Detective Harris pushed open the door to the ancient clock shop. The smell of oil and old wood hit him like a punch. Clocks ticked and chimed all around him—but one stood stubbornly silent. Its hands quivered, as if trying to escape time itself. A shiver crawled up his spine when he noticed the brass key lying on the counter, etched with a date: October 13th, 1923.
The shopkeeper looked like a skeleton pretending to be a man. Thick glasses, lenses like the bottoms of soda bottles, perched crookedly on his nose. He mopped the floor without really looking at Harris. "Not just any clock," he said, voice rasping like dry leaves. "That one… it only works for people who can find the missing hour. No one walks away the same."
Harris raised an eyebrow. "How… changed?" His voice felt too steady, too careful.
The man's gaze slid toward the restless clock. "You'll see soon enough," he said.
Rain tapped lightly against the single window, a little drumbeat of silver. Wet timber and rust mingled in the air. Harris's eyes wandered the room. Clocks towered on shelves like fragile monuments, faces cracked, hands frozen—or running strangely fast, like they had somewhere urgent to be. The walls seemed to watch him with every tick, daring him closer.
The key trembled in his hand. Without thinking, he stepped toward the wobbling clock. A faint whisper drifted into his ear, barely audible: "Time isn't yours to hold… not even a single moment."
A floorboard cracked behind him. Harris whirled—his heart hammering—but the store was empty. Only the clocks remained, counting their relentless time. He exhaled slowly, returning his attention to the key. Its weight throbbed in his palm, steady and insistent.
He slid it into the lock. The clock's hands glowed like molten metal, spinning faster and faster until the room seemed to hold its breath. Then silence. A whisper, sharper than before, curled around him: "One hour… one choice… one life…"