Gargoyles
The Age of Apocalypse
Prelude
Written by Donald E. Fleming II
Story concept by Donald E. Fleming II
Disclaimer: All Gargoyles characters are the property of Disney and Buena Vista Studios and are being used without their consent or permission. The X-Men, Nick Fury, Brian Braddock and other related characters and the 'Age of Apocalypse' storyline are the creation, and therefore the property of Stan Lee and Marvel Comics. I am receiving no reward for this story other than the satisfaction of being able to share it with others as it is intended solely for my own entertainment and the entertainment of Gargoyle fandom everywhere.
September 28, 1980 Paris, FranceDemona landed on the roof of Notre Dame Cathedral and approached the stone gargoyle at the far corner. Leaning over the edge, she touched a hidden catch and a compartment opened up. It's still here, she thought as she pulled The Praying Gargoyle statue out of its hiding place. When Valjean and the others died during the French Revolution, she had hidden it there, hoping to come back for it later. Well, now is as good a time as any, she thought. Especially since she didn't trust the Archmage to keep his word. She needed something to protect her clan, and the magic inherent in the statue would provide that protection. Cradling it in the crook of her arm, she stepped back onto the roof, just as the head of the gargoyle next to her was vaporized by a laser blast.
She dropped down and looked up, catching sight of her ambusher. The Hunter!
"It's over, Demon," he said.
I have no time for this, she thought. She could attack him; her immortality guaranteed she would survive, but she had since lost her desire to fight the Hunters, ever since the last Hunter she faced ended up sacrificing his life to help her rescue a child during the Purge. But she doubted that this Hunter would understand or believe that. She took a quick look at the Praying Gargoyle statue she held. I can't allow this to be damaged, she thought. Her eyes flared red as she prepared to defend herself.
The Hunter rushed her, and Demona jumped over him, clubbing him with her tail as she passed over him. He went down with a grunt, but got to his feet again as she landed on the roof. She snarled as he pulled a knife.
"I don't want to fight you," Demona said.
"Then stand still," he snapped back. "And I'll make it quick." He charged at her again.
Demona grabbed his knife hand and threw him over her shoulder across the roof. He landed hard and lost his grip on the knife, which skittered over the edge of the roof. He watched as it disappeared from sight.
Demona looked down at the statue again. She couldn't fight while holding on to it. It gave him an edge on her, she was forced to hold back for fear of damaging it. She set it down and pushed it into a corner with her tail while the Hunter got to his feet again. Hopefully, he won't bother it, she thought.
The Hunter rushed at her, and this time Demona met him head-on. She landed several blows to his face before he realized she was pulling her punches. Is this some game of hers? he thought. If so…
He drew back and landed a hard blow to her jaw, staggering her. She backed away from him, but he took the advantage and kicked her in the stomach, doubling her over. Then he grabbed her around the chest and began dragging her towards the edge, intending to toss her over.
"Now it ends, Demon," he said, pulling her roughly.
Demona caught sight of the approaching railing and realized what he intended to do. She panicked briefly, not wanting to be thrown over the side, and she flared her wings, throwing him off. The Hunter staggered back and went over the side.
Demona dashed to the edge, expecting to see him plummeting to his death. But why wasn't he screaming, she wondered as she reached the edge of the roof. She looked over and saw him dangling from a narrow ledge. She reached down to grab his arm, but he was just out of reach.
"Hunter!" she called out. When he looked up, she extended her hand a little farther. "Give me your hand!"
"Why should you help me?" he asked.
"Because I'm tired of this constant feuding between us," she said. "I want an end to it."
"It will be ended, Demon," he said. He could feel the ledge begin to crumble under his fingers. "With your blood." The ledge gave way.
"No!" she cried out. Without even thinking about it, Demona launched herself downwards, trying to overtake the falling Hunter. She caught up to him and latched on to him, then spread her wings to try to avoid hitting the ground. She almost succeeded, but she had fallen too far, too fast. She managed to angle away from the Cathedral before she and the Hunter hit the ground hard. They rolled a short distance before coming to a stop.
The Hunter was quick to recover. Demona, however, had dislocated both her wing and her arm and now she was helpless and in pain. The Hunter sat up and looked at her.
"I…I don't understand," he said. "Why…"
"Papa," another voice called out. Demona looked up and saw a trio of youngsters, two boys and a young girl, racing towards them. The oldest one looked oddly familiar. "Papa, are you all right?" the younger of the two boys asked. "What happened?"
The Hunter looked at Demona again, still confused by her actions. "I'm not sure why, but she…" He stopped, unable to let himself believe what had happened.
"She saved your life, Da," the oldest boy said. "I saw her do it."
The Hunter glared at his oldest son, but it was true. The Demon had saved his life. He pulled off his mask and looked at Demona. "Why?"
Demona finally pushed herself up into a seated position and turned to face him. "I told you. I'm tired, Hunter. Tired of the fighting. Tired of the running. Tired of the whole damned feud. Your family has pursued me for over nine hundred years, and I am sick of it. I have been for a great many years."
"Try telling that to my grandfather," he said. "The one you murdered."
Demona looked at him and saw the resemblance to the Hunter who had died helping her. "Your grandfather?" she asked. "Your grandfather died helping me save a young boy during Apocalypse's Purge!"
"Lies!" he shot back. "You murdered him! My father told me you did!"
"Your father wasn't there," she shot back. "I was!"
"Da," the oldest said. "Maybe she's tellin' the truth. Maybe great grandpa did die helping her."
"Jason," he said dangerously, but then the boy turned his attention to Demona.
"What happened to the boy?" he asked.
"I…I don't know," Demona admitted. "I managed to get him to an evacuation ship and handed him to a group of humans who were heading for England and that was the last I saw of him. All I remember of him was his eyes and a birthmark on his neck." She pointed to the side of her own neck, just below the left ear.
The Hunter's eyes went wide in realization and he looked at Jason, who had a birthmark in that very spot. Demona caught the movement. "You?"
It all came flooding back. The memory of that terrible night he had blocked for so long. His father and grandfather had put aside the Hunt for the Demon to help save their families. His great-grandfather had come back to find him when he had gotten separated and hid in a burned out building.
"Jason!" the elder Canmore called out. "Jason, where are ye, lad?"
He was afraid, more afraid of being found by the monsters spawned by Apocalypse than by the Demon. And when he saw her pass overhead, he called out to her.
"I'm here," he cried. "I'm here! Help me!"
Demona heard the cries. Figuring it may be another gargoyle, she investigated and found the small human boy huddled in the building.
"You shouldn't be in here, child," she said. "We have to get you out of here." She took him by the hand and was heading out when she was confronted by the Hunter.
"Let the child go, De…" was all he got out before an explosion rocked the structure and set it ablaze. The floor beneath them collapsed and Demona almost lost her grip on the boy as he fell through the hole.
The boy dangled in mid-air and Demona watched helplessly as he began slipping from her grasp. She turned to look at the Hunter, who had just gotten out from underneath some debris from the floor upstairs. "Help me!" she cried out. "I'm losing my grip on him!"
The Hunter raced to Demona's side and saw her holding onto his great-grandson's wrist precariously. "Oh Lord," he said as he extended his own hand into the hole. "Give me your other hand, boy!" he called out.
Jason looked up and saw his great-grandfather, in Hunter garb, next to the Demon, both trying to save his life. He reached up to grab his hand, missed, and tried again. On the third try, the Hunter reached a little farther and caught his wrist.
"Got you," he said. He spared Demona a brief look in gratitude as he began pulling him upwards.
When he was clear, Jason looked up at the Demon while she looked at the Hunter. "We have to get out of here," she said, gesturing towards the flames. "You go first, I'll follow."
He almost protested, but realized that since he was wearing his battle armor, he would stand a better chance clearing a path for them. The Demon had little to protect herself, and she needed to carry the boy in order to protect him from the flames. He took a look towards the door. "This way!" he said.
Demona got up and pulled the boy close, closing her wings around his body to protect him from the fire and falling debris, and followed the Hunter through the flames. He paused for a moment at one point and pulled off his cloak, draping it around Demona's shoulders.
"It's fire resistant," he said when she looked at him. "It'll protect you and the boy from the flames."
"Thank you," she said. She set her charge down long enough to secure the clasp around her throat and then picked him up again.
The Hunter had gotten ahead of her, but he stopped when he heard her call out to him.
"Hunter, wait!" she called out. She caught sight of him and realized that they were almost out.
"This way," he said, turning towards the way out.
A plasma burst caught him in the chest, burning through his body armor, and killing him instantly as it threw him back into the burning building. Demona looked up in horror as she saw a pair of mutants waiting for her to come out. Apocalypse's troops, she realized.
"Come out and surrender," one of them called out. He wore an odd visor-type device across his eyes. The hand of the one with him was smoking from the plasma burst he had killed the Hunter with.
"Or we'll level the place with you in it," the other one said. "We really don't care which."
The one wearing the visor turned to look at his companion for a moment. She couldn't hear what they were saying, but she suspected they were talking about her. She couldn't surrender, she thought. After what they just did to the Hunter, she doubted they would allow her to simply surrender. They'd probably kill her. She would eventually revive, but she still hated getting killed. And what would they do to the boy? She couldn't surrender.
"Have it your way then," she heard the second one say. She saw him raise his fist and energy began crackling around him. She punched her way through the rotted floor just as the plasma burst hit the structure.
Twelve hours later, Demona dug herself and the boy out of the flattened structure. It had been nearly dawn when the mutants attacked and Demona had been forced to wait for them to leave before heading out, but by then it was too late, and she had petrified before she could start digging her way to freedom. Luckily, the boy had started the job and also hadn't felt inclined to smash her while she slept. When she awoke, she finished digging them out and took off across the blasted landscape, hiding periodically to avoid detection.
"Where's my grandpa?" the boy asked at one point.
Demona looked down at his tear-streaked face. "Don't worry," she said. "He's…he's safe." She didn't want to lie to him, but she also didn't want to break his heart.
"Will I see him again?" he asked.
"Someday," she said. "I promise."
Charles Canmore looked over at Demona, realizing for the first time in years that she had been the one who saved his son's life back then. She had pulled Jason from the building, guarded him, fed him, comforted him during those long days it took them to get to safety. When they finally parted company, it was reluctantly and she had disappeared shortly thereafter He got up and walked over to her.
Demona looked up at him as Charles Canmore, the Hunter, offered her his hand.
"It seems I owe you my life, De…" He paused. He couldn't call her Demon any more, not after this. "Demona," he amended. "And that of my son's. It is a debt I can never repay."
Demona took the hand and allowed him to pull her to her feet. "Perhaps you can," she said.
"In what way?" he asked.
"I protected your son from Apocalypse's troops," she said. "Will you help me to protect my own kind from him? Do this and we can consider the debt repaid."
Charles looked at his children. Robyn, who had voiced her reservations about being a Hunter, even though her told her it was their destiny as Canmores.
"Just because our ancestors hunted gargoyles doesn't mean we have to," she had said. Jon, who had been afraid that he would get hurt. He was almost right. Jason, the oldest of the three, whose life Demona had spared all those years ago. What would their fates be if he gave up the Hunt?
"On one condition," he said. He walked over to stand behind his children, his legacy.
"What?" she asked.
"Keep my children safe," he said. "That is all I ask."
Demona looked the three over. Already the oldest was showing signs of growing into a fine young man, and his sister would one day blossom into a fine young woman. Both would make fine Guardians to replace Tom when he joined the Princess and the Magus.
"Very well," Demona said. She extended her hand to the Hunter. He took it hesitantly and gave it a brief shake. "It is agreed."
To be continued…