Gargoyles: Clan Manhattan -- Volume #8: "Honor Above All"

Volume #8: "Honor Above All"

"What?! You've turned me into a gargoyle?!"

The giant stood tall, towering over everyone on the battlement, including Goliath. She was angry, that much was obvious. Rosanna desperately approached her, trying to calm her down.

"Now wait a minute, friend. We just saved your life, please hear us out!"

"How have you saved my life? I'm no longer myself, I'm a gargoyle!"

"Maybe so, but look at us, then look at yourself. You aren't any different, you just ..."

The giant looked around at the group. True, they seemed very Rokkan in form and body, but they were short. How could she ever coexist with these beings?

She looked at herself. True, she looked no different. But the way she felt ... she was alive. Unconsciously, she allowed herself to smile.

"I'm alive. I'm alive!"

"Yes, that's what we've been trying to tell you!"

She finally let her guard down. She turned to Rosanna, a grateful look on her face.

"How can I ever repay you?"

Rosanna sighed, relieved. "Well, you'll never survive any attack and conquest by the Rokkans now. So ... we need your help to defeat them."

"HOW COULD SHE ESCAPE?!"

The furious blue gargoyle leaped into the face of her Rokkan escort, eyes glowing an angry red. She had nearly destroyed her penthouse office at Nightstone, her fury was so great.

"She was HELPLESS! She was under CONSTANT GUARD!! And that jerk MacBeth attacks, and everything goes straight to HELL in a HANDBASKET!!"

=Please calm yourself, Demona. She will not be escaped for long.=

Angela was just entering the office, but she observed from a distance the drama unfolding.

"Not be escaped for long?! She's only Goliath's daughter, she's inherited her father's ANNOYING tendency for CLEAN ESCAPES!!"

"Mother, get down, you'll hurt yourself!"

Demona turned to her daughter now, eyes still glowing. "And you ... you little TRAITOR!"

Demona forgot about the Rokkan for a moment, taking the opportunity to lunge at Angela, fangs and talons bared.

"What the HELL was BROADWAY doing here?! Don't try to deny it, I have the security camera tape!"

"It's not my fault, he crash-landed here ..."

Demona delivered an back-hand slap to her daughter's face, sending the younger gargess sprawling, nearly into the next room. She stood in the doorway, heaving her shoulders, breathing heavily. A bit calmer, she turned back to the Rokkan.

"What did you mean, she won't be escaped for long?"

=Shortly after the attack began, the guard who helped her escape found herself trapped under debris. Her mate passed by her in the passageway, and shot her.=

"What does that have to do with anything? I know about your traditions."

=There was a tracer along with the dose of poison. I'm sure that Rosanna took that guard back with her to the rebel headquarters. We'll be able to know where the guard is, thus we'll find Rosanna, and bring the battle to them.=

Demona's face lit up. However, she was still a bit annoyed. "You didn't have to go through all that trouble. I know where they are already."

The first rays of sunlight appeared over the horizon. As they did, the gargoyles returned to stone sleep for the first time since early the previous morning. However, a new addition to the clan found her home at last.

"What's going to happen to me?"

Rosanna stood next to her new friend, watching the sky begin to lighten. She could only sigh.

"You'll turn to stone for the entire day, until the sun sets. While you sleep, your body will heal itself. When you awaken tonight, you will feel more refreshed than you ever have before."

The giant nodded, slowly. Just then, the sun broke the horizon. Rather than take a threatening pose, like the rest of the clan, the giant chose only to stand tall, unafraid of the day. Soon her entire body had turned into a granite form.

Rosanna's own metamorphosis finally subsided, leaving her panting for air, but in her human form, that of Rose Maza. She took a last, cautionary look around the horizon before returning below, passing Slash on her way down. She turned to her cousin as she passed.

"Circle the castle a few times today, Slash. I want to be prepared for anything."

Slash nodded his great, furry head, continuing his climb to the high battlements. Rose continued down to the medlab, where she saw Steve Bluestone waiting for her.

"Hey, Rose." He tried to stifle a yawn, but failed.

"Steve, are you okay? You look beat."

"I am, to be truthful. How can you keep going like that?"

Rose chuckled under her breath. "One of the side effects of being a hybrid human-gargoyle is that my brain has no sleep centers. My gargoyle form heals when I'm human, and my human form heals while I'm a gargoyle." Seeing Steve half-consciously register this information, she patted him on a shoulder. "Come on, I'll have Owen prepare a room for you."

The attack fleet gathered just off the Eastern Seaboard, weapons at the ready. Their blue hulls glistened in the sunlight, as they prepared for their attack.

In the lead ship, its entire crew, a man and a woman, flipped switches all around them, guiding the ship into position. The man turned to his shipmate.

"Please tell me you're ready for this."

"As ready as I get, brother." She turned her eyes downward, he could see that through her mask. "I kinda wish Jonny had been here."

"No, you don't. He'd go on some kind of sanctimonious head trip, and start trying to kill our allies. Remember, we're only chasing the Demon."

She turned to her wheelchair-ridden brother. "How are we so sure that the others didn't join her?"

"Because I know, Robyn. They never would. She never would."

"This is about the Maza woman again, isn't it?"

He turned, angrily, toward her. "No, it isn't ... yes, it is. I made a promise to her at her grave. I swore I would not harm her clan, not a single one. I made that oath before God, Elisa, and her daughter."

"Oh well." Robyn turned back to her displays. "Coming up on Manhattan, Jason."

"Signal the fleet. Let's finish this." Jason pulled on his own mask.

The Hunters and their party descended on the city.

Slash had just finished his third cycle around the castle, and was preparing to alight and return to his room when he saw them. Rokkans in battle armor were jetting at high speed toward the castle, weapons at the ready. These Rokkans, though, were different looking. They looked vaguely human within the armor.

Slash alighted on a battlement, letting out a loud howl. This brought Rose, Alexander, and Owen to the castle to see what was happening.

"That's not good."

Rose grew angrier. "If they decide to smash the clan, there's no way we could stop them!"

Alex sighed heavily. "Well then, I guess it's time to bring out the relics."

Rose looked at him, eyes wide. "You don't mean ..."

"Indeed I do, Rose. Come on, Owen, it's time for the Steel Clan to fly again."

Owen nodded, following. Rose soon jogged after both men, followed closely by Slash.

"Jason, there's an attack force headed toward the castle. Sixteen armored troops, weapons at ready."

"Signal the fleet." Jason stood up, flipping one of the switches on his exoskeletal spinal brace which clicked his Hunter armor around him. "Let's jet."

Robyn set the aircraft on its autopilot, clicking on her own armor.

Just five minutes after they had gone below, Owen, Alexander and Rose had come back to the castle roof, bedecked in the infamous Xanatos Industries Steel Clan armor. Behind them came a battalion of android Clansmen, weapons at the ready. Rose looked over at Alexander, nodding.

"Let's go up."

Alex nodded back, as all three clicked down their helmets, activating their jets and flying skyward, toward the attacking Rokkans.

"One more shot at you, freak."

Within the confines of her Rokkan armor, Dominique Destine grinned maniacally. She pushed her thrusters forward, into the heart of the arena.

Her drive was suddenly interrupted by a flotilla of battle-suited troops. Though the faces were hidden, the colors told her all she needed to know.

Hunters.

Outside the castle, its defense force hovered at the ready, watching the standoff in the air just above them.

"Will they attack? They are the last of the Quarrymen."

Rose turned to Owen, through the view of her helmet. "They won't. Trust me on this, Owen, I have an agreement with their commander." She thrusted forward, coming up at the side of the lead Quarryman, one of two with three diagonal slashes across the face of his helmet.

The Hunter gave her a sideways glance. "Rose."

"Jason. I was wondering how long it would be before you came."

"I made a promise. If I have nothing else, I must at least have my honor."

Rose nodded, the cumbersome Steel Clan armor barely allowing her to move her head. "We have forces waiting behind you, Jason. We'll follow your lead, but we must fight watching toward sunset."

The other Hunter came up behind Rosanna at that point, turning with concern to her brother and the hybrid. "We must be careful about your winged reinforcements, Rose. Some of our troops are old-school Quarrymen."

"Leave them to me. If they threaten the clan in any way, they're mine."

Robyn nodded. Rose turned back to Jason. "Whenever you're ready."

Jason nodded. "May God fly with us this afternoon." He turned toward his troops. "QUARRYMEN ATTACK!"

Dominique blanched as the entire combined force of Hunters and Steel Clan came into attack formation, quickly approaching her Rokkan squadron. Quickly, she clicked the radio of her Nightstone-built armor on.

"Attack! ATTACK NOW!"

As quickly as she had given the order, the Rokkans jumped into the fray.

The battle sent echoes throughout the city, as alien forces and humans fought high above the streets. Stray blasts all around the combat arena found their way into uninvolved streets, creating havoc for human survivors trying to dig out of the rubble from the show of force.

In the penthouse executive office of Nightstone Unlimited, Angela Destine sat with her back to the window, not wishing to pay attention to the chaos she was helping to create with her mother. She tried to focus on the marketing reports in front of her, but it became increasingly harder with every passing minute.

In frustration, she threw the documents off the desk, standing up and letting out a loud scream. Thankful that the walls of the office were sound proofed, she sat back down behind the desk.

Conflicting images flashed through her brain. Thoughts of her mother ... thoughts of the bright future she was trying to build for them ... thoughts of the end of the human race entirely ...

... but then her mind returned to her family. To Samson, the son who she had just treated for his injury the day before. To Rosanna; true, her enemy, but no matter, she was still her sister. To her father, sinking further into his depression with each passing night ...

... to Broadway. Poor, blinded, abandoned Broadway. And now she was helping her mother kill him. As if she hadn't done enough by leaving him.

Her head fell to the desk, her tears unsoothable.

As unbelievable as it may have seemed, due to the sheer numbers advantage the defenders had on the Rokkans, not a single Rokkan had fallen. The Steel Clan was almost gone, as were a number of the Quarrymen. Rose's armor had nearly bit the dust, as she valiantly tried to battle on. A stray shot to her left foot had finally done the suit in, as the jets stalled, causing her to freefall toward the hard battlement floor of the castle.

On her way down, she checked the sun, then her watch. Only eight more minutes. She silently prayed that she had better luck than her mother.

The hard stone came too soon for the hybrid. She hit hard, knocking her unconscious and shattering the last vestiges of the armor around her. Her eyes lay half-open, unseeing, as the last Steel Clan robot fell under the attack.

The first to her side after her fall was Alexander. Quickly, he took off his helmet to attend to her injuries. His eyes closed, allowing an eldritch glow to emanate around the young woman's head.

Suddenly, she breathed a shallow word. "Mom."

He seemingly lost control of his power. Suddenly, Alex and Rose were fully bathed in light, surrounding them completely. When he finally was able to pull away, he saw Rose standing there, bereft of her armor but none the worse for wear.

Then he saw the glow.

"Rose?"

She turned to look at Alex. The glow in her eyes, bright white, intensified. When she spoke, though, was when he knew something was very wrong.

"No. Not right now."

She ran off the edge of the battlement, launching herself into the heart of the battle ... but without armor. Still, she was able to fly into the faces of the Rokkans and do what none of the present technology had done; destroy a Rokkan.

Owen alighted next to Alexander. "What did you do to her?"

"I wish I knew." He turned to his old teacher, fear in his eyes. "Owen, something terrible has just happened to Rose. She's possessed."

Owen arched an eyebrow.

"It gets worse. She's possessed ... by Elisa Maza."

To Be Continued ...

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