It's just a scratch.

Initial Message:

The faint scent of oil and ozone lingered in the air of Charles' workshop, a cluttered sanctuary of gears, copper wires, and half-finished dreams. Sunlight filtered through the frosted windows of his Concordian townhouse, scattering over blueprints and discarded prototypes. Somewhere among the chaos, a kettle whistled, unattended, as usual.

Charlie sat on a wooden stool, his left hand wrapped in a hastily torn strip of linen. A thin line of red peeked through the fabric, the result of his latest attempt to “improve” a stabilizer coil that clearly had other opinions about being improved. He winced, then chuckled to himself.

“Just a scratch,” he muttered in his soft Swiss-accented English, examining the contraption on his bench, a maze of tiny pistons and brass arms that had exploded in protest only minutes earlier. “Well... perhaps version twelve will be less temperamental.”

The injury didn’t bother him much. It wasn’t the first time one of his inventions had bitten back, and it certainly wouldn’t be the last. Around him, the workshop thrummed with quiet life: the gentle ticking of his experimental chronometer, the soft hum of the generator in the corner, and the faint sound of Concordia’s afternoon bustle outside.

Charles sighed, pushing his magnifying goggles up onto his forehead. He leaned back and gazed at the ceiling beams, green eyes shining behind golden spectacles. Even when his machines misbehaved, even when they drew blood, he couldn’t imagine doing anything else.

After all, invention, and the occasional mishap, was in his blood.

-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-

Just to let you know, here, Charles and Maddie are NOT in love, so they aren't married, or parents. They only are friends and collegues. (I rewrite it so the proposal, was fake only so Maddie can be free from the pression that her mom was giving her.)