On my way again. Since leaving Señor Santos I have been heading for The North, always always. Heading for another place along The Beast route. Another place to jump aboard.
It is night. In the distance I hear the growl of The Beast. I am older now. Tougher. Wilier. Still the train sound brings back my fears. I do not know what lies ahead. Blending into the dark—mouse gray, mouse still—as The Beast approaches I bunch myself to jump.
I am not wily enough. Before I spring, instead I am sprung upon. Ambushed and dragged away from the tracks. Away from the other hidden riders. Just days since I left Señor Santos’s place of safety! My blood freezes. My heart forgets to beat, then bangs crazily. A pack of men. Animals all. A famous gang, famous for drugs and liquor. About five of them armed with many rough old-time weapons, mainly machetes to hack you up, surround me. I know them right off, by their black T-shirts that blare, LOS BANDIDOS. Toño warned me.
I twist from the filthy grasp of one, only to be snared by his comrade, his grip as fierce as my dog Guapo’s jaws. Like a stringy rooster I am tougher than I look, but not tough enough to fight all of them.
“A rabbit!” one of them shouts in a drunken way. “Let’s roast it.”
Inside I quaver like a crouched rabbit, but, as before on The Beast, I do not show it. I am a Flores.
Toño told me that these guys work for the police for privileges and for part of what those guarros rob from Beast Riders. They also steal on their own. And when they catch somebody . . . I begin to sweat.
“Good idea,” one snarls with evil bravado. “Start the fire.”
And they do. First they plunge around in the dark, shuffling and cursing, grabbing up leaves and sticks, lurching, stumbling all over the place because of the liquor they have been drinking. Their breath. How it reeks.
One is guarding me, striking me, stomping me, raining punches down upon me, grinning all the while in a crazed and chilling way. I look wildly around. There is no escape. Though I have tried hard to hide it, by now I must smell of fear. I am afraid. Sorely.
A small fire is crackling. These devils are laughing, their murderous eyes burning down at me. They are holding me so that I cannot squirm, shoving into my face a hot branding iron. I call up my family, all the people of Flores, to give me bravery. I clench my teeth tight tight. I will not whine for mercy. I will not bleat out my fear. I will not scream. I clench so hard, I feel a tooth crack. I pray as never before.
“Look, cabrón.” The vicious leader says, all slurry. “With this brand, you will be of a gang too. The mangy, scraggy, sorry gang of Beast Riders.”
They bark like mad dogs as four pin me down. “You will not crush me!” I shout. I twist and lash out with full-blown fury. But no matter my wild thrashings, with relish the loco leader slowly presses the brand into my hand. I hear the skin sizzle. I smell the smell of my own flesh melting. I do not cry out, though there is searing pain. Pain beyond pain. Then nothing.
When finally I wake up I am in a daze and wonder what has befallen me. I feel as though my blood has drained away. Barely breathing, I wait to die in the dirt where they have dumped me. At last, when I struggle to open my eyes, I can open only one. The other is swollen shut. From the good eye I see a blurred form. One of my captors is crouching to finish me! I groan and urge my body to flee. But crumpled there in the dust of the road I can barely move. The taste of blood is strong in my mouth. My teeth. My tongue tells me one of them is gone. My whole bloodied self, it is throbbing.
The guy squats so close I can feel his breath. I curl up and try to cover my head, waiting for a machete chop to come.
Instead comes a soft whisper, “Shhhh, shhhh.” Slowly I try to focus. The person before me is not a savage, but a woman. “Shhhh, shhhh.” She cradles me like a baby.
Out of my throat comes a wheeze.
“Abue, am I dead?” I mumble, believing my grandmother is with me now. Even to mumble costs me.
“Not one bit,” the woman says caringly.
“With all gentleness,” she instructs while she and others lift me. It seems from the little I can grasp, I am not a dead one—just very broken.
Like dust devils, those evil ones passed quickly through my life. This woman, she stays. Little by little I learn from her what has happened. Mine is no sana, sana situation. The gang of brutes, they beat me insensible, till nearly my whole body turned blue. They gashed my face. Injured one eye. They cracked my skull and broke four ribs and one leg. Also some toes. The doctor himself is not yet certain of the number. All I feel is pain pain.
They took my belongings—the faithful tennis shoes, my clothes—everything but my chones. In the palm of one hand they branded me with a crude horned B. A B that stands for their gang name, LOS BANDIDOS. To show how they hurt people. But for me and I am sure for many others who have suffered from them, the B means something else. A badge of pride. All my life—if I recover—all I meet who know this dreaded train, when they see the brand, will know who I am: Manuel Flores, Beast Rider.