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Brood of a New Age

8.

Walter Miller winced as a sudden gust of wind not only knocked his glasses off his head, but also ripped a dozen of his newspapers and magazines off the stand - which he had just been about to slide in - and blew them around his ears. He cursed - and without looking for his glasses first, he jumped out of his newsstand and collected the, for him now blurry, printed matter. He had just been packing up anyway. Very few newsstands were still open at ten, but the pubs around here ensured that he had good business, especially in the evenings, even during the week. When the night owls wanted a beer to warm them up, or the gambling addicts needed lottery tickets and scratch cards, or the hookers and the gluttonous potheads needed some candy. Newspapers, of course, were no longer selling at this hour. The few remaining ones he was currently collecting he would have thrown away anyway. Apart from that, he would soon retire. His son would be finished with his engineering studies in no time, and as soon as he had a good job, the lad would support him. That was the way it went, after all. The boy was sometimes a terrible smart-ass and when he imagined he knew something, he was very full of himself. But he knew what was proper. Walter hoped.

"Bloody hell," he muttered as he grabbed the last magazine he could barely see. He was blind as a bat without his glasses. Diopters -9 sucked. If Cindy Crawford appeared in front of him now and stripped, he would at best think that the greengrocer around the corner, who had already closed for the afternoon, had come back to give him two melons.

He grumbled about this lousy end of a not particularly interesting or profitable working day. And where had this violent gust of wind come from anyway? Now it was almost windless again. He felt around on the ground. The area which was no longer illuminated by the street lamps was particularly difficult for his eyes. But he had seen that one of the newspapers had been blown there. He groped around clumsily and instead felt something he couldn't describe. It felt leathery. And warm.

"Don't panic now, buddy," said a manly calm voice that somehow reminded him of a singer. Raspy, tinged with cigarettes and alcohol and personal drama.

He looked up, his hand still on the stranger's shoe (it had to be a shoe. High-quality gray leather).

But since he wasn't wearing glasses, he didn't see anything of the guy at all except colors clouded by the darkness when he looked up. Blue jeans- pretty tattered but that was in fashion. And a gray coat, which was actually much too warm for this time of year. And at the top, where the man's head had to be, which was just a blur to him- alienating red hair. One hundred percent dyed- which was also modern if unusual for a man.

His last lost newspaper was held out to him.

"Don't panic," the guy repeated like an insistent mantra and yet it sounded like a threat and now he realized how striking the Italian dialect was resonating in every syllable. And a bad presentiment came to him. He grabbed the magazine and stood up clumsily. Stay cool he said to himself inwardly.

"I'm not panicking, mister. Just now a gust of wind tore my glasses off my head and I can't see a thing. But I don't need to see to know what you are either."

The red-haired man croaked questioningly and Walter Miller turned around with a grin. This guy here clearly hadn't been around long. Neither in this country nor with "The Family".

He walked back to his shop and went inside.

When he looked out his window again, there was no sign of the guy. He listened for a few moments, then shook his head and pulled in the few remaining magazines on the shelf outside his window so he could close up.

"Where is he?" he asked himself aloud, stumbling backwards against the cigarette section in surprise as the man answered, "I 'm here." He was standing right in his booth in front of his counter. And was just locking the door behind him - like the gangster he was.

"Damn! How did you - I didn't even hear you come in here behind me."

"Sorry man. Heard I was a quiet one before. Part of the job. Or ... used to be. Maybe still is. I don't know."

Walter looked at the grayish stain in front of his counter and fumbled for his glasses.

Then he gave it up and sighed.

"So, as much as ever I suppose."

"What as much?"

"... Did the family send you or not?

"... You bet the family sent me."

" And?" No answer came, and Walter didn't even have to see the perplexity of the man in front of him. He could almost smell it!

"Well wonderful," he murmured softly and peered out his open little window to the outside world - although he couldn't see much but he would have seen if someone was standing right in front of it and there was no one standing there so they could talk openly. Just to be safe, he slid the window shut and turned the Open sign to Closed. He preferred the veteran mobsters who knew how the game was played. Get in, get paid, get out.

"I know you're new, mister. And I'll give you what you want. I've never been in trouble, and I'm not going to be. I'm grateful for the protection."

"Uhhh..."

"So how much do you want them to bring - to the family?

The coin finally seemed to drop with the clueless amateur:

"Well, ideally, seven."

"SEVEN!" exclaimed Walter. "You're a day early and you want SEVEN?"

"Well - seven we saw on TV back then and I sure hope they're not less by now. I really hope they weren't dumb enough to get shot out of the sky like clay pigeons." The guy said quite grumpily and his coat, which he still wore but was obviously only closed at the top button and fell like a cape (whatever was fashionable among the gangsters these days), fluttered strangely animated and showed that the lining was red like his hair.

"I think we're talkin' at cross-purposes," Walter muttered, reaching under his counter. The guy in front of him hissed menacingly.

"Don't make a wrong move, man! Keep your hammer in or-." Walter pulled out the envelope and looked at the theatrical blur in front of him. It was nice to have a gangster in front of him who was SO OPENLY showing he had no clue but in his off hours he just didn't have the nerve for that.

He held out the envelope to the guy. "I've got a baseball bat under the counter, my friend. Not a hammer. And you don't have to get upset, I would never go against my guardian angels. I just wish Mister Dracon's staff would do a better job of training new family members. Here's the usual five hundred. Five hundred every two weeks. If it gets more, I hope Dracon or Glasses will seek me out to officially tell me themselves - no offense to you."

"Dracon. Of course," the guy grumbled, tentatively stretching out one of his arms- just as gray as the coat and finally letting himself have the envelope... Even his hands were in gray leather gloves in which he must be sweating incredibly. These gangsters were styled from top to bottom these days.

"You're brand new in town, I can hear that. I didn't know he was already importing his countrymen over here."

" I'm really brand new. And honestly ... I'd much rather have information than money."

Walter rubbed one eye wearily. He really didn't feel like playing nanny to a junior gangster who had just fallen off the boat. But maybe it wouldn't be bad to establish a friendly relationship with the new bagman in the neighborhood. Just in case he had a bad couple of weeks and needed a reprieve. If he would be nice now - he could save himself one or the other broken finger someday (even if he would be retired in three years at the latest).

He extended his hand to the man.

"Walter Miller. With whom do I have the pleasure?"

"I'm ... Dante."

"Just Dante?"

"Yes - just Dante. No offense to you but the last guy who gave me his hand, I cut it off and beat him with it afterwards."

"Okay," Walter said with a wry grin, seriously having to stifle a laugh. These gansters always thought they could earn their spurs by exaggerating their stories to the point of absurdity. The guy in front of him was quite muscular around the shoulders. You could see that even with the coat (or cape?). But to cut off someone's hand and then hit him with it? Please!

"What information would you like, Mister Dante? If I know anything, I'll be happy to tell you."

"Gargoyles. "

Now it was Walter's turn to falter. "Huh?"

"Gargoyles. I want everything you know about Gargoyles. And about these Quarrymen. I have seen them dragging hammers around. What other weapons or tools do they have?"

Walter's frown deepened.

"I rather thought you wanted info on the background of Dacon's organization. Or about the other families in New York. So you wouldn't get into another situation like you did with me."

"We can discuss that afterwards. Right now, I want everything on Gargoyles for now."

Okay, Walter thought to himself. He could apparently forget his eleven o'clock show on TV - if he hadn't found his glasses he wouldn't have seen much of it anyway. Apparently it was true what had been rumored for months. That Dracon had offered a bounty for someone bringing him a gargoyle. Or the head of a gargoyle. And this newcomer in front of him wanted to score points with his boss with such a heroic deed. A suicide mission. But okay... in the unlikely event that Mister Dante didn't croak or even catch a gargoyle, it was all the more important to build a good relationship. When there was nothing going on, he read each of his newspapers himself - so he knew everything that had been in them over the last few months. And a great deal of the rumors that circulated, about which even the newspapers did not let on. But a lot of it was just that- rumors.

He pulled the two stools out from under his counter and lifted one of them over it. "Please, young friend. Sit down. This story will take a few minutes."

"Is it okay to smoke in here?" Without waiting for his answer, Dante had already lit a cigarette. Briefly, in the dim light of his not overly well-lit newsstand, Walter thought he perceived something truly frightening in the face of his new mobster through the light and the cast shadows. - Then the flame went out again, leaving a blurry gray spot in which the cigarette glowed, and Walter decided at that moment, that he needed to install a better light source than the desk lamp on his counter. He knew where every tiny little thing was in his little kingdom, but he never wanted his bad eyes and imagination to play such monstrous tricks on him again. He smiled all the wider at his own frightfulness.

"Of course you can smoke in here. I'll even treat you to a beer, Mister Dante."

"Now we speak the same language," the new Dracon henchman stated and sat down.

.

.

Fifteen minutes later, Walter still hadn't found his glasses. But he hadn't looked much either. During the day he often had people who liked to have a chat with him. But ninety percent of the time the others were talking and he was just their agony aunt. It was nice that he could talk himself for a change. But he always emphasized that everything was just rumors and even the newspapers were not really trustworthy because they were - well - newspapers that wanted to sell circulation. And the truth sometimes brought no circulation. Dante without-surname didn't talk much. When he did talk, he had a pretty snappy mouth (which made him either very popular or very unpopular with the other mobsters) and was also a bit hot-tempered - for example, when he announced what a horse piss American beer was. But otherwise he seemed okay. He asked some strange questions and remained strangely vague as if he had already found out something about gargoyles that he didn't know if he wanted to share with Walter. But he listened to all of Walter's stories with interest. Then the conversation had come to the Quarrymen and Walter had even been able to tell him who in the neighborhood itself belonged to them (He didn't. How could he? - blind as he was). Where Castaway himself lived was no secret either. Everyone in New York really knew that. He had a fancy apartment in Downstown-perhaps financed by old money, perhaps by donations from his followers or anonymous patrons.

"If the Gargoyles know where this guy lives, why don't they kill him?" asked Dante at that moment.

Walter took his own cigarette butt out of his mouth and gestured with it.

"The most important thing you need to learn as a member of one of the syndicates here in town, Mister Dante, is that these Gargoyles don't kill."

"What, they don't kill? Never?"

"On the contrary. They fight crime. Like superheroes. Like Batman." Walter grinned at this comparison. Flying monsters weren't superheroes. But ... he liked the idea that monsters fought for justice and wanted to make the streets safer - if that rumor was true as he had heard it from various mouths. But he wouldn't bring that up to the mobster in front of him.

"When this big one was on trial a few months ago, his peers supposedly tried to get him out of jail. But he refused to go with them. Supposedly so the American legal system would prove he was innocent of whatever stupid shit they charged him with. Imagine THAT. As a minority, no, as a non-human trusting the American legal system! Totally insane. They must be saints."

"Or crazy," Dante muttered with an incredulous tone in his voice.

"Or that. At least he's out again now. As far as I know. From the stories I read and hear - apart from Castaway with his smear campaign - I didn't get the impression that these beings wantonly put citizens in danger who were victims of the crimes or were just in the vicinity. I assume they are mainly a danger for anytime you notice gargoyles around, you should run fast. They seem to like to shove naughty boys into garbage cans, or wrap iron bars around them, or hang them upside down from streetlight poles. And then all the cops have to do is collect these pretty packages. Basically, the mere existence of such uhh types is bad for business. For mine and for yours, Mister Dante," Walter added to make it clear that he was not really a Gargoyle sympathizer.

"Wow," Dante said, puffing on his fourth cigarette, visibly stressed. The small cubbyhole was already full of smoke and if he didn't open the door or the window again soon the smoke would settle into his articles.

"You sure they never kill?" asked Dante again.

"Not that I know of." Walter shrugged his shoulders while the man in front of him muttered in Italian, presumably to himself.

"Non riesco a crederci. Come possono avere una tale minaccia sotto il naso e..-" *

"Paolo Conte!" exclaimed Walter, snapping his fingers with a grin.

"Huh?"

"Your voice. Reminds me of a young Paolo Conte. I've been thinking about it for minutes and now the name has come back to me. Do you know him?"

"Personally?"

"I mean the music?"

"I'm Italian, so-"

"Do you sing, too?"

"I ... no."

"But you're a musician. Besides the job for the syndicate." He leaned to the side to open his sales window again.

"Ha! If my sister has her way then yes, she's just-.

"WHAAAHH!" screamed Walter, falling sideways from his chair. He saw at the edge of his vision the gray shadow leaning over the counter but Walter Miller just stared through his open window into the darkness. Except that when he opened the window, it hadn't been dark.

"What's wrong?" asked Dante, and with a shaky forefinger Walter pointed outside. "'Just-just now I saw a - I don't even know what I saw. It was a face! A red face with black hair."

Dante was silent for a moment. Then he asked quietly, grumbling.

"I thought you couldn't see very well right now."

" I can't either! But - it was red and two red glowing eyes sparkled at me when I pushed the window open. And I saw fangs glinting. I think."

Dante stood up straight again.

"I think you should go home and go to bed now. Your eyes are playing tricks on you," the mobster said, seeming to be in a hurry to get out all at once. Walter stood up with wobbly legs and propped himself up on the counter as far away from his window as he could get. One hand rested on the baseball bat down there on the shelf.

"And you're going out there now?"

"Of course," Dante said rather coolly and casually. He obviously didn't believe him. Hell, if anyone else told him what he'd just said he'd dial the number for the nearest loony bin. All this talk of gargoyles was making him go gaga. Dante had opened the door, stood there for a moment, seemed to look around outside (did he believe him after all?). Then he stuck his head in again - another illusion of light and shadow. His face appeared monstrously elongated for a moment. As if he had-

"Thanks for the info, Miller. And for the horse piss. I owe you," the gangster said, and was out the door before Walter could say anything back.

.

.

"ARE YOU CRAZY! I was THIS close to breaking through the glass there and killing that human."

"Oh, back to basics, Grace?"

"Don't mess with me now Dante! I am SO mad at you! You make me want to grrrrr!" She made a fist and shook it with bared fangs. The same fangs Miller had just seen-if only vaguely.

"We were just talking sis, now don't bitch."

"I turn away from you for thirty seconds to study the map and you're off! I've been looking all over this block for you. Every rooftop, every fire escape. And then you're where you're not supposed to be! On the ground! And talking to a stranger. AND you walk into his store. What would you have done if he was a Quarrymen? Or had a gun?

Dante raised his index and middle finger claw (something anyone else would have mistaken for a peace sign) and said without thinking. "Andreti maneuver."

Grace rolled her eyes. "Seriously? You would have gouged his eyes out? Then put him in a headlock and snapped his neck?

"PieckspieksSnap. A matter of ten seconds. Little blood, no claw marks. As requested by Mister Clean."

"Don't call Luca that! And THAT is not what he had wished for. No one should be killed anymore."

"Didn't have to. That was a nice guy. We were just talking."

"Talking?"

"The human didn't see me, I swept the glasses off his head before I landed."

"Why, Dante? Why are you talking to a random human?"

"Because I already saw from above how thick those glasses were. And we just don't have that information network here like we did in Naples where Dad could send his Minions out. You remember that the newsmen always had the best info."

Briefly she looked at him in amazement. He guessed she wanted to retort something else. Protest somehow, make some kind of argument. But then she weighed her head back and forth.

"Dante. That was ... kind of smart. Even if you had no idea if it would work."

Her gray brother grinned broadly.

"Trial and error. Not much of a risk for me. I'm now aware of all the rumors circulating about Gargoyles and Quarrymen. We can check that against the info Luka brings us.

"You really have more luck than brains. What if the human had found his glasses while you were locked in the store?"

"First, I closed the lock myself and always had the door in my back. Second, that shack wouldn't have stopped me. And third-"

He produced a pair of glasses from his pants pocket along with a white envelope. Grace's gaze darkened. "So you left this guy alone blind with a gargoyle for more than half an hour?"

"I was the Gargoyle- totally harmless."

He began to laugh at the immoderate irony of his words. He was probably the deadliest person in town aside from Grace.

"And what's in the envelope?"

Dante made an innocent face that still looked completely devious.

"Like I said. Nice guy."

She snatched the envelope from his hand and looked inside. Raised her head and looked at him again with wide eyes.

"What? He gave it to me. He thought I was an Italian mobster. And he wasn't wrong. Just not from the local syndicate. How could I disappoint him when he almost threw the money at me? For his ... guardian angel."

Dante emphasized the word as if it had to roll off his tongue. The grin disappeared when he saw his sister's eyes begin to glow again.

.

.

Walter was locking the door of his store. In the last hour his working day had become really interesting. And strange. And scary. And expensive. He fumbled with his bunch of keys - half blind and with the streetlight behind him, it was really difficult. His pounding heart didn't make it any easier, either. The baseball bat was leaning against the door directly in front of him. The scare just now had really shaken him up. He could absolutely reconcile it with his pride to make the five-minute walk home tonight with his baseball bat - and maybe even sleep with the baseball bat under his pillow.

His wife wouldn't mind. Susan had disappeared nearly two years ago. During the lost nights. Walter didn't know why. He had thought she was content. Not happy-but content. Just as he had not been happy, but content. And he didn't know how, because in the evening she had wanted to pick him up from the newspaper stand. Then suddenly it had been morning again. Her front door key had disappeared but her credit card and purse had been at home. Susan remained missing - like so many others. His missing person report had been only one of many and Walter had quickly given up his hopes and illusions that she would come back to him. But now - tonight - he couldn't let himself feel sorry for himself again. He was not one of those depressed abandoned men or widowers. He could get along fine on his own. It was lonely at times, but at least he didn't have to fight for the remote anymore or constantly eat vegetables as a side dish to his meat.

Tonight was all about getting home without being scared to death of every shadow.

No sooner had he thought that than he heard that whoosh again. A jolt of wind came from behind him and almost made him fall forward. A shadow obscured what little he saw to absolute darkness. Walter cried out, the key falling from his hands as he snatched up the baseball bat and spun around ready to strike.

But he hit nothing with it. He opened his eyes a crack and saw - nothing. And no one. Not a person. No devil with red glowing eyes. The shadow had disappeared. The wind had died down immediately.

He kept the bat up for a few more moments. From the distance he heard laughter and voices. Music from one of the pubs around the corner. Normal evening. No rift about to open up under him to swallow him. Slowly his heart calmed down. Then something giggled. No, not something. Himself. Walter lowered the bat and rubbed his face with his wet palm and chuckled.

"Walter Miller, you're scared of wind and shadows. God, it's really time for bed. Or for retirement," he said with amusement to reduce his own tension. He sighed again, bent down to find his bunch of keys, and felt around on the floor. There was the bunch! And ... what was that?

"Ahhhh," Walter exclaimed but for the first time that evening out of relief and joy. His glasses! He was more lucky than good. They must have been swept outside his door earlier in the first gust of wind - however it happened. And now the second stroke of luck - he hadn't stepped on them just now. He rose, beaming with joy, and put on his visual aid. At last he was complete again. And as he saw - he saw everything again. There was not a crack in the glass, not a scratch. Immediately the night lost some of its terror - even with Gargoyles in the air above him. He still didn't have the best eyes in the dark. But the light of the street lamps was enough for him. Now, almost cheerful again, he let the baseball bat rest on his shoulder. No one would mistake him for a boy who had just come from playing with his buddies, but he almost felt that way right now. The first notes of a whistled song had crossed his lips as he walked around his stand and saw something lying on the shelf in front of his window. It was so prominent in the darkness that he probably would have seen it even without glasses. So the white envelope stood out even more.

Stumped, he approached, wedged the bat between his legs and took the envelope. When he looked inside, his suspicions were confirmed.

He had to correct himself. The evening had been interesting. And scary. But no longer expensive. Now that he had his glasses back and he was sure that while Dante thought he was a tough guy, he was probably the worst new bagman Dracon had ever hired.

Dante translation: * "I just don't believe it. How can they have such a threat right in front of their noses and-"

Thanks for reading, Q.T.