<<@Team[Fix] Sounds good, let's make for the previous team's insertion point. No need to do more work than necessary.>>

With the physical security (hopefully) neutralized and the magical security coming down, Fix exits the van. Bringing the shotgun up and the goggles online, he sneaks his way up to the property.

A Nix can see and target the spirits from a distance, he begins to snipe them, counting on the defense of his spirits should they close to counter attack. He starts with one, then the other, working methodically.

The spirits roar int a frenzy as soon as the first bolt strikes, the elemental shrugging it off. Nix manages to get a strike on the second before they have him located however. They seem to be there in an instant, Nix's guardians holding them off on the astral long enough for him to plow another two bolts home, these ones sending the spirits reeling. What they lack in skill they make up for in pure force. Already half beaten, Nix's spirits quickly get the upper hand, trashing the guardians into the ether.

Nix pulls his focus from the spiritual world, back to the material world. He uses his neural interface to his comlink to reach out as he begins to move.
<<@Team [Nix] Magical defenses are down. Fix - You're up.>>

<<@Team[Fix] Right, follow me in. Dingo keep an eye out, make sure we don't get ambushed from the back.>>

With the known defenses down, Fix makes his way toward the house. Sticking to the cover available, he keeps a sharp eye out for any more threats.

Dingo curses to himself as he notices the data pack. He quickly fires off a command to his agent, ordering it to block the message. As the agent begins its work, he also prepares to step in if the agent fails to intercept it.

<<@Team [Dingo] Information packet targeting you. I'm intercepting it now. Get ready to dodge. If we missed a gun-drone, we could still be in trouble. >>

With this bit of encouraging news, Fix increases his pace and makes for a large tree for some semblance of cover. Trusting the automated defenses to Dingo, and magical to Nix, Fix keeps his eyes out for any of the beasts which could still be protecting the grounds.

Dingo Reflexively throwing out some code, Dingo manages to 'derail' it's routing after his agent sends it's self into a stuttering cycle repeat. It's not pretty, but it's effective.

Fix/Nyx

Perception Test : visual -2

Fix
As Fix moves closer to the manor house, something from the edge of his vision catches his eye. It's the slightest flicker, but a movement out of place gets his attention. Looking towards the right of the house attentively, he finally manages to spot it again; a large black shape, moving low in the grass, slow and steady in his direction, looking for all the world like a slinking lion with spiky black hair.

Contact, right of house. Quadruped, possible Hellhound, advise.

Spotting the threat Fix drops into a kneeling firing position, bringing the shotgun to bear and taking aim.

Whatever the creature is,it's moving low, but still coming quickly.

Dingo sighs to himself. Solve one problem and another rises.

<<@Team [Dingo] Employer's pet. He'd prefer if we didn't kill them, but if they're between us and solving this, we go through them. Take it out if it's a threat. >>

Keeping his aim steady, Fix fires off a shell hoping that the projectile taser is enough to slow it down.

Fix
The shock round hits, with the concealed hound giving a yelp of shock and pain before bursting out of the grass, something between a bark and a roar of rage tearing out of it as it charges, focusing it's rage on something living it can tear into.

Initiative
The hound still has a fair amount of ground to cover before it can get in an attack

As the beast closing in rapidly Fix continues to open fire with his shotgun, hoping to at least slow it down to give himself the advantage in close combat.

With luck the shells will prove worth their cost and keep this a clean run for a little while longer.

The second blast slams directly into the hound as it barrels towards Fix, taking it either in the face or head. It's hard to say as it all happens so fast, but the result is an unconcious hell hound on the ground a few meters from him, twitching in the grass.

<<@Fix [Dingo] huh. nice shot. Glad I didn't have to waste one o' the rounds from my new flying deathbot to save your ass.>>

After a quick scan of the area for any other threats, Fix continues on towards the house ready for any other beasts.

No hulking hounds nor shots from "deathbots" from above greet Fix as he makes his way to the manor door.

The house it's self seems not unusual. While tall and dark, the heavy oak door with it's heavy knocker doesn't seem to have been disturbed or tampered with in any way that he can see.

<<@Team [Dingo] known security systems highlighted on your AR overlays . Please note the eye-scanner/biometric dohicky on the door. Fix, can you handle that, or do you need me to come save the day again?>>

Fix sees the message from the overconfident hacker and grins.

That depends, we need the door left intact?, Fix replies while grabbing his mini-welder, next to the mono-chainsaw.

Nix follows Fix towards the house, shadowing both in step and cover, grimacing at the potential of having a gun ship raining bullets down on them.
<<@Team [Nix] My lead allergy tends to cause me to break out in bleeding holes...>>

As the hound closes in on them and Fix begins to fire, Nix trusts in the sam's ability to stop the threat and instead focuses on their flanks and overhead for multiple threats. He then follows to the door, his chameleon suit keeping him invisible to all but the keenest observers.
<<@Team [Nix] Dingo - If you can open it without damage, that would be preferred.>>

<<@Team [Dingo] Fine fine, I'm on my way...>>

Dingo finishes getting his agent out of the infinite loop and setting it up to intercept any further information packets that are targeting the team before switching over to AR. After checking that his knives and Colt Government are secure, he grabs his commlink and exits the van. Blinking away the glare from the sun, he locks the van (prepping an unlock command to be sent as soon as needed) and begins making his way towards the mansion, watching for the information packet signifying that he's about to get shot at.

Miraculously Dingo makes it across the open grass field to the manor home without further ventilation. Only the stout door stands between them and ... who knows.

Dingo sighs in relief and moves over to the biometric scanner.

"Our file didn't have the old man's biometrics, did it?", he asks as he begins studying the scanner and attached lock.

Nix looks at Dingo, amazed at the question. "You're the matrix guy... right?"
As the hacker looks over the hardware, Nix cast Clairvoyance and begins to survey the exterior of the mansion looking for any places where it may have already been physically breached.

Dingo hums and pulls out some of the tools he brought from his shop. As he begins opening the box up, he actually talks. "Gotta actually crack this thing open. Alarm on the door, microcamera here. I'll clean up the feed once I'm in."

With the door being worked on, Fix takes up a watch of the area from his position at the door.

Nix's wandering eye sees a lot more as he surveys the grounds. From a different vantage point it's easier to spot the blood splatter in the front, but it's nothing to the mess in the back. What was probably once a hell hound looks like it's been turned to hamburger in the back, and recently from the look of it. A number of trees and shrubbery show damage from gunfire as well, and it appears as though there was an attempt to enter through the back by force.
The exterior of the manor has been shot up as well, although it's thick walls took the punishment well. There's definitely more blood in the back that one hell hound would make however.

About the time Nyx manages to finish his recon of the grounds, Dingo manages to bypass he biometric lock's systems, effectively hotwiring it into opening. There's a surprisingly loud *clunk* as a heavy bolt slides out of place and then a softer *click* as the door unlocks and opens slightly.

Dingo grins and puts his tools away. "Need me to do anything else, boyos? Open the doors inside, too? Hold your hand so you don't trip?"

The click of the door brings Nix' focus back to the front. At the wisecracks from the hacker, he raises an eyebrow. "Would you? While you're at it, shoot the guards and deal with the spirits." Looking to Fix, then back to Dingo with a smile, "We'll wait."

With the door opened, and being covered from magic and matrix, Fix ignores the banter getting back to business.

Fix eases the door open with his shotgun, keeping a sharp eye out for any signs of traps or hostiles.

Manor House- Front Door
The large door opens easily into a large entryway, hardwood floors and walls decorated with what one can only assume are distinguished family members in old oil paintings adding to the authentic "old english" feel. The home seems in good repair, halls and rooms coming off from the main entry way still dimly lit, the lights left on. It has a musty smell like old pipe smoke and a close, tight feel, much of the spare space taken up by furniture, end tables, and other odds and ends.

There's no immediate signs of life, no 'dog at the door' or any other response to the team's entrance.

Nix temporarily dismisses his summoned spirit, follows fix through the doorway and ward after dropping his sustained and linked spells. Once across the threshold, he recasts and links his increased reflexes. He then looks to the team, "If you find an area in disarray, let me examine the area before we enter or disturb the area."

Giving a short nod from Nix's prompt Fix keeps focused for threats.

Sticking to the hallway he beings checking the rooms one by one, just as he learned with the Einherjars. While it'd be nice to have the proper team for this, Fix knows he'll just have to trust his own skills and that of his teammates.

A small grin spreads across his face as the fear and thrill rises within, reminding him why he enjoyed working as a a merc for so long. Body tense and senses peaked, Fix steadily makes his way into the house.

The house is quiet, the most prominent sound being the stead *tick* *tick* of a large grandfather clock just off the entry foyer. Listening for a minute, Fix can also hear a quiet but distinct whir of some sort of light machine down one hallway, as well as a quiet, irregular scratching sound coming from one of the further off rooms, in a different direction.

Heading down the hallway with the machine sounds, Fix continues to check and clear the rooms as he goes, hoping that the active machine may give them a clue to go on.

Nix wills his summoned spirit to appear. It does, appearing as something like a cross between an ork sized body builder and Sherlock Holmes. "Spirit." he whispers, "I am looking for clues as to the disposition of this home's owner or any persons here in. Search this home for signs of struggle, injury, death or anything living or dead." The spirit nods and pulls a spyglass from under its smoking jacket before streaking off into the mansion.

Fix
Moving carefully down the hallway, Fix spots the machine quickly. It's a small household cleaning device, an automated vaccuum/sweeper/floor polisher moving along the hallway clearning the rug and shining the hardwood floor where it's exposed.

Nix
Sherl-Ork Holmes dissapears to investigate the home, returning within a few moments puffing on a pipe thoughfully.
A preliminary investigation of the premises has yielded startling discoveries. Quite stirring really. There are three living human beings within the premise, yourself and your compatriots. A rather queer awakened chicken like creature is pecking thoughtfully at it's apparent food bowl a top a rather uninspiring attempted representation of a satyr in stone chiseled form.
There are no signs of an injury or death I was able to detect on the premises in my initial search. There was however a rather compelling collection of flora in the second floor solar, a rather exciting collection of plants really. There's a creature of some sort lurking within there as well, apparently making it's self quite at home. Some sort of reptile. More than that I was unable to discern due to the heavy bio matter in the area.
Another puff produces a very good smoke ring, bringing a tusky smile to Sherlorks' face.

While all of this was going on, Dingo pulls up his connection to the central node for the mansion and begins searching for internal cameras, commlinks linked in, etc etc.

Nix listens intently as the spirit provides its report. He then relays the details about both the paranormals to his team members before addressing the spirit. Thank you. I hold your service fulfilled.

<<@Team [Nix] Dingo - Sounds like the cameras are going to be our best option. Can you go back to the footage around and before the time of his disappearance?>>

The study will probably be our best shot for information aside from any digital recordings. The other animals are of no concern, unless you feel like feeding them Fix says, shooting a glance at Dingo.

With a clearer plan in established, Fix starts steadily making his way to the study keeping alert for any undetected threats.

Dingo hums and waves his hand at them distractedly. "Yeah, yeah, boyos. I'm grabbing the feeds now. Switch to AR to see what happening in the Big Brother house!"

The internal camera system covers a good degree of the potential entry points, each labeled helpfully in-system as the location it's covering. "Front Door" , "Kitchen Entry", and "Solar" are about as obvious as self explanatory, with the solar showing an elegant and lush green house complete with a small pool, although there's enough undergrowth that anything ould be hiding in the bushes.

"Dog Run" shows not only what looks to be a mostly concrete and chain link kennel, but also an access tunnel about the right size for a large dog, and what looks to be a hell hound laying very still and covered in blood down in the kennel.

"Servant's Entrance" has a large access door, probably for bulk or large item deliveries, as well as some damage where someone seems to have tried taking a blow torch to the lock from the outside.

"Rear Patio" appears to have mostly large glass doors, but heavy camera coverage, and offers open ground for security measures to cover, such as the "Death Balloon".

"Garage" shows a view of the closed garage door around the back side of the house.

The remainder show various views of windows throughout the house, showing little of the interior rooms themselves. The camera layout does appear to be set specifically with privacy in mind.

Fix
Moving through the manor house is easy enough, the halls wide and open, with little breakable at ground level, as people tend to do with small children or large pets. Pictures adorn many of the walls, along with small busts or statuettes in larger alcoves, many apparently very old judging by dates, mostly showing family members, or scenes of english Bmythology and and history.

A few actual tapestries hang on sections of wall as well, although each is placed within a discreet, secure case and tastefully lit to protect and preserve. Most depict fanciful scenes of knights and dragons, although there are occassional figurines of other fantastic creatures.

Finding the first floor study, more of a receiving room for less formal occassions than a bachelor's actual study, Fix still finds the large room full of clutter and rich with the smell of pipe smoke. Actual dead tree books sit about the room and heavy on shelves, although each seems to be tended to with special care. A stylish wet bar stis open with a large glass decanter of what looks to be whiskey still sitting out but stoppered. The other attention grabber in the room is a life sized statue of what looks to be a satyr, exquisitely detailed and rendered, with what looks to be a mix between a lizard and a chicken sitting atop it, looking at Fix thoughtfully.

Spotting the chick-ard, Fix makes sure to keep the shotgun pointed low and backs out of the room.

Once back in the hallway he starts rifling through his bag and addresses the others, "So, a chicken/lizard thing. Any thoughts other than shooting it?"

Dingo starts skimming through the old camera feeds, looking for records of the time around when their target disappeared.

It takes only a few moments to trace back through the inactivity of the security logs to get a window of time when there is no longer activity within the manor. As before, there is little in the way of inside views of the house and its occupant. A more detailed search finally reveals a shot from the garage as it opens and a tanned range rover pulls out. With the windows subtly mirrored, there is little to reveal or confirm the driver, but a thorough search shows no one arriving and no security alerts within the day of the departure.

Dingo quickly fires off a copy of the feed to the others. "Found him, boyos. I'm sending you a clip now. Tan Range Rover. Looks like nobody else was here. I'm gonna see if I can find out anything about the car. Fix, did ya get a pic of the lizard chicken thing?"