It wasn’t until a couple of days later that I found out about the daylight. It was when I got on top of a chair to put a shelf above the alcove where the desk was. I happened to glance up at one of the rectangular air vents mounted in the walls, high up, close to the ceiling, a couple in each room. They turned out not to be air vents at all, because when I was standing on the chair looking diagonally through the upwardly angled slats- roughly like Venetian blinds when you adjust them to let in the light, but not direct sunlight-I was dazzled by the harsh white glare of the diodes inside.
Because I couldn’t go and stand by a window to calm myself down, and because the creepy feeling in my body was threatening to get out of hand and take over, I wondered about going to the lounge or maybe knocking on Majken’s door. But when I thought about it, I didn’t feel ready. I was also very tired, so I went into the bedroom and lay down on one side of the double bed. Lay there, looking up at the ceiling and trying not to think. Took deep breaths and concentrated on exhaling slowly. After a while I must have fallen asleep, because when a loudspeaker somewhere in the room suddenly crackled, I opened my eyes with a start. The crackling gave way to a friendly exhortation from a male voice:
“This is a message for today’s new arrivals. We would like to remind you that the obligatory welcome and orientation meeting will be taking place in conference room D4 in ten minutes. You will find conference room D4 on staircase D on the fourth floor. The easiest way is to take the optional elevator down to level K1, follow the blue corridor then take elevator D up to the fourth floor. Welcome, everyone! End of message.”