Another lovesong on the radio. I wish there was something else to listen to, but I’m so restless I can’t stick with any of my CDs, not to mention they’re very far away from me and the discman, and... I dunno, the radio feels right. Sometimes I wonder if it is restlessness, or one of the memories wanting to listen to something I don’t have.
Should it bug me I think the memories have a personality? I mean, a consciousness, I guess. A will behind it all.
Ya know, I think it bugs me more that I’ve gotten used to the idea. I think some of the people that got eaten are still in my mind. Maybe it’s my way of handling the whole mess. And I am handling it. Took the pep talk from hell, or wherever Rhiannon happens to be wandering now, God grant it’s back at her home by this point. Control it, instead of it controlling me. Well, they still have their independent moments.
Heh. I just realized, you see all those people in the Nautilus room, working out at evenings, and how many times have I just watched them, wondering “just what are they thinking? What goes on in their minds?” And here I am, casually pumping enough iron that some of the football guys are doing a poor job of not staring. And what am I thinking about? Most of the time, damn little, actually. I’m not thinking, I’m remembering. Only problem is they’re not my memories, but from others, given to me thanks to a vampyre.
Wouldn’t that football jock get a kick out of knowing what I’m thinking? Nah, I think not. Well, enough of this toy.
Jay casually did one last rep, then stood up and wandered off to another of the weight room’s devices that she always considered uncomfortably close to resembling some sort of medieval torture device. Behind her, one of the jocks who’d been gawking at her sat down in the recently vacated seat and tried to lift the weights. It was only with extreme effort that he managed to succeed. Jay snickered and covered an outright laugh and the urge to try to flex her rather uninspiring looking arm muscles.
Ah, the joys of being a half gargoyle.
Took me a bit to recognize yeah, there are joys to it, not just blood and angst. There’s actually a lot to enjoy about it.
Flight. Ok, so I still get the heebie-jeebies jumping off roofs and out of windows, and let’s just NOT discuss heights during daylight, but the ability to glide around Cascade any night I want is pretty heady. There’s a freedom to it, while you need control to keep from becoming one with the skyscrapers. Having to be extremely conscious of gravity, while you hang at the edge of being free of it.... Such different things, making one wonderful activity.
Clan. It’s just gargoyle nature, I guess. Even more than humans, gargs are social critters. Without clan, there is such a feeling of.... Hmm. What’s the opposite of claustrophobia? I can never remember. A-something-phobia. It really makes it clear part of why Demona is so screwy. A gargoyle needs clan, just like we need to protect. And I get both with the Major Crimes crew. Well, ok, it’s mostly just the ones that are in on the Sentinel thing anyways, which helps. They were already halfway on the path of weirdness. I don’t care how much a freak Jim thinks he is, he ain’t got nothing on me, and compared to the clan- ok, so I’m not normal, but a lot closer than they’ll ever be. Scary thing is I’m proud of that fact. Go figure.
The protection thing is the other big perk. –ish. While it’s scary to have such a sudden drive to bring justice, play vigilante, it is SUCH a rush to fight for truth, justice, and all that stuff. And the rest of the clan.... Well, they can get nosy as hell, and very smothering, but it’s comforting to know you’ll always have someone at your back. Once you take into consideration that it might be, say, Frank that’s at your back. Still, the sense of being safe is great. Not just being part of something, but something that won’t turn on you. I guess this is why some people join gangs and whatnot.
Yeah. Great. Some people become gangers, I just went and got mutated into a gargoyle. Gangs, hmm. I think I got a few memories of that....
The bewildered football player watched her as her features turned blank, still going through the motions of exercise with a strangely zombie-like lack of grace. He looked away, not close enough to notice the mixture of colors and images reflected in her half closed eyes... reflections of nothing that existed on the white ceiling covered with fluorescent lights.
Jay came back to the present with a faint shudder, trying to brush the mental experiences off as something she’d seen on TV, heard about, maybe seen through a camera. Not experienced. She’d be having some nightmares in the near future.
Not like it’s the first time, she thought with a sigh. The violence is one of the real down bits. I mean, yeah, I grew up on TV violence and blood, guts, and gore, but that’s not real. Watching Dirty Harry kill off all the baddies is completely different from being right there in the middle of a fistfight, literally fighting for your life and hearing bones break, getting splattered with blood, and realizing that it would be oh so easy to just open the fist into your claws and use them to do permanent damage. I swear, sometimes I think the clan is so indoctrinated with Nicole’s martial arts/dirty fighting techniques, that they’ve forgotten the little fact that if their claws can go through stone, it’ll go through human flesh and bone without any problem whatsoever.
Now THAT’S scary. I know, since I’ve done it. Although the bitch wasn’t really human, not anymore. I still have Loar’s memories. They were the first ones I went through, really. She didn’t have much a personality at all. Stereotypical bookworm, nothing honestly exciting happened in her life. Until the vampyre sucked out her memories, and... well, I’m not quite sure what happened then. Spit some of it’s own back into her, I think. I don’t have any of her memories after the attack. I think the vamp has its own set that really does have a core personality, and it takes over the human host. How to Spread Vampyism. Lovely train of thought. Moving right along now.
My potential for violence actually disturbs me more than the rest of the clan’s. Ok, so yeah, it’s a hell of a double standard. But it all comes down to I’m human, and they never were. Even Tate has that inhuman side, that I don’t think they’ve ever noticed. It’s like the protection thing. A garg needs to be really fucked up not to protect. Even Demona protects, although her attempt to protect gargs from humans is really warped. The thing is, maybe it’s a culture thing, but I don’t think there’s any in the clan that wouldn’t happily sacrifice some bad guy to keep people safe. They work with the law, if outside it, most of the time, but then there’s the moments when the law bedamned, they go for protection. Like that serial killer Tate took out. We were told bring him back alive, but he didn’t even hesitate to kill. Very violently.
I didn’t get that at the time, and honestly, in a way, I still don’t. I shared his memory of the event, when we were all in my mind- now there’s a sentence that doesn’t make sense- so I do know where he’s coming from. Technically. I guess it’s like being in the mind of a complete nut, like... oh, what’s that movie? The Cell. Something inside is just flat out different, wired a totally different way. I’m sure Chad would yell at me, but the closest I’ve come to figuring it out is a Mac versus a PC. In the end they do similar things, but a totally different way. So what’s that make me?
A smile twisted her lips as her watch beeped the hour. Exercise time done, she slowed to a stop, took a mini rest, then stood and casually strolled back to her dorm room.
Gotta ask Chad about Linux.
Let me out of here!!!! A.K.A. Home
I actually wanna go back. To see more bloopers.
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Gargs as a whole, and assorted/associated lore belongs to Buena Vista and the Great Mouse. All used with the utmost respect, but not permission, no money is being made so please don't sue. The rest belongs to me, don't use without permission.