Chapter 1: La Muerte de Sartana

The people of Miracle City cheered for the Riveras as they stood on a large pile of defeated villains. Fireworks decorated the air in celebration. "Very good." White Pantera said.

"We rockin'!" yelled Puma Loco.

"Now that was family fun!" yelled El Tigre.

"Yes m'ijo." said White Pantera. Frida flew up to the top of the pile holding on to her inflated cat, landed next to Manny, and took him in her arms. "Kiss me you fool!" she said, spun him around and kissed him full on the mouth; then they all jumped off of the pile and into the air. "Familia forever!" yelled El Tigre and they landed on the ground. The police started to handcuff all of the villains and load them into the prison trucks. Police Chief Suarez spotted the Riveras and walked over. "Riveras, I cannot begin to explain how thankful I am for what you have done."

"It was no problema Chief Suarez. It is always a pleasure to rid this city of evil!" White Pantera said.

"Papa? How are all these villains gonna fit in that small jail?" asked Frida.

"They won't. We are bringing them all to a prison in the middle of the desert; it is much larger than the one we have here."

As the villains were loaded into the trucks, they found out who most of the villains really were. "Diego? You're Dr. Chimichanga?" Manny asked.

"Chi-pot-le!!!!!!!" Diego screamed as he was taken to one of the police trucks. He sat down next to Sergio who sighed and said "Didn't see this-a coming."

"I knew Zoe Aves was Black Cuervo!" Frida yelled with glee. "I knew it all along!" Frida started to dance and sing. "My arch-enemy's going to jail; my arch-enemy's going to jail!"

"Shut up Suarez!" yelled Zoe as she passed by with a policeman leading her to the trucks. "I will get my vendetta Frida Suarez! VENDETTA!" she is lead away by the policeman. Frida shrugs and continues dancing. The loading continued smoothly until El Oso tried to escape, Manny had to help the policemen try to restrain him. "I ain't going back to jails man! Especially since I can't escape from this one!" He struggled to get free and it was a giant mess, and everyone started watching the event. Manny started to fight him but got knocked back, landed on Django's guitar, and smashed it into a million pieces; thus causing Django to disintegrate.

"Django!!!!!" yelled Sartana. "No! He was my only familia. You bring him back this instant!" Sartana breaks free easily from the handcuffs and attacks Manny, knocking over El Oso in the process.

"Uh…never minds man, jail sounds nice." El Oso stops resisting and goes into the truck.

"You bring back my Djangy-wangy right now!"

"No way!" yelled Manny, and he started to fight Sartana. After a couple of hard hits, Sartana almost seemed defeated, but then Frida danced by, not realizing what was going on, and Sartana grabbed her.

"Ahhh! Dude, what is going on?!"

"Let her go Sartana!" yelled Manny.

"Bring back Django and I'll spare your friend!"

"Don't do it Manny!" Frida said very dramatically, and then she changed her tone. "She's not really going to hurt me, she never does."

Sartana tightens her grip on Frida. "Do what I say or watch your friend die!"

"Dude…I think she's serious." Frida said with a very terrified look on her face. Manny prepared to attack Sartana again, but she took a step back before he pounced.

"One more step and she dies."

Manny didn't know what else to do, so he nodded in agreement of Sartana's plan. Just as he started to pick up the pieces of Django's guitar, Police Chief Suarez knocked Sartana upside the head with a shovel, and she fell to the ground.

"Nobody hurts my Frida! Are you alright m'ija?"

"I'm fine Papa." Frida said shaken up a bit.

"Frida?" Manny asked and she ran over to him and hugged him for the very first time.

"She was really going to kill me."

"It's okay Frida, it's over now." Frida puts her head into Manny's shoulder and Manny holds her for a while. Zoe spots this, and gets a look of major disappointment and hatred on her face.

"Okay Sartana, let's get going." said Chief Suarez, handcuffing her again and leading her into the truck. Manny hears this, thinks of Frida, and runs over to him to stop him. "Wait! You saw what just happened. If she can escape from handcuffs that easy, imagine how easy she could escape from jail. We have no other choice but to get rid of her for good."

"And how do we do that?"

"The same way we got rid of Django, by destroying her guitar and making sure it is never put back together."

"Okay." agreed Chief Suarez. "Bring me Sartana's guitar." It is brought to him and he hands it to Manny.

"Will you do the honors?"

"It'll be my pleasure."

"Smash my guitar and you will regret it Manny Rivera!"

"Yeah, like I haven't heard that one before." Manny raises up the guitar and smashes it on the pavement.

"I will have revenge!" Sartana shouted as she slowly disintegrated into dust.

"Good job Rivera. So how do we dispose of the pieces?"

"Uh…I donno. Why don't you ask my dad?" Chief Suarez nods and finds Rodolfo. Manny then turns back to Frida. "You okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine." There is a short pause before Frida started talking again. "You know, you didn't have to do that."

"Do what?"

"Destroy her guitar; I'm sure I would've been fine. I mean, I do have El Tigre to protect me don't I?" Frida says this with a casual smile.

"Yeah, you do." Manny replied back, too with a casual smile. There is another pause, but this time it's an awkward pause, which was thankfully interrupted by Maria.

"Manny! Oh I am so proud of you." she runs up to hug him. "No more villains in Miracle City, and it's all thanks to you m'ijo!"

"Dad and Grandpapi helped too."

"Yes I know, but I am still proud of you. Well come on, I am coming over for dinner tonight, we are celebrating. Would you like to come too Frida?"

"Huh? Oh, um…yeah."

Maria turns to Manny. "Is she okay?" she asked quietly.

"She's just a little shaken up, that's all."

"Well maybe she'll perk up when it's time for dinner."

As they walked to Casa del Macho, Frida lagged along and didn't say anything. This started to concern Manny and Maria, so they stopped to talk with her.

"Frida, are you sure you're alright?" Maria asked.

"Oh yeah, I'm just…thinking."

"Wow, that's something you don't hear every day." Manny said quietly to himself. "Well hurry up, I'm starving." When they start walking again, Frida continues to lag along. "Hey Frida, there's gonna be churros." Frida snaps back to her normal self.

"CHURROS?!!!!" she starts to drool. "Well come on! What are we doing lagging around?!" she grabs hold of Manny's arm and she runs faster than Speedy Gonzales to Manny's house.

"But Manny!" yelled Maria, "We don't have any…churros." Maria sighs. "Oh well, I guess I'll just have to make some." She shrugged and continued to walk.

When they got home, Maria and Rodolfo prepared a humongous celebration dinner, and everyone stuffed their faces, even Senor Chapi and the donkey. After dinner was over, Manny and Frida went up to Manny's room to watch TV and Frida was very full.

"Oooh, I think I ate too many churros."

"Oh no, you didn't eat that many; you only ate the entire plate!"

"I'm sorry that you didn't get any Manny, you know how I am when I get near churros." She sits on his bed and Manny turns on the TV.

"So what do you wanna watch?"

"I donno. Ooh wait! I think that monster truck thing is on tonight!"

"What channel?"

Frida yawns. "Six." Manny turns it to channel six, but the news was on instead.

"Frida? Are you sure it was channel six? Because…" Manny turns to see Frida fast asleep. Manny smiles and sits down on the bed next to her. He watches her for a little while, and he starts to realize how pretty she is. He thinks about the kiss she gave him, and how it made him feel warm and fuzzy inside. A hair suddenly fell onto Frida's face and Manny took his hand and gently brushed the hair behind her ear. He stared at her a little longer and then started to stroke her cheek. She moved a bit and then woke up.

"What the heck dude?!" Manny was startled by her awakening, but still kept his cool.

"There was a…a bug on your face!"

"A bug?!" Frida jumped off the bed and started to run around the room. "Ahhh! Get it off, get it off, get it off, get it off!"

"It's okay Frida, it's gone."

Frida stopped running. "Oh." She yawns again and looks at the clock. "It's getting late; maybe I should get home huh?"

"Oh, yeah." Manny said slightly disappointed. "Hey, do you want El Tigre to take you home? It'll be faster that way."

"Nah, I'll be okay. But uh…thanks anyway." She walks to the door. "Night."

"Night." Frida leaves and Manny collapses on his bed and soon falls asleep.

Two weeks went by of a crime-free Miracle City, and Manny was bored out of his mind. He never thought that he would miss fighting a villain every day, and hate relaxing all day. Grandpapi had tried to get Manny to do some fun villainy stuff with him, but he, for the first time ever, didn't want to make Frida's dad mad at him; especially since he was on his good side for once. And what was weird, Manny hadn't heard from Frida since the battle two weeks ago, and he was worried. He didn't know if something was wrong or if she was just avoiding him. He called a couple of times, but her dad always answered the phone and would say that she wasn't there or that she was busy. He really missed her and he feared that she didn't want to hang out with him anymore because they weren't out fighting villains all the time; or maybe it was because she got really freaked out about what had happened with Sartana. Whatever the reason, Manny decided to give Frida some space for a while, and hope that she will eventually come back to normal.