He moved quickly at first, scanning for what mattered. Fire. Metal. Cordage. Containers. He found a case full of sealed ration tins mounted in perfect order behind cracked clear plastic, each with a neat little caption about resilience culture after the storms. Another held hand pumps, water filters, and foldout field stoves wired into place with little brass clips so no one would remove them. A wall board displayed evacuation satchels cut open to show their contents, each piece glued into outline like a child’s school project.

"Of course," he said to the empty room.

His own voice came back thin off the ceramic ceiling. He set down the broken tile chip and charcoal pieces he had carried wrapped in his pale cloth and tested the nearest case. Locked. The old latch had fused with age. He wedged his fingers under the frame and pulled. Nothing. He tried again with a metal placard support he snapped from a fallen stand. The support bent. Pain ran from his shoulder down through his side in a line that stole his breath. He stopped, leaning over the case, forehead nearly touching the cloudy lid.

His anger rose not because the case would not open, but because it was another system with its own rules, another smooth refusal. In his own time there had always been a password, an override, a badge level, a legal barrier, a board approval, a grant committee, a gate dressed up as order. Here too. Even the dead had built enclosures.