Standing in the doorway was a short, squat middle-aged man dressed in an exorbitantly expensive-looking teal suit. He had closely cropped black hair and big bushy eyebrows that were pulled down into a menacing glower. His dark, beady eyes never stopped moving, taking in the entire room and every occupant like he was observing bugs under a magnifying class.

“I knew we’d find you eventually, Juan,” Xarax said at last, letting go of Celia and stepping in front of her to create a sort of shield.

“I think it is I who found you,” Juan said, wagging a thick finger, adorned with a large gold ring, at Xarax like he was a school child who had missed an important lesson.

As the two men faced off, Celia flashed a quick look around the bar. The other patrons had all hit the floor, or were cowering behind whatever furniture they could find. Even the grisly old miners had abandoned their game in order to duck down under the pool table. She then looked over to the bar, where Phil had completely disappeared. He was no doubt on the ground trying to reach the shotgun he kept in case the government ever came to get him.

A slight movement to her left caught her eye. The mail lady was under a bar stool trying desperately to mouth something to Celia. The woman’s gray hair was in complete disarray, and her blood-shot eyes were bleary with drink. Her message still came across clear, however. Juan. Reyes. The woman mouthed both words carefully, shaking slightly with fear.

Juan Reyes.

I am going to die, Celia thought with a surprising degree of calmness as she realized what the woman was trying to communicate. That is Juan Reyes, and I am going to die.

Juan Reyes had been all over the news for months. He ran the meanest drug cartel across the border; he was cruel, brilliant, and had so far completely avoided any interference from either the Mexican or United States governments. That was because he had more money in his organization than most European countries, and he also controlled what amounted to the thirtieth largest army in the world. Some people said Juan was so wealthy – and so crazy – that he bought priceless paintings from around the world just to burn them. He got great enjoyment out of destroying beautiful things.

Celia couldn’t believe that Juan would dare to come this far over the border, no matter what connections he had. He tended to let his goons run rampant, doing his dirty work wherever necessary, while he stayed secluded in a fortress somewhere in Baja. Arriving in person that night was a daring move, tempting the US government to come for him. Celia’s body shivered as she realized that something very important must have brought him to Viento Frio. He was not going to leave until he found it, or until he had personally killed every person in the town, or maybe both.

“It’s a pity you were too busy flirting to keep watch. I had hoped for more of a struggle from you,” Juan sneered at Xarax, snapping his fingers impatiently while he talked. “Instead, you are caught like a mouse.”

Several large, muscled men appeared behind Juan with ski masks on. Some were carrying large guns; the others were carrying gasoline. He nodded his head once, and the men began move through the room, unscrewing the caps on the gasoline and pouring out the noxious liquid as they walked. Celia realized that they were planning to burn the place to the ground!

Behind her, Celia heard a quiet shuffle as the rest of the motorcycle club got up from their booth and began to file into the center of the room. As far as she had seen, they were all unarmed, so she didn’t hold out much hope for the situation. However, feeling their warm bodies begin to surround her made her feel less alone in the bleakness they were facing.

As one of the masked goons tried to get past Xarax, the biker body-checked the guy and sent him flying back. The hired gun lifted into the air at the impact, his feet leaving the ground as he flew backward towards the bar door. He hit the far wall with a loud thunk, and then slid down to the ground dropping his gun.

“You are making a mistake. You need to leave,” Xarax grunted.

The other masked men pulled up their weapons and leveled them at the room, fingers twitching dangerously near the triggers. Juan did not move, however. He didn’t even turn to see where his man had landed (not that Juan would be one to show concern, Celia thought upon reflection). Instead, his lips curled into a sickening smile. Smiling came so unnaturally to his face that it was like watching a snake attempt to communicate human emotion.

“So. You came to play?” Juan whispered softly, his smile widening.

“No, I came to punch your face in,” Xarax replied furiously, clenching his fists.

Shit was about to get real, and the whole bar knew it.

Celia knew it too, but for some reason she couldn’t look away from the drama unfolding in front of her. The end seemed inevitable, and her knees were threatening to go slightly weak, but she wasn’t going to die with her head down and back turned. Especially not if it’d give a single ounce of pleasure to that bastard Juan Reyes. Perhaps it was courage, perhaps it was the youthful denial of her mortality, but she refused to cower and accept her fate with eyes downcast.

“I love you, Mom and Dad,” she whispered softly to herself.

At her words, Xarax shoulders shifted slightly. He didn’t look at her, but suddenly a sense of calm began to fill the air. She almost thought she heard him say “protect her,” but it was so soft she might have imagined it.

Then he began to glow, a red aura radiating off his body like angry ocean waves. The air buzzed with static electricity, and the red glow increased with every pulse. He was perfectly still while this happened, for just a few milliseconds that felt like centuries.

Then he pounced.

Xarax threw his hands out in a punching motion towards Juan, even though they were still at least ten feet apart. Juan fell backward in surprise, his tiny eyes briefly opening wide. His face flung to the side, and a red mark instantly appeared, as if he had actually been hit by the punch.

Time, which had been so slow, suddenly hit fast forward. The henchmen opened fire as their leader grabbed his face in shock. The bar was peppered with bullets, the smell of gunfire clogging the already stale air. One of Xarax’s crew, a bald man with mahogany skin and curiously green eyes, grabbed Celia and pushed her to the floor as bullets flew around them like angry hornets.

She sank to her knees and braced herself for breaking glass, shattered lights, and splintering wood. She tried to calm her heart that was beating wildly at the knowledge that she was about to be shot, and it was going to hurt like hell.

“I got you,” the bald man said confidently. It didn’t make her feel any better.

The guns roared. However, she didn’t hear any sounds of destruction or screams of agony mixed with the exploding gunfire. There was certainly a lot of noise, and her ears were beginning to ache from the constant barrage of gunfire. But that was it – it was almost like the bullets were disappearing off into a vacuum.

She shot a quick look around the bar and realized that nothing seemed to be getting damaged. The bar remained exactly as before, no holes in the walls, no broken glasses. The other customers still had their heads down, but none seemed to be bleeding or writhing in pain from being shot.

“What the hell…” Celia mumbled in confusion.

Right then, she felt a soft thud on her cheek. It felt like being hit by a marshmallow, and she looked down in surprise as whatever hit her fell to the ground. It was a bullet. A long metal bullet glistened at her knees, shiny but slightly squished, as if the impact with her face had crumpled it. She grabbed her cheek in shock, expecting to feel a wound. However, the skin felt completely normal. There were no holes and no blood.

“Holy shit,” she gasped, her brain desperately trying to make sense of what was happening.

“Stay down,” the biker who had knocked her to the ground yelled. “Don’t worry about that right now.”

She looked up at him in complete confusion. She was shocked to find that he was now also radiating an unearthly light, but it was a green that matched his eyes. As she stared opened mouth, he moved in front of her, sparks shooting out of the rings on his fingers. She could vaguely see that the other bikers were doing the same. The bullets continued to do nothing but bounce off the men like wads of silly putty.

It looked like the bikers, whatever unholy creatures they happened to be, were about to decimate the cocky criminals in a single swoop. However, Juan Reyes had finally managed to regain his balance after Xarax’s long-distance punch, and Reyes was not done with the fight. He grabbed a golden ring off his finger, which looked much like Xarax’s, and threw it down onto the ground. An explosion ripped through the room, finally causing glasses to smash everywhere. Smoke filled the air, and Xarax and his men disappeared in the haze, their auras snuffed out suddenly and dramatically.

Celia’s vision went black.