It was a busy day at Central Park Zoo, New York, but now they were closing their gates until Monday. Spring settled beautifully on the fine Friday evening as the animals started to relax from a day of entertaining tourists.

In the Penguins' underground headquarters (HQ), the four penguins never relaxed, Kowalski, the tallest and smart one was in his lab working on his latest inventions that would be announced soon, Rico, the weapons expert and psycho was training with his fearless leader Skipper. Private, the shortest and youngest was sneaking into a hidden area behind his 1st prize plaque carrying a red box.

"Good golly!"Kowalski shouted suddenly, Skipper and Rico burst into the lab, ready to face danger.

Kowalski spun around to face his teammates, knocking over an empty beaker.

"Kowalski? You okay soldier?" Skipper asked, rolling his eyes.

"Oh sorry, I'm fine!" he laughed, "I've finished three inventions!"

"Good for you," Skipper said sarcastically, "What are they?"

"First off," Kowalski began, "here is a useful device I call, paper holder! Tired of mission files flying everywhere, well, no more with this metal device, it squeezes paper together, neat!"

"That's already been invented, it's a stapler." Skipper said.

Kowalski stared, disappointed, "Really?"

"Yes, show him Rico." Rico regurgitated a stapler and showed Kowalski.

Kowalski's beak dropped open in shock, Rico swallowed the stapler.

The tall penguin shook his head and continued.

"Ah, but I have another one!" Kowalski said, pulling out a piece of cardboard, "the place holder for-"

"Bookmark," Skipper interrupted, "and they make paper and plastic ones."

Rico giggled, Kowalski growled at him.

"Okay, but this will blow you away!" Kowalski said excitedly, "Annoying lemurs playing their stereo too loudly? Well, give them the transportable music player with headphones, they can even jog with it! What?"

Skipper shook his head "Humans invented it, they make a new one every month or so."

"It…but…I spent three months… I can't think of anything!" Kowalski shouted in despair "I have to invent something, It's not fair!"

He slapped his head and groaned, glaring harder at Rico.

"Keep your head up soldier and an idea will come, right boys?" Skipper said.

"Yup!" Rico said, Skipper waited for Private to agree, but there was silence.

"Private? Fall in soldier!" he ordered. No response came.

"I won't give up!" Kowalski said, "Where's Private?"

"That's what I'd like to know." Skipper muttered.

"Hello neighbors!" Julien shouted as he jumped into the HQ, swinging his tail everywhere.

Julien picked up Private's Lunacorn and started tossing it around to the annoyance of Skipper.

"Ringtail! I don't have time to play with lemurs, leave!" Skipper snapped

"That's King Ringtail"

Julien pulled himself into a dignified position, as dignified as he could while holding a purple unicorn doll.

"I will NEVER call you king, ever! We're looking for Private."

Julien glared at him.

"Eh, he didn't go bye-bye, I would have seen him from the royal throne."

A small noise interrupted their bickering, Rico slid over to Private's fish prize and tapped it, a small giggle came out. Hacking up a crowbar, he opened it. Private was sitting and hiccupping, candy wrappers surrounded him, he didn't seem to notice anyone.

"Mmm, peanut buttery" Julien said, licking a wrapper.

"Skipper." Kowalski said, pointing to a stack of Peanut butter Winky boxes.

Private began to vibrate.

"Fish and Chips, man! How many did you eat?" Skipper asked, Private giggled.

"Five whole boxes sir," Kowalski said, "I estimate his hyper sugar rush will overcome him in sixty seconds."

"In English Kowalski."

"Sugar rush in one minute, he will be hyper."

Private giggled louder and vibrated harder, Julien freaked out and left.

Skipper reached out a flipper to touch Private, then jumped back as the smaller one sprung to his feet.

"SUGAR!" Private yelled suddenly, then he began speaking fast. "Hi guys care for sugar? I love sugar, hahaha! I see unicorns, I love unicorns! I love unicorns! My name is Private, why is it private? Tell me your name please. Private. Stop saying that! But my name is Private! Fine, you don't want to tell me! I love penguins, hey I'm a penguin! AWESOME!"

Private zoomed around the zoo while the others tried to catch him. He messed up Joey's haystack, broke through Phil and Mason's chess game, ran over Mort, dove into Burt's peanuts, knocked Marlene into her pool slapped Kowalski, ran over Mort again, used Roy as a slide, woke Maurice from his nap, smashed a watermelon, and ran over Mort for the third time.

About an hour later, he bolted out of the zoo

"How long until the sugar wears off?" Skipper asked, clutching a stitch in his feathery chest.

"By this speed and amount of sugar, half an hour left. He should slow down in the last ten minutes." Kowalski panted.

Marlene the otter appeared, "Private just ran out of the zoo." She said.

"Thanks, Get him before he hurts himself!" they ran into the park, looking for the small one.

His loud giggling seemed to echo through the growing darkness of the park. Skipper searched the pond for Private with no luck. Kowalski searched in trees and under park benches, the only result he got was a bump on the head when Rico called out.

Rico who had been searching the perimeter of the Park, called to his teammates. He heard them arrive and pointed up, at a twenty story building.

Private was jumping around and laughing on the edge of the flat roof, until he lost his balance.

"Rico, trampoline!" Skipper ordered.

Rico got it just in time, Private bounced off and landed on Kowalski. Skipper helped him to his feet and stared at him.

Kowalski brushed off dirt from his feathers and looked at Private with concern.

"That was awesome! Do it again!" Private smiled, then he noticed Rico laughing,

Sudden realization hit Private like a hammer and he felt nauseous and horrified.

"We're going to the zoo, want to come?" Skipper asked.

For some strange reason, Skipper was calm when he should have been worried.

Rico was still laughing as he put away the trampoline, Kowalski felt a sensation of foreboding. Private stared at the ground sadly and Skipper took a few steps back into the street.

"Yeah, we should head back," Kowalski said, "wouldn't want anyone to- SKIPPER LOOK OUT!"

The warning came too late, the sound of traffic registered with them too late.

WHAM!

The metal screeched and groaned, Skipper screamed, pain coming from everywhere. A loud crack sounded and he was silent.

"SKIPPER!" Private screamed, terror tearing through his body.

"NO!" Rico yelled.

Kowalski thought fast, they managed to rush him to the zoo hospital, too horrified to speak. Images flashed in their heads, Skipper's breathing was ragged.

A squirrel that saw the events told Maurice who told the zoo.

No one slept happily that night, not even feet obsessed Mort. Marlene was devastated, she always had a small crush on Skipper and was pretty sure that no one knew.

The penguins didn't sleep much at all. Private shook, his sobs echoing in the HQ Private fell asleep at one in the morning, only to wake up an hour later from a nightmare.

"How can a nightmare be any scarier than what we've just seen?" Kowalski said hoarsely.

"Skipper bled in this one, and cried loudly," Private's voice was low too. "I miss him!" he burst into tears again.

"Why?" Rico croaked softly.

"It's my fault" Private sniffed.

"No, it's mine." Kowalski said, "I couldn't invent anything that works. I…wait…my invention…serum…I've got it! No one bother me!" He rushed to his lab.

Private fell asleep again and Rico put him in bed. Rico soon went to bed himself.