Sly Cooper 5: Promises Made By Thieves

Chapter 24: Asenath

I have had a headache that hasn't really gone away for months, and now it's really threatening to burst.

I crawl over and Slytunkhamen holds my hand from the bars.

"Is anyone coming?!" I sob.

"I don't know," says my husband, shaking and crying profusely. "I don't know!"

"Please!" begs Pili. "Someone help her!"

We see the dungeon door creak open, but not quickly. Catra's familiar guards walk in.

"She's about to have the baby!" says Sly. "Help us!"

"Very well," says one of the guards. I don't know or care who. I faintly hear keys clattering under my aching head, pounding heart and blazing womb.

Two guards hoist me up by my arms, and it wouldn't kill them to loosen their grip a little. I try to walk but tumble. They manage to catch me, and I just about throw up. If there was anything in my stomach to get rid of, it would be all over the floor right now. They keep me going, dragging me on my knees.

"Hey!" I faintly hear Slytunkhamen. "What about us?"

"What about you?" I hear the guard on my right. My goodness, his breath nearly knocks me completely out.

"We need to be there for her!" Slytunkhamen's voice begins picking up in alarm. "It's our baby!"

I feel more than hear another guard spit on the floor.

"Wha-You can't do this!" exclaims Pili. And I just now realize what this is implying. I can't do this without them! They deserve to see my baby! And I'm even more nervous now, about being vulnerable with them still locked up.

I attempt a lunge away from the guards but just end up hitting the ground, perhaps injuring the baby. My hands grip the ground as tight as I can but it's no use. I'm guided out, the doors slam shut, the fact I'm outside of the dungeon for the first time in months barely registering. I've never felt more unsafe.

The only solace I can invent for myself, when I'm placed in cuffs on a mattress nearly as hard as the wooden table it's on, is the fact this searing pain will be gone by the time the baby's out. I'm worried about screaming too much for fear of retribution. I'm given some water and a cloth for my head, and I choke out a thank you.

I don't know how long it takes, time blurring like my breaths, but when I hear the baby's innocent crying and the cord is cut, a fear I had in the back of my head ends up nulled, that he would end up dying while in labor from the horrible conditions.

Hearing the baby's crying, I don't even care anymore that I'm locked up, for the first time completely not caring. I all of a sudden know about half a dozen things I can do with him together in lockup. I see the guards toweling and rinsing him off, and I reach out my arms to hold him when he's dry and wrapped. I see the guard holding him noticing my outstretched arms. He smirks and turns to leave.

"Wait. Wh-What are you doing?!" I ask in a panic. I realize I have no idea where they're taking him, and from the looks of the expressions, it could be as bad as selling him to a different family, or chopping his head off. "NO! PLEASE!" I sob. "LET ME BE WITH HIM! DON'T HURT HIM! LEAVE HIM ALONE! LET HIM BE WITH ME!!!"

The guard is ignoring my pleas, walking away to I don't know where, not even looking at the angel in his hands. I can feel my vision whitening through my tears, threatening to make me black out underneath the ache threatening to kill me. My baby is going to grow up never knowing his mother or father. I'm never going to know what he grew up to be because I'm going right back in that-

The guard falls to the ground, out of my sight. My heart skips a beat, and my vision returns. Did my baby fall on the floor? Did my baby do that? I overhear a scream behind me. I weakly turn to see Slytunkhamen knock the guard out with a flowerpot. I blink away my tears and see Sly and Pili are also knocking the guards out, including ones running in, alerted by the noise.

Slytunkhamen has something in his hand which he's picking my cuffs with. And even more attention-grabbing, Sly is holding my baby.