AN: Sorry for the delay but I completely forgot about posting this weekend. Thanks to LaCuidadora for reminding me I owed you a new chapter. :P
Enjoy!
PS: also a 100% original one...and a crossover again (because one can clearly see a car in the NWZ "A deal with the devil" episode!)
The way this is going this story might get to 100 chapters easily. Just FYI...
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During this time, in Europe, having lost and retaken Madrid during 1812, and still faced with much internal opposition, King Joseph Bonaparte had started to realize his brother's plans for him to rule Spain were not as easily accomplished as Napoleon had believed. Despite his reforms, many of them welcomed by the peasants and noblemen alike, the Spanish had no intention of accepting a foreign ruler with no connection to their legitimate ones. Guerrilla fights were still going on all over the territory, food was becoming again scarce – even his troops having to sacrifice some of their horses to avoid starvation – and the Spanish noblemen hardly inspired him much trust.
Worse still, since he had first ascended the throne, some of the American colonies seemed to have suddenly discovered nationalism. Venezuela had declared its independence in 1811 and, although its ambitions to self-govern were quenched just a year later, the king knew that the fight was just beginning.
The Crown's most resplendent jewel, New Spain, from where originated most of the gold and silver on which the Bourbons and their forebearers built their fortunes, had been in open rebellion for years already. And, despite the fact that its initial leaders and many of the rebel fighters had been captured and executed in 1811, the battles were still raging on, even if they were limited in terms of their impact.
Furthermore, rumors of liberty fighters and of men appointing themselves as protectors of the people had abounded in Spain for years already, encouraging even more of those in the colonies to take up arms.
The king had focused on Spain, though, and had done little to stop the freedom fighters during his reign, leaving the viceroys and military commanders to put an end to the rebellious activities in the territories under their rule. Yet, in November of 1812, he suddenly decided the time had come to intervene on this matter, and proceeded in sending several of his most ruthless colonels with their own units of Royal Guardsmen to achieve exactly that.
One of them he sent to Los Angeles.
ZZZZZZ
Much of March 1813 had been rainy and quite cold for Southern California.
A night ride on the 1st, as Zorro, to help one of the De la Vega tenants fight off some bandits, caused Diego to become ill with fever during an entire week. That, in turn, gave the alcalde the opportunity to arrest and put into the pillories, unhindered, a couple of poor merchants, who had made the grave mistake of refusing to pay the traveler's tax.
Victoria had been sure Zorro would intervene, and was more than a little disappointed when her hero didn't show up, and the merchants were forced to endure the torturous position, as well as all the deprivation and humiliation that came with it, for over 24 hours. She protested the alcalde's actions – Don Alejandro the only other person who dared to speak out – then, when they were finally released, she offered the poor men a room in her tavern so that they might get some rest until they'd get back on their feet.
A couple of days later, when Diego was finally well enough to get out of the house again, and headed straight to the tavern, she could hardly stop herself from telling him about how Zorro had failed to avoid the two men's unjust punishment.
"He's so unpredictable!" She uttered at one point, as they were sitting at one of her tables, sharing a pitcher of lemonade.
"Perhaps that's for the best," Diego remarked, feeling partly guilty for not having helped those men, and partly enraged with how much things seemed to depend on him putting on that mask. "If he always shows up when he's expected, the alcalde might just use that to come up with the perfect trap to catch him. Instead, if we never know when and if he will show up, the people might also start doing their part to prevent injustice, rather than simply expect Zorro to fight everyone's battles."
"But what can the people do, Diego? They are too afraid of the alcalde!" Victoria told him.
"People should not live in fear of those charged to ensure their prosperity."
"Prosperity? All the alcalde does is oppress the people, Diego!"
Diego sighed. "That doesn't mean that things shouldn't be different…" he said.
"How, Diego? Our only hope is Zorro. He is the only one who can help us fight tyranny and oppression. If the alcalde ever catches him, all that hope will be gone."
He didn't answer but looked at her with concern.
What she had said was true, and it was true by design. Diego had put on the mask to stop a rebellion while, at the same time, find a way to stop the alcalde's tyrannical tendencies and, by so doing, give the people hope. And he had succeeded.
Yet, he was just a man. He was not infallible, even if he had done his best to make everyone think Zorro was. Yet the man could get ill. He could fail. Zorro could be captured, injured, or even killed.
True, he was smarter than Ramone and, for some reason, it seemed that chance was also on his side. But how long could that last? How long would he keep being Zorro?
"Do you know what else the alcalde did?" Victoria asked.
Diego shook his head.
"He asked Mendoza to make two signs and placed them on the pillories, just under those two people. He said it was so that everyone would know exactly who they were and why they were being punished. But, in truth, it was just to humiliate them further."
The caballero nodded, then asked, "What did those signs say?"
"That the punishment was justified by the fact that they had not paid the traveler's tax," she answered.
ZZZ
That evening, the alcalde entered his office with a smile on his lips. Zorro had not shown himself in over a week, and he was already hoping he might never see the masked man again.
Taking a few steps inside, his attention was suddenly drawn by the moonlight reflected off a nearby piece of metal.
Turning, he found Zorro's sword pointed at him.
"Uh, uh!" the masked man said, shaking his head when Ramone reached for his gun. "I am not here for a fight, Alcalde."
"What do you want, Zorro?"
"For you to be a better leader to these people. But, since I doubt you are capable of such drastic change, I will content myself with teaching you a lesson." The masked man uttered. "You see, Alcalde, I have spent the last hour inspecting your records and noticed something quite interesting. You, yourself, never paid the traveler's tax."
Ramone just stared at him in confusion. Moments later, one of Zorro's punches rendered the official unconscious.
ZZZ
The following morning, Mendoza exited the cuartel a little later than usual and headed for the tavern. Crossing the plaza, he noticed his lancers looking at a small crowd gathered at the entrance to the pueblo.
"Corporal," he called, "what's going on there?"
"We don't know, Sergeant! It's been like that since before our shift began." Gomez answered.
"Why didn't you go there to find out?"
"The alcalde gave us orders to remain at our posts, Sergeant," the same man replied.
Shaking his head at his men's stupidity, Mendoza decided to check out what was going on.
Some 20 people were there, laughing, and, as he made his way through them, he almost froze at realizing why.
Overnight, someone had taken the pillories there and had put the alcalde in them, his head facing El Camino Real, a view of his rear greeting everyone in the pueblo. The man was gagged, and, attached to the pillory, just under the wooden support, a poster read: "Luis Ramone, alcalde of Los Angeles: punished for not paying the traveler's tax." A large Z also decorated the man's coat, right on his bottom.
"Ay, Dios!" Mendoza cried as he hurriedly took off Ramone's gag.
"Get me out of here, Mendoza!" the man tried to shout but, after so many hours spent there, his shouts sounded more like whispers. "Get me out!"
"Si! Si, Alcalde! Right away, Alcalde!" the Sergeant uttered, spinning around in confusion like a headless chicken.
"Stop laughing!" Ramone had meanwhile started ordering the gathered crowd. "Stop laughing or I'll have you all whipped."
"You don't happen to know where the key is, do you, Alcalde?" Mendoza asked just as his commander had finished threatening the people, bending a little to look him in the eyes.
That just annoyed the official further. "MENDOZAAAA!" He shouted and, this time, the shouting was quite clear, and even the lancers in the cuartel heard it.
ZZZ
"Well, Sergeant," Diego uttered a while later, as the good man finished recounting for him all he had missed that morning, "I think the Alcalde might think twice the next time he decides to put people in pillories."
ZZZ
The next few weeks passed without Diego having to put on the black mask even once. Bandits seemed to have momentarily started avoiding the pueblo, while the alcalde was still brooding over the humiliation he had had to endure due to Zorro's own brand of justice.
So, during that time, the caballero focused on his correspondence with Padre Benitez of Santa Barbara, visited Victoria's tavern as often as he could, and, with the pueblo's padre feeling worse with each passing day, he agreed to take over for him teaching the neophytes how to read and write.
ZZZ
It was a hot day in early April 1813 when Don Alejandro entered the hacienda just around siesta time to find his son sitting in the library, a book in his hands. "Did you hear, Diego? Don Hugo, the owner of the Portillo Hacienda, died last evening. The funeral is due to take place tomorrow."
"Don Hugo? He was ill for some time, wasn't he?" Diego asked.
"Yes. Some sort of illness of the lungs. He's been carrying it around for several years... His servant, Torres, is handling the funeral. We should be there… I might not have been close to him, but he had no family, and I doubt many will attend considering how reclusive he's been during the last decade."
"Indeed," Diego said, leaning back in his chair. "Did Torres already inform his relatives? I suppose the hacienda will have a new owner soon…"
"Oh, I didn't ask about that, but I doubt he had anyone. He was an only child, had never been married, and, as far as I know, he's never fathered any children. Who knows who is due to inherit now?" Don Alejandro uttered pensively.
"Well, given what we know about the Alcalde, I hope the rightful owner will be found soon, or Luis Ramone might decide to confiscate the property."
"Yes… Mendoza mentioned that he is already working on a new law allowing him to seize any property unclaimed within 6 months after the death of its previous owner, and sell it to the highest bidder."
"6 months? That is hardly enough time in such situations. For all we know, the rightful heir to the property might be living thousands of miles from California. It might take him more than that just six months only to come here."
"Yes… That is what the other dons argued, as well. Don Emilio seems to be the only one standing with the alcalde on this issue…" Was all Don Alejandro said before heading toward his quarters.
Putting down the book he had been reading, Diego started looking for another book on the shelves, just as Felipe entered through the sliding panel to ask if he needed to saddle Tornado.
"You heard all that?" the caballero inquired. The boy nodded, causing his guardian to smile. "No, Felipe. For once, I think studious Diego might be of more help than Zorro. At least in this situation," he said, just as his eyes rested on the volume he was looking for.
ZZZ
A while later, a law volume in his saddlebags, the tall caballero headed for Los Angeles, set on preventing the alcalde from changing in any way the inheritance laws.
"What does he want? Oh, just let him…" Diego heard Ramone utter just moments after he was announced by one of the corporals.
He entered, the volume in his hands. "Alcalde," he said in greeting.
"What may I do for you this time, De la Vega?" Luis Ramone asked a little sarcastically.
"Actually, Alcalde," Diego said, "I am here to do something for you."
"Really? What?" By his tone, Ramone expected nothing good from that conversation.
The caballero smiled, opening his volume and handing it to the official. "I understand you are working on a new inheritance law and I thought I would save you the trouble. You see, as it turns out, King Philip the Fifth passed in 1700 a law declaring that, should any Spanish subject die without a will and without direct descendants, the rightful heir or heirs shall be searched and be granted a period of 3 years to claim their inheritance."
The man looked suspiciously at him, then took the book and started reading, frowning a little more with every word he glanced at. "Surely, a law passed a hundred years ago is no longer valid…" he said at one point.
"It was never repealed," Diego remarked.
"I will, of course, have to check this information…"
"Of course."
"I'll be keeping this!" Ramone continued, referring to the volume in his hands.
"I guess I can lend it to you for a few days…"
"Or more… We'll see!"
"I will want it back…"
"And you shall have it! After I am done with it." Ramone promised, waving Diego away.
The caballero nodded, partly afraid he might never get his book back unless Zorro decided to recover it, and exited the office. "De la Vega…" He heard the official utter with disdain just before the door was fully shut behind him.
Smiling, he headed for the tavern.
ZZZ
With the news of what resulted in the young don's successfully putting an end to the alcalde's intention of changing the inheritance law, Diego started finding himself at the center of attention in the pueblo, many people starting to request his "legal advice". So many, in fact, that he felt compelled to start studying again his law books, and even order a few more, in the hope that, with neither a lawyer nor a notary anywhere in the vicinity of Los Angeles, he might help those in need of such services.
One late morning, a little past mid-April, Diego was heading to Los Angeles to meet another haciendado in the tavern, having promised to advise him, during lunchtime, on how to draft his testament.
Deciding to take a country road through a field in order to shorten the ride, as he rounded a bend, he spotted a white-haired man in the bushes. Curious, he guided his mare towards him, stopping a few feet away, and watched as the man seemed to search for something.
"There might still be some quicksand around here. You should be careful," he warned the stranger in English upon recognizing him.
The white-haired man turned and stared at him, surprised by his presence there.
"Ah… Don Diego… You are alright, I see. Good… Good… Perhaps you might help me in my search…" he said, returning to study the ground.
The young caballero dismounted and neared him. "What are you looking for?" he asked.
"A piece of a newspaper. I think I might have lost it in these bushes the last time I was here…" the man answered as he continued looking around.
"You needn't search for it then. I found it already the day we met. I tried to find you later to give it back, but you… vanished… Or, at least, that was what I first thought…"
"You haven't used it by any chance, have you? The chloroform?"
"Chloroform?"
"Yes…"
"I'm not sure what that is, Doctor Brown."
"Ah… Well… In that case, I guess there was no harm done… Although… Oh, never mind... Can you give me the article?"
"It's at the hacienda. If you wait here, I can go get it." Diego agreed without much fuss.
"Alright! But hurry! I can't stay for too long. Too many unpredictable consequences. I could accidentally step on the lizard from which descended the one suffering the genetic modification that ended up providing a cure for lung cancer, or I might… Never mind! Please hurry!"
Diego stared at him for a moment, then headed for the hacienda at a gallop. The ride and search for the paper only took about 15 minutes but, as he returned to the place where he had found the stranger, the Doc had disappeared.
Climbing down from the saddle, the caballero left Esperanza under a nearby tree and started looking around. Some strange, continuous tracks, like those caused by the wheels of a wagon, yet far larger and more deeply embedded into the dry earth, directed him some eighty feet Southeast of where he was. There, he found the white-haired man, half-bent, pacing while holding a strange instrument in his hand. "I knew it! By God! It's right here!"
"What's right there?" Diego inquired, staring at him.
"Oh? What? Nothing! Nothing! There's nothing here! Forget you ever saw this!" Doc Brown said, hiding the device behind his back just as Diego noticed another larger device. It appeared to be a strangely-shaped iron box on wheels that had left the tracks he had followed.
"What on Earth is that?" he wondered.
The Doc glanced at the DeLorean, then at Diego, then back at the DeLorean, back at Diego, and repeated that once more. "Great Scott! You were not supposed to see that, either!" he uttered.
"Aha…" the caballero said, folding his hands across his chest. "Let me venture a guess here, since I have been thinking about it all, since last I saw you… You, Señor, are not from around here, are you? And what I mean to say, is that you are not from this time. Whatever that device is, it must be from the future… And so are you… Am I right?"
"You are not supposed to know that!"
"Don't take me for a fool, Señor... Besides, I heard your conversation with your sons after you left the tavern that night. That was you, wasn't it?"
The white-haired man stared at him for a few moments, not moving a muscle. "You heard that?" he eventually asked. "You mean, all this time, you knew it was me and my sons who saved you that night?"
"Saved me? Is that what you did?"
"Of course! If you would have fought that man, the alcalde would have hanged you for being Zorro!"
Diego would have been surprised about the man's knowledge of his secret identity, had he not already come to terms with the fact that he was not dealing with any ordinary man. "People know about me in the future? About me being Zorro, that is?" he eventually asked.
"I already said too much." the Doc uttered, then froze in place and turned to the caballero. "How come you don't seem too shocked to find out about this? Time traveling must be far beyond your powers of understanding."
"The mechanism of it, yes. But the idea… Traveling to other times and places, to witness events I only read about in my books… it has often crossed my mind, to be fair. The mere idea of being able to see the future… Los Angeles 100 years from now… All the wonders people might come up with in a few centuries… Or the past! Ancient Rome at its full glory… Troy before it was destroyed… Tenochtitlan before the conquistadores destroyed it… Chang'an during the Han Dynasty… To meet people like Leonardo da Vinci, Archimedes, Galileo Galilei, Caesar, and so many others… It must be incredible to be able to do that… Have you met any of them?" Diego replied, his enthusiasm growing by the second.
"Well… Da Vinci and I are close friends, to be fair. We exchanged a few ideas… I might have influenced some of his… Nothing major, or, at least, nothing he wouldn't have thought of himself at some point anyway… Still… But that's beside the point. You have the paper?"
"Yes…" Diego answered, taking it from his sash and handing it to the man. "The substance on this…"
"Chloroform… It's only supposed to be invented in a few decades, which is why I had to come back for it: to prevent any major changes to the timeline…"
"I see…"
"Alright… Goodbye, and good luck with your struggle!" the man said, heading for the car.
"Wait! What were you looking for just now? You said something was here…"
"Something that is not supposed to be found for several generations. All you need to do is make sure neither you nor any of your descendants sell this piece of land. Trust me!" Doc Brown said before he climbed into the car. "Wait…" he said, as he prepared to insert a new date, "today is April the 18th? 1813?"
"Yes," Diego said, curiously looking at the car.
"Then you have a long day ahead of you. Just make sure you have a backup plan to escape jail. That tyrant will be waiting for you tonight!"
"What tyrant?" the caballero asked, but the Doc had already closed the door and started the engine.
Moments later, the engine stopped, and the Doc descended again and started inspecting the wheels. "The darn floating device is broken," he remarked just for himself. "Jules and Vern must have used the DeLorean again! Without telling me and in spite of my express instructions not to do it! I will give them a good scolding for this…" he continued to mutter. "You wouldn't happen to know a long, straight road in good shape around here, would you?" the man then asked Diego as if just remembering he was still there.
"El Camino Real is quite close. But people travel on it all the time… Besides, it should be visible from the pueblo…" the caballero answered.
"Right… Though I doubt I have much choice… Perhaps I get lucky and no one in Los Angeles will notice me…" Doc Brown said pensively. "Is there any point from where you could see a large portion of it and let me know when it's empty? I will only need about half a mile… even less..."
"I think I can help you with that…" Diego replied. "But, before I do, what tyrant were you referring to earlier?"
The Doc didn't think too much as he answered. "Well, you might as well be prepared since you're meant to defeat him…" he said. "There's a Colonel Palomarez – if I remember correctly – sent from Spain to capture you… well, to capture Zorro… though that is just part of his mission as you will, at some point, come to realize. He's due to arrive with a small contingent of soldiers, today. Now, forget I ever told you anything, forget you've ever met me, and help me get back to my own time!"
"Which is…?"
"The end of the nineteenth Century… mostly…" he replied.
"We'll have such vehicles and be able to time travel by the end of this century?" Diego asked baffled.
"Of course, not! The car I remade with pieces I brought back from the end of the twentieth Century, but I no longer live in that time. My wife was born some 100 years before me, and she prefers the 1890s."
That answer just confused the caballero more. "But… Didn't you marrying a woman who should have been long dead at the time of your birth create a paradox?"
"No… Fortunately. Since she had died in the initial timeline the very day we met, and my going back in time resulted in me saving her life, I have not affected the timeline… too much… Not in any essential way…"
"But how can you know how you're actually affecting the timeline? Wouldn't it be possible that even stopping someone on his way – like me, today – might prevent a series of connected events from happening? And wouldn't that then lead to different outcomes?"
"Well… Yes… It's precisely why I am doing everything to prevent any of that. And when I cannot prevent it, I can still fix the timeline… Speaking of which, you have a meeting with a colonel to prepare for, and I really should go."
Diego nodded. "I'll signal when the road is clear," he said, heading back to his horse, and guiding Esperanza towards a nearby hill.
Once there, after studying carefully the surroundings, he noticed a small contingent of white-uniformed soldiers, headed by a blue-uniformed one, nearing Los Angeles. He waited for them to reach their destination before, noticing there was nobody else anywhere close on the road, he signaled that it was clear.
The strange vehicle headed away at a speed unmatched by anything Diego had ever seen before, and the caballero smiled, shaking his head a little when it disappeared in what looked like a bolt of lightning. Heading on Esperanza towards the place where he had last seen the car, he glanced at the tracks, then, a smile on his lips, headed towards the pueblo.
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AN: The inheritance law is made up. After all, the show also liked doing that - inventing laws when convenient - so I think it's fully in accordance with the spirit of the NWZ.