Chapter 115 IKEA Diary

So, I'm trapped in IKEA. Sounds like a classic bad joke. The lights went out at 10pm. I almost had a heart attack, a loud clang followed by pitch black. There are a lot of beds in this place, and my phone can be used as a light - but there's no fucking signal - so I found a bed and went to sleep. I spent most of the next day looking for an exit to no avail. But I did find a restaurant with meatballs, so at least I won't starve to death here. The finishing touch of the joke. Anyway, they were still warm and fresh, but I didn't see anyone cooking nearby. Maybe I should go to the bed before dark, it's hard to search in the dark.

It's 9:10am now, and the lights just came back on. I must have searched the entire area, and it's obvious that the exit is not here, so I have to find a direction and hope for good results.

Day 3 of the Magic IKEA Mystery Adventure. Some people may want to ask how I determine the time. First of all, I can look at my phone, and secondly, the lights here are switched on and off regularly, turning off at a certain time and turning on at a certain time, so you can judge the alternation of day and night based on the light switches.

I wasn't sure this place was weird before, but now I am. I walked in a straight line for about 3 hours (insert IKEA joke here) and then I came across a ladder that led to a huge stack of shelves.

I climbed up to get my bearings, and the place seemed to stretch on forever. Like something out of The Lion King, except the trees and grass were replaced with shelves, tables, and garbage. I did see someone moving around a little way off, and I went over.

At first I thought it was an employee - it was in a uniform.

But damn it was a maybe, maybe 7 foot tall monster with long arms and short legs, no face, the kind of thing they expect to work at Super IKEA. The thing completely ignored me though, and I wasn't even sure it knew I was there, since it had no eyes or ears. I thought about throwing something to get its attention, but its hands were big enough to crush a watermelon, so I figured I'd give it a miss.

It just kept walking and eventually went out of sight, so I decided to keep going the way I was.

Anyway, no comfy bed tonight. It seems I've entered the hard, pointy tables section of this store.

I'll probably have to make do with a few tablecloths. My phone ran out of battery today too. It didn't help, but I felt like I had just lost a vital lifeline.

Have you ever seen that scene in cartoons where you go through a door in a hallway and then come out another door in the same hallway? That's how I felt right now. For 2 days all I saw were the same exact bookshelves.

Row after row after row. I mean, come on, I love books as much as the next person but this is too much. I'm definitely still moving forward, I can see signs passing overhead. But sadly none of them say "Exit".

Not sure who I'm writing these questions for.

Let's just call this my autobiography for when I get out of here. I'm going to call it "My Super Normal Journey Through a Regular Old Ikea".

If I can get out

Finally found someone else! I'm not the only unlucky person stuck here.

Lucky, I guess. My 6th night here.

2 employee monsters came at me in the dark, not quite like the first one I saw, but still a mess. Heard them coming, they were saying something about the store closing and I had to leave, in a friendly and polite tone. I'm not sure which is weirder: that they have no mouths at all, or that they're trying to kill me when they say that. They run like mad dogs.

So I run. Running like a fucking lunatic through Ikea in the dark. But just as I'm leaving a bunch of big shelves I see it, lit up by torches and floodlights. They've built a whole town here!

A giant wall of shelves and bed boards and tables and all.

I swear to god it's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen. Anyway I think they saw me coming (or heard my -[deleted]sissy[deleted]-manly screams of terror) because they open the door and two of them wave me in. After the door is closed I can still hear the employees banging on it, still politely informing us that the store is closing. But eventually they go away.

They call this town "Exchange" because that's what the sign on the ceiling says. Returns and Exchanges.

They light up the night with lights they found and hook them into the wires. There are beds and food and people. There are over 50 wonderful people with normal faces and arms and legs intact. This is my seventh night here, and the first night I haven't spent in darkness. A full week in IKEA. This could be a TV show somewhere.

Now that I have people around me, I'm starting to feel more normal. Maybe normal isn't the right word. But after a week with only the sound of my own footsteps for company, I'm increasingly certain I'm going insane. I'm going to be locked in a padded room somewhere, banging my head against a wall. But no, I'm feeling pretty sane, thank you guys!

It seems like there are still some towns here. Some with more, some with less. I find it incredible - how could so many people disappear and no one notice. Someone must have noticed that everyone went to IKEA and then just fucking disappeared. Or maybe not everyone. Maybe we're just the lucky ones.

People here just call these employee monsters Employees.

They seem to be fine during the day, wandering the aisles minding their own business.

Once the lights go out, they turn into fucking lunatics. So during the day people can go find food, water, and whatever they need. There seem to be restaurants and shops that get restocked at irregular intervals.

Nobody knows what's going on. Maybe the staff did it. They don't seem to be very good at their jobs, either, since restocking sometimes takes a while, which means they need to conserve food.

Maybe they could get more done if they weren't so busy catching people in the dark.

Anyway, the staff go crazy when night falls, and everyone has to stay inside the walls.

Apparently this happens everywhere in this place, wherever the hell this place is. Uh-IKEA, where all the other IKEAs sprang up. Or maybe we're just in a regular IKEA and this is all just a crazy dream from mind-numbing boredom. Who knows.

Been here for 10 days now. Most people I asked said they had lost track of the days, and one guy, Chris, said he'd been here for years.

Years.

There seem to be rumors that people have managed to escape. And those who've seen the exit, just say it disappeared right before their eyes. I don't think everyone believes this, but I do.

Explains (part of) why we're stuck here in the first place. I mean, come on, employee monsters, and endless amounts of high-quality Swiss furniture. I don't understand why they just don't want to believe in disappearing doors.