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The door to the back of Herbert’s base slams open and Herbert roughly thrusts Tourdude back into his prison cell. “-And if I ever catch you trying to escape again, you’ll be more than just a missing person’s case. Got that?”
Tourdude grunts as his body is slammed into the metal wall of the cell. He tastes blood in his mouth as he weakly nods in response.
Herbert’s eyes narrowed to slits, giving Tourdude a critical stare. “I don’t even know why you even bothered trying. Clearly your pathetic little penguins friends don’t care about you, otherwise they would’ve tried busting you out of here by now. How long has it been since I captured you—two years?” He barked out a laugh. “Give up, you puny penguin. No one is coming to save you.”
He grins maniacally at the look of defeat on Tourdude’s as he locks him in the cell again before spinning on his heel and walking out of the room, once again leaving Tourdude in isolation.
Tourdude curled in on himself as he stared vacantly at the rows of markings he’d made on the wall, each mark representing the amount of days it had been since he was captured. Herbert was right, even if Tourdude hated admitting that to himself. No one was coming for him. They didn’t need him—the island was probably thriving without him. He had been holding on to hope that someone would eventually find him, but that hope has been slowly waning as the days, weeks, months, pass. He should have given up on having hope a long time ago.
Even if nobody misses his presence, he misses them—the island. He misses giving tours to new residents, showing them everything the island had to offer. He misses exploring all the island’s nooks and crannies and discovering its secrets. He misses the Tour HQ, which was more of a home to him than his actual igloo. And his puffle, Puffledude… Tourdude had left him all alone. He was always wondering if someone was looking after him. He hopes so.
For whatever reason, he's still holding onto a sliver of hope that he’ll break free. Through the various contraptions Herbert carelessly left around, he found a way to contact the island through the TourBots and send an alert that he was in danger, which was why he had broken out of his cell in the first place. It would probably be fruitless, but it was worth a shot.
The TourBots are his last hope at this point. He buries his face in his flippers and draws in a shaky breath.
Maybe Puffledude misses him at least.
-
The Tallest Mountain.
Rookie found himself staring at the image they had of it currently displayed on the EPF command room’s monitor. After months of searching for clues, they finally had a lead on Tourdude’s whereabouts. No one really knows exactly what happened to him, which has made tracking him down difficult. All they knew was that his last known location was in the island’s corn maze and after that, he vanished. It was eerie honestly—they couldn’t find even a hint of evidence in the corn maze that could lead them to his current location.
He anxiously bites at the end of the pen he was holding. Unable to sleep that night, he decided he’d try to be productive and work in the command room, maybe brainstorm exactly how they’d save Tourdude if he did turn out to be on the Tallest Mountain. Despite his best efforts to stay collected, his concern about finding Tourdude was starting to eat at him.
The other agents seem to do a good job of staying composed, at least outwardly. Whenever the topic of Tourdude’s disappearance is brought up, they just laugh it off and jest about his whereabouts, suggesting he’s somewhere absurd like Brown Puffle Island or even still roaming the corn maze, but underneath the jokes he could always hear a twinge of anxiety in their voices. He’d joke too, to bury his own anxiety. Joking around wasn’t working as well as it usually did, though. It probably didn’t help that he ended up getting lost in reminiscing about Tourdude earlier that day, which was the first time he had thought that deeply about him since he disappeared.
During a meetup, one penguin had asked him if he was friends with Tourdude, prompting him to fondly think back to his friendship with him. It was nice at first—he remembered the two of them playing Puffle Roundup together, with Tourdude being insanely good at it while he failed miserably. Tourdude tried his best to give him some pointers while stifling his laughter at Rookie exhaustedly chasing after a herd of puffles. As he spoke about him though, remembering more and more memories about him, he could feel a sense of melancholy threatening to push itself to the forefront of his mind and he switched the subject. He tried to forget about the conversation, but thoughts about Tourdude still lingered for the rest of the day.
It’s been nearly two years now since Tourdude went missing. While they finally had a lead, it wasn’t very reassuring. What if it just turns out to be a fluke and Tourdude isn’t there? What if they’re never able to find him? He couldn’t let that happen.
Finally pulling his eyes from the image of the Tallest Mountain, he looks down at his notebook to see an empty page staring back at him and lets out a sigh. Sitting here wasn’t going to bring Tourdude back; he should at least try to get some rest before the morning.
He leaves the command room and makes the slow trudge back to his igloo, trying his best to push down his emotions into the depths of his mind again. He can’t get worked up over this. He’s an agent, he needs to be able to keep the public’s worries at ease. He has to be strong. For the EPF. For Tourdude.
Finally making it back to his igloo, he opens the door and switches on his lamp. Once he makes it to his bedroom, he cracks a small grin at Puffledude, who’s fast asleep in his puffle bed next to his own. He gently pets his head and pulls the bed’s blanket over him. “Night, Puffledude.”
He gets into his own bed, finally feeling a wave of exhaustion come over him. Before he succumbs to sleep, he makes a silent promise to himself that they’ll find Tourdude—no matter what.