Death and Dishonor

by Abhimanyu Saxena

  “Namaste Dilliwalon”

  The entire crowd at Jantar Mantar erupted in a thunderous response; it made Devraj’s chest swell with pride. It took a couple of minutes for the crowd to settle down, and he cleared his throat to speak up.

  “As per the trends, we will win and end the reign of Bhartiya Party. CM Satyendra Singh has corrupted and robbed this great city of its riches. I will make sure that they stay with the common people where they actually belong because it is them who run this country. I know we have been through some troubled times and with an incompetent leader like Satyendra, this state is going down. But I won’t let him do that to us. I will fight for all of you. You all must have seen our ideas and goals that we wish to achieve; and if we win, together we will achieve everything.”

  He was received with a standing ovation, and the chants erupted throughout the place.

  “Devraj ka raj! Devraj ka raj!”

  He asked the crowd to settle down for an announcement. “Brothers and sisters, you all must be knowing of the manhunt that is currently going for the killer Arjun Rathore at loose. Your Govt. is not able to catch that cold-blooded killer and they just plan to fill their pockets with all of your hard-earned money. But I don’t care whether I win or lose this election, but I will help catch Arjun and stop the horrors of our city. The Police Commissioner has told me that they have appointed a special cop for this hunt – Officer Zayed. He will make it his life’s mission to catch Arjun as soon as possible.”

  Zayed was seated at one of the chairs near the stage with a grim expression on his face. He was not enjoying the cheers and claps of the public in his name. He stood up and shook Devraj’s hands and sat back in his chair.

  “I would also like to say that this murderer Arjun is spreading false rumors about my nephew Ajeet Singh, who is a dedicated and sincere Police Inspector at the Defense Colony Station. He has been so traumatized because of all the false accusations that he has gone to Haridwar to find the peace of his mind. I would request all the media people to broadcast correct information only and not false accusations of an evil mind. I must appreciate the hard work and dedication shown by Reporter Rita. She is a concerned citizen and projects all the news and reports in an unbiased way.”

  Rita blushed and waved to the crows who cheered her as well.

  “Lastly my friends, vote for our party and ensure that our Delhi progresses to greater heights with us. Jai Hind!”

  He folded his hands and stepped backstage. This conference was a success; people were cheering madly for him. He took a bottle of Bisleri and drank half the bottle in one gulp. He saw Rita coming towards him. She was in her twenties and had worn a sharp off shoulder red dress with her hair tied in a neat ponytail.

  “Thank you, sir, for the appreciation. I will keep continuing my hard work.”

  Devraj nodded and hugged her. “Wait for me in the car; there is no one at my house today. Keep up the good work, and you will bask all the glories.”

  She smiled. “Thank you, sir.” She was half his age, but she knew the dirtiness of the power game.

  Devraj was about to leave too when he saw Zayed nearby. He stepped ahead and placed a hand on Zayed’s shoulder. “Zayed miyan, make sure that you catch Arjun before the elections otherwise I will remove you from the force personally. I don’t care what you have to do; kill anyone, hurt anyone, do whatever it takes but I want him dead or alive.”

  “Sir, you don’t care about the people? I will try to catch the culprit to the best of my abilities.”

  Devraj smiled. “I hate the word try. And regarding the people, fuck them for all I care. I want results. Jai Hind!”

  Zayed rolled his eyes and left the place without saying anything.

  ~*~

  Ajeet looked at the monitor and laughed maniacally. He could see Arjun trapped downstairs in a forklift.

  “Ask all of the guys to go for him. I am safe here, I just want to watch him die,” he ordered one of his guys.

  “Sir, we don’t have much firepower.”

  “No worries, make him bleed with your fists then,” replied Ajeet.

  ~*~

  Within a second, all of them started firing towards me. I ducked down and crawled beneath my seat in the forklift. I had only a couple of bullets left in my gun. Luckily for me, the same was with them. They all were out in a minute of mindless shooting.

  “Catch him; he should not get away alive.”

  I jumped out of the forklift and punched the nearest guy. He fell backward but got up instantly and punched me across the face. I spat blood and slapped both of his ears at the same time. He collapsed immediately. There were a couple of men, who jumped in front of me. They both had baseball bats in their hands.

  “I don’t play baseball lads!”

  The cockiness didn’t go well with them as they swung their bats and I was writhing in pain. One of them caught my neck in a choke hold while the other one was trying to smash my legs. I leaped up and caught hold of the guy at the front with my legs and toppled him down instantly. Then I pushed the guy who had caught me in a hold backward until we crashed beside a large table. Then I saw something which made my eyes twinkle. It was a movable saw blade attached on a table. I kicked a button, and the blade started whirring with brute force. I elbowed his stomach and kicked his face.

  “I always wanted to grind someone once in my life.”

  With a swift motion, I pushed his face to the table, and the saw blade jumped into action. It was a horrific sight as the blade contacted his skull. It sounded like when you put a stone in a grinder. The sharp blades cut through the flesh and bone, and huge splatters of blood spurted out on my face.

  “Fuck! I never saw human brain cut out open like this.”

  I couldn’t hold this and threw up instantly. “Man, this gore business is not for me.”

  The second guy ran towards me with a steel rod in his hand.

  “Stop! There is a blade behind me. I don’t want to see your insides too.”

  But it was too late, he didn’t stop, and I just leaped like a frog to my right at the last second. He fell face first on the saw blade, and I could see his face being ripped apart slowly. Within some seconds, his face was lying on the floor. I tried to pick up his dead body and throw him aside from the blade. But, the fate had something else planned out for me. I slipped due to all the blood on the floor and fell on the blade with his body in between.

  “FUCK!!!”

  I made sure that I didn’t get in touch with the blade but what made it even worse was that now the dead body was directly in contact with the blade and it ripped apart his stomach. The intestines mixed with blood and body fluids fell on my face. I could taste the blood and the putrid smell of the fluids. I instantly switched off the blade and puked twice. I wasn’t prepared for this.

  “I can’t cleanse myself enough!”

  I wiped the blood off my face and moved upstairs. That’s when I saw something that made me look twice. There was a mountain of a man standing right in front of me. He was around seven feet tall and had giant boulder like hands. I looked at his legs; his one leg would comprise of three normal human legs. He was like the last boss stage in video games. There was only a single word to describe him – Hulk. He didn’t say anything yet but kept his gaze at me. We were like David and Goliath, but this time I wasn’t sure that David would be able to defeat Goliath. At that moment, the same young guy that I had tackled with outside entered inside still crying. He was still bleeding from one ear.

  “How are you still alive? And why are you still crying dude? Shit happens!”

  “Brother, I am not able to hear from one ear,” he groaned.

  “Why are you calling me brother? I killed you nearly half an hour back.”

  “He was talking to me. He is my younger brother.”

  I had nearly killed Hulk’s brother. My luck was indeed rotten. Without wasting a single moment, he picked me up and threw me on a conveyor belt. My head banged on the surface of the belt, and I s
tarted bleeding immediately. It was as if I was like a feather in front of him. He came near me and placed his huge hands on my face. I began drowsing, unable to breathe properly. I tried to kick him, but all was in vain until I powered on the conveyor belt and it started moving. Hulk tried to keep up with it, but I finally managed to breathe as I moved past him. The belt went till the room at the top. I was safe at the moment, and I took a sigh of relief.

  “You have not seen the last of me,” he shouted from below.

  “Phew! I never saw something like that in my life.”

  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw all the remaining goons running parallel across me trying to catch up as they zoomed past the stairs to the top. I saw my opening and jumped on the platform. I kicked the door, and there he was right in front of me – the bastard Ajeet smiling at me.

  “You asshole!”

  I clenched my wrist and hit his nose. He fell backward and tried to take deep breaths.

  “Why did you kill her? Who are you working with? Tell me everything otherwise I am going to kill you right here right now.”

  I locked the door behind me so that none of his goons could barge inside. A small monitor and empty bottles of beer were lying on the floor. He didn’t say anything and just kept laughing at my face. I caught his hair and smashed his forehead on one of the walls.

  “Arjun, you are fucked. Don’t make matters worse for you. You are already caught up in enough shit. Just hand over the flash drive to me, and you still could salvage your life.”

  I was breathing fire, I snapped and pushed him towards the wall again.

  “I don’t know what you are talking about. You killed Aditi man, even after all we did for you. You betrayed all of us. Pratap will kill you himself once he gets his hands on you.”

  “So you don’t know anything. Your rotten luck then!” he replied.

  He tried to hit me, but I ducked and pushed him near the window.

  “I want to kill you right now.”

  “Wh – What is stopping you?” replied Ajeet.

  “What were you saying about a flash drive? I need answers now. Otherwise, I am going to torture you the same way you tortured her.”

  “Do your best. The bitch deserved it.”

  I couldn’t resist any longer and connected a roundhouse kick square on his face. He smashed the window due to the impact of the kick and fell outside the building. There was a loud sound outside. I checked and saw him lying on some cardboard boxes, alive. He was injured, and his cries and wails were audible from down below.

  ‘Damn that rat didn’t die. But if I would have killed him, then all kinds of shit would have hit the fan.’

  At that moment, the door barged open, and four goons were looking at me.

  “Today is full of surprises, isn’t it?”

  I looked down again. Ajeet was not visible, I took the deepest breath of my entire life and jumped outside the window too on the heaps of cardboard boxes. I had lost my opportunity to catch Ajeet. I had to get away from his men now.

  “DAMN!!!”

  I fell a little bit awkwardly and hurt my left leg a little bit, which got twisted upon landing. It took a minute for me to get up and stretch my body. I had no time to tend to my wounds as I could see the four of them running towards me. Apparently, I had wasted enough time that they could come from the main gate on the ground floor.

  “When will this day end?”

  I started running towards a T-point, tracing blood drops which vanished at a point.

  “He must have escaped via a getaway vehicle.”

  I could hear hurried footsteps not too far from me. Then I looked towards my right and spotted a green colored Sedan stopping a few meters away from me.

  ‘Mother told me not to take a stranger’s help, but I got no other option now.’

  I ran towards the car and seeing me run; the driver opened the passenger seat door for me instantly.

  “Ajeet, get in fast, or it’s both our asses.”

  SAVIOR?

  A dark green Sedan entered through an Iron Gate. The driver kept looking around, a surprised look growing on his face.

  ‘Front gate open, no guards, place quiet as though touched by death,’ he observed. There was no sign of life, except for some lights on in and around the warehouse.

  ‘I knew they wanted to keep this on the down low but didn’t know it went as down as it could.’

  He dialed a number on his phone, but no one picked up at the other end. He sighed, ‘Maybe they are all inside, prepping to go. I can wait.’

  He drove further in towards the open parking area at the left where there were couple SUVs parked and an Omni van.

  He scoffed, ‘I expected a shit load of guards with such a high-value package. With the fuss they were making, I am disappointed. Well, as long as I get the money. It looks like it’s time that we are killing this evening,’ he turned on the radio. He opened the glove compartment and took out a pistol. He checked if it was loaded and cocked it before pushing it back under his knee.

  ‘Wonder what’s taking them so long. They just needed a five-minute head-start. Hell, why am I worried? I am here for the bucks, so I got nowhere else to be.’

  He tipped back his seat and put his arms on the back of his head. His phone started to ring, and he turned the radio off. The call was from a Private Number but got cut before he could answer. Suddenly there was commotion outside. As he rolled down his window, he heard multiple gunshots which were echoing in this remote place.

  Then he saw through the windshield that a man was running towards him from his left, as fast as he could.

  “Damn it, the package is in trouble,” he started the engine and raced towards the man who had many goons rushing after him.

  He stopped the car and opened the passenger side door, shouting, “Ajeet, get in fast, or it’s both our asses.”

  ~*~

  I ran up to the car and got in. The man pointed his gun at me, “You are not Ajeet!”

  “No, I am not.”

  “You are a murderer.”

  “Something tells me you are too. Now, please drive. Everything’s still the same, both of our lives are on the line here.”

  “Look, I am not gonna repeat this. I don’t have time for this shit, get out of the car,” he pointed the gun at my face.

  Just then, a bullet shattered the passenger-side window, making us flinch. “See?” I shouted, “They stopped caring who you were when you swerved to let me in.”

  “I didn’t let you in!”

  The gunners were real close now, and more shots hit the car, “Drive, drive!” I screamed.

  He threw the gun back across the dashboard, “DAMN IT!”

  We zoomed out of the gate onto the access road. I looked at the guy’s face and the ponytail. He had got older, but there was no mistaking him as the same guy who was in that picture with Aditi.

  “Why were you there?” I asked.

  “Oh, is it time for small-talk?” he scoffed and kept driving.

  “Well, we are in the same car, escaping somewhere together. I think it is. Why were you there?”

  He groaned, “Just passing through.”

  “Just passing through? In the middle of nowhere at a terrible time? What business did you have with Ajeet?”

  “Why do you think I would tell you that?”

  I was quick enough to snatch the gun from the dashboard, and it was my turn to point it at his temple, “Because of that.”

  “When people need some sophisticated things done, I come into picture. I was hired to move Ajeet because people thought this place might not be safe anymore.”

  “Really? I wonder how come?” I smiled. “Don’t let me stop you.”

  “I happen to own safe houses not so easy to find, so I was going to take him to one of them. Then I would have got paid, but you ruined the job.”

  “Hired by whom?”

  “They didn’t say, just got a call from a masked voice. I have done plenty of jobs to know that my
interactions are usually limited like this one. After that, I don’t ask much questions.”

  I thought to ask more, but just then a bullet shattered the rear glass of the car.

  “They followed us,” he shouted.

  Our followers had managed to quietly gain on us in the growing dusk when I was busy getting to know our driver. He picked up the speed, but they were close behind and fired at us.

  “Do you have anything else to defend us?” I asked.

  He took out a laptop from his bag in the back seat and threw it aside. I looked at him, “How can that defend us?”

  He slid open the bag chain completely and revealed an AKS-74U, an imported assault rifle. “Thanks for the help, Arjun.”

  “Whoa! You are prepared for a war.”

  I took the gun from his hand. It was a beauty with its compact size, effective range and burst firing. I always wanted to get my hands on one of these, but we never got it in our station. I came out of the window at my side and sat on it. I shot through the windshield to kill the driver of one of the cars as he was swerving right to overtake us. The car swerved off the road without its driver and lost its balance, hitting an electric pole. No living soul came out of it.

  In this aftermath, the other car which was an SUV had managed to overtake and block us. My driver managed to apply brakes just in time to avoid a major collision and just hit them lightly.