Yoo-hoo/panda: hey all! We thank for the reviews and hope you follow the ducklings on their perilous journey for chappies to come.
XXXXXXX
Hawkeye walked into the office the next day and without saying a word, filled the bowl with water and set a book entitled "So Ducklings Think You're Their Mother: how to raise orphaned ducklings" next to the bowl.
Riza Hawkeye was a woman of stability and though she could adapt quite well to any situation, she took a personal liking to having a day with minimum surprises. After all, prior preparation prevented poor performance. She filled her coffee mug with coffee and slipped in a little bit of her "own personal" coffee cream in the mug. The alcohol gave her the edge she knew she needed if the ducklings were to show up again and if she was going to thwart the Colonel's attempt of fowlicide. Taking a quick sip of her coffee concoction, Riza stepped out to gather the Colonel's paper work for the day.
XXXXX
With sparkles abound and the blonde mustache covering his lack of mouth, Alexander Louis Armstrong strode into work. As you can expect, Al secretly visited Armstrong by means strange and mysterious and promptly left the ducklings there.
However as the four previous receivers of ducks took them as a burden, Armstrong seemed overjoyed to have eight little peeping balls of fluff follow him. As he made his way to Mustang's office the eight had formed a single file. Armstrong had placed one curl similar to his on each tiny duckling head and all eight had their very own teeny tiny sparkles.
Armstrong's head was held high as he stalked down the hall to Mustang's office, oblivious to the snickers of the secretaries. It wasn't very long until he ran into Hughes. "Major Armstrong." Hughes greeted as he walked by, flashing a picture of his little girl to the major. After walking past Armstrong and the ducklings, Maes paused and looked back. "Hey, aren't those Breda's and Fury's ducklings?" He wondered.
"Not to my knowledge." Replied Armstrong. "I found them in my toilet this morning swimming around."
"What a drag. Did you hear what happened to Havoc the other day?"
"Hmm." Armstrong nodded, "Answered the door naked as a jay bird only to find the Lieutenant."
"Well, I hope they don't give you too much trouble. You know my little Elysia is begging us for a kitty. Look, here she is in front of the pet shop!" Hughes held out a picture of his daughter then knelt down to show it to the ducklings. They peeped their interest and politely formed a half circle each viewing the picture. Then each flapped his teeny tiny wings in approval.
"Um, Major," Hughes began realizing that sparkles and single curls of hair was not normal for ducks, "Why are they wearing wigs?"
Armstrong puffed up with pride and answered, "It is the Armstrong way of branding ducks. Duck rearing has been in the Armstrong family for generations!!" Hughes sweat dropped in reply as Armstrong made a duck call with his hands. "Good day, Lt. Colonel. Quack, Florencio. Quack, Jaala. Quack, Feofilakt. Quack, Vit Bohumil. Quack, Hatshepsut. Quack, Silkythreat. Quack, Sparklepuff. Quack, Roxelana."
"On Comet, on Cupid on Donner and Blitzen!!" Hughes finished as he walked away, thinking he could not believe Armstrong named them. "Merry Christmas to all and to all a good-hey! Wanna see a picture of my little girl?" Hughes said, seeing other co-workers who had not seen that particular photo and ran after them.
The ducklings peeped asking each other in their own little ducky language how one man could be so empty minded. They decided to drop it as they followed Armstrong: the man they called Mommy.
When the nine reached Roy's office, no one was present. So Armstrong placed the ducklings in the bowl and left to do his rounds.
The ducklings swam happily in their makeshift pond for about twenty minutes until Hawkeye and Roy entered. Riza had an armful of paperwork in her arms and a motherly tone in her voice. "Sir, you need to buckle down today. You got precious little done yesterday with…" she trailed off ass she beheld the now duckful bowl. "…the…ducks…"
"I'm going to kill Fury and Breda." Roy mumbled moving to his desk.
Hawkeye furrowed her brows. "Odd, Fury and Breda have not clocked in yet…unless they pawned them off to Fal- SIR!" her thoughts interrupted, Riza ran to Roy's desk where he was rummaging through his drawers for what she believed was an extra pair of ignition cloth gloves.
"Sure they were loud yesterday but that's no reason to kill them, Colonel!" Hawkeye reminded him with a slightly raised voice. Roy didn't look up and the lieutenant was certain that he had not heard her. What she didn't expect was the megaphone Roy grabbed from his desk. Though she had little time to breathe a sigh of relief for the Colonel threw open his large windows and yelled into the megaphone, "DO YOU WANT TO BUY A DUCK?!!"
"A duck?" A lone disembodied voice from the streets answered.
"A DUCK." Roy clarified.
"Does it quack?" the person questioned.
"OF COURSE IT QUACKS!" Roy answered and was told to hold on a moment as the voice yelled out its window, "Do you want to buy a duck?"
"A what?" a second voice hollered back.
"A what?" the first voice asked of Roy.
"A DUCK." Roy clarified.
"A duck." The first voice clarified to the other.
"Does it quack?" voice two questioned.
"Does it quack?" the first person hollered.
"OF COURSE IT QUACKS!" Roy answered and was told to hold on a moment as the second voice yelled out its window, "Do you want to buy a duck?"
"A what?" a third voice chimed in.
"A what?" a second voice hollered back.
"A what?" the first voice asked of Roy.
"A DUCK." Roy clarified.
"A duck." The first voice clarified to the other.
"A duck." The second voice relayed.
"Does it quack?" voice three questioned.
"Does it quack?" voice two asked.
"Does it quack?" the first person hollered.
"OF COURSE IT QUACKS!" Roy answered and was told to hold on a moment as the third voice yelled out its window, "Do you want to buy a duck?"
This went on for fifteen minutes until Riza was certain, six blocks away from central were inquiring about the ducks. Hawkeye had had just about enough. How was Roy ever going to get his work done if he was auctioning off the ducklings? She had to take action and seizing the megaphone yelled. "We're all sold out!!"
"Then stop trying to sell them!!" one of the voices answered indignantly.
"Lt. Hawkeye!" Armstrong gasped in horror. "How can you try to sell my ducklings?" He walked over to the bowl and picked up one of the eight. "Look at little
Feofilakt. How can you deny him?"
"Yeah, Lieutenant." Roy added then paused. "You named them Armstrong? That's just like you."
Armstrong nodded. "Allow me to introduce…the Armstrong Ducklings!!" He cried and ripped off his shirt, releasing sparkles everywhere. "Florencio, Jaala, Vit Bohumil, Hatshepsut, Silkythreat, Sparklepuff and Roxelana."
The Colonel and his lieutenant exchanged glances of doubt. They were both certain that each duckling had individual sparkles and their very own Armstrong haircuts. It was a moment until Hawkeye began to move, toward her desk where she had discarded the files. "Jaala, Armstrong?" she asked.
"It means wild goat."
"You named a duckling after a wild goat?" Riza wondered with a raised brow. She handed the Colonel his coffee, free of the alcohol cream she used in hers.
"Armstrongs have been naming our ducks after wild goats, Lieutenant."
"Point taken." Riza conceded. "But Silkythreat?" She placed Roy's work on his desk as Havoc, Fury, Breda and the newly healed Falman (twas a twenty four hour flu) entered.
"Sounds like homicidal lingerie if you ask me…" Riza finished taking a sip of her coffee.
The four underlings stopped dead in their tracks, eyes wide as they took in the rarest of events: Lt. Hawkeye speaking of her undergarments. "Looks like we've chose the worst time possible to walk into the office." Fury mumbled.
Abrupt ending? Yes, but guess what…I don't care. It sounded like a good place to finish. Please review.
