Keeper Mirth and his apprentice Button, working in the attic of the Old Toy Emporium, discover that the miniature memory cores within the final calibration device, the Miniature Memory Carousel, are suffering from a density drain similar to that affecting the larger infrastructure. The memory core of a chestnut mare is nearly transparent, resisting standard Joy Syrup sealant due to inverted surface tension. This confirms the antagonistic force is targeting small, personal reserves of joy. Button proposes using the highly volatile Indigo Binder, a deep indigo substance designed to force a binding against active rejection, which carries the risk of flash-freezing the memory. The challenge is stabilizing the binder, which requires a perfect, sustained high C note, impossible to achieve with the currently compromised Grand Chime Regulator. Button finds a solution by repurposing the tuning fork from a broken music box, planning to clean it with a localized thermal flare to generate the necessary pure tone for the binder application, a high-risk maneuver to save a single, precious memory.