Sly Cooper 5: Promises Made By Thieves

Chapter 83: Branwell

The only ones who I can tell are being completely clear about that dream journey are Bentley and Penelope. They've both been cheerful and up for adventure, but the others are quite down in the dumps. We all insisted to hear what happened, especially Murray. 

McSweeney, Sly and Carmelita recounted stories about having to reunite with some personal demons after they got sucked away. When Bentley and Penelope explained their story, even the depressed others cracked a few smiles. The Guru now being awake, we heard from him about how the power that was deliberately keeping him trapped in the state was being strengthened by what the others were going through, but the love Bentley and Penelope showed one another, their promise to forgive and forge ahead, was enough soul magic to not just defeat whatever demon was masked as Tonghia Chitter but whichever ones were...doing what they were doing against the others, and on top of that, enough to set the Guru free. Bentley and Penelope blushed a little hearing that, but I didn't mock them.

I can tell the ones who didn't go into the dream world desperately want to know the full sutories, but I know the right thing now is not to press them too hard. It was a scare when Murray got disconnected from everyone who went into the trance. And now we're all on a plane, the van in storage, on our way to the real big Shadow Order operation Penelope used to live in. Well, not all of us are here. The Panda King and Jing said they would stay at the resort to nurse the Guru completely back to health. We could tell even if he was awake, he was in no shape to do this operation with us. And we have no time to properly heal him.

From how Bentley has drawn out what the place is like, the safe could easily store however much khamium was in the plane. And if we don't hurry, its distribution will commence. Perhaps it already has. That plane definitely had the time to arrive in California before us. We're all playing catch-up by a day. Hopefully if they have had time to sell some of the drug then it won't be sold too far and wide until we wipe out the rest that we can.

We've heard over Bentley's plan, and there's a part of it I especially like, a code for getting the American police involved to catch Silvio in the act. Something I've had to breathe about for a little is I may have to just turn myself in. I'd been online for a fair bit back at Dominican Republic looking myself up, and there are talks about if my arrest and fugitive status are even legitimate. I do realize that my name hasn't been cleared yet, and maybe even after everything, I'll still have to serve some time behind bars for my arson. But if I manage to survive it like McSweeney did, then I'll be able to enter a program and find employment somewhere. Maybe I can start all over, and perhaps help out the Cooper gang from time to time if they need a field researcher. Cause after all this, I feel ready to face something like prison if I must. Am I still scared? Yes, but not as much as I used to be.

Something that worries me still about the plan is how Tonghia's words were described to us. According to Penelope they were in the exact type of wording she knew him for. If it was truly an illusion he was talking to her, then either it was under the guise of someone with significant knowledge of Tonghia and Penelope's relationship, or a part of Tonghia's mind was captured or something. Either way there's a very big chance now that the entire Order knows we're onto them. So we have to do Bentley's plan smart and we have to be ready for a backup plan.

We land at San Jose International Airport, we all get in the van, plug in the address into our GPS, go over the plan one more time with Bentley, and before we know it, we've parked the van and we've all split into our groups. Whether or not we're completely ready, it's time to do this!