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In Doctor Enoch’s office, there was an old grandfather clock on the side of the room. Made of sturdy, aged oak and brass gears, it was loud, both in the volume of its ticks and the weight of its presence. It was usually the first thing anyone noticed upon entering the Doctor’s room because the rest of it was comparatively sparse and modern. Yet in this otherwise modern and contemporary office, the only clock in the room was this centuries-old, completely mechanical contraption that required manual winding every morning to keep the time accurately. And when pieces of the grandfather clock did eventually wear down and break, rather than replacing the old clock with a new analog or digital one, Doctor Enoch himself went to a factory to personally manufacture replacement gears and springs out of the same materials the original were made of. The clock was not even originally part of the Doctor’s office, it was a curio relic Closure picked up at a junk sale some years prior which had been sitting alone in her workshop untouched the entire time since.
Enoch took one look at the grandfather clock during a visit and immediately bartered with Closure for ownership of the antique. He got it for a good deal, too, since by that point Closure was happy to free up some space in her increasingly cluttered workstation. She didn’t even question Enoch’s reason for wanting it.
Nobody but Enoch knew his reason for acquiring the grandfather clock. Many people’s eyes were drawn to it, but nobody openly questioned its presence in the Doctor’s office, and Enoch didn’t feel the need to tell anybody about its existence, let alone its purpose.
A clock was a clock, many assumed. There may be many different kinds of clocks, but they all told time the same.
Doctor Enoch was working away at rather menial paperwork when she arrived. At first, he didn’t even look up at the door.
“Come in,” He called out dryly to the door knocks interrupting the rhythmic ticking of his grandfather clock. Aside from visitors, there were typically only two sounds at any time in the Doctor’s office: the ticks from the clock and the subtle scratching sound of pencil on paper.
Now, those were both about to be completely drowned out.
The second the door opened, “Salutations, Doctor! Cleric of Landen Monastery, Operator Archetto reporting as instructed!”
Enoch kept his eyes on the notes he was writing into his papers as several seconds of awkward silence hung between them. But, since there were no further words from her, Enoch felt the need to set the record straight. “Archetto, you were the one who requested this meeting.” He replied, still not looking up.
Archetto leapt forward and gripped the backrest of the chair opposite Enoch’s desk. She leaned over it just enough to lift the back legs off the ground, Archetto then kept it balanced on its two forward legs as she stared down at Enoch’s desk. “Yeah! But you told me the time and place, right?” She asked.
Enoch’s pencil abruptly stopped as the tip of the pencil lead snapped. He sighed as he reached for the sharpener in his desk drawer, but he did not bother answering Archetto’s question, asking one of his own, instead. “Why did you want to come and speak to me?”
“Well, you see-”
“Could you take a seat, please, Archetto?” Enoch interrupted.
Archetto huffed a single laugh before she set the chair back down, walking around and sitting down in the chair with her hands in her lap like a proper lady. “My apologies.” She offered, but Enoch shook his head and lazily waved his hand.
“Just continue, please.”
“Alright!” Archetto politely coughed into a handkerchief, clearing her throat for the resumption of speech. “So, Doctor Enoch-”
“Just Doctor is fine.”
Archetto vibrated briefly. “Could you…!” She quickly stopped herself and exhaled rapidly. “Ahem…! I wished to ask if you were pleased with the recently displayed feats our Lord’s grace allowed me to bestow upon you!” She asked fancifully.
Halfway through Enoch stopped twisting his pencil in the sharpener, having chosen either through curiosity or confusion to give his full attention to Archetto, though he still kept his eyes where his hands were. “If you’re asking about the tryouts, yes, you did well, Archetto, that’s why you were brought on board as an Operator.” He explained.
“Ah, not to impose, Doctor, but I believe you may have a misunderstanding regarding my question.”
“Oh? By all means, could you please clarify?”
Archetto grinned even though Enoch was not looking, she couldn’t help herself. “I asked if you personally were pleased by my performance, Doctor. Not whether the scores were acceptable or not.” She clarified, going on to boast. “I know my skills are impeccable, as those others with my virtue and training can attest to, but I would still like to know how you yourself feel, Doctor.”
To that, Enoch lightly shrugged his shoulders. “It was fine.”
Archetto’s eyes went wide. “It was… fine?!” She loudly questioned.
Enoch let out a quick sigh, finally put his pencil down and looked directly at Archetto, showing off his focused expression. “My evaluation was that you met or surpassed every test I had for you, and when taking aptitude, personality and knowledge scores into account, you would be an exceptional Operator with whom I felt I could trust while on a mission to complete any task that would be within your skillset.” He slowly and carefully explained, Archetto’s gaze relaxing a little more after every minor compliment. “That was why I said ‘fine,’ I know you can get jobs done, I just do not particularly care for theatrics past that. However, I apologize if I offended you regardless.”
Archetto again covered her mouth before clearing her throat. “Well, when you put it that way, thank you, Doctor, and no need to apologize.”
With that out of the way, Enoch returned his gaze to his papers. “Was there anything else you needed to speak to me about, Archetto? I am somewhat busy.”
“Then I shan’t take up much more of your time! I have but one simple proposition.” Archetto declared, standing up for effect. “I would like to propose that, given my performance, the experience listed in my resume, and my connection to the monastery, that I am such an overwhelmingly positive aspect that keeping me as a mere combat Operator limits my usefulness!”
Enoch stopped writing part way through, but he made no other sign that he was paying special attention to Archetto.
“So, maybe I should skip all of the lower ranks and be immediately promoted to Elite Operator, wouldn’t you agree, Doctor?”
For a while, the only sound in the room again was Enoch’s old grandfather clock. A minute passed as Archetto awaited an answer, believing the Doctor to be thinking based on his hung head and lack of movement.
“Take it up with Kal’tsit.” Enoch stated bluntly, “I don’t have any say over who becomes an Elite Operator, but she does.”
Archetto blinked briefly but resigned herself to sigh disappointingly. “Well, doesn’t she listen to your advice?”
“Ha, not at all.”
“Well, drat,” Archetto pouted. “Still, I tried.”
Just as Archetto went to leave, she caught the edges of a smile on Enoch’s lips as he continued writing. “May I ask one more question, Doctor?”
“So long as it’s quick.”
“What’s with the grandfather clock?”
Enoch looked up at Archetto by the door, still smiling. “It tells the time. Thank you for the visit, Archetto.”
She definitely knew there was more to it than that, but Archetto felt the answer Enoch gave was fine.
At least at that time.
Sometime after their first proper meeting, Archetto caught quite a rare sight: Doctor Enoch in the shooting range. She had not seen the Doctor anywhere outside of lecture halls and mission prep rooms since onboarding, yet here he was, slowly walking behind the lanes of shooters with his hands clasped behind his back as if he were a proctor patrolling student’s desks during a written examination.
Briefly, Archetto entertained the thought that maybe Enoch had some to see her in action again, but she shook that thought away very quickly. It was obviously just a coincidence, Enoch had no idea of her training schedule and was probably just wandering through on a serendipitous walk, but that did not mean there was no opportunity inherent.
Smirking to herself, she waited until the automated drone finished removing everyone’s quarrels during a break. Once the target was clear, Archetto nocked an arrow and loosed it near dead-centre, an easy feat for an archer as experienced as her, but that was only the setup to her true trick. She peeked around the side of the lane shield to make sure Enoch was in a position to watch, and she grinned harder.
Archetto took aim with a second arrow and let it fly, there was a deafening thunk as the steel arrowhead pierced the back notch of the arrow already in the target, splitting it almost halfway down the shaft before coming to a stop.
“Yes!” Archetto hopped in place and cheered. “Doctor! Doctor! Did you s-”
Her heart sank when she caught Enoch’s back, he had been looking away from the range at that moment and must have not seen it. He did hear Archetto call out to him and so turned to look, but his expression was puzzled, he didn’t know what had happened.
“What is it, Operator Archetto?”
She tried not to let the failure intimidate her, there would be other chances. “Well, Doctor, look at the shot I just made!” Archetto proudly boasted, holding her palm out towards the arrow still stuck in the back of another. “Pretty impressive, wouldn’t you say?”
Again, her heart sunk as Enoch just shrugged. “It happens to everyone eventually, just mathematics and probability.” He explained, sounding thoroughly bored.
Archetto caught his sleeve as he tried to turn around. “It wasn’t a fluke, I’m just that skilled, watch!” She declared, and Enoch, along with a few other curious sniper Operators stood and watched as Archetto loosed another arrow perfectly into the back of the previous again. The resulting impact broke the first arrow completely, sending the scattered pieces flying in all directions. A few Operators clapped, but Enoch again remained unimpressed.
“This is impossible.” He declared. “No one is that good.”
“I am that good, Enoch! Watch!”
This time, Archetto really wanted to show off, so she fired two arrows in quick succession with her head turned away for maximum flex. The first arrow didn’t quite hit the bullseye, but again, she managed a perfect arrow on arrow hit, eliciting even louder cheers from the growing crowd watching.
As Archetto looked back at Enoch, she saw him holding his chin, seemingly in deep thought. After waiting a while for some form of response she was ready to speak up again but halted herself as Enoch asked one of the other archers for an arrow.
“Do it with this.” He said, holding out a one-hundred percent fibreglass arrow to Archetto. “That would impress me.”
Archetto tried not to let all the colour drain from her face as she picked up the arrow, Enoch was onto her. He was right about one thing, no archer was good enough to pull off this many consecutive arrow breaks, not even a perfectly calibrated machine was accurate enough. However, with a subtle amount of current put into her steel arrows she could make them magnetic. It was how she pulled off her impressive ricochet shots, it just turned out that a lot of foes she encountered had something metal on them.
But she couldn’t back down, that would give her game away, so Archetto took a deep breath and readied the arrow in her bow. She didn’t need to hit dead-on, just getting the arrows next to each other would be enough, she was this good, she knew it, she believed it.
Crack!
Archetto shut her eyes before letting go, but that sound was all she needed to hear to know she’d hit her mark. Slowly, she turned around with the largest grin possible to face Enoch, who was also finally smiling.
“Still just a fluke,” Enoch stated as the crowd dispersed. “But an impressive fluke, well done, Archetto.”
He then gave a small nod before leaving, while Archetto continued to stand back and smile.
It was a start.
…..
Convoy duty used to be so dull.
Nothing but driving the same trucks along the same beaten paths to the ends of Terra to deliver crates of medication to needy people, or occasionally protecting other trucks running the same routes. It wasn’t just Oripathy medications, either, many of these remote and destitute places needed more generalized pharmaceuticals like antibiotics, anticoagulants and anesthetics just as much as they needed treatment for the Infected, and Rhodes Island always tried to step up where they could. Local governments paid what they could for the shipments, but these missions were always a ‘give what you can afford to’ mercy case, so, many times they were essentially giving away drugs for free.
It hurt their bottom line a lot, something Doctor Warfarin continually stressed at meetings, but no one wanted to cancel the deliveries outright. With all of the devastation they had seen in Lungmen and Chernobog, everyone was anxious for a chance to feel as though they were doing some real good, even if that meant potentially having to tighten the belt for a few aspects of life aboard the landship. It was a generosity extended towards those that lived within Rhodes Island as well. It was expected that those they took on would work for the company if able to but in a range of flexible roles from combat and logistics to more mundane matters like sanitation and cooking.
Rhodes Island always needed more cooks.
But, if someone was determined to be unable to meet even the barest requirements, either because of disabilities or illness, they weren’t just thrown out into the wild to die, they were given the treatment and housing they needed, no question. Someone else, or even a collection of others often stepped in to fill the gap, just as Operator Robin had done for her father, but what many in Rhodes’ leadership often stressed was that while they may be a business, they were a cooperative business.
Or at least, they tried to be when possible. Money was important, after all.
Enoch didn’t think about these debates much, but a certain someone who was accompanying him in their squad’s assigned stakeout position kept bringing it up.
“You’ve gotta make up the shortfall somehow, Doctor, right?”
“What you’re doing is undeniably good, but won’t people wise up to you just being willing to give stuff away and scam you out of it?”
“I mean, I’ve known more than a few sisters who fell prey to this trap, but I’ve got some ideas, want to hear them?”
Enoch sighed as he watched his water kettle slowly heat up over a tiny gas flame. He hadn’t answered any of Archetto’s questions with anything outside of vaguely non-committal agreements: ‘Perhaps,’ ‘I suppose so,’ ‘You have a good point.’ But now, Archetto had him thinking about it, potentially distracting him from analyzing the terrain and determining possible avenues of attack.
Enoch shook his head, nobody was expecting any unpleasant activity. This stakeout was merely for show, ‘fly the flag,’ so to speak, so others in more dangerous areas knew Rhodes Island wasn’t a toothless courier service.
There was time to think about it, at least until the kettle began to whistle.
Enoch unhooked the radio transmitter from his belt and held it close to his lips. “Archetto?” He spoke softly into the microphone.
After a moment of static, Archetto’s voice crackled back, “Yes, Doctor?”
She was just up a tall tree for reconnaissance, around sixty or so meters, close enough that they could have just shouted at each other, but the Doctor preferred the professionalism of using the radio. Up in the treetops, Archetto wouldn’t just have a better shot at any passersby, but could also relay visual information to Doctor Enoch, who could use his tactical expertise to direct any engagements.
Not that anyone expected something like that to happen, which Archetto took to be the reason why Enoch didn’t climb up the tree with her, not that his face went deathly pale at the suggestion.
“I’m making some coffee,” Enoch spoke back through the transmitter, mixing the brew with his other hand. “You’ve been up there a couple of hours now, Andreana can take over. Why don’t you come down and have some with me?”
Again, there was a slight, static-filled delay before Archetto replied. “Oh? How kind of you, Doctor! I’ll be right down!”
Enoch quickly clicked the speak button. “Wait, how do you take your coffee, Archetto?”
“Lots of cream, lots of sugar!” She answered.
Enoch chuckled briefly. “Well, we only have powdered whitener in our ration kits, hope that’s good enough for you.”
Once down, Archetto quickly removed her gloves and spent a couple of minutes just holding the warm cup of coffee in her hands. It was the middle of autumn, and along with many of the tree leaves turning all sorts of colourful hues, it was getting slightly colder with each hour that passed in the afternoon.
Enoch, however, took his coffee plain and black, and he only blew briefly atop the drink’s surface before taking a sip.
“So, Archetto, now that you’re on your first actual deployment, is this position everything you’d hoped for?” He asked with just a hint of a small smirk. Enoch knew that despite everyone’s mutual feelings on the importance and value of these assignments, almost everyone regarded this part of the job as dull and boring.
“Actually, yes,” Archetto answered with a smile of her own, getting Enoch to blink. “I get to help people in need and introduce more people and governments to the work of the Monastery, what more could I ask for?”
After finishing her explanation, Enoch nodded, “Even though you haven’t been given an opportunity to flex your archery skills yet?” He asked.
Archetto closed her eyes and took a moment to sip her coffee. “Doctor, if I could help others without having to rely on my bow, that would make me so much happier… However, it is a cruel reality of the world we inhabit that the ability to defend yourself and others has become so essential.”
Enoch sighed and put his cup down. “I’m a doctor, saving lives is what I do… or at least, what I should have been doing.”
His halo and wings dimmed slightly as he stared self-reflectively into the grass between them, but Archetto broke Enoch out of his trance with a simple tap on the shoulder.
“Hey,” She spoke as the Doctor looked back up at her. “You are now, right?”
He smiled just briefly, Archetto may have made a good point.
As expected, the trucks passed and the delivery was made without any minor or major incident, save for one accidental flat tire. All of the Operators huddled into the small village to offload boxes of pharmaceuticals to the locals, many were impressed by the sheer size of the desperate crowd they attracted, but Enoch’s eyes kept gazing back to a handful of stern-looking elders looking disapprovingly at them from afar.
If you lived to be that old, you weren’t Infected. These people might be the last of their generation, those who escaped the negative effects of a new mine being opened in the province.
They knew it wasn’t Rhodes Island’s fault, but they still disapproved, and Enoch’s smile from earlier faded as reality came back into focus. This was the most they could do, the only thing they could do; stem the bleeding, while the wound remains open and festering. Rhodes Island wasn’t a political or military outfit, they couldn’t sway hearts and minds and influence the actions of those in power, so this was the most they could do.
And it was never enough. No amount of charity can fix a corrupt and exploitative system.
An hour later and all the packages for this village were delivered, it was now time to move onto the next, and the next, and the next, and by the time they were finished the trip, the first would surely need them again. Enoch leaned against the side of one cargo truck as the drivers refuelled their tanks from the fuel truck they had brought along with them. He took a long chug from a water bottle before splashing the rest down the back of his neck. The cool water in the now chilly evening against his skin caused his wings to flutter, and any meandering thoughts still in his brain disappeared.
Now was the time to focus, now was-
“Excuse me, mister?”
Enoch looked down and saw a group of three young children with scraggly hair and dressed in old, worn clothes staring up at him.
“Did you happen to bring any food with you?” One of the children asked, and another added, “None of us have eaten in two days.”
Enoch put a hand to his heart in shame. This was the futility of their task in full effect, if they saved enough people, it just created a new problem down the line.
“Well…” He paused to clear his thoughts, trying his best to keep the glow bright and strong. Of course, they didn’t bring any food aid, just each Operator’s individual meals for the day, and he had already eaten.
“Perhaps I can help?”
Everyone looked up to see Archetto somersault from the top of a truck, landing behind the group of children, who gasped softly in amazement.
She was holding something wrapped in colourful orange and red cloth, untying the bow at the top revealed her mess kit, and she opened it and distributed a sandwich and fruit to each of the hungry kids.
“I know it isn’t much, but I hope it helps!” Archetto said with a wide, tooth-filled smile.
Two of the kids tore into their food right away, but the third stopped to thank her, “Thank you so much, lady!”
“It’s Hildegard!”
“Thank you, Miss Hildegard!” Another of the kids thanked through a full mouth, and like they, they all ran off.
When Archetto turned around to face Enoch, her smile was already gone, no doubt put on for show earlier. Enoch had many questions, but he chose the most personal one first.
“Were you watching me?”
Archetto nodded right away.
“What for?”
She started twirling a long lock of hair around a finger. “Because you interest me, Doctor. I’m still trying to figure out the real answer to that question I asked you when we first met.”
Enoch folded her arms and raised an eyebrow, “I gave you a perfectly satisfactory answer if I recall correctly.
Archetto shook her head. “Not good enough for me, unfortunately.”
The Doctor sighed and resumed his earlier leaning against the side of the truck. “Was that your food you gave away?” He asked, abruptly changing the subject. “Won’t you be hungry?”
“No,” Archetto flatly replied. She then walked over to a nearby stump and sat down with her cheeks in her hands. “I’ll get a little peckish, sure, before we get back to Rhodes. But I won’t get hungry. I know what it’s like to be hungry, all of us sisters do.” She explained, sighing afterwards.
Without even thinking about it, Enoch took a step forward and extended his open hand slightly to Archetto briefly, before he just as abruptly pulled back. “Still think we’re doing good?” He decided to ask, immediately regretting such an insensitive question before the last syllable left his mouth.
But to his surprise, Archetto took it quite well, if somberly. “I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I didn’t think so.”
An uneasy silence fell between them, broken up only by the rumblings of motors and idle chatter of Operators in the distance. Enoch stared down at Archetto’s continually sad expression for a couple of minutes as she looked off into the distance, eventually, he cleared his throat.
“Archetto, could you come here, please?”
She got up, blinking a few times in confusion, but she still nodded and closed the distance until she and Enoch were an arm’s length apart.
Then, without any warning, Enoch hugged Archetto.
“D-Doctor?” Archetto peeped, obviously surprised by the embrace, but not finding it unwelcome. It didn’t last long, just a few seconds and Enoch already let go, though he still patted Archetto on the shoulder.
“Don’t lose that faith, Cleric Hildegard,” Enoch said, glowing as brightly as he ever had.
Archetto took a while, but she eventually met Enoch’s eyes with her own, and the slight, rosy blush on her cheeks gave way to a fierce and determined smile. “Of course! Thank you, Doctor.”
Enoch turned away before lazily waving his hand. “Call me Enoch.”
Archetto did from that point on, and hearing her speak his name always brought a small smile to Doctor Enoch’s lips.
There was one such time a couple of weeks later when the Doctor found himself in a rare and peculiar situation. He had completed all of the paperwork in his inbox with just over an hour left on the shift clock.
Now, senior staff at Rhodes technically didn’t work by shift, just by assignment, but Enoch always preferred to keep himself to a set schedule. It promoted focus and clarity, as well as a subtle feeling of jubilation when he knew his self-imposed timelimit was coming to an end. However, the few times he finished early meant he left himself with nothing to do. He thought about going over his work to check for errors, it was a valid suggestion, but something about it felt unwelcome; as if the idea of doing so was doubting his abilities.
And all the while he thought, the creeping tick of the grandfather clock in his office seemed to get louder and louder, or perhaps he was just paying more attention to it. Enoch didn’t want to listen to such an audible reminder of the time he was wasting, so he decided to do something he had never done in his office before.
Enoch was going to relax.
He took out his phone and scrolled through the tracks on his one album of songs to a suitably calming piece, the Missa Papae Marcelli mass. As the sound of smooth, singing harmonics overtook all other noises, Enoch unlocked the backrest of his office chair and leaned back with his hands behind his head, placing one foot over the other on top of his desk.
Enoch sighed contentedly and even began to hum along with the song, but it was barely a minute before he heard someone knock on his door. Cursing under his breath, Enoch put his feet down and lowered the volume on his phone, thinking it was just someone coming to complain about the noise.
However, when he heard Archetto speak to him through the door, that assumption quickly fell apart.
“Enoch? Wait, can I come in? That song…”
Now Enoch scrambled to stand up, almost tripping over himself as the back of his chair snapped upright. “Y-Yes! Please come in, Hildegard!” He happily replied.
Archetto opened the door and walked in, closing Enoch’s office door behind her right away out of courtesy. Once done, she got straight to the point, “I was walking by when I heard that song, I think it was the first mass they taught me at the Monastery.”
Enoch nodded along, “It’s one of my favourites. I happened to have some free time so I decided to… indulge a little.”
“I’m glad, Enoch,” Hearing that made him smile a little wider. “Can you turn it back up, please?”
He did so right away, and Archetto closed her eyes and breathed slowly as the music overtook them both. Enoch sat back down in his chair, but curiously, Archetto remained standing, even with an easily accessible chair on the other side of the office.
The reason for this became apparent to Enoch shortly after he sat down because a new sound began to accompany the music playing from his phone. He looked up and realized Archetto was beginning to sing alongside the choir in the mass, a little slowly and nervously at first, but soon she was up to her full voice, singing just as loudly and proudly as she would have with her fellow sisters.
Enoch couldn’t let this stand, so right away he jumped into the mass as well, even causing Archetto to falter briefly as she realized he had joined her in singing. It was awkward for the Doctor, exercising vocals he had no memory of using but seemed to be able to guide instinctively, but he made up for it with confidence and gusto, including standing up and joining Archetto on the other side of his office desk.
Now they sang facing each other, just an arm’s length apart, no doubt making so much noise along with the music that even offices at the end of the hall could probably still hear them. But even if someone came by to complain, Enoch knew neither of them would stop, for this moment was for them, and they knew they both needed it.
There was a brief pause between movements that allowed the two to rest, Archetto giggled as the realization of their impromptu duetto washed over, Enoch laughed a little as well, it was such a spontaneous but wonderful event.
“I haven’t had the opportunity to sing with someone else for a while,” Archetto claimed, with Enoch noticing she was blushing ever so slightly. “Thanks, Enoch.”
“Anytime,” He answered, and he meant it.
The next movement began to pick up, but neither resumed singing. Instead, they each found themselves inching slowly and slowly towards the other, both too busy staring into the other’s eyes to resume their earlier activity.
And then, out of the blue, Archetto grabbed Enoch’s collar with both hands and tugged him down for a kiss.
He was surprised, for sure, but the longer Archetto’s lips remained against his own, the more right it felt, the more natural, the more needed. He kissed her back, and the two spent most of the second movement with locked lips, Archetto’s hands locked around his neck while Enoch rubbed up and down the cleric’s back.
When they finally separated, it was simply for air, but that also allowed both of them to reflect on what had transpired.
“Hildegard, I-”
“I’m sorry,” Archetto apologized with a smile. “I just felt that I had to.”
Enoch took a deep breath followed by a smile of his own. “Thank you.”
Eventually, Archetto noticed the time on Enoch’s grandfather clock and turned white. “Oh, dear! I was supposed to go see Kal’tsit seven minutes ago! Ah!” She bolted for the door right away, her apology reaching Enoch’s ears even as she continued it from the hallway. “I’m sorry Enoch we can continue this conversation later!”
Enoch sighed, chuckling to himself as he returned to his office chair and turned off the music.
The ticking of the grandfather clock began to ring once again in Enoch’s ears as he thought of something else to do, but curiously, he noticed it getting slower. He frowned as realized he had forgotten to wind the mechanism that morning, and so he got up to do so, but as his hand slotted the crank into its hole, he decided against it.
Enoch decided that a better use of his time would be going to Closure’s shop and getting a small, handy, digital clock for his desk.
Having to wind and set the time every day was just jogging in place. It was time for a change.