October 1, 1997
6:38 p.m.
Castle Wyvern
As the sun set on another day, a chorus of growls and yawns rose up around the castle as the clan broke from their stone sleep, but none of them felt particularly rested after being plagued again by nightmares. Nevertheless, the clan eagerly assembled on the battlements to face the new evening, freed from their slumber once more.
Summer had faded into autumn, and the nights stretched out even further. Normally, the clan enjoyed this time of year as they had more time to be awake and active, and the nights were still pleasant as winter had not yet arrived. There was more time for leisure activities and not just patrolling the city. Hudson could catch more of his programs that aired earlier in the evening, and couples could spend more time alone together.
But the odd happenings in the castle continued to occur, which led to a growing subcurrent of tension that rippled through everyone. The pleasure of longer nights was soon dampened by shorter tempers, and there was a shared sense of paranoia that was atypical for the clan. Despite their best efforts, they could not discern the cause of the mischief, and since the consequences were generally more off-putting than harmful, they felt they had little choice but to go about life as usual.
Such was the case this night as Lexington alighted from his perch and stretched, casually brushing off the stone fragments that still clung to his olive green skin. His brothers and their mates soon passed by him on their way inside, and Lex decided to seize the opportunity to talk to them about something that had been on his mind.
"Hey, guys, wait up," he said, scampering after them. Based on Lex's tone and body language, Angela and Katana could tell this was meant as business between brothers, so they continued on ahead to give the trio some privacy.
"What's up, Lex?" Brooklyn asked as he and Broadway hung back.
"Halloween is coming up, and I was thinking it would be fun to coordinate our costumes together this year. How do you feel about the Three Musketeers?"
Broadway and Brooklyn exchanged a look.
"That's great, but… Katana, Gnash, and I already have a plan for this year. I'm sorry," Brooklyn proffered a little awkwardly. "I kind of spaced that you guys might want to do a theme. It's… been a long time."
Not a long time for me and Broadway, Lexington thought, but instead of saying what he was actually thinking, he masked his tone and conceded the point. "Oh. That makes sense."
"You going with a pirate theme?" Broadway teased their Timedancer brother, pointing to his eye patch.
"Hey," Brooklyn said as he elbowed him lightly in the gut. "Type casting much?"
The two looked as though they were about to get into a playful wrestling match, something they would have readily done before, but this time, neither of them made a move. A halting, almost expectant silence hung in the air, and then the moment quickly passed. Things were not the same between the trio anymore. The dynamic had changed, and they could all feel it.
"How about you, Broadway?" Lex asked his other brother, eager to break the tension.
"Yeah, sorry Lex, Angela wants to do a couple's theme this year," he replied with an apologetic shrug.
"Maybe next year," Brooklyn said as he clapped Lex on the shoulder.
Lex wanted to shrug off what felt like a patronizing gesture, but he just sighed and nodded instead. He didn't want to be a jerk, and he didn't want the apparent divide between them to grow any wider, so he let it slide.
After another mumbled apology or two, Brooklyn and Broadway turned and sauntered on ahead to join their mates and families, leaving Lexington alone.
It hit him hard at that moment that his brothers had moved on without him. They used to be so close, even long before Castle Wyvern was built upon the craggy cliffs of Scotland. The three had been nearly inseparable, always going on adventures and getting into trouble together, practically since the time they'd hatched.
But now their trio had fractured. First, when Broadway and Angela had started courting, and then when Brooklyn disappeared and reappeared in the same night, only 40 years older, with a mate, 1.5 kids, and a beast. Not to mention the infamous eye patch. He huffed to himself—even after witnessing it all firsthand, he could still hardly wrap his mind around it.
In the blink of an eye, things had changed forever. Irrevocably. They would never just be brothers again, with only each other to lean on. That time in their lives was over, and it broke his heart to recognize that so plainly for the first time. Lex squeezed his eyelids closed, holding back the burning tears that threatened to fall. He hadn't realized how good he'd had it until now. After his brothers had already moved on without him.
Lex walked glumly back into the castle, dragging his tail behind him. How could they abandon him like this? How was he so easily replaced? It's not like he expected things between them to stay the same forever, but he also didn't expect them to change so soon either.
Perhaps that's what gutted him the most. He'd always taken pride in how much quicker he'd adapted to change than the rest of his clan. Take technology, for example. The machines and computers of this age were more incredible than anything they could have imagined, and yet it all came so easily to him. Almost like gliding. He looked down at his hands, and then clenched his fists. He shouldn't be the one standing alone in that tower, he growled to himself. The next time they needed him to fix their game consoles or build an entire motorcycle from scratch, they could pound sand! If his own brothers didn't appreciate him anymore, then maybe he should spend his energy on someone who would.
At that thought, he perked up a little as it reminded him that he'd made plans to chat with Amp that night. He'd been looking forward to it for days and would have woken up filled with anticipation but for the distraction of the Halloween costume debacle.
He shook his head, eager to put that conversation out of his mind and focus on the next one instead. Amp knew a thing or two about coding, and Lex wanted to pick his brain about some tips that might prove useful.
Actually, he was lying to himself, he admitted. He knew way more about coding than Amp did, but he desperately wanted an excuse to talk to him, no matter the topic. In fact, he was so excited for their chat, he skipped breakfast and headed straight to the command center. With a five hour time difference between New York and London, there was no time to waste.
But when Lex flung open the door, his laptop was gone. Again.
He growled with frustration as he searched the command center top to bottom for his laptop, but it was nowhere to be found. Had he loaned it to someone and forgotten about it? He'd let Nashville use it last, maybe he'd decided to borrow it again without asking?
Lexington hastily left the command center in search of the young gargoyle and found him playing with Fu-Dog and Bronx out in the main courtyard.
"Hey, Gnash. Did you take my laptop?" he asked a little impatiently.
Nashville paused, gently gripping the ball he'd been tossing to the beasts a moment before.
"No," he said casually.
"Are you sure? It's not in the command center where I left it, and you were the last to use it."
"I didn't take it," Nashville replied with a shrug.
"Come on, just tell me where you put it. I won't be mad," Lexington wheedled, his tone less than convincing.
"Dude. I don't have your laptop," Nashville snapped, annoyed.
Bronx chuffed as if he were agreeing with Nashville.
"Just… give it back, alright?" Lexington said angrily.
"I don't have your stupid laptop. Why would I want it? The dumb thing only has a two-gigabyte hard drive," Nashville muttered the last part to himself as he threw the ball and Fu-Dog and Bronx eagerly chased it. But Lexington heard him.
"That laptop is top-of-the-line, and I need it, Nashville," he said using his non-preferred name. "Give it back NOW!"
Nashville turned and glared at him.
"I. Don't. Have. It," he growled.
Brooklyn happened to hear the arguing from an adjacent tower and quickly swooped down at that point, landing between his son and his brother.
"Woah! Let's take a breather, okay?" Brooklyn said calmly.
Nashville and Lexington looked past Brooklyn and glowered angrily at each other.
"What's going on?" Brooklyn demanded
"Nashville took my laptop without asking and won't return it," Lexington accused.
"I did not!" Nashville said indignantly.
"Why would you think Gnash has your laptop, Lex?" Brooklyn asked, mediating between the two.
"He used it last night—" Lex explained.
"With permission, and I returned it!" Nashville corrected.
"Then why wasn't it in the command center tonight?" Lex threw back.
"I don't know. It's not my fault you can't keep track of your things."
"I need my laptop back," Lex growled, his eyes glowing white.
"Hey, take it easy, Lex," Brooklyn said, taking notice and quickly putting a calming hand on his brother's shoulder. "Gnash said he returned your laptop after the last time he used it, and we have no reason not to believe him. Did you possibly leave it somewhere else?"
"No! That's where I always keep it!" Lex shouted in frustration, jerking his shoulder away from his brother's grip.
"It's gotta be around here somewhere then," Brooklyn said, keeping his voice level.
"This isn't the first time it's gone missing," Lexington said through clenched teeth. "Someone," he looked pointedly at Nashville, "keeps taking it without permission, and then I find it in weird places. I just want it back!"
"It's just a laptop," Brooklyn replied. "I'm sure it will turn up."
But it wasn't just a laptop to Lex—it was his only way to communicate with Amp. All of their conversations were on it. Private ones. About stuff he didn't want his clan to read. What if one of them had taken his laptop because they'd found out somehow and disapproved? Who would even do that? Goliath could act irrationally in the heat of the moment sometimes, but he would be direct about something like this. Goliath wasn't sneaky.
Was it one of his brothers?
Or Hudson?
It didn't make sense for any of them to act like that, though.
Lexington tore at his non-existent hair and let out a frustrated growl before storming away, nearly charging into his other brother as he did so. He paused and glared angrily at Broadway for a moment before continuing to march off, his tail lashing about behind him.
"What's gotten into him?" Broadway asked, confused by all the hubbub he'd clearly missed.
"Lex lost his laptop," Brooklyn replied.
"And he's blaming Gnash?"
"I don't think he really believes Gnash took it, or at least, I don't think that's all that's going on here. You know it's not like Lex to fly off the handle over something as innocuous as a misplaced laptop. It's probably something else."
"Like what?" Broadway asked quietly.
Brooklyn gave him a look that implied he knew something but wouldn't—or couldn't—say, and that sparked a memory for Broadway. Snippets of a conversation he'd seen on Lex's laptop a few months back surfaced in his mind. A conversation between Lex and the London gargoyle he called Amp.
Broadway had only seen a small portion of the conversation, and only by accident—well, mostly by accident—but it was immediately apparent that there was some unspoken thing Lex was afraid to confess to the clan.
Something that made him fear banishment.
Broadway must have visibly tensed, because Brooklyn's expression immediately softened and he gave his brother a jovial elbow in the ribs.
"Relax. I'm sure whatever it is, it'll be okay," Brooklyn said gently, but confidently. Then he patted Boadway on the shoulder and left, Gnash trailing sulkily behind him.
…
...
As hard as he looked, Lex still didn't get his laptop back until later that night. Hudson found it in the library and brought it to him, having heard about the commotion in the main courtyard earlier in the evening. By the time Hudson handed it to him, Lex was nearly in tears with frustration. Humiliated, Lex snatched the laptop with only a muttered word of thanks before skulking off as quickly as he could, averting his eyes so the old soldier wouldn't see the wet trails staining his cheeks.
As he navigated the halls of the castle, Lex stole a glance out one of the narrow windows. Although it was still a few hours until sunrise in Manhattan, he felt a shattering sense of loss. Amp would already be asleep due to the time difference, and there was nothing he could do about it. He didn't even have a chance to explain what happened, why he wasn't there.
"Stupid, insufferable hatchling," Lex muttered under his breath as he scrubbed at his wet cheeks and took his laptop back to the command center.
.
.
.
October 4, 1997
7:00 a.m.
West Side, Manhattan
Coldfire and Coldstone had been watching one of the warehouses Elisa had asked them to keep an eye on. They'd stood guard on an adjacent rooftop all night, with little to report. Dawn came, and though they still held deeply ingrained instincts that drew them toward the castle, they decided to hold their position a little while longer.
The entire clan had been observing the list of warehouses Elisa had given them over the last several nights, to no avail. But something felt different this time. Off, somehow.
Coldstone looked to his mate and could tell she sensed it, too. Their unnatural ability to remain awake during the day had given them a unique window into the human world that the rest of the clan simply didn't possess. They could also see and hear things that even the most acute gargoyle senses failed to detect. Those distinct differences, combined with a deep, foreboding sense of intuition, now urged them to stay. They cast their gaze about, scanning for heat signatures or other signs of movement.
It had been quiet all night, but just as the dawn started to fade from coral to gold, two black nondescript cars pulled up to the warehouse, parking just outside the surrounding chain link fence. One large man in his late seventies, along with a middle-aged mustachioed man, got out of one car. A moment later, three other men, two blonds and a redhead, got out of the second car.
Coldstone and Coldfire zeroed in on the group, keying in on every movement and sound.
"Cops have been sniffing around warehouses," they heard the redhead say in accented English. "They haven't hit this one yet, but it's only matter of time. We need to move stuff tonight. We didn't want to risk calling you and getting into details over phone, but we need to act now."
The older man narrowed his eyes, slowly surveying the building, then nodded in agreement.
"Tonight. 1:00 a.m. You know what to do," he said, then he got back into his car with the middle-aged man. After a small pause, the older man rolled down his window, almost as an afterthought, and stared hard at the redhead. "And no fuck-ups or the boss will have heads." Without another word, the window rolled back up, and the two men in the car tore away from the warehouse, leaving a small cloud of dust behind them.
The other three men stayed. Two of them had already removed their blazers and rolled up their sleeves before unlocking the padlock at the entrance of the chain link fence and ducking inside the building a few feet further inside the perimeter. The redhead lingered a moment, staring up and down the roadway and across the street at the adjacent lots, before eventually following suit, pulling the warehouse door shut behind him.
Coldfire looked to her mate who nodded. This was surely what Elisa was looking for. Careful to muffle the sound of their thrusters, they took off from the neighboring rooftop and veered toward the castle, the early morning light glinting off their metal bodies.