Before:

     The room where Niki donned her protective gear dropped like an elevator.

     When the door opened again, Niki, her protective gear on, stepped into a long, gray hall.

     Along one side of the hall, debris rained from the ceiling, refuse, garbage, pieces of this and chunks of that. On the other side of the hall, a furnace, not of flame, but of what, to Niki, looked like lightning swirls that crackled and blinded. 

     Niki also saw dozens in protective gear that hid every part of their bodies except for what could be seen through their eye slits for those that required eye slits.

     They all performed the same task.

     They picked up crap from one side of the hall to throw into the furnace on the other.

     Machines, looking like spiders the size of trucks, picked up the biggest chunks of debris to throw into the furnace.

     Those in protective gear got to everything else. A few of them used brooms to sweep up anything smaller than a thumb. Those with brooms refused to let anyone else touch them. It was like some sort of privileged position to hold a broom, Niki figured. 

     Hovering spheres flitted among everybody, poking here, zapping there.

     Niki watched as someone picked up something too big for it.

​     It dropped the object immediately, grabbed its back, and roared. The spheres zapped it with lightning.

     Now it really roared...

     and it swung on the spheres.

     It even got one, smacked a sphere out of the air to smash to pieces before another sphere zapped it unconscious.

     Everyone watched as two beings in protective gear picked up the unconscious figure to throw ​it into the furnace.

    Spheres zapped to get everyone moving and productive again.

    So that's how it is? Niki asked herself.

    She looked around for a chunk of debris that didn't look too heavy, carried it across the hall to the furnace, and threw it in.

CONTINUE