The bead curtain clattered softly behind Jonah as he stepped into the back room. It was darker here. The walls were lined with shelves—hundreds of small wooden drawers, each labeled in delicate handwriting: "Winding Springs," "Sapphire Pins," "Secondhands," "Black Dust, Type A."
He didn't know what any of it meant.
A single hanging bulb flickered above a worktable in the center of the room. The ticking he'd heard came from a small brass metronome perched at its edge, swinging left to right like it was keeping time for something unseen.
Jonah felt the air shift around him. Denser. Heavier. Like the room was older than the rest of the shop. As if time hadn't passed here the same way. He ran his hand along the edge of the table, brushing away a layer of dust that hadn't been disturbed in years.
And then he saw the journal.
It was resting beside the metronome, its leather cover cracked and warped from age. A brass emblem—a tiny clock face without hands—was embedded in the center. Jonah hesitated only a moment before flipping it open.
Inside: looping, elegant handwriting. Notes. Diagrams. Equations he didn't understand. But the first page had something he could read.
> If you've found this, then time has already started to slip.
Do not trust the clocks.
Do not let them trick you.
He read it again. And again.
What did that mean?
He flipped to the next page and found a sketch—intricate gears surrounded by runes. They looked oddly familiar, like the markings on the key now resting in his coat pocket.
He pulled it out and placed it beside the journal.
Exact match.
The gears in the sketch weren't part of a normal clock. They fit together in a shape that spiraled inward—almost alive. The writing beside it mentioned something called the Heartwind Mechanism, followed by:
> Built to store memory. Built to reverse the unwritten. Access requires the original key.
Jonah leaned back. His fingers twitched, like the key was trying to pull him somewhere. He turned in a slow circle, scanning the walls—and that's when he noticed the trapdoor in the far corner.
Half-hidden under a roll of carpeting.
He crossed the room and knelt beside it. There was no handle. Just a lock.
A lock that was exactly the shape of the key.
Jonah hesitated. Part of him screamed don't. He was just a kid with a weird watch, not some kind of explorer. But the other part—the part that had followed him into the rain, down strange forums, and into this eerie shop—was louder.
He slid the key in.
Click.
The lock released with a soft metallic sigh, like it had been holding its breath for a long, long time.
He pulled the trapdoor open.
A narrow staircase descended into darkness.
Jonah stared into it, heart pounding.
Something moved below. A soft glow—dim, shifting, like candlelight reflected in water.
And then, without knowing why, Jonah whispered aloud:
> "Time doesn't wait… but it remembers."
He took a breath, tightened his grip on the key, and started down the stairs.
The door shut itself behind him.