Sly Cooper's Half-Baked Heist (Patreon)

Here's our first story for the month, with Sly Cooper biting off a little more than he can chew!

A blue van parked along the side of the road, just across from a donut shop that had already closed its doors for the night. Slipping into the back of the van, a slim raccoon hunkered down with his two partners in crime; a hippo polishing off a box of donuts from the targeted shop, and a turtle busy at work on a massive computer console that took up half of the van. 

“Jeez, Murray,” the raccoon smirked, nudging the pachyderm’s robust, pink keg of a belly. “You’re eating those like you’ll never see another donut again.”

“Sly, you don’t know what you’re missing! This place is the best.” Murray patted his gut, making it reverberate like a timpani drum. He looked at the decorative striped box, stamped with a logo that read “Donut Steal.” The hippo huffed, polishing off the last football sized creme-filled donut, whipped cream dribbling out of the other end and on to the hippo’s fingers, which he licked clean. “It’s a shame we have to crack the place open like an egg.” 

Sly arched his brow, picking up the now empty donut box. The master thief stroked his chin, his striped tail swishing as he looked it over. The box was a little too on the nose, with its black and white prison stripes. It hardly seemed like the thing their target, diamond thief Horace Hoggley, would design. “We sure we’ve got the right place?”

The bespectacled turtle working on the massive computer swung around in his seat. “Oh, it’s the right place alright, Sly. Murray, did you upload the pictures you took?”

The hippo nodded with a grunt, pushing one of the buttons on Bentley’s console. Some slightly blurry photos popped up, showing a massive boar filling the doorway into the shop’s kitchen, preceded by his belly by at least a foot.

“Woof. That’s Horace, alright. Are we sure he’s not eating the diamonds?” Sly quipped.

Bentley continued. “We’re not sure how he gets the diamonds to the shop, but once they’re there, I deduce that he’s baking them into his donuts for special orders. Buyers will phone in with a special phrase, and then he prepares them in the kitchen, sending them out via secure deliveries.”

Sly’s grin widened as the seed of a plan sprouted in his head. “So, all we need to do is catch these special orders before they get shipped out.”

“Easier said than done, Sly. The trucks Horace has hired look like any other normal delivery truck, but they’re built like tanks. The armored trucks banks use are less well-armed,” Bentley explained.

Sly looked out the window, where a “Help Wanted” sign was hanging. “Nah, we aren’t going after the trucks.” He looked back to his crew with a smile. “We pick up our own orders.”

Horace Hoggley sighed casually as he looked over the resume in his hand, but given his sheer girth, it was more like a rumbling groan, causing small tremors across the gelatinous belly spilling out of his button-down chef’s jacket. The boar scratched at one of his tusks, then turned back to the racoon sitting across from him. “So, Mr… Cruller, was it?”

“Yessir!” Sly grinned, sitting up straight. With his hair slicked back and his blue sweater replaced with a chef’s jacket, he had transformed into Hans Cruller, young pastry chef and enthusiastic go-getter.

“Well, your resume is impressive. Though, I’m curious as to why a Cordon Bleu trained pastry chef with history in Michelin star restaurants wants to work at my humble establishment.” The boar sat up a bit, his belly spilling over the top of his desk. His coarse red fur along his face had been groomed into sideburns and a curly mustache, which he had a habit of twirling as he thought. He had it wound around his finger as he looked Sly over. The raccoon had a small moment of concern he had seen through his clever disguise, but he couldn’t back down now.

The thief smiled shyly, running his hand through his hair to seem extra innocent. “Well, I hear you do a lot of custom orders. See, I’d like to open my own bakery one day, so I’d like to get on the ground level first.”

“Hm…” Hoggley leaned back, making his office chair groan ominously. “Alright, Mr. Cruller, consider the job yours.” The boar hefted up his wobbling mass, reaching across and smothering his desk in the process to shake Sly’s hand. “It helps that you’re the only applicant that showed up. I can’t stand tardiness.”

Sly hid a smirk. Murray, in one of his more reckless driving movements, had  orchestrated a city-wide traffic jam. “Oh golly, thanks, Mr. Hoggley! You won’t regret it!” the thief wore his best smile as he enthusiastically shook the boar’s hand.

“Hah, well, I’m glad to see such enthusiasm. If you can start tomorrow, that would be grand. Though, I will give you one word of warning.” Hoggley’s smile disappeared, and he gripped the raccoon’s hand hard, with a lot more strength than his flabby build implied. “We get a lot of custom orders here… if you get a phone call asking for a custom order, you send it directly to me, alright? Only to me.”

“Oh gosh, Mr. Hoggley, sure, but can I ask why? I can handle custom donuts.”

“Not these, you can’t. These are… secret recipes. Like the secret menu at Starbuck’s. You prove yourself, and maybe I’ll let you in on my, ah… recipes.” Hoggley smirked. “Just keep your nose clean, Cruller. And get your uniform in a small size. You’re skinny enough to fall through a rail.”

The next few days were almost refreshing, in a sense. Sly, given his long-time career, had never worked a nine to five job. It was nice having a consistent schedule, and also not having to worry about alarm systems, complex locks, or guards with laser guns trying to kill him. The work was slightly tedious, and the customers could be nasty, but if there was a day where a shock pistol wasn’t pointed in his face, Sly considered it a good one.

He didn’t forget the mission, however. Hans Cruller was a model employee, and always managed to answer the phone, even while juggling three orders. Thanks to a small, discernable bug from Bentley, any time he forwarded a request for a special order, the Cooper gang heard every word.

At the end of his second week, Sly was hunkered down in the van with Bentley and Murray, going over the recordings of every call. 

“I think we can strike off orders for a dozen Boston Cremes…” Bentley muttered, striking another order from their list. 

“Why’s that?” Sly asked, chomping down on a donut. Hoggley was pretty generous with his baked goods to employees he liked. 

“Because you’re eating the last one,” Bentley answered, before turning in his seat, casting a glance at Murray.

“What?” the hippo balked, hugging a box of donuts to his barrel chest. “They’re really good! Some of the best donuts I ever tasted.”

“Yeah, Sly seems to be with you on that…” Bentley muttered, also glancing at the raccoon. Sly had his mouth full of the remains of his fifth donut for the day.

“Wuh?”

“Sly, what’d you have for breakfast?” Bentley asked, his arms crossed. 

“Three donuts and a cup of coffee, what’s the problem?”

“And lunch?”

“I went out for a burger and fries, and grabbed a bear claw, so sue me.”

“And dinner?”

“Hah!” Sly declared triumphantly. “I had a salad.”

“...And dessert?” the turtle asked, arching his brow. 

Sly gulped down the remains of his donut, wiping off his hands. “Bentley, it’s not that big a deal.”

“Sly, your sweater is starting to ride up.”

The raccoon frowned, tugging his blue sweater over a small potbelly hanging off his formerly lithe, toned frame. “Look, it’s part of Hans Cruller’s character. He’s a little pudgy, it adds to that whole innocent pastry chef vibe.”

“It’s… part of your disguise.” Bentley echoed, unconvinced.

“Aw, c’mon, Bent,” Murray leaned in, making the van lurch as he shifted his own augmented weight to pat Sly on the back. The hippo had been indulging in Donut Steal’s products more, and his own belly was beginning to fill his lap. “Sly never gets to let loose. Let him live a little! He can work this weight off like that,” Murray snapped his fingers.

The turtle sighed as he turned back to his computers. “Anyways, the orders you should watch out for are Death by Chocolate donuts and apple fritters. Neither one is on the main menu, but based on the recordings, each order sounds rehearsed.” He looked back at Sly. “If you can get into the kitchen after hours, you can look through the- Sly.” 

The raccoon had just plucked another donut from Murray’s box. “What?”

Bentley rolled his eyes. “When we’re done here, both of you are going on a diet.”

Murray and Sly exchanged a knowing look and a smirk. “Yes, mom.”

The next week went with surprisingly little event. Only one special order came in, and Hoggley was there to grab it before Hans could. Sly had to bide his time, building up his reputation as a model employee while also scouting out the rest of the shop. He also passed the time by sharpening his thieving skills, just to be ready for the right moment. He took it as a personal challenge to steal as many donuts from the display cases as he could in a day without raising suspicion; a dozen was his personal best. However, all those donuts had to go somewhere. He couldn’t just leave them lying around, and the inevitable began to take shape; Sly Cooper was getting fat. His uniform size had gone up from a small to a large at an alarming rate, and even that was starting to feel tight around his soft, round middle. His striped tail brushed against thick haunches, and it was getting increasingly harder to brush off Bentley’s concerns about his diet. 

Horace, however, seemed to like his star employee the more weight he packed on. By the end of his first month, Hans Cruller got an Employee of the Month award, along with two dozen donuts that the boar presented him with personally.

“I couldn’t help but notice you favored some of my donuts over others, Cruller,” the boar chuckled, clapping the raccoon on the back as his doughy mass pressed against him, tilting Sly to the side. With a flourish, he opened up the boxes. “Boston Creme, Strawberry Jelly-filled, Apple Fritters, and Death by Chocolate. I noticed you gazing over the fritters and chocolate in particular,” Horace winked, nudging the raccoon’s butterball belly. “I’m glad to see my employees enjoy my products. Never trust a skinny chef, right?” the boar chuckled heartily, his belly pooling against Sly like the tide coming in. 

“O-oh, gosh, Mr. Hoggley!” Sly plucked a donut up, instantly taking a bite. “I was hoping it wasn’t too obvious. I’ve been taking lots of notes to make my own.”

“Hah, well, given it’s a special occasion…” Hoggley steered the raccoon towards the back.  “I think I can finally show you the kitchen.”

“Golly, Mr. Hoggley, thanks!” the thief said with as much enthusiasm as possible. 

“Hah, think nothing of it, my boy! And please, Horace.” The boar waved his hand magnanimously, leading the way to the kitchen door. Using his immense bulk, he covered the entire opening, punching in a code in a keypad that Sly, no matter how keen his eye was, wouldn’t be able to catch. That was fine; at least he knew how to get in. He took note as the heavy door swung open, and he could swear it was a repurposed bank vault, with a foot of steel and bolts large as his arms.

“Well, this is where the magic happens!” Horace announced, stepping aside to let Sly take a proper look. The kitchen was roughly the size of a small warehouse, with several shelves piled with boxes, a massive fryer and conveyer belt system, and plenty of ovens, pantries loaded with ingredients, and some shockingly intricate security, judging by all the cameras. “This is what keeps Donut Steal so popular, my boy. We’ve got the room to expand and experiment as much as we want! Oh.” His smile disappeared as he spotted two burly boars in black turtlenecks. He looked down to Sly with his smile re-plastered. “Excuse me, Hans. Night shift.”

Horace lumbered after the two smaller boars, and Sly’s keen ear picked up the conversation.

“You blithering idiots! What on earth are you doing here during business hours?!” the immensely obese boar growled. “I’m about to hogtie you to a railroad!”

“Boss! Look, we got the loot-” Horace slammed a donut into the boar’s mouth.

“Shut up!” 

“But boss,” the second boar spoke up, dodging Horace wielding a braided torpedo of a donut. “We need to move the, uh, ‘pastries’ fast. We got a massive order for tomorrow!”

“What?” Horace snarled. He swerved around to Sly, who waved back innocently. The boar called his two minions in closer, lowering his voice. Little did he know that the Thievus Raccoonus taught Sly to read lips. “How massive?”

“Our entire stock, boss! Including the Beyond Hope Diamond.”

“Why didn’t they call?” Horace demanded.

“It’s a special buyer, boss. Interpol’s watching their line.”

“Right. Get out of here, both of you. We’ll talk later.” Horace shooed them out as they hurried, grabbing up two bulging sacks. When he finally turned back to Sly, waddling forward with his previous congenial smile, Horace brushed back his wiry hair. “So! Hans, my boy, how would you like to prove just how much you deserve Employee of the Month?”

“Oh, if it’s a challenge, Mr. Hoggley, I’m your guy!” 

“Good, good. I need, ah, a gross of donuts. Death by Chocolate.”

Sly’s brows bounced with genuine surprise. “One hundred and forty-four?”

“Yes, Cruller. But someone of your caliber should be up to the task, yes?”

The raccoon wore a brave smile. He forgot he might actually have to make pastries while masquerading as a pastry chef. “Of course, Mr. Hoggley. I’m your guy.”

Later that night, Sly slumped into the Cooper van, his face and uniform caked in flour. His hands were stained with jelly, too, as were his lips; after a stressful day like that, he felt he was well with in his right to eat his mistakes, which there had been a lot of, judging by how his belly pressed up against his chef’s jacket, swollen to the size of a Thanksgiving turkey that had been in serious need of a fitness trainer. 

“His entire stock?” Bentley clarified once the raccoon had relayed everything he had heard. The turtle stroked his chin, turning back to his computer and pulling up several research tabs. “By my calculations, based on how many ‘special’ orders he’s had, and the number of robberies in the area, he must have twelve pieces he’s trying to smuggle- with the Beyond Hope Diamond, they’re worth millions!”

“They’re going to ship the whole thing out after tomorrow night, just before the store opens. I’ll have to get in after closing, find the diamonds, and we’ll be out before anyone’s the wiser,” Sly smirked, always supremely confident.

“Uh, Sly,” Bentley rubbed the back of his head. “You sure you’re up to it?” He left a lingering look on the raccoon’s belly, pressing further out as it rested atop his soft, wide thighs.

“Bentley!” Sly scoffed. “This’ll be a cakewalk.”

“Mhm.” The turtle’s brow arched at the word “cake.” “That’s exactly what I’m afraid of.”

The raccoon stood, crossing his arms. “Just watch. I’ll get through this without a hitch.”

Alright, so there may have been one small hitch, Sly had to admit as he tried wriggling through the high window that led to Hoggley’s office. He may have been just the slightest bit stuck, with his augmented middle filling the space of the window frame. Panic was setting in, but Sly just managed to suck in his gut long enough to slip through, hitting the ground with a thud.

“Sly! Is everything okay?” Murray’s voice crackled over his earpiece.

“Yeah, yeah, I’m in. No worries.”

The raccoon picked his way through the office, then the store itself, where he snatching up one last strawberry donut for the road. He came to the fortified kitchen door. Pulling out one of Bentley’s gadgets, he scanned for fingerprints, feeding the numbers back to the computer.

“Calibrating the most common combination… alright, try 3778,” Bentley ordered.

Sly punched in the code, and heard the satisfying clunk of tumblers unlocking as he pulled the door open. “I’m in!”

Slipping into the cavernous kitchen, Sly’s jaw dropped. “Uh, guys… we have a small problem,” he hissed as he surveyed the kitchen. There were, by his reckoning, at least a hundred boxes, all of them filled with donuts. “Hoggley was really busy last night.”

“What do you mean?” Bentley demanded over the earpiece. “We don’t have a lot of time, Sly! Maybe we should abort.”

“No, no. I got this.” Sly grinned to reassure himself. “Don’t worry, I’ll get the diamonds. And maybe one last box of Boston Creme for Murray.”

“Sly-!” Click. Sly turned off his earpiece, pocketing it in his jacket. He opened up the first box he found; all his creations. A little sloppily done; he may have been over generous with the chocolate frosting, but still tasty. Picking up the first one, he weighed the donut in his hand. 

“Alright… here goes nothing.” He bit the chocolate pastry, the gooey, decadently sweet taste melting in his mouth. He groaned pleasurably, and then he nearly broke a tooth.

“Hah!” He pulled out a gaudily adorned diamond ring, still caked with frosting that the raccoon licked clean in short order. “This might be easier than I thought!”

It was not easier than he thought. The donuts numbered in the thousands, and all of them were a little too tempting for the raccoon. His willpower had been whittled down from constant snacking, and now he had been given the perfect excuse to dive headfirst into rampant gluttony. After diving into a number of boxes, he found that the ratio of diamond to donuts was discouragingly low, and he was getting short on time. Cradling his already swollen belly, the raccoon moved up and down the conveyor belt, grabbing for any donuts that he could reach. He practically inhaled Devil’s Food Chocolate, strawberry, apple fritters, crullers, glazed, anything- just to be thorough, of course. He found a few more diamonds, but this binge was personal- he had been teased with the delectable treats Hoggley made for weeks on end, and now, he was going to clean out the diamond thief turned pastry chef . 

No part of his body was left unaffected from his rampant binge, and after dozens of boxes, he was showing no signs of slowing down. At least, not in terms of eating. As far as moving? Sly didn’t notice at first, because he had told himself Hans Cruller was supposed to have his belly bumping up against things in his day to day minutiae, brushing against the cash register or straining his apron. But soon, he noticed his belly was brushing against other things- like his knees. Panting and sweating with the sheer tonnage of sugar and sweetener pulsing through his body, Sly practically slowed to a crawl, his boulder of a belly pressing down on the kitchen floor. With some effort, he lurched into a sitting position, thick rolls of back fat preceding him and jiggling as he settled on the floor, breathing heavily. His chef’s jacket miraculously stayed in tact, a thin swath of cloth traversing the fatty expanse of his back and wrapping around fat-swaddled arms, pinching his shoulders. There should have been no way it could reach around his chest alone; that had swollen up to a pair of flour sacks, sagging over the sides of his billowing flanks. His belly was packed tight with donuts and pastries, bloated to the size of a small car, it felt like. He sank a little deeper into the pillow soft mass of his gigantic rear, his legs splayed out to either side of his titanic gut.

“Okay… okay. One thousand, eight hundred, seventy six…” he huffed, taking one bite of the last chocolate-filled donut he could reach. He took one more bite of gooey, sinfully rich pastry, and nearly forgot what he was looking for when he bit down on something hard.

“Hah!” Sly held it up to the moonlight, a large, brilliantly colored diamond glimmering beneath the chocolate glaze. “That’s it, that’s twelve.” He sighed with relief; Bentley may have been on to something with that diet idea. Then he stopped, frowning. He was proud of himself with pulling off another heist, but was that applause he heard?

“Well, good job, Mr. Cooper, you found all of them.”

Sly turned his head, making his chipmunk cheeks and chins wobble. Horace Hoggley, who looked positively svelte in comparison to Sly now, was clapping. “You know, I’ll give you credit- it took longer than I care to admit to figure out Hans Cruller was Sly Cooper, but after I saw how little you could control yourself around my donuts, I knew all I needed to do was give you a little nudge in the right direction.” The boar chuckled, scooping up the diamonds Sly had uncovered and left in a small pile, easily dodging the lard-ridden raccoon’s feeble attempt to grab him.

“This… was a set-up?” Sly huffed. Talking was a little difficult right now.

“Yes, a little simple… I suppose you could call it half-baked.” Horace chuckled to himself, counting out the diamonds. “Wait. Where’s the Beyond Hope Diamond?”

“Uh…” Sly looked from Horace to the huge, chocolate-stained jewel in his hand. And then he stuffed it in his mouth.

“No!” The boar raced over, his belly like a moon getting pulled into Sly’s gravitational pull. “You fat idiot, spit it out! It’s worth millions!”

“Nuh-uh!” Sly shook his head, even as Horace started scrambling up the slope of Sly’s mountainous gut.

“Give it!” Horace demanded.

“Nuh!”

The boar straddled the raccoon’s blubbery chest, holding on to his chins to shake him. “Spit! It! Out!”

Sly’s response was a belch loud enough to shake the windows, a mighty roar that had been built up from far too many donuts for any sane person, and lasting a little too long for either Horace or Sly’s comfort. Horace’s face blanched as he got hit at point blank range, not just with the belch, but a diamond the size of a baseball. Sporting an impressive bruise on his forehead, his eyes rolled back, and the boar tumbled down the slope of the raccoon’s gut, landing in a heap as the Beyond Hope Diamond bounced off the boar’s own belly.

The huge thief rocked back and forth, jostling his own flabby body, building up enough momentum to roll on top of Horace, his immense rear sticking up in the air as his legs hung limply off the folds of fat that piled up beneath his blubbery thighs. Fiddling with his jacket, he reached for his earpiece.

“Sly!” Bentley’s voice crackled in. “Where’ve you been? Did you get all the diamonds?”

“Uh… yeah. In a manner of speaking. Listen, Bentley, I’m going to need you guys to come pick me up…” Sly hiccupped, spying one lone donut, a scrumptious looking strawberry piece. “No rush, though. I wanna grab something for the road.”