We make our way past the cafeteria, and the smell is soul-crushing.

I mean, it doesn’t smell like Master’s hut back when I did the...unspeakable. This isn’t giving me flashbacks to that and his almost-unforgiving face. No, the food the cooks are making smells ordinary and without heart, and they have nothing else to be able to eat. 

I clutch my belly, and imagine what it would be like to be so out of appetite I’d lose most of my weight. This McSweeney must weigh, like, less than 100 pounds by now. I decide I’m ordering the best, biggest pizza I can find when we get back home with the guy.

That ape Carmelita called Gronk, the other apes and pigs we’ve passed, and that mean warden Barkley both scared me in different ways. Gronk seemed legit furious at us and Barkley was so calm as he was being condescending that I can’t help but worry what he’s able to get away with. And if the other guards are trained to look mean and threatening, it must be a big part of their entrance exams.

I usually would have no doubt I’d be able to bust up anyone who would dare get in the way of The Murray. And keeping my cool around that guy totally sucked. We’ll show him. McSweeney’s never setting foot in this place again. Whether or not we pull off a heist with him and have to run, either way he’s going to be a free walrus in the next little while.

All the cells in this part of the prison do not have any bars, technically. It’s just three dark concrete walls and one glass wall with small holes for breathing. And they must open somehow. Oh, wait. I see locks.

One of the stocks of cells we pass by is closed off, and I see two of them have doors that are broken. There’s a blob of dried cement that signifies there was a hole that had to be patched. Must be the way Penelope escaped. I heard someone was noticeably with her to aid in her escape, someone little, but that person hasn’t been identified yet. There hasn’t been any other people declared escaped so it must be an outside friend.

It’s only Inspector Fox, Bentley and I going down these hallways, and I’m grateful that there isn’t really anyone with us. I’ve never met someone who’s been in jail as long as him, and yet I feel I’ll have a connection to him from what I’ve heard.

As we’re approaching the one where he’s supposed to be, we don’t announce ourselves automatically. His glass cell door is closed but I notice it’s unlocked. We see him from his back. He’s a giant plump kind-of-pink guy like me, except he’s got a lot of tattoos, which I can tell because he’s not wearing a prison uniform like the others I glimpsed at. Though he is wearing the same pants. I’m jealous they found a pair in his size. The tattoos on his back seem to represent himself and two others, perhaps Sly’s dad and that baddie Dr. M.

I wonder what he’s doing, staring to his back, whispering to himself, and I then see, as we get closer and see him from his side, not just his back, that there’s someone else in his cell. Someone just a little taller than Bentley, I think. He’s a dog, but not the buff breed of Muggshot. I don’t know what species he is. He’s golden brown and really doesn’t have a lot of meat on his bones, and he’s crying underneath his prison uniform and McSweeney’s pats on his shoulders. 

This is weird.

“Um…” Carmelita finally disrupts whatever they were chattering about, tapping the wall with her weapon. McSweeney and the pooch look in slight alarm. “Jim McSweeney? I’m here to escort you to your parole hearing.”

At this, the dog lays his head down a little, and the walrus starts breathing a little heavily. And I just notice that one of his yellowed tusks is badly broken. Like, a foot shorter than the other. How could that have happened? Did it happen in this prison?

“Yeah,” says this McSweeney quietly. “Fine-Hey. Who are the two of them, copper ma’am?” He’s addressing us. I find myself blushing.

“Uh...hi, Mr. McSweeney. We’re close friends of Sly,” says Bentley.

"Well, uh, more, much more than just close friends!” I add.

McSweeney smiles a little. “You visited to wish me luck on my hearing? Well, thanks, but, it’s best not to get your hopes up. My parole was denied ten years ago. Even if I’ve filled my maximum sentence, who’s to say I will truly be allowed to leave?”

“I looked through the paperwork myself,” says Carmelita. “As long as you behave, you should be okay this time.”

“Well…” McSweeney pauses, then takes a breath. “Who says the outside world is even right for me?”

Something’s not in the sandwich here. I may not be a genius, but there’s a worm that fell in the grease alongside the fries. Somewhere. And I think it has to do with that dog. What’s he doing in McSweeney’s giant cell?

“Who are you?” I ask to the little guy. It just had to happen. The dog looks away and seems half sad, half furious.

“He’s someone who needs protection these days. Protection he can trust.” McSweeney turns his head I think to look at Inspector Fox but midway through decides against it and then grunts at his shoes.

“Branwell Mapperson, right?” says Carmelita. The dog looks up. “College major who decided to burn down the house of one Ambera Silvio?”

Branwell scoffs, then sniffs, and I notice a tear. “Says some people.”

“Interpol is currently investigating,” she explains with patience but also some coldness. “Multiple sources and video footage showed you doing so, but considering the generally clean slate of your prior record, we are willing to give it further attention. Until then, you require being locked up.”

Branwell looks at Inspector Fox like she just told him his mother was ugly, then just looks away. “Jim,” he says to McSweeney, “be free. You don’t deserve to stay in here just to protect me.”

McSweeney sighs, and wipes a tear of his own. Then he seems to have an idea and looks to us. “Did you say you knew Sly?”

Bentley nods. Neither of us say anything. I don’t really know the right terrain to go off of here.

“Is he okay?”

All of us, even Carmelita, stretch our mouths wide as we wonder what to say. Finally Bentley goes, “As far as we know.”

McSweeney seems to gasp on the inside, if you know what I think I mean. “As far as you know? Where is he? Where is he supposed to be?”

I back up. “We’re not sure,” I say. “But we’re looking for him. And...if you came with us, we can look into him right away.” We then turn to this Branwell. “And any friend of a member of Sly’s dad’s old gang is a friend of ours. We’ll help you too.”

“Well,” says Bentley quietly, “we don’t know his exact situation, Murray.”

McSweeney turns to Carmelita. “He’ll be okay...right?”

She nods once.

He hardens up and nods once back. “Then we’ll find him.”