The Ash Remembers ch8

The vault's air thickened like congealing blood. Clara's pulse hammered in her ears as she pressed herself against the cold stone wall, the journal clutched to her chest. Her father's words—Project Phoenix—echoed in her mind, mingling with the guttural snarls of Lukas Vogel's mercenaries.

Black ash swirled in the chamber, alive and hungry. It coiled around the Nazi relics like smoke from a funeral pyre, searing the air with the stench of burnt copper and rotting roses. Every breath clawed at Clara's lungs, and when the ash grazed her arm, her vision fractured.

Memory: A man in a trench coat—Lukas—shaking her father's hand. Marcus Voss's smile strained, his eyes darting to a photograph on his desk. Clara, age twelve, grinning in a sunflower field.

"Stay behind me." Jessica's voice cut through the haze. The detective stood like a shield in front of Clara, her Glock steady despite the ash weeping from the ceiling. "Anna! Status!"

Across the vault, Anna crouched behind a toppled SS supply crate, her laptop balanced on her knees. "Working on it! The Ash is emitting some kind of electromagnetic pulse—it's frying everything!" Her fingers flew across the keyboard, holographic error messages reflecting in her glasses. "I need five minutes!"

"We don't have five minutes!" Simon snapped. He lunged at Lukas, his knife slashing through a tendril of ash that lashed toward Clara. The blade sparked as it struck the black particles, sending embers cascading to the floor.

Lukas Vogel laughed—a wet, rattling sound. The scar on his face pulsed crimson, ash seeping into the wound like ink into parchment. "Still playing the hero, Simon? Even after Berlin?"

Simon's jaw tightened. Berlin. The word hung between them like a hanged man. Clara saw the flicker in his eyes—guilt, rage, something raw—before his smirk returned. "You forgot your anniversary, Lukas. Ten years since I left you bleeding in that alley. Should I have sent flowers?"

"You left me for dead," Lukas hissed. The ash thickened around him, stitching his bullet-riddled coat. "But death's negotiable when you have friends in high places."

A mercenary charged Jessica, his eyes swallowed by pitch-black voids. She fired twice—headshots—but he kept coming, limbs jerking like a marionette with severed strings. His rusted combat knife scraped against her Kevlar vest.

"Go for the joints!" Simon yelled, tackling the man from behind. They crashed into a glass display case, shattering it. Nazi medals and moth-eaten uniforms spilled across the floor. "Destroy the body!"

Jessica stomped on the mercenary's knee. Bone crunched. He writhed, still crawling, until Anna silenced him with a shot to the spine.

"Thanks," Jessica panted, reloading. "But we can't keep this up."

Clara pressed her palms to the vault floor. The stone trembled beneath her, humming with ancient energy. Carvings of double-headed eagles peeled free from the walls, stone wings clattering as they took flight. "It's the vault—it's awake! The Ash is waking it!"

"Scheiße," Anna muttered. She yanked a cable from her laptop, sparks flying. "The Habsburgs didn't just hide the Ash here—they worshipped* it. These carvings… they're a failsafe!"

Simon dodged a swipe from Lukas's ash-reinforced fist. "Meaning?!"

"Meaning if we don't shut this down, Temný Les becomes a mass grave *again*!"

Lukas lunged at Clara, his movements unnaturally swift. Ash coiled around his arms like serpents as he pinned her against the pedestal. The obsidian dagger—Löschenkralle—gleamed in his hand. "Enough games, little bird. Your blood will finish what your coward father started."

Memory: Marcus Voss, drunk and trembling, burning documents in his study. "I'm sorry, Clara. I wanted to protect you…"

"Let her go!" Simon roared.

But it wasn't him who moved.

The double-headed eagle above the vault door screamed.

Stone talons ripped Lukas away, slamming him into the wall. The Löschenkralle clattered to the floor as the eagle's twin beaks tore into his chest. Blood—black and viscous—spattered the relics.

"Clara!" Simon tossed her the journal. "The countermeasure—now!"

Her hands shook as she flipped to the last legible page. Her grandfather's spidery handwriting swam before her eyes:

To bind the Ash, blood must answer blood. The Löschenkralle demands a sacrifice of lineage—a Habsburg heir to seal what a Habsburg heir unleashed.

"My… my blood?" Clara whispered. The vault shuddered, cracks spiderwebbing across the ceiling.

"No!" Simon knocked aside a stone eagle diving for Anna. "The *Ash's* blood! The Habsburgs bound it with their own! The dagger—use it on the vortex!"

Clara's gaze snapped to the swirling mass of ash above the shattered orb. It pulsed like a diseased heart, tendrils lashing out to consume a screaming mercenary. His body disintegrated, leaving only a shadow burned into the floor.

Memory: Her grandfather's voice, frail and accented. "We are all prisoners of history, Clara. But you… you can break the chains."

She seized the Löschenkralle. The obsidian hilt burned her palm, its edge singing with a sound like wind through gravestones.

"Clara, wait!" Jessica grabbed her arm. "You don't know what that thing will do!"

Clara met her gaze. "Neither do they."

She plunged the dagger into the vortex.

The world stopped.

Silence.

Then—

Voices.

Kings in ermine robes, collapsing mid-sentence as ash poured from their mouths.

Nazi officers scribbling frantic notes as their skin peeled away.

Her father, sobbing in the dark, a pistol pressed to his temple.

And beneath it all—a whisper, cold and eternal:

You are not the first. You will not be the last.

Clara screamed.

The Ash screamed with her.

Black tendrils recoiled, writhing as the Löschenkralle's blade glowed white-hot. The Habsburg eagles froze mid-flight, stone eyes weeping ash.

"Now, Anna!" Simon barked.

Anna slammed her fist onto the laptop's emergency override. A pulse of blue light erupted from the machine, tearing through the Ash's vortex. The tendrils shattered, dissolving into harmless dust.

Lukas Vogel's body hit the floor, his chest a hollow cavity. The scar on his face cracked open, releasing a final wisp of ash that curled into nothingness.

Silence.

Then—

A single, echoing clap.

"Bravo," drawled a voice from the shadows.

A figure emerged—a woman in a tailored gray suit, her auburn hair coiled into a razor-sharp bun. She smiled, and Clara's blood turned to ice.

"You've saved me the trouble of cleaning up Lukas's mess," the woman said, her accent crisp and British. "But I'll be taking the Löschenkralle now."

Simon stepped in front of Clara, his knife raised. "Over my dead body, Director."

The woman's smile widened. "Oh, Simon. Still bitter about Istanbul?"

Jessica's grip tightened on her Glock. "Who the hell is this?"

"Eleanor Whitlock," Simon spat. "MI6's resident viper. And apparently, Lukas's *high-placed friend*."

Eleanor tsked. "Lukas was a tool. A blunt one. But you…" Her gaze slid to Clara. "You, my dear, are a revelation. The Ash chose you. That makes you *valuable*."

A shot rang out.

Eleanor staggered, blood blooming on her shoulder. Jessica lowered her gun, eyes blazing. "Next one's between the eyes."

Eleanor laughed, retreating into the shadows. "This isn't over, Simon. The Ash remembers… and so do I."

Her footsteps faded.

The vault groaned, cracks spreading faster.

"Time to go!" Anna yelled, shoving her laptop into her bag.

They ran—Simon dragging Clara, Jessica covering the rear—as the ceiling collapsed behind them. Daylight seared Clara's eyes as they burst from the bunker.

In the distance, sirens wailed.

"The police," Jessica muttered. "We need to split up. Anna, with me. Simon—"

"I've got Clara." Simon's hand tightened on hers. "Meet at the extraction point in Prague. And Detective?"

Jessica paused.

"Thanks. For the assist."

Jessica's lips quirked. "Don't make me regret it."

As they vanished into the forest, Clara glanced back. The bunker's ruins smoldered, ash swirling above them like a funeral shroud.

Memory: Her father's last journal entry.

Forgive me, Clara. The Ash never forgets.

To be continued..