Work Text:
“We’re working on tunnels running to the south side of the mid-levels today!” He called out, voice slightly scratchy from age.
TFC stood atop an old metal shipping crate, hands planted on his hips as he surveyed todays work crew. His longish leathery ears emerged from beneath a mop of unruly gray curls, and an equally as impressive, long gray beard concealed much of his face. His eyes were bright and sharp, though, as he hopped down from the metal shipping crate. His stubby brown leathery tail swayed behind him, and with a step-tick step-tick, his boot hit the ground in time with his augmented leg.
Which was a peg leg. Being among the first generation to receive an augmented limb in the under-city, TFC’s leg, which he’d lost below the knee in a mining accident as a teenager, was replaced by an augment that qualified as ancient by this point. It was make of dark metal that had plenty of scratches and dings in it from decades of abuse, considering TFC hadn’t let the thing slow him down any from his passion, exploring and expanding the tunnels of the under-city. It had several obvious interlocking panel sections that flickered and pulsed with a steady redstone rhythm.
Doc offered to fix it…but it’s not broken yet!
He mused as he marched toward his redstone pallet. He wore dark jeans scuffed and nearly torn through at the knees from wear. A black tee shirt with sleeves that strained over his armored plates, on his shoulders and running down his arms, halting above each elbow like a hinge.He was an armadillo hybrid, so the natural armor was a feature of his subspecies, a brownish leathery color just like his ears and tail.
His white labs blazer was tossed over the railing of his redstone pallet. He only ever wore the thing on official business, but tended to keep it around on the off chance someone came by the live mining sites who needed him to look professional. It wasn’t like the blazer was suited to the sort of work he did.
The under-city was growing. For a population locked away beneath bedrock, it still managed to swell, and while the overpopulation problem hadn’t gone critical yet, they were hoping to ensure that never came to pass. Thus, the mining branch was established by the labs, and after a city-wide search, they’d hired the man who knew the tunnels, the walls, the very stone that kept them all both safe and held prisoner better than anyone else.
TFC had been honored, but tried to refuse the position.
Yet when they’d phrased it as him doing what he already did, but instead for a better paycheck, with better support, for a wider cause, well…he supposed he could put off retirement for just a few more years.
Glamor sparked cyan blue behind his eyes, and he grasped the rail of his redstone pallet and propped his augmented peg leg onto the edge.
“Let’s do some good work today!” He called over his shoulder to the others, who all called back their same encouragements.
Then he flicked the switch on the control panel, and with a sputter and a hum, his redstone pallet fired up.
He picked up his other foot, boot landing on the lip of the pallet alongside his peg leg, and turned the dial to send the machine speeding into the newest of his tunnels, already mapping out the details in his head. The under-city was still growing, and if a couple extra swings of a pickaxe, with the help of some glamor and hard work, from an old man like him would help it see a brighter future, then that made his chest feel light.