The Dragon's in the Details
Flash fiction, 900 words. For IAM's Jan. 24 prompt. Will he start by learning to play the recorder?
“Tell them,” whispered the dragon with an impatient thump of his foot. “You’ve got to tell them!”
Avery Thornton sighed. In a sing-song voice, she cried, “The Chief prefers the brass fittings to the chrome, please. Let’s keep them consistent.”
“Good,” purred the dragon. “Good.”
The Chief was two thousand years old and purported to be the best engineer in this era or any. But Avery had her doubts. He seemed to care more about appearances than blueprints.
And he was shy. So shy, in fact, that he spoke only in whispers, and only to a single human chosen in each generation. That meant that Avery was saddled with his hot breath in her ear until she retired. She was only twenty-two.
“And we’d agreed on ‘Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star,’” suspired the behemoth. “Don’t forget, we’d agreed.”
No, you’d decided, she griped inwardly. “Yes, yes, it’s right here.”
She unfurled the meticulous schematics that timed the pistons so that each rung a small bell when it fell, but only at the height of every hour. And so, in addition to running the city’s mills, factories, conveyors, trains, and anything else a central steam system might provide, the Municipal Engine would also serve as the city’s most childish clock tower.
The dragon reviewed the schematics with a first-time intensity, though in truth he’d looked at them every day for the past year.
“Lovely,” murmured the Chief. He always said that.
Work on the Municipal Engine continued day and night, except for Sundays, but the Chief, and thus, Avery, kept regular business hours. When the shift bell – an unmelodic, uncontrived ding – rang, she accompanied the Chief back to his quarters. Her last duties of the day were to make sure all his possessions were in perfect order, that he had exactly four freshly slain sheep for supper, and that the next day’s work orders were laid out for him to approve.
All of this was seen to, without fail, by conscientious domestic staff, so Avery stood dumbly while the Chief inspected his abode with a satisfied hiss.
But instead of tearing into his sheep, he curled up and regarded her with large, beady eyes.
“I cannot help but notice, Miss Thornton, that you seem restless.”
Avery flinched. The only rule the retiring Chief Whisperer had bequeathed to her was, “He’s kind of set in his ways, but don’t let it get to you. Don’t let it show.”
“It’s just the time of year, Chief. Spring. Makes me want to be outside.”
“Outside? Where all the pollen is? Goodness. I can’t think of a better time to be buried in machinery.”
His snout twitched. She didn’t want to be around when the dragon caught hay fever. The city would burn beneath a giant achoo. Hills would be shorn.
“Do you not like ‘Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star?’”
The question was so unexpected that she answered honestly. “Not enough to hear it every hour.”
He wilted on the ground. “Oh. Do all the humans share your opinion?”
“Maybe not small children.”
“I rather like it.”
“Well, you’re the one who has to hear it until the end of time, I suppose.”
“The machine won’t last that long. But also, do you not like brass fittings, Miss Thornton?”
“I do like them. That’s … not the issue.” She took a deep breath. No sense in being a coward. “But Chief, all you seem to care about are the silly things. The color of the fittings, and the sound that plays on this bell tower that we don’t need and wasn’t even on the original plans.”
“Silly? Oh, my dear. If you are a technician turning those wheels, staring at them, day after day, don’t you want them to look smart? If you are an ordinary citizen, you have no idea the kind of effort and exactness that went into creating this wonderful Municipal Engine, no idea how your national treasure” – at this word, the dragon purred – “was spent. But if we let them share in it, be part of the grand design, well, I don’t regard that as silly. I want everyone to love this work as much as I do.”
Avery stood abashed. “I see.”
The Chief sighed. “There’s a more prosaic reason, of course: You humans have simply gotten so good at building the difficult bits that you don’t need me anymore.”
“That’s not true!”
“It is. In fact, I had very little to do with designing the Municipal Engine. I have so much free time, I spend it fretting over fittings and tunes. What am I going to do with myself when you all surpass me?”
He seemed genuinely glum. Avery crouched beside him and placed her small hands atop one dejected paw.
“Maybe you can compose clock tower songs. If the best we’ve got is ‘Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star,’ we’re in dire need of aid.”
He perked up. “A mid-life career change! No more the Chief, but … the Composer!”
Avery nodded in agreement and felt sorry for the world’s musicians. But not for the world.
I started reading all the dragon's lines in Benedict Cumberbatch's 'Smaug'-voice, from The Hobbit. It fit surprising well, until I got to: “Do you not like ‘Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star?’” which just made me laugh. Good bit of flash fiction, I liked the personality of the 'chief' especially.