Black Heart, Iron Will

By: Phoenix Ride

Ch.1: Seeing Stars

It was just a normal Saturday morning at the Central Park Zoo. Alice and the crew were vacationing for the weekend, leaving all the animals with the freedom they needed to persue thier own goals. For Skipper and his team, that pursuit was pratice.

Ever since early dawn, Skipper, Kolwaski, Private, and Rico had put together an obstacle course stretching from one side of the zoo to the other. Skipper stood at the finish line with a timer in his flippers, watching if his team could manage to survive the course.

Kolwaski would have made it out in two minutes if he hadn't had stopped at the Doris obstacle, in which Skipper had placed up a picture of Doris saying that she wanted her and Kolwaski to date.

The sciencetist fell for it, and as such, fell into a bubblegum pit.

Private tried his luck next, and was nearly a minute ahead of Kolwaski's time, until he stopped to let Momma Duck and her little ducklings pass on by, claiming how cute they were as they went.

Skipper slapped his head in agrevation. Private had just failed the obstacle course as well.

Unfortunately that only left one bird left. Rico. The most pyshcotic and dangerous of the penguin rookery. Surely he could beat this obstacle course.

When Skipper started the timer again, Rico was on the loose. Slamming through each and every obstacle with sheer force. He was almost at the finish line with the fastest time when he spotted something off to his left.

A whole moutnian of deep fried fish. The smell was so tantalizing that it drove Rico away from the course. Skipper tried to call Rico back to finish the exercise, but the loony penguin's mind was already in another world, and he dived into the fish, enjoying the free lunch.

"Uh" said Skipper, freezing the timer " that's it boys, fall in,"

Kolwaski, Rico, and Private immediately lined up, sour expressions drawn on their faces. Well Kolwaski's frown was difficult to see through all that bubblegum, and Rico was still grinning about eating that fish.

"I don't know how to sugarcoat it boys, so I won't, you all failed this course" said Skipper, making his solidiers frowns deepen " I set up these obstacles to help you overcome your weaknesses, but you still fall for them. Why?"

"Maybe it's because...," started Private, before Skipper interrupted.

"I'll tell you why" said Skipper, his sapphire eyes set in glare " love. The common factor all villians see as weakness and use to their advantage. If I were a villian it would'nt have taken me two seconds to bring you posh nancy cats down,"

At that comment Kolwaski, Rico, and Private all froze. None of them ever wanted to imagine Skipper turning to the evil side.

"Sorry Skipper" said Kolwaski " we'll try harder next time,"

"You'd better" said Skipper, then looked over at the zoo clock " go ahead and take five men. We'll try the obstacle course again in a few minutes,"

With a salute Kolwaski, Rico, and Private slid back to thier habitat, leaving Skipper alone to observe the obstacle course. He hadn't meant to sound rough to his men, but they needed to polish off those weaknesses if they were to make a more successful unit.

Twelve o'clock and was nearing lunch, Skipper decided to run the course back to the habitat. Moving at lightning speed, he had made it past the tazer field, when he saw Marlene, reading a magazine, and walk unexpectly into the swinging wrecking balls section.

"Marlene look out!" yelled Skipper.

"Huh," said Marlene, dropping the magazine, just in time to see a gaint wrecking ball swinging toward her.

No time to think, Skipper leaped forward, pushing Marlene out of the ball's path, and taking the full brunt for himself. Marlene watched in horror as Skipper skywards towards the zoo clock tower.

Meanwhile, in the penguin habitat, Private had just finished making love smoothies for him and the other penguins when they all saw Skipper flying overhead. A sickening chime could be heard as Skipper's body slammed into the clock tower bell.

"Skipper!" yelled Private, and he, Kolwaski, and Rico immediately dashed to the rescue.

Marlene arrived shortly after the three penguins bent over thier unconious leader, covering her mouth in horror. Confused to see Marlene there and crying tears, Private asked what happened.

"He saved me from being hit by a wrecking ball" said Marlene, worriedly " is he going to be okay?"

Kolwaski lowered his head.

"I'm afriad not for a while" said Kolwaski, looking at Skipper " he's slipped into a coma. It's highly unlikely that he will ever awaken again,"

With nothing more left to say, Kolwaski, Private, and Rico gathered up their unconious leader and lead him away, leaving a depressed Marlene, crying over the mistake that she had done.