The elevator doors opened to a dimly lit ante room, similar to the one below - with the key difference that here three guards were standing around a soycaf machine, their SMGs hanging in their slings and their helmets beside them on the counter.



bnc meanwhile found out that the boss himself had tried to reach the guard station with the instruction to get Dr. Wennerstrom to turn on his commlink again.

Anna takes a few steps out of the elevator maintains her breathing and fire her taser with two hands, connecting to the guard but to little effect. She did not have much time to be disappointed because the guard responded with automatic fire. Anna tumbled to the left and crouched closer to the ground, and the fire missed her. The loud noise was exciting, but the automatic fire within the facility was bad news. Shark followed with an arrow that disabled the guard, "his arrows are so much better than my taser darts." She thought in response. Sure Anna could pack a heavy pistol loaded with APDS, but shooting people with such a weapon simply for being in the wrong place was a bit coldblooded for her. Though, would it still be a lethal weapon if they are so much heavily armored? Perhaps, she'll need to adjust her values to keep doing this kind of violent jobs.

Nova moved out of the elevator at a walking speed. Still, she moved pretty fast even then, thanks to her augmented limbs. While walking, she aimed at the closest guard, that Anna had not attacked, yet. Even with the silencer, her rifle was loud, but the sound would not carry too far into the facility. The shot connected, even though the guardsman did his best to avoid it. His armor could not protect him and so he dropped to the floor in an instant.

The remaining guard, that had not focused on Anna, whipped his SMG around, but almost got tangled up in his sling. His salvo hit pretty much everything in Nova's general direction, except for her. Luckily, she was far enough from the elevator, that any stray bullets bounced around harmlessly.

Sharkboy didn't flinch from incoming fire and loosed an SnS arrow right into the chest of the guard who absorbed Anna's taser dart. After a second or two of wriggling, he dropped to the ground unconscious.

As he moved out of the elevator, he hung his bow back over his shoulder. Approaching the guard, who'd just had a hell of a time actually hitting anything buy concrete and plaster, Sharkboy came to a stop directly in front of him.

"Hola."

As the bullets came flying their way, Wraith had ducked away intuitively, even though he wasn't actually their target.
When he straightened up again, Nova and Shark had already felled their opponents. Damn, these guys are tough.
There was only one enemy still standing.

He raised one hand, the fingers bent into a claw-like gesture, at the remaining guard and intoned: "Lord, make him submit to your will!"
Under his mask, his face turned sour as a faint headache warned him that he was using his magical powers too recklessly. Ugh. I really need to bind that Centering Focus.

The remaining guard shook it's head "No, that's bulldrek." and prepared to fire at Wraith

bnc smiles slightly, unseen.
"Guard's comm under control"

Without hesitation, Anna holds her taser with both hands, aims carefully for a brief second and then fires an accurate dart at the remaining guard. This time, the dart connects and penetrates the armor, as is evident by the involuntary twitches of the guard as the electricity passes through him.

Nova aimed her rifle at the remaining guard, but did not fire immediately.

Instead, she told him: "Alright. You are clearly outmatched and there is no way you will stop or even hinder us. Just drop your weapon, no communications with the rest of your team, and surrender. We won't kill you, we have no reason to do that. We will restrain you and probably knock you out, but in a couple hours you will wake up and everything will be over."

... unless he wakes up in one of those cells downstairs, if his employer doesn't like failure too much ...

The man dropped his weapon and slowly raised his hands - as well as he could with the taser tines pumping voltage into his muscles.
"I give up. Don't shoot."

"Good choice. Now put all your communication equipment and remaining weapons on the desk and stand over there in the corner. I will take a look at your colleague in the meantime," Nova said.

She slung her rifle over her shoulder and waited for the man to comply before moving to the fallen guard, to see, if he was stable or if there was anything necessary to keep him from dying.

<< Do we need any information from him? >>

"I don't think so. He's too unrealiable a source in any way."

bnc shuts down the commlink.

Anna closes in on the guard and whispers "Sleep well" in an almost sexy voice, while she places the taser to his neck and presses the trigger.
As a courtesy, she then uses the resist pain spell so that he feels better once he wakes up. It will take the edge away when you wake up. She says. She reloads the taser and says "Let's move on... there is not much time."

Wraith nodded in approval at Nova's diplomatic approach.
He was slightly puzzled, though, that she had just succeeded where he had failed without even having magical powers. His god was really making him look dumb tonight.


"Aye.", he agreed with Anna to hurry up and got ready to move on. Rosenberg's office was close. Wraith's heart was racing - he had never faced a man of such power and depravity.
"Nyan, things will get really rough from here on. Might wanna keep your eyes open for a hiding spot - no need to get caught in the fireworks."

He switched back to astral perception, keeping an eye open for Watchers. If the next door surprisingly wasn't warded, he took the time to quickly project ahead.

Nyan replied: "Good idea. I'm going to hide down behind the desk and warn you if someone comes through the elevator." She turned to bnc: "Junkcat has rebooted and keeps us hidden. Could you meanwhile GIGO the elevator to send people to the third level instead of coming here?"

Wraith found the next door warded as well. By now the team was familiar with the layout of the sublevels an knew the corridor square that waited behind the door.

bnc nods. "Gimme a tick"

Before she responds as Nyan bid her, she finishes her untouched task. Though it seemed like an eternity to her, it still was mere seconds, maybe half a minute, since Dr. Rosenberg tried to reach out for the guard whose commlink she hacked. She takes a couple of seconds to write an answer to Rosenberg to lull him at least another minute or so. Over the guard's commlink, bnc informs Rosenberg that the doctor had an accident. Apparently, he slipped and yanked free a cable and somehow managed to electrocute himself. "Checking his vitals and going to give you an update in a minute, doctor.", she finishes, then reboots her deck to get rid of overwatch.

Once the deck is back, she rehacks the host and manipulates the elevator.



bnc nods towards Nyan. "Good thinking. Done."

"Nice work Sprinklers" she says to bnc. Then she spots the ward, and drops her spells again to not be noticed as she passes through. >This run is like the practical spellcasting class all over again. she rants.

“How far, and how many more mystery doors do we open before we get to our vault?”

"After this door, there should be a square of corridors with Rosenberg's office at the very end. So two more doors, if the layout is the same.", Wraith said as he deactivated his focus and advanced towards the door without opening it yet.
"So. Who wants to go first?"

"Are the doors unlocked?" Nova asked.

As it turned out, on this level the doors were not locked - probably related to the fact that here no infectious diseases were studied, unless you counted unwashed soycaf mugs being left behind on office desks.

Anna says "Nova first, then myself. Shark at the back just in case, and the rest in between"
She summons a minor spirit and sends it to scout ahead, and verify that the way is clear. As she knows to summon always carries some risk, and indeed she feels some unexpected resistance from the little bugger, but she gets her single service. "Go ahead toward Rosenberg's room, and report any auras you encounter. "

bnc would have nearly missed it, but there was an active icon, mostly hidden inside the host's data flow, that looked very much like it belonged to Dr. Rosenberg. It was an expensive Caliban, and it's owner was either very cunning or had a stealth dongle on it. Had it not been for the tiny datastream indicating an active conversation, she wouldn't have noticed it.
What she very much noticed, was the form of the Patrol IC closing in on her avatar...


Meanwhile, Anna's spirit struggled with passing through the ward, but try as it might, it couldn't get through.

In the meantime, Nova headed for the door and opened it. She remained in the cover of the doorframe for a moment to take a look first and see if there were any problems ahead.

"Anna, it's probably best that next time we let our girl with the sniper rifle hang in the back, and the pro fighter start up close.

"What do you see, Nova?"

Nova glimpsed into the corridor, seeing a grey carpet and a rail below the ceiling - indicating, that here not a walking drone but a rail mounted drone took care of security. As below, doors to both sides of the corridor led to rooms around the square - offices. There was no guard in sight.

"Nothing much. Just some rails along the ceiling, guess we should watch out for those. Otherwise, as expected. A lot of doors."

Nova took a step back. Sharkboy had a point. He had trained to fight in melee most of his life. And she had a rifle.

With the door now open, Wraith had switched to the team's channel for communication.
"bnc, if these belong to a drone, can you do something about it preemptively?"
He hesitated for a moment.
"Oh, and Anna... I could really use that sweet painkiller-spell of yours before we confront Rosenberg. Nothing serious, just the spellcasting starting to wear me down.
If that's no problem for you...?"

Anna replies "Here you go hon." she takes one hand off her taser and brushes her finger on Wraith's hand. It only take a brief second, and Wraith can feel that his body is better resisting the pain. Though, professionally, Anna is unsatisfied with the results.

She agrees, with Shark as she cannot find a polite way to say that Nova is the most likely to survive being hit by a bullet. She could feel that toughness in her aura, and the cyber enhancement - the woman was as transhuman as they make them.

When the spirit gets stuck she shrugs and feels extra exposed without her spells, and spirits to protect her. She considers replacing the taser for the Ruger Super-Warhawk but decides that she'll only do so once they are exposed, as that gun could not be silenced. Or if it was silenced, it would not make that satisfying sound when she fires it.

"Si, but from this point, I wanna stay behind, physically. I can't focus on shit when I'm stuck in this meat bag."

bnc finds herself as comfortable a place as she'll get to escape her physical boundaries. A mere one or two seconds later, she says:
"Drone's under control. Tell me when you're ready."

"You want to stay here. Alone. Near the elevator and only point of entrance. I really don't think that's a good idea. Even if they cannot use the elevator, they could send spirits. We should stay together," Nova stated.

Anba suggests, "we can sumnon spirits to keep her hidden, and to physically protect her. There is risk, but these wards limits the mobility of our spirits so we do not give up much fire power.. This is the responsible way to do so."

"No, the responsible thing is her fighting through the distraction of sharing the same space as the rest of us until we're clear of here. We don't have the muscle to spare for carrying Ms. Skin&bones around, and she's not splitting off from the group, again."

Since facial expressions are difficult behind the Hazmat suit Anna texts bnc privately >>be nice cutie, we are on borrowed time here, and cannot start arguing,

"All right, just a second ... "

Ah, much better, Wraith thought as Anna's magic surged thgrough his body and took the headache away. "Thanks."
"With the drone down, nothing stops us from moving, right? I'd like to see what's behind that ward.", he said, quite relieved that bnc had - with surprisingly little fighting - agreed to stick to the group.

As bnc tried to break into Rosenbergs commlink, she suddenly became aware of the icon she had tried to tag - as it appeared directly in front of hers.
<<It seems you aren't actually any longer contained. Not that it matters, now that I have your sister as well.>>

@team "Förböveln! Rosenberg's noticed us, and he says, he's got Kerstin, too. Quick now!"
bnc loads her attack configuration and unleashes a stream of harmful data at the drone and the commlink, turning it into a stinking mess. Then she reboots her deck in AR mode, thus returning to her meat body to follow the group.

"Well, that's not good. Let's get this stuff while we can. Move!"

Nova also sends a message to Nacl's commlink.

<< @Herr Nacl: We got bnc, but Rosenberg knows now that we are here. How are things going on your side? Don't let Kerstin go with him. >>

>> Let's dash for the cure then, and he does not "have" Kerstain... this is a distraction to get you quietly. At least that is the plan.
She said and hurried the team to get going withot delay.

The rail drone vanished from the matrix, but not Rosenberg's icon.

Nacl replied: <<He just put our call on hold. The area is teeming with corporate soldiers, but so far they haven't caught up with us yet. Kerstin sits next to me and Splitterbruch is following us on his bike. We are followed but...>>
The call suddenly terminated and the matrix icon of Nacl vanished.

As the team ran across the carpeted floor, they became aware of a mist pouring from a vent behind them. Before them, the private office of Dr. Rosenberg lay - easily recognizable by the heavy, beautifully carved oak double door.

Sharkboy started running at the door, a bit panicked by the mist, "Quiet or loud?"

"Loud, I'll open it with my mind. Get ready!" When everyone is ready she casts the magic fingers spell and opens the door.
drain: 11d6t5 5

Anna got a grip of the door handle, but found to her dismay that the door didn't budge.

"It's locked... feel free to kick it or shoot it or whatever." She then quickly assensed the fog to make sure it is not another vampire.

Anna did a double take - not only was it a vampire mist, but it was the same they had seen in Linz.


In front of them stood a man in a full body armor. Anna could see that the whole armor was a focus of some kind

Anna quickly fired her taser at the armored man, but such meager weapons were not intended to penetrate well-insulated full body armors. The dart connected but had no effect on the vampire.

When the vampire materializes in his fully body armor, Nova wondered for a moment why the vampire mage in Linz had to leave his stuff behind. Surely there was some sort of explanation to this question, but this was not the time to figure it out. Therefore she aimed her rifle at the man and pulled the trigger.

With incredibly speed, the vampire through himself out of the line of Nova's shot.