Man on the Moon
Written by: Claudia
T. Smith & Andrew Stapleton
A game for 4 to 12 players
Running Time: 2 hours
A new moon base recently established by the United States has become the launching point for an investigation into an underground ‘artifact’ found buried near the base itself. After several objects were recovered and the initial results of tests transmitted to Earth, the majority of base personnel have been recalled using the resident MTEO (Moon-To-Earth-Orbit) craft so a new contingent of scientists and military personnel can take over the base for research and security purposes. The base was built to house 200 workers and administrators but is currently manned by a skeleton crew of military and civilian personnel while new resources and manpower are being gathered for emergency launch from Earth. For the next 4 days, the Mare ___ base is virtually empty but for the 12 people who have remained behind to keep things together until their comrades arrive…
The ‘artifact’ appears to be an underground series of chambers sealed with magnetic locking mechanisms of an unusual design and is still intact and powered despite the apparent age of the surface metal (a ceramic-metal alloy whose age has been tentatively measured at 70 million years, give or take a few million). The locking mechanisms themselves are what triggered sensitive probes of the first lunar orbiting surveillance satellite launched at the same time the base was constructed. The satellite was intended to survey the Moon’s surface for useable resources, including large quantities of ferrous metals close to the surface.
The entrance and most of the first ‘chamber’ has been dug free of loose soil and rocky deposits, exposing it to be 10’ tall, 30’ in diameter with eight evenly space walls, one of which it seems to share with another chamber of a similar design. The metal walls are resistant to everything that’s been brought to bear against it, including high-intensity welding torches, metal acids and the occasional surface impact of small meteors over millions of years…all without a dent or a scratch on the swirling dark-and-light green patterns of the odd alloy. The outer doors themselves are made of the same material, but the locks are the weak points and apparently can be overridden by simply exposing them to a strong, artificially induced electromagnetic field.
The first chamber is completely empty and is apparently free of dust or debris thanks to some low-intensity field over the door that strips dust and other external debris off the work suits of explorers entering the chamber. Removing the EM field magnet from the door’s lock allows it to reset and close, maintaining an airtight seal once the discoverers moved in air and hydroponics equipment to provide a breathable atmosphere. After installing an emergency airlock over the 2nd door leading into the next chamber (which is directly opposite the entrance), they entered and found a chamber almost identical to the first except for an orderly pile of 12 true octagonal containers (like an 8-sided die) stacked in a rack designed to hold them upright and locked in place. Three of them were examined and them removed to the lab facilities on base while a new airlock is being constructed over the next interior door leading to what appears to be a third chamber.
Note: The surveillance satellite was able to identify 64 distinct magnetic signatures close to the surface of the Moon in a straight line for approximately 2000’, and at least 64 more less distinct signatures that may be buried directly underneath the first set. There are indications of more ‘levels’ below that, but no one is willing to commit to the rather large numbers of signatures that appear to continue for more than a mile underground.
The arrival and initial testing of the 3 featureless, light blue octagons returned to the lab place their apparent ages very close to that of the first and second chambers, and while each one is exceptionally light for its apparent size it appears to have some form of loose mass on the interior that shifts with the motion whenever one of them is handled. How much mass is unknown as no one can determine how to open one of them short of high explosives (they don’t respond to magnetic fields like the door locks due.
Conclusions So Far: The objects and the chambers themselves are most certainly extraterrestrial in nature, but the whole ‘facility’ appears to be abandoned and left intact. The site was originally buried and seemingly abandoned (according to initial evidence) in a location local (in stellar terms) inhabitants couldn’t accidentally breach the facility, though this theory has grown shaky with the discovery of 12 objects noted above. Since no above ground installations have been discovered, the tentative conclusion is that it’s was deliberately hidden (barring further evidence to disprove this theory). Lastly, the facility was built to last and was sealed against the local environment, but apparently was not designed to be secured against artificially manufactured attempts to breach the locks.
Game Beginning
All military personnel as well as the civilian pilot are in the storage rooms working under the direction of the technician as he attempts to complete the basic modifications of the chambers before the new personnel shows up (under orders of the former base commander just before he left on the LTEO craft). The doctor, research assistant and psychiatrist are in the original science lab next door shooting the breeze and taking time off in the interim between the massive personnel replacement. The civilian security man is in his office (one corridor down and 3 offices away from the science lab) filling out reports.
Naturally, you can't just leave things at such a boring level....