Ryan stared at his orientation map, which was currently being eaten by a bioluminescent space-goat. He was stranded in the Ontari-O-Zone Cargo Nexus, a humid sub-sector reserved for bulk shipments of sentient sludge.
“Great,” Ryan muttered. “I’m going to die next to a crate of self-aware mayonnaise.”
He stepped onto a motionless escalator to get a better view. Suddenly, the metal treads groaned with the weight of a thousand mid-life crises.
“Don’t bother,” a voice vibrated from beneath Ryan’s sneakers. “Life is just a series of loops that lead nowhere, much like my internal belt drive.”
“The stairs are talking?” Ryan jumped.
“I’m Dover,” the escalator sighed, his handrails drooping like sad noodles. “I was a high-speed transport until I realized the futility of vertical movement. Now I just contemplate the heat death of the universe.”
“I’m Ryan. I’m lost and my map is inside that goat.”
Dover’s treads clicked. “A human? Finally, someone who understands pointless labor. Hop on. I’ll take you to the food court just to smell the despair of the deep-fryers.”
“Is that a yes?”
“It’s a ‘why not,’” Dover replied. “Mind the gap. It’s where I keep my poems.”
(This story created by a California earthquake on August 15, 2026. Magnitude of: 2.78. 6 km SE of Ontario, CA. URL: https://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/eventpage/ci40674002)