Jessica continued to watch Skipper, and he continued to watch her, he wasn't sure if he should move or stay still "They don't do much, there are boring." Carolyn complained sourly, this stung Skipper, skipper of all animal, Boring? He knew he wasn't the most fun guy around, but boring he was not.
He slid to the edge of the water on his belly and back flipped into the water, Carolyn lifter her head in amusement and watched him he jumped up and corkscrewed back down, landing gracefully in the water. Carolyn clapped her hands eagerly while Jessica rolled her eyes.
"Show off." She mumbled playfully, Skipper couldn't help but smile, as he jumped in the water below them and splashed water onto them. Jessica laughed and stepped back, dripping with waters from the stomach up, Carolyn shivered as her teeth chattered.
"Good thing they have feathers, that is freezing." She hugged herself and smiled happily, she was wrong about them being boring. "HEY!" a familiar boxy voice yelled. Skipper dove back into the water as the two girls turned around to she none other than Alice coming towards them.
"The Zoo is closed, you shouldn't be here." She called recognizing the two young girls, "than you shouldn't have given me the key to the zoo's gate on my 12th birthday." Jessica laughed pulling out the brass key from the pocket on her black jacket.
"Alice!" Carolyn yelled running forward wrapping her arms around the slightly larger woman, Skipper peaked his head over his habitat wall, did they actually like Alice? Than he saw it, the big blues eyes that Carolyn had, and the same shape of nose that Jessica had, even the smiles were the same, they were related.
"Aunt Alice I haven't seen you in 2 years!" Carolyn complained, Alice nodded her head in understanding. "Speaking of which I have 2 years of birthday gifts I owe you." Alice comment pulling the two girls along toward the zoo office.
-"she really called her Aunt Alice?" Marlene asked Skeptically, Skipper nodded his head. They remained silent for a moment, Marlene sat on the pile of pillows with Skipper standing in front of her. Skipper looked around the room was empty of people.
"Where are the others?"
"They went out, Darlene and Carlene said they'd take them off my hands, so me and Darrin have been relaxing." Marlene pointed to her older brother who was sitting at the table towards the door, he pushed an anchovy into his mouth before looking up to see Marlene and Skipper staring at him.
He waved playfully, with an annoyed expression on his face, Skipper walked over to the rug that covered up the entrance to the sewer. Marlene followed behind him, bored of hanging out with nothing to do. Skipper helped her down and turned to Darrin.
"Are you going to come, or sit here with nothing to do?" Darrin jumped up from his seat and followed Skipper into the dark hole. He slid quickly against the rough ground, with the to otters trailing behind him, putting a good distance between them, but not enough for them to get lost.
Skipper turned right at the lemurs habitat and headed toward his own, Darrin in front of Marlene by a few feet. Skipper opened the door to his habitat, it was dark and empty, but Skipper was still skeptical. Something didn't seem right, he knew someone was there with him.
He put a flipper out and stopped Marlene from taking another step, Darrin however stayed directly on Skipper's tail, following him into the unusually dark H.q. Suddenly Skipper felt a sleek sensation on his shoulder and it wasn't Darrin, He grabbed the strange object and threw it toward the left.
Aloud bang rang through the H.q. and a single yelped, a yelp Skipper would have known anywhere. Marlene flipper on the light switch, and noticed another Penguin was in the room, she was older and shorter, with crystal blue eyes that were filled with hope.
"Skipper?" she asked Curiously, Skipper nodded his head not at all alarmed by who she was. He seemed to know, The penguin rushed forward and wrapped her flippers around skipper, tears fell from her eyes and she happily sighed in relief.
"Skipper." she said again, as if she didn't believe it. Skipper slowly wrapped his own Flippers around her, a small smile grew on his face. "It's been a while, mom." He said in hushed tone, however Marlene was able to hear them, than all of them turned their attention to the figure that Skipper had thrown.
He was an older male penguin with grey blue eyes, his feathers were ruffled and uneven. He took several steps forward stopping in front of Skipper. He tensed up and stayed alert just in case, the older male seemed to have anger in his eyes, but soon it dulled to lifelessness.
"Skipper." He said plainly, Skippers eyes narrowed, and it was several seconds before he responded. "Captain." Was all he mustered up, Marlene's eyes widened 'I know Captain wouldn't take this as good news, but I know you would Mom'
Was this the captain from the unsent letters she read about, She pulled on Darrin's arm and motioned for them to leave, Darrin didn't ask Questions, they started inching out Slowly.
"Please Skipper, I'm retired, call me dad." The male said with a smirk, Skippers tensed up again, he hated that word more than anything on the earth. His eyes narrowed again at the older male, and the female watched them with Hesitation, and Marlene and Darrin continued to inch out.
"That's a negative Captain." Skipper turned away shutting his eyes trying to get the image out of his eyes of the male that stood before him. Marlene and Darrin were close to out of view, that was until they were interjected.
"Hold it, Front and center you two." The captain ordered pointing to the two otters trying to sneak out. The froze for a moment but slowly made their way forward stopping n front of Skipper.
"Who might you be, sneaking around like this?" The captain demanded, Darrin opened his mouth to speak, until Skipper jumped in front of them, making sure neither of the spoke. "That's classified information," He smiled proudly and the taller penguin.
The Captain narrowed his eyes and looked back at Marlene with a smile, She got an eerie feeling, as he made his way over to her. "Who might you be?" He asked sweetly, but Marlene didn't give him the answer he was expecting.
"Restricted information." she tried to hide her smile, but she felt proud of herself, and by the look on Skippers face he was too. Captain heaved a sigh and returned to Skippers mothers side.
"Marlene?" she said as if she was asking, Skipper and Marlene looked at her with suspicion. She sighed and smiled taking a step toward Marlene, who stepped back protectively. "I'm not Stupid Skipper, I have read you're letters, I don't burn them when I get them." She answered.
So Skipper did send some of the letters to them, Skippers mom wrapped her arms around Marlene happily. "It's so good to actually meet you, I've heard wonderful things." She announced, Marlene smiled at Skipper and he smiled in return, his mother was always the sweet one.