Anarchy-tica

A fic in which Gun Fawkes attempts to liberate some penguins from the scientists.

by Zena

Fic
The first thing Gun met in Antarctica was a penguin.

It was cute - a given for a penguin, and it waddled up to him with a friendly curiosity. Attached to it was a yellow tag.

Gun had frowned when he saw it. What sort of inhumane creature would tag something so adorable? Clearly, something ominous was at work, and as a symbol of justice, Gun could not let such an offense slide.

“Hello,” said Gun Fawkes, leaning down to address the penguin. “I am Gun Fawkes, son of Guy Fawkes, but with a gun.”

The penguin, being a penguin, did not reply.

“I see that your suppressors have silenced you into submission!”

Again, the penguin did not reply.

“Freedom of speech is an important right! Taking that away from you? That's horrendous,” picking up the penguin, Gun made a valiant pose. “We must remedy the sickness that has swept your land!”

In distress at being carried by a young foreign man, the penguin squealed. Or perhaps it was squealing in fan delight, for this young man was Gun Fawkes.

The love of the revolution. Hero of everyone’s heart.

And soon-to-be hero of the penguins.

“Let's find your friends,” said Gun to the still-squealing penguin. “I hope you have friends!”

As the two walked off in pursuit, Gun sighed.

“I wish I had friends…”

Half-way, the penguin stopped squealing, bit Gun (“hey, only the revolution can do that!), jumped out of his arms and ran off.

When Gun followed, he found a community of penguins.

They were macaroni penguins, the same species of the OG penguin. With sleek blond feathers across their heads, these penguins looked decidedly cooler than the young Georgian men with whom they shared a name.

“Hello,” Gun addressed them, and before he could make further statements, the crowd of macaroni penguins squealed and waddled to him.

He took his as a sign that the penguins liked him, not because he was some peculiar being of curiosity to them.

A penguin poked him in his leg with its beak. Clearly a sign of affection, he reasoned.

“I love you all too,” he said. “And it is with love that we fight for our freedom!”

That penguin, startled by his sudden exclamation, stopped poking his leg.

It was hard to walk when you have a crowd of penguins following, but what could he say? Gun Fawkes was a master at rallying the people.

He gathered a colony of Rockhopper penguins next, then some Adelie penguins. Gentoo penguins soon followed. Later, he found a group of Chinstraps. He liked those in particular; the black band around their necks resembled both his choker and the strap of his mask.

Even later, did he run into Emperor penguins for the first time.

“When we liberate you from the scientists, hopefully we might look into more names,” he said. “Imperialism is totally not cool.”

The emperor penguins looked crestfallen at this statement.

Good, thought Gun. They’re learning to abandon privilege.

“I had believed that I left my darling spouse behind for this trip, but obviously, I was mistaken. The revolution is here, and we shall fight for our rights!”

Amidst a crowd of oppressed penguins, Gun stood.

The penguins squealed. It may have been out of shock, it may have been mere penguin behaviour. Whatever it was, Gun only read those squeals as an affirmation.

“We are going to take down the scientists and researchers!”

The penguins squealed again.

“Too long have you suffered by their hand. But no longer! We are totally going to kick their butts. And we are going to kick their butts so hard, they will go crying back to the Arctic.”

At the mention of the Arctic, the penguins made more distressed noises.

With that, Gun realised that his brilliant plan, once spoken aloud, sounded brilliant no more.

He sweat.

One penguin noticed and made a noise.

“Of course I'm hot,” Gun replied to the penguin, thinking that the poor bird must be worried about his well-being. “I have sideburns, for Peter Piper’s sake.”

In fact, he was so hot that he, Gun Fawkes, the love of the revolution and the symbol of justice, the son of the namesake for cool hacker masks, could stand here, in the Antarctic Autumn, in a muscle shirt.

While sweating.

Not due to heat, but due to the stupidity of his plan.

The group travelled to the nearest scientist base.

The scientists there spoke in a weird accent that didn't bother to pronounce the ends of their words. Gun thought that was rather crass. The English language was too beautiful to be treated like this.

“SUP,” Gun shouted to get their attention. “‘ELLO.”

One of the scientists looked up – his eyes trailing from Gun Fawkes to the crowd of confused penguins behind him. Other scientists followed the first scientist in looking up. Gun had expected to see horror of their faces – fury perhaps, that their little creatures have risen up against them in an attempt to overthrow.

But all he saw was confusion – and hilarity?

The first scientist stood up and made an approach towards him, offering a hand to shake. “We are the Ross Dependency,” he said.

His voice was far too polite.

Gun Fawkes frowned. Clearly, this guy was attempting to police his tone and use calmness and sense to prove himself the one in the right! There was no way Gun would fall for this! “More like the Gross Dependency!” he said – a phrase to which several penguins squealed in support.

“That doesn't rhyme.”

“Well then, I am very Cross Dependency!” To illustrate his point, Gun crossed his arms.

One of the scientists pursued their lips in thought, then slowly nodded their head. “That works,” they said. “Makes perfect sense. What doesn’t make perfect sense is how you’re perfectly fine while wearing a muscle shirt in Antarctica.”

“I’m fueled by the perpetual motion machine of the fires of righteousness!” He made a fist. “And this? This is for hurting the penguins!”

With this shout, he punched the scientist. His fist hit their shoulder with a pathetic punch.

Out of politeness, the scientist gave a small ‘ow’.

Gun seemed satisfied with his handiwork.

The scientists, however, seem perturbed as to what to do with this young fool of a man.

“We could send him to the Australians,” whispered one to the others.

“Bro, I don’t think we could even be that mean to the Aussies.”

Deciding that any sense of debate in this situation was, at least, a waste of time, and at most, totally ruinous, an actually sensitive New Zealander picked Gun up and dunked him on a boat.

“Excuse me,” said Gun, but his simple protest was too no avail.

The scientists pushed into his hands a compass and a GPS and directions to the nearest landmass.

“Penguins!” Gun raised his hands, waving them, and attempted to address the friends he had made. “Please! Help me! Fight back! Fend for yourselves! Find the revolution in your hearts!”

But the penguins did not care. Instead, they approached the scientists. Happily now, friendlier than they had ever been to Gun.

A scientist hugged a penguin – and this penguin made no distressed squeals nor complaints.

Gun placed a hand over his heart.

He had failed those poor little creatures.

As he sailed off back North in his little boat, he sighed.

Maybe… just maybe he'll have better luck freeing the polar bears from global warming.

Bonus
AUDIO TRANSCRIPT