//------------------------------// // Chapter 2: Life Goes On // Story: Sly Cooper and the Silver Dust // by Kingdom Harmony //------------------------------// Life Goes On Sly normally slept in the day because it was easier to steal at night. However he decided to go to bed early this time, after all that happened he was pretty exhausted. Sly laid down and right on cue, there was a knock on his door. “Of course,” he mumbled to himself as he got up and walked over to the door. Sly opened it to see Silver standing there with his blanket over his head. He quickly assessed the situation and tried to guess why the little colt was still up. “Is the bed I made you no good?” he asked. “No, it’s fine, but I just can’t sleep, and I was wondering, well can I sleep in here… with you?” Silver asked hesitantly. “Sure, just keep your blanket. One isn’t big enough for the two of us,” Sly explained with a smile as he stepped aside to let Silver in. Once Silver got onto the bed Sly tucked him in. “Good night Silver.” “Good night,” Silver said with a yawn, “Dad.” This caught Sly off guard, although it didn’t take long for Sly to figure out that the kid was asleep as soon as his head hit the pillow what he said was most likely a slip of the tongue. Even so, it felt good to hear him say that. Sly may only have been nineteen years old, but he decided to be the best guardian he could be to this child. ----------------------------- Silver awoke at noon and noticed that Sly was still asleep, and decided not to wake him. He left Sly’s room by pushing the door open, which was possible because it had not been not completely closed. He then noticed that it was rather quiet in the house. After checking Murray’s room, it turned out he was asleep as well. Silver moved on to Bentley’s room and knocked on his door. “Come in,” Bentley called out and Silver was glad someone else was awake. As he stood up on his hind legs to reach the door knob it and jiggled it but couldn't turn it. “Sly is something wrong?” Bentley called out once more as his footsteps could be heard coming towards the door. “You know I’m rather busy with the budg…” Bentley stopped short when he realized he was talking to Silver. “Oh, sorry, I thought were Sly,” Bentley said as he looked at his watch. “I’ve been up later that I though.” “What do you mean?” Silver asked. “Well we tend to sleep during the day, being thieves and all. Still as the brains of the team, I need to balance the budget so we can care for you. It looks like I’ll be pulling an all nighter… or dayer in my case I suppose.” Silver giggled a bit. It wasn’t funny, but it was nice to see Bentley try to help. “I’m sorry I’m casing so much trouble,” Silver apologized. “Oh don’t worry about it,” Bentley commented. “To tell the truth, even though it defies every once of my intellect, I wanted to help you too. I was actually relieved that Sly stubbornness beat out my common sense. But... if you want to help me out, I could use the company to help stay awake.” Silver’s eyes beamed at the chance. “Can I?” “Come on in,” Bentley said stepping to the side. “I need to know more about you anyway.” ----------------------------- Carmelita Fox arrived at Interpol exhausted, but this case was serious and one or two all nighters was to be expected. Besides, after casing Sly for so long, she found herself much more active at night, so she should be able to handle this. Every available officer was put onto the Dusts’ murder case. Carmelita got back the results of the evidence she brought in and a theory of what happened. It turned out she was right on the order of events. The theory stated that the killer, which the cause of death identified as Clockwerk as the most likely suspect, broke in and did the deed. Afterwards he blow up the building and tried to bury the evidence in the ruble. A friend of the Dusts, seeing as they had no relatives on record, somehow survived the assault and cried at the scene of the crime before breaking a hole in the wall and running away. Carmelita decided to present the evidence to the director and see what he thought. “Director Barkley, I have an update on the Dust case,” she called into his office after knocking. “Good, come in,” Barkley called out. Carmelita walked in and handed the file to Barkley. Barkley read it over and seemed somewhat disappointed. “Well I suppose it was a long shot. Still this theory leaves one thing unanswered,” He commented. “Why did Clockwerk destroy the whole town? As powerful as he is, he never took such extremes before.” “Well,” Carmelita thought, “if you were really the only one that knew the Dusts’ location, maybe he only found out what town they lived in.” James Barkley’s eyes shot open. “That’s it!” he shouted. “Still, for him to find out anything he would have had to have found a way to trace the communications, that would explain the radio silence the Dusts’ gave use. Even so, he must have been pretty desperate to take such measures, meaning the Dusts’ were close to figuring out his location! Inspector, have the tech department pull whatever they can off their laptop. With a little luck we may just catch him this time.” “On it sir!” Carmelita replied. ----------------------------- It was late, approaching ten o’clock at night, and Silver still couldn’t sleep. He went to see Sly again, but even though his door was open, his room was empty. He looked out into the living room and saw Murray and Bentley talking about the budget that Silver helped with. Silver let out a loud and long yawn as his vision went a little blurry. “Where’s dad?” he asked sleepily while rubbing his eyes. As his vision reconstituted, Silver noticed Bentley and Murray looked absolutely shocked. However, Murray’s eye seemed to light up in a moment of understanding. “I think he means Sly,” he told Bentley. It was at this moment that Silver realized what he said. It definitely bothered and embarrassed him a little bit, Sly wasn’t his father after all. Still, it didn’t bother him as much as he thought it would, Sly did was trying to be a father figure and Silver quickly connected to him. Sly said what he needed to hear, not what he wanted to hear, and never sugar coated anything. Silver thought, maybe with time, he could see Sly as a father, but, as Sly would say, not a replacement to his real father, but just a different father. “Oh yes,” Bentley realized what Murray said was right and turned to Silver. “Sly is.. well he’s working.” Despite Bentley avoiding saying it, Silver remembered quite well that that meant stealing. “How many master criminals are around here?” Silver asked confused, remembering that the coopers only stole from one of those or corrupt politicians. “Well not all that many,” Bentley sighed, “but there are quite a few gangs and small time criminals to prey upon. It may be below Sly’s usual standards, but we need the money to eat. Try not to think about it too much, just go to sleep. He’ll be back soon.” “But what about you two?” Silver asked. “Well we tend to sleep in the day,” Bentley explained, “helps with our line of work, although, I do suppose that will complicate things, but I’m working on that tonight.” “No need,” Silver yawned, “I can’t sleep.” “What do you mean, you sure sound t…” Murray said before Bentley cut him off. “I see,” Bentley started. “Well, I suppose if you stay up all night and go to sleep first thing in the morning, you’ll be on the same sleep schedule as us. I guess I have some free time then. You want to play some games with me and Murray?” “I’m not sure I’m able,” Silver replied, lifting up one of his hooves. “We have a few turn based RPG’s. With a little help, I’m sure you can handle them,” Bentley suggested. “Thanks,” Silver said as he walked over to the sofa in front of the TV. “Don’t mention it. By the way, you said you birthday was in four days, right? “Yes,” “Well, we have an extra controller and with a little work I’m sure I can make it work for you. I’ll have it ready for a your birthday.” “Really?’ “As long as you don’t object to me making a few teaching programs. A young man, such as yourself should not be without an education.” Silver giggled a bit. “What’s so funny?” Bentley asked. “It’s just,” Silver let out a heavy sigh. “You sounded just like my parents.” Silver smiled slightly, feeling like his parents were still with him. “Okay I accept your terms... Uncle Bentley.” “Uncle?” both Bentley and Murray said in shock. “We’re family now,” Silver explained with a tear running down the side of his face, “and… well you may not the same as my original, you deserve the titles.” “Are you sure?” Bentley asked. “Yes, I may not have known you all that long, but your still my new family. I may have to make a conscious effort to do it, but you all deserve it. I think this is how my parents would want it. Some day maybe, the word will come out easier.” ----------------------------- James Barkley recently received the information of what was on the laptop. Finally, they had a lead and he called Inspector Fox into his office to explain the situation and how to proceed forward. “Yes sir,” Carmelita said as she came in. “We have the information that was on the laptop,” Barkley began. “There was a hidden file to the that states the Dusts were in the process of analyzing a rare alloy, acquired from the site of a Fiendish Five attack. If the alloy is as rare as they anticipated, not only will it link the Fiendish Five together, but it will lead us straight to Clockwerk.” “So what is this alloy?” Carmelita asked. “That’s the one issue. The Dusts never finished analyzing it so we don’t know what it was and the specimen they had couldn’t be found. We did a thorough search of the ruble and never found it. It is presumed to have been taken in the attack.” “So it’s another dead end,” Carmelita sighed. “Not at all. It’s actually the first lead we’ve had in ages,” Barkley countered. “You see there is a very good chance that the other members of the Fiendish Five have this alloy in their vicinity. As we do have both Raleigh’s resort and Panda King’s fireworks factory under constant watch we can be sure that there was no construction as of late. If they had it before they still have it now.” “Well, that does sound promising.” “Yes, well, here’s the plan. I will take over as head investigator on the surface. You will go undercover as Cathy Montoya, and find this alloy.” “Okay, but how will I identify it?” “Well the plan still a work in progress, but I have time to think that over.” “How?” “You see, I have come to the conclusion that we must tell the other dimension what happened to the the Dusts. Both of us will go and we will be gone about a day, if there’s no change in plains. That should be plenty of time to think over how to give you the ability to identify the alloy. We leave first thing in the morning, it's a long plane ride.” ----------------------------- Sly came in holding a large bag of loot and saw Silver sleepily laughing with Bentley and Murray. Seeing as the sun was beginning to rise, this was surprising. "What are you still doing up?" Sly asked Silver. "I couldn't sleep," Silver replied. "By the way Sly, why were you out so late?" Bentley asked. Sly dropped the bag of loot in front of him. "I went around and took as much as I could from all the gangs without drawing suspicion. We may need to use them again. ...Silver you really should go to sleep. You can sleep in my room again if it will help.” “Okay,” Silver yawned. “Thanks… dad.” Sly stopped for a moment and kneeled down to Silvers level. “You can’t just replace your family Silver,” he said. “I know, and I’m not trying to,” Silver explained. “You can’t replace my real dad, but as far as I can see, your still a dad to me, and deserve the respect.” Sly smiled. It seem the little colt took what Sly had told him to heart. “You're a weird kid, you know that, I don’t think many children would to respect their new family so quickly.” “Your right. Still, my parents would want me to accept and respect you.” “You're going to fit in here just fine. Still you don’t have to do this.” “Well, I want to, it may seem weird, but if you guys are going to act like parents, then I’m going to treat you like ones.” “Sly it’s best to just let him have his way,” Bentley interrupted. “He’s got his heart set on it.” “Okay,” Sly gave in. “Let's get some shut eye. I really overworked myself today." ----------------------------- After a five hour plane ride and a two hour helicopter ride, Inspector Carmelita and Director Barkley arrived at Interpol’s top secret facility, code named Rift, after the inter-dimensional rift hidden within. The first thing Carmelita noticed was that the facility looked more like a resort. However even stranger was the fact that when they approached the entrance, the guard just opened the doors without any ID. As they walked through the halls of this so called top secret headquarters, Carmelita decided to voice these concerns. “Why does this place look like a resort?” she asked. “Well when we first founded this location we didn’t know how long the officers we sent here would be stuck here,” Barkley explained. “So to make the job more appealing, we gave the place the comfort of a resort.” “Okay,” Carmelita accepted the answer, “but why is the security so low for a top secret facility like this.” “That one is a bit more complicated,” Barkley began. “Put simply though, after a few years, we found that trade between us and the other world wouldn’t be profitable. Even though we still keep in contact with the other world, however the need for secrecy died after a few years. The only reason this place is still considered top secret is that the process of officially declassifying it would take too much time and money. There are more reasons to keep it classified but that's the big one.” “I do suppose that makes sense,” Carmelita replied. The director and Carmelita walked into a room with a large monitor. "Patch us through to Equestria," Barkley commanded and the a few officers began to type on computers. Soon a image if a white unicorn with a blue, green, and purple mane popped up on screen. The video only showed the mare form the neck up, but there was still a very noticeable crown on her head. "Hello, my name is James Barkley,," the director introduced himself. "I am the current director of Interpol. May I ask who I am speaking with?" "Of course. I am Princess Celestia, the ruler of Equestria," the pony introduced herself. “This is unexpected, I’m not used to hearing from Interpol other than the monthly update. Is something wrong?” “Unfortunately there is,” Barkley informed. “We regret to inform you that Print Dust and his wife, Clue Dust, are... dead.” “What?” Celestia whispered in shock. “How?” “They were killed,” Barkley explained. “We are currently searching for the culprit.” “I see, I know it’s your jurisdiction, but if possible I’d like you to keep me up to date on any and all developments in this case.” “I understand, and I have some information for you right now. We actually know who did it. His name is Clockwerk, and he has been evading us for years. Clue and Print were in charge of locating him. And even though we took every precaution to keep their location secret, Clockwerk found them.” The was a moment of silence. “As it turns out the Dusts were on the verge of finding out the location of Clockwerk through a rare alloy recovered from an attack from his gang, the Fiendish Five. Unfortunately Clockwerk must have taken the alloy, so we lost the sample we had.” “That is quite the lead, but you still seemed to hit a dead end.” “Not quite. The women with me is Inspector Carmelita Montoya Fox. She is one of our best officers. She will be going undercover to try and find this alloy. With a little luck this should work.” Celestia stood there absorbing the information as it was presented. “Well, if that’s what you have planned, there may be a way for me to help, or rather I think I know somepony who can help. She’s a fast learner and knows many spells, which may come in handy with your search.” “That would be helpful, but I wouldn’t want to impose. Besides we don’t necessarily have much time to wait.” “It’s okay, she’s actually here helping clean up one of our latest celebrations. I could send her over so you can speak with her directly.” “I supposes we can put aside some time to see what she can do.” “Good, I’ll call you back in a few minutes before sending her over.” The screen shut down and the director and Carmelita waited. After a half an hour a phone ringing sound echoed in the room. “Please answer that,” Barkley told the officers as they patched the the call through once more. "Hello," Celestia started, "she's ready to go through. However, I thought it may help to send her assistant as well." "Very well," Barkley agreed, "send them over. I’ll call you back with my decision.” “Sounds like a plan,” Celestia said before the screen shut off. “Sir,” one of the offices started, “they're here.” “Inspector,” Barkley began, “since you will be working with her you should be the one to interview her.” “Makes sense,” Carmelita agreed, not only because it made sense, but also because she was tired of just standing on the side lines. When the doors opened, Director Barkley left the room and a lavender mare with both wings and a horn came into the room. As interesting as that was Carmelita’s attention was first drawn to the slight glimpse of the rift she saw. It seemed to be a literal tear in the fabric of reality. However when the doors closed she turned her attention back the the pony. Aside for the horn and wings, she had purple eyes and her mane and tail were navy blue with pink and dark purple highlights going through them. She also had a tattoo on her flank of a pink star on top of a white star with five little white stars surrounding it. This actually reminded Carmelita that the Dusts also had a tattoo in that location, Clue had one of a magnifying glass, and Print had one of of a fingerprint duster. She decided she would have to ask this pony about them, after all their flank was an odd place to get a tattoo to most, even if they were from a different dimension. Carmelita also noticed a lizard creature sitting on her back that looked more like a small dragon the more she looked at it. The dragon had purple scales and green spikes as well as green eyes. As a professional, Carmelita started judging her potential partner as soon as she came in. Anyone can do in interview with practice, but you can tell a lot more about someone from the way they act. This pony was looking all over the place with the bright eyed wonder of a child. Perhaps that's what she should be doing, being in a different dimension. Even so Carmelita couldn't work with someone so easily distracted on such a delicate case. That is, unless the benefit outweighs the risk. “Twilight, snap out of it, they're right there.” the dragon said waving a hand in front of her face. “Oh! Thanks Spike,” the pony responded and walked over to Carmelita. “I’m Twilight Sparkle, and I assume, you are Carmelita.” “Yes,” Carmelita replied, noting her formal introduction and probable deductive reasoning. “Celestia informed me that you were in charge of the case,” Twilight explained. “She also filled me in on most of the details.” “Good, that means that we can get down to business,” Carmelita started. “However, I’d like to ask you a few questions about you and your dimension. Still we don’t have much time, so answer in only a few sentences if possible. If it’s a long story that you can’t explain shortly, let me know and we’ll skip it.” “Okay,” Twilight agreed the the request. “First off, what’s with the tattoo on your flank?” Carmelita asked. “Oh, that’s called a cutie mark. Everypony either has one or will have one where I come from. They’re completely natural.” “Everypony… I think you mean everybody.” “Oops, sorry, that’s what we say back in Equestria.” This made Carmelita realize the cultural differences as a risk to the mission as well. Either Twilight will give them away, or she’ll have to risk wasting time on teaching her not only the geography and rules of this world, but how to act in order to fit in as well. “Okay,” Carmelita picked up, “you have both wings and a horn, I know what unicorns and a pegasi are, but I’ve never seen anything like you.” “I’m called an alicorn, and for the record, I’ve never seen anthropomorphic animals before either, and I’m not too surprised, intrigued, but not surprised.” Carmelita made a mental note on how Twilight added that last part as her intrigue would make it a little easier to train her and the informal side to her personality would make her a great to fit in on the undercover scene. Now that Carmelita indulged her curiosity, and even found out some unintentional information, she had an idea of the risk and benefits. As it is, easy to train or not, they really didn’t have the time to train a new officer, not to mention her intrigue of this dimension would probably get in the way more than it would help. Even so there was one possible benefit that would make or break this deal. “Well, that about covers my curiosity, for now,” Carmelita anconced. “To be honest, to allow you on the case is very risky, so I’ll just cut to the chase. Can you use a...spell… to find and analyze a certain rare metal ore? And if so can you do it from a distance?” “I do know a spell that can analyze the makeup of any object,” Twilight answered, “and it can cover a decent radius of about thirty feet. However, because I’m not familiar with your world I’d need multiple samples to verify the ore and relay it to you.” “If you had to guess, how many samples would you need?” Carmelita continued. “At least two,” Twilight told her. “and I should definitely be able to make do with four.” “Perfect,” the Inspector smiled. “You're hired.” “I see you came to a decision,” the director said as he came back over. “I’ll call back headquarters and let them know it will be about another two weeks before we get back. We need to get your partners up to speed on our world.” “Of course sir,” Carmelita acknowledged, “but may I recommend three weeks. There also a cultural behaviour difference to work out.” “Very well,” Barkley agreed. ----------------------------- Silver got up rather early, at just four o’clock in the afternoon. While Sly, Bentley, and Murray nomaly got up at six at night, Silver was still having trouble adjusting to the new sleep schedule he was given. Sleeping during the day just wasn’t natural to him. Still he was recently able to move into his own room when he slept, which probably wasn't helping the situation. But what could he do, he couldn't sleep in Sly's room forever. Silver got out of his bed and pushed open his door, which Bentley had removed the locking mechanism from in order to kept it from snapping shut. Bentley said that one day he'd install a door that Silver could use, but for now this would have to do. When Silver left his room, he was surprised to see Sly, Bentley, and Murray were all already up, and huddled around the table. "What are you doing up?" Silver asked with a yawn. All three of them turned around in shock before quickly regaining their composure. "Good morning," Sly greeted Silver. "We got up early so we could prepare for this." All three of them stepped to the side of the table to reveal a cake. “Happy Birthday Silver!” they all shouted at once and Silver looked around the room in shock to see a few minor decorations and a four presents one floor in the corner by Bentley's door. “Thanks,” Sliver said, beginning to tear up a bit in the eyes. “You didn’t think that we’d forget you birthday,” Murray asked sarcastically. As the tears slowly began to roll down Silver's face, he looked up to the three with a smile, all of his emotions swirling together. “To be honest, I forgot about it,” he said. Silver pulled himself together and gave Sly a hug. Afterwards he did the same for both Bentley and Murray before sitting down on the couch. “Okay, Bentley can you start breakfast while Silver opens his presents?” Sly asked. “On it,” Bentley said as he press a button on the wall and a small kitchen rose out of the floor, a kitchen that Silver had gotten all too used to seeing. “But we have a cake,” Silver said. “Yeah, why can’t we eat that?” Murray asked. “We can’t eat cake first thing in the morning, you both know that,” Sly said. “And you're supposed to be one of the adults here Murray,” Bentley added. “Can’t blame a guy for trying,” Murray joked and everyone laughed as he got up to get the presents.“Here’s the gifts.” “Thanks… Uncle Murray,” Silver said, still not used to the sound, but making the gesture anyway. Silver placed his two fore hooves on the package, and used his mouth to unwrap the first gift , a box of some fancy bard of cookies. “Those are my favorite snack,” Murray told Silver, “hope you like them.” “Thanks again,” Silver said to Murray once more before opening the next present, A box that contained a laptop and several programs. “That’s less of a birthday gift and more of your education,” Bentley explained as he cooked. “The laptop is handmade, as are the programs. They are designed so you can use them, even with your hooves. The laptop is still a laptop though, and still capable of anything a normal computer can do.” "Thanks alot… Uncle Bentley,” Silver said before continuing. The next gift contained a special hand crafted controller made by Bentley. It was shaped like a arcade panel, with a indented analog that was designed to work with Silver’s left fore hoof on the left, and the buttons on the right. There was also eight camera buttons below the main buttons and a D-pad below the analog. However what really made this different was a second panel that contains the L and R buttons, like gas and brake pedals on a car that Silver amused were supposed to be used by his back hooves. “I did promise, didn’t I?” Bentley said as he put some pancakes on a dish. “Yes,” Silver started, “and you delivered. Thank you.” After that Silver moved on to the last present, noticeably smaller than the rest, but Silver was surprised that there were more than three to begin with. After unwrapping it carefully to make sure not to brake it, it turned out to be a video game named Jak and Daxter. “What good is the controller, without something to use it on,” Sly stated. “After Bentley told me that he was making you the controller for today, I told him I’d handle the game.” “Thanks… Dad,” Silver said. “And well it may not be as fancy as the controller but it is just as important.” “Now Silver, why even bring that up?” Bentley criticized. “Because… Dad probably feels guilty that he couldn’t get me as large or fancy of a gift,” Silver explained, “and I want him to know it is just as appreciated. Bentley and Murray looked over to Sly. “Well,” Sly stated sheepishly, “he got me there.” “It’s remarkable how quickly you two connected with each other,” Bentley sighed and shut off the stove, put plates on the table, and pressed the button again to make the kitchen sink back into the floor. “Well, breakfast is ready.” ----------------------------- "It's only been about six days," Carmelita told Twilight as they walked down the hall, "and you already got down basic knowledge of the world and how to act." "Well," Twilight blushed, "I did have a lot of resources to use. That ... computer really made things alot easier." "Even so you're moving along much faster than I anticipated,” Carmelita complemented. “At this rate we’ll finish preparing you by the end of the week.” ----------------------------- While Sly was working, namely spying on a local drug dealer, he was also testing out Bentley’s newest invention, the Binocucom. The first function he tested was the basic binocular and zooming functions and Sly was actually surprised by how far it could zoom. Form his vantage point, the dealer was no more than a spec, but with the Binocucom he could zoom in far enough to read the words on the money he was carrying. It was at this moment that Bentley popped up on a small screen inside the Binocucom. “I see you're already using it,” Bentley started. “How does it work?” “It amazing,” Sly complemented. “You’ve truly outdone yourself this time. I came even see the numbers on the safe with perfect accuracy.” “Yeah I know, There’s a built in camera that allows me to see everything you are seeing.” “Nice,” Sly said intrigued. “Can it do anything else?” “Yes, it can take pictures,” Bentley began. “There is a small button on the side that does it, try and take a picture of the code for the safe as that guy puts the money in,” “Okay,” Sly said softly, and as the dealer typed in the code to his safe, Sly took a picture each time it he press a button. “Looks like it works," Bentley confirmed. “All the picture are here on my computer. I’ll get started on making a few more of these for the rest of us.” “Before you go,” Sly said, switching communications to an ear piece he had, “I wanted to ask about something.” “Okay, what is it?” “Well, Silver just turned eight a few days ago, right?” Sly asked as he headed down to the safe to take the loot. “Oh no! Sly he‘s not a Cooper. Heck, he’s not even a raccoon!” “I know, but I still feel guilty. I thought by the time I had a child, I'd have the Thievius Raccoonus back. And I think that there are a few techniques in there he can learn.” “Okay, but I’m not sure we’re going to have any better luck.” “About that, I think it time we stop solely relying on your sources and rumors. As good as your sources are, the Fiendish Five are extremely elusive. There is only one group with any one hundred percent accurate information on them.” “You don’t mean…” “Yes, Interpol, we’ll have to take it.” “Sly are you sure? You’ve only made it a point to only steal from criminals.” “Yeah, well lets think of it more like borrowing, we’ll give the file back right when we are done with it.” “Okay I suppose. If you're sure about this the we should act soon. My sources tell me that both Inspector Fox and Director Barkley are out and will be out for another twelve days.” “With your sources, we can hit the place tomorrow,” Sly said as he grabbed the cash from the safe and replaced it with a calling card designed like the cooper emblem, a simplistic raccoon face that’s top of the face and noise were black, the bottom was white, and the eye’s were blue. ----------------------------- Carmelita, Twilight, and Spike were almost back to the Interpol headquarters in Paris. Carmelita was definitely shocked that it only took Twilight nine days to learn everything she needed. It may have been only the basics, but she still was putting every other officer the inspector knew to shame. With less than a month of training, she could master everything. Even so, there wasn’t that kind of time. As soon as Twilight finished they started their flight back, they slept on most of the flight, but Carmelita decided to go over what they’d do when the landed now that they were only a few minutes away. “Okay,” Carmelita began, “When we get off I’ll be taking you to the forensics lab to analyze different elements of the periodic table. It may not help with finding rare ore faster, but when you do find it, we will already know it’s makeup and our scientists can locate the score, which is most likely where Clockwerk is hiding.” “Got it,” Twilight agreed. “So is that your headquarters?” Spike asked. Carmelita and Twilight both looked out the window. “Yes,” Carmelita confirmed before noticing something coming down the fire escape. “Sly!” “What?” both Twilight and Spike asked in shock. Carmelita turned to the pilot. “Take them to the landing site,” she ordered, “I’ve got someone to catch up with.” Carmelita opened the helicopter door. “Stop criminal!” she shouted as she jumped out. To Be Continued...