The Tinkerer Is Skittering About…

Coyle: Tinkerer likely prefers to hold onto the back of his leather jacket’s collar(?), basically right behind his neck. Although they’re holding on for dear life because considering his Pontiac battery is literally SMOKING all the time, if Tinkerer falls and lands on it, they’re either getting electrocuted to death, or getting severely burnt. They don’t hold onto Coyle for long, anyway, because his paranoia likely leads him to believing that “AUGH!! THOSE FUCKIN’ COMMIES PUT A TRACKER ON ME!” or some bullshit like that. Idk. Either way if Coyle senses something unfamiliar holding onto him for too long, he’s gonna freak tf out and considering how… “uncontrollable” he seems to be when stressed, Tinkerer has the risk of either getting caught/seen by him (and likely facing his wrath), or getting accidentally flung across the room. I think Coyle poses the biggest risk to Tinkerer out of all the Prime Assets. At his nicest he’d probably scold Tinkerer if they weren’t prioritizing fixing his shock grids first (greedy ass). Otherwise… well we know Coyle loves when he has more power and authority, especially if whoever he’s faced with is weak and helpless against him. If he isn’t killing them, it’s pure bullying or even torture. Also that man couldn’t be gentle if he even tried. He’s not handling them with any care. Oh and let’s not forget that apparently he had a history of animal abuse before Murkoff! Yeah Tinkerer isn’t safe at all near that man.

Gooseberry: Almost similar situation to Coyle. Although Tinkerer might hold specifically onto her lower back. This is because there’s the slight risk of Dr. Futterman “seeing” them. You can debate on whether Dr. Futterman turning his head and “spotting” Tinkerer holding onto Phylis would actually mean they’ve been spotted, because he’s a puppet. But Tinkerer doesn’t wanna risk it anyway. I’d say Gooseberry poses less of a threat to Tinkerer, they’d probably be able to hold onto her for longer without her freaking out (unlike Coyle), and if she did actually see them, I don’t really think she’d willingly hurt them? Dr. Futterman might, but maybe Phylis might even mistake them for like. A baby animal. As per usual, Dr. Futterman would probably be PISSED and think Tinkerer was just another pervert trying to get all touchy with his daughter, but Phylis would probably try to pet Tinkerer, or talk to Futterman, possibly concerned if Tinkerer was some kind of stray, baby animal and needed help. (Btw it’s not Phylis’ fault that she might think Tinkerer was a baby animal at first. She’s drugged up like CRAZY and thinks the child mannequins are real. I wouldn’t be surprised if she thought Tinkerer was a little stray.)

Franco: Hmm. It’s complicated. I’m trying to think. Maybe an also very similar situation to Coyle, where Tinkerer tries to hold onto the back of Franco’s suit, near his neck. Unlike Coyle where Tinkerer doesn’t hold on for long because of Coyle himself getting way too paranoid, Tinkerer doesn’t hold onto Franco for long because of Lupara. Yelling is already pretty uncomfortable for them, but the sound of Lupara firing off is like. Hearing the loudest thunder of your life, or something so loud that it actively hurts your ears. Also, Franco is kinda wild, and if Tinkerer were to be caught by him, I could unfortunately see Franco seeing them as if they were some kind of toy he can play around with. Not exactly mean, I could totally see him appreciating Tinkerer’s work, but he would just be a bit rough and careless when handling them.

Kress Twins: Tinkerer would probably hold onto the lower part of Otto’s pant legs. Or if they really felt like it, they’d climb into one of Otto’s suit pockets. They’d have to quite literally lay low, because either Otto or Arora would see them if they tried to climb any higher up on them. (Btw thanks @/therealrickette145 for this) Although I think Tinkerer wouldn’t be in TOO much danger around the twins if they both knew about them.. Maybe Arora would get morbid curiosity about their anatomy, or Otto would get a little defensive (likely interrogating Tinkerer a little to make sure they hadn’t ever touched his sister), but that’s it. They’d both probably appreciate Tinkerer’s work, maybe even helping them by picking them up themselves. I feel like they’d also want to keep Tinkerer for themselves as if they were a pet, though. But what probably matters most is “will Tinkerer get hurt or killed” and the answer is “probably not”, so they might be fine.

Liliya: I actually like thinking about this one a lot. Liliya is likely the most difficult for Tinkerer to hold onto, mainly due to materials (nothing to properly grab onto, too slippery for them) and how tight her clothing is on her (again, nothing to properly grab onto). So, Tinkerer would probably try to hold onto her necklace. OR… in a very cute idea, try to nuzzle themselves into one of the flowers around her head. (This is an actual thing that happens with mice sometimes, btw! Although Tinkerer is just a little person who wears a rat costume, sometimes mice will sit inside of flowers. Beware when you look this up though, unfortunately there’s a lot of AI slop between actual photos.) I’d argue Liliya is the least dangerous for Tinkerer. She’s quiet, has seemingly calculated and controlled movements, and she would likely be very unbothered by them. Also… she probably already knows about Tinkerer. I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s already aware of Tinkerer’s presence in the trials. She just won’t tell anyone, and doesn’t care enough to do anything about it. I don’t really know how Liliya would behave in a direct interaction with Tinkerer, though. Tinkerer is likely completely unaware that Liliya already knows about them. So they just have a very accidental relationship where it’s like, two animals helping each other simply because they feel like it, or they’re minding their own business that just so happens to also help the each other. (Considering Liliya also relys a lot on you being unable to detect her, her simply not caring that Tinkerer might be clinging onto her also provides an excuse for her to have absolutely no reactions to Tinkerer being on her, keeping her very sneaky.)

The only thing, the only GOOD thing about that trial is the Warden. He’s more sweet and gentle, as well as slow because he’s crawling all the time. Not much of a risk, unlike everybody else who just runs and slides and… aughh. The amount of times I’ve almost been killed by somebody throwing something or moving around too fast is ridiculous. I would say “watch where you’re going”, but I fear being perceived would be the end of my life.

Even if it was enforced properly, I just can’t trust most of my… “peers” to even follow it if they saw me. I mean. Pusher has seen me… once. I had to run off before he likely would’ve pumped a lethal amount of psychosis gas in my face. I think I’m lucky that he didn’t tell anyone about me. Maybe he thought I was a normal rat or something.

I’ll grab onto him sometimes to get a quick boost, but otherwise I like being safe and keeping my distance. He’s too rough, and violent. Like some kind of brute. And that electricity could probably kill me in an instant. A walking electricity pole or something.

…Although I can’t help but find myself watching him from afar sometimes. I mean, it’s scary to see what he does to the reagents, but when he isn’t being bothered by anything, he doesn’t seem too bad.. maybe.. he’s kinda handsome… I’m being a fool. It’s like watching a hungry predator stop to take a few breaths before it continues the hunt.