Sly Cooper: Family of Thieves

by Blackdrag-rose

Time: Prehistoric Discovery

When the van finally came to a stop, as in a crash landing in some snow, the gang carefully climbed out of the van and took a few moments to survey the area that they had found themselves in, while at the same time they made sure to keep both Elizabeth and Daniel safe, especially since it was cold out. Fortunately Diz, once more proving that his skills with his chaos magic was a great benefit to them, manipulated some of the various pieces of clothing that were in the van, ones that they wouldn't be needing at all, and created some winter type clothing for the kids, giving them some decent protection from the cold air. Another bit of good news for them was that there happened to be an abandoned looking hut of sorts at the edge of a village, or what would have passed as a prehistoric village, and they were sure that the structure was abandoned because it looked like it hadn't seen some use for the last couple of days, meaning the owner was either dead or lost in the wilderness surrounding the area they had landed in. Since they didn't have time to go out and search for a better place to stay and hide, as well as keep warm, the gang determined that this was the best spot for them to stay in and moved in before they were seeing... as well as finding a good place to hide the van, since this was a time period that didn't have metallic objects like this, which also meant that Clockwerk had to fly around in his miniature form to avoid detection.

What the kids found amusing was when a pterodactyl flew over their new safe house, mostly because Bentley pulled out his Dinosaur Repellent, a powerful cannon that seemed to be designed to exterminate any threats if they landed in this time period by some odd chance, before Sly stopped him since the creature was ignoring them... and, with the device put away, he got Bentley started on trying to figure out where in the world they were and what time period they were in, as well as seeing if he could fix the time machine and communicator so they could see which ancestor was under attack next.

Once they were all situated, as best as they could possibly be since it was thanks to Diz shifting some things around with his chaos magic that they weren't freezing to death, Sly headed outside as Clockwerk took to the air, as both he and Carmelita agreed that one of them should stick with the kids for now. As he walked outside he noticed that there was a crude sign with the name "Gunga' carved into it, a large penguin statue that appeared to rest in the middle of the ancient village, and one structure that definitely looked out of place, as it seemed to be an ice palace with a crown sculpted into the material it was all carved out of. Sly decided that there had to be someone here that didn't belong here, merely because of the fact that the creatures of this time period couldn't have known what a crown looked like, much less one that looked like a modern one that he and the gang could have stolen at some point in time, so he focused on climbing up to the top of the penguin statue that was nearby, even though that meant he had to climb up a pole and then walk across some vines to reach his target.

"Okay Bentley, I'm in position to begin my reconnaissance of the area," Sly said, speaking into his binocucom as he looked out over the area that they had landed in, which definitely looked like a cross between a valley and a village that had been set up nearby, before focusing on the matter at hand, "How are things with the time machine?"

"To be honest, it doesn't look good." Bentley replied, as he and Clockwerk had gone over what had happened to the time machine and he knew what was missing from it, since he had built it in the first place, "Looks like a couple of pieces of the time drive broke off of that crash landing. I need you to track down the missing components A.S.A.P. Fortunately, the advanced trajectoral management processor is still functional, so I was able to calculate their most likely positions. Unfortunately, they seem to have landed in some dangerous terrain. The Temporal Sprocket appears to have fallen close to some pterodactyl nests and I'm afraid one of these prehistoric penguins... might've gotten it's flippers on the Gravity Encabulator. Oh, they may look cute, but those little devils are nasty. This isn't going to be a simple pickup, Sly. Get some photos of their precise locations and I'll analyze them to formulate a plan. But watch your back, because, as I'm sure you've noticed at this point, we're not the first unexpected guests to arrive in this time period."

"Yeah, I agree with you on that." Sly stated, where his binocucom glanced over at the structure he had been staring at, the one with the crown, and he was happy to see that Bentley agreed with him, "It looks like someone installed some kind of conveyor belt system into that structure. That's definitely not anything these guys are able to make. I'll be sure to grab some pictures of the machinery while I'm at it, and maybe a picture of whoever Le Paradox sent to this time period."

Finding the Temporal Sprocket wasn't too hard, as a pterodactyl was currently flying around with it in it's talons, like it was something it was going to feed it's babies, but since it didn't appear that the ancient bird was going to land anytime soon Sly snagged a picture of it and headed out to find the next part that Bentley had asked him to locate. It then took him a few minutes to get to a good position where he could snap a picture of the prehistoric penguins that had gotten hold of the Gravity Encabulator, even though he had no idea what these items did for the time machine, before heading out towards the location of the conveyor belt. When he walked through part of the village, however, he found that he and Bentley were right in their thinking, as it appeared that there were some crates and barrels with Le Paradox's logo on them, meaning that there was someone here that definitely didn't belong in this time period, though whether there was a Cooper ancestor at this point in time they had no idea, since there weren't any records before Slytunkhamen created the Thievius Raccoonus. As he reached the perfect area to take a picture of the conveyor belt, however, he found an ice statue of some bear in clothing that definitely didn't belong in this time period, but he snapped a picture of the item he came for and one of the statue, just to be on the safe side.

As he grabbed those pictures, and prepared to leave the area, Bentley informed him that some activity was happening near his position and that he should check it out, to which he headed to the designated area and found a bear, the same one from the ice statue, standing next to a stone pillar, one that he was currently paining on. Sly waited for a few seconds, so the bear was looking back in the direction that he was standing in, all so he could grab a picture of the bear's face for later, as he was sure that Carmelita might remember him or they could ask Secretary Sen when the communicator was finally restored.

"Okay, there's no way that this guy belongs in this time period," Sly commented, looking at the bear's purple tracksuit, brown colored boots, a golden chain, a scepter in his right hand that looked like it could be a brush as well, and a medieval crown that definitely was out of place, "not with everything that he's wearing at the moment."

"I agree, he's definitely out of place." Bentley said, though at the same time he seemed to have picked up on something interesting, as he pointed Sly's binocucom towards a hole in the wall, one that the bear didn't seem to know about at all, "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"

"Yeah... let's see who this guy is and what he's really doing here." Sly replied, as the crates and barrels he found earlier meant that Le Paradox believed that there was a Cooper Ancestor living at this point in time, to which he quickly put his binocucom away and headed for the hole in the wall.

Once he was on the other side of the wall Sly had to carefully move over the points that were in front of him, as the water looked like it was actually tar and that meant bad things for him if he fell into the mass below him, but he kept his mind focused on what he was doing as he made his way over the obstacles. When he snuck through one part of the area he heard two guards, who were apparently more intelligent than he and the others believed, talk about Le Paradox, where their current boss turned one of the other guards, a guy by the name of Joe that had messed up, into a fur coat for the skunk and that the two guards knew he was bad news. The moment he got out of the area he had to sneak through Sly took to the upper level by jumping up onto a pole and walking above the guards that were patrolling the area, before finding a log near a gate that he could climb to get around the obstacle that didn't look like he could easily open it from his side, especially since this was foreign territory to them at the moment. The path he chose allowed him to climb on top of the gate and got a good look at the area in front of him, which revealed that the center of the bear's palace seemed to have been built around some lava that was still burning, though not hot enough to melt through everything that was around here by the looks of it.

What really caught his attention was the large, and definitely overweight and out-of-shape, brown furred with black strips and grey fur covering his torso and parts of his lower jaw, creature that resembled a prehistoric raccoon, and right now he was being kept down by a modern net... and, when Sly looked closely, he found that the creature was holding onto a large wooden stick that had a jagged bone hook, which resembled a Cooper cane.

"Bentley, are you guys seeing this?" Sly asked, because if he was right he might have just found the first member of the Cooper Clan, the one that all of them descended from in some form or another, and it looked like that they might be too late to save his cane from being taken.

"Holy missing links!" Bentley replied, confirming Sly's thoughts on the matter, that they were staring at what Sly had been thinking they were staring at, but he remained silent as he wanted for Bentley to continue talking, "There's a distinct possibility that he is one of your ancestors, possibly the very first one, which means that we need to get him out of here before that bear does something to him... maybe you can use the sabertooth tiger skin to assist you in freeing him."

Sly really had no idea how Bentley figured out that the skin was in the area that he was in, but at the same time he guessed that he really didn't want to know, so he put his binocucom away and used the nearby hooks to cross over the heads of the two sabertooth tiger guards that were below him. After that he used his paraglider to get over to the next ledge, by using an air vent that had to be generated from the lava, allowing him to climb up some ice and use the vines to slide into the area above the bear, who was currently painting a rather ugly picture of what was happening to the Cooper Ancestor at the moment. Sly spotted the key that was in the bear's pocket, which likely went to the door nearby, and carefully dropped down behind his target, where he slipped the coins out of the bear's pocket before swiping the key and climbed up the ice that was near him to get out of sight. Not even a few seconds later the bear turned around and walked over to the edge of the ledge that he was waiting on, allowing him to stare down at the scene that was in front of him, but that let Sly drop down into the area that the bear had been in and he slipped behind the painting, where he headed to the door that was in front of him and opened it... where he entered what appeared to be a bedroom of sorts that had a heart shaped bed, which the sabertooth tiger skin had been resting on.

Instead of worrying about the bear's tastes, since he was sure that they were horrible, Sly snatched the skin that was in front of him and smiled as he slipped on his newest costume, which seemed to cover his back quite well, the claws rested over his hands, and the head covered his own, making it look like he was a walking sabertooth tiger and that he had the skill to drop to the floor and play dead.

In front of him rested a lava flow and on the other side rested a post, where he found that if he assumed the playing dead position and focused he could use whatever lingering feral power was in the skin to attack like an actual sabertooth tiger, as in he could leap right over the lava flow and attacking the bird shaped post on the other side. It was an interesting tactic, one that he used to dispatch the two dodo guards that were blocking his path and then let he get near the wooden cage that was suspended in the air, even though he had to switch out of the costume to climb to the top of the cage when he neared it. As he drew closer to where the Cooper Ancestor was resting, however, he heard one of the guards take his cane and toss it up to 'the Grizz', who proceeded to hand it over to one of Le Paradox's men and walked away so the two of them could chat about something. That provided the perfect opportunity for Sly to use his new costume to leap through the air and take out the five guards that were manning the devices that were keeping the large Cooper tied down, which allowed the prehistoric raccoon to break free of his bindings and knock the guards into the lava around him, impressing Sly a little as he dropped down to greet him.

What Sly found out was that despite the fact that the prehistoric Cooper was speaking a dialect that none of them actually understood, Diz had surprised them once more, as his chaos magic apparently rubbed off on all of them, just in a very small amount that allowed them to understand 'Bob', and that explained how they were all able to understand both Rioichi and Tennessee earlier... before the two of them hightailed it out of Grizz's lair and made their way back to the safe house, so they could try and figure out what was going on in this ancient time period.

When the two of them got back to the safe house Bentley gave them all the rundown on Grizz, who had made his fame in the art world despite being a common thug, totally different from the last two foes they had taken on, and that he had been plucked from the streets by a prominent pop artist. For some time his primitive art seemed to do the trick and he lived the good life, but, like most stories went, his fame was short-lived and he soon fell back into his criminal roots when people realized his 'art' was bad, making him resentful to all of them in the process, and he got back at them by becoming Interpol's most wanted art thief. Bob, despite having fun staring at all of Bentley's gadgets, told them about how he had been forced out of his role as the main food provider for the tribe, something he did by stealing pterodactyl eggs with his 'tool', the cane that had been taken, and it was all because Grizz showed up and used his modern technology, to some degree, to harvest the eggs and prevented Bob from doing what he did best, allowing for his current depression that had allowed Grizz to capture him and steal his cane.

By the time they were all caught up on the situation they had found themselves in they knew that there was one thing they needed to do before they did anything else, and that was get Bob back in shape so he could help them recover the missing van pieces that they needed, and then they could help him take out Grizz... even though they still had no idea why the bear was running this operation, short of it helping take Bob out, and they had the feeling that they might uncover the truth in due time.