//------------------------------//
// Morning Routine 
// Story: Pony Shorts 
// by Miyajima 
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Sepia Tock awoke in a cold sweat, vague and disturbing images burning his mind’s eye as anguished cries in an unknown tongue faded away.

He sat in his bed for a moment, just breathing, clearing his head.  The blankets had been kicked off in his throes, and his two pillows were on opposite sides of the room.

Nightmares.  Third time that week.  And always the same.  Those voices, voices he recognised and yet… He could never make out who they belonged to, or what they were saying, but he saw them reach out to him, he heard them scream his name.

But it wasn’t his name.  It had never been his name.  It was just a nightmare.  He glanced at the clock on his bedside table, as the moonlight fell across the face.  It glowed in the pale light, luminescing with light all its own.  His own design, of course, he wasn’t Ponyville’s best clockmaker for nothing.

5:02 AM.  Nearly dawn.

It was always 5:02 AM.  Every night he had those dreams, those same dreams, he always awoke at 5:02 AM.

He looked at the clock again.  It was an odd thing, and he’d made it on a whim.  Tall and blue, painted wood with little panels.  He’d even installed doors at the back, with tiny glass panels, and on top was a little gemstone that shone when the clock needed re-winding.  He’d never had the heart to sell it.

He sighed, and dragged himself out of the bed, putting the covers back to where they should be.  As he passed the bookshelves, his gaze lingered a moment on another one of his timepieces, a simple fob watch with an intricate pattern of overlapping circles on the cover.

He was suddenly struck by the urge to open it.  It was an irrational urge, his mind told him, he already knew what the time was, and that fob had never kept good time anyway.

Or had it?  When was the last time he’d looked at it?

He reached out his hoof and deftly swept the fob onto his foreleg, carefully placing it on the floor.

He stared at it, critically inspecting it.  A scratch cut across some of the circles, marring the design.  Rust had set in to the chain, slowly eating away.  The finish was tarnished, blackened in places, almost like scorch marks.

For some reason, he found it hard to concentrate on it.  His body and mind kept reminding him of a thousand other things to do, anything to take his attention away from that little watch.

He shook them away and steeled himself.  Quickly, he jabbed his hoof at the catch, and instinctively shrunk back.

When he dared open his eyes, he saw an innocuous, innocent little fob watch, coming up to 5:15.  The minute hand ticked, and a tinny little chime announced the quarter hour.

Sepia yawned, shrugged, and put it back on the shelf.  Time for work.