Someone Who Understands Me
Aris Merquoni

All characters contained herin are property of Disney. Please do not sue, 
thankee verily.

Another Gargoyles/Newsies crossover, folkses, but this one's more of a 
crossover than the last one(That was News on the Fly- for those of you 
reading this on Gargoyles-fans.org, that one's only on my page.) This darker 
than my normal stuff, but it's lighter than, oh, Jewel Faulkner's materiel 
:). I can't think of anything else to say on this except give the requisite 
URLs for more info(newsies.org and gargoyles-fans.org), so, onward with the 
story.

-=-=-=-

Demona landed silently on the roof of the shabby building, picking the spot 
not for the view or the comfort, but because it was nearby. Breathing in the 
smoky air and coughing because of it, she looked around at the night-covered 
city.

New York, a bustling city in 1897, was quiet now, the darkness covering the 
city like a shroud. Taking the small crystal out of her belt, she breathed on 
it and whispered under her breath. The hazy crystal glowed, then cleared. 
Holding the cabochon-cut diamond up to her eye, she looked out.

She saw nothing that was useful- the vision was smoky even with the light of 
the full moon powering it. She got impressions of tall buildings, lights, but 
nothing more. Sighing, she tucked the talisman away. Future-scrying was an 
imperfect science, anyway.

Looking out over the roads covered in shadow, listening to the clopping 
sounds of a horse's hoofbeats from somewhere south, she sighed. Stretching 
her wings, and preparing to take off again, she imagined the city as it 
*should* be, a complex of gargoyle æries, the sounds of wingbeats and a 
bustling metropolis by night, and maybe the humans as servants by day...

No, humans were untrustworthy creatures, hating and destroying each other. 
Pulling her wings back in, Demona suddenly felt exposed. Dying was no fear of 
hers, but it hurt. The memories of a time long ago hurt as well, of the days 
when she was the Angel and the clan had protected Wyvern... and then, she 
remembered, the day when the clan had been destroyed, shattered, by the 
humans who had betrayed them. She shuddered as she remembered the fear, the 
confusion that she had felt, awakening and finding her brothers and sistes in 
fragments lying on the cold stone, never to rise again, and coming back to 
find her mate and the remaining clan frozen in stone by night, never to 
awaken.

She had tried to survive, and had banded together with a small group of 
bandits, only to be betrayed again by the one human who she thought that she 
could trust. And then, more recent memories came, like a torrent now that the 
dam had burst- memories of being hunted, crossbow bolts finding their mark in 
her body and nets tangling her wings, and the strange masked Hunters that 
showed up wherever she fled to.

Trembling with the pain, the sorrow, the grief and the loss that the memories 
brought, she almost missed the gasp, the sharp intake of breath behind her. 
But her reflexes were sharp, and she whirled, fear taking over now instead of 
anger. Fear that maybe the Hunters or Macbeth had found her, that they would 
hurt her... for she had been hurt too many times, and knew that the Hunters 
had a talent for pain.

But the figure behind her wore not the mask with the red slashes of the 
Hunters, nor had the figure of her immortal enemy. It was only a boy, a human 
boy, wearing ragged pants, a patched shirt, a vest, and an almost out of 
place bandanna. He was looking at her in shock and surprise, and she felt her 
muscles relax. This was not an enemy... yet, he was human.

"Who're you?" He asked, his thick New York accent piercing her thoughts.

She settled back into a ready stance by instinct more than by concious will. 
"My name," she said clearly, "is Demona."

He nodded. "Well, I'm Jack Kelley, and if you don't mind me askin', what're 
you doin' on th' roof?"

She raised an eyebrow ridge. "Standing on it," she answered sarcastically. 
"Is there a law against that?"

He smirked. "Nahh, but if there was I'd letcha jus'ta rub it in the bulls' 
face." He shrugged and slipped a hand into a pocket in a relaxed gesture. He 
drew out a cigarette and a match, and lit up. Glancing up, he asked, "want 
one?"

"Kind of you to offer hospitality," she said dryly. "You're not afraid of 
me?"

He shook his head. "Naah, not really." Shrug. "I mean, dere's enough on the 
streets as there is out t' get me, an' I figure if you're not gonna do 
anythin', I can worry 'bout somethin' more important." He glanced up and 
glared. "Not dat I worry, I mean, I'm too good fer 'em to catch me."

She blinked. "So you know what it's like..." she said involuntarily, then 
snapped her mouth shut with a click as her fangs impacted.

He cocked his head to the side. "You runnin' from the law or somethin'?"

"Are you?" She retorted.

To her surprise, he nodded. "Yeah, da bulls're afta me, but they're not gonna 
find me." He glared. "I've been out o' the 'refuge' fer a year now, and I 
ain't gonna go back."

Demona raised an eyebrow. "Refuge?" She asked.

"Yeah, this jail fer kids." He snorted, then spat on the roof. "Bastard who 
runs the place, Snyder, takes the money the government gives 'im and stickes 
it in 'is pocket. Treats erryone in there the same- like they don't exist. Or 
as toys, to push around when he wants." Jack took another drag on the 
cigarrette and glared out at the city.

She shuddered slightly. "I've been running... for so long," she was compelled 
to say. "Being hunted. Hunted with crossbows, hunted with guns. Hunted by 
*humans*," she spat.

He glanced over at her. "Hey, don't look at me, lady, I didn't do nuthin'. I 
hafta look after myself, y'her? I don't have no time to go around chasin' 
people I don't even know. I've got enough trouble surviving."

"Survival," she snarled. "The human race calls this survival. I call it a 
plague. Half of the city is dead weight, begging for money off of everyone 
else-"

"Hell, you don't know what it's like, livin' on the streets," he snapped, 
"tryin' to make a living selling newspapers that nobody wants to buy, 
wonderin' if you'll break even, much less get a profit, wonderin' if you can 
pay the rent-"

"Trying to survive through winter with a team of men with rifles after you, 
huddling in the snow and knowing that the hypothermia won't kill you and 
neither will the starvation, trying to find something edible in tree bark 
because you can't take the gnawing in your stomach any longer-" Demona was 
biting out the words, trying to take some of the pain out of them by 
delivering them with as much force as possible.

"Wondering if you'll be able to get another meal, sleepin' on the street in 
the winter when your clothes is rags, watchin' the upper class sneer down at 
you, gettin' picked up for stealing food and trying to eat-"

"Chased every waking moment, falling asleep at sunup wondering if you'll live 
to see another sunset, worrying about waking up in a cage, seeing shadows 
chasing you when you're alone-"

"Getting raped in jail, damnit, in jail until I got stuck in this hellhole 
refuge, being fed enough to survive but not more, and playing by their rules, 
wracking my brain for a way to escape, and seeing the bastards cover up the 
damage they've done when the governer comes calling, looking like good little 
lapdogs-"

"Being betrayed by those I trusted, finding everyone dead because I couldn't 
trust a human, being lost and alone, finding someone only to be betrayed 
again, driven off and chased, living on my wits and my wings alone, watching 
you humans take everything that belonged to us, spreading your filth over 
every corner of the earth, trying to sneak a place on a ship crossing the 
Atlantic so I could get away from the Hunters-"

"And then escaping and living on the edge again for a year, having to force 
smiles and wisecracks because that's who I am, Cowboy, the best newsie in 
this whole goddamn state, having to front it all and knowing it's a lie, 
nobody I can talk to, nobody who understands one *tenth* of what I've been 
through-"

Demona was talking to herself, now. "And memories don't help, the time before 
the massaccare, with Katharine looking at *us* like we're the scum and the 
humans are the divine creatures, not caring that we lost several of our own 
saving their worthless hides-"

"Nobody else to talk to," Jack continued bitterly. "Nobody who cares to ask 
about my past, nobody who'd care that my dad would beat me when he came home 
from work if he drank too much, nobody who'd care that my mom ran away and 
got herself hit by a train, nobody who'd care that I was stuck for three 
years on the street before I was carted off to jail-"

"And they didn't care," Demona murmured, "didn't care that we had pain as 
deep as their own, deeper! Didn't care that we gave our lives to save theirs. 
And now, nobody cares, because nobody's left. They're all dead and gone... 
there are no more gargoyles left. Nobody left to care. Nobody left to 
understand."

"Nobody understands me," they said together.

There was a silence as the two glanced towards each other, suddenly 
remembering that they were not alone. One had seen centuries worth of pain 
and betrayals, the other been through the same suffering in less than twenty 
years. As if in a trance, Jack took one step forward...

But then he turned away. "I need t' sleep, not stand here talkin' wit' a-"

"Gargoyle," Demona supplied.

He nodded. "Gargoyle." He licked his lips nervously and acted as if he would 
say something else, then turned and took the fire escape down to the lower 
level. Demona stared after him for a moment, then turned and spread her wings 
to leave. The pain of the centuries still pressed upon her, but it seemed 
lighter, now.

Now that she knew that somewhere, in a grimy city called New York, there was 
a human boy named Jack Kelly that understood her.

-=-=-=-

A black bird, easily hidden in the shadows of the building, watched the 
gargoyle fly away. "Sorry, Demona," the raven muttered, "but I like this 
human, and he needed the company." The black bird cocked its head. "And so, 
it seemes, did you." With a shrug that no mortal bird could have completed, 
Coyote flapped his wings and rose over the city, turning into a whirlwind and 
flying west.

-=-= The End =-=-