The back of the farmhouse has been extended and turned into a decent-sized office. A few wooden steps lead up to the door, which is locked. A hastily-written sign on the door says "Office closed today to pay respects to Bill".

You can see through the window that the office consists of a big room with a counter, probably where the secretary normally sits, and two separate offices behind that. Both office doors are closed, and one has a light on.

Knocking first, Tobias pulls out his Rod of technology, converting it to a lock-release gun in case no one decided to answer.

Hang on! a voice cries from somewhere deep inside.

A few seconds later, a burly man appears from the lit office. He walks to the door and without unlocking it gruffy says Whadyou want?

Tobias pocketed the rod. "Just want to talk. I'm with Tyson, checking our interests."

He held up the blank card in his wallet, which should appear to the man as a Tyson field department Id. "Can I come in?"

The man stiffens at the word "Tyson", but a gruff expression remains engraved on his face. Well come in then.

He unlocks the door and opens it. As you step through he points to the sign and says As you can see, we are closed today. I wasn't expecting anyone from Tyson, though. I guess you heard about our little critter problem? I can assure you that all of our cows are completely safe. We've been locking them up at night and we've always got an eye or two on 'em during the day.

[Private to Dr. Adele Sienkiewicz: You can return with Frank any time you like.]

Tobias nodded soberly, "I understand, but I was sent yesterday, and they don't like me staying longer than I have to.

"We at Tyson are dedicated not only to our assets in the field, but also those who take care of them. My condolences on this entire matter, but I do have some questions." Tobias stepped into the room, glancing around as if curious.

"Have you caught whatever it was that did this?"

[Private to GM: Can I make a spot check to notice anything of interest?]

The man leads you back into his office and invites you to sit down across the desk from him. You notice a plaque on his wall reveals his name to be Tony Shaw.

I thank you for your concern, Mr., uh, I'm afraid I didn't catch your name.

Anyway, we haven't caught the creature, but with those posses running around it's probably been scared away. We hear wild cats out in the mountains, but it's pretty unusual that one comes all the way out here. He'll go back home pretty soon.

[Private to Tobias Byrne: You look around the outer and inner office, but you don't see anything you wouldn't otherwise expect to see in a farm office.

14:22, Today: Facilitator, on behalf of Tobias Byrne, rolled 14 using 1d20+6. spot.]

"Rogers." Tobias said, sitting down, "Mr. Rogers."

"Forgive me if I sound ignorant, but do wild cats have a habit of attacking people so close to buildings like this?"

Well Mr. Rogers, to tell you the truth, it's very unusual for animals to attack humans. Usually they are skittish, so this one must have been very, very hungry. At the time of night when Bill was killed the cattle were in the barn for the night and most of the lights from the house were off. Bill was probably sitting on the fence smoking a cigarette before he left for the night.

Mr. Rogers nodded, mentally categorizing and taking notes. "I've heard some scuttlebutt that there have been other attacks around here. Is there going to be an autopsy?"

Yeah, two other people were killed, probably by the same animal. It's a very grim time for our little town. Dunno anything about an autopsy, though. You'd have to ask the sheriff, he's the one in charge of the investigation.
This message was last edited by the GM at 17:54, Fri 16 Oct 2009.

"Thank you." Tobias stood and extended his hand to Shaw. "Do you mind if I look around, look at the cattle, that sort of thing?"

Sure, if that's what you want to do. You want me to go with you?

"Rather boring stuff, really." Tobias said. "Paperwork, you know. Don't want to be a bother. I think I can find my way around."

Alright then, Mr. Rogers. He reaches out to shake your hand.

I'll be in here doing paperwork if you need anything else.

"Thank you." Tobias let himself out.

He was itching to follow those tracks, but didn't dare without the others. What if he actually found what had made them? He contented himself with poking around the outbuildings, looking for anything that appeared out-of-place.

About 500 feet away from the farmhouse are two large state-of-the-art corrugated steel barns, each of which holds at least a thousand cattle. Currently both barns are full, but they open up to allow the cattle to graze upon the seemingly unending acres of grass in the fields. Nothing appears out of place.

As you are poking around, a black town car rolls down the gravel drive carrying Frank and Adele.

Frank climbs out of the car and walks over to Toby.

"Right, I'm here," he said, "What's our next course of action?"

"Well," Tobias scratched his head. "There's nothing magical around here, at least not my kind of magic. The circles out in the countryside don't show any sort of pattern, but I can't help feeling they're related somehow.

"We'll have to talk to the sheriff about autopsies, but those tracks we can follow now." He gestured towards the body and the footprints leading off.

The set of bootprints and paw prints follow the dirt path for about 40 feet then turn off into the grass. As a gentle breeze rolls across the field you realize you have no hope of following them any further.

None of you have track so the DC is too high to follow the tracks through the grass :)

[Private to Tobias Byrne: 20:10, Earth/life sciences (10): Nada. And what a let down after all that waiting, eh? :D]
[Private to Francis 'Frank' Decourcey: Earth/life sciences (5): Nada.]
[Private to Dr. Adele Sienkiewicz: Earth/life sciences (30): After putting fresh eyes on the tracks, you realize that they are feline. They could be from a bobcat or wildcat, but it would be one of the largest such cats on record.]

"Well, we've got a snowball's chance in hell of following those," said Frank, as they realised that they weren't going to be able to follow the tracks. "Think it's time to go have a word with the sheriff. Not that hell like it much, know I wouldn't have when I was on the force."

"Mind you," he said, "This is big sky country, guess we might be able to find a decent tracker around here to help us. If you want to try that?"

Adele was somewhat distracted by the tracks on the path. "That's a...really, really big cat..."

She looked up. "Eh? What? Back to town again, or are we going to wake up sleeping cop over there?"

"Up to you guys." Toby said, "I'm feeling a bit useless at the moment."

"Best to let sleeping policeman lie," said Frank, wryly. "Doubt he's seen much anyway, judging by the look of him. Even if he had, not likely he'll be the type to share. Cops seldom are, 'specially country cops."

"My vote's with the tracker. We find someone who can tell us where that trail leads, given that's the best lead we've had so far."

"Tracker it is. I'm useless here, too. I can roughly guess what it is, and we probably do have a valid mandate to be here...but apart from that?"

Back to the car they went. (We presume.)