Well, would you look at that? I went three whole days without updating! Had a massive writer's block. And a massive migraine. (Did you guys miss me?)

As for the last chapter, about the hunters with their planes: This is a real thing in Alaska. It's called 'aerial wolf hunting', and I'd suggest looking into it (if you're not sensitive to such material, I don't want to go PETA on you guys.) and educating yourself about it. It's an unsportsmanlike conduct of the highest form and should no longer be tolerated. /rant.

Regardless, I hope you enjoyed the last chapter, so far, being the first serious one of the story (if I could have added a third genre, it probably would have been humor (maybe not after this one though)), but I intend to do more of them in the future.

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"That's why I need to get home. I've been gone for far too long," She'd concluded her, almost tearful at points, story (though she'd managed to keep it together well enough). She'd had the time whilst circulating the zoos to cope with her loss, about a couple years worth of time. She'd even, in time, come to accept that not all humans were the murderous beasts she'd decided they were on that fateful day. At least, the little ones weren't. She was still wary about the bigger ones… But now she had to count herself among them, for the time being. This was going to be difficult.

"So what you are telling me… " Julien inquired, a curious glint in his eyes and tapping the tips of his fingers together in a perplexed gesture, "is that you are being like… only a year old?" He did understand that canines typically didn't have such a long lifespan as him, a lemur… But in any case this revelation made him fairly uneasy in a way.

For a second she would only offer him a skeptical quirk of the brow at his question. Was that all he'd gotten out of that entire thing? Her age? She would have been offended, if it hadn't at least shown he had some morsel of a conscious, however small it may be, that he hitting on someone in the equivalent of their early teens wasn't such a good idea. "… Nnno." She answered finally, and unfortunately, truthfully, "I'm at least three." As soon as she saw the king's face light right back up at the apparently more acceptable age, she could have punched herself, right there and then. Just knocked herself right out. 'Fly, you fool!' a distant voice called from within the recesses of her mind, (or maybe it was Marlene,) but she elected to ignore it for the time be-

"AND, you are also being a princess among your people then, no?"

Sesi frowned. Maybe she should go.

"Enough, ringtail –"

"What ringtail? I am a human!" The new Julien argued. He had a point, as far as he was concerned; no longer was he ringed, and no longer did he have a tail. He quite liked this new form so far anyways… He was tall, even among Sesi… especially among Sesi, (she was actually a bit short, he'd noticed) and now they had a common… species… Things were on the up and up so far for him, but most unfortunately his crown no longer fit on his head without looking ridiculously tiny. He'd have to have Maurice make a more size-appropriate one for the time being.

He'd bent down to pick up a particularly shiny piece of Kowalski's shattered invention to gaze at his own reflection in, further inspecting himself. He'd poke here and there at his new facial features, or preen at his semi-curly locks, meanwhile Kowalski fumed. It'd been by his doing that the machine was broken in the first place, and an angry Kowalski was an unusual Kowalski. The others weren't sure they were ready to deal with that yet so the ex-penguins simply held him back, with reassurances of 'it isn't worth it's, and 'let it go man's.

"Who was knowing that I'd be so handsome even as a human?" He'd commented lightly to himself, taking only a few more seconds of self-admiration before he turned, offering the fragment over to Sesi. "You should be looking at yourself as well." The ex-canid had to admit… she was curious… she reached out to grab the piece, ignoring the king's wink at her, saying something about how only her handsomeness could rival his… well, knowing how highly he regards himself, that may have been quite the compliment if it hadn't sounded like he was talking about a man, so she simply settled for grimacing at his attempt.

"I want to see myself too…" Private griped to which Julien quickly hushed him.

"Royals first." He tsk'd at the youngest of their group; none of the others had seemed to be overly tolerating of this statement, however, deeming to glower at him when his back turned, and Sesi was much too distracted to notice Private's plea and so he pouted until it'd be his turn. Poor private.

She looked… really… good, actually… for a human, of course. She had very fair skin, but it looked very… charming on her, actually, and hair white as the snow from which she'd originated, hanging down to almost her hips. Her eyes were as pale, icy blue as ever too, and she did have to comment about… it looked like maybe some of her wolfish traits carried over, perhaps? She seemed to keep her pointed features, and natural eyeliner (some humans tried so desperately to get this look, she'd noticed before. Ha, she was going to be the envy of them all…)

Not to mention, her teeth. Her canines had remained unnaturally pointed, but all the rest had been changed into an omnivoric mix. Well,… it was somewhat comforting to know she could still bite someone if she needed to, but she doubted she'd get very far with this shortened snout. Humans seemed so physically… estranged from animals. Teeth weren't meant for damaging, claws… unless they grow them out, don't do a difference, and even when they do it's minimal. It was truly mindboggling for her sometimes, to see such an unimpressive creature at the top of the food chain. Then she'd remember what they almost succeeded in doing to her people, and then she could understand.

Not only her, but the rest of them had seemed to retain elements of their other forms. For example, Marlene kept her more rounded features and carried over her chestnut brown color into her hair and bright green eyes, semi-tan skin matching closely to Mort's complexion (except Mort had much lighter brown hair, and not-as-dramatically-but-still-pretty-disturbingly large eyes that beamed through you.) Julien had retained some of the mask-like dark circles around his eyes, limber frame to boot… Maurice was just as bad off weight wise as he was as an Aye-Aye… and had a horrifyingly vast amount of chest hair. The penguins… it was kind of hard to tell what they had kept besides their color schemes and facial features… but they could at least still tell them apart, and that was as good a sign as any.

True, she'd be much easier to notice with looks so nontraditional of a human's, but if she moved fast enough, this hopefully wouldn't be beholden of a challenge to her. As for the others, she wasn't exactly sure of what they were going to do now… and how could she be sure that once she did arrive in Alaska that they'd get the machine fixed in time? Most humans are actually fairly delicate if you take their technology away from them; many would perish quickly if suddenly placed in the environment that was her homeland, and would probably count herself among those who would; not being a human for the past entirety of her life, she wouldn't trust herself to just stumble in and know what to do. The thought never occurred to her of what would happen should she go home and not have her fur, obviously, she'd never needed to consider it before now. Now that she did, however, she supposed it could be a real problem.

"So what are we going to do now?" She started, "I need to get back and I don't think you can stay here." The last statement was more of an announcement than it was a guess, both her and Skipper knew this. He rested his chin on a hand as he puzzled over the thought for a moment or two. It was odd, really, to have another leader around, one who was more or less on his side (if not, then her own side), and a whole hell of a lot more level-headed than another certain mammal…

Lemur…

Julien…

In Skipper's opinion, anyone more competent than him could at least be taken with a grain of salt, and Sesi was to become the alpha? Alphess? Alphess; of her own entire pack, no help to note of… She should probably get a taste of it before she went back, hm?

Yes, he decided as he began, "Well, what would you have us do?" He challenged her. The wolf's reflexes and willingness to fight would only take a monarch so far; they needed to expect the unexpected and be damn well prepared to act in case of emergency. This may as well have counted as both; in the few short hours they'd have for planning while the night lasted, the keepers would arrive by morning. They needed to be long gone before then, because Skipper didn't expect the humans would take too kindly to a handful of strangers sitting around the penguin exhibit. Strangers dressed in nothing but stolen zoo merchandise. Meanwhile, in the back, Kowalski had been preparing his options clipboard.

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Well, didn't that migraine just take it's toll? Shortest chapter so far, I'm so ashamed! I… have lost the rhythm (for now, I don't plan on letting that stay.)

And no, if you were wondering, they aren't now like… preschoolers because of their (lack of) years. Their age equivalence is leveled out with how mature they were as the animal they were. Since they are all pretty much adults (besides private, and… potentially, Mort,) they would all be adults here as well. (Just clearing that up, in case).