Sly Cooper and the Gang In: A Long Lost Love

CHAPTER 4

Sly left the announcement ceremony in a daze. He'd seen that insignia before, lifetimes ago. So long ago, in fact, he sometimes woke up in the middle of the night wondering if it had all been a dream. That damn owl had haunted his family for generations, stalking the Cooper name since the Stone Age only to meet his end beneath Carmelita's boot. Or at least, Sly had thought he'd met his end.

Had Clockwerk somehow managed to reassemble himself? Did he have loyalists Sly hadn't known about that gathered his destroyed steel carcass and rebuilt the lunatic bird? Clockwerk had once said he'd survived on hate alone, maybe he'd crawled back from the grave to seek out more of it. Nausea bubbled in Sly's gut.

And if that was his insignia on the sketch for the machine hidden away at the top of FarFlight Tower, Clockwerk was undoubtedly involved in Carmelita's disappearance. The thought made his blood boil. It was all he could do to smile his way out of the building. All he could do to tip the doorman, slide into the back of the limo, and let Murray drive him away. His burly friend glanced in the rear-view mirror, took one look at Sly's face, and let conversation wait until they'd returned to the Safe House, taking every back way imaginable to avoid being tailed.

Bentley met him at the door. "Tell me everything you know," he said, wheeling ahead of Sly to the planning table. "We're gonna need it if we stand any chance at facing that thing."

Sly recounted what he could of the announcement event, the bystanders, and the names and faces of every investor and sponsor LaTour had spoken with. When he got to the owl insignia, Bentley and Murray went quiet. Sly sank down onto the dingy black couch and put his head in his hands. He missed his ears. These cybernetic ones might work better, but they weren't his. He missed his knees, his home, and his life before time took it from him. More than all of it, he missed his wife.

The scientist was the first one to speak. "Sly," Bentley said quietly. "If Clockwerk is behind this, there's something sinister afoot."

"What gave it away, pal?" Sly sighed, leaning back into the sunken cushions and trying to remember to breathe.

His friend ignored his sarcasm, opting instead for a more logical approach. "However he survived losing the hate chip, losing his body, he's undoubtedly planning something bigger than we had expected. If Carmelita got tangled up in this–"

"She did," Sly bit before he could stop himself. He launched to his feet, all the stress from the years of searching surging to the top like a boiling wave. "She did get involved in this. And she didn't tell me this was who she was going after." Why? Did she not trust me to pick our family, our life–to pick her, over my past? His head felt like it was burning, like oil ran through his veins instead of blood. "If he . . . if he . . . " Sly couldn't so much as think about it.

"If he had killed her," Bentley finished for him. "He'd have made sure you knew about it."

Murray nodded solemnly at his side. A small, unthinkable comfort.

"But LaTour and Clockwerk working together is a time bomb," Bentley continued gravely. "That machine is dangerous enough if it can open interdimensional portals and connect us with life on other planets. If Clockwerk is involved and is still trying to exact his obsessive vengeance over you, he could make it so much worse."

"Worse?" Murray snorted, choking on his soda.

"He could gather an army, could find cybernetic life somewhere that we couldn't beat, could change the machine to travel time instead of space and erase all of Sly's ancestors down to the very first, he could . . ." Bentley pressed his elbows into the arms of his chair and put two fingers to his temples. "He could do anything." After a long, steadying breath, he steepled his hands and fixed Sly with a look he knew all too well. "Sly, we have to stop him."

Sly wasn't sure he wanted to tangle with this genocidal bird again. He wanted to find Carmelita, and if this was somehow a distraction–if it was some side route leading him away from finding her–he wanted absolutely nothing to do with it. "All of my energy, all of whatever time I have left needs to go to finding my wife," he growled. "I gave up everything for you guys, for her. I won't lose it all again."

"But Sly." Murray held out his palms.

"No. He can't strong-arm me into this. We find Carmelita and let the rest sort itself out."

"But she always did everything to protect Paris." Her city, was what Murray didn't say. "She'd want us to save it."

That much was true. Carmelita had seen Sly's faked amnesia and took the first chance she got to get him on the right side of the law. She'd want him on the right side of this, too. Sly wasn't sure he could give up searching for her–if all his attention was on protecting her city for her, none of it would be on finding her–but if he found her, and she had no city, no world, to come home to . . .

Sly paced behind the couch and braced his hands on the back of it. "Fine. I'm in."