Clicks and buzzes
Time is of the essence, and it would appear that I have fifty-seven minutes of essence remaining to me. Fifty-seven minutes. At the third stroke. Precisely.
There is a great temptation to use it all up at once, repeating familiar key patterns until they die out on the line, obsessive-compulsive in the extreme. Instead I ration myself, convinced that I can eke out these precious ticking seconds over days. Weeks if need be. I can postpone my decision until the egg-timer runs dry. Would investing in new grains of sand be foolish and wasteful, or a statement of trust in a continued existence? Can grains of hope slip through my fingers too? Come in, no.24, your time is up.
There’s a warmth to this warbling tone, as if dust has settled on the stretches of cable, encased in rubber tombs, that twist their way between rocks and unwind across the ocean floor in every direction known to man; as if the satellites have turned to so much rust in their orbital car parks. But all I am given in return for my appreciation of this technology is dead air and the sound of my own breathing. If it weren’t for the occasional clicks and buzzes that make my heart palpitate and race to beat itself against the fleshy confines of my chest, I would swear that I wasn’t really here.