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Brood of a New Age

65.

At the same time, Elisa and Matt Bluestone, along with the entire GTF, were taking witness statements. Although the guys in the hazmat suits had assured her that no one would suffer any harm from the spilled toxin, after 10 such incidents within the last year, she was pretty sure that something was stinking fishy about these incidents regarding short-term mass psychosis. Even if she found it laudable that Xanatos obviously wanted to whitewash certain real or fake gargoyle sightings, he really had to come up with some new hoaxes, she thought morosely. Or ... was it not a hoax at all? Had he really? Heart pounding, she watched as the shrink-wrap crew wandered around with their air quality meters, taking samples from everyone's skin, the iron bar that had just been collected as evidence, and even the curb. Briefly she wondered if it was good to be standing around here WITHOUT such a suit and if that was the reason why her throat was tingling so strangely and she was getting gray spots in front of her eyes or if that was just the warmth. Then one of the guys under the lens of one of the TV cameras took off his hood and started to make his statement. And hopefully the lies he spewed were good enough to dampen the general outrage of bystanders. Three dozen people were still there who had "seen" the Gargoyle that had tried to kidnap the girl. They had stopped him and held him at bay until a large gray gargoyle came, injured four people, and grabbed the smaller one as well as the screaming girl. That was about the general tone of voice.

"That's not what happened at all," a woman yelled in the middle of one of the last testimonies. Elisa took her aside before she could be tackled and silenced by one of the Quarrymen, who were also already there with three carts.

She had only been there for ten minutes and already needed another story. Even though the plump blonde with the PIT tattoo on her forearm didn't look like the best source.

"So. What did you see, Miss-."

"Hopkins. Lyla. With a epsilon."

"... Okay. Lyla with a epsilon. I need the truth," Elisa said, writing down name and address of the woman.

"First of all," said Lyla with a epsilon, "-the first gargoyle wasn't dangerous at all. He was just a child. And it looked like he and the girl he supposedly tried to kidnap were friends."

Elisa looked at the student for a moment in bewilderment before adopting the most disinterested poker face possible again and writing Child! on her notepad where already at Big, gray gargoyle a D! was written, which of course could stand for dumb stuff but also for Dante. She knew there was only one gargoyle child in all of New York.

"What did this Gargoyle child look like?" she asked as casually as she could.

"Hard to say," Lyla replied.

"Why is that hard to say?"

"Because he was in costume. Like the girl. They were both clad in newspaper scraps over their faces, and the girl had fake horns and angel wings. And the little gargoyle multicolored birdwings."

"Multicolored?"

"They weren't real. These were costumes. Like they'd tried to disguise themselves so no one would see he was a gargoyle."

Elisa swallowed a lump of bitter bile. She had seen her colleagues putting away the tattered remains of costume wings.

"I think his beak was real, though," Lyla said now, looking miserable. "Those assholes who said they held the first gargoyle at bay. But they didn't. I didn't get close enough, and the idiots in front of me blocked my view. But they stepped on him. They almost punched him to death. He just wanted to reach the little girl. And she wanted to get to him. They were both scared to death. I could puke thinking about it!"

Elisa's pen cracked in half without her realizing she had put so much pressure on it. Now blue ink was running down her fingers.

"Shit," she muttered, apologizing without paying attention to the student's reaction.

"But ... then the gray gargoyle came," Elisa croaked, straining to clear her throat so that it didn't seem like she was totally getting off on it.

Lyla nodded. "The gray one also had a beak and red hair. He yanked some of the people away from the boy and threw them around. But he didn't consciously hurt them. The others may see it that way, but it wasn't like that. He only wanted to save the boy. And I heard the boy begging the gray one to take the girl, and the girl clung to the big Gargoyle. She belonged to those gargoyles. The humans were the problem here. Not the gargoyles!" she concluded, agitated.

"LIE," someone shouted from behind her, and not a moment later a Coke can sailed through the air, nearly hitting Lyla with an upsilon on the head. Elisa whirled around, one hand threateningly on her holster.

"Who did that?" she shouted, knowing at the same time she would get no answer from the ranks of Quarrymen sympathizers standing behind a barrier banner. Two or three wore hoods but several civilian people in the crowd looked at her with subliminal or outright disgust.

Matt came to her and also his hard gaze scanned over the crowd as well.

"What do we have?" she asked.

"Three or four of the passersby had cameras on them and one even claimed to have everything on video."

"But?"

"None of the footage shows anything. Everything is black."

Good! was Elisa's first impulse to answer. Instead, she said nothing. This was Times Square. Would be unusual enough if no one had had a camera. Whatever (oh WHOEVER!) had rendered the footage unusable played into her and the clan's hands. Still, Elisa's heart raced. Fearing for the most vulnerable member of the clan. No one knew that Nashville had escaped from the castle, otherwise someone would have already contacted her. But she couldn't start a panic among the gargoyles now, or they would provoke a dozen more missions by the GTF and the Quarrymen in Goliaths and Brooklyns blind protective frenzy. She hoped that Nashville (and the girl?) were safe with Dante. As safe as one could be with a former Camorra hitman. Even though Lexington had painted a neutral, almost hopeful picture of the Italians after the death of their human foster father, she hoped the children were safe with him. Otherwise, Quarrymen, the GTF, or even the Manhattan gargoyles would not be Dante's biggest problems. But she needed to get to the castle as soon as possible. She needed to speak to someone who knew how to keep his composure. Like Katana. She was his mother, but she was not so subjected to her feelings, which could only be a good thing in this situation. Blind actionism was out of place here. Speaking of which - Lyla, who had just started yelling "expressions of love" back and forth with one of the Quarrymen behind the barrier, was the perfect alibi. She shoved her notepad at Matt, grabbed the blonde by her meaty shoulder and maneuvered her toward her Ford.

"Matt. I have to escort Miss Hopkins home because of acute danger of assault. The atmosphere here can get too dangerous for someone like her."

Matt looked up from her pad with a petrified face.

"Okay," was all he said, and Elisa was grateful for that.

.

.

The sound of sliced air announced the approach of a gargoyle. But the sound was wrong. Too low and noticeable for it to be a child. The light of the city was completely blocked out as a large shadow obscured the window opening to Nashville's room.

Groaning, Nashville slid to the floor from slender but muscular, scarred arms.

"So, kiddo. You all right?" asked an unmistakable voice.

Nashville turned around, one of his wings hanging down at an unnatural angle, which alone was a painful sight. But his voice was even more loaded with pain than that his injured wing would be the sole reason.

"It's okay. Thank you for helping us. Thanks for fixing my wing. That was cool."

"It's okay. Tomorrow you'll be able to hold it normally again without pain. But Nashville?"

"Yeah?"

"You should ..."

Briefly, the gray gargoyle, standing hunched in the narrow window opening, looked uncertain. Then - perhaps because he realized he had no right to give Nashville any advice he would never have followed himself - he shook his head.

"Forget it. Shower the shit off. And don't tell anyone you saw me."

"I won't. Thanks again."

"You were one lucky bastard tonight. You know that."

"Yeah ... I know that."

"Okay. Take care of yourself, Nashville. I won't be around again - got a lot of my own shit going on right now."

"Okay. Ciao."

"Ciao."

The window opening was cleared as Nashville air cab glided away. For a few more moments, the boy stood in the room, gloomy to human eyes. But gargoyle eyes could see his exhaustion and dejection in his posture. Turning to his bathroom, he saw for the first time the dark shadow sitting in his desk chair - something he and his companion had missed because the window had been darkened and they had both been focused on each other.

He recoiled and hissed, eyes blazing and clawed hands raised in attack.

"Hello, Nashville," Katana said, mildly for the brief display of his protective streak. Instantly, her fledgling lowered his arms and abandoned his belligerent posture. The expression was now horrified and desperate. Because he had been caught. Caught betraying his clan, caught at the worst time, caught within his weakest moment.

His mother slowly stood up and came to him. "I see you found Dante-kun."

"He - he found us, more like," Nash croaked hoarsely, trying to turn away from her.

"Us?" She put a hand under his beak to raise his head. "What's that on your face?"

Nashville swallowed hard. "It...it's called papier mache."

" Papier mache ..." Katana frowned at this strange word, which until now had been quite unfamiliar to her. She would look it up later.

"Why do you disfigure your beautiful face with this papier-mache? I don't think it will do you any good out there."

With pointed claws, she scraped off some of the scraps of newspaper - only to see darkly discolored battle bruises underneath.

The Fledgling couldn't look her in the eyes.

"'It' didn't ... it didn't either. How long have you known about this?"

"Long enough. I had hoped you would restore your honor yourself by confiding in me. But ..." Her gaze had wandered over his body. Over the torn sweater she didn't know, his face that looked like it was falling to shreds because of those half-loosened strips of newsprint. He held one arm in front of his belly as if it hurt, and Katana noticed the large dark bruise on his exposed forearm. She was sure that if she forced him to take off his outerwear (which she would never do) her child would be covered with wounds. Then she saw the red swollen thickening where her son's wing had been broken and put back together. He now had to hold it in this position until sunrise so that the broken edges would not shift against each other again and the pain would not overwhelm him.

She herself felt her features stiffen and her vision dim for a moment because her eyes had to glow. She had come too late. One night too late. A night in which a lightning strike had hit the precious sapling of the clan. Her own child. Bushido taught that even bad experiences pave the way to the self. She was a warrior and came from a bloodline of warriors, a race of creatures fit to fight, used to injury and death by force. But there had to be more! More than preparing Nashville, more than preparing every future hatchling for a life of combat, injury and possible death! This couldn't possibly be their life in the 20th and soon 21st century? At that moment, Katana was so angry, even if it didn't show from the outside. She knew what injuries from a mob looked like. For fuck's sake, she saw the imprint of a shoe on his dark pants where a human had kicked him! How could she stand to wait decades for a slight improvement in the future, including the general acceptance of gargoyles, when her own child was so miserable right now? She wanted to be his mother! She wanted to throw herself in front of him against all the evils of the world, even though she knew that it could harm his character development. She was glad that her hatchling had lowered his head guiltily because it gave her the seconds she needed to regain her composure and again be the calm individual and level-headed warrior she perceived to be most beneficial to this clan. However, her very silence, disturbed the child even more and each additional second seemed to increase his psychological torment. He sniffled and his shoulders shook.

"Nash?"

"Yes ... Katana-san."

She stroked his cheek.

"Makoto," she said lovingly, and Nashville instantly knew what she meant and looked up with watery eyes. He licked his lips and repeated the words that had always been empty phrases to him. Until now.

"Truth ... Veracity. Authenticity. Lying is not only sin ... but weakness of character. Lying is the greatest form of dishonor ... because others can no longer trust you. By lying, you deny yourself the respect you hope others will give you. By deliberately lying ... you steal the purity of your mind. Without trust, ... there is no clan."

Nashville's voice had begun to tremble toward the end. Muscles twitched in his face from which Katana could see he was struggling not to cry. He was struggling not to allow this weakness in front of his own mother.

"I'm sorry," he whispered.

"No. I'm sorry."

He looked at her with fearful eyes and she stroked his soiled hair as she clarified her easy to misinterpret words. "I'm sorry because you didn't have enough trust and courage to confide in us. To have trust in me. Your strained relationship with Brooklyn and that the rest of us are too conflicted to intervene directly should not be a motivation for you not to articulate your sorrows and needs in front of the rest of us and act behind our backs. Yet that is what it seemed to have been. But this must stop now. Do you understand?"

The boy let out, in addition to nodding, an affirmative cooing sound that somehow had something of a chicken and yet was only a sign that he didn't trust his human tongue to form even one meaningful word without bursting into tears.

She didn't have to tell him it was dangerous out there. He knew it. After tonight, even more so. His weakness ... Katana felt, was her own shortcoming.

Nashville was a sapling, and though the larger trees protected it, they also robbed it of light and nourishment. She should have taken this more seriously. She shouldn't have dismissed it as a whim with every half-hearted smile and light-hearted quip from him. She, Brooklyn, the whole clan had to grow - so Nashville could grow. Bushido was a lifelong process. She pulled her boy, who wanted so much to be big and grown up and who she thought would expect space like an adult, onto her lap as she sat on his bed. He did not resist, but clung to her as he had done years ago while she caressed his brow bone with her thumb.

"I need her, Mom. I'm sorry," he croaked.

"Tell me about her. Tell me your story, Nash-chan. Restore your honor with the truth. And then we'll see how the clan can support you."

Thanks for reading, Q.T.