Chapter 2

He watched as Lexington put the two data tapes into the Computer terminal, and began to type in commands.

"Hmm... this first tape is heavily encoded. It might be a large database file, or even a digitized video record of some kind. It's going to take quite awhile for my decrypting software to crack it," Lex explained.

"What about the second disc," he asked.

"I'm going to call it up now, and take a look at the file directories." The screen filled with a seemingly random series of numbers and letters. "It's encoded too, but not as heavily as the first. What ever is on it must not be very critical data. Lets try running this thru the decrypt program first." The screen began to change, letters and numbers began moving and changing places. "I think it's almost got it!" Then the screen stopped.

"Well what does it say?" he asked.

"Don't keep him in the dark Lex," Brooklyn said. "Does it have anything useful on it?"

Lex sighed. "Not really. It's a read out of heart rate, respiratory functions, and brainwave activity. It must have been monitoring vital functions."

"Wasn't there anything at all besides that?"

"Just one thing." Lex scrolled up to the top of the screen and pointed. "This."

He leaned forward and read the one word out loud. "Argent." He frowned. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"It's Latin," said Brooklyn. "I remember seeing it in one of the books Goliath was reading once. It means Silver."

He looked down at his grey furred arm. "Could that be my name?"

"It might be... or at least that's what Sevarius named you," Brooklyn smiled. "And it fits."

"I think it's a cool name," said Lex.

"And what name would that be?" asked Goliath. The sound of his voice turned the trio around to face the group coming up from the kitchen.

"Lex found a name at the top of the second data tape. We think it's our friend's, and it fits him."

"My name is Argent... I guess. At least that's what the tape said. And it's better than Hey you."

"'Tis a fine name lad," Hudson remarked.

"Yes. Latin for silver," Goliath mused. "And a substance used to ward off werewolves... Sevarius has a strange sense of humor indeed. On behalf of our clan, we welcome you as our guest Argent."

He was about to thank then all for their hospitality... when a strange voice interrupted him.

"When Owen told us we had a new visitor in the castle I had thought that I wouldn't be surprised at his appearance, I guess I was wrong!"

He turned to see a dark haired man, with a red headed woman beside him... and in her arms she was carrying a baby. Startled by the strangers that had come into the room, his heart started pounding and he felt a slight tingle all over his body.

"Argent, what's happening to you?" shouted Goliath in alarm.

He was about to ask what he was talking about, when he looked down and saw that his entire body was begining to become transparent. He could see right through his own body! "I don't know! How do I stop it!"

"Fascinating," said the strange man while smiling.

"Calm down lad," said Hudson. He looked at Goliath. "Do ya think is magic?"

"I don't think so," Lex said while approaching the nearly invisible Argent. He sniffed the air. "Do any of you smell that?" The rest of the Gargoyles took deep breaths.

"I do. What is it?" asked Broadway.

"It's ozone," said Lex. "It's the same smell that lingers after an electrical discharge... like the ones Derek and his clan can fire from their hands." Lex looked lost in thought for a moment. "Try doing what Hudson said and calm down... get your heart rate back to normal."

He took some deep breaths, and slowly his heart began it's normal rhythm once more. He looked down and was pleased to see he was no longer transparent. "What happened?"

"I recall reading a file on a cloaking device that was still in the experimental stage. It uses an electrical field to bend light waves around an object... making it invisible."

"But what's that got to do with me?" he asked, still shaken from the unexpected experience.

"I believe I can answer that." The dark haired man said while approaching Argent. "Allow me to introduce myself first. I'm David Xanatos, this is my wife Fox." He indicated the stunning Redhead with the strange tattoo around her eye. "And she's carrying our son... Alexander." The child looked at Argent and instead of crying in fear, as he would have guessed the baby's reaction would be, the infant mearly grinned and cooed.

<The kid must be used to a lot of strange stuff going on to not even flinch at my looks.> he thought.

"Now as to your unique ability. The man who more than likely changed you was a former employee of mine," explained Xanatos. "His name is Dr. Anton Sevarius, and he is the world's leading expert on genetic engineering. At one time I wanted him to create creatures similar to Goliath and his clan, but instead of creating them from scratch... he used humans as baseline subjects to start. He began to mutate them using various forms of DNA, but he ran into a problem with making them able to fly. It seems that a creature as large as a Gargoyle would need to eat almost constantly in order to create the needed energy for flight. It seems that Gargoyles use a form of solar conversion process that to date is unique in nature to allow then to glide. They store the needed energy during the day. Dr. Sevarius solved that problem by using the same cells found in electric eels to provide a constant source of energy needed. This allowed not only for the power of full flight, instead of gliding, but gave his creations the offensive capabilty to discharge bolts of energy."

He gave Xanatos a blank look. "You mean that I used to be human?"

"It would seem so. I had no idea that Sevarius was still creating more mutates, or that he was working on a biological stealth-field... whatever else anyone may say about Anton, he's still a genius!"