Theresa the Tinker
I hope you enjoy this short story featuring a solo by one of my favorite characters ever to create: The Tinker, Theresa LeFesse.
Theresa LeFesse was focused. At least, as focused as Theresa LeFesse could be.
“While the empire was once thought to have entered a period of decline following the death of Suleiman the Magnificent,” she murmured as she read, “This view is no longer supported… Interesting.”
She blinked, coming out of the trance. “Wait, is Suleiman even important?”
Sighing, Theresa switched back to the paper’s directions. “The Ottoman Empire,” she said, with another sigh. “So good ole Sulei is, in fact, important.”
She returned to typing – well, copying and pasting would have been more accurate, but she figured that CTRL-C and CTRL-V was still technically typing.
Originally, the Master’s program in anthropology seemed like a good idea. She was looking at teaching jobs, and they’d want her to have one, sooner rather than later. Plus, Theresa was bored. Sure, her job was fun, and tinkering was better. But day after day of having no success or progress in either? At least a grade was motivation.
“Whyyyyy is history soooo borring?” she said aloud, to no one in particular. She looked up, at the light shining through the basement window. For a moment, she longed for the sun and grass and trees and fresh air, then she remembered that she would be even more bored out there. “Just concrete in my town,” she said, sadly. “And anyway, I put myself in this prison. I’d be a pretty lousy jailer if I let myself out all the time.”
She pushed back, catching sight of the multi-colored Glorpius crawling toward her. It was shaped like an octopus, provided you turned your head and squinted. It’s front legs – tentacles, she guessed – were pulling it forward, while the back ones lifted a Red Bull triumphantly over it’s head.
“You’re just the cutest little yarn-ball, aren’t you?” she said, picking it and the can up. Glorp had been a gift from her parents many years before. It looked like a children’s craft gone haywire, and acted similarly. It was fashioned from a mess of colored yarn, Awakened with some magical thread or another. Theresa kept it to shock enemies and annoy friends. And, occasionally, to bring her drinks.
Setting Glorp on her shoulder, Theresa turned back to her work. “You’d think history would be interesting,” she said to the wide-eyed stuffy on her shoulder, “You know, seeing that it’s stuff that really happened, but they just don’t know how to write well. Just listen to this.” She cleared her throat, readying herself for the role of a lifetime.
“The Ottomans consequently suffered severe military defeats in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. The successful Greek War of Independence concluded with decolonization of Greece following the London Protocol and Treaty of Constantinople.”
She turned, staring into the bright, crocheted eyes of Glorp. “I mean, come on. Tell me who led the military. Tell me how they died. Give me details. At the very least, remind me that Istanbul, was Constantinople, now it’s Istanbul, not Constantinople, been a long time gone, Constantinople, now it’s Turkish delight on a moonlit night!”
Theresa jumped off her seat, humming the music and emphasizing, “Doo doo doo!” as she marched around the alchemy table in the center of the room. She finished with a flourish and a loud, “ISTANBULLLLLL!”
Glorp, who had jumped off when she first started her dance, clapped two tentacles together.
“Thank you, thank you,” she said, bowing to Glorp and the rest of the scientific equipment. She went to return to her work, when one unfinished project caught her attention. “Hello, again,” she whispered, creeping forward to look at it closer.
It was an automaton, or at least, it would be, if she could get the driver to function properly. As it was, it just sat, a sad shell of metal plates and screws. Everything internally was hooked and operated fine, but whatever she tried to start it refused to work. Batteries just drained charge, magic just dissipated and screaming did nothing. She had tested the last one thoroughly.
“If only there was a way to combine the two?” she pondered. It had been presented to her as a challenge by a friend. The rumor was that there was no way to make it work, but Theresa was determined figure it out. If only she didn’t have the anthropology paper hanging over head.
“Okay, Suleiman,” she said, pushing away from the table, “I’m coming for you.”
Glorp was fighting with the pop tab of the red bull. It looked up with those wide eyes as she loomed over it, laughing at the attempt. “Oh, Glorp. Thank you,” Theresa said, picking it up and putting it back on her shoulder. She finished the job, and the red bull fizzed open. She took a sip, sighing, then turned back to the computer, squinting as she surveyed the document.
“That,” she concluded, “Is a killer opening paragraph. Too bad I don’t have anything else.”
Again. Why couldn’t history be interesting? It really was, when you got into the details.
Was Suleiman murdered? Did he die of old age?
More to the point, why did he want to become king? Or maybe he had a secret dream of being a peaceful farmer? And his advisors – what were their motivations?
That’s what history was built on, motivations. The motivation of Alexander the Great lead to an incredible empire. But why did he want to conquer the world?
Was it pride, thinking he was the only one who could rule properly? Fear, that someone else would control him? Was it just desire and lust for the wealth that surrounded him?
Those were the things Theresa LeFesse was interested in. That’s why she had taken up anthropology, to study the course of human history through the lens of societal and cultural change. But these books… They were interested in facts, nothing more.
What was the point, Theresa would counter? What was the point of a list of facts? Sure, it could tell you ‘Don’t kill the Archduke Ferdinand, you might set off World War 2,’ but it wouldn’t tell you ‘Don’t react to an oppressive regime in a violent manner.’ She admitted that might be a stretch, but there were so many more lessons beyond the story’s surface. What would happen if they dug deeper? What could they discover?
Learning from historical facts wouldn’t change how you acted in the future. Learning from flawed attitudes and perspectives? That was a way to move forward!
Theresa blinked, staring at the page, her brain filled with philosophical ramblings. “And…” she muttered, “There’s no way to connect that to the Ottomans.”
But what if there was?
Theresa took a step back in her mind. She could see her thoughts. One was the Ottoman Empire, a lump of clay with no life. The other was a bursting cacophony of lines and light – something she was excited about, but with no form.
Her friends called this meta-thought – thinking about thoughts and interacting with them. Theresa called it thought tinkering. Either way, it had creeped the jeepers out of the counselor she had been seeing. “That’s why you stay out of my head,” she muttered to any telepath who might be listening, then focused on unwinding the ball of light.
She forced it into the lump of clay, weaving them together to create… something. It was long and gray, but the bits of light sprang out from along it. She cocked her head, trying to make sense. Some of it worked, but most of it didn’t go together. What if she…. No, trying to kneed it didn’t work either.
Theresa opened her eyes, sighing again, taking another sip of her Red Bull. “Fine. Dull facts of societal features and changes it is.”
She forced herself through another painful paragraph, but then found herself drifting away into the world of her imagination, watching the Ottomans fight to retain control of their empire as old Suleiman slipped into forgotten history.
“What a name,” she said, her attention wandering over her shoulder and to the automaton. “Maybe it didn’t work for the thoughts,” she said, reaching up to pet Glorp, “But what about the physical world?”
She slid off the chair, lifting Glorp and catching its gaze. “Do you want a metal body?” she asked. “You can be a little Blorb tank. Wouldn’t that be fun?”
Glorp blinked and made a little squeaking noise, both of which she didn’t know it was capable of. Then, slowly and deliberately, it shook its head, which was impressive, considering most of its body was the head.
“Fine,” Theresa said, setting Glorp down and taking a seat in front of the automaton. She crossed her arms, resting her chin so she could stare the metal shell in its dead eyes. “You’re a shell,” she said quietly. “Just like the bare facts of my history paper. But there has to be some kind of energy behind you. That’s like the reasons behind the facts.” She squinted, trying to see what would motivate a tiny robot.
Her eyes drifted to Glorp, who was likewise cross-tentacled, studying the automaton. “But you,” she said, “You’re also complete within yourself. And you don’t need a power source.” She scratched her head. “At least, not that I know of.” She pinched herself. “I need food and water. But I’m also complete within myself.”
She returned to the automaton. “So maybe you’re complete within yourself, too? And you don’t like eating batteries or magic. Which makes sense, I don’t either. So maybe you like food?”
There was a sense of excitement again, like it was possible to finish the problem now. If this was done, she could ride the wave and complete the rest of the paper. And if it wasn’t, she would have distracted herself enough to be able to work on it again. It was a win/win situation!
Theresa dashed upstairs, scanning the refrigerator shelves for something to try feeding the little robot. She decided on using a sandwich from the day previous. She ran back to the basement, setting the plate down and trying to find some kind of orifice to use as a mouth. The only one was in the back, but something told her that sticking food into the wires wouldn’t work.
Instead, she took a bite, considering the problem. “Ah, well,” she said, picking it and the plate up and bringing them back to the computer. “I’ll keep thinking while I work.”
Without looking back, she reached back and grabbed Glorp, who was about to crawl off the edge of the worktable. She set it down on next to the automaton, returning to her research.
“A month before the siege of Nice, France supporting the Ottomans with an Artillery unit during the 1543 Ottoman Conquest of Esztergom in northern Hungary…. Suleiman I died of natural causes in his tent during the siege of Szigetvar in 1566.” She looked at Glorp. “So I guess that answers my question earlier. This is why we read, right?”
As Glorp nodded sagely, there was a whirring noise and the arm of the automaton twitched. Glorp scrambled away, its eyes bulging in shock. Theresa leaned forward, studying the small motion. “Hello?” she asked.
The automaton’s arm lowered, and in a dying electronic voice, said, “Moooorrrreeee….”
“More what?” Theresa said. “Tuna breath? Ottoman History?” She turned back to the page, keeping the metal creature in her peripheral and aiming her exhalations in its general direction. One couldn’t be too careful. “By the end of Suleiman’s reign, the Empire spanned approximately 877,888 square miles, extending over three continents. In addition, the Empire became a dominant naval force, controlling much of the Mediterranean Sea. By this time, the Ottoman Empire was a major part of the European political sphere, becoming involved in multi-continental religious wars.”
The arm of the automaton was moving again, as was the opposite one. The voice spoke again, this time stronger. “Motivatttionn…. Knoowiiing.”
“Your motivation is knowing?” Theresa said. “How do you even know those words? You’ve been alive for all of two seconds.”
“Listeenniiingg…. Read…”
Slightly bewildered, Theresa continued to read, tracking the continuing rise and fall of the Ottoman Empire, occasionally making snide comments or breaking into song. She noted important sections for her paper, taking moments every so often to fill out paragraphs and edit them.
Throughout, the automaton sat quietly, soaking in the information. Every so often, it would sigh, like it was eating a big meal. After about a half-hour, it began to stand. “Wobbly,” it said as it teetered from side to side.
Glorp came to the rescue. While initially wary of the strange metal creation, it had taken to how it sat and paid careful attention. Using its bulbous head, it stuck itself under the arm of the automaton, steadying it and making a thumbs-up with a tentacle.
The automaton waddled over to look at the computer, using Glorp as a crutch. It’s eyes focused, and a small hand pointed at one of the words. “Name,” it said.
Theresa bent down to see along the length of the automaton’s arm. “Suleiman?” she asked. “That’s your name?”
“Like it,” Suleiman declared, sitting down to watch the screen. “More.”
“More on Suleiman?” Theresa asked. “Or the Ottomans?”
“More knowing.”
“Okay,” Theresa said, opening her document. “Do you want to read my paper while I write it?”
“More knowing,” Suleiman said emphatically.
“Okie dokie, Sulei my Man,” Theresa said, starting to type. She glanced at Glorp, who shrugged.
With a laugh and a smile, Theresa returned to her paper. She had motivation for finishing now, beyond the want for a Master’s.
She looked down at the automaton, patiently watching the screen for more knowledge. “Thank you for my motivation,” she said. “Hopefully, this doesn’t lead to world destruction, huh?”
“No destruction,” Suleiman agreed. “Just knowing.”
“Good motto, Sulei my Man,” Theresa said. “Good motto.”
Read more of this series at the Adventures in Fantasy homepage!
