Hello to my lovely readers! I was overjoyed that I got 8 reviews for the previous chapter (: Thanks for all the great comments!
Okay, if you guys remembered at the start of chapter 4, Kowalski said it was a start of a new week without Skipper. So let's just assume its a Monday when the boys learn of Skipper's survival.
Hope you enjoy this chapter c:
Disclaimer: Don't own anyone/anything from Penguins of Madagascar.
Central Park, 2109 (nine minutes since Kowalski gave the order for preparations)
Kowalski slammed the brakes as soon as he reached the gate. Rico and Randy were already there, starting to load all the medical supplies onto the car. James and Private had four suitcases with them, loaded with weapons. Skipper had made them prepare all these weapons in advance in case they lacked a 'Rico'. Julien came running towards them with two cell phones.
"I found this two celly phone thingys in the Lost and Found. You just click number one and the green phone sign and then I click my green phone sign and then we can talk." Julien explained, panting, as he gave one phone to Kowalski.
"Thanks Julien. Randy and James would have to stay here while we go. We need eyes on the zoo and we can't let you three on solo. You two agents have training and you know what to do." Kowalski said, he and Private hopped into the back seat while Rico in the driver's.
"Please give us a stat update frequently, we need to know what is going on there." Randy requested.
"Same to you, contact us every 12 hours, starting from 0600 tomorrow."
"Goodbye, take care of Skipper." James wished.
"Will do." The two groups exchanged final nods and wishes before Kowalski commanded Rico to "Step on the gas."
The three left behind followed the car disappearing into the darkness with their gazes. "We need to go and buy them an excuse for a long-term disappearance."
"First we need to check on the animals." Julien informed.
"Agreed."
At the same time, Monday, 2110, IPDF Headquarters.
Skipper had gotten off his car around a mile away before starting to walk the rest of the distance to the HQ. He had a mini black shoulder backpack in which there were darts, guns and smoke bombs. He was wearing sunglasses too and he adjusted the small bracelets on his hand so that they won't fall off easily. His mind was not that clear at the moment and the real Skipper really didn't want to injure the penguins or worse.
In his hand he had a flamethrower. Its always the flamethrowers, isn't it?
Usually he would have gone for the 'charge in with the guns blazing' tactic but this time he opted for the silent shadows technique, or in layman's terms, stealth mode.
Back to the car, 2120.
Private and Kowalski had rechecked all their supplies and made sure all were working. Rico had been driving in a breakneck speed, faster than usual in the hopes of getting Skipper back to normal.
"Kowalski, I need to know how the base even looks like, I've only gone there once. I need more intel." Private requested his senior officer.
"The base can be divided into five parts, Central Wing, North Zone, East Wing, West Wing and South Zone. Central Wing is the only part that is visible above ground level and extends all the way underground. All the other parts are hidden underground. You've seen that the Central Wing is located in that woods area, its because we can't let humans find us." Kowalski explained as he took out a map and pointed to each of the buildings.
"Right here, is the North Zone, its were the training facilities and sparring rooms, plus all other teaching equipment are.
West Wing - Nuclear developments and other weapons creation facilities, which also include labs for experimentations and science. We've been trying to generate a less cost consuming way to meet our needs.
East Wing - Its a dorm for families and students, coming with all necessary living space. We also have our medical facility there, which extends to North Zone.
South Zone - Is the place where we actually store our vehicles, our hangars are there. Half of our top secret weapons are stored there. We need high clearance to enter THAT buiding.
Central Wing- Is where land vehicles are located. A quarter of all our weapons are there as that facility extends to ground level.
A few bridges and the vents system connect all these zones. Any Questions?"
"Do we have clearance for South Zone?"
"Yes, our team has clearance."
"One more, how's the security like?"
"We have patrols, rotating each 8 hours. There are more than a hundred teams out there, we have about 5 teams each shift. We need high security due to all the risks. For accessing each section and Zone/Wing, there are iris recognition scanners and password protection."
"Thank you. How long will we take to reach there?"
Kowalski took out his abacus and calculated, "At this rate, 67.4 minutes.
"Private, there's another map you might wanna use." Kowalski said, this time taking a clear plastic sheet with black drawings on it and placing it on top of the original map. There were so many lines on the plastic sheet that it made the whole figure seem so complex.
"What's this sheet?"
"This, is the vents system. Its top secret, only few people know about this. Skipper is the only one who even bothers to keep a map of it. He has planned many escape routes and made some improvements to the system."
"You mean just like the escape tunnels in our HQ?"
"Yes, he is the only one who has the full copy of it, as far as I can tell. Most people won't go there. So make sure that if Skipper goes missing, you and Rico check there alone okay? Top Secret. No other team probably knows about this."
Private nodded, looking out of the window, trying to mentally calm himself down about the upcoming fight. He had no idea how violent Skipper was going to be.
Another 40 minutes later…
Skipper climbed to the top of the Central Wing block using his grappling hook and climbed into a ventilation shaft. (I think that's how you spell it).
He was familiar with his position. He was near the entrance of the building, and waited for the CCTVs nearby to turn away from him before sneaking up on two penguins on duty and knocking 'em out. He dragged them to a corridor silently before proceeding down the hallways. A few penguins saw him and took out their guns, firing them almost instantly.
Skipper ran across the hallways, charging toward them while dodging every bullet and dart flying toward him, reached them and swiftly knocked them out with a blow to the head.
He was about to travel further into the block and venture underground but a loud siren sounded and red lights started flashing throughout the wing. Skipper swiftly turned behind and saw a younger, unarmed, penguin running away from him.
'He must have sounded the alarm!' Skipper thought as he flung two knives at the boy. But he was gone. Skipper walked over, pulled out the knives with no struggle and killed the cameras installed on the ceiling of the hallways.
He ran down the hallways and looked for a flight of stairs which led to the underground section of the base. There were two officers along the stairs and he knocked them both while running down the stairways.
There were several doors and he picked one, sneaking into the room it led to. He remembered that one was closest to the other blocks. He found himself in a room dark and silent, and his gut was telling him to prepare for a battle.
He closed his eyes and put his flippers arms in a defensive position, legs widening apart as he tried to pick out any kind of noise or movement through his hearing. It was just like the blindfold test. Go on instinct.
The real Skipper was having a little control. He could lessen the darkness of his thinking, though he was having a hard time from restraining himself to performing at his full potential.
He sensed a cold wind brush against his side and immediately moved to his left, dodging the blows of someone's bullet and some other tranquilizer darts.
"You underestimate me greatly." Skipper stated and chuckled dryly as he got warmed up for the fight.
But at the car...
"Kowalski, the phone's ringing. I press the green button right?"
"Yes Private. Wait, let me talk."
Private passed the phone to Kowalski.
"Hello?"
"Kowalski, this is Randy. We've got news."
"Yes?"
"Skipper's just attacked Central Wing.." Private looked at Kowalski who gulped.
"You got contacts with the General and other Captains?"
"Yes we do."
"You might want to fill us in on some details…?" Kowalski prompted.
"Oh yes, the General informed us on something important. You need to put the 'speaker mode' on for this. Private and Rico need to hear this too."
"What's the speaker mode? Sorry, I can't read." Kowalski muttered sheepishly.
"Its alright. Its the button above the green call button. Try that?"
"Okay it works."
"Private, Kowalski and Rico, the General said Skipper called the HQ at six. I'll play the conversation for you."
"HQ to Blue Eyes: What's the emergency? Where are you? Is that really you? How do we know we can trust you?"
"Listen General." Skipper started darkly, before pausing and talking again. "HQ: Do you copy?"
"HQ to Blue eyes: Loud and clear!"
"Listen, I'm in a bad state now. There's evil surging through my brain every minute I speak and its getting harder to fight my mind battles.
"What's going on! How are you even alive!? Where are you?"
"That doesn't matter General. If you don't act quickly you guys are going to get it, badly. Listen carefully. I'm in pain right now and I'm starting to drive again. Destination? Your base. Mission? Infiltrate and eliminate. Mastermind: Blowhole. Do you comprehend sir? I don't know if this is a secure frequency and I can't risk getting you in more danger than you are in." Skipper said.
"Understood. Do you have any idea when you'll arrive?"
The boys started hearing cries of pain. "Is that Skipper?" Private asked weakly.
"I'll give myself... three hours..." He muttered between breaths.
"Got it. Thanks for the warning."
"Don't thank me yet... Blowhole's out there... Hans too..."
"Blowhole?" Rico questioned.
"What about them?"
"Mind control - turns me evil...injected nanobots that can harm me if I don't complete...mission..." Skipper said.
"That's insane!" Kowalski yelled, going through multiple calculations in his head.
"It's taking me over... If I'm too far gone... sir, don't try to save me from myself..." Skipper muttered weakly.
Private's eyes widened in alarm. "Did he really mean that…?" He looked up to Kowalski, who nodded before turning away.
Randy started talking again, "Kowalski, how do you break mind controls?"
Kowalski took out his clipboards and started drawing situations on it.
"We don't know how Skipper got under their control - if it was a machine we could reverse the effects but I don't think we can get a mind control machine back from Blowhole. I highly doubt he was hypnotised so the best way is by using cognitive recalibration."
"Eh, what exactly is that?"
"Give a hard blow to his head."
"There aren't any other options K'walski?" Private inquired.
"Nope."
"You know what to do." Randy told them with a foreboding tone before hanging up.
At Skipper's location
Skipper felt a flipper coming toward him and twisted it before even looking in its direction. He spun the poor penguin around and threw him at two others, defeating all three of them. One penguin was throwing a punch at him while another a kick from from the opposite direction. He flipped over and knocked them both out at the same time. Once he ensured that the remaining officers had either been unconscious or temporarily immovable he went to the other side of the room and continued through another door.
He saw a few barrels in the room. Fuel. His eyes lit up in the sight of them. He saw them lined up along the walls and made an escape plan in his mind. He took out his flame thrower, set fire to two of them and climbed into a vent just before the fire spread and everything exploded.
"All personnel, evacuate Central Wing immediately!" The intercom blared. Skipper's head started throbbing due to the resistance to the mind control. He continued climbing through the vents, hoping to reach the North Zone as fast as he could without being caught. However his multiple injuries only delayed him.
Kowalski and team arrived just to hear explosions at the underground section of Central Wing.
"Hurry we must get inside!" Kowalski ordered as they all started belly sliding. Rico kicked open the front door.
There were a few dozen soldiers standing at the front lobby, some of them tending to injured personnel.
Kowalski didn't recognise any of the penguins. Fortunately Agent Nigel saw them and helped them out.
"Kowalski." Agent Nigel called out.
"Agent Nigel." They saluted.
"At ease soldier. Do you know what happened?"
"No sir."
"Skipper sneaked into the building, knocked some guards out and infiltrated the underground section. He blew up one of the rooms and the fire caused a few other rooms to be unstable. We just evacuated the guards out. Some of them are injured. We could use your help in first aid."
Kowalski nodded and Rico threw up a bag full of medical supplies. They had more of those in the car. The trio walked over to one of the guards who was leaning against the wall, surrounded by a few friends.
"Sir, I'm Kowalski and this is Rico, we're trained in first aid. Can you tell us where you're injured and what caused them?"
His flipper was bent, clearly broken. "Skipper broke my flipper… threw me into a wall, back hurts too much."
Rico already had the cloth to wrap the broken flipper and put it into a sling.
"This should prevent unnecessary strain to your arm, but it'll still hurt a bit. You might want to take pain killers."
"Thanks Kowalski."
The trio went to help the others who were hurt.
The speakers turned on and another announcement was made."Attention all personnel, intruder is still at large. Skipper has escaped from sight and is dangerous and armed. Please proceed with extreme caution."
Private, who was helping another victim under the guidance of Rico and Kowalski, looked up to them.
"K'walski, Skipper doesn't kill anyone right?" Private asked fearfully.
Kowalski jerked his head up at the unexpected question. "He...he hasn't killed anyone yet… but at this stage he's uncontrollable…."
"What?! How could you say that?" Private almost yelled, shocked at what Kowalski implied.
"It's true, he can't resist the mind control so he might display extremely violent moves."
"I know that Skipper's still in there… i can feel it…"
"I just hope that we can return him to normal in time Private. Before its too late."
"Me too K'walski."
2400+ words enough for you guys? I'd like to hear your thoughts about this chapter soon! Hope the scenes weren't confusing. Any room for improvement? By the way, please vote on the poll on my profile page, if you haven't. Thank you for taking the time to do so ^^