Chapter Sixteen

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Chapter Sixteen

My mind was racing as I stepped up to accept the penguimp’s challenge—not out of fear or anxiety, but excitement. There were so many jokes I could use, each one a modern day classic, that deciding which to tell was like choosing a single french fry to eat in a Galaxy-sized Wombo Combo. The penguimp folded its wings at me, somehow managing to look like it was frowning even though its beak couldn’t bend that way. All around us, the other penguimps were gathering around, eager to either hear the world’s funniest joke, or peck my eyes out of my skull. That didn’t bother me. None of them knew it yet, but they had played right into my hands. This was where my skills truly shone. My area of expertise. My comfort zone. My—

“WONK WONK?” the penguimp wonked impatiently.

“All right, all right, keep your tux on,” I said, making up my mind. “Okay, so, one day an old man went to the doctor. Doc, he says, I keep farting, but they’re completely silent and they don’t smell at all!”

“Oh my God…” I heard Hamstring groan quietly behind me.

“Oh, really? the doctor says,” I went on. “It’s true, the old man insists. I’ve probably farted at least ten times during this conversation, and you didn’t notice a thing, did you? Okay, says the doctor. Here are some pills. Take two a day and then come see me again when they’re all gone. A week later, the old man came back. Doc! he says angrily, My farts all smell like rotten eggs now! What did those pills do? The doctor says, ‘They cleared your sinuses. Now let’s work on your hearing!”

I spread my hands in a TA-DA motion and waited for the uproarious laughter to begin. I knew how these flightless fatheads thought. My joke—expertly selected from the countless thousands I had memorized—preyed upon their psychology in a way that was both elegant and barbaric, like a guy with a dainty British accent eating someone’s brain with a spoon. In just a few seconds, they would be falling over each other with laughter. A few minutes after that, they would hoist me up onto their shoulders and carry me through the gate, promising to worship my image as their new goddess for the rest of—

“Two,” said Brother Fossilicious from one of nearby penguimps. “Failure.”

“WONK?” the penguimp roared. “WONKWONKWONK WONK!”

I blinked in surprise. I wasn’t fluent in Penguimpese, but that hadn’t sounded like laughter. I glanced back at Yin, who was scowling at me.

“He asks, how dare you insult him in this way?” Yin snapped. “You speak of the Expulsion of Shame without first defeating him in combat. He says that if he had not already given his vow that all three of us would be allowed to tell a joke, he would have us flayed where we stand.”

I stared at her, confused. “But…But I just saw them laugh when this one farted on that other penguimp’s head!”

“He did that after beating the other penguimp in a fight!” Hamstring yelled. “You just broke one of their sacred traditions and called him a loser at the same time!”

“WONK WONK!” the penguimp snapped. “WONK!”

“He says, enough of this blasphemy. Tell the second joke.”

My heart began to race, and a drop of sweat trailed down the side of my head. This was okay. This was fine! I could work with this! The penguimps were turning out to be a slightly tougher crowd than I had anticipated. So what? I began to wrack my brain for another joke. Farts were out. What else would a bunch of angry flightless birds think was funny? I just needed a minute or two, and I’d have them rolling on the ground in—

“WONK!”

I penguimp’s voice jerked me out of my thoughts, and I looked to see him pointing—but not at me.

At Yin.

“H- He says,” Yin said in surprise, “that it’s my turn.”

“What?” Hamstring demanded.

I stepped forward. “Hold on, that’s not how I said this would go!”

It jabbed its wing at her stubbornly. “WONK WONKWONK WONK WONK WONKWONKWONK!”

“He says that it is what he said,” Yin translated. “Each of us gets to tell one joke—and only one joke. You had your turn, Rhyen, so now it’s mine.”

“But—” I protested.

“WONK WONK WONKWONK WONK?”

“Would we rather they just kill us now, then?”

“No!” Hamstring and I exclaimed at the same time.

“WONK WONK WONK!”

“Then stop wasting their time.” Yin swallowed hard and stepped forward.

“Yin…” I said as she walked past me.

She paused and gave me a reassuring smile. “Don’t worry, I’ve got this. Let’s see how they like puns!”

Puns? My heart sank into my stomach.

Without another word, Yin stepped into the center of the ring the penguimps had made around us. She shifted uncomfortably, obviously not happy with having so many beady little eyes trained on her at the same time. Was it weird for a genie to have stage fright? I supposed that made sense, seeing how she’d spent pretty much her entire life terrified of being seen as a tool instead of a person—and judging by the leers the penguimps were giving her, they didn’t even see her as that.

“I would tell you all a joke in Penguimpese,” she said, a nervous smile cracking the edges of her lips, “but I don’t like to use…fowl language!”

Everything went silent, and I crossed my fingers…

“Nine!” Brother Fossilicious announced.

Come on, come on, I prayed inside my head. Let that be a high enough roll!

The lead penguimp’s eyes widened in outrage, and it began to squawk in fury, spitting flying out of its beak, “WONK WONK WONK WONKWONK WONK WONKWONKWONK WONK!”

“Let me guess,” I said as Yin backed away. “You just insulted their sacred tongue and offended him even more.”

“Sorry,” she whispered.

“WONK WONK!” the penguimp said, pointing at Hamstring. The rodeo clown’s already-white face somehow turned even paler.

“He says let’s get this over with so they can kill us,” Yin translated.

“But I don’t know any jokes!” Hamstring protested.

I grabbed Hamstring by his arm and pulled him close so I could whisper in his ear. “Okay, listen! You’re going to say—”

“You are the last person in the world I want to listen to right now!” he snapped, yanking his arm away. “I’ll figure this out myself!”

“But you just said you don’t know any jokes!”

He reached up and jabbed a finger into my chest. “And you are the one who got us into this mess in the first place!”

My face started to turn blue with anger, and the penguimps began to wonk quietly in anticipation of a fight. “Me? You were the one who didn’t want to murder his way through a whole penguimp nest!”

“WONK WO—”

“Shut up!” I yelled, rounding on the penguimp. “Wait your kentucky fried turn, you undercooked drumstick!”

The penguimp backed down sheepishly.

“And you!” I snarled, turning back to Hamstring. “I'm trying to save my family, and that'll never happen if we just sit around thinking and planning, and not doing a single gazpachoing thing! So if you have a problem with that, then you and your girlfriend—”

I shoved him toward Yin, who caught him before he could fall on his stupid butt.

“—can go back to town and drink all the milkshakes you want while I actually try to solve the freaking problem!”

“Rhyen, that's not fair and you know it,” Yin protested, helping Hamstring back to his feet. “We're trying to help you!”

“Then why do you keep overriding everything I want to do?” I demanded. “It's my family that's in danger! My mom, my dad, and my grandpa, not yours! But for some reason you seem to think that my opinion is the only one that doesn't matter!”

“Because we don't want to see your family get hurt either!” Hamstring argued. “And if you're going to keep charging into every situation without thinking, eventually you're going to get killed! And then who's going to help your family?”

Marching over to him, I grabbed him by his shirt and pulled him close.

“Rhyen…” Yin tried to say, but I talked over her.

“I won't die!” I growled into his face. “I won't let myself die! Not until my family is safe and sound again. Then I'm going to hunt down the son of a lobster roll who did this and—”

“WONK WONK WONK!” the penguimp wonked, poking me in the side impatiently.

Everything turned red. Letting go of Hamstring, I turned to the penguimp.

“WONK WO—”

Grabbing Spartacus, I swung her like a golf club, hitting the penguimp right between its piddly little legs.

“WOOOOOOOOooooo…” it screeched as it went rocketing straight up into the air, its voice gradually growing fainter until it was completely gone.

“Natural twenty,” Brother Fossilicious said from somewhere nearby. I didn't even turn to look for him.

Time seemed to stop.

“Rhyen,” Yin whispered. “Do you have any idea what you just did?”

I tilted my head back, shading my eyes with my hand as I watched the impatient little creep fly higher and higher until it was just a tiny black speck high up in the sky.

“Well, would you look at that?” I said, a grimly satisfied smile stretching across my face. “I guess penguimps can fly!”

Yin and Hamstring were at my side a moment later, preparing for the inevitable battle. I sighed. Now that I'd vented my frustrations and was thinking a little more clearly, it dawned on me just how big of a mess I'd just gotten us into. Hamstring was right. We couldn't take on the entire penguimp nest by ourselves. But I had let my feelings get the better of me, and now my friends were going to pay the price for it. Just like my family was paying the price for me sticking my nose into Ichabod’s schemes.

Everyone you care about suffers just by being close to you, a cold, hateful voice whispered into my ear.

“Listen,” I said softly, “you two need to make a run for it, and I'll—”

“Hold them off by yourself?” Hamstring interrupted. “Not a chance.”

“We're with you until the end, Rhyen,” Yin promised. “One way or another.”

I paused, then turned to look at them, my lip quivering a little. “Really, you two? Making me cry right when a fight’s about to break out? Not cool!”

“If you two can hold them off for about a minute,” Yin said, “I'll be able to cast Lickety Split and warp us out—”

“Wait!” Hamstring exclaimed. “Listen!”

I glanced at him, then at the penguimps that were circled around us. Listen? What in the name of tofu was I supposed to be listening for?

And then I heard it.

At first it was just one of them, almost too quiet to hear. But then another joined it, and then another. A low, soft sound, almost like they were ashamed of themselves and were trying to hold it in.

“Wonkwonkwonkwonkwonk…”

Laughter.

“Wonkwonkwonkwonkwonkwonkwonkwonkwonk!” Gradually, it began to grow louder, as if the horde hadn't been sure if they were allowed to find my “joke” funny at first, but were slowly becoming more confident when they weren't struck by lightning for their impudence.

“What,” Hamstring asked quietly, “is going on?”

“WONKWONKWONKWONKWONKWONKWONKWONKWONKWONKWONK!”

The horde’s dignity crumbled to pieces as a plague of uncontrollable laughter rolled over them. Penguimps fell over, rolling on the ground, causing other penguimps to trip over them, which just made them laugh even harder. More penguimps came flooding out of the nearby woods to see what the commotion was. Even though there was no way for them to know what had just happened, they were all quickly infected with the giggle fits as well, and were soon laughing right along with the others.

“That's right!” Yin exclaimed, watching the chaos unfold with a slightly lost look on her face. “I completely forgot! Penguimps have a weakness to a specific brand of comedy: slapstick!”

“…ooooooOOOOOOOOOOONK!” the penguimp screamed as it came plummeting out of the sky to crash land right in the middle of the horde, making a perfectly penguimp-shaped crater in the ground and sending the other penguimps into yet another bout of hysterics.

“If I pretend like any of this makes sense, then can we get moving?” Hamstring asked.

He was right. It was time to face the lick, end this ridiculous Trial, and save my family. Hesitantly, I reached out and tapped one of the penguimps.

“Hey, I don't mean to interrupt when you guys clearly needed to get this out of your system,” I said, “but we kinda had a deal, and…”

Without even glancing at me, the penguimp raised its wing and snapped its…feathers? I don't know how that worked, and frankly I was beyond caring. All that mattered was that, with a loud and irritating CREEAAAK, the castle gate swung open. There was no key involved, but I was so not going to question things now.

“No objections?” I asked, taking a step toward it. “Anybody? I'll just be going, then!”

“Rhyen, come on!” Hamstring called. He and Yin were already on the other side.

Glancing around one more time, having a hard time believing things were working out this well, I hurried after my friends. Together, we made our way into the castle.

We immediately found ourselves in the throne room. It was drafty, moist, and cold in here, like the worst gas station bathroom you've ever set foot in—and the smell wasn't much better. As we approached the throne, a series of torches sprang to life on either side of the room. The flames were as gray as if they were in one of those old silent movies, and if anything, they only seemed to make the castle even colder. But they did their job of lighting the place up, and as they spread to the other side of the room, I noticed a figure sitting in one of the thrones, waiting for us.

A figure who was only too familiar.

“Welcome brave adventurers,” Count Traumedy greeted us, the colorless fire reflecting dully off his mask, “to your doom!”

NEXT CHAPTER 10/29/25