Sly Cooper: Family of Thieves

by Blackdrag-rose


Honor: Turbo Dominant Eagle

Bentley, who was positive that Carmelita and Judy could take care of Muggshot on their own, headed around the area that the former member of the Fiendish Five was located in, as he took the path that would take him towards the hangers, but instead of heading into the building he moved toward the area in front of the Baron's base of operations. His plan was simple, he just had to find the creature that was stalking the area, drug the thing enough to let the Guru take control of it, and then watch the fireworks as he tore through the guards that would serve as pilots against Sly and Carmelita in the finals. Of course, once the beast was knocked out, he would move out and hack into the terminals around the hangers, allowing him to gain control of some communications for when the finals took place, so he could figure out what to do when the Baron called for assistance. He shook his head as he entered the area that he was supposed to be in and found the beast he was looking for already walking around the area, meaning that he didn't have to go out of his way to find it and could get the show on the road immediately.

"A-ha, a perfect feral specimen of Lupus Gigantormus." Bentley commented, mostly speaking to himself at the moment, but at the same time he used his binocucom to zoom in on the beast, as he wanted to study it a little more before he pissed it off.

"So let me get this straight again." Sly spoke up, as he was waiting in the hanger, making sure that the planes were fine as Murray worked on them for a few minutes, since they had nothing to do this time around while the rest of his siblings ran interference back at the hotel room, "You plan on stalking that thing, drugging it, putting the Guru on board, and setting the two free to smash up the guards?"

"An airtight plan, I agree. It's simplicity itself." Bentley stated, as speaking about the plan would allow him to remind Sly of what he was doing as he focused on what was in front of him, even though part of this was still slightly terrifying when he thought about it, "By channeling the wild destruction housed in that bloodthirsty creature, we should be able to thin out the Black Baron's ranks... which of course mean fewer pilots flying against you and Carmelita in the finals."

"I'm all for evening the odds in our favor, but come on." Sly replied, as he knew that some members of his gang, and he was referring to his sisters and brother in that regard, loved to take risks that made no sense, though it seemed like Bentley was having his moment, "This plan seems a little... risky."

"Not at all. I've modified my sleep darts with heavy doses of Skunk Balm." Bentley informed him, as it was something that he had been working on before this point in time and, since he only had a limited amount of the substance in question, he had to be careful when he went forward with the next stage of his plan, "It should be enough the pacify the beast... provide he doesn't catch wind of me first."

"That sounds okay. You can just hang back and shoot him at a distance." Sly commented, as that sounded like the easiest thing that could happen at the moment, but the look on Bentley's face told him that he wasn't correct in his thoughts, which annoyed him a little.

"Given the weight of the darts, I'll need to sneak up behind him and take a shot within a few meters." Bentley said, to which he readied his darts as he stared at the beast, which was currently prowling the area in front of him, while he thought about what he was going to do next, "I'll send a signal that will let the Guru know that it's time for him to take control of the beast... and then I can focus on hacking into the computer nodes that are scattered throughout the area while he takes care of the guards."

"Okay. Good luck Bentley." Sly said, as he knew that this was going to be dangerous for his friend, not to mention the newest member of the gang, but since it appeared that Bentley had that under control he disconnected the connection and let him get to work on stalking the beast... while he and Murray continued to focus on the planes to make sure they were ready for the final match between them and the Baron.

Bentley moved out from the area that he was in and stalked the giant wolf that he needed to drug, though like he told Sly he could only get so close before the odor of the darts gave him away, and when he successfully loosed one of the darts into the wolf's rear he had to run for a few moments to be sure that he didn't get bitten. Once the beast stopped chasing him, and went back to his own devices, Bentley moved out of the area that they were in and repeated the process once more, causing the wolf to chase him again once the next dart hit his target and annoyed it, which he was expecting after the first time using a dart on it. He had to use four darts on the wolf before the Skunk Balm kicked in, causing the beast to run off into the distance before coming to a stop in a large part of the area below the Baron's keep and fell asleep where it was standing, where it collapsed and closed it's eyes. From that point forward Bentley sent out the signal and watched as the Guru moved towards the beast, just as he started to head towards the computer nodes near the hanger, before the beast woke up with the Guru on it's back and started assaulting the guards... though Bentley knew that the Guru already knew how many guards he needed to take out to even the odds for Sly and Carmelita.

What Bentley wasn't expecting was for Gilda to appear near where he intended to start the mission to hack into the various computer nodes and find what he needed to know, but at the same time he focused on the task at hand as he came to a stop near her.

"So, how do you plan to hack into the aircraft control tower?" Gilda asked, as she had the feeling that Bentley had an idea of what he needed to do, but right now she was interested in finding that out, mostly since she and Derpy really weren't doing much against the Baron's forces.

"It's simple, really." Bentley said, beckoning to one of the windmills that were near their location, as he had learned something while Sly and Carmelita were busy flying against the previous teams that they had sabotaged, "The whole system is linked through computer nodes which monitor the power generated by the nearby windmills."

"Really? All the power around here comes from the local windmills?" Gilda inquired, though at the same time some of the wind wrapped around her arm for a moment, as her power came from the wind itself, to which she smiled for a moment as she looked out at the area, "Honestly, I thought they were just for looks."

"The control nodes tell a different story." Bentley insisted, before he shifted in his chair for a moment, because he and Clockwerk had finished the modifications they had been working on earlier and now it was time for him to test them out in the field, to see if more changes needed to be made, "My turbo chair has been outfitted with an extra afterburner, meaning that heights such as what you see at the moment are nothing to me!"

Gilda nodded her head and watched as Bentley moved through the area around the tower that he was trying to hack into, using the launching devices that were scattered everywhere and the parts of the other planes that had crashed into the ground to get up to his target. She really had nothing to do, as this was mostly just Sly and Carmelita's show at this point, but she noticed that it didn't take Bentley that long to make his way through the first computer node and he made his way to the second one, where nothing seemed to change in the area around them. Bentley took a moment or two to make his way through the second computer node and then moved onto the third one, though as he did that Gilda slipped down behind one of the guards that was walking through the area and stole the loot that was in his pocket, giving her a little something to do while Bentley worked, before she noticed that he had completed the third computer and was moving towards the fourth and final one.

A few seconds later, as Gilda moved up to a safe area, she watched as Bentley used the afterburner that he and Clockwerk had added to the chair that he was bound to, allowing him to access the final computer node, though when he completed his task one of the windmill's sped up and broke off of the structure... where it flew through the air and whipped around the town for a moment before crashing into the structure that was keeping the water in the area near the hotel, enlarging the river by a decent about in the process as she touched down near Bentley once more.

"Windmill throwing stars, eh?" Bentley commented, though at the same time Gilda could see that he was already thinking of a way that they might be able to use this to their advantage, given what they had learned about the Black Baron before coming here, "This little system bug might come in handy!"


Once Bentley and Gilda returned to the hotel room, and set up a conference call with those in the hanger, he told all of them that they were now ready for the final round of the ACES Dogfighting competition and that it was time for what he called Operation: Turbo Dominant Eagle. In just a few hours, in the first few hours of tomorrow morning, Team Iceland and Team Belgium would begin fighting it out in the B-Champs round, which actually provided the perfect cover for step one of the plan that he had come up with and was verified by Clockwerk once he heard it. Sly was to head to the hanger with Carmelita, so they could suit up for the finals, while at the same time both Gilda and Derpy would fly up to the local gunships so they could plant some tracking devices on them before retreating. Murray and Diz would then use the two person rowboat they used in the sewers to pull down the aircraft communication antenna that rested near the now enlarged river, because with it out of commission the Baron would be forced to use an unscrambled radio frequency to call in the gunships for backup. If that happened, and both he and Clockwerk were sure that it would happen, they would be ready with our secret weapon, and, with the tracking devices installed into the gunships, they were guaranteed not to miss their target.

Of course it was up to Sly and Carmelita to take out last year's champ, the Black Baron, and show Penelope that they were as skilled as he told her when he found her in that chatroom, meaning all the rest of the team could do was sit back once they completed their tasks and wait for the pair to beat the Baron at his own game.

When morning arrived Bentley was excited when the B-Champs dogfight started, because with them going at it, flying over the town while blowing each other out of the air, no one was going to notice Gilda and Derpy slip onto the gunships and plant a tracking device in the location he specified. Bentley explained that, yes, the trackers did look kind of funny, as he and Clockwerk had put them together on such short notice since they hadn't been expecting to find that bug that he had discovered the previous day, before warning them that they were sensitive to extreme changes in altitude, not that it mattered to the sisters, who were used to high elevations. As the two of them headed out, to get the trackers in position, both Diz and Murray headed out to the river, getting into position for when Bentley called on them to do their part of the operation, while at the same time Sly and Carmelita accompanied the rest of the gang to the hanger so they could run one final test before they took to the skies and faced the Baron at long last. It didn't take Gilda and Derpy long to reach the four gunships in question and attach the trackers to the area that Bentley wanted them in, though once that was done they flew away from the gunships and headed towards the hanger... while at the same time looking down at Murray and Diz as they started using the rowboat to latch onto one of the support beams and attempt to pull them apart.

Fortunately it didn't take Murray and Diz long to break the first of the three support beams, nor did it take too long to get back and break the second one, though the third one gave them a little trouble when they had to deal with some falling planes, but eventually they cleared the bridge and the array came crashing down... to which the pair returned to the hanger so they could see off Sly and Carmelita, who waved at the rest of the gang before they took off and flew towards the area they had fought in the last time.

This time around both Sly and Carmelita had to separate from each other, as it appeared that the Baron's pilots were under orders to converge on their locations and destroy them accordingly, but, at the same time, he was in for a surprise as both of them used their skills and out maneuvered some of the pilots, causing them to crash and burn when they collided with one of their allies. The Baron, despite the fact that they were currently enemies, actually seemed impressed by the skills that the pair were showing off, even though both Sly and Carmelita were making a lot of things up as they went and just so happened to do so in a manner that made it look impressive, except for dodging, they were both good at dodging incoming attacks and dealing damage. Even Dimitri, who was commentating on the fight, sounded impressed by the performance and the crowd was eating it up, showing that he definitely had some skill in this sort of thing as Sly blasted a pilot that was gunning for Carmelita, who, in turn, blasted the Baron's plane enough to put it in the state where it needed to be taken down and repaired before something happened to it.

When the Baron tried to cheat by calling in the gunships, however, Bentley surprised him with one of the windmill throwing stars that he had discovered by accident, destroying two of the four gunships when they tried to target Sly, while also forcing the Baron to abandon his plan and drop down onto the larger plane that came in to retrieve him. What the gang found interesting was that Sly jumped out of his plane and chased after the Baron, where Clockwerk smiled as he activated the remote control function of Sly's plane to make sure it safely landed so they didn't have to repair it when the competition was over. From there the rest of the gang, along with the people that came to watch the event, observed as the Baron and Sly went at it on the wing of the plane that had come into the area, but the gang smiled as Sly managed to outmaneuver the Baron and his fists, before a well placed blow to the face damaged the mask that was over the person's face... only for them to discover that it was none other than Penelope that had been facing Sly and Carmelita in the air.

Just as they came to the conclusion that Penelope and the Black Baron were one and the same, even if the public felt that the Baron had given her the reins so he could retire without anyone finding him, Penelope rushed them to the winner's circle and proclaimed that they were this year's champions. Of course there was a bit of an awkward moment between Bentley and Penelope, on account of the photos they'd sent each other over the internet being a bit exaggerated, but at the very least Derpy smiled when Penelope smiled at Bentley. Once the award ceremony was over Penelope invited them to the 'Baron's' keep and explained that the disguise had invented to get her past the dogfighting league's strict age requirements, back when she was younger than she was now. However, after winning, the Baron became a celebrity, and she found herself putting on the costume more and more often, which was why she was glad that 'he' finally lost, because without that persona stuck to her she was free to take up a new path, and she joined the gang without hesitation.

The next day, after a good night's rest, the gang's latest recruit treated them to a week long aerial tour of Holland, showing them the sights as they took in the scenery and the places that she had come to know after winning her first competition all those years ago... and there was one thing that the gang agreed on, Penelope was going to be an excellent addition to their ranks, as she was fitting in just fine.