***DISCLAIMER: Hm ... one of these days I'll move to Germany and ditch all these
intellectual property laws : ) Anyway, The Gargoyles aren't mine. They belong to
Buena Vista and Disney etc. The Gargoyles Saga is an independant project run by
a bunch of folks far more fortunate than I to have the privilage, but hey, they
do a great job of it. I guess Anthony Giovanni is mine. The woman in the blue
trench coat belongs to someone else, who gave me permission to use her. Jake is
just a random Unseelie stooge I may use later. I feel uncomfortable taking the
TGS halflings as they are just developing the characters. Er ... one day I'm
going to give Terry Goodkind a stern lecture and chewing out for snagging and
abusing the title Seeker of Truth before I could use it. Of course, I'll wait
until he's done writing his Sword of Truth stories.***

     Angela glanced nervously at the horizon. As much as she loved to spend time
with her mother, she did not relish the glide back from Nightstone Unlimited
alone, especially in times like these. Still, even wartime could hardly take
away the joy she felt in being with her mother. With all these preoccupations,
her instincts and senses refused to betray her as she heard the cry and quickly
turned to spy a young woman. Being accosted in a nearby alley, the Asian girl in
a midnight blue trench coat had just been thrown against a brick wall by a
black-clad figure.
     Angela banked into a current of air and dove towards the alley with a roar
held in her throat as she swooped down with surprise on her side. Her eyes
burned red and she could taste battle above the scents of the fresh coffee and
new baked goods for the coming morning.
     Jake cursed and brought his hand back to slap the young Asian woman again,
threatening with a frightful green glow in his eyes. "Tell me where the urn is!"
he growled.
     With the utmost impertinence, the girl glared back at him, looking into his
glowing eyes with a righteous anger, which covered over her natural fear.
Snarling, Jake drew his hand back to lash out. The blow fell heavily, knocking
her to the ground.
     Angela's roar could no longer be contained. She slammed into the black-clad
thug from behind, smashing him off his feet as she rolled back up to her feet.
Her talons raised and her fangs bared, Angela advanced menacingly upon the man.
     Perhaps he had landed well or something, but the man was getting up much
faster than he should have. Angela leapt forward and was greeted by an
unexpected blow to her ribs as the man sprang to action. Angela knew how to take
a hit. She'd been toe to toe with the Pack and all manner of unnatural creatures,
but this human hit with much more force than she expected. This was not
roll-of-coins type impact either. That hit had the force of a bull behind it,
and it knocked the wind clear out of Angela. It had the force of ...
     Jake shook his right hand, half to alleviate the pain of impact, half in
psychological reaction to trying to extinguish the unnatural fire running along
his arm.
     ~ The force of magic ~ Angela realized as she staggered to her feet.
     "Don't bother to get up," Jake chuckled as he focussed on converting the
green flame aura to the shape of a blade. He raised it up with his hand and
swept it down in a deadly arc at the winged freak.
     Angela tried to roll out of the way, but it was too late ...
     With a shower of sparks and a ring of metal, the green blade of force was
parried by a well crafted steel sword. From the shadows had stepped a man with
long black hair in a pony-tail. His gray trench coat was swept to one side with
the fast draw of a weapon from its folds. He met Jake's green glow with a
steel-gray glare of calmness and danger.
     Jake snarled as the man stepped into him and levered the green blade up,
throwing him off balance and over the man's leg to the ground.
     Recovering his own balance, the man in gray stepped back, the iron crucifix
about his neck bouncing against his chest on its chain. He did not pursue into
his opponent, giving Jake the opportunity to muster a bloat of force to throw
against him. His green aura spiked heavily and lashed out.
     The swarthy fellow on the receiving end could only raise his off arm to try
and shield himself, apparently to save his eyes. Strangely, the gesture seemed
enough.
     It was quite insane, from what Angela knew of magic. Without any sorcery
she could perceive, and certainly lacking much in the way of iron, the human
simply diffused the lightening crackling towards him. Angela's watery eyes
blinked and she perceived the talisman about his neck. The wearer waited for the
halfling to complete his attack and then advanced on him. Angela tried to move
forward as well, but her nerves screamed in pain as she realized she had broken
ribs.
     His blade low and menacing, the human advanced on the Unseelie servant. The
surprised and drained halfling instinctively resorted to more mundane weaponry,
drawing his gun from the back of his jeans. The move would've given him a final
edge, except that as he swung the piece up the bare, the tip of the sword blade
slapped against it precisely. The human lunged and the blade jumped forwards
quickly, cutting his hand and causing him to drop the gun in pain.
     That was not the only thing to clatter on the ground, however, as a plain
iron crux fell to the earth a few feet away from it. Angela gasped. The man in
gray seemed not to notice. Jake broke into a sadistic smile and his eyes changed
to a sinister red glow.
     The bolt of magical lightening ripped at the human with tremendous anger
and fear. It was so violent a discharge that everyone in the alley could not see
the obviously gruesome result of the impact. Angela blinks her eyes and strained
to she as the dust and light cleared.
     She blinked again, but the seen was the same. The man in the gray trench
coat had slammed his fist across the halfling's jaw. He slammed the pommel of
the sword at Jake's head, shattering the hasty and slip-shod defenses the
Unseelie lackey had raised. The blade spun away, but the black-haired human
continued to lay into the man in beleaguered half-fay with his bare hands. With
a slight roar, the Angela's rescuer tackled the black-clad man to the ground and
began to pummel him into submission.
     "Argh!?" the halfling exclaimed as he threw off his assailant with
supernatural strength. He felt exhausted, not expecting to have to fight for
both mystical and physical leverage. He spied the mundane but welcomed sight of
a pistol near where the man in gray had fallen. He dove to it quickly.
     His hand clasped the gun just as a booted foot slammed down on it heavily.
Exercising skill and precision, the Good Samaritan had converted the attempt to
spring to his feet in the martial-arts movie style and landed his foot on the
weapon as the halfling dove for it. His balance off, the human had to plant his
hands on the concrete behind his back. The two combatants quickly locked eyes.
The Unseelie servant attempted to wrestle the gun away quickly, but the
dark-haired human shook his head with a wry grin as he rolled his weight on the
right foot and hand. Not only was the pin on the gun tightened, the left foot
and - more importantly - the left steel-toed boot were free to continue the
rolling motion across the halfling's face. An instant later, the man righted his
weight by slamming the foot back into place, the healing slamming across the
half-fay's jaw. In the moment after that, Angela's rescuer took his right foot
off the gun and spun his body over so he faced the earth, in the process, that
right foot knocked the last shred of the halfling's consciousness far from him.
     The man in gray dusted himself off and turned to check on those behind him.
Angela likewise turned to find that the girl in the blue trench coat was on her
feet, groggy, but pretty lucid. "Are you all right?" she inquired.
     "Sure, fine, I'll be fine," she said vaguely, trying to make a dismissive
gesture while holding her head. "Aw!" she moaned slightly. "Got to get ... home
... quickly," she mumbled as she stumbled out of the alley.
     "Wait!" Angela called after her. It was futile though, as she could not run
after her. It would jar her ribs too much. She sighed as the girl at least made
her way into an apartment building not even three doors away and disappeared. ~
At least she is not wandering around all alone ~ Her thoughts were cut off as a
hand rested gently on her shoulder.
     Surprised, she turned about, but it was the man in gray. His sword and crux
were in the other hand. "Are ~ you ~ all right?" he asked fiddled with the clasp
on the silver chain in his hand.
     "Yes, sunrise will heal it," Angela replied, still a little surprised and
overwhelmed, "But I need to get back home before the sun comes up."
     "Yes, it is not safe for a gargoyle in the day," the man in gray nodded as
he finally secured the chain and crucifix on his neck.
     "My name is Angela. Thank you for your help," she offered her talon in the
human fashion.
     "And I am called Anthony," he accepted the offer with the older style on
fore arm grip which was both familiar and surprising to Angela. "And it is I who
wish to thank you. I don't know if I would have found them in time had it not
been for you."
     Angela didn't know how to respond to that, but took it as a nice sentiment.
Her curiosity would not leave her any more than her pain, however. "How did you
stop him?" she asked, her need to know undisguised, "When you lost the
talisman?"
     Anthony looked down at his crux and shrugged. "Symbols only have the power
our faith in them grants them," he said calmly. "The power belongs to the soul
of the man, of all men," he continued enigmatically, "A Truth Seeker is just a
little better at using that which is there." He looked at where she held her
ribs and raised as eyebrow. "Let me take a look at that," he looked at her, "I
have had some experience with treating such injuries."
     He slowly reached a hand out and Angela bit her lip and nodded. He placed
is hand where hers had been. Instead of poking and prodding her injury as she
expected, Angela noticed he merely closed his eyes.
     "Goliath will be upset," she mused nervously, "He'll insist I shouldn't be
out like this alone."
     Anthony breathed in deeply once and murmured something in a musical dialect
of Latin. "Oro omni rogare juvo/ Sanguino sacro/ Covenamus/ Uno animus est pluri"
     Whatever else was said was lost as Angela felt a comforting and warm
sensation run through her body. When it departed, Angela no longer felt the pain
of her ribs. The man in gray sighed heavily as he leaned against the wall.
"Remember something, Angela, and remember it well: We are never alone. No matter
how dark the Path, no matter how lonely, we never walk it alone," he gathered
himself up and coughed once. "You'd best get going if you wish to beat the
coming dawn."
     Angela didn't want to run out, but she realized she had no time to ask any
more questions, she had to move ~ now ~. "How can we speak to you again?"
     "I'm sure this is not the last your race will hear from me," the young
man smiled enigmatically and bowed. Angela began an ascent up the fire escape
quickly. He turned his attention to the wall where the Unseelie was propped
under the graffiti of a seven-pointed star.
     Angela looked back as she heard the sirens in the distance. The man in gray
was gone, dissolved back into the shadows. But he had left a mark with his
blade. Carved into the wall space which had once proudly displayed the Unseelie
graffiti was now a Six-Pointed star. Looking back on what some called the Star
of David, Angela pondered the deeper meaning of the phrase "We are never alone"
and that of the man who had said it. As she glided, free of her injury, she knew
one thing for certain: her Clan had never been alone in their fight against the
darkness, and it never would be.