Chapter Sixty-Seven – The New Girl

Trinity reached over and tugged on new-somewhat-bigger-sister’s sleeve.

Aurora glanced up. She was sitting on the floor, back against the couch and one leg folded up. The TV was playing a documentary about bears that Trinity had seen twice already. She was actually watching it now, from another body.

“Yeah?” Aurora asked.

“I need help,” Trinity said.

“With that?” Aurora asked..

“I’m in love, and I need help.”

“Eh?” Aurora said. Or asked. Trinity wasn’t sure what it meant, except that it was Aurora’s favourite noise to make.

At the moment, Trinity and her sisters were all alone at home. Emily was off to school, and Miss Headerson couldn’t do classes today because Steffie had a doctor’s appointment. So they had to stay at home and entertain themselves.

Trinity was mostly indoors, so it was okay. The last bit of her was outside, watching her loved one. “I can’t get through the barrier,” Trinity said.

“The what?” Aurora asked. She turned and then stood. She was a lot taller than Trinity, like a head and a bit. Unless Trinity counted all of her height all together? That’d make her three times taller than she was now, so technically she was actually way taller than Aurora.

But then she’d need to calculate her weight three times, and that would mean that Athena was allowed to make fat jokes, so Trinity settled on being shorter for the moment.

“Alright, you’re gonna need to give me a bit more.”

“A bit more what?” Trinity asked.

“Information,” Aurora said.

“Oh. That makes sense. Uh, okay, so… it was like in the movies.”

“What movies?” Aurora asked.

“The romance ones. Like Athena likes,” Trinity said with a gesture to Athena, who was on the couch with the laptop.

Athena looked up. “No I don’t,” she lied.

“I genuinely have no idea what you mean,” Aurora said.

Trinity reached over the couch with one body and rubbed one of her chins while putting both hands on her hips. “It was love at first sight. I saw him, and I fell in love, and now I need your help getting to him.”

“Yeah, alright, and who exactly did you fall in love with?” Aurora asked.

“I also wanna know,” Athena said even though she wasn’t looking away from her computer.

“He’s a little guy, black, with one eye, and he likes trash too,” Trinity said.

“I’m concerned. I think I should be concerned, right?” Aurora asked, and Athena made an ‘uh-huh’ sound.

“Come on,” Trinity said as she reached out and grabbed Aurora’s hand. “I’ll show you.”

It wasn’t as easy as grabbing Aurora and making her follow. They had to put their shoes on by the entrance, then Trinity had to go through a whole thing where she convinced Aurora that technically Emily had told all of her sisters except for Aurora not to leave, and that Trinity was only one-third gone, so she’d only get one-third of a spanking if she was caught, and Miss Headerson had explained that some things couldn’t be turned into fractions. (Trinity was the best at maths. Miss Headerson was very impressed with her.)

Then, once they were out of the bunker, it was a short walk to where Trinity’s love was waiting. She didn’t venture far from home, in case she had to run back for something. This was basically like patrolling the neighbourhood.

“Oh, there’s your third you,” Aurora said as she came up to the other one of Trinity’s bodies. This one was pressed up against a fence. It blocked off an entire alleyway, was twice as tall as Trinity, and had barbed wires at the top, obviously to protect what was within.

“Is… is your love the dumpster?” Aurora asked.

The dumpster was about the only thing in the alleyway. It was behind a jewellers and an electronic’s store, which was probably another reason the back was blocked off by a fence and had a bunch of cameras.

“It’s him,” Trinity said as she pointed.

Aurora followed her pointing finger to the side of the dumpster where the love of Trinity’s life was resting. He was so small and shiny and precious.

“Trinity, that’s, eh, that’s one of those Broomba floor cleaners,” Aurora said.

“He’s beautiful,” Trinity said. “Is that his name?”

“I think you could call it whatever you wanted.”

“Him,” Trinity said.

“How… how do you figure it’s a ‘him’?” Aurora asked.

“Look at the jawline. He’s obviously a ‘him’,” Trinity said. “And I love him.”

Broomba stared back at her. He only had one eye, round and exceptionally googley. There was tape where his other eye had been, but it was missing now. It only made him cooler. Like a pirate. For dust. A dust pirate.

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“Well, okay, but it’s in the trash… which isn’t a problem for you, but we can’t exactly get to that, can we?”

“You could,” Trinity said. “Push your horns at the fence.”

Aurora looked around, then up the fence. “Yeah… that would work. One shove and those supports would probably give out first. But I have a better idea.”

Aurora then did something very unexpected. She walked around and right into the store. Trinity followed, still holding her taller-sister’s hand and listening as she explained to a tired looking counter-person that Trinity really wanted the Broomba in the dumpster out back, and it was in the trash anyway.

The clerk shrugged, then five minutes later, Trinity was united with her love.

“He’s so pretty!” she cheered.

“You… uh, sure she wants that?” the clerk asked.

“Yup, pretty sure,” Aurora said. “Thanks, eh.”

“You’re welcome?”

Trinity skipped back home, hugging Broomba close. He was much smaller than she’d imagined from afar, but heavier too, and he smelled like dust and chewed gum and old plastic, and Trinity loved him a lot.

“We should see if Maple would feel like fixing him,” Aurora said. She was still holding onto Trinity’s hand, but of the body not holding Broomba.

“I like his one eye,” Trinity said.

“No, I meant… like, the mechanical parts. Battery’s probably dead or something. He looks a bit worn out too.”

“Oh,” Trinity said. She held Broomba up before herself, then nodded. “Okay.”

Maple, when they got back home, was found in her bedroom. There was a machine that looked a bit like one of those animatronics Trinity had seen a couple of days before, only without the skin and a lot more spikes. “Maple, I need help,” Trinity said as she turned Broomba around. “Broomba needs help.”

Maple blinked, then adjusted her glasses with the heel of her hand. “Huh? Oh, it’s a dust-collector. Where did you get it?”

“We’re in love,” Trinity explained.

Maple didn’t seem to get it, but she did take Broomba from Trinity and placed him on her workbench. “If only I had plastic explosives,” Maple muttered.

“If I find any, I promise to share,” Trinity promised.

Maple nodded absently. From the way her eyes looked a little glassy, Trinity knew that her sister was almost in a gadget-making trance. Usually she’d leave Maple to her own devices, but this was Broomba. If he had hands, she’d be holding onto one while Maple operated on him.

With her tail flapping under her coat, Maple took apart Broomba’s skin of plastic shells and set them aside, then she started to tug at the motors and computer bits and batteries and other innards within Broomba’s body. “Just one little bin?” Maple muttered. “Why only one battery? What’s this do? No, that’s silly. Hmm. How does he know where he’s going with just one googly eye? No depth perception.”

Tools were brought in, then discarded as Maple got to work. There were flashes of light, and sparks as she cut into things. The room smelled like melting plastic and inventions.

Finally, after several long hours, it was done.

Broomba came to life with a mechanical whirl. His new eye opened, and a sweep of red lasers scanned the room around him. He now had four little legs, and a little grippy arm from a toy tractor on his tummy, as well as a dust-scooping whirly thing that could move up and down.

“Done,” Maple said. “He needs to be fed one battery every seventy-two hours or so. More if he’s been active.”

“Okay,” Trinity said with a serious nod.

“The weapons system will only turn on for intruders and mice… hmm, might have to adjust that if we ever get a mouse-sister. Oh, and don’t touch the self-destruct button on his belly. It’s the red one, with ‘Self-destruct’ written on it.”

Trinity nodded seriously. “Okay. What happens if I do?”

“There’s a count-down timer. You’ll have ten seconds to double-tap the button to cancel the self-destruct. Otherwise, the dust-dimension in his chest will invert, and all the energy that went into creating a pocket dimension will turn into kinetic energy going outwards. Oh, and all the dust will come back too.”

“Okay,” Trinity said. “Thank you, Maple, you’re the best.”

She hugged Maple, who blushed prettily. “I-it’s nothing,” Maple said. “Back to work for me.”

Trinity nodded, then ran out of the room with Broomba, her tail wagging behind her.

She hoped that Big Sister Emily was okay with the idea of Trinity finding love.

***

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