Darren Powell was doing a routine patrol of the perimeter fence at Warragamba Dam in the middle of the night when a four-legged, bald ball of cuteness stumbled out of the gutter screaming.
But "Bobbie", as the security guard would dub the wombat joey, quickly decided Mr Powell was her best friend and would not let him out of her sight.
"I got out and had a look and heard it screaming and walking into the gutter and banging into stuff, walking back and forwards, and I know it's very rare for one not to be near its mother because they're very protective," Mr Powell said.
He eventually picked up the four-month-old wombat and put it in the patrol car with him.
"I don't know if it thought I was its mother or what, but it started being like a pet dog.
"She was following me around. Everywhere I walked she'd be walking between my legs," he said.
"She'd find me and come running at me and, as soon as she got close, she'd try and climb up my leg."
Injured and dehydrated
The veteran security guard finally took her back to the security office watching over Sydney's main drinking water supply west of the city.
"He's absolutely besotted with her," Blue Mountains WIRES branch coordinator Tracy Burgess said.
The wildlife rescue service was contacted at 2.41am on Thursday, January 11.
Bobbie, who would still have been living in her mum's backward-facing pouch, was injured, dehydrated and had likely not eaten for a week when Ms Burgess drove down from the Mountains to pick her up.
"It looks like a dog bite on her back leg. She's still pretty much unfurred; her fur's just coming through," she said.
Bobbie the orphan
But mum was nowhere to be seen.
"I'd suggest she'd been savaged by a dog - a feral dog or a dingo, one of the two," she said.
Bobbie was taken to a vet at Wentworth Falls Animal Hospital and her wound was already healing. She otherwise appears in good health.
She will be raised by hand by another WIRES volunteer until she is is old enough to be released - hopefully with a buddy - into bushland south west of Sydney.
Ms Burgess said it was rare for wildlife rescue volunteers around greater Sydney to pick up wombat joeys, but adults hit by cars or with mange, the skin disease, were more common.
If you see an injured native animal contact WIRES on 1300 094 737.
