OPERATION: accueil SWEET HOME
CHAPTER THREE
~ Of Thursday and the Times ~


“All right, men, none of us want to see Marlene shipped out of here, so we need to come up with the right plan to block it,” Skipper declared as he took his siège at the table, tableau with the other penguins. “I want to hear every possible option.”

Rico grinned at the thought of every possible option, and promptly regurgitated a stick of dynamite.

“Kaboom! Kaboom!” he mumbled as he pulled the stick from his mouth. “Ha, ha, ha!”

Skipper shook his head.

“I like your attitude, Rico,” he said, “but what would we blow up, Marlene’s habitat? We kind of need that.”

As Rico then began to re-swallow his dynamite, a thought popped into Kowalski’s head.

“What’s so special about Thursday?” he wondered.

“What do toi mean, Kowalski?” Skipper inquired.

“I mean, when Marlene was talking to us, she a dit that she overheard Alice tell the two men she was with that she could have everything arranged to ship Marlene out on Thursday,” he responded. “Something tells me that those men needed to be guaranteed of this.”

“That ‘something’ is your gut, Kowalski,” Skipper replied as he smiled.

“But why?” Private asked.

“The gut can’t always tell toi why, Private,” Skipper replied. “But recon usually can.”

“You really think this is worth looking into?” Kowalski asked.

“Yeah, I do,” Skipper replied. “Who knows what kind of crooked backroom deal that zookeeper and those men might have cooked up together.”

Skipper then glanced up at the clock.

“Looks like Alice is still on her break,” he said. “Let’s roll on out of here and see if we can uncover some réponses down at her office.”

And with that, the four set off for Alice’s office; sliding on their bellies the whole way, they reached it in no time, and were pleased to find the door unlocked.

“Search every drawer, open every filing cabinet,” Skipper ordered as they all entered. “Look everywhere, men; leave no stone unturned.”

As the team began to look for something to tell them just why Thursday was the jour that Marlene had to be shipped out on, Kowalski spotted something.

“Ah, Skipper,” he a dit as he stood on haut, retour au début of Alice’s desk, pointing at a rock she used as a paperweight, “I think this may be the stone toi were referring to.”

“What do toi got there, Kowalski?” Skipper asked as he approached the desk.

Kowalski picked up the pieces of paper that were under the rock and skimmed them over before replying.

“It’s a cover letter and an accepted purchase order from the St. Louis Zoo,” he said. “Apparently they’re paying the Central Park Zoo $14,000 for a female otter.”

“Anything there about the Thursday mystery?” Private inquired.

“I was just getting to that,” Kowalski replied. “It says that they want to purchase a female loutre promptly, and if they cannot get ours par Thursday, they will rescind their offer and obtain an loutre from some other zoo.”

“Well, today is Monday, so that gives us three days to somehow block this abomination,” Skipper declared. “This zoo just wouldn’t be the same without Marlene.”

“Wouldn’t be the same?” Kowalski pondered as he rubbed his lower beak with a flipper. “Skipper! That’s exactly it!”

“What’s it?” Skipper wondered.

“Think about it, Skipper, the zoo really wouldn’t be the same without Marlene,” Kowalski replied. “Since she’s the only loutre here, the humans have come to expect to see her whenever they visit the zoo. I bet if they knew that there was a plan to ship our only loutre away, they would revolt and protest in front of the zoo armed with pitchforks.”

“Pitchforks?” Skipper questioned puzzledly.

“Well, maybe they wouldn’t get that up in arms,” Kowalski conceded, “but it would probably create a public relations nightmare for the zoo.”

“You really want to get the humans involved?” Skipper questioned. “Is that wise?”

“If we do it the right way it is,” Kowalski replied. “But, unfortunately, I do not know what that way is.”

After momentary silence, Private raised a flipper and jumped up with an idea.

“Oh, how about we send a copy of the papers montrer Marlene’s scheduled transfer to The New York Times?” he suggested. “They’ll spread the word all across the city.”

Skipper shook his head.

“Private, do toi really think that The New York Times has time for an loutre story?” Skipper questioned skeptically. “Aren’t they busy enough already giving premium advertising rates to organizations that they agree with?”

“What?” Private asked, confused.

“Oh, never mind,” Skipper shrugged, then tapping a flipper on Private’s shoulder. “All right, young Private, I guess it is at least worth a shot.”

Upon hearing his leader’s comments, Kowalski waddled over to the copy machine in the corner of the room and made a copy of the papers montrer that Marlene was to be transferred. Unlike the last time he had tried using a copy machine, he did not inadvertently copy his tailfeather region in the process.

“Here toi are, sir,” Kowalski a dit once he completed the copies and handed them to Skipper.

“Thanks,” Skipper a dit as he accepted them, then turning to Private. “Private, toi and Rico go tell Marlene about ‘Operation: Inform the Media’ while I stay here with Kowalski to get these papers ready to go out in the mail.”

Private nodded as he and Rico then began to leave Alice’s office.

“Wait!” Skipper then called to them. “I almost forgot, but Rico, I’m going to need a stamp.”

Rico then immediately hacked-up and handed his leader a postage stamp.

“It’s a good thing this stamp is the peel-and-stick type,” Skipper chuckled as he took it from Rico, “because it would probably be ruined if it was the kind toi have to lick.”

As Rico and Private then left Alice’s office to tell Marlene of the plan to expose her transfer in the pages of The New York Times, Kowalski handed Skipper an envelope that he had addressed to the paper’s news bureau.

“Kowalski, why did toi write your real name and the zoo’s address in the return address l’espace on this envelope?” Skipper questioned as he looked it over.

“Well, why not?” Kowalski wondered as he shrugged his shoulders. “I mean, it’s not like any human will ever know that there’s really a manchot, pingouin named ‘Kowalski A. Kowalski’ at the Central Park Zoo.”

“I guess,” Skipper somewhat hesitantly agreed as he put the papers inside the envelope, sealed it, and affixed the postage. “So, is there even a mailbox around here that a manchot, pingouin can actually reach?”

“Not exactly,” Kowalski replied as he motioned for Skipper to follow him out of Alice’s office, “but I’ll lift toi up so that toi can drop the envelope in.”

Skipper then followed Kowalski down to the nearest mailbox. Upon arrival, Kowalski lifted Skipper par the feet so that he could place the envelope inside.

“In the mailbox today,” Skipper commenté as he released the envelope, “on Page 1 tomorrow.”

And with that, the envelope was off to The New York Times. And Skipper just couldn’t wait to read the suivant morning’s edition.

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