The Speed of Darkness
Chapter 2 - May the Fifteenth
Skipper's log. 700 hours on May the fifteenth.
Well I finally managed to graduate from boot camp. I know, great, right? I got shipped off to Denmark before I could even choose if I wanted to go or not. Captain stuck me in this dump of an outpost on the very outskirts of Ringsted, a tiny town in the middle of nowhere.
The trip here was unpleasant. Getting stuffed into a crate no bigger than a suitcase with a couple other nervous and sweaty privates for seventeen hours was nowhere near first class. I couldn't even get out for some fresh air and to explore the plane; the crate could only be opened from the outside. They didn't want us getting into trouble at sixteen thousand feet, I suppose.
On the upside, the two other penguins I met got shoved into the same room as I did, so we had lots of time to introduce ourselves on the way here. The first one is named Johnson. He's short, very short, and also seems very young. Probably younger than I am, judging by the fact that he hasn't got all his feathers in yet. He acts young too, and seems naïve about what war is really all about. I wonder if he lied about his age to get into this program, because he talks as if he were still a small boy. 'I'm going to shoot me some hostiles' he said to me. 'And be the hero, so everyone will look up to me.' He seems focused on that goal, and I hope that I won't have to be the one to break it to him that war isn't all what it is cracked up to be.
He didn't talk much about his home life. I'm not one to open up my person life either, but he changed the subject on almost every question asked about his background. Apparently he was raised in captivity in much the same way I was, in a Seaworld in Dallas, Texas. He said only a little about his Mother and Father, but I think that the humans separate the chicks from the parents at that place, so he probably never even met them.
Manfredi, the other penguin I was stuffed up with, is a lot different than Johnson. He seems very old, and talks with a slow drawl similar to what my grandfather used to tell me stories with. Even though, judging by his looks, I still think I'm the oldest one here. Manfredi had a bigger grasp on reality than Johnson, and kept telling him that if he keeps believing what he does, he will be dead in no time. I have to admit it made me laugh, because I was about to tell him the same thing. Manfredi has got his head screwed on straight, I have to admit that much.
He's about the same height as me, but he's more intimidating that I am because his massive build. He took up most of the room in the crate, and he was very picky about us not touching him. I have to say I have never seen a penguin as burly as him, and when I asked him about it he just told me that 'he works out.' He was also was easily angered on the trip over here, but he seemed to calm down when we got settled in our room in this Godforsaken outpost. I'm not sure if he had a fear of flying or something, but by the looks of it it seems likely.
He talked a lot about his personal life. I could probably write a seven-hundred page biography about him right now. He said a lot about his fiancé, Sarah. I guess he was already missing her, which I don't necessarily blame him for. I have never been in a relationship, so I have no idea what that would be like. More on topic, Manfredi was born in raised in the open area of Antarctica. He told Johnson and I horror stories about his uncle Fredrick was eaten by a lion seal. Johnson claimed he deserved it for being named Fredrick, in a joking way, but Manfreeti doesn't seem to take fondly to jokes. Johnson was quiet for most of the rest of the trip after Manfredi called him a series of explicatives, but I don't really blame him. I'd never want to get on a penguin like Manfredi's bad side.