GARGOYLES: Re-Awakening

Wind-Up: 2

The clan had been flying for a good half hour. Circling, actually. Demona was looking, listening, waiting. Goliath's concern was growing. Was her anger so deeply entrenched that they would search all night for her opportunity to prove that he was wrong—that the humans were all so terrible? As always, he called on his patience, refusing to let whatever emotions were stirring in him to control his behavior.

Goliath's young companions, the red, blue, and green members of the clan were somewhat bewildered at the entire beginning of this evening. Here they were in a new world, with so much to discover, and they were spending their first hours circling, waiting for they knew not what. "I'm hungry," the large blue one said.

"You said that five minutes ago," came the reply from the red one.

"Well I still am. We haven't stopped for breakfast yet. What are we doing?"

"He's got a point," the green one said. "We've been circling forever out here. What do you thinks going on?"

The red one contemplated for a moment. "I don't know." He fixed his eyes forward at his leaders ahead of him. "Something is off between Demona and Goliath. It's like their having a fight or something," he said, finally.

"How come when those two have a fight, I end up missing breakfast?!" The blue one exclaimed.

Just in the next moment Demona took a sudden sharp, downward dive. Goliath and the Elder followed and the three, somewhat haphazardly, quickly adjusted. Within a minute, they were all gathered on a rooftop. Demona looked at the group. Reaching her arm out and pointing toward the edge, she said only one word—"there."

Goliath and the others looked at each other, then strode to the edge of  roof. Below was a large crowd gathered, shouting and raising their fists. Police cars and officers were blocking the crowd's attempt to push their way toward a small shop that read "Persian Delights Deli." The scene was chaotic. The Gargoyles all flashed back to the many times they had seen a crowd, weapons in hand, pushing against the gate at castle Wyvern. They each felt their adrenaline surge, causing their wings to raise slightly. "Just observe," Demona said. "You'll see that you cannot help them anyway. And more than that, you will see that there would be no point."

The five looked at each other. Goliath remained silent, but wrapped his wings around his body and turned his gaze down toward the street. The others looked once more at one another, uneasily, and then followed suit. Below, the crowd was growing louder and the shoving was increasing. The officers on the scene were shouting, attempting to hold their line. Only now did Goliath notice the police van off to one side. He did not know it, but they were the team attempting to make contact with the people inside the shop who were holding the owner and his wife hostage. It was going badly. They were having trouble bringing order to the situation. The mob outside was a distracting ruckus, making it difficult to establish contact with the people inside. They were worried that before long, the whole thing could escalate into an all out riot, and then people were certain to be hurt.

As if on cue, there was a slight perturbation in the far left flank of the crowd and then, suddenly, a police barrier was toppled. The shouting of the police officers gained in intensity and urgency. The other officers on the scene began to shift slightly in the direction of the problem, but as soon as they did, the people they were meant to be holding back surged forward, causing the police to lurch back to where they had been. From above, it looked like the crowd was beginning to pulse back and forth, like a ship on choppy seas, lurching back and forth in a storm. The talons that held Goliath's wings closed around his neck released. He could see what was about to happen and, instinctively, was considering intervening, but just as he was about to spread his wings wide a sudden movement caught his eye.

A police car came speeding in from seemingly out of nowhere and screeched to a halt just beside the left flank of the crowd, where the police line was about to be broken. Out came a dark haired woman, badge in hand, with an energy that actually seemed to catch the crowd in its pulse, absorbing their energy into hers. Suddenly, the chaos on that side halted, calming the rocking of the crowd that had threatened to collapse the police line and sending a momentary calm through the entire mob.

"Who is that?" The red Gargoyle asked, curious about the effect that her arrival had had. Goliath did not answer, instead his eyes narrowed and his gaze locked onto the new arrival. He recognized her. This was the same woman whom he had saved from certain death. The one who had fallen over the edge of Xanatos' building during the battle on the rooftop. What he did not notice was that beside him, Demona saw her too. Her eyes were also narrowed, but not out of curiosity—out of something darker. The two of them remained rooted in place, side by side, looking at the same situation and the same person through two, completely different lenses. At that moment, only Demona knew that either those two lenses would merge to become one, or they would split apart, and if they should split, the consequences would be dire.