When Brooklyn awoke, he saw he was on the high castle-like building. It had quite a view. What an amazing city. The lights were coming on, making the city even more amazing and gorgeous to look at. His wakeup time was three hours after his clan woke up, given the time difference of where he was currently, in Utah.
He went to find his backpack to get his essential nutrition for the first part of tonight. He found it where he had left it. He picked it up and took off from the castle building. Maybe it was a hotel. But he was off to explore this city some more. He just really wanted to have some fun first. It was so big it was worth exploring. He would do his best to not be spotted unless he saw folks getting beat up or something. He wouldn't let that happen.
…
It had been a week since Brooklyn had come to Salt Lake City. He had been having a real good time here. He made sure to stay out of sight except for when he came down to protect the innocent. Baddies were on the run the instant they saw him so he didn't have to do much to intimidate other than making his eyes glow and growl.
Brooklyn thought that if he didn't have a clan back home waiting for his return, he would gladly settle down in this city and be its guardian.
During his time in SLC, he had visited movie theaters, attended concerts, gone to museums, gotten the food and liquid drinks he wanted. He had even snuck down once and rode a dude's motorcycle. It had felt good to ride one again. Maybe someday he could have his own again. He hoped so.
It had been over three weeks since Ray and his team had implanted the artificial womb into his body. He had stayed there for another two weeks before Melina helped him to escape. Then he spent a week on the run. Now he had been in SLC for a week.
As fun as SLC had been, Brooklyn knew he had to be moving on if he was going to get home soon. He had just really needed some time to have some fun. He hadn't known the last time he had really had fun, and especially by himself for that matter. He stayed on the highest building or even churches during the day. Some churches he had found here had gargoyles on them too. Sadly, he had found no other living gargoyles here in this city, though it would have been nice. Finding a female was his ultimate dream, other than getting back home.
On his final night in SLC, a short time after Brooklyn had eaten, just before he was ready to set off again to find his way out of the city, he suddenly felt a sharp twinge of nausea in his stomach.
"Oh, I hope I didn't eat too much." Brooklyn declared. He put a hand on his belly and rubbed it. Then he opened up a bottle of water and took a drink. He didn't know how much it would help but it was better than nothing.
The nausea wasn't that bad that he couldn't move on. From the few people that had seen him, they were likely going to start talking soon about a strange red creature here in their city that was likely attacking people. Brooklyn didn't want to get on the news. But then, who would believe crooks of any sort? But then, there was a chance that authorities could believe them since the whole country likely knew about gargoyles being in New York and might worry about them moving into other places like Bigfoot did.
And again, Ray could also be looking for him too. That lit a spark in him that he had to really move on. Of course, even the innocent ones might talk about him too. They had run off screaming or run off silently. None of them had dared talk to him. Brooklyn hated that his looks frightened humans all too easily. Sometimes it wasn't easy as simply protecting the humans for none of the gratitude they returned.
Brooklyn looked at his map and he began following the road out east again after he found it. It was the main highway, but soon it split up. He took the one that headed south on I-15. He had no idea where he was going. Possibly to Provo or something. It all depended on his wings and how they felt. He wasn't going to stop in one place for very long anymore. Just long enough to have his break for stone sleep and food and drinks, then he would keep moving.
At some point, he might take a train or something. His wings might get too tired to keep on constantly gliding like this. He might even walk at times if places seemed safe enough. He just didn't want to risk being destroyed during the day. He wished there was a way to get a message to his clan that he was free and on his way home.
Brooklyn wished he had some company to talk to to make his journey seem less boring and lonely. He had been lonely for quite some time, but now he was truly alone. He had been for over a month and a half. He was glad that he had managed to talk Melina into helping him escape Ray's captivity.
Living in a cage without being able to get out was no way to live at all. He knew how all captive animals felt like that. But then, some of them had been born into that life and knew nothing else. It might not have bothered them, but then, there were those that were captured from the wild that would be bothered by it.
"I feel so sorry for those poor animals that have to live in cages after what I went through." Brooklyn admitted. "I know how they would feel; never getting to get out and run around or get in the air. Well, that's my own thing." He couldn't help talking out loud to himself since he had no one else to talk to at the moment.
If he was seen from the highway, then he would start just gliding over regular landscapes that were near the highway. That might be the better thing to do so he would be less likely to be spotted from the streetlamps. He didn't want to be seen unless was necessary like protecting. But he still wouldn't stick around.
He had been heading to the southeast. It had just seemed like the better way to go.
Some nausea returned to his stomach and it made him groan. Had he eaten something that didn't agree with him? But he wasn't going to let it deter him from gliding. He was pretty high in the air. He couldn't just land. He hoped it would pass without disturbing him too much.
But as the night wore on, ignoring the nausea turned into dizziness too and he couldn't ignore it any longer. "Oh, I don't feel so good." Brooklyn said and headed to land on the ground. He wanted to get down there before he would end up passing out and crashing.
He got down to the ground where he felt like he was going to fall over. "I might need to get myself some anti-dizziness and nausea pills somewhere." Brooklyn told himself. He held his head. It felt like it was spinning. His belly hurt too. "I need to sit down." He said.
Brooklyn went to look for a resting spot. His wings could have a little break. He would still try to keep on a lookout for natural predators too while he was awake. He needed to stay awake during his nighttime ability to be active, at least while he was trying to get home.
He spotted a big rock and he went to go sit down by it to lean on it. He took his bag off and took out a water bottle to take a drink. He thought he was just thirsty. Drinking sometimes helped but little did he know what was really causing it.
The dizziness was quite much and he laid his head against the rock just trying to get it to pass. Come to think of it, he was a bit tired. All this traveling would be wearing him down. Stone sleep wasn't always enough.
Brooklyn looked up at the stars. It was nice to see them. But the dizziness got to him, making him close his eyes, thinking it would just be a few minutes. Before long though, he was fast asleep.
The embryo that had been implanted inside Brooklyn a month ago was the reason for his sudden ailments. This was only the first time, and it wouldn't be the last for this to happen to him.
He woke up again closer to sunrise. Brook saw the lighting on the horizon. "Great. How long was I asleep? Now the rest of tonight was wasted on moving on." He growled to himself.
Brooklyn pushed himself up. He took one last drink of water before he put it away. He put the bag down at his feet and he got ready to greet the dawn. Well, hopefully the rest of both ways would be enough to keep the ailments away, or so he thought.
The sun rose and Brooklyn took his pose.
…..
The next night, Brooklyn found himself near the town of Price.
He had woken up and felt that same nausea coming on. "Oh, what is wrong with me?" he asked. He gave his stomach a rub. "Maybe it just needs food."
Brooklyn hoped eating would settle his stomach down. He took some food out of his bag and sat down to eat the food, some bread, and apples. He also had some water. He would need to get some more water soon. The bottles were running on low. He was near the town. Surely there was a gas station there somewhere.
Brooklyn saw there were high mountains in the background behind the town. He didn't know which it was but he might find out. But just finding someplace that had food and water was his priority more.
He ended up breaking into a gas station to fill up his water bottles and grab some more food. He wished he could just jump on a truck or train, but he didn't know who he could trust to let him go with them. Maybe at some point he would.
Nausea welled in his stomach some more. He gave his belly a rub. He normally never experienced nausea this much before. But little did he know that it would become a normal thing for a while. If he had it really badly, he wouldn't eat anything, just drink his water.
Brooklyn kept traveling to the southeast as much as his wings could take him and he would stop for dizziness issues, bad nausea, or stone sleep. He wasn't wanting to stop for very long periods of time.
Before long, he entered Colorado. One night, the winds were getting stronger and Brooklyn smelled rain on the wind.
"I need to find a place to get out of the coming storm." Brooklyn told himself.
He didn't care if it was an old barn, tool shed, or stable. He didn't want to be gliding out in any storm right now. The land was pretty devoid of houses right now. But he could also just land and try to find a cave or something, or he would have to just get drenched if he couldn't find shelter.
But before long, he saw some lights in the distance, out in the middle of nowhere. He looked and saw it was a farmhouse. Thank goodness! Brooklyn wasn't about to attract attention to himself, at least not with not having been discovered.
There was lightning on the horizon when the red gargoyle made it to the farmhouse just in time. It wasn't long before the clouds released their fury. Brooklyn got drenched just trying to find a door in their barn that opened. He had to tear the hinges off another. And another one broke off, giving him an entrance.
"This place sure is rundown." Brook said to himself as he entered into the barn. Luckily, there wasn't any livestock in here. The barn was too rundown for that obviously, but from the look of things, it must have been a dairy barn at one point in its history.
He could hear the pounding of the rain on the rooftop of the barn, then some lightning and thunder cracked, making him jump a bit. Gliding in storms wasn't one of his favorite things to do but he had done them before if he really had to. He still couldn't help the shiver that escaped off of himself from being soaked in the rain. He instantly wrapped his wings around his shoulders to try to warm himself up some more.
Brooklyn looked around for any possible place that might be good enough to stay the night here. How he wished he could be home at the castle, watching TV or something, or reading in the library. He just wanted to be at home with his clan again. He missed them like crazy. Then, a sudden dizzy spell hit him again.
He put a hand on his head. "Oh, what is wrong with me?" he asked himself. He was tired of these dizzy spells and nausea. He didn't have nausea at the moment, but it would likely return. He wasn't eating anything that could be causing him such discomfort that he knew of. But then, he thought back to the night of the surgery that Ray had done on his stomach.
"Ray must have put something inside my stomach to hurt me." Brooklyn realized in shock. "But why would he do this?" He knew he needed to get home and get possible treatment for whatever was bothering his stomach lately. But that part was still a long way off.
Brooklyn kept looking around the barn. Eventually, he actually found a blanket on some straw bales. He pulled it off and wrapped it around himself to try to get some more warmth from it. Straw didn't smell too bad. From the dizziness going on in his head, Brook felt like he had to lay down. He laid down on the straw to try to get some rest. He put his bag beside him. He took a bottle out and took a drink of water. He wasn't usually prone to getting sick, but he felt sick at the moment.
When he put his water away, the dizziness and tiredness made him end up falling asleep on the bales of straw. The blanket was a bit scraggly, but it was enough to warm him up as the storm raged outside the rest of the night. This had been the first rainstorm he had seen in a while but he still knew what to do. He would prefer to stay out of the storms if he could help it.
Brooklyn woke up some hours later as it was getting close to sunrise. Sleeping at night was seeming to be something that he was getting good at lately. He would get some gliding in during the night but he had to eventually set down to rest his wings and refresh himself.
Now that he was awake after many hours, he was certainly nice and dry and warmed up again. The dizziness had passed too. Then he felt his stomach rumble for food.
"I hope I can keep my food down if I eat something." Brooklyn said to himself. He pushed the blanket off and reached for his bag. He unzipped it and reached in for a sandwich that was in there. He also got a bottle of water too. He needed to keep his energy up.
Brooklyn knew that sunrise was coming soon and he would need to find a hiding place in case some humans came into the barn, even though there didn't seem to be a reason to. He didn't want to risk being discovered and some science lab to be called while he was stone, or worse, smashed in stone sleep.
He saw some rafters. That might be a good place to hide until tomorrow night. He carried the blanket with him and he climbed up to the rafters. There was a window up there. It would let light in and there was some light starting to come in.
Brooklyn sat down in the corner of the rafter and felt that it would support his weight. He covered himself with the blanket for safety. He hoped no one would discover him. If someone did discover him during the day, he hoped they were gargoyle friendly. Even if he woke up and there was someone watching him, he would try to befriend them, but if they screamed and ran, he knew he would have to leave and fast, or he could catch up with them and try to talk to them. But running seemed more like a better option in case there might be a gun in the house. He didn't want or need to be shot at.
Brooklyn would worry about tomorrow night when it came. The sun didn't exactly shine this morning but the clouds brightened up enough that it came through the window and he turned to stone for the day.