Path to Becoming the Greatest Space Mercenary - Chapter 379

Chapter 379: Chapter 379 Into the Bowels of the Station
Urs, Robert, and Serena kept watch on the situation outside for nearly thirty minutes while the Alliance Police did battle with Rook and his troops.

It was not going well, as the infamous bahnen seemed practically unstoppable.

Nevertheless, the Alliance Police posed at least enough of a challenge that Rook was having to fight seriously, and Urs used this to study him.

There was no guarantee right now that he would go up against the man leading this assault, but Urs was planning for that possibility.

‘They’re getting closer to one of the hidden entrances right now. Someone with decent tactical intelligence must be commanding the ones searching. I can tell that they’ve determined that we did not slip past and are still hiding somewhere in the area.’ Urs thought, shifting his attention momentary away from the intense battle and towards the groups of people searching the alleyways where he and Avery’s parents had disappeared.

It was only a few minutes later that the same entrance that Urs had used to get into his safe house was discovered.

The squads that were searching for them had been going along the walls with a device that emitted waves of sound to detect hollow spaces.

With this piece of equipment, they were able to locate the secret door that perfectly blended in with the wall.

“I’m afraid that we done have much longer. Let’s get ready to go quickly. There’s no telling how long it will take them to reach this place, but I don’t plan on us still being here when they arrive.”

At Urs’ prompting, Robert and Serena got up from the couch the two of them were sitting on and collected the few things they had.

Urs did the same, though, he had a mountain of gear to grab, and it took him nearly a minute to get everything situated where he wanted it.

During that time though, something unfortunate occurred.

The network of micro cameras that he had set up all over the colony suddenly went down. Leaving Urs blind to what was happening outside.

“Damn it! They caught on to how we’ve been watching them.” Urs said as he ground his teeth in frustration.

He figured that this was likely to happen at some point, but right now was certainly inopportune.

The people targeting Avery’s parents had just breached into the maze that would ultimately lead to the safehouse.

Yet now he would not even be able to monitor their progress or know how many were coming after them.

So far, he had kept ahead of their enemies thanks to the information he was able to collect through the cameras he had set up.

Being able to watch his adversaries’ every move had been the advantage that Urs needed to successfully combat the difference in numbers.

Now though, he did not have that card up his sleeve to play any longer.

Still, this was not an unexpected outcome, so Urs calmed himself down and moved onto the next part of the plan.

From the center of the room where the table sat, Urs disconnected the magnetic lock that kept the piece of furniture from moving and shifted it out of the way.

Below it just looked like the normal floor of the room, but Urs knew that this was merely a façade.

He grabbed a thin piece of cloth that served as camouflage and moved it away. Revealing a hatch that would take them down and into an escape route disconnected from the maze and other entrances

When Urs disengaged the hatch’s seal, an unpleasant smell began wafting into the room.

“I know you said to expect it to be bad, but it’s stronger than I thought it would be.” Serena said, scrunching up her face in displeasure and pinching her nose.

“Sorry, but there was nowhere else to make the secondary escape route. The entrance is close to where the first underground treatment plant is, so the smell is exceptionally foul right here. But once we get past this area, the scent will dissipate.”

Before the three of them headed down into the sewer that Urs had connected his safe house to, he sent down a small surveillance drone to make sure on the off chance that someone was waiting for them down there, they were not caught unaware.

Fortunately, there were no signs of any people. Just the sewer water carrying away waste and a couple of maintenance robots surveying the interior.

“Robert, you head down first, and Serena you follow closely after him. I’m going to stay back to cover our tracks and make it more difficult for them to follow us.”

Nodding his head, Avery’s father quickly descended down the ladder that would lead into the bowls of the colony that few people ever ventured into.

Once the two of them had gone out of sight, Urs moved the table and locked it back in place and then positioned the camouflage cloth so that it would cover up the area again when he closed the hatch.

This would make it far more difficult for those searching for them to find where they went, but that was not everything that Urs had planned.

From out of one of the bags on his back, he left behind a present for the next person to come this way.

A high yield charge that he affixed to the roof of the hatch.

Now when it was opened next, an explosion strong enough to completely destroy the safe house and bury this entrance would occur.

Satisfied with the countermeasures that were in place, Urs hastily climbed down to meet back up with Robert and Serena.

The smell from where he was at was already starting to burn his nose, so Avery’s parents who were down in the thick of it probably found it unbearable.

When Urs finally did reach the bottom, he saw the two of them holding their shirts over their mouths to try and mitigate the foul smell as best that they could. Though their efforts were mostly in vain, and the too looked dangerously queasy.

“It’s only a couple hundred meters until we reach the treatment facility. After we pass through it, it won’t be nearly as bad.” Urs said, urging them forward.

Soon they came upon a large structure that was drawing the sewer water into it.

However, the path to the side that they were on ended, and they were met with a sealed door that would lead into the facility.

Both Serena and Robert looked dismayed by this, believing that they had reached a dead end.

“Don’t worry. I made sure to… acquire an access card through certain means when I was having the safe house built.”

From out of one of the many pockets in Urs’ pants, he pulled out a slim card that gleamed in the low light of area.

When he touched it to the access panel outside of the door, it lit up green and the lock was disengaged.

From there they entered the facility that was fully automated and headed to the other side where they exited.

Nothing much had chaged between the two areas, except that the water on this side was running clear, and there was hardly any smell to speak of.

“We’ve got a long way to go through here, but it should be safer than being topside. I doubt that they posted anyone down in the sewers.” Urs said, leading the way for their trek through the underbelly of Yuson II.

…

We’ve finally breached into what we believe to be the base of Urs Orso. However, no one appears to be around. But there are signs that they were here not long ago.”

Clarien was listening to the report of the squad leader that was the first to get through the maze that led to Urs’ safe house.

The place was still fully stocked and there were even weapons visible on display in one of the rooms.

Some of them were actually quite rare, so Clarien had instructed the team to collect them even if they could not use them at the moment because of biometric security.

Of course, their main objective was to locate the targets, and it was obvious that they had been in this place from the smell of food lingering.

“The autochef was last used approximately forty-nine minutes ago. Proof that they were here until recently. There are a few doors that are still sealed that we’re attempting to access now.”

Using high intensity laser cutters, they breached into every room and searched them extensively.

They found another three entrances into the maze and following them to their ends led them back into the network of alleyways.

Yet there had been no sign of either Urs or Avery’s parents reappearing in the area, so it was concluded that they must have gone somewhere else.

Fourteen minutes after entering the safe house, the squad leader located the secret hatch that they used to escape.

“Sir, we’ve found a hidden escape route that they likely used. It must lead into some underground facility, though we don’t know what it is yet.” The squad leader reported to Clarien.

From where he was, he pulled up the plans of Yuson II and homed in on the area. Discovering that the building was placed directly over a main sewer line.

After the squad learned of this and were ordered to follow, each of them made faces of clear displeasure.

Still, just because it would be uncomfortable to descend into a sewer was not enough reason for them to stop. They would have a much worse consequence waiting for them if they disobeyed an order over something like this.

Except, had they known what was waiting for them, they probably would have deserted their mission. Surrendering to the Alliance Police and being arrested would have at least preserved their lives.

The moment that they began cutting away at the hatch to unseal it, a massive explosion engulfed the entire safe house.

Consuming it in a blinding white flash and killing everyone inside instantly.