And that was Rush's "Tom Sawyer" followed by Danzig's "Mother" and what a looker she is. Heh heh. Okay, we have a full half hour of songs coming up for you on your way to work, but first, let's hear from our sponsors; Chapter The Twelfth, in which our heroes hang out in the halls, tear down walls, and just talk, talk, talk.
"Okay guys," Bentley began, his projector aimed at the wall of the captain's cabin, "We have a full schedule ahead of us, so it's best to cut to the quick." CLICK. Pt. Grizzly. "With the Panda King, successfully integrated as one of their own, he will be privy to information revolving around the bases goings on. However, to stay at Bullet Bay, he'll have to prove himself." CLICK. The wrecked com room. "From what I can tell, this incident sparked quite the fracas. Fortunately, it seems the event's been taken as a large desertion, same goes for our hyena friend in the brig. So far, no fingers have been pointed at the Panda King for any discrepancies in his story, with any luck our "friends" won't do anything more to blow his cover. Now," CLICK. The Fence. "So far this has been able to stop Sly dead in his tracks, last night's endeavors would've been a fiasco were I not on scene. Sweet and simple, this fence has got to go." CLICK. A herd of the rare African herding rhinos. "Normally it would've been impossible for us to accomplish this, however, with the help of this local rhino herd, I think we can paint a different picture. Murray, using your "animal magnetism", I need you to get these rhinos to stampede. Really whip 'em into a frenzy, then you and Suzy Q lead 'em to straight into the fence. This absolutely important, if those rhinos deviate from the designated course, this operation's a bust." CLICK. The Fence. "Now, since we don't want our horned heroes to be flash fried, I'll do my part and disengage the power boxes. Logically, I won't have the time I'd like to properly disengage the boxes stealthily, so I'll have to resort to simply blowing them up, *sigh*." CLICK. The sniper towers. "Which, of course, I cannot do with a bullet in my head, crazy as that idea sounds, I know. Penelope, if you'd be so kind as to entertain our zebra friends with your own brand of fun, we could certainly avoid any embarrassing situations. You know, like the ones where I end up a splattered mess all over my chair." CLICK. The mine field. "Guru, I want you to be on standby, I'm not going to lie, there's a million and one way this operation could go wrong, having you run telekinetics should greatly improve our odds. Use some of the local mines and a little bit of imagination and I'm sure you'll do swell." CLICK. General Red's house. "Also, apparently from the their communications, a couple of cult VIPs are set to arrive. They're set to engage in a meeting with General Red on arrival. There's a lot of contradiction as to how long they're staying, but Sly, I need you to get in on that meeting. I'm sure the world's greatest thief should have no problem doing a little bit of leg work, eh? Okay guys, let's get set.
The Grinder
Gabon coast, Africa 5:09am
The Panda King smiled, this operation was going to be easier than he thought. Anyone else on the team could not have possibly pulled this one off. The new recruits were waken at four in the morning, allowing them, for those who were smart enough to choose to, four hours or less of sleep since their arrival at midnight. This was no sweat since he'd imposed fiercer work hours on himself in his rigorous martial arts training, frankly, four in the morning was just another old pal. One strange thing was that they were told to leave those who'd missed the bugle call alone, one guard had told them that they'd just volunteered for special training.
After that, it was off to the mess hall for whatever the cooks had tossed in a blender and called a meal. The food wasn't half bad, nothing worse than what he had in prison. The repast had those old time, soul numbing favorites; meat and not meat, the way to tell the two apart was anyone's guess.
The meal, and all it's bland, tasteless goodness, was made even worse by the presence of the skunk woman from the night before, she didn't talk to or approach him, as per the usual, but stayed within eyeshot of him. Every so often, no matter how well she tried to play it cool, he'd catch her staring at him, once again following the formula. It was during these instances when he took his turn to stare at little miss creepy that he got a chance to notice facets about her that he couldn't in the darkness and chaos of the night before. He could see that her frizzy hair was tied in a ponytail and was of a dark blue hue. He could also see that she was slightly muscular, probably worked out a lot. From the lack of apparent upper body development and the size of her thighs; he'd peg her as a runner, probably had a kick like a mule that'd probably knock down doors and most guys twice her size flat on their butts. The Panda King jotted down all these tidbits in his head, for further reference, now he knew what to look for in a crowd so he could avoid her.
Taking a break from looking at lady loony the stalker, The Panda King supposed that since he was here, he might as well get to know those he intended to dupe, beat up, hospitalize, and any number of rather unsavory things to. Turning to a mole on his left, he found out that the rodent got wrapped up in this organization thanks to his girlfriend, and had recently proved his loyalty to Clock-la by taking that very same love of his life on a swimming trip in a pair of cozy cement shoes, charming fellow ain't he? Hoping to find a somewhat more stable mentality among the base's female population, The Panda King was disappointed to find that the lady penguin who sat across from him had discovered Clock-la while in prison for failing an attempted murder. When she got out, the cult gave her the skills so that the next time she went back in, "attempted" wasn't part of the sentence.
After finishing his meal, and silently thanking the universe for the existence of insane asylums, it was off to the store houses to get one's gear. His equipment contained boots, polish, flashlight, gun, knife, Bible of The Clock-la faith, toothbrush, y'know, the usual. He was then told to stow his gear on his bunk, where he was told to file in to his platoon for training, he couldn't help but notice that the sleepers from before had done a Houdini and disappeared.
Which of course brings us to the now, where the Panda King stood side to side with a bunch of other chumps who were standing outside at the training grounds and staring at a podium. No, that's a lie, The Panda King was sure that was what he was supposed to answer if asked about what he was staring at, but he, like those who stood around him, were gazing, some open mouthed, at the real show that was taking place just behind the podium. The Panda King finally had his answer to the mystery of the missing sleepers, as he saw those who slept from his, and what he assumed to be from others, barracks tied to wooden poles. The accused were left to the classic combinations of big, mean, and violent that manifested themselves in the form of the wildebeest flash light guards. The guards had no problems with hurting violators of the wakeup call rule, and proved as such by slamming their fists repeatedly into the stomachs of said violators. The Panda King looked on, the public beatings were halted only for individuals who'd succumbed to unconsciousness or had coughed up too much blood. He smiled wryly and thought cynically to himself; well, this is certainly…inspiring.
The General was smiling broadly as he made his way to the training grounds. The first day of every two months was always like Christmas to him, in all honesty this was the most fun he could have without needing to smoke, raid the fridge, or cuddle afterwards. If there was one thing that could make up for all the roller coasters he'd never be able to go on due to his height, it was the first day of every two months. Once he got near Alpha Zero Company, he made sure to get "the look" on his face.
God did he love the look, if he had children, never, not in a million years, even if they ended world hunger or came up with a cure for aids or cancer, he'd never love his kids nearly as much as he loved "the look". He was a completely different person when he had "the look" on, the change was astounding. Peter Parker puts on a mask and he's The Amazing Spider-man! Ten year old Billy Batson says "SHAZAM!"; he's Captain Marvel, Earth's mightiest mortal! General Red? Well General Red get's "the look" on his face and he stays the same guy, but boy is he one mean, hard bitten, raw dog monster. When he gets the look on his face; birds stop singing, children cry, demons get their horns and sometimes, on cold winter nights, they say if you're very still and very quiet, you can hear the howling of those who "the look" is focused on, their wails carried by the wind. God did he love the look.
The Panda King got his first good look at General Red as he marched up to the podium. From the rippling of his muscles as he walked, The Panda King could tell that the hyena guards on either side of the general were really just for show. When General Red took to the stand, The Panda King took note that several wildebeest guards had quit punching the sleepers to stand at the general's side. Then something completely unexpected had happened, General Red looked down upon the troops of Company Alpha Zero, with a furious scowl that could strip paint from walls and the bark off of trees, then, and amazing as it sounds, trust me, it did happen, General Red smiled.
The general waited a few moments, basking in the mass confusion, augmented with a slight dash of fear and uncertainty. Then, still smiling, he asked, "Is there anyone who thinks that they're not supposed to be in this platoon?...Anyone?...Come on, don't be shy." Several people raised their hands, at which point the wildebeest guards took notice and quickly grabbed those who identified themselves and tied them to the posts. The recruits now identified as punching bags started to be spat upon, their guts drilled by fists, their teeth smashed, you know, the usual.
General Red loved that gag, no matter how many times he did it, nor with which batch of recruits he did it with, there was always, always, at least one sap dumb enough to raise their hand. He especially loved the irony of it, in the old days he was called too extreme for doing it, now under Clock-la, she constantly berates him and calls him too soft for not killing them. Now, as much as he'd enjoy simply standing there and pointing at the suckers who essentially signed their own beating warrants, he was here to do a job, and by thunder he was going to get it done.
So, pulling his face back into "the look", he turned once more to Company Alpha Zero and asked, "Now that you know the consequences for failing me, does anyone of you maggots know why you're here?"
One dalmatian, a slow learner obviously, raised his hand, "Because-"
"Trick question stupid!" the general pointed at the recruit and he was quickly seized by guards and added to one of the empty posts. "Now, anyone else want to interrupt me?...No?...Good. Now none of you idiots know why you're here, because I haven't told you why you're here. If some of you aren't the total failures that I suspect you all to be, you'll notice a few subtle differences between yourselves and the other recruits.
The Panda King did notice. All the other platoons and training circles were made up of groups of roughly twenty recruits, the crowd he stood in now, if he had to hazard a guess, would hold up to roughly a two hundred or more.
"I have read through each and every one of your files and the files of all those on base, and one thing is for certain; you worms are without a doubt the lousiest assortment of recruits to ever wash up here at Bullet Bay. The Glorious Lady Clock-la has authorized that I am allowed to execute each and every one of you, for…well whatever reason I think of really. Now, no matter what's running through your mush filled little heads right now, concerning this information, you should translate the message as such; you are such horrible screw ups that you turned to Clock-la and her magnificent following, and even then you were still crappy. So crappy that even she doesn't give a fart about you…well you're not even maggots, more like specks. So here's the score, I'm not gonna kill you, but I'll close. I'm gonna hurt you, I'm gonna torture you, I've got a whole theme park of horrible things I'm gonna do to you, I'll bring you real close to the final curtain, so close that you'll know hell, and the worst part is; when it's all over, you will be the most hard bitten, most strong willed, most capable, and without a doubt the best warriors in Clock-la's cause…and you're gonna thank me for doing those terrible things to you. Oh, and before I forget, from this point on, unlike the other recruits here at Bullet Bay, the next time you screw up; I ain't sending you to no post like the chumps behind me, I'm sending you there."
The Panda King looked to see where he was pointing and saw wall with posts in front of it, but with the dried blood on the ground and the bullet holes in the wall, there was no question about what happened there. The bear looked back to see the general still staring at the company. General Red waited until the crowd's full attention before breaking into a broad, toothy grin, lighting a large stogie and jamming it 'tween his teeth. "Okay kids, it's time to get this show on the road. Let's take a walk."
Then General Red stepped down from the podium then began to walk, and, at the orders of the guards who flanked him, so did the crowd. Those from Alpha Zero Company who'd been tied and beaten at the posts were cut down and limped meekly behind the procession, their black eyes and bruises swelling. They stood as prime examples of extreme lengths General Red's training intended to go. The Panda King looked around, trying to get a bearing of what direction they were going. From his observations, he couldn't gather much, but from the way some of the snipers in their tower looked at them and shook their heads in a pitying manner, he could tell it wasn't going to be good.
It wasn't until he saw the perfectly trimmed hedges did he realize that they were heading towards General Red's own home. They walked through the general's victory garden, taking care not to tromp on any of the veggies, lest they face the consequences. Soon they reached General Red's vast backyard, where the crowd was ushered onto a taped off area, which soon became a tight fit as this was the first time such a large crowd had been subject to what was about to come. However, after much hustling and squeezing, the entire company had filed into the space, allowing the process to continue.
Not being at the forefront, The Panda King easily lost sight of the short statured militant, however he did hear the signature beeps of a keypad being pressed as a code was entered. Soon, the entire taped off area began to sink into the ground, being lowered by a massive scissor lift. On the journey through the mysterious lift, The Panda King noticed several signs on the walls that rose up past them; "ROSES ARE RED…VIOLETS ARE BLUE…ALL HOPE IS A GONER…AND SO ARE YOU!", clearly the work of a master poet.
Soon enough, the lift had reached the bottom of the shaft and therefore the troop's destination. The place was a dead end except for a pair of double doors at the bottom, and in light of all the guns, bombs and cult worship, the Panda King got to thinking that there was something particularly nasty on the other side of those doors. However, despite whatever reservations the munitions expert carried with him, the crowd surged forward, forcing even The Panda King's large form forward.
On the other side of the doors was a large room that allowed the recruits and guards alike some breathing room. On the opposite side was another pair of double doors and another podium for the general. General Red walked up to the stand and resumed staring at the gathering.
"Okay kids, I think it's clear by now that there are quite a few of you in this group. Now, since I personally will be training you, I can't afford for all of you sissies to waste my time. So! Today we are going to have a little test, to weed out the maggots from the mud they feast on. Behind me is The Grinder, a hall of doom and death of my own design, it will test the most basic ability any soldier needs, the ability to survive. For some, it is your first step in your training, for everyone else it is your last. I'll be waiting for whatever sorry saps are lucky enough to make it out in one piece on the other side." And with that, General Red stepped down and exited through the double doors.
"Okay meatbags!" One of the hyena guards shouted as several more came in through the lift, "File in against the left wall. Only teams of two will be allowed to go into The Grinders at any time. You will be called up randomly as will your partner. You are to line up, double file, against the right wall and wait your turn for measurements and then to wait your turn to enter the Grinder."
This was quite the unexpected turn of events, The Panda King found himself in quite the difficult impasse. All of Bentley's fail safe plans were devised to avoid any life threatening situations in the event of the enemy discovering The Panda King's true identity, he'd never been prepped for possibility of danger before such an event occurred. To help complete the disguise, he'd stowed the binoc-u-com earpiece in his boot, so even if Bentley had concocted some strategy to get him out of this, there was no way the turtle could contact him. The Panda King had no doubt in his mind that the danger was real, from everything General Red said, Clock-la already considered this entire group to be failures and dead in her eyes.
The only plan the Panda King could conceive was the same plan all along, go along with what they say, keep a low profile, don't get discovered, and don't die. He then thought it best to get a bearing of his chances of survival in this thing. Looking around the Panda King took a quick head count, factoring in all those who'd already entered the Grinder, finding the count up to be in the neighborhood of one-sixty, considering the average training squad was usually a chalk up of twenty, he could already see this was going to be a slaughter. Twenty out of a hundred and sixty, the odds were far from good, but he was The Panda King, a former legendary member of the world renowned Fiendish Five, demolitions expert for the Cooper Gang, master and creator of the Flame-Fu martial art, perhaps that, and a little bit of luck, would be enough to see him through.
The proceedings were somewhat docile and boring, kinda like a dentist's waiting room, despite the magnitude of the situation they were all facing. This soon changed as the seventeenth pair took their turn to go. The pair was a tortoise that, from the way he was drooling slightly as he was engrossed in trying to free himself from a finger trap, he looked like he did nothing but eat, sleep, and weight lift all day, while his partner was a hare that was in dire need of a haircut and carried a burnt out surfer look on him, he too was equally stumped on the mystery of the finger trap. As the door to the Grinder opened, the body of an anteater fell out, he was covered from head to toe in deep gashes and had several daggers jutting from his back. Dead was too light a term to describe this guy's condition.
Two hyena guards grabbed the guy's body and took a pair of mops that were stowed under the podium before heading into the Grinder themselves. Instantly a wave of anxiety and fear consumed the room. The entire place filled with the sounds of whispering and panic. The Panda King stood statuesquely and chose not to become one with the rabble, his eyes darting back and forth from the guards, who were trying to reclaim silence and order, to the ones in the crowd who whispered the lowest and eyed the guards in a rather menacing manner. A shot rang out through the room and quieted all as a hyena guard fired a shot into the ceiling using a service revolver.
"THAT'S ENOUGH!" he shouted, waving the weapon at the lot, "You've already been told this is what's happening! Told that Clock-la would rather see you all dead! In fact you're all dead already! This is your chance for redemption, if you don't like it, we are authorized to kill each and every one of you! No one try to be a hero, and just tough it out!" He waited for his words to take effect, and slowly but surely they did, the room was at peace once more, gripped with fear but peaceful nonetheless. "Now!" the guard looked into the hat, from which the names were being pulled, "Privates Grizzly and Law!"
The Panda King walked forward, the sound of his boot steps, and the boot steps of another from behind him, echoed throughout the room. He stood at attention in front of the hyena that'd called him out, whilst there he slightly tilted his head to get a look at who his partner was and he immediately regretted it.
You know that one person in your life, that annoying as hell classmate, or that friend of a friend, that one person if put into words, you don't necessarily want to die, you just want them to not be alive…any more, that one person in your life that no matter how many times you see 'em, you can't help but enjoy the image of you cracking them across the chest with a good old fashioned baseball bat. Well, take that person and put 'em in that one situation where you see 'em at the grocery store, or the library, any place beyond the normal place where you're required to put up with them, that feeling of unpleasant surprise you get, where it feels like your guts are twisting up inside you and you can't decide whether or not to just avoid them whilst hoping they haven't spotted you or eviscerate them on the spot with you bare hands. Well that was the exact feeling that came upon the Panda King as he found out that Pt. Law, his partner for an upcoming gauntlet of death traps, was none other than the same skunk woman who'd been staring at him time and again.
As much as he would've liked to call her out on the spot, in front of everyone, confronting her for her strangeness, sadly, there were other things on his plate at the moment. Concentrating on their hyena superior, The Panda King did his best to push the unpleasantness of the situation far from his mind.
"You two," the hyena said sternly to the two, "Report to Lt. Hayes at the end of the line, and wait for further instructions."
The two did as they were told, Pt. Law leading the way, allowing The Panda King his turn to stare at her for a change. The walk wasn't long, considering Lt. Hayes was still in the same room as them, a large room, no question, but still a room. Lt. Hayes was yet another hyena guard but unlike the guard that preceded him, he carried a nice shiny clipboard (it wasn't that shiny, but it did have a nice sheen nonetheless), and carried a perennially tired look about him.
"Okay," he said as the two privates approached, "Let's sum this up, I don't wanna be here all day *yawn*." He then jabbed his pen in the skunk's direction, "Full name?"
Pt. Law blinked at the question, as if for a moment she'd forgotten her own name, before answering, "Kitsune Law." Kitsune Law, the Panda King repeated inside his own head, it was an awfully oriental name, which was weird since she spoke with a slightly Hispanic tone. But, as an afterthought, he gave a quick glance to the people who made up the colorful cast of Company Alpha Zero, and the fact that he himself was a giant Chinese panda with the first name "John", it wasn't much to worry about, although the name "Kitsune" was oddly familiar.
After Law gave her full name, Lt. Hayes jotted it down and proceeded to use a tape measurer to get her height and width increments.
"I've, uh, already been fitted for my uniform," Law said, clearly embarrassed and uncomfortable with the informality of being touched in such a manner.
"Uniform yes, coffin no," Lt. Hayes said as he jotted down the numbers, "and you've got some paint on your shirt collar." Law took immediate notice of the small white gob and quickly removed it, as if it were some contaminated toxic waste.
After that it was business as usual, the Panda King gave his name (the fake one), got his measurements and took his place next to Law in line, all that was left was to wait. During their time in line, The Panda King made a point of staring at Law, who for her part did everything in her power to act as if the bear wasn't there. What was with her? The question seemed to be impossible to expel from his mind, for as long as he knew her, which admittedly was not long at all, her every waking moment seemed almost dedicated to staring him down, and now, less than a step away, she's acting like he was the "fatty" funhouse mirror (A/N: every chick I know will gnaw their leg off long before they look at that thing). And why was she even looking in the first place? What in the heck did she want out of him? With the current crowd located at Bullet Bay, he wouldn't be surprised if she had a couch waiting at home which, if she had her way, would have his skin all over it.
Even with the staring contest occupying the Panda King's attention, which he was totally winning, the wait was un-bear-able (ha ha ha…fine don't laugh, at least it's a different direction from the pickle jokes). It wasn't that the line was long, no not at all, the line had gotten to a length of six spaces tops, and that's where it stayed, it was the anticipation that kept his gut twisting into knots. You know that feeling you get when you first go on a really big rollercoaster, y'know, the ones they advertise on TV and your friend's friend's second cousin's step brother, by marriage, swears that he saw someone die on it? You know how when you're less than a minute or so away from getting on the ride, you start to have a few second thoughts, and you get this horrific feeling of fear, doubt, and dread? Well that feeling gets drastically increased when you're about to be thrown into a death trap, crazy isn't it?
The Panda King gritted his teeth as it became his and Law's turn to go into The Grinder. One guard stood at the podium which was also the door controls. Ever since he'd admitted the team prior to the Panda King and Law, a polar bear reindeer duo, he was staring at a screen that had two smiley faces on it. Almost immediately after the two entered one of the yellow faces turned to an all too grim skull and crossbones, the Panda King knew all too well what that meant, it took some time but soon the other smiley soon followed suit. It was time. The hyena pressed a button and the metal double doors opened soundlessly, their well oiled gears going into action once more. He looked to the next to contestants, his eyes completely impassive as he gave the okay for privates Grizzly and Law to enter.
When the two entered, they were immediately greeted by a black curtain, to keep prying eyes from getting a jump on the competition by seeing the first trap. Walking carefully past the veil, as the metal doors snapped shut behind them, they entered a short hallway that had a door at the end. The place was lit by green lighting and the walls, floor, and ceiling seemed to be built in a classic Victorian era style, and the air was thick with dust and the scent of rot, so yeah, much like your average haunted house. The only exceptionally strange thing about this place was that all along the wall were several cuckoo clocks.
"We should just run it," Law suggested, saying her first words to the Panda King, ever.
"I'm sure that the others have thought that one up too," the bear countered.
"Maybe they got through," she retorted, but her words were mumbled, unsure.
Suffice to say, they didn't run. They took a few tentative steps down the hall, practically tiptoeing, as if some terrible invisible beast were slumbering in the hall ready to devour them. However, once it turned out that this was not the case, they began to walk at a steady, but still slow, pace. As they walked, the Panda King looked at the clocks on the wall, he didn't pay much attention to them until he realized that they all had no minute or hour hands, only the ever rare second hand, and they all were in perfect sync. He would've continued to ignore them, but the image of the recruit with the daggers in his back popped into his mind.
The second hands were reaching the twelve when the apprehensive Panda King pulled an alarmed and confused Pt. Law to the ground. She tried to lift his massive arm off of her when the clocks above rang out in a great chorus of bells and whistles. However, instead of plastic representations of a bird notorious for committing murder at birth, when the tiny doors opened they shot out daggers that flew every which way, their targets being the open cuckoo door adjacent from their own.
"You could've said "duck"," Law complained, dusting herself off.
"You'd ask why." The Panda King said flatly.
"Whatever," She said, more mad that she'd been shown up than thankful for the assist. The two moved quickly to the door and entered…
Another hallway, identical to the last, minus the clocks. Another difference being that the floor was rubber. Whatever danger they represented would become clear momentarily, the Panda King thought to himself. "Ladies first," The Panda King said to Law, giving a slight bow.
"Oh geez, I'm honored," she replied with a sneer.
The two walked forward carefully taking everything, looking for any sign of danger, although admittedly there wasn't much to go on. They were about halfway down the hall when all of a sudden they heard a slight hiss. They turned around to find it's source when they were greeted by the ignition of a wall of fire. This alone, frightening as it was, posed no true threat, that is until that very same wall of combustion started to move towards them at a staggering speed. The two turned to high tail it out of there when they found that the door had moved away, they looked down to find that the floor was a massive treadmill, that one that was going at a high speed, and was picking up more by the second.
Now, it wasn't that the Panda King wasn't fit, he worked out almost as if it were a religion unto itself. It was the fact that he wasn't much of a runner, in fact, from his formidable size and legendary strength, he highly doubted there'd be anything he'd have to run from. He now realized how wrong he was, as he soon began to huff and puff from lack of sleep and a terrible lack of cardiovascular fitness, he was bar-b-q.
Law on the other hand, as the bear had guessed, was well acquainted with running, her powerful legs rocketing her across the floor. However, the floor had started to really pick up the pace, putting even her speed to the test. In a last ditch effort, she closed her eyes, crouched and astounded the Panda King as she leaped the amazing two thirds of the hall to turn the door knob at the end, not even Sly could jump that far.
Instantly, as the knob turned, the flames shut off and the floor ceased to move. Law looked back and was disgusted to find that "Private Grizzly" was flat on his butt. "Get up," she practically snarled, "we don't' have all day."
The Panda King would've shot something back at the stalker freak, but he was just glad that she didn't see him have to put out the flames on a particularly embarrassing part of his pants, he wasn't going to be sitting down any time soon.
The two walked into (surprise, surprise) another hallway, however, they couldn't find anything immediately suspicious. Being somewhat understandably paranoid, the Panda King suggest they go back to back down the hall, and Law, being equally somewhat understandably paranoid, agreed (gee, what's their problem? It's not like anyone trying to kill 'em or something like that, right?). However, amazing as it sounds, they made it to the end of the hall without so much as a hitch. Law, who had taken the front took in everything, noting even a white "X" painted on the floor, however, that's not all her fantastic skills of deduction procured. As she reached to turn the door knob, she realized…
"There's no knob," she said over her shoulder to The Panda King.
If the bear had a warm, beating heart that allowed him to feel alien emotions such as humor, mercy, or compassion, it would've stopped at those words. "What?!" he nearly roared as he whirled around to see for himself, and sure enough, where one, or at least anyone sensible, would normally place a door knob, there was instead a bare space of wood, and the slight hint of crushed dreams of freedom.
"Great, what do we do now?!" Law shouted, her voice becoming somewhat hysterical.
"I don't know," the bear admitted, gritting his teeth and keeping his cool, but just barely, "But we need to-"
The Panda King's guiding words were cut short as a bright light shot out at them from their right. The two turned to see a security monitor, the black, white and gray imagery showed an above view of baboon recruit. He seemed to be searching for something, when something suddenly caught his attention to his right. He turned and seemed to be somewhat confused as he stared intently at something off screen. Law gasped when she saw that the ape was suddenly shot dead, twice in the back by some unseen assailant.
The film glitched out and went to a different scene. It was the same set, but a different guest star, the Panda King recognized him as one of the two that went before them, the reindeer. He too seemed to be looking for something, but he seemed to have found it. He turned to a spot on the floor and started to pound away at it, he stopped however, when something caught his attention. The bear gritted his teeth, not out of surprise as the reindeer met the same end as his predecessor, but because the Panda King saw that the deer was striking an all too familiar white "X".
The bear was a brown and green blur as he spun around, ready to rip something to shreds, but only coming face to face with the barrel of a gun. The pistol was held in a threatening manner by a zebra guard who'd been behind a trap door, the click from the hammer cocking caught Law's attention as well. The three stood in an intense silence, the two recruits not knowing their fate.
"Don't panic," were the zebra's only words, rather than a reassurance however, it sounded more like an order, and considering that he still had a pistol pointed at the two, neither one was in a mood to disobey orders. The two became extremely apprehensive of the striped horse's actions as he reached back into the secret room he had come from and flicked an unseen switch. They were somehow relieved that they weren't crushed, stabbed or torn limb from limb due to the zebra's actions, and only the door opened. The situation had become an odd mixture of frightening and relieving as the guard waved them through, yet still had his six-shooter trained on the two.
Both the Panda King and Pt. Law let out great audible sighs as the door closed behind them. Sadly however, their troubles were not yet, as once again they found themselves in another haunted house hallway. They cautiously moved down the hall, when they heard the all too familiar hiss of gas being released. However, unlike the last time, the two were met with a thick green fog that was coming into the hall from all directions. At the rate it was filtering in, it'd take less than a minute for the whole hall to become filled to the brim with gas, and considering that the lights had changed to red and began to flash violently, they did not want to be in there by the time it was full.
The two got low to the ground and rushed to the end of the hall. Once there, they reached a problem, one they'd got hung up on already. The door had no knob.
"Oh, COME ON!" Law shouted, "What are we going to do?"
"Look for something!" the bear roared. And so the search began, which admittedly didn't last long, as The Panda King found out something about the floor and Law found a button.
The skunk took moment to stare at the big red circle with the words "DON'T PUSH ME BUSTER!" comically placed on it. "Oh, that's quaint," Law sardonically muttered as she reached her hand to push. Her finger barely brushed the button's center when "Grizzley" spun 'round and slammed her against the door. A flash of blinding white pain was all that she saw before she could make out the bear's massive brown paw pining her to the wall. "ARE YOU LOCO!?!" the skunk yelled, genuinely questioning the bear's sanity, "That gas is gonna be on us any second! PUSH THE BUTTON!!!"
"Look down," the Panda King instructed, his voice a pillar of steady tranquility.
Law was not in the mood for a game of Simon Says, but since the bear had already pulled her bacon out of the fire twice within the hour, she went along with what he said. As it turned out, the two were walking on thin ice, well, glass to be specific, glass that'd need to be pretty thick to support their combined weight. However, despite that, it did not distort the view of several bodies who had been left to the combined mercy of gravity and the spikes that pointed up towards the two recruits, not pleasant at all (duh).
"Well what are we supposed to do?" Law asked disheartened, defeat and fatigue setting in fast.
"We look," The Panda King asked simply, releasing the woman. Make no mistake, the Panda King was quite afraid for his life, but he'd be damned if he was going to allow himself to die at any time before one o'clock, that's when Cheers came on (where everybody knows your name), followed by MASH, it made up the afternoon comedy block, which he absolutely refused to miss, that was of course unless channel eighty-eight brought back Addams Family and Sanford and Son, followed by the Alfred Hitchcock Spook Slot.
"Look for what!?!" Law said, rapidly searching the walls, fighting the urge to press the button in her panic stricken state.
"I do not know, something that's, oh! It's probably this." The Panda King was looking at a door knocker just a little out of his reach, and even further out of the lady's. Hurriedly, the two looked around for an instrument that could aid them in their uphill journey, finding a chair that was all the way at the other end of the hall, deep within the poisonous fog that was steadily advancing.
Dismayed at this turn of events, the bear looked deep into the skunks eyes, and the skunk looked deep into the bears, and in that one perfect moment, they learned something about one another; neither one of them was dumb enough to volunteer to go get that chair. So adding together all his facts, the Panda King came up with a million and one plans, all of them ending with him dying, and one plan that would work…but he wouldn't like it. Taking one more look at the fog cloud, the Panda King reviewed the reasons why he should want to do this, (partly Jing King, partly his commitment to the Cooper Gang, mostly his own will to live) and he got down on all fours.
Now, the act had caught Law completely out of left field. She really never expected to see "Grizzly" on all fours, firstly since it's a position requested by others for women,…or certain, shall we say, "eccentric" gentiles, or just guys in prison or hillbillie country that have no luck at all. And secondly, because here was not the place and now was not the time for such antics. She stood confused, thinking that the nature of facing his own demise cooked the bear's brain. That was until he grunted and nodded his head towards the knockers, everything becoming clear, and to be honest, if it weren't the life threatening situation, she would've relished the prospect, oh well, she'd just have to save this moment in her brain under "golden memories" and "never gonna happen again".
Law hastily climbed up and stood upon the Panda King's back, the bear hardly grunting at the added weight. Even with the added height, Law had to stand on tiptoe to reach the knocker. Taking the brass ring, she pulled back and knocked three times, as loud as she could, waiting for, well, something. Sadly, for the longest time, nothing happened, the gas continued, unimpeded, it's smoky tendrils beginning to shift silently over the bear's fingers.
Then, suddenly, that all turned around. The slight hiss of released gas turned to the roaring vroom of a vacuum, the gas receding to 'til it was transparent puff, then nothing at all, Law got off the bear's back, to his relief, and best of all, the door opened.
The two walked into the white lights of a waiting area almost identical to the waiting are preceding the hall of horrors. One major difference being the change up of numbers, when the two entered they were greeted by fourteen faces, nine slightly nodding and somewhat unknown, four being guards and hardly caring, the last marching up and all too familiar.
"Well I'd say I'm impressed, but I'm not," General Red commented as he strode broadly towards the two, "Good job just as well though, and I see neither of you died, that's a first."
The two stood at attention, unsure of how to answer this praise mixed with insult.
"Major! Clipboard! I wanna register these two personally." Red shouted to one of the hyena guards. The guard in question hurried over, carrying a clipboard. He handed the general the panel of wood and a pen, then stood at ease at general's side.
"Okay," he said, taking the pen in his hand, pointing towards Law, "What's your name sweetheart?"
"Kitsune Law, sir," the skunk answered, slightly blushing at the highly informal designation.
"Kitsune…Law," The ant said as he masterfully penned the lady's name, his expertly crafted cursive outshining and contrasting to the messy scrawls above, "and you big guy?" he said, pointing the pen at the bear now.
"John Grizzly, sir," the Panda King lied coolly.
At the mention of this particular name, General Red did a double take, nearly dropping his pen. "…The pizza guy?..." the ant said, unsure if he'd heard the name right, starting to doubt the legitimacy of the story as he stared at the Panda King's muscular form.
"I assure you, sir," The Panda King began, in a bid to put the general's suspicions to rest, "they were very, very, big pizzas."
At this statement General Red broke out into a rousing chorus of laughter, "HA HA HA! I guess so!"
"I'm glad to see that even when he has work to do for our glorious mistress's cause," came a smooth, embracing, almost hypnotic voice from the other end of the room, "The great General Red has time joke around." Instantly, every head in the room turned to the same spot, the direction the cloaked insult came from. At the room's exit, there were of the biggest, meanest, and most ruthless wildebeest guards on base, but it was clear none of them were articulate enough to have a word like "mistress's" in their vocabulary. It was clear that they weren't the main attraction, they were goons, stooges, clowns, call them what you will, it was clear that their ringmaster was the guy front and center of their ranks.
He was a panther, a perfect panther. His fur was a striking shade of midnight blue, it was smooth with a grand sheen, not a single stray hair to be found, in a word; flawless. That was just the icing on the cake, his muscles rippled like water on a placid creek, yet looked as sturdy and strong as steel, he buff, but not a walking mountain of muscle like some. Then there was his face, Hollywood handsome didn't come close to what this guy had, it was nicely rounded off where it needed to be and sharp cut, straight and narrow everywhere else, it all working to draw you view to his eyes. His eyes were yellow, and unlike those of most jungle cats, they weren't fierce, or shifty, or anything of the like, no, not at all. They were wide, caring, and genuine, these could've been the eyes of your mother, or your father, your sister, your brother, your best friend, or even your lover…these were eyes you would trust and believe in, even if you didn't wanted to.
The panther strolled into the room, as if he owned the place, and from the reactions from the recruits, one if they didn't know better would be inclined to believe it as well, the guy knew how to make an entrance. Not to mention the wildebeest entourage didn't hurt either, it was a pure show of force and he didn't care who knew it, in fact, he that was his intent, he was out to make a lasting impression, and it was working.
However, it did not work nearly as well on some as it did on others. "Colonel Cobalt, can't you see I'm in the middle of something here?" General Red said curtly, turning around, obviously not impressed as his face switched from joy to strong disapproval, but at least he hid it loads better than his four hyena guards, who barely had it in them to keep from baring their teeth at these smug looking newcomers.
However, despite the less than warm reception, this did not stop Colonel Cobalt from trying to take over the situation. "So," the panther said, circling General Red to look the Panda King dead in the eye, "Am I looking at the next leader of the notorious Company Alpha Zero?"
"There are people still testing for that," The General cut in sharply, "You'll get your chance to be acquainted when you meet with the company's squad leader, whoever that is, at the officer's barracks."
"But of course," Cobalt said, turning to look down at the General who only stood as tall as the panther's waist, "Once again General, I must congratulate you on your decision to deny my many requests of being allowed to bunk in your luxurious home and have me stay with all the common officers in the officer's barracks."
"Sure thing Colonel," General Red said with a fake smile, "because I know you'd never go over my head and complain to Clock-la that I was being too hard on you." Instantly, the smile completely disappeared from his face, "Now I assume that there's a reason why you're here and not doing something useful."
"Yes, well, it has just occurred to me that with this recent rash of deserters and traitors amongst our honorable ranks, in this glorious force the grand lady Clock-la has so geniusly-"
"Get on with it!"
"Yes of course. It has occurred to me that there is a possible security risk at having only so few men work the bay guns. It really is getting hard to tell friend from turncoat these days, perhaps if you'd be so kind as to give me the register of men on duty, or at the very least, let me recommend several men I trust to assist in the task. I assure you we'll all rest easier this way, trust me."
"Hmm…well seeing as I seem to sleep pretty well as it is, and since the men I set up for the bay guns are men I'd trust my life with, and that's not a term I use lightly, I think the bay gun crews are just fine the way they are."
At this answer, Cobalt's eyes widened, the idea that someone actually telling him "no" just completely blew his mind. So, nearly stuttering, he began, "But-"
"However! Since you and your girlfriends here got enough time to come and make requests, it means you've got time to do some work around here. You six," The General said, pointing a sausage sized finger at the wildebeest guards, "the jeeps around here are getting pretty dirty. Get to the motor pool and give 'em a good scrub down. Wash, rinse, wax, the whole nine yards, in fact, do it twice." The wildebeest thugs seemed dismayed, confused, they absolutely did not understand how they got all this work out of the blue. That, however, was not the end, the hyena guards shared secretive grins with one another as General Red rounded on Colonel Cobalt, "As for you, Colonel, I need you to take inventory of all the store houses, leave no rutabaga unturned."
"But that'll take-"
"I don't care how long it takes, just get it done. I want every scrap of food and toilet paper jotted down. If there's a single sheet missing, I wanna know about it. And once you get done with that, give these girls a hand with washing the jeeps. That's an order, is that clear?"
For a moment, every eye in the room rested upon the ant and the panther that towered over him, unsure of the outcome of this situation. For the longest time, the smart money would've been that Colonel Cobalt would've gone into a blind rage and attacked the General, however, in an amazing turn of events, the panther merely broke into a warm hearted smile. "Yes sir. For what greater joy could there be than to serve our grand lady Clock-la, her love and protection washing over us as we do her work." With that Colonel Cobalt, and his men, turned on heel and headed for the exit.
"Yeah, whatever. Corporal Asher!" The General called to another of the hyena guards, "Accompany the Colonel here and make sure he carries out his orders, instead of shoving them on someone else." At this, Corporal Asher had no qualms about not hiding his smile, as he trotted along to watch a despised higher up do a lot of grunt work.
However not all hyena's bore a grin to see the Colonel hit the road. When the panther was out of earshot, the major who stood at the General's side said to his commander, "With permission to speak freely, was that the wisest choice sir? You know he'll just have the lady Clock-la force you into giving him what he wants."
"…No," General Red answered bitterly as the exit doors closed.
"You don't think he will?"
"You don't have permission to speak freely." He then turned back towards Pt. Law and the Panda King who were looking at all corners of the room, pretending they saw nothing of the scene that'd just played out before them, "As for you two…I think you two deserve something special. Get down, start doing some pushups. You can stop when I get tired of watching you worms squirm."
Doing as they were told, the two got onto the floor and began their exercise. General Red was soon dissatisfied with the amount of difficulty the task presented the two, and with a snap of his fingers, a bucket of water was placed upon each of their backs, which they were given explicit instructions not to spill the buckets or heaven help 'em, then as an afterthought, two more were added to the Panda King's back. Now things were really cooking, and that's just how he liked it.
Now I don't know if you know this, but these pushups were hard. Now, I'm not saying that pushups in general are hard, it's a decent, honest exercise which greatly benefits millions across the globe into a desired state of physical fitness. However, I'm sure some of you have done pushups at least once, and I'm sure you will agree that when a bucket of water is added into the equation, the task becomes significantly more difficult. But even that difficulty pales in comparison to the difficulty of when you do the exercise immediately after an already exhausting activity, like say, and mind you I'm just shooting this out there as a random example, get done running a horrible death filled gauntlet.
Now the exercise is actually a lot more accomplishable and far less daunting when the one doing it uses the power of their mind. Most people when exercising will merely think inspiring words at themselves, or merely concentrate on counting how many they're doing or have done so far. However, if the burning of their muscles is far too much and almost unbearable, many people enter an almost trancelike state where they see themselves as what they want to look like, or even go so far as to imagine themselves at some exotic locale, or even at home, anywhere but the horrible place that they are in. The Panda King and Law were at that point.
Now, as much as the Panda King would've liked to be in front of the TV on the ship, watching Cheers, or Law would've loved to catch a wonderful tan at Honolulu, General Red was determined to remind the two of where they actually were.
"Is everything to your liking Private Law!?!" General Red shouted into the skunk's ear.
"Yes sir," Law answered under some considerable duress.
"Not getting tired are you?"
"No sir," Law grunted.
"See, thing is I noticed that you've barely cleared fifty and you're already starting to sweat. It's actually pretty disgusting."
"I'm sorry sir."
"Ain't that the truth!" the General shouted out with a grin before turning on the Panda King. "And what about you pizza boy!?! You're not having any regrets about working for Clock-la are you?"
"No sir."
""No sir" what?"
"No sir, I do not have any regrets."
"Well we've got to change that quick, fast, and in hurry don't we? You're sure there isn't anywhere else you'd rather be right now?"
"No sir," the bear answered, trying to keep his mind off the fact that his arm muscles were screaming at him, for the love of God, to stop whatever it was he was doing to cause such pain.
And so it went. With a snap of his fingers the General added a bucket each to their of the backs, and after everyone (mostly Law and The Panda King) got over the initial shock of that decision, things began to settle into a steady and decent flow. The General would of course be on hand to give out helpful little tidbits of information, such as they should quit now because empty space is far more useful and pleasant to look at than they, or how there is evidence that the rules of natural selection are all bunk, seeing as how a couple of turkey eyed losers such as they made it all the way to the floor in front of him. He would of course take breaks from this, seeing as insulting is quite the tiring industry, allowing the hyenas to inform them that the world would be so much more better off if those two just got up, walked out into the middle of the road, laid down on their backs and died. It really was an interesting situation, filled with a broad spectrum of feelings, like an emotional rainbow, and even to this day, if you were ask them to describe the whole experience in one word, as I'm sure you'll agree, they would say, "SUCKED!"
Pushups aside, the proceedings were somewhat slow. I mean, sure people were going into the grinder and were getting taken out at a steady pace, but it wasn't quick enough to keep those not involved from becoming bored, which might explain why the guards took to torturing Law and the Panda King so well. However, even though it felt like wading through quicksand, things finally settled down and the last recruits had gone through the grinder. The Panda King felt his blood run cold when one hyena informed General Red that out of one hundred and sixty recruits in Company Alpha Zero, only forty-three remained.
"Forty-three!?!" The General shouted, genuinely confused, "There's never been that many survivors before. Hmm…" As much as General Red would've relished the opportunity to ponder on this phenomenon, there were other matters to tend to at the moment. So, going with a great spark of insight, he walked over to where Law and The Panda King were still steadily doing push up, their face nearly red and toenail sized puddles of sweat forming under them.
"Okay recruits!" General Red called out to the forty-one other survivors of The Grinder, "Gather round, I wanna show you kids something." He politely waited for all the recruits to gather around, making sure everyone got a good view of Law, the Panda King, and himself, before continuing. "Look at 'em," he said, pointing his finger at the two on the ground, "They are a couple of losers, aren't they? Sweat covered, smelly, and beat up."
The recruits seemed slightly confused by what was happening, they were pretty banged up themselves, and word around the campfire was that they'd been doing pushups since there was barely enough recruits around to play a game of softball, but that didn't stop General Red from going on to continue raking them over the coals.
"Just look at 'em…these two worms love the ground so much, they can barely keep themselves off of it…Say, why don't you kids show 'em how we all feel about trash like this in Bullet Bay?"
The recruits were unsure, but a few had begun to start in nervous laughter.
"Oh come on! You gotta show 'em what you really think of 'em! Give 'em a piece of your mind!"
It was slow at first, but soon General Red had whipped the recruits into a frenzy. Soon Law and The Panda King, who, might I add, were still doing pushups, heard themselves being called every foul and dirty name in the book, and a few that weren't. In less than a minute, there was a crowd of people who were hooting, hollering, shouting, spitting, essentially everything short of physically running up and proceeding to thug stomp the two.
"Ooh!" The General shouted as he listened to the chorus of insults, with a great broad grin on his face, "Her Mother!?! Good one! Spitting too!?! Pour it on!" Then suddenly, the mood of the room changed, partly because the recruits had run low on new insults, partly because they were dehydrated and had little spittle to spare, but mostly because General Red's face turned to a look of pure hatred and rage as he slammed his fist into one of the recruits.
FWAP!
The punch in question, involved General Red's fist and an understandably surprised platypus. The blow created a resounding smacking noise that quieted the recruits who trained their attention to their comrade who was now on the ground, clutching his chest, spitting up blood and gasping for air, then their eyes shot to the ant responsible for it.
To say that General Red looked furious was putting it mildly whilst adding a fluffy pink bow. His nostrils were flaring, his four hands were constantly clenching and unclenching, and his jaw was set tighter than most dentists would think possible. For the longest time the only sound heard was the General's haggard breathing, and the hard huffing and puffing from Law and The Panda King as they continued to carry out their orders.
"IT'S NOTHING TO LAUGH AT!" General Red suddenly snapped out. "Get those buckets off them, and take him to the infirmary," he said to the hyena guards, his last request intended for the platypus who still on the ground. Two guards quickly moved to remove the buckets, whilst a third helped the recruit up off the ground and helped him hobble off to see a doctor. All the while, Law and the Panda King remained on the ground, doing pushups still, unsure of what to do.
"You two, get up and stand at attention," The General instructed them waiting for them to carry out his orders before engaging the small crowd of recruits once more. "These two, you humiliating batch of gutless cowards, are nothing to laugh at. Not only did they make it successfully through The Grinder like the rest of you, but they also were capable of doing pushups for nearly two hours straight immediately afterwards, with weight on their backs, and with no questions asked. But most important of all, they are only recruits out of the lot of you who did not allow their partner to die. They are shining examples that you should look up to, pinnacles of loyalty in your lady's name, and more importantly, your new squad leaders, who, might I add, you just finished spitting on. How smart do you morons feel?" He then turned to Law and the Panda King, with a mischievous grin on his face, "So, what's your first order?"
The Panda King merely smiled and said, "Ladies first."
Law got a look on her face that resembled the look of joy found mostly on the faces of kids with magnifying glasses near ant hills. "Do laps," she began, "around this room from now until dinner, the one found at the back of the group doesn't get fed."
The crowd stood unflinching for a moment, not quite sure what exactly transpired. Fortunately, or unfortunately, really a sort of glass half full/half empty sort of deal, the hyena guards were on hand to provide enforcement. "You heard her, maggots! Get moving, NOW!" one guard shouted to the lot, brandishing a nightstick in a very threatening manner, his comrades following suit. Pretty soon the whole room became filled with the sound of heavy footfalls.
"You know," General Red said to Law, "You'd be surprised just how many new officers pick that option. Lots of variations on the punishment, but still the same basic formula."
"Excuse me, sir," The Panda King piped up, "but what do we do now?"
"Hmm, good question…how 'bout lunch?"
Gate Crashers
Gabon Coast, Africa 8:24pm
"Okay," Bentley said over the binoc-u-com, from his hiding spot in the bush, eyeing his entrance point from the night before, "let's go over this just one more time."
"Aw, dude, we've gone over this, like a zillion times already," Suzy Q complained over the radio waves, "You're gonna give my brain a total meltdown man."
"Actually," Penelope cut in, "It's been eight times over the course of today, but I do agree."
"C'mon Bentley," Murray began to boast, "I'm pumped! You're pumped-"
"I'm not pumped," Bentley corrected.
"I'm pumped! C'mon pal, let's cut this fart loose!"
"…Okay, let's do this. But whatever you guys do, make sure-"
"Asura mi ono?" The Guru asked, getting his first bit of dialogue since the start of this act.
"No, pumpkins have nothing to do with this."
"Blow the Panda King's cover?" Penelope interjected.
"Close, and a good one, but not quite there."
"Let you get shot?" Suzy Q suggested.
"That's the one."
"Aw sweet, like, what do I win man?"
"Two cents and a swift kick in the teeth, now get to work."
"Aw man, I always win that."
It was the start of the operation, Bentley took a deep breath and looked around. Zebra's were still in their towers, guns at the ready to tag any and all intruders, but that's not what bugged. True, if one of those gun toting ponies caught sight of him, he'd be twenty types of dead, but that wasn't a problem last night, well, not a large one. The trouble laid in the fact that without the distraction of the incoming recruits from last night, all the hyena and wildebeest guards were set back to their routes of inspecting the outer areas of the base. The hyenas were no problem, seeing as Bentley didn't consider himself much of a rooftop man, which of course left the all too friendly flashlight guards which patrolled the base at ground level. It wasn't that he didn't have confidence in his team's abilities, there was no doubt in mind that Penelope and the Guru had him well protected, but it just wasn't quite the same sense of security that having Murray around provided (let's face it folks, having a giant pink hippo bodyguard, capable of knocking just about any bozo into next Tuesday in just one hit, is a pretty sweet deal).
"Well," he said, trying to psych himself up for a task he really didn't want to do, "I just can't sit around all day." He paused to stare at his chair for a moment, "Well, not in a literal sense at least."
Penelope sat and stared from her hiding place in one of the trees. Using her binoc-u-com, she saw and slightly giggled as she watched Bentley plant a dart in the middle of one of the guard's butt cheeks. "Hmph, funny," she smirked to herself as her shelled sharpshooter jetted over the fence and into the tower booth. Once there, Bentley opened up one of his chair compartments and deposited a large rock that disappeared in a puff of smoke and revealed the location of none other than the Guru himself. Bentley waited in the tower booth while the only team member actually shorter than himself climbed out of the booth and disappeared. That was Penelope's cue.
She turned to the wider end of her bough and flipped he helicopter on. She hated starting up in the trees, it took a surgeon's precision not to get the small chopper's rotor's caught on any of the jungle's various vines and branches, but considering that the zebra snipers carried rifles that could easily pick her off from a mile or so away, she was more than willing to grin and bear it. So, after only a few snags and heart stopping moments, she was able to climb up and out of the upper canopy and off towards the base. Now things were really getting busy.
Things were far from busy. Murray was in charge of getting the rhino herd moving, and despite the best suggested efforts "Hey Suzy Q," Murray called over to his, his words partner falling on deaf ears, well, not deaf ears per say, but they might as well be when those ears have headphones that are cranked up as high as she had 'em.
So after several pebble throws numbering in the twenties, Murray came to grips with the fact that he was not an expert marksman, least as far as stone throwing was concerned, as well as gained Ms. Q's attention.
"What, man!?!" Suzy Q shouted, turning the volume down, refusing to remone the headphones. She was a bit annoyed that her investigations of this mysterious new thing called Metal were interrupted by the same guy who had introduced her to the stuff.
"The stuff's not working," Murray answered honestly.
"Like, what?"
Feeling a visual aid was needed in this situation, Murray jabbed a thumb towards the inert herd of rhinoceros.
"Yeah, so?" she asked, the current situation's problem being lost on her.
"We need to get 'em moving!"
"Oh yeah. Well dude! Did you tell them that with capitalism-"
""With capitalism, we're doomed to a society that thrives upon destroying the small. So as such, our streets are paved with crushed dreams of the helpless, and the gutters are only a refuge for the homeless, downtrodden and orphaned to bleed away and die." Yeah I told them that, they just kept on eating their grass, or whatever it is they're eating."
"Okay, how about the fact that the government is so stressed out, deranged, and manic in their actions against any form of communism that at any given moment they could impose a totalitarian regime and take away just about any right on the books, and no one will be able to stop them because the masses have been brainwashed by religion, radio, and television that the government is all powerful, but always on their side and out to protect them and that anyone who talks bad on the government is out to kill people and their children?"
"I told them that too."
"Dude! It doesn't make any sense, that stuff scares the snot outta me."
"Well they don't seem to care about that stuff."
"Did you do that yelling thing?"
"I tried that right after the government totalitarian thingy."
"And?"
"Nothing."
Now, I want to take a moment to review one of Murray's techniques, so that it's effect is not discredited or forgotten. The Guttural Roar, as Bentley once put, is one of "The Murray's" handier, yet lesser known, tactics. The skill requires Murray to firmly plant his feet on the ground, stare his opposition dead in the eye, then, with all the air his sizeable lungs could muster, yell like an axe murderer. This scare tactic has been known to make trained killers, whose bread and butter was the gruesome murder of others, wet their pants and run like scared children from a particularly frightening and engaging campfire story. Unfortunately, as tragic as it may seem, the rare African herding rhinoceros is notorious for two things. One being a mating call that is oddly similar in sound quality to a vacuum cleaner, and two being very, very, hard sense of hearing. In a brief, but much exaggerated, description, you know that old guy in the old folk's home with the yodeling horn sticking out of his ear and you have to yell into it for him to hear you? Well that's what the rare African rhino has to deal with from birth, and it doesn't get much better from there.
Meanwhile, back on the base front, Penelope moved her chopper into position at the far end of the fence, so as not to draw attention to Bentley incase the copter was spotted prematurely. Whilst there, she saw the genius himself use his chair's boosters for a slow descent to the ground. On the ground he looked around for the nearest fence power box, the ominous buzzing of electricity raised the hair on the back of his neck, that is if he had hair, but I digress.
Spotting the same one he'd first looked into the night before, he wheeled over to open it once more. Inside he found all the wires exactly as he'd left 'em, so he quickly pushed past these to see the wire patch for the automatic power cut on for the fence. Unfortunately from the look of things, the device had a small metal antenna sticking out of it. Now, if he were the scholarly, hard thinking type, which he was, he'd say that just ripping the little sucker out of there would tip someone off that he was there and doing something he ought not to. Luckily however, he was the sort to suspect things like that from the beginning, and as such had a plan of action that was already in motion.
A particularly bored zebra sniper sat in his tower, surveying the same, old, boring as hell, barren landscape that was the minefield. Now don't be fooled, this particular sniper loved to be on the night shift guard duty, because it gave him all the time he needed to ponder life's great mysteries. Such as the meaning of life. Who created the world and why. What's the Statue of Liberty wearing under that toga? If he was black with white stripes or white with black stripes? If King Kong fought the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man, who would win? If King Kong won, would he eat Stay Puft? If so, would he eat the whole thing or just the parts that didn't touch the ground? Or more importantly, what would he do if he also had to fight a chocolate monster and a robot made out of graham crackers all in the same day? Would he call up Godzilla and Rodan for help? If so, and if they won, would they tell spooky stories while they ate their fallen foes? And if so, how many batteries would they need for their flashlight, and what size would they be? And if so, who would tell scariest story (I think Rodan)? And while they told these stories, would they constantly need to keep Mothra away to keep him from flying around the campfire? Y'know, just the basic questions every guy asks himself…I think.
Anyways, taking a detour from this veritable well spring of intellectual discussion, our guard was not pondering on such subjects at the time. In fact, he wasn't pondering any questions that'd distract him at the time, hence the afore mentioned boredom. So being bored and such, as most guards tend to be, he allowed his eyes to wander, as most guards tend to do. It was during this wandering of the eye that he noticed something particularly strange about one of the sniper towers, thankfully it was a cloudless night or else he'd never caught sight of it. It was really weird, when he first caught sight of it, he coulda swore it was some little dude holding a stick, but after he took a closer look through his scope all he saw was a pinwheel and a puff of smoke. However, this all became irrelevant as he felt a tug on the back of his shirt, and this very bored guard was transformed into a very unfortunate guard as he fell through the air, his transformation ending with him being a very hurt guard as he landed ungraciously in a pile of trash bins.
Penelope could not believe what she was hearing, as she dispatched the last sniper guard by using the chopper's grappling hook to dispatch the last sniper by tossing him into some garbage cans. "I thought you wanted this to be a covert op. Bentley."
"Well not exactly," The turtle answered from the binoc-u-com.
""Silent as the grave," "Not to be seen, whatsoever," those were your exact words Bentley."
"Yes, but the words "covert op." were never uttered now, were they?"
"Cut the nonsense!"
"Hey, it's not my fault, someone's watching the power box's timer, if I shut it off they'll know it wasn't an accident."
"Oh, yeah, and causing a big ruckus will definitely remove all doubt. You're getting senile in your old age Bentley," she finished coolly.
"OLD AGE!?! I'll have you know I'm-"
"Not caring. Listen, there's got to be a way to go about this without waking up the whole base."
At this, Bentley took a second to think about this. Incidentally, he did figure out a way to do this without waking up the entire staff of Bullet Bay…but he didn't like it. So switching the frequencies on the on his binoc-u-com, he called out for info, "Rhino team, come in rhino team."
"Hey man…whassup?" Suzy Q answered in a very bored tone of voice.
"Well what's your status?"
"Hmm…oh yeah those rhinos…um what's that thing you wanted us to do with them?"
"Move 'em?"
"Yeah that…they're not doing that…it's a real problem."
"It's a very real problem, but listen, I want you to inform me when they do get moving."
"So wait, you don't want us to move 'em?"
"No, move 'em, move 'em as fast as you can just tell me when you get it done."
"Oh yeah, sure thing dude, no problem."
"You know, that's not very reassuring coming from you."
"Hey listen dude, if The Stay Puft Marshmallow Man fought King Kong, who'd win?"
"And that's the reason why."
"Huh?"
Bentley didn't bother replying, he simply shut off the sound to his binoc-u-com for the moment. Now was not the time for talking, now was the time for running the numbers. He had Penelope play his guardian angel with her chopper as he wheeled off towards his destination, and from the sounds of pain and punishment he heard from above on the rooftops and around the corners he assumed that she was doing a good job of it. Which left him with the serenity he needed to run the numbers.
The numbers. He started by taking a quick gander at his watch, which read 8:43 local time. Now, during his brief and admittedly hurried look at the base's schedule he noticed that it was hectic and unpredictable, seemingly changed and switched up on a mere moments whim, just the sort of thing to keep soldiers, or anyone who's not psychotic, on the their toes. However, the only standards that seemed to stay intact throughout the chaotic day to day changes was; dinner at eight, kitchen closes at eight-thirty, lights out at ten, simple yet sweet. Now since the kitchen closes at eight-thirty with a lights out call at ten, that left the bulk of Bullet Bay's staff with an hour and a half to shower, polish their boots, kick back and relax, whatever, before lights out. Bottom line: most guys weren't working, and the few that were didn't act like it.
So, confident in his calculations, Bentley was not at all surprised by what he found at his destination, the communications hub. The turtle was looking at the building with the radio tower from a dark corner across the way from it, he was taking one more look around to make sure that he'd be alone as he exposed himself, the faint sound of a guard being flung against a jeep assured him that he was. Bentley quickly crossed the street to hide in the shadows cast by the comm. building, taking care not to be spotted as he peeked into one of the windows at the back of the building. He smirked mischievously to himself as he surveyed the scene inside, two guards, a hyena and a zebra, sat at different desks, the pony playing solitaire while his buddy, a scholarly type, was more drooling than gazing at a magazine that showed the very sensual anatomy of a Ms. July (don't worry folks, I'm sure the guy only reads those magazines for the articles, NOT!), the two had "prey" written all over them.
Finishing up with surveying his targets, relieved that this situation needn't devolve into him brawling, Bentley immediately came up with a plan. First things being first (ain't that weird?), the turtle slowly pushed up on the window, taking care and not going too fast incase it was rusty or whatnot. The greatest enemies the Cooper Gang has ever had to contend with, going all the way back to the gang's roots, they have come closer to getting Sly, Bentley, and Murray killed or captured and alerted the guards more times than any fancy laser grid or high priced electric eye, these fiends are known as screechy windows, rusty door hinges, and creaky floor boards.
Luckily, their presence was not there that night, as Bentley had no trouble silently cracking the window without alerting the guards. Still working on a no sound basis, Bentley went on to quietly open his chair's grapple-cam compartment, removing the small device and placing it upon the windowsill. After that he circled around to the front of the building and tried the door, jiggling the knob he found it unlocked, which was understandable since it wasn't lights out yet, this was checkmate. Pressing the button to deploy his chair computer Bentley didn't even bother to look at the screen, his hands working from his spectacular memory. He pressed his ear to the door so he could hear the goings on of the inside and pressed the button to initiate the grapple-cam's default distraction noise; "YO UGLY!" Instantly, Bentley heard the noise of two sets of feet hit the floor as the guards inside jumped to their feet and stared at the window, confused.
Bentley quickly put his computer away and opened the door, firing tranquilizers into each of the guard's backs, the slobs never saw it coming, literally. Bentley now had full control of the communications hub, he quickly went to work by accessing the computers in the room, clicking off rather controversial sites the hyena had been gazing at beforehand. He hacked several security gates to come to find exactly what he suspected, if he'd simply deactivated the fence's automatic cut-on; the whole base would rise up like beehive that had firecrackers tossed at it, and they'd all zero in on his exact position. So not being one to put up with that sort of nonsense, Bentley quickly shut that particularly nasty feature off and called it a day. After that he decided to leave a few more little presents before he left, you know, setting up alerts for when certain key phrases are typed in, leaving wire taps on the phones, and making it so that tomorrow, the base's radio station plays nothing but The Bee Gees all day (ooh, he is evil), he finished up by grabbing his grapple-cam and pulling the darts from the guards backs.
That was just about the time that Suzy Q got on the line, "Hey, little turtle dude!"
"It's Bentley, Suzy," Bentley replied over the binoc-u-com.
"Yeah, whatever, listen, it's, like, really groovy! We got the rhinos moving! We're on our way to the base now!"
Bentley high tailed it out of the hub and headed full tilt towards the base's fence, it was all coming together now.
Now I'm sure that some of you out there are a little confused as to the sudden success of our airheaded little duo of Murray and Suzy Q, so please allow me to explain. Another little known fact about the rare African herding rhino is their relationship to the color yellow. Much like how a bull becomes enraged at the sight of the color red, a similar effect is seen when the color yellow is introduced to the rare African herding rhino, except the feeling induce is fear. So, after yelling 'til his throat was sore to get the rhinoceri to, he decided, after a lot of convincing from his partner, to take a mid-mission break. Suzy Q took her free time to compose a protest song against the government so as to protect the rights of potatoes (here's a sample: "Who are you to criticize? You sit up there and fiddle your lies. All the while, you never smile, turning spuds into fries."), Murray on the other hand had decided that it was time for a quick snack. Imagine their combined surprise when Murray pulled out a banana he'd brought with him to munch on.
Which brings us to now, where Suzy Q was sitting atop the rhino at the head of the heard, while Murray was at the back of the herd, holding up an empty banana peel, yelling, "BOOGA! BOOGA! BOOGA!" The job is not as easy as it sounds however, since the way to Bullet Bay was not the most direct one, many times the stampede came dangerously close to veering off running amok in places other than the base, thankfully Suzy Q was on hand to see that such a tragedy didn't occur. She used her eye lasers to cut down several trees to block off any alternative paths the rhinos could take, although she felt really bad about doing, thank goodness this was all for a good cause or she'd never get any sleep after this was over, not that she actually slept in the conventional sense mind you, but she was programmed to do something that was just as close. But to sum things up, she and Murray would be at Bullet Bay in next to no time at all.
Suzy Q and Murray would be at Bullet Bay in next to no time at all, and that was a severe problem. Bentley had rechecked his binoc-u-com and from what he could fathom with the speed the holographic marker he'd pinpointed to Murray and Suzy Q was moving, he wasn't going to have the time to do things the right way, which meant he had to rush, and he hated rushing things. He wouldn't have the time to open every single power box and dismantle them properly, nor would The Guru have the time to telepathically move all the mines out of the way, and from what he could gather from Suzy Q, there was no way they could slow that stampede down.
So, moving like a bat outta hell (I love that song by Meatloaf), Bentley worked quickly to fasten remote detonated bombs to each of the fence power boxes, and he even sent word to Penelope to use her chopper to help The Guru remove all the land mines. Now there was a reason why Bentley hated rushing things, because when you're in a hurry you often tend to make mistakes, cut corners, in short; do a shoddy job. Even the smallest precautionary measures, such as covering your tracks, or looking over your shoulder every so often, can be over looked.
So you can imagine Bentley's surprise when he found himself staring down the barrel of a gun. Now this gun did not materialize out of thin air, Bullet Bay was not the sort of place where such instances occur, even though there was a recent rash of rumors going about speaking of ghosts on the rooftops, but no. Bentley was placing a remote bomb on the last fence power box when he became enveloped in a bright light coming from behind him. Logically Bentley turned around to see the light's source, a wildebeest flashlight guard, that's how Bentley came to be staring down the barrel of a gun.
The situation was far from ideal, the thug had the drop on Bentley and they both knew it. Bentley was extremely low on options, he couldn't deploy any gadget that'd dispatch the guard, Penelope was busy helping the Guru, so no chopper was going to swoop down and save him this time, and any sudden movements or calls for help were a guaranteed way to eat lead. However, something happened, something that baffled the turtle with an IQ well over two-hundred, rather than plug an extra air hole right between Bentley's eyes, the horned hitman smiled, pointed his gun in the air and turned his back to the turtle.
Acting on adrenaline and instinct, Bentley wasted no time in deploying his tranquilizer gun and planting several darts into the guard's back, dropping him like a sack of hammers. After which, Bentley took a moment to pause for thought, why had the guard done that? He was a card carrying member of the Clock-la Cult and Bentley was high up on their most wanted list. That guard should've plugged a bullet right in his remarkable and currently confused brain, or at least tried to detain him for interrogation, torture, and what he imagined would be a very slow and painful death. Sadly, as much as he'd like to take time and muse on the enigma, time was one thing he did not have. So focusing on the current dilemma before him, he accessed his binoc-u-com, "Rhino Team, what's your status."
"On your door step dude!" Suzy Q hollered back, smiling brighter than a kid in a candy store, this job certainly beat sweeping up the old lab.
Bentley could not help but feel somewhat awestruck as he turned towards the jungle just in time to see a solid wall of trees collapse and a firm line of unstoppable rhinoceri were moving towards the base's fence with no intention of stopping, no sir, not while the evil and malevolent yellow colored thing was out get them, and be damned anything that'd get in the way. Well being one of those things that was in the way, Bentley felt obliged to get the hell outta the way. He swiftly deployed his fish pole gadget, attaching it to the unconscious guard's dog tags, then he pressed the nitro boost which and in a burst of rocket powered speed, his chair pulled him forward into safety, dragging the guard into safety as well by dragging him along by his face.
It was there that things began to happen by milliseconds, Bentley pressed the button which detonated the bombs, when the bombs detonated the power boxes blew, when the boxes blew the fence was no long electrified, without the fence electrified the rhinos rushed the fence unharmed, when the rhinos rushed the fence it fell and laid destroyed. Bentley the unclipped himself from the wildebeest guard, leaving him face down in the dirt, and began to head for the rendezvous point, it was mission accomplished.
Shady Speak
The Gabon Coast, Africa 9:33pm
Sly peeked out and around from his hiding place under one of the jeeps by Bullet Bay's motor pool, and he had to say he was impressed by how spic and span the cars were, they must've been washed earlier that day or something. Finally things were beginning to calm down, after the rhino incident the whole base was on high alert, they were looking for those responsible, but from what Sly could gather from listening in on passing guard squads, the whole incident was begging to be chalked up as a freak accident of stampeding animals and a worst case scenario of faulty machinery. He was still reeling from getting into Bullet Bay all, true with the electric fence and landmines out of the way it should have been a cakewalk, but things remained were far from ideal to get in. General Red put up for a special call to duty, a force of what had to be at least three platoons were sent to the outskirts of the base. Sixty or so trained killers roamed the perimeter of what used to be the fence, and even then there were more guards going out and about, removing debris and escorting the errant rhinos off the base and back into the jungle.
Things were far too busy, it'd be impossible for sly to sneak onto the base. In the end they had to resort to Penelope air lifting Sly into the base, which presented dangers in it's own right. Afraid of a possible air strike, searchlights roamed the skies with AA guns at the ready. If so much as a toe was tapped by moving spotlight, or if a single guard had put a call in after seeing a chopper silhouetted amidst the moonlight, heavy shell fire would've tore through Sly like tissue paper. Fortunately, luck was on his side, as Penelope performed the drop behind enemy lines flawlessly without incident, after which Sly made for the closest cover, which so happened to be the jeep under which he now lay, and he'd stayed put ever since.
Which brings us to now, and the go call that set Sly in motion. "Okay Sly," Bentley said over the binoc-u-com, "The coast is clear…I think"
"You "think"?" Sly echoed back skeptically.
"Which brings us to your first task, you've got some time before General Red meets with those cult V.I.P.s, I need you to run a few quick errands."
"Right, because breaking into the house of a man who bench presses trucks isn't nearly dangerous enough."
"Hey, you only have to worry about that if you get caught. Besides, name one time when have my plans ever gone awry?"
"The Anubis head job in St. Louis."
"Okay that's not fair, besides how was I supposed to know the mobster's girlfriend would still be in the bedroom, he was talking to his wife in the next room for crying out loud! Besides, she never woulda saw you if you'd done what I'd suggested."
"Throw her out the window!?"
"Murray was pulling up with the mattress truck, she would've been fine, a little bump and that's all."
"We were eight stories up, that's not "little"."
"You say tomato, I say to-mato, now are we going to start this mission or what?"
"Okay Bentley, what did you have in mind?"
"Well, the reason why I said "I think" is because I've lost radio information from the communications hub. Something must be interfering with my bug, I need you to check out what it is then check back with me, okay?"
"Read you loud and clear Bentley, I find what's bugging your bug in no time flat."
"You know, I expect lame puns like that from Murray, you could try to do better."
"Hey, I thought it was "pun-ny"."
"I'm not even gonna dignify that one with a response," Bentley said as he closed the line.
Sly came out from under the jeep and looked around, the sound of marching feet echoing in the distance. Wanting quick access to the rooftops, Sly wasted no time in find a viable means by which to do so. Being the ever imaginative type, Sly looked around, and where most people would see a pile of horribly over inflated tires lying under a storm gutter, he saw a stairway. Sly took a running start and jumped on the tires, which sagged at first but then sprung Sly just high enough for him to catch his cane on the gutter, from there it was just a bit of good old fashioned upper body strength and he'd gained access to the roof tops.
Looking around at the skyline of Bullet Bay, it hit home to Sly just how notoriously annoying this mission could get. After light, the greatest enemy any thief can face is lack of cover, and he let out a slight sigh at the fact that he could see clear across to almost any roof top on base, the bland, uniform, one size fits all design of the buildings providing little to no cover. Sly could easily see why having radio surveillance on all guards all the time would be so crucial at a place like this. He'd have to rely majorly on the gloom of night and the misdirection of the guards if he was not to be detected. The same misdirection, for instance, that just so happened to be present in a somewhat skittish guard that occupied the same rooftop as Sly.
Thanking his lucky stars that the guard was facing away whilst staring at the guy, Sly was seventy-two percent sure that it was the same hyena guard he'd encountered the night before. The fact that he kept looking down at the roof's shingles as if they were about to start moving under his feet brought the probability of this being the same guy up to a decent eighty-six percent assurance. So being a real rotten and quiet kind of guy, Sly sauntered up behind the guy without making a sound and whispered into his ear, "Good evening."
Using the guard's sharp intake of breath as a go signal, Sly gave the guard a good natured shove over the edge and into a mud puddle below. Sly became one hundred percent sure that this was the was the same exact guard when he pulled his face up out of the mud and started shrieking at the top of his lungs, "IT'S BACK! IT'S BACK!"
Sly began to chuckle to himself at his random act of mischief, that was until he heard the sound of marching feet. He got low to the roof as a small crowd arranged themselves around the hysterical guard on the ground, the miniature mob listening intently as he described how he saw "the ghost" this time, a red skinned, razor toothed demon with a hook shaped tail. Now as nonsensical and far from the truth as this description was, it had drawn the attention of all the guards in the area, clearing up several nearby roof tops, which was something Sly had not expected, so he was more than content to file this incident under "happy accidents".
Returning to a mission state of mind, Sly made sure not to waste such a stroke of luck, and made his way towards the communications hub, which wasn't far from the motor pool. So making brilliant use of the guard free rooftops, various flag poles and numerous power lines, Sly found himself on a building across the way from the communications hub. He was about to jump on the power line leading to the hub's roof when he paused to stare at a rather interesting sight; slinking out of the shadows was a Private Kitsune Law, Sly recognized her from the binoc-u-com video of The Grinder. Now as much of a rude and spiteful woman the skunk cold be, even Sly had to admit that there was something generally familiar and likable about her hair and the way she walked. Of course her likable saunter was gone for the moment as she seemed to be keeping low to the ground, looking to shiftily to the left and right (thankfully for Sly's sake, never up). From her secretive demeanor Sly would guess that she was up to no good, which in a place like Bullet Bay probably meant she was doing her job. However if the answer was the former or the latter, Sly really didn't see the importance, which why he was content to file this incident under "don't know, don't care".
Sly kept low and waited for the Pt. Law to slink off out of eye sight before returning to work. He jumped and landed on the thin wire as expertly as any trapeze artist, walking the high wire with ease. In less than half a minute Sly was on top of the comm. hub once more which left him to scale the radio tower once again. Sly went once more to the lowest hanging and hooked his cane along it, pulling himself up.
In less than the time it took to tie one's shoes, Sly was up at the top of the tower. Once there he could see why the bug wasn't giving out any info, it'd been smashed into a million pieces, and amongst the green and splintered remains of Bentley's device, someone'd placed a bug of their own.
"Uh, Bentley?" Sly said, opening a binoc-u-com line, "I think I might've found your bug problem."
"Oh, that's a shame," Bentley replied wistfully as Sly held up several pieces of bug shrapnel for Bentley to see.
"And it looks like our mysterious friends from last night left us a gift," Sly said as he lifted up the small, generic, and generally ugly little metal box.
"Ugh! They destroyed my bug and replaced it with that?"
"What's wrong with it?"
"Oh nothing, except fourteen months old and outdated like crazy. It's generally the latest state of the art and sold mostly to armies and police, but that's on the legitimate market, on the black market it is strictly bottom of the barrel, we are clearly not dealing with professionals here."
"Do you want me to smash it?"
Bentley thought on this prospect for a second, "Hmm…no. If we did, our mysterious friends would probably just return and place another one here. Just replace our broken bug and leave the other one be."
"Uh, how? I don't know how to repair your gadgets, besides this one looks pretty smashed."
"No, no, no, I placed a spare bug in your side pouch."
"Wait you were messing with my stuff? When?"
"When you weren't looking."
"And when was that?"
"Details, details, details, Sly, you really don't need too many of them in your life, they'll only just worry you."
"Uh huh," Sly said as he reached into his side pouch and removed the turtle's small, green device, "and are there any other liberties you've taken with my stuff that I should know about?"
"Now Sly, that would be telling, and that'd only ruin the surprise."
"Right, well I've got my eye on you."
"Okay, Mr. Paranoid, once you get done there I need you to go see the Panda King, he's got a current listing of troop schedules and this month's list of important events, he's waiting for your rendezvous outside the officer's lounge."
"Yep, that's me, Sly Cooper, errand boy extraordinaire."
Sly placed the device and received confirmation from Bentley that the Cooper Gang once again had gained radio surveillance on all of Bullet Bay. He also heard an all too familiar ping as the officer's lounge was marked by a blue holographic marker. Sly looked to see that the officer's lounge was wasn't far from General Red's house, in fact it was one of the first building one would come across when exiting the premises of The General's house. Judging the height of the radio tower, which was tall enough to catch the occasional cloud on particularly muggy mornings, and the direction of the wind that night, which was pulling in the general direction of his destination, Sly smiled, relieved that he needn't go have to return to ground level, or even rooftop level to reach his destination.
Sly leapt from the radio tower, and before gravity got hold of him and made street pizza ala raccoon, Sly pulled out his paraglider, the large cloth easily catching the air. Sly leaned forward, moving towards the officer's lounge, drifting soundlessly over the guards below, the wind at his back greatly aiding his progress. Within minutes Sly had made a potentially long, secretive, and dangerous journey across the guard filled base with not but a single jump.
Coming in a little too high, Sly made several circles about the building known as the officer's lounge, so as not to make a sound from merely dropping on the roof. Once low enough, Sly retracted the paraglider, landing and making a sound no louder than the snap of one's fingers, something that could easily be lost amongst the loud sounds of revelry that came from within the building. Sly then got low to the building as a simple precaution and crept along the roof's edge, finding The Panda King in his "grizzly" disguise leaning against the wall next to the lounge's front door, a hay colored corncob smoking pipe stuck between his lips.
"I didn't know you smoked," Sly said from the roof.
The Panda King was startled at the sudden question, he slightly jumped and looked around before looking up to see Sly peeking down at him over the roof's edge. "I don't," he answered, leaning back against the wall once more, "It's a gift from Jing King," he then blew into the pipe and several bubbles exited it, floating in the air for a moment before popping.
"Christmas?" Sly asked.
"Chinese New Year," the bear corrected.
"Well I hear tell that you've got a nice little present for me."
The Panda King reached into his shirt and pulled out a collection of papers rolled up newspaper style and held together by a rubber band. The bear wasted no time in throwing the collection of papers up to Sly.
"Oh, by the way," Sly started, catching the bundle in midair with the hook end of his cane, "I saw your girlfriend not too long ago."
"Girlfriend?"
"Oh, you know, pretty little thing, dark blue hair, brown eyes, ten types of creepy, has a thing for staring at you."
"Hmph, Law. Your sense of humor is lacking Cooper."
It was at that moment that they abruptly heard the heavy footfalls of someone marching towards them. Sly retreated back into the darkness of the rooftop, while the Panda King did his best to look innocent (fat chance of that working though). From out of the shadows, looking mad as hell, was none other than Private Kitsune Law. She made a beeline for the lounge's door, but stopped when she caught sight of the Panda King.
"What are you doing?" she more snottily demanded than asked.
"I'm leaking important information to Sly Cooper," he replied honestly, "he's on top of the roof as we speak."
"Fine, whatever," she said, ignoring what she thought was sarcasm, making her way to the door, "I don't have time for this…idiot."
"Oh yeah," Sly said once Law entered the noisy lounge, "I can already see the flowers of true love blooming between you two."
The Panda King looked up and gave Sly a look of disgust and resentment, as if he'd just been force fed sour milk. He then put his pipe away and growled, "I'm getting a drink," entering the lounge and leaving Sly alone outside.
Sly checked his watch and saw that he didn't have long before General Red was to meet with the cult V.I.P.s, it was time to head to the house. Sly jumped down from the lounge's roof and quickly made his way into the shadows. Preferring the cover of darkness (go figure), Sly kept to the shadows as he made his way towards General Red's house, keeping his distance from the well lit, heavily guarded, and constantly monitored road (as crazy as that idea sounds).
Using these covert tactics Sly soon found himself standing at the edge of the seven feet high, four feet thick wall of hedges encircled the three story building that General Red called home. Not wanting to rush in and get a well deserved bullet between the eyes, Sly dropped to the ground and crept as silently as he could under the bushes to take a peek at just what exactly he was going up against.
Things being what they were, it was not the best situation he'd ever encountered, yet not entirely hopeless either, it'd be a work out, no questions there. For starters, the entire inner perimeter was being patrolled hyena guards, the back door was heavily lit and well guarded, and the front was even worse, you couldn't swing a dead cat without hitting musclemen, the lightest concentration of guards, as usual, existed on the roof, four zebra snipers place at each corner of the house, of course this is all not counting the number of guys that could be in the house. Then to pile more icing on the cake, Sly took a miniature spray bottle out of his side pouch, shooting out a fine water mist that caught the red light of various infrared lasers the crisscrossed the house's lawn. Not to mention the windows were of an old style, with multicolored stained glass inset at the top, they weren't going to open, and he didn't even want to fathom the number of alarms that'd go off or the kind of hell sure to follow if he smashed it.
General Red sure knew how to set up a decent security array, it was certainly a warm welcome if you were the suicidal type, but Sly was a never say never kinda guy and, well, he never said never (it's sort of in the description). There was a glimmer of hope however, and it existed on the house's eastern front, this was the side that General Red's vegetable garden was on, to the side of the house away from the heavy guards that existed at the front and back, the garden practically stretched from the hedge wall to the house. In Sly's experience, the vegetable garden usually held a soft spot for whomever owned it, it existed as a private quiet little world, far away from the woes of the world, very rarely does someone allow something so heartless something so cynical, insensitive, and heartless as a laser array to come across it, there were also rumors that lasers ruined your carrots. And the piece de la resistance, there was a trellis that ran up this side of the house, laden with vines that ran in and out of the framework. In the back of the Thievious Raccoonis, there is a glossary, and the phrase ""trellis," adj.; "laden with vines"" is described with "please see; "ladders"".
'Which leaves me to deal with the perimeter guards,' Sly thought to himself as he watched the hyena's boots trample back and forth through the grass. He watched the guards feet, getting a feel for the time in which he'd have to take action until he'd get spotted, he decided the situation called for his world famous ventriloquist act. To start with, any good ventriloquist act begins with a dummy, wooden or otherwise, and one such thing presented itself patrolling near the zucchinis. Sly watched the footsteps and marching patterns of his prey's associates, he counted that he had fifty-three seconds to act without being seen, and whilst fifty-three seconds to you or me might not be long at all, but to someone like Sly, it's all the time in the world.
The last witness turned his back on the zucchinis. That's when the clock started. Sly reached out his cane and tripped up the guard, two seconds. Dropping his cane momentarily, Sly grabbed hold of the guard's legs and pulled him under the bushes making sure to keep his face in the dirt and not allowing him to alert his buddies to his plight, ten seconds. Sly then grabbed the hyena by the head and slammed him into the ground over and over again until the guard stopped moving, twenty-two seconds. Sly then moved quickly to get the guard's arms tucked at his sides in his shirt, thirty-one seconds, after that Sly then ripped the back of the guard's shirt strait up the middle, making sure not to tear all the way, stopping the tear at the center between the hyena's shoulder blades, thirty-six seconds. Sly then got out from under the bushes and got up, forty seconds, grabbing the guard from under the bushes, and putting his own arms through the guard's empty sleeves, pulling the hyena's back to his own chest, forty-five seconds. He then spun the hyena himself around, pressing himself back into the hedges as far as he could go, using the guard's body to conceal himself, forty-seven seconds. Sly then took a quick moment to dust the dirt away from the guard's shirt front, whilst kicking the hyena's legs into a position that hopefully made the guard look like he was leaning back, fifty seconds. Sly finished up by folding "the guard's" arms across his chest, fifty-one seconds, the illusion was complete with two seconds to spare.
Two seconds later, Bud, a perimeter guard, noticed a very strange sight, one of his partners, Lou, in patrolling the vegetable garden must have lost his mind, because he now leaned back against General Red's hedges, an offense that easily earned three hours at the beating poles, but he was also directly shirking his duties, something the General tended to get a lot more maniacally creative over. "Lou!" Bud whispered desperately to his clearly suicidal friend, "What are you doing?! You know Marx had to sit in a tub of ice in the meat freezer with a plate of warm food constantly kept out of his reach for a full two days, just because he was late for his guard shift! General Red is right inside that house; he could be looking out here any minute! And he's been really grouchy lately, please don't do this to yourself!"
"…Take a hike," Lou sharply replied in a rude and gruff tone of voice, it didn't sound right.
"Are you okay Lou?" Bud asked, slightly offended but still worried.
"I'm perfectly fine. You on the other hand seem to be afflicted with severe stupidity and ugliness, on top of being deaf. Take a hike!" at this point Lou made a series of hand gestures which are often blurred out on TV, their meaning being rather descriptive and somewhat unsavory.
"Fine, what do I care? When you get in the hospital, tell Marx I said "hi"…***hole."
Sly waited for Bud to return to his regular routine and another time space of fifty-three seconds before making his move. Once the timer started again, Sly sleeved Lou's arms and placed his hands in his pockets, leaving him to continue to look like he was snoozing on the job. Sly then retrieved his cane from under the hedges and made a dash across the garden and up the trellis, the only evidence of his presence being an unfortunate and trampled upon eggplant.
Sly clambered up the trellis, climbing up to the roof's edge stopping only to peek and take stock of the situation on the roof. There was a skylight that seemed to lead to the third floor, where The General office probably was. But to cut the glass or simply smash it would definitely draw the attention of the four snipers, who would probably call in spotting public enemy number one as a standard before trying to take his head off. He needed to bring Bentley in on this trick.
Sly climbed down the trellis a little bit, so as not to be disturbed during his conversation, "Bentley, you there?"
"Nope, no one here but us chickens," the turtle replied over the binoc-u-com.
""Chicken" huh? Well I guess it's a change from "honey"."
"Shut it, what's on your mind?"
"How do the guards' walkie-talkies work?"
"Actually, Murray and Suzy Q just finished talking to our hyena friend in the brig on just that subject. Apparently all standard guard communications are routed through the radio tower."
"He told you that?"
"You just need to know how to ask things in just the right way."
"And you know how to ask the right way?"
"No, but Murray does," the turtle admitted, the sound of cracking knuckles faintly being heard in the background.
"Could you use that bug I planted to block all radio transmissions?"
"Yes, but shutting it down would alert Bullet Bay to our presence, it wouldn't take 'em long to track down our pirate ship Sly."
"I'm not saying to shut it down permanently, but for a minute or so."
"I suppose I could, but what exactly are you planning?"
"Nothing much, just playing a little bit of Simon Says."
"Okay shutting it down now, you have two minutes."
"Two minutes? I thought you had confidence in me."
Sly closed the line and got on the roof. He ran to the center and threw down an alarm clock gadget, the shrill sound of bells instantly drawing the four guards attention, Simon Says "look over here". As a reflex they all instantly went for their walkie-talkie, telling those listening about the sensational news that Sly Cooper was among them, at least they would have if Bentley hadn't blocked all radio communications, Simon Says "shut up". Sly then threw down a smoke bomb, taunting the zebras all the while, "Figures, wusses like you morons would have someone else go after me. Shame too, Clock-la probably would have rewarded whoever caught me." At this, the zebras were not going to allow this golden goose to get away, all of them rushed into the smoke, poor saps, Simon Says "walk into the smoke". By the time the smoke cleared from the roof, Sly was already using one of the guard's keycards to open the skylight and go down the stairs therein, leaving four very hurt and very unconscious zebras on the roof, Simon Says "go see a doctor".
Sly crept down the stairs, taking his time so as not to incur the wrath of any possible creaky floorboards. Once at the bottom of the stairs he found himself in a hallway which turned sharply to the right. Peeking around the corner, Sly found what could probably be assumed to be General Red's office, considering it's on the top floor, has a fancy oaken door with golden handles, and had six hyena guards, all armed to the teeth, conversing about how lucky they were to be allowed to even see General Red's office.
This was a problem, there was absolutely no way that he could discreetly get into that office. It was possible that he could go down to the door, loosen the teeth in each guard's head, and waltz in the office, saying that he wasn't Sly Cooper, just a very good look alike. Yeah, and after he did that, he'd call up Clock-la and convince her to forget this whole "take over the world business" and then they'd all go on a nice big picnic. But somehow, despite the plan being as brilliant and flawless as it was, he just couldn't see it working.
The problem was the guards, even if he could lure a few guards away with the alarm clock gadget, there'd still be a few who'd remain to alert anyone in that office that there were hijinks going about. It was about this time that Sly felt rather cold. Looking about, Sly found that the source of his "cool" disposition came from an air vent on the wall to his right. Sly smiled to himself as the answer to his dilemma blew out cool air, "It's like dad used to say, when all other means are spent…vent."
Sly reached into his side pouch and pulled out a screwdriver that he'd recently begun to carry on his person at all times, a habit which he'd picked up since Antarctica. He reached up and undid the screws which held the grille to the wall, placing it silently to the floor. He then crawled inside and made his way to General Red's office.
When he made his way inside the office vents, Sly stooped at the grille that gave him the best possible view of the room, and his heart stopped dead at what he saw. Inside what he saw could have been any number of rotten duos, Wolfman and Frankenstein, Fred and Barney, heck, even Alien and Predator if they could keep their hands off one another, any one of those teams, and Sly would've been able to take it in stride. Unfortunately, what sat in two rather nice and probably expensive chairs in front of what could presumably be called General Red's desk was two faces he'd not expected to see, both of whom he first saw in Clock-la's entourage backin in London; the "#1" kangaroo, and the raven named Edgar, the one who killed Raleigh. The idea that two more members of the Fiendish Five were on base was alarming, their presence could mean the end of this mission by tonight, and as these two were somewhat terrible on their own Sly could not help that one rather unpleasant face was missing from the scene.
Sly's confusion at the location of General Red was short lived however, as the one and only army ant stepped through the door. "Sorry to keep you two waiting," General Red said, making his way towards his chair, his face momentarily obscured, as the desk actually came up to his hairline. "I just got done talking on the phone with Clock-la," the ant continued once he got in his chair and could see eye to eye with his fellow Fiendish Five members.
"It is guut to see you herr general," Edgar said, tipping his hat.
"Yeah, top o' the mornin' and all that," the lady kangaroo said with an Irish brogue.
"Morning?" The General said in mock confusion, "At this time of night?"
"Eh, got t' be mornin' some'ere," she answered shrugging her shoulders
"So, I understand zat somesing to your fence, correct?" the bird questioned.
"Ah that is such a pain," General Red said, a look of frustration evident on his face, "Apparently, from what I was allowed to gather is that bunch of rhinos went berserk."
"What yer "allowed ta"?" the kangaroo said confused, "I thought this 'ere was yer base, ay?"
"Yeah, but that wormCobalt went behind my back as usual, and made it so that he's the one who's in charge of investigating what happened to my fence. I didn't even want that damn fence on the base because things like this could happen. I told her we needed a concrete wall, but no."
"I take it zat you ont Cobalt 'ave come to no agreement?"
"Heh, heh, no."
"Ont zat is vhy?"
"He's a slimeball, bible thumpin', watchdog piece of garbage, and if I had my way, I'd personal plat a bullet in his head, and he knows it."
"Eh," the lady began nonchalantly, "ye got no one t' blame yerself there Reddy boy. It's yer own checkered past with higher ups that calls fer a watchdog."
"I can understand and almost respect that. It's the fact that at almost every turn he's running off and crying to Clock-la on how I'm being too hard on him and going too soft on the troops by allowing them free time. Get this, one day he ran off to complain that I'm giving the troops too much to eat, and I catch the slime eating a steak and lobster lunch, he'd smuggled it in and tried to say that it was a gift from Clock-la herself."
At this the lady snorted, "That was a bad move. So wha' did you do t' 'im?"
When met with this question, a look of undeniable anger flooded General Red's face, "That's the worst part, since he's Clock-la's eyes and ears here in Bullet Bay, I can't actually punish him, the worst I can do is order him to do some meaningless and mind numbing task. Same goes for any flunkies he dictates are essential to his task, which is the entire wildebeest division, gutless rats."
"Must be difficult to run a base under such conditions," the raven interjected.
"Don't I know it? He's turned a lot of men against me, and I've lost control of the bay guns due to him. He's an ambitious little turd, I'll give him that."
"Really?" the kangaroo questioned, "'Ow so?"
"The other day I caught him in here, sizing up the office, and ever since old Doc Burger got pinched, he's been taking every opportunity to suck up and make himself look pretty."
"Ha, ha, HA! Yeah 'e's a greedy un alright."
"Ze boy is living in a pipe dream if he sinks zat Clock-la vould offer the guut doktor's place to him," the raven concluded.
"And why's that then?"
"It vould be an admittance of vrong doing, a sign of veakness, a sign ve cannot avford to make."
"Uh oh, looks like Edgar wants us chap on about, as 'e'd say, "vork". Listen Reddy, it's been quite the bit of a trip, ay, and I've got a hunger that's burnin' from my gut t' my gob. Got anythin' t' eat 'round 'ere?"
"Sure thing dollface, kitchen's on the first floor, but my chef's gone off shift, you'll have to cook for yourself."
""Dollface"?" the kangaroo said as she got up and headed for the door, "Well aren't you awfully cheeky. Oh, and before I forget, I completely agree with…eenie, meanie, miney, Reddy."
General Red waited for the lady to leave the room before rounding on the bird, "Okay, Edgar, time to answer some questions. What're you two doing here?"
"Vell, it is just zat vith Doktor Burger gone, ze lady is somevhat concerned," Edgar said calmly.
"Concerned?"
"Yes, zat's vright."
"Afraid that I'm going to run?"
"Nien, you be dead if zat vere ze case."
"Then what's she concerned about?"
"To be perfektly honest, afraid of ze Cooper."
"That string bean slime?"
"Ah, ah, ah, zat "bean" vonce defeated our lady."
"Yeah, but that was years ago."
"Nonzeless, he haz dealt a heavy blow vith ze doktor's defeat. Many members have left vith Burger's imprizonmet, ont you are a far more prominent member zan he, imagine vhat vould occur vith your defeat, especially vith ze lady's speech so soon. Ont Sly Cooper iz notorious for showing up at ze vorst of times."
"So you two are here to babysit me?"
"If it pleazes you to sink so, yes."
"It doesn't."
"Vell, it iz only an offer, an olive branch, ze lady haz left ze final decizion in your hands."
"Well, if that's case, then-"
"Ont before you do," Edgar interrupted earnestly, "pleaze permit me to speak."
"…Go ahead."
"…In ze original Viendish Vive, after zere greatest victory, ze capture of ze Thievious Raccoonis, zey split into various locations of ze globe, each to build moderately successful criminal empirez, each becoming zere own veritable name in ze vorld of crime. But ze greatest veakness zey faced, ze source of zere downfall vas-"
"Sly Cooper, heard it a million times."
"Nien, ze source of zere downfall lay in a lack of comradery, vonce zey had gotten vhat zey vanted, zey abandoned vone anozer, ont as such, vone by vone, zey fell to a mere boy vith a cane in hiz hand ont a cap on hiz head. So you see vhy ve are here mien general."
"…And I say whether you two stay or go?"
"Zat iz correct, yes."
"…This is my base, and I run it the way I see fit. Now if some pencil necked punk with a stick in his hand comes to my base, messes with my men, and tries to make me look stupid, I handle it. Now I appreciate the gesture, but I'm afraid that your services won't be needed. Is there anything else?"
"Not for ze moment, no."
"Then I expect you guys to be heading out by daybreak."
"I vouldn't have it any ozer vay."
Sly waited a little bit longer in the air vent to see if any more subjects of crucial importance would come up in conversation. Sadly however, from talk of the travel to the base, preference in foods, and what color the kangaroo's underwear may be (incidentally it was yellow, they agreed it to be blue), Sly discerned that the two were now only going to engage in small talk, it was time to head back to base. His plan for extraction was relatively simple, get out of the vent, go up the stairs, make it to the jungle, and head to the ship. Simple, sweet, and easy to conduct.
Unfortunately, as easy the plan was on paper, and, well, everywhere else, it hit a small snag. He got out of the vent, and went up the stairs, but it was about the third phase of the plan that things began to go south. You see, Sly had reached the roof and was surprised, understandably so, to feel a severe pain in his jaw as someone introduced their knee to his face, the meeting was far from jovial. The blow was powerful, painful, and even knocked out two of his back teeth. He waited for the little birdies fluttering about his eyes to hit the bricks before looking for the one responsible for knocking the taste out of his mouth, which just so happened to be the kangaroo from the room below…you know in retrospect, the snag wasn't nearly as small as I'd lead you to believe.
"Well, well, well," the lady began, putting her dukes up, "I thought I 'eard a rat crawling about in the vents, and it's a big'un too."
Sly waited a moment to speak, seeing as he had to spit out the mixture of blood, spittle and missing teeth that had mysteriously formed in his mouth (well, not mysteriously but it did make it somewhat messy to speak). "PTEW! Well that's an awfully interesting way to say hello."
"Eh, I like t' keep thin's somat in'erestin'."
"…What?"
"I said I like t' keep-"
""Thin's somat in'erestin'"."
"Yeah, s'right."
"Okay what? Listen, I work with a koala that doesn't speak a lick of English, and he's so much more understandable than you. Are you trying to speak English? Is that it?"
"'Ay, I think I spe'k pretty good En'lish."
"No you don't, that's kind of where the confusion's coming from."
"Wha'ever."
"I gotta ask," Sly began with a grin at the upcoming classic line, "what's a girl like you doing in a place like this?"
"Workin' fer Clock-la? Eh, what kin I say? The hours're good, the pay's respectable like, and it beats flippin' patties. 'Sides what other gig let's me knock the teeth outta yer gob?"
"There's a fox I know who asks herself the same question, I should introduce you, you'd get along just fine."
"S'all right, sure, just as soon's as I git done smashin' yer face in."
"Yup, get along just fine." Now as much Sly's somewhat calm demeanor may lead you to believe that he was unafraid of the red headed woman standing before him, allow me to enlighten you to the contrary, he was scared out of his mind. In between sentences, Sly was involuntarily tonguing the empty spaces in his gums where he used to have teeth not five seconds ago, and to further complicate matters, he kept having to tighten the grip he held on his cane, as the sweat from his palms made his grip somewhat slick, despite wearing his gloves. This lady, well to be blunt, this lady hit hard.
Now Sly was not a connoisseur for getting knocked upside his head, but it certainly was not the first time he'd been hit in the face, and to be honest, he was astounded that he was still awake, even though nothing would probably taste right for a while. He'd never seen anyone hit as hard as she did. In fact, the only one that came close was Murray, back in the Contessa's prison where he'd been head tripped into grinding Sly's bones to make his bread. During that entire unpleasant fiasco, Murray was in high end, full tilt, "kill everything that moves" mode, this girl on the other hand, she had come extremely close to landing a knockout blow on the first hit, and from Sly could tell, by looking at the smirk on her face and the lax stance in her legs, she wasn't even trying.
Now as much posturing and bluffing Sly was doing by not breaking down, clutching his jaw, and screaming "ARGH! MY FACE!", it's somewhat humorous to think that Sly had no intention of fighting this woman, and the greatest card Sly held was the fact that she didn't know this. Which is why when Sly made a move like he was about to rush her, which was something she had about twenty-three ways of dealing with, fifteen of them involving lethal force, instead of following through on the physical threat, Sly reached into his side pouch and threw down a smoke bomb.
Instantly, as the small pop of the relatively simple device was heard, as soon as it's wispy and opaque contents obscured the kangaroo's view of Sly and vice versa, the raccoon made a break to the left. Now there was a reason as to why Sly picked this direction, in fact there's two of them, the first being that it was the direction that went straight towards the jungle, aside from the one or two building between that roof and the trees that secured Sly's freedom, the second reason being that it was a direction other straight ahead. In Sly's experiences with clouds of smoke, guards, nine times out of ten, afraid of losing the elusive raccoon will run straight forward through to the other side of the smoke, now there's no real explanation Sly can give to explain as to why this is, it's just something guards do. However, when this phenomenon occurs, it benefits greatly not to be in the same place, or even run in the opposite direction. Was it brave or noble? No, but so far it's been an extremely effective means of dealing with most riffraff.
Now, there is a reason why I used the qualifying word "most" in the last sentence, seeing as not long after the throwing of the smoke bomb Sly encountered a prime example as to why the word riffraff did not exactly fit to describe his opposition. Sly was making his grand dash for the roof's edge, his fingers just itching to deploy the paraglider which would secure his entrance to?...Well let's not always see the same hands now…yes, the jungle, that's right. Sly was just a few scant steps from the edge, subconsciously beginning to crouch for his leap, when something caught his throat. Now I'm not saying like as he ran, he had his mouth open and a beetle flew down the wrong tube, no. I'm saying that a certain lady kangaroo ran up behind him, grabbed him by the throat, picked him up by that very same crucial part of the body along with the back of his shirt, and flung him back into the smoke which had yet to dissipate or even entirely exit from the device which Sly himself had thrown down.
Using his somewhat exceptional agility, and with a little bit of luck, Sly twisted in the air and landed on his feet, kinda like a cat or Einstein (few people knew that about him), aside from the fact that he coughed as he forced air into his lungs and touched his free hand to the nice, shiny, new bruise about his neck. Sly quickly stopped seeing to these minor injuries, now was not the time for sitting about and crying about scabby knees, rhetorically speaking, now was far too dire a situation for such distractions, not rhetorically speaking.
The only problem was that for all accounts, the girl was gone. He knew that she was still on the roof of course, it'd be silly to think otherwise, and of course he wasn't the sort to rely on eyesight alone, but he should have at least been able to hear her. Let me tell you something about Sly Cooper, he without a doubt has one of the sharpest senses of hearing on the face of the Earth, and understandably so, when his profession is taken into account. But it is an amazing thing, freak of nature sort of stuff, bordering on miraculous, when Sly Cooper concentrates those astounding ears of his. He can literally (and this is no exaggeration) hear a flea jump from one blade of grass to another, give an accurate description of a humming bird's heartbeat, hear the click of unlocking tumblers on a three foot thick steel, and he can accomplish all this without the use of a stethoscope or any other sound aiding devices. His ears are that good.
The disconcerting part of this was the fact that as amazing as Sly's ears were, he heard nothing. Of course heard the hiss of the smoke bomb as it expelled the last vestiges of smoke from within itself, as well as he heard one guard at the front of the house complain how Col. Cobalt got him banned from the enlisted men's and the officer's lounges. But as hard as he strained his hearing, entering a state of concentration most martial arts experts would be proud of, he could not, not matter how hard he tried, absolutely could not hear where the lady kangaroo was. No footsteps, no breathing, nothing, it was as if she were a ghost or was never there at all.
Then it happened. Sly was trying to hear for her, trying but failing, when he sensed a presence, but from where he did not know. He then felt the warmth of her breath as she whispered these words into his ear, "You tried to run, cheeky blighter." Knowing that she was behind him, out of a mixture of instinct and fear, Sly spun around and cracked his cane against…nothing, there was nothing there once more, at least that's ears were telling him once again, and they had just become somewhat faulty as the heavy sound of his own heart beating on high end began to obscure his hearing slightly.
The smoke finally began to clear up, which allowed Sly some visibility, but ultimately this turn of events was somewhat ineffectual as the lady saw fit to end the fight there and then. This grandstand of pain and punishment began with a running punch that cut across the other side of Sly's face and intensified Sly's already somewhat profound feeling of slight concussion. Luckily for Sly, the girl now stood in front of him, using what strength he could summon, desperation fueling actions and his adrenal glands functioning to put his speed and strength at top gear, Sly ran forward, bringing his cane back for a baseball swing that'd put some major league batters to shame, at least the ones that didn't use horse steroids (do they even exist?). Sadly however, as powerful as the blow was, which incidentally was strong enough to shatter bones and turn bricks into powder, it was not strong enough and certainly not fast enough to effectively strike his assailant. The girl easily caught the two handed blow with one hand, grabbing the cane with ease, pulling Sly towards her in an easy and fluid motion, allowing her free hand to do…something.
It's hard to explain, many times in review of this night Sly could not accurately describe what occurred, all he knew was that the girl reached out towards his left underarm, pressing into several exact points in his muscles with her fingertips, and when she'd stepped away, his arm had fallen to his side, as limp and useless as a wet noodle, and any effort to get it in motion caused incredible pain. In a move of even further desperation, Sly struck out his cane in one working arm he had left, which was disabled in the same manner, as well as give the girl the leverage needed to flip him flat onto his face, causing him to drop his cane in the commotion.
Sly wasn't on the ground for long however, as the lady delivered a kick to his stomach which painfully lifted him off the ground and put him back onto his feet. Sly was barely conscious, to say that he was standing only meant gravity hadn't got to him yet, his eyes only staying open out of a primal fear of not knowing what could occur should they close, he was in trouble. This fact however, failed to move the lady kangaroo, or at least failed to move her from moving, which is to say the woman continued to move, undaunted by any moral obligations, towards the master thief. Sly stared at the woman's right fist through charcoaled eyes, watching it tighten for the briefest moment before it became nothing but an unidentifiable blur that swiftly moved towards his face, sending him flipping through the air, his flight ending with him once again face down on the roof.
Sly lay defeated before his opponent, cringing at the sound of each footstep the woman continued to take towards him despite this fact. Tremors of pain shot through his body as the woman used her foot to turn Sly over onto his back, after which she lightly dusted away some of the dirt that had accumulated on his shirt front, setting a nice clean seat for herself on Sly's chest.
"And ta think," she said as she settled her toosh on his beaten and broken body, "You once put one over on t' boss lady. Not much of a screama like most uns, gotta give ye that."
If Sly had the ability to speak coherently at the moment, he might've commented on how lucky he felt to receive the compliment.
"Oh, an' I'm sure yer little friends are probably worried 'alf t' death about you."
Sly wasn't one hundred percent sure on that, he did however vaguely recognize the sound of Bentley shouting out orders on the other end of the binoc-u-com, but the words were far away and sounded alien.
"An' as I'm sure they're probly earin' in on all o' dis, they can put their minds t' rest. If I know General Red, and I 'appen t' know 'im rather well, 'e'll want this t' be a private soirée, and as such, I'm going to let 'im discover you on 'is own terms, I'm not even gonna let 'im know yer up here, I'm just gonna leave ya up 'ere fer yer friends to pickup, an' if thin's go the way I think they will, I'll be 'eadin' 'ome by day break. So…g'night." POW!
Sly swam in darkness, the last blow knocking him over the line and into unconsciousness. In his sleep, Sly had a dream. He was eight years old again, and his clothes didn't fit him well. He floated in darkness, no, he wasn't in darkness, he was in the dark closet of his old house's den, where his-
"OH PLEASE!" came a woman's voice from out of the shadows, continuing to berate with a slight southern drawl to it, "You don' mean to tell me that every time you pass out, this is where you return to!"
In an instant, the closet door snapped shut on the den where some atrocity was sure to occur. The eight year old Sly rubbed his nose as the door slightly smacked it in the swiftness it took to close.
"Please, come in."
The closet door opened once more, but the venue onto which it opened was entirely new. The place was a far cry from normality which was present in his father's den, the place was unreal, you couldn't shake a stick without hitting a silk pillow or satin drapes. The few places that weren't covered pillows or frilly cloth betrayed the existence of a dirt floor and wood and clay walls. And the few places that had neither, there lay tarot cards, spent thread spools, sewing needles, burnt out candles, and Mardi Gras beads, in summation, the place was a chaotic mess.
The only exception to the tornado wreck the room resembled was a single round and wooden table that sat at the center of the circular room. Taking a few unsure and tentative steps into the strange room, Sly looked about, not sure if abandoning the familiarity of the closet was the best idea. There was perfume in the air, and not just one type. He could tell as his nose was engulfed in thick and heavy waves of alluring scents which seemed to cloud Sly's concentration and make his movements somewhat slow and lethargic. Uncertainty increased several times over when the closet door closed of it's own volition once Sly hard gone far enough to not get his tail caught when it slammed shut. He rushed back to see if he could possibly pry it open, but to no avail, he was trapped. Sly looked about to take further stock of the room to find that the place was illuminated by candles of various shapes, sizes and colors that floated mystically in the air, he was astounded to see that as the wax melted and dripped down the sides of the candle, the droplets of melted wax succumbed to gravity for only the briefest moment before stopping in midair and reattaching itself to the bottom of it's waxy home.
As amazing as this was, Sly continued to look about for any means of escape, finding it in a single, glassless window. Rushing to the small portal, Sly had to jump, pull and strain himself to look outside, his small child's body not providing him the proper height needed to look without work. For a brief moment, Sly became horrified at the prospect of not returning to his proper age, he'd have to wait years and years before he could properly reach the top shelves again, the concept was far too mortifying to grapple with. Luckily Sly had other things to occupy his mind, he pulled himself up to see that he was in a rainy swamp, where this swamp was…was anyone's guess. But Sly reassured himself with the cold comfort that if worst came to worst, he could make a break for it by swimming, at least that was until he reminded himself that he couldn't swim to save his life. He silently hoped that those words wouldn't require a literal occurrence. Sly refrained from saying some awfully rude words about the fact that he was now no longer just trapped, but perfectly trapped, with no idea where he was, and left to face the fact that he wasn't even his proper age.
"Would you please sit down?! Some people have things to do after this." The woman's voice chastised. Sly felt somewhat relieved that the voice no longer came out of everywhere at once, but now had a source, or so he hoped. The voice came from the direction of the closet, to which Sly turned to discover that the closet door was gone, frame and all, in it's place was a doorway, the room onto which it opened was blocked by thick purple curtains.
"Why are you still sitting there?! I told you to…oh I'm sorry. Silly me…I forgot the darn chairs." Instantly, two thick wooden chairs shot out from behind the curtain to float and set themselves at opposite ends of the round table, Sly felt somewhat impressed to see the mess on the floor actually move itself out of the way and allow the chairs to land. Realizing he had no options left, Sly got down from the windowsill to take his seat at the nearest chair, once again facing evident height problems in this task as well.
No sooner had he done this, when he heard a clattering of metal and china from behind the curtains that marked the room's only entryway. Sly watched the curtains began to move and reveal his somewhat enigmatic host. He became horrified however when he found the voice who'd been ordering him about this entire time was none other than his former nemesis, a former member of the old Fiendish Five, the mistress of the mystic arts, the wild witch, Mz. Ruby.
"YOU!" Sly exclaimed and pointed at the sight of the voodoo priestess.
"Yes, yes, it's me," the gator woman retorted lazily, as if they were discussing the weather.
"You," Sly practically growled, his shock and fear quickly turning to anger.
""Killed my father!" you'll say. Then I'll say, "No Luke, I am your father!" Then you'll shake your head and say "No. That's not true, THAT'S IMPOSSIBLE!" By which time I'll retort, "Search your feelings. You know it to be true." Then you'll begin a series of blood curdling screams in which the only intelligible word is "no", after which I'll pickup with, "Luke, you can destroy The Emperor, he has foreseen this, it is your destiny. Join me, and together we can rule the galaxy, as father and son!" You'll look around until I say, "Come with me, it is the only way." Then you'll jump off the edge into the black abyss, and months later, a blind Han Solo will knock Boba Fett into the sarlacc pit."
(A/N: Yeah, that's right, Mz. Ruby's a Star Wars fan, what're you gonna do about it? Give me a bad review? (Oh please God don't!) You know, it's surprising, not many people know that Mz. Ruby actually owns models of an X-wing fighter, and The Millennium Falcon, both signed by George Lucas, Mark Hamill, James Earl Jones, Harrison Ford, and Carrie Fisher, mister Ford's signature is the only one on the list missing from her model of The "Incomplete" Death Star. It is also rumored that Mz. Ruby is actually capable of playing the Imperial March on guitar, the only possible living witnesses to this being Muggshot and The Panda King.)
"Listen," she continued, "I don't want to be at this all night, so speaking from one adult to another, let's refrain from the clichéd and over used dialogue, okay? And before you do something silly, like scream a war cry and leap across the table in some misguided attempt to throttle me, please keep in mind that you currently lack your cane, your backup, are currently in the body of an eight year old, and at anytime, magic or no, I could scarf you down faster than three platefuls of flapjacks. Now before I sit down and have to get up again, tell me, are you one of those weird types who take cream with their tea?"
The last question caught Sly completely off guard. It hadn't been until she asked it that he noticed that she'd been carrying a tray laden with a rather eloquent china teapot with two matching cups, a sugar bowl, and a plate piled high with several squares of lemon pound cake.
"Well?" she snapped, reminding Sly that he'd been asked a question, "Cream or no? I'm not holding this tray for my health."
"…No," Sly tentatively answered, feeling thoroughly confused as the situation had not only taken a turn for the weird, but hit the nitro button on it's way.
"No cream, good," Mz. Ruby said as she settled her large form into her chair opposite Sly, setting the tray within arm's length of the raccoon, "Saves me a trip. Oh, and I suggest you take advantage of the pound cake, I hear near death experiences can really leave you hungry."
"I'M DEAD!?!" Sly exclaimed, his blood running cold at the prospect of meeting his own end.
"Near death. NEAR death! "Near" is the key word in that sentence. Honestly, you need to pay attention. I hate havin' to repeat myself."
Sly was about to say something rude when he felt his gut twist and rumble, and as much as he wanted to insult Mz. Ruby for taking that tone of voice with him, he could not deny that he needed food without delay, and he'd be crazy to spend his time jawing on. Sly reached across the table and picked out his own square shaped pastry. He was about to scarf the whole thing down in one bite, when it occurred to him just who exactly was the one serving these treats to him. Several images of himself starting to gag and foam at the mouth struck his imagination, followed by the classic warning of "Don't take candy from strangers" which soon came to mind, and when he thought about it, no one was stranger than her, Dimitri had a close second.
So rather, than eat the pound cake, which Sly was almost one hundred percent sure had rat poison in it, he began to toy with the pastry, sniffing at it, looking at it from all manner of angles, feeling moderately proud of himself at having seen through Mz. Ruby's clever little-
"OH FOR CRYIN' OUT LOUD!" Mz. Ruby shouted, suffering from a severe case of annoyance. She reached across the table and yanked the yellow square from out of Sly's hand and picked up two more on the journey back, popping them all into her mouth. She vigorously chewed the lot and swallowed, after which she opened her mouth wide to offer up further proof that she'd indeed ingested the suspicious snacks. "There," she said, settling back down, "Reassured?"
Sly was about to comment on the fact that after being spontaneously returned to an eight year old body after suffering a so called "near death experience", especially after being told how easily he could be eaten, seeing the inside of an alligator's was anything but reassuring. However, before he could compose the words in his head, his stomach did it's Audrey II impression ("Little Shop of Horrors" for those of you who've been living under a rock, those of you who haven't seen it; you have my sympathies). So satisfied with the knowledge that the pastries weren't poisoned, at least not all of them, Sly returned to the plate stole another pound cake square and practically inhaled it.
After six more pound cakes done in a similar way, the last four being eaten at a somewhat slower pace due to some slight choking, Sly had calmed down enough to approach both the situation and his hostess more diplomatically. "Okay," Sly began, wiping the crumbs away from his mouth, "Let's cut to the chase, why am I here?"
"Well that's an awfully philosophical topic, with many crossroads into the question of "what is the meaning of life"," Mz. Ruby replied with a wicked grin, pouring Sly a cup of tea, tossing in a couple of sugar cubes before sliding the cup to him, "Writers and poets have been trying to get that one for years, haven't even come close if you ask me."
"glug, glug, glug. You know what I mean," Sly said sourly after downing half his cup.
"Yes, yes, yes…You and I are here to have a conversation, and not just any conversation, but an important one at that."
"glug, glug, glug. What's that?" Sly asked, confused at the simplicity of and vagueness of the answer, but not so confused he couldn't slide his cup back to Ruby for a refill and grab yet another pound cake.
"Well you see," Ruby said, sliding the raccoon's cup back to him before filling her own, "a conversation is an occurrence when two or more people exchange dialogue, but that's not important right now."
"Why are you doing this?"
"Well I rarely get gentlemen callers, I'm always looking for a reason to break out the good china, and to be honest, I really enjoy making tea, it's a nice break from all the dark spells, spiritual summonings, and zombie creating, which in itself can be somewhat tiring work."
"No, why are you helping me?"
At this Mz. Ruby gave Sly a smile similar to one a cat would give a canary when they're stuck in the same cage. "Why Sly whatever can you mean?"
"I know you spotted me back in London, yet you didn't call the guards, and now that I've been listening to your voice, I'm fairly certain that you probably had a hand in waking me up and keeping me from drowning back in Antarctica."
"I might've done a thing or two, yes."
"Yeah, but that's not it. Another thing that's always bugged me is that when you went to see Clockwerk, you were already an accomplished criminal, with a rather respectable empire to your name. And even after that when you'd claimed your share of the Thievious Raccoonis, your selections did not benefit you whatsoever, and those that could've been of some use to you, you completely abandoned. You've been capable of turning bank vaults in to butter knives, had access to countless numbers of zombified foot soldiers, could probably rip apart just about anyone you see with a few weird words from your lips. Yet despite all this you allowed me to take your most precious possessions, trample about your home, and not only allow me to go at you in one on one combat, but allow Carmelita and the rest of the cops to take you away without so much as a scratch. Your entire criminal career is nothing but a long list of contradictions, bad plays, and random acts of bloodthirsty violence, and I think you're about to tell me why."
CLAP. CLAP. CLAP. CLAP.
At the end of Sly's speech, Mz. Ruby set het tea cup down to give him applause, picking up the cup once more to fill her second cup, as Sly finished up his fifth. "Well, well, well, and here I was thinking the turtle was the only smart one out of infamous Cooper Gang."
"I've never been stupid, just quiet."
"I'll bet," the lady said, taking a sip from her cup, "You're wrong however when it comes to me and Clockwerk, he came to me. But you are correct when you say there's a method to the madness. I don't tell people this, because of the controversy it would cause and the bedlam it would bring to my modest life of mischief, but I can see the future, and not just one future, but all possible futures that could occur. While my motives seem chaotic, they actually adhere to the formula needed to create, in my opinion, the best future for the world possible."
"And the deaths of my parents fit into this perfect world how?"
"First of all, I'm not aiming for a perfect world, just a good one. Secondly, where would Venice be right now?"
"…What?"
"Venice. Where would it be? As I recall, some time ago, you and your friend Bentley travelled to Venice, Italy to re-induct your lifelong friend Murray back into the ranks of the Cooper Gang, am I correct?"
"Yes, but-"
"Let me finish. As you ventured to reunite with your friend, you uncovered the plot of a late Don Octavio who's scheme would've held the entire city within his sway, causing the deaths of many people. But now thanks to your actions, it is police who patrol the streets and canals of Venice, and it's people are free to live their lives, safe from the grip of organized crime."
"Someone else would've-"
"You asked the question Sly boy, now listen to your answer. If I'm not mistaken, some time before that, you encountered a peculiar logger by the name of Jean Bison. Now, Clockwerk or no, one thing is for certain, Jean Bison's clear cutting and smuggling operation would have gone on undisturbed. In a few scant years, all of Canada and many places beyond would've been clear-cut and damaged beyond repair, creating endless numbers of barren wastelands and doing untold damage to the environment."
"So what, he-"
""So what"? Then allow me to be blunt, if your parents had lived, how would you have met Bentley and Murray?"
"I…" that's the amazing thing, there was no way he could finish that sentence. Sly sat there and thought and no matter how many times he ran the scenarios in his head, even if he did somehow meet his two best friends, there was no way he would've formed the same bonds of loyalty and brotherhood that made the Cooper Gang what it was. Sly even doubted that he'd be thief if his parents had lived, because the one thing he wanted to be, more than anything else, was a fire fighter. As much as Sly hated to admit it, as gruesome as the truth was, Sly had to admit that Mz. Ruby was right. Everything, and everyone Sly held near and dear, came at the cost of his parents grizzly death, there was no way around it.
"Okay," Sly began, gaining a brand new perspective of the character that was Mz. Ruby, "Why am I here?"
"You and I are here to have a conversation, and not just a conversation, but an important one."
"What's it about?"
"Quite a number of things, but you won't remember them."
"I won't?"
"At least not until it's time for you to remember them, because if you have the information beforehand, there's no telling what catastrophic events could happen. Trust me Sly boy, with everything that's set to occur, whatever happens, good or bad, needs to happen, and they need to happen in a certain way."
"So where do we start?"
"I don't know, how about we start with Murray?"
"…Murray?"
Sly awoke in terrible pain, which was understandable considering what happened not too long ago. He felt the bitter sting of the cool night air as it moved across his bruised up body. Sly looked about to see that he was flying over the jungle, being held by Suzy Q who carried his cane in her backpack, the sound of Penelope's chopper beating in his ears.
"Hey bossman," Suzy Q said into her binoc-u-com, "Sly's totally awake dude." She then turned her head towards Sly, "Hey man, what's up?"
"Just got back from a tea party," Sly answered groggily, fighting past the soreness in his jaw, but still just glad he can reach the top shelves once again.
"Tea party huh? That's, like, totally awesome! Did they have crumpets?"
"Naw…pound cake."
"Cool."
And that's chapter twelve folks! I am horrendously sorry for the long wait, over a month since I updated! I still can't believe it. And it pains me to say it, but from where I'm standing, it looks like you kids will have to settle in for another long wait. With college coming up, and getting out of my parents house, it looks like a lot of my writing time's about to be lead up against the firing wall. I am not, I repeat, AM NOT abandoning the story. I will continue to work on and update the story, so if your slacker sense starts tingling, get on the horn and remind me to get off my lazy butt and GET TO WORK! Because I want to see how the story ends too.
Now, to lighten things up a little, it's that time again to give last chapter's reviewers the warm, fuzzy kiss on the feet that they so justly deserve:
Starwing Bravo: Well, for anyone to say I'm funny is a real feather in my cap (excluding of course comments about my looks made behind my back). But to add the genius that is Tom Clancy into the mix, well when I read that, it just made my day. Thanks for the review, and I hope to keep you interested.
Wolvmbm: Wait, I thought Han and Leia tied the knot after the Empire bit the dust, not before. Ah well, whatever. I do hope that my portrayal of "Private John Grizzly's" military career was up to your liking, if not, well, there's actually nothing I can do about that, I suppose I could rewrite the section, but it's a pretty long one. So the most you could probably hope for if I did do a suck job on this chapter, is a heartfelt apology, and a postcard saying as such, probably one with a silly frog on it (don't ask me why).
The Good Thief: Aw, why thanks dude! I'd thought you'd be a little broken up by saying adios to Burger boy, and I hope to make up for the loss of that character by making this chapter totally awesome. Thanks for the support.
Jake: Thanks man, it really helps, but please, put the shotgun away, in these hard economic times, we can't afford you to waste good buckshot on a guy like me. Use the rusty meat cleaver, it's far more frightening, and puts out more for your dollar.
Arkturium: Well so far it's been a fun mission to write for, (long as heck though). And with polite ghosts, I know what you mean. This one time, a ghost held a door open for me, but he totally failed to tell me it lead to the alternate dimension, my evil dimension self's a real douche. Always going about, helping the homeless, protecting the environment, staying away from unhealthy habits such as coffee drinking and Russian roulette, the guy's a total jerk. Oh, and sorry 'bout the names mix-up, won't happen again Hash.
Kurieo Parnok: Oh really? Who's been spreading the good word? I'd like to send 'em a thank you note and whatnot. Oh, and I'm glad you're getting a kick out of the story, it's always great to hear that I'm making someone, somewhere, someway, somehow smile (try to say the last five words four times, fast). I hope to hear from ya soon.
Kindom Rider92: You should play the games, they're a nice slice of pretty awesome dude. Also thanks, I think I did a pretty good job on the new Fiendish Five too. As for the suggestions, trust me, they're concepts I've already file in into my story's point of view.
Okay, sadly, I gotta end things on a somewhat legal standpoint, considering I've made a horrific amount of pop culture references, so once more; I do not own the copyrighted character's or copyrighted dialogue which appears in this story. I do not have anything of value for which you can sue me. So now that THE MAN is appeased once again, and with no sacrifices to boot, I gotta head on out because it's nine in the morning and I've been up writing since seven in the morning…yesterday. So, to everyone out there watching me on the information super-something or another, remind me to do my job and type 'til my fingers bleed, review to inform me in the event that my writing sucks or if there's evidence to the contrary, protect the rainforest, read a good book every so often (which ironically perpetuates the need for the destruction of the very same trees I just told you to protect), and hey, don't be afraid to laugh like an ax murderer once in a while, it's done wonders for me. Oh, and most important of all; take care of yourselves, because there's only one you.
Your pal,
--Grimm.