As the gang drove to their next destination, both Sly and Ben decided to read up on the pages of Sleigh MacCooper they had gotten from Mz. Ruby.
"The night was a cold one, a wee spot o' gold hanging from a cord by the camp. The crooks heard aboot my coming and wanted to lay a trap. I was not fooled, however. I snuck through the walls with nae a sound, reaching the top rung and smashing the legs of the crook that dangled the gold. After, did I enter the base and smash apart ten vaults, each one containing a dozen gold ingots. With my surreal strength, I smashed a hole right through the weak back wall and jumped from the cliff to a narrow ledge, running along the wall until I was far out of reach of the vile Vikings, their gold mine, tried and true as the day they tried to noose me wife."
"Well, looks like Sleigh was just as daring as he was buff," Ben smiled at that entry.
"Yeah, but look at the picture...and also this one that Mz. Ruby gave us," Sly said, Ben then noting what he was talking about. The mysterious Clockwerk's shadow in both. For Sleigh, he was hiding behind a ledge while Clockwerk flew in from afar. And for Slytunkhamen, the shadow of Clockwerk looming down over the invisible thief's body, his wings folded and ready to pounce.
"That's just like the shadows in the files on Clockwerk...just how old is that guy?" Ben wondered. No ordinary person should be able to be alive since Egyptian times unless there was something else about Clockwerk that they didn't know about.
Before he could ponder further, Ben let out a scream of pain as he clutched his head, his eyes changing from their usual hazelnut to bright gold. Murray slammed the brakes on the van so he, Sly, and Bentley could check up on their distressed friend.
"BEN! Are you okay?!" Bentley cried.
Ben then found himself in some kind of house. It looked very modest and humble. He then turned and saw an adult raccoon man ushering a little raccoon boy that Ben recognized instantly.
"Sly! What the-?!"
Suddenly, the front door of the house swung open and five shadows appeared. Ben recognized them as Sir Raleigh, Muggshot, Mz. Ruby and who he could guess was the Panda King, the fourth member of the Fiendish Five the gang were currently heading towards.
However, it was the fifth member and the largest of the group that froze him to his core; He was a gigantic owl made of pure metal with glaring yellow eyes filled with nothing but pure hatred.
Sly's father took out his cane and lunged forward, easily handling Raleigh, Muggshot, Mz. Ruby, and Panda King but the owl, who Ben could only guess was none other than Clockwerk himself, overpowered him.
"CONNOR!" Screamed a woman's voice as Ben turned to see an adult raccoon woman who he guessed was Sly's mother.
"NO! GET OUT OF HERE!" Ben yelled, his voice actually mixing in with what Connor just said as he rushed to Sly's mother desperately, only to pass through her as if she was a ghost. He then turned around just in time for Clockwerk's talons to slice through her like a hot knife through butter, blood splattering everywhere but none of it getting on Ben, only phasing through him.
"YOU MONSTER!" Connor was heard yelling as Ben looked up from the blood on the floor to see Sly's father lunge at the beast, only for Clockwerk to skewer him through his torso with his metal beak, more blood spilling everywhere.
Ben looked to see that Raleigh, Muggshot, Mz. Ruby and Panda King had recovered and actually looked horrified at what Clockwerk had done. In fact, Panda King was currently blocking the door of the closet that Connor had put Sly in to keep him safe.
"Find where they are keeping the Thievius Raccoonus!" Clockwerk ordered his cohorts, who all numbly nodded and ransacked the house until they found the vault containing the Thievius Raccoonus. Ben watched helplessly as they tore up all the pages and divided them amongst themselves before leaving. However, Mz. Ruby and Panda King stayed, both of them looking remorsefully at the closet that Sly was still hiding in, and looked at each other, knowing what needed to be done.
Suddenly, Ben found himself sucked out and into a black void as he could hear the voice of all of Sly's ancestors crying in his head at once.
"Defeat Clockwerk! Defeat the curse upon the Cooper legacy!"
Ben soon found himself back in the van. Sly, Bentley, and Murray were gathered around him, fraught with worry. Ben's eyes turned from gold back to their normal hazelnut and he immediately stumbled out of the back of the van to puke his guts up.
"Ben!" Sly, Bentley, and Murray jumped out of the van and ran to their friend as he finished upchucking everything he had eaten in the past few days after the ordeal he just went through.
"I saw them..."
"Saw what?"
"Your parents, Sly...I-I saw them getting killed...I saw the Thievius Raccoonus getting stolen...I-I saw CLOCKWERK!"
"Y-You did?" Sly asked in shock. It was already a traumatizing experience he went through as a child, but to have his friend witness the horror himself was something he couldn't bear to think about.
"His eyes, unfathomably empty, full of nothing but hatred, devoid of all compassion, all humanity...No one has eyes like that...no one!"
Ben was breathing heavily as Sly placed his hands on his shoulders gently, shaking him to snap him out of his frightened trance.
"Ben! Look at me! It was just a vision! You couldn't have done anything! It's okay!"
Ben's breathing slowed down, his eyes slowly relaxing as he calmed down. He saw his friends all looking at him worriedly before slumping his shoulders.
"Oh god, I think I'm gonna puke again..."
And so Ben turned and threw up the remaining bits of his stomach interior as Sly, Bentley, and Murray stood by his side, doing their best to console him as he processed the horrific information he had seen.
But there was one question that remained present in all of them; Why did Ben suddenly have that vision? And why now?
Just a little filler chapter before we get to the Panda King's chapter.