The Smashing of the Clock!
(...and finding a crystal.)
DING DONG, DING DONG, DING DONG...
"SHUT UP!" A frazzled woman screamed, throwing her cup aside in frustration towards tall Grandfather clock. Oh it'd SEEMED like the smart thing to do when she'd found it and bought it. It was old and worn out and 'would bring a bit of class to their home'.
But the only home that was enough of a building, as most of the homes on Neith's land were still tents, was the small two bedroom house. Two bedrooms, one bathroom, and one room that was supposed to do for the rest. Living room, kitchen, dining, even laundry...
So there wasn't much space to put this oversized ticking thing anyway. It had to be squeezed in beside the couch and the end of an ironing board, right next to a window, near the front door.
And that wasn't all!
It turned out that being old and worn out also meant 'somewhat in need of repair.' The Grandfather clock didn't just chime on the hour, it chimed off the hour too, and between the hour, and beside the hour, and any other way it could. Morning, night, it didn't discriminate! It loudly and proudly reminded them that something like Time existed.
Neith glared at it as she picked up the pieces of broken china off the floor. It was pretty all right, oh it was that, but she was tired and she didn't even live in the house. She had a tent about twenty metres away, the noise was THAT BAD.
The sound died away leaving a ringing in her ears. The half-elf dumped the broken china into the bin and went about making a new cup of tea. Kettle on, tealeaves into teapot and...
DINGDINGDINGDING
...and hot water and tealeaves all over the wall as a hand jerked hard against the side of the teapot to knock it hard into the wall!
"Ahhhhhh!" Neith couldn't have sound more desperate and depressed as Romeo calling for his Juliet at that point. It did partly have to do with boiling water all over her hand though, she thrust her hand under the cold water and shot death glares of ultimate and deadly hatred towards the clock. Class?!
It just merrily ding dinged onwards with the strength of it sending little vibrations through the puddles of hot water and tealeaves.
She was starting to not care how old it was. Or how much class her cluttered living room slash dining room slash kitchen slash laundry had now, it was bugging her.
Then the cold water turned a rusty brown on Neith... then cut out.
"AHHH!"
Her hand stung, she had hot water all over the place, the teapot might be cracked, her tea was being made out in the open where tealeaves sat in the hot water, the clock was STILL GOING...
Three steps and several leaps over things and she was at the clock with a meat tenderiser in a hand and the door to the swinging thing open. It was supposed to just be one light tap really, just a 'tap!' to remind the clock to behave. Neith barely noticed that one light tap turned into several not so light taps, or that sprockets and springs were falling, or that the swinging whateveryoucalledit was now not swinging and hanging a bit loose. She wasn't done till the clock was done.
And finally it was done.
It looked as clockish as ever, if you ignored the bits of clock innards in a pile at the bottom of the cabinet within it, the wood looked just as good! So did the clock face. If she cleared away the guts of the clock, no one would ever know... and it would be 'class' without telling the time. Oh well, Neith thought as she threw the meat tenderiser towards the couch, there were some sacrifices she had to make for the well being of her family.
She started to sweep the bits and pieces into an ice-cream container just in case she ever wanted to get it repaired (HA!). Neith jiggled the bits and pieces around and as she did she noticed something that didn't exactly belong there. A long silver cord. She tugged at it, jiggling a bit to shake broken clock bits off it, and found herself holding a clock-like pendent on that very same long silvery cord. It was beautiful.
"Well, if you're what comes of smashing clocks, I should buy some and smash some more, I did want something new to wear." Neith put down the container and hung the pendent around her neck. With a new pendent and a nice quiet house, she went back to work on her cup of tea.
But several days later Neith KNEW that it wasn't just a normal pendent. She'd spent over a year and a half selling necklaces that sprung kids and she knew when she was wearing something not normal. At first she assumed that this necklace was another TtLG necklace, though it hadn't been found the same way, and she wasn't worried. But now she was starting to wonder, it didn't behave the same way. It didn't even feel the same way.
Besides, it was warm all the time, and not because her skin warmed it. TtLG necklaces didn't do that.
She was half tempted to take it off again. Leave it off... and leave it alone. Stick it back in the clock even. Who knew what magic it contained, what it was doing to her? But even if it was harmful Neith knew that taking it off after that length of exposure was a bad idea. So it stayed on her at all times, the strange clock-shaped crystal, and she only dared get a closer look at it when she could look in a mirror. She had to go find someone. Someone in Gaia would have an understanding of what this thing was. She didn't feel like she had to rush just yet, it didn't feel like an 'evil' thing... but she still wanted to know what it was she'd just done. And that someone would be able to tell her... or at least give her a small understanding?
But finding that someone would be a problem. This was Gaia. Magic wasn't unusual, and that made it nearly impossible to find the right type of specialist. There were thousands of magic types, of magic items, of magic specialities, how was she supposed to find the person or persons who understood this particular necklace?
But there were bigger things to worry about. Like those bloody UFOs that had appeared since she'd smashed the clock. She thought she'd found a way to sleep, but noooo.... now she had to deal with frightened kids and freaking out elves and keeping her crystal safe from the UFOs and the bright lights all night. She'd go searching when it got light and when she'd had a nap.
