Player Handouts
  Index
  Kickstarter Backer List
  4
  5
  10
  21
  26
  32
  40
  42
  49
  55
  61
  70
  71
  73
  74
  
  4
  Blue
  Memetic
  CHAPTER One
  Introduction
  Cascade
  “An alien civilisation more advanced than anything the Commonality has ever known—and 
  it just collapsed? What the hell happened here? What aren’t we being told?”
  —Arbrin Raze, Foliate Vine Emissary of the Dendryphon Protectorate
  Blue is a scenario pack for the Mindjammer roleplaying 
  game. It describes a unique lost colony which exists among 
  the ashes of a fallen, near-transcendent alien civilisation. 
  Twenty-eight years ago, the New Commonality of Human-
  kind rediscovered an unusual culture on the edges of the 
  Outremer subsector (TX 2.3.3 of the Rim Sector). For most of 
  the seven millennia since its foundation in 3570FA, the Jessila 
  civilisation had survived in total isolation, prevented from 
  sending signals to the Commonality by a mysterious and 
  irresistible alien force, orders of magnitude more advanced 
  than humankind, which inhabited the second of the star 
  system’s two garden worlds. To survive, the colony genurgi-
  cally tailored itself to the exigencies of its system, developing 
  phenotypes (or phenes—see page 11) which spread to all its 
  environments. 
  Six hundred years ago, the alien civilisation fell, and the 
  barriers which had isolated the Jessila system collapsed. The 
  Jessilan phenes found the approaches to the planet Blue 
  finally clear, and landed to find a devastated world. A few 
  hundred alien survivors huddled in the ruins in primitive 
  squalor, unable to remember anything about their civilisation 
  or its collapse.
  In the centuries which followed a hybrid culture has come 
  into being, and the population of alien “Blues” has increased 
  and stabilised again. But none of the survivors nor any of the 
  Jessilan phenes have ever had any idea of what happened on 
  Blue, nor ever understood the technological relics which litter 
  that shattered world.
  Until two years ago. Twenty-six years after Rediscovery, 
  a Commonality sensor sweep detected a small, well-hidden 
  enclave of survivors of the fallen alien civilisation deep below 
  the surface of Blue. Now interest in the vanished hyper-
  advanced culture has soared; but not everyone, nor every 
  Blue, is happy about the prospect of contact with a mysteri-
  ous alien past.
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
  The Phenes
  Jessila’s human population is divided among six pheno-
  types, or phenes, adapted to different environments: the 
  amphies, arboes, drylanders, glacers, quatics, and stand-
  ers. Full details are provided on page 11.
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
  Where Is Blue?
  We’ve deliberately not fixed the location of Blue in Com-
  monality Space. It’s somewhere close to the Frontier, 
  somewhere the Commonality only reached twenty-eight 
  years ago. We’ve placed it notionally in the Outremer 
  subsector of the Rim Sector (see the Mindjammer Com-
  panion), but you can place it anywhere appropriate to 
  your campaign.
  
  Journey and Arrival 
  The Old Earth colony vessel Complex Unity entered the Jessila 
  star system seven thousand years ago, with a manifest of 
  six thousand five hundred colonists in stasis. Representa-
  tives of a subculture with a deep-seated belief in genurgic 
  self-modification, the expedition aimed to find a new home 
  where the culture could develop without hindrance. With an 
  F-class main sequence star 1400 LY from Manhome, the target 
  system had been selected as a prime colonisation candidate 
  due to the presence of at least two garden worlds.
  As the Complex Unity approached, an unprecedented 
  event occurred. Every sentient being on the vessel received 
  what appeared to be a thoughtcast; even those woken from 
  stasis later remembered the short simple message in their 
  own tongue. Its gist is preserved today:
  “Travellers from the stars: welcome to the Transparency of 
  Blue. If it is your purpose to pass through our system, then we 
  wish you well on your journey. If you wish to stay, the third 
  planet is yours. We inhabit the second; if you stay, you may 
  make no landings there, nor make or receive transmissions 
  there or to any location outside this system. The choice is 
  yours. We will not communicate again.”
  Sensors indicated the presence of an energy field around 
  the planet in the system’s second orbit, and a cool but almost 
  ideal garden world in its third. The Complex Unity elected to 
  establish a colony, and deal with the implications of the mes-
  sage later, rather than strike out again into the unknown. They 
  named their world “Jessila” after the first child born there, and 
  retained the name “Blue” for the forbidden alien world.
  The Barrier
  The Complex Unity never attempted to breach the energy 
  field, known as the Barrier, which surrounded the second 
  planet. However, further observations quickly discovered 
  Memetic
  CHAPTER Two
  History of the Jessila Colony
  Cascade
  “For the Blue, history and dream are one. The past is hypothesis, nothing more.”
  —The Transmissions of Croaker Verdigris, 194 NCE
  
  6
  Blue
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
    
   
   
  Table 1: A Timeline of the Jessila Colony
  Jessilan 
  Calendar (JC)*
  Commonality 
  Calendar
  Years Ago
  Event
  1
  3570 FA
  -7124
  Colony foundation.
  2
  3573 FA
  -7121
  Catastrophic proto-Mindscape failure.
  85
  3767 FA
  -6927
  Jessilan terraforming project begins.
  182
  3994 FA
  -6700
  Jessilan civilisation returns to space.
  343
  4372 FA
  -6322
  Jessilan terraforming project ends.
  438
  4595 FA
  -6099
  Yoden colony is established.
  566
  4894 FA
  -5800
  Jessilan colony rebuilds to T6.
  700
  5207 FA
  -5487
  Altstar supernova event. Jessilan civilisation collapses.
  716
  5244 FA
  -5450
  Yoden colony fails.
  759
  5344 FA
  -5350
  Establishment of the Jessilan Unanimity governmental system.
  868
  5599 FA
  -5095
  Jessila once again rebuilds to T6.
  904
  5684 FA
  -5010
  The Volcanic Period: Increased earthquakes and vulcanism cause 
  planetary devastation.
  962
  5820 FA
  -4874
  The Bionomad Migrations
  1059
  6047 FA
  -4647
  The Unanimity is overthrown in violent revolution.
  1121
  6191 FA
  -4503
  Completion of the Hove Elterm space elevator.
  1254
  6503 FA
  -4191
  Founding of Drulia’s Triumph.
  1293
  6595 FA
  -4099
  Discovery of the Prasong aerostat in the deep atmosphere of the 
  gas giant, Unity.
  1310
  6634 FA
  -4060
  Discovery of the Promise artefact.
  1319
  6654 FA
  -4040
  Recolonisation of Yoden.
  1343
  6712 FA
  -3982
  Construction of the Arch orbital habitat begins.
  1389
  6818 FA
  -3876
  Establishment of Endurance Station on Harbour’s (Jessila VI) inner-
  most moon.
  1476
  7025 FA
  -3669
  Jessilan civilisation reaches T7.
  1505
  7090 FA
  -3604
  Lifespans are effectively unlimited.
  1669
  7474 FA
  -3220
  Discovery of the Greenstone asteroid and building paste.
  2385
  8948 FA
  -1746
  Establishment of the Jessilan Republic.
  2789
  10094 FA
  -600
  The Blue Collapse Event.
  2802
  10125 FA
  -569
  Barrier Fall.
  2813
  10151 FA
  -543
  Establishment of the Jessilan Voluntariat governmental system.
  2830
  10191 FA
  -503
  Jessila develops a basic gravity engine capability.
  2832
  10196 FA
  -498
  Discovery of the link portal on Blue.
  3033
  166 NCE
  -28
  Rediscovery of Jessila.
  3044
  192 NCE
  -2
  Discovery of the Sapphire Vault by the Commonality research 
  vessel Atem Boroden.
  3045
  194 NCE
  0
  Present day.
  *1 Jessilan year = 2.34 standard years
  
  7
  History of the Jessila Colony
  a second field, dubbed the Wall or Outer Barrier, in the 
  furthest reaches of the star system (4.2 billion kilometres 
  from the system primary), which distorted signals crossing it, 
  making communication outside the system impossible.
  As the Jessila colony stabilised and rebuilt its capability 
  to send probes and humans into space, missions tested the 
  prohibitions of the “Message from Blue” to find them still in 
  place. Crewed vessels could approach no closer than 91000 
  kilometres from the planet Blue, nor travel further than 4.2 bil-
  lion kilometres from the system primary, before briefly losing 
  power and being brought to a stop. Uncrewed vessels were 
  converted into clouds of glowing plasma. No source for these 
  effects has ever been found. As Jessila reached T7 (the First 
  Age of Space), “running the Barrier” became a rite of passage 
  for pilots, although officially forbidden.
  The distortion effect of the Outer Barrier had a pernicious 
  influence on Jessilan civilisation. With observations of stars, 
  galaxies, and other astronomical phenomena restricted to the 
  low levels of precision of ground-based telescopes, advances 
  in astronomy, astrophysics, and related sciences were seri-
  ously held back until the Barrier Fall event (page 8).  
  Colonisation
  The six thousand five hundred human colonists of the 
  Complex Unity had come from a thriving T7 society. After 
  the Jessila colony’s foundation in 3570 FA, the difficulties of 
  maintaining advanced technology with a limited population 
  resulted in a rapid drop in tech index to T6 and eventually T5. 
  The colony’s first and most enduring loss was space travel.
  Before landing on Jessila, the Complex Unity conducted 
  an exploratory survey of the system, and placed a satellite 
  network around Jessila and relays around the system’s other 
  planets, including several outside the Barrier around Blue. 
  Thereafter, no Jessilan ventured into space for four hundred 
  standard years, until year 182 of the Jessilan calendar (JC), 
  with its longer orbital year. 
  Instead, Jessila concentrated on building and expanding 
  its infrastructure, and preserving its medical and genurgic 
  capabilities. As ancient equipment failed, the small popula-
  tion stabilised at a T5 base with T6 meditech and genurgy, 
  using genurgic modification to enable its population to 
  develop into half a dozen phenotypes, adapted to thrive in 
  the rigorous environments of ice age Jessila. A catastrophic 
  proto-Mindscape failure three years after Foundation wiped 
  out 10% of the colony’s knowledge base, and the Outer Bar-
  rier meant that any knowledge lost was not replaced. In the 
  absence of any “call home” from Jessila, the Old Commonal-
  ity doubtless assumed the mission had failed, and no ships 
  ventured into the system until the Rediscovery Era.
  For nine hundred standard years (from 182 to 566 JC), 
  the Jessila colony expanded and developed its technologi-
  cal capabilities. By 566 JC Jessila had regained T6, and its 
  phenotypes had stabilised into the six phenes (interfertile 
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
    
   
   
  Longevity and the Phenes
  Jessilan civilisation has never collapsed into savagery, de-
  spite the difficulties which have assailed it. There are two 
  reasons for this: first, the continuity of knowledge provided 
  by enhanced longevity; and, second, the adaptations 
  provided by the phenes. From the outset Jessila priori-
  tised meditech and genurgy, and even after the Altstar 
  supernova event that wiped out half its population, it 
  worked swiftly to regain these capabilities. Even in Jessila’s 
  darkest hour, average lifespans never dropped below 100 
  standard years (43 Jessilan years), and for most of Jessila’s 
  first four millennia remained between 150 and 300 stand-
  ard years (64 and 128 Jessilan years). The phenes survived 
  in marginal environments, including the oceans for the 
  amphies and quatics. Since approximately 1500 JC the 
  phenes have been more or less stable, and lifespans have 
  been effectively unlimited; while the average is currently 
  around 400 standard years (171 Jessilan years), there are 
  a few individuals who are more than 2000 standard years 
  old (855 Jessilan years). 
  customisations of the human form) still in existence today. 
  However, the return to T7 was destined to be more difficult.
  In 700 JC, some five and a half thousand standard years 
  ago, the massive star Omega 4 Reticuli (Altstar), 37 light 
  years from Jessila, underwent catastrophic core collapse and 
  exploded as a type II supernova. Astronomers today believe 
  the Outer Barrier prevented the explosion from causing 
  irrevocable damage to the Jessilan biosphere; contemporary 
  records clearly show the barrier darkening on all wavelengths. 
  Although Blue received additional protection from its own 
  barrier, Jessila nevertheless suffered significant radiation 
  damage to its biosphere, crops, and advanced technology. 
  Half of its estimated 30 million population perished as a result 
  of the supernova or its aftermath. Although the challenging 
  evolutionary environment strengthened the phenes which 
  survived, it nevertheless took Jessilan society four centuries to 
  recover, regaining T6 only by 868 JC.
  The advance to T7 took another 1400 standard years, due 
  in large part to the widespread devastation caused by the 
  increased vulcanism and earthquakes of the Volcanic Period 
  which began in 904 JC, five hundred standard years after 
  the Altstar supernova. Slowly, Jessilan civilisation recovered, 
  achieving T7 in 1476 JC, with a population of half a billion, sig-
  nificant offworld industry in asteroid mining, and permanent 
  monitoring stations on Blue’s third moon.
  
  8
  Blue
  Thereafter, the pace of technological advance slowed, per-
  haps due to restrictions in observational astronomy caused 
  by the Outer Barrier. The few items of Blue technology which 
  had been discovered provided some impetus; although none 
  were fully functional, some led to breakthroughs in materials 
  and manufacturing technologies. Nevertheless, Jessila had 
  reached T8 in only a few capabilities by the event now known 
  as Barrier Fall (2789—2802 JC).  
  Barrier Fall
  The alien Blues of the second planet had remained 
  enigmatic and seemingly unchanged for six and a half 
  millennia. Then, over the course of eleven days in 2789 
  JC, a little more than half the surface vegetation on Blue’s 
  islands turned sickly grey, artificial lights vanished over 
  the entire planet, and huge wildfires engulfed portions 
  of the land. Jessilan observation posts recorded the rapid 
  disintegration of the envelope around Mystery, one of 
  Blue’s small moons, releasing its artificial atmosphere. In 
  addition, three huge structures of unknown function on 
  Blue collapsed in a matter of days, as did two thirds of the 
  planet’s extensive “bridge” network (page 28).
  Messages to Blue continued to receive no reply, and 
  probes continued to be stopped or destroyed. After several 
  months with no further perceptible change, crewed ships 
  tried to cross the Barrier and were prevented as before. 
  This situation continued for thirty-one standard years. 
  Then, in 2802 JC, without warning, Jessilan orbital tele-
  scopes suddenly received enormously clearer views of Blue 
  and of other stars. A crewed ship attempted to penetrate 
  the Barrier, and succeeded in approaching closer than 
  91000km to Blue. Uncrewed probes breached the solar 
  system’s boundaries. The Barrier was gone!
  After a few days of heated deliberation and observa-
  tions, the first Jessilan vessels landed on Blue. Explorers 
  found a devastated planet, where more than half land-
  based life forms had become extinct three decades before. 
  The alien civilisation was gone, and almost all the Blues 
  were dead.
  First Contact
  Surprisingly, the Jessilan expeditions also found four 
  hundred survivors, living a subsistence existence in 
  the ruins of Blue. With body plans vastly different from 
  humans, the alien “Blues” had clearly been engineered to 
  be both durable and immune to aging. Their behaviours, 
  however, were anomalous, and not what the Jessilans had 
  expected of a civilised species so superior in technology 
  and evolutionary level. The remaining Blues seemed almost 
  simple-minded, and many had no recollection of what had 
  gone before, nor any understanding of how to interact 
  with their environment.  
  On Jessila, reactions to Barrier Fall and first contact with 
  the surviving Blues were swift and profound. Many people 
  had long been in awe of the Blues, and almost a quarter 
  of the population worshipped them in an Alienist religion 
  (page 14). Finding the Blue civilisation in ruins, and the few 
  pathetic survivors unable to remember any more than the 
  merest fragments of their past, quickly transformed Jes-
  silan reverence into an outpouring of compassion. Almost 
  unilaterally, Jessila’s societies agreed to provide massive 
  programmes of aid.
  Rediscovery
  Even after Barrier Fall, Jessilans saw little reason to send 
  transmissions beyond their star system; after millennia, 
  the idea of “calling home” seemed neither relevant nor 
  appropriate. A few hobbyists used small orbital transmit-
  ters to send signals in the direction of Old Earth; these are 
  presumably still en route. Most people believed they would 
  never contact Old Earth, or any other human world, again.
  The first Commonality event horizon probe entered 
  the Jessila system in early 3033 JC (166 NCE). Commonality 
  archives had thrown up fragmentary records concern-
  ing the Complex Unity, and a probe flotilla had been 
  dispatched to determine the expedition’s fate. The EHP’s 
  arrival shocked Jessila, both because no one had believed 
  faster-than-light travel might be possible, and because the 
  Commonality differed from Jessilan expectations in almost 
  
  9
  History of the Jessila Colony
  every respect. The sudden arrival of a vast and powerful 
  civilisation of humans, xenomorphs, hominids, synthetics, 
  and even alien species left a substantial minority of Jes-
  silans reeling in culture shock.
  Recent History
  In the three decades since, some of the initial shock has 
  faded. Indeed, many Jessilans have become disillusioned; 
  while Commonality technology is more advanced than 
  the T7—T8 tech that characterised Jessila before Redis-
  covery, it pales before the marvels once achieved by the 
  now-fallen Blues. Many Jessilans regard the Commonality 
  research teams as little more than scavengers, plundering 
  the ancient Blue ruins for treasures they can steal—treas-
  ures which rightly belong to the Jessilans and the Blues. 
  In particular, many Alienists believe Jessila’s phenes to 
  have been chosen by the Blues to safeguard their secrets, 
  and regard outsiders coming to “study” the prelapsarian 
  Blues as unwanted interlopers. 
  Commonality agents note that even Jessilans with no 
  inclination towards Alienism hold the Blues in special rev-
  erence—including the recently discovered Sapphire Vault 
  and its Hermetics (page 19). They regard the increased 
  factionalisation in Jessilan society as a harbinger of immi-
  nent collapse if integration efforts are not managed very 
  carefully indeed.
  
  10
  Blue
  Memetic
  CHAPTER Three
  Jessilan Culture and Society
  Cascade
  “For a single star system, Jessilan culture is bewildering. In fact, there are many cultures: old, 
  new, even those still being born. And of course we’ve added to the mix. The question, as ever, 
  is what we take away…”
  —Mordanta Rimini-Skylane, Javawayn SCI Force agent, Jessila III
  According to the Security and Cultural Integrity Instrumental-
  ity, Jessila is a culture currently in Stage Two: Normalisation. 
  However, this process has really only just begun, and the 
  label masks a great deal of optimism and wishful thinking, 
  and ignores the turbulent reality of a culture in the throes of 
  change.
  Beginnings
  The human colonists who left Old Earth more than nine 
  millennia ago, early in the First Age of Space, to settle Jessila 
  were members of a subculture devoted to a semi-religious 
  philosophy promoting physical diversity and modification as 
  a way to promote the common good. Known as Modifica-
  tionalism, the movement’s members modified their bodies 
  to better serve specific roles, and radical modifications were 
  not uncommon. The group’s insular nature and tolerance for 
  extreme divergence elicited distrust and prejudice among 
  outsiders, and so the six thousand five hundred colonists who 
  set out in the Complex Unity colony ship were determined to 
  settle well away from other inhabited systems. 
  Modificationalism died out in Manhome less than a cen-
  tury after the Complex Unity’s departure, and even on Jessila 
  it survived less than four hundred standard years. Its most 
  important legacy for Jessilan culture was an enduring respect 
  for morphological freedom, and a widespread belief that 
  people should work together for their common good.
  Mystery and Curiosity
  The isolation of Jessila for much of its history, and the pres-
  ence of the mysterious and seemingly all-powerful Blues 
  on the second planet, have been formative influences on 
  Jessilan culture—influences which remain today. Jessilans 
  found themselves surrounded by unavoidable yet unsolv-
  able mysteries, and open curiosity about their nature was 
  often frowned upon. Instead, a subtle curiosity was expected; 
  SUPPORTING CULTURE
  THE JESSILAN CULTURE
  Physical Stress:  1  2
  Mental Stress:  1  2  3  4
  Consequences: 1 mild + 1 moderate
  Tech Index: T7
  Scale: Planetary (+6)
  Reach: Planetary (+6)
  Memes: Respect For Morphological Freedom; Open 
  Curiosity Is Frowned Upon; Our Mysterious and 
  All-Powerful Blues; Cooperation For the Common 
  Good; The Unsolvable Universe.
  Capability Memes: What Is Human Anyway?
  Skills: Superb (+5) Empathy, Rapport; Great (+4) 
  Contacts, Will; Good (+3) Assimilate, Resources; Fair 
  (+2) Science, Technical; Average (+1) Knowledge, 
  Provoke.
  STUNTS
   Traditionalist: a:1 against mental and physical 
  attacks.
  CAPABILITIES
   Biotechnology.
  
  11
  Jessilan Culture and Society
  careful observation instead of direct questioning; and an 
  acceptance that highlighting a person’s inability to provide 
  answers in public was both inconsiderate and rude. Jessilans 
  will often discreetly rifle through bags or drawers so as not 
  to “bother” their owners, and commonly assume that owners 
  won’t mind their belongings being gone through as long as 
  nothing is disturbed or taken. 
  Direct and open curiosity is more acceptable among 
  Jessilans living off-world, and is one of the big cultural differ-
  ences between Jessila and subculture communities on the 
  Arch habitat, the moon Yoden, in the asteroid belt, or more 
  recently on Blue. In fact, as if in compensation, Jessilans living 
  off-world are often excessively curious, and will rigorously 
  interrogate visitors and new immigrants. These cultural 
  clashes are often the subject of numerous jokes and media 
  dramas. 
  Diversity and Phenes
  Prior to Commonality contact (page 8), the only sentient 
  beings in the Jessila system were humans and Blues. Xeno-
  morphs and synthetics were either rare or controversial, and 
  the Complex Unity carried only human passengers. However, 
  Jessila presented the colonists with an array of challenging 
  environments, and throughout history Jessilans have enthusi-
  astically embraced genurgic adaptation to thrive there.
  Initial plans to terraform Jessila waned after the colony’s 
  tech index was compromised, and movements gained 
  momentum to adapt colonists to the environment rather 
  than vice versa. Late in Jessila’s first millennium, in 962 JC, 
  these movements reached their peak in the Bio-nomad 
  Migrations, as substantial populations opted for genurgic 
  alterations to incorporate bio-tools and other enhancements 
  to better adapt them for lives of nomadic hunter-gathering 
  in the Jessilan wilderness. These bio-nomads or bions 
  quickly accounted for 10% of the population, and although 
  widespread interest in the bion lifestyle and subculture 
  faded within two or three standard centuries, the movement 
  has had periodic resurgences throughout history. Currently 
  almost 5% of Jessila’s population identify as bions, including 
  a sizable minority of vacuum-adapted individuals living and 
  working in the asteroid belt.
  These adaptationist movements—in some ways deriving 
  from the Modificationalism of the colony’s founders (page 
  10)—eventually had far more wide-reaching implications 
  for Jessila’s population. Over the course of several millennia, 
  six body types became standardised, and have remained so 
  since. Known as phenes, they’re essentially elective hominid 
  genotypes. They are as follows:
  AMPHIES
  Mandatory spend: 1 aspect.
  Humans with enlarged and adapted lungs who can dive and 
  hold their breath as easily as cetaceans, but who otherwise 
  possess humanoid bodies. Most have thick, otter-like fur, 
  but some have smooth, dolphin-like skin. The amphie phene 
  accounts for approximately 10% of the system’s human popu-
  lation (approximately 90 million individuals), almost all on 
  Jessila, and is the largest phene group on Blue, with 115,000 
  individuals.
  Mandatory Extras: Amphibious.
  Typical Enhancements: Longevity.
  ARBOES
  Mandatory spend: 1 aspect.
  Humans with prehensile feet and enhanced balance and 
  jumping ability who live in forests and low-gravity environ-
  ments. Some are furred, but most are not. Some arboes are 
  adapted to hold their breath for long periods, and survive up 
  to 30 minutes even in vacuum. Approximately 1 in 5 Jessilans 
  belong to this phene, some 180 million individuals, including 
  half of those people living and working on airless moons or 
  asteroids such as the Belt (page 34).
  Mandatory Extras: Adaptation (Forest Canopy or Vacuum 
  or Low-Grav).
  Typical Enhancements: Adaptation, Expert Climber, 
  Jumper, Longevity.
  DRYLANDERS
  Mandatory spend: 1 aspect.
  Humans adapted for life in deserts who need one quarter of 
  the amount of water necessary for unmodified humans. Dry-
  Drylander
  Arboe
  
  12
  Blue
  landers have small, lizard-like scales instead of skin. Just over 
  20% of Jessilans belong to this phene, 180 million people, 
  mostly in the desert regions of Farland on Jessila.
  Mandatory Extras: Adaptation (Desert Environment).
  Typical Enhancements: Energy Resistant (Heat).
  GLACERS
  Mandatory spend: 1 aspect.
  Humans with thick fur and blubber who can live in frigid 
  environments; one in five Jessilans—180 million people—and  
  most inhabitants of Yoden (page 36) belong to this phene.
  Mandatory Extras: Adaptation (Glacial Environment).
  Typical Enhancements: Energy Resistant (Cold), 
  Longevity.
  QUATICS
  Mandatory spend: 1 aspect.
  Humans with seal-like bodies and human-like arms who can 
  breathe both air and water. This rarest phene accounts for 
  only 5% of the Jessilan population (approximately 45 million 
  individuals).
  Mandatory Extras: Aquatic.
  Typical Enhancements: Longevity.
  STANDERS
  Mandatory spend: None.
  Humans with few overt modifications, other than the stand-
  ard enhancements for longevity, resistance to disease and 
  radiation, ability to metabolise the Jessilan biome, and volun-
  tary fertility control common to all phenes. Roughly a quarter 
  of Jessilans (225 million people) are standers.
  Mandatory Extras: None.
  Typical Enhancements: Longevity.
  Note that phenes are neither absolute nor permanent. Jessi-
  lans are free to modify their bodies as they wish; most tend to 
  fall into one of these six phenes. For practical reasons mem-
  bers of phenes tend to congregate together, but prejudice 
  between and against phenes is rare, perhaps because of the 
  fact that, even before Rediscovery, switching between phenes 
  was a relatively trivial matter, requiring simple genurgic 
  therapy and a few weeks of physical transition.   
  Government
  Jessilan politics has of course changed many times since 
  the colony was first founded, often drastically. The Modifi-
  cationalist philosophy (page 10) of the original settlers was 
  both communalist and relatively authoritarian, with leaders 
  whose authority was almost absolute. The most long-lasting 
  polity until the current Voluntariat system was established 
  in 2813 JC was the Republic which preceded it, which lasted 
  for twelve hundred standard years. Prior to that the most 
  long-lasting system had been the famous Unanimity, the 
  rigid, electronically-selected meritocracy which took control 
  of Jessila shortly after the Altstar supernova event in 700 JC 
  and only relinquished power some seven hundred standard 
  years later, having shepherded Jessilan society through the 
  Stander
  Glacer
  Quatic
  Amphie
  
  13
  Jessilan Culture and Society
  supernova recovery period and the Volcanic Period of 904 
  JC that severely damaged Gathering five standard centuries 
  later. The Unanimity is still remembered today for its great 
  effectiveness and efficiency, but also for its uncompromising 
  authoritarianism; it was overthrown in Jessila’s only known 
  violent revolution. Since then a deep distrust for authoritarian 
  government has been a cornerstone of Jessilan culture, and 
  all polities have been both representative and highly respon-
  sive to the public will.
  The current Voluntariat system arose as a result of public 
  discontent with the Republic’s dismal response to Barrier 
  Fall and claims that it was doing little to aid the surviving 
  Blues. The Voluntariat system is extremely but unobtrusively 
  democratic; every adult citizen wishing to participate in gov-
  ernment at any level (which over 90% of Jessilans appear to 
  do) uses their Voluntariat implant, or a conventional Mind-
  scape implant, or (for the few who refuse implants) polling 
  wristband which monitors their physiological and neural 
  responses. All participating citizens spend a few minutes 
  every day studying current major issues, and their implants 
  and wristbands monitor their reactions to automatically 
  report their preferences, which the Jessilan Mindscape then 
  codifies into policy. Decisions are implemented by the System 
  Council, and public reactions to these decisions are again fed 
  back into the system to help refine them. This also serves to 
  monitor the effectiveness and success of individual council-
  members; if ratings fall too low, members are replaced rapidly. 
  The system works at a more devolved local level also.
  In the Voluntariat system, individuals are free to explore 
  whatever issues, questions, and events interest them. All 
  decisions are considered valid as long as at least 20% of 
  participating citizens have registered an opinion on a topic. 
  Occasionally the System Council requests citizens to examine 
  particularly important and / or pressing issues. 
  Prior to Rediscovery, the Voluntariat Polling Network 
  was part of the Jessilan proto-Mindscape (in fact it was its 
  backbone). Since then, Mindscape engineers and SCI Force 
  specialists have attempted to persuade the System Council 
  to make the polling network part of the Jessilan Mindscape 
  the Commonality installed several years after their arrival. 
  However, while many Jessilans welcome the Mindscape, a suf-
  ficient minority of citizens distrust the Commonality and the 
  Mindscape, and so for now the Voluntariat Polling Network 
  remains entirely distinct. Nevertheless, a growing number of 
  undecided citizens are becoming vexed with the existence of 
  these two parallel networks, and predictions are that the two 
  will unify within five years. SCI Force is keeping a close eye on 
  developments as cultural damage may be substantial if this 
  happens in the face of significant popular opposition.   
  THE COMMONALITY PRESENCE 
  IN THE JESSILA SYSTEM
  The Commonality has a low-key presence in the Jessila system, 
  managing Mindscape nodes and ship maintenance and repair 
  facilities, but in general keeping out of the day-to-day admin-
  istration of Jessilan society. Its instrumentalities have offices, 
  and in particular SCI Force is fairly visible, as are research teams 
  investigating both the Blues and the Hermetics.
  The 3-Space Instrumentality
  The presence of the 3-Space Instrumentality (3SI) in the Jessila 
  system is known only to a few; it’s not public knowledge, even 
  to other Commonality instrumentalities. A mysterious and 
  somewhat sinister branch of the Commonality government, it 
  was only established over the past thirty years, and has always 
  had a presence in the Jessila system. Its official function is to 
  manage the Far Gate Project—the vast Commonality-wide 
  endeavour to construct 3-space gates in all major systems 
  and sector capitals.
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
    
   
   
  The Jessilan Mindscape
  Before Rediscovery, Jessila had a typical T7 proto-Mind-
  scape which enabled rapid easy communication and a 
  sharing of sensory experience, thoughtcasts, and remote 
  control, but which lacked more sophisticated phenomena 
  such as exomemories, memoplexes, and thanograms. 
  As cultural integration got underway, the Commonality 
  offered Jessila systemwide access to the full range of Mind-
  scape tech, and was permitted to install Mindscape relays 
  on a limited basis.
  Both Jessila and Blue have global Mindscape 
  instances, and various asteroids and moons (including 
  Yoden and Endurance) have local nodes. These have 
  been in place for about twelve standard years. However, 
  according to the Articles of Rediscovery, all Mindscape 
  facilities in Jessila come with an option to restrict them to 
  only those functions and services which were present in 
  the original Jessilan proto-Mindscape. A few small cities 
  (particularly in the offworlder exclusion zones known as 
  preservations—see page 24) have even gone so far as to 
  restrict Mindscape access so that residents cannot access 
  any of the newly introduced features. These restrictions 
  do not usually apply to visitors, including offworlders, but 
  some of these settlements are considering restricting all 
  Mindscape use to pre-Rediscovery levels.
  
  14
  Blue
  Like all Commonality instrumentalities, 3SI members are 
  extremely competent. They’re also ruthless; their field of con-
  cern has many security implications, and they are absolutely 
  not above all manner of skulduggery and deceit if it advances 
  their agenda—to find out more about 3-space, what it is, how 
  it can be used, and to maintain 3SI control over the interstel-
  lar network they’re now constructing. As far as the 3-Space 
  Instrumentality is concerned, tomorrow belongs to them. 
  What the 3SI are doing In Jessila is anybody’s guess. Was it 
  really a coincidence that Commonality 3-space breakthroughs 
  occurred at pretty much exactly the moment the Common-
  ality contacted the Blues? The 3SI are very interested in the 
  aliens—both the fallen Blues but especially the mysterious 
  Hermetics and their unfathomable technology (page 19). 
  They have a base in Gathering City (page 23), in Hasan’s 
  Rescue (page 29), and also at the Sapphire Vault (page 64).
  3SI personnel fall into two groups. The first comprises 
  scientists: driven, passionate, but with a very flexible ethical 
  code, these are people obsessed with 3-space travel, regard-
  less of what it costs. The second group comprises security 
  personnel: highly-trained and lethal, capable of both equivo-
  cal and unequivocal measures (see page 45) as necessity 
  dictates. The 3SI even has a very secret team of annihilator 
  synthetics, for those times when you can’t afford to leave any 
  traces…
  See page 43 for more on the 3SI. 
  Social Factions
  Jessila is a culture in the throes of profound change, and 
  needless to say there are countless factions vying for 
  hegemony, each with their own vision of what their future 
  should look like.
  ALIENISM
  Throughout its history Jessila, like many colonies, developed 
  a plethora of idiosyncratic faiths and philosophies which exist 
  nowhere else. One that has proven enduring and unique is 
  the religion known as Alienism. Its proponents worship the 
  Blues—particularly those from before Barrier Fall—believing 
  them to be semi-divine beings who have guided the lives and 
  destinies of the human inhabitants of the Jessilan system for 
  millennia. The most fervent even believe the Blues somehow 
  induced the Complex Unity colony to come to Jessila in the 
  first place; before Commonality contact and the introduction 
  of planing technology, this belief was regarded as unscientific 
  and impossible.
  Most Alienists believe that once the Jessilan colony had 
  been founded, the colonists by implication had accepted 
  the terms of the “Message from Blue”, and from that point 
  forward the Blues had begun watching over them and help-
  ing guide them towards prosperity and spiritual perfection. 
  They cite the fact that the Barrier saved the Jessila colony 
  from extinction during the Altstar supernova event as clear 
  evidence of the Blues protecting humankind, and regard the 
  Jessilan research team that unlocked the secret of building 
  paste (page 18) as acting under the subtle guidance of the 
  Blues. 
  Many non-believers consider Alienists to be irrational 
  believers in impossible superstitions. However, more eloquent 
  believers point out that nothing the Alienists believe is impos-
  sible per se, and that the claims they make about the Blues 
  can be explained by a technology far in advance of human 
  capabilities. 
  Barrier Fall and the discovery of the Sapphire Vault (page 
  64) sent shockwaves through the Alienist faith. After Barrier 
  Fall, more than a third of the membership abandoned their 
  beliefs, while those that remained determined some unfore-
  seen catastrophe had occurred, requiring them to help the 
  Blues, just as the Blues had previously helped save human-
  kind. 
  The Sapphire Vault discovery has polarised Alienists. Some 
  believe the surviving Blues on the surface were somehow 
  impure, their civilisation destroyed because of its wickedness. 
  Others contend that the Hermetic Blues in the buried enclave 
  are the ones responsible for the collapse, and still represent 
  a terrible danger. Tensions have been growing within the 
  Alienist faith for several years, and it may be about to split into 
  two. At present, 15% of Jessilan humans (approximately 135 
  million people) consider themselves Alienists.  
  While the Commonality prohibits religious belief in the 
  Core, here on the Fringe it’s more pragmatic. Nevertheless, it 
  remains generally critical of the Alienist faith.
  ALIENISM AND THE BLUES
  In the six centuries since Barrier Fall, most surviving Blues 
  have found Alienism disturbing. Despite their gratitude 
  for humankind’s aid, and their acknowledgement that the 
  Alienists have been some of their most dedicated supporters, 
  most Blues find the human desire to worship them baffling 
  and intrusive. In particular, Blues on the planet Blue do not 
  permit Alienists to discuss their beliefs unless invited to do so, 
  although this situation rarely arises, as few Alienists wish to 
  live on Blue: most find the world a sad and disturbing place, a 
  vivid reminder of the mortality of a civilisation they believed 
  to be effectively divine.
  INTEGRATIONALISTS
  A significant minority of Jessilans see contact with the Com-
  monality as a liberation from millennia of isolation. These 
  integrationalists often wear clothing and ornament mod-
  elled on styles popular elsewhere in the Commonality, and 
  purchase imported goods, especially personal devices and 
  ornamentation that can be worn or carried. Avinna, Jessila’s 
  primary spaceport, the Arch orbital habitat, and the Jessila 
  asteroid belt are the principle integrationalist centres.  
  
  15
  Jessilan Culture and Society
  ANTI-COMMONALITY FACTIONS
  In general, Jessilans accept the necessity for contact with 
  the rest of the galaxy, although a substantial minority want 
  nothing to do with it beyond the technological uplift they 
  gain from the Commonality. Most regard contact with the 
  Hermetics as far more relevant—and perhaps they are right, 
  even if it was the Commonality that discovered the Sapphire 
  Vault in the first place. Many Jessilans are concerned their 
  culture and way of life will be wiped out by the overwhelm-
  ing power of the Commonality, and many, including the New 
  Blue movement (below), actively work to oppose Common-
  ality integration. Many move away from areas with regular 
  Commonality contact, avoiding Avinna, the Arch, and the 
  Jessila belt; in recent years they’ve been concentrating in 
  areas known as preservations—effectively exclusion zones 
  where non-Jessilans are not allowed without express permis-
  sion. Government officials and culture agents alike worry that 
  the preservations are the harbingers of huge cultural conflict 
  to come.
  THE NEW BLUES
  Researchers studying the Blues since Barrier Fall have noticed 
  that, in the absence of anything more than fragmentary 
  memories about their past culture and nature, many Blues 
  have looked to Jessilan human culture for inspiration and 
  identity. Just as the mystery of the Blues and the Barrier has 
  shaped Jessilan human cultures for millennia, so too has 
  human culture been reshaping the Blues. Although the Blues 
  reproduce slowly and are relatively few in number, many 
  Commonality anthropologists and memetic engineers now 
  see a shared human-Blue culture developing in the Jessila 
  system, combining elements of both species’ cultures. They 
  believe that Jessilan culture will become increasingly tailored 
  to both species as the number of these “New Blues” increases.
  New Blue culture is especially obvious on Blue, where 
  humans outnumber Blues by two to one. The Blues either wel-
  come humans, or are at worst indifferent to them—in large 
  part because their world is still so empty—although they do 
  not accept open Alienism on the world. New Blues tend to 
  oppose Commonality integration, largely because they’re 
  creating their own culture.  
  The discovery of the Sapphire Vault has had a profund 
  effect on the New Blues. Most take the ongoing rejection 
  by the Hermetics as validation of their views, and see the 
  continued isolation of the Vault as proof that their previous 
  civilisation was stagnating and bereft of intellectual curiosity.  
  RESTORATIONISTS
  Many Blues, and indeed humans, have a profound interest 
  in their fallen civilisation, and are actively engaged in find-
  ing ways to restore it, researching its culture and advanced 
  technology both on an amateur and professional basis. These 
  Restorationists are fascinated by the Commonality’s recent 
  discovery of the Sapphire Vault (page 64), a lost enclave of 
  prelapsarian Blues buried deep beneath the planet’s surface. 
  Indeed, they’ve become increasingly discontented and baf-
  fled that these pre-Barrier Fall Blues—commonly referred to 
  as Hermetic Blues or simply Hermetics—categorically refuse 
  to interact with them. Rumours are rife that Restorationist 
  extremists are planning to infiltrate the Sapphire Vault, or 
  even to kidnap one of the Hermetics.
  THE BLUES
  The Blues are a 12-limbed hermaphroditic amphibious 
  invertebrate species, massing 50-90kg, with ovoid, bilaterally 
  symmetrical bodies 1.2 metres long and 0.5 metres wide, car-
  ried on six tentacle-like “legs” to a height of 1.6 metres. Their 
  bodies are supported by a hydrostatic “skeleton” allowing 
  their limbs to become rigid or flexible at will. Their “legs” are 
  attached a third the way up from the base of their bodies, 
  and six similar but thinner “arms” are attached a third the way 
  down from the top of their bodies, branching in two at the 
  ends and used for manipulation. 
  Blues possess six bulging “eyes” placed equidistant around 
  the circumference of their bodies, each with overlapping 100° 
  fields of view providing excellent omnidirectional stereo-
  scopic vision. A mouth is located in the top centre of the body, 
  together with a complex blowhole with airways separate from 
  the digestive tract. Blues are excellent swimmers and can hold 
  their breaths for up to thirty minutes, but cannot breathe 
  water. Many spend most or all of their time on land.
  While most Blue technology was destroyed when their 
  civilisation collapsed, Blue bodies show evidence of exten-
  sive genurgic engineering. They are resistant to disease and 
  toxins, heal rapidly, and regenerate lost limbs and organs in 
  2-10 standard months. They appear to reproduce voluntarily, 
  giving live birth to a fully viable individual 50% full-grown, 
  which possesses a high degree of inherited “knowledge”, 
  including language. Modern Blues reproduce slowly—once 
  every ten years or so—but it’s theorised this may be elective. 
  The Blue nervous system / brain-analogue is distributed 
  throughout their body, and comprises several discrete organs. 
  One organ, capable of transmitting and receiving electro-
  magnetic (radio) signals (dubbed the wave gland), is used to 
  communicate at distances of up to 60km. Their senses run the 
  whole EM spectrum, from gamma radiation right through to 
  ultra low frequency waves. Additionally, the upper manipu-
  lating tentacles of Blues possess specialised nerve clusters 
  enabling them to transmit and receive complex nerve signals 
  by touch. This effectively allows them to communicate and 
  perceive “emotions”, including whether or not an individual 
  is knowingly telling the truth; these emotic transducers are 
  casually known as heart strings among Jessilans. Blues are 
  consequently careful about touching one another, and even 
  
  16
  Blue
  the most casual uninvited touch is viewed as a serious inva-
  sion of privacy. Heart strings also detect sound waves, thereby 
  functioning as a kind of Blue “ear”.
  Blues do not naturally “speak”. However, their blowholes 
  are capable of emitting modulated sounds, and so they’re 
  capable of human-style speaking in a “breathy, fluty” voice. 
  Blues with experience of humans often prefer to com-
  municate about complex subjects using their wave gland, 
  broadcasting by “natural radio” directly to receiving devices. 
  Even non-Hermetic Blues find the concept of human speech 
  to be a hit-and-miss, somewhat comical affair; many have 
  become avid collectors of very bad human jokes. 
  Blue Culture and Behaviour
  Little is known about the culture and behaviour of the Blues 
  before the collapse of their civilisation. Today their survivors 
  and descendants are highly social creatures which congre-
  gate in communities of at least one hundred individuals (and 
  preferably more). They are diurnal, with hours of darkness 
  split into rest periods when wave gland activity drops to a 
  minimum; family units often spend this time linked by their 
  heart strings, apparently “dozing” or “asleep”. Their commu-
  nities appear to be a mostly flat hierarchy, with individuals 
  assuming specialist and even representative roles in an ad 
  hoc and little understood process. Larger-scale “leaders” are 
  recognised, but as yet it’s unclear how that status is achieved; 
  it’s possible a “wave gland acclamation process” is involved.
  BLUE NAMING CONVENTIONS
  The Blue “language” is essentially a form of electromagnetic 
  radiation “broadcast”, ie similar in nature to naturally emitted 
  radio waves. Blue names are an example of this; a pure tone, 
  broadcast at a precise, unique frequency. Known as spectro-
  scopic naming, no two Blue names are alike.
  Needless to say, this isn’t much use to humans. Instead, 
  non-Blues “transliterate” Blue names into the human language 
  equivalent of the approximate position on the electromag-
  netic spectrum their names correspond to, and then usually 
  prefix or affix a nickname, often one relating to the transmis-
  sion of sound, music, EM radiation, and so on. This results 
  in names such as Aerial Indigo, Piper Xenon, Crumphorn 
  Gamma, Strontium Chant, Skirl Protium, and so on.
  Hermetic names differ, in that they don’t use the affix, 
  but instead specify the EM spectrum designation to a greater 
  degree of detail, usually numerically. This leads to Hermetic 
  names such as Lanthanum 924, meV 229, Muriatic Acid 1141, 
  Cinerious 40, and so on.
  The native Blue name for their own planet is in fact a 
  falling scale covering the range of blue wavelengths emitted 
  by the world. Many Blues have declared themselves appalled 
  at the lack of euphony, beauty, and accuracy in the human 
  language name.  
  
  17
  Jessilan Culture and Society
  BLUES AND THE MINDSCAPE
  The Blue wave gland can naturally perceive the monitor band 
  signal emitted by a Mindscape implant. Initially the signal is 
  gibberish, but Blues with prolonged exposure have shown 
  themselves capable of perceiving structure in the signal, and 
  even of picking up on Mindscape communications specifically 
  directed at them. 
  This is extremely approximate, and doesn’t permit any 
  detail; it’s perhaps a little like humans trying to read binary. 
  However, in extremis Blues and humans with Mindscape 
  implants are able to engage in very rough, primitive commu-
  nication—perhaps an Investigate or Notice roll to perceive a 
  communication of up to three words in length.
  It’s theorised that Hermetics can naturally decode monitor 
  band signals and interface directly with the Mindscape. This 
  remains unconfirmed. 
  Blue Attitudes to their Past
  The Blues are divided in their attitudes to their pre-Barrier 
  Fall civilisation. Almost a third of them mourn its loss and 
  seek to restore it, but the rest either regard the past as dead 
  and gone, or are actively suspicious of their fallen civilisa-
  tion’s prior isolation and secrecy. Several hundred Blues have 
  already voyaged beyond the Jessila system on Commonality 
  vessels, and those Blues who disapprove of their previous civi-
  lisation are quick to point out that, were it not for Barrier Fall, 
  their species would never have encountered the Commonal-
  ity or have been able to travel between the stars.
  Blue Occupations
  Blues are perhaps best described as “unenthusiastic” workers. 
  They may be initially very interested in a task, but this interest 
  rapidly wanes, and they look for stimulation elsewhere. Jessilan 
  researchers have described them as “natural potterers”; xeno-
  anthropologists suggest that Blues are prey to an instinctive 
  disinclination towards tasks which would be unfulfilling to their 
  hyperadvanced forebearers—a dilemma that seems insoluble. 
  EXOINTELLIGENCE BUILD
  EXOINTELLIGENCE BUILD: 
  THE BLUE*
  Life Form Concept: Sybaritic Amnesiac With a 
  Blind-Spot For Physical Exploration.
  Evolution Index: +1 (+4).
  Exoscale: +1 (+4).
  Exointelligence Concept: Large Group 
  Exointelligence Avoiding Isolation (Large Group 
  Exointellligence Directing Its Evolution to 
  Transcend Environmental Challenges).
  Behaviours: Species Self-Identity; Transcends to 
  Avoid Challenges; Takes Its Environment With It.
  Exointelligence Skills: Empathy +1 (+0), Investigate 
  +3 (+8), Knowledge +0 (+8), Notice +3 (+8), Science 
  +3 (+8), Will +0 (+8).
  Manifestation: Sensorium: Radio Sense (Wave 
  Gland); Comms: Wave Gland and Heart Strings; 
  (Integral Part of Transcending Species Massmind); 
  (Voluntary Abdication From Temporal Flow).
  Skills: Investigate, Notice, Science.
  Stunts: Ghostless Shell, The Power of Deduction, 
  (Polymath), (Sensor Scan).
  Natural Abilities: (Prescience Routines).
  Attacks and Defences: Mental Blast (Use Provoke for 
  Physical Stress damage attacks). 
  *Entries in parenthesis are additional abilities for 
  Hermetics only.
  SUPPORTING EXOINTELLIGENCE
  THE BLUE (NON-HERMETIC)
  Physical Stress: 1  2
  Mental Stress: 1  2
  Consequences: 1 mild + 1 moderate.
  Scale: Medium (+0).
  Evolution Index: +1.
  Exoscale: +1.
  Life Form Concept: Sybaritic Amnesiac With a 
  Blind-Spot For Physical Exploration.
  Exointelligence Concept: Large Group 
  Exointelligence Avoiding Isolation.
  Trouble: Adrift in a Sea of Lost Memories.
  Behaviours: Species Self-Identity; Transcends to 
  Avoid Challenges; Takes Its Environment With It.
  Manifestations: Sensorium: Radio Sense (Wave 
  Gland); Comms: Wave Gland and Heart Strings.
  Skills: Fantastic (+6) Science; Superb (+5) Investigate; 
  Great (+4) Notice; Good (+3) Provoke; Fair (+2) 
  Technical; Average (+1) Empathy.
  STUNTS
   Ghostless Shell: +2 Stealth bonus to hide from 
  view, even to sensors and synthetic senses.
   The Power of Deduction: 1/scene, spend a fate 
  point to discover / create one aspect per shift on 
  target of Investigate roll; you get one free invoke.
  EXTRAS
  ê Mental Blast: Use Provoke to make attacks 
  causing physical stress damage.
  
  18
  Blue
  Blue Technology
  Until Barrier Fall the Blues appear to have confined them-
  selves to their own planet, but explorations of the Jessilan 
  system have revealed this was not always the case. Evidence 
  exists of ancient visits to asteroids and other planets in the 
  system, most of which date from roughly 50,000 years ago, an 
  era when the Blue civilisation was clearly much less advanced. 
  The most impressive and intact of these date from -30,000BP, 
  when the Blues seemed to have been extremely active 
  through the entire Jessilan system. While most artefacts seem 
  non-functional or so advanced as to be meaningless, some 
  have been found which have led to Jessilan technological 
  breakthroughs.
  CONTEMPORARY BLUE TECHNOLOGY
  Since Barrier Fall, no surviving Blue has shown any apti-
  tude for technical innovation. As a result, they use Jessilan 
  technology, often with a high level of skill. Over the centuries 
  since Barrier Fall, some Jessilan devices have been produced 
  catering to Blue physiology, including bubble-like vehicles, 
  bulbous hand tools, and even Blue-tailored vacuum suits. 
  Availability of such Blue-oriented devices is almost entirely 
  restricted to the planet Blue.
  Any new discoveries of prelapsarian Blue tech legally 
  belong to the Jessila system government, who customarily 
  reward the finders very generously. Refusing to hand over 
  discovered Blue tech in a timely fashion is a serious crime.
  BUILDING PASTE
  This most widely-used of Blue technologies has had a major 
  impact on Jessilan society. In its “unfixed” form it’s an ivory-
  coloured substance the consistency of warm modelling clay, 
  which users can induce to “grow” into an exceptionally dura-
  ble and self-repairing building.
  The method of use is fairly simple. First, a user spreads a 
  small amount of building paste in the shape of the desired 
  foundation for the structure. Then, exposing the paste to a 
  specific pattern of coloured lights causes it to grow, and can 
  be used to direct that growth to form floors, openings for 
  doors and windows, and other additions. 
  Building paste is a form of self-replicating nanotech that 
  draws its required elements from the surrounding environ-
  ment. Once placed and activated, it remains apparently 
  dormant for ten hours while it sends out “roots” more than 
  five metres below the surface, anchoring the structure and 
  acting as conduits for collection and distribution of constitu-
  ent elements. Then the structure grows upwards at a rate of 
  50 centimetres per day, with the new paste hardening into 
  a material as durable as anything the Commonality can pro-
  duce. Structures made from building paste continue to grow 
  upwards at this rate until complete, a point again determined 
  by the application of a particular pattern of lights. At that 
  point the structure ceases to grow, but veins of unhardened 
  building paste permeate the structure and can replicate 
  and flow to damaged areas, repairing it in a manner which 
  removes any evidence of previous harm.
  Building paste was first discovered in the Greenstone 
  asteroid (below) in 1669 JC. Researchers worked for over a 
  century to learn to replicate and reshape it. The unfixed paste 
  is completely inert without the correct sequence of coloured 
  lights and, as far as researchers have been able to determine, 
  poses none of the dangers often posed by other forms of 
  self-replicating nanotech. Using light sequences users have 
  absolute control of a structure’s shape, as well as the colour 
  and texture of all surfaces.   
  GREENSTONE ASTEROID
  Most Blue artefacts in the Jessilan Belt have been found in 
  caverns or crevasses of asteroids, but most are simply small 
  devices that appear to have been dropped or abandoned, 
  or in a few rare cases ancient monitoring equipment. The 
  asteroid known as Greenstone contained something very 
  different, and so far unique: a luxurious “villa” or dwelling, and 
  the origin of the building paste (above) that now forms the 
  basis for many structures on Jessila.
  Greenstone is 19 kilometres long and 14 wide, and con-
  tains a roughly cylindrical cavern 200 metres across, made 
  entirely from brilliant emerald green building paste. It has a 
  series of interior partitions, and the surprisingly regular axial 
  rotation of the asteroid provides an effective gravity of 0.08G. 
  This in itself was a clue; most asteroids are unable to tolerate 
  even such mild rotational stress, and further analysis revealed 
  the building paste was present in filaments throughout the 
  asteroid, stabilising and reinforcing it.
  The interior cavern walls are highly decorated with images 
  and reliefs of building paste. When the “villa” was discovered 
  these formed the first depictions of the Blue aliens and their 
  lives ever seen. Even today the asteroid remains a major tour-
  ist attraction, especially for Commonality visitors, and a holy 
  site for the Alienist faith, which has tried several times, unsuc-
  cessfully, to claim sole ownership. Greenstone is a protected 
  site administered by the system government, which permits 
  limited supervised visits by tourists and faithful alike.
  
  19
  Jessilan Culture and Society
  LINK PORTALS
  One of the most impressive Blue artefacts was discovered 
  five hundred years ago, in 2832 JC, in ruins on Blue. An 
  exploratory expedition uncovered a large ring structure of 
  an unknown material, roughly 2.5 metres in diameter and 12 
  centimetres thick. Observations through the ring’s aperture 
  detected a distortion field similar to a heat shimmer, but 
  otherwise the ring appeared to be solid and inert. However, 
  anything passing through the ring immediately emerged 
  from a second, identical ring, eventually discovered in a par-
  tially collapsed cavern on Mystery, Blue’s second moon. 
  The two rings required no external power source, and 
  today continue to operate as a two-way 3-space gate when 
  one or both are moved anywhere in the Jessila system. 
  Similarities with Commonality 3-space technology are 
  obvious, and the timing of the Commonality’s invention of 
  3-space gating is at least a remarkable coincidence, occur-
  ring at approximately the same time as Jessilan Rediscovery. 
  Nevertheless, there are significant differences: Commonality 
  3-space gates are large, delicate, cease working if accelerated 
  too rapidly, and cannot be used in planetary atmospheres or 
  in gravity fields higher than 0.04G. The Jessilan link portals 
  have none of these restrictions. 
  The Jessilan System Council has so far not permitted 
  the Commonality to take either of the link portals outside 
  the Jessilan system. Many people openly wonder why the 
  Commonality permits such a situation, given the potential 
  strategic gains if link portal technology were to become more 
  widespread. Cynics suggest that secretly such exchanges are 
  bound already to have been attempted; there are many theo-
  ries—including some truly wild ones—about the results.   
  The Hermetics
  Two years ago, in 3044 JC, the Commonality research vessel 
  Atem Boroden conducted a deep scan of the planet Blue, and 
  discovered a large, air-filled, and apparently artificial cavern 
  buried half a kilometre beneath the ocean floor. Encompass-
  ing an area of over 350 square kilometres, the cavern was 
  deemed to be of sufficient interest to warrant a more detailed 
  study, which quickly located what appeared to be an airlock 
  complex concealed in an unusual undersea rock formation.
  The Commonality approached representatives of the Blue 
  community and asked if they could shed any light on the 
  structure complex, and if they would object to the research 
  team investigating further. Even the oldest of the surviving 
  Blues knew nothing about the find, and the Blue community 
  were as curious as the researchers to find out what it was. 
  Negotiating the airlock required time and caution, but 
  after several weeks the research team reported breaking 
  through to a vast cavern system containing a thriving subsur-
  face biome of brightly hued vegetation in blues, whites, and 
  pale turquoises—apparently a replica of the planet’s surface 
  ecosystem before the Barrier Fall event. They also discovered 
  three separate settlements inhabited by thousands of Blues—
  over twenty thousand in all. Initial contact efforts however 
  were disappointing; the aliens seemed largely indifferent to 
  their visitors, barely acknowledging communication efforts 
  and providing noncommittal and uninformative responses to 
  the research team’s overtures. Not only has this situation con-
  tinued unchanged; it has even worsened, as the subsurface 
  Blues have steadfastly refused to communicate with Blues 
  from the surface, or to provide any reason for their disinterest. 
  The subsurface Blues were quickly dubbed Hermetics, 
  a nod to their secretive and hidden existence beneath Blue. 
  Despite continued efforts, Commonality researchers have 
  been able to determine little else other than the fact that 
  none of them has ever been outside their “Sapphire Vault”, 
  and that they have at least some access to their species’ 
  hyper-advanced prelapsarian technologies—theoretically far 
  in advance of Commonality capabilities. This alone has guar-
  anteed tight security and a continued Commonality presence 
  at the Sapphire Vault. Nevertheless, it’s equally clear that the 
  Hermetics are entirely wrapped up in their own concerns, and 
  have no interest in the outside world. Most researchers agree 
  that they are cooperating on a single project they consider of 
  vital importance. 
  HERMETIC TECHNOLOGY
  The Hermetic Blues refuse to share their technology with 
  outsiders, or to explain any of its principles. Many in the 
  Commonality research teams believe the Hermetics do not 
  actually understand their technology, and are attempting 
  to conceal their ignorance; they contend the prelapsarian 
  devices are self-replicating and self-maintaining, and that the 
  Hermetics do not so much operate the devices as request 
  their aid. Xenologists believe the Hermetics are connected 
  to the Sapphire Vault devices on an unconscious level; rather 
  than turning on a water dispenser, they simply think that they 
  need water, and the dispenser automatically responds. The 
  research team is split as to whether this method of opera-
  tion was common to all prelapsarian technology, or whether 
  it’s something specific to the Sapphire Vault. The prevailing 
  theory is that prelapsarian tech also incorporated a strong 
  “conscious control” element; some researchers believe the 
  Hermetics have access to such tech and regularly use it, but 
  do not allow outsiders to see it.
  THE HERMETIC EFFECT
  The Hermetics have been a polarising force in Jessilan society, 
  and among Alienists (page 14) in particular. Some Alien-
  ists believe that the Hermetics are “the pure”, and that Blue 
  society had in some way become impure and deserving of 
  destruction. Others believe that the Blues of the Sapphire 
  Vault are themselves a wicked force, who destroyed the Blue 
  civilisation and now menace the survivors and indeed all 
  inhabitants of the Jessila system.
  
  20
  Blue
  THE FUTURE OF JESSILA: NEW 
  BLUES OR COLLAPSE?
  SCI Force reports that the Jessilan situation is highly unstable 
  and unsustainable in the long run. Many factions threaten to 
  pull Jessilan society apart, and yet the Commonality pres-
  ence continues to catalyse these destructive forces rather 
  than improving the situation. Perversely, the nascent New 
  Blue culture, with its ability to unite the best of Blue and 
  Jessilan societies, appears to hold out the greatest hope. The 
  fact that the New Blues oppose Commonality interference 
  would normally dictate the Commonality withdraw from the 
  Jessilan system to permit more subtle manipulations to occur; 
  however, the presence of Hermetic link portal technology and 
  the machinations of the 3SI are ensuring, for now at least, that 
  this does not take place.
  SUPPORTING EXOINTELLIGENCE
  THE HERMETIC BLUE
  Physical Stress:  1  2  3  4
  Mental Stress:  1  2  3  4
  Consequences: 3 mild + 1 moderate.
  Scale: Medium (+0).
  Evolution Index: +4 (+3 difficulty to comprehend and 
  perceive Commonality humans).
  Exoscale: +4 (-6 penalty for Hermetics to perceive 
  Commonality humans, +12 shifts on success; +6 bonus for 
  Commonality humans to perceive Hermetics, -12 shifts on 
  success).
  Life Form Concept: Sybaritic Amnesiac With a Blind-Spot 
  For Physical Exploration.
  Exointelligence Concept: Large Group Exointellligence 
  Directing Its Evolution to Transcend Environmental 
  Challenges.
  Trouble: Dedicated to an Unknown Deadline.
  Behaviours: Species Self-Identity; Transcends to Avoid 
  Challenges; Takes Its Environment With It.
  Manifestations: Sensorium: Radio Sense (Wave Gland); 
  Comms: Wave Gland and Heart Strings; Integral Part of 
  Transcending Species Massmind; Voluntary Abdication 
  From Temporal Flow.
  Skills: Transcendent (+11) Science; Posthuman (+10) 
  Investigate; Transhuman (+9) Notice; Legendary (+8) 
  Knowledge, Will; Epic (+7) Physique, Provoke.
  STUNTS
   Ghostless Shell: +2 Stealth bonus to hide from view, 
  even to sensors and synthetic senses.
  The Power of Deduction: 1/scene, spend a fate point 
  to discover / create one aspect per shift on target of 
  Investigate roll; you get one free invoke.
   Polymath: For a fate point, use Science in place of any 
  other skill for one check or exchange.
   Sensor Scan: Use sensorview and Notice for passive 
  sensing construct actions.
  EXTRAS
  ê Mental Blast: Use Provoke to make attacks causing 
  physical stress damage.
  ê Prescience Routines: For a fate point, make an 
  Empathy, Investigate, Knowledge, Notice, Science, etc, 
  create advantage roll to create a prediction.
  
   
   
   
  Memetic
  CHAPTER Four
  The World of Jessila
  Cascade
  “It’s a cold world, and dry, but so beautiful. To stand in the shadow of the towering blue-
  woods in the morning, watching the shellapods extruding limbs as they swing between the 
  treetops, and hear their eerie dawn song… And to feel yourself strong in the low gravity, so 
  alive.”
  —Glimpse of Numen Rim-600beta, event horizon probe responsible for Jessilan 
  Rediscovery, at its lodge on Mt Landation.
  Jessila III is commonly referred to simply as “Jessila”, and for 
  millennia (until very recently) was the almost exclusive focus 
  of human activity in the system. It’s a cool and somewhat 
  dry garden world, with three large continents separated by 
  narrow seas, and only half of its surface covered by oceans. 
  The climate has warmed as a result of terraforming over the 
  past seven millennia, and now approximately a fifth of the 
  planet—mostly in the polar regions higher than 50 degrees 
  north and south—is covered in kilometre-thick ice sheets, 
  and one of the non-polar continents sports an inland sea 
  where there was previously desert. The world is in a mild ice 
  age, although much more verdant than before; the Jessilan 
  government has long since scaled back its terraforming 
  efforts to avoid further disruption to the ecosystem.
  EARLY JESSILA
  When humans arrived in 3570 FA, a third of the planet’s sur-
  face was glaciated. Coastal regions had abundant life, but the 
  interiors of the two largest continents were sandy desert, and 
  the third polar continent had a vast ice sheet at its interior.
  The Complex Unity expedition rapidly colonised the coastal 
  regions. Two standard centuries after foundation, in 85 JC, 
  Jessila began a six-century period of terraforming, modify-
  ing the climate using orbital mirrors and gradually increasing 
  atmospheric carbon dioxide levels. The result was to reduce 
  the level of glaciation to roughly a fifth.
  
  22
  Blue
  Inferior Garden World / United World
  High Concept: Rediscovered Human 
  World in an Ancient Alien Star 
  System.
  Aspects: Yellow-white F-class Main 
  Sequence Star; Ancient Human 
  Civilisation; Partly Terraformed; 
  Population of Genurgically Adapted 
  Phenes; T-Analogue Biosphere.
  PLANETARY TYPE: INFERIOR 
  GARDEN WORLD
  Planetary Age: Mature (+0).
  Orbit: Outer Habitable Zone (+1): 
  1.8AU.
  Year Length: 854d.
  Size: Standard (+1): 11700km.
  Density: Standard (+0).
  Surface Gravity: Standard (+0): 0.9G.
  Day Length: Standard (+0): 23h.
  Atmospheric Pressure: Standard 
  (+0): 1.1 Old Earth.
  Surface Temperature: Cool (-1) 10°C.
  Surface Liquid: Average (+0): 50% 
  water.
  Seasonality: Low Standard (-1).
  Satellites: 1 planetoid (+1) (Metler).
  Habitability: Agreeable (+3).
  Planetary Bodies: 6 (3 gas giants).
  CIVILISATION TYPE: UNITED WORLD
  Designation: Commonality Aligned 
  (+0).
  Population: High Standard (+1): 900 
  million human phenes (10% amphies, 
  20% arboes, 20% drylanders, 20% 
  glacers, 5% quatics, 25% standers—
  see page 11); minority population of 
  30,000 Blues.
  Government Type: Representative 
  (-2).
  Societal Dev: Widespread Unintrusive 
  Collective (+4).
  Openness: Equivocal (-1).
  Control Index: Property (-2).
  Trade Index: Low Moderate (-1).
  Embargo: No Embargo.
  Tech Level: T7 (+2): First Age of Space.
  Starport: Avinna, C-class starport 
  (+3); Gathering City, C-class starport 
  (+3).
  Mindscape: Global (-1).
  Culture: Fringe World culture in Stage 
  2: Normalisation.
  1 hex = 800km
  JESSILA (JESSILA III)
  Gathering
  Lauress
  T r a n s f a r l i a n  O c e a n
  Lauress
  FarLand
  Harmony
  GLimmer
  s i lv e r f l e c k  O c e a n
  Drulia’s 
  Triumph
  Avinna
  Mirror of the 
  City of Glass
  Mirror of the 
  Forbidden City
  
  23
   
   
   
  Colonisation and Settlement
  From initial coastal settlement, human expansion followed 
  upon terraforming, occupying new verdant regions in 
  areas previously dry and sparsely inhabited. Later, genurgic 
  modification produced new human phenotypes—known as 
  phenes—better adapted to Jessila’s long (854 day) year, which 
  thrived in Jessila’s varied and challenging environments, 
  reducing the need for further terraforming and minimising 
  disruption to the local ecosystem. The six phenes comprise: 
  amphies, arboes, drylanders, glacers, quatics, and standers. 
  See page 11 for more.
  Principal Jessilan settlements are as follows:
  Gathering City
  Jessila’s largest settlement is located at the site where the 
  first colony shuttles landed seven thousand standard years 
  ago, on the continent of Lauress, named after the captain of 
  the Complex Unity. Little more than traces of the first colony 
  remain; one of the original shuttles used to be part of a 
  sculptural ensemble in Landing Park in Gathering, but was 
  destroyed in the tectonic upheavals of 904 JC: the current 
  sculpture is a copy from that era, and has been restored mul-
  tiple times. Landing Park remains the heart of Gathering and 
  an important part of Jessilan culture; almost everyone in the 
  system has visited at least once. 
  Today Gathering is Jessila’s second largest city, with a 
  population of 15 million, comprising mostly standers and 
  arboes, with sizable minorities of amphies and quatics. There’s 
  also an enclave of 10,000 Blues, mostly concentrated in the 
  shallows and along the coasts of Suffamond Bay. 
  Gathering is also home to Jessila’s second spaceport. Its 
  equatorial location was selected to permit construction of a 
  low-tech space elevator, today called Hove Elterm. completed 
  in 1121 JC. It still stands, 4km from Landing Park, at the former 
  heart of the spaceport; although today most orbital interface 
  traffic uses gravity engine vessels rather than the seventeen 
  hours required for space elevator transit.
  AREAS OF GATHERING CITY
  • 
  Ankorsilve: Terraformed forests of transplant flora, these 
  are today a popular spot for day-trippers.
  • 
  Arfress Arbour Hill: One of the few terraformed moun-
  tains in western Gathering, this hill sports a modern 
  Alienist chapel.
  • 
  Bluewood Facility: The Bluewood Maximum Security 
  Research Facility is located some 2-3km outside Gather-
  ing City, and is completely off-limits to all but authorised 
  personnel. See page 42 for more.
  • 
  Bluewood Range: The forests of the Bluewood Range 
  mark the beginnings of the native Jessilan biome. 
  • 
  Breaker Island: Breaker Hill was said to be the site of a 
  mysterious battle in Jessila’s early history, though it’s not 
  clear who the combatants were. Today it hosts a semi-
  permanent archaeological dig. 
  • 
  Bristic Vale: Terraformed pastures of modified transplant 
  flora and fauna, extending deep into the native blue-
  woods.
  • 
  Chastamine Hill: A steep rise covered in bluewoods with 
  excellent views of the whole city.
  • 
  Firport: The oldest spaceport on Jessila, and still in use 
  today, although most traffic now passes through Avinna. 
  Its skyline is dominated by Hove Elterm.
  • 
  Holljesla Vale: Terraformed farmlands planted with modi-
  fied transplant flora.
  • 
  Hove Elterm: Ancient space elevator constructed in 1121 
  JC, it’s still operational, although mostly used for low prior-
  ity cheap transits and occasional tourism. 
  • 
  Intrid Heath: Famous for its terrestrial transplant grass-
  lands and peat bogs, although little else will grow here. 
  • 
  Landation Range: These mountains were a native blue-
  wood preserve even at the colony’s founding, and are 
  home to native fauna and modified transplant fauna.
  • 
  Landing Park: Generally held to be the landing site of 
  the Complex Unity in 3570 FA. It’s now the heart of urban 
  Gathering, and a popular tourist destination.
  • 
  Navirine Hill: Extensive quarries were dug here in Jessila’s 
  early history, and many caves were used by fugitive Alien-
  GATHERING CITY, JESSILA
  Ankorsilve
  Kilometres
  0
  1
  2
  3
  4
  B lu e w o o d R a n g e
  l a n d at i o n R a n g e
  S u f fa m o n d 
  B ay
  n o R f e l d R 
  B ay
  R a R e c h a m p S t R a i t
  n u j e S l a n 
  R i v e R
  Arfress 
  Arbour Hill
  Holjesla 
  Vale
  Bluewood 
  Facility
  Bristic 
  Vale
  Navirine 
  Hill
  Sanctuarine 
  Hill
  Novamine 
  Hill
  Venthine 
  Hill
  Intrid 
  Heath
  Origala 
  Island
  Breaker 
  Island
  Ruins of 
  Fonsetla
  Chastamine 
  Hill
  Landing 
  Park
  Voluntariat 
  Palace
  Firport
  Hove Elterm 
  (Ancient Space 
  Elevator)
  
  24
  Blue
  ists during the Second and Third Persecutions.
  • 
  Norfeldr Bay: These days a popular sports area, it used to 
  be a fertile ground for harvesting native aquatic fauna.
  • 
  Novamine Hill: This rocky outcrop bears little good soil 
  and was never terraformed. Once a year thousands of 
  shieldfins emerge from Norfeldr Bay to spawn here.
  • 
  Nujeslan River: This river is tamed and dredged today, 
  though in antiquity it was cold, turbulent, and prone to 
  devastating and unpredictable floods.
  • 
  Origala Island: A prestigious luxury residential district 
  with extensive parklands.
  • 
  Rarechamp Strait: Now a stretch of bay overlooked by 
  prestigious dwellings. There are numerous archaeological 
  sites on the sea bed.
  • 
  Ruins of Fonsetla: A very early colonial settlement has 
  been found on the seabed here in the middle of the bay. 
  There’s a debate that it may even predate Landing Park.
  • 
  Sanctuarine Hill: More impenetrable and densely for-
  ested with the native bluewoods than Navirine Hill, this 
  has been an Alienist place of pilgrimage for millennia.
  • 
  Suffamond Bay: Suffamond was once called the “Garden 
  of Jessila”, and its stones are still plated with a wealth of 
  brightly flowering transplant flora. Many of Gathering’s 
  minority Blue population live in enclaves here.
  • 
  Venthine Hill: Overlooking the Transfarlian Ocean, 
  Venthine Hill is bleak, stormswept, and a popular spot for 
  romantics and lovers of tales of woe.
  • 
  Voluntariat Palace: Seat of the System Council.
  Avinna
  Jessila developed a basic gravity engine capability five hun-
  dred standard years ago, in 2830 JC, based on reconstructed 
  theories from surviving elements of the original Complex 
  Unity slowship, coupled with fragments of devices scavenged 
  from Blue in the aftermath of the Barrier Fall event. While early 
  transports were large and expensive, they soon replaced the 
  space elevators as the preferred method of interface travel, 
  and led to the construction of a second spaceport, Avinna, 
  on the island continent of Harmony, far from Gathering City,  
  where the risk of space elevator collision could be avoided. 
  Today Avinna is Jessila’s largest city, with a population of 21 
  million, and is considered more modern and outward-looking 
  than Gathering. It also has a sizable glacer population (page 
  12).
  In the past thirty years, Commonality contact has resulted 
  in more efficient, cheaper, and more widely available grav 
  suspensor vehicles, further emphasising Avinna’s impor-
  tance. Avinna Spaceport has been Jessila’s main spaceport 
  for seventeen standard years, and is the first destination for 
  most visitors to the system. Its extrastellar district is home 
  to immigrants from across Commonality Space and beyond. 
  Integrationalism (page 14) is popular here.
  Drulia’s Triumph
  Jessila’s third largest city was founded in 1254 JC, and was the 
  terminus of the planet’s second space elevator. It’s located on 
  Farland, the second equatorial continent, and until the intro-
  duction of gravity engines five hundred standard years ago 
  served as its primary spaceport and transport hub. It has a 
  population of 12 million, including many drylanders from the 
  continental interior, and 15,000 of Jessila’s minority popula-
  tion of Blues.
  The Arch
  The Arch is Jessila’s single orbital habitat. It’s an orbital 
  loop—a vast space station almost 30,000km long and 5km 
  wide, sitting in geostationary orbit at an altitude of approxi-
  mately 28,000km and sketching a graceful arc between 
  Jessila’s two space elevators. It was constructed in 1343 JC, 
  long before the development of gravity engines, and was a 
  monumental technological achievement that required five 
  hundred standard years to complete. Although no longer 
  as necessary as it once was, since interface travel is easy and 
  the space elevators exist mostly for tourism and inexpensive 
  bulk cargo, the Arch is still home to 30 million people, with a 
  majority of arboes, and remains one of Jessila’s main research 
  and manufacturing centres. Integrationalism (page 14) is 
  popular here.
  The Mirrors
  Even Jessila shows evidence of Blue activity, although there 
  are no obvious ruins or artefacts. However, two large, flat, 
  perfectly smooth areas each of more than 3 square kilome-
  tres are thought to be sites of previous Blue habitation that 
  were “removed” shortly before the Complex Unity expedition 
  arrived in the system. Known collectively as the Mirrors, and 
  comprising the Mirror of the Forbidden City and the Mirror 
  of the City of Glass, they are now weathered and somewhat 
  uneven, but at the time of Jessila’s initial colonisation they 
  were mirror-smooth and highly polished.
  The Preservations
  There are areas on Jessila and elsewhere in the system 
  which are actively resisting Commonality integration. These 
  preservations are usually somewhat distant from major urban 
  centres, and are effectively exclusion zones where non-Jessi-
  lans aren’t allowed without express permission, usually in the 
  form of travel permits. There are preservations across Jessila 
  away from major settlements.
  THE JESSILA ECOSYSTEM
  Jessila’s ecosystem shares many similarities with Blue. While 
  a few biologists are convinced that the Blues are responsible 
  for these similarities, most believe that natural meteorite 
  
  25
   
   
   
  infall has been exchanging single-celled and bacterial life 
  forms between the two planets for billions of years. Like Blue, 
  Jessilan life forms lack rigid skeletons, instead relying on 
  hydrostatic skeletons for support. However, Jessilan life forms 
  frequently have durable shells covering most of their bodies, 
  and plant analogues share wide-reaching “root anchors” 
  permitting them to tower in excess of 150 metres above the 
  ground. Additionally, the single biggest difference is that no 
  native Jessilan life forms show signs of genurgic modification 
  before the arrival of humans. 
  Like most life-bearing worlds, Jessila’s ecosystem is 
  t-analogue, meaning it cannot be metabolised by unmodified 
  humans. Efforts in the early colonial era used orbital micro-
  wave arrays to sterilise regions which were then colonised 
  and farmed with short-term stock. Later, the colony began 
  engineering its crops and animals to be compatible with 
  local life forms, and developed genurgic therapies to enable 
  colonists and their descendants to metabolise the t-analogue 
  biosphere.
  ECOSYSTEM
  THE JESSILA ECOSYSTEM
  Biodiversity: Standard (+1).
  Paradigm: T-Analogue.
  Metabolic Bases: Photosynthesis, Flesh and Blood 
  Analogues.
  Body Plans: Primary Sessile: Bluewoods—Enormous 
  (+3) Biradial Multibranched No Frame With No 
  Segmentation; Primary Motile: Nacreoforms—
  Medium (+0) Bilateral 8 limbs No Frame With No 
  Segmentation; Secondary Motile: Lentillids—Small 
  (-1) Radial 8 limbs No Frame With No Segmentation.
  Environmental Characteristics: In a Mild Ice Age; 
  Severe Storms; Large Interior Deserts.
  Key Parochials: Durable Shells, Root Anchors.
  
  26
  Blue
  Memetic
  CHAPTER Five
  The Planet Blue
  Cascade
  “The first view of Blue took my breath away. So bright, so vast. Ruined megastructures I 
  couldn’t comprehend towered kilometres above the clouds, generating their own weather 
  systems; bizarre organic bridges ran for thousands of kilometres across the trackless sea; 
  and here and there were the Blues—translucent-skinned semi-aquatics, almost like children, 
  as lost and as bewildered as we. And yet once they had commanded worlds…”
  —Genurgist Leem Kyzer, founder of the Chembu Ponics facility, Hasan’s Rescue
  Blue is a beautiful oceanworld, larger than Old Earth, with a 
  higher gravity, and almost completely covered by water. Only 
  11% of the world is dry land, divided into two medium-sized 
  continents named Jasmine and Lavender, and many dozens 
  of islands in several archipelagos.
  Blue Before Barrier Fall
  Before the Barrier Fall event (page 8), direct observation of 
  Blue was difficult. No external probe or vessel could approach 
  closer than 91,000km, and the Barrier distorted all electro-
  magnetic radiation, including sensors. Over the millennia 
  since the foundation of the Jessila colony, initial probes in a 
  far orbit of Blue were supplemented and replaced by increas-
  ingly sophisticated observation platforms, until by Barrier 
  Fall no fewer than three hundred observation satellites and 
  a single large orbital station on Blue’s third moon, Citadel 
  (orbital distance 115,000km), surveilled the world without 
  cease.
  Over the entire period up until Barrier Fall, observations 
  remained highly consistent. The planet appeared to regularly 
  undergo extensive modification, with the shape and size 
  of many islands changing significantly over the course of a 
  century or two. More than 10% of the land forms appeared to 
  be floating structures, as they regularly moved, some following 
  presumed ocean currents, others apparently under their own 
  power. Although the mysterious Blues seemed to prefer living 
  in relatively low density settlements, artificial lights could be 
  seen on every landmass, even on islands less than 20km across. 
  The most obvious structures on the planet were a series 
  of three enormous constructs—possibly buildings—one on 
  each of the two continents, and the third on a large island. 
  Each “building” was 8-12 km tall and 40-60km across. The 
  traffic in and out of these structures suggested they were not 
  cities, but rather had only limited habitation.
  Jessilan observations also revealed extensive construc-
  tion and heat signatures suggesting high energy use on 
  the planet’s second moon, Mystery. Despite its low gravity, 
  Mystery appeared to have a breathable atmosphere similar 
  in composition to that of Blue, although it was unknown how 
  this was contained. Spacecraft of exotic design periodically 
  travelled between Mystery and the surface of Blue, but their 
  infrequency led observers to conclude that Blue possessed 
  some other means of transporting its inhabitants and other 
  objects.
  One of Blue’s most distinctive features were its so-called 
  bridges (although their true function remains unknown even 
  today). Both continents and approximately half of the islands 
  more than 100km across were connected by an enormous 
  network of these structures, the longest of which stretched 
  more than 12,000km. Bridge width varied between 500 and 
  1000 metres, and orbital images indicated many were cov-
  ered with structures. 
  Although accurate data were impossible to obtain, 
  estimates were that the Blue population numbered between 
  200 and 500 million individuals. The aliens appeared to be 
  roughly human-sized, but higher resolution images were 
  
  27
  The Planet Blue
  Inferior Garden World / United World
  High Concept: Bright Blue 
  Waterworld with a Collapsed Alien 
  Civilisation.
  Aspects: Decadent Aliens in the 
  Ruins of Hyperadvanced Greatness; 
  A New Hybrid Culture; Unfathomable 
  Technologies; Earth-Shattering 
  Mysteries Hidden From View; 
  Scavenger Culture; T-Analogue 
  Biosphere.
  PLANETARY TYPE: INFERIOR 
  GARDEN WORLD
  Planetary Age: Mature (+0).
  Orbit: Inner Habitable Zone (-1): 0.84 
  AU.
  Year Length: 285d.
  Size: Large Standard (+1): 18,000km.
  Density: Standard (+0).
  Surface Gravity: High Standard (+1): 
  1.3G.
  Day Length: Reduced (-1): 31h.
  Atmospheric Pressure: High (+1): 1.4 
  Old Earth.
  Surface Temperature: Warm (+1) 
  20°C.
  Surface Liquid: Almost Total (+3): 
  90% water.
  Seasonality: Low (-2).
  Satellites: 4 planetoids (+1) (Primus, 
  Mystery, Citadel, Rogue).
  Habitability: Agreeable (+3).
  CIVILISATION TYPE: UNITED WORLD
  Designation: Commonality Aligned 
  (+0).
  Population: Low (-2): 350,000 human 
  (115,000 amphies, 235,000 among 
  other phenes); 150,000 Blues.
  Government Type: Representative 
  (-2).
  Societal Dev: Consensus 
  Redistribution Model (+1).
  Openness: Guarded (+0).
  Control Index: Property (-2).
  Trade Index: Low Moderate (-1).
  Embargo: No Embargo.
  Tech Level: T7 (+2): First Age of Space.
  Starport: Hasan’s Rescue, D-class 
  starport (+2).
  Mindscape: Global (-2).
  Culture: Fringe World culture in Stage 
  2: Normalisation. 
  1 hex = 1250km
  BLUE (JESSILA II)
  Cobalt
  Lavender
  v l i k i a n O c e a n
  Ex-Megastructure
  vauLt 
  Zone
  Vliksun 
  Bridge 
  Dwellings
  Jasmine
  Hasan’s 
  Rescue
  Ex-Megastructure
  Ex-Megastructure
  
  28
  Blue
  unachievable due to the Barrier’s distorting effect. Detailed 
  representations only became possible after Barrier Fall (see 
  page 8), although carvings found in the alien “villa” of the 
  Greenstone asteroid (page 18) were, upon analysis of the 
  dimensions of doorways and the structure of the few remain-
  ing furnishings, determined to be a faithful depiction of the 
  Blue physiology—see page 15 for more.
  Long-term observation suggested a maintained and well-
  balanced climate and ecosystem, although land areas could 
  increase or decrease by as much as 10% over the course of 
  100 standard years. 
  Blue After Barrier Fall
  The first Jessilan visitors to Blue after the Barrier Fall event of 
  2802 JC found a radically changed world. Almost half of the 
  planet’s land surface had been wiped clean of all life, right 
  down to microorganisms in the soil, and almost all traces of 
  the aliens’ civilisation was gone. Many structures seemed to 
  have simply melted into a form of paste or goo (page 18); 
  others had been violently destroyed; and others still had 
  simply vanished, replaced by flat, polished bedrock, similar 
  to the “Mirrors” on Jessila (page 24). The few technologi-
  cal devices that were recovered no longer functioned, their 
  nanoscale crystalline circuitry shattered.
  The Jessilan explorers found a scattered handful of survi-
  vors among the ruins. This “first contact” was a pathetic affair: 
  the Blues seemed reduced to a primitive existence, huddling 
  in the shells of buildings for shelter, foraging for what little 
  food they could find. First reports of the aliens described 
  them as “stunned”, “lost”, and “dazed”; with time, it became 
  clear that none of the few hundred surviving Blues had any 
  more than fragmentary memories of their previous exist-
  ences, and no idea of what had happened to them. None of 
  them could make use of anything other than simple tools.
  Subsequent research began to piece together tantalising 
  clues about the fate of the Blue civilisation. Most of the larger 
  alien settlements had been in locations which had been 
  wiped clean of life. Any structures or devices which remained 
  there crumbled rapidly to dust over the three years which fol-
  lowed, and the few survivors found there succumbed equally 
  quickly, their bodies decaying with unusual rapidity.
  Limited communication with the surviving Blues was even-
  tually established. According to their reports, almost all of the 
  Blue population had died immediately after their civilisation’s 
  collapse; most of the remainder fell into profound comas from 
  which they could not be roused. The unconscious Blues initially 
  ate by reflex when fed, but eventually even this reflex failed, 
  and within two years almost the entire Blue species was extinct.
  BLUE TODAY
  In the six standard centuries since Barrier Fall, the planet has 
  begun to recover. Almost two thirds of the formerly lifeless 
  regions have been reclaimed through the patient reintroduc-
  tion of native micro-organisms genurgically engineered by 
  Jessilan scientists. Every damaged structure that could not be 
  repaired has been demolished. Some structures dating from 
  before Barrier Fall still remain, maintained by the self-repair-
  ing qualities of the mysterious substance known as building 
  paste (page 18). These have been supplemented by new 
  structures made from building paste, as well as some dwell-
  ings and other buildings constructed from other materials. 
  Even today, many humans and even some Blues find the ruins 
  of the prelapsarian Blue civilisation disconcerting.
  The Bridge Network
  While more than one third of the Blue bridges survived Barrier 
  Fall, many were badly damaged and unable to self-repair. Today 
  less than half of those remain, although those that do possess 
  functioning self-repair systems and still provide basic facilities 
  like fresh running water and small but comfortable shelters for 
  travellers. As yet no one can adequately explain why a world 
  with such easy and rapid transportation technology main-
  tained such an extensive network.
  The structures which had been observed on the bridge 
  network turned into building paste during Barrier Fall. Never-
  theless, 60,000 humans, including many amphies (page 11), 
  and 30,000 Blues now make these bridges their homes—the 
  so-called bridge dwellers. 
  Last year a team of Commonality archaeotechnologists 
  identified what they believe to be part of a 3-space trans-
  portation device built into the structure of every bridge, 
  including a crystalline “conduit” connecting a series of human-
  sized (or Blue-sized) niche halt alcoves built into the bridge 
  superstructure precisely every 1200 metres. It’s theorised 
  that a Blue could enter any of these alcoves and pass through 
  3-space to any other alcove on any other bridge. The theory 
  gels with the results of Blue redactive probe therapies which 
  have retrieved memories from Blue subjects of “shifting” along 
  or through the bridge network. Researchers believe that while 
  duplicating the bridge transportation network is currently 
  beyond Commonality capabilities, they are hoping to be able 
  to restore functionality to at least part of the network in the 
  coming years. 
  Settlement and Population
  Blue remains sparsely settled, with a total population of only 
  half a million. From an initial survivor base of just four hun-
  dred, there are now some 150,000 Blues in the Jessila system, 
  the vast majority living on Blue. Researchers attribute this feat 
  to the genurgically enhanced robustness of the Blue stock. 
  Despite the gaping holes in their memories, the Blue survivors 
  and their offspring have proven to be intelligent beings with 
  a keen interest in the universe around them. Today almost a 
  quarter of all Blues live off-world (some 35,000 individuals), 
  mostly on Jessila itself.
  
  29
  The Planet Blue
  The small number of Jessilan humans living on Blue is partly 
  due to the fact that, even after six hundred years, many 
  phenes still regard Blue as strange. This, coupled with the 
  planet’s 1 3G surface gravity and t-analogue biosphere 
  (requiring genurgic therapies to metabolise) continues to mit-
  igate against immigration from offworld. Nevertheless there 
  are dedicated researchers and people who are fascinated by 
  the Blues living here, and tens of thousands of individuals 
  who simply decided they wanted to live here. They are cur-
  rently concentrated in four main settlements.  
  Cobalt
  A shortening of the native Blue name (page 16), Cobalt is one 
  of the two largest Blue “cities”, located in a region which was 
  not destroyed during Barrier Fall. It’s one of only six locations 
  where most of the prelapsarian settlement survived and did 
  not require extensive reconstruction; fifty of the four hundred 
  Blue survivors were found here, and several of them remem-
  bered its former name.
  More than 30,000 Blues live in Cobalt. They have rebuilt 
  some areas, and outfitted structures with devices which were 
  destroyed or ceased functioning during Barrier Fall. Unusu-
  ally for Blue, humans are not especially welcome in Cobalt. 
  Although Jessilan law states that individuals may not be offi-
  cially forbidden from living anywhere, almost all of Cobalt’s 
  Blues are Restorationists (page 15) whose ultimate goal is to 
  rebuild their civilisation and restore the Barrier. 
  Those phenes who have attempted to live in Cobalt have 
  found themselves largely ignored by the Blue population, and 
  with the exception of a handful of researchers few even visit. 
  However, the Blues welcome Commonality researchers, giving 
  them full access to all prelapsarian artefacts in return for the 
  results of their research. Cobalt’s Blues dislike having to rely 
  on outsiders, but realise that where Jessila has been unable to 
  recover the secrets of prelapsarian Blue technology, the Com-
  monality may succeed. 
  Hasan’s Rescue
  Researchers attempting to understand Blue technology settled 
  upon Hasan’s Rescue as an ideal location for a research sta-
  tion. It lies only 120km from one of the three megastructures 
  destroyed during Barrier Fall, yet itself survived the cataclysm 
  mostly intact. Yet none of the four hundred Blue survivors 
  comes from here; the nearest was found almost 2000km away.
  Today Hasan’s Rescue is a thriving city. Most Blue struc-
  tures are set aside for preservation and study, and inhabitants 
  live in structures which have been built since Jessilan humans 
  first arrived. The city has a population of 200,000 humans 
  (90% phenes, and about 10% non-Jessilans) and 10,000 Blues; 
  despite its location, it feels very much like a human city, 
  with the prelapsarian structures concentrated in a “museum 
  district” which forms one of the planet’s two main tourist 
  attractions. 
  HASAN’S RESCUE AREAS
  • 
  Blue Species and Cultural Institute (BSCI): Also known 
  as “Blue Sky”, this institute collates and studies research on 
  all aspects of Blue. Although Jessila-run, the Commonality 
  has a strong presence here, particularly in the form of SCI 
  Force (and indeed 3SI) teams (page 13).
  • 
  Chembu Ponics: The Chembu Genurgy Corporacy tries to 
  maintain a presence on most Commonality worlds. As a 
  waterworld with a formerly hyper-advanced semi-aquatic 
  exoculture, Blue was a high priority. Unlike many Chembu 
  Genurgy branches, this one specialises in R&D, and under-
  takes relatively little genurgic modification.
  • 
  Deadland: The depopulated wastes of remnant Blue 
  debris which cover most of the bridges.
  • 
  Hume: The large modern district of Hasan’s Rescue, 
  mostly comprising contemporary buildings and inhabited 
  by Jessilan phenes and approximately 10% non-Jessilans, 
  including Commonality citizens.
  • 
  Interponten Sea: A small but landlocked sea more or less 
  bounded by Blue bridges. Its coasts are cultivated and 
  inhabited by a large Jessilan population.
  • 
  Melt: This district contains semi-ruined Blue bridges in 
  varying states of repair. Many are still in use. They have a 
  “melted“ look.
  • 
  Museum District: The most developed part of the city 
  districts known collectively as “Hasan-on-the-Bridge”. 
  HASAN’S RESCUE
  Deadland
  Kilometres
  0
  1
  2
  3
  4
  i n t e R p o n t e n S e a
  w e S t v l i k i a n o c e a n
  Restoration 
  Plantations
  Chembu 
  Ponics
  Niche 
  Halts
  ConFornat 
  BridGe
  Hume
  Nublu
  Prelapsarian
  1
  Too Blue 
  For You
  Museum 
  District
  Museum 
  District 
  Waterpoint
  Melt
  Blue Species & 
  Cultural Institute
  idLik 
  BridGe
  Waterpoints
  Waterpoint
  Deadland
  Shantytown
  Shantytown
  Chembu 
  Ponics
  Hume
  Starport
  2
  3
  
  30
  Blue
  There are many prelapsarian Blue structures here, in good 
  repair. Often their original purpose is unfathomable.
  • 
  Museum District Waterpoint: The waterpoint (see 
  below) in the Museum District. See page 49.
  • 
  Niche Halts: These alcoves occur at 1200 metre intervals 
  along every bridge on Blue. They’re roughly 5 metres wide 
  and 3 metres high, and contain a faucet providing clean 
  drinking water when any object approaches within 0.5 
  metres.
  • 
  Nublu: A new district to the north of Hasan’s Rescue, it’s a 
  strong point for the hybrid “New Blue” culture (page 15).
  • 
  Prelapsarian: A district of mostly new construction but 
  with many areas of Blue archaeological merit. 
  • 
  Restoration Plantations: Areas inhabited predominantly 
  by Restorationists, these are essentially preservations (see 
  the adjacent textbox). Commonality humans generally 
  aren’t welcome here.
  • 
  Shantytown: Inhabited by native Blues and various 
  “nonconformists” of other species, these are impoverished 
  and ramshackle areas beyond Jessilan or Commonality 
  supervision.
  • 
  Starport: The ground facility of Blue’s spaceport, with 
  some very basic repair capability. Larger ships are handled 
  in orbit.
  • 
  Too Blue For You: A Blue “bar”: see page 44.
  • 
  West Vlikian Ocean: The open ocean which comprises 
  most of Blue’s surface area. There are occasionally some 
  terrific storms here.
  • 
  Waterpoint: Similar to the niche halts (above), these 
  are water pools 10 metres in diameter, which continu-
  ously flow with fresh drinking water. Many have conduits 
  transporting the water away, with varying degrees of 
  sophistication.
  1: Walgury’s Tenement: See page 46.
  2: Croaker Verdigris’s Shanty: See page 48. 
  3: The Barrier Device Ruin: See page 49.
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
    
   
  Preservations on Blue
  The “offworlder exclusion zones” which exist on Blue tend 
  to be no-go areas in larger settlements, rather than settle-
  ments in their own right. The shantytowns and deadlands 
  in Hasan’s Rescue are generally regarded as preservations.
  
  31
  The Planet Blue
  The Vliksun Bridge Dwellings
  The most unusual settlement on Blue is the Vliksun Bridge 
  Dwellings, some 50km off the coast of the continent of 
  Jasmine. The bridge still provides dwellers with fresh water, 
  and automatically irrigated strips of the bridge surface are 
  used for limited farming. The Vliksun Bridge Dwellings set-
  tlement is unique in that it has humans and Blues in roughly 
  equal numbers, with 60,000 humans (including about 20,000 
  amphies) and 40,000 Blues, mixed in a progressive “New Blue” 
  culture (page 15). 
  Unlike Cobalt, where the Blues inhabit prelapsarian struc-
  tures because they are trying to understand and restore their 
  past, most Blues in the Vliksun Bridge Dwellings live there 
  simply because they enjoy cohabiting with humans, and 
  because the bridge provides a unique environment. 
  The settlement is also the headquarters of the Rapid Blue 
  Transit research team, investigating the theorised transit 
  mechanisms built into the bridge’s “niche halt” superstructure 
  (page 30). Many Vliksun Bridge Dwellers are already antici-
  pating the research team succeeding, and are planning to 
  distribute the settlement along the entire 9500km length of 
  the bridge, at locations with especially striking views.
  The Vault Zone
  The exact location of the Sapphire Vault discovered two 
  years ago (page 64) has never been made public. However, 
  it’s known to be somewhere in this area, which is strictly off-
  limits, its airspace closed, patrolled by Jessilan security forces.  
  THE BLUE ECOSYSTEM
  Blue’s ecosystem is still recovering from the collapse of the 
  Blue civilisation. Several classes of large life form became 
  extinct, and more than a fifth of the planet’s land area is still 
  barren and lifeless. The dominant exoflora are large, low, 
  fan-shaped point producers that can cover an area up to 
  10 metres in diameter, but which stand only 1 metre high. 
  Numerous small- to medium-sized exofauna depend upon 
  these flabelliforms for food; similar exoflora also form large 
  floating mats in the planet’s seas. 
  Observations made since Barrier Fall indicate that the 
  planet’s biome was originally heavily genurgically engi-
  neered: all of the larger exoflora provide complex nutrition 
  to Blues, and there are no exofauna which are dangerous to 
  them. Moreover, Blues can use their heart strings (page 15) to 
  discern and alter exofauna emotional states.
  ECOSYSTEM
  THE BLUE ECOSYSTEM
  Biodiversity: Standard (-1) (recovering).
  Paradigm: T-Analogue.
  Metabolic Bases: Photosynthesis, Flesh and Blood 
  Analogues.
  Body Plans: Primary Sessile: Flabelliforms—Large 
  (+1) Radial Multibranched No Frame With No 
  Segmentation; Primary Motile: Ceruliforms—
  Medium (+0) Bilateral 12 limbs No Frame With 
  No Segmentation; Secondary Motile: Scuttles—
  Small (-1) Radial 8 limbs Exoframe With 2-Part 
  Segmentation. 
  Environmental Characteristics: Genurgically 
  Engineered World; Recovering From Global 
  Disaster; Most Land-Dwelling Life Is Amphibious.
  Key Parochials: Amphibious; Hydrostatic Skeleton; 
  Mentally Link By Touch.
  
  32
  Blue
  Memetic
  CHAPTER Six
  Other Worlds of
  the Jessila System
  Cascade
  “There’s a strangeness to exploring the Jessilan solar system. For millennia none of them could 
  leave, and there was little reason to explore the other planets. But they had the tech, for mil-
  lennia, and tried several times to kickstart an interplanetary era. It seems the ancient Blues did 
  likewise. So there are ruins and remains everywhere—and we’re only finding them now.”
  —Orca By Moab, Constellation-class Space Force System Survey Vessel and cetacean 
  eidolon, operating out of Endurance Station 
  In addition to Jessila and Blue, three other planets and 
  an asteroid belt orbit the system’s yellow-white F5 main 
  sequence primary.
  Gas Giant
  High Concept: Small Hot Gas Giant of 
  Interest Only to Scientists.
  PLANETARY TYPE: GAS GIANT
  Year Length: 40d.
  Surface Gravity: High Standard (+1): 
  1.2G.
  Population: 30 on Crucible, the gas 
  giant’s largest moon.
  Satellites: 5 small moons.
  FORGE (JESSILA I)
  
  33
  Other Worlds of the Jessila System
  
  34
  Blue
  Asteroid Belt
  A belt of asteroids and other 
  planetesimals occupies the fourth orbit 
  in the Jessilan system, between Jessila 
  and Unity. It’s almost twice as dense 
  as the Manhome Belt, but because 
  its orbit is smaller it contains roughly 
  the same mass and number of bodies. 
  Asteroid mining is common, popular 
  with loners and individuals who enjoy 
  risk. All bodies were mapped millennia 
  ago, and there’s little chance of sudden 
  strikes. Nevertheless, there’s still a 
  romance to the profession, and on rare 
  occasions miners still discover ancient 
  Blue artefacts and installations.
  The few Blue relics found on the 
  surfaces of asteroids were discovered 
  long ago, in poor condition due to 
  repeated dust and debris impacts. 
  However, miners have made more 
  than five hundred separate discoveries 
  inside asteroids, most inside small 
  crevices or caverns, and almost all 
  abandoned temporary structures or 
  broken tech of little scientific interest. 
  These discoveries have nevertheless 
  made their finders wealthy due to their 
  value to collectors.
  Ten percent of these relics have 
  been found to be made of unknown 
  materials, or to have contained 
  fragments of technology which 
  might be reverse-engineered. In all 
  cases, these contributed to Jessilan 
  technological advancement. Almost 
  two dozen were in small artificial 
  caverns; the most famous, the “alien 
  villa” in the Greenstone asteroid, was 
  the source of both building paste (page 
  18) and the first depictions of the Blues’ 
  appearance.
  Today, useful Blue artefacts dating 
  from before Barrier Fall are vanishingly 
  rare, but miners still dream of 
  finding caverns filled with wonders. 
  In fact, miners have become more 
  hopeful than ever since T9 sensors 
  have become available from the 
  Commonality; remapping efforts 
  began three years ago, and have 
  already discovered what seems to be 
  a broken Blue sampling drill last used 
  31,000 years ago. Unfortunately, last 
  year the remapping project was called 
  into question when it claimed to have 
  found a second artefact that was later 
  revealed to have been a fake created 
  by Commonality makepoint.
  High Concept: Miners of the Wild 
  Frontier.
   PLANETARY TYPE: ASTEROID BELT
  Population: Very Low (-3): 70,000 
  humans (35,000 arboes, 35,000 among 
  other phenes).
  JESSILA BELT (JESSILA IV)
  Gas Giant
  Unity is a large gas giant 60% the mass 
  of Jupiter. It’s warmer than Jupiter, 
  with a sparse but vibrant ecosystem, 
  where clouds of “air plankton” support 
  enormous yet fragile filter feeders, in 
  turn fed upon by sturdier carnivores. 
  There’s no evidence that Unity’s 
  biome has ever involved intelligent 
  life; the most complex life forms are 
  comparable in smartness to snakes or 
  lizards. Eight thousand humans live on 
  the Prasong aerostat in Unity’s upper 
  atmosphere (page 35). 
  High Concept: Jovian Gas Giant With 
  an Exotic Ecosystem.
  PLANETARY TYPE: GAS GIANT
  Orbit: Outer (+2): 6 AU.
  Surface Gravity: High Standard (+1): 
  1.5G.
  Population: Low (-2): 900,000 humans 
  on Prasong and Yoden.
  UNITY (JESSILA V)
  
  35
  Other Worlds of the Jessila System
  THE PRASONG AEROSTAT
  The largest and most intact Blue artefact in the Jessila 
  system is named for the woman who discovered it some four 
  thousand standard years ago in 1293 JC. It floats deep in the 
  atmosphere of the gas giant, Unity, a flattened oval 1400 
  metres in diameter and 900 metres thick of a very high tensile 
  hull metal-analogue with a nanoscale structure which may 
  be a variant on building paste (page 18). Although deserted 
  and stripped of advanced tech when discovered, its hull was 
  intact, and even today contains a breathable atmosphere with 
  pressure and composition identical to Jessila II (the planet 
  Blue). 
  Researchers believe the structure was used for gas mining 
  or atmospheric research; a 40-metre diameter pipe extends 
  from the base of the aerostat some 21 kilometres into Unity’s 
  atmosphere. The temperature differential provides power for 
  life support for a managed biome on the aerostat also trans-
  planted from Blue.
  Since its discovery the aerostat has been home to 
  seven separate settlement efforts. One wished to conduct 
  exhaustive studies of the structure; three used it as a base 
  for atmospheric research; and three sought an exotic and 
  self-sustaining home that provided an otherwise unattainable 
  connection to the mysterious Blues. Today the aerostat has a 
  population of 8000, and is a regular tourist destination.
  Prasong Aerostat Areas
  • 
  Tourism and Leisure Living Areas: Originally a vast 
  dome, this space has been divided with internal partitions 
  to make it into a comfortable and even luxurious habitat. 
  • 
  Administration and Living Areas: Originally part of the 
  original dome, this space is less luxurious than the one 
  above it, and contains facilities for aerostat administration 
  and living quarters for its operators.
  • 
  Research: The first level “below the boom”, this contains 
  some Blue devices but by and large is filled with recent 
  partitions and researchers analysing the workings and 
  principles of the aerostat.
  • 
  Storage and Docking Bays: Comprising an “outer ring” 
  of docking bays and an inner one for storage of both vital 
  materials for day-to-day running of the aerostat, and also 
  of materials and devices salvaged from the aerostat for 
  analysis.
  • 
  Life Support and Blue Technology: A dense “garden” 
  containing Blue flora and fauna tailored for long-term 
  aerostat life support.
  • 
  Blue Engineering Technology: The most delicate and 
  highly secured part of the aerostat, this is essentially a 
  closed self-repairing system running on principles not 
  even the Commonality fully understands. Its systems 
  maintain the aerostat’s internal integrity and environment, 
  and also its position and viability in the Unity cloud layer. 
  Although thousands of years old, it’s still an estimated T11 
  tech index in complexity.
  THE PRASONG AEROSTAT
  900 metres
  Research
  1400 metres
  Administration & Living Areas
  Storage & Docking Bays
  Life Support & Blue Technology
  Blue Engineering 
  Technology
  Tourism & Leisure 
  Living Areas
  
  36
  Blue
  Terrestrial Planet Gas Giant Moon
  High Concept: Frozen World 
  Religious Centre on a Gas Giant 
  Moon.
  Aspects: Iceball With Primitive 
  Hydrothermal Vent Life; Spectacular 
  Views; Artists, Musicians, and 
  Believers; Polar Ice Temple.
  PLANETARY TYPE: TERRESTRIAL 
  PLANET GAS GIANT MOON
  Planetary Age: Mature (+0).
  Orbit: As Unity.
  Year Length: 14.3 standard years.
  Size: Small (-2): 6000km.
  Density: Standard (+0).
  Surface Gravity: Low (-2): 0.3G.
  Day Length: Very Rapid (+3): 18 
  standard hours.
  Atmospheric Pressure: Low (-2): 
  0.35atm (methane, nitrogen, carbon 
  dioxide).
  Surface Temperature: Cold (-2) -40°C 
  to -80°C.
  Surface Liquid: High (+1): 65% ice.
  Seasonality: No Seasonality (-10).
  Habitability: Inimical (-1).
  CIVILISATION TYPE: AS JESSILA
  Population: Low (-2): 892,000 humans 
  (800,000 glacers; 92,000 other phenes).
  Tech Level: T7 (+2): First Age of Space.
  Starport: New Gathering, D-class 
  starport (+2); Mirali’s Enlightenment, 
  E-class starport (+1).
  Mindscape: Global (-1).
  1 hex = 418km
  YODEN
  THE MOONS OF UNITY
  Unity has over a dozen small moons and two large ones. The 
  smaller moons are uninhabited, although most have auto-
  mated research stations. The innermost of the larger moons 
  is called Jumble because of its extreme tectonic activity and 
  internal tides; it always has at least several dozen active volca-
  noes, despite being only 2500km in diameter. The outermost of 
  the larger moons is called Yoden.
  Yoden
  Unity’s largest moon, Yoden, is effectively a small planet, with 
  a low gravity and a thin atmosphere of methane, nitrogen, 
  and carbon dioxide. Tidal heating from Unity maintains the 
  temperature at a very cold -80°C to -40°C, and two-thirds of 
  the surface are covered with ice sheets overlying shallow seas. 
  Yoden’s buried oceans are home to simple single-celled life 
  around hydrothermal vents. 
  Humans can walk on Yoden’s surface wearing only warm 
  clothing and a breathing mask, and until Barrier Fall it was 
  the second most habitable location in the Jessila system. It 
  was first colonised six millennia ago, in 438 JC, although that 
  yeeman ranGe
  G r e a T l i d d e d 
  O c e a n
  Old 
  Sinker
  T r a n s p O l a r 
  v e n T O c e a n
  onsanFeutre
  PoLdir
  West 
  CirCuit
  aLee-aLLai 
  mountains
  Polar Ice 
  Temple
  Mirali’s 
  Enlightenment
  siFostan
  Ruins 
  of Port 
  Obele
  New 
  Gathering
  Fineworn 
  Ruins
  
  37
  Other Worlds of the Jessila System
  SUPPORTING NPC
  ALIENIST CARETAKER
  Physical Stress: 1  2  3  
  Mental Stress: 1  2
  Consequences: 1 mild + 1 moderate
  Scale: Medium (+0)
  Aspects: Dedicated Glacer Guardians; Protect the 
  Temple, Keep the Promise; We Defer to the Blues; 
  Endless Reinforcements; What’s Hidden Beneath 
  Those Holo-Robes?
  Skills: Great (+4) Knowledge, Notice; Good (+3) 
  Provoke, Unarmed Combat; Fair (+2) Physique, 
  Ranged Combat; Average (+1) Athletics, Stealth.
  STUNTS
   Grappler: +2 create an advantage Physique bonus 
  when wrestling or grappling.
   Holy Dread: +2 Provoke attack bonus against 
  believers.
   Keen Hearing: +2 Notice bonus to detect sounds.
  EXTRAS
  ê Commonality Grav Pack: Use Athletics as Pilot; 
  move and attack up to 2 zones away.
  ê Haze Field: +1 defend bonus and basic ray 
  shielding.
  ê Stun Pistol: Causes mental stress damage with the 
  Ranged Combat skill; range 1.
  colony failed six hundred standard years later after the Altstar 
  supernova event. 
  Yoden was settled again in 1319 JC, this time by Alienists 
  (page 14) wishing to live apart from the rest of humankind. 
  The colony thrived, and Alienists still account for a third of 
  Yoden’s population. Most live in the settlement of Mirali’s 
  Enlightenment (population 300,000), which most Jessilans 
  today regard as the spiritual centre of Alienism. With its 
  spectacular views of Unity, Yoden is also home to a significant 
  artistic community: New Gathering (population 500,000) is a 
  major art and music centre for the entire Jessilan system, and 
  home to the Rachan Institute, which thousands of artists and 
  musicians apply to join every year. 
  Yoden’s greatest attraction is the Polar Ice Temple at the 
  moon’s north pole. An edifice 400 metres high and covering 
  three hectares, constructed principally of solid ice (a durable 
  material at frigid temperatures), its central area (approximately 
  one quarter of the total) is pressurised with a breathable 
  atmosphere, although maintained at ambient temperature to 
  prevent melting. It stands outside the habitation domes, and 
  houses a Blue artefact of major importance, discovered here in 
  1310 JC and known by Alienists as the Promise. Resembling 
  a smooth piece of polished branching coral, violet in colour, it 
  floats in the temple’s exact centre, 1.2 metres above a raised 
  circular platform, and has the distinction of being the first 
  operational Blue artefact ever discovered. When touched by 
  any living thing, the Promise glows as bright as day. Both it and 
  its pedestal are protected by a haze field and sophisticated 
  anti-theft system, and guarded by a contingent of thirty “care-
  takers” who live several hundred metres away in a concealed 
  hillside settlement. Visitors may petition for special permission 
  to touch the Promise; this requires a background check, and an 
  escort of four armed caretakers to guard against theft. For more 
  information on the Promise, see page 55.
  ALIENIST POLAR ICE TEMPLE AREAS
  • 
  Airlock and Guard Station: While the temple interior has 
  a maintained environment, its approach is via the hostile 
  Yoden surface. There are four airlocks at the cardinal 
  points: elaborate, monumental affairs, each guarded by a 
  single caretaker, or two in times of emergency. 
  • 
  Central Pressurised Area: The interior of the temple is 
  like a vast cold ice cave, with freezing but breathable air, 
  hauntingly lit. There are usually four priests (page 57) 
  active at any one time, and two caretakers.
  • 
  Haze Field: An Average (+1) haze field surrounds the 
  Promise. It can be forced through slowly, but running into 
  it is like being struck.
  • 
  Pedestal: The pedestal is a round circular platform, 5 
  metres across and 1 metre high. It contains grav suspen-
  sors and a haze field generator, as well as Superb (+5) full 
  spectrum sensor and surveillance equipment tracking 
  anyone approaching.
  • 
  The Promise: The Promise stands here, floating in a 
  suspensor field 1.2 metres above the pedestal. It resem-
  bles an elaborately branched piece of translucent violet 
  coral—see page 60 for more.
  ALIENIST POLAR 
  ICE TEMPLE
  The 
  Promise
  Haze 
  Field
  * Airlocks & 
  Guard Stations
  Central 
  Pressurised 
  Area
  Pedestal
  *
  400m
  200m
  *
  *
  *
  
  38
  Blue
  Gas Giant
  Harbour is the most distant 
  planetary body in the 
  Jessilan system and a typical 
  small, frigid gas giant, with 
  little to distinguish it except 
  for a spectacularly large 
  and colourful ring system. 
  It’s the only ringed planet in 
  the system, and ever since 
  reaching T7 Jessila has maintained a base here, on 
  Endurance, the innermost of Harbour’s moons. 
  High Concept: Small Frigid Gas Giant With Beautiful 
  Ring System.
  PLANETARY TYPE: GAS GIANT
  Orbit: Extreme Outer (+4): 48 AU.
  Year Length: 328.9 standard years.
  Surface Gravity: High (+2): 2G.
  Population: Sparse (-4): 6000 humans on the moon 
  Endurance.
  HARBOUR (JESSILA VI)
  ENDURANCE
  Endurance orbits Harbour at an inclination of 30° to the plane 
  of the gas giant’s rings, providing anyone on the planet-facing 
  side of this tidally-locked moon with Spectacular Views. Endur-
  ance Station was established in 1389 JC as a small astronomical 
  monitoring station, but quickly grew to include a large luxury 
  resort. Even now it’s largely the preserve of the wealthy or 
  well-connected, although it’s grown substantially since Com-
  monality contact. It can accommodate 6600 people.
  Endurance Station comprises an almost perfectly 
  transparent dome 1200 metres across and 400 metres high; 
  accommodations, private meeting rooms, and so on are in 
  enclosed structures, but almost every other facility has an 
  unobstructed view of the rings. 
  The stunning views and the station’s concern for the pri-
  vacy of its visitors makes Endurance Station a popular place 
  for deals and negotiations. Mindscape access is noticeably 
  impaired due to the many restrictions required to defeat 
  intrusion attempts. The dome is shielded against EM radiation 
  outside the visible range, and sensors automatically monitor 
  and jam any signals which use visible light. Permitted comms 
  (Mindscape or otherwise) must pass through a single excep-
  tionally secure transceiver, constantly monitored by Enduring 
  Confidentiality, the station sentience.
  The remoteness of Endurance Station imposes a signifi-
  cant time lag on communications; it takes 6 ¼ hours for a 
  signal to reach here from Jessila or Blue. This frees residents 
  from outside distractions and limits intrusion attempts, and as 
  a result the station famously has recently become the venue 
  for high-level negotiations between the Jessilan system 
  government and the Commonality. Although espionage is 
  rarer than Mindscape dramas would suggest, feeds of excep-
  tionally sensitive negotiations have been made available by 
  parties unknown to considerable official embarrassment. 
  Arrests and re-education of spies at Endurance Station have 
  been made sufficiently high-profile to persuade potential 
  lawbreakers that most attempts aren’t worth the effort.
  Endurance Station today is a careful balance of luxury 
  resort, high security diplomatic facility, and a paranoid hive 
  of overreaching privacy measures. It hosts four hostels (or 
  Iceball
  High Concept: Diplomatic 
  Haven on an Isolated 
  Iceball Moon.
  PLANETARY TYPE: ICEBALL
  Size: Small (-2): 1900km.
  Surface Gravity: Low (-2): 
  0.4G.
  Day Length: Rapid (+2): 20h. 
  ENDURANCE
  ENDURANCE STATION
  Sand
  Sable Rose 
  Hotel
  Elevation View
  1200 metres
  Ring River
  Blue Emerald 
  Hotel
  Hotel 
  Victor
  Nightline 
  Hotel
  Sea
  Forest
  The 
  Conduit
  Monitoring & 
  Transceiver Arrays
  Docking & 
  Landing Bays
  
  39
  Other Worlds of the Jessila System
  “hotels”), each with 1000 rooms, and each has its own enter-
  tainment and carousing facility, referred to as the “casino”, with 
  its own ambiance, clientele, and specialist games of chance.
  ENDURANCE STATION AREAS
  • 
  Blue Emerald Hotel: With the vibe of a luxurious tropi-
  cal safari lodge. Sounds of Tropical Wildlife; Nights of the 
  Iguana; Romantic Rainforest Rendezvous.
  Casino Tropicale: Often hot and heady, and tempers 
  may fray. Roulette; Random Halo.
  • 
  Conduit: A high security access tunnel and comms link for 
  the single monitoring and transceiver array for the entire 
  station.
  • 
  Docking and Landing Bays: Acts as a D-class starport.
  • 
  Hotel Victor: A bright club-house atmosphere. Playing the 
  Field.
  Casino Inferno: With a splendid terrace and enclo-
  sure overlooking the racing track, where a variety of 
  personal and animal races are run. Racecourse.
  • 
  Monitoring and Transceiver Arrays: These are dishes, 
  observatories, antennas, and dipole arrays, coordinated 
  by the Enduring Confidentiality sentience and guarded by 
  numerous sentinels, drones, and mechanicals.
  • 
  Nightline Hotel: A night-time venue for those who prefer 
  to carouse under cover of darkness. Starlight Skyscraper 
  Romance; Top Floor Cocktails and Music; Speakeasy.
  Casino Nox: In the Nightline Hotel. Blackjack; Exoblack; 
  Tonight Is Forever; Anonymous Sophistication.
  • 
  Ring River: A circular watercourse kept in constant 
  motion, flowing into and out of the Sable Rose “sea”. Take a 
  Flowboat Around the Rim.
  • 
  Sable Rose Hotel: An open air, sea and beach feel. Sun, 
  Sea, and Sand.
  Casino Lux: Technosnap.
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
    
   
   
  The Universal Appeal of Games of Chance
  No matter how intelligent sentients become, it seems that 
  humour and gambling are the two passions they continue to 
  share with humankind. The “casinos” of Endurance Station 
  are perfect examples of these passions being harnessed to 
  create an environment where cultures, intelligences, and even 
  species of very different levels of complexity and evolution can 
  coexist and interact constructively. The “games” on offer take 
  many forms, and indeed go through fads, fashions, and phases 
  (although there are always old favourites).
  You can invent games of chance on the fly; it’s also a great 
  chance to let your players improvise details. In additional to 
  historical games, here are some ideas for less traditional ones:
  • 
  Exoblack: Each player receives a random exomemory. 
  Each then has to decide whether a subsequent exomemo-
  ry will reinforce or contradict it.
  • 
  Random Halo: The game decides on a random question 
  or parameter (there are various “genres” of this game…), 
  and the player establishes their answer in their own halo. 
  All other players then do the same, and one is selected at 
  random to go up against the player. The “better” param-
  eter wins.
  • 
  Technosnap: Each player has to use Technopsi to predict 
  the result of a series of random events. The latest correct 
  prediction wins; or the latest incorrect prediction, in the 
  event there are no correct predictions…
  Supporting Construct
  Physical Stress: 1  2  3  4
  Systems Stress: 1  2  3  4
  Mental Stress: 1  2  3  4
  Consequences: 3 mild + 1 moderate
  Scale: Enormous (+3)
  Aspects: Diplomatic Haven on an Iceball Moon; 
  Paranoid Den of Spies and Intrigue; “Enduring 
  Confidentiality” Station Sentience; Bristling With 
  Defences; Deliberate Comms Blackspot.
  Skills: Fantastic (+6) Contacts, Systems; Superb 
  (+5) Active Sensing, EW; Great (+4) Deceive, Passive 
  Sensing; Good (+3) Hull Strength, Will; Fair (+2) 
  Bureaucracy, Resources; Average (+1) Close Combat, 
  Ranged Combat.
  STUNTS
   Docking Bay: 1 Huge (+2) construct, 10 Large (+1) 
  constructs, etc.
   Passenger Accommodations: Accommodations 
  for 600 passengers.
   Top Urgency: +2 to Passive Sensing when on top 
  urgency alert.
  EXTRAS
  ê ECM Array: +2 defend bonus vs EW and 
  Mindscape attacks.
  ê Extended Docking Bay: 10 Huge (+2) constructs, 
  100 Large (+1) constructs, etc.
  ê Extended Passenger Accommodation: 
  Accommodations for 6000 passengers.
  ê Mindscape Instance: Enables technopsi and local 
  Mindscape connectivity.
  ê Repulsor Shield: +2 defend bonus against 
  physical attacks.
  ENDURANCE STATION
  
  40
  Memetic
  Adventure:
  Transparency
  Cascade
  “Law enforcement on Blue was confusing at the best of times. A whole population of aliens 
  who had no idea what they were doing there, and then humans—and others—who either 
  wanted to study, worship, or rob them. All that added up to the weirdest of mayhem. 
  “But this was different. When I got to the flapping tents of the bar, the blood was everywhere. 
  Human blood, Blue blood. Then someone said a Hermetic had done this. Thank god it had ‘sur-
  rendered’—no one knew if we could even stop these guys if they put their minds to it.”
  —Rajel Symnester-3, ISI RimSec Agent seconded to Hasan’s Rescue.
  OVERVIEW
  Transparency is a deep, action-packed, and high stakes 
  campaign adventure which can easily extend over multiple 
  sessions of play. It introduces the players to the environ-
  ment of the Jessilan system and the mysterious Blues, and 
  involves them in events which could change the course 
  of Commonality history entirely. There’s a lot to lose in 
  this adventure—careless PCs could easily find themselves 
  destroyed—but also an enormous amount to gain. What was 
  the secret of the Blues?
  Who Are the PCs?
  There are many ways to get involved with the events of 
  Transparency, often depending on who the PCs are and what 
  they’re doing in the Jessilan system. Here are some ideas. 
  ISI AGENTS
  The Internal Security Instrumentality has been working with 
  the Jessilan security services over the past few years—the 
  complex situation is a great proving ground for agents. The 
  PCs basically play police force agents from the Commonality 
  or Jessila, investigating the Hermetic murders.
  SCI FORCE AGENTS
  The ever-popular “culture agent campaign” is also a definite 
  option in Transparency. The PCs play agents of SCI Force, the 
  Security and Cultural Integrity Instrumentality, which has a 
  presence in the Jessilan system. Their task is to monitor Jes-
  sila’s ongoing cultural stability, and to ensure both the human 
  and Blue elements integrate smoothly into the Commonality 
  mainstream.
  FREE AGENTS
  The PCs could be new traders, mercenaries, tourists, or just 
  “travelers” in the Outremer subsector, passing through the 
  Jessilan system for any number of reasons. In this case, they 
  may be actually in the Too Blue For You when Fluorantimony 
  Hex attacks, and get swept up into subsequent events.
  RESEARCHERS AND SCIENTISTS
  Scientific characters abound in Jessila—contact specialists 
  studying the Blues, archaeologists researching the prelapsar-
  ian Blue civilization, scientists from corporacies and even the 
  secretive 3-Space Instrumentality (page 13) investigating the 
  bewilderingly high technology possessed by the Blues before 
  Barrier Fall, and arguably still extant in the largely off-limits 
  Sapphire Vault. In this case, they may be directly called in to 
  the “interrogation” of Fluorantimony Hex (page 42).
  OTHERS
  You can play many other characters in Transparency, includ-
  ing integrating it into your own campaign. As ever, try to 
  
  41
  Adventure: Transparency
  establish hooks for your PCs into Jessila and the events of the 
  adventure—try and give your players a personal stake in the 
  adventure so later events will truly matter to them.
  Once you’ve decided upon who the PCs are and how they 
  come to be involved in the events of Transparency, pick one 
  of the scenes below to begin with. By default we assume you 
  begin with Episode One Scene 1: The Hermetic Killer, but 
  other starting points are certainly possible.
  The Default Plot Thread
  By the beginning of play, the events of Transparency are 
  already underway. This section loosely describes what hap-
  pens if the PCs do nothing at all to affect the outcome of 
  events. Knowing players, this won’t happen, and your game 
  will rapidly diverge from the default timeline described 
  below. However, we present this default plot thread as a 
  rough sketch for you to bear in mind and fall back on when 
  running your game.
  There are many theories about why the civilisation of the 
  Blues fell. In order to understand the events of Transparency, 
  it’s necessary to reveal some secrets. GMs should bear in 
  mind that the information below is not known definitively by 
  anyone—although some may certainly be on the right track. 
  Take care to preserve an element of mystery, and only reveal 
  secrets to the players when the actions of the PCs merit it. 
  Six hundred standard years ago, when the ancient hyper-
  advanced civilisation of the Blues was destroyed, the Blues 
  were engaged in an ambitious feat of self-directed evolution-
  ary engineering: to finally transcend the physical world, to 
  “go post”, and transform themselves into a life form existing 
  in the quantum flux between the branes that separate the 
  many universes of the “manifold”—the higher structure of the 
  cosmos. Some of them believed their approach was flawed, 
  and opted out, locking themselves away in a “Sapphire Vault” 
  to work on an alternate process.
  The attempt to go post was a catastrophe. Resonant ener-
  gies of an utterly unknown nature tore forth from the breach 
  in space-time necessary for the Blues’ transformation and, in 
  order to avoid even greater destruction, the Blues aborted 
  their attempt and destroyed themselves—or perhaps the 
  secretive “Hermetics” from the Sapphire Vault destroyed them, 
  in an act of terrible genocide. 
  The Hermetics locked themselves away, trying to work out 
  what had gone wrong, and to try again. Now, six centuries 
  later, they’re close to their second attempt. They’re on the 
  verge of restoring their advanced Mindscape-analogue, the 
  planetary exomemory called Transparency. 
  However, there are forces which don’t want the Hermetics 
  to succeed. Rejectionist Blues allied with humans attempt to 
  sabotage the Hermetic efforts, but are themselves attacked 
  and wiped out by a Hermetic assassin. The Hermetics, allied 
  with the Restorationist faction of the Blues and the Machi-
  avellian 3-Space Instrumentality from the Commonality, 
  perform initial tests, causing all Blues to experience a brief 
  moment of “mental contact” when they “zone out”.
  Then, a week before Transparency comes fully online, 
  the Barrier around Blue and the Jessila system, which fell six 
  hundred years ago, “flickers” for less than a tenth of a second. 
  This registers on instruments throughout the Jessilan system, 
  causing huge consternation. Are the Jessilan worlds going to 
  be cut off from outside contact again? 
  A week later, Transparency comes back online, and the 
  Hermetics once again attempt to “go post”, initiating a process 
  of transcendence known as the Brightening. This takes 30 
  hours and, this time, avoids the 3-space “resonance” which 
  destroyed the Hermetic civilisation six hundred standard 
  years ago. It succeeds, and the entire planet of Blue vanishes 
  from the universe, together with all of its inhabitants and its 
  technological secrets. 
  Unless, of course, the PCs can stop it…
  Structure of the Adventure
  Transparency is structured in a sequence of four episodes, 
  each comprising one or more scenes, followed by an epi-
  logue. Everything here is provided by way of example only, 
  closely tied to the default plot thread above. The episodes 
  and scenes present possible locations, adversaries, allies, and 
  events which are likely to crop up in your game, depending 
  on your players’ decisions. Feel free to use or ignore what 
  follows depending on your needs; our aim is to support your 
  game by providing the things you need, and not to dictate 
  what should or should not happen.
  
  EPISODE ONE: BLUE MURDER
  One of Jessila’s alien Blues has run amok in the Blue capital of 
  Hasan’s Rescue, killing many humans and native Blues. When 
  apprehended it turns out to be one of the strange and hyperad-
  vanced Hermetics—the first ever seen outside their mysterious 
  Sapphire Vault! 
  In this episode, the PCs first come into contact with the events 
  of Transparency. They don’t have a lot of idea what’s going 
  on, but are rapidly swept up into the mystery of a murderous 
  alien on the rampage on the strange world of Blue (page 26).
  Scene 1: The Hermetic Killer
  In this scene, the PCs have their first encounter with one of the 
  ancestral Blue survivors, the murderous Hermetic known as 
  Fluorantimony Hex.
  Location: Bluewood maximum security research facility, 
  Gathering City, Jessila (page 23)
  THE HOOK
  A Blue has been apprehended by Jessilan security forces 
  after going on a murderous rampage in the settlement of 
  Hasan’s Rescue, the “capital” of the planet Blue, in which it 
  killed 35 individuals—15 humans, and 20 of the alien Blues. 
  Rumours are rife that the Blue is actually a Hermetic, one of 
  the advanced ancestral survivors from the top secret Sap-
  phire Vault (page 64) located somewhere on Blue—the first 
  time one has ever been seen in the outside world since its 
  discovery two years ago! Its name, appropriately enough, 
  resolves to the chemical signature of a powerfully corrosive 
  acid (see page 16 for Blue naming conventions), and it’s been 
  nicknamed Fluorantimony Hex for short. It’s currently being 
  held in the Bluewood maximum security research facility just 
  outside Gathering City on the planet Jessila (page 23).
  What was the reason for this seemingly senseless attack? 
  And what is a Hermetic doing outside the Sapphire Vault?
  MEETING THE HERMETIC
  There are many ways the PCs could come into contact with 
  the Hermetic known as Fluorantimony Hex, depending on 
  their origins (see “Who Are the PCs?” above). For the Jes-
  silan authorities, however, apprehending the Hermetic is a 
  hugely important event. Security is incredibly tight, the best 
  specialists in the system have been drafted in to participate 
  in the “interrogation”, and the Commonality itself is sending 
  observers from SCI Force and the little-known and mysterious 
  3-Space Instrumentality (see page 13). Some of these may 
  even be the PCs. 
  Present this scene in such a way that the PCs themselves 
  are key decision-makers in the investigation; this shouldn’t be 
  a scene where they’re just observers. If this doesn’t fit with the 
  characters’ story, then skip the scene, and present its findings 
  to the PCs in other ways. 
  Fluorantimony Hex is a genuine alien—far stranger than 
  any hominid or xenomorph ever can be. It’s even stranger 
  than the somewhat helpless Blues, fallen from their greatness; 
  it’s an order of magnitude (at least!) more evolved than any 
  human: more intelligent, advanced, and with massively dif-
  ferent motivations. It probably doesn’t even see the PCs and 
  other characters as sentient beings. 
  Let the PCs conduct whatever analyses or interrogations 
  they see fit. Empathy, Investigate, Provoke, and Science are all 
  great skills, as are stunts such as Xeno-Empath, The Power of 
  Deduction, Okay Fine! and Specialist. Additionally, the “First 
  Contact” procedures from Mindjammer page 412 are also 
  appropriate. Let the players come up with their own investi-
  gative methods; they know how these things play out! 
  Bear in mind the Hermetic’s evolution index and 
  exoscale in any actions, which tend to make investigations 
  more difficult (see Mindjammer page 408). The PCs should 
  have access to any reasonable equipment or specialist 
  knowledge they need for the job at hand. If you like, have a 
  Cold Serious Science situation aspect for emphasising just how 
  high-pressure this first scene is. 
  
  43
  Adventure: Transparency
  SINISTER SURVEILLANCE
  There are some shady looking Commonality folks keeping an 
  eye on the investigation. They won’t directly engage with the 
  PCs, and will deflect attempts to quiz them. Unless the PCs are 
  directly involved with them (see “Who Are the PCs?” above), 
  an appropriate skill check (perhaps Investigate, Knowledge, 
  Provoke, etc) is needed to even find out that they’re agents 
  from the mysterious and secretive 3-Space Instrumentality 
  (page 13). 
  Their presence in the Jessila system may come as a 
  surprise to the PCs; in fact they’ve been here for years, 
  researching the Blue link portal technology (page 19). 
  The 3SI team is lead by scientist Gel-Gul Faraqisti (over-
  leaf). He’s several hundred years old, ruthless, obsessed with 
  3-space travel, and knows much more than he lets on, both 
  about 3-space and the lost technology of the Blues. He has 
  a dozen personnel as his personal staff: 3 assistants and 10 
  security officers (including 4 annihilator synthetics) for both 
  equivocal and unequivocal measures (see “The Sanctity-of-
  Life Principle” on page 45). 
  Faraqisti’s team are pro-Restorationist (page 15), in as 
  much as they want to see what the Hermetics are capable 
  of. They’re playing a dangerous game, effectively poking the 
  Hermetics with a stick to see what happens. They’re currently 
  wondering if the Hermetics are going to pull some high-tech 
  “gating” or “transfer” of the captive Hermetic from the security 
  facility. When they don’t, they’ll wonder why—and if that 
  refusal is evidence of something else (it is, but these are early 
  days…). It’s likely that the PCs’ approach in the interrogation 
  will be diametrically opposed by the 3SI.
  Faraqisti’s agenda is complex. He’s trying to find out 
  more about the link portals (page 19) and related Hermetic 
  technology, and to understand why the Hermetics no longer 
  use it. He won’t hesitate to act directly if the PCs get in his 
  way or threaten his work. There’s no love lost between the 3SI 
  and pretty much any other agency in the Commonality, and 
  Faraqisti will act as if he thinks he has carte blanche.
  RELEASE DEMAND
  While the PCs are investigating the Hermetic, the security 
  facility personnel around them suddenly become even more 
  agitated. Communiques have been received from the Hermet-
  ics of the Sapphire Vault, demanding the immediate release of 
  Fluorantimony Hex! The demands are quite insistent; they’re 
  not yet threats, but both Commonality and Jessilan person-
  nel are jittery: the defensive capabilities of the Hermetics 
  are simply unknown, but likely to be far beyond what the 
  Commonality is capable of. The Bluewood personnel begin 
  putting pressure on the PCs to wrap up their investigation.
  Allow each PC one more action to finish up the interroga-
  tion. 
  The 3SI will want to push for more time—almost as if 
  they want to see what the Hermetics will do. They’ll win the 
  day unless the PCs shout them down—a contest of Deceive, 
  SUPPORTING NPC
  Physical Stress: 1  2  3  4
  Mental Stress: 1  2  3  4
  Consequences: 3 mild + 1 moderate.
  Scale: Medium (+0).
  Evolution Index: +4 (+3 difficulty to comprehend and 
  perceive Commonality humans).
  Exoscale: +4 (-6 penalty for Hermetics to perceive 
  Commonality humans, +12 shifts on success; +6 bonus for 
  Commonality humans to perceive Hermetics, -12 shifts on 
  success).
  Aspects: Hyperintelligent Alien Mass-Murderer With 
  Unfathomable Motivations; Doesn’t Perceive Humans 
  As Sentient Beings; Weird Radio Senses Cause Glitches 
  Everywhere; Natural Mindscape Overload; Hair Trigger 
  Force of Mass Destruction; High Stakes Diplomatic 
  Disaster.
  Manifestations: Sensorium: Radio Sense (Wave Gland); 
  Comms: Wave Gland and Heart Strings; Integral Part of 
  Transcending Species Massmind; Voluntary Abdication 
  From Temporal Flow.
  Skills: Transcendent (+11) Science; Posthuman (+10) 
  Investigate; Transhuman (+9) Notice; Legendary (+8) 
  Knowledge, Will; Epic (+7) Physique, Provoke.
  STUNTS
   Ghostless Shell: +2 Stealth bonus to hide from view, 
  even to sensors and synthetic senses.
   Polymath: For a fate point, use Science in place of any 
  other skill for one check or exchange.
   The Power of Deduction: 1/scene, spend a fate point 
  to discover / create one aspect per shift on target of 
  Investigate roll; you get one free invoke.
   Sensor Scan: Use sensorview and Notice for passive 
  sensing construct actions.
  EXTRAS
  ê Mental Blast: Use Provoke to make attacks causing 
  physical stress damage.
  ê Prescience Routines: For a fate point, make an 
  Empathy, Investigate, Knowledge, Notice, Science, etc, 
  create advantage roll to create a prediction.
  FLUORANTIMONY HEX, THE RAMPAGING HERMETIC
  
  44
  Provoke, Rapport, etc, between Faraqisti and the PCs. If the 
  PCs win, the interrogation ends without event; if they lose, 
  the Hermetics immediately erect a powerful Great (+4) Huge 
  (+2) scale force field around the exit of the CCC (Contact 
  Command and Control) facility in the Sapphire Vault (page 
  64), effectively preventing the Commonality and Jessilan 
  authorities from accessing the Vault without using subterfuge 
  or force. At the same time, the Jessilan culture will incur a Ten-
  sions With the Hermetics situation aspect (page 10).
  WHERE NEXT?
  It’s up to the PCs what they do next. An obvious point of 
  investigation is to visit the “scene of the crime”—see Scene 
  2: Too Blue for You below. If the PCs prefer to remain pas-
  sive, then you can move straight to Episode Two Scene 2: A 
  Moment of Transparency.
  Scene 2: Too Blue for You
  In this scene, the PCs visit the location of the murders committed 
  by Fluorantimony Hex, trying to understand what happened. 
  Location: The Too Blue For You “bar” on the edge of the 
  Museum District, Hasan’s Rescue, Blue.
  THE HOOK
  Too Blue for You is a “bar” on the edge of the Museum District 
  in Hasan’s Rescue, the “capital city” of the strange alien world 
  of Blue (page 29). It’s also the “scene of the crime” where 
  Fluorantimony Hex committed 35 seemingly senseless 
  murders. It’s currently under lockdown, cordoned off by the 
  security services; it hasn’t been touched since the killings. 
  Usually the place has a mixed clientele of humans and 
  Blues—and in fact a greater proportion of Blues than you’d 
  normally expect, probably because of the Museum District’s 
  proximity. 
  GETTING TO BLUE
  Although you can just jump to the chase and declare the PCs 
  arrive on Blue without event, you can also make a deal of get-
  ting there if you like; Blue is probably unlike any world the PCs 
  have ever visited. See page 26 for details, but stress that it’s 
  the location of a fallen alien civilisation which had a technol-
  ogy far in advance even of the Commonality, and the site of 
  countless mysteries—including why today it’s little more than 
  a primitive water world of shacks, shantytowns, and a weird 
  hybrid culture existing in the ruins of an ancient near-trans-
  SUPPORTING NPC
  Physical Stress:  1  2  
  Mental Stress:  1  2  3  4
  Credit Stress:  1  2  3  4
  Consequences: 1 mild + 1 moderate
  Scale: Medium (+0)
  Aspects: Machiavellian 3SI Controller; Utterly Obsessed 
  With 3-Space; Creepy Slow Movements; Don’t Get In My 
  Way; One Day It’ll Be Payback For Thaddeus Clay!
  Skills: Fantastic (+6) Science, Technical; Superb (+5) 
  Deceive, Provoke; Great (+4) Contacts, Will; Good (+3) 
  Investigate, Resources; Fair (+2) Bureaucracy, Knowledge; 
  Average (+1) Empathy, Ranged Combat.
  STUNTS
   Far Gate Engineer: +2 Technical bonus when working 
  on Far Gates or with related technology.
   Mindburn: Use Will for mental attacks using the 
  Mindscape.
   Mind Games: Use Deceive to make mental attack 
  actions..
   Okay, Fine! Use Provoke instead of Empathy to learn 
  aspects.
   Probe: +2 create an advantage Will bonus to discern 
  surface thoughts.
   Specialisation 
  (3-Space): +2 Science 
  bonus for 3-space 
  related rolls.
  HALO
  ê Neurosynthetic 
  Extensors: +2 bonus 
  on Knowledge, 
  Science, or Technical 
  rolls where reasoning 
  power is determinant; also invoke / compel.
  ê Special Ops Mindscape Implant: Local Mindscape 
  connectivity and special ops technopsi.
  OTHER EXTRAS
  ê 3-Space Instrumentality: Organisation Extra: Good 
  (+3) Intrusion, Security.
  ê Longevity: Longevity aspect, +5 skill points, and a 
  hundred years older.
  ê Nanocells: Control Mindscape-enabled devices via 
  physical contact without Mindscape connectivity.
  ê P-Suit: Armour:1 damage reduction, +1 defence bonus; 
  Vac Sealed.
  GEL-GUL FARAQISTI
  
  45
  Adventure: Transparency
  cendent greatness. Remind the PCs a force field once closed 
  off the entire planet—and indeed the entire star system—and 
  no one has yet managed to work out why it switched off. 
  Let the PCs make create advantage rolls if they like; there 
  are always things to learn, things to observe, which may come 
  in useful later. On successful rolls, let your players improvise 
  their own details if they feel comfortable doing so—oth-
  erwise you can reveal tantalising snippets about the world 
  which may come in useful later.  
  RAJI’S PLACE
  Too Blue for You is owned by Raji, a Jessilan woman who 
  considers Blue her home. She and her staff of one Blue, Slide 
  Indigo, and one human, Isayn, are the only people in the 
  otherwise abandoned bar. The PCs can quiz any of the three 
  about the attack, as well as conducting their own analyses. 
  By its nature Too Blue for You is maybe not quite what the 
  players would expect of a “bar”. It has elements of a desert 
  oasis kasbah, a beach hut, a tent, even a public baths or 
  sauna. It’s also a fairly typical example of the hybrid “New 
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
    
   
   
  The Sanctity-of-Life Principle
  The hyper-advanced technology of the Commonality 
  reaches terrifying levels in the field of conflict. The ability of 
  a weapons system to completely, totally, and irreversibly 
  annihilate a target is not a matter of chance, but of choice. 
  It’s been this way for thousands of years. If the Commonality 
  wants an individual dead, there’s very little that individual 
  can do about it; in fact, it’s very unlikely he’ll ever see his an-
  nihilation coming.
  In a civilisation where irresistible annihilating force can 
  be brought to bear almost casually, factors other than the 
  destructive power of weaponry hold sway. For millennia, the 
  Commonality has treated violence as a tool in its arsenal; 
  usually one to be resorted to when a situation has already 
  spiralled down into failure and imminent disaster, but 
  equally one to be employed with surgical precision.
  When people may live centuries—perhaps even millen-
  nia—if accident does not destroy them, life is precious. Con-
  sequently, the Commonality only sets out to kill an individual 
  when it really, really has to. When approving the use of 
  violence to resolve a situation, any Commonality controller 
  has three levels of measures which he or she can deploy:
  Dissuasive Measures: In most cases, non-lethal but 
  highly effective strikes are sufficient to resolve a situation. 
  Any opposing personnel or personnel obstacles are neutral-
  ised without injury and removed from the immediate field of 
  action. Dissuasive weaponry includes stun guns, knockout 
  gases, confusion fields, etc.
  Equivocal Measures: This is the most common set of 
  measures employed in time of war. The goal of the conflict 
  is not to destroy opposing personnel, but to achieve other 
  strategic or military targets to which opposing personnel 
  are merely hindrances. When using equivocal measures, 
  the Commonality doesn’t really care whether opposing 
  personnel are injured or even killed; it would rather they were 
  not, but in using strikes to rapidly achieve strategic goals, 
  collateral damage is often inevitable. Equivocal measures 
  weaponry includes conventional arms such as null weapons, 
  kino weapons, blasters, and so on.
  Unequivocal Measures: Sometimes the goal of a strike 
  is to very specifically terminate one or more individuals. In 
  such cases, the Commonality employs overwhelming force 
  to that end, with the one proviso that collateral damage is 
  to be avoided. Usually the target has no chance to survive 
  an encounter with unequivocal measures. Unequivocal 
  measures weaponry includes disassemblers, disintegrators, 
  micro-nukes, field separation units, haze folds, and more. 
  Often annihilator synthetics and mechanical assassins 
  are the specialists used in unequivocal measures actions.
  More information on the Sanctity-of-Life Principle and 
  its associated measures can be found in the Mindjammer 
  Companion. 
  
  46
  Blue” culture evolving in the Jessilan system, especially here 
  on Blue.
  Fluorantimony Hex killed 20 Blues here, and 15 humans. 
  On an appropriate roll (Provoke, Rapport, etc, perhaps aided 
  by Empathy, or even using Domination or Probe), the PCs can 
  discover that just under half of the dead—humans and Blues 
  alike—belonged to a faction in Jessilan society known as the 
  Restorationists (page 15). They often met here, talking about 
  the great things they’d do when the Hermetics returned Blue 
  to its former glory. One of the group—a Chembu hominid 
  from the Commonality named Walgury—wasn’t with them 
  that day, and quite by accident survived. 
  WHERE NEXT?
  This scene can lead in any number of directions, depending 
  on the success of the PCs investigations and the questions 
  they ask. You can present Walgury as a direct link to Scene 3: 
  Out on the Bridge, either on a successful investigation roll, 
  or as a success at a cost, in which case he’ll have been tipped 
  off and on the alert (see below); you can even provide a lead 
  to Scene 4: The Rejectionist, or even Episode Two Scene 1: 
  The Device Chamber. Alternatively, you can move directly to 
  Episode Two Scene 2: A Moment of Transparency.
  Scene 3: Out on the Bridge
  In this scene, the PCs encounter a survivor of the Hermetic attack, 
  out in the Confornat shantytown on the Blue Bridge megastruc-
  ture.
  Location: The shantytown on the Confornat Bridge, 
  Hasan’s Rescue, inhabited by muddle-headed Blues and 
  dropout humans.
  THE HOOK
  Walgury is a mercenary-minded Chembu Alienist who lives 
  in the Confornat shantytown in Hasan’s Rescue. He’s the sole 
  survivor of the Restorationist group which met in the Too Blue 
  For You, murdered by Fluorantimony Hex. Exotic and alien, 
  he’s also desperate and poor, hiding out in the ramshackle 
  tenements of the shantytown in fear for his life.
  GETTING HOLD OF WALGURY
  Walgury is terrified, sure that whoever killed his comrades is 
  still out to get him. He’s more than paranoid, and is likely to 
  think the PCs are working for the killers. 
  Walgury is lying low in shabby digs on the second floor of 
  a dry and dusty tumbledown tenement block in the Confor-
  nat shantytown. If he has been tipped off (see “Where Next?”, 
  above) or is otherwise ill-disposed to the PCs, he’ll have 
  activated the booby-traps protecting his home. Otherwise, 
  they’ll only be activated if the PCs fail a Stealth roll on their 
  approach.
  Walgury has several small improvised ceiling-mounted 
  explosive devices which use a modified form of Blue building 
  paste (page 18), provided by his mysterious patron, Croaker 
  Verdigris (page 48). Simply put, each of the devices sprays 
  CHALLENGE HAZARD
  Physical Stress:  1  2
  Systems Stress:  1  2
  Consequences: 1 mild
  Scale: Small (-1)
  Aspects: Wide-Angle Area of Effect; Just Out of 
  Reach.
  Skills: Great (+4) Intensity; Fair (+2) Magnitude
  ACTIONS
  ê Action 1: Roll Notice vs Great (+4) to spot the IED 
  hidden in the ceiling.
  ê Action 2: Roll Intrusion vs Great (+4) to disarm the 
  booby trap before it can activate.
  ê Action 3: Roll Athletics vs Fair (+2) Magnitude to 
  avoid being spattered by building paste. Affects all in 
  the zone.
  ê Action 4: Hazard attacks with Great (+4) Intensity 
  vs Physique in exchange 1, Superb (+5) in exchange 2, 
  etc, doing physical stress damage, to a maximum of 
  Legendary (+8). Armour and fields protect. Continues 
  until targets are 3 zones from IED lights, or lights are 
  deactivated.
  ê Action 5: Roll Intrusion or Technical vs Fair (+2) 
  each exchange to deactivate the lights.
  CEILING-MOUNTED BUILDING 
  PASTE I.E.D.
  TOO BLUE FOR YOU
  The New Blue Bar
  Awnings
  Water
  Booths
  Bar
  Fluorantimony Hex 
  Attack Area
  
  47
  Adventure: Transparency
  its immediate zone with a fine spatter of building paste, and 
  then immediately flashes a sequence of lights which triggers 
  a building paste growth program which penetrates any soft 
  target. Growth continues until the lights are doused.
  If Walgury is alerted, he’ll leap out of the back of his shack 
  while the booby trap goes off at the front, unless the PCs are 
  clever and position themselves to head him off (a contest of 
  Athletics, Physique, etc, against his Athletics). Depending on 
  the situation, he may even attack the PCs if he believes his life 
  is in danger. 
  Walgury is open to persuasion, although a lot depends 
  on how the PCs approach him. Figure a Rapport or Provoke 
  roll opposed by his Good (+3) Will; Walgury may have aspects 
  to invoke if the PCs have been particularly aggressive or 
  threatening.
  TALKING TO WALGURY
  At some point it’s likely the PCs will end up talking to Wal-
  gury—though whether that’s a warm alliance, frank exchange 
  of views, or brutal round of interrogation depends very much 
  on their actions. Use Rapport, Provoke, Deceive, or other 
  appropriate skills to get the following information from him.
  Regardless of result, the PCs will realise that Walgury is no 
  longer an enthusiastic Restorationist: something has changed 
  his mind, and he’s now very much more in favour of the status 
  quo and the developing “New Blue” culture (page 15) in the 
  Jessila system.
  On a success, they’ll discover the reason for this change: 
  he has “seen things” in ancient Blue ruins beneath Hasan’s 
  Rescue—things which the Restorationists had discovered—
  which have made him believe that a future coexisting with 
  the Blues is better than a restored Hermetic world. There’s 
  some kind of powerful technology down there: “things way 
  beyond our understanding. Who knows what it all does?” A 
  Knowledge roll or search of the Mindscape will reveal this 
  is news to everyone—no one has ever even heard of ruins 
  beneath Hasan’s Rescue before!
  On a success with style when talking to Walgury, the 
  PCs will discover that he was contacted by a mysterious 
  non-Hermetic Blue named Croaker Verdigris, who asked him 
  to sabotage the alien machinery beneath Hasan’s Rescue. 
  Walgury now believes all his team was contacted—and that 
  was why they were attacked by the Hermetic assassin. The 
  Hermetics didn’t want the alien machinery sabotaged—but 
  his mysterious Blue sponsor did.
  WHERE NEXT?
  If the PCs have wrung the information about Croaker Verdigris 
  from Walgury, they can also follow his instructions to where 
  he lives; see Scene 4: The Rejectionist. They may also follow 
  Walgury’s directions to the mysterious ruins below Hasan’s 
  Rescue; see Episode Two Scene 1: The Device Chamber. 
  Alternatively, they may take other actions, or even wait; see 
  Episode Two Scene 2: A Moment of Transparency.
  SCENE 4: THE REJECTIONIST
  In this scene, the PCs encounter a non-Hermetic Blue who is ada-
  mantly—even violently—opposed to the Hermetic agenda.
  Location: The deadlands beyond the Confornat shanty-
  town, further out on the Confornat Bridge.
  THE HOOK
  Out beyond the shantytowns which cluster around Hasan’s 
  Rescue, the Blue Bridge megastructures give way to depopu-
  lated salt-swept wastes, cluttered with debris and jetsam, 
  and inhabited by a sparse population of wanderers, misfits, 
  SUPPORTING NPC
  Physical Stress: 1  2
  Mental Stress: 1  2  3  4
  Credit Stress:  1  2
  Consequences: 1 mild + 1 moderate; currently suffering 
  moderate consequence They Killed Everyone!
  Scale: Medium (+0)
  Aspects: Lapsed Restorationist With New Blue 
  Sympathies; Ex-Team Systems Imagist of Chembu Ponics; 
  The Other Side of Human; This Is A Whole New Way of 
  Life We’re Building! They’re Out to Get Me!
  Skills: Great (+4) Deceive, Technical; Good (+3) Investigate, 
  Will; Fair (+2) Athletics, Contacts; Average (+1) Ranged 
  Combat, Unarmed Combat.
  STUNTS
   Blue Tech: +2 
  bonus to Technical 
  overcome rolls when 
  trying to work out 
  what something does.
  EXTRAS
  ê Aquatic: As aspect.
  ê Mindscape Implant: Enables technopsi and Mindscape 
  connectivity.
  WALGURY, THE CHEMBU 
  SURVIVOR
  
  48
  and ne’er-do-wells eking out an existence on the native Blue 
  biome and the Bridge sustenance systems which operate 
  even today.
  One such misfit is Croaker Verdigris, a non-Hermetic Blue 
  who is the mysterious patron of Walgury the Chembu and his 
  now-dead group of Restorationists. 
  CROAKER VERDIGRIS’S SHANTY
  The shanty is a lean-to of reclaimed debris, including mis-
  shapen hunks of building paste, slats and prefab components 
  brought by Jessilan colonists, and even home-made pieces of 
  fabric and weave made from seaweeds from Blue’s oceans. It’s 
  picturesque and crazy—and genuinely looks like the sort of 
  place a magician, wise man, or hedge wizard would choose to 
  live. All manner of gew-gaws decorate the walls or hang from 
  weirdly-angled eaves and gables.
  Croaker Verdigris may be at home, or if not he’ll be less 
  than an hour away. 
  GAINING CROAKER VERDIGRIS’S TRUST
  Croaker Verdigris is less unstable than Walgury. Although 
  he’s aware of the danger from the Hermetics, he also realises 
  that if the PCs wanted him dead, they wouldn’t be talking. 
  However, he’ll also be conscious that the PCs may have inad-
  vertently given away his location to others (see “Clandestine 
  Surveillance” below).
  Let the PCs encounter Cloaker Verdigris in the conditions 
  they want. This may be their first proper encounter with a 
  non-Hermetic Blue—see page 15 for more. Although the 
  Blues are fallen from their once near-transcendent state, 
  Cloaker Verdigris is nevertheless as intelligent as a brilliant 
  human, deeply insightful and knowledgeable about the state 
  of his world. If the PCs wish to pull the wool over his eyes, 
  they’ve have to overcome his Empathy, Knowledge, Science 
  or Will; otherwise they can use Rapport or other appropriate 
  skills to create friendly advantages. 
  WHAT THE PCS CAN LEARN
  Croaker Verdigris has thoughts about what the Hermetics 
  are up to. He believes they’re involved in a project: perhaps 
  a re-run of their attempt 600 standard years ago (he’ll say 
  256 years ago, using Jessilan years) to “go post”; perhaps an 
  attempt to drive the humans or even the Commonality off 
  Blue, and maybe even out of the system; or perhaps some-
  thing else entirely. He has also guessed the agenda of the 
  3-Space Instrumentality (page 13). He’ll share his opinions 
  with the PCs if he believes it’s in his interests; the PCs can use 
  Deceive, Provoke, Rapport, etc, to encourage him to do so.
  In addition, the PCs may learn the following:
  • 
  It’s obvious that Croaker Verdigris himself isn’t a Restora-
  tionist. Clearly not all Blues are.
  • 
  He doesn’t trust the Hermetics at all. In fact, he doesn’t 
  even behave as though they’re part of his species: he 
  believes they’re out to destroy him and his people, and 
  the New Blue culture they’re building.
  • 
  Croaker Verdigris also knows the location of the device 
  chamber ruins beneath Hasan’s Rescue (page 29).
  • 
  Croaker Verdigris is old—he remembers fragments of his 
  life before Barrier Fall, although he knows he was far more 
  intelligent then, with his memories part of a store similar 
  to the Mindscape. On a success with style, the PCs may 
  even extract a name for this memory store: Transparency.
  SUPPORTING NPC
  Physical Stress: 1  2  
  Mental Stress: 1  2  3  4
  Consequences: 2 mild + 1 moderate
  Scale: Medium (+0)
  Aspects: Rejectionist Historian; Mystical World View; 
  Opposes Restoration; Telling the Lost History of Blue; 
  Collector of Exceptionally Bad Human Jokes.
  Skills: Superb (+5) Knowledge, Will; Great (+4) Empathy, 
  Rapport; Good (+3) Science, Stealth; Fair (+2) Investigate, 
  Notice.
  STUNTS
   Ghostless Shell: +2 Stealth bonus to hide from view, 
  even to sensors and synthetic senses.
   The Power of 
  Deduction: 1/scene, 
  spend a fate point to 
  discover / create one 
  aspect per shift on 
  target of Investigate 
  roll; you get one free 
  invoke.
   Survival: +2 
  overcome and create advantage Knowledge bonus for 
  surviving in hostile environments.
  EXTRAS
  ê Mental Blast: Use Provoke to make attacks causing 
  physical stress damage.
  CROAKER VERDIGRIS, THE 
  MYSTICAL BLUE HISTORIAN
  
   
  CLANDESTINE SURVEILLANCE
  The 3-Space instrumentality is taking a very close interest in 
  the events surrounding the Too Blue For You. If the PCs have 
  been alert, they may be aware of this: Mindscape Notice, 
  Investigate, or other sensing / sensorview rolls may pick up 
  telltale traces of surveillance which a Superb (+5) Hacker roll 
  can trace. 
  If the PCs aren’t very stealthy, the 3SI are tracking them. 
  They’ll first need to declare they’re trying to avoid surveil-
  lance, and then make a Superb (+5) Stealth roll, and a second 
  appropriate skill or stunt roll in the Mindscape (such as Ghost 
  in the Machine) to avoid the 3SI locating them. If the 3SI are 
  already onto them (for example, if they’ve been following 
  them since the Bluewood facility, page 23), they may also 
  need monitor band cloaks (Mindjammer page 136). 
  Note that, if the 3SI succeed in their surveillance attempts 
  (whether the PCs realise this or not), they’ll attack Croaker 
  Verdigris and the PCs as soon as they have the location of the 
  Blue Field Device (page 51)—see Episode Two Scene 1: The 
  Device Chamber. It’s possible that shrewd PCs who are aware 
  of the 3SI surveillance may be able to misdirect their atten-
  tions…
  WHERE NEXT?
  It’s very likely the PCs will now be heading towards the ruins 
  beneath Hasan’s Rescue, and Episode Two Scene 1: The 
  Device Chamber. If they prefer to delay, you can move to Epi-
  sode Two Scene 2: A Moment of Transparency, or—if you 
  prefer to send in the ninjas!—you can have the 3SI attack the 
  PCs directly at Croaker Verdigris’s shanty in the deadlands.
  Scene 1: The Device Chamber
  In this scene, the PCs enter the hitherto unknown ruin beneath 
  Hasan’s Rescue, and find a team of specialists hard at work on an 
  alien Blue device!
  Location: Ancient Blue mechanisms in strange tunnels 
  deep beneath the Museum District waterpoint in Hasan’s 
  Rescue. 
  THE HOOK
  The PCs, possibly in the company of Walgury (page 47), 
  Croaker Verdigris (page 48), or both, travel to the “waterpoint” 
  reservoir on the northwest edge of Hasan’s Rescue’s Museum 
  District. There, ancient Blue technology bubbles up fresh 
  water, desalinated from the surrounding ocean, from where 
  it’s fed to residences throughout the city. There are ancient 
  Blue buildings from before Barrier Fall east and south of the 
  waterpoint, and recent New Blue builds to the north and 
  west, including some reclaimed from ancient debris. One 
  of these buildings—otherwise non-descript—contains a 
  spiral ramp in its basement which leads down to a hitherto 
  unknown network of tunnels dating from before the Barrier 
  Fall. Many bubble-like chambers “bud off” from the tunnels, 
  including a 10 metre diameter cylinder some 30 metres long, 
  which contains a strange, spiral, fluted, almost glass-like 
  assembly of apparatus with a completely unknown purpose. 
  EPISODE TWO: THE BLUE 
  FIELD DEVICE
  Something mysterious has been discovered in unknown ruins 
  beneath the Blue capital of Hasan’s Rescue. People have already 
  died for it—and now some very lethal factions are converging on 
  its location, each intent on controlling it for themselves!
  In this episode, the PCs come into direct contact with the 
  Hermetics’ plan for their species to once again attempt to “go 
  post”. At the start it isn’t obvious that this is what’s happening; 
  instead, a weird force is affecting the minds of all the Blues, 
  and it looks like the mysterious “Barrier” which once isolated 
  the Jessilan system—and which “fell” 600 standard years 
  ago—is once again on the verge of rising. Little by little, the 
  PCs realise something big is happening—something which 
  may yet end in a desperate race against the clock!
  
  50
  A group of two dozen or so Blues are busying themselves 
  with unfathomable tasks about the apparatus. 
  DEVICE CHAMBER AREAS
  • 
  Prelapsarian Tunnels: These smooth featureless tunnels 
  are 1.7 metres in diameter, with a circular cross-section.
  • 
  Suspended Conduits: These vanish into the floors, walls, 
  and ceiling. They are translucent violet, coral-like; similar 
  to the Promise (page 37).
  • 
  Suspended Cylinder: This is the device itself, approxi-
  mately 2m in diametre. Suspended 1.7m above the floor, it’s 
  possible to walk beneath it. It contains a spiralling glass-like 
  apparatus assembly. Milky and translucent, it appears to 
  contain a medium which will refract a light beam.
  THE 3SI ATTACK
  If the PCs haven’t been stealthy (see “Clandestine Surveil-
  lance”, above), before they can do anything they’ll be attacked 
  by a 3SI “combined measures” group which has pursued them 
  searching for precisely this location. It’s more than likely the 
  PCs will have no idea who’s attacking them—except that 
  they’re lethal. 
  The 3SI combined measures group “CMG-4” has a clear 
  mandate: unequivocal measures (page 45) are author-
  ised for both Walgury and Croaker Verdigris. For the PCs, it 
  depends who they are: if they belong to SCI Force or another 
  official body of the Commonality or the Jessilan govern-
  ment, then CMG-4 will use equivocal measures—they won’t 
  specifically try to kill them, just make sure they’re neutralised 
  so they can get on with their job (they don’t want the hassle 
  higher up the chain of command). If the PCs don’t have a 
  weighty official status—if they’re new traders, travellers, even 
  tourists or itinerant mercenaries—then they’ll also be the 
  target of unequivocal measures, as CMG-4 tries to annihilate 
  them as cleanly and with as little fuss as possible.
  CMG-4 comprises a single annihilator synthetic and a 
  group of 3 human equivocal measures specialists.
  SUPPORTING NPC
  Physical Stress: 1  2  3  4
  Mental Stress: 1  2  3  4
  Consequences: 1 mild + 1 moderate
  Scale: Medium (+0)
  Aspects: Unequivocal Measures Specialist; Quick 
  Clean Efficient Kill; Terrifyingly Lethal Weaponry; 
  Lightning Fast Movements; Strength of Steel and 
  Servos.
  Skills: Fantastic (+6) Melee Combat, Ranged Combat; 
  Superb (+5) Athletics, Provoke; Great (+4) Physique, 
  Will; Good (+3) Deceive, Notice. 
  STUNTS
   Killing Stroke: 1/scene, pay 1 fate point to increase 
  a physical consequence you inflict by 1 step.
  EXTRAS
  ê Disassembler Field Projector: Weapon: 6 rating, 
  range 1; any consequence represents lost body mass 
  which can only be recovered by regeneration; Instakill 
  Attack.
  ê Hyperdense Exoskeleton: Armour :3 rating.
  ê Monofil: +6 Melee Combat damage; Cuts 
  Anything, Hazardous In Use.
  ê Null Pistol: Default Ranged Combat weapon ; 
  Recoilless.
  ê Repulsor Field: +3 defend bonus against physical 
  attacks; Visually Distorting.
  THE ANNIHILATOR SYNTHETIC
  GROUP OF 3 GOOD
  (+3) MINOR NPCS
  Stress: 1  2    1  2    1  2  
  Scale: Medium (+0)
  Aspects: Killing is Secondary to the Mission
  Skills: Good (+3) Ranged Combat; Fair (+2) 
  Provoke; Average (+1) Athletics, Melee Combat 
  (+2 teamwork bonus).
  THE EQUIVOCAL MEASURES 
  SPECIALISTS
  THE DEVICE CHAMBER
  30 metres
  10 metres
  Suspension 
  Conduits
  Suspended 
  Cylinder
  Accessible Floor Area - 1.7 metres Headroom
  
  51
  Adventure: Transparency
  CMG-4 have arrived at the Museum District waterpoint in an 
  Armadillo-class grav APC (Mindjammer page 253). Figure 
  that the annihilator synthetic will kill Croaker Verdigris in the 
  first exchange, and Walgury in the second, before turning its 
  attention to the PCs if necessary; it will switch the weapon 
  it uses against the PCs, even if it means that it loses: at this 
  stage, the 3SI isn’t willing to attract unnecessary attention to 
  itself, at least until it knows what’s going on (compare this to 
  Episode Four later, when the success of the Hermetic project 
  is at stake).
  TALKING TO THE RESTORATIONISTS
  The two dozen Blues in the device chamber are led by a Blue 
  technician by the name of Shroud Excimer. Their attitude to 
  the PCs depends on how they’ve arrived; if they turn up in a 
  hail of gunfire and proceed to slaughter their way through 
  the 3SI combined measures group, they may find the Blues 
  more than reluctant to talk openly. In any case, the Blues will 
  be close-mouthed around strangers, and the PCs will have to 
  deal with Shroud Excimer to get anything from them.
  The Blues are Restorationists (page 15). They’re 
  embarked upon a sizable endeavour—since the device cham-
  ber was discovered the project has grown in scale, and now 
  half of the group are new members who may be a security 
  leak, and who are Much Easier to Pump For Information if sepa-
  rated from Shroud Excimer’s surveillance.
  ANALYSING THE DEVICE
  The Blues won’t naturally let the PCs analyse the Blue field 
  device. They’ll have to use persuasion, violence, or threats 
  of violence to do so. Treat this as a physical or mental stress 
  conflict against Shroud Excimer.
  The device itself is initially pretty unfathomable. It com-
  prises an intricate assembly of coils and threads, ranging 
  in size from fist-sized to microscopic, in a repeating, almost 
  fractal pattern. Analyses using Science, Technical, Active or 
  Passive Sensing, or sensorview Investigate automatically 
  reveal dimensional components which suggest the Heisen-
  berg minima found in zero point power cells (Mindjammer 
  page 115), as well as components apparently fulfilling mass/
  energy conversion purposes. A successful analysis expands 
  this to include conduits somehow funnelling effects from the 
  device deep into the bedrock—extending ten kilometres or 
  more before turning out into the ocean. In fact the device is 
  linked to the Tectonic Extruder technology the prelapsarian 
  Blues used to modify the size of their island continents prior 
  to Barrier Fall; it’s up to the GM whether the PCs are able to 
  deduce this.
  A success with style on the analysis will reveal a second 
  device hidden within the main device. It uses the same power 
  supply, but appears to be a form of field generation module, 
  capable of projecting a field of extremely high power at a 
  range of tens of thousands of kilometres from the device. It’s 
  inoperative at the moment, but there is a signal loop hidden 
  deep within the device which is detectable in sensorview 
  (or using the Blue wave gland) which a further analysis roll 
  may reveal to be some kind of countdown. To what? Astute 
  characters may link this with the “Barrier” which cut off Blue 
  from the rest of the Jessilan system before Barrier Fall; if not, a 
  Knowledge roll or Mindscape search can confirm this.
  This is the first time an apparent component of the Barrier 
  has been found—and understandably the authorities will 
  insist that the Blues stop their tinkering once they know what 
  it is, especially if news of the “countdown” leaks out. How-
  ever—and the PCs may be unable to figure this out at this 
  point—the activities in the device chamber are also part of 
  an effort by the Hermetics and Restorationists to re-establish 
  Transparency, the Hermetic Blue exomemory / Mindscape 
  analogue which is a pre-requisite for their second attempt at 
  going post (see Scene 2: A Moment of Transparency). If the 
  PCs don’t handle this very carefully, they may have a major 
  diplomatic crisis on their hands.
  WHERE NEXT?
  It’s up to the PCs what they do with the information they 
  gather. Let them travel wherever they like in the system and 
  SUPPORTING NPC
  Physical Stress:  1  2  
  Mental Stress:  1  2  3  
  Consequences: 1 mild + 1 moderate
  Scale: Medium (+0)
  Aspects: Leader of the Blues; Ludicrous Punster; 
  You’ve Got To Go Through Me First; Orders From On 
  High; Secret Agenda.
  Skills: Fantastic (+6) Technical; Superb (+5) 
  Investigate; Great (+4) Provoke, Rapport; Good (+3) 
  Empathy, Knowledge; Fair (+2) Notice, Will.
  STUNTS
   Blue Tech: +2 bonus to Technical overcome rolls 
  when trying to work out what something does.
   Overseer: 1/scene, make an overcome action to 
  generate a pool of shift points you can redistribute.
  EXTRAS
  ê Curious Vari-Tool: +2 Investigate and Technical 
  create advantage bonus with Blue or Hermetic 
  devices; Unfathomable Hermetic Design.
  ê Mental Blast: Use Provoke to make attacks 
  causing physical stress damage.
  SHROUD EXCIMER, THE BLUE 
  TECHNICIAN
  
  52
  use the information however they see fit. It’s sufficiently 
  important to open doors for them, and even secure resources 
  and propel them to the head of their own ops teams if needs 
  be. They may even be able to gain access to the Sapphire 
  Vault; see Episode Four Scene 2: Getting Into the Vault.
  Then, when you’re ready (and if it’s still appropriate), move 
  to Scene 2: A Moment of Transparency, and / or Scene 3: 
  The Device Awakens.
  Scene 2: A Moment of Transparency
  In this scene, the PCs encounter an incomprehensible alien phe-
  nomenon of vast scope and power, as every member of the Blue 
  species appears to experience a mental fugue state!
  Location: Anywhere in the Jessilan system.
  THE HOOK
  Ideally this scene should occur immediately after the PCs 
  have found a clue about what the Hermetic Blues are up to, 
  such as analysing the Blue field device in Scene 1: The Device 
  Chamber above. Although the “Transparency” event is itself 
  something the PCs are witnessing and which is ultimately 
  beyond their control, it’s important to convey a sense of 
  player agency here: the PCs aren’t simply passive observers, 
  but they’re investigative participants in a historic event. They 
  should feel empowered—they stand to learn some seriously 
  important stuff.
  At the start of this scene, the following happens. Every-
  where throughout the Jessilan system, at exactly the same 
  moment, every single Blue experiences a Moment of Transpar-
  ency. Each stops what they’re doing and “stares into space”. 
  This “zoning out” lasts for thirty seconds. Then, just as 
  suddenly as it began, it ends; each Blue goes back to normal, 
  carrying out what they were doing before the moment 
  began. None of them have any recollection of what just hap-
  pened. Needless to say, this freaks out a lot of the humans 
  watching—and probably freaks the Blues out too.
  IMMEDIATE ANALYSIS
  During the Moment of Transparency, the Blues are utterly 
  unresponsive. Any analysis automatically reveals elevated 
  neural activity throughout the Blue’s distributed brain / 
  nervous system; a successful sensorview or even Mindscape 
  connectivity analysis will show massive activity in the Blue 
  wave gland (page 15). On a success with style, the character 
  can make an intuitive leap that this may be analogous to a 
  Mindscape handshake.
  AFTER THE FACT
  It’s more difficult to analyse the Moment of Transparency once 
  it’s over. Limited public areas in Hasan’s Rescue and across Jes-
  sila have DP feeds the PCs can dip into using sensorview, and 
  Investigate rolls with PSAs, hand scanners, etc, can attempt to 
  pick up residual traces, perhaps directly analysing the nervous 
  systems of selected Blues. Such analyses should be at least 
  Great (+4) difficulty, and perhaps Fantastic (+6), increasing by 
  +1 for every hour or so that passes.
  On a success, analysis reveals space-time disturbances 
  which suggest jump wake disturbances or even Heisenberg 
  minima, as though some kind of 2-space emergence took 
  place. A success with style reveals these traces are detectable 
  at any location which was occupied by a Blue at the moment 
  of transparency.
  TALKING TO BLUES
  Talking directly to Blues is instructive. Just before and just 
  after the moment, each Blue experienced a sensation “as if 
  everything was suddenly becoming more and more transpar-
  ent. It all became to clear; I could see through everything…”
  DREAMS OF BLUE
  Following the moment of transparency, every Blue which 
  survived Barrier Fall (ie excluding those which have been born 
  since that time) experiences strange and vivid “dreams” of 
  “before the Fall” during their rest periods. 
  PCs talking to Blues a day or more after the moment may 
  learn this automatically; otherwise the information is avail-
  able on a casual Knowledge roll sift through the Mindscape.
  WHERE NEXT?
  Let the PCs pretty much decide where to go from here. 
  Depending on the extent of their contacts, the next scene 
  may be Scene 3: The Device Awakens, Scene 4: The Barrier 
  Flickers, or even the events of Episode Three: The Promise 
  or Episode Four: The Brightening.
  Scene 3: The Device Awakens
  In this scene, the Blue field device beneath Hasan’s Rescue begins 
  to activate—and it may not be the only one. Factions through-
  out the system start to close in, and the PCs risk getting shut out!
  Location: The Blue field device chamber deep beneath 
  the Museum District waterpoint in Hasan’s Rescue. 
  THE HOOK
  The PCs may witness this directly, especially if they’ve been 
  investigating the device chamber (page 49). Alternatively, a 
  Fair (+2) Knowledge or Notice roll may pick up traces of chat-
  ter in the Mindscape; a subsequent Great (+4) Hacker or other 
  appropriate skill roll reveals that the Blue field device beneath 
  Hasan’s Rescue has begun to activate. Indeed, similar energy 
  traces are appearing all over Blue, at every waterpoint and 
  niche halt. Something is happening!
  DEVELOPING A THEORY
  The PCs may try to develop a theory about what’s happen-
  ing. This is a contest against the Superb (+5) complexity of 
  the Blue field device activation event. If the event wins the 
  
  53
  Adventure: Transparency
  contest, the PCs are foxed, unable to come up with a theory. If 
  they win, they come up with a theory.
  In each exchange, every PC may make a roll for the con-
  test; however, only the highest single result counts in each 
  exchange. PCs may also try to create advantages as usual; 
  note that if a PC tries to create an advantage for himself and 
  fails, then his contest roll does not count for this exchange.
  The winner in each exchange generates victories as usual; 
  additionally, they get to declare one fact about the event. This 
  is in addition to any situation aspects. 
  If the PCs are victorious in the contest, they may create a 
  theory which explains the Blue field device activation event; it 
  should take into account any situation aspects created previ-
  ously.
  Also, in keeping with the Mindjammer rules, if the PCs 
  successfully come up with a theory, that theory should be 
  true. As GM, you may want to reveal certain facts in the form 
  of the situation aspects the players create to ensure their 
  theory doesn’t contradict some of the assumptions behind 
  the default plot thread (page 41) and make sure the adven-
  ture continues to make sense. You don’t have to do this, of 
  course; you can happily let your PCs come up with utterly 
  original facts, and let your story tell its own truth about what’s 
  happening in Transparency. But we’re assuming you want to 
  keep things roughly consistent; in such a case, you can reveal 
  the following situation aspects, or ensure that the aspects the 
  PCs come up with don’t contradict them:
  • 
  A Network of Secondary Devices: There’s a network of 
  secondary devices across Blue, and potentially throughout 
  the Jessilan system.
  • 
  The Device Chamber Blues Activated the Network: The Blues 
  in the device chamber are at least one group whose 
  actions have caused the network to activate.
  • 
  Mindscape or ZIP-like Emissions: The emissions from the 
  Blue field device and other energy traces display simi-
  larities to both zero-point energy signatures and the 
  Mindscape monitor band. They’re intermittent, certainly 
  to begin with, but increasingly strong and stable.
  In fact (see below), the Blue field devices are about to 
  re-establish the prelapsarian Blue exomemory known as 
  Transparency, and also surround the planet Blue and all Blue 
  natives with a powerful energy field. This all becomes evident 
  in Episode Four: The Brightening, but the seeds of it are 
  here—if the PCs make the hypothesis.
  INFORMATION AND EXOMEMORY CONTROL
  As soon as the PCs begin to investigate the Blue field device 
  activation event, they’ll begin to notice that they’re not the 
  only ones. Agencies such as SCI Force, the 3SI, and even the 
  Jessilan administration want to not only get as much informa-
  tion as they can about what’s happening, but also to prevent 
  this information from falling into the wrong hands or being dis-
  seminated in an uncontrolled and potentially destabilising way.
  “Information control” is one of the principal jobs of gov-
  ernment, and the Commonality is an expert at it. Indeed, if 
  the PCs are working for SCI Force or a similar organisation, it 
  may be up to them how they restrict or release the informa-
  tion about what’s happening. 
  In any case, the 3-Space Instrumentality (or SCI Force, if 
  the PCs are 3SI agents themselves) are already trying to take 
  control of the information about this event. They are creating 
  restricted content zones (Mindjammer page 191) around 
  information in the Jessilan Mindscape; the PCs may end up 
  being locked out—even from their own exomemories!
  You can introduce this at an appropriate moment when 
  any PC attempts to act upon his or her knowledge of the 
  Blue field device: see the box “How Can I Get Locked Out of 
  My Own Memories?” (overleaf) for the concepts and rules 
  involved. For the corresponding skill levels, use those of Gel-
  Gul Faraqisti on page 44.
  KEEPING IN THE LOOP
  As well as being locked out of the Mindscape, the PCs will 
  increasingly find themselves sidelined by the Jessilan gov-
  ernment and military, as forces such as 3SI or SCI Force use 
  their influence to exclude the PCs from further activities and 
  investigations.
  In order for the PCs to keep in the loop, they’ll have to 
  make an appropriate organisation action against the Jessilan 
  government or organisation in question. 
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
    
   
   
  Creating Theories in Mindjammer
  There are many ways to generate theories in Mindjammer; 
  this is just one suggestion. However, you can use the pro-
  cedure detailed here more widely, in any context where the 
  characters are facing an unfathomable situation and must 
  try to understand and explain what’s happening.
  In such a case, the first step is to identify the problem. 
  In this example, that’s a given: the PCs are trying to answer 
  the question: “what’s happening in the Blue field device 
  activation event?”. When you try to come up with a theory 
  to tackle a different situation, be sure to phrase the question 
  you’re trying to answer in a similar way. Examples include:
  • 
  How did this alien species come to live here?
  • 
  Why did the star’s spectral class suddenly change so 
  drastically?
  • 
  Why did our attempt to communicate result in our being 
  attacked?
  
  54
  Note that in order to successfully interact with an 
  organisation, a character either requires specific stunts or 
  an organisation extra. Characters without either may find 
  themselves unable to avoid being kept out of the loop by the 
  machinations of the organisations in the Jessilan system, and 
  may no longer be able to access the device chamber or other 
  similar facilities in a legal way.
  AGENTS
  Gel-Gul Faraqisti’s 3SI team assumes control of the device 
  chamber. The only way to dislodge them is by embarking 
  upon an organisation conflict with the 3SI in the Jessilan 
  system or the Jessilan government itself (see above), or by 
  engaging in physical or mental conflict with the team directly. 
  Note that openly attacking the 3SI team with weapons will 
  have serious repercussions; doing so with threats, bravado, 
  persuasion, and coercion (a mental stress conflict) will be 
  equally effective but without the repercussions—although 
  it’ll probably be a little less long-lasting.
  WHERE NEXT?
  At this point events are taking on a life of their own, and the 
  PCs have a lot of options. Shortly after this scene, the barrier 
  will flicker as described in Scene 4: The Barrier Flickers. 
  Alternatively the PCs may get wind of the theft of the Promise 
  in Episode Three: The Promise, or you can just skip straight 
  to the beginning of the Brightening in Episode Four: The 
  Brightening.
  Scene 4: The Barrier Flickers
  In this scene, the ancient Blue Barrier reappears—just for an 
  instant. It once cut the planet of Blue and the entire Jessilan 
  system off from the rest of the universe, until it fell six hundred 
  standard years ago. Why did it just come back, however briefly? 
  And will it happen again?
  Location: Anywhere in the Jessila system.
  THE HOOK
  Just for a tenth of a second—almost indetectable in human 
  terms—the ancient Blue energy barrier, which once isolated 
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
    
   
   
  How Can I Get Locked Out
  of My Own Memories?
  If, like most PCs, you’re a Mindscape user, then you routinely 
  use the Mindscape to store direct perception feeds, data 
  result sets, thoughtcasts, and so on, relating to events you’ve 
  experienced. The more important the event is to you person-
  ally, and the more involved you’ve been in it, the more likely 
  this is.
  Together, these data, as well as the direct engrams of 
  the memories you may choose to upload / thoughtcast, 
  are termed exomemories, and are stored in your halo in the 
  Mindscape.
  It’s possible for powerful forces—legal or not, such as SCI 
  Force—to hack and even classify those exomemories. See 
  Mindjammer page 188 for how to access exomemories, 
  including restricted content. You can restrict content you 
  haven’t created yourself on an appropriate Will or Technical 
  roll with a special ops or black chip. If you have a special ops 
  or black chip, you can create fictionals (including changing 
  and falsifying exomemories) using Deceive, or using the 
  Hacker or Mindscape Engineer stunt (see Mindjammer 
  page 193).
  In such cases, when you try to remember an event, the 
  metadata and subsidiary data around the memory, and 
  possibly even the Mindscape copy of the memory engram 
  itself, may all differ from the memory in your own mind. The 
  natural temptation is for your mind to alter itself to accom-
  modate. It takes a considerable effort of will to avoid this 
  (see “The Trouble With Fictionals”, Mindjammer page 192).
  SUPPORTING ORGANISATION
  Physical Stress: 1  2  3  4
  Mental Stress: 1  2  3  4
  Credit Stress: 1  2  3
  Consequences: 1 mild + 1 moderate
  Scale: Planetary (+6)
  Reach: Planetary (+6)
  Aspects: Centralised Government Headquartered 
  On Jessila; The System Council Decides; Ambivalent 
  Relationship With the Commonality; Used to 
  Ruling the System Worlds By Decree; Benevolent 
  Approach.
  Skills: Great (+4) Bureaucracy, Investigate, Rapport; 
  Good (+3) Security, Structure, Will; Fair (+2) Resources, 
  Science, Technical; Average (+1) Contacts, Knowledge, 
  Notice, Provoke.
  STUNTS
   Aid Package: Use Resources for moderate and 
  severe physical recovery actions for organisations.
   Known Knowns: +2 defend bonus against Deceive.
   Only Connect: Use Investigate instead of 
  Knowledge to deduce facts from observation.
  THE JESSILAN GOVERNMENT
  
  55
  Adventure: Transparency
  the world of Blue and the entire Jessilan system, reap-
  pears. It hasn’t done this for six centuries. There are reports 
  of minor damage here and there—but the real damage is 
  the panic which ripples through the system. Is the barrier 
  coming back up? Will Blue and the whole Jessilan system be 
  cut off again?
  SPACE TIME FLUCTUATIONS
  The PCs may detect the Barrier flicker, or hear about it, 
  anywhere in the Jessilan system. Attempts to find analytical 
  information in the Mindscape will face a Fantastic (+6) dif-
  ficulty due to information control and being out of the loop 
  (see above), unless the PCs are themselves responsible for 
  that control and still in the loop. It’s much easier to conduct 
  your own analysis: Active or Passive Sensing, or sensorview 
  Investigate attempts, are Fair (+2) difficulty.
  Success registers an increasing number of incidents where 
  the fabric of space time in the vicinity of Blue fluctuates 
  in minor but incomprehensible ways. A success with style 
  reveals the readings begin to trace out “entanglement paths” 
  in the space-time “quantum foam” traversing the Jessilan 
  system.
  TRACING THE ENTANGLEMENT PATHS
  Characters may attempt to “map” or “trace” these entangle-
  ment paths. These are create advantage actions resulting in 
  situation aspects linking locations throughout the Jessilan 
  system with points in the Sapphire Vault on Blue (page 64). As 
  GM or player you can make up your own examples, but the 
  main two are:
  • 
  The Promise to the Sapphire Vault: This entanglement path 
  connects the Alienist Polar Ice Temple (actually specifically 
  the relic known as the Promise—page 37) on the frozen 
  world of Yoden with the Sapphire Vault on Blue.
  • 
  Beacon to the Sapphire Vault: This path connects a hitherto 
  unremarkable asteroid to the Sapphire Vault—see Scene 
  5: The Link Portals.
  WHERE NEXT?
  The PCs have an open choice of where to go from here. See 
  Episode Three: The Promise if they decide to check out the 
  Alienist Polar Ice Temple on Yoden, and Episode Four Scene 
  2: Getting Into the Vault if they decide to try and enter the 
  Sapphire Vault. They may also check out the entanglement 
  path beginning in the asteroid in the Jessila Belt: see Scene 5: 
  The Link Portals below.
  Scene 5: The Link Portals
  The PCs follow the entanglement path to an asteroid in the Jes-
  sila Belt, where they discover a powerful Hermetic artefact.
  Location: A new asteroid in the Jessila Belt, dubbed 
  Beacon. 
  THE HOOK
  This is a simple scene. The PCs travel to a hitherto unremark-
  able asteroid in the Jessila Belt dubbed Beacon which turns 
  out to have a facility very similar to the Greenstone asteroid 
  (page 18). The asteroid—some ten kilometres in length—is 
  rotating on its axis, and has a cylindrical area at its heart 
  some 200 metres long which is riddled with tunnels, carvings 
  and reliefs, and structures of building paste, all in vacuum or 
  ancient stale atmosphere. It requires some tunnelling to get 
  to, but there’s a shaft which is blocked only ten metres from 
  the surface which can provide direct access.
  THE ARTEFACT
  A search in the Beacon tunnels automatically locates a clearly 
  technological artefact which appears to emit a “space-time 
  resonance”; a ring structure some 2.5 metres in diameter, 
  similar in appearance to a 3-space gate, known as a link 
  portal (page 19). It connects directly to Secundacule Gamma 
  (C) in the Sapphire Vault (page 64).
  WHERE NEXT?
  In all likelihood, if the PCs have got to this point, they’re prob-
  ably going to follow the link portal to Secundacule Gamma 
  in the Sapphire Vault—see Episode Four Scene 3: Exploring 
  the Sapphire Vault. In this case, we recommend you choose 
  a suitable moment shortly after their arrival and when they’ve 
  begun exploring to begin the Brightening (page 61). 
  They don’t have to traverse the link portal, of course. They 
  may instead choose to try and move the portal, or even use 
  the news of its location as a powerful bargaining chip with 
  the authorities to improve their standing and access to events 
  (potentially getting “back in the loop”—see page 53 above). 
  In this case, you could move to Episode Three Scene 1: The 
  Theft of the Promise or Episode Four Scene 1: The Bright-
  ening Begins.
  EPISODE THREE: THE 
  PROMISE
  Something profoundly significant is happening in the Jessilan 
  system, and panic is spreading. The PCs have the power to shape 
  the destiny of a civilisation. What will they choose to do?
  In this episode, the adventure enters the realms of conspiracy, 
  intrigue, and political machinations, where the PCs may find 
  out who the stakeholders are in the Jessila system, and what 
  they hope to achieve. The PCs may come out of this with 
  increased power, prestige, or contacts. If this isn’t your style 
  of play, and you’d rather concentrate on the events directly 
  concerned with the Hermetic attempts to “go post”, then go 
  directly to Episode Four: The Brightening instead.
  
  56
  Scene 1: The Theft of the Promise
  In this scene, the PCs investigate a suspiciously coincidental 
  “theft” of an ancient Blue artefact on the icy moon of Yoden, 
  centre of the Alienist faith.
  Location: The Alienist Polar Ice Temple, Yoden.
  THE HOOK
  In the chaos following the Moment of Transparency and the 
  ancient Barrier flickering briefly to life, rumours fly around the 
  Jessila system and Mindscape that the legendary Promise, 
  the ancient Blue artefact which is a sacred relic for the Alienist 
  religion, has gone missing from its sanctuary on the icy moon 
  of Yoden (page 36). Some are saying it’s been spirited away 
  by the Alienists for safe-keeping; others that it’s been stolen 
  by mysterious agents; and others still that as a powerful Her-
  metic artefact it’s somehow playing a role in the mysterious 
  events currently unfolding.
  Perhaps answers lie on Yoden itself.
  SITE INVESTIGATION IN THE POLAR ICE TEMPLE
  Although Yoden is sparsely populated, and with a high pro-
  portion of Alienist worshippers, there are no restrictions to 
  going there. It’s even possible to visit the rather awe-inspiring 
  Polar Ice Temple—although normally you’d have to make a 
  rendezvous in advance to get access to the interior.
  Things are a little more chaotic right now. Since the appar-
  ent theft of the Promise, Jessilan security forces are quizzing 
  everyone at the ice temple, and trying to keep casual visitors 
  away. Enterprising PCs making appropriate rolls (such as 
  Rapport, Resources, Deceive, Contacts, Provoke, and so on) 
  should be able to find a way in. If they’re sufficiently stealthy, 
  they may even be able to do so without people knowing 
  (although the 3SI may still have tabs on them—see page 43).
  Once they’ve gained access, the PCs may conduct an 
  initial investigation with whatever tools and access levels they 
  have; or talk to the Alienist clergy in the temple (see below).
  The pressurised interior of the Polar Ice Temple is being 
  treated as a crime scene—see page 37 for map and location 
  descriptions. The Promise artefact is missing from its dais, but 
  it’s not immediately obvious what happened. 
  A Notice or Active Sensing roll using sensorview reveals 
  that the thieves gained access via the 400 metre high temple 
  spire, which is hollow to its apex. A success with style identi-
  fies deformations in the ice crystal structure at the top of the 
  spire, revealing the thieves melted their way in, probably 
  using an emergency variform airlock (see the adjacent box), 
  which was subsequently taken away after the theft. They then 
  descended vertically to the pedestal, possibly using anti-grav, 
  and bypassed the haze field (page 37). All surveillance equip-
  ment and DP feeds were disabled during the theft. 
  A deduction roll using Investigate, Knowledge, or an 
  appropriate forensic stunt, reveals equipment of at least 
  T9 would have been required for the theft to be this unno-
  ticeable; somehow the temple’s internal security systems 
  have been circumvented, and the temple clergy caretakers 
  rendered unconscious without killing them (there are thirty of 
  these in total—half on duty at any one time).
  HACKING THE OFFICIAL INVESTIGATION
  This same information can be found by hacking the current 
  Jessilan security force investigation. This is a Superb (+5) 
  contest; on a failure, the PCs are tracked down by the security 
  forces and will face pursuit by a 3SI combined measures team 
  (page 50) based in Mirali’s Enlightenment. 
  A hacking success will also reveal indications of an 
  n-space departure from the Polar Ice Temple shortly after the 
  theft, which has been deleted from the official record. The 
  destination of the Erstwhile Probity in-system transport (an 
  STL craft) was the outer solar system—probably the gas giant 
  of Harbour.
  TALKING TO THE ALIENISTS
  The temple clergy, including almost all of the caretakers, are 
  devout Alienists (ie not Schismatics—see Scene 2: Talking to 
  the Schismatics below) and supporters of the Hermetics. The 
  current head of the Polar Ice Temple is Fenda Carmushale, a 
  human Alienist priest.
  Unless the PCs can prove their bona fides with the Her-
  metics or the 3-Space Instrumentality, Fenda will be extremely 
  suspicious, and try to tell the PCs as little as possible, instead 
  feeding them with disinformation. Like many Alienists, she 
  believes an extreme faction in the Alienist ranks known as 
  the Facilitators has stolen the Promise. The Facilitators have 
  the support of a clandestine group in the Commonality at 
  least partially represented by the 3-Space Instrumentality; she 
  knows that there’s shortly to be an important meeting on the 
  high security luxury resort of Endurance Station in the outer 
  solar system.
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
    
   
   
  Equipment: Emergency Variform 
  Airlock
  Tech Index 9. Costs 2 stunts
  Initially a dome-shaped circular package 50cm in diam-
  eter and weighing 15kg, this may be carried or slaved to 
  follow on its own grav suspensors. It contains a very short 
  range thermal lance (w:4, Armour Piercing) and a series of 
  variform constructors to penetrate surfaces up to hull metal 
  in strength and create a basic but durable airlock capable of 
  cycling one person at a time.
  
  57
  Adventure: Transparency
  WHERE NEXT?
  In addition to the clergy staffing the Polar Ice Temple, there 
  are other staff among the caretakers and indeed back in 
  Mirali’s Enlightenment who aren’t as ardent supporters of the 
  Hermetics. See Scene 2: Talking to the Schismatics. The PCs 
  may also want to check out Endurance Station in the outer 
  solar system, to follow up the faint traces of the route the 
  thieves took after leaving the planet. See Scene 3: Intrigue at 
  Endurance Station. Additionally, it’s also quite possible now 
  just to move straight to Episode Four Scene 1: The Brighten-
  ing Begins. 
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
    
   
   
  The Cultural Impact of 3SI Involvement 
  in the Theft
  Although cultural conflict isn’t an overt component of 
  Transparency, some of its events have profound cultural 
  implications which you can use in your game if you like. If 
  news of the 3SI / Commonality involvement in the theft of 
  the Promise breaks, the Facilitators have a plan to use that 
  information to simultaneously discredit the Commonality, 
  weakening its influence in the Jessilan system, while simulta-
  neously strengthening that of the 3-Space Instrumentality as 
  the secret force behind the Facilitators.
  This takes the form of a meme attack (Mindjammer 
  page 304) against the Commonality culture. The Facilita-
  tors want to see the Hermetics succeed, and grab any tech 
  increases they can from their observations. They’ll use any 
  advantages they can get from the meme attack to move 
  Jessila toward becoming a 3SI fief, ostensibly run by the 
  Facilitator faction.
  SUPPORTING NPC
  Physical Stress: 1  2  
  Mental Stress: 1  2  3  
  Credit Stress: 1  2  3  
  Consequences: 1 mild + 1 moderate
  Scale: Medium (+0)
  Aspects: Unthinking Devotee of the Alienist Way; 
  We Are Nothing Before Hermetic Greatness; Ageless 
  Glacer Priestess; Jealous Gatekeeper; Gel-Gul 
  Faraqisti Saved My Soul!
  Skills: Great (+4) Bureaucracy, Deceive; Good (+3) 
  Contacts, Knowledge; Fair (+2) Provoke, Rapport; 
  Average (+1) Empathy, Resources, Will.
  STUNTS
   Cog In the Machine: Use Bureaucracy to take 
  organisation actions.
   Cool Customer: +2 Deceive bonus when bluffing.
   Specialist (Alienist Philosophy): +2 bonus to 
  related rolls.
  EXTRAS
  ê Adaptation (Glacial Environment): As aspect.
  ê Haze Field: +1 defend bonus and basic ray 
  shielding.
  ê Mindscape Implant: Enables technopsi and 
  Mindscape connectivity.
  FENDA CARMUSHALE, 
  HUMAN ALIENIST PRIEST
  
  58
  Scene 2: Talking to the Schismatics
  In this scene, the PCs talk to Alienists who don’t support the Her-
  metic agenda, and are worried about what the Hermetics may 
  be planning to do.
  Location: The Polar Ice Temple, Yoden; or Schismatic 
  districts in Mirali’s Enlightenment.
  THE HOOK
  The Schismatics were originally a fairly minor group of Alien-
  ists who rejected the Restorationist agenda. They count Blues 
  among their number, although they’re mostly human; they 
  essentially want things to stay as they are. 
  Since the Moment of Transparency and the recent flicker-
  ing of the Barrier, the Schismatics have suddenly become 
  more vocal, opposing pro-Hermetic factions throughout the 
  system. The apparent theft of the Promise from the Polar Ice 
  Temple on Yoden has them particularly excited. 
  SCHISMATIC ENCOUNTERS
  The PCs may find Schismatics in several places. Some of the 
  caretakers at the Polar Ice Temple are Schismatics, and may 
  even approach the PCs if they overhear or simply see them. 
  There’s also a fairly sizable Schismatic community in the 
  Yumini Dome quarter of the Alienist city of Mirali’s Enlight-
  enment. Finally, there are pockets of Schismatics on Jessila 
  and Blue. All of these are also contactable via the Jessilan 
  Mindscape.
  Talking to the Schismatics is easier than talking to other 
  Alienists, and especially Facilitators. Usually a Rapport (or 
  Deceive) roll is all that’s required to establish trust, and then 
  the PCs can ask whichever questions they like. The PCs can 
  find out the following:
  • 
  The Schismatics haven’t taken the Promise.
  • 
  They’ve recently started to find the Hermetics disturb-
  ing; there have been signs in the Alienist church that the 
  Hermetics may have an agenda which does not take their 
  worshippers’ interests into account at all. This opinion is 
  shared equally by Schismatic Blues, who have become 
  increasingly frightened by their hyper-advanced and alien 
  forefathers.
  • 
  The Schismatics believe the thieves had some kind of help 
  from the Commonality—or even that the Commonality 
  stole the Promise. 
  • 
  Some Schismatics blame other Alienist splinter groups. In 
  particular, the Facilitator faction is mentioned—a secretive 
  group of radical Restorationists which is believed to have 
  Commonality backing. 
  • 
  The high security luxury resort of Endurance Station in the 
  outer solar system is said to be a notorious meeting place 
  for Facilitators—and a den of spies.
  WHERE NEXT?
  There are many clues from talking to the Schismatics that 
  point to Scene 3: Intrigue at Endurance Station. Equally, 
  though, you may wish to just straight into Episode Four 
  Scene 1: The Brightening Begins if the players believe they 
  now have enough information. 
  Scene 3: Intrigue at Endurance Station
  In this scene, the PCs end up in a Jessilan nest of spies, on the trail 
  of the Promise and the shady forces arrayed around it.
  Location: Endurance Station, on Endurance, the moon of 
  the cold gas giant Harbour (Jessila VI).
  THE HOOK
  There are many leads pointing to Endurance Station, the 
  high-security luxury “diplomatic resort” (and nest of spies…) 
  on the distant frigid moon of the gas giant Harbour. Said to be 
  a meeting place for forces from all across the Commonality, 
  and factions from throughout the Jessilan system, the radical 
  Restorationist group known as the Facilitators may well have 
  brought the stolen Hermetic artefact known as the Promise 
  here. But why?
  TRAVEL TO ENDURANCE STATION
  You can treat the interplanetary voyage to Endurance Station 
  with as much or as little detail as you like. Harbour occupies 
  an outer system orbit, so journeys may take anything from a 
  couple of hours to half a day or more. It’s even possible you 
  may want to run this as a chase as the PCs pursue the thieves 
  of the Facilitator faction who stole the Promise (page 56).
  SPIES AND CONSPIRACIES
  Endurance Station positions itself as a “neutral ground” on the 
  edge of the Jessilan System where factions and representa-
  tives from all across the Jessilan system and Commonality 
  Space can meet in confidence. Obviously that makes it a den 
  of spies, too; the PCs will find that all manner of people are 
  immediately interested in knowing their business, some of 
  them not so subtly. Equally, information brokers are every-
  where, offering to tell the PCs what they want to know—for a 
  price. Can you trust them? Well… 
  See page 38 for more details on Endurance Station. 
  OCULUS FORTE, THE COMINT NEGOTIATOR
  Regardless of where the PCs base themselves in Endurance 
  Station, everywhere is abuzz with talk of the latest arrival—a 
  mysterious yet powerful figure apparently from high up in 
  the Commonality. This figure has recently arrived on a sleek 
  and cutting edge T10 Hyperwing-class Very Fast Courier Spark 
  Candescent, which is in Endurance Station’s Docking Bay 4C, 
  refusing to give interviews or appear for DP shoots.
  The figure’s identity is restricted, unavailable on casual 
  searching and requiring at least a Superb (+5) roll of Hacker 
  
  59
  Adventure: Transparency
  or other appropriate skills. His name is Oculus Forte, a 
  “negotiator-without-portfolio” from the Commonality’s Com-
  munications Instrumentality.
  Let the PCs take whatever actions they like in Endurance 
  Station, but each time they do something which may bring 
  them into contact with Forte, the 3SI, or the Facilitators, then 
  have them make a Great (+4) Stealth roll, Fantastic (+6) if the 
  PCs are already known to any of these three factions. On a fail-
  ure, they gain a We’re Tracking Your Every Move aspect which 
  may be invoked and compelled at awkward moments. 
  At some point the PCs may notice Forte being approached 
  by a delegation. If they’ve met Gel-Gul Faraqisti or any of the 
  Facilitator team which stole the Promise, they’ll recognise 
  them in the delegation; otherwise it’s a Great (+4) Knowledge 
  or Investigate roll to place them using the Mindscape. Under 
  normal circumstances in Endurance Station this meeting will 
  take place in actuality; if there’s a security concern, Forte may 
  decide to shift it to an exotic, Blue-inspired, restricted access 
  imposality instead (Mindjammer page 191).
  The Facilitator delegation don’t have the Promise with 
  them. However, they discuss it with ComInt Forte, requesting 
  guidance—what would the Commonality like the Facilitators 
  to do with it? Both Forte and the Facilitators seem to tacitly 
  accept that the Promise is important in the Hermetics’ plans, 
  and particular in what’s happening in the Jessilan system 
  right now.
  Use this meeting to convey any information you need 
  to to the PCs. You can let the players go wild improvising, 
  too, if they’re happy doing so. For example, what is Forte’s 
  recommendation—what does the Commonality suggest the 
  Facilitators do with the Promise? Well, we’d suggest the Com-
  monality would probably want the Facilitators to do whatever 
  they can to assist the Hermetics to complete their project, 
  while remaining at a distance to observe and report. However, 
  you can also let your players improvise this detail, and run 
  with it in your game.
  Here are some other pieces of information you can convey 
  to the players at this point:
  • 
  The 3SI representatives among the Facilitators believe 
  the Hermetics have made a major 3-space breakthrough 
  which the 3SI could use.
  • 
  The Facilitators as a whole believe that the Hermetics 
  may be somehow entering 3-space as part of their “going 
  post”. 
  WHERE NEXT?
  From here the PCs may try to track the Facilitators back to 
  where they’ve hidden the Promise: see Scene 4: Retriev-
  ing the Promise. Alternatively, they may begin to receive 
  information from the rest of the system that something 
  astounding is happening on Blue. See Episode Four Scene 1: 
  The Brightening Begins.
  SUPPORTING NPC
  Physical Stress: 1  2  
  Mental Stress: 1  2  3  4
  Credit Stress: 1  2  3  4
  Consequences: 1 mild + 1 moderate
  Scale: Medium (+0)
  Aspects: Native of the Harper Domain; Hyperintelligent 
  Core Worlder; Exotically Ageless and Elfin Handsome; 
  Ruthless Diplomat; Doesn’t Suffer Fools.
  Skills: Superb (+5) Deceive, Provoke; Great (+4) Empathy, 
  Will; Good (+3) Rapport, Resources; Fair (+2) Bureaucracy, 
  Contacts, Knowledge; Average (+1) Investigate, Notice, 
  Stealth. 
  STUNTS
   Best Foot Forward: 2/session, turn a Rapport roll boost 
  into a situation aspect with a free invoke.
   Fortress of the Will: +2 Will bonus to defend vs Provoke 
  and Will damage / control attacks.
   Mindburn: Use Will for mental attacks using the 
  Mindscape.
   Negotiator: Use Rapport for organisation actions.
   Probe: +2 create an advantage Will bonus to discern 
  surface thoughts.
  EXTRAS
  ê The Communications Instrumentality: Organisation 
  Extra: Good (+3) Intrusion, Security; Extreme Sanction.
  ê Cosmetic Enhancer: As aspect to customise physical 
  appearance.
  ê Longevity: Longevity aspect, +5 skill points, and a 
  hundred years older.
  ê Neurosynthetic Extensors: +2 bonus on Knowledge, 
  Science, or Technical rolls where reasoning power is 
  determinant; also invoke / compel.
  ê Pheromone Synthesis: +2 Rapport overcome and 
  create advantage bonus against susceptible targets in 
  same zone; also as aspect.
  ê Special Ops Mindscape Implant: Local Mindscape 
  connectivity and special ops technopsi.
  OCULUS FORTE, THE COMINT NEGOTIATOR
  
  60
  Scene 4: Retrieving the Promise
  In this scene, the PCs attempt to take possession of the Blue arte-
  fact known as the Promise from the Facilitators—at any cost!
  Location: A safe house or accommodation suite in one of 
  the hotels or districts in Endurance Station (page 38).
  THE HOOK
  The Facilitators have brought the Promise to Endurance Sta-
  tion, and the PCs have tracked them back to where they have 
  it hidden. However, the Facilitators aren’t going to let them 
  take it without a fight.
  THE CONFRONTATION
  Although the Facilitator delegation aren’t obvious combat 
  specialists, they have a 3SI annihilator synthetic guarding the 
  Promise at all times. Depending on how well the PCs organise 
  their retrieval operation, the annihilator synthetic may be 
  accompanied by one or all of the following: 1 3SI supporting 
  NPC, 1 Restorationist supporting NPC, then 1 group of 4 3SI 
  and 1 group of 4 Restorationists. 
  The actual process of getting to the Promise is a roll of 
  Athletics or Ranged Combat, etc, trying not to do damage 
  specifically but to push through the “block” created by the hail 
  of covering fire. It’s also very likely the PCs will have to disable 
  the annihilator to seize the Promise.
  Stats for the annihilator synthetic and for the 3SI minor 
  NPC group are provided on page 50. Other NPCs are shown 
  below.
  WHAT DOES THE PROMISE DO?
  The Promise is very alien. It resembles a smooth piece of 
  polished branching coral, violet in colour and two metres in 
  length, its translucent limbs intertwined. In a certain light a 
  microscopic network of fibres seems to run through it, like 
  veins or circuits. When touched by any living thing, the Promise 
  lights up with a purple flare, shedding a light as bright as day 
  into adjacent zones.
  The Promise has changed in recent days. Since the Moment 
  of Transparency, it has brightened when oriented in certain 
  directions, and has even sent out “tracers” of fluorescent 
  filaments up to ten metres in length. These align with the 
  entanglement paths discussed in Episode Two Scene 4: The 
  Barrier Flickers. 
  In game terms, the Promise has two aspects. The first 
  is Flare Gate to the Sapphire Vault Link Portal, which can be 
  invoked upon navigation rolls to locate or travel to Secundac-
  ule Gamma (C) in the Sapphire Vault (page 64). It can be used in 
  traversing the link portal itself, including locating the Beacon 
  asteroid in Jessila’s Belt (page 55); and, for a fate point, it can be 
  used to open a simultaneous link portal from any niche halt on 
  Blue’s Bridges (page 28), again directly into the Sapphire Vault.
  Its second aspect is Interface to Transparency, which can be 
  used to connect with the Blue exomemory (page 62) once the 
  Brightening begins.
  WHERE NEXT?
  At this point the PCs are perfectly positioned for the climax of the 
  adventure; see Episode Four Scene 1: The Brightening Begins.
  SUPPORTING NPC
  Physical Stress: 1  2  3  4
  Mental Stress: 1  2  3  4
  Credit Stress: 1  2  3  
  Consequences: 2 mild + 1 moderate
  Scale: Medium (+0)
  Aspects: Leader of the 3SI Facilitator Delegation; 
  High-GD Ursoid Xenomorph; Built Like a Brick Fresher; 
  Unexpectedly Subtle; Hulkingly Handsome.
  Skills: Superb (+5) Ranged Combat, Will; Great (+4) 
  Physique, Provoke; Good (+3) Deceive, Rapport; Fair (+2) 
  Notice, Stealth; Average (+1) Athletics, Resources.
  STUNTS
   Illusion: +2 Will bonus for Technopsi create advantage 
  actions to create images in target’s mind or optic nerve.
   Mindburn: Use Will for mental attacks using the 
  Mindscape.
   Overseer: 1/scene, make an overcome action to 
  generate a pool of shift points you can redistribute.
   Probe: +2 create an advantage Will bonus to discern 
  surface thoughts.
  EXTRAS
  ê Biomed Array: Fair (+2) Technical skill for overcoming 
  mild consequence recovery obstacles.
  ê Large: +2 Provoke bonus, plus aspect.
  ê PSA: Fair (+2) Investigate and Notice skills for sensorview 
  actions; and/or +2 bonus to sensorview actions.
  ê P-Suit: Armour:1 damage reduction, +1 defence bonus; 
  Vac Sealed.
  ê Special Ops Mindscape Implant: Local Mindscape 
  connectivity and special ops technopsi.
  ê Subdermal Null Beamer: +2 Ranged Combat attack 
  bonus; weapon:2 rating.
  SECURITY OFFICER BO KUMADEK
  
  61
  Adventure: Transparency
  SUPPORTING NPC
  Physical Stress: 1  2  3  4
  Mental Stress: 1  2  3  4
  Credit Stress:  1  2  3
  Consequences: 3 mild + 1 moderate
  Scale: Medium (+0)
  Aspects: Bizarre Blue Cyborg; Natural Traitor; 
  Fascinated by Human Pain; Flurry of Flashing Blue 
  Limbs; The Bloody Right Hand of Bo Kumadek.
  Skills: Superb (+5) Provoke, Will; Great (+4) 
  Athletics, Physique; Good (+3) Deceive, Notice; Fair 
  (+2) Investigate, Science; Average (+1) Resources, 
  Unarmed Combat
  STUNTS
   Grappler: +2 create an advantage Physique bonus 
  when wrestling or grappling.
   Tough As Nails: 1/session, pay a fate point to 
  reduce moderate physical consequence to mild, or 
  erase a mild.
  EXTRAS
  ê Mental Blast: Use Provoke to make attacks 
  causing physical stress damage.
  ê Transdermal Reinforcement: You can take an 
  additional mild consequence.
  ê Wave Gland Amplification Fold: Allows the 
  mental blast to make “full auto”-type attacks (an area 
  effect).
  NOX NOCTIS, THE GADGET 
  BLUE
  GROUP OF 4 AVERAGE 
  (+1) MINOR NPCS
  Stress:    
  Scale: Medium (+0)
  Aspects: There to Make Up the Numbers.
  Skills: Average (+1) Ranged Combat (+3 
  teamwork bonus).
  RESTORATIONIST 
  FACTIONISTS
  EPISODE FOUR: THE BRIGHTENING
  After unprecedented system-wide events harking back to the era 
  of prelapsarian Blue, a sudden energy surge surrounds the planet 
  Blue with a gradually intensifying glow. At the same time, con-
  tact is reported throughout the system between Blues and a form 
  of non-localised exomemory store—perhaps an intelligence in 
  its own right! 
  In this episode, the Jessila system is affected by an “apoca-
  lyptic” event, as a mysterious and intensifying energy field 
  surrounds the planet Blue. It’s predicted that in less than 
  30 hours the energy field will exceed theoretical maximum 
  power, after which “singularity” no one knows what will 
  happen. This is the climax to the adventure, and may spell 
  destruction for the PCs; a major event that may have reper-
  cussions throughout the Commonality.
  Plot Stress
  In this episode, the PCs are “on the clock”, as the intensifying 
  “Brightening” appears to be leading up to an apocalyptic 
  event. We’re using Plot Stress (Mindjammer page 432) to 
  track this countdown.
  PLOT STRESS ACTIONS
  PLOT STRESS CONSEQUENCES
  The Brightening Countdown to Singularity: 1  2
  Action
  Plot Stress 
  Inflicted
  The PCs travel between planets in the Jessila 
  system.
  1 point
  The PCs stop for an in-depth investigation or 
  analysis period.
  1 point
  The PCs attempt to enlist the assistance of outside 
  forces (SCI Force, the Jessilan military, etc).
  1 point
  The PCs engage in a physical or mental conflict.
  1 point
  Consequence
  Description
  Mild (-2)
  Unrest: As the Brightening is increasing, 
  people throughout the system panic at the 
  unfathomable events. PCs approaching official 
  facilities or population centres are subject to 
  spontaneous attacks by groups of panicking 
  civilians (figure a 4-person group of Average 
  (+1) minor NPCs per PC).
  Moderate (-4)
  Blue Fugue: The Brightening becomes A Daz-
  zling Visual Distraction, and Blues everywhere 
  suffer from Periodic Bouts of a Fugue State 
  lasting up to several minutes at a time. This is 
  similar to the Moment of Transparency (page 
  52).
  Severe (-6)
  Time Is Running Out! As the 30 hours 
  approach their end, the glow surrounding the 
  planet Blue is twice as bright as the brightest 
  sun Jessila or Blue have ever seen.
  Taken Out
  Transparency Achieved! See Epilogue: The 
  Chaos of Blue Vanishing (page 70) for more.
  
  62
  Scene 1: The Brightening Begins
  Without warning, the very air on the world of Blue begins to 
  glow—an effect that’s visible from space!
  Location: Anywhere in the Jessila system.
  THE HOOK
  Despite attempts to suppress it, news breaks throughout 
  the Jessilan system that an astounding event is unfolding on 
  the planet Blue. There, the whole planet has begun to glow 
  faintly. The reason is unknown. The glow appears to follow 
  certain “lines” criss-crossing the planet, and already it’s start-
  ing to intensify, gradually becoming brighter. 
  WHAT IS THE 3SI DOING?
  During this scene, regardless of the PCs actions, the 3SI are 
  reacting rapidly to the developing situation, trying to gather 
  information and work out how long they have until transpar-
  ency is achieved. At this point they’re in a similar situation to 
  the PCs.
  TRYING TO ANALYSE THE GLOW
  The PCs may try to analyse the glow. As above, conducting an 
  analysis incurs one point of plot stress.  
  First, the PCs must gather data, requiring equipment such 
  as starship sensors (from orbit), or a PSA, hand scanner, or 
  other sensorview-enabled gear from the planet’s surface.
  Second, they must analyse the data. This is a Fair (+2) roll of 
  Science. 
  • 
  Analysis automatically reveals the glow is following the 
  path of the waterpoints and niche halts on the bridges of 
  Blue. 
  • 
  On a successful roll, the PCs discover the magnitude of the 
  “Brightening” is increasing exponentially, and will reach a 
  “singularity” in less than 30 hours.
  • 
  On a success with style, the PCs discover the data are 
  similar to a little-studied set of signals detected on Blue 
  immediately prior to the “die off” of the planetary biome 
  before Barrier Fall six hundred standard years ago (page 
  8). 
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
    
   
    
   
   
  Blue Fugue: The Contact With 
  Transparency
  At some point during this episode the players will incur suf-
  ficient plot stress to unlock the moderate (-4) consequence 
  Blue Fugue. Alternatively, as GM you may simply declare 
  that point to be reached. 
  Thereafter, anyone in the Jessila system may make 
  occasional spasmodic contact with a “Blue exomemory 
  store”—a “planetary exomemory” which the Blues will call 
  Transparency. It’s the same as the phenomenon contacted 
  in the “Moment of Transparency” (page 52).
  It’s possible to attempt to communicate with or even 
  query Transparency using the Mindscape and sensorview. 
  However, unlike the Mindscape, Transparency appears to be 
  in some way conscious—although completely beyond any 
  human capacity to understand. In game terms, Transparen-
  cy has a higher Evolutionary Index than even the Hermetic 
  Blues: Posthuman (+5), indicating a +5 obstacle to mutual 
  comprehension and perception between it and the PCs. 
  Treat communicating with Transparency as a Superb 
  (+5) mindburn attack against a character’s Will. If the PC 
  wins, he comes away from the communication, awed and 
  impressed, but with some information. If not, he suffers an 
  appropriate amount of mental stress.
  On a success, the PC understands that Transparency is 
  somehow opening “conduits” in the fabric of space-time to 
  communicate, almost as if it’s a ZIP cell or currently travel-
  ling in 2-space; sensorview will even detect signals similar to 
  a tachyon distortion field (a 2-space wake). 
  On a success with style, the PC will experience a contact 
  with a vast and superior intelligence: Transparency itself. 
  There is some kind of mind there!
  
  63
  Adventure: Transparency
  WHERE NEXT?
  The PCs have free rein. If they’re aware of the Sapphire Vault, 
  they may try to locate and enter it: see Scene 2: Getting Into 
  the Vault. Alternatively, they may travel within the Jessilan 
  system: see Scene 4: Against a Background of Evacuation.
  Scene 2: Getting Into the Vault
  In this scene, the PCs attempt to enter the secret “Sapphire Vault” 
  of the Hermetic Blues—despite the security measures arrayed 
  against them!
  Location: Either the Vault Zone on Blue, or any link portal 
  in the Jessila system. 
  THE HOOK
  Numerous clues have been pointing to the Sapphire Vault on 
  Blue as a focus for the current incomprehensible yet worrying 
  Hermetic activity in the Jessila system—and perhaps even its 
  key. The PCs may attempt to locate the entrance to the Vault 
  and force their way in; or they may use a link portal (page 19) 
  to “gate” directly in. 
  FORCING YOUR WAY INTO THE VAULT
  Locating the Vault is a task in itself. Even approaching the 
  Vault Zone will result in the PCs being warned off by Blue 
  Planet Command, an airborne defence force run by the Jes-
  silan system government. It’s a Great (+4) contest of Active 
  Sensing or Passive Sensing to locate the Vault on the ocean 
  floor; on a failure, the PCs are attacked by a BPC Orbital 
  Defender (use the stats for the System Patrol Boat on Mind-
  jammer page 241). The characters may have contacts, etc, 
  they can draw on for advantages in the contest.
  Once the PCs have located the Vault entrance, they’ll have 
  to descend to the ocean floor and enter the airlock of Contact 
  Command and Control (CCC) (page 64), at which point 
  they’ll be engaged by the 3SI forces situated at the entrance 
  to the Vault to deter intruders. This will be a difficult fight, 
  but with thought, good tactics, and a little luck, the PCs can 
  prevail.
  At this point, figure that the 3SI force will comprise all 
  of the remaining personnel in Gel-Gul Faraqisti’s team, plus 
  an additional annihilator synthetic (page 50) and one group 
  of 3 equivocal measures specialists (page 50). Note that this 
  could be up to 5 annihilator synthetics and two groups of 3 
  EM specialists, though it’ll likely be less. They’ll attack using 
  unequivocal measures; this is no longer a political confron-
  tation, but a desperate attempt by the 3SI to wipe out any 
  opposition before they can disrupt the Hermetics’ plan. 
  Once the 3SI forces are neutralised, the PCs can enter the 
  Vault. 
  USING A PORTAL TO GET INTO THE VAULT
  So far there is only one set of link portals in the Jessila system 
  (page 19). However, it’s possible that one of the “entangle-
  ment paths” in Episode Two Scene 4: The Barrier Flickers 
  above will point to a terminus in the Beacon asteroid. Also 
  (see page 60), the Promise may be used to activate a Blue 
  bridge niche halt as a portal into the Vault.
  Passing through a link portal is a similar experience to 
  using a 3-space far gate, except in this case you’re on foot, 
  not inside a reinforced craft, and therefore likely feel rather 
  exposed. Passing through appears instantaneous (there’s 
  actually a slight delay, depending on how close you are to 
  the Vault), and takes the character directly to Secundacule 
  Gamma (C) (page 64).
  WHERE NEXT?
  If the PCs do manage to enter the Sapphire Vault, then you’ll 
  probably want to use Scene 3: Exploring the Sapphire Vault 
  next.
  SUPPORTING CONSTRUCT
  Physical Stress: 1  2  3  4  
  Systems Stress: 1  2  3
  Consequences: 1 mild + 1 moderate
  Scale: Huge (+2)
  Aspects: Commonality Strong Point on the Edge of 
  the Alien Unknown; The Only Way Is Up Or Down; 
  Let’s Make Sure We Don’t Start A War; The Illusion of 
  Control; Reactive Policy.
  Skills: Great (+4) Knowledge, Passive Sensing; Good 
  (+3) Hull Strength, Intrusion; Fair (+2) Systems, 
  Technical; Average (+1) Active Sensing, Close Combat, 
  Ranged Combat.
  STUNTS
   Beat Them At Their Own Game: +2 Intrusion 
  overcome and create advantage bonus to enter zone 
  closed to constructs.
   Passenger Accommodation: Accommodations 
  for 20 crew.
   Top Urgency: +2 to Passive Sensing when on top 
  urgency alert.
  EXTRAS
  ê ECM Array: +2 defend bonus vs EW and 
  Mindscape attacks.
  ê Makepoint: Produce basic materials and small 
  items of equipment.
  CONTACT COMMAND AND 
  CONTROL
  
  Scene 3: Exploring the Sapphire Vault
  In this scene, the PCs penetrate the mysterious Sapphire Vault of 
  the Hermetic Blues.
  Location: Inside the bizarre and incomprehensible Sap-
  phire Vault of the Hermetic Blues.
  THE HOOK
  The PCs have entered the Sapphire Vault, and are now explor-
  ing, either more or less at random, or looking for a way of 
  understanding or even managing the Brightening.
  THE SAPPHIRE VAULT
  The Sapphire Vault is a vast artificial cavern system lying 500 
  metres beneath the ocean floor of the planet Blue. Compris-
  ing three main caverns, the complex is approximately 19km 
  wide by 18km long, a total of some 350 square kilometres. 
  The Vault is highly coloured in blues, whites, and pale tur-
  quoises. The ceiling, far above, goes through a luminosity cycle 
  in tandem with the day-night cycle of the planet above. The 
  caverns themselves contain a complete biome of prelapsarian 
  Blue life forms, all of which appear to be specifically tailored 
  to help the Hermetic Blues, and many of which blur the lines 
  between life form and artefact. Examples include the Feeder 
  Breeders and The Clean Up Crew. Many of these are dangerous 
  to intruders such as humans and even non-Hermetic Blues.
  There are artefacts in the Sapphire Vault which are clearly 
  not life forms, and which appear to be self-maintaining 
  prelapsarian devices. These appear to respond to unconscious 
  controls from the Hermetics, and perhaps also conscious 
  commands. 
  Some 20,000 Hermetics live in the Sapphire Vault, con-
  centrated mostly in three main settlements. All are engaged 
  in unfathomable activities which in fact are a re-run of their 
  failed attempt to go post some six hundred standard years 
  ago. They’ve spend the intervening period attempting to 
  understand what went wrong; this time, they believe they’ve 
  got it right. 
  SAPPHIRE VAULT AREAS
  • 
  Aqua Secreted: This is the most mysterious of the Her-
  metic settlements. Almost all of us is underwater; flooded, 
  but possibly deliberately so. A dazzling column of light 
  which emerges from the water marks the location of 
  “Brightening Control” (page 68).
  • 
  Contact Command & Control (CCC): SCI Force and the 
  3SI have a presence here; they’re bitter rivals. Teams are 
  engaged in observation of the whole Sapphire Vault 
  remotely: they try to avoid entering the Vault in person as 
  it can be very dangerous, from both Hermetic patrols and 
  the life form / artefacts of the Vault biome. 
  • 
  Primacule: The Primacule settlement comprises three 
  hemispherical settlement craters, with strange Hermetic 
  structures which may serve as dwellings for as many as six 
  thousand Hermetic Blues. Most are concentrated about 
  the Codex Spire at Primacule Alpha’s northern end.
  • 
  Secundacule: The Secundacule settlement has a triangu-
  lar structure, with each settlement crater connected to the 
  other two. There are some four thousand Hermetic Blues 
  here, and much of the settlement crater area is covered 
  with biome flora. Secundacule Gamma (c) is unremarkable 
  except for the fact that it’s the destination of link portal 
  transits into the Sapphire Vault.
  • 
  Terticule Alpha: There is only one settlement crater in 
  Terticule, and it’s flooded right up to the brim. Beneath 
  the waters is the submerged settlement of Aqua Secreted 
  and its dazzling column of light.
  • 
  Vault One: The dimmest of the three vaults, lit only by the 
  varying ambient light from the cavern ceiling. The biome 
  here is relatively slow moving.
  • 
  Vault Two: The median vault, bisected by a long narrow 
  “lake” of water 250 metres wide at its narrowest point, and 
  up to 1km deep. The biome here is similar to that on the 
  surface of Blue, if more diverse.
  • 
  Vault Three: The brightest of the third vault is lit by the 
  great pillar of light emanating from the submerged settle-
  ment of Aqua Secreted.
  SAPPHIRE VAULT
  Contact Command & 
  Control (CCC)
  Aqua 
  Secreted
  A
  B
  C
  A
  B
  C
  VAULT ONE
  VAULT TWO
  VAULT THREE
  primacule
  secundacule
  TerTicule 
  alpha
  Kilometres
  0
  1
  2
  3
  4
  5
  
  65
  Adventure: Transparency
  FIGHTING BETWEEN THE BLUES
  Once the PCs have penetrated the Sapphire Vault, they’ll 
  be fair game for the Hermetics’ lethal defences, which will 
  immediately start tracking them down. Each time the PCs 
  move between locations in the Sapphire Vault (see the 
  adjacent map), have them make a Stealth roll against the Epic 
  (+7) detection abilities of the Hermetics. If they fail, then a 
  Hermetic excision team (below) will descend from the “sky” 
  on grav suspensors to wipe them out.
  This will be a desperate struggle: the Hermetics have 
  made unequivocal measures into a fine art, and the PCs are 
  trespassing on their innermost control centres at a criti-
  cal moment in their species’ evolution. If you want to have 
  mercy on the PCs, have the excision team target any non-PCs 
  on their side first, and be generous when adjudicating PC 
  concessions. It’s perfectly likely that the PCs will keep getting 
  driven off by excision teams until they finally manage to 
  sneak through to their destination (see ”The Nature of the 
  Brightening” below).  
  Each excision team comprises at least one Hermetic 
  exciser and one squad of Hermetic exterminators. You can 
  beef this up if your PCs are armed for bear, but we recom-
  mend having no more than two excisers. Note also that if the 
  3SI are still at large they may well team up with the excision 
  team!
  THE NATURE OF THE BRIGHTENING
  Wherever the PCs are in the Sapphire Vault, their surround-
  ings will be illuminated by a bright and rapidly shimmering 
  glow emanating from Vault Three. Specifically this is a blin-
  GROUP OF 5 GOOD (+3)
  MINOR NPCS
  Stress: 1  2   1  2   1  2   1  2   1  2  
  Scale: Medium (+0)
  Aspects: Wiping Out the Primitive Life Form 
  Infestation
  Skills: Good (+3) Ranged Combat; Fair (+2) Notice; 
  Average (+1) Athletics, Provoke (+4 teamwork bonus).
  A SQUAD OF HERMETIC 
  EXTERMINATORS
  SUPPORTING NPC
  Physical Stress:  1  2  3  4
  Mental Stress:  1  2  3  4
  Consequences: 3 mild + 1 moderate.
  Scale: Medium (+0).
  Evolution Index: +4 (+3 difficulty to comprehend and 
  perceive Commonality humans).
  Exoscale: +4 (-6 penalty for Hermetics to perceive 
  Commonality humans, +12 shifts on success; +6 bonus for 
  Commonality humans to perceive Hermetics, -12 shifts on 
  success).
  Aspects: Coldly Alien Destroyer; Difficulty Perceiving 
  Primitive Humans; Indomitable Pursuit; Total Awareness 
  of the Sapphire Vault; The Project Is the Only Goal.
  Manifestations: Sensorium: Radio Sense (Wave Gland); 
  Comms: Wave Gland and Heart Strings; Integral Part of 
  Transcending Species Massmind; Voluntary Abdication 
  From Temporal Flow.
  Skills: Transcendent (+11) Science; Posthuman (+10) 
  Investigate; Transhuman (+9) Notice; Legendary (+8) 
  Knowledge, Will; Epic (+7) Physique, Ranged Combat; 
  Fantastic (+6) Athletics, Provoke.
  STUNTS
   Ghostless Shell: +2 Stealth bonus to hide from view, 
  even to sensors and synthetic senses.
   The Power of Deduction: 1/scene, spend a fate point 
  to discover / create one aspect per shift on target of 
  Investigate roll; you get one free invoke.
   Sensor Scan: Use sensorview and Notice for passive 
  sensing construct actions.
  EXTRAS
  ê Damper Field: Any shifts of physical damage hitting the 
  exciser must roll to beat Superb (+5), or no damage is done.
  ê Excision Field Projector: Causes a 1m sphere of matter 
  to disappear in a blinding flash of heat and light. Weapon : 
  6, range 2 ; any consequences represent matter which is 
  simply gone, and must be regenerated. Physical armour 
  has no effect, but energy shields do. If used in 2-space, 
  this causes a cataclysmic explosion, destroying the ship 
  and precipitating the debris back into n-space; Globe of 
  Annihilation.
  ê Grav Suspensors: Use Athletics as Pilot; move and 
  attack up to 2 zones away.
  ê Mental Blast: Use Provoke to make attacks causing 
  physical stress damage.
  ê Prescience Routines: For a fate point, make an 
  Empathy, Investigate, Knowledge, Notice, Science, etc, 
  create advantage roll to create a prediction
  HERMETIC EXCISER
  
  66
  dingly bright column of energy which is emerging from the 
  centre of the Aqua Secreted Hermetic settlement in Terticule 
  Alpha (page 64). Fair (+2) analysis rolls will liken this energy 
  column to the 2-space lattice which covers a planeship shortly 
  before it translates into 2-space. It’s rising from the heart of 
  Aqua Secreted; it’s about 50 metres in diameter, and rises 
  straight up and through the cavernous ceiling of the Vault.
  If the PCs make it through to Aqua Secreted, they’ll 
  encounter no opposition until they attempt to enter Bright-
  ening Control, the complex and intricately-fluted facility at 
  the heart of the city. At that point, see “Destroying Brighten-
  ing Control” on page 68 below.
  WHAT IS THE 3SI DOING?
  If there are any survivors of Gel-Gul Faraqisti’s team (page 
  50), they’ll now be at large in the Sapphire Vault, perhaps 
  even cooperating with the Hermetics and attempting to 
  hunt down and wipe out the PCs. Whenever the PCs attempt 
  to move between locations in the Vault, they must make a 
  Stealth roll against the 3SI team’s Superb (+5) detection abili-
  ties to avoid being tracked down and attacked. 
  WHERE NEXT?
  If the PCs make an attempt on the Brightening energy beam, 
  see Scene 5: Stopping the Brightening (Destroying Bright-
  ening Control). If they retreat from the Sapphire Vault back 
  out into the Jessila system, see Scene 4: Against a Back-
  ground of Evacuation.
  Scene 4: Against a Background of Evacuation
  In this scene, the PCs are undertaking other actions in the Jes-
  sila system, while around them rages the panic caused by the 
  Brightening!
  Location: Anywhere in the Jessila system.
  THE HOOK
  The PCs are attempting other actions elsewhere in the Jessila 
  system during the Brightening. There’s a lot of panicking, 
  and political chaos, and the security situation is deteriorating 
  rapidly.
  PANIC
  The Commonality and factions in the Jessilan government are 
  attempting to evacuate Blue, and some are even readying to 
  leave the system. Preparations are underway everywhere. As 
  people see these preparations, they start to panic, and some 
  are already getting hurt.
  If the PCs attempt any actions on a planet at this point, 
  this is the first thing they’ll come across. They may attempt 
  to intervene, trying to calm people down, seize the initiative, 
  and lead them to safety.
  Calming the panicking mobs is a Great (+4) contest of 
  Rapport, or any other appropriate skill. On any failure, the PCs 
  incur an Out of Control Crowds aspect, and the PC which made 
  the roll incurs physical stress equal to the negative shifts; 
  armour or force fields have no effect.
  If the PCs lose the contest, they find themselves attacked 
  by the panicking crowds: see “Fighting” below. 
  On a success, the PCs lead victims of the panic to safety, 
  and gain a Calmed and Controlled Civilians aspect. 
  FIGHTING
  The PCs find themselves under attack from panicking crowds! 
  They are likely to be stirred up by talk of Hermetics and Resto-
  rationists, and of course by the weird light beams illuminating 
  Blue and locations throughout the system. 
  Whenever the PCs find themselves under attack this way, 
  figure each is attacked by 4 Average (+1) minor NPCs.
  OBSERVERS
  A successful Fair (+2) Notice or Passive Sensing roll while 
  travelling the Jessila system will notice that, just as vessels 
  and people are preparing themselves to flee or take shelter, 
  just as equally other forces are readying themselves to stay 
  put and take measurements, observing the progression of the 
  Blue event. 
  Who are these people? It’s obvious at first glance they’re 
  from the Commonality. A Fair (+2) Investigate roll using the 
  Mindscape reveals they’ve been preparing for some time; 
  the PCs may identify members of SCI Force, 3SI and other 
  instrumentalities and ministries; but there are other figures 
  here, too.
  On a success with style, the PCs track the observers to a 
  special monitoring post, either on planet or in space, where a 
  large array of detection and observation equipment, moni-
  tors, recorders, and drones has been set up to observe the 
  planet Blue and other locations in-system. Characters making 
  Stealth rolls may get close to the observation equipment, 
  and a successful Investigation or Science roll reveals that the 
  procedures being followed are more those one would expect 
  of a first contact mission rather than an astronomical event. 
  GROUP OF 4 AVERAGE 
  (+1) MINOR NPCS
  Stress:    
  Scale: Medium (+0)
  Aspects: Terrifying Mindless Mob Driven By 
  Hysterical Fear.
  Skills: Average (+1) Unarmed Combat (+3 teamwork 
  bonus).
  THE PANICKING MOB 
  LASHES OUT
  
   
  WHERE NEXT?
  If the PCs try to thwart the Brightening, go to Scene 5: 
  Stopping the Brightening. Otherwise, go to Epilogue: 
  Transparency Achieved (The Chaos of Blue Vanishing).
  Scene 5: Stopping the Brightening
  The PCs finally work out a way to potentially stop the Brighten-
  ing! Will they succeed, and what will the consequences be?
  Location: Inside or near the Sapphire Vault; or even 
  attacking it from orbit, via the link portals, etc.
  THE HOOK
  As the clock is ticking away and the Brightening approaching 
  singularity, the PCs may try to stop it. There are several ways 
  to approach this (see “Other Ways of Stopping the Brighten-
  ing” below), but principally in this scene we’re looking at the 
  PCs creating a devastating and disruptive explosion. In game 
  terms, this is a challenge (Mindjammer page 147).
  ANALYSING THE PROBLEM
  Once again, the PCs are going to try and create a theory 
  (see page 53), this time to answer the question “How can we 
  disrupt the Brightening?” It’s a Fair (+2) contest of Science or 
  another appropriate skill; the PCs may have aspects remain-
  ing from analysing the Blue field device activation event 
  (page 52) which may be invoked. Each exchange of this con-
  test causes 1 point of plot stress (see page 61), applied either 
  piecemeal or in total (it’s the player’s choice).
  On a failure, the PCs are stumped, and must try something 
  else (although they may succeed at a cost). On a success, the 
  PCs may come up with an explanation of a way to disrupt the 
  Brightening, in the form of an aspect. This may be anything 
  which makes logical sense; for the purposes of this scene, 
  we’re going to declare that the Brightening is being powered 
  by the Hermetic connection to Transparency, and that con-
  nection may be disrupted by a “3-space pulse” detonated just 
  at the moment of singularity: A 3-Space Pulse Will Disrupt the 
  Transparency Singularity! 
  The PCs need to build a “3-space torpedo”!
  CREATING THE 3-SPACE TORPEDO
  If working out how to disrupt the Brightening was a Science 
  roll, actually constructing a “3-space torpedo” is a Technical 
  roll. Let the PCs declare what they need: we suggest some 
  pretty heavy duty gear: probably a set of planing engines, 
  with optional situation aspects provided by the Promise, a 
  link portal, and / or a torsion field projector.
  The Technical roll is against a Superb (+5) opposition. 
  Failure isn’t a failure to create the torpedo, but rather a suc-
  cess at a cost; its detonation is going to damage the PCs or 
  their vessel. On a success, the PCs may once again create an 
  appropriate aspect, such as This Torpedo Will Send Shockwaves 
  Through 3-Space! 
  DETONATING THE TORPEDO
  The third part of the challenge is actually detonating the 
  torpedo at the right place at just the right moment. When the 
  Brightening reaches its exponential singularity, the fabric of 
  space-time will begin to unravel, creating a breach—and that’s 
  exactly where the PCs need to focus their disruption. 
  Now, there’s no doubt about the torpedo actually detonat-
  ing, but the PCs are going to make a Ranged Combat roll to 
  target it precisely at one of the space-time interstices being 
  opened. 
  This can be done anywhere in the Jessila system; there are 
  interstices opening everywhere, like threads of lightning. It’s 
  probably most dramatic closer to Blue, where the “lightning 
  threads” are converging. 
  Targeting the 3-space torpedo is a Superb (+5) Ranged 
  Combat roll. The PCs may invoke aspects from creating the 
  torpedo, as well as any other aspects. 
  On a success, the torpedo explodes with a brilliant flash, 
  disrupting the Brightening and sending tsunami of stupen-
  dously powerful space-time disturbance tearing throughout 
  the Jessilan system. Stress how incredible these forces are: 
  there are earthquakes on all the system’s planets in the system, 
  and a series of coronal mass ejections which immediately begin 
  to disrupt communications in the system—the star storm.
  The torpedo stops the Brightening in its tracks!
  
  68
  On a failure, either the torpedo explodes but doesn’t stop 
  the Brightening (see The Chaos of Blue Vanishing on page 
  70), or the PCs select a success at a cost. In this case, make 
  sure the cost is commensurate; damaging or wrecking the 
  ship, hideously mutating one of the PCs bodies with bizarre 
  space-time re-alignments, and so on, are appropriate.
  BUT WAIT—WHAT’S THIS? A PULSE DRAGON PHENOMENON!
  Disrupting the Brightening by means of a “3-space disturbance” 
  has a major twist: it causes an instance of the Pulse Dragon 
  Phenomenon (Mindjammer page 92)! The space-time breaches 
  throughout the Jessilan system disrupted by the 3-space tor-
  pedo become “doorways” for strange sinuous belts of writhing 
  space-time fabric, which a Knowledge roll or other appropriate 
  roll quite unbelievably determines are pulse dragons!
  This is an unprecedented chance to analyse this rare yet 
  lethal phenomenon. And yet it wreaks havoc: any nearby craft 
  are destroyed; in the case of any serious costs being incurred, this 
  may mean the PCs’ craft, too. The only real defence is to run away.
  The pulse dragon phenomenon appears in orbit around Blue, 
  and descends towards the Sapphire Vault. There are earthquakes, 
  huge tsunamis. The Sapphire Vault is completely wiped out.
  If the PCs want to retrieve anything, or make close observa-
  tions of the phenomenon, a Fantastic (+6) Pilot roll is required. 
  On a failure, the PCs’ vessel incurs consequences equal to the 
  negative shifts. See The Chaos of the Pulse Dragon Phenom-
  enon for the aftermath, including observations.
  OTHER WAYS OF STOPPING THE BRIGHTENING
  The 3-space torpedo isn’t the only way of stopping the Bright-
  ening—although it may be the most obvious. You should allow 
  pretty much any decent idea the PCs come up with to have a 
  reasonable chance of success, as long as it all sounds suitably 
  scientific, risky, and at least vaguely like it makes sense. In addi-
  tion to the “disruption” solution, you may find the PCs’ ideas 
  may also end up as variants on the following two solutions: 
  DESTROYING BRIGHTENING CONTROL
  This is extremely difficult. It’s an attack on the Brightening 
  Control in the Aqua Secreted settlement in Terticule Alpha, in 
  the Sapphire Vault (page 64). Assuming the PCs can physi-
  cally get to Brightening Control (see Scene 3: Exploring the 
  Sapphire Vault, above), they must then take out the facility 
  by mustering as much firepower as they can. The stats below 
  portray Brightening Control as a Huge (+2) construct; note 
  that scale effects (Mindjammer page 174) apply, making it 
  difficult for the PCs to do sufficient damage unless they have 
  highly destructive weaponry.
  If the PCs destroy Brightening Control, it will stop the 
  Brightening in its tracks. However, this time there won’t be a 
  pulse dragon phenomenon; instead, see The Chaos of Trans-
  parency Denied in the Epilogue, below.
  MANIPULATING THE COSMIC MANIFOLD
  In this case, the PCs’ theory about how to disrupt the Brightening 
  focuses on what the Brightening is actually doing. It’s a Fair (+2) 
  contest of Science or another appropriate roll, and the PCs may 
  have aspects to invoke. Each exchange of the contest causes 1 
  point of plot stress (see page 61), piecemeal or totalled.
  On a failure, the PCs are stumped, and must try something 
  else (although they may succeed at a cost). On a success, 
  they come up with an explanation of what the Brightening 
  is doing, and how to stop it, in the form of an aspect. This 
  time, in our explanation (and remember—your game may 
  decide differently!), we’re going to declare that the Hermet-
  ics are trying to move their entire species and indeed their 
  whole planet into the “inter-brane flux” which exists between 
  the membranes of the manifold universe—a transcendence 
  which will take them outside space-time itself! To stop this, 
  the PCs will somehow have to “displace” the inter-brane flux, 
  “sliding it to one side” so that the destination of the Brighten-
  ing is no longer the flux, but instead an alternate universe! 
  Displacing the Inter-Brane Flux Will Prevent the Hermetics From 
  Taking Blue Out of Space-Time! 
  The PCs follow a similar process to creating the 3-space 
  torpedo. Next, they must come up with a technical solution 
  for displacing the inter-brane flux! Again let them declare 
  what they need: probably planing engines again, maybe 
  3-space knowledge, a link portal, even the Promise, a set of 
  gravity cannon, and so on. It’s a Superb (+5) Technical roll 
  again, with failure resulting in success at a cost. On a success, 
  let the PCs come up with an appropriate aspect such as We 
  Are About to Manipulate the Cosmic Manifold!
  SUPPORTING CONSTRUCT
  Physical Stress:  1  2  
  Systems Stress:  1  2  3  
  Consequences: 1 mild + 1 moderate
  Scale: Huge (+2)
  Aspects: Uncanny Translucent Hermetic Structure; 
  The Heart of the Labyrinthine Terticule Assembly; 
  Incomprehensible Structures; Coordinated Blues; 
  Terrifying Energies.
  Skills: Great (+4) Close Combat, Ranged Combat; 
  Good (+3) Active Sensing, EW; Fair (+2) Passive 
  Sensing, Systems.
  STUNTS
   Direct Denial Attack: +2 EW create an advantage 
  bonus to cow the opposition.
   Distributed Systems: +2 Systems defend bonus 
  against attempts to overwhelm your systems.
  BRIGHTENING CONTROL
  
  Finally, have the PCs make a Superb (+5) Ranged Combat 
  (or possibly Technical) roll at the moment of Brightening 
  singularity to properly “displace” the cosmic manifold and 
  redirect the Hermetics’ attempt from the inter-brane flux. 
  On a success, the Brightening fails, but without disturbing 
  3-space! The Hermetics’ attempt at transcendence is thrown 
  back on its beginnings, and they’ll have to work out what 
  went wrong—again! See The Chaos of Transparency Denied 
  in the Epilogue. But before that happens…
  A PARALLEL UNIVERSE…
  As a reward for the PCs’ ingenuity, before the membrane inter-
  stices close, they gain a brief glimpse into an alternate universe. 
  Make a big deal of this: right in front of them, on their sensors, 
  sending readings completely off the scale, is an alternate, parallel 
  universe. The laws of physics as we know them no longer hold. 
  Awesome vistas spread out before them; maybe there are no 
  stars, but weirdly fluctuating clouds of actinic light. Maybe there 
  are hints of huge cosmic topography, unfathomable structures 
  hundreds and thousands of light years long. Flickering corusca-
  tions blink across their field of vision, flashing organised patterns 
  tantalisingly suggestive of life of an entirely different nature…
  Treat this as a special advancement milestone. Any PC can 
  change an aspect or stunt (including buying new ones if they 
  have sufficient refresh) to represent the fantastic and esoteric 
  knowledge they’re gaining from this. Let your players go to 
  town; have they invented a prototype interdimensional drive? 
  Communicated with a cosmic intelligence? Acquired a view on 
  life and the universe which gives them almost messianic inspira-
  tions? This is the sort of experience which will one day take the 
  Commonality to tech index 11 and beyond, so enjoy yourself…
  And, of course, the PCs will end up on the radar of the 
  3SI—Hounded For Information By the 3SI!
  WHERE NEXT?
  Go to the Epilogue!
  
  70
  EPILOGUE: TRANSPARENCY 
  ACHIEVED?
  At this point the Transparency scenario is over. All that remains 
  is to tie up loose ends; to reaffirm what on earth just happened, 
  and determine what the benefits—and consequences—were, 
  both to the PCs and the Commonality as a whole. 
  The Chaos of Blue Vanishing
  If the PCs fail to stop the Brightening, its glow finally becomes 
  impossibly bright as it reaches its exponential singularity. The 
  Blues on the planet Blue become euphoric, ecstatic, then cease 
  interacting with the outside world, entering some kind of trance-
  like communion. The glow flares to unbearable levels, and the 
  whole planet disappears! A huge gravity quake tears through the 
  Jessila star system—destructive to nearby vessels, moons, etc, 
  but even causing quakes on Jessila. The PCs must make a Superb 
  (+5) Pilot roll or suffer consequences equal to the shifts of failure. 
  The PCs have witnessed some kind of transcendence—an 
  entire species “going post”! There are Blue survivors—those 
  who weren’t on the planet Blue—who briefly remember 
  the experience of Transparency before the planet vanished. 
  Beyond a feeling of breathless enlightenment, all they now 
  know is that they’re no longer intelligent enough to under-
  stand or explain the experience. 
  Where did the Blues go? All analyses point to some kind of 
  transference into interstices between the membranes of the 
  cosmic manifold—“dimensions” parallel to all points in space-
  time, but outside of it. Human comprehension begins to fail, 
  but hyperintelligences and gestalt linguists will be exploring 
  the ramifications for years to come.  
  The Chaos of the Pulse Dragon Phenomenon
  If the PCs stop the Brightening by explosively disrupting the 
  fabric of 3-space, this also causes a near-cataclysmic pulse 
  dragon phenomenon. 
  The Hermetics of the Sapphire Vault are probably all 
  destroyed, as is the Vault itself, and likely the greater part of 
  the 3SI contingent in the system. Everyone is freaking out that 
  the Pulse Dragon Phenomenon manifested itself inside the 
  gravity well of a star system—the first ever recorded in almost 
  200 years of observations—completely independent of the 
  operation of planing machines. But it was clearly the Phe-
  nomenon—so what happened? Is the whole Commonality in 
  danger from this new development?
  Theories abound, and many opportunities for learning. 
  Let the PCs come up with new theories if they like (page 53). 
  Perhaps it was the 3-space disruption caused by the 3-space 
  torpedo’s energy pulse that caused the pulse dragon phe-
  nomenon to occur? Or was it merely a by-product? Does the 
  phenomenon somehow power itself from 3-space energy? Or 
  was it trying to shut down the 3-space pulse, or even prevent 
  further uses of the 3-space torpedo? 
  In the ensuing chaos, regardless of any theories, the 
  surviving members of the 3SI immediately leave the Jessilan 
  system, bound for the Core Worlds.
  The Chaos of Transparency Denied
  If the PCs stop the Brightening without precipitating a Pulse 
  Dragon Phenomenon (ie by destroying Brightening Control or 
  manipulating the cosmic manifold), the Hermetics may well 
  still be at large—although tensions may be extremely high if 
  they even suspect that they’ve been deliberately thwarted. 
  However, there are now major technological advances to 
  be looked into: the possibilities of interdimensional travel, 
  3-space manipulation, even 3-space gating directly onto 
  planetary surfaces. Let the PCs make theories and conduct 
  research as above, if they like. If they’re successful, they may 
  be responsible for a tech capability boost (Mindjammer page 
  297) for the entire Commonality. This will give them enor-
  mous kudos in Commonality circles—and they get to name 
  their theories and the phenomena they’ve discovered after 
  themselves, if they like. 
  
  Player Handouts
  71
  ALIENIST POLAR ICE 
  TEMPLE
  The Promise
  Haze Field
  * Airlocks & Guard 
  Stations
  Central 
  Pressurised Area
  Pedestal
  *
  400m
  200m
  *
  *
  *
  ENDURANCE STATION
  Sand
  Sable Rose 
  Hotel
  Elevation View
  1200 metres
  Ring River
  Blue Emerald 
  Hotel
  Hotel 
  Victor
  Nightline Hotel
  Sea
  Forest
  The 
  Conduit
  Monitoring & 
  Transceiver Arrays
  Docking & 
  Landing Bays
  
  Player Handouts
  72
  THE DEVICE CHAMBER
  SAPPHIRE VAULT
  TOO BLUE FOR YOU
  The New Blue Bar
  
  73
  Index
  INDEX
  Alienism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
  Annihilator Synthetic, The . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
  Anti-Commonality Factions . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
  Arch, The . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
  Avinna . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
  Barrier, The . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
  Barrier Fall  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
  Belt (Jessila IV) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
  Blue (Jessila II) . . . . . . . Inside back cover, 27
  After Barrier Fall . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .28
  Before Barrier Fall . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .26
  Ecosystem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .31
  Blue Field Device, The . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
  Blue Fugue: The Contact With Transparency 
  62
  Blues, The . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15, 17
  and the Mindscape  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .17
  Attitudes to their Past . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .17
  Culture and Behaviour . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .16
  Exointelligence Build . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .17
  Hermetics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .19
  Naming Conventions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .16
  Occupations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .17
  Technology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .18
  Bridge Network . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
  Brightening, The  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61, 65
  Brightening Control . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .68
  Building Paste . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
  Ceiling-Mounted Building Paste I.E.D. . . 46
  Clandestine Surveillance  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
  Cobalt . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
  Contact Command and Control . . . . . . . . 63
  Croaker Verdigris, the Mystical Blue 
  Historian . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
  Default Plot Thread . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
  Device Chamber  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49, 50
  Developing a Theory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
  Creating Theories in Mindjammer . . . .53
  Drulia’s Triumph . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
  Endurance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
  Endurance Station . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .38
  Equipment: Emergency Variform Airlock 56
  Equivocal Measures Specialists, The . . . . 50
  Polar Ice Temple . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37, 56
  Prasong Aerostat, The . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
  Preservations, The . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24, 30
  Promise, The . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55, 60
  Pulse Dragon Phenomenon, The . . . . . . . 68
  Raji’s Place . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
  Recent History . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
  Rediscovery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
  Restorationists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15, 61
  Sanctity-of-Life Principle, The . . . . . . . . . . 45
  Sapphire Vault, The . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
  Security Officer Bo Kumadek . . . . . . . . . . . 60
  Shroud Excimer, the Blue Technician . . . 51
  Sinister Surveillance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
  Social Factions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
  Space Time Fluctuations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
  3-Space Instrumentality, The . . . . . . . . . . . 13
  3-Space Torpedo, The . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
  Too Blue For You. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
  Tracing the Entanglement Paths . . . . . . . 55
  Unity (Jessila V)  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
  Moons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .36
  Universal Appeal of Games of Chance . . 39
  Vault Zone . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
  Vliksun Bridge Dwellings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
  Walgury, the Chembu Survivor. . . . . . . . . 47
  Yoden . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
  Fenda Carmushale, Human Alienist Priest 
  57
  First Contact . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
  Fluorantimony Hex, the Rampaging 
  Hermetic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
  Forge (Jessila I) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
  Gathering City  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
  Gel-Gul Faraqisti. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
  Getting Locked Out of Your Memories . . 54
  Greenstone Asteroid  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
  Harbour (Jessila VI) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
  Hasan’s Rescue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
  Hermetics, The . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
  Hermetic Effect, The . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .19
  Hermetic Exciser . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .65
  Technology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .19
  Information and Exomemory Control . . 53
  Integrationalists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
  Jessila (Jessila III) . . . .Inside front cover, 22
  Colonisation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7, 23
  Commonality Presence. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .13
  Culture  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .10
  Early Jessila . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .21
  Ecosystem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .24
  Future: New Blues or Collapse? . . . . . . . .20
  Government . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12, 54
  Mindscape . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .13
  Timeline . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
  Keeping in the Loop . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
  Link Portals  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19, 55
  Manipulating the Cosmic Manifold . . . . . 68
  Mirrors, The . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
  Moment of Transparency, The . . . . . . . . . . 52
  New Blues, The . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
  Nox Noctis, the Gadget Blue . . . . . . . . . . . 61
  Oculus Forte, the ComInt Negotiator . . . 58
  Parallel Universe. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
  Phenes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .4, 11
  Amphies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .11
  Arboes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .11
  Diversity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .11
  Drylanders . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .11
  Glacers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .12
  Longevity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
  Quatics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .12
  Standers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .12
  Plot Stress . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
  
  Inferior Garden World / United World
  Jessila II is known as “Blue”, and is a 
  beautiful oceanworld, larger than 
  Old Earth, with a higher gravity, 
  and almost completely covered by 
  water. Only 11% of the world is dry 
  land, divided into two medium-sized 
  continents named Jasmine and 
  Lavender, and many dozens of islands 
  in several archipelagos.
  Blue is a unique world. Until some 600 
  standard years ago it was inhabited 
  by an apparently hyper-advanced, 
  near-transcendent alien species, and 
  was cut off from the surrounding 
  universe by an impenetrable force 
  field. 600 years ago the alien “Blue” 
  civilisation and its protective shield 
  fell, for unknown reasons. Today it’s 
  a world of vast and unfathomable 
  ruins, and a small number of devolved 
  alien survivors. Jessilan humans are 
  attempting to settle the world, and 
  joint Commonality / Jessilan research 
  teams are everywhere, trying to make 
  sense of the world.
  Blue’s “capital” is the settlement of Hasan’s 
  Rescue, which also hosts its starport. 
  Other settlements include gargantuan 
  structures of unknown function, often 
  penetrating the upper atmosphere. There 
  are many mysteries on Blue.
  High Concept: Bright Blue 
  Waterworld with a Collapsed Alien 
  Civilisation.
  Aspects: Decadent Aliens in the 
  Ruins of Hyperadvanced Greatness; 
  A New Hybrid Culture; Unfathomable 
  Technologies; Earth-Shattering 
  Mysteries Hidden From View; 
  Scavenger Culture; T-Analogue 
  Biosphere.
  PLANETARY TYPE: INFERIOR 
  GARDEN WORLD
  Planetary Age: Mature (+0).
  Orbit: Inner Habitable Zone (-1): 0.84 AU.
  Year Length: 285d.
  Size: Large Standard (+1): 18,000km.
  Density: Standard (+0).
  Surface Gravity: High Standard (+1): 
  1.3G.
  Day Length: Reduced (-1): 31h.
  Atmospheric Pressure: High (+1): 1.4 
  Old Earth.
  Surface Temperature: Warm (+1) 20°C.
  Surface Liquid: Almost Total (+3): 90% 
  water.
  Seasonality: Low (-2).
  Satellites: 4 planetoids (+1) (Primus, 
  Mystery, Citadel, Rogue).
  Habitability: Agreeable (+3).
  CIVILISATION TYPE: UNITED WORLD
  Designation: Commonality Aligned 
  (+0).
  Population: Low (-2): 350,000 human 
  (115,000 amphies, 235,000 among other 
  phenes); 150,000 Blues.
  Government Type: Representative (-2).
  Societal Dev: Consensus Redistribution 
  Model (+1).
  Openness: Guarded (+0).
  Control Index: Property (-2).
  Trade Index: Low Moderate (-1).
  Embargo: No Embargo.
  Tech Level: T7 (+2): First Age of Space.
  Starport: Hasan’s Rescue, D-class 
  starport (+2).
  Mindscape: Global (-2).
  Culture: Fringe World culture in Stage 
  2: Normalisation. 
  1 hex = 1250km
  BLUE (JESSILA II)
  Cobalt
  Lavender
  V l i k i a n O c e a n
  Ex-Megastructure
  vauLt 
  Zone
  Vliksun 
  Bridge 
  Dwellings
  Jasmine
  Hasan’s 
  Rescue
  Ex-Megastructure
  Ex-Megastructure
  
  ADVENTURE IN THE RUINS
  OF AN ALIEN WORLD
  Blue. A beautiful yet alien world. Until six hundred years ago it was 
  the home of an unimaginably advanced alien species, poised in 
  splendid isolation on the brink of transcendence, refusing even to 
  communicate with the lesser intelligences which had colonised 
  its planetary twin. That’d be us—homo variens, the diverse and 
  curious descendants of the colonists from Old Earth. Even our 
  probes and telescopes were deflected, leaving us with tantalising 
  glimpses of wonders beyond our ability to understand.
  Then, six hundred years ago, the alien civilisation fell. Almost 
  overnight: the lights on the surface of the planet Blue went out, 
  the aliens’ structures seemed to dissolve, and the barrier which 
  had protected them from prying eyes for millennia collapsed. 
  But where had they all gone? Amid magnificent ruins we found 
  devolved life forms, as confused and as uncomprehending as we. 
  None of us ever knew what had been lost. Until now. Now the 
  Blues are back—and no one knows if even the Commonality can 
  resist them. Let’s hope they want to be friends…
  There’s been a murder on the fallen world of Blue, a planet 
  of ragtag survivors and curious human colonists researching 
  the remains of a near-transcendent alien civilisation. But the 
  culprit is stranger than anyone had imagined; and, as factions 
  manoeuvre for influence and control, a mystery is uncovered 
  which threatens to change the Commonality forever!
  BLUE includes:
  • 
  Two whole alien worlds: maps, ecosystems, exointelli-
  gences, cultures, and more;
  • 
  A multi-session adventure of intrigue, conspiracy, and mys-
  tery spanning an entire star system;
  • 
  Secrets of the Commonality and the Mindjammer setting!
  BLUE is a complete adventure supplement for Mindjammer—
  The Roleplaying Game. The Mindjammer—The Roleplaying 
  Game core book is required for play. 
  M i n d j a m m e r
  T
  h
  e
   R o
  l
  e
  p
  l
  a y
  i
  n
  g
   G a
  m
  e
  SKU: MUH042206
  www.mindjammerpress.com
  TM
  
SOURCE: textdata/thevault/FATE (fudge) [multi]/Mindjammer - Fate/Mindjammer - Blue.pdf