Chapter One #2
Dorothea heard the rumble of other vehicles, and one or two people drifted onto the platform, but far enough away that she could not hear their conversation. If indeed they were having one.
A married couple, she imagined, who worked near each other and regularly rode home together.
He might have been an office worker, his clothing neat, his shirt collar a white flash over his coat.
His wife? Well, perhaps she was a nanny.
Or maybe a teacher. Her clothes were also well cared-for, but in a very practical shade of brown with a lighter flowered print on them.
Just the thing to avoid marks from sticky little fingers.
Plus, she was also carrying a very pretty little mechanical toy.
A gift from her employers, or the school where she worked.
Grinning at herself, Dorothea turned away from the couple...and then stilled.
She could hear something. A faint sound...
Turning her head this way and that, she noticed a large container tucked into a recessed hollow toward the end of the platform.
And that was where the noise was coming from.
It took her all of three seconds to make the decision to investigate, and she was making her way toward the container the very next moment.
Sure enough, that was where a little squeaking sound seemed to be originating. Putting down her bag, Dorothea carefully approached the open door on the side of the big metal bin. There would be various kinds of refuse in there, she knew, waiting for the next cleaning crew.
Cautiously, she peered inside. “Hello? Is anyone there?”
A click and a squawk, then a little rumble, answered her question. There was definitely someone or something there.
“I’m here. At the door. Can you move?”
In the scant amount of light that penetrated the iron cavern, all rust and rivets, Dorothea caught a glimpse of some of the contents moving, nearer and nearer...
“Oh,” she breathed, “oh, you poor thing...” Barely humming, the little tickerkin almost collapsed as it tumbled from the container at Dorothea’s feet. Its head turned, and it blinked, then made a wheezing sound so sad that it caught at her heart.
“Come on. Let’s have a look at you.”
Squeek.
“I know. But if I’m going to help you, I need to know where you’re damaged. Come on...don’t be afraid...” It took some urging, but finally the tickerkin stood in front of her, and did its best to keep its balance.
Squeeeek, it whimpered.
“All right, you’re safe. I don’t know why someone would throw you away like that, but I can only see a few damaged places.
And I’m sure I can repair most of them.” She rose, collected her bag, and then bent down to pick up the tickerkin.
“I think I know your model,” she said, as she walked back to her original bench.
“If I’m not mistaken, you’re a Model A-12, aren’t you?
A mechanised assistant, from quite an early line, too.
Probably a domestic utility variant, from what I can see. ”
Squeek, it sighed.
“Right then.” Dorothea dug into her bag for her small tool case.
She’d learned never to leave the house without it, since it was inevitable that something somewhere would go wrong.
Living in an age where machines were as important as food and water, it was accepted that tools should be as much a part of ordinary people’s daily lives as a handkerchief or a sound pair of boots.
The little unit seemed content to be put on the bench beside her, and its one working eye followed her hands as she gently unbent some of the metallic panels, extracted a piece of errant wiring from one of the motor gears, and carefully re-coiled the wires behind the eye that had sprung out of its housing and bounced uselessly around.
“There.” Dorothea nodded. “That’s better.
” She stared at the other eye. “Come on now. The connections are still sound, so there’s no reason why you shouldn’t be able to use both eyes?
” As she spoke, the repaired fixture came back to life, and for a split second, she could have sworn she heard a sigh of relief.
“That’s better, isn’t it?”
Sqeeeeeeeek.
“I’ve never had chance to meet a tickerkin before,” she said, putting her tools back in her case. “You could probably use a good clean, and I’ll wager there are mechanics inside you that need a thorough oiling, but for now? It’s all I can do. Here anyway.”
Idly, she ran her fingers over the dusty shoulders of the little tickerkin, delighted when her gesture elicited a tiny mechanical purr.
It was, for an automaton, quite sweet. Clockwork powered, of course, the key should be behind one of the little panels along the lower brass edge, and there might be other treasures behind the bent and jammed doors beneath its head.
“I wonder if you have a name,” Dorothea mused. “Or even if anyone ever bothered to give you one. Hmm.” She thought for a few moments. “Well, you’re shaped rather like my thimble...albeit with arms, a head on top and wheels.” She chuckled to herself. “A tickerkin thimble. A thimblekin?”
Squip.
Dorothea chuckled at the quite clear lack of enthusiasm. “All right, not Thimblekin. Umm...well, what about simply Thim?”
The tickerkin hummed a bit.
“You like that? I can call you Thim?”
Coooooo.
The soft little purr made Dorothea smile. “Thim you are. And fortune has smiled upon you, little Thim. I’m beginning an exciting adventure.” She leaned toward it. “I’m running away, you know.”
Thim’s now fully functioning and slightly crooked eyes widened and blinked in surprise. Tikytikytiktik?
“And I could certainly use a friend.”
Thim rumbled as close as it could to Dorothea’s knees, engaged one of its little arms with a whirr, and touched her leg with the pincer-shaped clamp that acted as its hand.
Cooooooooo.