Clockwork

Chapter Five

Felicity had a headache from trying to figure out who her mystery customer was. She relayed his voice over and over again until her head spun. She was pretty sure that it was a male voice as it was quite low. Someone of a high status, most likely, as it was quite eloquent. Where had she heard it before?

"Earth to little parasite! You've been staring at the wall for 10 minutes now and I need my food."

The nauseating voice of Patron Gulton snapped her back into reality. She jumped with a start, sloshing the bowl of soup around. The Patron glared at her as she stumbled to correct her mistake. Boy, she hated evenings. As it was winter, the light went too quickly for her liking and she was forced to go home and cook for the Patron.

The Patron took this as an opportunity to use her for whatever she wanted and she often didn't go to sleep until after midnight, her body sore from hours of cooking, scrubbing and cleaning. Even the Patron's droid, Arion, mocked her, dribbling oil in his wake. Arion knew that Felicity would be in trouble if it wasn't cleaned up. Felicity often fantasised reprogramming him into a less intelligent droid. Or move his chip into on of the electric dustbins. Oh, that would be good.

Gulping down the last of her meal, Felicity timidly approached the Patron.

"May I go out and buy some part to fix one of my customers goods?"

The Patron looked down at her, his multiple chins wobbling. He looked like an overgrown turkey.

"As long as it comes out of your own money. I give you a home, food and a shop to sell your paraphernalia. I think it's time you repay me."

"Of course. Thank you." Felicity muttered, not trusting her voice to get any louder. She was the one that paid for the food, the rent and cleaned everything. Hypocritical git.

She ran outside, grabbing her coat. She had no intention of buying spare parts (why should she when she could make better quality ones from scratch?) but instead was heading to her secret hide out. This was where Felicity was working on her special project; a small jet to get her out of Amortia for good. She had found the engine in the local dump and had fixed it up. Years of scavenged metal made up the exterior, bent into shape by her expert hands. This was her proudest achievement and her ticket out of here. Just a few more months, then she could escape. The day couldn't come fast enough.

Turning her mega-telescreen on, she started to hum as the daily news came on. She needed the background noise to help her think. The stranger's telescreen lay on her desk, a screwdriver sticking out of the interface, a sea of wires emerging from the machine. Turning her soldering iron on, Felicity got to work, trimming and repairing the faulty wires. Looking closer at the interface, she noticed that a panel had appeared underneath the wires. Bingo.

Prying open the panel, she found the main motherboard. God, was it complicated. Chuckling to herself, she began to tinker with it. It was at times like this that she was happiest. The humming of the electronics made her feel good, knowing that she controlled the life sparking from wire to wire.

"Soon Crown Prince Kyros will be giving a speech on the Queen's new policy on citizens without papers. His majesty is now approaching the stage-"

Felicity rolled her eyes. The Queen was hell bent on throwing unregistered people into jail. As she herself was unregistered, she wasn't exactly happy with the new policy but it made her laugh on how anxious the Queen was to rid the world of them. Her goons would never find her.

"I address my fellow citizens today on behalf of the Queen, my dear mother Avarice. In her omniscient wisdom, the Queen has introduced a new policy which is to be put into action within the month. As some of you may be wondering-"

Felicity's screwdriver fell to the ground with a clang. That was the voice. Of course she'd heard it before, during every speech. She was so stupid not to have recognised it before.

Her customer had been the Crown Prince Kyros.