The battle raged on the long forsaken fields of Warren Forest. Defenses had been build, and a couple destroyed, either form sheer neglect or carelessness. The battle was rough but the source well had survived intact.
Lock now looked out on the landscape. The battle had gone on for some time, and soon all the clockworks that were left would crumble, as the always did, into piles of gear and scrap. Lock thought it a bit funny that after an hour or so of walking the earth and ripping down helpless wall with their bare hands, that the clockworks all just seemed to 'pop' in mass and disintegrate into piles. Of course it saved him the trouble of going and hunting each one down, which Lock knew could be a pain, as the clockwork had tendencies to trap themselves in awkward places. Hmm... perhaps Lock should look anyway...
Lock hopped down off the wall he was so 'gracefully' perched upon, landing a bit heavily on the ground. He checked his immediate area, looking for anything out of the ordinary. Nothing was amiss so he continued out beyond his artfully crafted metal walls, collecting source and anything else that appeared useful as he went. Lock had to commit multiple trips to carry source back to the source well, as the mass clockwork death left so much of it upon the ground. He finished with that relatively quickly and ventured out further into the woods.
Lock hadn't placed any defenses out this far (mostly because they would be hard to maintain) so there was a small chance that a clockwork had gotten lost on its way to the 'wall of death' surrounding the niche of trees the source well was in. Lock referred to it as such because any enemy who approached such wall quickly blasted to pieces by turrets. The only problem with the wall was that by the end of the day it left huge mountains of gears and parts in front of it. For its trouble though, the wall sure did work effectively.
Lock quickly stopped his walking and froze, as he heard the subtle turning of gears that signaled a clockwork. He looked around and saw nothing, but did not move as not seeing a clockwork did not necessarily mean one was not around. Some of them were crafted with deceptive mechanisms, such as invisibility or magical ranged attack. Lock stood still, if there was a clockwork around, it would eventually reveal itself. Sure enough as metal walls rust, a clockwork stumbled out of the trees. Lock immediately got into his battle position, but the clockwork did not attack as it was too preoccupied with swinging wildly at the leaves it had dislodged when it came crashing through the trees. It did not stop until the leaves had settled on the ground. It let out what seemed to be a sigh of relief, and then its eyes settled on Lock and it flinched and jumped back, cowering.
Lock glowered at it. This could be one of its tricks to get him to lower his guard, so he could get a free attack. After several minutes of the clockwork cowering, it made a feeble attempt to crawl away. This caught Lock off guard, but he quickly moved to block it.
"Where do you think you're going?" Lock asked, almost growling.
The clockwork resorted to cowering. Lock dropped his offensive pose, and settled for crossing his arms and frowning at the clockwork. Lock did not move and the clockwork made no further attempts to escape. Lock shook his head and began to walk away.
"... Y-your not going to hurt me?"
Lock quickly turned around. The voice had sounded like it came from the clockwork, but Lock had never heard one speak, or with words at least. Lock walked back over and the clockwork cowered again. Lock stopped walking.
This was an interesting position Lock had found himself in. Here he had a clockwork that did not attack him and not only that, but seemed to be scared of him. Lock could simply kill him, as he was accustomed to doing, or he could... Lock had never though of any other options. Clockworks were just bad, and had to be stopped, to leave one alive was just... Lock sighed, he was probably going to regret this. "C'mon, get up."
The clockwork did not immediately get up. Instead it let out a 'huh'.
"Get up. You're coming with me." The clockwork simply stared at Lock, perhaps wondering what brought this on.
"Why?" It asked, somewhat defiantly.
"Because I'm taking you captive." Lock thought about this, he had never heard of Kingdom Force taking prisoners, but then again, the clockworks did kind of die after a couple hours. Regardless, Lock had decided this was the best course of action.
The clockwork continue to sit, and look at Lock as if it was thinking of something. "Ok." It let out simply, standing up. Lock was surprised, it was easier taking prisoners than he had thought.
"Ok, well um..." Lock scratched his head; he had never really done this before. "Follow me, I guess."
The clockwork began walking towards Lock, and Lock suddenly became concerned for his life, but then he remembered that he had told him to follow him. "what?" The clockwork asked, slightly confused.
Lock shook his head. "Nothing."
Lock led the clockwork back towards his base. Stopping a short distance away from the 'wall of death'. The clockwork was a distance away trailing Lock. Lock wondered where he would put it, he could build walls after all, so Lock could make him a little prison. As the clockwork approached, Lock noticed his turrets move a bit, but he shrugged it off as they did that pretty commonly. He started planning the layout for the wall and heard the clockwork talking to itself. Suddenly he heard what sounded like a gunshot followed by a scream. Lock turned to see the clockwork who was on the ground now, and a cannonball lodged into the ground inches away from it. It did not take long to figure out what happened. Lock sighed, as this meant he had to dismantle his turrets for the time being.
"Go stand over there!" He yelled to the clockwork, who quickly followed his orders. "And don't touch anything!"
Lock sighed again, and painstakingly dismantled the turrets. Lock looked up at the sky and noticed how dark it was getting; he wouldn't have time to build the prison for the clockwork. He looked over at it. It was sitting in the grass, drawing circles in the dirt with a stick. Lock decided to not worry about it and just to prepare for the night.
Lock was starting a fire when the clockwork walked over and sat down. It had its stick, and began drawing circles in the dirt as it was earlier. Lock just started the fire, and sat down on conveniently placed log. Lock glanced over at the source well and the light from the fire bounced off it in an odd manner.
Lock looked at the clockwork, who was silently staring at the fire. Lock began to wonder if this was the best idea. He would have to go to sleep eventually, and the clockwork would be awake, ready to attack him. Lock decided, as a precaution, to fashion some cuffs out of source and tie the clockworks hands together.
The clockwork stared at him for a bit, before going back to staring at the fire. Lock was satisfied in this, and settled down to sleep.
So to be 100% frank, I haven't played Lock's Quest in ages, so I'm not sure of the accuracy of everything. Though I do remember the clockwork that attempted to 'join' you. I was pretty sad when Isiah (or whatever his name was) killed it. So, now I'm writing a story about it, hooray. Also I started writing this because the sure deficit of stories about Lock's Quest. So, if you enjoyed, please review and hopefully I will be able to update this soon.