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Description
Maybe if you had seen the sun more than a couple times in your lifetime you'd have had the good sense not to look directly at it.

Alas, the first time you can personally recall was at the tower, and the second time was now as a beam shot from the direction of the tower and split the clouds. Goliath was pulling you along, reaching over to scoop you up to safety and the sun appeared in the blink of an eye.

"Agh!" you cry out as you're blinded, ducking down to cover and rub at your watering eyes. At the same time, you feel the pressure of an arm lifting you from beneath your legs, and you're being held, and there's a leathery 'woosh' as the noises of battle are abruptly muffled...

And then you're not moving anymore. And all at once there's not so much yelling, or screaming...

...But the sound of crashing, breaking stone.

You open your eyes to try to look around but your vision still isn't back yet. A persistent white light consumes the center of your vision and when you put out a hand, you touch stone.

"Wh--" You try to move, but something's cinching around your waist. You can barely twist your body let alone slip out of it, "--Goliath??"

Pat. Pat pat. Your hands feel across his chest - and it's stone. All of it. Your hands trace from his chest up to his neck, to his jaw, and it's angled-- outstretched, facing you. He was trying to say something and was caught in the middle of it.

Right beside you something crashes and crumbles across the ground, the impact of it causing you to yelp and cover your head, your ears. You realize then what the noise is -- and it's...

Death.

It's Gargoyles smashing to the ground caught mid-flight by the sun. It's bad guys, it could be good guys, it could be Brooklyn, or Broadway, or Lexington-- Or... or...

"Fuck!" You whimper into your knees, each panic-driven breath you draw a needle-sharp pain in your lungs, "God, fuck, no..."

But the thumping quiets after a time, and though there shouldn't be... there's talking. Conversation. Laughter.

You uncover your ears and try to listen. It's muffled and you still don't know why, but you suspect it might have something to do with that explosion at the corner of the shipping container.

"Alright! Round 'em up." A male voice calls out from a distance, "Get those six loaded up in the transports, and fetch the belts out of the rubble to recycle for the new soldiers. Don't forget to loot the place for extra supplies! Torch anything we don't need."

The voice has grown closer now, and you can hear the sound of footfall crunching across the ground. The pungent smell of cigarette smoke wafts up to your nose and makes you want to sneeze-- but you pinch your nose tight and you hold it in because... nobody's said anything about you yet. They haven't seen you yet, clearly, somehow.

"We don't want any rats filling the place back up after we leave. Make it inhospitable." The crunching of footfall pauses some distance away from you, replaced only by the steady beeping of a vehicle reversing closer. The brakes hiss, a door squeals as it lowers and THUMPS on the ground, and you can hear many more boots slapping the ground as people fill the area.

You do your best to slow your breathing, you pull your shirt up to breathe into it so you can mute the quiet wheezing that comes with each breath. You're quiet. So quiet, so opposite of the racing cacophony in your mind.

Who are these people?

What's going on??

Why are they doing this?

What happened to everyone?

Are they okay?

What's going to happen...?

As gravity suddenly shifts again, you flinch and squish yourself against Goliath's chest. You hear people grunting around you and you realize Goliath has been tipped over and now, by the bouncing, is being carried.

"Heavy, man..." Someone mutters through a respirator.

"Not as heavy as that fat one." Someone replies with a snarky sort of laugh.

"I just wish this guy hadn't of wrapped his wings up like this. There's hardly anything to hold on to!" Another groans-- helping you realize why nobody knows you're there.. simply because they can't see you. Goliath wrapped you up, hid you, protected you... again.

"Are we sure this is even the guy?" A fourth.

"Of course it is! He's the biggest, he fits the description. An' if it's not--even though it IS, you dumbass--we just smash it to bits back at HQ." replies the third.

"Cut the chatter!" Barks that first voice from a distance, "Hurry up and get them loaded so we can wrap it up again! I'm sick of wearing these stupid things."

Quiet, baleful muttering is shared among those carrying you and Goliath, and soon the racket of looting fades away in favor of a frankly sweltering environment and a deep multi-faceted humming sound.

"Up! Watch you don't break off a corner on the wall or somethin'. Easy does it, right in the chamber..." mutters directs a female voice through a respirator.

Gravity shifts again and you brace yourself against Goliath's shoulder when you're moved upright. And then as you're slid across the ground, you find yourself in some sort of heat source - a tiny sliver of light streams down past Goliath's face and hisses as it touches your shoulder and burns.

It's the tiniest of noises which escapes you as you squirm away from it so it streams just past your shoulder. You hear an inquisitive noise from outside of your cocoon.

"What is it, Daniels?" The female voice asks.

"...Thought I heard him make noise." A gruff voice responds.

"Don't be stupid. He's under sunlight - he's pacified." You hear someone rapping their knuckles against Goliath, "See? Now get moving."

A derisive snort is given as a door clicks closed, and then there is a steady hiss as strange-smelling, recycled air fills the chamber. It's both sweltering and stuffy and you thank the universe you're not as claustrophobic as you could be because... god, this would be the worst situation for you.

The truck rumbles to life and then you're moving. You don't know where you're going, but so long as you're waiting for your vision to come back and you're stuck here, you see no better time to try to rest and recover than now. It's what Goliath would want you to do given the situation. You know you need it.

Sleep doesn't come in a situation like this. You maybe drift in and out a bit but each bump in the road jolts you back into the waking world. You relish what little rest you do get as the truck ambles along to some distant location.

'I don't know how,' you think to yourself, not speaking aloud for you think someone may be riding in the back of the truck with the group as a guard, 'but... I'm going to fix this. I'm going to get you out of here. It's my turn to save you for once.'

Description
Maybe if you had seen the sun more than a couple times in your lifetime you'd have had the good sense not to look directly at it.

Alas, the first time you can personally recall was at the tower, and the second time was now as a beam shot from the direction of the tower and split the clouds. Goliath was pulling you along, reaching over to scoop you up to safety and the sun appeared in the blink of an eye.

"Agh!" you cry out as you're blinded, ducking down to cover and rub at your watering eyes. At the same time, you feel the pressure of an arm lifting you from beneath your legs, and you're being held, and there's a leathery 'woosh' as the noises of battle are abruptly muffled...

And then you're not moving anymore. And all at once there's not so much yelling, or screaming...

...But the sound of crashing, breaking stone.

You open your eyes to try to look around but your vision still isn't back yet. A persistent white light consumes the center of your vision and when you put out a hand, you touch stone.

"Wh--" You try to move, but something's cinching around your waist. You can barely twist your body let alone slip out of it, "--Goliath??"

Pat. Pat pat. Your hands feel across his chest - and it's stone. All of it. Your hands trace from his chest up to his neck, to his jaw, and it's angled-- outstretched, facing you. He was trying to say something and was caught in the middle of it.

Right beside you something crashes and crumbles across the ground, the impact of it causing you to yelp and cover your head, your ears. You realize then what the noise is -- and it's...

Death.

It's Gargoyles smashing to the ground caught mid-flight by the sun. It's bad guys, it could be good guys, it could be Brooklyn, or Broadway, or Lexington-- Or... or...

"Fuck!" You whimper into your knees, each panic-driven breath you draw a needle-sharp pain in your lungs, "God, fuck, no..."

But the thumping quiets after a time, and though there shouldn't be... there's talking. Conversation. Laughter.

You uncover your ears and try to listen. It's muffled and you still don't know why, but you suspect it might have something to do with that explosion at the corner of the shipping container.

"Alright! Round 'em up." A male voice calls out from a distance, "Get those six loaded up in the transports, and fetch the belts out of the rubble to recycle for the new soldiers. Don't forget to loot the place for extra supplies! Torch anything we don't need."

The voice has grown closer now, and you can hear the sound of footfall crunching across the ground. The pungent smell of cigarette smoke wafts up to your nose and makes you want to sneeze-- but you pinch your nose tight and you hold it in because... nobody's said anything about you yet. They haven't seen you yet, clearly, somehow.

"We don't want any rats filling the place back up after we leave. Make it inhospitable." The crunching of footfall pauses some distance away from you, replaced only by the steady beeping of a vehicle reversing closer. The brakes hiss, a door squeals as it lowers and THUMPS on the ground, and you can hear many more boots slapping the ground as people fill the area.

You do your best to slow your breathing, you pull your shirt up to breathe into it so you can mute the quiet wheezing that comes with each breath. You're quiet. So quiet, so opposite of the racing cacophony in your mind.

Who are these people?

What's going on??

Why are they doing this?

What happened to everyone?

Are they okay?

What's going to happen...?

As gravity suddenly shifts again, you flinch and squish yourself against Goliath's chest. You hear people grunting around you and you realize Goliath has been tipped over and now, by the bouncing, is being carried.

"Heavy, man..." Someone mutters through a respirator.

"Not as heavy as that fat one." Someone replies with a snarky sort of laugh.

"I just wish this guy hadn't of wrapped his wings up like this. There's hardly anything to hold on to!" Another groans-- helping you realize why nobody knows you're there.. simply because they can't see you. Goliath wrapped you up, hid you, protected you... again.

"Are we sure this is even the guy?" A fourth.

"Of course it is! He's the biggest, he fits the description. An' if it's not--even though it IS, you dumbass--we just smash it to bits back at HQ." replies the third.

"Cut the chatter!" Barks that first voice from a distance, "Hurry up and get them loaded so we can wrap it up again! I'm sick of wearing these stupid things."

Quiet, baleful muttering is shared among those carrying you and Goliath, and soon the racket of looting fades away in favor of a frankly sweltering environment and a deep multi-faceted humming sound.

"Up! Watch you don't break off a corner on the wall or somethin'. Easy does it, right in the chamber..." mutters directs a female voice through a respirator.

Gravity shifts again and you brace yourself against Goliath's shoulder when you're moved upright. And then as you're slid across the ground, you find yourself in some sort of heat source - a tiny sliver of light streams down past Goliath's face and hisses as it touches your shoulder and burns.

It's the tiniest of noises which escapes you as you squirm away from it so it streams just past your shoulder. You hear an inquisitive noise from outside of your cocoon.

"What is it, Daniels?" The female voice asks.

"...Thought I heard him make noise." A gruff voice responds.

"Don't be stupid. He's under sunlight - he's pacified." You hear someone rapping their knuckles against Goliath, "See? Now get moving."

A derisive snort is given as a door clicks closed, and then there is a steady hiss as strange-smelling, recycled air fills the chamber. It's both sweltering and stuffy and you thank the universe you're not as claustrophobic as you could be because... god, this would be the worst situation for you.

The truck rumbles to life and then you're moving. You don't know where you're going, but so long as you're waiting for your vision to come back and you're stuck here, you see no better time to try to rest and recover than now. It's what Goliath would want you to do given the situation. You know you need it.

Sleep doesn't come in a situation like this. You maybe drift in and out a bit but each bump in the road jolts you back into the waking world. You relish what little rest you do get as the truck ambles along to some distant location.

'I don't know how,' you think to yourself, not speaking aloud for you think someone may be riding in the back of the truck with the group as a guard, 'but... I'm going to fix this. I'm going to get you out of here. It's my turn to save you for once.'