After about a month the reporting about the dead politicians had died out; I decided to leave the ducts and return to Senhor Ferreiro. My left knee was totally loose and useless, so I jammed a piece of metal into it to make it rigid and found a broom that I could use as a crutch.
I climbed out of the House of the Deputies at three in the morning and tried walking, it was not easy, but I persevered and half limped and half dragged myself along the streets. A couple of drunks threatened me, I thumped them, there was still some go left inside me. Half a kilometre later, the sun had risen, I reached the little old hut and sat on the bench.
Senhor Ferreiro was certainly glad to see me, he noticed my damaged knee immediately. He grabbed a pair of front forks and a front wheel, he cut the forks to size and the spokes of the wheel in half. He explained his idea, he would pull my knee apart, weld the forks inside my left thigh and weld the spokes to my foreleg. The axle of the wheel at the top of my foreleg would fit into the forks in my thigh.
“It will work as a simple hinge joint just as we humans have – what about it?”
“Sounds great – let’s try it.”
My damage control went into overload – so much electrical current from the welding – my systems went bananas – what a buzz. However I recovered. I fitted a spare actuator to operate the knee and with a bit of practice I could sorta walk. I cooked something really nice for Senhor Ferreiro that evening. Perhaps I would stay a while or longer and help him and maybe earn some money to buy a reworked leg, or even a new one, from the internet.