by Peter David
He hung there for long seconds, sending a silent prayer of thanks to whatever deity had enabled him to make the most unlikely leap. Then, very slowly, very carefully, he began to pull himself up.
The hat slipped out of the opening, but Zorro caught it with one hand and quickly slapped it back atop his head. Then, displaying most impressive upper body strength, he hauled himself up, up into the window and through.
If there was a member of the crew nearby, then Zorro would have more trouble than he knew what to do with. Fortunately the same deity who had enabled him to get access to the vast floating vehicle was still keeping a watchful eye upon him. All the pirates were apparently still engaged with whatever was happening topside. Zorro was alone.
He knew he had to find a place to secret himself immediately. He quickly found a set of stairs that led to the lower decks, and from there he made his way until he could go no further. A darkened room was in front of him, and so he secreted himself in it and prepared for the voyage to start.
At this point he didn’t have the faintest idea of what he was going to do. All he knew was that he had to come up with some plan in terms of dealing with the pirates. He might well have conceived a strategy to deal with Diabolito, but there were at least a dozen or more swords he would have to deal with, and even the magnificent Zorro the Fox could not battle those sorts of odds by himself.
Except as it turned out, he did have help. If he could free his father and Quintero, that would be two more worthy swords by his side.
Yet they would still be outnumbered by at least four to one. Furthermore his father was not a young man. He had no idea how his father would survive in a lengthy battle. If his heart gave out in the strain, it would both diminish his team by a third, but would forever haunt Zorro for thrusting his father into a situation that killed him. Presuming, of course, Zorro’s life would extend much beyond that very moment.
As his mind raced to discern his next move, he suddenly heard the sound of footsteps coming toward him. Could it be they had seen him somehow? That they knew where he was hiding and were preparing to take him captive?
The room was empty and all shadows, and so Zorro backed up and secreted himself at the farthest part of the room from the door. Then, as silently as he could, he withdrew his sword from its sheath and kept it securely in his hand. He waited, the blade unmoving in his firm grasp.
The door opened, but since there was little illumination on the outside of the door, Zorro managed to keep himself hidden in the shadows.
A familiar form was standing there, looking into the darkness. There was a pirate behind him.
“This is a storage room,” said the pirate to Don Alejandro. “I hope you don’t mind sitting in the dark.”
“Not at all. I will pretend it’s my coffin,” said Don Alejandro.
Senor Zorro’s heart nearly exploded with joy. Rather than having to sneak all over the ship, that same benevolent God was delivering his father right to him. All of these were solid signs they were being watched over and would invariably triumph over the pirates, no matter what the odds stacked against them were.
The pirate was laughing at his father and Zorro had to tamp down the impulse to leap forward with his sword extended and plunge it right into the blighter’s chest.
They spoke back and forth for a few moments more and then the bound up Alejandro was partly shoved, partly stumbled into the dark room. He stared right in Senor Zorro’s direction and didn’t see him. Zorro thanked himself for the blackness of his costume.
The pirate closed the door, plunging the room into complete darkness. Fortunately enough, Zorro had been in the darkness long enough that his eyes had adapted to it somewhat. He couldn’t make out any details, but was able to discern the general shape and outline of his father.
Don Alejandro was just standing there, his head slumped forward, looking as if he was ready to pass out, but couldn’t muster the energy to collapse.
Quickly Senor Zorro brought his sword forward and touched his father’s back. Don Alejandro froze, not having the slightest idea what was going on. He must have sensed that something sharp was being tapped against his back, but he had no idea whence it had come or what the person wielding the sharp-edged weapon was about to do.
Then Zorro, with a single slash of his sharp blade, parted the ropes that were binding Alejandro’s arms. Don Alejandro gasped and turned to see who in the world had just freed him.
“Did you miss me?” Zorro asked.
Don Alejandro started to cry out, but Zorro immediately clamped a hand over his mouth to prevent him from making any sound. It took Alejandro long moments to recover himself. “Can you keep your voice down?” whispered Zorro. Alejandro managed a nod and Zorro removed the hand.
Alejandro, his fingers shaking, reached up and touched his son’s face. “You aren’t a ghost. You’re alive.”
“Of course I am. Were you led to believe otherwise?”
“Yes! The pirate claimed that he had killed you! And Maria said she forced you off a cliff.”
“There is some truth to both claims, but obviously I am still alive.”
Don Alejandro felt his son’s shoulders. “You’re wet.”
“That happens when you go swimming fully dressed.”
“You swam to this boat!” he said with incredulity. “How did you manage it?”
“The way that people normally swim. Father,” he said briskly to try and get Don Alejandro back on track, “Did I see correctly? Have they captured Quintero as well?”
“Yes,” said Don Alejandro. “He was also taken prisoner.” His voice was getting a bit loud and he noticed it and immediately dropped the volume before Zorro could warn him to do so. “She is his sister.”
“Madre de dios,” Zorro whispered. “That makes all the sense in the world. I wager he was unaware that she had taken up with a pirate.”
“He was as surprised as I was, if not more so.”
“So I assume we can count on him to aid us when we make our move.”
Don Alejandro looked hopeful. “We have a move to make?”
“Very much so. But we are going to have to wait a while to accomplish it.”
“What are we waiting for?”
“We need men to join us in combating the pirates. I am hoping that we will be able to find them on the other ship, the one the pirates helmed when capturing this one.”
“Of course,” whispered Don Alejandro. “That makes perfect sense. We join blades with them and we overwhelm the captors!”
“Except we are hoping they will still be alive,” said Zorro worriedly. “That is the one thing we do not know for sure. There is reason to believe Diabolito may indeed have spared them in order to accomplish something else with them, but it’s hard to be certain. So we will have to wait. And father … you cannot tip off to the pirates that you have seen me alive.”
“Of course not, Diego. I am not a fool. Even though,” he added ruefully, “I very much feel like one. How could I not have known that woman for what she was?”
“Unless you have acquired the skill of mind reading and simply forgot to tell me, I feel secure in saying you have nothing to be ashamed of. Now … I need to get out of here.”
“I don’t see how you can,” said Don Alejandro. “I heard him slide a bolt down into place.”
“Whatever can be slid down can be slid back up,” said Zorro with confidence. He moved to the door and put an ear to it to verify for himself that there was no one on the other side. He heard no breathing, no hint of any presence outside the door. Then he took his sword and slid it between the door and the doorframe. He did so about two feet from the floor, and then very carefully slid it upward. It stopped momentarily when it reached the bolt that had been slid down, and then he pushed upward. The blade effortlessly caught the simple locking device and pushed it upright. Zorro smiled as he then pushed against the door and it opened immediately.
“Excellent!” breathed Alejandro. “I will come with you!”
“Diego … you are alive. For that, I could fly in the air for you if you asked me to do so.”
“I very much doubt it will come to that,” Zorro assured him. “Now let’s get you settled back in.”
It took mere moments to get his father sitting down facing the door, with his untied hands kept behind him so that no one could see them. Zorro then did as he said he would, draping the ropes over them so that at a single glance, it would look as if he was still firmly bound.
“Stay here,” Zorro warned in a low voice.
Don Alejandro shrugged. “Where would I go?”
Zorro had stepped outside the room, and now he swung the door shut and dropped the lock back into place.
Now came the tricky part: Finding Quintero.
As it turned out, it was much easier than he could possibly have expected. He simply walked the length of the ship to the other end, and discovered another locked room very similar to the one that his father had been restrained behind. He knelt close to the door frame and said in a low tone, “Quintero?”
Immediately a response came back from within. “Yes. Who is this?”
“The one who tried to send you a warning, but you wound up tossing the messenger into jail.”
There was a pause and then the single name came, and it was not a question or a guess: “Zorro.”
“The same. Hold on.”
He lifted up the door bolt, one identical to that which held his father. Apparently the ship did not have a formal, barred brig, which made things a bit easier for him. Otherwise he would have been dealing with a locked cell, which could have been somewhat more problematic.
He opened the door then and saw that Quintero had been left in exactly the same position as his father. His hands were tied behind his body and he was seated alone in the darkness. Zorro doffed his cap and said, “Hola, Senor Captain. How goes it?”
“You would know. You and your friends put me in here!”
Zorro knew that he should have ignored the jibe. But for some reason, he couldn’t bring himself to do so this time. He stepped in, allowing the door to swing shut behind him. He heard the bolt slide down back into place, but was certain that he could unlock it with his blade as he had done with his father.
“You are a fool, Quintero,” said Senor Zorro. “You are in this situation through your own doing; it has nothing to do with me. I sent Miguel to warn you so you could show up and be the hero for once. But no, you couldn’t do even once what you should have done in order to save the day. You had to let your overwhelming distrust of me guide you straight into the pirates’ hands, even though you were warned. You were warned. What sort of moron ignores a warning about pirates?”
Quintero, somewhat to Zorro’s surprise, said nothing. Instead he lowered his head and looked away from him.
Zorro knelt in the dim light so he could face him directly. “We should be on the same side, Quintero. Think. Think throughout the entirety of our co-existence. In all that time, I have only ever fought on the side of the poor and helpless, the victims of Los Angeles. I have dispatched villains whom you yourself were looking for. I have caught vile murderers you had your men looking for all over. The only times I have interfered with your soldiers were when they were doing something that was wrong.”
“Like collecting taxes?” Quintero finally said. “Legal taxes, determined by the governor … ”
“Taxes that would strip the people of every centavo they have in their pocket,” Zorro countered. “Not to mention that you have endeavored to collect levis on the churches, which should be immune from any taxes. You know as well as I do that it is wrong to go about and take money from the Frays. And if you do not believe me, then I can very much assume that when your time comes to answer for your sins, someone far mightier than I will inform you of the wrongness with which you have lived your life.”
“You think to lecture me on what I will face upon my passing? As if a bandit like you even believes in God.”
For a long moment, Zorro was silent. Finally he said, “Have you ever actually read the bible, Captain? Truly read it, cover to cover?”
Quintero was clearly about to toss off a glib answer, but then something halted him. “I’ve … read parts of it,” he said.
“I’ve read the entire thing, many times,” said Zorro. “I have made a number of discoveries in doing so. I found God to be the most vengeful creature that has ever lived. I found angels are not cherubic, angelic beings but instead God’s right hand, his warriors who inflict his judgments. I have found that he who walks in the spirit of God’s words shall be redeemed when he passes into the next world.”
“And is that what you think you are? A man walking in the spirit of God’s words?”
“Yes. Because we are told to help one another, and that is what I do. I help others.”
“And in doing so, break the law.”
“Laws that prevent us from helping each other should be broken. Laws that hurt others should never have been written. Besides, laws are made by men, and men are nothing but imperfect. Certainly you must admit that, Captain.”
“Men are made in the image of God. Does that not mean they reflect God himself, and therefore God is not perfect?”
“We are made in God’s image in the same way that our shadows are made in our images. They have our general outline, but none of the detail that makes us truly what we are. It’s the same with God’s reflection. We are his shadows, but it is our thoughts and actions that make us what we are.”
“I’ve had enough of this,” said Quintero. “Why do you not do what you came here to do?”
“Really? And what is that, exactly?”
“Why, to kill me, obviously,” Quintero snarled. “As you did with my predecessor, Captain Ramon.”
For a long moment, Zorro was silent. When he finally spoke, his voice was quite soft, but there was an undeniable trace of anger in it. “Captain Ramon deserved to die.”
“As do I, I assume,” Quintero said with a contemptuous laugh.
“Whether you deserve to die or not isn’t my decision to make, Captain. But Ramon died because his continued life would have presented a threat to an innocent woman.”
“What ‘innocent woman’?” Quintero said. There was obvious disdain in his voice.
It took a second for Zorro to summon her name to his lips. “Lolita Pulido. You might also know her as Lolita de la Vega.”
Quintero was clearly surprised by the speaking of her name. “I met her on one occasion. A very sweet woman. Her early death was a tragedy.” Then he shook off the recollection. “How did Ramon present a threat to her?”
“He had pirates kidnap her so that she could be presented to him as a gift for cooperating with the outlaws. He was going to … ” It was getting difficult for Zorro to keep his voice steady. The remembrance of Captain Ramon was enough to fill the heart of Don Diego de la Vega beating beneath his shirt with pure rage. He dared not allow that to show through, however. Zorro could and should speak of such things with a flat disinterest, recalling these actions that had been performed by another. Diego, on the other hand, felt nothing but wrath as he recalled Ramon’s evil actions, and Zorro could not permit Diego’s voice and emotions to seep through. He had long managed to deceive Quintero, but the captain was not a fool. He would undoubtedly recognize Diego’s emotion slipping through on Zorro’s tongue. Speaking flatly and steadily, he started again. “He was going to kidnap her, take her far away from here, and make her his through whatever brutal means he chose to employ.”
Quintero was clearly about to brush off Zorro’s assertions, but something caused his voice to catch. He said nothing, and his silence surprised Senor Zorro. “Go ahead, Captain. Tell me that I am lying.”
He didn’t. Instead he said, “I knew Ramon. Served beside him some years back. He was never the most … gentlemanly of gentlemen. He thought women existed to be used and tossed aside. That in a marriage, a woman had no rights and should be utterly subservient to their husbands.” He actually chuckled at that. “He claims he read that in the bible. Do you recall that passage, Senor Zorro?”
“Ephesians, 5-22,” Zorro said without hesitation. “Women should submit to their husbands in all things.”
“So does your reading support Ramon’s beliefs?”
Zorro shrugged. “It is called the good book, not the great book. However men of the time translated God’s beliefs, they were likewise limited by their own. Not every word should be taken literally. I do not believe for a moment that God wants wives subservient to their husbands. Do you, Quintero?”
“I have never given it any thought. I have always been married to the army.”
“Give women a try at some point. They can surprise you.” He cleared his throat. “We have gone substantially off topic, Captain. No, I am not going to kill you. In point of fact, I need your help.”
Quintero stared at him incredulously. “My help? You need my help? I hope you recall the contents of the Book of Revelation, Zorro, because clearly the end times are upon us.”
Somewhat to his surprise, Zorro laughed at that. “I had no idea you have comic timing, Captain. As it turns out, I am quite serious. Both you and Don Alejandro are very much going to be assisting me when I make my move.”
“And when will that be?” asked Quintero.
“I admit, I am typically something of a strategist, but in this case, Captain, I will somewhat be making it up as I go. Our moves will entirely be dictated by what the pirates choose to do and when they do it.”
Quintero was about to protest, but before he even spoke a word he withdrew them back into his throat. “Very well,” he said. But then he added, “There is one condition I insist on before any of this goes forward any further.”
