Baby Penguin's Arc

Chapter 1 of 4

Baby Penguin was still chasing the fish when the ice ran out. One moment there was a silvery, half-see-through shape flickering under the frost. The next moment the frost was gone, and Baby Penguin's short flippers were brushing wet grass. The fish was gone too. Baby Penguin stopped and looked back for the colony. It saw only a big painted sign at the edge of a path, and past the sign, trees it had never seen before. Its parents were somewhere behind the last blizzard, on the tundra. This was not the tundra. Baby Penguin picked a direction and waddled. The ground felt wrong, so it switched. It switched again. Every direction smelled like mud and warm leaves. A red and white flag hung from a steel pole above the path, still in the flat air. Baby Penguin did not know the flag. Baby Penguin did not know anything here. A green shape stepped out from the reeds. He was tall and wore blue overalls. A coil of rope hung from his left pocket. He looked down at Baby Penguin the way a person looks at a small problem he does not have time for. "You're lost," said Alligator Sam. Baby Penguin nodded. Sam crouched. "I pull people from the mud. Storm knocked three into the swamp this morning. One is chest-deep." He pointed with his snout down the path, toward a low building with flower boxes and a paw print on the sign. "Clinic's that way. Vet is inside. Brown hair. Blue scrubs. Tell her Sam sent you. Wait there." Baby Penguin looked at the path, then at the reeds, then back at Sam. Sam was already standing. "I can't carry you. I need both hands for the rope." He waited. "Can you walk?" Baby Penguin nodded again. "Then walk. Straight line. Don't switch." Baby Penguin waddled down the path without turning. It reached the door with the paw print. A woman in blue scrubs opened it before Baby Penguin could figure out the handle. She looked at Baby Penguin, then past Baby Penguin at the empty path. "Where did you come from?" Baby Penguin opened its beak and closed it. "Sam," it said. Valerie the Veterinarian crouched, the way Sam had crouched, but softer. "You're a long way from cold," she said. She lifted Baby Penguin under the short flippers and carried it inside. The door closed. Baby Penguin was warm and dry and somewhere it had never meant to be. Its parents were still on the tundra, and the tundra was not out this door.