Summary

Chapter 5 picks up with 13-year-old Abel in 1999, who after being "rescued" by Osmin, is dumped on the side of the road. For the next two years, Abel exists like an animal on the streets of Cunaviche until he sees Osmin again, who challenges Abel to fight one of the two boys who beat and kidnapped him two years earlier. Abel knocks the pimple-faced boy to the ground, bloodying his fists, which delights Osmin, who then promises Abel revenge against the guerrilla who killed his family and destroyed his life. Abel describes how his gang maintains order and discipline in the region by dispensing savage biblical justice against local undesirables, the police ceding their authority to the paramilitary narco gangs. One day in 2001, Jefferson Lopez Quesada, the regional commander of the local paramilitary cells like Abel's, arrives in La Vigia. He announces...