DANGER MOUSE:
LOST LUGGAGE
WRITTEN BY ZARIUS
Note: Contains Spoilers for "The Spy Who Came In From The Cold"
Penfold felt like a folded up accordion as his body was pried off of the chair in Col. K's office, after he had once more been sat on by the Elephant Felicity.
Another dark time for our heroic hamster, another incident that will linger long in the memory.
It didn't seem fair, given only mere hours ago he had successfully relieved all of London from Baron Greenback's elephant flu outbreak, having developed immunity to the virus through his previous stint tightly pressed against Felicity's buttocks.
Now after building himself back up to heroic status, he found his social standing had taken a humiliating step back again, as he recalled the howls of laughter from inside the office before he was retrieved, and those same laughs followed him through the halls of the Danger Agency as the remaining agents caught wind of what had happened.
They say elephants never forget, and everyone in London had been an elephant at some point or another, so the quality of their cerebral fortitude would be considerably higher now.
And they would all remember the second coming of the dark time. Penfold was at a loss at how to feel about that.
He wanted to cast his mind back to happier times, when he was working on that barge as a child, or when he was with the circus, or when he was with his parents staring out at the city he would have a hand in saving.
He cast his mind back to those happier times, and struggled to wonder how things could go so wrong when he intended to do so much right.
As he entered Squawkencluck's lab, he found she was in the final stages of reverting back to her normal self, having also been infected with the Elephant flu
"Oh Penfold, there you are, I heard you were sat under Felicity again, so I called you back to run a comparison between the time you spent under her this time and the time you spent under her in the first forty-eight hour period" she said.
"What do you hope to get out of it?" Penfold said.
"Nothing, I just wanted an excuse to talk to you" said Squawk.
"Oh, so you can have a jolly old chortle at my troubles under the trunk like everyone else is?" Penfold said in a huff.
"Well, slightly, but no, Danger Mouse told me about that story you gave about being abandoned by your parents...and how you seemed to be ok with it."
"They accidently left me on the road, there was no intention of leaving me alone" said Penfold, "They were just in a hurry to get to the airport that day..."
"...And they happened to lose their luggage" noted a sarcastic Squawk, walking up to Penfold and clutching his hand
"It's ok Penfold, you can let it out, you saved the whole city, people won't forget that, true what happened to you at the end of the day is an amusing little epilogue, but they won't forget the rest of the story, this incident WILL slip from their minds...but what you've carried with you since childhood? That hasn't left a mark and I feel it ought to" Squawk continued.
"Why? It just gives me a reason to surprise them when they see me again...they'd be so happy to see how far I've come" Penfold replied.
"You really buy that? You really think you'll see them again?" said Squawk, unsure if she wanted to make Penfold confront the truth she knew he was psychologically repressing.
"I'm hoping our reunion is the same as when I left them, come to think of it, the same as my conception too, at least from what they often told me..." Penfold said.
"Don't say it" requested Squawk, knowing he was going to say 'accident'.
"Why?" asked Penfold.
"Because I'd rather be proud of everything you've done deliberately since that day" Squawk said, and gave him a hug.
Penfold walked out of the lab feeling a bit better about himself. He didn't know what had just transpired between him and the Professor, all he knew is he appreciated her curiosity.
He reckoned that, on the day he met his folks again, they would learn all about his friends and how much they meant to him.
Accidents happen.
And whenever they did, what to many would seem like a discarded piece of luggage usually never felt so lost.