☠️Mera’s Knight☠️ · @RaiderXman
23rd Apr 2019 from TwitLonger
Going Home/End of the Road
Part 2 End of the Road
José remains on his hands and knees for a few more seconds before standing up. He looks at his bloodied fist with curiosity, he watches as drops of blood fall onto the asphalt. Once upon a time it would have taken much more than punching the ground to break skin. He reaches into the pocket o his trench coat with his left hand and pulls out an old wrinkled black bandanna. He wraps his right hand in the bandanna and makes a fist. He wipes tears from his eyes with his left hand.
José stumbles forward a bit with his first steps before resuming his journey. As he walks up the alley He briefly sees the Black Cat I n her classic black catsuit, his favorite look for her. “Felicia?”, is all he can get out before she vanishes into thin air. “I kept my promise Felicia. I look after Angélica. I kept her safe. I got her out of New York before all hell broke loose. Knowing her, she would have been in the thick of things as war broke out between the mobs. She’s fierce, loyal and always does the right thing, always protecting those who need it most. You would have been proud of her.” José makes it to the cross street , the street he lived on as a kid, his old neighborhood.
He turns to his left and steps onto the sidewalk. A female figure crouches down out of sight on a nearby rooftop. The rooftop of a low income housing unit that was one house down and across the street from José’s childhood home just up the hill. José smiles, “Agent Morales, you don’t disappoint. I knew you would be waiting.” Pretending he didn’t see her, he continues walking up the sidewalk , remembering their encounter in Los Angeles, in Southern California.
José was hiding out in an old abandoned in one of Los Angeles’ rougher areas. agent Morales had tracked him to that warehouse and was now just outside the building, gun in hand. José, meanwhile was expecting her and hiding in the ceiling, lying in wait. He watches as she slowly enters the empty warehouse, light entering from broken windows. Agent Morales slowly makes her way deep into the warehouse, looking around for any place that can be used as a hiding spot. Suddenly he leaps down, landing behind her, getting the drop on her. He comes up on her quickly before she has a chance to react. He reaches around her pulling her arms up and using pressure points on her hand to easily disarm her,
Holding her gun down at his side in his right hand he walks around to face her, just a few feet away. “I suggest you don’t try going for your backup gun. Agent Morales.
They stare at each other for a few moments, in silence. For Agent Morales, it’s the first time she’s been face to face with him during this cross country chase, at least with the opportunity to talk to him. “So what now? You kill me?”, she says. “After everything we’ve been through, do you believe I’m a cold hearted killer? I could have disappeared in Atlanta. I stayed, I risked capture. I didn’t have to help you or the family trapped in the fire. I could have let them die, I didn’t. Do you remember Phoenix, Arizona? If I wanted you dead , all I had to do then was nothing. I saved you! You’re an hones, fearless but you’re reckless at times and don’t think. That’s why you jumped chasing me through rooftops. You didn’t make it, remember, the pipe you were holding onto was breaking, I came back for you. And what about all those other assignments, all the drug raids, who do you think was out there keeping you safe. You have to have known someone was helping you, keeping you safe.” , he replies. Caught off guard she stutters a little, “Wh-what? That was you? You’re a liar!”, she says angrily. “Think! You’ve always been aware of you’re surroundings. You must have seen me lurking in the shadows, working out of sight of those not aware of my presence there.”, he says. “Why would you do that.” , she asks curiously. “I have my reasons.”, is all he says. “Then why didn’t you stay and try to clear your name.”, she asks to keep him talking, looking for an opportunity to act. “I did try! “ he yells angrily before calming down. “The mobs have the right people paid off. I was the only one protecting those neighborhoods, keeping the mobs at bay. Those properties were going to become very valuable and the movs wanted them, so they framed me to get rid of me. I would have saved that woman if I could have, but I got there too late. The police officers were on the mobs payroll so I fled the scene. From a rooftop I saw them destroying and planting evidence to frame me. Once I was out of the picture, a mob war broke out for control of land.” She studies him closely. “Come back with me, I’ll help you.”, she says. He rubs his left hand over forehead and top of his head in frustration. “Damn it, Angélica! Stubborn, como tú mamá, just like your mother.” José looks upwards and says, “Felicia, she gets that from you!” Agent Morales stands still shocked by hearing him speak her mother’s name. “How do you know my mother’s name?” He smirks. “ I’ve always known it Angélita, your mother and I were friends. She kept me safe when I was a foolish and powerless young man chasing her. And when I was lost, she brought me back, she saved me. I was there there on the happiest day of her life, the day you were born.” His voice cracks as he says, “ and because all she meant to me, on her death bed, I promised to keep that which she loved the in the world safe and to always keep my eye on you.”
Agent Morales stands there in shock, finally believing everything he’s been saying. She watches as he crouches down paying little attention to the card that drops from his coat. José places the gun flat on the floor and with a hard quick motion slides it past her. She turns he head slightly to see where it goes. José quickly comes around behind her and using skills learned from the Black Cat slips something into Angélica’s pocket unnoticed. He whispers in her ear, “Patience little one, it’s almost over.”
José releases her and runs out the old abandoned warehouse. Agent Morales retrieves her gun and chases after him. Once outside, she stops looks around and sees no sign of him. She puts her gun in it’s holster, then puts her hand in her right coat pocket feeling something in it. something in it. She pulls out a necklace with a small black cat.
She remembers seeing her mother wearing it in a picture. She also remembers a second necklace with a crucifix.
She smiles to herself as she holds it out in front of her.
She recalls an old picture of her mother wearing the necklace. But not just this one she recalls her wearing a second necklace. “ what was it? A crucifix! The one he was wearing.” Suddenly remembering the card that dropped from his trench coat, she it. “ an old California drivers license. “What did he say? It’s almost over? Is it the end of the road? He’s going home?
He walks up the hill to his childhood home and stands in front of it with a smile, remembering simpler times, good times. He walks to the stairs and climbs the five steps. He UPenn’s the door and enters. Again he sees it as he remembers and not it’s current state of ruin. “Ya llegué , I’m home.” He walks from the living room to the kitchen and around an imagined table. He stops just outside a bedroom. After a moment he descends the stairs to his old bedroom.
He stands at the bottom of the stairs and looks around, He makes a face seeing two toy guns, not his breaking his illusion. Now he sees an old room dirty, no furniture, falling apart. He sits on the dirty floor and leans on the wall. He stares at the guns and remembers playing with friends as the illusion rebuilds around him.
After several moments, he gets up still holding the toy guns. He heads back upstairs and into the living room. He left the door open. As he steps onto the porch closing the door, SWAT officers stand at the ready. One officer yells out something like freeze, drop the guns and hands in the air. José’s not really paying attention. He walks to the edge of the porch holding the toy guns up at either side of his head. He stares out searching. He sees Angélica and gives her an acknowledging look. Then, suddenly he lowers the guns as if to shoot. The officers open fire, drowning out Agent Morales shouting, “Hold your fire.”
José takes several shots to the chest, he drops the guns and they tumble to the bottom of the stairs as he stumbles backwards against the stairs. Agent Morales walks up to the house. At the bottom of the steps she sees what are obviously toy guns. She climbs the straps and crouches next to him, and simply says, “Why?” He turns his eyes to her and says in a labored voice, “I’m tired, my time was running out, my powers fading. I wanted to come home. Now they can never take me from here. I can’t look after you anymore, Angélica. Take ca... ca.” She closes his eyes as her own tear up.
Back in New York, she stands in front of a deli looking across to where José had been framed. No longer an agent, having resigned, frustrated with a system that blocked her every move to clear his name. The deli owner steps outside and stands next to her. “Are you Agent Morales?” Lost in thought, not giving a thought to how he knows her name, she peplies, “ Just Morales, no longer an an agent.” He says “Oh. Is it true? Is he dead?” Paying him little mind she says, “Yes.” In a somber voice he says, “ He told me to give you this.” and hands her a flash drive. “what is it?” He looks at her and says, “Video of what really happened.” He heads back inside as she stares at the flash drive in her right hand.
Epilogue
Social media blows up, with video of what really happened, his name finally cleared.
It’s a cool fall night and the moon hangs low in the night sky. On a rooftop, a lone female figure prowls the night wearing a black catsuit and mask adorned with two necklaces. One bearing a smal black cat and the other a crucifix. It’s the night time, her time, the Black Cat,
The End