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Brood of a New Age

105.

Walter had been watching Mr. Dante from the kitchenette the whole time during the fifteen-minute broadcast. But his face as he watched the other gargoyles on the screen remained serious and devoid of any major emotion even during their fight for Nashville's life. Only one nationwide channel was still on continuous transmission and this gave Walter the opportunity to switch over where they watched together on the news as demonstrations for the acceptance of the Gargoyle race took place in different parts of the world. In Pakistan there had even been riots with weapons and in other countries it was already clear that organizations similar to the Quarrymen were stirring. For every reaction there was always a counter-reaction. That was the only lesson Walter remembered from his physics lessons as a child.

But at the latest when they saw the records marked "Life", as the entire clan flew back to their castle, including a small gray figure in Brooklyn's arms, Walter saw Dante's tense shoulders slump a little in a barely perceptible sign of relief. Walter found it funny that he only thought of these strange creatures as Brooklyn, Lexington, Broadway and Nashville. He couldn't think of them as anything other than real persons with characters, aptitudes and sorrows, and he hoped the other people who had seen these television images felt the same way. It was so much harder to be afraid or disgusted by something you knew the name and a little bit of the personality of.

Walter dared to bring Dante a coffee (a little staggering but nowhere near as drunk as he had hoped to get). Not coffee from the store but from his own coffee machine, but he had better beans from the gargoyle's last stay and when Dante took the cup with a polite 'Thank you' and drank it, he didn't seem to care what it tasted like. The gargoyle's injuries were healed. He hadn't showered this time, nor had he redone his braid, but although his suit was still a total loss, at least his hair and skin were clean again. Walter had led Dante straight to the TV (after the latter had done something in his son's room and had therefore stepped out of the door five minutes after sunset,) hoping that the recordings would tempt him to leave quickly - preferably WITH his carpet corpse.

But Dante just sat there after turning off the TV and looked contemplatively into his coffee cup.

The gargoyle's silence made Walter more nervous than a whore in a church.

"So..." he said cautiously. "Those gargoyles ... you were with them in that fight in that warehouse? At that point, the footage was very confusing."

"Yes. I was there."

"The red female. She spoke the same accent as you."

Dante grinned. "Would be unusual if she didn't. She's my sister."

"Oh! Ah... I'm sure you're glad she and Nashville are doing well."

Dante drank the last sip of coffee, handed the cup to Walter and leaned back, crossing one leg over the other.

"I'm glad everyone's doing well. At least those who deserve it," Dante said cryptically. Whereas before he had always seemed like a spoiled prince and a volatile criminal on the way to the top, moreover like someone who really enjoyed it, he now somehow had a different aura.

Not depressed, not broken. He didn't seem like someone who absolutely had to get somewhere. He seemed like he was already there. Still threatening, still spoiled - but with a calmness in his body that was hard to grasp. No longer a prince. But matured. A king who was summing up his past battles and planning how to use his new power (which was perhaps only a power over himself and his future).

Walter cleared his throat uncomfortably.

"Where are you going to go now? With that guy in the carpet," Walter asked quietly, hoping it was a man. He didn't want to imagine that it could be a woman.

"I'm going to take him to someone who can do more with him than I can."

Oh God! ORGAN DEALERS! Walter thought for a second. Before he remembered that the corpse's organs had been rotting for a day already. He hadn't been able to peek into the room yet, but he hoped his neighbor below wouldn't get dripping corpse-soup into his dinner. So far he hadn't been able to detect any visible stench. But good - Dante wanted to take him with him. That was good. He wouldn't probe any further. Not to worry too much - that was how he had survived the last few years. But ... even though he still had a vague fear of Dante (even though he had never been anything but "polite" and "friendly" to him), he had to ask about other things. Dante - he realized now that he had seen the other gargoyles - was young. Maybe only in his early twenties, although Nashville had said they aged differently, but they were stone half the time. Dante was a boy - sort of - and Walter, even though his own son was not what he wanted him to be, felt something towards the gargoyle that any father would feel towards his child. Concern for his future.

"'Since ... whatever you had to do with the criminals is over now, surely you'll go back to the others. Surely things will be better now that many more people are speaking out in favor of your species. I don't think it's so far-fetched that Washington will gradually adapt laws to suit you and your needs. Some reports are already talking about petitions signed by hundreds of thousands."

"Maybe they will," Dante said, shrugging his shoulders as if such a thing didn't affect him at all. And it didn't, as Walter realized with his next sentence.

"But I'm not going back to this clan. I want to go home. I want to go back to Italy."

"But - Gargoyles belong together. I thought so. Are there others like you in Italy?"

The gargoyle laughed - but it no longer sounded like a mobster. Well, a little, but only subliminally. His voice was rich and genuine and seductive in a way that made a man like Walter uncomfortable because he liked that laugh so much. How would younger people feel then? Men and women alike.

Dante looked at him and his grin was real too, still creepy but also the kind that made you smile back.

"Dracon was right about one thing. I am one of a million. And that's why I can't and won't ever be able to fit into the structures of a gargoyle clan. I'm going back to the castle- but only to settle a few things. So that my sister and her mate can see that I'm all right and to agree on what to do next. But honestly ... after this whole American shitshow, I've learned that I'm at my best when I do what makes me see the light." He lifted his head a little and looked up at the ceiling with a grin, like a child talking about a future that might never happen but that he would reach for anyway.

"I want to find my inner peace. Maybe it will take me years to heal ... but I have to start trying. I will try to build my own clan and my own life. That broadcast - it ran for a few hours worldwide, did you say?"

"I-hä?- Yes! Worldwide on every channel," stuttered Walter, who was still quite perplexed to hear words like inner peace from Dante's beak - especially with that blissful smile.

"Excellent," said his guest. He stood up, reached into his back pocket and pulled out an extremely wrinkled card, which he looked at with an equally cryptic smile before going into the hallway where he picked up the phone and dialed a number.

Walter was surprised to hear him speak in the deepest, most glorious Italian when the person he had called picked up. His voice was even better in his native language and the man literally melted into the cushion of the couch, relaxing involuntarily after more than 14 very tense hours full of vague ghosts of fear in his head. He didn't understand a word, of course. But it didn't sound like he was talking to another mobster. He was disappointed when Dante said goodbye with a subliminally flirtatious "Ciao, Capo," and not twenty seconds later wandered through his living room toward the window with his corpse Wrap.

The gargoyle climbed into the window opening with his package under his arm, turned around again and gave Walter a strangely affectionate smile.

"I take it you don't need goodbye kisses?"

Walter chuckled, happy that his visitor was leaving but also wistful. His son had a girlfriend. Such a strange on-off relationship. But maybe ... one day he would tell his grandchildren about his strange "forced friendship" with a very special gargoyle. Shining children's eyes hanging on his lips while his son rolled his eyes at his tall tales would be a nice image.

"The time with you was anything but boring, Mr. Dante."

Human and gargoyle grinned.

"You're a fine fellow, Miller. You deserve better." The gargoyle nodded in the direction of the hallway. "Clear your son's room of my splinters. You won't see me again. Have a good life, Walter. You deserve it." Then he leapt from the window sill with such force that his claws tore the wooden frame apart. Walter stared after the flying gargoyle with a grin. The torn out window frame would be expensive. How did he explain that to the landlord? Nevertheless, he felt light and content. Maybe Dante's new spirit was infectious. Maybe Walter would hear from Dante again. He doubted that the sometimes diva-like gargoyle would lie low as the only one of his kind in Italy. Not in the long term.

As he went into his son's room with a hand broom, bucket and dustpan to carry out the last maid's task assigned by Dante, he noticed with relief that the room smelled a little of urine but not of 12 hours of corpse-in-August. On the bed was a slim, battered silver suitcase, which made the newspaper seller frown. This suitcase was not his and not his son's. Dante must have forgotten it. Why did it look so familiar to him? He picked up the suitcase and, irritated, read the note stuck between the dented but still closed lips of the suitcase.

As promised, I won't forget my friends. I doubt anyone will miss this. D.

Walter Miller made a questioning, inarticulate noise, opened the suitcase and felt his eyes widen to the point of pain. He toppled back onto the bed. The contents of the suitcase slipped out partially and slid down his horizontal body from his stomach to his throat. The tickle of the paper against his skin made it real. Real enough for Walter to start giggling. His giggles turned into loud laughter, loud enough for his downstairs neighbor to yell something that Walter couldn't hear over his euphoric laughter. For the first time in weeks, his heart wasn't racing out of fear. For the first time in years, maybe decades, his heart was racing with happiness.

He would have to wait a long time for the shining eyes of children at his story. But ... he could have the bright eyes of beautiful elderly women hanging on his lips while they all drank cocktails next week. By a pool in Florida. He WOULD have that next week. He grabbed what had slipped over his stomach and against his throat and made banknotes rain down.

.

.

Demona was finally able to stretch out on her couch after seeing the clan take off in the live footage outside New York Presbyterian Hospital. They had managed to zoom in close enough to see Lexington in Coldstone's and Nashville in Brooklyn's arms. Demona was interested in who the red, unknown female with the human in her arms had been, but she already had a pretty good guess that she was from Dante's clan and the little Camorra prince just hadn't told her about this sister - that little bastard. She swirled the snifter in her hand and looked at the liquid in the light of the television. The last glass. As a human, she had drunk the whole bottle during the day. But her transformation had removed her drunkenness as always, as the stone sleep had done in the past. But didn't she have a right to get drunk? Because of that shit on TV!

Now that she had thrown Thailog, Sevarius and Brentwood out of her company, including her premises, she was back at the helm of Nightstone unlimited and not "Mr. Alexander Thailog", but she still enjoyed going to work later. She had only wanted to check the first figures of the stock exchange in the morning and the first thing she had seen when she had turned on the TV was Brooklyn fighting for the life of his damned hatchling - she had spilled her hot coffee on her blouse in shock at the sight of her former clan members and she had sworn to send the bill for the cleaning to the clan. After her burns had healed, she had found the nerve to look at the whole record. Which wasn't hard since it was on every damn channel. What a nuisance to her routines! Was this how people had felt when she'd had her petrification spell broadcast on a continuous loop for hours? That was awful!

And even if Demona didn't want to admit it - the images of the clan, this montage was also upsetting for her. She had fumed with rage and shattered half her living room over the impertinence of this disgusting reporter to film her clan (ex-clan) so shamelessly in these intimidating, private, and then desperate moments. Impertinent to show the humans of the world how pathetic, how ridiculous, how ... vulnerable these Gargoyles really were. Demona felt massively repulsed by much of the recording and - ... yes... if she had allowed honesty even towards herself - also moved and fearful. But she couldn't admit such a thing - not in this century, not in this decade. So she blamed her palpitations and watery eyes at the sight of the battle for Nashville's life (in which Gargoyles, the reporter AND that Quarrymen maggot worked together) on her loathing.

She'd felt so disgusted and violated by the images that she'd called her chauffeur and secretary that she wouldn't be coming into work today. Instead, she had left the program running all day, had acquired a life-threatening alcohol poisoning several times throughout the day, and had recovered from it thanks to cursed Fey magic so she could keep on boozing. And all this time she had been waiting for joy to set in. Joy to see her enemies suffering like this. Joy that there would be at least one less enemy (or future enemy) when Nashville died. It should have given her a devilish pleasure to imagine how it would profoundly damage and weaken her ex-clan to lose their hatchling. Had they thought only the egg was under constant threat from the world (and yes, from Demona herself)? They had been stupid not to protect this youngster enough from the madness of the world. They deserved to have him snatched away from them by the disgusting humans.

All this had gone through her mind many times and she also considered whether this shameful act by the humans, the Quarrymen or whoever the fatal bullet had come from would drive the clan or at least parts of it into her arms. She had fantasized in her fuckfaced deadbeat hours that Goliath would come crawling up with his clansmen behind him, blubbering and raging at the same time, telling her that he had now realized that she had been right all along. In her more sober hours, she had known that this would never happen. But as mentioned, she had been waiting for some kind of comforting feeling and there had been neither satisfaction, nor gloating, nor anything else like it. Just this ... emptiness inside her, this painful tugging where her heart had been centuries ago when she saw the pictures. Even her anger at Travis Marshall had seeped away by the time the sun went down and she turned into a gargoyle again.

Not until now... after the shot of how the whole clan had obviously taken off, including an awakened Nashville, did Demona feel the tension leave her muscles and jaw, which she must have been clenching painfully the whole time. And still she blamed it on disgust and recent frustration that all the idiots had gotten away with this and certainly wouldn't learn a lesson again.

Well, after hours she got up from her couch (the cushions of which she had slashed during her transformation, just like her human clothes) and stretched. Then she switched off the television, leaving the room in darkness - not for her own eyes, of course. She didn't want to watch the rest of the broadcast - she had even seen the unedited version from the Internet on her home computer, plus reports from France and Australia, where she had branches. Right now, a beaming, fat-titted newswoman had been chatting to some of the many people who had been gathered outside the hospital for hours and were already singing their funny songs about hope and love again. Their eyes had been shining with enthusiasm and reconciliation.

Demona knew what mass hysteria looked like. And how quickly love could turn to disappointment and then back to hate. Yes - now most of the humans were moved, full of affection and goodwill, enraptured by the warmth, camaraderie and love that Demona herself had once experienced as part of a gargoyle clan. As if the humans wouldn't remember their hatred of gargoyles in a few weeks or after the next negative incident. As if humans would forget their true destructive nature in the long run. It was so ridiculous. So deceptive to stupid, naive little Gargoyles like the Manhattan Clan. And yet... current events tugged at certain coils in Demona's mind, reminding her of the project Sevarius had started that was now on hold. It should make it easier for her to keep up her cover as Domenique Destine, but it wasn't really that important. But ... If - as unlikely as it was - the Wind of Change turned out to be a tailwind for the gargoyle race ... then perhaps a resumption of the project, maybe even an expansion, wouldn't be a bad idea. She could finish it herself if only ... she needed a medium for it. To be able to go into mass production. A smirk tugged at Demona's lips at the thought that at some point this project would make all the gargoyles in the world-

She lost her thought and smile when the doorbell rang.

HER DOOR!

She threw herself to the floor, plucked one of her weapons from under the couch, crawled to one of the building services control panels and pressed the code for the automatic door opener. From the safety of her couch, she saw the door slowly swing open inwards... but saw no shadow scurry in. Nor did she hear anyone calling or whispering, shoes or claws on the tiles of her entryway. Just a kind of anxious breathing. She pricked up her ears and heard a human heartbeat. But quite fast and fearful. The heartbeat of an intruder would sound very different. And which intruder was ringing?

Demona crept to the door far enough to peek out. And saw no one standing there.

But when her gaze lowered, there was a corpse on her doorstep.

NO, not a corpse.

This guy, hands behind his back and ankles bound with duct tape, a sack over his head so he couldn't see, naked except for white piss-stained underpants, was the source of the frantic heartbeat. Demona wrinkled her nose in confusion and disgust. Still vigilant, scanning the area of her garden for signs of an ambush, she stepped closer into her doorway until she stood in front of the guy lying there. She let out a discontented, disparaging growl and this caused the bound worm in front of her to stiffen, gasp in panic, emit muffled questioning sounds and turn its head in the sack in an unreflective instinct to learn more about its surroundings and the dangers therein. Now she also saw that there was a note on the human's naked chest. Stapled to his skin at all four corners and therefore already quite bloody. Demona took another look at her surroundings. Before she put the weapon away, bent down and tore the piece of paper from the human's body and read it:

Dear Demona,

no woman should say to an Italian (and even less to me) that he is an ingrate lover. And even if you wanted to blow me away (and I still think you are an overreacting nutcase) I must admit that I enjoyed our tryst. Thanks for the information about my clan of origin, too. Especially for that I send you this gift. I think that even you will remember me fondly with it. I would have liked to gut it for you but I made a promise not to kill any more humans. I think you are more of a DIY woman anyway. Have fun, D.

P.S. You will be as happy as I am to hear that I am leaving this American nightmare behind. I have other plans in Italy. If all goes well you and everyone else will hear from me whether you like it or not. Drop by for a ride if you leave your guns at the hotel. Arrivederci, bellezza.

"Drop by for a ride - you arrogant bastard," Demona hissed, however, not quite without being able to hide her amusement at this impertinent letter.

Then she lowered her eyes to the human, naked except for his underpants, writhing like a worm. Why would Dante lay such an annoying "gift" at her feet as a parting gift? And why did he think she would like it? Sure, she liked killing humans - who didn't? But even if it was a Quarrymen or something like that, ordering her people alone to dispose of the body was unedifying. She wrinkled her nose, grabbed the sack and tore it off the human's head. He let out a fearful whimper, blinked hard, and when his eyes found hers, they widened in stunned panic. The gag in his mouth (sport socks?) prevented the human from speaking, from cursing, from pleading. You name it. Despite his bound wrists and ankles - he tried to wriggle away in mindless panic.

Demona herself was stunned for a few seconds and didn't realize who she was seeing there. When the former Quarrymen leader, who had caused so much trouble for her and her former and future clan, had just rolled down the last steps, a broad smile spread across her features. Wider than she had been able to manage for decades - perhaps for centuries. Her dark laughter echoed across the compound as she hopped down the steps with a childlike vigor not seen in a thousand years. She grabbed her wordless but shrilling gift by the wrists tied behind his back, dislocated both his shoulders at the opportunity, and carried him inside.

"Welcome to Destine Manor, Castaway. You and I- we are going to have SO much fun," she purred, giggling, before the door slammed shut behind her.

I love it when people get what they deserve. I'm not really an advocate of torture - but for some people, death is just too good. Maybe human nature (maybe German nature) ... most likely it's just me that's so depraved. Whatevs- have a nice day ^^

Thanks for reading, Q.T.