Chapter 227: The Boring Part

The psychic field weakened enough over the next half hour for Callum and the others to move closer.

Hans met them near the collapsed avenue while Engineers checked the newly exposed levels from the safer side of the crater.

One of the soldiers approached with a radio report.

"Commander. Message from the nuclear power plant lab. Doctor Shearman says his current experiment finally produced a stable result. He requested more time before coming here."

"Let him finish then."

"Understood."

Hans brought the Radar map back up.

The collapse had exposed considerably more than the first opening suggested. Parking levels connected into service corridors, underground commercial spaces and reinforced sections buried underneath several of the surrounding towers.

Some areas resolved clearly while others did not.

One structure farther west appeared only as a thick block of reinforced concrete with several internal gaps the Radar could not separate properly from the surrounding foundations.

Hans marked it.

"Start with the accessible sections. Don’t force anything reinforced yet."

The Engineers moved off.

Hans kept looking at the unresolved block.

Whatever was inside had survived the Tree, the bombardment and most of the district collapsing on top of it. That alone made it worth checking.

...

The first Engineer reports came back within the hour.

Most of the exposed levels belonged to ordinary financial-district infrastructure, although several bank vault sections would need clearing before anyone touched their contents.

The reinforced block was different.

Its outer walls continued several levels below the surrounding foundations, with no direct connection to the commercial spaces beside it.

Hans checked the location again, then closed the map. The Engineers could handle the rest.

"Keep surveying the exposed levels. Send anything unusual back to base."

"Understood, Commander."

Hans left the recovery teams and headed back along the cleared route together with Callum.

By the time they reached the outer streets, Kimmy and Yunera were coming from the opposite direction.

"Hans... what did you do this time?"

"I thought the explosions were obvious."

"No, that’s not what I mean. Your aura, it changed again."

"Ah?"

That probably explained why Kimmy was staring. Hans glanced back toward the Core.

"I found something interesting."

"Acting mysterious again," Yunera rolled her eyes. "If you don’t want to tell us, then don’t. It’s that easy."

"It’s not that easy. Remember Tyrus’s experiments?"

The two women shuddered. Kimmy spoke first.

"Wha—what about it?"

"Nothing dangerous. Just an opportunity you two were looking for."

The two women stepped back.

Hans shrugged in response. "The Tree is already dead. It won’t wrap you up in vines and branches."

"The Tree is not the problem. That Tyrus guy is!"

Yunera gritted her teeth. She could still remember Tyrus treating her reaction like another variable while the psychic pressure crawled through her head.

"If you’re talking about that psychic thing, I already took care of it."

"Took care of it? How?!"

The two women asked at the same time.

Hans smiled. "Trade secret."

Yunera slowly drew her blade from its sheath while Hans could almost picture a small storm cloud forming above Kimmy’s head.

"Hans, do you still remember what I said on the rooftop before?"

"Not really. My mind’s been preoccupied with the operation lately."

His communicator suddenly rang. Hans calmly picked up the call.

"Matilda. Is that so? I’ll come over then."

He closed the call and looked at the two. "Sorry, job’s not done yet. See you around, ladies. Viper, give them a tour of the Tree."

Callum stared after him. Was he really supposed to appease two unhappy women with a tour of a tree corpse? Who would want that?

Hans gave him no time to answer before disappearing down a side street, leaving a trail of dust behind.

"That bastard. Sister, is he trying to play tricks on us?!"

Kimmy sighed after she realized that Hans’s aura vanished within her spatial vision. "He’s already gone, sister."

"Hmph! Once I get to Tier One as well, let’s see who runs from whom!"

...

Hans reached the Cinderrow observation building not long afterward. Matilda had already gathered several reports by the time he entered.

"What’s the hold up?"

"Grefort."

Hans pulled the nearest report toward him.

"That’s very specific."

"The operation is ending faster than the paperwork."

Most of the outer districts had little left for the combat companies to do. Patrols were still checking buildings and underground sections, but the fixed Radars had not shown another significant concentration outside the Core.

Civilian movement had followed the cleared territory for weeks. The Southwest Colony was considerably smaller than it used to be, while Westgate, Highcross and several other districts had residents occupying inspected homes and commercial buildings again.

The people who remained behind mostly had nowhere useful to return to.

Matilda placed several reports beside one another.

"Engineering wants priorities for restoration. Recovery wants instructions for the Core. The companies want to know which positions they’re keeping, and the councils want several more checkpoints transferred to civilian control"

"And what did Recovery find?"

"Bank vaults, corporate storage, government offices, underground commercial levels, data rooms, transit facilities and several structures they haven’t identified yet."

Hans looked through the list.

"That’s a lot of things I don’t want someone accidentally converting."

"That’s why they asked."

Another report covered the Core itself. Several streets remained unstable, the biological remains would take time to remove, and Engineers had begun marking entire blocks where the underground damage made ordinary access unsafe.

Matilda pointed toward it.

"The Core is the only district I’d keep completely restricted for now. Everywhere else is becoming less of a combat zone and more of a city again. Is the Commander interested in running as the city’s mayor?"

Hans leaned back. Getting rid of the Tree handed him another problem.

He had spent months building an army to take Grefort. Now he had to figure out what that army was supposed to do after taking it.

The thought felt annoyingly familiar.

Hans stared at the reports for several seconds before remembering a rooftop in Ironford and the conversation he had supposedly forgotten less than an hour ago.

"Ah."

Matilda looked at him. "What is it, Commander?"

"Nothing. I remembered something."

The military part was already running without much help from him. Companies could patrol the districts, hold important facilities and move wherever another threat appeared. Engineers could inspect roads, buildings and utilities, while the recovery sections sorted through whatever survived.

But there was only so much value in taking a city apart for Gold.

Houses still needed water. Streets needed clearing. Power had to reach more than his own bases. Hospitals, schools, businesses and whatever passed for local government had to work again if Grefort was supposed to become anything more than one enormous military camp.

Fortunately, Hans did not have to do all of that himself.

The councils already handled civilian matters. Engineers had been restoring infrastructure for months, and thousands of people living across the cleared districts probably knew considerably more about their own neighborhoods than he did.

"Matilda, do you think I’d fit as a mayor?"

She shook her head. "I think your current clothes suit you better, Commander."

"I’d like you to be honest for once."

"I am very honest, Commander."

Hans sighed.

The final boss was dead, but there was no victory screen telling him what came afterward. Just an entire city that needed to work again.

Hans looked over the reports one more time. He could figure out what to do with Grefort first.

Everything beyond it could wait until tomorrow.