Chapter 2:
(From Bentley's perspective)
"Bentley…Bentley…, your breakfast is ready."
-I opened up my eyes to see the nurse smiling at me, holding a thermometer which she had just pulled out of my mouth. I took a quick glance at the clock above the curtains. It was quarter past ten. Sly and Murray were scheduled to check back tomorrow at noon. I straightened myself onto the bed so the nurse could give me the food. "Would you like me to help you eat," she said in a very sweet and caring voice. "I'll be fine," I replied and motioned for her to go. When she left for good, I threw the breakfast at the door and cried out in agony. I didn't care if it was pancakes and an omelet which was actually Murray's favorite dish. Murray. He was the one that found me, lying there on the cold, barren floor. I had fell 200 plus feet according to him. Of course, Murray's math is always wrong and I knew that I had fallen way more than that. Murray was the one who carried me onto the blimp and drove my unconscious body to the hospital in Maine, not too far from Jean Bison's operation in Canada. Jean Bison. If he hadn't shown up with the page of the Theivius Racconus, none of this would have happened. I examined myself for the one-hundredth time. My two legs were gone for good; meaning another miserable life in a wheelchair. But I had also suffered a broken back, two broken arms, a cracked skull, dislocated shoulders, and a damaged abdomen. Obviously, no one could survive such egregious injuries because how would you be able to walk, move, or even possibly talk? That's why I was forced to commit to the "Operational Project". The "Operational Project" is a new method of modern technology that allows the victim that has suffered life-threatening injuries to undergo treatment with the help of robotics. To put it bluntly, most of my body parts are now robot parts. Robotic legs, robotic hands, robotic everything. I was a cyborg.
I had no choice but to go with this project. That was after all, my only means of survival. I've been staying at the hospital for almost 6 months now. Sly and Murray have been checking on me ever since. I tried to show them that I was happy for their support but they could tell through my grief, that I wasn't really in the mood. I was just able to talk last week and it was three days ago when I had my first real one to one mental conversation with myself. It all came together. Sly was the one responsible for my disastrous state and it would be Sly who would eventually pay for it.
It is nothing short of the truth that Sly and I were the best of friends since growing up in the Happy Camper Orphanage. We did everything together and it would be detrimental if I didn't include Murray. The three of us began pulling off heists after heists until at last we pulled off the big one, recovering all of the pages of the Thievius Racconus, Sly's old family book. We would go on to pull off two even greater heists, recovering the Clockwerk parts and breaking into the Cooper Vault while thwarting Dr.M's plans. Those were the good old times. But as we pulled off each heist, it became crystal clear to me that I was indeed the heart and soul of the gang. Yeah, Sly pulled off the missions, but without my intellect, my knowledge, my brains, the Cooper Gang would never have existed. I saved Sly's life numerous times. I rescued him from that witch of a woman in the Contessa for Pete's sake. And what do I get it? No credit at all. Sly still thinks I'm second-fiddle to him. I can only imagine how Murray feels. He left us for a while when he thought that it was his fault that I suffered my leg injuries and that it was his fault that I was put into a wheelchair. It wasn't his fault. It was Sly's fault. Sly was the one who put Murray and me into the wild goose chase of locating Clockwerk's parts. Sly was the reason why I now look like a freak.
Past memories began entering my brain. Jean Bison's ax. The ice cracking. Me pummeling toward a cliff, managing to hang on for dear life. Seeing Carmelita in the same way too but on the opposite side of me. And then came the betrayal. Sly at first walked up to me and I thought he was going to save me like the good times. I saw his hesitation so I calculated the scientific-geometric-biological-genetic scale ratios of my dilemma and concluded that my hands were about to slip in any second, meaning that he could only save one of us. He chose Carmelita. He chose the cop that tried to bust us every time we were finishing a well-planned heist. I hated Carmelita right from the start. Every time I planned out a heist, she would have to mess it up somehow. I soon though using my brains of course realized that Sly developed a keen relationship with the Inspector Fox. It was only a matter of time when he would choose her over the gang, but I would never suspect it to end this way. He left me to fall to the end of a cliff. It was me. Bentley! Your best friend! And he thinks he can just apologize for that! It was time for me to sabotage the Coopers once and for all.
The Next Day:
That was painstakingly one of the most unforgettable days of my life. I knew what I had to do. But first I had to bust out of this dump. I looked at myself again. The nurses told me about two months more and I was free to go. Two more months? And besides, I hate hospitals! They for some reason, spook me out! The clock showed that it was seven a.m. The nurse would not check on me to see how I was doing until eight. I jumped out of my bed and found it extremely hard for me to even walk. My legs felt so stiff, so un-real. But with an assortment of tries, I got the hang of it. I maneuvered my way towards to the nearest window and busted it open. Landing on a rooftop, I surveyed where I was. Maine.
I knew where I had to go first. I had to revisit Penelope.