Man, I got a summer job and have no time. I know this update is a bit short and VERY late, and I haven't read any other fics in a while, which I might never get to, but I'm trying.

Chapter 11 Found

It had been a year since Carmelita disappeared. The longest, coldest year Sly had ever known. Bentley had been e-mailing friends, calling connections, and putting his brain to use for any solution to the riddle of her location. Murray had been driving almost non-stop, checking locations or transporting the gang to a supposed location.

Sly had retreated to his room, barely speaking. His meals were short, and the fact he hadn't bathed or shaved in weeks was all-to-obvious. Almost every night he woke up from the same dream; Carmelita chasing him, killing him, a red gleam in her eyes, most of those nights he spent crying.

Leads had become even scarcer as the year went on. It was like she vanished of the face of the earth, from her very existence. Then the e-mail came. She was somewhere in Italy, a small town of Biarci somewhere in the North. On no other leads, the gang had headed that way, in hopes of finding her. Their hopes were to be all to realized.

"She's got to be here Sly, there's nowhere else she could be." Bentley's voice came from the front of the van, where he sat on his lab top, attempting to cheer Sly up. Sly had taken to the back, lying on the floor staring at the ceiling.

"You mean we've got no other leads. She could be anywhere." Sly replied without even looking at Bentley. His voice was husky from all his crying in the night.

Bentley turned around in his seat. "If you think we'll never find her, we'll never find her. Besides, she's got to be here." He huffed.

"What makes you so sure?" Sly questioned, although his usually quirky nature at questioning Bentley was gone.

"She's standing in the road up ahead." Murray anxiously announced, causing both Sly and Bentley to jerk back to the front.

Carmelita, or Robert, whichever one you prefer in her possessed state, stood ahead, a silenced pistol aimed directly at the van. She was grinning, but the grin was definatly Robert's, cold and utterly maddening.

Sly gritted his teeth. As desperately as he was to get Robert, he couldn't harm Carmelita at the same time. "What should I do?" Murray asked in a whisper, as though Robert could hear them.

Bentley paused for a moment. "Cut around her and then drive into town. I'm sure she'll follow us, but we'll be able to prepare the book." He proposed.

"Sounds good to me" Murray agreed before hitting the gas and curving right around Carmelita. Sly went flying headfirst into the wall as the van went on two wheels before returning to the ground.

In the midst of their turn, Carmelita-Robert leapt for the van, but fell short in the dust. She stood and yelled "Damn you Cooper!" As often as Sly had heard it, it was now like a hot knife in his heart. He gazed back in pity at Carmelita with a scrape on her cheek. But pity was in two seconds replaced with anger. Burning anger that made him grit his teeth and glare into Robert's eyes. For one brief moment, Sly saw fear where Robert's madness usually stood.

"I'll get you" he whispered hoarsely. "I'll get you."

With Carmelita in possessed running pursuit, the gang continued toward the town. Something caught Sly's eye, a white piece of paper, inconceivably white, stuck in the windshield wipers. He reached up into the front of the van, ignoring the annoyed protests of Murray and Bentley. He reached out the window and grabbed the note, falling back in the back of van. He carefully opened the note with shaking hands.

Sly,

You must stop in the town at the church. Ask the father for your blessing in this matter, than flee into the tunnels. Run until you meet a dead end, don't stop. We'll meet you there after you read page 132, fourth inscription.

"Head for the church!" Sly yelled, eager to free his love from the hands of their most tormenting enemy.

The town was very old fashioned. With a main street covered in all kinds of shops and citizens who knew each other by name. The church was located at the top of a hill in the east of the town, clearly visible from any one in the town. The sight of a woman dressed like Carmelita was unusual to folks there. And her chasing a speeding van was just unnatural, which it was in a sense.

"I'll jump out, she wants me. Just keep driving into the woods." Sly yelled as he opened the back doors.

"Are you crazy?" screamed Bentley hysterically.

"No, just concerned!" Sly yelled back as he jumped lightly out the back of the van. Robert saw him, and quickly gave chase on the church steps. Sly ran inside, slamming and bolting the door behind him.