I don't see any obvious signs pointing to a manger's office, but my destination seems clear enough. Whoever or whatever I'm looking for, I'll find them at the very top of this place.

I make my way to the escalator in the center of the room. It accommodates eight people standing shoulder to shoulder. I can feel massive engines thrumming under my feet as the steps ascend.

Looking to my left or right, I can see down the aisles as I pass them, and I notice that the merchandise becomes progressively more strange with each level. On the first few it's just odd health food and exotic produce. Then I begin to see snack packages with pictures of people wearing expressions of horror, or breakfast cereal boxes with cheerfully drawn cartoons depicting frightened children running from some unseen pursuer. Then kitchen utensil aisles lined with bizarre, curvy machines made of wood and cast iron, some with crablike metal legs. Then produce sections full of unfamiliar vegetables with too-bright colors and strange growths that almost resemble appendages. Then a meat aisle with whole newborn calves in plastic-wrapped, styrofoam packages, and a butcher's glass case with displays of small animals that I can't actually identify, strange things with smooth skin and huge eyes, some of which twitch occasionally. By the time I am nearing the top floor of the ziggurat, the aisles contain things so alien that I am unable to look at them. Impossible shapes, nauseating colors, and twisted, abstract forms with no dimension, a queasy, rippling menagerie straight out of a deep fever dream. I have to close my eyes to avoid vomiting.

Finally, I arrive at the top level, and find myself in a bare white room. I am alone. The shoppers riding the escalator with me had been steadily dwindling as I ascended, and the last one stepped off just before the fever dream floors. There are no guards or clerks here, just the white walls, featureless except for a door at the end.

I walk toward the door and stop in front of it. It looks like any ordinary office door. The lettering on the frosted glass window reads:

SAFEWAY HEAD OFFICE

Employees Only

I test the knob, and find it unlocked. I push the door open, and step inside.