The words echoed dully through Sam's broken mind as he stepped towards the TV set. Time to go. He felt the Test Card Girl gently, oh-so-gently nudging the small of his back with her tiny, frozen hand, urging him forward, prompting him not to turn back. Even though he could no longer see her small, pale face, he knew she was smiling. Time … Time to go … Time. The dying embers of his mind latched onto the word. Time. It mattered. Why? Why did it matter? How could anything matter now, here, on the edge of Oblivion? And then something inside him clicked. A thought. A memory. Groping clumsily with numb fingers, he reached into his pocket. And there it was – the familiar gold-plated casing with the delicate chain wrapped around it. The fob watch. The last relic of Life. Sam suddenly realised he could sense the ticking of the delicate mechanism inside the metal casement. The nerve endings in his fingers, dead and cold moments before, had enough life in them to detect the spinning of the tiny cogs, the shuddering of the tiny springs, the remorseless action of the tiny hands as they worked their way round the face.
