The Lets Read Podcast - 367: THE CAMPING TRIP THAT ALMOST KILLED ME | 9 TERRIFYING True Scary Stories / Rain Ambience | EP 352

Episode Date: October 6, 2026

This episode includes narrations of true creepy encounters submitted by normal folks just like yourself. Today you'll experience horrifying stories about Camping & Undercover CopsHAVE A STORY TO SUBMIT?[e-mail] ME ON -►YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/c/letsreadofficial► Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/letsread.official/♫ Music & Cover art: INEKThttps://www.youtube.com/@inektToday's episode is sponsored by:Mint Mobile

Within three decades ago, when my buddy Henry and I, who I call Hank, were still in high school, we got so bored one spring break that we decided to go camping out in South Texas brush country. If you drive southwest of Corpus Christi away from all the palm trees, white sandy beaches, and turquoise blue ocean, the land suddenly flattens out into this endless stretch of scrub. We call it the brush, I suppose, on account of it being so dry and bristly, but it should be called the thorns because those are what you really got to look out for. They'll prick you something awful if you're not careful and where you're doing it, and even if you are careful, one stray branch will catch your clothes and put a hole in your shirt.

It's not even counting all the prickly pairs, but at least they're kind of colorful. And then aside from those, you've got your black brush, your mesquite and wiesatchi trees, and one of the stars of our story here, the Guahelio shrubs. Now, don't get excited, chilly fans. it's not related. It's hot, dry, and dusty. It's real drought country, but while most of the time it's all sandy and beige and sad looking, you get one good rain and bam. Wildflowers start popping up all over the place and it can look really pretty. And that's what it looked like when me and Hank went out to camp that day, since it had rained a few days previous and thanks to the dry wash still

being flooded, there was a gentle trickle of water into all the surrounding soil, meaning the brush was so green in places that the bushes were like thick walls that you could barely see through. And so there we were, walking on all that still loamy soil after a full day's hike, and we're poking around looking for somewhere to set up camp. The sun was starting to dip, so the heat wasn't so bad anymore, and the air had that kind of fragrant green smell because of the rains. And then all of a sudden, as we're coming up to this big old Guelhoelio bush, we start hearing this gentle buzzing sound floating through the air. It took me a second to figure out what it was, but as we got closer, I realized what it was long before I saw it. It was a beehive, but I couldn't figure out

why it was so loud until I saw it. And I swear to Almighty God when I say this, but that thing was the size of a goddamn washing machine. No, I'd seen quite a few beehives by that age, and a couple of hornet nests, too, but never one as gigantic as the one sitting in the crook of that guahilio. It was all gray and papery and loud, too. I mean, obviously, it's going to be louder if it's larger, but hearing that thing up close was freaky. Just that low hum from what must have been hundreds of bees crawling around in there, maybe thousands. We crept a little closer, not scared, just kind of awestruck by the sheer size of it. I mean, you know bees right, you don't bother them, but sometimes they don't bother you.

Wasps or hornets would have been a different story, and we would have been up and out of there faster than you can spit. But since it was just plain old honeybees, we stop and look for a second, thinking, damn, would you look at that? That would have saved us a whole lot of trouble if we had. The first is that the Guadhylio's one of the bees' best friends out here in the brush, because it puts out those little blonde fuzzy flowers in early spring that the bees go crazy for.

It's like prime rib for them down in these parts, so having their hive in a gualhelio shrub is like having an apartment in a buckies and looking back on it, it kind of makes sense how that thing was so big. But then the second thing I didn't know, and this is the real kicker, is that these were no ordinary bees, no sir. But unfortunately for us, there was no way of knowing until it was way too late. And so we stood there, looking at the beehive, having gotten as close as we could stomach. And then as we're looking at it, one of the bees kind of flies out and buzzes near my buddy for a second before zooming back to the hive. Now, we didn't see it for what it was, because we still thought that we were looking at regular bees. But by then, one by one, more and more of the little things came buzzing through the air towards us, like they were checking us out.

No, I said, don't move a muscle, Hank. They're more scared of you than you are of them. But those little bastards were not scared of us, and they were about to go prove it in a big and bad way. The handful that came to check us out flew off, so both me and Hank were like, oh, dodged a bullet. But then suddenly, it was like the whole entire hive

kicked its buzzing up a gear, and we knew we'd piss them off by being too close. We started backing up. Not too fast as to piss him off even more, but not too slow either, and you can be sure of that. But it did no good at all, and the last thing we saw before we turned tail and ran was this big black cloud bees forming in the air as they came streaming out of the hive and straight towards us. Now I ran as fast as my legs could carry me, running through the maze of brush as we tried to escape this coming swarm. But the bees didn't need to follow me. They could fly over and through stuff that I had to go around, so even though I was going fast as anything,

it wasn't before I started to feel a few stingers around my neck and shoulders. I screamed, swatting at the pain as I ran, but it did no good. And almost all the bees that caught up with me managed to stick their stingers someplace, either in the back of my neck or my shoulder where my vest didn't cover. And you'd think I was getting it bad. You should have seen poor Hank. I was always the fastest out of the two of us being taller and skinnier and such, so by the time the buzz behind me started to peter out and I actually dared to look back for Hank. He was some way behind me already, and he was getting absolutely mobbed.

He was swatting at the bees as he was running, but even that just gave them more to sting. He wasn't particularly graceful either, so every time he's waving his arms around, it's throwing him off balance and slowing him down. He was getting eaten up back there. Like I genuinely think the bees were coming from me, but suddenly realizing that he was the easier target and flew all the way back to Kamakazi into him and one final screw you before they died. I was yelling, come on, Hank, run!

Stop trying to hit him and just run! But it was like the more they stung him, the slower he got. I ended up snapping a branch off a smaller mesquite tree, one that had a nice flash of green on the end, and then running back to try and swat away some of the bees that were chasing him. I ended up getting a couple of more stings, but it was worth it just to not to have to watch my buddy getting stung half to death while doing nothing about it. And when I say half to death, I mean half to death.

He didn't actually look all that bad at first, because I guess there hadn't been enough time for all the stings to kick into his system yet. And so the first thing that caught my attention were all the stingers still stuck in his neck and arms in the back of his legs. Some had even flown up his shorts, too, and while they hadn't inflicted any direct hits on the old meat, he had Stinger stuck in his thighs as well as every other place. He was in a heck of a lot of pain,

and he swatted them off of himself, but he couldn't walk, and he wanted out of there. And so off we went. But then, as we're walking, the swelling started. I mean, it wasn't funny at the time, and it's still not very funny thinking about it today, but Hank later joked about how he looked like some balloon animal. It was one of those dark humor-type deals that didn't get so much as a laugh as the damn-type reaction,

but at the same time, I think that that might be one of the most accurate descriptions possible. Hank went from looking regular to looking like he was made entirely of a red balloon animal, and he did so in the space of about five minutes. His face and eyelids swelled up into these tiny little slits, so bad he could barely see, and then his skin turned as red as a beat, but with these tiny little white stinger marks interspersed and welts popping up everywhere that he'd been stung. I remember being on the verge of telling him how bad it looked, not to rub it in or anything, more to say almost like,

I think we're going to need a priest if we don't get you to a freaking hospital soon. But Hank didn't need telling. He knew. He started to pant as we walked, making these wheezing sounds as his throat, started to close over. He kept saying how bad it burned too, how it felt like his whole body was on fire and how he needed Jesus to help him. That last part was more of a reflexive thing, saying, Lord help me, Jesus help me. But I've never heard Hank talk like that before, like he had one of God's hands on him already, and it was scaring me. Not just because of how bad it looked and sounded, but because we had miles upon miles of thick South Texas brush between us and the

the nearest stretch of road. And I didn't know how much longer Hank had in him before he just keeled over and couldn't walk anymore. Not even a mile into the journey, Hank started limping real bad where one leg was getting stiff from all the bee venom that he had running through his veins. He was grunting with every step, cussing under his breath as he stumbled into thorns. Sweat was practically pouring off of him too with those big beads of it running down his neck and forehead. Now I asked him if he needed a rest, so he'd have the energy to keep going. But Hank said that he wanted to keep moving, that he needed that hospital and he needed it bad. But then, after about another mile, he started to get faint. His knees buckled at one point

and he almost went face first into a prickly pair, and I caught him under the arm and held him up, telling him to stay with me. But then, the vomiting started. Hank doubled over after pulling his arm away from me, and then he heaved until nothing came out. I thought he was done because he kind of got up on one knee, but then the heaving started all over again, very dry this time. That was when I was the most scared he was going to die, right there under that cat claw. They called them, wait a minute, bushes too, because they give a nice patch of shade, but we didn't have a minute. We kept on going, but Hank's breathing got shallower, and he started shaking like a leaf while almost dragging that stiff leg of his behind him.

We'd walk 20 yards, stop so he could puke or lean on some tree, and then push on again. Now, I kept telling him that he didn't have much further to go, even though I knew it was a lie, and I said just about anything and everything to keep him going, to keep his mind focused, too, anything so he wouldn't just straight keel over and pass out. I had to support him the last part of the way, and that felt like it went on forever. But after all that heat and dust and those goddamn thorns, with Jake getting weaker by the minute, we finally broke through the brush and spotted the highway ahead of us. Since I figured it was safe to let Hank lay down, I tried telling him that he could stop and finally rest some,

but he didn't need to be told. He went down like some sack of potatoes the second he realized that it was asphalt ahead of him and not just some more scrub. And then I ran in the middle of that road and started waving at any approaching truck. This old boy and a diesel duly slammed on the brakes, took one look at Hank, then jumped out to help me get him into the back seat.

After that, we hauled ass back towards Corpus Christi, calling 911 on the way while Hank was just slumped in the back seat. And by the time they wheeled him into the ER, I was convinced that I was never going to talk to my friend again. But the doctors knew just what to do for all that bee venom that he had in him. And while I couldn't even begin to tell you what it was, it sure is how it worked.

Hank spent a couple of days in the hospital with doctors keeping him monitored while all the swelling went down, but he pulled through. In fact, we knew pretty quickly that he would, because the doctors told a gathering of me and his family that we'd gotten him to the hospital pretty much just in time,

and they could get to treating him before all that bee venom started damaging his liver or kidneys. I don't think I was listening all that hard after hearing that Hank was going to be fine. I was too relieved to do anything but fall back on a chair with my head in my hands while holding back tears of relief. I had to doubly hold them back when Hank's mom started hugging me and saying that I saved her son's life. I don't know if I agree with that, but she sure made it seem that way at the time, and even Hank's dad was rolling a few silent tears at the news that the son was going to pull through.

In the end, the only question that was left was, why the heck did those bees act so aggressive? And to that question, it was a very clear answer. Like I said, those bees were no ordinary bees. And a lot of y'all are probably going to be hootin and hollering at this saying, I knew it. But we were told they were called what's Africanized honeybees, or more commonly known to you, as killer bees. And the whole story of them goes something like this. Back in the 50s, Brazil had the bright idea of cross-breeding their native honeybees with African honeybees,

with the goal being to up the amount of honey they were making. This did the trick all right, but it also meant the hybrid bees were extra aggressive. Like so aggressive that they killed a bunch of people just from the sheer number of times they'd sting someone. The Brazilians tried to contain these killer bees, but they broke out sometime in the 70s, I think, and they slowly but surely made their way up through Central America. and Mexico, and then up into the southern United States for me and Hank to stumble across one day. It was a big story at the time, and it was wild thinking that me and him had been a part of it in some really small way. We stayed friends for years afterwards until he moved away on some scholarship, and he never got much faster, but he did get way bigger and not in a bad way.

We never did go camping again. Hank swore it off completely, and then after he moved away, we kind of lost touch. It's sad, but such is the way of the world, I suppose. But I know he won't ever have forgotten about that evening that we spent out in the brush and how nature was really quick to remind me of who's really in charge out there. I never intended to be an undercover cop. My plan was to work enough time as a beat cop to make detective and then work my way into financial crimes or something equally cushy. Do the full 25, make it out with a pension, and then hey,

presto. I can play golf for the rest of my days. But life, as they say, had other plans for little old me. I was still in uniform when the city had a string of overdoses among high school kids in the early 2000s. Kids were dropping like flies and the department was getting crushed in the press. So brass needed someone who could blend into the streets without looking like a cop and they needed them quick. Now I was still young, kind of skinny looking and having grown up on the streets, I knew how to walk the walk, not just talk the talk. And not only did the job come with automatic promotion to detective, but the bonus pay they were offering was better than anything financials were about to offer me. I was also really sick of working uniform, clocking in and out like a regular Joe,

and getting disrespected on the daily by just about everybody. And so, after weighing it up, I thought, screw it, and took the job. I worked Friday as usual, then come Monday morning, my lieutenant pulled me into his office and said that he was sad to see me go. He knew where I was headed, so he wished me luck and told me to be careful. And then up I went to the third floor where my history as a police officer was officially expunge from the record. There was no big fanfare or anything, no pep talk or welcoming ceremony. They gave me a pager, a beat-up civic with hidden compartments, and about three weeks of crash course training on how not to die.

I grew my hair and beard out as they taught me how to build a legend as they called it. And now I had to remember every single lie I ever told, because the streets have a long memory and a short fuse for liars and cheats. And then once I was ready, they dropped me in at the deep end. I became Mickey, a junkie from upstate who moved to the city for a regular fix. I spent the first couple of weeks scoping out all the high-intensity drug trafficking areas. learning who the players were, rushing up on the more contemporary street talk, and making sure no one recognized me as a cop. I obviously wasn't working the same neighborhoods as my days as a beat cop,

but it's a small world, and I didn't want to get too close until I was sure that no one would clock me. But then once I'd established a presence, mostly by walking around pretending, I was boosting and scoring, I was able to start making some moves. I was looking to get in with the local dealers right, to figure out who was pushing bad dope onto good kids and causing this spat of overdoses.

Now, I needed an angle, and together the team behind the scenes, this is what we came up with. I'd tell one of the corner guys that I had a solid connection for his boss, one that had land them high-quality product at rock-bottom prices. And then when they inevitably showed interest, I'd tell them my Marine Corps brother was in charge of the mail over there in Kandahar, and he was shipping kilos upon kilos of Afghan heroin back to me in all these specifically marked packages that didn't get scanned. I was Mickey No Needles, with my legend being that I wasn't a total scumbag, so when I met with an underboss and made my proposal, he told me to come back with a sample. And then when that sample was satisfactory, I made a second proposal.

I could get them a steady stream of that cheap Afghan dope, but I wanted into the organization so I could learn the tricks of the trade. When the dope ran out, they were free to kick me to the curb if I wasn't pulling my weight and my money wasn't right. And with that, they agreed. I spent the next six months deeply embedded in one of the state's biggest dope-dealing networks, slowly earning more and more of their trust until I was able to start passing on information that would lead to arrests,

without making my new friends suspicious. Things went tremendously well in that time, and I learned a hell of a lot during that time as well. But probably the most important thing that I'd learned during that first stint that I spent undercover was not to fly too close to the sun. Not too soon, anyway. Because even when you think you've got a crew cracked

and eating out of your palms, it only takes a touch of paranoia to put the entire operation in jeopardy. And in this case, It was a stroke of bad luck. The same day my info led to the arrest of one of the group's cash couriers, one of their stash houses was raided by the DEA. The raid was completely unconnected to my own department's UC ops

as the agents had been working on their own intel. But to my new friends, it looked an awful lot like a concerted effort and that the info had come from an informant in their organization. Well, they were right. The leaks were coming from. me. Just nothing which led to the raid on that house. But obviously that didn't matter to us or them and the reality was that my days undercover were numbered. The backroom team didn't just pull me out, not even with the increased danger, because even with them being wise to my general

presence, the presence of an informant or undercover meant the organization would be under pressure. And if they were under pressure, they'd make more mistakes, which in turn would lead to more arrests. They only wanted to pull me out once, say, kind of tipping point had been reached, when the threat to me outweighed the good all that paranoia was doing. And for a while, that tactic worked exactly as planned. And then one day, I got the call that pretty much ended my stint under cover. About the same time my character, Mickey No Needles, started to make serious money, the department rented an apartment for me.

It was a crappy apartment in a crappy building, but that lined up with my character not giving a damn. because he'd been homeless. To him, even a crummy apartment felt like a palace, and I didn't care if the plumbing was a little shoddy. Now, anyways, one day, a guy that I worked with called Pete had buzzed my apartment with two of his boys. This was a pretty regular occurrence, so it didn't raise any alarm bells,

but then once we were sat down, Pete told me the good news. His bosses had found the rat. moments like that either make or break you as an undercover and i know guys who have talked their way out of trouble whose performances would have won an oscar had they been put to film and so instead of so much as flinching i kind of sighed with relief and said finally and then asked pete who it was but when he said the rat turned out to be some nobody who worked at a corner store somebody was slinging dope outside of i didn't need to hide my surprise No one was stupid enough to talk to the cops about the crew I'd infiltrated, especially not some Indian kid who worked a corner store for his uncle. They had a bad reputation and based themselves in a real see-nothing-know-nothing kind of neighborhood, so right away the story didn't sound right to me. But Pete was insistent.

In fact, the bosses had the kid tied to a chair in some basement downtown, beating the crap out of him while they got him to recount everything he told the cops. and they wanted everyone above street level there to see it. I just had to go with it, man. I knew that there was a chance that it might be a trap and that it'd be me that it ended up tied to that chair, but coming out with some excuse as to why I wouldn't go would also look suspicious, so I had no choice.

I carried a gun with me, so if things got sketchy, I could always try defending myself before they got the straps on me. But my character would want to see this guy that was out to put him jail, and he wouldn't be squeamish about seeing him get hurt either. And so I just went with it, put on a jacket, and got into Pete's car. Nothing he did or said made me think that I was about to get whacked, and, ironic as it may seem, criminals tend not to be the best liars. Those that are end up becoming defense attorneys. Am I right or am I right? And so by the time we got where we were going, I was fairly convinced that I was in the clear. And I was.

Because there, sitting in the middle of this grimy old cabin is some Indian kid. Could have been no older than 20, and he'd been beaten to a goddamn pulp. It was a tough thing to see, knowing that there was a good chance this kid was there for next to no reason. Maybe he said good morning to a cop, and some extra paranoid dealer got it into his head that it was him who had been feeding them information. There was no way of knowing for sure. I never found out for certain of my new friend's hunt should have been correct, but the fact remained. It should have been me in that chair, and just standing in that room with those guys felt like holding a loaded gun to my head. The bosses had figured that the rat was someone on the

inside, but even if he wasn't, they still wanted all the underbosses and captains there to get a firsthand look at what happened to traitors. The things they did to that poor kid will haunt me for the rest of my life, and the hardest thing I ever had to do was act like I was enjoying it, at least until the kid's inside started showing on the outside. And then, and only then, could I let a little of what I was really feeling shine through? They tortured that poor kid to death. There was no quick execution, no bullet to the head or blade to the throat. They beat and burned and tasered that kid until his body gave out, and he didn't wake up again. He passed out a whole bunch during, but they were always able to bring him around again with a taser and some kind of smelling salt someone had with them.

But then one time he passed out and he just didn't wake up again. And that was all she wrote for that kid. Only in the movies do people do the right thing in those situations. Only the hero stands up and says me when their skin is on the game. Because in real life, only a gun to my mother's head would push me to stop what was happening. and tell them that it should be me in that kid's place. Because while it might have been hard to watch him die, the easiest thing in the whole world was keeping my mother effing mouth shut.

When they were done with the kid, the bosses gave some speech about how we should expect the same thing to help us if we ever talk to the cops. And if our dealers or corner boys did the same, we were expected to do the same thing to them and make sure no one stepped out a line who didn't have a death wish to begin with. And then after that, when all was said and done, they sent us out on our way again. Pete was so shocked and grossed out by what he saw that he declined my dinner invitation when we

drove back into the city. I wasn't feeling particularly hungry myself, but that wasn't the point. It was to make it look like I was, when I knew damn well that I'd say no to everything except a strong drink and a cigarette. I acted as cool as possible given the circumstances, much more of a someone finally took out the trash attitude than that poor kid attitude. Because even the guys Pete brought with him had these looks on their faces saying, why didn't they just shoot the kid already? That was disgusting. Pete dropped me back at my place, saying that he had stuff to do. And then after lazily walking up my steps and giving him a wave to say, thanks for the ride, I just about sprinted up the stairs to my second floor apartment

and called time on the whole operation. I was out in the field by the end of the day, and debriefing with my backroom team about all the crap that I'd seen, heard, and done when I wasn't wearing a wire. All stuff that I could provide personal testimony for in a court of law. The operation was a huge success, and we managed to put away a grand total of 23 criminals on the back of the work that I'd done. And that felt good, but it didn't do anything for the guilt that I felt. Because even though I'd helped put his killers behind bars, I still feel like I had. had that kid's blood on my hands. And no matter how much I try, I'll never be able to wash it off. When we were kids, summer meant freedom. No homework, no teachers, no school, just a whole lot of time

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fees extra. Initial planned term only. Greater than 50 gigabytes may slow when network is busy, includes up to 20 gigabytes hotspot, capable device required. Availability, speed, and coverage varies. See mintmobile.com. My name's Rowan, and I live here in the Netherlands with my wife and two young children. I have a nice life and I'm grateful for it. And to look at me, you might never suspect that I went to prison for eight years on charges of drug trafficking and brandishing a deadly weapon. But I did, and since enough time has passed that I don't mind telling the story anymore, I figured you and you viewers might like to hear it. Now, I never planned on being a trafficker. I didn't need it either. I only started after a friend named Hans talked me into it,

and because it brought a little bit of excitement to my very meaningless existence. Hans, myself, and a friend of ours named Wim were all university graduates, and had settled into the 9 to 5 routine for a few years already. And then one day, Hans's girlfriend called us with some bad news. He'd been into asset trading for quite some time. We just didn't know how deep he really was. And so when we found out that he'd lost almost a quarter of a million euros when the stock markets crashed, we were shocked. Hans fell into a deep depression and had to take some time off of work. Now, he wasn't himself for this whole period and it was very sad to see, but then one day, he came back. And at first he said he was just feeling better in that the medication

that he'd been taking had done its job, and he wanted to return to work. But I didn't believe it and neither did whim. It didn't seem like Hans was better so much as his symptoms had changed. He got very busy and became very secretive, so much that his wife thought that he was having an affair until he let her in on his little secret. I don't know how he talked her into it. Maybe all she was interested in was the money, but after a little more planning, Hans let me and Wim in on his secret too. He was going to make his money back by selling ecstasy tablets. We thought Hans had gone completely crazy, but he hadn't, and far from it, in fact. The thought of making all that money back dragged him back from the brink of sanity, and then, since Wim was chronically unemployed,

despite his qualifications, he didn't need much convincing either. It was me that needed the most convincing, but not only had Hans laid out what seemed to be a full-proof plan, but it all just seemed so incredibly exciting. Now, I might not have been struggling for money, but I was very much struggling with a lack of excitement in my life. I had a very demanding job, unfortunately, one that paid very well, but exciting, it was not. And being confined to this very gray and flavorless lifestyle, it sort of nurtured a kind of rebelliousness in me. At the time, I didn't recognize that rebelliousness for what it really was, a desire to self-destruct. But along with a sense of camaraderie between myself, Hans, and Wim, there was a real sense of all these bankers broke the rules, ruined lives, and got away with it.

Why shouldn't we make a little money selling pills to the English? In comparison, selling ecstasy was infinitely more honest to me. And the work went like this. Nian Wim would take turns driving from Amsterdam to the Czech Republic. It was a 16-hour round trip, and there we would pick up shipments of raw MDMA, organized by Hans, before driving back into Holland for sorting and pressing. And then once we'd turn the powder in the pills, we'd work with one of two fishing vessels and smuggling the packages into English waters,

where it would be met by local distributors, and packages would be exchanging hands. We kept things simple, discreet, and very profitable. Then, with Hans in our fishing boat doing all the hard work, all women I had to do was go on a road trip every two weeks and bring back some nice checked logger along with 10 kilos of product. 16 hours in a long drive, but we got to collect obscene amounts of cash for one day's work every two weeks, which, as you can imagine, we were very happy about. It was all so simple, at least until one day's.

day when things got complicated. Whim was meeting with the captain the fishing boat that we were working with, and so the captain could hand over a shipment of cash from England. Now, they were followed by a group of Moroccans who were targeting drug dealers, beaten very badly and then relieved of almost 60,000 euros worth of British currency. It was a disaster for us, a huge setback. But not only had we all lost that money, we had to change all of our routines and find another fishing boat to work with, which was not easy.

We also had to expand the organization somewhat and find somebody who was capable of preventing a similar recurrence. What we needed was a criminal security guard. And as you can imagine, this was also not easy to find, and Hans had to do a great deal of interviewing in order to find the right guy. He obviously had to be very discreet, but he wasn't simply there to fight off any robbers. He also needed to be intimidating in a lot of. enough that his presence would deter any robbery attempts, and it was by this logic that he decided

on a man named Dennis. According to Hans, Dennis was an ex-con, well known in the criminal underworld, and most importantly, a former weightlifting champion. But it was his reputation among Dutch criminals which drew Hans' attention. Because for some reason, anyone who ever crossed Dennis or worked against his interests ended up dead or in prison, making him a person. making him an asset worth paying for, even if it did put a major dent in our profits. We managed to find another fishing boat crew to work with, captain by a man named Nils, and for the next 18 months or so, everything ran smoothly again, until we ran into two quite concerning problems. The first occurred when two little upstarts decided to try and rob us again.

Now he figured that they were connected to the Moroccan crew who robbed us the first time, but that second time, it did not go well for them. They used a fake pistol and a kitchen knife and tried to corner me as I came out of a public toilet at a service station. Dennis was standing some way away, smoking a cigarette, and I think maybe the boy thought that he'd left, and it was their time to strike. Well, it was not. And recognizing the gun to be a decommissioned replica, Dennis knocked out the knife-wielder

and began stomping on him. And he did it so much that I had to get him to stop. because while I too was angry at the threat to my life, murdering this boy would just bring way too much attention down upon us. However, since this was simply Dennis doing his job and ensuring the boy was in no position to come back at us for revenge, for a while at least, this was only my secondary concern. The first involved Niels, our new fishing captain.

I was conducting a cash collection one day when Niels asked about getting out. He'd been involved with us for 18 months or so, like I said, and having made a sizable amount of money from it, he wanted to quit while he was ahead. He wanted to know how that would work, and since I had no idea, I told him I'd ask Hans and relay back to him what was said. It seemed like a very considerate thing to ask as it had give Hans time to find alternative forms of transportation. Hans had also been quite reasonable in the past, so I expected a reasonable response. But when I asked him, Hans was not pleased. He said if Nils wanted to quit, then he needed to leave Amsterdam, maybe even the country. Now, we already had a load of loose ends hanging around in terms of the two fishing boats we used to work with that quit after the attack.

So if Nils wanted out of the job, he needed to make himself disappear. And this was obviously not the answer I was hoping for. We'd always been gentlemen thieves, if you will. but Hans was now talking like a gangster, saying Nils should shut up, keep taking his money, and stop making problems. When I told him Nils wasn't going to like this answer, he told me to make him like it, but not with violence or anything, but by raising his share. I agreed that might sweeten the deal, so to speak, but when I told Nils what Hans said,

he was equally unimpressed. He accepted the pay raise, but no matter how much I tried to dress up what Hans Hans said as a positive, you great at what you do, we need you, etc. Nils understood a threat when he heard one. He kept calm during the exchange. He didn't want to alert his crew that anything was wrong, but I remember how he almost simmered over when he asked me if he was trapped and if Hans was threatening his family or not. No, I told him it wasn't like that, how Hans was just stressed and how I'd even try and up his share even more if it smoothed over the misunderstanding as I put it. I did my best, but my best wasn't good enough, and from then on, our relationship

with Nils started to deteriorate. I did my best to shield Hans from it, and I suppose that shielded Nils, too, but he became almost impossible to deal with at times. He kept asking for an increase in his share, which Hans wouldn't grant, and then whenever I had to give him the bad news, he'd stop answering our calls, sometimes when we needed him most, too. It didn't hamper our operation, but it added a layer of stress that was clearly designed to force our hand and find a different boat captain. If we wouldn't let him go willingly, he was going to make us get rid of him. The only trouble was, he still had to be very good at his actual job in order to not get himself caught, meaning no matter how displeased he was, he always delivered and kept Hans happy.

Now flash forward to just over a year after Neil said that he wanted out, and I honestly thought things had smoothed over. He was still very much cold with me, but he'd stopped complaining and being difficult and was very much more proactive in keeping up with dates and times, etc. Amazingly, Dennis was still with us too and had managed to keep himself out of prison despite being in a lot of law-breaking.

And honestly, he refused to even park his car correctly sometimes. It was like every law he encountered was a direct challenge that he had to defy. He was a constant source of, worry for us and we were terrified that something he did would attract attention to us. But at the same time, he did his job fantastically and somehow kept trouble at bay. It was almost like a tornado. We were right there in the center of it. And things went on like that for some time until one day when the storm finally hit. I remember Hans texting me one day asking if I wanted to go for coffee. I told him sure, but when he came back to pick me up, he drove me to an abandoned warehouse near the dog.

and walked me inside. I knew then that it must have been business-related and that the added discretion means that Hans was worried about something. But then, and out of nowhere, Hans pulled out a gun and pointed it at me. He kept asking, is it you? Is it you?

Over and over. And what else could I say, but I don't know what the hell you're talking about? He told me to pull up my shirt, pull down my pants, take off my shoes and give him my phone. And with the gun pointed at me, I did everything he said while shaking like a leaf. I realize very quickly that there was an informant somewhere because what else would Hans be looking for? But it was only once he was happy it wasn't me that he confirmed it.

He didn't know if it was an informant or a full-blown undercover cop, but someone inside organization was talking to the police. It was, as you can imagine, a very surreal. situation. There I was, pulling up my pants in a cold, dark warehouse on the edge of town, while one of my old university friends turned gangster was explaining how our lives, as we know it, might well be over. Now, he wouldn't say how he knew, just that he knew. But if we didn't get rid of the mole, the mole was going to get rid of us. It had been a no-wire operation, meaning the police had enrised their operative by strapping a microphone to him, and we're planning on getting a conviction based on the mole's testimony alone. The gears were in motion, and the hammer of justice

was bearing down on us, but if we could take out the mole and stop all that testimony from reaching our courtroom, we might just skirt the charges if we weren't found with any product in our possession. And then since he wasn't the mole, and I wasn't the mole, there were only three possibilities, Wim, Nils, or Dennis. Now, it obviously wasn't Dennis. The prospect was almost comical to us. In fact, when Hans did have the temerity to ask if he was working with the police, Dennis said that if he asked him that question again, he'd kill him.

Now, he also suggested that we torture Wim so we could really be sure that he wasn't the informant, but I knew from the start that it couldn't have been him. The trafficking operation was the best thing to ever happen to him, and even having found a full-time job and a girlfriend, he'd never have given up and betrayed us. No, Wim also acted very offended when Hans asked him the big question, but once we'd ticked him off the list, that left only one person who could have been feeding information to the police.

Nils, our fishing boat captain. And at that moment, it all made perfect sense to us. No wonder Nils had stopped complaining and asking for raises. No wonder he seemed way more interested. interested in usual in where the shipments were going and where we produced our product. He was talking to the police. It made sense that they couldn't put a concealed microphone on him either, because the guy used to wear about seven layers and be out at sea for long stretches.

He might well have been relaying information to some kind of handler, but without his personal testimony, the police wouldn't be able to submit what they'd learned as evidence, meaning he was the one we needed to disappear if we wanted our own imminent problems to do the same. Naturally, Dennis volunteered on the spot, saying he'd see to it personally if we raised his share. Hans agreed, but he also wanted one of us to be there, partly to make sure Dennis didn't go overboard and draw unnecessary attention to our dealings. It might sound crazy to some, but I put up my hand right away. Having been the one to deal with him for the most part, I took Nielse's deception personally, and I also felt responsible, and felt if I paid more attention to him, I might have noticed his

betrayal somehow before it became a threat to us. There was also a self-preservation aspect to it, too. Hans was clearly feeling murderous, enough that I believe that he'd have killed me in that warehouse if he'd suspected me of being the mole. So what better way to prove my loyalty to the operation, above all others, then deal with Nils personally. We bought a gun after that first robbery two years prior. I knew how to shoot it, just not accurately, but I wouldn't need to be accurate when I put it to Niel's head. And if it jammed, well, that's what Dennis was there for. And so off we went, at a time that we knew Niels would be alone at the docks doing paperwork after his crew went home. We'd set it up as a meeting, so we knew that he'd be there.

But he knew we were coming too, so there was a chance the police might take the opportunity to snatch us before we could go through with the hit. But that didn't deter me. I was quite literally furious beyond reason. I'd done everything I could to keep him happy and on board, and he repaid us by ratting us out to the cops. So when I walked through the door to his office, I had no problem pointing the gun at him and demanding to know when he started talking to the police. And that was all I personally wanted to know. when? I wanted to know which time he'd told me, okay, I'm good, everything's fine, and it was all a lie, which time he shook my hand and went right to the police to rat us out. There was still a sliver of

doubt in me, I kind of hope that it was all a terrible mistake, and there was no mole at all. But to my horror, Nils admitted it. I told him if he told me the truth, I'd let him leave. Drive him to the airport and put him on a flight to Brazil or something before his family followed. And he believed me and asked me what choice we had given him. The implication was that he was trapped, that his family was at risk, and it gave him no other option than to work with the police. And while Nils's eyes kept on darting towards Dennis, I mistook the look for fear and what it truly was was expectation.

Once I decided Nils truly had to die, that he had betrayed us. I tried to pull the pistol back so I could shoot him, but no sooner did I grab the slide that I felt something cold and rigid against the back of my head. And then I heard the voice of Dennis in my ear saying, Drop it. I tried to argue with him,

but Dennis moved like lightning, sending the grip of the pistol in the back of my head, and he hit me so hard it felt like he cracked my head open and then said he wouldn't tell me again. I thought the only explanation was that Dennis was working on behalf of our supplier, and that fearing our imminent arrest might put them on the radar of Interpol and had ordered us to be liquidated. It was like a triple crossing or something. Very confusing to be in the middle of, especially when Dennis wouldn't answer any of my questions.

And things only went down after dragged me back to the car and he told me I was under arrest. Within minutes, the whole place was swarming with police cars, one to take me into custody, and one to take nils off to safety and maybe half a dozen filled with officers who searched the entire site for anything incriminating. The same thing was happening at our homes, too, with officers emptying closets, drawers, and cabinets for anything they could use to prove we were traffickers. And they found a lot. Enough to put us away for quite some time, and the only reason I got out after eight years, was because I was a model prisoner who paid a lot of money and restitution to the state.

When I got out, I had to enroll in all kinds of post-release programs, and one of the conditions forbade me from reaching out to Wim, who was out himself by then, or Hans, who got a lot longer than Wim and I, thanks to him being the ringleader. I ended up going back to university and starting my own business, and then a few years after that, I met my girlfriend, now wife. Meeting her was like a rebirth and I felt like I'd been handed a second chance. I wasted my first one and as I tell her every day I won't waste the second.

Not for all the money in the world. So it came out of nowhere. One minute we were laughing around the fire, swapping dumb stories and roasting marshmallows. Then the next minute, it all came smashing down on us like some kind of apocalyptic event. We planned the trip for weeks, thinking some camping out on the flats would be fun. It was me, my buddy Scott, his girlfriend, Sarah, and her cousin Ryan. We hiked on the Friday afternoon, found a sweet spot by the river, and set up camp before the sun dropped. We had some dogs, marshmallows, and graham crackers, the whole ordeal.

Scott kept saying that it was the best trip ever, but looking back on it, those feel like famous last words. Saturdays started just fine. We fished a little, hiked a little, and then we're back at camp by early evening. We had a fire roaring, music playing low on the portable speaker, and then off in the distance we saw a lightning flash from some dark clouds as a storm moved in our direction. Not long after, the wind picked up, not too much, just enough to whip the trees around a little. We figured that it might rain, but that was no big deal. We just tossed a couple of extra logs in the fire and kept on doing our thing.

And then suddenly, and from out of absolutely nowhere, the first hailstone hit like a gunshot. When it landed right in the dirt by Sarah's foot, we saw it was the size of a golf ball. It was like a split second where we were all silently thinking, did that just happen? But then came the next couple, and there was no doubting it anymore. Then the next minute, it was almost like God emptied a giant freezer up there in the sky. Ball-sized chunks of ice slammed down onto us, not little pellets. These things had weight, and they actually whistled as they fell. One nailed the cooler and split the plastic on the lid.

Another put a hole straight through the roof of a tent. Someone yelled to get under the trees, but they barely helped, and branches cracked overhead as hail ripped through the leaves. We scrambled to cover our heads with whatever we could grab, sleeping bags, backpacks, anything that might provide enough shelter. Sarah screamed when one caught her hand. I heard the crack from ten feet away, and Scott tried to pull her toward the bigger pines,

but a hailstone smacked him in the shoulder, and almost dropped him to his knees. Ryan was cursing up a storm, blood already running down his face from a gash on his forehead. I don't remember the one that got me, just the sudden explosion of pain on the side of my head, and then nothing, my lights went out. And when I woke up, the world was spinning.

My scalp felt split open, and the blood was sticking in my hair and down my neck. My left hand throbbed with two fingers already swelling up, fat, purple. and the camp looked like some war zone. Tent shredded, gears scattered and battered to hell, and the fire was dead too, just these wet ashes and broken branches. Scott was shaking me, asking me if I was good in a voice that just sounded far away, and Sarah sat nearby crying, holding her broken fingers against her chest. Ryan had a t-shirt wrapped around his head, already soaked in blood, and the hail had stopped, but the damage was done. We were all bruised up badly

with cuts everywhere and my head pounded like someone was hammering nails into my skull. Now the hike out was supposed to be just a couple of miles, but it might as well have been a hundred. We packed everything that wasn't destroyed, but that meant my pack was a hell of a lot lighter than it had been on the way in, but every step still hurt. My vision kept blurring and I kept stopping to lean against the trees while the others waited. Scott's shoulder looked messed up and Sarah couldn't even use her hand, and Ryan kept pressing that shirt to his scalp and muttering that he probably needed stitches. And we fumbled across the flats and near silence, mostly just heavy breathing and the occasional

groan. My brain felt like someone had taken a chunk out of it, and the trees kept moving when they really shouldn't have, and at one point I thought that I saw the trail split in two, but Scott steered me straight and kept me from falling down. We finally got back to where we were parked at around three in the three. the morning and after piling into the truck like the walking wounded we were we drove straight to the hospital the doctors poked and prodded and asked me a million questions and then told me that i had a concussion some fractured fingers and lacerations that probably needed stitches and they kept us for a few

hours pumped us full of painkillers and then sent us on our way that was two years ago we still talk about it sometimes but never like it was fun and we quit camping completely after that one Some people say nature is beautiful and sure it is, but nature literally almost killed us with goddamn ice bombs one time. And so these days, I'll just take my couch and some YouTube. I spent eight years undercover in the New Jersey Mafia, and as you can probably guess, it wasn't pretty. Now it sure ain't the Sopranos there anymore. All the wise-cracking, lovable rogues are either dead, in jail, or consulting on the next Scorsesey movie. The smart ones got out too. Investments, stocks, all that Wall Street crap. And now they're just

living off the interests and waiting to die so they can hand it off to their doctor-lawyer kids and Guido grandkids. And when they left, they took it all with them. All the shell companies, all the scams, all the connections with New York, it was all gone. Only a handful of families stayed together, and the ones that did found themselves competing with the Russians, the Albanians, the Albanians, and a one-percenter motorcycle gang called the Pagans. It got real ugly up there for a while, and the Decavalcante crime family was bringing in military-grade hardware from out of state just to take back what they considered theirs. And since I was already working undercover with a couple of Decavocante associates,

I started working the weapons angle to try and figure out who their connection was. I was hanging out with this guy called Tony, because that's one thing that definitely changed after the Sopranos. Every third guy was named Tony, and it was a nightmare. Tony D, Tony S, or in this case, Tony V. But anyway, Tony's an asshole, a real piece of crap. But he was close to the weapons shipment, so he's who I attach myself to. We used to hang out at this bar which paid them protection money.

I used to play like I was Tony's driver so he could get drunk. That way, he kept me around because I was useful to him. He could get sauced and I'd be his sober proxy doing pretty much whatever he asked me to. And since that meant that I was a shoe-in to get info on the weapons they were bringing in, I didn't mind being some A-hole mafioso's gopher. One night, he gets a call saying he needs to go make a cash delivery, which I assumed was connected to the weapon sales. Tony then finishes his drink and tells me to drive him to his girlfriend's place,

which turned out to be this cramped one-bedroom in the Iron Belt. Tony was married already, and he had a couple of kids too, but he also had this Colombian sidepiece that he used to visit sometimes. He used to tell her she was his girlfriend and made all kinds of promises to her about taking her on vacation to the Bahamas one day. But it was all nonsense. He was just using her to get off and so he could turn her apartment into a goddamn stash house. Now anyways, we show up at the apartment building and somehow Tony's able to get us in without buzzing because the block's buzzer is busted. We walk up to, I think it was, the third floor,

and then Tony starts banging on our door like, it's me, let me in. And there's this moment of silence before we heard her saying something like, hold on a second. But then we both heard it. There was fear and her voice. Something was going on behind that door.

I knew it, and Tony knew it. So he started hammering his fist against the door, saying, open this door right now. Now, there was another cry of okay, okay, before we heard the chain and key locks being undone. And then Tony shoved his way into the apartment while asking what the F was going on. Now, the first thing we both see is this girl's bra just lying there on the couch while she's wearing nothing but a towel. Tony then rushes into her bedroom and sees an open window leading to the fire escape. He then found a guy's shoe under her bed and that's when all hell broke loose.

He moved fast. grabbing her by the hair and yanking her into the room while yelling and still holding the shoe, saying, what the F is this? I said nothing at first. But then he started hitting her, not slapping her either, like straight up punching her. He hit her in the stomach. And then once her hands weren't covering her face anymore, he started slamming his fist into her face so hard she was bleeding from the first blow. I stepped forward, my hand reaching for the piece I kept hidden under my jacket. I told him this wasn't the play, keeping my voice low and steady, trying to cool the situation down without sounding like a cop. But Tony whirled around towards me. His knife was already

out, and then he lunged forward and pressed it to my throat. Not so hard that he'd cut me, but hard enough for me to freeze up and raise my hands in the air as in to surrender. And he warned me, in no uncertain terms, that this was his business, his woman, and if I knew what was good for me. I backed the hell off. Now, I knew the one wrong move in my cover would be the least of my problems, so I raised my hand slowly, eyes locked on his and told him it was none of my business. Tony's girl was screaming and pleading, but I forced myself to stay in character. I was a loyal foot soldier, someone who sympathized with what Tony was doing, and so that's how I played it. But at the same time, I told myself that if he tried to kill her, I'd drop him.

No hesitation. My Glock was ready under the jacket and my finger itching on the trigger. But he hadn't crossed that line. Not yet, anyway. Tony turned back to her, shoving his girl against the wall before he started ranting about how she'd betrayed him, how she was going to be sorry, and how he'd make sure that she never did it again.

He called her all kinds of terrible things, and how he'd make sure that she was back in Bogata by the end of the week, because he had friends in high places. That last part was bull crap, something he used to scare her, but even though they weren't directed at me, his words cut deep. I could see her flinching every time he raised his hand to her while tears were streaming down her face, and then he backhanded her so hard and actually echoed around the sparsely decorated apartment. I remember shifting my weight uncomfortably ready to intervene as Tony grabbed her by the throat. He then slammed her down onto the worn carpet and then started beating her again after putting the knife on a nightstand.

He humiliated her verbally the whole time, telling her how worthless she was, how she'd pay for disrespecting him. She curled into a ball, sobbing and trying to shield herself, but he wasn't done. It kicked at her legs, yanked her up again by the arm and continued to assault with open palms and closed fists, all like I wasn't even there. All it could do was to stand there. Jaw clenched so tight it ached with every instinct screaming at me to end it. Life undercover means buying your sense of right and wrong under layers of deception. I'd seen Tony rough-up rivals before, but this was ugly in a way that made me sick to watch. I wanted to shoot him, but my mind kept going over the consequences, how killing him then would have blown months of work, as well as endangering the larger operation.

Shooting him might even get me killed, but I told myself that if they started to strangle her, or if, if you're not even, his hand found that knife again, then the rules had changed. I kept on watching, feeling my trigger finger burning, but finally Tony stepped back. It was sweating and breathing heavily while his girl was laying on the floor bruised and whimpering with blood trickling from a split lip. He spat on her, told her what would happen if she ever crossed him again, and then, as if flipping a switch, he turned to the nightstand which had the knife on it and went back into business mode. He took out bundles of cash that she'd been holding for him and then tossed them at me to hold. Then we left her there, broken on the floor.

I glanced back once as we stepped into the hallway trying to memorize anything I could so I could write it down later. I felt disgusted with myself for not stopping it, but that's the job right there. Become the monster, so you can catch the bigger ones. Outside, we climbed into the car and Tony Little Cigarette. I could see how his hands were still shaking from the adrenaline, but he started talking about the drop we were headed to like nothing had happened. I nodded along, playing my part, but in my head I was already drafting the encrypted notes that I'd send later. Details on the cash, the drugs, the violence, all of it.

As we headed toward the warehouse district, I kept my eyes on the road as my mind replayed the beating. I hated myself, but this life doesn't let you save everyone. Sometimes you just watch, practice patience, and wait for the net to close. Undercover work was the hardest thing I ever did as a cop. It strips you down and makes you question how much of yourself you lose to the character you're playing. But Tony V. trusted me more than ever after that and saw me as someone who knew when to shut up and back his play. By the time we reached the drop point, my resolve had hardened. Tony V. was going down one way or another, and when he did, he did.

did, I made sure that I buried him for good. I moved to Los Angeles in 1998, met my girlfriend the following year, then by Y2K we were living in a small, Silver Lake apartment together. We were very compatible, and where we weren't almost identical, our personal differences complemented each other in a way that made us work. But there was one thing we could not agree on, and that was my love of camping. I pitched tents everywhere from Joshua Tree to the Sierras and it became especially important to me once I moved to the concrete jungle of L.A. Getting away from the big city became doubly important just to decompress. I'd swap all the smog for cool, clean air and then wake up to the sound of birds singing

instead of traffic and the yelling of crazy homeless people. My girlfriend, on the other hand, was way more into luxury hotel and spa weekends, and the most she'd ever theoretically commit to in terms of camping was a tour of the West Coast in a camper van. And even then, she said that she'd have to really think about it so she could make sure that she had as many home comforts as possible on hand. And so, without outright coercing her, I started a week's long campaign to try and change her mind. I started showing her epic photos from my past trips, emphasizing things like stargazing and how the Fresh air would be great for her.

She's very much a health nut like that. Then started working the whole, it'll be romantic angle, telling her how to be just me and her without anyone else for miles around. How we'd get to soak up all the good vibes nature was making while making smores with roasted marshmallows,

her one true weakness. She'd always count her with something like, what if a bunch of bugs crawl into the tent? Or, what if we picked the one day a year when it rains in L.A.? And while I did kind of understand her concerns, it didn't stop me. I just so happened to pick the Reese Witherspoon movie Wild to watch while we were eating takeout. And then the next week it would be into the wild.

And you might be noticing a little theme here because she sure did. And then after maybe two months of slowly and gently convincing her, she agreed to a sort of compromise. No multi-day backpacking deep in the mountains, no eating of canned garbage and drinking creek water that tasted like chlorine pills. Instead, we go someplace a little closer to home. Runyon Canyon Park. Now, anyone who knows the park might be laughing right now

because it's literally just a foothill in the middle of Hollywood, and if you look it up, you can see the Hollywood sign right there above you. It's surrounded by concrete on three sides, so it's probably like the least wild place I could possibly pick out. but seeing as it was so urban adjacent, low commitment, and easy to bail if she hated it, my girlfriend approved. I mean, maybe I'm talking the place down a little for the purposes of the story because some of the views that you get up there are absolutely fantastic.

I mean, you can see all the way out to the ocean on a good day, and all of that after some very convenient parking. We could park on the street, pack light, and be on trail quickly. And then after a day's hike, we could set up our little tent and let the real fun. begin. We headed out into the late afternoon to beat some of the crowds. Runyon is always popular with runners and off-leash dogs. And then starting from the bottom, we took a mix of trails from a solid loop until we hit the wooden steps up the east ridge toward Inspiration Point, where the views open up dramatically over Los Angeles. It wasn't brutal, but enough to get the blood pumping and

earn that we're really outdoors feeling. And then by the time the sun was almost set and the city light started twinkling below, it felt magical. We found a nice, somewhat tucked away spot on a flatter section of ridge as dust settled, and while we weren't quite allowed to roaring campfire thanks to the park's rules, we had a nice little setup with a portable lantern stepping in for ambience. The hike had worn us both out in the best of ways, and her complaining turned to laughter as we watched the sunset paint the sky. It wasn't deep back country solitude, but for Los Angeles,

it delivered epic views and she admitted it wasn't as scary as she thought. And before we climbed into our tent, I suggested that we hit up Big Sur on our next trip, to which she starts responding, saying, easy, tiger, let's see how I feel in the morning. But what neither of us knew at that moment was how neither of us was going to make it until morning. And so after crawling into the tent, we settled down on the sleeping mats that I brought along with me. she had the extra comfy one. I used my old one. And then after a little pillow talk, it was too warm to cuddle, we each went off to sleep. And then the next thing I know, I'm waking up to the gentle pitter-patter sound of water hitting the fabric of the tent.

And my first thought was, holy crap, she was right. We picked the one night of the year when it rains in L.A. But that was just the first of a couple of different thoughts, because the second one involved me realizing that it couldn't have been rain. The stream of fluid was too localized to the side of the tent and too loud to be anything but one solid stream coming from someplace. And that's when it hit me that some a-hole was literally pissing all over my damn tent. Now, I reacted much like anyone would and immediately shouted something loud and curse-filled

while making a B-line for the zipper keeping the flap shut. I was furious, dude. I mean, I figured it was probably just a bunch of kids doing it as a prank after one of his buddies dared him to do it. But I was banking on being able to chase them off into the darkness and giving them a little scare for their troubles. But then, as I'm thrusting my feet into my shoes, I smell it. This sharp, acrid smell that smelled like something flammable. And then no sooner was I like, uh-oh, but wolf. The side of our tent burst into flames, from where someone either tossed a match or put her lighter to it,

and set all that flammable liquid on fire. My girlfriend was obviously awake by the time we saw the flames because I'd been shouting and moving around all angrily and insane, and so while I was still sitting there with my foot half in my shoe, it was her who grabbed the little pocket knife that she was keeping under her mat, laid open to, usually a big no-no, and started slashing at the wall of the wall of the wall of the wall, tent to make a hole and make it fast. Each of us dived out of it and I remember looking back expecting to see either total darkness or the last of the kids who set our tent on fire running into it. Instead, I saw maybe four or five guys, grown-ass men by the looks of things, and they weren't

running either. They were just standing there, watching us as we spilled out of the slash and terror and confusion. I just shouted run. But my girlfriend had already. looked and was screaming as she ran for the trail. Now, I kind of lagged behind her a little looking back and getting ready to fight when they started to chase us, but neither of them did anything but stand there silently, either watching the tent burn or watching us run from it. And somehow, I feel like that freaked me out just as much as if they did chase us. It kind of felt like they didn't need to, you know, like they'd already set up a blocking force

for us and we were running right into it. But thankfully, that was just the fear talking, and we ran and ran through the darkness without ever bumping into anyone, let alone anyone with bad intentions for us. Luckily, I had my car keys on a chain along with a couple of others, so we were able to get into my car and start the engine without issue. But when the headlights lit up the scene in front of us, and we could see that there was no one following us, and we kind of took it down to gear. And instead of driving off frantic, we took a second to just say, say, what the actual F just happened to us up there. We did drive off pretty soon after, on the off chance that they were following us somehow, and then we reported what had happened to the cops once we got back.

But, and any L.A. natives were probably thinking this from the very beginning, but the detective we spoke to was not sympathetic to what we did. Now, he wasn't overly rude, but he basically asked us what the hell we were thinking trying to camp up on Runyon Canyon, because while it can be a pretty beautiful place and very charming to Midwest transplants like me, the park's just too damn close to the city to really be safe. He obviously felt bad that someone had tried to burn us alive, but he also said that we made his job pretty damn hard, seeing as there were tons of kids in that area who were capable of such a thing, not to mention all the crazies that walk up and down Hollywood Boulevard, which is pretty

close by. Someone might have been drunk, bought a bunch of lighter fluid planning on burning the Hollywood sign, but then they saw our tent and figured, hey, beats hiking another two miles uphill. And it was that simple. It could have been just about anyone and the chances of catching them were slim to none. Now, he didn't think that there was much to it. There being four of them or five of them and them just watching us either, as he said that there might have been gangbangers or we were in their favorite smoking spot or literally anything. And in so many words, we made one hell of a mistake and my girlfriend never let me hear the end of it. She never went camping again, which meant I only went like twice the whole time that we were together.

And then the first thing I did when we broke up was head out on some week-long hiking trip out in the Sierra's. It wasn't a bad breakup and I never felt resentful or anything that she refused to try it again in any place. because ultimately I do kind of think it was my fault. I think I should have dropped the issue when she first said no and just gone someplace on my own that'd be safer, at least safer from people, that is. I'd been deep undercover for nearly 18 months, warming my way into the East Midlands drug networks

that fed the streets of Nottingham, Leicester, and Derby. My name was Gilly, a pale, unreliable smackhead who'd been brought up on the estates. The handlers back at the station had spent weeks getting my look right, including the movie makeup track marks that were convincing enough under scrutiny and the clothes which smelled of stale sweat and damp. I was slow and I didn't talk much. Being a man of few words was your best bet around those sorts of people that I'd infiltrated. On the night in question, we ended up in a rundown flat on the edge of Northamptonshire, one of those pebble-dashed two-up-two-downsounds that smells like damp plaster.

and old Sigs. The windows were boarded up on the ground floor and the only light came from a bare bulb swinging over the kitchen table. The top man, who everyone called the gaffer, had called what I thought was a routine meeting about the next shipment coming in from the coast. I was there because I'd earned a fragile place on the fringes of their operation, doing things like fetching wraps, taking the fall on small dumps, and proving that I was too much of a junkie to be anything other than harmless. At least, harmless to them anyway. When the gaffer

walked in, the atmosphere shifted completely. His face was tight, his jaw clenched like he was chewing glass, and then he told us why we were really there. Word had gotten out that someone was talking to the police, and this was all off the back of a big seizure the week before, which had cost them serious money. I knew they chalked it up to bad luck at first, but now, The paranoia had set in hard. The gaffer didn't raise his voice. He never needed to. He simply told us that there was a grass in the room and that he was going to find it.

Three of us were pulled forward. Me and these other two low-level scroats who were paid in junk, not cash. I was positioned against the cracked kitchen room wall between a quiet lad from Derby who'd been moving gear for him for years, and another face I only knew from drops, a twitchy-looking toe rag with prison tattoos creeping up his neck. My heart was hammering in my chest, but I kept my face slack and my eyes half-lidded, with my shoulders slump like the only thing on my mind was the next fix. And that was the trick to everything, staying character, even when every instinct screamed to run.

The gaffer pulled a gun like it was nothing, this grubby, dark thing that looked like it changed hands a lot while seeing plenty of use. He checked the cylinder in front of us just to prove it was loaded, and then he stepped to the first man, and I watched from the corner of my eye as he pressed the barrel against the lad's forehead. The room seemed to shrink for me as the adrenaline started to kick in, and the air seemed to get thicker as he laid out the situation clearly. He either told him the truth or one of us wasn't leaving on our feet. The first man stood rigid, breathing fast and shallow, but had nothing that satisfied the question hanging over us. They say time is an elastic concept, and it's true. Because in those types of situations, entire minutes stretched out to feel like five or ten at a time, like the rules of time and space don't apply to you anymore.

And that's what I meant about the room shrinking, too. So much in life is about perception, undercover work included. The Gaffert lowered the gun after what felt like ages, though it was probably only minutes, and then moved along. The second man tried to keep still, but his hand stood. twitched at his sides. When once again the barrel went to the lad's head, it was like I could smell the fear in the room. But since my own shirt was practically soaked through under the ratty hoodie, that might have just been me. I focused on breathing, keeping it slow, shallow, and disconnected, any twitch of real panic, any sign that I wasn't as high as I was supposed to be,

and I was finished. But then came the biggest test, because then it was my turn. The barrel was still warm from being pressed against the skin of the other lads, but I kept my gaze fixed on a stain on the opposite wall, letting my body sway slightly, as though the withdrawal still had a hold of me. I acted strung out and dopey, but inside my mind raised through every mistake I might have made, every slip in the cover that could have caused my luck to run out. I could feel the gaffer studying me, looking for the tell that would mark me as the informant, then just as the tension reached a breaking point, the lad to my left broke. He started stammering about a rival dealer operating out of a lockup in Leicester

and how he'd only bought it from him once or twice. He swore he hadn't said anything to him not on purpose anyway. I stayed exactly as I was, detached and distant, even as relief washed over me like a wave. The barrel lifted from the head and the gaffer stepped back, seemingly satisfied with the information he'd been given. He hadn't been looking for an informant. He'd just been looking for the dickhead who'd been speaking to the people they shouldn't, because even a breach of discipline as small as that needed nipping in the bud before it got worse. He pocketed the revolver, then told the three of us to F off, and then as far as I know, the meeting moved on to business

as though nothing had happened. Later, I made the long, careful journey back to the safe house. My hands wouldn't stop shaking. I debrief the handlers over the encrypted line describing every detail while the adrenaline still course through me, and how 18 months a year and a half of work had nearly ended against the wall of Northamptonshire. But even with all I'd gone through, the operation had to continue. You learned to live with that gun to your head, and some nights I still feel that warm metal against my temple. I wonder how long it's going to be before it happens again, but the job continues. The criminals don't rest, not while there's lives to be ruining and money to be made while doing it.

And so neither can we. So I used to live for camping. It was honestly my entire personality. The second best feeling in the world to me was hauling my pack onto my back after counting the days, assembling gear, and pouring over maps of the area I'd be heading to, just so I could familiarize myself with them in advance. And then the best feeling, on the other hand, was hitting that part of the woods where There was nothing but me, the trees, and all that quiet.

It was my happy place, and I've been doing it since back when I was a kid, when my dad would drag us all up into the mountains every summer. I used to hate it when I was smaller, but then as I got older, I learned to appreciate it, and it snowballed from there until it was weekends, long weekends, even solo trips when nobody else would tag along. Now, my buddy Squirrel and I were like the main two dudes. If I planned a little trip, my friend named Squirrel was almost guaranteed to show up with his gear. Oh, and he's called Squirrel because picture a guy named Squirrel and that's what he looked like. No joke. Plus, his name was actually Darrell, so it kind of rhymed, actually, but anyways.

Now, way back when, Darrell and I headed up to the spot that we've been eyeing for months. It was kind of a tradition by that point, because every spring for the past few years, we've been taking a tough trail, setting up camp in the backcountry and then just, unplugging from all the bull crap of regular life for a couple of days. And then that year, after a solid hike of about eight miles with some real elevation, we set up camp in a spot where the views were worth the blisters. We got there mid-afternoon and then set up the tent and a nice little clearing under these big old pine trees. The wind was picking up a little bit, but nothing crazy,

and we figured it was just mountain weather doing its thing. We lit a campfire, cook some dogs, and cracked a couple of beers, and then talked about a whole bunch of nothing important until the sun went down and stars came out. Even the breeze kind of worked after we climbed into our tent to get some rest, and after all that hiking and all that beer, I think I fell asleep the second my head hit the sleeping mat. But then, at around two in the morning, we woke up to the tent shaking like it was about to blow away. Now, that must have picked up suddenly, and bad too, because it had gone from breeze to full-on gale-force winds that were roaring through the pines like a freaking freight train.

It woke me and squirrel up quick, one than the other, and then we're yelling over the noise about whether we should pack up and move. Now, camping under a whole bunch of trees isn't the best of ideas, especially if they're kind of isolated. They make for great cover, but also they attract lightning. But since we also couldn't think of anywhere close worth moving to, and since it didn't seem smart to go out into the pitch black pouring rain, moving on seemed dumber than staying put.

And so we zip the tent tight and got ready to ride out. And then not even ten minutes later, it happened. There was this loud crack, like a gunshot almost, and then this massive whoosh. And so fast I didn't even have time to scream. A huge branch, what they call Widowmaker, came down right on top of the side of my tent. Now, widowmakers are the dead ones just hanging up there waiting to drop when nature takes its course. or a strong enough wind comes along to do the job for it. And it hit like a ton of bricks,

with the pain exploding in my left leg and hip the second it landed. Now I heard my own bones snap, dude. I didn't just feel it. I heard it happen. It also pinned me across my lower body, crushing my leg and smashing my pelvis. I couldn't even breathe right at first, let alone move. Squirrel asked if I was okay and I respond, no. in this really strained voice, and he freaked out trying to get the branch off of me, but they wouldn't budge.

The rain was still hammering down, and the wind was still screaming, and so every time of gusts hit and the trees around us groaned like they were about to come down, too. I was yelling in pain, telling squirrel to stop because he was only making it worse. I saw the blood was soaking through my sleeping bag, too, and even though I could feel my leg twisted all wrong underneath me, the blood scared me more than anything. I told Squirreled that he had to go get help. He didn't want to leave me at first, and I could see it in his face with my headlamp shining up at him, but he knew that he had no choice. We both did. We were miles from the trailhead, no cell service, nothing. It was either him or nothing. And so he grabbed his pack, left me his

extra flashlight and some water, and then took off running down the trail in the storm. I watched his light bounce away through the thin canvas of the tent till it disappeared, and then I was all alone. Obviously, I pulled through, or I wouldn't be writing this right, so there's really no point doing that whole thing of willy or won'ty make it, because no prizes of anyone guessing that obviously I did. But I was up on that hill for around eight to nine hours, and they were the longest of my entire life.

The pain was non-stop. Every single breath hurt like someone was grinding my bones. I tried to shift myself a little bit every so often, purely out of desperation, I guess. But that branch had me locked down solid, and any attempt to move only made the pain worse. I got soaking wet too as the rain kept on leaking through the ripped tent, so it wasn't long before I was soaked to the bone and very cold. I kept talking to myself out loud, stupid stuff like, you're okay, buddy. helps coming.

But I wasn't okay. The fact help was coming was the only thing that kept my mind in one piece, because by far the worst part was the fear. Every gust of wind made those big pine trees creak and sway overhead. I kept staring up into the dark, waiting for another crack, another widow maker to finish the job. I kept asking myself, what if the whole tree came down? What if squirrels slipped and broke his ankle out there?

What if he makes it, but he can't find his way? in the dark until it's too late for me. My life didn't so much flash before my eyes as my death did. I thought about my mom and dad, about my sister, about the guy at my job hearing about the way I died and thinking, poor dude. I thought about the autopsy they'd do about my funeral. I tried not to, but I couldn't help it. I started singing songs in my head, counted stars when the clouds broke, prayed a little,

even though I really am not one for church, but every time my mind went back to dying again. Time got weird too. Minutes felt like hours, and the only consolation I got was not feeling like I was about to pass out or go into shock. I think I lost a lot of blood, but the pain kept me awake, and that's how I knew I wasn't completely screwed, which, like I said, kept me sane. Finally, sometime after dawn broke, I heard voices. I yelled out as a little. I yelled out as, best I could, and then I saw lights coming through the trees. Squirrel had made it. Having run those miles in the stormy dark like a man possessed, he brought a whole rescue crew, paramedics, forest rangers, S&R guys who had the gear to lift the branch. They worked carefully,

talking me through what they were doing the whole time. And then when they finally moved the wood and got me on a stretcher, I almost passed out from the relief. There were all these new pains as stuff started to shift to my leg and hip, but the relief of feeling all that pressure taken away was, well, I've never felt anything quite like it before or since. They got me to the hospital, but thanks to the pain meds, the memories of it are all kind of blurred. I got surgery on my leg and they put pins in my pelvis. The doctors said I was lucky that my nerves were mostly intact and I wouldn't need an amputation, but luckily, ain't the word that I'd used to describe the months of rehabilitation where I basically had to learn to walk all over again.

I walk with a limp now and sometimes with a cane on bad days. I had to forget all about camping, at least serious camping anyway. And hiking, I can pretty much forget it. It took me a long time before I could lie in a tent without my chest getting tight. And even all these years later, I still have nightmares where I'm crushed by something. usually an elevator that gets smaller and smaller until I can't breathe and then it falls like whoosh just like that branch did and life's different now and by that I mean a lot slower I garden a little watch birds from the backyard I'm grateful to still be here but man I miss

those nights under the stars that widow maker took more than my mobility that night it took a piece of who I was. Sometimes I drive up to the old trailhead just to sit and look at the mountains. I don't get out, but the woods are still beautiful from a distance, and the fact that I'm still here to see them, that's something, right? Me and squirrel are still good friends, but he doesn't much look like a squirrel anymore. He comes around sometimes and will sit on the porch, drink beer, and reminisce about old trips. I sold most of my gear, but I kept one tent. Maybe if I have kids someday, they can have it, and if they want to go camping with her uncle Squirrel, because I know no matter what happens, squirrels got their backs, just like he did that day with mine. So it was early June of 2003 here in

West Virginia, and my buddies and I had just graduated college, and we've been planning a post-grad camping trip for months that I was really looking forward to. There was me and my three buddies, Bobby, Mike, and Josh. And since we've been camping together before, we figured a few nights out in the woods wouldn't be a problem. We packed up Mike's brother's old pickup with some tents, a collar full of meats, and some beer that we had talked to him into buying us, and then drove out to the spot in the hills that Bobby swore was perfect. And he was right, too. It was quiet, pretty, and right next to a creek. It was the kind of scene that looked like it could have been on a postcard, really, but looks, as they say, can be deceiving. We got there late afternoon after a

real sweaty hike and found that creek sparkling like it was ice-cold liquid crystal. We set up camp really quick, got ourselves a fire going, and then set up a grill that we'd brought with us so that we could cook up some burgers while we drank our beers. Now, by the time the sun started dropping, we were feeling pretty good. One of those nights that makes you forget about all your worldly cares. But I was wiped, like dead on my feet tired. I pulled extra shifts all week and the hike up into the hills just finished me. off. And so when the boys decided to head down to the creek to take a little bath before we turned

in for the night, I just waved it off. They called me a lightweight and laughed and then took off down the little path towards the creek. I could hear them yelling and carrying on like kids and it sounded like they were having a blast. But I just leaned back into my camp chair, cracked another beer and watched the fire as the woods got darker. After a bit the guys came back, dripping wet and grinning and we threw some wood on the fire. fire and settled in for the usual campfire talk. You know, things like old stories, dumb mistakes, who was dating who, and everything was great. The vibes were good, but then Mike started acting off. At around 10, he stood up and just rubbed his stomach and said he felt kind of sick.

Now, he looked pale in my flashlight beam and said something about probably eating too fast before he headed into his tent and saying he needed to lie down. And Bobby was next. He kept scratching his arms and neck saying how the skeeters must have eaten him alive down at the creek. He tossed another log on the fire so the smoke would keep them away, and since the woods are always full of bugs, none of us thought much of it. Josh was the only one where I thought something was obviously wrong, not just too much beer or being skeeter bait, but legitimately having some sort of medical thing.

Something about his face looked weird, a little puffy like he'd been stung or something when, I asked him, though, he just shrugged and suggested that he was a little allergic to something. He felt fine, so he wasn't worried. Now, he kept talking for another half hour, but by that point, the energy was dying down. Josh crawled into his tent and I stayed up a little longer staring at the coals, and then finally laid down on my sleeping bag to catch some zes. Now that night I slept like a baby.

No tossing or turning, no dreams I can remember, I was just completely exhausted. and so all I really remember is lying there listening to the crickets and then waking up to the sound of someone vomiting. And hard, too, like they were trying to puke their guts up. Now I sat up fast, head still kind of foggy as I unzipped the tent, and then what I saw made my stomach drop. Mike was on his knees by a tree, making all the puking sounds that I'd heard, while Bobby was sitting groaning against a log with his arms and face covered in ugly red blotches. Josh, on the other hand, he looked the worst. His eyes were almost swollen shut, and his cheeks and forehead were puffy and red, and it sounded like he was having trouble breathing, too.

It looked like they were all dying, and painfully, too, the kind that makes tough teenage boys whimper for their moms. Now, I asked them what the hell happened, but no one really said much. Mike was puking too hard. Bobby was scratching himself talking about how it burned and itched all at once, and then there was Josh. wheezing while talking about not being able to see, and all three were just begging for my help. And the first thing I thought to do was grab water.

Stuff for Mike and Bobby to drink and stuff to maybe pour over Josh's face, because hopefully cooling it off might have helped with a swelling or something. But they didn't need water. They needed immediate medical attention, and the pressure of it being down to me was probably the single worst feeling of my entire life. Nobody thinks they're going to be the hero in the moment, I guess. You just do what you got to do. But all I remember thinking as I ran for the trail was like,

they're going to die, and I'm going to end up an alcoholic wondering if I could have saved my friends. But I guess the terror of that thought spurred me on and did almost the opposite of me panicking, because after that, I was just an absolute machine. Our phones obviously had zero signal out here, so the first thing that I did was grab the map from Bobby's, bag and look for the nearest ranger station. When I spotted one four miles down the road, I took a

second to check my bearings and then took off running like a crazy person. I never run like that before my whole life. The only sport that I played was backyard football, so while four miles didn't sound all that far on paper, and practice, it was complete hell on wheels. My legs started to feel like lead. I puked, had to slow down before I passed out, all of that. But I never stopped. I never once stopped still, and those three miles felt like it could have been 300, and I lost count of the number of times I tripped and almost fell. But when I finally burst through those trees and saw the ranger station, I almost cried with joy and relief. After I abandoned the door as hard as I could, the ranger on duty, a guy named Daryl,

came to the door angry as hell, asking what all the fuss was about. He took one look at me and got serious real quick. I told him everything about my buddies and the weird. symptoms they had and he relayed all directly to county dispatch. And within maybe 20 minutes of my arriving there, a couple of ATVs showed up with paramedics and we raced back to where we were camped. When we got there, the guys were in even worse shape, but the medics moved fast. They had IVs, oxygen, and other stuff all ready to go.

And then after wrapping them up and loading them onto the ATVs, they disappeared off down the trail. They airlifted them from a clearing near the station while me and D.D. Darrow followed in the ranger's truck all the way to the hospital in the nearest town. The whole drive, they kept asking questions about what we did, what we touched. And when I mentioned the creek, his face got tight. And then he said how they'd had problems up there a couple of times before. I asked him what kind of problems, but he said it was best to wait for whatever the doctor said.

At the hospital, I sat in the waiting room covered in dirt and sweat, feeling useless for hours and hours, until finally a doctor came out and explained what had happened. It was chemical burns, severe poisoning from something dumped in the creek that the boys had washed in. He said that there were probably industrial solvents, all kinds of heavy metals, and God knows what else. We later found out someone had been illegally dumping waste upstream, probably for about a year for the water to get that bad. The water looked fine, but it was poison. and my friends had done just about everything but go swimming right in it. They'd splashed around it, drank a bunch, and then let it get in their eyes.

And that's why it hit them so hard while I was completely unaffected. All three of my friends pulled through, thank God, but not without side effects. Mike still gets stomach issues sometimes when he eats certain things. Bobby won't even use bug spray anymore because the smell reminds him. And these days, Josh wear his sunglasses when the sun's too bright for him. The cops and environment of people get involved. It turns out it was some shady company cutting corners, paying off truckers to dump barrels into the woods.

They got caught eventually, but that didn't fix what happened to us, and we never went camping again, and never even disgust it. The four of us still hang out, but now it's just barbecues in somebody's backyard or catching a game at a bar. And even today, every time I see a creek or a lake, I get this certain feeling in my chest. We set up camp right next to the whole creek full of liquid death and didn't even know it, while the decision to stay by the fire might well have saved my life.

We survived, but man, we sure is how it learned our lesson. Be careful with water sources when you're out in the trails, especially when it comes to drinking stuff, because no matter how nice and clean it looks, you never really know what's in there, not until it's too late. Hey, friends, thanks for listening. Don't forget to hit that follow button to be alerted, of our weekly episodes every Tuesday at 1 p.m. EST.

And if you haven't already, check out Let's Read on YouTube, where you can catch all my new video releases every Monday and Thursday at 9 p.m. EST. Thanks so much, friends, and I'll see you in the next episode.