A scientific breakthrough; That's what it said on the paper.
For me, it would prove to be a job, then the path to a new world.
It was revolutionary technology, and many new hire-ons were required. Including doctors, maintenance workers, consultants... (sigh) And janitors. I was hired as one of the latter.
My parents were happy either way.
One night, my boss had me cleaning the entire facility. Yeah, he was one of those bosses.
"Now, you'll be doing this by yourself. Be careful with the merchandise. This ain't no place for fun, got it?" he said.
"Understood, sir!" I replied with a salute. Menial job or not, I was determined to work as hard as I could.
"Okay, okay. No need to be obsequious." He said with a frown. "Nobody else was able to come tonight, that's all. This is practically just a figurative milk run. All you need to do is clean the place. Wash the floors, clean the surfaces, just make sure that everything is in working order. What could go wrong?" he said before leaving me to my job.
I winced at the last bit. He just had to say those four words. Still, I had my instructions and hopped to it.
When I began, it seemed like everything would be fine, like I was worried over nothing. I started to hum while I was working. Being a brony some time ago (I still watched an episode or two now and then), it seemed apropos to go with Winter Wrap Up at first. I started with th hallways, moving on to the break room at the back, then the offices. By that point I had gone through Art of the Dress, even a few brony songs I'd heard on Youtube.
Finally, I'd moved on to The Room. The one where The Magic would happen. Well, when people started signing up for the proceedure, anyway. The way I heard it, there were a few people signed up to see the future. Of course, that wasn't the only good part of the process. You'd also be fully healed, for example. No old scars or even any minor scratches. As a fringe benefit, you'd be fully rested when you came out and supposedly wouldn't lose any muscle mass, however long you were to stay in there. Also, you'd be able to get any shots you'd be missing out on. Why? I had no idea. It wasn't my place to ask anyway.
Apparently, though, someone spilled some coffee on the floor and didn't clean it up. Judging by the amount there was, it was a large coffee, too. Thus it was up to me to clean that up as well. After that, I had to wash my mop out. Then I went back to what I was doing.
Apparently someone had been fiddling with the settings on some of the machines, but that wasn't my business either. Then, it happened. I slid on a wet spot and got stuck in one of the machines. Just... of course. At first it seemed like it wouldn't be a problem. However, I heard the door lock. Right then, my eyes widened. I started to panic, trying to jimmy the lock on it, but to no avail. And besides, I was starting to... feel... sleepy...
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(A day or so later...)
"Look, lady," my boss said, "it was his fault. He was clumsy and slipped."
Being observant, my mother noticed some of the coffee stain remaining. "He wasn't the kind to drink coffee." she pointed out.
My boss' eyes widened and he went to look at the stain. "Looks like whoever had that had a milky one, too. I'll have to ask around." he finished. "Either way, It's out of my hads at this point. He's locked in there for however long it's set for." he added. "Hopefully it wasn't too long..."
How wrong he was.