The Hidden Vault

The Hidden Vault

By Paul McCann

While the banks were    trying to stay trading the war was almost in motion and staff were working overtime to try and cope with the demand as people were panicking to get all their money from their accounts . The daily commotion of people trying to make large withdrawals of money from their banks had become very difficult for the tellers and bank managers to deal with .

At one of the major banks during this time a rare crime was being carried out unseen and unknown by the bank manager ,

One of the tellers was working along with some counterfeiters who had printed fake bank notes that were being exchanged for legal tender to customers .

All of the forged banknotes were placed in a secret vault that had been built and fitted by an out of work builder who had been hired by the bank manager to repair some damaged fixtures behind the front counter that were broken on purpose to get the repairs done . The builder was recommended by a relative of the corrupt bank teller who managed to convince the bank manager he was a good tradesperson person and could do the job very quickly . Due to the threat of war, it was almost impossible to get a tradesman to do any work so the bank manager agreed to have the builder work after hours /

On the night of the scheduled repair work the builder had already built a secret vault that he installed at the place where the teller stood .

With the touch of a button a secret slot like a letter box opened for depositing legal tender and another panel opened up to where all the counterfeit notes were kept . The action was swift and unseen as the teller took hundreds of legal tender notes and dropped them into the letterbox slot and the same number of counterfeit notes were put in their place . After the swap was made, the teller would then proceed to count out the money to an unsuspecting customer in the bank .

The plan was quickly put together as the war machine weas in progress and customers all over the country were attempting to withdraw all the money from their accounts .So many poor innocent people were being robbed as millions of dollars were being withdrawn everyday . The government were helpless to stop this crime as they had no idea of what was going on .

The crooked bank teller and her accomplices were very cruel with the action that was put into place . Once a day when the time was right the bank teller would empty all the cash notes from the secret vault and replace the fake notes into the hidden vault .

The scheme worked like a well-oiled machine and was never detected . As the war began many of the fake bank notes were now in circulation which started an inflation .that was bringing the country to its knees ,

The bank teller and her associates had never thought about that and in the end all the money that had stolen was almost useless .

So many people had lost family inheritances at the hands of these criminals .

who had frequently emptied and refilled the secret vault .

One day as the bank trading, the building was hit by a bomb killing everyone inside the building . As looting was happening all over the country many honest poor people had to turn to crime as a means of survival .

Some of the looters ran into the bank to see what they could take .

One of them found the secret bank vault there that had been uncovered by the damage inside and he managed to take the vault and carry it from the building . The entire building had been destroyed and all the staff inside at the time had been killed . They never got to enjoy any of the fortune they had been accumulating  .

There were so many victims of their crime . The streets were full the poor , hungry and those who were gullible . Spilling over onto sidewalks were homeless people as a spiralling inflation waged its own war on society with  boxes of matches costing hundreds of dollars  . Money was worthless and militants walked among the shadows looking for an escape . But all the  international flights had been cancelled  and ships were also held up tied to their moorings in ports all over the country .

The working class , middle class and the professional side of society had all losses as investments , insurances , pensions and personal savings had been wiped out completely  .

It seemed that the crooked gangsters had never seen this coming and were also helpless to turn around the situation they had created with the major banking institutions that were now forced to close their doors . 

War was now out of control and people had to try to survive as best they could by whatever means they were able to .

  The smoking guns of war raged day after day and more and more people were being buried until a surrender had come and the war ended .

After the war they had to rebuild the city again with new banks and shops and houses  . Even new prisons had to be built to house all the criminals who were being rounded up by the newly formed police and security forces.

The streets were filled with beggars who were once very wealthy members of society . The gangsters we all behind bars again and life was slowly returning back t o normal again or what ever normal was if there ever could be normality again after what had happened .

It took as long time before the lives of people came back together .

Money was still worthless and people were using other things as legal tender  such as alcohol and tobacco , food and clothing . All of these were being traded and no one really had used worthless bank notes to get what they needed .  Years passed by and soon businesses were booming again . In every city there were many people who had rebuilt their lives with honest and faith and a new kind of society appeared . These special handful of people had somehow stitched together a fabric of life from the remnants of the past and the message that they brought to the world was one of hope for a better future and one that guaranteed peace and love to a world that had already seen the devastation of life in the dark days that had now disappeared .

The End .