DiScLaImEr: I do not by any was own any of these characters except Monique Devereaux and Jaque Devereaux. The others belong to Suckerpunch Inc.

Chapter Two

Carmelita stirred. Her dreams were good. She met a boy, he was handsome, charming, chivalrous and made her feel like the princesses she grew up learning about. He was a carpenter who worked with a nearby company and he made her feel very comfortable, and he respected her old-fashioned, religious based values. But the weird thing, the really weird thing, was that the boy was Cooper. Sly Cooper, the thief that she had been chasing up and down Paris for years. Maybe, that was who Sly Cooper would've been had he been adopted from Happy Trails Orphanage and gone to school, a nice one, had parents. Parents that would've joined the PTO, carpooled him to basketball games, took him to church, talked him through his teen years, his first love and eventually his first heartbreak. Or maybe her heart was telling her something, 'Look at who this boy could be. Look at what a man he could clean up to become!' Her heart could whisper urgently.

Carmelita finally woke up, disappointed that it was just a dream. 'Too bad,' she thought, 'He'd've probably turned out very well.' How little she knew...

"Hey guys, I'm home!" Sly shouted as he walked into the front door of their temporary home. They were staying at an old gas station, accompanied with housing, that had gone out of business years ago right outside Paris. He took off his hat and jacket and hung it on the coat rack right inside the doorway. He walked down the hall and turned into the second bedroom on his right. He quickly changed into some basketball shorts and an old white t-shirt. He scurried around his room, cleaning. He'd been doing a lot of that lately, it must have been a nervous habit, it stopped him from thinking... too much. Once his floor was vacuumed twice to perfection, he went to the bathroom, pulled out some Windex and began scrubbing at his windows and mirrors. He sprayed, wiped, sprayed and wiped until he could hear them squeak. He then ran his hand along his bookcase, it was already gathering dust, he concluded even though he dusted it that morning. After a quick dusting, he began to straighten his pictures. Sly had an obsession with photography. When he took pictures it was like he was being set free for a moment. It was his own way of putting time in a bottle, one picture could bring him back to the same moment again and again. His pictures were a wide variety of things ranging from his favorite heists, his pals, Bentley and Murray, and last but not least Inspector Carmelita Fox, the woman who'd been on his heels since the day they met at an Opera House. In each picture her expression was irked, irritated or just annoyed. Except one, one he had kept and used as a bookmark. She was smiling, fresh out of police academy, probably 19. She was wearing a baseball cap, backwards and was playing catch with her father, who looked remarkably like her except for his freckles and shorter black hair. He took this picture of her a week after she had first been assigned to him. "Damn, she's... gorgeous." He said, barely audibly. Sly looked in the mirror and stared at himself. 'What do you think your doing?' he asked himself. 'Your working at something that will never happen, something that will never be.' He tore his gaze from the mirror and flopped on his bed. "i know..." he whispered, letting it trail off into the immaculate distance of his room. He lay there for a minute, closing his eyes trying to calm his crazy almost teenage-like emotions.

He opened his eyes and stared at his off-white ceiling then realized he had to do something to get his mind off of things. He sprung off his bed and walked into their living room where Bentley, an extremely intelligent turtle, was tapping away on his laptop, mumbling to himself. Murray, an amazingly strong and large, sensitive hippo was watching a cartoon on TV. Neither noticed Sly walking into the room. Sly watched them and a smile grew. The kind of smile you get from just looking at the people you love, being happy. He stood there a minute, becoming amazingly captivated by their enjoyment. "Um..." He started. Bentley and Murray didn't even jump. They were used to it. "It's almost 6:30, do any of you want to play some basketball?" He asked. He knew what their answers were even before he brought it up. No from Bentley, he was too small and, face it, he can barely even walk without tripping over something. Murray was already absorbed in something that was designed for 11 year olds and he was too tall to play. He would just stand next to the net and drop the ball in, over and over and over again. "its okay, Sly." Bentley mumbled from behind his computer and Murray just shook his head, "Maybe later."

"Okay guys, i'll just shoot some hoops myself." Sly replied. He didn't want them to know how badly he didn't want to be alone. "Wait, Bent." He said, trying to create conversation. "what are you working on? You look pretty determined." He said a silent prayer, hoping he was on to something. "Actually, Sly, I'm analyzing the information you retrieved from Inspector Fox's Gateway computer. It seems this case, ya know, the one involving the illegal transportation of potassium cyanide, is fully operating in Paris. The ring leader seems to be a Monique Devereaux, the only daughter of Jacque Devereaux, the inventor of the Huntnitize. She grew up playing the perfect daughter role, but when she was 17 she started speaking about how people could read her mind and everyone was plotting against her. Now 21, she's been diagnosed with Schizophrenia. Some accredit it to the fact that her dad created a device to hypnotize his prey..." Bentley let the last thought linger in the air obviously going over what he just said. "Anyways, back to Mademoiselle Devereaux. She began hunting, just like her father, but her liscense was taken away when she was a diagnosed Schizophrenic. She started fooling around behind the law and became very wealthy selling potassium cyanide to religous cults and hitmen." He then paused at Murray's confused look. "Potassium cyanide is an inorganic compound that causes caridiac arrest within two hours of consumption." Murray blinked. Twice. "You drink, or eat, this and you'll have a heart attack two hours later." Bentley explained, again.

"okay, i get it." Murray said, truthfully.

"that's really interesting." Sly said, trying to be nice. He felt better when he was nice, it just made him feel good. "When do we strike?"

"well, there's a reason I didn't tell you this Sly." Bentley said, struggling to be nice and polite to his best friend. "We all know you have a tendancy to... um... er... well, Sly, your kind of... a lady's man." Bentley said finally coming to grips with his explanation. "Monique is rumored to be unbelievable gorgeous and charming and i don't think we should put you around that kind of person in your life right now." He finished gentley.

By this time Sly had sat on the ugly yellow couch they had set up. Out of all the answers, he had not expected that. He looked at his little green friend. "what do you mean, this time in my life?" Sly responded, trying to not sound aggresive.

"Listen, Sport, we've all noticed that you've been trying to stay busy. You've vacuumed your carpet 5 times today! You've been getting barely any sleep, and you've been eating way more then usual. They're all signs of borderline depression, Sly. We know somethings going on that your trying to avoid. We would've talked to you about it but we both know that you are the quiet type. We don't think we need to add lady trouble to whatever's wrong." Sly looked down into his lap. He wanted to deny everything. He wanted to say he was okay, he didn't know why he wasn't sleeping, or why he was so hungry, or why he couldn't sit still. He wanted to say that everything was fine, nothing was wrong but, an equal part of him wanted Bentley to look him in the eyes when he denied everything and say, really? He wanted to tell them the truth, Carmelita's been on my mind day and night. She's a cop, i'm a theif. It'd never work out. But guys, oh, she's so gorgeous and beautiful, inside and out. And they'd try to understand, really try to. They're great friends, he knew, but they'd never be able to see what he saw and feel what he feels so often. He didn't want them to worry about him more. They might even try to help, but no one could know what to do. He wanted to run out of the room with his basketball, shoot some hoops, and pretend that everything was perfectly normal. That he grew up in a family that held him through all of lifes tragedies and to jerk him to reality when his head got too big. He'd pretend to go to church every sunday, then out to lunch afterwards. Then when they all got home he and his adopted brothers would change clothes and play some baseball. He could fantasize having a real career, maybe being a carpenter because, after all, he had nimble hands. He'd fall in love with a pretty girl, though he had trouble believing there was ever a girl as pretty as Carmelita. Heck, maybe, if he was feeling daring, he'd pretend that Carmelita was attainable, not just some tantalizing object of affection. But more than anything, he wanted them all to be happy. His friends were his lifeline. They grew up together in the orphanage and supported eachother, they were family. They're both so worthy of happiness. And himself, he wanted to be happy too. He wanted Carmelita to find the right man, whomever he may be, and for her to be the happiest she'd ever been.

Sly finally looked up and he looked at the face of the two men he'd grown up with. He blinked, he'd never let them see him cry. "Guys," He started, but his voice cracked. "I know something's going on in my life, but," He trailed off. His friends looked at him understandingly. "i'm working on it. But i do need something to get my mind off of this... thing." He then brightened up, feeling better knowing that he could tend to his raw instincts and put some horrible person behind bars. "I don't mind meeting a pretty lady." What a typical Sly Cooper thing to say.