A/N: Before I start with this chapter, I would like to take a moment to explain how my human OC character Harley Keener is going to transform physically and mentally into Clockwerk. If you've read my previous chapter, then you'd know that I had Harley Keener discover the last surviving Clockwerk part, which was one of his eyes, and had the Clockwerk eye attach itself to Harley's right eye and take it over. That in part was based on a story element from one of the Sly Cooper stories on here written by jumbochamploonrules named Sylvia meets Sly, specifically the twenty seventh chapter of it. Here's a brief summary of the events of that chapter in the story: The main character of the story, a human girl OC named Sylvia Martin gets into Arpeggio's blimp and helps take down Clockwerk a.k.a. Clock-La with Sly Cooper and Inspector Carmelita Fox.
The way that Sylvia Martin takes down Clock-La in the chapter of Jumbochamploonrules's story is weird, to say the least. The first thing she does is swap out Clockwerk's eyes for fake versions of them, which backfires. Then she destroys Clockwerk's face using the Cooper Cane. After Clockwerk's hate chip gets destroyed, Sylvia notices that one of the Clockwerk parts survived being destroyed, that being the Clockwerk Eye, which attaches itself to Sylvia's face and replaces her eye with the Clockwerk. I used that part of Jumbochamploonrules's story and I implemented it into this story. The way the Clockwerk Eye functions in this story will be different to how the Clockwerk Eye is used in Sylvia meets Sly.
In Sylvia meets Sly, the surviving Clockwerk Eye doesn't turn Sylvia evil like it should have. Instead, Jumbochamploonrules had the "brilliant" idea to have Sylvia wear an eyepatch to cover up the Clockwerk Eye. I can't even begin to tell you how stupid it is for Jumbochamploonrules to have his character cover up and downplay an evil object like Clockwerk's Eye by putting an eyepatch over it. Are you kidding me? That's nonsensical. Sylvia should've removed the Clockwerk Eye from her immediately rather than just have her allow herself to have the Clockwerk Eye on her face like that. And Sylvia doesn't turn evil because of it. My version of the Clockwerk Eye will have none of that nonsensical bullshit that happened to Sylvia with the Clockwerk Eye in Jumbochamploonrules's story.
My version of the Clockwerk Eye will make it as part of Harley's slow transformation into Clockwerk. It won't be some comedic Odd Couple bickering bullshit like in Jumbochamploonrules's story when he had Neyla talk to Sylvia through the Clockwerk Eye. Hell no. It's already bad enough Jumbochamploonrules had royally screwed up the canon storyline of the Sly Cooper games in his story. The Clockwerk Eye will appear on Harley's face only when he starts acting like Clockwerk, not when he is his usual self. This story will also take inspiration from the Japanese body horror movie: Tetsuo: The Iron Man as the basis of Harley Keener's physical transformation into Clockwerk. Tetsuo: The Iron Man is a Japanese body horror movie that involves a man literally turning and transforming into a human/metal hybrid being. It will be like that for Harley's physical transformation into Clockwerk in this story. Luckily, Jumbochamploonrules hasn't yet found out about me stealing a part of his story to use in my story. I hope that he never finds out about what I did.
"Are you sure the map is here?" Harley asked Sly and Murray. They were at a museum located off the Lingurian coast of Italy to retrieve the map of the location of the Cooper Vault in Kaine Island. Sly Cooper's father had hidden the map of the location of the Cooper Vault in a museum in Italy when he was three years old. A walrus named Jim McSweeny had told Sly all about the Cooper Vault and where it was located, which led him, Murray, Harley and his sister Emily to this museum in Italy. Sly hoped that the map to the location of the Cooper Vault was in the museum.
"The map has to be in this museum." Sly said to Harley. "McSweeny specifically told me that the map would be in this museum!"
"Well, it's just that, given the long passage of time between the time your father put the map of the Cooper Vault in the museum when you were a kid and now, could have it been possible that maybe the map might've been relocated somewhere else?" Harley wondered to Sly.
"That might be a possibility." Murray said.
"Let's just hope it's not the case." said Sly. "I'd hate to go all this way for nothing." Harley had brought his younger sister Emily along with Murray and Sly to the museum with him. He hadn't turned into Clockwerk yet. He didn't yet know it, but soon his internal organs will start to fail only to be replaced by machinery. The Cooper gang entered the museum. They treaded carefully, as to avoid possible detection from the guards. This was the very first time that Sly and Murray were on the field without Bentley. They had to make this heist work. There'd be no room for error. Sly and Murray walked down one corridor while Harley and Emily walked down an adjacent corridor.
Murray suddenly bumped into a pedestal that contained a vase. The raccoon noticed that and thankfully caught the vase just before it shattered to pieces on the ground. Harley was surprised and apalled by how clumsy the hippo was on this heist.
"Are you freaking kidding me?" Harley scolded Murray.
"I'm sorry." Murray said apologetically.
"Sorry? You want us to get caught by the guards?" Harley exclaimed.
"I'm sure Murray didn't mean to do it on purpose." said Sly. "This is our first time in the field without Bentley. I don't blame Murray for being a little on edge."
"Being nervous doesn't give him a free pass to be a klutz. He needs to be more freaking careful and not be so god damn clumsy next time!" Harley exclaimed. Sly, Murray, Harley and Emily continued their heist to steal the map to the Cooper Vault. They were lucky that none of the security alarms had been activated yet.
They soon entered a room that had a statue of a walrus in it. Murray used his immense strength to lift up the walrus statue. The walrus statue was heavier than the hippo had anticipated. Murray accidentally hit Sly on the head with the arm of the statue. Sly cried out in pain for his head being hurt. Harley ran to his aid. Murray couldn't lift the statue anymore. The statue shattered to the ground with Murray on top of it. Suddenly, the alarms started blaring.
"You got to be freaking kidding me?!" Harley said. They were forced to get out of the museum. Sly had found a picture frame and a canvas. He was forced to leave the canvas behind. Harley started sprinting after Murray and Sly His heart was beating so fast it was a wonder how he didn't have a heart attack right then and there. His breathing was shallow. Harley suddenly stopped running. He could feel a surge of energy emenating from within his body That meant that his mind was suddenly taken over by Clockwerk's spirit. Harley's left eye suddenly disappeared to be replaced by Clockwerk's eye in it's place. His other eye turned yellow. He was transforming into Clockwerk.
He didn't expect his sudden transformation into Clockwerk to happen in a museum of all places. His body suddenly started to floating in mid air. He noticed a security camera. Harley/Clockwerk stared at the camera. Harley/Clockwerk zapped at the camera using his eyes. He hated being recorded. He then began to fly through the air really fast through the air. Harley/Clockwerk's eyes could see everything clearly, albiet in a yelllow tint. He noticed Sly, Murray and Emily heading toward the exit. Harley/Clockwerk suddenly felt compelled to viciously attack the raccoon thief for seemingly no real reason at all. Harley didn't want to attack his raccoon friend. The Clockwerk side of him however, begged to differ.
Sly, Murray and Emily were wondering where Harley went. They had noticed he was gone when Sly realized that Harley was no longer following them out of the museum.
"Where the hell is Harley?" Sly asked Murray and Emily.
"I don't know. Last him I saw him, he was running with you guys. Then, he just stopped running." Emily said. "I have no idea where he went."
Before Sly or Murray could respond back, Sly suddenly felt something hit him in the back. He suddenly started to feel like he was flying through the air. Someone had intercepted him from behind. He began to be lifted into the night sky. He looked up to see a familiar human boy flying through the air. The boy had wavy brown hair and was Caucasian. Both of his eyes were bright yellow. They were glowing. One of his eyes seemed to be larger than the other one, which was normal sized. Sly gazed into the yellow eyes of the flying boy. The raccoon suddenly started to feel light -headed. Sly began to feel like he was experiencing deja vu again, but he didn't know why. Sly had no idea that he was staring into the eyes of Clockwerk once again, who was possessing the body of Harley Keener.
Clockwerk felt invigilated to see Sly Cooper once again. He hated the fact that Sly Cooper and Carmelita Fox had managed to defeat him back at the volcano in Russia a few years ago. He didn't think he was going to be defeated by one of the descendants of the Cooper family. If he'd known that he'd be defeated by Sly Cooper in the future, he would've killed him back when the Fiendish Five first broke into the Cooper household when Sly Cooper was eight years old along with his father and mother. Harley/Clockwerk grabbed Sly by the collar of his shirt and threw him onto the ground while he was flying.
The raccoon landed on the ground. He hit the ground hard. Harley/Clockwerk slowly flew into the ground beside him. Both Sly and Clockwerk had landed in an empty field in the Italian countryside. Unbeknownst to them, they had landed right at the location where the iconic 1971 Coca-Cola ad was filmed at. The 1971 Coca-Cola ad was one of Harley's favorite commercials of all time. He knew the melody of the song that was featured in the commercial by heart.
"Surprised to see me?" Harley/Clockwerk said to Sly in a deep, metallic sounding voice. Sly had a look of terror upon his face. He had no idea that he was looking at his best human friend Harley Keener who was currently being possessed by Clockwerk's soul.
"Who are you?" Sly asked the human boy. Harley/Clockwerk chuckled at Sly's question. He couldn't believe the raccoon wasn't able to recognize that his worst enemy had been brought back to life inside of Harley Keener's human body.
"Harley? What are you doing? Why are your eyes yellow?" Sly asked the boy.
"The person you call Harley Keener isn't here right now." Harley/Clockwerk said to the raccoon, who managed to get back up to his feet.
"Harley, stop playing around. You're starting to scare me!" said Sly.
"You think I'm scaring you? You want to know something that's real scary?" Clockwerk said before pouncing his body onto the raccoon's body. Sly fell to the ground on top of Harley. "This is really scary!"
Suddenly, Clockwerk's soul left Harley's body, returning him to normal. Harley was confused as to how he and Sly had ended up on a hill in the Italian countryside. The last thing he remembered was him running out of the museum with Sly, Murray and his sister before blacking out suddenly. He didn't remember what happened to him afterward. Harley's eyes were no longer yellow or glowing. His eyes were normal now.
"Where am I?" Harley asked. It was then that he realized he was on a hillside at the dead of night. He had no idea how he ended up ontop of a hill with Sly. He got up off of Sly's body and went back upon the ground. Sly didn't know what to think. One minute, Harley's eyes were yellow and glowing, the next minute, Harley's eyes were no longer yellow and glowing. Sly Cooper had no idea that Harley had been suddenly possessed by the spirit of Clockwerk a few moments ago.
"Harley?" a voice called out. Harley turned around to see his sister Emily with Murray standing behind him. They were happy to see Harley again.
"Harley. Where'd you go?" asked Emily. "One minute, you were with us at the museum, the next minute you and Sly suddenly wound up here on this hillside. We followed you here from the museum. We didn't know where you were." Emily told her brother.
"I don't know how I ended up here with Sly." Harley said.
"Are you okay?" Emily asked Harley.
"Yeah. I'm okay." Harley said. He then looked around at his surroundings. He was in the middle of a lushious green hillside with flowers. Harley had a feeling that he'd seen the hillside before somewhere. He couldn't quite put his finger on where he'd seen this hillside before.
"You know, I had the strangest feeling that I've seen this hillside before somewhere." Harley said.
"You have?" Sly asked.
"Yeah. Almost as if I've seen it before on TV." Harley said. He then tried to remember where he'd seen this particular hill before. He was sure he'd seen this hillside before. Then, he remembered where'd seen the hillside. He suddenly knew where he was.
"I know where we are. A very famous commercial was filmed right here on this hilltop." Harley said. "It was for Coca-Cola. I know because I've seen it many times before on TV."
"A Coca-Cola commercial was filmed here on this hill?" Sly questioned. Harley was a bit shocked by what Sly said. He figured that Sly would've known that the hillside they were on was part of a very famous Coca-Cola commercial.
"You've never the Coca-Cola commercial?" said Harley in astonishment. He then began singing the melody of the song featured in the 1971 Coca-Cola hillside commercial. He'd seen the commercial so many times as a kid that he was able to memorize the song: "I'd Like to Buy a World a Coke" by heart. Emily soon joined in the song with Harley. Harley could imagine himself being on the hilltop with the other people holding Coca-Cola bottles like in the commercial. Soon, Harley and Emily finished singing.
"Did you get the map?" Harley asked Sly.
"No, unfortunately." Sly explained. "I had to leave it behind. I didn't want to, but it was rather me leaving it behind or risk getting caught by the police."
"Ok. We'll get it some other time." Harley said. "Let's get something to eat. I'm freaking starving!" Harley and the Cooper Gang walked down the hill in order to get something to eat. Little did any of them realize that a darkness was growing inside of Harley's body. A darkness that would soon overtake him and Sly Cooper, along with Carmelita Fox of Interpol. Harley's brief transformation into Clockwerk at the Lingurian museum was only the beginning of something bad and sinister.
