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Artificial night fell on the City, and Goliath and Bronx both awoke with their usual roars. The gargoyles bursting out of their stone skin were a familiar sound at sunset, and their roars carried over the darkening City.

Goliath dropped from his turret and glided towards the wall that surrounded the castle, landing before the gate that would open it to the rest of the crew. Elisa must have still been asleep or otherwise occupying herself in the castle, because the gate was closed. Goliath considered the gates, and the high, newly repaired wall that kept most visitors out of the castle. His instincts to keep the castle fortified against entry during his sleep were still strong, but he considered them as objectively as possible while examining the gate.

In times of conflict, this castle COULD still be used as a fortress. But if he was to open it to the crew formally, perhaps it was time to leave them open, and trust to the crew that he sought to protect.

Or perhaps that was still a step that could wait until he had met more of the crew, and trusted them a little better.

[ooc: a few players have expressed an interest in having their characters sneak into the castle to explore while Goliath is asleep during the day. If you have a character who would snoop around an old castle uninvited, feel free to tag in!]

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"I doubt any life on this ship could be considered 'normal' anyway."

Goliath brushed her hair back again, smiling with contentment he had thought he had given up on having. Love was complicated - theirs more so than others, but they were complications he wanted to meet and overcome with her.

"There is much I cannot give you that you could still have on this ship," he reminded her, growing serious again for the moment. "And if we can return to Manhattan, we won't have the same freedoms we can have here."

Like, for example, him having rights as a sentient being, which was something he'd come to enjoy.

She couldn't deny that there was a part of her that was still frightened of the complications, but Elisa had left the time when she'd let those fears overrule her heart behind her.

"I know. But it's you - this - that I want."

It was strange to think that it had taken the encounter with the hunters (and with Jason in particular) to help her realise that.

"If we get back to Manhattan, we'll deal with it, together."

This would have been the right moment for a kiss, but kissing was still not a part of Goliath's romantic vocabulary.

He still remembered the kiss she'd given him that morning, so long ago, but pleasant as the memory was, it was a human gesture. Instead, he drew her into his arms again, and the way he held her close and stroked her hair conveyed the same feeling.

Not so long ago, this would have been the point where he would have spoken his heart to her clearly, informed her that he had given up on happiness, that her return had woken him from a sleep of a different kind.

If so much of what he felt for her required great sacrifice on her part in returning those feelings, perhaps those would still have been the right things to say. If he had still been the same person who had never known the loss of a world, of a family, and had not yet known by experience that he could, that he must survive it, perhaps he would have said it anyway.

What he settled on after stroking her hair in silence, his voice soft with gratitude, was - "Just to see you again would have given me joy enough."

When it came to romance, Elisa was more than happy to do things the gargoyle way. She wouldn't object if Goliath decided to adopt certain human customs - particularly kissing - but, for now, this was what felt right.

She leaned into his touch, then, after a moment or two, raised her own hand to mirror the gesture.

"Then I guess you're just going to have to get used to having more than that," she teased, though the look in her eyes - a promise that made it clear that she really did mean what she said - was somewhat more serious.

"I could do that."

He returned her seriousness with the sincerity that she knew him well enough to expect.

"There's a lot about this ship that has kept my time here tolerable." Civil rights, for example. "I do not forsee myself tiring of more reasons to be happy."

He didn't mind the idea of putting that to the test, either.

"Elisa, I -"

It might have been the right time to speak his heart plainly, or that moment might still have been a little ways off. He paused to consider this, and to give her time to field his confession if the moment was not right.

At that moment however a particularly large figure came into sight high over head, a dragon of around one hundred and fourty foot long from snout to tail tip winging its way through the night sky of the city. The bronze scaled behemoth banking a slow turn that brought it near directly over castle Wyvern though many hundreds of feet into the aid, seeming to pay those far below no mind as it flew onwards.

Elisa knew what she wanted to say - what she felt - but, even now, the words stuck in her throat. She'd never been good at admitting her feelings and love was the most intense feeling of all. It left her feeling vulnerable in a way that she'd never experienced or expected to experience before.

Before she could think of what to say, they were interrupted by the enormous shape winging overhead.

"What the ..?" she exclaimed, turning her gaze upwards instinctively. "What was that?"

She knew what it looked like, of course, but that wasn't necessarily the same thing. Not on a ship like this.

"A dragon." Obviously - "But not the one I know from this crew. I've never seen this one before."

Instinctively, Goliath pulled Elisa close to him, ready to defend her if he had to. The dragon flew over without giving them notice.

" - that did not emerge from the pods with you, did it?"

Podpops are riots, but even a riot couldn't conceal a dragon of that size.

Elisa had reached instinctively for her gun, but she let her hand drop back to Goliath's arm when the dragon flew off without as much as a downward glance. She was stunned despite herself and despite the strangeness of life on the ship. Every time she thought that she was used to Stacy, something new and unexpected knocked her off balance again.

"I'd definitely have noticed a dragon," she assured him. "Is there anywhere in the ship that it could have been hiding?"

"I don't know why it would. Dragons are not unheard of on the crew."

The one he knew was a bit smaller, of course.

"Perhaps we should investigate."

That was, of course, the precise moment that a noise elsewhere on the grounds of the castle caught Goliath's attention. He frowned in the direction of the rear wall, where motion had most definitely just caught his eye.

"Maybe it didn't know that when it arrived," she pointed out. "Maybe it's first instinct was to hide."

Maybe the dragon - or whatever it actually was - had been persecuted in the same way that the gargoyles had been persecuted in their world. Which made Elisa wonder why the creature had finally emerged. Had it realised the truth or was something else responsible?

She followed his gaze towards the rear wall, returning her hand to the handle of her hand gun.

"Have we got company?"

Goliath frowned in the direction of the intruder, still considering the dragon, wondering which to investigate first.

The intruder was closer. Much as he didn't want to leave Elisa and in spite of his thoughts of opening the castle, it was still his territory to secure.

"I'm going to find out. Will you stay, or go with me?"

"Do you want me to come with you?" she countered, "They're probably just curious. The castle does stand out."

And it no longer had the tactical advantage at being at the top of a skyscraper.

"Why don't you investigate the intruder and I'll start looking into the dragon?"

Where once Goliath might have simply accepted her accompaniment, now the memory of Elisa injured very near to mortally by a member of the crew returned to alarm him.

"No. I don't want you to be alone with the dragon if it turns out to be dangerous."

Nevermind that she'd been alone when she first went to investigate him, and he was most certainly dangerous.

Though she still didn't know the exact circumstances of her injury, she knew enough to know where Goliath's concern stemmed from. She could have pointed out the innumerable dangers she'd faced without him - both before and after they'd met - but that wouldn't have helped. He knew, underneath his anxiety, that she was capable of taking care of herself. He was just concerned.

"I won't go and confront the dragon," she soothed, "I'll just go down to the precinct and ask a few questions. See if anyone knows what's going on. It is my job, remember?"

"And my job is to protect you."

To protect her, and to protect this castle - but he had already learned that it was much easier to repair the castle from damage than it was to sit by her bedside when she was injured.

"Wait a moment, and I will go with you. This will not take long."

"I don't know if I'd call it a job, but thanks," she said, touching his arm gently. There would come a time when he couldn't protect her - again - but this wasn't it. She'd just have to hope it wouldn't be for a while and that she'd be able to make sure he was aware of something that he'd never quite got the hang of in New York. That it wouldn't be his fault.

"I won't go anywhere. Except maybe to grab my jacket."

He took it upon himself. All things considered, it's his favorite job.

"I'll meet you at the gate."

He brushed her hair behind her ear once more before leaving.

Elisa watched him go before turning on her heel to head back into the castle. She was both a little relieved and a little disappointed that their conversation had been cut short before they'd had a chance to say anything. It wasn't that she wasn't sure of her feelings. She knew that what she felt was real and she didn't regret the choice that she'd made. But she was nervous about revealing such intense feelings when she usually kept that sort of emotion in check. It was a big step, even here and now.

She retrieved her jacket - it didn't go with the plant suit, but it was another piece of home - and headed down to the gate. They'd deal with the dragon now. She'd deal with her own insecurities later.

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