A.N. Welcome to chapter two of Night Frights, I hope that all who read it will enjoy it. This chapter is going to be focusing on the mutant situation mostly. I will be introducing my OC's in this chapter. I do not own the X-Men or Gargoyles, the only mutants that I own are my three OC's in this story.

Warning, there will be flashbacks of child abuse and child entrapment in this chapter.

Chapter Two: Mutants and Memories

The wind had picked up and was becoming cold andbitter as it blew down through the alleyway, scattering garbage and dried leaves across the ally floor and walls.

Griffen pulled the tattered blanket around himself and his two younger siblings (who weren't his blood relatives but were mutants just like him, so he called them his family). He watched as the sun started to set before standing up and stretching his sore muscles, his cat-like ears twitched as he heard movement from behind them farther down the back of the alley. Griffen ducked down in the shadow of a large dumpster. He put his finger to his lips, motioning silence from the two younger mutants that crouched behind him. They watched as a drunken older male stumbled past them, not even noticing the three pairs of eyes that followed him on his tottering path through the alley.

Griffen kept his head ducked till the drunk had left the alley before he stood again, and reached down and helped Holly and Cody to their feet before lifting the lid of the dumpster that they had hidden behind moments before.

"Griffen, what are you doing?" Holly, who was eight, asked as she turned over a wooden crate so she could stand on it and watch what Griffen was doing.

Griffen sighed before answering Holly. "I'm trying to find us some dinner, I know that there isn't much around here, but I'll try to find something edible for us to eat."

"Do you need any help?" Cody asked as his stomach growled loudly, and he looked slightly sheepish before muttering. "Sorry about that."

Griffen smiled sadly before saying, "don't apologize, it's my fault that we had to leave the Morlock tunnels, not that there was much food down there either, but at least it was safe."

"That's not your fault either, Griffen, neither of us blames you for wanting to be out in the open and being able to see the sky if I had wings as large yours' I'd want to see the sky too. Besides, the Morlock tunnels connected to the smelly sewers, yuck!" Cody said, making a face at the last part. At this Holly laughed before going over to the spot that they had been sleeping in after leaving the Morlock tunnels, she went and tried to fluff up the small bedding in the large box that used to hold a refrigerator or something as large. The box was big enough to hold all three of them, though Griffen usually slept on one of the broken fire escapes trying to keep an eye out for any trouble before it happened. He was the lightest of all of them for sleeping when he wasn't sleeping he was keeping watch over Cody and Holly.

Griffen couldn't help but snort at Cody's statement, shaking his head as he dug farther into the dumpster, he knew that is was his fault that they weren't still with the Morlocks, it was the darkness and the dampness that brought back too many bad memories from a time in his life that he didn't want to relive again and again, besides the fact that the tunnels were too narrow for him to fully stretch out his wings in the tight underground passages and catacombs that ran under the city of New York. He tried not to shudder as the memories came again like a bad dream, he could still hear the chain that had been attached to him with a mutant power inhibitor collar. That chained him to the wall in the house of Mr. and Mrs. Bowers. The people who had taken him in after his parents had died when he was 10, the Bowers had a foster house for kids.

The only problem was that Mr. Bowers HATED mutants with a passion when Griffen was dropped off there one of the first things that he did was take Griffen down to the basement and show him where he was going to live for the next five years. Mr. Bowers told Griffen that his new chore was to keep and maintain the furnace and the water heater, he then showed Griffen the cot that was down there for him to use, right before sticking him with a needle full of tranquilizers, when Griffen woke he was chained to the wall, with no way out. When he tried to call out for help, Mrs. Bowers came down and told him that if he was quiet, her husband wouldn't come down and whip him for making too much noise.

While Griffen lived there for five years, he learned to keep quiet and not to lash out when getting belted because if he did, he was whipped with a small whip that was supposed to be used on cattle and not on children. After a while Griffen almost got used it, then about almost four and a half years into the beatings and captivity, Mr. Bowers came down to the basement and started to build what looked like a large cage for an animal, but knowing Mr. Bowers he knew that it was for something or someone else.

"Looks like you're going to have some company. I got two more freaks of nature upstairs locked in one of the bedrooms just waiting for their new accommodations down here to be fixed up first," Mr. Bowers said with an evil laugh.

After working on making a large floor to ceiling cage against the far back wall, Mr. Bowers then turned and started to walk towards Griffen with a cruel smirk on his face as he approached Griffen holding a large wrench in hand.

Griffen shifted as Mr. Bowers came closer to the point that he had turned into a shivering little ball of nerves as he tried to shield himself from getting another beating from the larger human, his wings were still too weak to take much abuse from him when he was angry. The last time Mr. Bowers had come downstairs he had been very angry and drunk, he had brought the whip and two full beer bottles down with him, after emptying one of the bottles he started having some fun with Griffen by cracking the whip on the walls and floor all around Griffen, cackling evilly whenever Griffen yelped in pain when the whip struck him. After he had finished the last of his beer, he picked up both bottles and threw them as hard as he could against the wall where Griffen lay crouched as he tried to catch his breath from running back and forth trying to keep from being struck by the whip. All Griffen did was try to shield his head from the larger shards of flying glass, the smaller fragments rained down on Griffen's unprotected body with several glass shards embedding themselves in his wings and back. Griffen spent the rest of that night pulling shards of glass out of himself while sitting in a puddle of blood and glass. After that had happened he was always scared when Mr. Bowers came near him, and though he didn't do anything to Griffen except shorting his chain so that he couldn't interact with the newcomers that he was going to be bringing down, Griffen still curled into a protective ball till he left.

After a few minutes of quiet, Griffen heard the heavy footsteps from come down the creaking old wooden steps that led to the basement, Griffen climbed onto his small cot and tried to stay out of the way as much as possible. was grunting and swearing as he carried down first of the two new mutant members, Griffen watched from the safety of his cot as dropped the first mutant on one of the cots inside of the large cage, from what he could see from his bed was that the new mutant was a younger male and that he had been drugged with something before being dumped on the cot like a bag of flour when he was done doing that he went back upstairs to bring the second mutant down. The second mutant was a small female which was also dumped unceremoniously on the other cot, before turning the light off and stomping back up the creaking stairs.
Griffen waited quietly, till the sounds coming from upstairs had died down for the night before he sat up and finally had a good look at the two newcomers. They were still unconscious, which Griffen was thankful for, he didn't want to scare them when he got up off of his bed and walked as close as his chain would allow him to get to the two of them. He looked over the two of them before letting out a sigh and walking back to his cot in the darkened corner of the basement. Lying down he listened to the sounds the old house made as it settled, before drifting off to sleep himself.

Later that night, Griffen was awakened by the sound of the metal gate rattling and the sound of someone sobbing softly and another voice whispering quietly. Griffen sat up on his cot, as he did his chain rattled slightly when he moved, he didn't think much of it, having grown used to the sound that the chain made each time that he moved. The whispering stopped, and it was almost quiet except for the crying which slowed down to a few hitched sobs now and then. Griffen lied back down and was starting to slip back into the darkness of slumber when he heard a voice call out from across the room.

"H-hello, who's there?" The voice called out stuttering slightly if fear, Griffen sighed before sitting up and climbing off of his cot his chain rattling as he moved closer pausing right before he felt the hard yank from his chain when he reached the very end of the now shorter chain. Griffen sat down when he felt the chain go taut, sitting cross-legged in a spot that he knew that the moonlight would hit him when it stopped hiding in the clouds. "Please don't scream when you see me, the moonlight should be shining any minute now," Griffen said softly as he waited to see their reactions at the sight of him would be.

As Griffen finished saying this the full moon broke through the clouds lighting the place that Griffen sat at, Griffen closed eyes against the sudden brightness from the light of the moon, he waited, expecting that either of them would gasp and try to get as far from him as they could.

But he was wrong, both of the two new mutants sat looking him over, the girl was the first to speak saying. "Hi, I'm guessing that you were the one we heard earlier. Wow, your tail is so pretty when the moonlight hits it! My name is Holly, what's yours?"
Griffen was shocked that the small girl wasn't scared of him or his looks, it took him a few minutes to respond to her question, but he smiled before answering saying. "My name's Griffen, and I'm glad that you like my tail." His tail waved slightly in front of him catching moonlight on the tip of it where instead of having a normal fluffy tip like that of a cat or dog Griffen had seven golden-colored feathers in the shape of a fan on his tail. When he moved it in the moonlight it looked just like a small gold fan, it also reflected a fan pattern of the far wall much to holly's delight.
"It's so pretty!" Holly said before she jumped up on her cot as she tried to touch the bright spot on the wall, Griffen moved his tail causing the bright pattern to move as well, Holly giggled before chasing after it.

Griffen smiled as he watched the little girl's antics, he had never been this friendly to anyone, the only people that he had seen besides Mr. and Mrs. Bowers, was a few of the kids from upstairs, who were brave enough to face the monster chained in the basement. He remembered when one of the normal kids had broken something upstairs, as punishment the guilty party had to spend a night in the basement with Griffen. The kid had stayed up near the door to the upstairs crying for most of the night, he had only come down to peek around the doorframe before going back to the top of the stairs and staying there the rest of the night.
Griffen was quiet as he watched the boy mutant who still hadn't said anything, the boy cocked his head to one side as if he was trying to figure out something that puzzled him. After several minutes of silence, the boy finally spoke, saying. "My name is Cody, and I'm sorry if I'm staring but you are the first mutant that I've seen that looks like you. How far is your wingspan? Have you ever been able to fly? Why do you have feathers of the tip of your tail?" Cody asked all while looking over Griffen.

Griffen laughed good naturally before he spread out his large wings, saying. "I'm not sure the actual wingspan, but I can easily touch both sides of the room with them when they are spread out, as, for flying I've only been able to get a few feet off the floor. As for the tail feathers I use them for flight and also as a distraction at times, you see I have a hidden weapon right behind these feathers." Griffen said before he closed the feathers on his tail like closing a hand fan, and holding his tail up so that both of them could see, he had two sharp bony points like spurs slip out and stick up ready for an attack.
"Whoa! That is SO cool! Is that your only defense though?" Cody asked as he marveled at Griffen's tail spikes.
Griffen smiled before answering Cody. "No, I can also do this if I'm really scared or hurt," he said as he flexed his right hand and then held it under the moonlight so the other two could see, his right hand was now sporting five large curved claws, like the kind you expect to find on a large cat on the tips of his fingers. "As you see I have more than just the fur, ears, and tail, of a cat," Griffen said as he grimaced slightly as the claws retracted and his hand relaxed from the way he had been holding it.
As Griffen finished speaking, Holly piped up saying. "Can you see in the dark like cats? Is your fur soft? Do you shed?" She asked as she bounced on her cot slightly waiting for Griffen to answer her questions.

Griffen sighed before he answered Holly's new questions. "My night sight is slightly better than humans, but when I try to see in the dark I get migraines from doing it. As for my fur, I think that it's soft enough, and I do shed it in the Summer when it gets hot. Here do you want to feel?" Griffen asked as he held his hand out to them.
"Can I?" Holly asked before reaching out her hand and sticking her arm out of the crack in the chain metal door pushing her arm out almost to the shoulder when it got stuck on the upper part of her arm, she gave a groan of disappointment before calling to Griffen.
"Well, that is as far as I can go without getting stuck in the gate, do you think you can reach me from here?"
"I can try to reach you, but Mr. Bowers shortened my chain for a reason," Griffen said as he stretched as far as he could with the chain reaching its limit, but he still was too far from Holy outstretched hand for him to touch.

"I'm sorry, but I can't reach you," Griffen said as his ears lowered and he rubbed at his throat that was aching from trying to reaching Holly.
"What if you tried your tail?" Cody pipped up as he watched as holly tried to reach Griffen with no success from ether side of the room.

"I guess I can try," Griffen said as he pulled his chain to the max length, and then turned around and sat having his tail reach out to Holly's reaching hand. It felt a little weird when he felt Holly's fingers touching his tail rubbing the fur on his tail gently and lightly touching the feathery tip.
"You're right it is soft," Holly said as she gently petted Griffen's tail. After a few minutes of Holly's gentle rubbing, Cody also joined by sticking his hand out and started petting as well. All while this was happening Griffen let his wings relax and spread slightly in the moonlight, the light from the moon made his wings glow golden where the moonlight hit it.
As both Holly and Cody kept petting Griffen's tail, they heard what sounded like a cat purring coming from Griffen.

"Dude, are you purring?" Cody asked with a disbelieving laugh as he looked over at Griffen, who looked just as surprised as Cody and Holly from his own purr.
"I didn't know that I could do that!" Griffen said in surprise, his left ear twitched slightly as he tried to process what had just happened.

Gargoyles, X-Men, Gargoyles, X-Men, Gargoyles, X-Men, Gargoyles, X-Men, Gargoyles.

Holly looked up from where she had been making their bed, she looked over at Griffen and Cody who had for the last few minutes stopped moving around in their quest for dinner from one of the large green dumpsters.

"Um, guys?" Holly said as she stepped closer to the two of them. Cody was the first to break out of the trans-like state that both he and Griffen had gone into.
Cody's mutant power was like that of a telepath, except instead of being able to read people's minds and thoughts, he had the power to tap into a person's memories, and replay them again in the person's mind. Making the person take an unexpected trip down memory lane, and making them feel everything that had happened in that memory.

"W-what? Oh no, it happened again didn't it?" Cody said as he rubbed his eyes blearily as he came out of the memory trip with a groan of disappointment in his acting up abilities.
"I'm afraid so, and it looks like you took Griffen along for the ride," Holly said as she pointed out where Griffen stood with a blank far off look in his eyes.
"Aw, kitty litter!" Cody said as he threw up his hands in defeat before walking over to where Griffen stood and tried to bring his friend back to the real world.
After a few minutes of waiting, Griffen slowly came out of it, shaking his head slightly as if trying to shake away the memories that he had just been in.

"Griffen, are you with us?" Holy asked as Cody looked at the ground ashamed with his powers that had caused all the trouble in the first place.

"Yes I'm back, and don't worry Cody, the memory that I went to was the first night that I met both of you, which is one of my few favorites," Griffen said with a small smile.
"Well, I'm just glad that it was a good one, and I'm sorry for dragging you back there," Cody said with a bit of a mumble as he continued to not make eye contact with either of his friends.

Griffen smiled before he stepped away from the dumpster and went over to Cody. "I know that this isn't your fault Cody, and I'm not blaming you just because your powers are acting up, right now. You need to learn how to control them that's all," Griffen said as he knelt down and rapped Cody up in a large hug. Cody stiffened for a moment when Griffen first hugged him, before completely collapsing into Griffen's hug with a sob of relief as he hugged Griffen. Holly watched the two of them hug, not knowing if she should join the little hug pile or not. She looked over at Griffen, who smiled before beckoning her to join them, which she did. After Holly joined the two of them, Griffen rapped his large wings around them both, making sure that both of them were safe and comforted.

"Aw now, ain't this sweet?" A new voice says from behind Griffen, coming from the front of the ally. Griffen turned slightly trying to keep Holly and Cody out of sight from the new person that had stumbled onto their home.
"What do you want, haven't you ever seen a mutant before?" Griffen said with a slight growl in his voice as he carefully nudged both of the two smaller mutants behind him keeping them hidden as best as he could. He stared at the large teenage male that was looking at Griffen with a look of both fear and disgust, before picking up a broken piece of pipe off of the ground, and then looking back at Griffen with a malevolent grin as he started to walk closer to where Griffen stood.

"What are you trying to hide there, Mutie freak? You steal something, or are you trying to hide more of your sewer dwellers?" The teen laughed evilly as he continued his approach towards Griffen, who had spread his wings, and unsheathed his claws, his tail was also waving about with the bone spur sticking out as well.

"One idiotic human, that is trying to start a street fight with me?" Griffen scoffed as he kept Holly and Cody behind him.
"Who said that there is just me to take you down Mutie scum? I have friends too," the teen said right before giving a loud whistle. After a minute or so, the teen was joined by three other teens, each was holding a weapon of sorts. Two of the newcomers had switchblades, and the third held a wooden bat, all three looked huge like they lifted weights in their time off from bullying other smaller kids.

The large leader gave a loud shout right before trying to strike Griffen with the broken piece of pipe swinging it like a bat with the heavy slightly jagged end swinging in a deadly arch towards Griffen's head.

Seconds from being struck with the pipe, Griffen shoved the green dumpster into the path of the oncoming pipe with enough force that when the pipe struck, it buried itself in the dirty green dumpster making it impossible to be pulled out, unless you had super strength, which none of the four thugs had.
"My turn." Was all Griffen said before he swung his tail up and tore through the teen's lower right-hand jacket sleeve and gave a nasty scratch on the teen's lower arm as well.

When the teen felt the pain from the scratch and saw the blood dripping from the tear in his jacket, he stepped back from where Griffen stood and said to his friends.

"I think I've been stabbed! That mutant menace cut my arm open!" The teen yelled as he showed his friends, the scratch and torn jacket. His friend with the wooden bat came up to take a look at the injury, right before the other two thugs with switchblades rushed at Griffen, one running to the side of Griffen while the second ran straight at Griffen, both had their weapons out and ready for blood.

"Not going to happen!" Griffen snarled as he focused on the thug that was trying to get behind him, waiting till the bully was almost behind Griffen before he spread out his left-wing with enough force to send the thug into the dirty brick wall of the ally. While he was busy with the thug that was trying to get behind him, the one in front of him slashed at Griffen catching him under the ribs leaving a bloody cut under the ribs. Griffen gasped at the sudden pain right before he grabbed the teen by the wrist and dug his claws in before bodily throwing him into the dumpster with a low growl.

That was when the last idiot teen decided to attack Griffen with the wooden bat, trying to strike Griffen on the head and failing miserably.
Griffen ducked the first clumsy swing and then grabbed the bat when the jerk tried again, his claws digging into the wooden bat easily.
"Wow, a new scratching post, you really shouldn't have," Griffen said before he started to scratch the bat tearing large grooves into the thick base of the bat, and braking the bat in half before throwing it into the dumpster where the other teen still laid knocked out in the dumpster where Griffen had thrown him.

Griffen then spread out both of his wings, unsheathed his claws and had his tail come forward ready to strike out with his bone spur as well as growling the whole time.

"Get lost, and take your friend who's still awake with you!" Griffen growled out, as he watched the two remaining teens take off running in the opposite direction of the ally, before turning to look at Holly and Cody who had been crouched down behind him for the entire fight.
"Are you two alright?" Griffen asked as he looked them both over checking for any injuries on either of them.

"I'm okay," Cody said with a grin as he tried to peek at the teen in the dumpster, Griffen pulled him away before he could look.

"I'm okay too," Holly piped up before she saw the still bleeding cut on Griffen's left side. "You aren't okay though!" Holly exclaimed as she caught sight of Griffen's wound, which was painting his side a deep red color. "Why didn't you tell me that you got hurt, again?" Holly scolded as she gently placed her hand on the cut, letting her mutation start to heal Griffen's injury.

"I won't be able to heal it entirely, but I can get it to scab over, and heal it the rest of the way after we all have eaten something," Holly said as she concentrated on healing Griffen's wound.
Griffen hissed at the pain that came from Holly as she made the cut slowly close up and scab over, before leaning back and sitting down quickly as she started to feel slightly light-headed after using her mutant power to heal Griffen.
Griffen smiled as he looked down at Holly who was now sitting, before picking her up in a bridal carry and with a few strong wing beats later he landed on the roof of the derelict building that made part of the ally and setting her down behind some old rusty pipes where she was out of view from anyone that came up without wings.

Meanwhile, Cody had peeked at the thug in the dumpster just to satisfy his curiosity before looking up and yelling at Griffen. "Hey, are you going to give me a ride too? I mean I can try to get up there, but I think that you would be faster, plus these two knuckle-heads are going to wake up sooner or later and I don't want to be here when they do."
Griffen sighed dramatically, before leaping off the two-story building into a nose-dive spreading his wings right before he hit the pavement, just so he could make Cody freak out when he did.
"Don't do that, unless you are trying to give me a heart attack!" Cody yelped as he watched his friend's theatrics as Griffen finally landed in the ally.
"I thought you said that you wanted a ride up, so why are you complaining when I got down here as fast as I could?" Griffen said with a bit of a smile on his face as he looked at Cody with his head cocked to one side.
"Don't give me that look, I know that you did that just to freak me out!" Cody said as he shook a finger a Griffen and his daredevil stunt.
Griffen just shook his head in response before kneeling down so that Cody could climb on his back after Cody had gotten on his back he took a large leap, spread his wings out and flew up to where he had left Holly before speaking again.
"Now, I will tell you what my plan is, but I need you to promise me that no matter what happens you will stay up here and that you will stay hidden," Griffen said in an all serious tone of voice that made both Holly and Cody look at him and pay attention to what he was about to say.

"Do you remember the two bullies that ran off? I saw which way they were running, and they were headed straight for the large crowd of protesters that are standing out in front of City Hall.
You already know what will happen when two bloody, terrified teens reach that already hot-headed crowd, they will come looking for us. And I can't carry both of you when I'm still injured and don't even think about me leaving one of you behind!" Griffen snapped as he saw Cody's hand go up, he then put it down and lowered his head at Griffen's angry voice.
"Then what are we going to do?" Holy asked in a quiet, scared voice, as she looked up at Griffen she saw the fear and courage shining in his eyes.
"No, Griffen, if you go down there, you could get hurt or worst, killed!" Holly said as she tried to stand, but didn't have the strength to stay upright by herself, and found herself falling back right before Cody caught her and helped her back into a sitting position. Cody then glared at Griffen, before he opened his mouth ready to read Griffen the riot act over doing something stupid and dangerous, even if it was the only way to get out of this new predicament that they were in now.
But before Cody could speak, Griffen spoke saying. "I need to do this, I couldn't lose either of you, plus I don't think that any of the thugs saw you, they were too preoccupied with fighting me to notice either of you." Right after Griffen said that he took a few steps back from where Cody and Holly sat and spread his wings and lept off of the roof, spiraling down to the dark ally below.

"Wait!" "Griffen be careful!" Both Holly and Cody called out as they watched Griffen land and get ready for the fight that was sure to come.

"Don't worry, I will be back soon!" Griffen called back at the scared voices that floated down from their hiding place on the roof. He then fluffed up his fur making himself bigger looking then he was, along with pulling his tail close and unsheathing his claws readying himself for the fight of his life, and the lives of his little family.
Unbeknownst to the little family, there were two sets of eyes watching from the skies as they patrolled the streets from above on silent leathery wings. The two Gargoyles glided over the alleyway before heading back towards the restless gathering at the city hall, all the while keeping a sharp eye out for any trouble.

Well, there you have it my second Chapter to Night Frights, one of my longest chapters yet! I will be adding a new story before I make the third chapter to this. To those of you who liked my Hunting With Friends story, I will be making a new crossover of Blue Bloods and Supernatural, with vampires as the main monster for the story. Thank you, Burbur, alienraptor, and James Birdsong for reviewing. And for AnimeGamerGirl23, Tenchi Saotome, and r.j. harma for following this story! Please Follow and Review!