Chapter 4 Two Truths and a Lie

Needless to say, the ride home was uncomfortable.

Mostly because Carmelita drove recklessly when she was angry (though still obeying the traffic laws to the letter), and when she heard Sly recount what had happened that afternoon, she was furious!

"Oh, those two! I never thought they would sink so low!" the vixen growled under her breath. "When I get my hands on them!"

"So you do know them, then," said Sly in realization. Carmelita only got this angry when it was personal. "I knew them."

That made Carmelita quiet for a long moment, her eyes glued to the road before she finally said, "Yes. You knew them. They weren't lying when they said you were friends as kids. But while you joined Interpol, they took up… less legal practices."

"They're criminals?" asked Sly, not totally surprising given they'd openly admitted to being thieves (along with him, apparently), but it was good to hear Carmelita confirm it.

"Yes," said Carmelita. "Not entirely dangerous ones. Or, at least, I didn't think they were. But to try and take advantage of you when you're vulnerable like this! I never thought they'd do something like that!"

"So it was a lie, then?" said Sly, wanting to hear the words from her lips. "That I'm a criminal too?"

Carmelita glanced at him and then back at the road. "Oh, of course it was a lie, I mean time travel? Bentley should give up crime and begin writing science fiction. To think something like that is real, it's loco!"

Sly felt a smile spread across his face even as he gripped his seat tighter as Carmelita took a sharp turn. "I know, right? They almost had me going for a bit."

"And that is why you have me, to keep you on the straight and narrow," Carmelita said with a nod to herself as they pulled up in front of their apartment.

It wasn't until later that Sly realized she'd never really answered his question.

It took some convincing for Sly to talk Carmelita into going to work that night.

Bentley and Murray resurfacing had her spooked and she was worried they'd come breaking into their apartment to take another chance at Sly. It was only when Sly promised to keep his shock pistol in reach and to fire at them on sight that she finally agreed to head out. It wasn't like she could take the night off anyway. Not when she felt she was so close to a break in her case.

It wasn't until he was sure she was gone, that Sly sat on their couch and finally pulled out what he'd been hiding and placed it on the coffee table in front of him.

The Thievius Raccoonus.

Bentley and Murray had left it when they'd fled, and Sly had managed to snag it and sneak it back home without Carmelita noticing.

He knew he really shouldn't have held onto it. He should have given it to Carmelita as evidence and be done with the whole mess.

But something in him just couldn't do it.

Besides, Bentley said the book was his anyway.

For what felt like hours but was probably minutes, Sly just stared at the book before him. Something inside him told him that opening it would be the point of no return.

But still…

That story Bentley and Murray had told was crazy.

(The fear in Carmelita's eyes when he remembered something.)

There's no way he was some rehabilitated criminal.

(The constant resentment from his other coworkers.)

Did this book really hold his family history, or was that made up too?

(He always wondered why his personal file was bare of his history.)

They couldn't really all be thieves, could they?

(No one would tell him how his parents died or let him see their file. Claiming it was stolen.)

He couldn't actually be a thief, could he?

(The ease with which he could sneak around and his willingness to bend the rules.)

Sly sighed and reached up to ruffle his fur, before deciding to bite the bullet.

He reached out… and opened the book.

He was shocked to see the first page written entirely in what looked like Egyptian hieroglyphs with translations scribbled on sticky notes in the margins.

According to this, his earliest known ancestor was an ancient Egyptian raccoon named Slytunkhamen, and it detailed his exploits robbing booby-trapped temples in Egypt.

Also, he could apparently turn invisible… Huh…

Fascinated, Sly picked up the book and flipped through the pages, seeing more and more depictions of raccoons with his last name detailing their thieving exploits.

At least, until he stumbled upon a page written mostly in Japanese kanji detailing the history of one Rioichi Cooper in the seventeenth century.

Rioichi… isn't that the name Bentley mentioned?

Oddly, unlike the rest of the book, Rioichi's page was surprisingly blank. Maybe Bentley had seen these blank pages and assumed the words had disappeared for his time travel theory. There was no way-

Sly turned the next page in Rioichi's section and froze.

The words on the entire page were growing fuzzy. Before his very eyes, the kanji started to lift off the page and vanish into thin air.

But he didn't get a chance to do much more than register that before the pain came roaring back.

Sly choked and collapsed off the couch as it felt like someone was trying to rip out his heart with their bare hands. The book fell open on the floor beside him, and he could only watch through the pain as even more words disappeared. Reaching out for the book to try and do something to stop it, Sly saw something even more horrifying than the pain and the vanishing writing.

His entire arm had turned transparent.

Sly watched in horrified fascination as his arm seemed to flicker in and out of existence, the flickers corresponding to more agonizing shocks of pain. It was excruciating.

Then, suddenly, it stopped.

Gasping for breath, Sly slowly pulled himself back up and looked at the book. Almost the entire page had been erased, leaving only a few words on the aged parchment.

Having no idea what was going on, Sly strained to reach his phone and pull up the group chat he'd been debating on deleting.

You'veBeenStruckBy:

I'm not saying I believe you about the time travel

But I'm willing to give you a chance to prove it exists.

:PinkTornado

SLY! I knew you'd come through.

:Spex_Guy

You seemed pretty against it before.

Did something happen?

You'veBeenStruckBy:

Have you ever seen Back to the Future?

:PinkTornado

YES!

You'veBeenStruckBy:

Remember what happens to Marty when his parents don't meet

:PinkTornado

YES!

Oh

Oh no

Sly!

:Spex_Guy

We'll come to you.

You'veBeenStruckBy:

I'll send you my address.

:Spex_Guy

Appreciated.

You'veBeenStruckBy:

… You already know it, don't you?

:Spex_Guy

I do. But I still appreciate you being willing to give it to me.

Sly sighed as he put down his phone and tried to regain his strength for their arrival.

He just hoped he wasn't making a huge mistake.

A/N So... I Back to the Future-d Sly. I thought it was odd that in the game there were no apparent consequences for Le Paradox and his goons meddling with the timestream. So here are some consequences, and they hurt. Seeing the writing disappearing alongside his pain was impossible enough for Sly to give Bentley and Murray a shot. That, and while he's still not ready to admit it, he's starting to have doubts about Carmelita's side of the story.