Moving in the Danger Zone

When Kowalski entered the zoo again, he made himself clear that he had to be even meer careful then before. If Skipper caught him now, Private was lost…

But he knew what to do. Something told him that Rico was still here… somewhere. And he was alive. Kowalski thought about that gut feeling. Surely, it was just a hope his mind was clinging to, not to give up. Skipper had always told him to listen to his gut. Skipper… Kowalski's stomach cramped. The old Skipper. Nothing was left of their leader, their protector. He was now the greatest danger of all.

Kowalski decided to look in their habitat for Rico. The danger was, that Skipper could be there too, and if Rico should be really there, he was surely already dead. But he had to make it clear.

Every five seconds, Kowalski threw a nervous glance over the shoulder while he was waddling through the deserted zoo. door reaching the fence of the pinguïn area, he listened if he could here any noises from inside. But the wind was howling too loud, although it was far not as strong as in the park. He thought of Private. Then he jumped over the fence and went carefully closer the lair-entrance. The hatch was open. Carefully he looked inside. No sign of Skipper.

"Rico?" he whispered – no response.

Before he climbed down the ladder, he took a look around to make sure that Skipper wasn't already coming for him.

When he stepped down the last rung past the bunks, his foot landed in something wet. He looked down.

His stomach turned. For water was this liquid to thick… he also noticed dark sparks of already dried blood on the wall.

Kowalski took a deep breath and stepped over the pool to zoek the rest of their HQ. But he had no success.

He was pleased when he had left this cold place again, that had once been their home, and stood outside. What next?

His hart-, hart jumped to his throat when he heard a scream from the volgende habitat. Panicking, he searched for a cover and slid behind the little hut beside the lemur habitat. He climbed to its top, boven and looked over the zoo.

From there he could see, who had screamed and why.

In the baviaan habitat, Darla and one of her vrienden backed away from Skipper. Kowalski could see the motionless body of the third girl lying on the grass. Skipper pointed with his blood-besmeared sword at Darla.

"What? Ya believing in my strength now, stupid mammal?" he zei "Did u really think that I wouldn't hear u sputtering with your friends, huh? One already paid the price, and you're next!"

He stepped towards them and the baboons backed away till they were stopped door the habitat's wall.

"Please" begged Darla in a high voice. "We do everything u want!"

"Oh, I just wanna see u dead" Skipper shrugged.

Kowalski was watching terrified. He couldn't just let them being killed. He was just about to jump on the roof of the hut when something in his brain shouted: "No, stop! Don't do that."

He wouldn't have a chance against Skipper, and he couldn't leave Private to his fate. Desperately he looked around. On the foot of the hut lay several stones; he jumped down and got one. But for a good throw he had to get closer.

"Good night" grinned Skipper and made himself ready to jump. His sword blinked as if it was alive itself and looked vooruit, voorwaarts to reach into people's flesh.

Darla and her friend begged him for mercy but Skipper laughed.

Kowalski climbed on the brick uithangbord of the lemur habitat, that was only halfway destroyed. He aimed and with all his strength, he threw the stone. It hit Skipper in the back of his head and he stumbled.

Darla and her friend were standing in shock. Then, Darla discovered Kowalski on the uithangbord of the opposite habitat. He was wildly gesticulating. Darla got it.

"Come" she zei to her friend and took her door the arm. Within seconds, the baboons had jumped over the uithangbord and where running through the zoo. They climbed over the external zoo uithangbord and disappeared in the park.

Kowalski saw Skipper regaining consciousness. He hadn't really passed out but he felt dizzy and had problems to stand tall. A thin trail of blood was running down his neck. However, he yelled in anger and turned around to spot the one who had dared to attack him.

But Kowalski had already vanished from the uithangbord and was running back through the zoo. He needed something to hide... The hospital zone!

"Come out u little son of a bitch!" he heard Skipper's murderous shout behind him.

The door of the hospital was ajarred; Kowalski reached for it. When he got to the door, Skipper came in sight and looked into his direction - just a moment after Kowalski had hidden in the doorway. But Skipper didn't turn the look off. Had he seen him?

Kowalski hold his breath, sucked in his stomach and went through the door, not to verplaats it a millimeter. Through the gab he looked back.

Skipper turned around and went away, towards the park. Maybe he hoped to get Darla and her friend after all. At least he didn't walk through the zoo gates where he had met Private…

Kowalski sighed relieved and sank down on the wall. Too close… again.

Once his hart-, hart was beating normal again, Kowalski made his way to the doctor's office. There, he would surely find something that would help him breaking Private's chains.

When he entered the corridor, he saw something letting his hart-, hart fell. In the middle of the hall laid the body of an animal. Kowalski saw at once that it was one of the spin monkeys. He bend over him to look after his condition, but at once he realized door the wide open eyes of the monkey, that he was dead. Kowalski hardly knew those guys from the habitat positioned volgende to the hospital. He thought, the name of this one was Mark…

Kowalski went further through the corridor. As he reached the ajarred door of the treatment room, he hesitated. What would he find in there? meer dead bodies? Mark's had been littered with cuts and he had had a stab in his chest which had been surely the reason for his death. Also, it was still blood floating out of the wound which could just mean, that he wasn't dead since very long.

Kowalski plucked up courage and pushed against the door. In the room it was cold, because the window was wide open and the wind was ice cold blowing inside. But no meer corpses were lying around.

Kowalski would have liked to close the window, but that would have been noticeable from outside.

He jumped up on the tray and started searching between the medicaments, medicine devises, tools and syringes.

He accidentally pushed a glass bowl, standing on the edge of the tray, down and it burst with a loud noise on the floor. Kowalski could smell alcohol.

"Damn" he whispered and looked out of the window. At least, no sign of Skipper after all.

But then, he heard a noise from the edge of the corner. He froze. He wasn't alone. Had Skipper yet sneaked through the window while he had turned his back on it and was now waiting with his sword right behind the shelf for him?

Kowalski felt his hart-, hart racing again and he grabbed a scalpel as weapon. He jumped down to the floor and stepped slowly towards the dark corner where he had heard the noise. He couldn't see anything there, but he heard someone moving.

Kowalski got closer. If it was Skipper, then he would be surely attacked any moment. He held the scalpel high in front of him and made another step forward.

A deep growl came out of the darkness, threatening and at the same time desperate. But it sounded familiar.

"Rico?" Kowalski asked slowly and got another snarl as respond.

"Rico, it's me. Kowalski."

The growling stopped. Kowalski heard the person moving again. Maybe it wasn't Rico. Maybe he was getting ready for an attack.

Kowalski looked above him and noticed a light switch on the wall. He jumped up and hit it. A weak bulb went on and set the dark corner into a yellow glimmer.

Once Kowalski had reached the ground again, he looked up… and took instinctively a step backwards.

It was Rico. He was lying down on the uithangbord in his own blood. His breathing was fast and his look wildered. He stared at Kowalski. He took a step towards him and Rico whimpered and tried to push himself panicky up the wall.

"Rico" Kowalski zei softly. "It's me. Kowalski! I won't hurt you."

Rico sank down on the uithangbord and glanced at him. Like in Private's eyes there was something in Rico's that made Kowalski sad. But it wasn't as severe. He took another step towards him and noticed that he still held the scalpel in his flippers. Slowly, to not frighten Rico any more, he bend down and laid it on the ground. Then he got closer to his friend. Rico's body trembled from the effort to keep himself in a half standing, half sitting position.

"Come on, Rico" Kowalski zei with meer strength in his voice "I'm not going to kill ya!"

Rico gave in and slid down on the wall.

"Good" Kowalski nodded.

Rico moaned. His body tilted to the side and he crashed to the floor.

Kowalski was immediately with him and rolled him sideward. A deep cut went right over Rico's right side.

He groaned when Kowalski let his flippers verplaats over his body. Everything hurt. Before Skipper had wounded him with his sword, he had also beaten him up.

"Don't worry, Rico. We can fix this" Kowalski zei and stood up. In this room was everything he needed. The scientist fetched some medicine wire and forceps, pulp and absorbent cotton. With that he went back to Rico.

Rico saw what he was about to do and lead his head stretched on the floor.

While Kowalski was putting stitches in his wound, he moaned from time to time, but he hold bravely still.

Kowalski discovered that the wound wasn't as bad as it looked like. When he was done, he stuck several big plasters over the injury to protect it from dirt. A bandage around Rico's body would have been too large and had only hampered him.

Eventually, Kowalski wiped the blood of Rico's feathers as far as possible and helped him getting on his feet.

"Can u walk?" he asked the weapon's expert. Rico nodded. But when he made his first step, he buckled sideways. Kowalski caught him and helped him going.

"Listen, Rico. Private needs our help. He is in the park. I promised him to be back soon and I'm already too long away. We have to hurry."

Rico nodded. The pain didn't make him feel like giving any word familiar noises away…

They took some of the medical stuff with them for Private. Then they went on their way. As they passed the dead spin monkey Mark in the hallway, Rico stopped. Kowalski did so too, because he had laid Rico's flipper around his neck to help him walking.

Rico looked down on the dead.

"Rmbglava" he mumbled.

"You fought with him together?" Kowalski asked. "Against-"

Somehow he wasn't able to pronounce his name.

Rico nodded.

They left the body behind and asked themselves if they would soon end up like him…

Skipper was nowhere to see when they left the hospital. Nervous like they were, they went through the zoo. Kowalski got suddenly aware of the fact that they wouldn't be veilig just because they had passed the zoo gates. They had to free Private and verplaats as soon as possible. Private…

"Listen, Rico" Kowalski zei silent and looked around – for a hundred's time now.

"Mmh?" Rico made, looking at the paving stones moving away under his feet. This distracted him from the pain a little.

"Private is in a bad condition… I want u to know this: Skipper has done something to him I'm not sure about, but it hurt Private and I'm quite worried."

Rico looked up.

"I say it again, I'm not sure" zei Kowalski and stretched his head when he looked over his shoulder for another time.

"But I think it might have been rape."

Rico's head flipped up. "What?"

"That would explain why he can't talk about it… again, it's a very quick illation and it's vague… but Private may be about to loose his mental balance. We have to take extra care of him. u understand?"

Rico nodded. They had now passed the gates.

The wind had become even stronger. The two penguins made their way over the gras to the rock where their comrade was chained to. Rico felt his strength returning and he could walk again with almost none of Kowalski's help.

Private had rolled together like a kitten. He held his tortured flippers carefully pressed against his belly.

Kowalski bend over him. When he felt the flipper on his shoulder, Private flinched.

"It's just us" Kowalski reassured him. Private looked up and a little smile formed on his face when he saw Rico.

"Rico, I need something like pliers here" zei Kowalski, inspecting the rod through Private's flippers. Rico chocked them up and made himself to work with a soldering bolt on the chains to Private's feet. He knew there was no time to leave and the first important thing was to free Private from the rock. They could care for the leg irons later on.

Private whimpered when Kowalski pulled his flippers up carefully. The chains were quite fine-boned, but Kowalski didn't wonder about that. These chains weren't effective door their strength, they were effective door their pain. Kowalski severed the linken of one chain and laid it aside.

"Okay, Private, this one might hurt" he zei holding Private's flippers still gently. "Rico, would u hold his flippers? I will pull out the rod."

Rico had already melted through the chains on Private's feet; he knelt behind Private's back and took his arms.

Private whimpered. He had pushed his face to the ground to not see anything.

"Okay, here we go" zei Kowalski and took the rod carefully with his own flippers. He pulled it out through the bloody holes of Private's wings and was as carefully as possible. Even so, it caused immense pain to Private and he started to scream.

"Shhh" made Kowalski reassuring, not lifting the look from his work. Private flinched and Rico had to hold him meer tightly. Finally, Kowalski pulled the rod entirely out of the little penguin's flippers.

Private had started to weep. Kowalski ordered Rico to choke up the first aid kid they had taken from the animal hospital and started to vet the young private; his flippers as well as his wounds on his back and side, which had eventually almost stopped bleeding.

They helped Private up and he immediately pushed himself sobbing against Kowalski.

"Sh. It's okay, Private. It's over" Kowalski zei softly and stroked over Private's back, while he was trembling. Private hold his bandaged flippers against his own chest and pressed his head tightly against Kowalski's.

Kowalski turned his head and looked at Rico. But Rico didn't notice. His look was as stare as his entire body and pointed back to the zoo.

Kowalski got a very bad feeling. He let go of Private and span around.

Skipper stood right in front of the gates. He held his sword in his right flipper and looked their way as if he was surprised door their sight.