The Deaths of Hector Morales

There's a wedding today and unfortunately I've been a lil busy this week so I'm gonna cheat this week. Here's a story I wrote some time ago. Hope you enjoy it.

Congratulations to the couple. Hope you have many, many, happy years together.



The Deaths of Hector Morales

Ever look back on your life and wonder if it was for anything? I think about that sometimes. I wonder to myself if any of the good shit or the bad shit I’ve ever done made a difference to anyone. It doesn’t always seem like it. A guy can do a lot of good for a person and never hear a single “Thank you.” Let him forget one woman’s birthday though. I’ll be damned if he doesn’t hear the end of that. So maybe it matters to someone, somewhere.
It doesn’t matter if it does mean anything but I think some people like to believe it’s all for something bigger. To some folks it’s comforting to think we’re pieces of a puzzle spilled on some big, black, starry night sky and not somebody’s knocked over trash spilling in a gutter. She’s definitely one of those people.
Her name is Alexis. I met her seven years ago. She was just an eleven year old girl then but she’s something else altogether now. She’s always been a little strange, far too hopeful to be born in this world. She never seems to think anyone can do any wrong. “They just do what they’re supposed to do.”, she’s often said to me. She believes in something the rest of us can’t. I don’t care if she is only a hundred and twenty-something pound teenage girl, that faith of hers makes her stronger than most.
My name is Hector Morales. I ain’t her daddy, but I’ve been acting like I am for seven years and she’s been calling me that for just as long. I have no blood relation to the girl who wears the angel wings, but I take care of her. I’m all she has in this world. All she has is a short, scrawny, El Salvadoreño of a thief who’d punch the devil himself out if he tried to lay a hand on her. Did it for her to several others already today, what’s one more? I may just punch out El Diablo just to be able to tell people about it. Prison etiquette does say take out the biggest and baddest first.
Hell, the way I’m shot up now I probably don’t have much of a choice on that. One, two, three, three wonderful holes for leaky red stuff to drip out of ‘A ‘A ‘A. I always liked The Count. I wonder if he’s going to Hell too. I guess if a vampire who teaches kids to count is going to Hell a thuggish thief like myself ain’t got a prayer.
I’m dying and I’ve damned myself. I did it before I knew her but I’ve been trying to make up for it since. Dead criminals all usually go to the same place, whether they want to or not. Now at age thirty-three Mama Morales’ baby boy goes away again, forever. I’ve seen the book, I saw it written. Once something is written in that book it can’t be changed. I guess it’s a law of the universe. It’s also how I came back in the first place. That pissed a lot of people off. If I didn’t these guys have been fighting the wrong guy for seven years. Seven years of fighting both sides and anyone who thinks I’m nuts or a bad father.
These guys who shot me are the real bad guys. Not just because they shot me either. You can see it in their eyes. The flash of red like their murderous intentions can be seen. Kind of reminds me of the red eyes people get in bad pictures. Their eyes don’t stay like that. It comes and goes. The red eyes leave and that somebody forgets what he’s doing. This bunch hasn’t forgotten.
I sit here on this roof top bleeding. She’s fighting them off on her own. No weapons, no lethal moves, all heart. She’s doing well, too. She will tire soon though. The guy with the gun is getting up too. I better get moving, no time to bleed anymore. I’m damned and dying, she’s the only thing worth fighting for.
I hurl myself up and charge the weasel with the pistol. Before he can raise his bleeding arm I give him a right cross. As he goes down I take back my knife. I use the razor sharp blade to shred my opponents. By now we’ve attracted media attention. There’s a helicopter flying overhead with a spotlight shining down on us. The whole world will see my spectacular death. Hi, Mom.
Another knife is pulled by the woman at Alexis’ feet. I’m still twenty yards away. It strikes her dead center in the stomach. With an unnatural speed and strength I reach her as she falls. I pull the knife from my daughter and force it into the hand of her murderer. I’m surrounded by our assailants. “I’m okay.” she says. I believe her without wondering why.
The crowd around us dissipates. One familiar face is seen among them, a man who has hunted us for seven years. The rocker with the red eyes. He’s the one that really scares me. Not because he’s younger and faster than I am. Not because he’s an underground rocker with influence over a lot of people. Not because he carries a big “Dirty Harry” style magnum. Sure those things make him dangerous. But it’s the things that I’ve done to that man and the way he just keeps grinning and taking it.
Click-Clack. Boom!!!
Rock-salt seasons the creature. The pink haired, red-eyed rocker falls. The rock-salt makes his back sizzle before his wounds close back up. “Thanks, Mike, late’s better than never.”
Mike cocks his shotgun and points it at the rest of the crowd, smiling. He’s a happy kid most of the time. Today he’s happy to be doing some good. They screech like ungodliness, like rabbits being turned inside out. They screech and attack the young kid. He blasts again and again. His unholy victims begin to show their true forms, rotting corpses. They are twisted shells of greening meat, yellow eyes with teeth to match, they are only puppets controlled by the songbird. The poor bastards died only to be used as some twisted devil’s pawns. They’re strong. They don’t feel pain. They don’t stop coming unless their master says so.
The red-eyed man draws his pistol. I’m unarmed. Mike is being overrun by the ghouls. Alexis is wounded in my arms. She says she’s not dying and I believe her. She struggles to stand and does. “You will not take him today! Today the world will know of your deception and cast you from its flock.” She speaks but the voice doesn’t belong to her. It’s stronger. The voice carries unimaginable power behind it.
“Girl, I want to know your secret! It’s what I’ve always been after. How do you live here? How is it that you do not have a tell? No marks, no limitations to anything, you live as one of them.” The devil cocks his pistol ready to fire.
“I am one of them! This is my father and I will die protecting him as he will die protecting me! He is what this world has to offer in abundance. You and your kind can never over take them.” Her wound begins to shine. It’s as though a ray of sunlight were spilling out from inside her. She raises her hand and lightning flashes from it striking the corpses smothering Mike. They turn to smoking ashes.
“I want to know, girl. Tell me how you did it! How could you escape your shackles? I want to know!!!” BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! The rocker fires into her before I can do anything about it.
Instead of red, she bleeds light. Her true power is shining through. My baby girl is going to light up the sky. Her skin cracks and shatters. She is made of light. I’m almost blinded by her body as I watch her. She sprouts her wings finally. She’s been wearing fake ones for so long I bet she’s happy to have them. I might not have a camera but I guess I’ll have to ask the guys in the helicopter for a copy of the tape. She’s even got a crowd of cops gathered in the street to watch her dance. Her daddy is so proud of her.
Mr. Red-eye points his pistol at her. She shows him it’s a mistake. He sizzles with the beam of light that strikes him. He’s singed and pissed. His arms flame red and transform his pistol into a sword. He himself shows his true shape. The red-scaled demon roars with it’s claws clutching the sword. She strikes him with another beam of light. It doesn’t hurt him this time. He plunges towards Alexis with his blade. I take mine from the pile of ashes and leap into her light. I drive my blade into the belly of that beast and he drives his into mine. A light between us flashes and we separate in an explosion. We hit the rooftop at the same time. He’s human again with my knife still in him. I have a big gaping hole in my belly.
“You fool! She’s not supposed to be here and you know it. You protect her from us and them. You have no one on your side. It’s hopeless. You’re all damned if you think otherwise.” His eyes glow red and blood streams from his lips as he struggles to stand. He plucks my switchblade from his gut and drops it. Flames burst from his wound and consume him. His body is reduced to ashes fluttering like moths in the wind.
“Well, I’ll be damned.” I say to myself.
Alexis drops down gracefully like a setting sun. She kisses me once on the forehead and whispers, “I’ll see you later, Daddy. We both have places to go now but we will see each other again.”
I don’t doubt her for a second. “I know it, Darlin’. I love you. Take care of yourself.” She begins to cry and I wipe away her tears. My daughter disappears into the evening sky a thousand fireflies taking their place in the stars.
“Mike? Hey, Mike!” I shout.
The young guy under all the ashes slowly comes to. He spits the used-to-be-dead-people from his mouth and hacks on what he’s already swallowed. “Ugh.”
“You still alive, Mike?” I holler.
Mike sits up. “Yeah, are you?”
“Nope, not for long anyway. Sorry to leave you with the mess.”
“Hell, you didn’t really wanna clean up anyway. You two take of each other. I’ll take care of this here.” Mike, the kid with a crush on my eighteen-year-old daughter who’s risked his life time and time again to save me and her, is left alone on this world to pay the price of what we’ve done. He’s a good guy. She thinks he’s handsome too. She’s never said so, but a father can tell.
She’s gone and I’m about to be. He’ll ask himself as the cops bust through that door leading up to this rooftop, “Was all of this was worth it? Was any of this for anything?” I hope he’ll say yes and I hope he’ll understand what it’s all for.