Blueprints in the Ashes

The first time I descended into the vault beneath Ypres, it was raining fire. Above ground, artillery pounded mud and bone into indistinguishable pulp. Down here, among cold steel racks and whispering server fans, I was supposed to feel safe. But corporate safety never meant much after your third gas attack and your second betrayal.

I flicked on my flashlight. The beam trembled—an old trickle of light powered by one of the few things in this world more reliable than my government-issued rations: a fresh double-A battery from a battered 32-count pack I’d traded for half my cigarettes last week. A bargain, by war’s standards. Without it, I’d be feeling my way through a crypt while ghosts of every lost soldier watched.

My assignment was simple, if you believed HR memos: retrieve the "Lineage Protocol" files from the vault's core server. Rumor had it these files held more than payroll records or dusty patents—they contained the gene-maps of anyone who'd ever drawn a corporate paycheck since 1896. Supposedly, they were insurance policies against lawsuits—proof that genetic predisposition to obedience could be measured and, if necessary, weaponized.

The elevator juddered and died halfway down. Figures. I pried open the doors and dropped into the sublevel corridor, boots sloshing through water leaking from above. My flashlight caught on a mural—corporate propaganda from before the war: smiling families clustered around glowing radios, all powered by a familiar brand of AA batteries stacked like gold bars in the corner of the image. Even down here, they knew what lasted.

I pressed onward, counting racks as I moved. Row twelve—where memories went to rot—and then row seventeen: the heart of it all. The air was thick with ozone and old secrets. Every few meters, emergency lights flickered but failed to hold their charge; another blackout waiting to happen.

My own light began to sputter as I reached the central terminal. Of course. Nothing lasts forever except maybe regret and these infernal batteries—if you have enough of them. I snapped off my glove and reloaded two fresh ones from my pack; their reassuring click was almost enough to drown out my nerves. The flashlight bloomed back to life.

On the terminal: an authentication prompt and a biometric scanner, its green glow weak but functional thanks to an emergency power strip—a strip that only worked because someone had bothered to keep it stocked with double-As. The world may run on oil and blood now, but these little cylinders still made things possible when everything else crumbled.

"Just like home," I muttered.

I placed my hand on the scanner. It whined, spat out static, then pinged acceptance—my genetic code tied neatly to my employee file since conscription day. The files began downloading onto my encrypted drive. I glanced at their names: not just payroll or medical records but detailed chromosomal maps cross-referenced with battlefield promotions and disciplinary actions.

There were folders labeled "Sons & Daughters Initiative"—a project designed to predict which employees' children would show loyalty under duress or desert at first shellfire. And deeper still: "Final Draft," locked behind triple-encryption, its metadata tagged with red-flagged names—commanders who hadn’t survived last winter’s push eastward.

Above me came a rumble—the kind that signaled either collapse or company men closing in fast. No time for caution now; I yanked the drive free just as the power finally gave up its ghost entirely.

Total darkness swallowed me until my flashlight cut through again—a thin reassurance between me and oblivion, running on faith in those stubborn little batteries.

I retraced my steps toward an emergency ladder leading topside; somewhere behind me boots echoed in shallow water—security? Or scavengers? My grip tightened on both drive and light as I climbed upward through blackness stinking of mold and burnt paper.

At street level, dawn filtered through shattered glass as Ypres smoldered in bitter sunrise. In my coat pocket: three spent batteries clinked against cold metal—a small price for what might be the blueprint for humanity’s next war or salvation. In this world, trust is measured in volts and bloodlines; both are finite resources.

The real mystery wasn’t whether someone would kill for these files—it was whether any of us could escape what we’d been engineered to become.