Penguins

Penguins
By Alan McCormick and Jonny Voss
Published by dead drunk Dublin

Leaving the forest, Udo sails on his wardrobe boat across a shiny mirror glacier. Soon he is met by a line of soft melting snow and can’t go any further.

A group of eight penguins, who think they are a husky sleigh team, come to the rescue. They harness themselves to the boat and start pulling.

‘H’ shouts the lead penguin.
‘U’ shouts penguin Number 2.
‘S’ shouts another.
‘K’
‘I’
‘E’
‘S’

The eighth penguin stamps his feet with nothing to shout.

‘What’s that spell?’ shouts the lead penguin.

‘HUSKIES,’ yell back the penguins (apart from the eight with no letter to his name).

The boat flies through the sludgy snow and the vocal seven break into song:

‘We are the Huskies, who never make you slow,
We are the Huskies, who’ll lead you through the snow.
We are the Huskies, whose backs are strong,
We are the Huskies, and this is our song.’

‘Excuse me,’ cries Udo interrupting their song, and bringing them to a halt.

‘What is it?’ snaps the lead penguin.

‘You’re not huskies, you’re penguins,’ replies Udo.

‘Tell him to look at our tails,’ shouts Penguin Number 2.

‘You don’t have any tails,’ says Udo.

‘He’s right, we don’t have tails. We’re penguins,’ says the normally silent eighth one.

‘P-E-N-G-U-I-N-S,’ spells Udo trying to help.

A murmur of disquiet settles on the penguin team. They look each other up and down, raise their heavy black wings from their sides, and bend over to examine their tiny paddle-like webbed feet.

‘Penguins; we’re penguins,’ announces the lead penguin. ‘Number 8, you’ve been right along.’

They start to run in small steps like penguins and the boat creaks as it gets pulled along.

‘P’ shouts the lead penguin.

‘E’ shouts penguin Number 2.

‘N’ shouts another.

‘G’

‘U’