Gargoyles: The New Adventures of Old Pog

Disclaimer: Gargoyles is property of Disney. Old Pog, or just Pog as he is called in this story, is a canon character and thus is property of Greg Weisman and Disney. All other characters are mine…mostly.

Chapter 4: The Underground Railroad

Hugo Manor, New Orleans, 1840 AD

Lavue walked up to a tall female with yellow skin and fur, she had an unusual wing configuration, two wing fingers, and a third finger that extended halfway down her wing, and the abruptly stopped, webbed together with the ribbing of her main wing. Like all of the New Orleans clan that Pog had seen so far, she had an upturned bat-nose, and large bat-like ears.

"Charlebois. We met these gargoyles while awaiting Demona. They claim to be of a clan in London. They look... strange, I never saw wings with feathers before, but they are gargoyles, their odor confirms it," Lavue said in rapid-fire French, too fast for Unette to translate.

Charlebois, the yellow gargoyle turned and looked at the Londoners inquisitively. "Really? London? I had heard rumors that a clan had survived London, but never dreamed them to be true. This is a such big city, and there is so many humans. "

"The small one that looks like a Unicorn speaks French, the males do not do. Dia thought we should bring them here, because, as you suspected Demona lied us," Lavue continued.

Charlebois nodded and turned towards the visiting London gargs. Unette looked annoyed, she could speak French, but Lavue and Charlebois had purposely spoken too fast for Unette to catch.

"Welcome to New Orleans," she said smiling. "I can't believe you're actually here."

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Macbeth entered the parlor of the old shop and cautiously looked around. Places like the It is Nought Voodoo always made him uneasy. There's magic, and then there's dark magic, and New Orleans seemed to attract the darkest magic.

Macbeth looked around at the bottles and vials of various poisons. At the shrunken heads and Voodun dolls. The shop seemed empty…but Macbeth knew better than to think that.

"Madam Tia?" he called out curiously. "Madam, are you here."

"Well, well," a thick Jamaican accent called out. "Macbeth mac Findleach. Always knew you was gonna come crawling back tru my doors."

"I dinnae have time for this Tia," Macbeth said in annoyance. "Is he here right now?"

Tia looked surprised. "De situation 'ave to be pretty bad if Macbeth mac Findleach is looking for the void."

"The situation is worse than you know," Macbeth said grimly. "Soon though, it will be over; once and for all."

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"My family has tracked this Demon for almost 900 years," Gavin Canmore said. "Each time someone gets close, she manages to escape us yet again, but this time will be the last. We'll finish off the Demon, and the hunt will finally be over."
"If this thing has been alive for over 900 years," Sweet said looking at his new master in confusion. "What on earth makes you think that you'll take her down? It seems to me that she's got enough experience fighting your family that at this point you can't win."

Gavin looked annoyed. "I didn't ask for your opinion."

Sweet shrugged. "You're the boss. Where to?"

Gavin smiled, pulling out a mask with three red slashes on it and putting it on his head. "I've tracked her down to this city, she's a crafty one, and she's planning something…something big."

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"Our clan came here from Paris in 1719," Charlebois said as the walked along the corridors of the manor. "Only a year after New Orleans was founded."

The hallways were yellowed with age, and a number of oil paintings hung on the wall, showing pictures of French gargoyles boarding a ship, with hatchlings and humans.

"We wanted to get away from France," She said turning. "We didn't feel safe anymore, and when the clan had the chance to go to the New World, a relatively unexplored untouched place…"

"You jumped at it?" Pog guessed. Charlebois nodded. "We built Hugo Manor ourselves; we purposely designed it to look ratty and uninhabited. So that no one would want it."

"You did a smashing job," Unette said dryly as glanced around at the hall. She lifted up her hoof and looked down at the carpet in disgust. It did look like the manor would fall apart any second.

"It's an illusion," Charlebois said smiling. "If a human finds this place during the day, he'd never dream it was inhabited. He'd think that the manor is on its last legs."

"Amazing," Pog said. Grinning as he looked at a painting of a male French gargoyle dressed in turn-of the century apparel.

"Yes, well," Charlebois looked down ashamed. "It has not worked out for the best. We are a dying clan."

Pog and Unette stopped and looked at one another. "How so?" Unette ventured.

"You may have noticed that there aren't very many males around here," Charlebois said sighing. "In truth, we have only 5 males, and 14 females. Our clan was always small, but in the last three rookeries, we've had only two males hatch, both of them in the 1798 rookery. Our clan stands no chance of survival unless some new blood is brought in."

Something clicked in Pog's head right then. "Oh…you mean us."

Unette rolled her eyes. Peryton was going to love this; he'd started flirting with several girls upon arrival, and they'd dragged him off to show him something in the conservatory.

"Yes," Charlebois said looking at them hopefully. "Two healthy young male gargoyles dropped from nowhere? It's as if you were sent to us."

Pog and Unette looked at each other. Pog had frankly never thought about taking a mate. He had plenty of time…or so he thought. The breeding night was still 8 years off. There were several females that Pog fancied; Leona, Kitsa, Charlotte, and even Unette…an opinion he would not have the courage to tell her to her face.

"Peryton's going to be overjoyed," Pog said looking at his rookery sister. "I'm not sure how much help we can be though; there are only two of us. There are nineteen of you."

Charlebois nodded understandingly. "Of course…and we'd never force you into something you did not want…but I've got a mate, and so do Trystal and Roxana. And old Thembreil, he lost his mate after their fist egg. Though it tends against gargoyle nature…Thembreil is courting two girls from the youngest breeding generation for the sake of the clan."

Pog nodded. That meant nine available females that would be pursuing Peryton and himself. He got a headache just thinking about it.

"There is another solution," Unette interjected with a wry look on her face. "Our clan has 167 members: and quite a few unmated males."

"Are you serious?!" Charlebois exclaimed. "A clan of over a hundred gargoyles is living in one of the largest cities on earth?!"

"Um…well, yeah," Pog said. He turned and looked at Unette. "How many gargoyles is Knight's Spur capable of supporting?"

She shrugged. "In theory, about three hundred. It's a theory we've never had to test though; the clan's never been bigger than 250 gargoyles at a time. Due to our breeding policy."

"What breeding policy?" Charlebois asked, looking very surprised.

"Enforced isolation during the female's final heat." Unette said. "Limits the clan to two eggs per lifetime instead of three. It's not an absolute rule, but generally it's the clan's policy. Keeps us from outgrowing Knight's Spur—our ancestral home."

Charlebois's jaw simply dropped. "Ce n'est pas possible…it's juste simplement pas possible. Cent et soixante-sept ? A Londres ?"

"I assure you it is possible," Unette said. "Our clan is experts at hiding in plain sight. We legally own the land that Knight's Spur rests on, that's part of the reason why we're undisturbed."

"Your clan could join us," Pog said turning and looking Charlebois in the eye. "As Unette said, there's plenty of room."

"Merci beaucoup, Pog," Charlebois said smiling and shaking her head. "But our clan is needed here, and I'll show you why."

She led the pair down a set of stairs that led to the lower levels of the manor. They quietly entered the cellar, which initially looked like an abandoned wine cellar. A tall light-skinned man in his 40s with a strong cleft chin and dressed in Quaker clothes was helping four darker skinned humans into a tunnel. He glanced up at Charlebois as she came down.

"Is that the last of them Charlebois?" he asked, as he ushered a mother and child into the tunnel. A tall dark-skinned man, with muscles upon muscles nodded to the light-skinned man and ducked into the tunnel. The Quaker slid the wine-rack into place, completely sealing up the tunnel, and presenting the façade that there was no tunnel at all.

"No," Charlebois said shaking her head. "Thembreil is bringing four more down in a few minutes."

He nodded somberly, then he cocked his head at Unette and Pog, noticing them for the first time.

"Levi," Charlebois said smiling. "This is Unette and Pog, they came from London. Apparently there is a clan still living in London."

"A pleasure," he said smiling. He removed his hat and bowed for a moment, then he took Unette's hand and kissed it.

"Pog, Unette," Charlebois continued. "This is Levi Coffin. Some call him the 'president' of the Underground Railroad."

Levi frowned. "It's really a group effort."

"Underground Railroad?" Pog asked confused.

"Helping 'slaves' escape to the north," Charlebois snarled at the word 'slave' as though it filled her with contempt. Her eyes even flashed crimson.

"That's a very noble cause," Unette said, she turned and looked at Levi. "It doesn't bother you that you're working with gargoyles?"

Levi looked taken aback. "Who am I to question the will of the Almighty? Clearly he gave you and your kin the power of speech, for all I know, you're entertaining angels. If He can give a donkey the power of discourse, he can certainly do it with stone statues. I know not how He made you, I only know that you seek to do what's right, that's what matters to me."

It was Unette's turn to look taken aback. "That's a very wise attitude for a human to have."

"I just try to follow out the teachings of the Good Book," Levi responded. "I don't claim to do anything else. It's always safe to do right."

The large black gargoyle that looked like an oversized bat came down the stairway. "J'ai plus de fugitifs dans le foyer ici. Vous voulez qu'ils soit venu maintenant ? C'est presque l'aube."

"Vous remercier Thembreil, mais cela n'est pas nécessaire. Levi peut les prendre dans le tunnel. Nous devons nous reposer," Charlebois responded.

"It is nearly dawn," she said turning to Pog and Unette. "We would be honored if you would roost with us."

"The honor is ours," Pog said nodding. The three gargoyles trudged up the stairs and onto the roof, where Peryton was already waiting for them. He grinned at his rookery siblings.

"I've died," he said. "I've died and gone to heaven, but they decided that I was ready for Heaven yet, and so they sent me to the New Orleans where they're in desperate need of males."

He climbed onto a nearby perch and gripped it with his bird-like talons, flaring his wings and preparing for stone sleep.

Pog climbed onto an empty perch of his own, and looked uncomfortably at several females who were giggling and pointing at him. He planted his hooves firmly on the pedestal, not wanting to fall off of his roost during the day, as it was easier for hoofed gargoyles to do.

He glanced over at Unette, who had taken a similar stance. She kept looking down at the murky swamp-water and shuddering.

Pog noticed a male red-furred gargoyle, with a large beak, and the standard French attributes of a bat nose and ears talking with Charlebois. It took the hippogriff garg a moment to realize that he must be Charlebois' mate.

Each gargoyle snarled as they greeted the new day. There was a sound like the grinding of gravel, and each gargoyle became petrified.

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"She was here," Gavin said to Sweet. The pair of them looked around the wreckage of what had been 'Raven Dracken's Voodun Parlor' a hot spot for the acquisition of unusual spell ingredients in New Orleans.

The place had been torn apart, and there were shattered vials, and claw marks embedded into the solid stone walls. Sweet's eyes bugged out as he saw the body of Raven Dracken, the shop's proprietor lying in the corner.

"The Demon did this," Canmore said bending down. "What are you up to?"

"What could make claw marks in solid stone?" Sweet murmured aloud to himself."

"We need to take inventory," Canmore said looking up at Sweet. "We need to know what she took."

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Macbeth waited on the corner of Bourbon Street for a little over an hour after the sun had risen.

"So Macbeth," a deep penetrating voice declared. "You seek me out." Macbeth spun around but saw no one nearby.

"Where are ya," Macbeth said looking nervous. "Show yuirself."

"Come now Macbeth, you didn't actually expect to see me did you? After all, you're really seeking Nothing!"

With that, a masked figure wearing a dark cloak and hat seemed to shimmer out of thin air. His mask seemed to smile mirthfully in the early morning light.

To Be Continued…

Author's Notes: Levi Coffin was a real person, often called the "President of the Underground Railroad." It is estimated that he helped between 2,000 and 3,000 slaves escape to the north. The attitude that I have written for him reflects the attitude given in the quotes that I read online and in the family history book, because you see, Levi was an ancestor of mine.

He and his wife Catherine ran the "Grand Central Station" of the Underground Railroad in Newport, Indiana (Called Fountain City nowadays) They were Quakers and believed that all humans were descendants of Adam and Eve and like so many of the deeply religious of that time; despised slavery.

Levi was even quoted as saying : "The Bible, in bidding us to feed the hungry and clothe the naked, said nothing about color, and I should try to follow out the teachings of that good book."

I merely extended this attitude towards gargoyles as well. I like the idea of gargoyles helping fight a very serious injustice, but like Greg Weisman did with MIA it is the real people, like Levi, Catherine, and Harriet Tubman who are the heroes and not fictional gargoyles. I tried to pay respects to my ancestor as best I could, but in the end I leave it up to the reader to judge as to if I succeeded.