Welcome to the third Chapter of Night Frights, since my second chapter was mostly about introducing my three and their powers, this Chapter will have both the Gargoyle clan and my meeting for the first time. I may even include some of the X-Men further in this Chapter. Please review and let me know if you like it, and follow for more up-coming Chapters in this story.
While Griffen waited in the alley for the trouble that was coming, Elisa stood with her partner Matt Bluestone watching the crowd as the large group still stood in defiance of a bill that would allow mutant children to be accepted into public schools without image inducers or collars that would stop their powers from manifesting. There were several individuals from a school for mutants, such as Charles Xavier, Ororo Munro, and Hank McCoy, who were speaking to the council about the ramifications of such a bill. They were trying to help Mutants who needed help and training on how to use their powers safely in a world run by humans. Their friend Logan was waiting outside mingling with the protesters keeping an eye out for any trouble from the crowd, no one noticed the short leather jacket-wearing man who was walking among the noisy crowd.
Logan growled slightly when he got shoved aside by two terrified teens that reeked of blood and fear, the two boys were headed to the middle of the group where the more hot-headed parents stood holding signs and talking back and forth. He noticed that there were two plain-clothed cops watching the crowd as well, a female and her male partner stood under a slight overhang from a nearby store, trying to stay out of the cold wind. With the way that the sky was clouding up, Logan thought that Storm was letting loose a little with her mutant abilities and causing a storm to start.
Elisa looked up from where she had been scanning the crowd on the lookout for trouble, she saw the two teenagers running through the crowd, and heard the gasps from the surrounding crowd as the two teens pushed past them looking for someone in the crowd.
"Dad, Dad!" The first teen had found who he had been looking for calling out to a man in a dark brown jacket holding a sign, standing with a few others in the middle of the crowd.
"Son, what happened to you, why is your arm bleeding?" The man asked as he looked over his son noticing the torn jacket sleeve and the bloody scratch on his arm, and the terrified face of his friend, who looked like he saw a ghost or monster that had scared him terribly.
"Dad, remember when you said that I could go off with some of my friends? Well, we went off into an alley to have a smoke, and we stumbled onto a mutant freak in the alley. He was digging through a dumpster when I went to ask him what he was doing he attacked me, ripping up my jacket and arm before Ted and Jared went after him and he knocked both of them out and then scared the stuffings out of Dan here." The son said to his father all while holding his injured arm, trying to stop the bleeding.
The father stared at his son for a moment more, before he handed his phone to his son saying. I want you to call your Gran and have her come and take you to the hospital, and have your arm taken care of. I'm going to go and take care of a mutant menace, the father then turned to four others who had been standing nearby watching the whole time. Let's go take care of that little mutant problem before it gets worse, he said to the four men.
Logan who was standing near enough to hear what the angry father had said, stepped back into the shadows as he watched the father and four others leave the group, hunting the mutant that had hurt his son. Logan followed the five men, keeping enough distance so that the other group knew nothing of a following extra shadow at the back of them.
Meanwhile, Griffen decided to play it safe and perch on the broken fire escape partly hidden by shadows, made by storm clouds drifting over the moon. The bottom landing of the fire escape hung about eight and a half feet up from the alley floor, giving him plenty of room for flight if he needed to get out of there in a hurry, plus enough height to make it hard to be hurt by being hit by anything. Lightning flashed in the upper atmosphere followed by a low rumble of thunder, Griffen shifted slightly aware that he was perched on a rusty metal fire escape, and though he was slightly worried about the electric storm that was blowing in, he was more worried about the sound of footsteps and voices that were growing louder as the minutes past. It started to rain, along with another flash of lightning lighting the sky for a moment, before shrouding Griffen in darkness again. Griffen sat still in the dark, like one of the stone gargoyles that stood on the top of the police station, he had only seen the stone statues once when he was looking for a place to hide with Holly and Cody, it had been mid-afternoon when he saw them, looking like they were guarding the building just by being there and protecting the officers inside. Griffen was pulled out of his thoughts when he heard the group enter the alley.
"Alright, where are you, ya filthy garbage eating mutie?" The adult male shouted as he looked around the floor of the alley as if looking for their mutant on the ground. Lightning lit the alley for a few moments right as one of the other men in the group looked up and saw what looked like one of those creepy-looking stone monstrosities that were on the police building, except the eyes of this one were open and it moved its tail slightly. The man who saw Griffen wasted no time in letting the leader of the group know that he found the mutant, by shouting. "He's up on the fire escape!" The other four came back from where they had been searching, soon all five men stood under the fire escape waiting for their leader, the boy's father to speak.
Griffen bit back a growl in the back of his throat, as he watched the group of men gather under him. He curled his tail closer around him as he waited for the leader to say something, his wings folded behind him, he stood waiting for them to make the first move. The father was the first to speak saying. "There you are, I was looking for you, could you come down so we can talk?" The father asked as he shielded his eyes from the rain that had become harder as they waited for Griffen's response.
Griffen watched the group of men before speaking, saying, "The ONLY way that I'd come down to your level is if your four friends went to the end of the alley and waited there while we talk, and you keep your hands where I can see them at all times. I won't touch you as long as you keep at least ten feet away from me." Griffen spoke just as an enormous bolt of lightning flashed across the darkened sky followed by a loud thunderclap.
Griffen waited as the men talked amongst themselves, the rain was still coming down in buckets soaking Griffen to the bone as he waited for them to make up their minds. After a minute or two, four of the men left walking back to the alley entrance, leaving the father standing in the rain looking up at Griffen. "Well?" The father prompted as he stood under Griffen's ledge of safety, on the broken fire escape landing.
"Step back, at least ten feet please, I need the space to land, unless you want to be knocked over by my wings," Griffen said with a smirk, as he watched the father comply too his request. After the father had moved back, Griffen dropped down using his wings to slow his descent to the muddy alley floor.
"Now, what did you want to talk to me about?" Griffen asked as his wings folded behind him and his tail curled around him protecting him unconsciously.
It took the father a minute to speak, after seeing Griffen as he came down from a good height watching the large mutant as he spread his wings and flown down, the size of him alone was worry-some, let alone his wingspan.
"I wanted to ask you why did you attack my son, and scare his friends?" The father said crossly as he stared at Griffen watching for any movement from the winged mutant.
"First of all, your son and his thugs attacked me first, I was just protecting my home when your son tried to hit me with a broken pipe. Second, after I dealt with your son his thuggish friends went after me so I protected myself." Griffen said with a bit of a snap. "That's why your son needs stitches and why his friend looked like he wet himself when he tried to hit me with a wooden bat, I caught the bat and shredded it right in front of him before breaking it in half and tossing it into the dumpster, I think that was when your son's friend wet himself before hightailing it away from here." Griffen finished with an annoyed huff, as he shook himself of excess water from the rain that was still falling hard. One of Griffen's cat-like ears swiveled back when he thought he heard something move on the roof, he was sure that he had placed both of the younger mutants far enough back on the roof in a place that would be hard for either of them to get to the edge without making some noise. The noise started again, this time louder and closer, making Griffen turn and look up trying to catch a glimpse of the noisemaker.
While Griffen's attention was focused elsewhere, the father reached into his right coat pocket and pulled out a small hand-gun and pointed it towards Griffen. Right as Cody poked his head over the edge of the roof trying to see if Griffen needed help or not. Griffen growled quietly when he saw Cody face and was half tempted to fly up there when the gun-shot rang out, Cody let out a yelp of pain before clutching his shoulder and dropping out of sight, back onto the roof.
Griffen turned, his whole body tense and ready to tear into the one being that had threatened his family and had caused harm to Cody, the father stood there with a little smirk on his face, still holding the small firearm.
"Now you can feel the same panic and pain that I did when my son came running to me covered in blood, besides I don't think that I killed your friend," the father said as he watched as Griffen's wings flared out and his hands bunched into fists right before his hands opened and a wicked set of claws shot out of his fingers like that of a cat. When he saw that he knew he was screwed.
Griffen had his eyes closed while his claws came out, when he opened his eyes they were practically glowing gold. The only thing he said was, "You shouldn't have done that, you just woke the beast inside of me." Griffen growled as his ears flattened and the fur on his body stood up along with his tail which was whipping back and forth behind him.
The father took a step back from the furious mutant that as every second past looked ready to tear him apart, with a pair sharp looking claws. The Father said suddenly nervous, "Hey, I am about 85% positive that your little mutant pal is still alive. Besides the fact that I still have four rounds left in the chamber, which is a pretty good reason to not do something rash."
Griffen just snarled crouched down as if he was readying for a pounce, his eyes set on the man that had hurt Cody, his wings flared out ready to balance him when he went for the man's throat.
The father jumped back when Griffen lept at him with an angry scream, right before slipping on a broken bottle and pulling the trigger on the small gun as he fell, he had been aiming at Griffen's chest, but when he slipped he lost his aim and the bullet went through Griffen's right shoulder and his wing before burying its self into the alley wall.
As the shot rang out, six different pairs of eyes turned towards the sound echoing from the alley-way, Logan who was the closest growled under his breath and quickened his steps still staying silent as he hurried toward the sound of a fight starting.
Goliath, Brooklyn, and Broadway had been perched on the roof of City Hall, watching the restless crowd below when the sound of a gun-shot rang out, Broadway immediately turned from where he had been keeping an eye on his human friend Elisa Maza who was standing with Matt Bluestone keeping watch over the large crowd of protesters with a few other plain-clothes officers, Broadway eyes aglow growled as he looked for the perpetrator who had used the gun.
The crowd below was starting to get agitated when they heard the gun-shot they got even worst, to almost panicking and mobbing the officers in charge. Goliath took one look at the nervous crowd below, before speaking to Brooklyn and Broadway who were waiting on his word before leaving to go looking for the person who had shot the gun.
"Go and find the person who was firing a gun, I will stay here and try to help with the crowd," Goliath said right before the two other gargoyles took to the sky in search of the person who had the gun.
Brooklyn was the first to notice the small human-sized body on the dilapidated building lying near the edge of the roof along with another small child scrambling over some broken pieces of metal and wood trying to get to the unmoving child as quickly as possible.
Broadway was more focused on what was going on below in the alley, right as they were circling to land, the second gun-shot went off, causing Broadway to snarl in anger, his eyes glowing as he dove down into the alley-way where Griffen was fighting with the father. Meanwhile, Brooklyn circled the roof where the two kids were before landing a little ways off from where the children were crouched. He watched as a little girl ran over to where a little boy lay near the edge of the roof, the girl knelt down and touched the boy before saying.
"Oh Cody, how is it that whenever Griffen tells you to stay put you never listen? Now you got yourself injured and probably scared Griffen half to death!" Holly partially scolded even though there were tears in her eyes as she looked him over. She didn't notice the smaller gargoyle land nearby, she was too worried about Griffen who from the sounds of it was tearing into the man that had shot at Cody at the moment, from all the sounds of snarling and growling coming from below. She then touched Cody, letting her healing mutation take over and start healing Cody, as far as she could tell all Cody had wrong with him was that he had a rather large bump on the back of his head and a bullet crease mark on his right shoulder.
All while this was happening on the roof, Griffen was struggling with the father's two friends that had come back when Griffen launched himself at the father with his claws out and ready for blood. The two friends wrestled Griffen off of the father when they saw him on top of him with his claws buried in the man's chest. One of the other men had gotten behind Griffen and grabbed Griffen's wings and yanked backward pulling Griffen far enough off for the father to roll away from the furious mutant that was trying to tear him to pieces, the second man grabbed the discarded gun and tried to aim at the struggling winged mutant.
When Griffen realized that he was fighting a losing battle with the three angry and frightened adults, he tried to take to the safety of the skies, but with his injured shoulder and a bullet hole in his wing he was only able to get a few scant feet into the air before he felt the bite and burning pain from another bullet, making his left side feel like it was lit on fire. Griffen let out a scream of animalistic like pain and suffering, before falling back to the dirty alley floor in a pile of tangled wings and limbs. Griffen was in too much pain to realize that there was another winged shadow swooping down into the alley with a growl.
Broadway landed almost on top of the downed mutant, before banking slightly, enough to land in front of the mutant protecting him from the men who were now trying to hide from the angry gargoyle. One of the braver men who had previously shot Griffen pulled the gun up and fired at Broadway firing two shots into Broadway's upper chest and emptying the gun on the gargoyle. The gun clicked on an empty chamber, as Broadway gave a loud growl before grabbing the now empty gun from the stunned man's hand and crushing it in his large clawed hand, with a snap and crunch.
Two of the men beat a hasty retreat in the face of the large gargoyle grabbing their injured friend, the father, who was sporting several deep claw marks to the chest and face. They were so focused on the gargoyle that they nearly ran into the smaller man who stood at the entrance of the alley, the stranger was wearing a leather jacket and a cowboy hat when the three men approached him he gave a low snarl before throwing the first punch at the man who had fired at the gargoyle, right after he hit the first man the other two started to try to stop him from doing it again to no avail, and after he had finished with the first man Logan moved on to the next man who was still standing. After breaking the second man's jaw and nose, Logan turned and picked up the injured father and pinned him to the wall of the alley, holding him there with his claws on either side of his neck, with the third claw slowly slipping out and touching the father's throat, before whispering in the father's ear.
"If you ever hurt another mutant again, I'll hunt you down and end you!" Logan growled out before he released the father, who he watched, as the cowering man stumbled away from the alley, before turning towards the fallen mutant, and the unknown creature who was still in the back of the alley. The mutant was still crouched on the ground half sitting on the alley floor, as blood dribbled out of his wounds, the unknown creature was still standing in front of the downed mutant, and was staring down Logan as if waiting for him to make the first move.
Broadway had folded his wings around him after the smaller man had scared off the other men, he had noticed that the smaller man had some long sharp claws that came out of his hands, and had guessed that he was also a mutant just like the winged mutant that was behind him. The winged mutant in question was still hardly moving from where he had landed, the rain that was still coming down was washing away the blood from the fur on the mutant as he sat there, which was one of the very distinct differences from looking like that of a gargoyle that and the fact that he also had feathers on the tip of his tail. The feathers were covered in blood and rainwater making them look messy, but they looked important to the winged mutant. Broadway was about to say something to the mutant when a child-like scream of terror rang out from the roof.
At the sound of the scream, the winged mutant was on his feet in an instant and was up onto the fire escape within minutes, after climbing the fire escape as far as he could, the mutant spread his wings with a grunt of pain and taking a deep breath took to the sky with a snarl of anger and fear.
While Broadway was down on the ground with Griffen and Logan, Holly had her hands full as she started to heal Cody's injuries and wasn't paying attention to her surroundings. When Cody started to come around from being knocked unconscious, and after focusing on Holly for a moment, he realized that they weren't alone on the rooftop. Cody at first thought he was seeing things, but after rubbing his eyes and looking over at Holly he then looked over her shoulder again staring at the thing that kind of looked like Griffen but smaller with horns and clawed hands, as for the color it looked kind of reddish with a white hair or mane around the face which was like a beak of a bird but with sharp teeth.
Lightning flashed letting Cody have a good look before being plunged back into darkness, the rain was still coming down in buckets and the thunder rumbled loudly around them, the thing that Cody saw in the lightning hadn't moved closer to them, all that it did was tilt its head up to the sky as it watched the storm clouds above them.
When the sound of thunder had resided Cody grabbed Holly's hand and then pointed towards the mysterious creature that was still watching the two of them.
Holly turned to where Cody was pointing and gave a gasp of fright, as lightning lit the roof again, revealing the small red gargoyle where he crouched a few feet away from them. Terrified Holly let out a scream as she jumped back away from the gargoyle, before losing her footing and sitting down hard on the roof.
Brooklyn felt bad about scaring the little girl and started to try to go to them without frightening them even more, but before he could try, there was a sound of clanging metal right before lightning struck the roof on the other side of the alley. The air around them was electrified and it lit the whole sky for a few scant seconds, backlighting Griffen as he flew up to the roof with a snarl of fury as he landed in a crouch ready to tear into whoever was foolish enough to touch his family.
"Griffen, you're hurt!" Holly exclaimed as she looked at him, his fur and clothes were covered in blood and his right-wing was also covered in blood and slightly dragging and he was barely standing up, holding himself up with his wings and trying to gather enough strength to go after the red gargoyle that had scared her.
Griffen started to stand, but that was when his body decided that enough was enough and his legs collapsed from under him. He fell to the ground with a groan, as another wave of pain washed over him, causing him to clutch his chest, as it felt like his whole middle had been lit on fire.
Griffen pulled his wings closer to him as he sat there, Cody crawled over to him getting under his right arm to try to support him. When Griffen felt Cody next to him he pulled his wing even closer covering from anything that could hurt him, he had left his left-wing out waiting for Holly to come closer.
Holly wiped the tears from her eyes before crawling over as well, and Griffen did the same to her, before wrapping his tail around him as well.
Brooklyn didn't know what to do with the large wing cocoon that held three injured mutants, he was still trying to figure something out when he was joined by Broadway, who had climbed up the old building after watching the smaller mutant on the ground walk back into the dark shadows and disappearing from sight.
Logan after leaving the alley he rejoined the rest of the group of protesters waiting till he saw his friends before he went to them he looked up and caught the eyes of another gargoyle on the roof of the Town Hall building, he kept eye contact for a moment before nodding his head in respect and then going to join his friends who were waiting on him.
Meanwhile, Elisa Maza had reached the alley where the gunshots had originated from, all she found were two men still unconscious, lying in the opening of the alley when she went further into the alley she saw signs of her gargoyle friends there. She saw the large claw marks that led up to the roof of one of the abandoned buildings that made the dirty alley, she looked up but couldn't see anything with the pouring rain coming down, she was about to go and look for a way to the roof that didn't mean that she had to jump high enough to reach the broken fire escape. While she was thinking it over she heard the sound of wingbeats, when she turned she was greeted with the sight of her friend Goliath when he landed in the alley behind her, she spun around with a smile on her face.
"Goliath, am I glad to see you!" Elisa said as she walked over to the larger gargoyle, she took one more look at the claw marks before turning to Goliath again and saying.
"Can you get me to the roof? I'm almost positive that one or more of your clan was here when that gun went off, and I just want to make sure that they are alright."
Goliath looked up at the building for a moment, before saying.
"Sure climb on and hold on tight," he said as he knelt down to let her on his back, after making sure that she was holding on tight he started the climb up the old building.
When they reached the roof, Goliath growled slightly at the sight of Broadway's bleeding injuries on his chest, Brooklyn didn't look injured just upset as he kept looking over at what looked like a couple of tarps at first glance, but when Goliath came closer he realized that it was a pair of large leathery wings wrapped around someone in the middle. As Goliath and Elisa kept approaching the wings that hadn't moved, Brooklyn stepped in front of them and said.
"Don't get any closer, they are terrified of us and after what happened in the alley they won't be too thrilled to see Elisa either."
Brooklyn tried to explain before Broadway picked up a small piece of broken brick and toss it towards the wings. Before it could touch the wings a fast whip from Griffen's tail caught the piece of brick knocking it back at Broadway, before curling around the wings again.
"What was that, and what do you mean they?" Elisa asked as she tried to wrap her head around what had just happened, still unsure if she had seen it happen or not.
"That is what happens when you throw something at me." A quiet voice spoke out as the wings shifted folding slightly back showing the winged mutant and the two smaller mutants that were still next to him.
Elisa had to hold back a gasp of shock and horror when she saw the way that the winged mutant had been injured, and how he was still able to protect the two smaller mutant children under his wings like that of a mother hen, even when he was coated in his own blood he still protected those smaller than himself.
Goliath was the first to speak after the winged mutant had shown himself to the rest of them on the rooftop.
"Greetings, my name is Goliath, and my two smaller winged brethren are named Broadway and Brooklyn, and my human friend is Elisa, what if I may be so bold to ask is your name?"
The mutant cocked his head to one side before answering the question,
"My name is Griffen, and these are my siblings," he said as he nodded to them to tell their names as well. The little boy was the next to speak saying.
"Hi, my name is Cody, and my sister's name is Holly," he said as he pointed to the smaller girl that looked a little out of it while she leaned up against Griffen.
Holly still hadn't said anything besides curling closer to Griffen, as she looked over the newcomers with a scared look in her eyes.
Cody however, had pulled away from Griffen's wings as he stood and came closer to Brooklyn and Broadway, watching them and Goliath with a smile on his faces as he approached them.
"That is pretty cool that your wings can do that, Griffen's wings aren't as flexible as your's though, but when he isn't hurt he can fly for long ways all while carrying me and Holly," Cody said as he looked at the way that the gargoyles had folded their wings around them like a leathery cape that hooked in the front with two clawed points that were on the corners of their wings.
He then noticed that Broadway had also been hurt, even though he wasn't bleeding as much as Griffen had been before Holly started healing him, he still had two bleeding injuries on his chest and stomach, that were oozing blood down his blue/gray front.
Broadway shrugged and winced slightly before saying.
"Don't worry it's not as bad as it looks, and it only hurts a little, plus it will heal up by tomorrow night, so you don't need to worry about it." Broadway finished saying that with a smile at Cody who still looked like he didn't believe him.
But before Cody could go on asking more questions, Griffen stood with a grunt of pain folding his wings back, Holly was still clinging to Griffen holding on to him with a hug around the middle, Griffen looked down at Holly before whispering to her.
"Are you alright, I know that it took a lot out of you when you healed me, after healing Cody and all, if you need a couple of minutes I can sit back down if you need me too."
Holly looked up at Griffen with a small sad smile before whispering back to him.
"If you can give me another minute before you stand up again, my head is still spinning and my stomach feels like it is twisted into a knot, but other than that I should be good enough for us to leave in a couple of minutes if you can give me that."
Griffen nodded, before slowly sitting back down, though when he did Cody noticed that he had, and came over to check on them, that was when Elisa came over to see what was wrong as well.
"What's wrong? Is Holly alright?" Elisa asked as she came over with a concerned expression on her face.
"I'm fine, just tired and a little dizzy," Holly explained as she sat next to Griffen, she took another deep breath before speaking again.
"Healing multiple people at the same time takes a lot out of me, and right now I was only able to stop the chest injuries on Griffen and slow the bleeding on the shoulder and wing, thankfully it didn't hit any bones on its way through," Holly said as she finished still not feeling like herself.
Griffen waited a few minutes before looking over at the largest of the gargoyles who was standing off to the side with one of the smaller gargoyles, speaking in low whispers amongst them selfs.
Elisa went over to the two them as Griffen stood and helped Holly to her feet, Holly was still slightly shaky as she waited for Griffen to come up with a plan for them, though it wasn't Griffen that spoke with a plan first, it was Goliath and Elisa that came over to them, Goliath's rough voice spoke saying.
"Elisa, and my brothers and I may have a place for you to stay till all three of you are healed entirely if you would like to live with us above the police station in the attic of the building it would be safer then being on the streets while you heal. That is if you want to if you don't want to live with us that is also fine by me, but I do think that my younger nestlings would love to have you at our home". Goliath finished speaking and waited for the older mutant to speak, while Broadway and Brooklyn waited for an answer.
Griffen looked at Cody, who was nodding his head, before looking at Holly who also shook her head yes, before looking back at Goliath and saying.
"Sounds good to me, it's just that with my injuries I can't carry either Cody or Holly till I'm fully healed," Griffen said with a sigh.
"Don't worry about that, I can carry Cody if he would like to fly with me," Brooklyn said with a smile.
And I can carry Holly on my back, Broadway said as he spread out his wings getting ready for flight.
After hearing this Griffen looked over the two smaller gargoyles before nodding his head and pulling his wings back letting Cody run over to where Brooklyn stood, Holly, gripped Griffen's wing for a minute or two before she was also going to Broadway, who wrapped her in a hug before letting her climb on his broad back.
"Hold on to my neck tight," Broadway warned before swooping off of the roof and catching a warmer updraft taking to the skies with Brooklyn and Cody right behind them, Cody giving a whoop of excitement when they became airborne.
Griffen shook his head at the others and was about to take to the air himself before looking back at Goliath and Elisa who was still on the roof.
"Are you coming?" He asked as he looked over at the two of them, waiting for Goliath to join him in the air.
"I will join you as soon as I get back from putting Elisa back on the ground, I'm sure that her partner is looking for her, as well as some other officers," Goliath said right before he gently picked up Elisa and took her down to the alley floor.
Griffen nodded before taking to the sky himself, his shoulder and wing still hurt but he could keep flying as long as he kept his smaller siblings in sight ahead of him as he flew.
Goliath joined them a few minutes later, and all four of them headed for the safety of the police bell tower, passing over the wet, busy streets as four shadows in the night.
Author's note: Well, I hope that all who read this enjoy it as much as I enjoyed putting it together! If any of my faithful readers like this, please review! I LOVE hearing from you! I will try to get the next chapter up soon!