Chapter 15: Settle for Less

It took less than a minute for Alejandra to guess why Brian wasn't there when she went to visit him at the hospital and it took less than a second to scream internally once she had learned she was right in the worst possible way. The receptionist may have been given a fake name, but no one else could match that description other than Santana. She had been right from the beginning, Tezpozitli had been sent to force him into an offer he could not refuse, Whatever it might have been, she was not entirely certain, her knowledge of Los Muertos' inner workings was cursory at best beyond what was necessary to make it through the day.

She knew Brian was a prideful creature, despite his poor attempts at concealing that fact, and she knew Santana to be one of limited patience. Logically, that meant she would never be seeing the angel eyed boy again, but her shrewder senses told a different story. The ends and the means of Los Muertos had always been money, regardless of their supposed hatred for the wealthy, and a leader of such people would not lack the cunning to use a young man of Brian's talent to achieve that end. The courier had told her once that he didn't care for his own safety, though she had never fully believed that, but she did know for certain that nothing terrified him more than failure and that was road enough to manipulate him into Santana's plastic hands.

She was halfway home already, unsure where to focus her frustration and more importantly, her efforts. She blamed herself in part for this, for being too soft on Brian, for thinking she needed to take things slow to help him see the insanity of his ways. He was long overdue for serious disarming speech, and so she channeled her thoughts into crafting one for when she saw him again. If she would ever see him again.

Her mother had still tolerated him living with them even after the day Alejandra learned of the mad joy the would-be hero derived from fighting, but this was something else entirely. No matter how justifiable his reasons for it were, Brian had committed grievous bodily harm, even if it was easily repaired for an omnic. Tezpozitli may have retaliated with near-lethal force, but even without the gang behind him, the law would still likely find him to be the one at fault and considering the would-be hero was living on the streets only a week beforehand, even stepping foot into the court would doom him one way or another. It was exactly the ammunition Santana would need to force the boy into whatever corner he wished.

It was all another glaring example of why the world needed heroes. She imagined she would be hearing that line repeated soon enough as part of the rebuttal to her rhetoric, of which hypocrisy was going to be the main feature of anyway. Brian had tried to be subtle in his grooming of her to be more suited for his narrow view of heroics through his questionable attempts at tutelage amongst other things, so he would have no solid argument against her doing the same. That was assuming, of course, he would even care to put it up for debate. He was nothing if not obsessed with his vision, dangerously vague as it was.

Her gaze had been distant as she pondered, only focusing once she came to an unfortunately familiar impasse three blocks from home. To think how pure this had all started, the hero rushing to the aid of the distressed damsel, now turned to a wild dog fighting amongst his own while she was simply there, fending for herself. Their brief training turned from a moment of bonding and a lesson in self-reliance to him not wanting the burden of her safety. She didn't want to believe it, she needed herself to be wrong, for this to be some fabrication of her mind, but she knew the same could be said for her first impression of the Angel-Eyed boy. Preferring not to tempt fate, she turned back to loop around the street to take the main sidewalk.

Only a minute and a half into her detour, she realized how foolish and almost cowardly she was being, thinking an alleyway could be cursed. "Brian wouldn't be doing something this stupid…" She thought "...Well, not in this specific way anyhow." Even this deep in her anger over his actions, she still kept him so high in her esteem, something she wanted to kick herself for. However, her brief misstep got her mind running even faster about the would-be hero. Was he actually beyond such superstition when he had proved so many times how foolish he truly was?

Brian, polite as he attempted to be in his wording, showed next to no interest in the metaphysical. Perhaps that is what fueled his outburst, having a heritage so deeply rooted in faith to be dragged out and thrown in his face. Alejandra knew precious little about the Jewish people and she imagined he did too, given how little he wished to talk about his family. His resentment for his parents could easily have run deep enough to extend to the blood in his veins. It was another theory she didn't want to believe, but he hadn't exactly shown himself to be stable in the time she had known him.

Of course, that led into the more personal question: why had she continued to treat him so warmly after his disturbing confession after his run-in with the glory seekers two days ago? Why had she invested so many of her feelings in a boy she had met only six days ago and only really known, or thought she'd known, for four? She could not deny that she had something to gain by it, just because she had aspirations of becoming a strong and independent woman didn't mean she had no plans of sharing that with a strong independent man, but that was far from the first thought in her mind. If he was so consumed with the idea of being a hero, then she would need to help him learn what that meant, and in doing so, she believed that would make her one too.

It was getting colder now that the Day of the Dead was creeping ever closer, being only a week away. The tradition had been slowly growing ever closer to Halloween over the last forty years in the Baja, but down here in Veracruz, the American influence had barely moved the holiday an inch. As much as Alejandra and most other locals would like to pretend it was because of an ironclad sense of culture, it was more down to the cruel realities of the time. In a town like Dorado, sending children door to door in the dead of night was akin to throwing them in the van yourself. Such thoughts brought up a point Brian himself had made in the last defense of his lifestyle, that his pain was to the world's profit if lowlifes like Los Muertos could be stopped dead in their tracks.

It was obvious that he had the skills to deal with the average thug under their employ, even whole groups of them, but to suggest he could even begin to fight a war against them was something beyond insanity. Even if he had an army at his back, trying to bust Los Muertos may do more harm than good, given how ingrained they were into Dorado's infrastructure, to say nothing of the more direct damage. If there was any way to cleanse this town of Los Muertos, it would be an uphill battle, fought one corruption case at a time over the course of years, but it could be won with heroes on the frontline.

Even that was a problem in itself, reducing his existence to a soldier in a theoretical war inside her head. Him having a similar train of thought is what started this whole mess in the first place, he needed his life set on track before even considering how he would factor into the rest of the world. Brian was proving to be an eternal Catch-22, even considering how to help him lead to an endless loop of logic that inevitably lead to him dying face down in an alley before he made anything of himself. There were times when she wondered if she even could save him from himself, but not once did she truly give up hope. Even if he hated her for it, she would steer him back to sanity; heroics was nothing without its deal of sacrifice.

Her self-doubt was bringing her no closer to an exact solution and she had mulled over the situation for days now, all he had done yesterday was cement her fears. She had many of the pieces ready, but not quite in place, she didn't even know where to start with what was proved to be a long, long talk. Turned the corner that would send her down the other road, she was forced to choose an opener now as she saw Brian trying to sneak his way back to her home. He had his hood up for once, though she doubted the cold air had been a factor in that decision as she caught a glimpse of the bruise on his eye. His damaged sight wandered to her and the change in body language was instant, yet unmissable.

He immediately averted his gaze and was clearly panicked, as if he was debating the merits of just running away and damning the consequences. Alejandra wasn't about to give him that chance, hurrying her pace across the virtually empty sidewalk. She understood the sediment, anxiety was rife in her as she made her approach, but she had made her decision. His life had more value than any half-baked fantasy she had in her head.

It was too late for him to run now, not that he showed any signs that he would anymore. He stood, not quite firm and undeniably anxious as she closed in, seeming to have a speech of his own that he had hastily been throwing together. Crossing the street without incident, she stepped quickly into Brian's personal bubble. Although he was two, nearly three years older than Alejandra, she was only just shy of matching his height, yet another thing that might have fueled his outbursts. His eyes were darting constantly around her own as if shame was keeping him from steady eye contact.

There were many poignant ways she could have started what could be a life-changing speech for both of them, but she decided on, "Santana?"

Brian nodded and redundantly answered sometime after. "Yeah…"

"I told you it was a trap."

"I know..."

"And you said you didn't care."

"I know." He said frustrated, though clearly not with Alejandra.

"And now you're being blackmailed into something just because you had to prove how much of a big man you were."

This time, he was upset with her. "It-!" Even if there was no one to share the street with them now, it was a business district on a Monday, so he held his tongue for a split moment and gestured to the back alley he had only just emerged from. The baker's daughter followed, wishing to keep this between the two of them as well.

"It wasn't about that," He continued as he leaned against a graffiti-covered wall "I hate having to put up with crap like that and you can't tell me he didn't deserve it."

"That's not the point, you knew things were just going to get worse if you attacked him, but you did it anyway. That's not being a hero, that's just blind rage."

"Well, what do you know!? How would you feel if people treated you like dirt your whole life, just because of who your parents were? You can't tell me you wouldn't want to do the same thing."

"I can and you're still not getting my point, you can't just commit a crime and decide it was the right thing to do just because someone was rude to you. Two wrongs don't make a right."

"They do when no one else is trying to be right." Stubborn wasn't sufficient enough of a word to describe Brian, though he did coincide one point. "I mean, sure, it backfired this time, but it's the principle of the thing."

Alejandra found it hard to believe a human being could be this obtuse, even intentionally, they were running in circles frustrating each other and making no progress. With an irritated click of her tongue, she dug into another unfortunate aspect of the situation he made for himself.

"So what exactly does Santana have you doing for him? You wouldn't be out here if you didn't say yes to it and you'd probably die before doing any of their usual dirty work, so I'm at a loss."

"They stuck me in a fight pit and Clayface said if I give him fifteen quality fights they'll have tinman drop the charges,'' Brian explained, still clad in his armor or ire.

"Wait, you checked out of the hospital then immediately got into another fight? Is that-" She cut herself off to answer the question with a snatch of the courier's hood. Pulling it down, the story of a particularly brutal fight was written on his face. His right eye had come centimeters from being torn out judging by the scar marks of fingernails and the bruise she had glanced at before covered a fist-sized length across his other eye, and this was only the pain she could see.

"Two fights actually, he didn't think the first one wasn't quality enough." Brian commented, under the false belief that it would break the momentary tension.

Alejandra kept her annoyance in check by saying it with a sharp exhale before moving swiftly on. "And if you don't play along, what happens?"

"He said something about killing my family, but there's no way he can."

"What makes you say that? I thought you said it was borderline anarchy where you lived?"

"Oh it is, but the Triad's don't like Mexicans on their turf and that's just the civilians. Plus it's not like what's left of the old cartels are going to work with them just to kill one lower-middle-class family."

"Hence, why you hate talking about home."

"Part of it yeah."

"Then tell me all of it, you owe me a lot of answers, so we might as well start there."

Brian seemed more confused than agitated by her request, something she took as a sign of her structuring her intervention poorly, yet answered regardless.

"Thought I made the whole deal with my parents clear, but yeah, the rest of Oakland was just as bad, worse really. Don't really see what this has to do with Santana."

"We'll get to how we're going to deal with him, right now I'm trying to deal with you. I want to be sure you don't do this all again as soon as your contract's up.

"Still not seeing what my hometown has to do with that."

"Plenty, I'm willing to bet that there was more behind you beating up that bully when you were in grade school than him calling you gay. He brought up something about you being Jewish too, didn't he? And, well, I don't really want to go there, but I did think it was weird how you pointed out that he was Chinese..."

There was a flash of hurt before it was quickly masked by anger and that was answer enough.

"I'm not assuming the worst here" Alejandra reassured, hoping that was true "I know what you said about the Triads and everything, I just want the whole picture."

"It's just the way of things there:" He explained, a hint of spite in his voice. The Chinese hate the Hispanics, the Hispanics hate blacks, the blacks hate the whites, the whites hate themselves, and everyone hates the jews. You can imagine what it was like being both of the last two. I don't miss it."

"And...How do omnics fit into that?"

Brian grimaced at the implication, the second in so short a space of time, yet had nothing to hide with his answer.

"Between how Hollywood treats them, who's sitting at the top up there, and Israel 'expanding' after the omnic war, people ended up treating 'em them and Jews the same, like shitty backstabbing gremlins. Not many of either in Oakland cause of that, plenty in San Fran though, which doesn't help change those opinions. Just keeps adding more conspiracies to the pile, and I wish I could say they were all nuts."

Alejandra had to pause before responding, being careful not to follow the thread into politics or any other moral labyrinths that neither of them knew or cared much about.

"You shouldn't care that much about what people like that say. What you were born as doesn't matter, it's the kind of person you are that does. I might not like the way you go about things, but I do believe you're trying to do what you think is right."

Brian had clearly wanted to get those thoughts off his chest, as he didn't show a hint of his earlier apprehension.

"Easy for you to say, you didn't have to live with everyone treating you like trash then calling you the privileged one if you tried to defend yourself. They're stuck in the twenties up there and back then they acted like everyone else was stuck in the other twenties. I'm barely Jewish anyway; family's mostly euro-mutts, they just see a color and write the rest of the story themselves."

"Which is where that 'white people hating themselves' thing you mentioned comes from, right?"

"Been that way since forever and no one ever tries to change it. They'd rather complain about what they think every other state is like and pretend like they're the best people who ever lived while people get stabbed to death daily right outside their door and most of them ain't white either. They're all cowards, too afraid they'll get called racist to stand up to it when it really happens and call anyone who does one just to fit in with their shitty little pack. "

She had a hard time believing all this, even if Brian seemed completely sincere. It wasn't as if racial strife was a foreign concept in Dorado, though nearly all of it in modern times was focused against omnics given how hard the Crisis had hit Mexico, if nothing else, the disdain in his voice was real. However, she was not swept up in his emotions to the point of losing focus, a victim of hatred isn't absolved of the blame when they become the next perpetrator.

"Right, but we're starting to lose the point here: How does any of that justify you committing grievous bodily harm?"

The would-be hero didn't answer, he clearly wanted to, yet he simply couldn't draw anything but blanks for a long moment. Scrambling for a response, he restated the same argument he always made.

"You can't tell me I'm wrong for doing what needed to be done. Someone needs to stand up to crap like that, even if it kills 'em. Ain't that what being a hero's about?"

His obstinance sounded unnatural to Alejandra like he was forcing himself to believe that.

"Not when it makes things worse for everyone, at that point, you're just getting in a fight for the sake of it. Putting yourself in harm's way is bad enough, but think about how it's going to affect everyone else for once."

"We can't just let assholes like that get away with doing whatever they want. I don't care what happens, I need to fight them."

There was desperation in his voice and the reason for it was hidden in his choice of words.

"'Need to'?"

"Course we need to fight back, any life spent on your knees isn't worth living."

"That's not what you said. You said 'I need to fight them', not 'we need to' and I don't think that's a regular slip up."

He was standing straight now. "Just what are you getting at?"

"You said before that you'd be doing this even if you didn't enjoy it and I'm starting to understand why. Like I said, I don't doubt that you're trying to do the right thing, but this is all you have isn't it? You hate where you grew up, how everyone treated you, including your family, so that led to you hating what you were. The only thing you've found to make you feel like you matter is heroics, specifically the kind that lets you beat up people."

"There's a lot of ways to help people, fighting is just the only one I'm good at. You'd be down an eye if I didn't put that into practice."

"That's not what I'm arguing, and I'm not calling you wrong, I'm saying you're not going in with a good mindset."

Brian was displaced by those words, almost like it was a case of deja vu, but stayed silent as Alejandra completed her thoughts.

"If that expression after your fight at El Macho was anything to go by, you aren't doing this for attention and you aren't doing this to protect what you love, otherwise you would have just stayed up North and picked fights there. There's only one thing left making you wander around like a wild dog. You either want violence for the sake of violence, which we've ruled out, or you're doing it just because it gives you a reason to get up in the morning."

The would-be hero simply shrugged, his ease an obvious facade. "Well, I could have told you that."

"But you didn't. Why wouldn't you just tell me that instead of talking in circles?"

After another round of awkward silence, Brian admitted the truth he had buried. "I was gonna, but after the way you reacted after I beat those two down, I figured you wouldn't understand. It was either this or neck myself by twenty and like I've been saying, this does a lot more good."

It wasn't the confession she wanted to hear, but not one she didn't expect.

"Can't you see that's the problem? The whole point of being a hero is standing up for what you believe is right, but you don't believe in anything. No god, no country, no family, nothing. You doing all this just because it gives you some vague direction in life doesn't make you a hero, it makes you a decently dressed hobo picking fights that people let you get away with. I understand it perfectly, I'm not sure you do"

Brian had little to say and for once that might have been a good sign. He was locked in ambivalence, caught between his pride and the hard truth.

"I believe the world needs heroes and that no one else is willing to even try. It doesn't matter if I'm not the right man for it, I'm the only one stepping up. I have to believe that's worth something."

It was nothing too different than what had been said before, but the feeling behind it spoke volumes.

"You don't need to kill yourself to live" Alejandra assured, having finally pierced through his shield of denial. "Helping people and trying to better yourself is one thing, fighting fire with fire is another. All you're going to get if you keep up like this is another bullet in the head, I can't let that happen."

Brian clicked his tongue, "Then what do you expect me to do?"

"That's up to you really, but I'm not saying you shouldn't try to stop Los Muertos. There isn't a person in this city who doesn't want them gone, including most of the gangsters themselves, but no one has a shred of hope that they can do anything. You could give them that hope, just like you gave it to me."

Another rollercoaster of emotions ran its way through Brian, though he hid it far better this time. She couldn't blame him for that, it was the first time she had been so direct with her feelings, mixed as they were now. It wasn't as if he didn't realize they were there before, his attempts to smother the flame had been nothing less than blatant in the past. It wasn't until today that she had any solid idea why, he was too afraid to let anything stop him on his path to ruin, even if it could make him happy.

He was pacing up and down the alley now, not looking at her or anything in particular. There wasn't much pride would allow him to say, other than what he shouldn't.

"Every time I've been in a fight, people just started filming it on their phones. Happened at that taco place, happened on the road, and it's happening in Vemana. Just 'cause they need heroes doesn't mean they're looking for any, they just want to sit back and clap along. Why should I bother with them? We're better than that."

That was too much. Even with her resolve to solve this with tough love, she had held back the edge of her tongue. Not now, not after that level of arrogance, not after choosing 'We' instead of 'I'.

"You can't be serious!? You can't go through all that talk about trying to do right then turn around and say you don't care about anything! You can't live like a murder hobo for half a year and pretend like your better than anyone! What, do you think everyone who's not hunting for fights like a psychopath is wasting their life or something!? Yes, they're scared of what will happen if they try to rise up, but that's because they have something to lose, families they'd leave behind. You threw all that away and you call yourself better than them?"

Brian didn't hesitate in his cold response. "Better dead on your feet than alive on your knees."

Her rebuttal was even faster and twice as harsh. "And it's better to live on your feet than die on your knees. You can try to justify it all you like, you're wasting effort trying to cure the symptoms instead of the disease, and I'm not just talking about your headcase. What's the point of fighting if you're not fighting for anything? Do you even have any goals beyond hitting people? Do you think Overwatch recruited that Tracer woman based on how many fights she won as a kid?"

That struck a chord, Alejandra wasn't sure which one, but it was a loud one.

"I'm making something of myself! Even if I'm nothing now, that a hell of a lot better than what I was before! I don't care what anyone thinks, I know what I'm doing."

"Right, you know so well that you got ribcage broken and forced into being a pit slave for a crime lord." Alejandra scoffed, he was grasping at straws now, trying to convince himself more so than her. "Let's say you become the best fighter the world's ever seen, what then? What are you going to do with all that skill? Are you planning on wandering the streets for the rest of your life, only stopping to beat people into the pavement if they call you names?"

Brian didn't answer, she wasn't expecting him too, not that she hadn't already deduced the truth from his circular ramblings.

"You don't have any long term goals, you just want to live day to day trying to 'improve' yourself, and getting in fights is the best method you've found to do it." She continued. "I think I understand why, even if you don't want to say it. Everyone treated you like dirt in your hometown just because of who your parents are, even them, and some of that stuck, didn't it? And I'm willing to bet that's how Tracer fits into this, you're not used to people saying anything good about you, so when you got praise for doing what you got you sent to a therapist last time, you had some direction for once. I don't blame you for wanting to do what makes you happy but think about the consequences of what you're doing further than two seconds ahead. You're not the only one that risks losing something when you bite off more than you can chew."

Brian kept trying to hide his feelings, but there was a limit to how much he could hold back when they came in force. None of what she had said was anything he wouldn't have already known, he just didn't want to accept any of it. He needed to believe in something, even as drenched in nihilism as his thoughts were, he had to latch onto whatever gave him hope, misguided as his efforts in pursuit of them had become. He had drive and talent, one punch granting him the former and proving the latter, but the shadow of doubt left him second-guessing where they had led him.

"Then what do you expect me to do?" He repeated, this time with the venom replaced with what almost sounded like desperation. "I can't live like other people, could never stand it before and doing it now would feel like dying."

Now they were making some progress, even if the words had changed little, the meaning did. "I'm not telling you to stop, I'm asking you actually start being a hero instead of just saying you're one. You should be trying to improve the world around you, not exploiting loopholes to get some sort of revenge on it. You're strong and smart enough to have lived this long on your own and looking for trouble, but you could be applying all that in much better ways. Take this whole mess with Vemana, you're inside the heart of one of Los Muertos' biggest money-making schemes surrounded by a bunch of people just as capable as you who probably also don't want to be there. You could easily be dealing a lot of damage if you play your cards right."

In a moment, Brian's whole demeanor changed, standing tall, but no longer as a measure of defense. "You have a plan?"

"Not yet," She admitted, with only the barest of details on his place in the underworld and her practical experience with it, she could do little more than form a groundwork, but maybe that would be enough for now. "Just think of that as our short term goal. It's making the best of this whole situation and it's not an opportunity we can just pass up. I don't know how much we'll be able to do, but we have to try, for everyone's sake."

"And you're calling ME the insane one? They have enough people in that hole to take the city by force if they wanted. What are two dumbass kids gonna do?"

"Because it wouldn't be just us two. Like I said, plenty of people in Los Muertos don't want to be. If you can find a way to convince enough of them that they can get out alive then we'd have enough to work with to have an actual plan. You were willing to give that dog a chance even when it was ready to rip my neck out, think about it the same way."

Even Alejandra was shocked she had made the suggestion, only months ago did she believe the gang to be invincible and a mere six days ago she thought herself incapable of wounding them. Brian seemed not to hear the meaning of her words, just the weight behind them, and that brought out accusations of his own. "Alé, remember when you told me about that Russkie visiting your place looking for some hacker?"

She had no idea where he was going with this, but she played along all the same, considering it only fair enough with how long she had held the reigns of the conversation. "Uh, yeah, what about her?"

"You never said why they came to you and I'm not thinking this was a door-to-door deal."

"Well, it's because they thought we might know," She answered simply, though she had to admit, defensively. "We might not like it, but a lot of Los Muertos come to our store, some of them even pay for what they take, so we know a lot of faces."

"And that's the only way you knew that face?"

Three sentences, that was enough for him to turn the tables and make her the apprehensive one.

"Just what are you implying?"

"I just don't think it's a coincidence Santana didn't threaten you when he was he was trying to get me in the pit. He was willing to point a gun at someone a thousand miles away, but not one down the block. Why?"

She knew this would be coming eventually, whether at his insistence or her trust, yet there wasn't much she could give as an answer.

"I don't know, Los Muertos just never leaned that hard on us for some reason. Sombra liked our bread and she was always a weird one, that's the only way it ever made sense to me."

"Gotta be something wrong in your head to call yourself Shadow unironically."

"Not sure what that Russian had against her, but her end of the crime business doesn't really have borders."

Brian squinted at that, though his right eye remained just a hair more open, Alejandra doubted that was intentional.

"And you just happened to know where she was?"

With a heavy sigh, she told a tale she had kept secret from the rest of the world. "Because she told me. About five years ago, she just kind of took me under her wing one day when I was getting bullied, I don't know why. She offered to rig my grades, force people to treat me right at school and stuff like that. I just figured it was a trick, like what Santana probably did to you, but she never bothered with threats. She would just show up from time to time, ready to spring a deal on me whenever things weren't going right. She never mentioned wanting anything back, she even flat out denied it, but there was no way I was about to trust anyone from the gang. Anyway, the day after that whole mess with Inigo and 76, she tried to apologize by saying she could 'make him pay' when he was in prison. I didn't want that, he may be an absolute scumbag that steals from kids, but could never live with that kind of thing. She ended up telling me where one of her safehouses was in case anything like this happened again, I don't know why. So when Zarya -uh, the Russian woman- came saying she was here to arrest her, I just told her what she told me. If I'm honest, I'm still not sure how to feel about it, I mean sure, she was a criminal and all, but she never seemed like that bad of a person. I figured it was all just lies, but if Santana wasn't even considering trying anything then...Well, I really don't know what to think..."

Mercurial as ever, Brian shifted to match her doubts and seemed to regret his demand for an answer. He was clearly holding another question back, the repeated false starts and sporadic eye contact again betraying his pathetic attempts to appear collected.

"I can tell you still have something to say, what is it?."

"Well, had a half question-half theory, don't like what it'll imply now."

"We're not having this talk to make each other feel good, what's on your mind."

He took a half-seat on a nearby trash can, looking more uncomfortable than ever, which was something she didn't think was possible anymore.

"Alé...What exactly did your Dad do for a living?"

She wanted to be upset about that implication, but given the information he had, Alejandra could easily see herself making the same assumption were their roles reversed. She had her own doubts about the father she could barely even remember and how he had managed to provide for their family in a time when Los Muertos was at its zenith of power, but that was something she had always forced to the back of her mind. Not now though, not after she had demanded so many answers from Brian, she had to be above the emotional cowardice that evading the question would represent. It just wouldn't be what a hero would do.

"I only know what my mom told me, and it's not much to tell. He worked in real estate and apparently he was one of the best, given where we used to live before we had to move into the store. I was too young to remember much of those days, but I do remember him spending most of his time at work, I barely saw him. Mom always said he worked himself so hard back then because he was trying to keep this town in the hands of the people. Heavy way to put it, I know, but keep in mind this was before Santana became the local boss and Los Muertos bought up most of the land and most of the people through it. So it might sound like it was a cushy job, but he ended up butting heads with the gang and somehow won a good chunk of the time. Even they had no idea how he did it, at least that's the impression I got from overhearing some of their old guard talking. When he died and Overwatch ended up leaving, Santana and what was left he could throw together basically just steamrolled through. I know what you're really asking and no, there's no way he's connected to them."

Brian leaned back, fully seated now, chewing over everything she had just said. They both seemed surprised at how little time it took before he eased to the edge of his seat and came back with two questions.

"So, how did it happen?"

"Dumb bad luck. It was back when Overwatch was clearing Los Muertos out when they sold weapons and info to Talon, even they aren't proud of that cash grab, from what I'm told. A handful of their gun dealers held themselves up in an old bean factory of all places and Overwatch started making their move. Turns out, they had a whole lot more than just army reserve surplus and whatever they could smuggle from up north, somehow they got their hands on some old plastic explosives. Nobody knew until the whole building went up, ended up killing everyone inside and more than a few outside. Dad wasn't even on the same side of town when a piece of sheet roof punched through his window, and since every ambulance was either already at or rushing to the scene of the explosion…"

"I'm sorry..." Brian said after a pause. Pigheaded as he was, Alejandra knew that moment of empathy to be genuine.

"It's fine. Like I said, I was very young when it happened, so it doesn't hurt as much as it should."

Unsure how to respond, the courier gave an awkward nod before moving on to his next question. "And, uh, is there anyone you're related to they might not want to mess with? Like you're not Santana's third niece or El Chappo's great-great-grandsomething?"

"No, nothing like that. Mom's side of the family's from the Baja and all of my dad's were killed in the Omnic War when he was a boy."

"And you're sure none of them could have survived?"

"Not from what I was told about it. I mean, we Colomar's are a resourceful bunch, but nothing that nuts. There wasn't a building in town left standing by the time the war ended, they had to basically rebuild the entire coastline. Dad only survived because he was a school when it happened and that was one of the first places the cops were there to evacuate. Like I said, it doesn't make sense."

Brian rose back to his feet with determination in his face and a plan baking in his head. "Right, guess I'm gonna have to ask around while trying your wack-ass plan."

After a moment's confusion, Alejandra lit up at his acceptance. "I'm not asking you to burn the whole place down, just to gimp Santana's legs while we think of a way to get you out alive. I was thinking more like rigging fights to make him lose money or getting some evidence for the police."

"Even that's setting the bar a little high. Grandma was a sand jew, not a city jew, so I ain't got any talent for hexing goyim."

Alejandra didn't dignify that slight against his own people with a response, growing all the more doubtful of him being 'used to it'. "Getting you out of there is just step one though, we still need to keep them from pulling you back in or burying you under."

Brian averted his gaze and took in a sharp breath "Well, it'll be about a week by the time the deal's up. Head should be healed up enough by then to make the trip back."

"No, it won't," she put bluntly "Not if you refuse to get treatment after every fight."

He considered lying about that, she could tell by the compulsive lick of his teeth before his false start, but the hard swallow and nervous tug of his hoodie let her know he had opted for the truth. "It feels like admitting I lost if I get anything more than an ice pack on it. Besides, not a good idea to trust someone who keeps tequila next to the meds."

"It's more of a loss to let pride keep you from using common sense." Alejandra chided "What good is a hero that dies in a gutter because he cared more about how cool he looked than his own health? Again, you're not thinking more than a day ahead in your life, that's not going to lead you anywhere except the inside of a box."

"You've been saying that for about ten minutes now…"

"Then give me something here! Say anything to make me believe you'll start caring about yourself! You're a person, not a tool for beating up thugs."

He was pacing again, visibly upset, though Alejandra wasn't sure if she was the subject of it. "Where do you expect me to go? What do you expect me to do? Far as I care, it's this or nothing, no matter where I go."

"I understand that," She replied "I don't like it, but I understand it. If you want my opinion: You should head back home, try to patch things up with your family-"

"That ain't happening." He interrupted

"And do something for your community." She continued with insistent ire. "Even if it's just teaching other kids how to fight back, you should have been helping the people within your reach instead of trucking all the way here just to find fights easier. If you're looking for a purpose in life, make it something that helps other people instead of just feeding your urge."

"No one back there would give a rat's ass about anything I'd try to do for them or even think about trying to stand up for themselves! They're nothing but spineless trash, not even worth the effort!"

She'd had enough, she could barely even recognize this petulant vigilante as her angel-eyed savior. "Real damn heroic," She scoffed "You're ready to fight and die just to kill time, but you refuse to even try doing it to help anyone!? How much of a child do you have to be to let dozens of people suffer just because a few of them looked down on you? You don't want to be a hero, you were just looking for any excuse to pretend you're better than they are!"

Even with all she'd said now, even with all she'd believed about Brian's aimless fury and all the anger he was clearly repressing now, she had never believed him to be morally capable of harming her. In that, she remained correct, but for the briefest moment, as he lunged forward to invade her bubble, she saw a rage violent enough to disabuse that notion. Flight instincts engaged in the simple form of a step back, Brian managed little more than a syllable of speech before he caught himself for the fool he was being.

"No one there wants to be helped, and even if they did, they wouldn't let a white boy do it for them, anyone who would turn on me the second they learned I had a few drops of jew blood in me, and I don't have enough shekels to my name for them to give me a second look. There's no saving that hellhole, no reason to even try, should have just let the omnics just burn it down, nothing worth anything would have been lost."

"What about your brother?"

Struck a nerve didn't come close to describing the change in his manner. He simply stood there, devoid of any obvious emotion, lacking the words to defend himself. Alejandra finished her thought once it became clear that Brian didn't know what his own were.

"I found some footage of your incident at the museum, it wasn't exactly high-quality, but I caught that heart to heart before you left. You looked happy, both of you did, not that empty joy I saw when you were fighting those two glory hounds. That's what I want for you, what you should be fighting for, and not just for your own benefit either. You think the world you grew up in is unfair then you should do something to change it for the better instead of running away or do you really think it was heroic to leave your brother on his own in a place like that?" There was never a more stubborn creature than Brian that Alejandra ever managed to meet in her lifetime, but though his tone and voice denied it, the subtle shift in his eyes let her know that thick skull wasn't impenetrable.

"There was no way I could take him with and no way I could stay, I had no choice."

"Do you even believe that? You never needed to leave, you just wanted to go somewhere where you could indulge yourself without accidentally helping any of the 'trash' people you grew up around. That kind of thinking makes you even worse than they are."

He was out of excuses, and he left a considerable gap of dead air in his search for one. For all his bluster, fire, and fury, it was less a feeling of defeat washing across his face, but more of a resignation to a truth he'd buried for his own sake.

"How do I even start?" He said in his unearthed melancholy "I've never been strong enough to make a difference and never been good enough to care about making one. Whole reason I'm even here is 'cause I needed something to make me stronger and I figured beating up actual gangsters instead of drugged up teens would get me somewhere. I can't pretend like I know what I'm doing anymore, but I have to keep doing something, anything to be better."

"To make things right?"

"If I'm honest, I'm not sure if I cared, I just didn't want to be 'some cracker' or 'half-dick' anymore and this is the only way I had."

It wasn't much, but it was something, and that's all she asked for. "Well, admitting there's a problem is the first step and all, but don't stop there. It's not like you to settle for less and I know that's what you see normal life as, but that's all the more reason for you to show everyone else that they don't have to, just like you showed me."

He had no more excuses, no more anger, and now there was nothing left to discuss. "All right, then…" He relaxed for the first time in the minutes that felt like days. "I'll try it your way, can't pretend like mine's working anymore."

She didn't like that implication, he'd been aimless for long enough and she wanted him to find a better way on his own, not tell him where to go. "Don't think of it as my way, we need to make this a team effort. The most important thing here isn't dealing damage to Santana, it's getting you out alive and on track to being a proper hero. A mutual loss isn't a victory here, they'll be another Santana within the hour if no one has anything else to believe in or rally behind. You can give that to people, and not just here. It's the ideals behind the action that make it matter."

"Right…" He was not denying her truth, though that was her first assumption, he was simply tired of this moral quandary for the moment. "Let's head back, I have rent to pay and bruises to sleep off."

"Rent?" Alejandra asked, genuinely surprised.

"I'm not a complete dumbass, making you drag me back to the hospital after my own screw up ain't exactly keeping in good faith with you and your mom, so I ought to pay now even if I'm about to get kicked out. Don't worry, it's my own, I don't need their money."

She couldn't pretend like he was that far off the mark, her mother's reaction to what Brian had done could only be described as a violent disappointment. Still, she didn't think she was outraged enough to send him back into the cold, at least not if she could explain the situation delicately enough. His sense of honor, schizophrenic as it was, would help with that and hopefully keep him on track once he was well enough to head back home. "Well, guess I was worrying a little too much, you've got plenty of good in you, just needs a little polishing."

The supposed hero began to fidget again "Wish I could be sure of that…"