I keep imagining this from the penguin’s point of view:
“Gustav, my friend, why so glum?”
The penguin in question looked up from his half-eaten sprat, shaking his head in disgust.
“Not glum, Sebastian. Affronted, outraged - I had the most perturbing encounter with one of the Beakless Ones.”
Sebastian nodded solemnly. “Yes, they are often perturbing. What happened, my friend?”
Gustav sighed heavily, looking up to the sky and holding his flippers wide, as if to ask the gods “why?”, before mournfully retelling his experience, “I was on the beach where the Beakless sometimes wander, contemplating names for this year’s chicks, when one of them approached. It seemed harmless enough to greet - they’re cute, in a strange, bald and flat-faced way, are they not?”
“Oh Gustav, you kind-hearted fool.”
“Such a fool, I am!” Gustav’s moans had gathered a small crowd already - the only thing penguins love more than a bellyful of fish, is a story. A good storyteller was always guaranteed a warm spot to huddle in the winter, surrounded by bored friends longing for entertainment.
“What did it do, Gustav? Did it kick you?”
“No! When it got close, I called out to it, ‘hello, friend!’. It stopped and returned the greeting - awkwardly, but it was rather sweet, like a chick learning it’s first chirps. ‘Hollow fren,’ it said back to me. I was charmed, but not wanting it to learn poor pronunciation, I repeated the greeting, and so did it! Getting clearer each time, till it could almost pass for a true penguin itself.”
“Gustav is a wonderful teacher,” Adelina, his mate, stated with a proud nod of her lovely blue head. “You remember how well our chicks could enunciate, before they even caught their first fish.”
“But what of it, Gustav? What happened to sour this experience so?”
“We went back and forth, till I was satisfied. It lowered itself near the ground, and I moved closer, carefully, not wanting to alarm it. I was just about to tell it how pleased I was, that it learning so quickly, when all of a sudden, it looked me right in the eye and said ‘Fuck off, freak.’”
There were avian gasps all around.
“I was so appalled, I could not bring myself to even chide it.” Gustav bowed his head in shame. “I turned and left without another word.”
“It said that to you? Oh dear.” Sebastian tilted his head in a piercing glare towards one of their fellows, focusing on the only one who was slapping his sides and chortling. “Björn, you scoundrel! What have I told you about yelling obscenities at the Beakless?”
Björn cackled and bobbed his head in defiance. “How was its enunciation, Gustav? You soft-hearted buffoon!”
