The Debtor System: Starting with a debt of 1 billion

Chapter 41 Gears

Morning light shines through the blinds.

Lin Mo sat at a table piled high with tools, a precision screwdriver in his hand. In front of him was an old-fashioned clock he had found at a flea market. The bronze casing was already oxidized and blackened, the glass cover was covered with cracks, and the hands were stuck at 3:15—the time they had escaped from "Eden".

"It's badly broken." Acha stood at the door, watching Lin Mo carefully disassemble the clock case. "If you can't fix it, just throw it away. Who uses a mechanical clock these days?"

"It's not broken." Lin Mo didn't look up, gently picking up a rusty gear with tweezers. "The gear is just stuck."

Acha sighed and turned to leave.

The only sounds in the room were the clatter of clockwork parts and the occasional cries of seagulls outside the window.

Suya walked in carrying a cup of hot milk. Looking at the parts scattered on the table, she asked softly, "Brother, what are you doing?"

"I'm performing surgery on it." Lin Mo picked up a piece of soft cloth and gently wiped the rust off the gears. "You see, these gears are like our heartbeats. If even one gets stuck, the whole clock will stop."

He picked up a tiny screw and tried to screw it into the gear shaft, but found that he couldn't get it to budge.

"It's too tight." Suya squatted down, looking at the stubborn screw, "Just like the knot in our hearts."

Lin Mo stopped what he was doing and looked at his sister.

Suya reached out and gently took his hand, guiding the screwdriver's angle. "Don't force it, brother. Just like we're in the deep sea of ​​consciousness, we have to follow its contours... take it slow."

Lin Mo took a deep breath and adjusted his strength.

"Click".

With a soft click, the screw was finally screwed in.

As if a switch had been flipped, Lin Mo began to focus intently on assembling. He repaired the broken spring, adjusted the curvature of the pendulum, and repositioned each gear into its proper place.

Suya stood to the side, using cotton swabs dipped in alcohol to carefully clean the dust off the clock face. Under her wiping, the intricate Roman numerals gradually revealed their original golden luster.

"Brother, do you remember?" Suya pointed to a small scratch on the clock face, "When we were little, we made marks on the laboratory wall with our fingernails."

Lin Mo paused for a moment.

Of course he remembered. It was their secret code, a sign that they were still alive.

"Back then, we thought time was a cage." Lin Mo looked at the reassembled movement, a hint of tenderness in his eyes. "Now I realize that time is a gift."

He placed the last glass cover on the clock and gently patted the clock.

"Tick-tock, tick-tock, tick-tock."

The old bell, which had been silent for countless years, suddenly made its first sound.

Then came the second tone, and then the third tone.

The hands began to move slowly, from 3:15 to 3:16, then 3:17...

Su Ya's eyes welled up with tears.

This was no longer a countdown alarm, no longer a command to kill, but the sound of their own heartbeats.

Lin Mo stood up and pulled his sister into his arms.

"It's fixed." Listening to the rhythmic ticking sound, Suya felt as if she were hearing the most beautiful music in the world.

"No," Lin Mo said, looking at the rising sun outside the window, "we fixed it."

On that sunny afternoon, a dilapidated mechanical clock began to tick again in the abandoned base. It no longer recorded killing and escape, but the solemn ritual of two survivors restarting their lives amidst the ruins.