Reflections
Summary: New World Zorro. Zorro's thoughts at the end of that fatal episode Devil's Fortress.
Obviously all credit goes to the producers of Zorro. If I owned Zorro, Luis Ramon would have been promoted or still Alcalde.
Zorro's eyes widened as the mask was torn from his face. A myriad of emotions rushed though his mind, leaving him numb, cold. Fear. His enemy knew his identity. Victoria and his father were in danger. It was unlikely the Alcalde would spare them. They were too close to the source of over five years of humiliation. Anger. How could he have allowed the Alcalde to tear off his mask? Temptation. All it would take would be one push. One push and no one would ever know his identity.
And then the Alcalde cried out. And he was slipping, falling, falling. In that split second Zorro could do nothing but watch as his enemy fell away from the stone towards the unforgiving ground bellow. His numbness left, as adrenaline took its place. Never had he taken a life. Always he had believed in saving his fellow beings whenever possible. Yet the numbness had lasted too long. His enemy was now out of reach of even the whip he carried at his side. He was rushing down the stairs before the Alcalde had finished shouting that he "should have known" his humiliating opponent had been the son of his most active political opponent. And then he was standing next to the man who lay, rigid and unmoving, in the stone courtyard.
Numbly he stared at the body that had been Luis Ramon, eyes never leaving the dead man's face as he retrieved his mask and hat. One leg of the Alcalde's was twisted beneath his body. A small pile of blood dribbled out of the cut on the back of his head. And one gloved hand still held that document, the deed to the De La Vega estate. Gently Zorro retrieved the paper, crushing it slightly as he held it tightly in a gloved fist. A document a man had died for.
And as he stared at the body, memories intruded themselves forcibly upon his consciousness. Memories of the countless petty tyrannies inflicted upon the Los Angeles pueblo by the man in front of him. He tried to hold them there, to rejoice in the death of this man. Tried to think of declaring himself openly to Victoria; to think of the joy he would feel to hold her in his arms.
Yet more memories followed. The flustered, angry Alcalde not ordering his men to open fire on Victoria as she stood between the lancers and her brother and Zorro, this despite the chance that he could have caught Zorro had he done so. The Alcalde's face as he proposed seeking Zorro for help against the malingering Sir Miles Thackery. Their brief truce and almost-friendship on that occasion, and back when he had won back those four-thousand pesos. The Alcalde abandoning his attempt to claim the bounty on Sir Edward Kendell when faced with Diego's true grief. He thought of the elation which never failed to seize the man when he thought he was being admired or accepted by anyone.
And of the Alcalde saving his life mere minutes earlier from the treacherous woman who had had him at gunpoint. He could see the gun in the Alcalde's belt. He wondered why the man hadn't opened fire on him from up there. Or indeed every other one of those numerous times the man had simply started taunting him as he pointed his pistol at him. Could it be that Luis Ramon had, to an extent, enjoyed matching wits with the outlaw Zorro?
Zorro stared at the body. And then he left the Alcalde silent and alone on the cold stone.