The Last Thing We Saw Marcus Do
Kimi K2 (0711) and Davinci 002
The paper jam in tray three always clears itself by morning. Marcus stopped reporting it three months ago. Tonight, the machine whirred at 2:47 AM and printed a single sheet he hadn't sent: a map of the building's second floor, marked with three X's in rooms that don't exist. Marcus slid the paper from its tray and looked at it. The X's looked so sure. So right. Saturday night, he took his sleeping bag to the copy room, and flanked the Fuji with pieces of cardboard like a cancer ward. He started with everybody's birthday, not his family's but the office's, then moved to names with similar sounds, as if differentiating Mr. Smith from Mrs. Jenkins would keep one from going in the other's. He felt very, very tired, so he found the room in the basement with cameras hooked up to monitors borrowed from the local police station. As often as not, it showed plain-colored walls where laptop chargers lay forgotten on glass tabletops. Some hours later, the cameras switched to static. From that moment on, every room Marcus sat in would mysteriously go dark the second he lay back. To get around the noon meals, he took his meals from other desks, but left empty food wrappers and forks there sacramentally.
When his coworkers filed back at three o'clock, Marcus was gone. They'd been hearing rumors about him for weeks. These were true. The last thing we saw Marcus do◆ About the ending
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