Work Text:
Tick, tock, tick, tock, tick.
The droning ticking of their grandfather's clock was usually all they heard for hours on end. Funny, they hadn’t noticed how they’ve become so acclimated to such a thing. They suppose they ought to have, for working on this hobby as long as they have. Sometimes, when they blink, years go by. And at times, they feel as if simply getting through a day or two takes a year. This doesn’t keep them from loving what they do, no, of course not. After all, every job, every hobby, has its slow days. They would say, after having done some thinking one day, that it was all worth it.
Er, however…
Swatch moves the magnifying loupe that was zoomed in on a particularly complex looking mechanical part away from their eye and sighs, rubbing the exhaustion that nested in their eyes away. They feel the heavy drag of their eyebags, weighing down their face like chains. Stepping away from their desk, they rest their feathered hands on their hips and admire their handiwork.
Swatch sighs again, letting their eyes pick apart the partly refurbished cuckoo clock, finding more and more issues with it the more they inspect it. Shaking their head, they push aside the project on their work desk so as to not get pulled back in. They know what happens when they start thinking about what they can fix in the moment. They’ve learned their lesson the last few times they gave in.
They shiver thinking about how exhausted they were afterward. Not again.
Swatch walks toward their chair, grabbing the stained, previously white sheet and throwing it on top of the unfinished clock. They cast a worn down glance at the polished grandfather’s clock sitting patiently by the wall.
“Goodness…eleven already?” They squint at the hands, moving slowly, as if they too were as tired as they were.
They nodded, shrugging on their coat and flicking the lights off to head home.
The next day started the same as any day. It was a Tuesday, they think, but it doesn’t matter to them. The days blended together and like any other. Swatch was dead set on finishing their shift as fast as possible, in order to continue their current project. This time, it wasn’t a commission, just another roadside job that caught their eye on one of their walks.
Swatch has always liked cuckoo clocks, for some strange reason. There was something so fascinating about the many ways in which you could decorate such an everyday object into a marvelous work of art. Something so mundane as a clock could be turned into something with a million little details carved delicately into the wood, also carefully chosen specifically for the clock. You could make it anything, really. Theme it around birds, theme it around holidays, theme it around whatever obscure interest you may have. You could shape it into whatever you want. It’s a strange canvas to want to paint on, but they think it’s rather beautiful with all the elements surrounding it.
Swatch stopped cleaning the counter and glanced at the abstract clock on the cafe wall, and noticed it was just about time to clock out. Perfect. They turned to the Swatchlings on duty and nodded, they understood and took their place, working efficiently.
Swatch made their way through the back door quickly. Once they made it out, they let out a huff of relief.
Finally.
Swatch slows their pace, now leisurely walking through Trash Zone once again to see if they could find anything new they might want to take home and fix up.
They couldn’t see anything that caught their eye, so they walked deeper through the area, finding a strange closed off door they’ve never seen before.
“That’s…” They begin, letting their voice die in their throat as they look around.
It’s damp, and there are vines strangling the walls. The baby blue coating on the chipped brick walls are faint, a scene Swatch has never seen before displayed with blues, yellows, and off-whites that could nearly count as grey.
In the center sits…a marionette? Huh…
Swatch feels a tingle up their spine at the sight of it simply sitting there. The entire room is dim, yet there is a faint light shining down on it, as if forcing their attention on it. As if it was telling them to take it.
Take it.
Take the doll, Swatch.
They shake their head, feeling it cloud up for a moment. Strange indeed.
They made their way toward the doll, but before they could reach for it, they heard a dial up sound. Turning their head to see a slick black rotary phone.
This thing is ancient …how old is this place?
They move their head toward the phone, and pull it up to their ear.
All they can hear is static, and for some reason, there’s a sharp pain in their ear.
Swatch drops the handle of the phone, deciding it best not to go near it again.
Perhaps it would be best to leave this place…being in here for so long is making their feathers stand up.
So they take the marionette, whose head is just barely staying on, and they make their way to their workshop.
The wretched, burning smell of mixed assortments of garbage soon left their senses and was brought to a familiar warehouse. Entering, Swatch flicked on the lights and hung up their coat on the rack. They looked around the room, finding no other suitable spot to place the doll, and opted to sit it aside with their latest work in progress.
They glance at the work desk, eyes drifting toward the marionette limply dressed across tattered, used wood.
They know they shouldn’t start a new project when they’re already working on something, but…that doll…it seems so familiar. Swatch had to figure out why. Maybe fixing it would be the key to jogging their memory.
So, they grabbed all the materials they needed to fully refurbish it. However, before they could start the process, they had to inspect what issues it had in the first place, and determine which parts held priority over the other.
Swatch reached across the desk to grab their magnifying loupe and moved it over their eye in order to properly survey just how much damage there is.
“Hoo boy… this is gonna take some work…” Swatch huffed.
This thing was damaged. By…a lot. The paint was peeling off in bunches, there were parts that were rotten and needed completely new replacements…
They took a look at the inside, and paled at the poor condition of it as well. Swatch was hoping the mechanisms would at the least have some minor damage but this looks…
Seriously, what happened to this thing?
They close the marionette’s chest cavity with a strangled sigh.
This is going to be one hell of a project.
…But they always say that, don’t they?
“Well,” Swatch huffs.
“...Time to get to work.”