Private saw the moment Manfredi and Johnson broke off down a side passage. Five military penguins slowed and turned, but Private shouted.
"Leave them!"
The penguins turned, saw who was speaking, then saluted and turned to resume chasing Blowhole. Private threw himself onto his stomach and slid after the murderers of his parents. Rico's warning not to let his anger cloud his thoughts flashed through his mind, and he forced himself to think as he saw the pair waddling away. When they heard him, they looked back to stare at Private. And then they laughed.
Private had never known such offense. They thought he wasn't a threat. They thought he was an easy target. They thought to kill him like they did his parents. And rage blinded him as they entered a cavern, still laughing. He thought to himself, I will prove them wrong.
Manfredi and Johnson turned in the center of the cavern, and Private popped to his feet. Skipper and Kowalski hurried in, panting and terrified, but as the three penguins in the center began to circle each other, they caught sight of their little boy's face. His blue eyes shimmered with fire that was so like Rico's and the other native-borns that for a moment they wondered if it really was their Private and not some native of Antarctica. But then the penguin spoke again, and the telltale British accent told them that it was indeed Private, and he was certainly no little boy anymore.
"I owe both of you," Private said, standing tall as he stalked around.
"You're the child of Lita and Pol?" Johnson said, his voice full of derision.
"I am their son, yes," Private replied.
"Hm, shorter than both," Manfredi said, his deep voice dripping with scorn. "Bad genetics."
Private bristled, narrowing his eyes, but he didn't say anything. His claws flexed with each step, and he noticed Skipper and Kowalski, but they were not threats, so he ignored them. Manfredi and Johnson stayed right in front of Private, their black eyes full of anger. Private could still feel the rage in his heart, but he fought it, knowing he needed to think. The two penguins were already angry, but they were used to angry. He needed to get them enraged, beyond thinking.
"Rico was right about you," Private said quietly.
Their expressions changed from smirking confidence to dark hatred. Johnson clicked his beak, and Manfredi snarled.
"Don't mention that idiot," he boomed.
"Why not?" Private asked, stepping slowly, a smile tugging at his beak. "He's the one who's trained me."
"Then you will lose," Johnson hissed.
"I don't think so," Private said, keeping his voice low. "I think the reason you hate Rico is that you're afraid of him. Both of you know that you couldn't beat him. That's why you didn't kill him with Lita and Pol. Because you wanted him to die that night, didn't you? But something happened that stopped you."
Johnson growled low in his throat, his eyes flashing dangerously. "Yes, we wanted him to die. But Lita and Pol fought hard. We were wounded, and Blowhole came to get us before we could kill Rico."
"He didn't wait?" Private asked.
"The boss is a little…touchy about punctuality," Manfredi said slowly.
"Too bad. Because Rico's alive and well, despite you torturing him. You really should have killed him when you had the chance."
"We'll get another one," Johnson said.
"No," Private said softly. "You won't."
And he lunged forward, feinting for Johnson. As they began to move forward, he changed directions and thew all of his weight into Manfredi, who yelled in shock as Johnson missed Private by half a foot. The bulky penguin hit the floor, and he twisted to try and drive his beak into Private, but the young penguin was too quick, and he was already diving for Johnson's back. He struck Johnson square in the back, his beak diving deep. Johnson screamed, flinging himself onto his stomach to slide away as blood bubbled out of his wound.
Skipper and Kowalski cried out in fear, and Private threw himself sideways to avoid Manfredi. He could taste the blood on the edges of his beak, and his instincts screamed in joy as he listened to them, spinning around with triumph in his eyes. To his dismay, Skipper and Kowalski were beginning to move forward, ready to fight for him. Manfredi had turned to his commanders, ready to lash out, but Private screamed.
"No!" he roared, and everybody froze. "They are mine, Skipper! Back off! Now!"
Skipper and Kowalski stopped, wavering for a moment, then they stepped back, looking frightened. Private couldn't blame them. Manfredi was a large penguin, and he could hear Johnson's soft footfalls on the icy floor as the skinny bird tried to surprise him. Private squared off with Manfredi as the bulky bird faced him again, murder promised in his eyes. But instead of fighting, he dodged Johnson as he lunged for Private's back. Johnson gasped as he ended up driving his full weight into Manfredi, who went down again with Johnson on top of him.
Snarling, the large penguin threw Johnson off of him, flinging him into a wall with great force. The skinny bird shrieked in pain as he struck the wall back first, and he slid down, leaving a smear of blood on the wall as he landed on the floor. He lay in a heap and shivered, blinded by pain. Manfredi didn't pay any mind to Johnson, so outraged at Private's clever fighting.
"You will die just like your parents," he growled.
Private didn't answer, his eyes gleaming with triumph. Johnson was down for the count, and Manfredi was so enraged that he wasn't thinking, wasn't planning. He was going to win! As the large bird circled him, looking for a weakness, an opening to take the irritant down, Private calculated. If he could wound him like he did with Johnson, he would consider things even. He didn't want to kill either of them. He had agreed with Rico that he would let Buzz take them and punish them for being traitors. It wasn't his place to kill them.
Clicking his beak, Private stepped forward, and Manfredi launched his bulk at Private and pinned him. The unexpected tactic was cheating. This wasn't what wild-style was like, and Private swore loudly, uncaring that his commanding officers were watching with wide eyes.
"Cheat!" he screamed. "Cheat! Cheat!"
But Manfredi merely grinned and drove his beak into Private's shoulder. Pain, blinding and all-consuming, loosed a scream from Private's throat. Nothing that Rico had ever done to him had hurt as bad as this. It drove all thought from his mind, and it was instinct alone that helped him to curl up and bring his claws up into Manfredi's belly.
Manfredi's expression twisted, and he let out something between a squawk and a moan as the tips of Private's claws, sharper than they had ever been in the zoo, pierced the soft flesh of his belly. A gush of warm blood flooded over Private, and he shoved at hard as he could with his claws. They went deep for a moment before Manfredi was thrown a couple of feet away, and he lay there gripping his wounded shoulder and gasping for breath. For a moment, his vision swam with black streamers as the pain nearly overwhelmed him.
He forced himself to sit up, clutching his shoulder hard, trying to staunch the bleeding, looking for the next attack. But none came. Manfredi was curled in a ball, his flippers over his stomach. Between his flippers, Private saw something that was bloody and pink, and he turned away to keep his lunch. His gaze landed on Johnson lying half-conscious in a puddle of blood. That was it then. He'd won.
His shoulder gave a nasty throb, and Private groaned as tears bubbled out of his eyes. He felt sick and sore now that the adrenaline was going away. He tried to stand, but sat down hard, wrenching a sob out of his throat. And then a flipper touched him. Private's eyes snapped open and he saw Kowalski, his eyes wide with fear, staring at him as if he didn't know him. Skipper stood behind him, the same look on his face. And Private suddenly understood. They hadn't been afraid of Manfredi and Johnson. No, that look of fear was for him.
'But they needn't fear me,' he thought. 'I'm their little Private. I would never hurt them.'
Kowalski spoke, breaking through the fog of pain. "He's losing a lot of blood, Skipper."
"Do we have any materials to care for him?" Skipper asked.
"I don't know. Let me look around. I think that closet's a storage unit."
Five minutes later, a roll of bandages and rubbing alcohol lay beside Private as Kowalski examined the wound. He clicked his tongue.
"Deep. Very deep. Needs sterilized."
Skipper looked pained as he glanced over Private's pinched face. "Is there anything else?"
"Skipper…"
"He's in enough pain already, Kowalski!" Skipper shouted, distress plain on his face.
"I can take it," Private said softly, tears still pouring from his eyes.
And they both looked at their little boy. The white of his belly was drenched with blood, both his own and Manfredi's. Because the feathers were ruffled, the blood wasn't rolling off of them, and he was stained red. Private's muscled body, so different from the pudgy boy they had last seen him as, was trembling with pain. But his voice and eyes were resigned to feel more.
"No," Skipper said softly. "We…we can find some anesthetic, something to help."
"I can go and look again, but I didn't see any," Kowalski said. He stood up but stopped when Private tugged him back down.
"No. I can take it," Private said. He looked directly at Skipper, who seemed ready to cry. "Skipper, I can take it. Believe me. I'm not that little boy anymore."
And Skipper did start to cry. "What happened to you, Private?"
Private's smile was laced with pain. "I grew up. Kinda had to. It's hard to survive in Antarctica. There's wolves, leopard seals, other penguins. But Rico taught me really well. I'm okay. Just do it quick, Kowalski. Like you would with Rico."
Kowalski and Skipper both wanted to shout that he wasn't Rico, but they recalled the fire that had glinted out of Private's eyes, so like Iczalie and Rico. And they knew then that Private was more like Rico than he'd ever been before. It seemed that the gruff penguin had rubbed some qualities off on Private. They should have been glad that the usually sullen member of the team had finally passed something on to their little boy, but they were bewildered and confused by just how much had been passed on.
"I don't want to lose you, Private," Kowalski finally said, tears pouring down his cheeks.
"You haven't lost me," Private said. "Everybody has to grow up sometime. I'm still me, Alecks."
Kowalski doubled over, laughing and crying at the same time. "You know my name!"
"Yeah. Olek told me what it was. I always thought Kowalski was your first name."
"Tata?" Kowalski asked faintly. "My dad's here?"
"And mine," Skipper said tightly. "Why does he have to butt in?"
"Don't talk like that, Skipper," Private scolded tiredly. "I don't like hearing you talk about him like that."
"You don't know him."
"I do know him. He was penguin enough to admit to Rico that he was sorry for how he acted. He knows that you weren't lying about Hans, and he's willing to talk things out. So don't talk like that until you've talked to him. Okay? For me?"
Private looked at Skipper and Kowalski with the biggest eyes they had ever seen. And they saw that their little Private was still there. They didn't know how the changes would affect his personality, but just seeing that it really was Private under all the muscle and anger calmed them down. Skipper looked at Kowalski and nodded.
"Wait a sec. Gotta get him something to bite on."
Skipper found a piece of leather. "Wonder what this came from," he mused.
"Probably wolf hide," Private said. "What do I do?"
"Bite it," Skipper said. "Because this is going to hurt. Bad."
Private placed the leather into his beak and bit down. Kowalski took a deep breath and poised himself to pour the alcohol.
"You can handle this?" he asked, unsure.
Skipper broke in, sliding behind Private to grasp his flippers; he was ready to hold him down so he didn't writhe too much. "He can handle this," he said.
Private smiled at Skipper then braced himself for the first sting of alcohol. He knew he would scream, but it was okay because Skipper and Kowalski were here again. Everything would be okay now.