October 29, 2025 – 11:00 PM

Somewhere in the tech support wilderness, where ticket numbers are endless and hold music loops like a cursed chant, Todd answers a call.

“TechEase Solutions, this is Todd. Have you tried turning it off and on again?”

Static. Then:
“I tried. It screamed.”

“Uh… it screamed?”

“Yes. Like a chorus of the damned. Then my cat burst into Latin.”

Todd checks his coffee. Decaf. Damn.

He continues his script: “Sir, can you tell me what device you’re using?”

“It’s a—uh—vintage PDA? Said ‘limited release.’ Found it in a pawn shop run by a guy with no eyes. Paid in teeth.”

“Okayyy… Have you installed any apps?”

“Just one. Called SoulBridge 1.0. It says ‘Press here to pass on.’ Now my lights flicker when I sneeze.”

At this point, Todd’s supervisor, Brenda—who’s been dead inside since 2011—leans over and whispers, “Just escalate it to Tier 3, hon.”

“I can’t escalate to Tier 3, Brenda! Tier 3 hasn’t responded since the Halloween outage!”

Meanwhile, the caller is muttering incantations and the line emits Gregorian chanting.

Todd, now visibly sweating, tries one last thing:
“Okay, I’m going to walk you through a factory reset.”

“Already tried it. Now my grandma’s voice is coming through the rice cooker.”

“Sir… please unplug the device.”

A beat. “Too late. The app says ‘Connection complete.’ The floor is turning into fog.”

Silence.

Brenda sighs. “We lost another one.”

Todd closes the ticket:
Issue: Unresolvable metaphysical breach.
Status: Closed.

He takes another call.

“TechEase Solutions, this is Todd…”

/ End Run