De León interviews members of GOET in an upscale Tegucigalpa restaurant, contrasting the setting with Honduras’s crushing poverty and violence. GOET was a US-backed Honduran police force created after the 2014 spike in unaccompanied minors. Their mission was to stop Hondurans from migrating by detaining unaccompanied minors, those under 21 without parental permission, single parents without spousal consent, and undocumented migrants from other countries. The agents described Honduras’s extreme poverty and pervasive gang violence by MS-13 and Barrio 18, which forced young people to flee. When De León asked about the cognitive dissonance of arresting children fleeing for their lives, the agents admitted the work was emotionally difficult but insisted they must enforce the law. They confirmed that the US government provided training and technology to support their work.

De León then describes Programa Frontera Sur, Mexico’s 2014 immigration enforcement initiative launched under US pressure. Though framed as migrant protection, it primarily increased raids and deportations, leading Mexico to deport more Central Americans than the United States while absolving the US of responsibility for abuses on Mexican soil. De León recalls witnessing his friend Escobar, a smuggler, being arrested by a corrupt Mexican immigration agent angered by De León’s interviews about official corruption. Escobar defiantly told the agent he would be back on the tracks in five days. Weeks earlier, De León attended a presentation by FEDCCI, or Fiscalía, Mexico’s special prosecutor for crimes against migrants, where an agent discussed dismantling MS-13 operations. De León notes that increased security fuels crime against migrants and increases demand for smugglers. At a migrant shelter, when the agent asked victims to report police abuses, a migrant asked what to do if police were the perpetrators, and the room erupted in knowing laughter. Another migrant later told De León he was tortured in the Fiscalía’s office until his family paid ransom.

De León explains the demographic shift from Mexican economic migrants to Central Americans fleeing violence. The latter faced longer, more dangerous journeys across multiple borders, paid thousands more, and had smaller US support networks. Many young people fled gang violence with no concrete plan. Previously, migrants could travel relatively quickly on freight trains called la bestia, but Programa Frontera Sur made this harder, increasing reliance on smugglers. Many low-level guides were former migrants or gang members themselves. De León argues that arresting smugglers is futile because they are easily replaced, and law enforcement searches for kingpins miss the reality of desperate people enduring violent, complex experiences on the tracks.

At a street corner called the Pleasure Palace on the train tracks in Pakal-Ná, a smuggler named Papo aggressively ordered two local boys to leave. When the boys persisted, De León gave them money to make them go. Alma, holding her daughter Dulce, explained that the children were nuisances who stole food and drink. Chino joked that in a few years, the boys would become robbers themselves. De León describes Pakal-Ná as a crime-ridden town near the tourist destination of Palenque. In 2015, while running an anthropological field school, he wandered onto the tracks and met Chino, Santos, Papo, Alma, and their crew, beginning his multi-year research project.

At the Pleasure Palace, Santos tattooed the word catracho, a Honduran nickname, on Chino’s arm while the group smoked marijuana. Two other men, Bin Laden and the Breadman, waited for tattoos. Migrants walked past toward the nearby shelter, and the crew watched them with knowing looks. De León outlines a typical smuggling operation: a broker called Zero texted coordinates to guides like Chino and Santos, who were paid $400 to move six people from Corozal to Pakal-Ná. The nearly 200-kilometer journey involved walking, hiding from immigration agents, and foraging for food. The group encountered farmers, bought supplies from locals, and navigated armed checkpoints. After a grueling week, they reached Pakal-Ná, where they had to contend with MS-13.

The local enforcer, Payaso, a knitter who controlled access to the town, ensured all guides and migrants paid the required fee. A shopkeeper named Oscar maintained a ledger tracking payments. Alma, Papo, and local children served as Payaso’s informants. The clients were delivered to the shelter to await the next leg of their journey, which would involve multiple extortion fees and ultimately cost around $7,000 to reach the US border. The guides collected their remaining payment, netting about $120 each after a week’s work. They bought supplies and headed to a party. De León reflects that the smuggling network is complex and fluid, with roles like migrant and smuggler often overlapping and changing.

Chino recklessly jumped between moving train cars in Pakal-Ná, showing off for onlookers. De León worries about his safety, relating Chino’s death wish to his own troubled youth and struggles with trauma and depression. He believes this shared experience gives him insight into the smugglers’ worldview. Chino demonstrated expert knowledge of Mexican migrant routes, having attempted to cross five times. He recounted once making it to Laredo, Texas, where he hid in a tree for eight days before being caught by Border Patrol. He was only in the US for a month and ended up unhoused. He first left Honduras at age 16. He admitted life as an undocumented person in Mexico was extremely difficult, and he feared returning to Honduras because of the gangs.

In Honduras, De León interviews Chino’s sister Marina, who recounts their family’s history of suffering. Chino’s teenage mother abandoned him at six months to his grandmother Luz, who raised him in poverty. He was a sickly baby who nearly died of pneumonia. Marina detailed the deaths of four of her seven siblings from violence and lack of medical care. At 13, Chino was devastated by the electrocution death of his older brother Miguel, who had been his father figure. Chino turned to drugs and alcohol, became rebellious, and told Marina the Devil was inside him. He moved to Dos Caminos with his birth mother and stepfather Wilson, who taught him armed robbery. He joined a local gang and witnessed his friend Casper’s murder.

At 16, Chino was brutally attacked with machetes in what appeared to be retaliation for a friend’s actions, nearly dying from his injuries. Unable to pay his hospital bill and now having a clavo, a figurative nail—an unresolved problem—with the gang, he escaped through a window and fled to Mexico. His first year on the tracks was marked by exploration, drug use, and learning to be a guide. He returned to Honduras briefly but had become violent and addicted, terrorizing his family in drunken rages before leaving for Mexico again. When De León meets him, Chino is seven months into this second trip. He advised a younger migrant to return home and avoid ending up like him. He expressed deep shame over his failure to reach the US and provide for his family. He could not return to Honduras without rejoining the gangs or being killed. He planned to go to Mexico City, where he could disappear.

Jesmyn, a young woman, smoked with male smugglers in Pakal-Ná. De León notes she held her own in this hypermasculine world and had the hyperawareness of a seasoned smuggler. A year later in Honduras, Jesmyn recounted arriving in Pakal-Ná with Chino and Santos, who were working for a smuggler named Shadow. Chino had promised her safe passage after she was attracted to him. Stranded for a month, she found work at a restaurant and spent nights with the Pleasure Palace crew. She once defended a harassed Honduran boy from a Mexican man, earning the nickname Reina del Sur, or Queen of the South, from the other smugglers. De León discusses the heightened risks women face on the migrant trail and their survival strategies, including protective pairings with male companions. Jesmyn clarified that her relationship with Chino was based on attraction, not a need for protection. She stated she felt freer and less afraid in Mexico than in Honduras.

At age five, Jesmyn watched her mother Ramona grieve over a murdered man she believed was her brother. At 10, she learned the truth: Her grandparents had raised her, her sister was actually her aunt, and the murdered man was her biological father, Oscar. De León explains that such fluid kinship arrangements are functional responses to poverty and violence. Oscar was a charismatic youth who refused to join gangs but maintained a strong religious upbringing. He reported a coworker for stealing from their boss. After the coworker was fired, he retaliated by stabbing Oscar to death.

Growing up, Jesmyn noticed local gang members and found them both frightening and intriguing. At 13, a powerful, older gang member named Smiley became obsessed with her, stalking her for two years and waiting outside her school. He once climbed to her bedroom window to watch her undress. After she told her mother, she went into self-imposed house arrest for a year, never leaving home without a chaperone. When Smiley was arrested, Ramona sent Jesmyn into exile with her birth mother in a coastal town. While Jesmyn was away, Smiley was killed by a bomb in his prison cell. Feeling liberated, she packed her bags and headed for the Guatemalan border, hoping to reach the United States and provide a better life for her grandparents.

Santos worked as a drug carrier crossing the Sonoran Desert with a group. When a young Honduran collapsed from exhaustion, the Mexican guide threatened to stab and abandon him. Santos intervened, refusing to leave his fellow countryman and arguing he could not trust a guide who would do this. After the guide called his boss, threatening to kill both Hondurans, Santos insisted he would not abandon the sick migrant. The guide reluctantly agreed to rest. The next day, when a Mexican member of the group collapsed, the guide treated him with patience. Santos confronted the guide about this racist double standard. Another drug carrier told Santos he was too soft-hearted to be a desert guide, and Santos agreed.

Back in Pakal-Ná, Santos danced at the Pleasure Palace for the crew. De León describes him as gentle and unsuited for smuggling, wanting only to return to honest construction work in the United States. Santos’s father died when he was 11, and he left home at 13, heading north. He came of age alone on the migrant trail in Mexico. At 16, the Zetas cartel kidnapped and tortured him in Tamaulipas, carving lines into his arms. With no one to call for ransom, he was miraculously released. Police found him and brought him to a hospital. After recovery, he was given money for a bus home but used it to attempt crossing the US border instead. He was caught and deported but immediately left Honduras again.

In Pakal-Ná, he asked local gang members for work and was hired to guide migrants to Celaya, earning $400. After several successful trips, he saved enough to head north again, paying his way as a drug carrier in the desert crossing described earlier. He found stable work in Phoenix but was deported after a minor traffic stop in Tucson. Back in his hometown, the MS-13 leader Spider gave him an ultimatum: join the gang, leave town, or be killed. Spider gave him three weeks to leave. Santos returned to Mexico, taught himself tattooing on the tracks, and met Chino. They bonded over shared experiences and became partners, guiding migrants together.

Santos disappeared from Pakal-Ná for over a week. He had fallen asleep on the tracks and was caught in a midnight immigration raid, part of increased security around Pakal-Ná under Programa Frontera Sur. He was detained for six days and deported to Honduras. Within 36 hours, he was back in Mexico, running from immigration agents again. Fifteen days after his arrest, a weary Santos told De León he was now scared. He described how Programa Frontera Sur had made migration much harder and more dangerous. He explained the constant stress of being a guide, dealing with untrustworthy clients and violent criminal groups who collected fees. He concluded he was not born for this work and found nothing noble about earning money as a guide.

The chapter opens with a scene of a drive-by shooting involving Papo’s motorcycle in Honduras, an incident that derailed his life. As a teenager, he was caught by Border Patrol while freezing in a Texas ditch with a group of migrants. His mother had left him with an aunt in Honduras when he was young and paid a smuggler to bring him to the United States 12 years later. He grew up in La Ceiba surrounded by constant violence and the fear of gang death. Released from detention because he was a minor, he was ordered to attend high school in Texas but struggled with language barriers and cultural disconnect. At 18, he dropped out to work menial jobs and help repay his $7,000 smuggling debt. He was arrested for minor marijuana possession and deported after arriving 15 minutes late to his court hearing due to getting lost in the courthouse. Back in Honduras, he felt targeted because of the motorcycle incident and fled again.

Alma’s mother abandoned her as a baby, promising to send for her from the United States but never did. Raised by her aunt, Alma later comforted her own daughter Dulce in a detention cell in Tapachula, promising everything would be okay. Her first husband was murdered, leaving her a widow with a baby daughter named Gaby. A subsequent boyfriend was a violent man with an alcohol addiction whom she fought back against; he fathered Dulce and then disappeared. As a street vendor in San Pedro Sula, she was extorted by gangs for an unsustainable amount, forcing her to close her business and flee with Dulce, leaving her older daughter Gaby with her aunt. She vowed to return for Gaby, determined not to repeat her own mother’s abandonment.

At the Pleasure Palace in Pakal-Ná, a drunk Chino talked about dying by suicide while Alma scolded him. Alma worked as a mole for the local MS-13 clique, posing as a helpless migrant mother to gather intelligence on new arrivals. When fair-skinned Mexican gang members arrived to enforce a newly imposed head tax on migrants, Alma spoke with them privately and then went with Papo to collect fees. The crew made breakfast, boiling water in a plastic Coke bottle over an open fire. Papo recalled first meeting Chino on the tracks and expressed sympathy for him, believing Chino was exploited by the people he worked for. He daydreamed about visiting California to legally buy marijuana. Alma interrupted, reminding De León they were just trying to survive. A train departed, and Chino correctly predicted it was a trap for an immigration raid. It returned empty.

A social worker visited to document Papo and Alma’s living conditions for a humanitarian visa application. Alma hoped the visa would allow her daughters to attend school. De León helped them prepare their story, advising honesty. Papo nervously joked about his real job selling marijuana for MS-13. He recounted being wrongly blamed for a murder because a neighbor used his motorcycle and helmet in the crime, resulting in death threats against him and his family. He broke down crying as he told the story, showing vulnerability for the first time. He said he wanted a visa to get a legal job and finally stop living in the constant fear he had experienced in Honduras, the United States, and Mexico.