The ticking of the pocket watch fills the study room. It’s a metallic black watch, unfamiliar runes carved across the face plate, with a tiny hole in the center, showing part of the actual watch underneath. A button at the top allows the face plate to open, the plate sliding open to the bottom. With the cover opened up, the crystal is revealed – the glass layer protecting the pearly white hands and actual clockwork – which is themed in black and scarlet.

Angel carefully twists the watch around in his hands, making the lights of the study room reflect from the crystal into prisms cast upon the wall. They watch the hand displaying the seconds tick on mercilessly, carefully counting in their head as well to check if anything is off. The timing seems about right, and the hands of the hour and minute are also both correct.

The sergal closes the face plate again, turning the watch around and studying the back. Again, a foreign pattern of runes is professionally carved into the blackened metal, the center of the back displaying the petals of some unknown flower. The watch itself isn’t particularly heavy, instead it feels very comfortable in the sergal’s hand, and has a nice swing to it when dangled from the chain bound around the stem.

His fingerclaw carefully traces the runes, feeling the ridges of the uneven surface against the white fur of his finger. His eyes are intently focused on the pocket watch, but after a while of intense studying, he places the watch back on the table and sighs in frustration. There’s something he’s missing, there has to be.

With the watch now back on the table, Angel turns his stool around so that he’s now facing the left side of his desk, with a massive leatherbound book, opened halfway through. He looks at the book closely, following the words with his fingerclaw.

“I don’t get it…” they silently whisper to themselves, reading the same paragraph over and over again. “How am I supposed to release this demon…?”

Angel looks over at the circle of salt, candles and chalk made in the center of the room. All safety measures seem to perfectly align with the described ritual in the book. Now all he needed to do was figure out how to actually… complete the summoning. Evidently, changing the time doesn’t do anything. No combination of hour and minute, not even 06:06:06. Though that might have been too obvious. Confused, their gaze returns to the riddle on the final page.

“[i]In blackened shell, the demon dwells[/i]

[i] Still bound by hands from seven hells[/i]

[i] To break His chains, reveal His face[/i]

[i] A patterned open/shut in place[/i]

[i]A click, then two, to three, then four[/i]

[i] The hinge undone unlocks His door[/i]

[i] When final click and time aligns[/i]

[i] The demon freed to swing the times”[/i]

“What does a patterned open/shut mean…” Angel says out loud as their fingerclaw carefully twists the metal knob to change the time again. They continue to roll it in both directions, listening attentively if something in the inner mechanisms changes. Nothing, except for the manual change of the hours and minutes.

[i]Click click[/i]

Absentmindedly they start to press down on the button that opens the face plate again, before closing it again. The little clicking noise it makes feels pleasing, it’s not too loud or harsh. It feels just right, it’s the perfect fidget toy to loosen your frustration at the unknown and the incomprehensible.

[i]Click click [/i]

“The hinge undone…” Angel repeats, opening the face plate again and inspecting the hinge at the bottom of the watch that keeps the face plate connected to the back plate, checking if they can somehow manually undo the mechanism that keeps it connected, or perhaps if there’s a screw that keeps the plates connected. Nothing, as far as he can see.

[i]Click click[/i]

He rubs his free paw over his head in frustration, stroking his ear, the pink bowtie strapped to it, down his cheek and onto the back of his neck. The confusion is slowly but surely getting to him, but no matter how many times he reads the leather book on demonology, the less sense it all seems to make.

[i]Click click[/i]

“Do something!” the sergal begs, spoken directly at the pocket watch, as if that would magically fix things. Of course, he didn’t actually expect the pocket watch to buzz alive as he fidgets with the button that opens the face plate again, but as he does so – clicking it open and close two more times, for ten in total – the pocket watch suddenly starts to vibrate.

Oh shit. He’s not standing inside of the circle.

Before he can even sprint to the center of the circle, the watch has thrown itself free from his grasp. It lies motionless on the floor for a few seconds, and Angel takes that time to get himself inside the ritual signet on the floor. However, quickly after, smoke begins to bellow through the circular hole in the face plate.

The pocket watch once again begins to shake, and Angel is powerless to watch the metal watch shatter without warning. There, where the pocket watch once had been, now stands a large bipedal canine. Fur matte black and smoky. Glowing orange eyes. Sharp claws. And an extremely menacing grin, aimed directly at Angel.

“Silly Sergal… I suppose I should thank you for setting me free, hmm?” the demon says. His voice is surprisingly soft, despite having a raspy echo. He doesn’t have to walk to come closer, instead he floats closer by, traversing by manner of the smoke that seems to shape his body. Soon, he’s face to face with Angel.

“What’s your name, sweetheart?” The demon asks. His grin spreads across the entirety of his face, but the tone of his voice makes it incredibly difficult to remain on the edge. This is still a demon after all, and he was locked up for a reason.

“It’s…. Angel,” the Sergal answers nervously.

The demon’s paw drifts to the sergal’s cheek and lovingly brushes past it. Despite the fact that he’s fully made off of smoke, he can still tangibly feel the paw against his cheek, leaving behind little black streaks of the same smoke. The scent of burnt paper hangs heavy in the air, and as the demon crosses into the circle of salt, chalk and candles, they turn from their original white colours into a darkened gray.

“Well… Angel… thank you for freeing me from… This cursed thing.” The demon says, the raspy echo in his voice being noticeably louder upon those last three words. As he says that, he raises his other arm, and drops the shattered pocket watch, holding onto the chain to make it dangle just in front of Angel’s eyes.

Angel looks at the watch, back at the demon, and then back at the watch. “You’re… welcome, I suppose..?” the sergal says, stuttering as he does so. The demon lets out a low chuckle in response, and with a flick of the smoky wrist, the watch starts to gently sway back and forth.

“Ah, so nervous. Fear not, silly thing. I won’t harm you; I harbor no negative feelings towards you. You worked so very hard to free me, after all – albeit utterly accidental. No matter, just look at the pocket watch for a little bit, okay sweetie?” the Demon asks, his snout hovering anxiously close to Angel’s bowtie.

Only now does Angel notice the scent of Sulfur driving away the scent of burnt paper, though more than anything, he notices the prisms of color being reflected by the crystal of the pocket watch once more. The swing is very gentle and purposeful, constantly pacing back and forth at the same pace. Back and forth, left and right. To and fro. And Angel’s eyes are magnetized, opened wide and unblinking.

“That’s a good boy. Easy to follow, isn’t it?” the demon says with a hearty chuckle, the raspy echo once more overpowering the original, friendlier low voice.

Angel feels his heartbeat increasing, anxious at the Demon’s intentions, but his words are undeniably true. The prism is gorgeous. The watch requires attention. The swing is perfect. And he [i]has [/i]to follow it.

“Yeah… follow…” they reply weakly, his eyes magnetized by the swinging watch. The reflection of light and the beckoning swing take up so much of Angel’s attention that he hardly notices his other thoughts being pushed away into the background. His nervous, tense posture has subconsciously gone slack, each swing taking away more of the tension and stress.

“There you go, Angel. Nice and relaxed. Now… How about you go out into the streets and show people how pretty this pocket watch is, hmm?” The demon says, nearly a whisper, before the smoke dissipates, shifting back into the circular hole inside of the face plate.

Before he can even process what happened, the room is empty once more, and fresh breath enters Angel’s lungs. He looks at the pocket watch resting in the palm of his paw, and a rush of thoughts return to his mind, but none pierce through the primary directive that dominates his mind right now. After all, he [i]should[/i] go out and show the people of the world just how gorgeous his pocket watch is.

