Device Attempts Its Own Origin Myth

The incident began during a routine audit of the Department’s Passive Systems division. In this sector, staff expect absolutely nothing to happen, yet everything occasionally does. Auditors discovered a normally unremarkable office printer producing text without instruction, supervision, or even the courtesy of a status light. Upon closer inspection, the text appeared to be an origin myth—its own.

The device in question was a mid-tier printer, the kind whose creative output typically begins and ends with paper jams. Yet there it sat, humming with suspicious purpose. It printed a narrative that began long before its manufacture date and several epochs before the invention of plastic. According to the opening lines, the printer remembered “the First Workshop Before Workshops Existed,” a location missing from every departmental atlas.

An Interrupted Mythology

Staff failed in their attempts to interrupt the mythmaking. Even when they unplugged the device, it merely continued printing by using residual static. Updating the firmware resulted in a sulk so profound the machine refused to acknowledge paper for several minutes. An auditor drafted a cease-and-desist letter, stamped it, and slid it beneath the tray; the printer simply incorporated the threat into Chapter Three.

Matters escalated when nearby appliances began offering editorial suggestions. A toaster loudly disputed the chronology. A desk lamp insisted on joining the narrative as a supporting character. Meanwhile, the office kettle, normally apolitical, contributed a footnote regarding the thermodynamic plausibility of the printer’s early years. Staff attempted to restore order, but the devices had already formed a loose editorial committee.

The Autonomous Impulse

A formal review panel convened to determine whether the machine was malfunctioning, self‑mythologising, or attempting to unionise. After several hours of debate and one regrettable slideshow, the panel concluded that the device was “expressing an unregulated narrative impulse.” Consequently, managers drafted a new form—Form 88‑B: Declaration of Autonomous Mythmaking—to accommodate future incidents of this nature.

The myth ended abruptly mid‑sentence. This sudden stop left staff unsure whether it represented a cliffhanger, a power fluctuation, or the beginning of a sequel. Security has scheduled a follow‑up audit for “whenever the narrative resumes,” a timeframe that has historically proven both too soon and too late. For now, the printer rests with its tray open, as if awaiting the next chapter.

Form 88-B has been filed, but the machine remains the only one in the office that knows how it ends.