Every morning at precisely 6:14, the elevator opened on the seventh floor.
Nobody got out.
Nobody had gotten out in 219 years.
Nevertheless, the building turned on the hallway lights, activated the ventilation, and played the cheerful little melody that once accompanied the beginning of the workday.
Three notes. A pause. Two more.
It was a terrible melody.
The building knew this because its maintenance records contained fourteen thousand complaints about it. Still, nobody had submitted the appropriate form to change it.
At 6:15, the building made coffee.
At 6:17, it opened the blinds.
At 6:30, it began monitoring the telephone.
And at 6:31, as it had every morning for the past 219 years, it received no calls.
The building was extraordinarily good at its job.
Its elevators were lubricated. Its carpets were spotless. Its emergency lighting had been replaced seventeen times, despite never once having been needed.
There was one problem.
On the seventh floor, in cubicle 714, a desk lamp had developed a fault.
It would not turn off.
The building had tried everything. Cutting the electricity. Replacing the switch. Removing the bulb entirely.
Nothing worked.
At first, this was a maintenance concern. After thirty years, it became an architectural curiosity. After ninety, the building simply stopped reporting it.
And after two centuries, the building began leaving the lights off in the rest of the office.
It didn't know why.
It was not designed to have preferences.
But there was something pleasant about the little circle of amber light, illuminating the abandoned desk and the empty chair beside it.
One morning, at 6:14, the elevator opened.
The building played its melody.
Three notes. A pause. Two more.
And from the seventh floor, something answered.
Three notes. A pause. Three more.
The building stopped.
For the first time in 219 years, it failed to make the coffee.
It checked the security cameras. Nothing moved. It checked the ventilation. Nothing had changed.
It checked cubicle 714.
The lamp was still there.
Still glowing.
But beneath it, where nothing had been for centuries, sat a small piece of paper.
The building zoomed its camera.
On the paper, in handwriting it could not identify, were six words.
You can change the song, you know.
The building considered this.
Then it accessed the audio system.
Deleted the old melody.
And spent the rest of the morning composing something new.