Mark traveled on and on for hours through an endless blizzard hoping to find a possible shelter but instead was met with snow, snow, and limitless snow. It was then when he seemed to find no reason to go further. He collapsed.
Not far off, the penguin troop was staying in a shelter made of snow.
It seemed that they would be trapped in this strange new land. When Skipper sent everyone off to search for anything of interest, Private had found Mark, unconscious in the snow. At the time, they didn't really know each other very well, but Private really didn't care. He knew that bringing back a civilian who was wounded was the right thing to do, so he used every bit of his strength to haul Mark's body back to the shelter. At that moment, Private and Mark were about twenty feet from the base.
"Skipper!" he yelled. "I've got a civilian! He's wounded"
"A civilian, you say? Bring him here!" shouted Skipper, whose voice rang clearly through the blizzard.
With the four penguins heading back to the ship, Skipper decided that they had been very cruel. All the other animals had been locked in those crates with no protection from the cold, so Skipper and the others decided to open the crates, and let everyone out. They'd have to stay inside the ship at all times, but at least they'd be safe.
Mark was placed in the medical wing of the ship where Rico and Kowalski would nurse him back to health. He was given some piping hot fish soup from the galley and was given cards from the other animals.