Episode 13 - The Map is Not the Territory

By Wednesday, Olivia had accepted that her tea preferences now automatically appeared in the breakroom.

She hadn’t written them down.

She hadn’t told anyone.

And yet, there it was that morning: a new box labeled “Olivia’s Favorite – Lavender Chai, Slightly Spicy.” The station was listening.

She wasn’t sure how she felt about that.

It started as a joke.

She was flipping through a stack of old courier forms—most of which referred to delivery entrances that no longer existed—when she found a yellowed, hand-drawn floor plan labeled “OtherWorlds TV – circa ???”

It was wildly incorrect.

The Archive was listed as being on the roof. The Vault was underground and above the lobby. There was a room called “Studio Xeno” with a skull icon drawn next to it. Another simply read: **“Do Not.”

Olivia made a face, pulled out some graph paper from the supply closet (which was located in a different place every day), and decided to make a map of her own.

She started with the lobby.

That was safe.

Then the breakroom, the hallway to the recording booths, the kitchenette, the front staircase. So far, so good.

She added Bernard’s favorite hovering spot near the vending machine. Marked Charles’s office with a polite question mark. Noted the door to the Vault—but didn’t label it.

By the time she looked up, three hours had passed. And the breakroom was no longer where she left it.

Olivia stood in what should have been the breakroom doorway.

It wasn’t.

It was a corridor of flickering televisions stacked three high on each side, each playing a different scene from a horror film she’d never seen.

As she stepped back, the corridor narrowed behind her.

A low voice whispered from one of the screens:

“She’s looking too closely.”

She bolted.

When she returned to the front desk, her map had changed. The ink had bled. The paper was warped. And someone had drawn a little cartoon of her in the corner with the caption: “Still trying? Bless her.”

She told Bernard.

He was, of course, delighted.

“Oh, the building loves when people try to map it!” he said, spinning gently in the air like a joyful balloon. “It plays back. Makes a game of it.”

“So I offended the building?”

“No, no,” he said. “You engaged it. That’s a very good sign.”

She gave him a flat look. “You could have warned me.”

He twirled a tentacle. “You didn’t ask.”

That night, Olivia went back to her desk.

The layout made no sense. The station didn’t follow time zones. The vault had a key that changed color. And her reflection had started smiling first.

But for the first time, she didn’t feel like an outsider trying to survive a weird job.

She felt like part of the building.

And the building, in its own quiet way, was responding.