~Sleep~

Jin grumbled and let his mind go numb as he pulled the tattered blanket over his shoulder. He felt frozen to the bone - the upside being that it made it easier to keep his eyes shut.

~Sleep, Jin~

Turning over once and then again, he adjusted to his new position and tried to forget about the ache in his muscles. So weary, so very weary. It was so easy to get here and yet so hard to remember how.

~Sleep, Jin Wang~

Oh yes, that was how...

Opening his eyes, someplace behind his eyelids, Jin was met with the bright, if somewhat subdued light of sunset, casting an orange glow through the windows of his small, yet immaculate shop. He smiled and was warm again as he looked down as his fine clothing, so soft to the touch and the smell of age and refinement. This was how it was and how it was supposed to be.

He stood and moved through the shop, ignoring the annoying tingling sensation in the back of his mind. A warning perhaps, or something he was supposed to remember he wasn't sure - only that it was not important at the moment. With the grace of a dancer, Jin moved about the room. He felt young and alive again as he stroked his fingers over the mahogany antique furniture and hand crafted stone mosaics from around the world. Most of them were from China, none of them younger than 10 years old. The oldest amoung them from a year so long ago he could not remember. So fine and comforting to care for them again, to touch them and to remember them. He laughed, in spite of himself.

Chiding himself and his girlish giddiness, he explored further. Somewhere, on the back shelf, there was - IS - a small music box. Yes, there it was, right where he had left it. He took it down from it's place and sat it in the palm of his right hand even as his left trembled with the anticipation of what he was about to do. Taking a deep, calming breath that he had learned from...somewhere he couldn't remember, he slowly opened the lid of the box, letting the pings and whirrs of the box come alive into music.

Jin frowned. There was something wrong. Rubbing the back of his head he pushed the tingling sensation in his mind away as it threatened to grow more present in his thoughts than the problem at hand. There was something wrong with the box, or more specifically, the music coming from it. He leaned his head forward and placed his ear directly above the box. There it was, ever so faintly, mixed into the music ever so subtly as to give it a mournful tone - the sound of a crying child.

Pulling back, Jin eyed the box suspiciously. The pit of his stomach fell out and his mind seemed to roar with the tingling sensation now. Shuddering and shaking Jin sat the box back on the shelf, then realized he had to lean there a moment as a feeling of nausea washed over him. Again, he breathed deeply but it didn't seem to help. Pushing himself away from the shelf, he wrapped his arms around himself as a feeling of cold seeped into his muscles. Tight and nervous now, he went back behind the counter searching for the heating controls.

He had been one of the first in the area to install centralized heating. He had been one of the first in the area who could afford it. Indeed, it had come at great expense but he felt it was quite worth it. First of all, there were the antiques, some of which were very peculiar about which temperature they preferred to age at. He paid close attention to their needs, after all they were his bread and butter, and some the children he never had. Is that why he had heard a child crying in the music? Shrugging, he ran his finger over the controls to the heat and smiled as the furnace came to life. It sounded tired from lack of use but it literally cried out at being able to exert itself again.

Jin froze and looked back over his shoulder. Crying, from the furnace. Soft, but heated and getting louder. It had to be his imagination, a tired man letting his years get the best of him but no, it was there. Jin could hear it and it frightened him. Damn the cold, he would bare it not to hear the sound of crying. Stomping back to the controls, he turned off the heat and huffed at his own silliness. First giddy as a girl, now scared like a child. /No, not a child. Don't think of a child./

Wiping his brow, Jin adjusted his coat and cleared his mind in a practiced manner. He could not remember where he has learned that little trick, but he was finding it terribly useful lately. Now was no time for senility after all, he had a long walk home in the dark and then, if he were lucky, a night on the town with the most beautiful mature lady his money could find. Placing a smile on his face, he looked up into the mirror to check his appearance and blanched as in the mirror he saw the reflection of an old wizened man with a wide-brimmed hat behind him. The quiet shattered with the sound of a distressed child.

Jumping back, Jin spun around to face the intruder, his mind tingling with the cry of the child. Gritting his teeth to bite back his fear he prepared to give his most stern speech to... nothing. A noise cried out once more as a shirl cry broke the air. No, not a cry, a bell. He blinked and shook his head. This was becoming too much. A night that started beautifully was ending in terror. The bell rang again and Jin realized it was coming from the door. A customer at this hour? Jin sighed and shook off his tension once more before resigning himself. He would answer it, and then ask them to come back tomorrow. It was late and he was tired. Yes, that is what he would do.

Going to the door, Jin found himself limping. He felt so old now, like another one of his antiques. At the door, he forced himself to straighten. Antique or not, he could still show his best face. It was this thought he had in mind when he opened the door and stared once again into the face of the old man from the mirror.

Eyes opened wide, Jin stumbled back instictively, "Who are you?"

He received no answer as the man took two steps, his long strides carrying him into the shop to stand in front of Jin. Cold, hard eyes stared down at him. The man's lips quivered as if preparing to speak and Jin felt a cold chill run down his spine. Falling back, kneeling down to the ground, Jin raised his hand to beg off the man. "No, no I remember. Please Lord, not again, I serve, I serve..."

The man opened his mouth, and the anguished scream of a child issued forth like a kamikaze wind from behind the man, cracking the wooden braces of the door and pouring into the shop. Jin sat helpless, gripping his fingers into the floor as the scream pierced his ears which he could swear were bleeding.

A crack, a shatter and the scream knocked over antique lamps and split mahogany chairs. Glass burst and rained down over Jin's head as the wind knocked over the music box. Somehow Jin could make out the sound of the music, and he scrambled towards it, crying in anguish as he feared that too would be destroyed. The scream ripped through him like knives and he could feel his clothes rip and tear into shreds. Pulling, dragging himself towards the sound of the music, Jin felt the tingling in his mind burst and shatter through his mind like the scream of the child. Somehow he managed to push himself and reach out to touch the music box. With one final effort he grasped it and with it, the noise and wind ended.

Jin remained huddled with the box, waiting with his eyes closed.

~Look at me Wang~

He opened his eyes and first saw himself, in the rags and worn clothing of the homeless. He shuddered. He dared not look at the rest of the shop. He knew what he would see, only the destruction of everything he once had. What little hope he had left rested in the music box in his hands, untarnished. Nodding as he grasped that hope, he looked up towards the voice in his mind and blinked through tears trying to see something that wasn't there. Confused he dropped his gaze and saw the image of a small boy, sitting upon a red wooden chest. Curious now, more about what was contained in the chest than the sad expression on the boy's face, he say up.

~See what your selfishness has wrought?~

Jin looked around. He didn't wish to, but he could not ignore the question of the young child whose sad eyes were so old. As he feared, there was nothing left except what he had in his hand.

~Because you could not save one precious thing more valuable than your riches, you have lost all.~

Taking a deep breath and holding back his tears, Jin forced himself not to tremble. "Please...another chance. Another chance for me, your humble servant." He watched as the child considered, watched it raise his finger to his chin in thought.

~Give me what you have in your hand.~

Jin looked down at the music box, the last that remained from his precious treasures. He looked up at the boy again and shook his head. "No, no please, not this."

~Then it is over. There will be no more chances.~

Shaking, Jin stood and walked over to the boy, his hands cupping the music box in his hands. The boy reached up and pryed the box from Jin's hand gently. He opened it, letting the music play once more.

~Find the crying jewel and this shall be returned to you, both as a reward and as a gift to sing the child to sleep.~

Jin nodded meekly, with finality. "Is there anything else?"

~No, you may wake now.~

Jin closed his eyes, tired both in mind and body. Cold in heart and soul.

~Wake, Jin Wang~

Jin shuddered and pulled the blanket close around him as the cold invaded his sleep. He turned, trying to find something warm to lie against.

~Wake, Jin~

Light bathed in him in the new day's dawn and pressed against his eyelids trying to find his eyes. It poked and pressed and generally made itself a nuisance. Vaguely, in the back of his mind, Jin could hear crying and as he woke, he found himself humming a familiar tune from his youth, his own eyes wet.

~Wake~