Goliath And Elisa In Gargoyles: Season 2

"And a Hunting We Will Go"

Summary: Someone does some fishing. Some very expensive fishing.

Words: 1,191

3/4

Warnings! Animal Death

~Beep!~

~Beep!~

God, someone please shoot me! 

~Your call may be put on hold~

Elisa couldn't help but roll her eyes.

The disembodied, dial up music on the other end of the line almost made her see red. Two hours, two damn hours! She's been on hold since four in the afternoon! 

‘Come on, come on, dammit, let's go already!’

~Beep!~ 

~We're currently busy at the moment, but a representative will speak to you shortly~ 

~Beep!~ 

‘Shortly my ass!’

The music played again, like a hellish melody.

'I hate tax season. Hate it!' Bored, Elisa snagged her pen tapping it harshly against the kitchen table. 'Next time I'm hiring some smuck to do this shit' 

'If I can afford' 

The tapping stopped for a minute.

~Beep!~ 

~We're currently busy at the moment, but a representative will speak to you shortly~

'I'll make it fit'

Somehow.

Another twenty minutes past before someone finally, finally picked up the damn phone. But, despite the blessing the call just added to her frustrations.

"....how many dependents did you say you have again…...?" 

Her lips tightened, doing her best to not snap- "Three. Three kids" she can't remember how many times she had to repeat that now.

This was stupid, beyond stupid. She just wanted the call to end for god's sake, the man over the phone kept droning on and on, in a hush wispy, barely audible voice about tax deductions or something, it was very obvious that he hated his job and sounded like he wanted to be anywhere, but on the phone with her.

It was like pulling teeth. 

One by one by one.

Sitting on the couch watching Teletubbies with the kids was starting to sound like heaven right about now.

After a while, her mind drifted. ‘Whoever wrote tax laws ought to be shot.’

She heard something squeak in between the irritated tapping and clicking of her pen. Ignoring it, she leaned against the kitchen chair before switching the phone to her other ear.

Another squeak. Sounded like wet shoes sliding against a tile floor.

She ignored it again, clicking her pen.

'I need a drink after this. Maybe I can raid Xanatos stash without him noticing'

~Squeak~

'Ugh, what is that?!' but she didn't feel inclined to worry about it. The castle was riddled with strange noises. It used to freak her out, but she had gotten used to it over the years. And besides, she wasn't the only resident lurking around.

~Squeak~ 

"Maza, a word if you may" Elisa rolled her eyes again.

"I'm busy Xanatos, bother me some other time" 

“I believe it may interest you”

“You can’t hide from Fox forever Xanatos”

“I’m not, but this isn’t about her”

~Squeak~ 

'Okay! That was getting annoying!' she snapped around her chair to level Xanatos with a glare and find the source of that ungodly sound only to stop and freeze.

Xanatos was drenched head to toe. His characteristic ponytail was undone. Hair was in his eyes, slopped around his shoulders and he smelled like fish and algae.

He looked completely disgruntled. Which was also rather uncharacteristic. And the jacket of his suit was missing.

"Wha-?" 

"Hi, Auntie Lisa!" 

Then she looked down. 

Two giddy kids were tucked under his arms. Alex's eyes gleamed, shined really, his long dark, red curls stuck to his face. And there was Aodh, wrapped in Xanatos' jacket, not giddy, or mischievous, but unperturbed as she munched on a half-eaten koi fish.

They were a wet mess.

The crunch of bone and flesh invaded the quiet for a second.

"They raided the koi pond" 

As if the half-eaten koi fish didn't give her a clue. Elisa didn't know whether to laugh at the spectacle before her or sigh. Wasn't Owen watching them?

"You didn't say we couldn't play in it, dad!" 

"Please tell me that wasn't expensive"

"The pond's fine. The fish on the other hand-" Xanatos glanced at her daughter, he seemed almost amused despite his obvious veil of exasperation "well I'll leave that to your imagination" 

'Well, isn't that just peachy' Everything in this building was outstandingly expensive to suit Xanatos opulent tastes. He's right on that matter, she didn't want to imagine what that fish might cost her, if he were a pettier man. 

"Why do you have a Koi Pond just laying around anyway? Inside a building. Where anybody can just trip and fall in it" 

"I like the aesthetic." 

"Sure." Right. Of course.

"It's not like I expected two troublesome kids to try and make it into their personal fishing spot." 

"Ah-huh" 

"Nor was I prepared for one of them to actually eat the koi fish" 

Elisa smirked a little "Oh really, and here I thought you were always prepared for the impossible" 

He looked disgruntled again. The shock faded, but damn did he look miserable.

That suit had to be worth more than anything she's made in the past five years. She can't help but snicker-

-who would've thought that all it took for him to lose his cool was a bunch of unruly kids.

Karma was beautiful in its own way.

"Can I have my own Koi fishpond then, dad?" 

Xanatos refined from a sigh.

"I'll think about it" 

"Yes!" It definitely wasn’t a yes, but Alex interpreted it as one.

“David!”

There was something akin to fear in his eyes “Ah,” he cleared his throat “In the kitchen, dear.”

Fox walked-waddled into the room; they saw her belly before they saw her “Are you hiding up here again-” Xanatos turned around on instinct.

“Hi, mom!” Alex waved.

Fox blinked a few times before she broke down into hysterical fits of laugher.

“Fox, please” she had to hold onto the threshold to hold herself up.

“He fell into the pond trying to fish the kids out” Elisa supplied as flatly as possible. Fox snorted.

“I did not fall.”

“Had a nice swim, David!?”

“I guess you now know what it feels like to swim with the fishes, huh, Xanatos?” Elisa couldn’t help herself. Fox had a conniption fit.

“The children could’ve drowned”

Now both women were laughing.

“I can swim, dad, Aodh too, you know that, and Puck was with us.” Corrected by a child.

“Speaking of Puck-Owen, where is he?” she asked in between fits of laughter.

“He scampered off, after I-collected the children”

“Left you for dry, huh?” Elisa got the impression that he wanted to roll his eyes at her. But forced himself not to for whatever reason. Instead of saying anything he placed Aodh gently on the floor. The sudden jostle of movement hardly interrupted her eating.

“We’re still playing, dad!” Alex protested.

“Both of you need a bath” he squirmed out of his father’s grasp “Alex.”

“We can take a bath together! Come one, Aodh!” he grabbed her fingers, and dragged her along. Aodh simply followed without much fuss towards the baths. Alex knew the castle like the back of his hand, as he led them away.

She was still eating the fish.

Elisa shook her head; hopefully, that was the extent of today’s excitement-

~Beep!~

‘You’re call has been disconnected’

Dammit.

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Thanks for Reading!

Storyboarding the opening sequence of Gargoyles for a class assignment! I watched the sequence a couple of times and wrote down the beats before jumping in. I stopped at 40 sec though, but I might come back and do the rest of the sequence if I have time. Alas, back to my grad project/portfolio!

I’ve seen a couple of comments to the effect that, in “Awakening”, Goliath was the one who was treating Demona badly. They’re basically saying something along the lines of he was going behind her back and messing around with another woman. And I feel like I have to address this, because it’s a huge mischaracterization.

Goliath was not in any way cheating when he befriended Elisa. First of all, as of the end of “Awakening”, he had known Elisa for all of two or three days. Goliath is not the type (nor has he ever been characterized as the type) to jump into bed with someone he’s just met. We have Word of God that he’d fallen in love with Elisa as of “Deadly Force”, but it took Puck literally switching their species in “The Mirror” for him to even consciously realize those feelings, much less act on them. Goliath, at the point of his breakup with Demona, did not see Elisa as anything more than a friend.

Secondly, we’ve seen Goliath interacting with plenty of female characters, both human and gargoyle, without there being any hint of anything sexual going on, Princess Katharine and his rookery sister Desdemona being notable examples. While he and Elisa had real chemistry, and she was definitely harboring an attraction to him, the important thing is that neither one of them ever acted on those feelings until well after he and Demona had broken up.

Listen, if you think that even so much as talking to someone of the opposite sex is grounds for suspicion of cheating, then please, get therapy. Similarly, taking issue with your partner making friends with someone solely on the basis of which demographic they belong to, while otherwise knowing nothing whatsoever about that person as an individual, is a lot more indicative of bigotry than it is of any actual problem with the friendship.

Goliath didn’t dump Demona because he wanted to get his freak on with another woman, he broke up with her because she lied to him, blamed him for making the best decision he could after she’d withheld critical information, then pinned him to the floor and held a gun to his chest when he called her out on it. If you switched the characters’ pronouns, there wouldn’t be any question as to why this relationship fell apart. Whatever was or wasn’t going on between him and Elisa had nothing to do with it.

"And a Hunting We Will Go" Series

Chapter I:

Summary: In retrospect, Elisa should've seen it coming-

Chapter II:

Chapter III:

Everyone's always talking about Elisa "monster fucker" Maza, but no one ever talks about Goliath being labeled by the gargoyle community, as the dirty human fucker.

Alfons Mucha

“And suddenly, the monster in him falls silent as he rests his head on her lap.”

— Everything feels better with her. (via empiregrotesk)