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(M tf Clockwork Owl)

Johan was a good man, and a hard working one at that. Appointed captain of the city guard only three years after joining, the city was enjoying a plummeting crime rate thanks to his tireless efforts. Johan managed the guards the same way he managed his life- glancing up at the huge clock tower in the middle of town often. He scheduled his life carefully, making sure everything he needed to do was allocated a bit of time, so that everything progressed forward a bit each day. The guards shuffled their shifts around, positioning themselves in a way where they did not need to watch everything all the time to prevent crimes. The crimes required a certain amount of time to preform- the guards only needed to be there long enough that there would never be enough of a window to properly pull anything off. When someone did still pull a heist they were caught soon after, because there still was not enough time to get away between the regular guard shift windows. Almost everyone loved Johan for his work- but not quite everyone.

Johan never seen the man who attacked him- he briefly seen a figure in the shadow and the shape of a bow before the arrow tipped with a vial of acid struck him in the face and robbed him of his sight. Whoever it was is skilled in many arts- because Johan's cry for help was completely muted by a silence spell, and then he was caught in a large and sudden explosion. They knew not to take risks with him- kill him as quickly as possible to rob Johan of his greatest weapon- time. After that, Johan only remembers a few muffled and distorted voices- his ears too badly maimed to hear properly. Pain was the only thing he was able to feel, and he started to feel it in less frequent glimpses as it drained the life from him. No good deed goes unpunished.

Johan woke suddenly in a place that smelled of dust and faintly of metal and wood as well. He was not awake long enough to understand what was going on, but seen a figure standing over him swathed in a huge ornate robe. The man shushed Johan in a calming voice, trying to comfort him, and Johan seen the glint of gold from a large Sorq hanging from around his neck- the emblem of the God of Life and Death. Knowing the one watching him was a religious man was enough to put Johan at a bit of an ease as he slipped from consciousness again.

Johan woke again some time later, looking up at a huge wooden roof far above. The constant sound of churning metal immediately told Johan where he was- he was inside the clocktower. The huge chamber was lined with gigantic turning gears and illuminated by the reverse side of the giant clock faces- which were made of moonstone. Moonstone lit up under the cover of night, so it made the clock face clearly visible even in the dark. Johan tried to get up but could not, his body did not respond. Seeing he was awake again though, the figure walked into his line of sight. It was a man who looked to be in his forties- his short bristly beard peppered with grey hairs. His robe was giant on him and a pleasing base green color, embroidered ornately with golden thread, making it extremely heavy. He had a hood on that was held in place by an amethyst pendulum at the front top- to prevent strong winds from yanking it off. His sight was comforting- but Johan was a bit cautious when the man reached down to pat him on the chest and Johan seen his arm was not his own. Under the large sleeves, the man's arm was pale grey in flesh, and his pinky finger was twice as long as any other digit and ended in a talon like claw! The man must be a Necromancer! They gain power through sacrifice, and since they can easily reanimate bodies, they will often sacrifice the body they were given at birth to the souls of necromancers past to gain power, and then just steal new body parts from other creatures.

"You are awake again too soon, my friend."

"What happened to me? Why can I not move? I suppose I owe my life to you, then?"

He smiled warmly. "You owe your life to Theo, God of life. Surely it was only divine intervention that a Necromancer such as myself just happened on you before you died. I found you in a grim state indeed. They left you as little more than a vaguely human shaped pile of charred meat. Necromancers can cheat death as many times as they want- but only if it is recent. Without a physical host, the soul disperses into the air and becomes intangible. Once the soul has lost its shape we cannot restore it. We can manipulate it, and reanimate the body still, but not give the soul its shape back. The body would be little more than an empty puppet at that point." There was a loud clack as the hour hand on the giant clock moved. "Time is on your side it wound seem."

"So I rightly died then?"

The man placed a hand behind Johan's head, propping his torso up enough that he could look down at himself, and see there was not much there- and nothing he recognised. He only had the upper portion of his arms, and his torso ended at the hips! Even beyond that, what he seen looked like a life sized doll! He moved the stump of his left arm and could see at the very end some gears inside turning- they moved when he flexed his 'muscles'. The Necromancer properly introduced himself as Greth. He explained that Johan's old body was completly unrecoverable, the criminal left nothing to chance. Greth however found him before he fully died, and ripped the soul out of his body. He then took Johan to a local Automancer, who specialised in prosthetic limbs and the two of them got to work building a new body. A life-like clockwork doll that would act as a new body, animated like an Automancer's golem, but using Johan's still-whole soul allowing it to have a will of its own, unlike golem. Greth explained that he needed to place Johan's soul in the new vessel as soon as possible or his soul would become 'darkened' and be more aligned with Eoh the God of Death. Eoh and Theo were considered the same God- her identity and power shifts with her mood, dealing life or death accordingly. Johan was not one to believe in their God but he was greatful to Greth no less for it.

The experience was frightening and unusual for poor Johan. According to his mind, his limbs were still there- even though his eyes could plainly see they were not. Obviously since they were not actually there, trying to move them did nothing and there was no feeling in them at all. Greth told him he should not be awake yet, but putting him under too powerful of a hypno spell risked the sleep becoming too deep for him to return. Greth cast another hypno spell and put Johan back to sleep, with the promise his body would be completed when he woke again.

True to his word, the next time Johan woke up, it was because Greth woke him to see the complete body! Now Johan was able to sit himself upright. He looked down at himself, turning his hand arm and flexing his fingers. It was strange- it still felt like his old body would have, but full of minor discrepancies. Touching his arm with his other hand, he could still feel his 'skin' normally even though it was a type of stiff, break-proof plastic the alchemist guild had created from the blood of a specific tree. It felt just like his skin did, but was not harmed so easily. It did not bend like skin, so thinks that would normally hurt had a harder time doing so. If he were to run a blade across its surface his brain sound tense himself up, because it would feel like it should hurt, but will not be able to cut easily so the pain won't actually come. No more paper cuts either. Because it did not bend like skin though- his joints were all ball-joints like an expensive doll. He could also feel movement under the surface though which was odd for standard Automancy. An Automancer can put together a working human figure from nothing but rocks- so generally prosthetic limbs are nothing more than animated doll parts; there is no reason for there to be any inner workings. He could feel extremely small movements in his arm when he flexed- and usually only when he made a sudden movement. The feeling of tiny gears locking into place- the teeth of the gears interlocking inside. Johan stood up slowly, looking his entire body over the best he could. Seeing he had no clothing he almost cupped a hand onto his crotch, realizing how silly that was at this point. Not only had this entire body been built by Greth and his friend- he also definitely did not have genitals. Like a doll, his crotch was completely smooth. Touching the area still felt mildly pleasurable though- a ghost sensation for the part his brain was not yet ready to admit was not there. His overall form looked like a statue- a well sculpted and pretty well detailed human figure, with ball joints to move about. Like a doll- he had a head of hair to about his shoulders but it would not grow at all. If he cut it but wanted it to be longer again, he would need to see an Automancer to place new hair in.

Johan walked around in a circle for a bit- listening to the weight of his steps on the floor. "My body sounds like it is about the same weight. Why does the insides feel more complicated than a mere doll? What am I on the inside? Is there anything organic in this body?"

Greth shook his head. "You are actually a bit lighter than you were as a proper human- liquid is hefty and you no longer have any liquid mass. You are filled with extremely complex clockwork gears and such- this very clocktower is a child's toy compared to the complexity of your body. It was Theo's blessing that my friend's fervent efforts were completed in such haste. Inside of your mouth, just behind your top row of teeth you will feel a button- press that and you will see just why your body took such effort to create."

Johan pressed his soft rubber tongue to the button in his mouth and felt an odd feeling through his entire body! All of the gears started to turn on their own, guiding his movements on their own. Though it was hard metal gears turning and shifting, to him it felt like muscle strands twisting and shifting placement. Unlike his hands, his toes were not able to move individually- they could bend but they all moved together, since more dexterity than that in his feet was unnecessary. Now though his foot seemed to open up, releasing huge clawed toes from it! The outer panels that made the human foot structure stretched and then re-set over the much larger digits as the 'bone' structure within literally telescoped outward, stretching the length of the foot tremendously, but also causing it to become much, much more narrow. What had been the bottom of his foot flipped out and became a fourth digit off the back of the foot. Johan would have fallen onto his face had he been left on his own- but the gears locked in place to prevent that from happening for him. His upper legs relaxed and bent more, since his legs themselves were now very long. He still retained full feeling of everything- even in his new shape all his human sensations translated to something. The talons felt just like his toenails would- even though they were a LOT bigger.

His entire torso felt like there was a gentle pressure within- slowly inflating him like a balloon. It expanded, putting greater space between all the inner-workings as the plastic that made up the skin divided and relaxed as well- sliding out to overlap each plate slightly- and flipping to reveal a gunmetal grey finish on the inner side; now made the outer side. The panels covering his entire torso now looked like dark metal feathers! Long plates that were in his lower back completely hidden under the surface slid out and locked in place behind him- forming a fan off of his tail bone- a short bird tail! As each change finished he regained control of the body part. He shifted back and forth on his new legs, listening to the talons click against the floor. Dragging them at all immediately made a grinding sound that told him their tips were extremely sharp.

Johan raised his hands in front of himself as he felt his arms shifting. His fingers looked like they had fallen apart for a moment, the cogs and gears that controlled their movement however locked together more tightly. Panels from his torso shifted onto his arms a bit as his arms broke into more and shifted down. His hands grew into a sort of third segment to his arms and all the outer pannels formed into narrow sheets off his entire arm, forming into metal bird wings! All of the metallic feathers were still individual pieces so the wings could be ruffled or tensed just like a real one. The feeling that was his fingers and their movement controlled the final segment of the wing.

His teeth slid out much longer and pressed tightly together now- locking together to help the seam between each one vanish as they pressed out from his lips and formed into a small beak with a steep downward hook. This also pushed his nose up and back, regressing into nothing more than nostrils at the base. His entire face seemed to break up and push back, completely losing its shape for a moment as his head and neck expanded like his torso had. It expanded so wide that it almost just looked like a continuation of his torso! His ears became large and pointed but took the appearance of feathers like the rest of him. His hair was collected and formed into two tight streams that now shifted to just over his eyes- looking like two extremely long eyebrows. With the human eye sockets and eyelids pulled back and away, it revealed his eyes were actually huge inside there. Since they are made of glass, he no longer has to worry about straining them. The front of his head became rather flat even though the rest was large and round.

Johan flapped his new wings a bit- feeling the air catch under them and his body to get lighter with each beat, telling him that he could in fact fly. "W-what is this? What have I become now?!"

Greth smiled and pat him on the shoulder. "The button allows you to transform between two forms, my friend. A human man, or a Clockwork Owl!"

Greth made a fist and gave a half-hearted punch on Johan's chest, his body absorbed the impact entirely. The feathers and expanded, round torso put each part a good distance from one another, which actually created a good bit of empty space in the middle. When hit with something in this form, his body had the ability to bend and flex around the impact. The impact pressed the feathers and gears further in which locked them together more tightly. In this sense, this made his body somewhat like a very fast racecar in your world may work. They actually seem very poorly made, and even rattle a bit like they will fall apart- but that is because if it was made rigid, it would tear apart when it hit high speeds. The faster it goes- the force pulls the parts together more tightly and allows it to continue on where a car that was seemingly more sturdy would actually just explode apart. Outwardly the mechanical owl looked like it would be extremely heavy and unable to fly, but it weighed less than Johan did as a normal human, so it was not too heavy at all. Johan no longer had muscles to tire out, so his actual energy level was the only thing that dictated how long he could stay in flight. This immediately brought Johan to his next question to Greth- what does he eat? If his body is a clockwork doll or owl now, does he no longer sleep, or eat? What does his body actually get powered by? Greth explained he would need to sleep just like before, because his mind still needs to enter a REM cycle to sort his thoughts would, even if his brain is no longer organic. Eating was no longer possible- he had no stomach. He did not even have vocal chords- his voice was a projection from his thoughts; he could talk without moving his mouth, his brain just moved the mouth anyway instinctually. He was powered like any of the golem were powered- the spell is perpetuated by will power, except rather than imprinting the will of someone else onto him, its his own.

Greth and Johan walked out onto a narrow balcony that ran around the outside of the tower, used by people to clean the outside of the giant clocks. Johan did not even know how long he had been dead for, but he was back now. Thanks to the fact moonstone glows in the dark, the inside of the tower was lit the same regardless of whether it was night or day, so Johan was a bit surprised to see it was the dark of night outside. He had just woken up so it felt like the day to him. But they both supposed that was appropriate given his form- owls are nocturnal.

Greth smiled at him, motioning over the city below. "Theo willing- this is a new chance for you, my good friend. Your good deeds for the people here have been rewarded; your killers work undone. Things have been chaotic since you perished. The citizens in a bit of a panic and the other guards in a confused state. Some brave and talented fool even broke into the royal Arcaenum in the heist of the century while you were out of the picture. A testament to how vital your role had been in keeping everyone safe."

"Someone broke into and robbed the CASTLE?!"

Greth chuckled. "Yes, imagine that, eh? That took some balls, even with you gone. But.... this is a good opportunity for you now, and for the city."

"Oh?"

"Everyone thinks you are dead. Even in your human form, you do not look like your old self- no one will know that is you unless you tell them. With your second form you can fly and observe people in the dead of night from high above. The criminals are emboldened now by your death and thirsty for profit thanks to your efforts in life. The rats have crawled out from the woodwork- it's time for the owl to feed. In this new form you are more a threat than ever to them, and now they no longer have an identity or role to pin you with to try and predict your actions."

And so Greth seen Johan off as he flew into the night air to enjoy his new body and plan his next actions. The city may not yet know it, but it got its hero back. Crime would once again dwindle in these streets now prey to the watchful owl.