Chapter 2: The Currency of Regret
"What do you want?" Mark demanded, stepping between the stranger and his wife, though his knees felt like water. "If this is some sick joke—"
"A dead battery. A missed exit. A traffic light that stayed red just a few seconds too long," the man in black interrupted, pulling a vintage silver pocket watch from his vest. He flipped it open. The hands weren't moving, but a faint, rhythmic clicking echoed from inside it. "The universe operates on a strict schedule, Mark. Leo's time expired. But yours hasn't. Not yet."
Claire gripped Mark’s sleeve, her knuckles white. "Mark, don't look at him. There's something wrong with him."
"I can give you back those four minutes," the stranger offered, ignoring her completely. He held out the open pocket watch. Inside, instead of clockwork, a swirling, dark mist seemed to trap the reflection of the hospital hallway. "You can walk down this hallway before his heart stops. You can put that mask on his face. You can hear him say your name one last time. You can save him."
"How?" Mark breathed, the desperate, irrational hope of a grieving father blinding him to the obvious danger. "What do you want from me?"
The stranger smiled, a cold, humorless curve of his lips. "Time is a closed loop, Mr. Avery. To put four minutes back into your son's glass, we must drain someone else's. I require a trade. Thirty years of a living soul's remaining time, traded instantly to reset the clock."
"Take mine," Mark said without a second thought. "Take my years. Just let me save my son."
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"Mark, no!" Claire screamed, but as she reached out to grab him, the stranger snapped the pocket watch shut.
The world went pitch black.
