Fun with Penguins
...
When Jack had mentioned the effects climate change were having on the South Pole at the last meeting, Bunny, like the other Guardians, had expected him to do something about it. But… but not this. Really, anything but this. What was the kid thinking? The Guardian of Hope, seething, silently promised to wring the little blighter's neck when she saw him next.
It was one thing to spread a little frost on her sentinel eggs or the tunnels (which she hated to the point of chasing the winter spirit around the world until she caught him) but another thing entirely to turn her Warren – a spring haven – into a near perfect replica of Antarctica, complete with icebergs floating in the dye river. And if that wasn't bad enough, there was a colony of penguins huddled together right in the middle of the snow-covered clearing.
"How did he even get you here?!" she asked in confused fury.
The sound of her voice attracted the large birds' attention and as one they turned to stare at her with beady eyes. Bunny stood to her full height, making it clear to them that she was boss and would not be intimidated. A rather chubby one (she couldn't be certain but she was pretty sure it was the one who had first confronted Tooth down at the Pole) stepped away from the group and waddled towards her, something held in its beak. It looked up at her expectantly until she took what turned out to be a folded piece of paper, turning away as though bored the second its duty was over.
"'Hello, my name is George,'" Bunny read aloud, raising a brow. "'I have been designated 'General Penguin' for the duration of our stay with you. Please refer to me as Sir'? What the heck is this?" she flicked the paper (which was written in a slightly messy but still elegant script that probably was the work of Jack Frost). The penguin, George, didn't even bother to look at her and started preening under one wing.
"'As you know, the South Pole has been having some trouble lately'," she continued reading. "'Jack has been trying to restore a bit of order but my colony and I do not understand the concept of not following him and have, as a result, put ourselves in some rather precarious situations that could have easily been avoided. Because of this, Jack has deemed it safer for us to remain here with you where we will not be inclined to stand in a large group on thin ice or throw ourselves off high cliffs before checking if there are predators waiting below.'"
Bunny shook her head, brow continuing to furrow the more she read. "'Jack will be back to collect us as soon as he is finished. You do not have to worry about feeding us, as we are capable of going lengths of time without food and someone will be coming to bring us some fish every now and again anyway. P.S. Do not let us leave the Warren and don't be mean to us or we will show no mercy.'"
The letter was crumpled within a furry fist and a loud, infuriated cry of 'Jack Frost' quickly followed, so loud that had there been anyone standing in the Outback near the opening to her Warren they would have heard it loud and clear. Believer or not.
...
...
North looked up from the ice block he'd been carving as something black and white moved in his peripheral vision. It was safe to say he was more than a little confused to find it was a penguin. Staring at him. Silently judging.
"Where did you come from?" he asked, gently setting his prototype aside on the bench.
The penguin didn't reply, not that he'd really been expecting one, and proceeded to fully enter the room, turning its attention to a shelf near the door. North watched in bemusement as it seemed to inspect the contents on display before apparently finding his matryoshka doll worth further investigation. The only thing that stopped North from getting up and shooing the penguin away then and there was the way it was so careful in gripping the wooden doll in its beak (and also the fact that it was there in the first place considering there weren't supposed to be penguins at the North Pole).
With surprising intelligence it managed to open the first layer, then the second, then the third, and the fourth and so on until it finally reached the centre that Jack had returned upon receiving his own. Which it then grabbed and waddled out of the room without a care in the world. It took North a minute to register what had happened before he was able to get up from his seat and chase after it.
If he'd been confused by one penguin, he was downright flabbergasted by the sight that greeted him as he entered the workshop. None of the yetis were working, all standing very still and eyeing the small group of penguins and elves who appeared to be crafting… something. He honestly wasn't overly sure what it was supposed to be. The penguin that had stolen the centre of his matryoshka was quick to rejoin the group, its friends celebrating in their own squawky way at its find.
North shook his head, ordering the yetis to just ignore it and get back to work before heading back into his office for a shot of vodka.
...
...
The Tooth Palace was its usual hubbub of tiny fairies zipping about, heading to and from the largest spire where the Tooth Fairy herself could be found issuing out orders. While she'd taken it upon herself to get out into the field more often, today was not one of those days. There was just so much to do!
Tooth paused in directing a group to San Diego when one of her fairies flew up to her, carrying on about something along the lines of penguins and teeth. More than a little confused (and 80% sure she'd heard wrong) she consented to letting the fairy direct her to the scene of the crime, a flock of her other workers following behind (probably more so in interest than having been awaiting orders).
"Wow, you really weren't kidding," she said to the fairy who had alerted her as she gazed upon the scene.
There were three emperor penguins on the American spire, each of whom were busily pulling tooth canisters out of their spots in the walls, examining them, then placing them in a pile before moving on to the next one. The seemed to notice the presence of the new arrivals as they suddenly turned to face them, unreadable expressions on their faces.
"Um, hello," Tooth greeted nervously. Honestly, how had penguins managed to get here in Asia, for goodness sake? The memory of Jack and his own colony of penguins came to mind and she briefly wondered if these were some of them.
One of the penguins chirped at her, revealing a very tooth-free beak (not including the serrated barb-like things on their tongues and roofs of their mouths). Tooth shuddered, as did her small companions and as one they slowly backed off, trying to erase the image from their minds and deciding so long as the birds didn't damage any of the canisters it should be okay to leave them be.
...
...
Sandy decided he really liked penguins. And apparently they had decided they liked him, as he was currently sitting on a sand cloud surrounded by them while they tried to preen him (not a very easy task considering he was made of sand). He'd spotted them near Jack's lake and had quickly realised they should not have been there and so descended just long enough to pick them up. How they'd ended up in North America was beyond him but he knew he would have to return them back where they came from after he was done delivering dreams in this part of the world. Which would require figuring out where, exactly, that was. It was possible they were from a zoo, but something told him they were the same ones he had met when they'd found Jack down in Antarctica.
For now, though, he had a job to do. A job the tall birds were rather delighted in; they'd probably never flown before and were getting quite the kick out of it. He did, however, have to keep an eye on them. There had been more than one occasion where one of them got a little too adventurous for comfort and actually tried to fly on its own (i.e. jumped off the cloud) and Sandy had had to catch it before it could hit the ground. No amount of disapproving looks and shaking fingers seemed to be doing much to stop the adrenalin junkies, though.
...
...
Bunny was in a state of mild panic. And she was annoyed that she even felt panicked at all. Honestly, it wasn't her responsibility to keep an eye on the bloody birds Jack had dumped on her and it certainly wasn't her fault that they'd wandered off through the tunnels when she'd turned her back. And yet there she was darting through tunnel after tunnel looking for them. She didn't even know how many had gotten out!
It was with great relief that she'd arrived at North's place to find the man himself, slightly drunk, directing her to the first group of birds, who were working with the elves to create some kind of trash-sculpture, complete with shiny wrappers for decoration. They hadn't been all too thrilled with her arrival, though, and had refused to budge when she'd told them to go down the tunnel back to the Warren. And so Bunny had tried a more forceful approach.
Big mistake. The note certainly hadn't been kidding when it said 'no mercy'. Bunny had the scratches and bruises to prove it.
It had taken the bribery of a handful of fish chucked down the hole before they would finally comply with what she wanted. And then she'd been able to move on to the next location.
...
...
Tooth had been in a right state, quietly rambling about teeth and the horror that there were creatures out there who didn't have any and her own personal nightmare of 'what if I didn't have teeth?'. She'd been so out of it that Bunny had needed some of the smaller fairies to show her where the culprits were.
She'd been a bit shocked at the size of the canister pile the birds had created but didn't say anything. It couldn't have been too big a deal or the fairies would have done something about it. …Right? Judging from the way they shuddered at the mere sight of the penguins' beaks told him otherwise.
Bunny was pleased to find this group a little more cooperative than the last, and it had only taken pretending to throw a tooth canister down the hole to get them to chase after it (and Bunny had found himself amused at the mental comparison she'd made to dogs).
...
...
She was still missing a few, she knew. And she needed to find them, fast. The others she'd found in the domain of the other Guardians, so maybe Sandy had seen some. But then there was the problem that Sandy was always on the move. In the air. Not only did she have no way of reaching the little man, but she also had no idea where he was.
It was while she was standing in the middle of the countryside, trying not to think about what would happen if Jack came back to find some of his penguins missing (and trying not to wonder about why she was so worried in the first place since there wasn't much worse that could be done to her Warren and she was far from scared of Jack Frost), that a stream of golden sand floating nearby caught his attention.
Heart lifting slightly, Bunny raced towards the dream sand, running a paw through it to get Sandy's attention when she was close enough. She could see a golden cloud floating in her general direction and allowed himself to relax a bit. Sandy would know where the rest of the blighters were. She hoped.
A loud squawk-like noise broke her out of her thoughts and she looked up in time to see something black and white falling through the air towards her. She barely had time to cry out before it collided with her, knocking her flat on her back.
"Ugh," Bunny groaned, lifting her head to see what had attacked her. A large penguin manoeuvred its way off of her and started waddling away. Bunny wasn't sure whether to laugh or curse every penguin and Jack Frost in existence, and instead settled for banging her head against the ground.
Sandy had finally reached her, looking rather apologetic. He created a series of images above his head and Bunny managed to get a pretty clear picture of what had happened. Or rather, not happened. She'd failed to catch a suicidal penguin.
"At least I've found some more of them," Bunny groaned, mentally tallying the group of birds and adding it to the list in her head. "I think that's all of them," she told Sandy, but in actuality she wasn't completely sure. She probably should have counted the original group before this mess had started. Or rather, she should have opened a tunnel to the South Pole and forced them all through before going and murdering Jack Frost.
Sandy formed a question mark, obviously confused about the whole situation.
"Jack Frost," was all she'd had to say and Sandy nodded knowingly.
...
...
"I'm baaack!" a painfully familiar voice called and Bunny tilted her head to see Jack landing just a few feet behind her. "Did they behave?"
"Because of you and these bloody birds, I've had to go halfway around the world collecting the bloody things!" Bunny snapped, standing to her full height and cherishing the way she towered over the winter spirit.
Jack wasn't fazed in the slightest, though. In fact, he was grinning a bit. "Well, you were warned, Cottontail."
"Why the bloody hell did you leave them here? How did you even get them here?"
"I left them here cause it's nice and open with plenty of room. You don't want to see a claustrophobic penguin, trust me. Oh and also to get you back for the high-heel thing. As for getting them here, well… let's just say I appealed to their more… 'adventurous' side."
"You'd better put my Warren back exactly the way it was," Bunny said threateningly.
"Sorry, can't melt ice, only make it," Jack shrugged nonchalantly. "But it should melt pretty quickly," he added after taking a look at the murderous expression on Bunny's face. "Either that or you could go find a fire spirit."
Without waiting for a reply, Jack waltzed over to the colony, greeting them all. "Did you guys have fun?"
The chirped at him in a way that could have meant anything from 'yes' to 'I like chocolate milk'.
"Hang on a minute."
Bunny involuntarily winced at the sharp tone Jack's voice had taken.
"Where's George?" the winter spirit turned to him, face a blank mask.
That name sounded familiar… oh. Oh no.
"Bunny," Jack continued, eye twitching slightly. "Where is my General Penguin?"
And that was how they all found themselves in Pitch's lair, watching in amusement as George the General Penguin cornered Pitch Black against a shadowless wall, the latter looking like he would rather be wearing a dress and singing 'I'm a Barbie Girl' than be where he was.