• That great ornate discus suspended above the mantle swung his arms in a reckless circle as he shouted each step, each minute, each hour of the impercievable nothing that was time in his unending dull monotony until the whole of his march became an unintelligible blur and then finally nothing. Unheard by all who sat within that small room.
    But not to the man in the corner.

    There he sat, in his cold, wooden chair, hidden beneath the mindless, voiceless, incompassionate flood of gold and class and value and posh. Beyond the silken rug- beyond that china vase- beyond the endless trinkets of dead lands, and the crystal chandelier, and above that great cold fireplace of marble- there hung the damned mariner as he dutifully marched away a song he could not even know.

    And the greatest energy between them, the wired gaze of the small man in his chair.
    With wavering eyes he watched that mariner’s hands move. He did not erre, he did not flinch. His ears, weathered as they were, heard yet every note of the brutal hymn.

    Tick.

    Tick.

    Tick.

    Tick.

    The man dared not fail. His wrinkled lips were dry as bone, but he dared not lick them, lest the small distraction invade his attention, infect it, penetrate that line between him and the clock- Sever it- No. He could only wish it.

    Let me be dead already, his mind groveled. Let it come. Let me be asleep, or away, or engaged.

    But still he watched. He clung to that one moment- that great, small, moment between him and infinity. With a perverse fear, he suffered himself the beatings of the clock’s hands.

    In a moment. Just in a moment, it shall mean nothing. Dear god, let me look away.

    But still he clung. He MUST cling.

    And almost as if in defiance of the truth, in mad defiance of himself, he fed on the hope that was born. And so was beaten, beaten again, as the hands of our mariner came nearer, nearer, direct next to their final destination.

    My God.

    Tick.

    Tick.

    Tick.

    Silence.

    And with a short gasp, with that one daring leap beyond insanity, the old man realized that the clock had stopped at last.

    The man in the fez looked up. In finality, he looked up. And his empty voice rang louder than even the soft decibels that projected it.

    “And here we are at last.”

    Now the old man swung his gaze, wildly, fearfully, with the last of his insane disbelief toward the great ivory door in the wall, and as it flew open, wide, fast open, he saw now what he had been fearing more than anything through his whole life, in its truest form-
    And he screamed.

    For beyond the door…

    Was nothing.