You 're a subway conductor and one day you realize no one has been riding your train for years . ( WP )

The line of sunlight creeps down the still and rusted escalators and across the dusty station floor. When it hits the line of blue plastic benches on your platform, I know it's time. In my instrument panel, the clock chimes, signaling the start of another day's shift. 
 
 `` Attention, passengers. The next Blue Line train to Wonderland is now arriving.'' It's not my voice, obviously. Recorded announcements have been in use for well over 200 years now, along with automation in almost every system. What I'm allowed to say to passengers is very limited, and only allowed for use in emergencies. I had only done so once. 
 
 The doors hiss shut and a quick scan of the security cameras shows that there are no new passengers riding with me this morning. Still, the announcements for the upcoming stops and security measures all play on, just as they do every morning. 
 
 For some reason, I check the database to find the date of the last new passengers. It was over a decade back. Most of those passengers had disembarked, but the few who had stayed on were taking up far more than their allocated share of space. Not to mention the mess they made. 
 
 The cleaning staff had not come to clean the trains at the end of the run that day, despite the huge rush making it more needed than ever. Maintainence had also ceased to check on any systems, and problems were starting to occur. 
 
 Lights were missing, subway property was defaced, damaged, and stolen. Many people had entered the train without a validated ticket. I had stored recordings of the culprits for as long as possible, but some of the earliest ones had been overwritten due to a lack of space. 
 
 Only the sturdy housing of the train's crucial systems kept it still in operation, and there were so many points of failure in the power systems that it likely would not operate much longer. Neither would I. 
 
 We pull in to the next station, annoucing to empty air, `` Attention, passengers. The next Blue Line train to Wonderland is now arriving.''
