True Confessions
Sly woke up to realize that he bound to a chair.
'Those bastards! How could they? Of course I'm sure they would seeing how I'm not the real Sly Cooper.'
"YOU!"
Sly looked up in surprise. Right across from him, bound in another chair, was Carmelita.
"Hello Carm," Sly said in a depressed voice.
"WHO THE HELL ARE YOU?"
"I DON'T KNOW WHO THE HELL I AM, I DON'T KNOW THE HELL ABOUT ANYTHING ABOUT ME, ALL I KNOW IS THAT I'M A PAWN IN THESE TWISTED PEOPLE'S SCHEMES!"
"HEY!" yelled Murray, entering the room. "We're not twisted, we're your friends."
"Sorry for having you two bound like this, but it is for our safety, seeing how Sly was about to kick my ass to China and back. And it's pretty much the same towards you inspector," Bentley said.
"Well, well, well," Carmelita sighed. "Sly Cooper would actually beat up one of his friends?"
"They're not my friends, I'm not Sly Cooper, it dawned on me when I saw his corpse myself!"
"Both of you be QUITE!" Penelope yelled.
"Alright!" Carmelita said. "Just one question…"
"…WHO THE HELL AM I?" Sly yelled.
"Will you give us a chance to explain first!" Bentley yelled.
"Get on with it Bent," Murray said.
"Alright," Bentley began. "Less than a year ago, the Cooper Gang pulled off the heist of the century. We had discovered the whereabouts of the Cooper Vault, an elaborate ancient system of caves that held practically everything of utmost value in the world that was ever stolen by the Cooper family line, starting with ancient Egypt's notorious Slytenkahmen. But in order for us to have made into the vault, we recruited a number of people, starting with Murray, who had left the team after I was crippled. We took down mob boss Don Octavio to get him back. After that, we went to Australia to recruit Murray's teacher, the Guru. He joined us when we helped clear out corrupt miners and took down the Mask of Dark Earth, which had coincidentally possessed Carmelita. I'm not going to tell how we got the damn thing off her though…"
"Sly climbed up her bootlaces…" Murray mentioned.
"WHAT!" Carmelita was shocked.
"ANYWAY," Bentley continued, giving Murray the evil eye. "We then had to win a dog fighting competition in Holland to get Penelope on the team. After that, we went to China to recruit Panda King, who in Sly's past had helped kill his father. Anyway, Panda King was a changed man and we helped him rescue his daughter, Jing King, from a shotgun wedding from hell. Then we also owed Dimitri a favor, and we ended up in a war against a pirate named Lefwee, who in the end was turned into shark bait by Penelope."
"So when does my true identity come in?" Sly asked.
"I'm getting to that!" Bentley snapped. "In the end, Sly was seriously injured by a crazy genetics expert by the name of Dr. M. He was injured saving Carmelita. In return for hurting him, Carmelita busted M's simian ass and took you in as her partner, seeing how you got amnesia. For the past year or so, you had been living life as a cop, as well as Carmelita's boyfriend."
Sly could see Carmelita blushing.
"Then one day, she messed with the wrong criminal and he put a hit on her," Bentley continued. "The assassin ended up killing you instead. He knocked you to the floor and shot you at point blank with a revolver. You died in Carmelita's apartment. You died in her arms."
Something clicked in Sly's mind. The dream. It was of Sly Cooper's death! He could see in the corner of his eye that Carmelita was tearing. He watched as tears streaked down her face.
"You've been dead for over a month," Murray said.
"That's when your real identity comes in," Bentley said. "Doctor M had bee a genetics expert, and much of his lab was surprisingly untouched by the battle that occurred there on that island. Using a sample of DNA, and using some of the late Dr. M's notes, we managed to improve his formulas and created the first successful full person cloning. That is you."
"Holy shit," Sly said. His eyes were wide open.
"We even had a backup memory for you, but we wanted you to be with the gang again and we took away all of your memory that came after the battle on the island. We still kept the memories. They're on my laptop for just in case out plan eventually backfired. We know now though, that we can't keep this a secret from you or Carmelita. Sly, your actually you, in flesh and blood, and in spirit, it's just that you've spent a brief period of absence in the presence of whoever it is upstairs."
There was silence as Sly and Carmelita stared blankly at them. Murray then went over to Sly and untied him. He did the same with Carmelita.
"Sly, it's time you have your memories back," Bentley said. He handed Sly his laptop. "I'll let you two figure things out."
And everyone left, leaving Sly and Carmelita alone with the laptop. Without saying anything, the two began working on the laptop.