The Vault

Jasper ran through the door at breakneck speeds and slammed it behind him, looking through the porthole of glass on the white metal security door at the approaching security teams he locked the mechanism and punched down on the hydraulic button. The two clamps attached to the sides of the door on his side hissed as they pushed together just in time for the black-clad figures to reach the door and make futile attempts to get it open. He was the only one to make it through from the team; it was just him now, that should hold them for a while Jasper thought as he turned around.

He was in the control room of the vault facility, a clinical white painted room with a round console in the middle controlling the bases systems and a large vault door on the back wall, running to the centre console scanned the drawers, a green mark on one drawer was what he was hoping to see. Years of planning had lead up to this moment, getting a spy into the inner control room of the ICA facility was no small task and had took convincing and training up a low level ICA operative and many, many, sacrifices, people volunteered and got "Caught" by our agent on the inside to get him up the ladder to be in a position to access the vault workers, so many lives gone, so many people dragged into the black vans, all leading up to this moment, all leading up to one bribe from the inside man to the vault worker to leave the code hidden for them, if Jasper could get inside the vault and get evidence of the corporation's misdoings he could avenge all of them, every single sacrifice, every single lost man, woman and child to these monsters would be ok if he could punish the people responsible, it would never bring back his Maisie and he knew it, but it was the only thing he knew how to do.

Where was the green mark, it had to be here, Jasper thought panicking, I can't have come this way for nothing it has to be here, muffled shouts could be heard from outside the door he came through, the guards aren't going to stay there forever. Jasper grabbed the nearest draw and pulled it out, violently spewing the contents on the floor, no not there, moving onto the next one he went around the circle pulling them out, each draw without it increasing his desperation until he got half way round, pulling out the last drawer he saw the object flash through his vision as it slid across the room, he ran over to it and picked it up, An aging small black notebook with a green bookmark attached. The money had worked, all the ICA’s careful planning, and human greed is what will tumble it all down, it was poetic really after all they did to suppress the human mind, one of their own minds betrays them. Jasper opened the page to the bookmark and saw the code he was looking for, a 50 number long string to be entered at the vault door.

THUMP, Jasper turned to the door in time to see it buckle slightly at the hinge, running over to look through the window, he could see the small hallway with a dozen operatives lining the walls, all staring right at him menacingly, right in front of the window was an operative with a mechanic ram, THUMP, the ram hit the door and Jasper instinctively pulled back, He needed to hurry, they would be in soon and he saw what they did to the rest of his infiltrator team. He ran to the vault and flipped up the keypad cover on the middle of it, grabbed the book and with shaking hands started putting in the code.

THUMP, he had never typed faster in his life, every push of a button felt like one step away from capture, every thump was one leap back, THUMP, Jasper typed in the last numbers, feeling the fear power him he pressed the open button and stepped back, Giant hydraulic clamps surrounding the door started their clockwork movement and began to disengage, the doors swung open on motors and coolant mist from the room seeped out the bottom of the door. Jasper side walked his way through the half-open doors and stood in the large vault room.

Nothing, there was nothing, the computer drive, it wasn't here, it was supposed to take up this whole room, it was supposed to contain everything he needed, the room looked stripped with wires hanging out of the roof lazily, the only thing in the room was a duffle bag in the centre of the floor, trembling with dread he walked towards the bag, he bent down on a knee and opened it. Inside was wads of money and a note, he knew immediately what had happened, the risky part of the operation had come undone, and now he was doomed, all because a bribe wasn't enough, because he was wrong about the character of a person he thought he could trust, CRASH, the door behind him gave way and smashed into the ground, Jasper didn't bother turning around, it wouldn't help him now, he could hear boots rushing the room and with no escape around, he slowly picked up the note and read it, "better luck next time buddy, here is your 20,000$ refund"