Kyle:

I woke up on a small bed that felt like it was made of just wood and a few blankets. Thomas was sitting next to me as I jolted myself up, feeling like I needed to move that moment, but as I came up, I forgot why. "You're alright," said Thomas, putting his hand on my shoulder.

I looked at the boy, "Thomas, you're not tied up. Why are you still here? Or is here still-"

"The home of the gargoyle? Yeah, we're still there. Jason had to fix your leg and he left me here with you saying he had to get something to treat the wound. He said you were lucky that tourniquet held at all since it looked like a total amateur put it on you. I think he had to free me so I could watch over you. Almost like he actually cared about you hmm?"

I sat up a little. "I got it, I got it," I said. I sighed and held my head. "I figured it out before I faded out there. What my kind did was wrong. We're the monsters." I admitted. I gritted my teeth as it felt like half my mind wanted to attack me just for saying that. What that meant... my mother and father even...

I looked down at my leg, seeing a series of strong cords on it and a board held tightly over it. I could feel almost nothing below my knee as I lifted it up. Thomas quickly lifted up a hand in front of my face.

"Hold on, Jason said you should still leave it alone. You could make it worse."

"Not really," I said. "I had tissue rebuilding drugs injected in me a while ago. Bet you that wound is well on its way to healed by now." I looked around the new room. "Still... we're still in Jason's house?"

"One of the bedrooms," Thomas explained, nodding. I looked around seeing the room was just a bed in an otherwise bare area.

"No, that's not why I'm asking. It's the same shack and all I can see that, but Jason is the one who fixed my leg?"

"What, you think I know proper tourniquet procedures?" asked Thomas in return. "I'm smart, but I'm still nine."

"True." I looked at my sides. "Why do I still have my swords? All that time and he still hasn't taken them from me."

"Really I don't think he cares. It's not like you weren't pathetic enough fighting him with working legs."

I raised my head and put it on my fists. "You are really good at pointing out inconvenient truths you know that?"

"Thanks, I'll take that as a compliment," Thomas said, with a grin.

"Alright listen. Jason is out, hence we need to get out of here."

"Not exactly disagreeing, but you have any ideas?" Thomas asked.

"I might have a few," came a voice above him.

Thomas spun around. "Xao! Jessica!"

"What took you guys so long?" I asked.

"I'll take that as a thank you," Xao commented.

"We figured if the big guy wanted to kill you, he would have done it already," Jessica began explaining. "Kyle draw out your sword and get ready with your...trick." I obeyed, pulling out the sword Jessica had gifted to me, waving for Thomas to moving away. "We're coordinating something right now, so just play along."

"What might that plan be?" Asked a deep voice above them. It was Xao and Jessica's turn to quickly turn around now. I was expecting them to jump back and start leaping into action, but they just stood there acting completely stunned.

In fact, what Xao pulled I really didn't see coming. He gave the gargoyle a fearful grin and said, "Um... nice knowing ya'll." He then vanished in a blur of colors and shot out the open door into the rest of the house.

"XAO!" Jessica shouted as the teenage Pharaoh vanished. She then looked up at Jason as he folded his arms and looked down at her. "Um..." A powerful force shot through the door into the room and Jason was thrown forward, his head immediately embedding in the wood above my bed. "Do it, Kyle!" Jessica shouted. I yanked my sword into position just below the man's neck, ready to strike... and froze. Jason tore his head out of the wall and looked down at me. "Kyle what the heck?!" Jessica demanded. "That was the best chance we were gonna get."

"The best chance to what? Continue our parent's war?" I asked. Jason looked down at me as Xao re-entered the room, right hand raised and a sword in his left hand. I sat up. "Am I the only one who's figuring this all out? Jason doesn't want to kill anyone."

"For the record, I figured that out a while ago," Thomas interjected.

"Shut it," I snapped at him. Thomas obediently pulled a pretend zipper over his lips. "The only reason he's been so aggressive with us is because he's afraid of us, actually just as afraid of us as we are of him."

Jason turned to look at Xao, who timidly stepped backward. "Might want to amend that statement a little," Xao said.

"Fine, we're terrified of him and he's just a little nervous, the point is," I continued, "he's not a killer for the sake of it. Truth was he only defended himself and what his grief-ridden mind made him believe belonged to him."

"And I will continue to defend what is mine," said the man, reaching for his sword.

"Really?" I asked. I looked at Jessica with a raised eyebrow. "You think you can light this whole place ablaze?" I asked.

"What this shack?" she asked. "Are you serious? I could do it in my sleep."

"Go for it," I commanded. Jessica grinned, electric energy starting to emit around her. Jason's eyes quickly shot to the girl. I held up a hand for her to stop. "Well?" I asked him. I shouted behind him to Xao. "If anything happens in here, destroy the desk in the front room." Jason spun around to look at Xao as the teenager turned and pointed his hand out the door.

"What are you doing Kyle?" Jessica asked.

"I'm figuring this guy out like a person rather than just a monster," I said. I then looked up at Jason as he looked back at me with wide eyes. "How many drawings will you be able to save before this place goes up? One, two... none?" Jason turned to look at Jessica. "Really? You think you have time to stop them both?" I asked. Jason looked back to me. "So now it comes down, doesn't it? What do you do? Do you save the memories of your real family, or do you keep fighting us for Thomas?"

"I'll just stop them, I'm a gargoyle I can-" he began, but Thomas seemed to have an idea of his own. He stepped between Xao and the gargoyle.

"I know you're fast, but how fast are you?" he asked. "Fast enough to get through me too?"

I pointed my blade at the man, while still sitting down. "Not shaping up well is it?" I asked. "You could easily kill us all and just try again in another hundred years to find another boy, desperately trying to redraw your family based on a fading memory in the meantime. You could destroy everything you care about and think you care about and give in to your madness... or you can stop this. You can give us Thomas. You can give up your delusions to keep your real memories."

"The pictures won't bring them back," Jason said, looking back at the entrance to the room.

"Neither will a boy that hates and fears you, along with a house full of innocent blood," I said back. The man turned to me. I saw the fearless creature fading, a very scared man reflected in his eyes. "So, what's it gonna be? Man or monster?"

Jason looked back and forth a few times, his hand finally dropping to his side away from his sword hilt. "You can go," he said, stepping away from my bed. No one moved. "I said you can go." Still, no one moved.

I shook my head. "I would get up, but I can't," I said, looking around. Still, no one else moved. "Xao get over here."

"We're trusting a gargoyle?" Jessica asked.

"Why not, we trusted a trickster didn't we?" I asked. I paused. "Ya know, I just realized, said that way that really sounds kinda off." Xao slowly took a step forward.

Finally, Thomas shook his head. "Well if everyone else is playing the statue game, I'm helping Kyle walk out of here, you can catch up when it's convenient for you."

(***)

The four of us walked away from the house, Xao carrying me on his back and Jessica constantly checking over her shoulder.

Finally, the girl spoke up. "Why didn't you just kill him?" she asked.

I shook my head and replied. "I realized he wouldn't kill us, so how was it worth it to kill him? We stood to gain if we overcame our problems together, but if we fought it out, we all stood to lose everything. I figured I'd just confront him with it all."

"You could have killed him with one shot and we would have gotten out just as easily," Xao said.

"His was still a human life," I said back. "You never kill if it's not worth it. That man had a chance to turn around. He wasn't hopelessly consumed by his greed and power like Darius or Gregory; he was just going through some hard times."

"But he's a gargoyle. That means he's hopeless," Jessica argued.

"Does it?" I asked.

"If it doesn't," she said, "then that means- the Purge- we killed..."

I looked around, swallowing uncomfortably. "We didn't do it... but we didn't question it either." Jessica looked at me, starting to shake her head, mouth ajar. "Yes, our parents are mass murderers."

There was a shared silence between us until we reached the sub.

(***)

In the back of the sub, Jessica sat with me while Thomas and Xao sat in the front two seats. Jessica finally opened her mouth to speak. "So... what does this mean? I mean... our nation committed genocide."

"We didn't," I said.

"Not like we've been conscientious objectors," she replied. "Where do we go from here? Your parents were in that war..." She held herself and bit her lip. "Mine might have been too."

"I know," I said. "Worse yet, my father was... someone pretty important during the war."

"So your dad was responsible for what happened to that man's family?" Thomas asked, turning around to look at us.

"I suppose in a way," I said with a nod, "I know he would never have ordered something like that specifically, but he didn't object when the order was handed down to hunt down all gargoyles, even those not involved in the war. The way he tells it, he was all too happy things were so simple. He said it was just good versus evil like it's supposed to be."

"But they weren't all evil then," Jessica said. "Our fathers were wrong."

"How could they have known that?" I asked. "The gargoyles were so powerful and the ones our parents were fighting really were monsters. Remember the stories? If they're true, then those creatures set out to conquer the entire world by force. That was madness pure and simple and the creatures themselves were so powerful, our parents were terrified. They did what they thought they had to."

"But... how do you know when someone is truly evil, and when you've just made a mistake?" Jessica asked.

Xao shook his head upfront. "You don't," he said. "That's why you don't kill if you have a choice in the matter. Truth is I knew what they did was wrong before this big reveal."

"You did?" I asked.

"You didn't notice me treating the gargoyle differently than the two of you?" he asked. Xao continued to pilot our sub through the Thames. "Thing is, I understand what our parents did, but the gargoyles were still people."

"So which race was in the wrong?" Thomas asked.

"It wasn't about races," Xao answered. "Everyone wanted to make it about that, but really, in the end, it was about individuals." He looked out the window

"So our parents... they were the real monsters," Jessica said. "What does that make us?"

"Human beings with choices just like everyone else," Xao answered. He looked back ahead. "The question is, what will you do, now that you know?"