Chapter Three
Savio dragged Private into a small room before setting the young penguin down, and then promptly curled up, clearly planning on taking a nap.
Private made a beeline for the open door but stopped dead in his tracks when he saw a penguin walk into the room, closing the door behind her.
"Hello son," she said.
"W-what?" Private stammered. He backed away from the strange female penguin, who apparently was claiming to be his mother. His mother was in England with his uncle Nigel, right? That's what both Skipper and Uncle Nigel had said. Yet, he couldn't help but notice that she spoke with a British accent.
"Look at you," the penguin said, ignoring Private's stammering. She circled around him three times before she stopped in front of him and stepped closer, taking his flippers in hers.
Private could see admiration in her eyes, but he couldn't get over how cold and hateful her eyes seemed to be, even when she was looking at him.
"You look so much your father," she continued, her eyes becoming even colder if possible, "Tell me, how is he?"
Private gawked at her, his eyes wide, "What? Wh-what are you talking about?" he stammered helplessly, while Savio began to snore from his corner of the dark room.
The penguin blinked, and then backed up, frowning now, "Of dear, Private, has he not told you anything?"
Private shook his head, his mind reeling, "I'm afraid I don't understand what you're talking about".
The penguin seemed to feel sympathy for him, for she started explaining a moment later, "Your father, Skipper, he took you away from me when you were just an egg, didn't he tell you that? After all, he seemed to trust the rest of his team to tell them he was a father. Why do you think he put so much effort into raising you?"
"What! Skipper, he-he's not my father! You're lying! If he was, he-he would have told me!" Private yelled, "I don't even know you, why should I listen to you!"
"Because," the penguin said, "I'm your mother Karen". Private gulped, Karen was his mother's name, Skipper and Uncle Nigel had told him so.
"Tell me my boy, does Skipper even care for you. After all, if he was proud of being your father, why wouldn't he tell you what he was to you," Karen continued.
Private scowled, but her words did make sense . . . the feeling of sheer fury began to bubble through the young penguin. Skipper had lied to him, who was to say he hadn't lied about other things . . .
Skipper's P.O.V
The rat army took them to a large casino building, one all too familiar to Skipper. It had been where Slade had first begun to train him and Hans, so many years ago.
Once inside, Skipper saw that it looked very much the way it had then; with the casino machines and tables covered up with white sheets, gathering dust, while training equiptment of every assortment littered the place.
The rats took them to a small area of what had once been the bar area and locked them in a cage behind the wooden bar.
"Good luck getting out of that!" one of the rats chuckled, "especially with Rhonda here to guard you!" and with that said, they walked away, laughing among themselves and high-fiving.
For a while, the group struggled against the cage bars, and Rico tried to unlock the cage door by puking up several useful items, but Rhonda kept swiping them from him until a cold cruel laugh swept through the air, coming towards them. Slow clapping . . .
A shiver ran down Skipper's spine as a dark furred lemur made his presence known in front of them. Deadshot. The very lemur who had turned Skipper into what he was today, and had forced him onto the path of being a commando. The one who had killed his family and his mentor, Slade.
"What have you done with my son?" Skipper demanded, "And how'd you get out of prison?" He shooed his teammates and Julian behind him with his flippers, fully determined to protect them at any cost.
"Oh nothing, he's just meeting his mother for the first time," Deadshot laughed, before he turned his attention to the others behind Skipper, "Tell me lads, do you know who I am?"
"You're an enemy of Skipper's, which makes you an enemy of ours," Kowalski spat, while Rico growled. Even Julian looked furious.
"Let us out of here, I'm the king of lemurs, I demand you too!" the lemur king snarled furiously, coming up to stand beside Skipper; Kowalski and Rico moved to stand next to the older penguin as well.
Deadshot snorted, "Some king," he sneered, and went on to add, "Don't you love my army? Iit wasn't very hard to become their leader, after all they all hate you! And now, we're going to take over New York City, starting with the central park Zoo!" Deadshot cackled, and then left them; leaving Skipper to do nothing more than shout insults at his back.
After a while, the four of them grew tired and huddled in the corner of the cage farthest away from their guard, Rhonda, whispering among themselves, trying to figure a way out.
"After we figure out how to get out of this stupid cage, we'll go find Private, and if Karen hasn't already, then we'll tell him the truth," Skipper said with finality, "Then we go and help the zoo".
"So," Julian drawled, "The Private is your son, but you didn't tell him of this because you were afraid you would not live up to his image of you? Come on, even with you as his leader, he still looks up to you".
"It's a long story Julian," Kowalski muttered, while Rico suddenly stood up, eyes narrowed with anger.
"Hans?" Kowalski snorted, "We should have known you'd be here". Skipper, Julian and Kowalski stood up, and glared at the puffin as he made his way lazily over to Rhonda who looked like she was about to fall asleep. Leave it to the puffin to ruin their plan by making sure their guard didn't fall asleep.
Skipper felt a knife tear at his insides, the last time he had come up against Deadshot, Hans had been on his side, and now it seemed that Hans had switched sides.
"I thought you hated Deadshot," Skipper spat furiously as Hans stopped in front of Rhonda. The puffin wisely chose to ignore him.
"The Deadshot says it's my turn to take a shift as their guard," Hans said, jerking his head at the cage.
"Good," Rhonda yawned and began to move away from the cage, "Cause I'm about to pass out". Hans took her place beside the cage, and while Skipper and Kowalski whispered among themselves on how to take him out, the puffin watched Rhonda until she had disappeared from sight.
Then Hans let out a sigh of relief and started to unlock the cage, his eyes now wide with fear, but determination.
"What are you doing?" Skipper asked icredilous.
"Shush," Hans hissed softly, "They'll hear you!" With a quiet snap, the lock fell off, and Hans pushed the cage door open, "Come on, let's get out of here!"
"Y-you're helping us?" Kowalski's eyes went wide as they scrambled out of the cage. Relief spread through Skipper, Hans it seemed still hated Deadshot as much as Skipper himself did.
"Let's just say I helped put Deadshot into prison last time, and I plan on doing so again," Hans sniffed, and then added to Skipper, "Overheard what you said earlier, went to try and find Private. They're holding him in our old room".
"Old room?" Julian and Kowalski echoed. Skipper's three allies facial expressions all showed confusion, and surprise.
"We had the same mentor who Deadshot later killed; this was our old hideout," Skipper explained, not wanting to go into detail at the moment. He turned to his old nemesis/friend, and said, "Lead the way Hans".
