Chapter Text
As Victoria struggled with her captor, she wished that his grip was just a tad looser so that she could reach her shoe. She wasn’t nearly as deadly with it as her Mamá Imelda or even, if the younger Riveras were to be believed, her hermanita Elena, but she could wield one well enough to protect herself.
She gave a gasp as the grip on her became tighter. As a skeleton she knew it shouldn’t hurt since nothing short of snapping the bone would damage a well remembered person like herself, but they were creatures of memory, memories were held within the mind, and her mind was saying that it was painful, and she was reacting accordingly.
A glance at Rosita saw that she was in the same predicament, and she saw her tía wince as her captors grip tightened. Everyone that had crowded around, seemed to be looking at the man, and Héctor, thinking that a man that was nearly forgotten had to be the instigator of the conflict.
Then, Victoria heard a bark, it was loud, it sounded like something that would come from the mouth of a large, vicious, guard dog, and she was surprised to note that it had come from Marco. She had never seen the small alebrije angry before. She had heard his yips of excitement, had heard his nervous whines, and had even been around to hear playful growling snarls when he played with Dante, but never before had she heard him angry.
One look a Héctor and she could see why he was enraged, anger seemed to be radiating from him, making a nearly tangible aura around him. The man was glaring, and it too was something she had never seen before, the glare he was giving was strong enough to rival any that Mamá Imelda might do, it was not aimed at the man that was still insulting him, no, but at the two men that were restraining her, and her tía.
Another wince on Rosita’s part was all it took to push him over the edge. Marco barked again, loud and ferocious, and suddenly there was a white light, everyone around them, closed their eyes reflexively, but the glow did not last very long, and a few blinks were enough to restore their vision to normal.
When the glow faded, Marco had grown to an enormous size, he was probably even larger than Pepita, his front paws were still tipped in neon green, but now it ran from the tips of all of his paws upward like he was wearing socks, he had other markings now too. While he was nowhere near as luminescent as most alebrijes, his face had a blue stripe running from between his eyes down to his nose, his ears and tail were tipped in a bright red, and made so much brighter by the inky darkness of his fur. Dotted though that black fur though, were specks of silver, shining like stars in the night sky.
The most startling attribute, however, were his eyes, instead of the chocolate brown they had come to know, Marco’s eyes were now a shade of orange, eerily reminiscent of the glow of final death. There even seemed to be a cracking of energy about him, that lent itself to that thought.
Marco bared his teeth, they were sharp as daggers, and promised broken bones for any who tried to oppose him, no matter how strong the memories tied them together. Héctor stood, walking until he was beside Marco. The man and the woman were looking fearfully at Héctor and Marco. The alebrije growled snapping at them when the man and his arm candy failed to move. The two skeletons backed away quickly neither of them watching where they were going which was likely the reason they lost their balance and fell into a nearby fountain. Together, Héctor and Marco made their way to Victoria and Rosita, and the crowd readily parted for them.
The two men holding them, let go as though the women had turned to fire, and quickly backed away from them tripping over themselves in their hurry to get away.
“Are you ready to go home?” Héctor asked, his voice was very soft, and both of them knew that he really was giving them the option to stay, but there was power in that quiet voice. The power of fury on a tight, but short leash.
They both nodded.
Marco bent down, so that they could get on his back, he bared his teeth, daring anyone in the crowd to get close to them. Everyone around them had the self-preservation instincts necessary to stay away.
Héctor climbed on last, and Marco took off like a bullet. They assumed that he was going to run all the way home, but Marco leapt, landing nimbly on a building, and hardly jostling his passengers. He continued that way, making leaps so gracefully that it felt as though he was gliding. They continued that way until they landed in the backyard of the Rivera estate, and Marco laid down on the ground so they could get off of his back.
Once they were on the ground, Héctor turned to them. “Did they hurt either of you, in any way?”
Even if they had been hurt, both women would never have admitted it, seeing as it was a near certainty that Héctor would go back, and make them pay for what they had done. The fury in his features was so potent, that it was easy to imagine him striking down those slanderous people in the plaza, and as nice as it might initially be, they knew that it was better for everyone involved if he didn’t.
“I’m fine, I promise,” Rosita said calmly.
“We’re both okay, thanks to you, and Marco,” Victoria added.
Marco looked over at the sound of his name, and Victoria tried not to show how much he unnerved her in this form.
Apparently, the alebrije saw through her, because he lowered himself once more, becoming as small as he great size would allow, and whined. How a creature that looked like it was ripped straight from a child’s nightmare, managed to look cute, was a mystery, but it was true, and she petted him a little, to make sure he knew that she wasn’t scared, just startled.
“More importantly,” Rosita said gently, “are you okay?”
Fury still was apparent on Héctor’s face, so she made sure to be as calm as possible, in an attempt to sooth that anger before he could lash out. Though she had asked softly she was worried, his bones were still brittle, even if they were becoming stronger now that his memory was being shared, so it was likely the assault he had suffered might have added damage to him.
He took a deep breath. “I’m alright. I just… need to calm down.”
“I’ll get some snacks ready, and a few treats for the alebrijes, I could use a bit of help, ” Rosita said.
Victoria nodded, and the two of them went inside.
“Thanks for helping us today,” Héctor said to Marco as he hugged his alebrije. Marco gave a soft growl, trying to comfort Héctor. “I was so angry when those men, grabbed them.” he hissed. He was happy none of the others had been in the plaza with them, anyone grabbing any of his family like that would have been enough to consume him with fury, but if it had been Imelda or Coco or Miguel…
Héctor took another deep breath, trying to force the encounter out of his mind, he had to, if he was ever going to calm down, and he did need to calm himself or he was liable to do something rash. He closed his eyes, in an effort to steady his breathing, and began to hum a wordless tune.
Marco growled along, as he caught the melody. He had no idea how long they stayed there like that, but eventually, the rage receded.
Rosita had finished making the snacks when Héctor walked in, Marco, in his tiny form, riding on his shoulder. It was clear the man was much calmer, and more apparent that in the wake of his anger, he was quite embarrassed to face them, which both women thought was silly, but perfectly in character for the man that they were getting to know. The fury that had been invoked, was nothing like they had ever seen from him, and it was flattering to know that such a mild mannered man, who seemed relatively indifferent to attacks directed at him, had become that way to protect them from harm.
“What would I have to promise you so that you wouldn’t tell Imelda about this?” he asked.
“More than you ever had, and ever will,” came the answer from Victoria.
“That’s what I thought you would say,” he said, with a resigned sigh, as allowed himself to collapse onto the sofa, his long limbs splayed like a tossed stuffed animal. The fall was highly controlled though, because Marco wasn’t jostled at all.
Rosita, giggled as his expense. "Even if we didn't tell her she would hear about it soon enough. There were a lot of people there, and I saw a few customers of ours there today."
“Just let me be far away when you tell her,” he begged.
“Far away, when they tell me what?” asked Imelda.
Héctor jumped up, almost making Marco lose his grip. Steadying the little wolf, he said, “I just remembered, I have something I need to do. I best be-”
“Héctor.”
Héctor swallowed hard, and sat back down on the sofa, before he even realized he had done it. He knew that tone, and even if he was already dead, it still struck fear in his heart, even if the actual organ had been absent for over ninety years.
“Imelda, mi amor, how lovely it is to see you looking so beautiful today. So how was your day?”
After a look, that clearly stated, that such distractions were ineffective, Imelda folded her arms. “Who is going to tell me what happened?”
Both Victoria and Rosita looked at Héctor who had proceeded to curl into a ball on the sofa cushion he was seated upon, with his head resting on his knees. The man made a hand wavy motion in their general direction, which they interpreted as ‘go ahead’.
“I guess we are,” Rosita said. “So we were walking around the market to get a few things, and just to be outside, and Papá Héctor was telling us some stories from when he was younger like the zombie chicken incident.”
Imelda tried not to smile as she remembered that, she had teased the twins mercilessly for months, and they had sulked for more time than that, vowing to get revenge on Héctor.
“Héctor had just paused after he had proudly proclaimed he got on well with the chickens, and this woman walks by and says, ‘nearly forgotten folk shouldn’t be around the well remembered, because we might catch something from them,'” Victoria said with a sneer.
“You heard her?” Héctor asked quietly.
“Of course we did, but you didn’t seem to, and we didn’t want to say anything about it because we didn’t want to upset you.”
Héctor shrugged, “ It doesn’t bother me anymore. There are a lot of people that seem to think that way, so I’m used to it.”
Nobody said anything to that even though it was clear that they wanted to. All three women, and the alebrije, were thinking the same thing. Nobody should have to get used to that kind of treatment, no matter what state they were in. The Riveras had never gone out of there way to make contact with the nearly forgotten, but they were not prejudice against them, nor would they berate, and assault them for something that they had no control over.
“Anyway,” Rosita continued forcing the thought away to be dealt with later, “he finished the story, and we were just walking, minding our own business when a man came up to us, and asked if Héctor was bothering us.”
“I wanted to hit him with my boot, but Héctor stepped in, and said were familia, and thanked him for his concern.”
Imelda rolled her eyes, that sounded like something that Héctor would do, it wouldn’t the first time he had stepped in to save someone from the kiss of a shoe wielded by a Rivera.
“Then the man pushed him to the ground, hard enough that he might have damaged something, and his two male companions dragged us away from Héctor , we protested, but they were strong, and insisted that we were brainwashed, and in danger.” Victoria scoffed.
“There was a woman with the man that had originally approached us, and she started saying that the forgotten shouldn’t mingle with the remembered, and accused him of lying when he said we were his familia.” Rosita continued.
“What happened next?” Imelda asked after the silence had gone for far too long for her liking..
“I got angry,” Héctor said with a growl. “They wouldn’t listen to Victoria or Rosita, and I could see they were using too much force, they wouldn’t listen! I couldn’t standby and let them be hurt. I couldn’t.”
Marco let loose a growl, he was also remembering how angry both he and Héctor had been, to see members of the familia, a familia that was so recently was able to be claimed by him, and that happily claimed him in return, being mistreated, by some ignorant fools that knew nothing about them, and their relationship.
Imelda knew that Héctor had a protective streak a mile wide, she had seen it in the brief years they had been together when alive, and more so after Coco was born. Now if he could only be half as impassioned for his own sake, everything would be probably be a lot better.
Rosita reached out, and pulled him close to her. “It’s okay Papá Héctor we are fine.” she said soothingly. Marco stopped growling, and yipped, coming closer licking Héctor’s hand to try to cheer him up.
“Héctor was angry, and then Marco gave a loud threatening bark, there was this ball of light, and Marco was enormous. He took us home, we put away our purchases, and we made snacks.” Victoria finished quickly, not wanting to drag it out, and rekindle the anger of Héctor or his alebrije any further.
There was a brief silence, and then Héctor removed himself from Rosita’s embrace, uttering a quiet, “Lo siento.”
“What are you apologizing for?” Imelda couldn’t help asking.
“They wouldn’t have been in that situation if it wasn’t for me,” he confessed.
“Did force your company on them?”
“Of course not!” Héctor exclaimed.
Imelda wanted to sigh, but she held back. It was good that they had been the ones to ask him to go with them, but she knew that by the way he was feeling, it was going to take a long time for him to get comfortable enough where he would explicitly ask anything of any of them.
“Did you tell those people to attack them?”
“Of course not!” he growled again.
“Do they blame you for any of it?”
Just like that his passionate fury dissolved, and he looked at the ground, clearly uncertain.
The three women looked at one another, shocked that Héctor could believe for even a second that any of them would blame him for what had happened. No wonder he had been so antsy and nervous.
“Abuelo,” Victoria said gently, and Héctor’s head snapped up at that. That was the first time that she had called him by that name, and Victoria was shocked to see him gazing at her as though she held the answers to all of life’s mysteries. After a hug so strong she was scared that he would break one of his bones, with the force that he had put into it, she continued. “You did nothing to provoke that attack, and everything to avert it, tía Rosita and I would never think badly of you or blame for what happened today.”
Héctor still seemed somewhat unconvinced so Imelda walked over to him. “You had no idea that people would react as violently as they did, and you didn’t invite trouble, in fact, you tried to calmly avert trouble, and when your family was threatened you protected them. I’m very proud of you Héctor.”
Héctor reacted to Imelda’s praise as he always had, by smiling, and looking at her, as though he couldn’t believe that she had really said that, but it was still clear that he blamed himself for the incident, and nothing they could say would alleviate that guilt from him.
“Dios mio,” Imelda sighed if they didn’t do something soon, Héctor was going to do something stupid, like withdraw from the family completely or leave thinking it was the only way to protect them from himself.
“Mijas we have a problem, Héctor is determined to make all problems somehow his fault, what are we going to do about his incessant need to be a martyr for all familial problems that arise when he is around?”
“I don’t-” Héctor started to protest.
“Well I guess we’ll just have to convince him, that he isn’t a problem.” Victoria decreed.
“Perhaps including him in more family events, even if he is reluctant, would help?” Rosita offered.
Imelda nodded firmly and turned to Héctor, only to find him walking up the stairs, Marco astride his shoulder.
“Héctor,” she said exasperatedly.
“”I thought we were done,” he answered, before jogging the rest of the way up the stairs.
She shook her head, that man was going to drive her crazy, but she’d leave him alone for now, after all she had to make the list of all the things that he would be need to attend, and hopefully, getting closer to the family might help him to work through his tendencies to heap blame on himself. It might also start him on a path towards placing more value on himself, since it was clear that he didn't believe he was important or as important as they thought him to be. They were going to do their best to help him see how much he mattered, how important he was to them. Imelda closes her eyes, and thanked whatever fates had set in motion the events that led to Miguel appearing in the Land of the Dead. It was an adventure that would have stopped her heart if she still had one, but in the end Miguel wasn't the only one that had learned the true value of family that night.