Chapter 5 - "Echoes in the Frame"

There is the original. There is the reflection. And there is the one who learns how to hold the blade.

The package arrived early.

No return label. Just a long, slender box wrapped in brown paper, a wax seal in place of tape-a single circle of blood-red wax, blank-faced, pressed tight against the fold like it was watching.

The name on the front chilled in its simplicity:

Detectives of Ashbrook.

Marcus LeClair cut it open slowly, careful not to disturb anything traceable. Inside, there was no device. No powder. Just a single object:

A photograph.

A man. Seated upright at a small café table.

Dead, but posed. Hair neatly combed. Hands folded like he was waiting for a waiter who would never come.

On his wrist-etched cleanly into the skin-was the same signature:

3:11.

Brandt held the photo closer. “Taken through glass. Distance. Maybe surveillance.”

The angle was too clean for coincidence. Too still to feel accidental.

On the back, written in blocky handwriting:

He deserved to finish his sentence.

Marcus exhaled, jaw tightening. “Sentence as in... life?”

Brandt didn’t blink. “Or a final word.”

Marcus’s voice dropped. “Or prison. Or penance. Whatever it was... someone decided they had the right to cut him off.”

They stood in silence, the ticking of the precinct wall clock filling the air, each click landing like part of the message.

-

Michael’s eyes opened before the sun.

He didn’t set alarms. The body, when properly aligned, obeyed the rhythm. Woke on the minute. Acted on the hour.

His apartment was clean in the way a blade was clean-nothing soft, nothing warm. One cot. One desk. One chair. All function. No noise.

Above the desk, pinned like scripture, hung the core:

Chaos corrodes.
Precision redeems.

Order carves away the waste.

He brewed coffee with unbroken focus. Measured to the gram. Boiled to temp.

Two nights ago, the mark had held. Elegant. Quiet. Unresisted. She had tried to speak before the end, but the moment passed.

She wasn’t aligned.

She belonged to a different hour.

So he'd ended her early..

It wasn’t murder. It was correction.

He didn’t act for fame.

He didn’t act alone.

He listened for the tick. And when it came-

He obeyed.

-

A video, low-res and voiceover-heavy, crawled its way to 900,000 views.

The narrator whispered as screenshots of clock carvings slid by:

“We’ve been looking at this like crime. But it’s not. It’s curriculum.”

“Each death is a lesson. Not just a warning. Instruction.”

In the comments:

• TimelyStudent49: "What if the clocks are telling us who goes next?"

• RhythmicWitness: "I keep dreaming the same numbers. 6:00. 3:11. 8:15. Are we supposed to be learning something?"

• DannerLives: "Y’all think this is random but there’s an ORDER. A SYSTEM. This is theology dressed as math."

It wasn't just a pattern anymore.

It was becoming scripture.

-

Miss Trenton stopped mid-roll-call.

Madeline, quiet in the reading nook, sat cross-legged over a stack of drawing paper.

No cats today.

Just clocks.

Pages and pages. Blue gel pen pressed so hard the corners tore. Every one of them different-but not a single minute hand.

Some were labeled. Others left blank.

3:11
8:15
6:00
?

Miss Trenton crouched beside her. “Sweetheart... what are these?”

Madeline didn’t look up. “I’m just copying.”

“Copying who?”

She blinked slowly.

“The ones who know the time.”

And without meaning to, Miss Trenton glanced toward the wall clock.

-

Brandt held the photo against the window, morning light bleeding through like an x-ray.

“No blood. No mess. Just... display,” he said softly.

Marcus turned the image in his hands. “It’s a statement.”

Brandt nodded at the inscription. “You think it connects to the others?”

“The signature matches," Marcus said. "But the phrasing... it’s more than a message. It’s a philosophy.”

“We’ve been treating this like a series of crimes.”

“It’s not?” Brandt asked.

Marcus tapped the photo once. “It’s a syllabus.”

Brandt’s brow furrowed.

“It’s not just about death," Marcus continued. "It’s about timing. Sequence. Every move's part of a lesson plan.”

Brandt looked down at the photo again, the man’s eyes-fixed on something just outside the frame.

“We’re not hunting a killer,” Marcus continued. “We’re following a doctrine.”

-

In a shipping container converted into a room - bare, a man sat at a table with a laptop and a battered three-ring binder.

He’d found the first whisper on a lost philosophy board, disguised as poetry.

Then more - fragments shared under usernames like:

• RhythmWitness

• PendulumAscends

• TickedTrue

The Law hadn’t asked for faith. It had given proof. Clean incisions. Measured order. Calm faces.

He opened his binder.

I will learn the hour.
I will not rush.

I will not delay.

Beneath it:

The Master carved the first clock.

We only keep time.

He wasn’t ready to act.

But he was listening.

And when the chime struck-

He would know his minute.

-

The homepage was still blank, but more assertive.

They’ll call it madness. But it’s always been math.
You’ve all been late before.
That’s why this is necessary.

In the bottom-right corner:

[ 38:11:22 ]
(blinking... blinking... blinking...)

Now, in faint, hard-to-see type:

"Class is in session."

-

Three victims.

Three times.

Three stages?

The pattern wasn't clear, but the ground was shifting beneath them.

Brandt stood behind Marcus, arms crossed. “You really believe there are more?”

Marcus nodded slowly.

“They’re not just watching,” he said. “They’re waiting for their turn.”

Somewhere, a clock ticked.