Disclaimer: Happy Feet is not mine, I swear. And you wouldn't think I made money off this fic if you saw the computer I typed this on.

The Day the Music Died
By Fanficworm

Norma Jean expected to come home to see her husband's eyes staring ahead at nothing in particular, the faint rise and fall of his breath the only sign he still lived. It wasn't that she was trying to be mean or anything, or that she was in a particularly bad mood; it was just that the staring seemed to be all he did since their son Mumble went into exile. You couldn't really blame her.

Some days, though — rare days, spaced far apart — Memphis would actually feel almost normal and even let her feed him to make up for his lack of desire to leave the cave, and on those blessed days Norma Jean would allow herself to hope. Maybe he was getting better, she'd think. Maybe he was finally forgiving himself like she and the rest of the colony had forgiven him and now he could move on with his life.

But soon she'd learned all too well that sometimes hope could be dangerous. For every good day where it looked like everything would end all right, there were three worse ones. Those days, he could be so wracked with guilt he could barely move, and all attempts to bring him out of it invariably ended in failure. Those days, Norma Jean's hope turned into frustration, and then into disappointment, and sometimes into a taste of that horrible darkness her husband battled within himself every day.

That never stopped her from hoping, though. Not really.

Norma Jean waddled into the cave she now called home, savouring for a moment the feeling of fresh food in her belly. She'd found a fish today near the breeding grounds (of all places), brought in by a skua. While it ate its lunch it caught sight of another skua with a strange band on his leg, and flew off to mock it. Seizing the opportunity, Norma Jean ran off with the fish and a story to tell. The fish itself was a good size, too – not huge, but big enough for her and Memphis to share. He'd like that. He'd always liked fish best out of all the food there was to catch out there.

She smiled. This was going to be one of the better days; she was sure of it.

"Memphis?" she said. "Memphis, sugar, I'm home."

Her voice echoed in the still, dead air of the cave.

"Memphis?"

When she found him he looked like he hadn't moved all day. He just stood there in the same spot he stood all morning, the only difference being that now his head hung low, lolling on his chest.

She steeled herself. She needed to be strong now. She wasn't going to let him suck her into his personal void again. Not today.

She smiled again, trying to be cheerful. "Hey there," she said. "You hungry?"

Memphis sighed in reply, shaking his head and turning away.

She made her way closer to him. "I found a fish today near the crèches. I took it off a skua while it was distracted. Thought you might wanna share." She eyed him. "It'll cheer you up."

There was a flash of the old Memphis in his eyes as his gaze bolted up to match hers. "A skua? Great Guin, did it hurt you, Norma Jean? Are you all right?" He checked her over, muttering and fussing and showing more energy than he had shown in weeks.

As touching as his concern was, she shook him off. "I'm fine. It didn't even see me."

"Are you sure? It didn't–?"

"Memphis," she said, genuinely smiling now, "don't worry about it."

He stopped, like she'd just snapped him out of it. "All – All right," he said, "as long as you're okay." The worry came back to his face. "You are okay, right?"

She nodded. "Yeah."

"Thank the Great Guin," he breathed, and the change that came was undeniable. He visibly relaxed, his breathing slowed, and the old Memphis was slowly dragged back to wherever this new Memphis kept him now. His head drooped again, just a little, and the hunch returned in his posture. He reminded her of Noah the Elder just then, Great Guin talk and all.

"You still wanna share the fish?" she said, patting her belly. "I've kept it fresh. It won't digest for a while."

He shook his head again, and began to waddle away.

"Memphis," she said, "talk to me." She went after him. "You can always talk to me."

He stopped, and sighed, defeated. "I'm sorry, Norma Jean."

She frowned. "What for?"

"All that happened with Mumble," he said. "I blame myself."

"It wasn't all your fault," she said for the umpteenth time, an edge creeping into her voice. "I forgave you for dropping him as an egg a long time ago. The whole colony has, and the whole colony was there with you when he left. Any one of us could've stopped him going but we didn't," she said, and her tone softened. "He wanted to go in the end. There was nothing any of us could've done once he made up his mind."

He didn't move, didn't say anything.

"His… differences," she said, "you don't really know if they were your fault, sugar."

A memory came to her then of Mumble as a chick, dancing his heart out when he was supposed to be learning how to sing. The way he just knew how to move his feet and let his body compensate for his lack of vocal talent, it was like he had something guiding him, something bigger than himself--something bigger than any of them. The passion in his eyes, the pure joy that just bounced off his body and into general space in a way that it was even infectious… She'd never seen anyone happier than him when he danced; she'd never seen anyone more alive.

"And anyway, I don't think anything was wrong with him in the first place," she said, finally. "His dancing's a gift; it always was."

He kept looking straight ahead of him, the guilt passing over his face again like some dark shadow. "I was dancing when I dropped him," he said. "I was dancing and singing when I should've been focussed on him."

Dancing?

He mistook her silence for anger and waddled further into the cave, leaving her alone again.

"Where are you going?" she called.

"I need to pray."

"Memphis…"

He didn't reply.

Watching him go, the full weight of what he just revealed suddenly made itself known to her.

He was dancing when he dropped Mumble. Dancing! And all this time she thought he was doing something she could excuse and forget about, like running from a predator or being pushed too hard by the other males. But dancing? Of all the times to do it, why the most crucial part of fatherhood? That careless--!

Her first impulse was to march over to where he was and yell at him until she lost her voice, but reason kicked in and she forced her beak to stay shut.

It was two months of standing still, she told herself, and this was Memphis she was talking about. Before the hatching he was one of the most active, spirited penguins she knew. He didn't mean to drop him, and he obviously felt bad about it otherwise he wouldn't be in the state he was in now.

Besides, she thought, the last thing he needed was more guilt, especially over something no one could change now. He was too close to the edge as he was. She couldn't risk losing him as well as Mumble.

So she kept silent, willing her emotions back into check.

Such was the burden that was love.

Memphis's voice echoed through the cave walls. Its deep, rich tone, honed on lively tunes that he used to capture and keep her heart with so long ago, sounded all wrong for the solemn hymn he intoned more than sang. For all its beauty, the song had no heart.

He sounded like a stuffy old Elder, she thought, drained of life but weary of it all the same – not like her Memphis at all. He hadn't been that Memphis for a while.

He'd changed after Mumble hatched. He was suddenly more agitated, more serious, more religious. He laughed less and virtually stopped singing. And then there was that sudden fixation on fitting in. That surprised her, especially since this was the same penguin who deliberately caused all the sound in an entire field of singing penguins to pretty much stop so that everyone would look at him.

And on the rare occasions where he did sing, she noticed, he'd stopped dancing altogether. For every song that escaped his beak, dry and forced though they were, there wasn't so much as moving flipper or a tossing head that went along with it. She'd always put it down to stress of fatherhood; she had no idea how much guilt the act carried with it until now.

Dancing when he dropped the egg? Her mind reeled again. What could he have been dancing to?

"Here she is!"

Norma Jean almost jumped at the interruption of her thoughts.

An Adélie penguin popped seemingly from nowhere into the mouth of the cave, grinning like a loon. "Hey guys!" he called behind him, "Over here! I found her!"

Four more of them came at his signal, and Norma Jean recognised them as Mumble's foreign friends, the ones who followed him on his quest to bring back the fish. They entered, bringing with them a newcomer whose species of penguin Norma Jean didn't recognise, all looking around the place and chattering away about how big the place was and how bad Emperor Penguins were at giving directions and how this had better be the right penguin this time, Néstor, or we're disowning you.

Norma Jean's heart all but stopped when she didn't see Mumble there with them. "Mumble?" she called above the heads of his friends. "Mumble, sweetheart, you there?"

"Uhh… Norma Jean, ma'am?" another one of the Adélies piped up. "He didn't come with us."

"What?" she said. "What do you mean? Why isn't he here?"

The new one pushed him out of the way. "You're so tactful, Raul."

He preened at one of the large yellow feathers that grew on the side of his face, scrutinising her. "So you're Mumble's mom?"

"Yes," she said. "Where is--?"

"He's got your curiosity," he said. His chest puffed up with self-importance and his yellow feathers stood on end as he began to talk. "I am Lovelace, formerly known as Guru," he said. "I have travelled with your son Mumble far and wide, beyond the land of the Adélies, past elephant seal territory and to the Forbidden Shore…"

"Mumble was right!" Raul blurted. "He was right about the aliens taking all the fish! We saw them! All of us! And he made contact!"

"Wait," she said. "Aliens?"

"Yeah!" another one said. "There was this huge whale-looking thing that knew how to break the sea ice, and it scooped out all the fish using its tongue!"

She tried to picture it.

"Mumble thinks that the aliens made it," the one called Néstor said, "that they were probably inside the thing controlling it."

"But where is he?" she asked. "Why isn't he with you?"

At this the group looked at each other, uneasy.

She swallowed, and voiced the question that had haunted her since his exile. "Is he--?"

"We don't know, but knowing him we wouldn't worry," the smallest of the Adélies said. "He went after them and he sent us here to make sure ju and Gloria were okay."

Raul nudged him. "The message, Ramón. Give her the message."

"What message?" Norma Jean said.

Ramón raised his head to look at her properly. "He said to tell his father that he tried. We'd tell him ourselves but we heard he's gone loco."

Néstor nudged him this time. "Ramón!"

Ramón looked genuinely confused at this. "What?" he said. "I thought he was—"

"Tried?" Norma Jean said. "But what did he try to do?"

He shrugged. "We don't know. But we figured his crazy dad would—"

The rest of the group gave him a sharp jab with a flipper. "Ramón!"

"Excuse this loudmouthed fool," Lovelace said. "He's tired from the journey." He gestured to the group. "All right, boys, time for us to be heading off. There's work to be done."

The group complied and started to leave, Ramón muttering something about how he used to be the leader.

"Wait," she said. "Where are you going?"

"To spread the word!" one of them crowed.

Another one joined in. "And keep the legend of Mumble Happyfeet alive!"

The Adélies exulted, congratulating each other.

Norma Jean smiled in spite of her worry. Mumble was lucky to have found friends as fiercely loyal as these, brave enough to stand up for him and keep his memory alive while not caring if it got them into trouble. He was lucky indeed.

"Boys?" she said.

They turned to face her.

"If you ever need a place to stay," she said, "you're all welcome here anytime."

They thanked her for that in their lively foreign way, and left.

She made her way back to see Memphis, a smile trying to force itself out of her. It was dangerous to hope, she knew, but something inside her said that Mumble was indeed alive. She knew that more than she knew anything else, and it didn't really count as wishful thinking if it was fact. He was alive, and he was a legend. Somehow he would make the aliens stop taking all the fish. The colony, and all those who needed the fish to survive, would all be saved, all because of him.

Yes. This was turning out to be one of the better days after all.

"Memphis?" she called.

She didn't notice until now that he had gone silent again. Her voice bounced off the walls and returned to her full force, as if it didn't reach him at all.

She found him in the same position he was in when she returned from the crèches.

"You aren't singing, daddy," she said.

His eyes closed slowly, and squeezed tightly shut with pain.

"Memphis?" She laid a flipper on his shoulder. It was the least she could do.

"The music's gone," he said. "Gone clean out of me."

He took a breath, not opening his eyes.

"I heard everythin'," he said. "About how Mumble's gone off and..." He couldn't finish.

"You don't know that for sure," she said, trying to smile. "For all we know he's just fine and he's coming back soon."

He looked like he wanted to say something, but he just ended up sighing and turning away.

The cave fell silent, and its air became dead and still once more. Memphis retreated deeper into himself and his sorrow, not to be budged out of it by anything other than his son's return.

The music within him died, and Norma Jean was left alone to wait.

And hope.

She turned, and left the cave.