An Honest Mistake
Disclaimer: El and Sands belong to Robert Rodriguez, not me. I'm sure they're very happy that is the case. RR would never do the things to them that I do.
Rating: Big PG-13 for violence. We're getting ever closer to an R rating
Summary: Sands screws up, and El makes a choice.
Author's Note: Thanks as always to Melody, and to everyone who has written me or left a review.
And I sure hope I'm not the the only one doing a dance of joy for Johnny's Oscar nomination. Hearing that announcement this morning made my whole damn day. bg
****
Sands woke before dawn. The air in the house was the coolest it ever got, and outside the broken window the world was hushed.
He lay very still, testing his body. Every inch of him ached as though he had been beaten. A tight band of pain circled his midsection, cutting him neatly in two. His throat was raw and it felt like ZZ Top was playing the world's loudest concert inside his skull, fuzzy guitars and all.
In other words, he felt fine.
Slowly he pushed himself up on his elbows. Inside his skull, ZZ Top turned the amplifiers up to 11, and he hissed in pain. The only good news was that the cold chills seemed to be gone, and the dry desert heat of his fever was now just a sauna where someone had bumped the dial up one degree too high. Whatever pills the doctor had given him, at least some of them were doing what they were supposed to do.
When he was sitting up as much as possible, he listened. Ahead and to his right, he heard El's even breathing. Long scrutiny laid to rest any doubts that El might be shamming; the mariachi was truly asleep.
Scorn curled Sands' lower lip. It was a miracle El had survived this long, if he had a habit of falling asleep in front of his enemies.
He took a deep breath and rose to his feet in what was supposed to be one smooth motion, but what turned out to be one ungainly lurch off the mattress. His knees buckled and he staggered forward, pinwheeling his arms, trying desperately to stay on his flailing feet. Somehow he made it to the wall with the broken window, where he was able to lean forward and brace his weight on his hands.
He let his knees sag a little more, then reached down and unzipped his fly. He pissed out the window, feeling goosebumps break out on his fevered skin at contact with the morning air.
He knew the only reason El had fallen asleep was that El believed him too sick to be a threat. Which meant El had underestimated him.
El Mariachi had just made a very large mistake.
He tucked himself back inside and zipped up again. Truthfully he had no desire to kill El. Why should he? His beef was with the cartels. The days of worrying about keeping the balance were long gone. Nowadays his thoughts ran more toward wholesale slaughter.
He staggered back toward the mattress, but he miscounted the steps. His foot struck the unyielding corner, and he went sprawling. He tried to duck and roll, but his limbs would not cooperate. He landed facedown on the floor, hard. Pain blasted through him. Every muscle in his body locked, so he couldn't even scream.
From the corner, El decided that this was a good moment to learn how to be a smartass. "Have a nice trip?" With his thick accent, it came out, "treep."
Sands ignored this. He was too busy trying to regain control of his treacherous body.
Thankfully El seemed to have exhausted his supply of wit. The mariachi sat very still in the corner, saying nothing.
Sands became suddenly aware that when he had fallen, his sunglasses had slipped. They barely clung to the tip of his nose now, and the left earpiece dangled against his cheek.
Hot rage slammed into him. He never took off his sunglasses. The only people who ever saw the ruins of his face were his victims, just before he killed them. And here he was giving out a free peepshow, with El Mariachi having a front row seat. The only thing missing was the guy out in the lobby selling popcorn.
"See something you like?" he snarled, unconsciously echoing Ajedrez's last words to him.
"I'm not sure," El said.
Having expected a simple, "yes," this response caught Sands off guard. So instead of telling El to fuck off, he just rearranged the sunglasses and sat up. He had to sink his teeth into his lower lip to stay silent against the pain that surged through his stomach, but he managed it. Barely. "What the fuck is going on here?"
El did not pretend to misunderstand. "I do not know."
Sands scooted up so he was sitting on the edge of the mattress, his arms wrapped about his body, cradling his hurt. His head pounded sickly and he wanted to lie down, but he refused to give in to his body's weakness. Not in front of El Mariachi. Some things were just not permissible. "You came here to kill me. So why haven't you?"
"I don't know," El said. To his credit, he sounded confused.
"Uh-huh." He offered El a quick grin. "You know, as far as cold-blooded killers go, you've really got that all-muscle-and-no-brains part down pat."
"Is that what you think I am?" asked El.
"Aren't you?" Sands returned. He realized he was immensely enjoying himself. It had been a long time since he had carried on such a lengthy conversation with anyone, and even longer since there had been anyone he could match wits with.
"I don't know what I am," El said softly.
Sands didn't like the tone of those words. He wasn't about to start playing Sigmund "tell me about your mother" Freud with someone whose life was so fucked up he didn't even have a real name.
And then he was saved. From outside he heard voices. Quiet, and trying to be even quieter, but very definitely voices.
His head snapped up and turned toward the window. El was still talking, so he shushed the mariachi with a curt hiss. The pain and fever were forgotten in a rush of adrenaline. It had always been like this. When it was showtime, he forgot about everything except the desire to kill, and the need to survive.
"What is it?" El whispered.
"Men. Two of them." Crouched over, he hurried to the window, keeping to the left of the opening. He could hear them clearer over here. They were discussing the best way to break into the house. Fast and clean, one of them said. No mistakes.
"Only two?" El asked.
Sands backed away from the window and stood up when he judged he was clear. He walked over to El and held out his hand. "Give me a gun."
"No," El said immediately.
"Give me a fucking gun!" Sands demanded. "I am not going to sit here blind and helpless while some cartel assholes think they can get the drop on me."
In the silence that followed, he could almost hear what El was thinking. But you are blind and helpless.
That pissed him off. A lot. The men outside were not here to sell makeup. They meant business. Deadly business. And here was this clown in a fucking mariachi getup trying to deny him the chance to stay alive. Thoroughly enraged, Sands made a swift decision. I'll show you blind and helpless, fuckmook.
El was still sitting down in the corner. Sands was standing in front of him, a little to El's right. He lunged now, using his knee to slam El's head against the wall. Before El could react, he reached down and seized El by the throat, pulling the mariachi up off the floor, again giving El's skull a hard rap against the wall.
Although he had been caught off guard at first, El was quick to recover. He lashed out with both hands, landing hard blows that nearly knocked Sands off his feet.
That, of course, was not allowed. Sands kicked El in the ribs as hard as he could, causing El to cry out and involuntary double over.
This was allowed. In fact, it was perfect. When he slammed El's head against the wall for the third time, he had more room to work with. The solid thunk of bone meeting plaster filled him with vicious satisfaction.
El slumped. Sands followed him down and deftly plucked the pistol from the waistband of El's jeans. "Thanks," he said.
The men were in the house now. He could hear them moving through the halls. They probably thought they were being stealthy, but to Sands, they sounded as loud as a herd of buffalo.
He stepped over El, who was writhing weakly on the floor, and made his way over to the bedroom door. He had used this house as his hideout for years, and he knew it by heart. He slotted himself into the narrow space between the open door and the wall, the pistol held in front of his chest with both hands.
The men in the hall drew nearer. Sands waited. He was feeling no pain.
And then several things happened at once.
The men came into the room. One of them shouted. Sands fired. A man screamed.
"No!" El cried. "Stop!"
The man who had screamed fell to the floor. El shouted again, louder this time, "Don't!"
A hair's-breadth away from pulling the trigger again, Sands froze. Normally he would not have, but something in El's voice gave him pause.
"You fucker!" This voice was unfamiliar. Heavy boots clomped across the floor. Sands tensed, and raised the gun.
"Lorenzo, stop!" El roared.
"He shot Fideo!" yelled the strange voice. It sounded much closer now.
"Don't kill him!" El shouted.
Sands decided he had had enough of this shit. He pulled the trigger. A split second later something struck him across the face. The force of the blow spun him around and dropped him to his knees.
He tried to bring the gun about and aim at his assailant. He could hear El shouting, but none of the words made sense over the ringing in his ears. Then he was hit again, and he was falling, falling.
Into a black far deeper than the one that filled his waking hours.
****
When he came to, he was lying facedown on the floor. His hands were bound behind him. Sticky blood covered one side of his face, an itchy sensation that reminded him eerily of the Day of the Dead. He hurt. All over. Mostly his head and stomach. And the fever was back, invisible fire raging merrily through his blood.
El and the man named Lorenzo were talking in urgent Spanish. Or rather, they were arguing.
"What the hell are you protecting him for?"
"I am not."
"The fuck you aren't. Let me kill him."
"No."
"Fideo is dead because of him! He tried to shoot me! How many times has he tried to kill you in the last five days? And now suddenly you're his guardian angel?" The man named Lorenzo spat on the floor. "What the fuck's the matter with you?"
"Is that what you think?" El asked. His voice was quiet.
"Man, I don't know what to think!" Lorenzo yelled.
This Lorenzo guy was not very bright, Sands thought. The tone of El's voice did not encourage shouting right now. In fact, hearing El talk, Sands thought the best course of action right now for everyone involved would be to shut the fuck up. Certainly that was what he planned to do.
And he would have done it too, had Lorenzo not walked over and kicked him in the gut. Against his will, he uttered a choked cry of pain. He tried to curl up, but his body would not obey him.
Someone jacked a clip into a gun. It sounded unnaturally loud in the sudden stillness of the room. Sands held his breath and waited to die.
"What the fuck is wrong with you?" Lorenzo shouted.
"Get away from him," El Mariachi said.
Footsteps walked away. Another set approached. Chains jingle-jangled. The muzzle of a gun was pressed to the back of his head.
Sands grinned, hoping his pain did not show on his face. "Finally. Only took you long enough," he said.
The gun jabbed him. "Give me a reason not to kill you now," El said in his heavily accented English.
Sands said nothing. He had no reasons. He had begun dying in a dusty plaza three years ago, courtesy of Armando Barillo. It was time someone finished the job.
He could hear a harsh note in El's breathing. The gun trembled against his skull and pressed harder. The tension grew until it became almost unbearable. Yet nothing happened. Sands began to grow irritated. He wished El would just get on with it.
Lorenzo suddenly said, "What the fuck is that?"
"Someone's knocking at the front door," Sands said helpfully. He thought it showed remarkable restraint on his part not to add, you fucker.
El whapped him with the gun. "Shut up. It's the doctor."
"How do you know?" Lorenzo asked.
"He said he would come early," El said. "Go let him in."
After a moment of silence, Lorenzo walked from the room. "Okay," Sands said. "Now's your chance. Kill me."
"You'd like that, wouldn't you?" El said in disgust.
"Well, frankly, no," Sands said. "But it beats lying here all tied up and nowhere to go. This is very boring, El."
Shattering the early morning stillness, a loud crash reverberated through the front half of the house. Gunshots rang out. Sands jerked in surprise, lifting his head so he could hear better, ignoring the way El's pistol suddenly felt like it was half-buried in his skull.
Footsteps ran down the hall. Lorenzo was yelling.
And then suddenly he wasn't.
The gun at his head vanished. A hand seized his upper arm and hauled him to his feet, nearly dislocating his shoulder. A deep voice in his ear hissed, "If I find out you tipped them off, I will--"
El did not finish the threat. Still gripping Sands by the arm, he whirled around and ran for the window.
Helpless not to follow, Sands went with him.
******
Author's Note: I truly never meant to kill both Fideo and Lorenzo. It just...happened. That's what I get for writing a story about a psychopath.
