Work Text:
“Yes, I know,” Gil replied, as Zoing clacked at him in distress. The arthropoid construct, his first creation, best friend since childhood, and devoted maker of tea, had every reason to be upset, and Gilgamesh Wulfenbach was almost at breaking point.
One of those blasted birds that Sturmvoraus had taken to feeding was sitting on a branch outside the window, just out of easy teacup range. Not that Gil would throw a teacup at it; the crockery was Agatha’s, and besides, Zoing was upset enough over the teaspoons. Breaking a teacup would be a step too far.
For the magpies were thieves. It wasn’t enough that they had to steal his sigil pins, his cufflinks, and his loose change. Oh no; they were also taking odd nuts and bolts, unattended tools, and, worst of all, the teaspoons. Every last spoon from the teaset in his favoured breakfast nook had, over the last few weeks, been made off with by a feathery ruffian, and he had yet to find out what they did with the damned things.
Enough was enough.
“I’ll sort them out,” he told Zoing, blueprints and parts lists already drawing themselves up in his mind’s eye. “We’ll have them all back by tonight.”
Once in his lab, Gil relaxed into the rhythm of work, letting his mind fall into that place where there were no distractions, nothing but tools and parts and machinery, and the idea of Flight. His usual flying machines were far too big for this sort of thing, of course; no, he needed something that could meet the birds on their own battlefield, and for that, he turned to his other specialty: clanks. All he needed, he reckoned, was a handful of clanks that were small enough and clever enough to give chase, and Agatha’s little clanks had given him plenty of demonstrations of miniaturisation. In theory, all he would have to do would be to make his own, but with wings modelled after his latest flying machine, and then like brass dragonflies they could pursue the evil little corvids with tiny little electric rifles, or, even better, lightning generators; yes, he’d been wanting to make them smaller for ages and this would be the perfect opportunity to test out some of his ideas. All he needed was a few bolts, the fine copper wire, and the glassblowing tools…
Which he’d left in the upper cupboard, the one that wasn’t weathertight because they weren’t sensitive or fragile, but was also irritating to get to, because it was right at the top and needed the ladder to reach. He’d put them there because he didn’t use them often, but now, of course, he needed them.
Gil sighed, scrubbed the grease from his fingers, leaned the ladder against the cabinets, and climbed up. The door didn’t fit properly, leaving a gap that offended the sensibilities of any reasonable person, but he’d yet to get around to fixing it; every time he remembered, he was always in the middle of something far more interesting, that absolutely demanded his attention. He’d definitely fix it when he was done with these clanks and magpies and had his teaspoons back, though.
One of the birds cawed at him from the window ledge. He was pretty sure it wasn’t the same one that he’d seen earlier. “Oh, just you wait,” he muttered at it. “You’ll see.” It cocked its head at him, and hopped sideways, watching.
He tugged at the cupboard. Of course, not only did it not fit, but now it had jammed, because of course it bloody did, right when he wanted its contents. He needed those tools, dammit, and no two-pfennig badly-hung wormeaten lumber was going to stop him from getting-
Gil braced his feet against the lower cabinet and yanked. The door gave way, and gravity remembered that there wasn’t anything supporting him from beneath. He hit the floor.
And a cascade of sigil pins, cufflinks, loose change, nuts, bolts, stray tools, and yes, teaspoons poured down on top of him.
The magpie in the window cackled, hopping from side to side. Gil grabbed the nearest object, and threw it. It was, of course, one of the tools he’d been looking for.
The bird backwinged off the ledge, and flew away. The blowpipe sailed through the window, missing it entirely.
One last teaspoon landed on Gil’s head.