Chapter 9: Their rescue

Chapter nine and they still haven't gotten together. I'm getting frustrated with myself for not putting them together.

Flashback, Krack-Karov volcano, Russia (A.K.A Clockwerk's Lair)

Time: The ten seconds

Izzy's POV

Sly had done it! He had taken down Clockwerk, the ancient enemy of his entire family. He had avenged his parents' deaths and everyone else the Fiendish Five had ever hurt. At the last minute, Sly had also managed to snatch the last pages of the Thievius Raccoonus from Clockwerk's talons. He had the whole book. That was something he hadn't had in many, many years. He always used to tell me about how we would steal it back together. Now we had done it and I was so happy for him!

Right now, Sly was standing on the platform with an absentminded smile on his face. He was probably reminiscing all the past jobs and heists we'd done to steal the book pages. I was watching him from afar, smiling as well. I thought about calling out to him, but movement on the other side of the platform caught my eye. My head whipped in that direction. There, on the other side of the platform stood Carmelita Fox. I could see that she was pointing her shockpistol at Sly and in her other hand, there was a pair of handcuffs. What I didn't see was her face, but I knew, just knew by some divine providence, that she was smirking an annoying, victorious and all around bitchy smirk!

Sly noticed her and he slowly turned around and at her command, raised his hands into the air. I was sure Carmelita was going to slap the cuffs on him right then and there, but for some reason, she lowered her gun slightly and relaxed her stance a little.

"What's going on?" I wondered, "Why isn't she arresting him?"

It's not like I wanted for Sly to get arrested, but it was very odd that Carmelita didn't immediately cuff him. I continued to peer to the platform, waiting for something to happen. Sly was slowly moving closer to the inspector and with every small step, her guard dropped a bit more. It was probably subconscious because Inspector Carmelita Fox would never let her guard down in the presence of Sly Cooper.

"What are you doing?!" I thought in panic.

Sly had stopped right in front of her. I could easily picture the confused face she must've been wearing. Why didn't he do something?!

Unfortunately, that was when he did do something...

Sly kissed Carmelita. He kissed her full on the lips. It was a quick kiss, no more than a second or two, but during that infinitesimal amount of time, my heart broke into a million little pieces. Hot tears welled up in my eyes and streamed down my cheeks. I felt betrayed and heartbroken. I know that it didn't make any sense to feel that way. Sly didn't know that I was in love with him, therefore he didn't need to think about me while kissing someone else, but it still felt like a knife through the heart. I turned my back to the depressive sight before me and decided to return into the van. Neither Murray or Bentley noticed my tears or my face when I passed them. They were thankfully too busy doing something else. I managed to hold in the sobs until I got into the van, but even there, I couldn't let it all out. I feared that they could hear me.

I grabbed two blankets and wrapped the other around myself. From the remaining one, I fashioned a pillow and threw in on the floor. I couldn't let the guys see I'd been crying. They would ask why and that would be a question I'd be unable to answer. But I knew they wouldn't disturb me if I was asleep, so I laid down on the floor and nestled myself against the makeshift pillow and closed my eyes. I made sure to cover my head with the other blanket.

I had originally thought about just pretending to be sleeping, but once I closed my eyes, I found that I felt really tired. No wonder, really... We had, in single night, invaded Clockwerk's fortress and defeated its crazy master. It had been really stressing and it didn't take long to fall asleep.

I vaguely registered Sly hushing the two other and telling them that I was asleep before completely passing out into troubled dreams...

Bentley's POV

The plan had worked! I had managed to convince Carmelita to help us rescue Sly. She would be doing it inadvertently, without any knowledge about our little operation on the side of her raid. Of course, we had no intention of waiting for her to find our two missing friends and that was why I was currently monitoring the situation with Penelope. She had slipped into the house at the same time Carmelita had lead her raid there. The inspector had a group of other Interpol officers with her and I was constantly afraid that Penelope would be discovered.

"Everything alright, Penelope?" I asked for the tenth time in an hour.

"Yes, Bentley. Everything's fine" she sighed with annoyance, "They haven't noticed me yet. I'm on my way to the cellar"

"Be careful out there" I cautioned. I really wasn't fond of the idea of Penelope in jail, "Carmelita and her men will incarcerate you without hesitation"

"Don't worry, they haven't found their way down here yet" she assured me.

"I always worry" I almost sighed.

"I know, sweetie. That's one of the reasons I love you"

I blushed at that and I could hear her giggle on her end. I started to mutter something in return, but Penelope's voice cut me off.

"Someone's coming"

"Who?!" I exclaimed in panic.

"It's..." she halted and lowered her voice to a very, very quiet whisper, "Inspector Fox"

My panic skyrocketed when I heard the inspector being mentioned.

"She's going for the cellar door"

Izzy's POV

I was dozing off in Sly's arms, dreading for another visit from my monster of a father. He hadn't arrived yet, which I found strange and relieving. I didn't know if I could take anymore of the torture. Even with Sly there afterwards, I was starting to feel it taking its toll on me. I didn't sleep well anymore and the little food we were given everyday didn't rouse my appetite. I only ate the little I did, because Sly refused to touch it before I'd gotten enough nourishment. Even in this terrible situation, he still looked after my needs before his own.

"You're such a good person, Sly" I said quietly.

"Huh?" he let out a confused sound at my sudden praise.

"Because you always think of others before yourself" I continued.

I looked up at his face, which, I noticed, was only a few inches from mine. He too was looking at me with those hypnotizing brown eyes of his. I had the sudden urge to close the distance between us and-

"Kiss him. I want to kiss him while I'm still sane enough to do it"

I debated for a brief moment if it was OK to just kiss him out of the blue. How would he react? Would he kiss me back or would I just make everything awkward and ruin our friendship? I thought back to the morning when I kissed his cheek for the first time. He'd been surprised alright, but he hadn't really shown any dislike towards the fact that I'd kissed him, if only on the cheek.

"Do it" my brains encouraged.

For once, I didn't argue, I didn't want to argue with my mind. I slowly came upwards, all the time looking into Sly's eyes. They were full of question, but I think I saw something else in there as well, something I couldn't quite name...

"Sly..." I whispered.

I snaked my arms around his neck and leant even further, our lips closing in on each other.

"Izzy..." he breathed.

I could feel the breath on my face and I felt a pair of arms adjust themselves around me, abruptly pulling me a bit closer to him. Our lips hovered only an inch or two apart. My eyes closed, continuing to lean in, waiting for the inevitable meeting of our lips...

But the universe was against me, like it had been from the first damn moment I fell in love with Sly. Just when I was about to make the distance between us vanish and finally kiss the raccoon I'd loved for so long, there was a loud sound and the door was kicked open.

A bright light was pointed at us, blinding us momentarily. I was instantly afraid that my father had come to torture me again. I pressed myself to Sly, but his arms didn't come to wrap around me like they usually did. There was a long moment, during which nothing happened and the light was still shining at our eyes.

"Sly" a very familiar, female voice gasped.

I recognized that voice! It was-

"You got to be kidding me!"

Now, I wanted to scream. I wanted to scream and punch the owner of the voice and vent out the frustration of eight years. Especially when a great deal of that frustration had been caused by the inspector of Interpol who was still pointing her flashlight at us.

"Carmelita" Sly responded.

The light blinding us was averted, allowing us to see the vixen who'd chased us all around the world. She was staring at Sly with wide eyes, completely ignoring my existence, as usual. Her shockpistol was pointed at us, but the arm holding it was visibly trembling.

Sly stood up, pulling me with him. I withdrew my arms and remained next to him. He hadn't taken his eyes of Carmelita. They were devoid of emotion and his face didn't betray any feelings of delight or happiness. He crossed his arms and gave her a look that one could almost interpret as a glare.

Carmelita cringed slightly and her arm holding the pistol dropped. In fact she dropped the whole gun to the floor.

"Sly, I-"

She didn't or couldn't finish that sentence. I was observing the situation between the former lovers, all the while wishing that I wasn't chained to the stone pillar. They continued to look at each other. Sly with his slight glare and Carmelita with her sad eyes.

Then, without any warning and with a lightning fast movement, Carmelita's arms were wrapping around Sly and silent sobs were heard.

"I'm sorry, Sly. I'm sorry I lied to you. I didn't mean what I said" she wailed.

I stood dumbfounded, looking at the vixen who was desperately trying to apologize. My dumbfoundness turned into horror when I saw Sly's arms slowly coming up with the intent of wrapping around Carmelita. I couldn't let that happen. My thoughts were selfish, but they say that love is the most selfish of feelings...

"No, you won't ruin this for me! No, no, no..."

"NO!" I screamed.

I didn't really think about what I was doing when I grabbed the inspector and forcibly pried her off of Sly.

"Don't touch him! You've hurt him enough!" I snarled at her, coming to stand between them.

Carmelita regained her composure and glared at me with narrowed eyes. I was standing in front of Sly and I could hear him gasping lightly. Apparently, he'd been a bit behind Carmelita with snapping out of the trance.

"This is none of your business!" she snapped.

"Sly is my friend and I care about him! I'm not gonna let you hurt him again!"

"You're the only one here I'm going to hurt" she growled.

She took a step closer to me and I prepared myself for the fight.

"Carmelita" Sly said quietly, causing both of us to look at him, "I can't come back. I can't... love...you, anymore"

To say I was enjoying to see Carmelita break down and fall on her knees would be an understatement. I was loving seeing her suffer for all the hurt and pain she had caused Sly.

"She deserves it!"

A quiet sob from behind me had me turning around, alarmed. Sly too had fallen to his knees and was sobbing violently. I quickly lowered myself to his level and hugged him tightly.

"It's OK, Sly" I cooed in his ear, "I won't let her hurt you anymore"

That was all she had ever done to him. Hurt him, lied to him, claiming to love him when she only loved the Sly she herself created. It was disgusting! How did she think Sly would ever forgive her for something like that?

"You" was heard from behind us.

I looked over my shoulder to see Carmelita standing up again and glaring at me with pure rage in her eyes.

"This is your fault!" she shrieked, "You filled his head with lies and stole him away from me"

If only she knew the irony of that statement... and yes, I was going to steal Sly away from her.

"You're the one who lied to him! And for what? Only so that you could 'make something good out of him'!"

Her eyes widened hearing this.

"Yes! Sly told me! He told me everything!" I shouted at her, "You don't deserve him"

Before Carmelita could shout something back, an audible "click" of a lock drew our attention. I looked down. The chain around my ankle had been removed. I looked at Sly's hand. There, between his fingers, was a hair pin. Then I looked back at Carmelita and realized that he'd snatched it from her hair. When, I had no idea, but I was now finally free.

"Izzy" Sly's hoarse voice sounded.

I glanced at him behind me. My eyes found his and I almost gasped at the broken and dull look the normally so vibrant orbs held. They were looking like back then when he'd told me about their break up.

"Let's go home" he said as his own shackle clicked and was thrown away.

Sly stood up and I went to stand by him. His hand came and gripped mine tightly. I threw Carmelita a victorious look and watched as she became even more enraged.

"You're both under arrest" she snarled.

"I'll take care of her, Sly" I whispered, putting my hand on his chest.

He gave me a curt nod before taking a step back. I, on the other hand, stepped forward. Carmelita's fists were clenched and she was gritting her teeth. She was furious, which meant that she was unfocused and probably very easy to take down.

As soon as I was close enough, she tried to punch me in the face. It was a reckless attempt as I just simply sidestepped and took the opening to strike the neural points of her arm. It fell to her side, completely numb and useless for the next few hours. Carmelita let out an actual growl and jumped at me again, trying to kick me in the face. This attempt also proved futile as moments later, she fell to the ground with her left foot paralyzed.

I knelt beside her, crushing her good arm under my feet. I bent down to whisper into her ear.

"Sly will never be yours again" I said, "He's mine now"

"Yours?" Carmelita said with genuine confusion on her face, "But you never-"

"I did" I snarled, "Long before you"

Applying heavy pressure on certain neural points right under her ears, she fell unconscious in less than ten seconds. I got up and turned to see Sly walking to me. He stopped next to me and took one last glimpse at Carmelita. With a long, sad sigh, he turned away from her. I hugged him quickly before we left the room. On the way, I took his hand that was fumbling to find mine again. I squeezed it comfortingly.

"Psst" someone whizzed.

"Who's there?"

"It's me!" someone exclaimed excitedly as a small figure landed in front of us.

"Penelope!" I shouted happily.

I lifted my friend from the ground and crushed her into a hug.

"Izzy... can't... breathe"

"Sorry" I apologized sheepishly, "What are you doing here?"

"Saving your skins, that's what!" she told us, "Come on, follow me. I know a safe way out. The whole house is crawling with Carmelita's men, but fortunately she told them that she herself was taking care of the cellar"

We followed our mouse friend along a dimly lit hallway to a heavy door. I didn't fail to notice a hand returning to mine when the door opened and revealed that it was almost sunset. The last lights of the day stung our eyes slightly, but they adjusted soon enough. Penelope lead us to a familiar sight. The team van was waiting for us in a remote alleyway and it's driver was impatiently waiting for us to arrive.

"SLY! IZZY!" Murray roared when he saw us.

He jumped from the driver's seat and run to meet us. We were suddenly engulfed in one of Murray's bone crushing hugs.

"OK, we're glad to see you too" I wheezed.

Murray held us for a moment longer until setting us down and running back to the van and resuming his original position behind the wheel. The three of us walked to the back door in a brisk pace. Penelope jumped in first, followed by Sly, who pulled me after himself.

When the door closed, Sly collapsed on the nearest seat. His eyes closed and he heaved out a long breath. I sat next to him and wrapped my arms around him. He did the same to me without looking and we stayed like that for the ride to the safe house.

"You two look so cute together" Penelope blurted out suddenly.

My head snapped in her direction and I gave her the worst glare ever. She shrunk back a bit and I looked at Sly. His face hadn't changed. He still had his eyes closed and his head was resting against the seat's headrest, but I could tell that he wasn't sleeping.

Either Sly didn't hear Penelope or didn't care about the comment. I really hoped for the former.

"We're here!" Murray announced.

I felt the van stop in the garage and I got up along with Sly and Penelope. We hopped out of the van and into another hug from Murray. After he let us go, we walked to the living room, where we saw the last member of our little group of thieves.

"Bentley!" I exclaimed and jumped to hug him.

I was happy to see him again as well. Once, I let go of him, Sly came from behind me.

"Thank you, Bentley, for getting us out of there" he said earnestly, squeezing his shoulder, "And thank you Penelope and Murray"

Sly's voice was quiet, broken. Just like when he'd first told me about Carmelita and the revelation of his amnesia.

"Damn that woman!" I cursed in my head.

"Anytime, Sly!" Murray exclaimed happily.

"Yeah, Sly, you'd do the same for us" Penelope replied.

Bentley nodded in confirmation.

Sly gave us all a tired smile before abruptly turning around and presumably going to his room. Everyone looked after him in slight bewilderment. This was very unlike Sly, but I understood completely why he was like that.

"What happened?" Bentley asked, sounding worried.

"Carmelita happened" I said darkly.

"Oh" he voiced, right away understanding the situation, "In that case, I think you should go talk to him"

He wheeled away before I could ask him why I should talk to Sly. Of course, I was going to go talk to him, but why exactly had Bentley suggested it. I looked to Penelope who gave me nod and a smile. I followed Sly into his room and found him there, lying on the bed with the cover thrown carelessly on him, barely covering his midsection. He was still awake and didn't look sleepy at all. His eyes focused on me when I walked in. I went over to his bed and sat down.

Sitting there, I realized for the first time in a while that I reeked! Figures after so long without a shower, but at the moment, I couldn't find it in myself to care. Though, I wanted to get out of these dirty clothes and put on new, clean ones, but that would involve getting up and I had already firmly decided that I would sleep with Sly. I looked at his almost clotheless body.

"Well, what the heck!" I thought.

I undressed myself. I could feel Sly's eyes on me the whole time, but I didn't really mind. I threw aside the last piece of clothing so that when I crawled next to him and pulled the covers over us, the only thing I had on me were my undergarments. We both blushed heavily.

I was lying on my side, staring at Sly, who was on his back and staring at the ceiling. I waited for a long moment before he shifted to lie on his side as well. We were now looking into each others' eyes.

"Do you want to talk about it?" I asked softly.

"No. I just want to forget it all" he said quietly, "How about you?"

"Do I want to talk about it? No, not really. I want to forget it all as well" I replied.

Sly nodded. There was another silence.

"Do you miss her?" I asked out of nowhere.

He looked a bit surprised, but shook his head nonetheless.

"No, I don't. I don't want to cry over her anymore" he said.

I nodded, feeling very happy inside.

"And besides" he continued with a smirk, "I have you, Isabelle"

I felt my cheeks heat up and I smiled at him. He smiled back and pulled me to him. I happily complied and brought my arms around him.

"Good night, Izzy"

"Good night, Ringtail"

His chuckle was the last thing I heard before a sudden exhaustion took over my mind and compelled me to the Land of Dreams.

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