The Speed of Darkness
Chapter 40 – Antarctica

"BRING IT IN SLOWLY, RICO."

Skipper's voice was calm, even though the other animals in the room were not. The boat made its way through the ice slowly, splitting the thick sheets with ear-shattering cracks. Skipper did not expect to be so far from shore before encountering the ice sheet, but then remembered that it was still winter in Antarctica.

"Can't we continue on foot from here, Skipper? I don't know how much more this ship can take," said Marlene. She was wrapped in a length of green cloth she had fashioned into a sort of jacket, and her paws were covered makeshift mittens and boots. Skipper, had not realized that Marlene and Julien would not be as well-prepared for the icy cold as he and the other penguins were.

"Negative," responded the leader finally, looking down at the global positioning system in his hands. "Kowalski's signal isn't for a few more miles. If Sarge got his raft in here somehow, we're going to get ours in too."

"I think Marlene may have a point, Skippah," spoke up Private. He had a purple scarf wrapped around his face, covering his beak and most of his upper body. "If it's all the same it wouldn't be much slower to continue on foot."

"I'm not particularly interested in hiking across this barren wasteland. If you want to get out and walk, be my guest."

"I am to be thinking dat I will be staying here," said Julien.

Of all the animals in the helm, he was the one who was handling the cold the worst. Skipper , of course, was designed to put up with the cold temperatures. His think feathers and layers of fat made him not even realize that it was below zero. Even Marlene had some form of defense from the cold; her watertight fur lined her body and kept most of the cold air out. Julien on the other hand was accustomed to the tropical air of Madagascar, and as such had pulled a particularly large sock up over his body, using holes for his arms and legs. Those were in turn wrapped in some form of insulation, and his head was entirely wrapped in a scarf. It gave him a very silly appearance, but Skipper knew it was all the lemur could do to keep warm.

"The faster we move the better," affirmed Skipper. He glanced down at the GPS again. "For now we just need to hope that those hostiles are going to leave Kowalski behind on their raft, so we can get to him more easily."

"Do you think that Sarge will give up his assets so easily? He is going to use Kowalski as a means to get to us," said Manfredi solemnly. It was the first time he had spoken in a while.

"Ship!" wheezed Rico suddenly, pointing widely towards the ship's bow. Skipper redirected his attention to the horizon, and sure enough, there was a ship-shaped black dot just barely visible through the dim light. It looked entirely encased in ice and was already beginning to become coated in snow.

"You know what to do, Rico," instructed Skipper.

"K'waski!" cried Rico unexpectedly, pushing the throttle to maximum. The boat lurched forward, throwing all of the animals off balance.

"Rico, no!" Skipper shouted, but it was too late. There was a loud sound of wood splintering, metal snapping, and ice cracking as the front of the boat was pushed up several degrees. Skipper grabbed onto the captains chair to stop himself from falling over. As soon as the motion stopped, he heard the engine cut out.

"Good Lord, man," said Skipper, "what got into you?"

Rico looked worried as he hopelessly attempted to turn the starter with his flipper. "K'waski?" he said, smiling awkwardly.

Skipper slapped his head. "No problem. Looks like you get your way Marlene, we'll have to go on foot from here." He waddled over to his backpack and looked inside. There were a few small cans of fruit, the remaining tuna, Manfredi's rusty dagger, a small bit of rope, and a few emergency flares. "This was everything useful you could find?"

"Yes, unfortunately," answered Marlene. "There actually isn't a whole lot on this boat. I'm just thankful we found enough clothes to keep warm."

Skipper nodded, putting the GPS back into its watertight pouch. "Alright team," he said, looking in Manfredi's direction. The robot-penguin gave him an approving nod, so he continued, "Sarge is probably halfway to the Sun by now, and Kowalski is probably still with them. That doesn't mean we can't check their boat for some weapons, though, so let's head there."

"Out into dat cold?" objected Julien, wrapping his long arms around himself and shivering. "You must be kidding."

Skipper saw Marlene roll her eyes. "You knew where we were going," she said.

"Yeah, de Ant-tar-ika. I was hearing from Maurice dat dis place is an island. Islands should be warm, like de Madagascar."

"This is no tropical island," explained Skipper. "Now lets get going before we loose daylight."

Julien merely nodded in return, knowing that he'd have to brave the cold eventually. Staying on this disabled boat was no good.

As the group climbed off the side of the boat and onto the ice sheets, the sun was already beginning to fade. Skipper had seen it rise only a few hours ago, and knew that it wouldn't remain up long. Skipper knew winter in Antarctica meant very little sunlight, or for a few weeks, none at all. He knew they would have to operate by starlight for most of their time here, but he was thankful for at least the fact that they weren't in a total whiteout already.

The last time he had been here, once with Private, Kowalski, and Rico after hijacking that shipping barge, it had been a total white out. They could hardly see a foot in front of their faces, and it was cause for immediate return to a warmer climate. He had brought the trio here that time on the grounds of showing them the Sun, but changed his mind at the last minute when they arrived. Now, he strongly wished that he hadn't. He wished that he had shown his comrades what the sun was, and then maybe if they knew about the threat, Sarge wouldn't be so close to his goal again.

The whiteout he remembered was not here now, though. Rather than a vicious wind that ruffled his feathers, only a light breeze caressed his beak. It only took a few minutes for the subzero air to numb his feet and bill, but he knew it was causing no harm. He just wasn't used to the cold air again after so long. A couple of mild New York winters had spoiled him.

"What boat will we use to leave, Skippah?" piped up Private suddenly as they walked.

Skipper refocused on the task at hand, and the nodded in the direction of Sarge's larger boat. "Isn't it obvious?" he said.

"But then how will Sarge and his henchmen get out of here?" continued Private, tightening his scarf.

"They are not leaving," answered Manfredi.

"So we're going to leave them here?"

"I guess you could say that," said Skipper.

"Are you sure they'd be okay here? I mean, I don't think there's any food around..."

Skipper whipped around at his specialist, his brow arched. "Why are you concerned for their well-being? They stole Kowalski from us!"

"know they've got Kowalski, but I don't think they've hurt him at all. It just doesn't seem right to leave them here for dead."

"It will not be such a matter of leaving them here for dead," said Manfredi, causing Private to smile slightly, "as leaving them here dead."

Private's smile vanished, and his eyes grew wide. "You don't mean..."

"I thought you understood this already, Private?" said Skipper. "I already told you it's either them or us. Did you already forget how Sarge almost killed you and Marlene on the dock?"

"Well, no," said Private, rubbing his new scar that had formed from where Sarge slashed him, "but I don't like this whole revenge thing. It's a vicious circle."

"There is more to it than just revenge," said Manfredi, gazing out at the horizon as they continued walking. "My target is a vile, corrupt penguin. All he cares about is gaining power and respect. He values it more than any penguin's life. He would gladly cut down any animal to get what he wants. He needs to be stopped. And I am going to stop him."

Private gulped, looking frightened, "You don't think he could change?"

"You witnessed what happened inside the bunker the day Johnson died. When there was no reason to still be fighting, only reason to work together, my target cut down a young, innocent penguin. It was all because he wanted to escape that prison, and he did not care what happened to us other penguins. When Johnson stood in between him and that goal, my target ended his life without regret."

"Why should there be more bloodshed, though. There's no point to it."

"I thought the same thing in the bunker. My thoughts were wrong though. There is will always be bloodshed."

"At any point in time, someone or something on this planet is always going to want something else dead," affirmed Skipper.

"I don't think I'd be able to do it, if it came down to me..."

"Do what, Private?" asked Skipper.

"You know... kill Sarge," he stuttered.

"I will be the one to end my target's wretched life. There is no need to worry," calmed Manfredi. He still did not take his eyes from the horizon. Skipper knew he was looking in the direction of the Penguin City, knowing that they would go right through it to get to the temple of the Sun as quickly as possible.

Private nodded at Manfredi's comment, then said, "What about his henchmen, though? What if I need to kill one of them. Or worse. What if one of us winds up getting killed?"

"A necessary sacrifice," said Manfredi unexpectedly, making all of the other animals turn in his direction. He didn't seem to notice, though, and continued walking.

"Wait, you mean you'd let one of us die to get to Sarge?" Marlene said, surprised.

"Nothing is more important then to see the life leave his eyes," answered the bulky penguin. Private stopped walking suddenly, making the others stop as well. Manfredi continued walking as though he didn't noticed.

"So your goal is more important to you than our lives?" he said, balling his flippers into fists.

Manfredi stopped, but without turning to look at Private, said, "Yes."

"Then you're no different than Sarge anyway. At least no better," shot Private. Manfredi tensed his flippers and Skipper saw him look to the ground. The leader wished that Private had not compared him to Sarge. He knew Manfredi would not stand to be alluded to his enemy.

"You've killed before, haven't you?" continued Private.

"That's enough," commanded Skipper, waving his flippers.

"How does that make him any different than Sarge, then, Skippah?" asked Private, redirecting his attention towards the leader.

Without warning, Manfredi charged at Private. Private flinched hard, pulling his face back from the enraged penguin's first. Skipper moved to stop Manfredi but halted when the penguin froze, his flipper mere inches from the young penguin's face. The leader could see his flipper quivering, and a tear streak down his face. However, he didn't know if it was because of the cold blowing in his eye or the hurtful things Private had said.

"What you say is true," said Manfredi, not lowering his flipper. His normally calm, slow drawl made way for something that Skipper had not heard from the penguin in some time. It was anger. The penguin continued, "I have killed before. Several weeks ago, in an alley, I ended the life of an innocent pigeon. He did nothing wrong, merely insulted me. It reminded me of my target, though, and I lost control of my own actions. As he plummeted to the ground, lifeless, in my eyes it became something new.

"I witnessed the death of my love. My fiance. Dead by my hand. By my hand. So you see, Private," he said, finally lowing his flipper and taking a step back from the frightened bird, "this is where my target and I differ. While he does not care who died for him to achieve his goal, I am filled with regret at it.

"There is not a day that goes by where I do not regret the decisions I have made. They have resulted in the deaths of everyone close to me. It resulted in the death of that pigeon."

Private whimpered out a meager, "Sorry," before moving away. He slid in behind Rico whereas Manfredi reorientated himself towards Sarge's ship.

"Manfredi's right," said Skipper to Private as they began walking again. "When we first met in the city, that pigeon was all he could think about."

Private said nothing.

"As for one of us getting killed, there is no need to worry. None of us are dieing anytime soon." Skipper affirmed, trying to boost Private's confidence.

His own confidence had been shaken by Manfredi's comments, though. Would the robot penguin really sacrifice of of their lives in exchange for Sarge's? That wasn't the Manfredi that Skipper knew. Though he already knew that the Manfredi he knew was long gone, the comment made him with wish that past Manfredi was still here. Past Manfredi would do anything for his brothers, even throw himself into the line of fire. This Manfredi seemed goal-driven, objective, and even a little selfish. Skipper suddenly hoped a life or death situation wouldn't fall into Manfredi's hands.

Trying to get his mind off of the robot-penguin, he glanced down at the GPS in his flippers. Kowalski's dot was definitely moving away from them, towards the south pole.

"Kowalski's not on the ship," he said after the several moments of silence.

"I just hope he's still unharmed," Marlene offered.

"No sense in charging out after him now. We would never catch up with them. We need to take any supplies we can from their ship and then meet them at the temple."

"Aye-aye!" cried Rico.

~Author's Note: Short, transitional chapter. Hope it wasn't too boring!

I've been drawing some scenes this story and posting them to Deviant Art. If you'd like to check them out, search up Cudabear. They should pop up.