There are two types of people in this world: Those who believe there are two types of people in this world, and those who do not.
Personally, I don’t buy into this kind of tripe. I know that when it comes to the outdoors, there are THREE types of people in this world. There are backpackers, car-campers, and trailer/RV campers.
Even this isn’t exactly true. The reality is we are all in a death match with nature. For some, this is more of a struggle to regain balance. For others it’s more a battle to subdue nature underfoot. For all of us, our tactics change as we age.
The bottom line is that when I was younger I had the audacity to hike miles into the wilderness with only the gear I could carry on my back. I would set up camp, raise a fist, and shake my naked buttocks at the wild—dare those mosquitos to brave my hairy butt or defy the renowned protection of my hair-pants. I was young. I was unburdened by failure and…the wisdom that comes from learning from one’s mistakes.
Then I got married and had kids. My mistakes increased in magnitude and frequency. The next thing you know, I’m doing the unthinkable. I’m car camping.
That’s right. A graduate from the University of Montana…car camping. Pack the car. Ride into some campground via paved roads. Pay the five bucks (it’s more like $13 these days), toss out the tent, set the picnic table, and stoke up the grill—a spatula in one hand and a tetra pak of wine in the other. The saddest thing about this whole turn of events is that ten years later, I could barely remember the feelings of disgust I used to hold toward lowly “car-campers.” Instead, I had fixed my ire on those lazy “trailer campers.”
Of all the nerve! They don’t even pretend to enjoy the outdoors! They bring a mobile home to the campground! The wife and I turned up our nose at those “rugged indoorsmen and women.” Then the inevitable happened. We continued to age. Our whole stinking society has continued to age, and I might add the process hasn’t been all that graceful. It’s like we’re all driving around in SUVs because “they sit higher off the road.”
Anywho, the family and I just went car camping. The plan was to take a simple one-nighter to a known campground less than a two-hour drive. Just to get out of town. You know, to get “outdoors.” To throw off the burden of modern shelter—the drag of civilized life—and connect with the garden.
I should have known we were in for it when we pulled off the main road and the temperature gage read 93 degrees…at 2pm. We found the last available spot in a crowded campground (despite it being a Tuesday). We unpacked the car, set up the tent, and slipped down to a private spot on a beautiful river where we spent a couple hours playing in the water.
The wife sat in a camping chair in shallow, babbling water and read on her Kindle. I helped the boys dig up some gravel in the river and screen for corundum (sapphires and rubies). Hey, Idaho’s known as the Gem State for a reason. At first, everything played out perfectly.
Then I noticed a few mosquitoes. My oldest son reacts pretty violently to the nasty bloodsuckers. By the time we got back to the campsite, we were being swarmed. Even I ended up with something in the neighborhood of twenty bites on my back alone. While my hair-pants are still impenetrable, I have my vulnerabilities. And those skeeters found them.
To fully comprehend how much mosquitoes love my older son, you need the full picture. We’re out of the water now. It’s 96 degrees. He’s wearing black from head to toe. He’s wearing a long-sleeve hoodie with the hoodie up. And he’s getting bit on the head, the wrists, the ankles, and through his pants. I didn’t realize it at the time, but the fuse had been lit.
Ten hours later, the bomb went off. Around 4:00am, my older son woke up right beside me and promptly vomited all over his side of the tent. I tried to pull stuff out of the way while my loving wife tried to navigate our son outside of the tent. He puked several more times—once on the outside of the tent and then throughout the campsite while staggering around and crying for help from my wife, superman, God, or anyone listening.
Looking back, that was when it happened. That moment was when my family fully shifted to the darkside of camping. Oh it’s only a matter of time now before we end up buying a camping trailer. You mark my words. The end is near. All it took was middle-of-the-night, mosquito-induced vomiting inside a crowded tent to surrender the fight.
Nature, you win!
In Case You Still Haven’t Checked it Out…the Lost DMB Files are Streaming!
(The 2nd Season of The Green Ones will start up soon!)
During the month of July, this email update will take an intermission between the end of Season 1 of The Green Ones and the start of Season 2 of The Green Ones. I’m using this intermission to expose all of you to my Lost DMB Files series (set in the same Schism 8 universe as The Green Ones). I hope you enjoy these pulpy Western stories!
If you want to read the Lost DMB Files in addition to (or instead of) The Green Ones, you’ll need to sign up for the separate https://lostdmbfiles.substack.com/ substack. After the intermission, this email update will go back to streaming The Green Ones. The https://lostdmbfiles.substack.com/ substack will send out a weekly update for the Lost DMB Files.
Read Del Rio Con Amor, Scene 4 — Scene 8
[Start with the introduction to the series.]
Ah Puch paused, his hand resting on the door handle of what appeared at first to be another passenger car just like the last. On closer inspection, steel-backed window facades revealed a freight car had been disguised to appear as if it carried human lives. The two men tensed. The ruse meant the car carried cargo considered more precious than human life. This had to be the one.
The metal door grated open an inch at a time. Chancho glanced at Ah Puch. No angry voices came from inside. They heard nothing over the pulse of the rails beneath them and the wind whipping past.
There was no point in peeking inside. It would take several seconds for their eyes to adjust to the darkness, and under the circumstances, caution would come across as guilt. Chancho shrugged. Crushing his sombrero against his chest, he swung around Ah Puch and slipped through the narrow opening without a sound.
Chancho crouched low in the darkness and immediately felt Ah Puch settle in behind him. Senses heightening, he waited for his eyes to adjust. The scent of decay crowded him, like an open air market after the rain. Dust motes swam in the slice of light that poured through the opening. Chancho detected no threatening noise, nothing other than the expected rocking of the rails and the closeness of cargo squeaking against its restraints.
Ah Puch placed a quick hand on Chancho’s shoulder.
Chancho tilted his head and closed his eyes. Less than a few meters away, a pattern distinguished itself from the rhythm of the rails. A regular breathing, verging on snoring, rose above the din.
At a disadvantage in the relative dimness, Ah Puch slid the metal door slowly shut. Swallowed up in complete darkness, Chancho groped along the floor for his bearings. Identifying an isle through the cargo, the two men slipped further into the middle of the car until a safe distance from the sleeping guard.
“He can’t be the only one.” Chancho squatted with his back against a wooden crate and focused his eyes intently into the blackness where he knew Ah Puch’s face should be.
“At least one more at the other end.”
“What are the chances they’re both asleep?” Chancho’s eyes seized on the cumulative traces of light seeping through holes where bolts had gone missing until he distinguished the outline of his friend. “Right. So what now? I was expecting to sweet talk our way to this point.”
“Find the gold. We have to confirm its exact location.”
“Right.” Chancho pivoted his head slowly, trying to discern the best path to take through the stacks of crates surrounding them. He stopped when Ah Puch gripped his shoulder.
“Don’t worry, mi amigo. We’ll probably still need to sweet talk our way out of this.”
Chancho grinned. He could see Ah Puch’s ironic smile perfectly in his mind’s eye—a reminder to both of them they were doing what they loved. “I’ll see you back here in ten minutes.” He squeezed Ah Puch’s arm. “If the devil doesn’t get me.”
As Chancho turned from his friend, the train shimmied along another rough patch of rail. Groping in the dark for balance, he gripped something leather—leather and unsecured. Losing balance completely, Chancho fell backwards, pulling the object with him. When the object jerked from his grasp, he realized he had been holding a boot.
“What in the… Guzman? That you? Dammit, stop playing.” Chancho froze. “It hasn’t been an hour yet. Guzman?”
Chancho cleared his throat while scrambling to his feet. He decided on a gravely voice. “Like hell it hasn’t. Get your lazy ass out of bed.”
“Hey!” A sudden shifting in the darkness preceded the sound of a pistol slipping from its holster. “Who the hell are you?”
“Plan B,” Chancho mumbled. Cocking his right leg toward the sound of the guard's voice, he yanked up on his inner bootstrap while extending the leg into a full kick. The kicking motion fell short of the groggy guard’s face. But the strap, upon extending into a pull cord, ignited a small explosion in the tip of Chancho’s boot. Among dissipating sparks, a cloud of fine powder burst into the guard’s face.
“What in the—” the pistol fired. The bullet whizzed past Chancho’s ear, ricocheted, and dug into a wooden crate.
“Chili!” Chancho warned Ah Puch, crashed into a web of hemp rope, and shielded his face from the spreading cloud.
Choking, the guard squeezed off another round before his pistol clanked to the ground. “Santa Maria! It burns!”
Chancho knew the guard had failed to resist touching his face thus grinding the chili dust further into his skin.
A new voice echoed in the dark. “Torres? What the hell is going on? Ruiz?”
Peeking from under his sombrero, Chancho saw the outline of Ah Puch crouched two meters away—outside the effective range of the chili. On the edge of the cloud, Chancho felt the sudden urge to sneeze.
The guard who had caught the brunt of it, Torres, continued to choke on every breath. “Intru— intru—” he coughed in between each attempt to sound the warning, unable to string together three syllables without the powder triggering the reflex. Chancho struggled to contain his giddy excitement over how beautifully the chili bomb had incapacitated the man.
“Someone’s in here with us, sir.”
“Ruiz? How the hell did someone get in between us?”
“I… uh—”
Guzman swore. “Do you know who fired the shots?”
“It wasn’t me, sir.”
Chancho knew the two guards would be forced to act soon, and he and Ah Puch were both exposed to opposite lines of sight in their current positions. Torres was the problem. He occupied the only nook out of sight from the others, and his being at risk elevated the situation. Not only did Chancho have to prevent any further harm, he’d have to convince the general the whole thing was a friendly misunderstanding.
Chancho tied a bandana around his nose and mouth, tipped his sombrero low over his eyes, and bumped his way toward the incapacitated guard, Torres. Chancho needed to steer Torres toward the front end of the car, where Ruiz had been sleeping, and away from Guzman, their commanding officer. This would keep the scales tipped to their advantage.
Even through the bandana, Chancho’s throat itched with every breath. He easily located Torres by his groaning and tugged him off his cot by both legs. The guard hit the ground with an ooff. As Chancho dragged him kicking and clawing, Ah Puch leaned in close to the guard’s ear.
“Now go, if you want to live.” Both men pulled Torres to his feet and shoved him toward Ruiz’s end of the car.
“Torres, that you?”
“Intruders!” Torres pronounced the word he had struggled with for several seconds.
“We figured that. Are you alright?”
Having cleared the area of human threat, Ah Puch and Chancho leapt onto the cot and leaned against the outer wall of the freight car above the lingering chili dust. With crates stacked to the ceiling on both sides, they were finally out of sight.
“He’ll be fine.” Chancho spoke loudly enough to address the guards. “Chili powder. It burns like hell, but nothing like your mother’s salsa the next morning. You know what I mean?”
Chancho and Ah Puch held their breath and suppressed the urge to sneeze or cough until the fine chili powder had settled among the shifting dark. The guards hesitated as well. Nothing came from Guzman’s end of the car. Torres’ muffled swearing drifted from the front.
Growing impatient to resolve the situation and move the plan forward, Chancho addressed them. “My friends, this bashfulness is getting us nowhere. Guzman, it was Guzman, right? Of course. You cannot leave your post unattended to go for help, and besides the next car contains nothing but cargo, correct?”
Chancho paused briefly, but no response came. “And Ruiz, you also do not want to leave your post while Torres, ah, my sincerest apologies for the chili, is incapacitated. And besides, you would need a command from our laryngitic Guzman. So, I’ll make you a deal. Send Torres to fetch the general, and I promise my friend and I will remain still until he returns. Hmm?”
He waited another moment. “We’re Rurales on special assignment to help you guys protect this precious cargo from nasty revolutionaries. All just a misunderstanding.” Movement echoed from the front end of the car. A gash of light and rumbling of rails spilled into the confined space as Torres presumably fumbled through the opened door and closed it behind him. “Ah, very good. Hopefully the poor guy can find his way.”
Ah Puch placed his hand on Chancho’s shoulder. He nodded toward the crate they were standing on. The two men stepped down and tested the air quality, finding it back to normal. Ah Puch rubbed his hand on the side of the box and whispered. “When the door was open, I caught a glimpse. Help me crack this open.”
The two men worked quietly, jimmying their blades under the edge of the box all the way around three sides until the lid creaked open. “Mother Mary.” Even in the minimal lighting, the luminescent ocean of gold cast an eerie glimmering onto their hands and faces. They allowed themselves a single smirk before replacing the lid and snugging it down. “It’s real now. It’s real, and we’re going to liberate it.” Chancho sat down on the crate and leaned back against the wall.
“All the generations of my family put together have never seen so much wealth.” Ah Puch’s hoarse whisper grew ragged around the edges. “Only the smallest fraction of it would have provided a full life for my parents, a chance to start over—escape the hacienda where they died without two kernels of corn to rub together.”
“I’m sorry, my friend. It should never have happened.” Chancho shook his head in the dark. “But we will ensure it never happens again.” He nudged his friend with his elbow. “What are you going to do with your share?”
“We have not succeeded yet.”
“Oh, come on. I’ve waited this long to ask.”
Ah Puch sat quietly for several seconds. “I’m going to buy the hacienda where my parents died, and distribute the land to the peons enslaved there. I’ll make sure no one takes it from them again.”
“Will you stay there and farm?”
Ah Puch snorted. “Me? I’m no farmer. I’ve been a bandit since I was a child. There’s nothing after the revolution for me.”
“Nonsense. You could come with me to the orphanage.” Chancho put his hands behind his head. “That’s what I’m going to do with my share. I feel guilty for abandoning the sisters. Hey,” he nudged Ah Puch, “a bunch of nuns living in the wilderness. They could use some hired protection. You know, the sort a lifelong bandit could provide?”
Before Ah Puch could respond, the door to the car slid open forcefully, flooding the space with light. The general swore in a thunderous voice. “Why can’t you two stay out of trouble?”
“Chili powder?” Standing in the open door of the armored freight car, the general scrutinized the two Rurales anew.
Chancho relaxed. If the general had intended to throw them underneath the moving train, he wouldn’t have dismissed everyone but Guzman. “Despite our reputation,” Chancho shrugged, “even the Guardia know when to kill and when to simply spice things up.”
Obregón barked an abrupt, high-pitched laugh then turned serious. “You still insist on petting your horses, or will you stay out of my way?”
Lengths of track clacked past them. Chancho felt the effects of waning adrenaline on his muscles. “General, you’ve had time to discuss the matter with your officers. I’m positive they have not provided you with a satisfactory scenario for today’s events.”
“I do not need my officers’—”
Chancho continued, “What you need is a means to deliver your cargo to Corpus Christi. I can give you what you need.”
“You two are chapping my hide. If I wanted Rurales to drive my train—” the general stopped himself.
Chancho interjected, “Four Rurales will not help much in a shootout with Villa’s cavalry, not while we are sitting ducks. But there does not need to be a shootout.”
Obregón nodded impatiently, “Go on.”
“There is an alternate track, an abandoned rail running parallel for twenty kilometers. It is long enough to bypass the Villista ambush.”
“Villa is not so stupid to choose a place that could so easily be—”
“It accesses an old silver mine, abandoned over 15 years ago. Goes through some rough country. Most of Villa’s men were only children when it was in use. As you know, Villa grew up in Chihuahua. They don’t know it exists. Did you?”
The general quipped back, “And you?”
“I grew up here, and again, it is my job to know everything about Coahuila. We rode the entire length of the rail only two months ago. It is old, but functional. You will barely need to slow down.”
“Indeed.” Obregón rubbed the nub of his amputated arm through the dense material of his uniform.
“You cannot continue as you are. Your train will be derailed and torn apart.” Chancho tilted his head. “You cannot go back and wait.”
As if it were simply impossible for the general to consider advice from Rurales, he turned to the weary soldier standing beside Ah Puch. “Guzman?”
“If these men are telling the truth about the alternate track, it would be our best option, sir. Plus,” he half-grinned, half-snarled, “it would humiliate Villa.”
Chancho cursed himself silently for not thinking of that himself. Guzman had turned out to be helpful after all.
The general nodded, “And if they are not telling the truth?”
Guzman turned his gaze toward Chancho. “Then we use them as shields against Villa.”
“Very well. While I appreciate the suggestion, I’m afraid they’re right about our options. If they are lying about the alternate track, we will indeed kill them, but we will not fight Villa today. Reinforcements could arrive by tomorrow morning at the latest.” Obregón turned toward Chancho. “Now tell me where to expect the signal for this alternate track. Then Guzman will escort you to see your horses, where I will expect you to stay until you are called upon.”
Chancho and Ah Puch both nodded.
Wiser than most soldiers Ah Puch had encountered, Guzman followed him and Chancho at a safe distance. Gripping his knife tightly, he allowed the Rurales to saunter through the armored freight car on their way toward the back of the train. The light streaming through the door where Obregón had exited allowed Ah Puch to inspect the cargo.
Most of it seemed common: a dozen crates of coffee beans, an equal amount labeled cerveza but most likely packed with tequila, and several dozen crates of vegetables to make the whole shipment appear as mundane as possible. Near the far end of the car, stashed in the shadows, Ah Puch read the label on a dozen oversized metal boxes: Geological Survey—Secretariat of the Interior. Without time to ponder its contents, they reached the metal door.
Chancho tugged it open.
The blistering sun greeted them. With Guzman watching from inside the armored car, Chancho and Ah Puch leapt across the coupling and waved goodbye. Seconds later they had shut themselves inside the suffocating darkness of the next freight car.
“Cheery fellow,” Chancho said.
Ah Puch grunted. They staggered forward in the dark until Chancho bumped into bales of hay. The car echoed and rattled, revealing its relative emptiness. Its smell informed them it contained mostly feed and grain. They bumped their way to the other end and heaved the door open to let in light. Their partners in crime, Jorge and Emilio, waved at them from the railing of an open-air livestock car containing several horses, their four included.
Chancho gave them the thumbs up. “Any trouble with the caboose?”
They shook their heads and smiled.
Chancho breathed a sigh of relief before settling back on a bale of hay to map out their next steps.
Ah Puch searched the shadows of the car to ensure they were alone before joining his friend. “Things are going well,” he offered.
“Hmmm? Oh, yes. Did you see those metal boxes?” Chancho scratched his chin.
“Mining. I’ve seen them used before in mining.” Ah Puch stretched, touching his toes.
“I wonder what’s inside them.”
“Rocks, dirt, ore.” Ah Puch cracked his neck and shrugged. “There’ll be plenty of time to look later if this plan works.” The second half of the sentence sounded more negative than he had intended.
“Oh, it’ll work. What is there to go wrong now?”
“What is there—” Ah Puch sputtered. “Everything we’ve done up to this point has been easy.” He leaned forward. “This is not a game. There are over a hundred people on this train that will kill us if they find out what we are doing, several who will try to hunt us down and kill us if we succeed.”
Chancho held steady. “No one will find out what we are doing. We’ve located the gold. We’re in position. Besides, only two people on this train have even seen our faces. They’ll be too busy losing a revolution to find us.”
Ah Puch grunted and sat back. “One thing at a time.” He knew Chancho would be useless if he grew distracted or discouraged at this point. A sly grin crept across his face. “The boot bomb worked pretty well.”
Chancho laughed. “Pretty well? It was incredible. Torres is wishing he could've been strapped naked to a cactus instead. The only problem is now I have a hole in my boot.” He held the tip of his boot up for Ah Puch to inspect.
“Bah. It’s nothing. I could fix it in five minutes, if I had my tools.”
Chancho slapped Ah Puch’s leg. “I can't wait to try out the spurs.”
Thanks so much for taking the time to read these scenes of Del Rio Con Amor, Season 1 of The Lost DMB Files. I’ll be publishing FREE daily scenes from The Lost DMB Files until…I die…or something terrible happens. Seriously, I’ve got over 400 scenes written so far, and I’ll be writing more until the story reaches its natural ending. You are totally welcome to read the entire story for FREE! If at any point you decide you would rather finish the story in ebook or print format, just click the buttons below and you can do that as well. If you enjoy reading the serial releases, BUT you would also like to support me as a writer (my kids need wine!) please subscribe to my premium content for bonus scenes, exclusives, and insider access to my process. And of course, I’d be grateful if you would share this post with any of your reader friends who you think would enjoy The Lost DMB Files. Happy reading!