Time Is Running Out...

- somewhere in Berlin-

He stood there for a long time, trying to understand. People walked by him, doctors, patients, nurses, interns. No one paid attention. No one noticed. No one but him. He stood there, unmoving, staring. The clipboard hanging loosely from his fingers, his pen had already slipped to the floor. People went by and he stood there, staring. He was pretty sure he was not crazy.

"Scheisse..." he whispered again.

Somewhere in the waiting room, someone screamed and he jumped, looking around quickly, taking in the surroundings. He had never been a nervous person, but this was... well, simply put, it was fucking creepy.

The ticking of the clock seemed to grow louder and louder and he turned to stare at it again. It was all he could hear in the chaos of the emergency department. He felt chills run down his back. The clock. No, he wasn't dreaming. It WAS going counter-clockwise... If it was a joke, it really wasn't that funny. No, it wasn't. Especially with everything else... everything that was happening lately. He didn't think it was funny. At all.

But was it actually possible? Could you really set the mecanism of a clock to work backwards? He felt the urge to take one of the chairs from the waiting room and climb up there to check. No, it was a bad idea. It was only his first year as an intern and people at the hospital already thought he was trippy, he didn't need this. He heard his name somewhere in the distance.

"Weissmann! Ich brauche dich in hier!!!"
[Weissmann! I need you in here!]

Finally, he tore his gaze away from the clock and turned to see Dr. Schwartz at the other end of the hallway. He felt a bit dizzy. The man walked up to him.

"Was ist falsch? Bist du krank?"
[What's wrong? Are you sick?]

"Ich fühle mich nicht wohl," he whispered.
[I'm not feeling well.]

"Nimm einen Pause! Fünfzehn Minuten!"
[Take a break! Fifteen minutes!]

He didn't know where to go. He would have gone home if he'd been allowed to. He usually enjoyed night shifts, but lately it'd been a nightmare. It seemed everyone was getting sick at the same time. The waiting room was crowded, people were even waiting outside. And he was so tired. And the clock kept going backwards and he didn't know why, but it made him feel incredibly uneasy. He left the hallway leading to the emergency room. The elevator was out of order again, just like all the monitors and the automatic doors. He took the stairs to the fourth floor and walked up to the nurses' station next to the pediatry department.

"Hallo, Jenna," he said to the young woman sitting behind the desk.

"You look tired, Klaus. How long have you been here? Twelve hours?" asked the brunette quietly, smiling up at him with kindness.

"Almost... Look, I know it's going to sound weird, but... there's a problem with the clock in the..." he began, unsure if he should tell her about this. She cut him off.

"I know, it's stopped. This one's stopped too," she said, pointing to the one behind her. "They all stopped, Klaus. Don't you think it's strange that..."

The sudden ticking of the clock starting again interrupted her. Klaus looked up, Jenna turned around. They stared at the needle as it ran backwards. They stared. It made a complete rotation before any of them could speak. "What the hell..." Jenna said quietly, looking back at him. It was then that, deep down inside, in the depths of his conscience, Klaus started to think that... maybe... just maybe...

Jenna was breathing faster. "Do you think it has something to do with what's happening to all the equipment?" she asked, looking around nervously. "I mean... all the monitors shutting down, the fire alarm going off for no reason, and the televisions not working, and the elevators... This can't be normal. They checked everything and no one knows why and... now the clocks..."

But Klaus was thinking. Something in his brain was finally putting the pieces together. Something inside of him knew.

"Where are you going?" Jenna asked, standing up when she saw that he was walking away.

"I'm gonna call your brother."

When he got to the staff room, Klaus went straight for the phone, but stopped short as he caught sight of his laptop, which he'd left there on the table hours before. The screen was black. At first glance it looked like someone'd turned it off or it went to sleep, but he could see a thin red line in the middle, glowing eerily in the dark of the room. Nervously, he dialed Red's phone number. There was no answer. He left a voicemail.

"Red, it's Klaus. I'm in Berlin. Look... did you... notice anything weird lately? Just... call me back, will you?" Then he added, quickly, quietly. "I think it's real, Red. I think it's started."

He hung up and left the room quickly. But he missed the small, yellow post-it that was stuck to his laptop's touchpad. He missed the message, written in dark red ink. "It's begun."