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Souls of the Night – Vol 3

33.

Behind me I heard dozens of female shrieks of horror (not coming from me for a change) and deeper surprised shouts but also occasional cheers (I recognized at least Anthony's and Chad's voices) as if this was a real martial arts fight. Or was it?

But it shouldn't be like that and okay - Floyd was the instructor here but also a man and I perhaps provoked him unnecessarily with my defensiveness. Maybe it would do us both good to put a stop to it now and remind him that we didn't have to fight.

I gave up my crouched stance and stood up straight, holding out both hands with my palms facing him to appease him.

"Mister Floyd. That's enough now. We're all tired. Let's just stop and shake hands like good uhm - sportsmen at the end, okay?"

I wasn't really good at small talk or chumminess, but it sounded pretty acceptable to my ears. Some of my coworkers in accounting or Lavonne, who was pining over me like I was fighting for her, were cheering me on to keep going, I could handle Floyd. But I was Nathaniel Sharif, the human being. I didn't want to prove myself to anyone. I wasn't a gargoyle anymore, I didn't have claws or a body made for fighting and the protective instinct that went with it, even if it felt like that all the time because of the echoes. I wished I could go home where I could try to cling to my crumbling reality again - by making contact with the creature or by concentrating on the aching muscles and pain in places that my human body and only my human body had. I ignored the humans trying to push my buttons with encouragement and the faint whispers in my head that I could really beat him (of all times the entity made itself known now?!).

Floyd blinked at me, puzzled. Then he grinned and stood up.

"That was an excellent display of attack deflection and in calm and confident de-escalation. Wonderful Nathaniel." He said as he approached me and even though I was only human there was a seemingly not yet human fiber in me that noticed his predatory smile and the gleam in his eyes before he abruptly crouched down right in front of me and swung his leg out, knocking me off my feet.

I fell to the ground because I had ignored the impulse that felt so natural to take my opponent down before he could do the same to me. And as Floyd towered over me, I gasped because he lost face with the ceiling spotlight behind him and I had a moment of panic when I thought I saw Jussuf. But Jussuf had Floyd's voice. " So what do you do, Nathaniel, if you can't de-escalate the situation? When your opponent really has it in for you?"

I jumped to my feet and even though most of my brain and especially my eyes realized that this was Floyd No-last-name and not my long-time rapist/ex-boss/soon-to-be brother-in-law (which I will try to prevent) I knew my voice sounded deeper and rumbling as I cocked my head petulantly and glared at the instructor, who knew nothing of my torment but was still for some reason going too far right now. I placed my hand firmly on his chest where I could feel the muscles underneath to keep him at a distance but managed to hold my position while I spoke despite irrational dream-triggered anxiety.

"Mr. Floyd. I'm being serious. I'm just a little accountant who tries to avoid physical conflict. I WILL NOT participate in these exercises. I WILL NOT be pressured into demonstrating anything with you. I've experienced violence in my past and I refuse to participate because this feels way too threatening and I don't think it's your professional remit to make employees feel pressured. So that's enough." I took a step back and turned around, keeping my head down so that I don't have to meet the eyes of my colleagues and my boyfriend. I hadn't wished to reveal that I had been a victim of violence and even though I hadn't gone into detail, I felt strangely ashamed and dirty. But I had to make it clear to this strange man with straightforward arguments.

However, the illusion that Floyd remembered from my words that this was just a training session with engineers, office workers, mechatronics specialists or maintenance workers who were basically barely able to defend themselves didn't stick with me for long.

I stumbled as the creature whistled a warning from INSIDE my ear, but by then I had Floyd's muscular arms around my neck and he was lifting me a few inches off the ground in a headlock hold.

"Wonderful verbal defense, Nathaniel. Like we've practiced that. But you must never admit to anything like personal experience - it makes you look vulnerable and like easy prey. Let's move on to physical defense," Floyd groaned because I had grabbed his arms but my legs were thrashing in his grip. I growled and again it didn't sound human in my ears but damn this Floyd must have taken too many steroids because he was nuts to pick on one of his " disciples" and it didn't feel like exercise and I REFUSED to let him get away with that. I threw my head back and slammed it against his chin which made him howl in pain either because I had knocked his teeth together or because he had bitten his tongue. He loosened his grip, I regained my footing and threw him over my oh-so-slender shoulder to the shouts and cheers of the other humans (and maybe of one gargoyle).

My inner Gargoyle let out a huff, nonverbally mocking my opponent, even though I knew I DIDN'T HAD an inner gargoyle. Not an outer one, not an inner one. At least, I shouldn't have. I was Nathaniel Sharif the human, the accountant. Dull, slow, weak and wimpy but when Floyd jumped up, gave a very human snarl to counter my so very not human feeling snarl and was now clearly coming at me belligerently it was the most natural thing in the world for me to growl and meet his attack. I had no claws, no fangs, no gargoyle strength but I would not roll onto my back and present my throat in the face of this mountain of muscle that reminded me of Jussuf. When he tried to grab me with both hands I jumped up at him, he - so surprised - almost toppled backwards where I used this to put my foot on his chest, using him as a springboard and clawing my fingers into both sides of his shirt. The fabric made tearing noises as I used my momentum to pull the man twice my size backwards. The ground seemed to shake under his weight as he went down.

The wind entity inside my head plucked a strand of consciousness and suddenly I felt another opponent approaching at my back. Slender but muscular arms wrapped around my neck from behind and I brought my leg around Natasha's in one fluid motion, causing her to stumble and fall forward extremely inelegantly before she could close her chokehold around my neck. Then Floyd was with me again, grabbing me under both arms and as I saw Natascha coming towards me, her nose bloody, her eyes sparking and I swear at that moment I smelled my opponent's blood and let it spur me on. I had no real excuse, no more stormy fire to blame for my behavior because the airy essence that still dwelled within me might have made everything seem lighter and widened my consciousness almost like precognition but it was nothing more than that - I felt it. Everything was me and although everything happened so quickly, I was calm inside and just let my body do its thing. Natascha grabbed one of my legs as I threw myself upwards into Floyd's grip around my shoulders but I kicked her hand away with the other. It was no problem to keep my spine stable and in tension long enough to wrap my legs around Natascha's neck. I yanked her closer and didn't care that I had her so close to my private parts because the way her eyes grew wide and disbelieving as I took her in a perfect tringale choke even though I was theoretically hanging between her and Floyd almost made me laugh.

The opponent at my back saw what I was doing, of course, grunting questioningly while putting pressure on my arms, squeezing them so tight I yelped as he almost twisted them out of their sockets. This pain - I hated it and LOVED it at the same time because I felt so strange in my body since I was human again and I hated pain but I wanted to feel real and this was real. I was in my human body even if I felt constantly torn. I heard someone hissing at the edge of my focused consciousness and I thought it was Lexington. He would rush to my rescue like the protective male he was because that's how he was, promise or no promise, he wouldn't just stand by and watch me get hurt. But NO, it was me who hissed and at the same time, despite the pain in Floyd's helpful grip, I pulled myself up and slammed my brow bone- wrong, my forehead- against his chin again, making him howl, letting me go. My hands hit the mattress where I used the floor to throw Natascha, gasping for breath, over me. She slammed onto the mats and slid across them to the feet of my colleagues and teammates, but I couldn't pay any attention to them and their sounds and expressions of bewilderment because I wasn't finished yet.

But just as I didn't feel the need to let the fight end, neither did Floyd because he got to his feet and adopted a boxer's stance. He must have been listening to what I had stuttered earlier, or he had forgotten and just made a big mistake. I stood up without completely abandoning my gargoyle stance. Unlike Nashville, who always had to watch his claws when boxing so as not to slash his skin when punching, I didn't have that problem. Legs wider in the basic position, keeping my distance where I could (although Floyd wasn't a punching bag, of course, but I would turn him into one if he didn't leave me alone), I began to prance light-footedly where Floyd puffed like a bull and looked at me with the wide eyes of a prey animal. Oh he sent out such contradictory signals, I liked him so much and I only had to twitch in his direction for him to launch panicked attacks that could really hurt me as an obviously weaker opponent.

And where I was able to block the first two or three blows well and might have been able to turn the tide quickly, Natascha of course came from behind again and kicked me in the side as I coaxed an agonized grunt from Floyd with my first own punch. Pain from her kick and Floyd's subsequent blows to my torso rippled through my flesh and bones in hot waves, robbing me of balance and causing me to lose focus. "That's not fair!" one of my colleagues shouted. 'Stop it,' I heard someone else yell behind us.

"Nathaniel, break it off," Lavonne was clearly shouting now, and I didn't like the anxious tone in her voice, but it was so much more genuine than the aloof promiscuous femme fatale she'd tried to portray to me before.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw my friend's blue-clad blur move abruptly and my "Everybody back off!" sounded like it meant the people even though it was directed only at Lex. This had to do with me. Not with him. I didn't know why the two instructors were getting serious or if my resistance was driving them to it, but this was my fight, these two people and especially Floyd my prey.

"Enough!" Chad rumbled, grabbing Natascha around the waist. He was head of security on the evening shift in House B and he knew how to put someone out of action, but this was no ordinary opponent. Was it her instinct or a panic reaction that made her self-apply her training but she rammed her elbow into Chad's ribs causing him to groan and go down. For the first time, anger really flared up inside me. This was my clan! My- my workplace clan but nevertheless and a blow against one of mine was more serious than blows against me.

"That's it!" I hissed, dropping to the ground only to immediately jump up, grab Floyd's waist and throw him to the ground in a high arc. As he lay there I raised my fist and punched his solar plexus. I didn't have that from this class. It was a move that was forbidden to gargoyles because their punch was so much stronger and they could kill people with it. I myself could have hit harder but this was enough and Floyd reared up briefly with a breathless wheezing groan before he could barely move a muscle, probably because he was shaken by dizziness and nausea. At least he didn't even faint. I didn't stay with him but ran to Natascha who had just jumped up to take Chad out with a Flying Elbow Drop (thanks WWE shows with Brooklyn and Broadway). I couldn't think of a suitable WWE move but I did the next best thing in the two seconds I had left and the one second the human woman was in perfect position. I wasn't a gargoyle anymore so it wasn't a no-go, I pulled my leg up and kicked Natascha in her side, not at the level of her ribs but where her pelvic bone was. And in that millisecond, an unprecedented energy ran through me. Not heat, not fire, but lightness that made all my nerves vibrate and did something to my muscles, bones and joints that felt like flying. Yet it wasn't me who was flying. But Natascha did. My kick - fueled by something that must have caused the wind creature in me - sent her body flying across the hall. Goliath would have managed a kick like that. Maybe Broadway too. But I ... didn't even question it at that moment. That should have broken my leg, but only Floyd's and Natascha's previous blows hurt - not the one I'd just taken. The woman writhed in pain.

Floyd, meanwhile, had managed to turn onto his stomach, his breath wheezing as I crawled to him - and yes, I crawled and my non-existent tail held me in perfect elegant balance like the predator I felt I was - I saw that he was bleeding from the mouth. When he felt me above him, he made a very funny noise.

I puffed with a grin, finding it cute that a shrill sound came from this mighty man who had tried to challenge me when I put a hand on the back of his neck and pinned him to the ground with that and his fear alone. I shoved my face in front of his and I almost imagined I saw blue-white glowing gargoyle eyes in the mirrors of his own widened ones. My voice was deeper, almost the pitch it had when I spoke my miserable Arabic. But now a subtle gargoyle rasp rolled over my words, making me shudder myself.

"I really enjoyed the partner exercises. I'd love to take part again. But I didn't want to be attacked - not even to demonstrate anything. I repeat; I have no good experiences with violence and it triggers me in bad directions. I don't want that. Have you learned your lesson ... Are you okay with that?" I hadn't realized that a questioning okay could sound like an order, but it did. And probably not just to my ears. Floyd made that ridiculously shrill small animal noise again, nodding tensely, his steel-hard neck muscles twitching several times under my fingers where I could feel the claws but there were none.

I released him from the pressure, stood up, looked down at the panting human as he slowly turned and crawled back a yard before straightening his upper body without taking his eyes off me.

Then I took a breath.

And was just the human again.

That was obvious because terror instantly swept over me. Both trainers were lying on the ground. Both were bleeding, both looked at me fearfully as if I were a demon. I had been clear the whole time, had been with myself the whole time but still I had been - more when I had forced the two much more trained people to submit to me and seeing them crawl in front of me had created this sensation of restored order in me that now felt so strange and loathsome afterwards. I was currently so stunned by the scene that I couldn't even break down whimpering like I used to. Everything here felt so wrong where it had just felt natural and right.

"Sorry," Floyd croaked, and he probably didn't know why he was apologizing any more than I did. Ah, or did he - he shouldn't have forced me to participate in this last exercise. What could have happened, it was just a little exercise? It would have been if the participant hadn't been me. Former gargoyle, former victim of violence, former possessor of inner demons that had made me burn and given me other powers but at least currently either host to a different kind of entity OR in the process of developing atypical schizophrenia. Everything I had done before now felt like a madman's fever dream again. I couldn't have kicked Natasha across the hall or triggered this fear in Floyd. I was just a human, a human, the being inside me was silent as if it had never been there. Yes - even if there were still echoes in me, I had only been able to do all this because of the adrenaline. Adrenaline - people - just normal people - lifting cars up to pull small children out from under them - wasn't there even a YouTube video with something like that? Floyd and Natascha had only seen the puny but not entirely clumsy human, had jumped to assumptions, and had paid for it. They hadn't considered what adrenaline could do with someone.

I nodded at Floyd, consciously looking at my team and the other people for the first time. Everyone was staring at me. Some in awe, some horrified. Correction - most horrified. My gaze found Lexington's, who was slowly climbing back down from the railing of the gallery where he had probably jumped to help me before he realized I didn't need help. He looked at me with his mouth agape as if seeing me for the first time. What did he just see? I asked myself and deepest despair twisted my heart and my other guts.

"I'm... sorry," I said and although I didn't run, my walk was more than hurried as I left the training hall. I knew very well and immediately what I was apologizing for.

.

It wasn't until I was in the changing room that I realized I was hurting pretty much everywhere, but it didn't bother me too much. I probably set a new record for changing and I couldn't say I enjoyed the pain but it felt like my connection to reality again so I held on to it. I'd hoped to be quick enough to be gone by the time my colleagues, Chad and Ant arrived because I couldn't face them. Not after the scene I'd just caused. I had humiliated myself so much - at my new job, which I liked so much. But I couldn't stand the others today - and perhaps I would never be able to stand them again.

I lifted my gaze from my shoelaces, which I was struggling with because my hands were shaking so much, but none of the humans entered - it was Lexington. He closed the door behind him, rushed to me without a word and hugged me. And I needed that hug so badly and I returned it with all the strength I could muster as a human but at the same time I broke under his lovefilled gesture that needed no words (something that happened too rarely with both of us nerds) and I sank to my knees and let his wings cocoon me. His suit smelled like detergent but I pressed my nose into his wings and tried to let his scent soothe me while he cuddled me, rubbed wide circles over my back and kissed my mop of hair over and over again.

I shivered and clung to his clothes, trying to pull myself out of the post-adrenaline panic before it could overwhelm me.

"It's okay, Nate. It was just the echoes."

I froze in his embrace.

"What did you see?" I asked anxiously.

"You were growling, hissing - your body language and tone of voice -gargoyle threatening gestures. At least I saw that your movements were more fluid, more instinctive and more dexterous than humans could manage. You mixed the exercises Floyd showed you with those from our training sessions. And this kick! Damn, I almost imagined you were using invisible wings and tails and you were so agile and defensive and terrific and so - oh damn but it doesn't matter. I saw afterwards that you were scared yourself. It ... it was stupid that I didn't have you excused from those exercises in advance. I ... could have falsified something in your records with a note that you didn't have to participate in something like that. But ... Heaven, I've watched the classes from time to time on the cameras and neither Floyd nor Natascha have ever handled a participant that hard."

"I'm - I'm sorry. I, I didn't mean to, I didn't mean to hurt them." I sputtered as I stood up with shaking legs and Lex placed me on one of the benches without letting go of my hands. I couldn't get the image of both people lying on the floor and bleeding out of my mind.

"It was their fault. Theirs alone. Floyd went way beyond his authority. I have no idea what got into him. Both of them. Natasha should have been the voice of reason but she looked like she was enjoying it! Before you kicked her ass."

"God, I kicked a woman's ass! I didn't mean to stand out, I messed everything up. Everyone looked at me like I was a freak. I - I'm a danger. My powers are gone - i think, I don't have a gargoyle body anymore and I'm still a danger!"

Lex wiped my cheeks with the pads of his thumbs but new tears kept coming even though he cooed and assured me that no one thought I was a freak and I wasn't a danger and the two trainers deserved their thrashing.

Then he lifted my head and kissed me gently before scrutinizing my face as if he was looking for something. He had his lower lip caught between his teeth and his smile was mild.

"You opposed violence towards you. There's nothing wrong with that. You warned Floyd before- in no uncertain terms. You became resilient. Stronger. Even without powers and without a Gargoyle body. I'm proud of you. Just because you've learned how to fight back in the last three months doesn't that make you a bad guy. I'd say this skill was overdue. You're okay - and those two idiots will be okay too, I didn't hear a bone break."

"But... fuck Lex, the way everyone looked at me. Like I was a psycho."

"You're not a psycho! And I'm assuming you're more of a legend now than they think you're dangerous. Floyd got carried away. After a few moves, it wasn't about demonstrating something to the others, it was about proving something to himself and everyone watching. Even the humans must have seen that."

" ... wrestling him down, incapacitating him and Natasha was as ... natural and easy as breathing ... at that moment. It wasn't supposed to be like this. No human should behave or feel like that."

Lex's ears twitched and his gaze went to the door closest to the gym. The humans were coming.

"I can't -" I began in a croaky voice and he nodded.

He stood up and pulled me to my feet.

"I don't want you to be alone. Please come with me to the castle tonight."

"You have to patrol later. We agreed that we would both stop neglecting our duties because of each other."

"I know. But Heather will be happy, Tachi will claim you for ironing. And Nash ... he'll come on his own and pretend he doesn't care about your company when he actually does, you know that. And you can cuddle watchbeasts - whether human or gargoyle, that's therapeutic."

I smiled sheepishly as he led me out of the changing room. These arguments all sounded very good. I needed Clan now. I also wanted to go home and retreat or try to contact the entity again to find out what part it had played in the scene just now, but I knew I would be alone with my thoughts there and that didn't feel healthy right now.

.

.

"What the hell happened?" Jim Miller asked as he ripped open the back of the unmarked van and Natascha and Floyd literally crawled inside.

"What did happen? That's what you're asking us?" Natascha asked, her heavy Eastern Bloc accent making her sound like the villain in a bad movie, which is why the mercenary Darkwing 1995 had hired to join the regular trainer, whose name he'd forgotten, generally didn't speak much.

"Yes, that's what I'm asking you. You look like you've been beaten up when you should just be checking this one guy for oddities. Or did ... the gargoyle get you?" Miller asked, hungry for dirt to use against Lexington Wywern. Natascha huffed sarcastically, baring her teeth where the male sat on the truck bed with his back to the wall, looking pale and strangely traumatized. Now it was her turn to talk.

"The measly gargoyle was there. But the guy we were supposed to check out beat us up like this. Who the hell is he? He kicked me across the hall! I flew ten yards and probably have a dozen cracks in my pelvic bone. He hit Floyd in the solar plexus like he wasn't worth the effort. He's got less muscle than my fourteen-year-old niece and he wiped the floor with us."

Miller now showed his own manic snarl. He wished he could hack into the house's security cameras but they were too well secured. He wished he could have equipped the instructor he'd bribed with a thousand dollars from the small fortune Darkwing 1995 had sent him to act as a mole, or the mercenary herself with bodycams. But Lexington or one of the other nerds would have noticed them immediately. However he took what he could get.

"I want every detail you can remember," he said coldly.

.

Five minutes later, Miller saw things more clearly. The guy who had beaten them up like that was called Nathaniel Sharif, and he really did work at this company - as an accountant - the laughing stock of the century. But he had to be more than human because he had taken on a mercenary and a guy who not only worked as a self-defense instructor but had won several prizes in martial arts tournaments. And when fighting, he had mostly had the upper hand, growling and generally not behaving or moving in an overly human way. Lexington had been there, with Natascha keeping an eye on him the whole time, which the gargoyle probably hadn't noticed because his attention had been focused entirely on his lover. And he must really be his lover because Lexington had wanted to rush to his aid but had refrained from doing so when he realized that Sharif knew how to defend himself. And his eyes had briefly flashed white-blue! Human eyes just didn't flash.

Natascha had come to the end of her story, which hadn't been very relevant after Sharif and Wywern had disappeared (not together but one after the other). Although Jim wondered if he could use it as leverage for whatever, that the two obviously didn't make their relationship public to the staff at LeXa ltd. Why didn't Sharif (what a ridiculous name for a gargoyle) work there as a gargoyle? That would be possible and they wouldn't have to keep their relationship a secret. Or did they keep it secret for other reasons? Sure, it would be a scandal if the truth about a gay gargoyle couple became known beyond Jim's website, but it would be a short-lived scandal that would quickly be overshadowed by general acceptance.

Even if Sharif would really be human - which he wasn't - no sir, he couldn't be - nothing but a few clairvoyant people on the internet would say anything against it. Because nowadays any perversion was totally okay and acceptable and Jim wondered why it hadn't already been Obama who legalized the fucking of non-sentient beings like - like goats and hamsters. Thank you shitty leftist media and LGBTQwhatever movement and thank you perverted Maza bitch who had already set new disgusting standards in 1997 with her admission that she was romantically involved with Goliath and he was romantically involved with her. Sure it was possible by now that these commitment ceremonies of gargoyles were equated with human marriages or that humans and gargoyles could marry. Maza just didn't and had her human fake alibi boyfriend because her job forbade such close coterie.

Or ... and Jim Miller's paranoid malicious snoop heart instantly beat faster even if he didn't know whether in terror or delight at the possibility - what if Sharif wasn't the only gargoyle in disguise at LeXa ltd who could walk in the daytime? What if more people there were not human? What if all four hundred plus employees there were in fact gargoyles - what if they infiltrated Brooklyn, New York, America! THAT would really be a population transfer! Not obviously like the Mexicans who flooded the country, but hidden. Hidden in human bodies. Until it was too late. Then EVERYONE could be a gargoyle and no one would notice. AND OH GOD, Maza's human stud was actually her gargoyle stud! Why hadn't anyone noticed? And of course not all gargoyles would pretend to be white Americans but some would pretend to be other ethnicities like Sharif so it would look less suspicious. Damn, that was SO wicked. That was SO brilliant! And Jim and his few allies like Darkwing would be the only ones who knew about it and who could save humanity. Now he was still seen as a weirdo but he was already a hero only no one knew that.

Floyd's phone beeped and although the man was obviously a little traumatized by his fight with the disguised gargoyle (although he had brought that on himself with his wounded pride because Jim hadn't told him to take the freak on) he managed to pull his phone out of his pocket in a mechanical gesture. He stared at his screen and there was a look of horror and then amusement on his face as he grinned tiredly.

"Email from Lexington Wywern. I've been released from my coaching duties at LeXa ltd. Unpaid and permanent."

"Do you need any more proof that Sharif and the gargole are connected?" asked Jim, who wasn't even surprised. Of course Floyd was fired - he and Natascha had tried to take apart the Wywern asshole's bitch - had almost exposed him, and Wywern couldn't risk such a danger to himself and all the other disguised gargoyles in the place.

He put a hand on Floyd's shoulder and practiced his friendlier, less maniacal smile.

"Floyd. You don't need this job. The thousand dollars was just a drop in the bucket. Our sponsors have even bigger, more rewarding plans for you. For Natascha, too, if you're interested in the job." He looked at the blonde, who was sticking tissue in her nose because it wouldn't stop bleeding, the woman nodded and Floyd nodded too. He regretted that Floyd could no longer be his mole in there - but he would find another one. Darkwing 1995 had proven to be good at tracking down someone who was obviously not a gargoyle - he would find another person who was easily bribed and would push their cause to bring down the gargoyles. Of course, they were pawns but fuck it. Floyd, apart from his connection to LeXa ltd, was an asset to the cause. He was experienced in combat (even if he had underestimated Sharif). He needed more soldiers for the next missions.

Extra long chapter. Nathaniel kicks ass - where's my cheering horn?

And where Miller throws himself seamlessly into his psychosis, Nate knows less and less what is real and what is not. What he perceives and feels internally and externally fluctuates within a very short space of time - I'm not sure if that gets so obvious. I think I'll squeeze in another therapeutic session.

Thanks for reading, Q.T.