Diablo continued to work for his new master in the days that followed, patrolling during the day then being able to rest at night.
Shadow Man was pleased at how obedient his gargoyle had been so far. He became even more submissive willingly thanks to his amnesia. Despite sometimes having small distant memories, the devil was as blank as an empty piece of paper.
He continued to help Diablo with his flying too and teaching him to fight. Diablo at first didn't want to, not liking the idea of hurting anyone or anything. They were in the yard that day on the first day of fight training.
"Now, I want you to come at me with a punch to start," Shadow Man instructed. Diablo backed up.
"I don't want to hurt you, Master," he begged. Why must they have to learn to fight at all?
Shadow Man shook his head. "There are those out there that could hurt me even more than you could, my boy. You need to learn these techniques if you are to survive." He said in a growling voice. Diablo's ears flattened at the idea of anyone else severely hurting his master. He then nodded, balling his hand into a fist, coming at Shadow Man, swinging weakly.
Shadow Man tripped Diablo with ease, dodging the punch. "Pathetic, Diablo. Is that really the best punch you can do? I heard gargoyles were fierce warriors." Diablo felt sad he had disappointed his master, getting up and dusting himself off. "I'm sorry, Master. I'm not used to fighting," he said. Shadow Man shrugged. "Whatever. Again."
Diablo then narrowed his eyes in focus, trying to summon his strength and bravery, running at Shadow Man, trying to punch again. He missed a second time but then a memory blinked in his head; seeing a large lavender creature that looked like the ones in his dream use his tail like his in combat. Smiling, he used his own tail, grabbing Shadow Man's foot with it, tripping his master this time around.
Shadow Man was winded but not hurt, somewhat surprised from Diablo remembering to use his tail but knew it was necessary for the beast to do so. Diablo held out his hand, pulling his master to his feet, who dusted himself off. "Impressive," he said simply. Diablo flushed.
"Another lost memory helped, Master. It was another creature like the ones I saw in my dream. Were they gargoyles, too?" he asked.
Shadow Man didn't want to tell Brooklyn that they were once his family. "They were, but nobody you knew." he said. Diablo's ears fell again. He had hoped they were somehow related, but the gargoyles didn't have beaks like him, so they probably weren't his blood family. "I guess…" he said softly in sadness.
Shadow Man put a hand on his shoulder. "Forget them, Diablo. You can have a better life here with me, where you have all this open space around you, and no cities. Doesn't that sound nicer?" Diablo looked at him, seeing the 'care' in his master's eyes. He nodded. It did. "Yeah," Diablo replied.
"You've been a good boy in patrolling my lands and not wandering away, Diablo. I will give you a good meal tonight." Diablo smiled from his praises, which he still loved.
"Thank you," he said. He and Shadow Man then ventured indoors since they'd been practicing for most of the day.
….
Diablo lay in his bed that night after another hearty meal. He was slowly gaining his weight back after not having eaten in his coma. He found himself staring at the window at the night sky, unable to sleep for some reason, feeling the night air calling to him once again.
Why does it feel wrong to sleep at night? What's wrong with me? Diablo thought to himself, tossing some more under the sheets. It was 2:00 in the morning.
The red gargoyle grumbled from not being able to sleep, getting up and leaning on the windowsill, pushing the window further open. He was glad that it wasn't locked. Diablo smiled when feeling the night air on his face, the moon completely full tonight. But then suddenly, Diablo heard something in the air, eyes lighting up when it sounded like an intruder.
It sounded like there was something going on with the chickens. They were squawking loudly, thus alerting Diablo with his much better hearing than the human ears.
Diablo went to try to open his door. It was locked. He began knocking on the door to alert the humans. "Help! There's trouble! Wake up! Let me out!" He called out but there was no answer. Everyone was obviously sound asleep.
He stopped pounding on the door and then knew he had no choice but to go check out the noise going on down by the chickens. He jumped out his window to go check out the noises.
He ran over to the chicken coop area. Another thing that was drawing him into the night was he found he could see just fine in the dark. He saw a big creature that was chasing the chickens around their coop. He took a sniff and there wasn't much of a scent of the predator animal, but the chickens sure had a smell to them.
But from the sounds, it sounded like a cat. But it wasn't the normal house cat, it was more like a bobcat or a cougar.
Diablo knew this was trouble. He pressed the button on his anklet to alert the humans in the house. He knew he had to stop this predator before all the chickens were dead.
A memory surfaced again, this time with him facing off against some bad humans and him feeling fierce at seeing them hurting an innocent. This got the red gargoyle growling and his eyes started to glow. He let out a loud roar in anger that this dangerous animal was hurting the helpless chickens. He opened the door of the coop.
The animal stopped attacking and it looked his way. It growled its displeasure at having its chase of a meal disrupted. This trespasser was going to pay for ruining its dinner.
As Diablo sized it up, it was too big to be a bobcat or coyote. It was bigger. It was a cougar! It screamed its angry roar as well, sounding similar to a female gargoyle.
The cat stalked against Diablo and the gargoyle began to circle around the coop too. But it didn't take long for the cat to make its move and it jumped onto the gargoyle.
Diablo did his best to protect his throat from the cougar, but it was clawing and biting at his arms and legs badly. He even made some clawing motions himself, making wounds in the cougar's shoulders. One clawed foot found its way to Diablo's chest and it left deep bloody wounds there.
The wounds stung but he had to keep on fighting. His arms were also paying a good price too. He made one final scratch across the cat's face before a gunshot was heard and the cougar was shot dead.
Diablo was left panting hard and he looked up at the faces of his master and some other men.
"Master, I tried to tell you all that there was trouble, but no one answered me." The gargoyle hoped his master wasn't mad at him. "I was defending the chickens as best I could."
"I can see that, Diablo. Good job. Come. Let's get you looked at because these cats can be deadly killers like the wolves." Shadow Man directed.
Diablo got up off the ground with wounds throbbing on his chest and arms. He was bleeding out of several wounds that he knew of. They got him to the house while other men would deal with the cougar's body and a few dead birds in the coop.
In the infirmary in the house, Diablo sat on the table and the doctor had a good look at his wounds. "You sure took a beating from that cat." The doctor complimented him.
"I know."
"Well, we'll see in the morning how many of my chickens are left alive." Shadow Man said.
The doctor had to sew up a few wounds on his arms and chest. There were some scratches on his legs as well. Diablo had at least kept the cat from his face and throat.
All the wounds, even the ones that didn't need stitches, were all given some antiseptic medication so hopefully Diablo wouldn't get a major infection from the wounds. The wounds were then bound in bandages.
For the next few days, as bad as the wounds were, he would need to take it easy and rest up. The doctor also put him on antibiotics to make sure that infection didn't set in.
From cat scratches of any size, wounds could be deep and get infected easily, as well as from their teeth. There was such a thing as cat scratch fever too, and they didn't want him to get that.
Diablo was still in his bed with the bandages and stitches on him when his Master came to visit. He kept thinking about that memory that night and about the bad humans, wishing for more answers.
"And how are your wounds, Diablo?" Master asked with a smile under the hood. Diablo didn't feel much pain as he did the first night and knew they would soon take the stitches out. "Ok, a little sore but I'll live. But Master, when I was fighting my eyes glowed. How did they do that?"
Shadow Man was unsure, too. "Even I don't know, Diablo. But perhaps while we clean up your wounds again in another week the doctor can examine your eyes about it, discover the mystery." Diablo was nervous about that, but he nodded, hoping for further answers about his abilities. Deep down though, Diablo still felt that some other part of him is missing. He just couldn't place it.
But Diablo didn't mention his memory of fighting bad humans to his Master. The young gargoyle didn't want to make him angry about it, settling down into bed again as Shadow Man left him.