Chapter Text
As far as the usual class of bandits that attempted to outwit Zorro and earn the reward on his head, Diego had to admit that these ones were somewhat more clever. They had realize that the masked bandit had some sort of connection to the innkeeper and had decided their best course of action was to kidnap her. He didn’t know if they also determined some connection to Don Diego that led them to also kidnap Felipe, who was volunteering his time to help the senorita with a few errands and was therefore driving the cart, or if it was just bad luck.
Diego had very little time to consider his options. He had stumbled upon the abandoned cart with its broken axle and over heard enough of the discussion between the bandits to realize that he didn’t have time to get home, change into Zorro, and then deal with them. No - better to approach this as Don Diego. To approach the bandits as Zorro would surely spell death for Felipe and Victoria. He believed that if he approached as a Don, then they would take him to where they were keeping the other two and once there he was certain that he would be able to devise a plan of escape.
So far his plan had gone well, he supposed. He was sitting on his horse with his hands tied behind him and a blindfold over his eyes, but deduction and intuition told him where he was headed. He knew he was being led toward an abandoned homestead and he knew which one - this was an area he knew quite well. Now he just had to figure out what to do when they got there. He allowed himself to be manhandled off his horse and into a building. The blindfold was removed roughly and he was quickly pushed through a door that was slammed behind him.
As the door to the dark and musty room opened, Felipe and Victoria sprang to their feet. In an instant, Felipe had stepped in front of Victoria in what was surely an ineffective yet determined effort to protect her. When Diego’s face appeared in the door, Felipe stepped toward him at the same time as the bandits shoved him forward. Felipe reached forward and steadied him as he stumbled over the uneven dirt floor, unable to keep his balance with his hands bound.
Felipe couldn’t keep himself from embracing Diego for a moment as Victoria moved quickly behind him to untie his hands.
“Oh, Diego - they took you as well? How terrible!”
They all drew apart and Diego looked both of them over. Victoria appeared unharmed. Felipe’s lip was split on one side and a bruise was forming on his opposite cheek. Diego reached out and gently touched his face. Felipe shrugged him off.
I’m alright. He signed.
Victoria frowned. “They hit him, Diego, when he was trying to protect me. He was very brave.”
“Of course he was.” He said softly. Felipe blushed, barely noticeable through his already reddened cheeks.
“What is it that they want?” Diego asked Victoria.
“Zorro.” She said simply. “They think that he will come for us, or that we know who he is.”
Felipe’s hands flew through the space between him and Diego. Victoria couldn’t understand him at all, but Diego understood everything.
They are tired of waiting - they are planning on interrogating us soon.
Diego didn’t like the sound of that. Not at all. Felipe continued.
One of the bandits said that he wouldn’t hit a woman, and the other one said that it wasn’t worth the risk to abuse a Don. They argued about what to do. The one in charge is willing to hurt Victoria, but he agreed to start with me. I heard them say it. But luckily they do not know that I can not speak.
“Luckily, Felipe? How is that a good thing?”
Because they will try to make me tell them who Zorro is -- but I will not be able to.
“Absolutely not! I will not let you do that.”
I don’t think that you have a choice. They will take me and that will give you time to get us out. You will find a way to save us.
Diego was silent. Felipe signed his last few words again.
You will save us.
Victoria looked back and forth between Felipe and Diego. It was as if she wasn’t even there, and she finally broke into the one sided conversation.
“What is it, Don Diego? What did Felipe see them say? They were whispering but Felipe could see them talking.”
Diego couldn’t answer her right away. It was all too much. He was perfectly willing to accept the consequences of his actions -- he had the scars, cracked ribs, and yellowing bruises to prove it. But for Felipe -- who he treated more like a son than a servant -- to ask this of him... To ask him to step aside and let those men take Felipe away and try to beat the identity of Zorro out of him... It was too much.
Finally Diego looked up from his clenched fists and met Victoria’s eyes. “Felipe has just informed me that these bandits are disinclined to hit either women or Dons - or rather that they won’t *begin* by beating women or Dons. They also haven’t yet realized that Felipe can not speak. He believe that is is good news because it means that they will try to beat the information out of him first.” Diego’s voice was bitter and cold. Victoria was horrified. She turned to face Felipe.
“No Felipe. You can’t do this!”
Felipe signed slowly and deliberately. He wanted to make sure that Victoria understood him. She repeated his words aloud as he signed.
“There is no choice. Diego will find our escape. I will be fine. He will have time. I will be fine. Zorro will be safe.”
Victoria’s voice trailed off and Felipe turned away from her.
Felipe had spent years playing deaf. He was very good at it, even managing not to flinch when a bandito tried to test his deafness by firing a gun off right by his ear. When he had regained his hearing and decided not to tell Don Alejandro he had tried hard to act no differently than he had in the past when he was truly deaf. He made sure not to be the first person to react to a sound -- he waited until someone in his line of sight turned toward something, and only then did he turn as well. He tried very hard to remember what had been said to him directly and he could lip read and not make reference to too much that had been said when he couldn’t have seen the speaker. Even when he thought that no one was around who could see him he remembered not to react to sounds. It was too risky not to assume that someone somewhere might be watching him.
But now he had to change all that, and he needed a few minutes to think. He signed to Diego, I need to sit and think a moment. And he sat on the hard bench and dropped his head. I need to face them when they speak, I need to react to sounds that they make behind my back. I need them to think that I am silent because I refuse to talk to them, not because I can not speak. He generally avoided making noise, although he was perfectly capable of grunting and making some sounds. He usually tried to avoid it, though. He thought that making sounds that weren’t words made him seem dumb, in addition to mute. But in this case he thought it would be a good idea to make the kinds of sounds that speaking people did without thinking.
He tried to make the noise in the back of his throat that people made when they were saying no to something or disagreeing. He tried it a few times. “Mm mmh.” It sounded alright to him. Then he tried the sound when someone was agreeing. “Mm hum.” Not bad. He looked up at Diego, who was staring at him with a dazed look on his face.
How did that sound?
“Excellent, Felipe. Excellent.”
I think I should make noise. Talking people don’t realize how much noise they make when they think they are being silent.
“Yes. Of course.” He tried to reason with the boy. “There must be another way. We’ll rush them when they open the door...” Felipe was already shaking his head firmly.
No. They will overpower us. They will hurt Victoria. You will find a way out while they are distracted with me. I know you will.
Suddenly they heard the lock on the door being opened. Felipe stood up and turned toward the door and then turned back toward Diego. The brave mask slipped a moment, but then returned. He looked perfect - like a belligerent teenager who would rather take a beating than tell the banditos anything. Quickly Felipe darted toward Diego and hugged him fiercely for a half of a half of a second and was back standing in front of the door when it swung open. In an instant he was gone - grabbed by the grimy men and ripped out of the room as the door slammed behind him quickly. Felipe had been right. Rushing the men at that moment would have been stupid and dangerous. Something Diego would gladly have tried it he had been the only captive, but with Felipe and Victoria there it would have been foolish.
But the instant the door had shut he sprang into action. He ran his eyes, and then his hands, over every inch of the interior of the room. Nothing immediately presented itself as a means of escape. He surveyed the room to see what sort of tools he could make. There was nothing but the bench. He turned toward Victoria, who stood frozen near the back wall.
“What do you have on your person that might help? That I might be able to use?”
The question seemed to shock Victoria out of her dazed state. She began to pat her hair and her dress and feel in her pockets.
“I have a few hairpins, my sash, a copper bracelet. Nothing of value...”
Victoria moved to the door and pressed her ear against it. “I hear nothing.” Suddenly they both heard something that chilled them to the bone.
A hoarse scream rang out, torn from an unused throat. Diego froze. He needed to focus and as much as he hated it, that meant that he had to put Felipe’s cries out of his thoughts. He could do no one any good if he couldn’t find a way out of their small prison.
In addition to what was in Victoria’s possession and on his person, there was very little in the room. A bucket of water and a ragged wooden cup as well as a bench precariously attached to the wall seemed to be the only additions to the room. Diego quickly inspected the door. Through a crack in the side he could tell there was a latch but not a lock on the outside upper third of the door. His heart lifted a tiny bit - if he could get to that latch he could get the door open.
There was a small barred window toward the top of the door. The bars were placed too close together for Diego to reach through them, but he wondered if Victoria’s small arms would pass through.
“Victoria.”
But she was frozen, listening to the sounds that Diego had pushed from his thoughts.
“Victoria!” He spoke sharply, trying to shake her from her focus. She turned and looked at him with a pained expression on her face.
“What, Diego?”
“Come here and try to fit your arm between these bars.”
Victoria rushed over, but the window was too high. Without a thought and as if she weighed nothing, Diego swiftly lifted her up. It was to no avail, though. No matter how she struggled and pushed, she could get no more than her hand and wrist through the gap.
Diego quickly set her down and went about examining the bars more closely. They were set in the wood securely. Too securely for him to break them out by hand, but maybe not too securely for him to break them out in some other fashion - if he could only figure out how to do it.
Suddenly he pushed past Victoria and began kicking savagely at the leg of the bench attached to the wall. The anger and emotion of the past few minutes was released in the strength with which he attempted to destroy the bench. Victoria stood back, frightened by the display from the usually passive Diego. She didn’t know what he was doing? Was he going mad? Was this part of his plan?
Finally Diego managed to break the leg of the bench free. He jumped forward and snatched it up.
“Victoria, your sash, please.” He spoke quickly, and Victoria frantically unwound the printed silk from around her waist, handing it to him with haste. She had never seen Diego like this, but she was relieved. Had she been sitting in that room alone while forced to hear poor Felipe scream she didn’t know how she would manage.
As if on cue, the sound of another ragged scream reached them.
Diego sprang into action. He submerged the silk in the bucket of water for a moment, then wrapped it around the center bars in the window. Using the leg of the bench for leverage, he twisted the sash tighter and tighter. The bars were too short and thick to bend, but they were set in the door using only framed wood. If he could put enough pressure on the bars, he predicted that they would splinter the framing and release one of the bars, allowing enough room for him to reach through the window.
He twisted the bench leg around again and again, straining as it tightened. He could feel the wood begin to give way, fiber by fiber, but the wet silk was strong enough to keep from tearing. Every turn was more and more difficult, but with each turn he could feel the tremors of the wood beginning to fail.
Finally, with one last effort, the bottom end of one of the bars broke loose. Diego grabbed it and started wrenching it to and fro. It quickly came free, allowing Diego to reach through the window and unlatch the door.
Turning back toward Victoria, Diego gave her quick instructions.
“Victoria, I don’t want to anywhere near what is about to happen. I want you to go outside and get on your horse. Untie the rest of the horses as well. If anyone comes out of this wretched shack except me, I want you to scatter the horses and ride as fast as you can toward town. Do you understand?”
Victoria nodded silently. Diego took her hand and quickly led her out of the room and, turning away from where the men had taken Felipe, he ushered her out the back door and then swiftly turned and rushed back into the run down house.
Victoria followed Diego’s instructions, but she couldn’t keep herself from shaking as she sat on her horse. Every rustle of wind through the bushes or chirp of a bird made her jump and when, after what felt like an eternity, Diego again emerged from the door, her relief was so complete that she practically fainted. But there was no time for that.
“I need your help in here, Victoria.” was all that he said, then he turned and rushed back inside without hesitation. Diego would have liked to reassure Victoria, to assist her from her horse and tell her that everything would now be fine, but there was no time for that. He loved Victoria, yes, but Felipe needed him now.
Victoria entered the house as quickly as her shaky legs would allow her to and headed past their previous prison and into a larger open room. She looked around in utter amazement. What on earth had happened here?