Chapter 8 Catch a Tiger by His Toe

The next few missions passed quickly with Rioichi breezing past the security on his restaurant to reignite its sign and send a message.

("Woah, he's good," Sly said from over Bentley's shoulder watching Rioichi's progress on his computer screen.

"He was always your favorite of your ancestors," Bentley said, though his eyes remained glued to the computer screen. "You thought his stories were just the coolest."

"I can see why," Sly said, wishing Rioichi's pages of the Thievius Raccoonus hadn't been so sparse so that he could have read them. "Whatever his stories are, he sure lives up to the legend."

"Indeed," agreed Bentley.

"Your admiration is appreciated, but there is a contraption here, and I would like to know what it does," came Rioichi's voice over the radio, making the two realize he could hear them the whole time.

The two shared an embarrassed look and Bentley quickly got back to work.)

A minor heist to steal a geisha kimono for Murray to use to gather information.

("I was not aware your large friend was such a good dancer," Rioichi commented into his com as Murray had the guards eating out of the palm of his hands with his routine.

"I wasn't either," Sly admitted and wondered if he'd known that before.

"I was," said Bentley smugly.)

Gathering even more intel straight from the tiger's soliloquizing mouth through the use of Bentley's RC car with a camera and microphone attached to it.

("There's no way that should have worked," Sly said as Bentley fooled yet another guard by disguising his toy car with a silly-looking chicken hat.

Bentley gave him a look. "Sly, we are in ancient Japan, before even regular cars were invented. What's more likely to these guards? That they just saw a piece of futuristic technology drive by them, or that they just saw a very weird-looking chicken."

Sly held his hands up in surrender. "Fair point. You win."

They then watched on the screen as El Jefe fell for the chicken hat as well.

"Okay, in that case, he has no excuse," said Bentley dryly as El Jefe shrugged off the disguised car and continued talking to himself about his plans. "He should definitely know better."

"Guess he's just an idiot," said Sly.)

And getting ahold of some poisonous plants to knock out the guards to make their job a little easier.

("Should I be concerned that you're so good at mixing poisons?" asked Sly, as he and Bentley watched Rioichi prepare his spiked sushi.

"You are quite good at it," Bentley agreed.

"How many times must I remind you all that I am a ninja," said Rioichi in reply, rolling his eyes as he did so.

"That… didn't really explain anything," said Bentley.

Instead of Rioichi, the answer, instead, came from a surprising source."Ninjas know tons about poisons. It's one of the ways they use their environment to their advantage so they can take down their enemies as quickly and quietly as possible," said Murray as he chowed down on some un-spiked sushi Rioichi had made for him.

Sly and Bentley stared at him in surprise, and the ninja in question passed Murray another clean sushi roll as a reward.

Seeing the looks he was getting, Murray shrugged. "What? I watch a lot of anime," he said before shoving the entire sushi roll into his mouth and eating it with one bite.)

Until finally they knew all they needed to to take El Jefe down.

As they made their way to their assault on El Jefe's fortress, Sly was actually feeling a lot more confident. Though he may have only had a recent reintroduction to thieving, this he definitely knew how to do. Taking down bad guys was one of his favorite parts of working at Interpol. Well, that and working with Carmelita.

That last thought made Sly grimace, remembering how he and Carmelita had left things off, but he did his best to shake it off. He may not have Carmelita to watch his back, but he did have Rioichi, Bentley, and Murray. Their plans may seem crazy, and the trust he had in them may be new, but those crazy plans worked and that trust was growing stronger by the day.

Though speaking of crazy plans, there were still things that he questioned about them, namely- "Are you really going into this fight in that kimono?" Sly asked Murray, who was still in full geisha garb and hadn't taken it off since they'd gotten it.

Murray beamed and flexed his muscles through the kimono's long sleeves. "Of course," he said confidently. "The Murray is not above playing mind games when taking down scum. When the guards see me they both won't want to hurt such a ravishing beauty as myself, and they'll underestimate me. That will be their mistake."

Sly snickered. "Makes sense, Carmelita would use that trick too."

"Indeed," agreed Rioichi. "Such is a valuable weapon in any kunoichi's arsenal."

"See," said Murray proudly. "Works every time."

"I'm not so sure about that," said Bentley as he checked that his explosives and darts were all in working order. "Pretty sure they'll stop underestimating you once they see you bench press three of them at once."

"Doesn't matter," said Murry. "By then The Murray will have them right where he wants them."

"Love the confidence, big guy," said Sly.

They were almost to the Dragon Gate when they could hear all the snoring of the guards. Looks like Rioichi's spiked sushi was delivered successfully.

Upon hearing that, Bentley waved for them to stop. "You're up first, Sly. You need to get that gate open."

"More pickpocketing and getting the switches inside the statues, got it," Sly said as he went ahead first.

And he did just that, but seriously, why did everything here have to spew fire? It was a good thing he still had that samurai shield, otherwise his goose would have been cooked, literally.

He got the front door open and then it was a quick trek up to the palace which now had a massive (and in Sly's opinion, tacky) statue of El Jefe looming over it.

Though they didn't get a chance to look at it for long, as from out of a nearby gorge a massive zeppelin began rising up until it loomed over their heads.

Most of the group were stunned speechless at the sight, but Bentley reached up to adjust his glasses and squinted at the zeppelin. "Wait! That's my time travel technology!" he exclaimed.

Sly looked closer, and sure enough, littered along the side of the massive balloon were the same mechanical enhancements as were now set onto Murray's van.

With that thing in the air, it would only be a matter of time before they were spotted. They needed to finish this fast.

Or, maybe it was already too late, as El Jefe was waiting for them at the palace bridge.

The tiger gave them a nasty grin. "End of the line, Coopers!" he shouted over to them, before ordering his guards to attack. "Get them, you fools!" before turning and leaving, slamming the entryway doors shut.

With a nod to the rest of them, Rioichi ducked out of the fight to open the way, while Sly, Murray, and Bentley distracted the guards in an all-out brawl.

Turns out Murray was right about his disguise, though, apparently the knowledge that 'Madame Geisha' could pick any of them up like a sack of flour and toss them several yards only made 'her' more attractive. Guess the real Madame Geisha better start working out once she gets back from vacation so she can live up to the hype. Should shake up her routine.

Fortunately, it wasn't long before Rioichi managed to get the gate open, but it was still plenty of time for them (well, mostly Murray) to knock all the guards out cold.

Unfortunately, Rioichi was the first to walk through the gate and was immediately pounced upon by El Jefe.

Next thing any of them knew, El Jefe had Rioichi by the throat and was ripping his bamboo cane from his hands with a cry of, "HA! It's mine!"

Sly wanted to do something, to move and help his ancestor, but he found he couldn't. As Rioichi struggled to breathe it honestly felt like the tiger had both of them by the throat at the same time, and already Sly could see his hands begin to grow hazy. He struggled not to let El Jefe know about this little effect, but something must have shown, as Bentley was giving him concerned side-eyes, and Murray looked ready to throw himself at El Jefe to get him to stop.

Thankfully, El Jefe was oblivious and quickly tossed Rioichi at their feet.

As the ninja raccoon gasped for air, Sly felt his hands solidify again and breathed a silent sigh of relief.

He didn't get a chance to relish that relief as Rioichi shot back up and yelled, "MY CANE!" like he'd just lost something priceless.

And considering the brief lesson on Cooper history Rioichi had given him, Sly knew that cane meant more to him than any treasure he could steal.

But El Jefe was already on the run and setting fire to the bridge behind him to keep anyone from following.

Anyone who didn't still have a fireproof shield and armor, that is.

Taking a brief moment to get his feet into the Samurai armor's boots, Sly leaped after El Jefe with a shout of, "Don't worry, I'll get it!"

Behind him, Rioichi looked relieved at the offer, but Bentley frowned. "We've gotta go after them," he said, his eyes scanning their surroundings for another way across.

"Why?" asked Murray, "Sly's been in tougher fights than that chump."

"But he had all his memories then," Bentley replied worriedly. "One day of catch-up isn't enough to bring back a lifetime of experience… Er, no offense, Rioichi."

"None taken," said Rioichi as he searched for a way across as well. "The wolf is only the mightiest hunter because he does not hunt alone." He then spotted something that looked promising, and said, "This way!"

Bentley and Murray hurried after him, and with some difficulty managed to get across and catch up, only to see Sly in what looked like a standoff with the tiger atop one of the scaffoldings for building El Jefe's statue. Sly had his cane in hand, and El Jefe was gleefully swinging around a pair of twin katanas, just waiting for Sly to come in reach of them.

Which is why everyone was surprised when instead of trying to hit him with his cane, Sly instead pulled out a shock pistol and zapped El Jefe unconscious before he could even register the weapon.

That was not a method Sly had ever used before.

"Wait, have you had that this whole time?" Bentley shouted in shock.

Sly, who was already pulling out a pair of handcuffs of all things, looked over at him in surprise. "Of course, do you know what Carmelita would do to me if I went out unprepared? She made it clear that if I was going to be her partner at Interpol, then I'd better have my gear with me at all times. That means always having a shock pistol and a few pairs of cuffs in my back pocket."

That made sense, but still, "You were supposed to be on bed rest when we came to get you, and Murray said you'd barely recovered from your attack when we'd arrived. When did you get the chance to grab those?" Bentley asked, not exactly thrilled at this sudden change.

Sly looked away, uncomfortable. "Ah, right, uh, after that afternoon, well…"

Reading what he wasn't saying, Murray's face fell under his geisha makeup. "You were going to use it on us?" he asked, looking hurt.

Sly winced and tried to explain. "Look, I didn't want to, and I'm not now, but-"

But whatever he was about to say was cut off when he noticed movement behind him. Sly wheeled around to see a mouse in a gas mask and yellow hazmat suit standing over El Jefe's unconscious form to steal Rioichi's cane.

With the shock pistol and handcuffs in his hands, the instincts he'd been honing in recent years took over, and Sly aimed his pistol and shouted, "Interpol! Don't move!"

Bentley felt something inside his chest grow cold at the sight of Sly of all people saying those words and meaning them. He and Murray knew conceptually that Sly had been working for Interpol since his memory loss, and Bentley had even been keeping tabs on his cases to make sure Sly was okay. Even so, actually seeing Sly Cooper act like an officer of the law was a hard pill to swallow. It was just so… not him!

Sadly the mouse didn't listen to Sly's warning and instead threw a bomb before he grabbed a rope that pulled him up towards the zeppelin still hovering overhead.

"I said stop!" Sly shouted, jumping out of the range of the bomb and firing off shots to make the mouse let go of the rope or at least drop the cane.

Sadly, between his vision being obscured from the explosions, more bombs being tossed his way, and the way the rope was swinging the shots went wide and soon the mouse was safely inside the zeppelin along with Rioichi's cane. But even as the long hairless tail vanished into the cockpit, Sly noticed something small and gold come tumbling out of it and bounce along the ground until it came to a stop at his feet.

Sly paid it no mind as he stared up at the zeppelin, and through a large front window, he could swear someone up there was glaring back.

Then, before his very eyes, the entire zeppelin sparked with electricity and then disappeared in a blink, leaving nothing but the open sky and the still unconscious tiger to show for it.

It was gone.

Disappointed, Sly finally looked down to see what the small gold thing had been and was surprised to find a golden sheriff's badge looking like it'd come straight from a Western, but those wouldn't exist for centuries.

Pocketing it for later, Sly finished cuffing El Jefe and worked on getting both of them down from the scaffolding.

He reached the others without fanfare, Bentley too busy staring at his shock pistol with distaste, and Murray still looking like a kicked puppy.

Seeing this, Sly quickly put the pistol away, hoping he hadn't ruined whatever camaraderie they'd been building. "Look, I promise I'm not going to use it on you," he said to both of them. "It was only just in case you two turned out to be crazy catfishing kidnappers, which you obviously aren't so don't worry about it."

Murray perked up slightly at that, but Bentley's frown only deepened at the reminder that Sly didn't know or trust them as completely as he used to.

"And I'm sorry I couldn't get your cane, Rioichi," Sly said, turning to his ancestor apologetically.

"You tried your best, but I can not expect you to grow wings and fly," Rioichi replied sagely, though still clearly disappointed. He then took in the awkward tension between them all, and asked, "Is this miscommunication of yours connected to that long story you summarized for me."

"Yeah, it's a big part of it," Sly admitted.

"Come on, Rioichi," said Murray as he slung El Jefe over his shoulder to carry him. "The Murray will tell you all about it on the way back."

"Much appreciated, Murray-san," Rioichi said as he followed the hippo, leaving Sly and Bentley behind.

Sly looked over at the turtle, wondering what to say. "Look," he started. "I didn't want to arrest you guys, but I just… I didn't know you. To me, we'd just met."

But Bentley just turned his wheelchair and began rolling away. "Come on," he said sullenly. "We need to plan our next move."

Sly reached out after him like he wanted to stop and talk, but had no idea what else to say and dropped his hand.

Needless to say, it was a very awkward walk back to the hideout.

A/N Hey, is anyone else not getting email notifications from this site? I've not gotten any for a couple of months, and every time I post a chapter there's a notification that the emails are not getting through. I've done everything I can think of to fix it myself, from adding this site to my contact list, to checking my spam, to even switching emails and making that one have Fanfic as a contact. Nothing has worked. I'll check my messages on the site later if anyone responds because I'm sure not getting an email.

Anyway, one step forward two steps back for the Cooper Gang starting to bond again. The sight of Sly with a shock pistol and acting like law enforcement is basically a cursed image to Bentley and Murray, and add to that the fact he had it on him when time traveling was because he didn't yet trust them hurt a lot. Sly, meanwhile, is just proving to be in more and more danger the more his ancestors are, and he could really use a break, please.