Hello! This is the third and regrettably final part of my Flashback series. It's kind of funny, because the other two stories got eleven reviews before it sort of teetered out... can this one get more? That's my challenge! Huzzah!

Looking back, Skipper knew that things might have turned out at least a BIT differently if he and the rest of the team hadn't been so impatient that day. After a particularly hard workout before breakfast one hot, August day, and he'd decided it would be in the team's best interest to hijack the truck that the fish usually came in from.

Skipper and Kowalski saw a large crate in the back end as Rico knocked out the driver and made for the penguin habitat.

Kowalski studied the crate. "Uh, Skipper, we may have a problem."

"What's up?" Skipper said. "No fish?"

"Well, it isn't fish, but it is something… vital to the success… of our…um… exhibit." Kowalski wasn't sure how Skipper would take this, so he danced around the answer.

"And what would that be?" Skipper asked.

"Well… penguins. Two, I'd wager." Kowalski answered finally.

Skipper raised an eyebrow and turned around. He tapped on the glass and shouted to Rico, who was now driving, "Rico! Get us back, double-time!"

"Yeah, yeah!" Rico answered back, and made a wide turn.

Once the team was back at the HQ, Kowalski, Skipper, and Rico carefully carried the crate onto the floe of cement. Private had been keeping an eye out for Alice. Rico was about to rip open the crate, when Skipper took the crowbar from him and told the team to step back.

"We have no idea who - or what - is in there!" he admonished. Skipper slowly tore open the crate himself and stepped back quickly.

Two penguins cautiously walked out. The first looked… exhausted. Like she (yes, she, for both looked female) hadn't gotten a wink of sleep for several nights due to worry. She stood in front of the second one like a protective shield. The other girl looked much younger, perhaps a few years younger than Private, and she would have been quite a looker if it weren't for the strange dark-grey cast to her normally white feathers. Actually, she looked remarkably like Skipper - flat head, cynical expression, cautious movements - and she carried a bag containing a notebook of some sort and about two dozen pencils. The older female's and Skipper's eyes met. Their mouths dropped open.

"Skipper?" she gasped, shocked.

"FALL BACK, MEN!" Skipper shouted. He, Kowalski, Rico, and Private ran out of the habitat, jumping the fence and moat in one bound and taking refuge in a hot-dog cart.

"Who are they?" Kowalski asked with some amazement. Who in the world could be so bad that Skipper was afraid? "Are they in league with Blowhole?"

"No, worse, much worse!" Skipper said, still shaken.

"Kaboom?" Rico guessed.

Skipper regained his composure enough to roll his eyes. "Rico, if they were suicide bombers, we still would be running.""Who are they, then?" Private cried out.

"I have no clue about the younger one, but the woman in front, she's… she's…"

"An old enemy?" Kowalski guessed, trying to help out his leader.

Skipper snorted. "You could say that, I suppose… she's…my ex-wife." he finally said

Rico and Kowalski exchanged a worried look.

"Uh… Skippah," Private said, using his therapist-voice, "Isn't your ex-wife a blonde bobblehead doll named Lola?"

"Well, yeah, but this girl, her name's Vanessa," Skipper explained, "she came way before I met any of you. In fact, she was before I joined the army!"

"And she's dangerous… how?" Kowalski said, desperate for answers by now.

"I was supposed to be gone a year and a half, but I loved being in the army and just kept re-enlisting, and then I met you and Rico, and the General made us an official team and I couldn't leave then… I haven't seen or heard from her in almost eighteen years, except some of the new recruits years back told me she'd filed for divorce and had been captured by the humans and sent to a zoo… so, now, if I knew Vanessa at all, I know she's still furious with me!"

"Well, maybe if you just went and talked to her, she'd understand!" Private reasoned cheerfully.

"Besides… we still haven't had breakfast yet, and Alice will be waiting with fish for us soon." Kowalski added. Rico's stomach growled as if in agreement.

Skipper sighed. "All right, we'll go back… but stay on your toes!"

There was a BANG of someone's head hitting the metal roof of the hot-dog cart and a groan of aching pain.

"Not literally, Rico." Skipper said exasperatedly. This was going to be a long day.

…

It took all of Skipper's manly willpower - and the growl of his own stomach - to jump back into their own habitat. Alice had already come by - the crate was gone, and the new penguins were starting in on their breakfast. The older one - Vanessa - looked up.

"So, it really is you, Skipper?" she said passively.

Skipper nodded stiffly.

Vanessa motioned for the younger girl to stay. She rolled her eyes and swallowed another fish.

Vanessa strode up to Skipper, cool as a cucumber, saying, "You know, it's actually really nice to see you again."

"Yes, it is." Skipper agreed. Maybe this wasn't so bad after all.

"Know why?" she asked while her accommodating smile quickly faded away.

Or maybe it was so bad after all. "Why?"

Kowalski and Rico grimaced as Vanessa punched Skipper in the face.

"That was for saying you loved me!"

*Punch / Grimace*

"That was for leaving me to chase your stupid army fantasy!"

Skipper, rubbing his soon-to-be blackened eye, said affronted, "I didn't chase any fantasies, I was drafted! You know that!"

"Then why didn't you come back?" she demanded. "A year and a half! That's how long you were supposed to be gone! And when the rest of your fleet came home, I thought you were dead. I mourned for your sorry tail feathers, only to find out you were alive and well, happy without me. And I needed you back, Skipper!"

"You didn't need me, you were fine on your own." Skipper snapped.

"No, I needed you! I had an egg on the way, and there were literally no males left in the rookery that weren't already mated or still losing down feathers!"

"Wait, wait, back up - an egg?" Skipper cried.

Vanessa nodded tersely and gestured back to where the younger girl was sitting and talking with Private. Neither the girl nor Private had heard a word of the argument.

Yikes! Skipper's a daddy!

Wait... what's Private doing with that girl? Ooh la la!