Culture Japan’s Danny Choo gives us an inside look at one of Shinagawa’s automated bicycle vaults, proving once and for all that they are not operated by tiny elves working under illegal labour conditions.

Our favourite part is when the official explains that the vaults keep bikes safe from “the weather and pranksters.” Damn those pranksters, stealing our bikes! Not funny this time, you guys.

As cool as this contraption is, as you can see in the video, there’s a creepy aspect to it as your bike is machine-inserted into a cavernous bicycle Matrix, where the bike presumably enters a digital slumber, dreaming bike dreams while its life energy is slowly harvested by the Machines.

Source: YouTube tokyostormtrooper via TokyoDesu