Disclaimer: I do not own The Penguins of Madagascar or any of its characters. I do own the penguin Alex in this story.

Hope you all enjoy!


Noon was approaching and Central Park was swarming with humans. Some followed the trails through the park while others sat on blankets laid out in the short grass. To avoid being seen, a young penguin darted from tree to tree, jumping into the branches and using the leaves as cover whenever someone would walk by.

She eventually came to the end of the trees and looked up. There was a brick wall in front of her, and on top of it was a clock tower where a couple of monkey statues stood with hammers in their paws. Metal gates surrounded the tower; inside the gates a sculpture of a lion chased a zebra. Large letters above the entrance told her that she had finally made it to her destination.

Hopping down to the ground, she faced the wall, her mind racing. The end of her quest was in sight. What she has been searching for was just beyond these gates. Realizing this suddenly made her nervous, but she already came so far. She had to see this all the way through.

As she stood there, she saw that the zoo was open. People walked in and out of the arches that acted as the entrance. She needed to find a way in without being noticed. Glancing around, she spotted a sewage pipe. Quickly, she dashed down into it and crawled until she found herself under one of the exhibits. She climbed out, and, with a jolt, she saw that she was in the polar bear's habitat. Without making a sound, she slipped over to the bars that separated the large creature from the rest of the zoo.

Her heart pounded hard In her chest when she saw a group of humans walking her way. She ducked behind a trash bin before they saw her. When the coast was clear, she dropped to her belly and slid over to a sign that pointed in several different directions. She studied each word carefully until she saw the one she was looking for.

The young penguin headed to the habitat, hiding behind cans so she wasn't seen. She soon came to the enclosure. Through the bars, she could see four black-and-white aquatic birds standing on an island that was in the middle of a pool. They had their backs to her and were waving at the people gathered around to look at the cute animals. The humans held buckets of fish in their hands, and they tossed the food to the birds.

As she watched them eat the fish, her stomach rumbled, reminding her of her hunger. She stiffened when one of the penguins lifted its head and turned in her direction; she dove behind a nearby garbage can.

Several moments passed and nothing happened. Finally, she dared to look back and she let out a sigh of relief when she saw that the penguin had its back to her again. She noticed for the first time that it was a male and he stood a ways away from the others, his head held high. Clearly, this penguin had authority.

She watched as he turned to one of the others, a rather tall penguin. "Is it just me or do you also feel like someone is watching us?" His head moved from side to side as if surveying the area for anything suspicious. She knew she should be hiding so that she wouldn't be seen, but she was curious to hear the tall penguin's reply.

The penguin looked at its friend, swallowing the fish that it was eating. "Well sir," it began— also male, the young penguin thought— and the tall bird pointed to the people around their habitat with his flipper. "We are being watched by the humans."

The first penguin, who had a flat head, knocked the other one's flipper away. "That's not what I meant, Kowalski!" he snapped at him.

Kowalski shrugged. "Don't worry so much, Skipper. You are only being paranoid." But he didn't give him any time to respond before going back to eating with the other two, who didn't even look up from their meal.

The young bird behind the trash can narrowed her eyes. So that's him, she thought, forcing herself not to run out of hiding to confront the penguin she had journeyed so far to find. I need to get him alone. His team couldn't get involved.

Quietly, she backed away from the penguin habitat, ducking behind yet another trash can when several kids ran by her. She watched as they stopped in front of a cart selling pretzels. Her stomach growled again. But the zoo was crawling with humans; she knew she couldn't risk going in search of food. Even though she was hungry, she decided to go into hiding until the zoo closed.

Looking around, she noticed a brick wall circling the exhibit next to the penguins'. There were palm trees growing in the habitat, and she could see something large in the back that seemed to be built into the wall; there was some sort of red liquid leaking out of it.

She glanced to another part of the enclosure to where a platform stood, tall enough for the animals to look down on the humans passing by or gathering to see whatever lived in this habitat.

Dropping to her belly, she slid over to the wall. She jumped to her feet and glanced around, spotting the plaque that would give her more information about this habitat, like who lived in it. After a quick check to make sure no humans were near, she climbed onto the plaque, studying the words. During her journey, she had learned how to read so that she always knew where she was.

"Lemur habitat." She thought back to the stories her mother used to tell her when she was just a hatchling, about many different animals she had encountered in her lifetime. One of the animals her mother had talked often about were lemurs. The young penguin herself had never met a lemur before. The animals at her old zoo weren't that friendly and they rarely left their enclosures.

Suddenly she was really curious.

Looking into the exhibit, she noticed for the first time that there was a chair on the tall platform. She tried to see into the back but the bright sunlight made everything look blurry. She was so distracted with this new discovery that for a few moments she forgot all about the humans walking around. When she remembered that she should be hiding, she jumped down into the lemur habitat.

Once on the ground, she walked farther into the exhibit, staying close to the platform. She was expecting to see one of the furry creatures who lived in here. But nothing moved and she couldn't hear anything. Where was everyone?

Suddenly a shadow fell on her. She jerked her head up, gasping. She found herself staring at something she's never seen before. It was a huge, square object that looked like it was made out of balloons. A head of a creature stuck out of it, seeming to be wearing a leafy hat.

She could feel her heart pounding in her chest. Slowly, she started to back away, unable to take her eyes off the unknown thing. She jumped when she ran into something, but she realized that it was only the platform. She bolted behind it, breathing heavily.

What was that thing? she wondered. Surely it couldn't have been a lemur? Her mother never said they were that big!

Finally, after what felt like a lifetime, she got the nerve to look back. But the thing never moved. Embarrassment washed over her. It's not alive… she thought, suddenly feeling stupid. She should have known that! She saw many weird things on her journey, and even though she's never seen anything like this before, she should have been smart enough to know that it couldn't be alive.

She was about to come out of hiding to investigate the strange looking thing when suddenly an animal popped out of nowhere, and the young penguin pressed her back against the platform. She didn't know that she was holding her breath until she started feeling lightheaded. Breathing again, she listened to the laughter of the animal that had appeared.

Finally she poked her head out of hiding and saw the creature bouncing up and down on the huge, weird object! She stared in shock as the animal enjoyed itself. The penguin wondered if this was a lemur, noticing its ring tail and suddenly remembering that her mother told her that some looked like that. She narrowed her eyes in confusion when she saw the hat on top of the lemur's head.

Curious, the penguin slowly walked back to the huge thing, glad to see that the lemur was so distracted that it didn't seem to notice her as she ducked behind the weird thing. She watched it jump up and down; she didn't know why, but she found this creature very interesting. There was just something she couldn't quite understand that made her feel like she could just sit here and watch it for hours.

After a while her beak parted in a huge yawn, exhausted from the long journey. She curled up in the short grass, the lemur's laughter still ringing in her ears. Her stomach growled again. I'll stay here until all the humans leave, and every animal is asleep. Then I'll go find food and then do what I came here to do, she decided in her head, closing her eyes and her last thought before falling asleep was, I will get answers to my questions.


Something poked the young penguin's side, bringing her back to consciousness. She blinked open her eyes. A blurry shape stood over her, and she heard someone talking but couldn't understand what they were saying. When her eyes finally came into focus, she saw the lemur from earlier leaning over her. He stopped talking and blinked, clearly waiting for an answer.

The penguin got to her feet and dusted the dirt off her stomach. She then looked up at the lemur, surprised at how much taller he was than her. "Um… what?" she stammered.

"I said," the lemur started, annoyed," who are you, penguin, and what are you doing in my kingdom?" He walked closer to her, poking her belly, and she stumbled backwards.

"Kingdom?" Before she could say more, there was a flash of black-and-white and four penguins appeared, flipping into the habitat and landing between the female penguin and the ring-tailed lemur.

Anger burned in her as she stared at the leader of the group, her flippers folding into fists and her brow bending. Just seeing him made her want to jump on him and started throwing punches, but she knew he could probably beat her.

Skipper looked at the lemur and asked," Do you know this penguin, Ringtail?"

The ring-tailed lemur shook his head. "Why would I be knowing this penguin? I have never seen her before in my life." He crossed his arms and added," I thought you would know her, since, you know, she's a penguin, like you, silly penguin." The lemur took a step toward Skipper and looked him in the eyes.

Suddenly two more lemurs appeared, and the young penguin recognized one of them as an aye-aye from her mother's stories. The other one was a smaller lemur— it kind of looked like a mouse. The new lemurs walked over to everyone, and the aye-aye asked," What's going on?"

No one answered him.

Skipper turned to the female penguin and looked her over, crossing his flippers over his chest. "And who would you be?"

She stepped forward which brought her inches away from his beak. She hesitated when she noticed his team moving forward as if to protect him, but the leader lifted his flipper to call them off. "Don't you recognize me?" she finally said. She took a step back and looked away, shifting her feet. "No, of course not. I was only a baby when you left…"

Skipper and his team and the lemurs looked confused, she noticed. She sighed, but when she turned back to the leader, anger hardened her heart. "My name is Alex," she introduced herself.

"Alex," the leader penguin muttered under his breath. Then he said a little louder," That name… sounds… so… familiar…" His eyes suddenly went huge and he gasped. Did he finally get it? "Alex! Is it really you? I haven't seen you in years. Not since—"

"Not since you left my mother," Alex interrupted, unable to keep the anger out of her voice.

"Skippah," the smallest penguin, who looked to be a little older than Alex, spoke up. "Who is this?"

Skipper didn't reply to him. For a long moment, it felt like it was just him and Alex. They stared at each other, shock and confusion shining in Skipper's eyes.

"Hello…" Alex stopped for a dramatic pause. Then she added in a voice filled with all the hatred she felt toward this penguin: "Father."


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