by Anmol Batra
Hours pass by in his dream world. The sun rises from the East and settles in the West and Zaffar can’t find a way to escape. The bow quiver of the purple archer seems to hold infinite arrows and he continues to fire them without taking a breath.
And then a moment comes when the tired Zaffar is out in the open. He gestures to the archer to strike him in the chest, exhausted and defeated. This time the archer loads a burning arrow, pulls the bow back and calmly takes aim for his chest.
After a fraction of second, Zaffar feels a crack in his bones as if someone is trying to get out of his ribcage. He takes a deep breath and feels a hand thrusting out of his lungs.
“AHHH!”, he screams. He blinks and a spirit dressed in another purple bursts out of his chest. He swiftly glides in the air close to the purple archer, pulls the purple arrow from his bow and stabs it into his forehead.
The entire body of purple archer is a flame, and a moment later turns into a black dust, dissipating in the air.
Zaffar breathes heavily. So far he is unable to discern reality from dreams. In a tired voice he questions his redeemer, “Thank you! But who are you?”
The saviour turns around, a tall man with a well-trimmed beard, big eyes dressed in complete purple with golden bracelets. Shocked, Zaffar breathes heavily.
“You… You look just like me.” Dazed, and with horror, Zaffar gasps heavily.
“Yes Zaffar, I am who you are,” explains the rescuer with a voice; Zaffar’s voice.
“I am nothing but memories of your past life. This is your eleventh birth. I am the knowledge within you. Your Past, your own self.” He continues.
“I don’t really understand. Wait... I think I am dreaming.” Zaffar pleads with himself.
The saviour glimmers mysteriously and the entire archery range starts to fall. Iron bars from the roof start bending themselves upwards and take the shape of a sinkhole. Bricks start dismantling themselves from the wall along with the fixtures. Everything arranges itself in an upwards cyclone with its eye in the sinkhole of the roof. Bricks, chairs, broken arrows and target boards spiral in the tornado, feeding themselves into the hole.
Zaffar feels the dust pricking his eyes. He covers his face with one hand, but the next moment he is greeted with complete silence. He opens his eyes, only to see a rusted ceiling fan and a patchy ceiling at its back. In the dead silence he could only hear cold wind gushing into the room, creating a bleak noise. He swiftly gets up and finds himself in the same butcher’s house with bloodstains smeared across the white tiles.
◆◆◆
Chapter 9
The Search for Evidence
23rd December 2012 8:00 AM | Aditya Hospital, New Delhi
Swati & Arjun visit Nidhi at the Hospital. They both wait, sitting alongside Nidhi’s table, which is mounted with thick glass covering the entire wooden top. Arjun looks around the room which smells of medicine and Swati fiddles with her notepad, reading her old notes.
Minutes later, Nidhi enters the premises. A bright, pretty face with a slim physique, sharp features, eyes beset with makeup and raven hair.
She greets them before taking a seat. Swati and Arjun reciprocate. Without wasting time, Swati dives in.
“Nidhi, Akif attended the patient on the 13th; do you have any idea where Ankita may have kept his belongings?”.
“I don’t know,” replies Nidhi “We have all been trying to trace exactly that.”
“Is Akif aware of this?” Swati interrogates further.
“Maybe. Akif took a day off the next day and hasn’t returned since then. He had a problem in his hometown. His phone remains switched off, but he is replying to emails,” clarifies Nidhi.
“Could you please let us see where they kept the patient?” Asks Arjun with curiosity
“I can let you in that room, but we don’t have any belongings for that patient,” replies Nidhi, staring back at Arjun
Nidhi, Swati and Arjun head to the room where the hospital had kept Billal. A small room with a single bed and metal rack placed along with it. The rack still had the white tray, but the blood-soaked cotton had now been replaced with clean surgical scissors covering the coins that were lying at the bottom of the tray.
Arjun is reluctant to disclose things to Nidhi and to create a distraction he wilfully knocks the white tray containing the coins to the floor.
“Ohh! Sorry!” says Arjun and starts picking up the scissors that had fallen on the floor.
Swati engages Nidhi in conversation and Arjun carefully places Billal’s coins in his pocket.
“Arjun, have you received any threatening or extortionate calls from anyone so far?” asks Nidhi.
“No, I haven’t,” Replies Arjun.
“Please do let me know if you come across anything related to Ankita,” pleads Nidhi.
“Sure, I will” replies Arjun in a hurried voice.
Arjun and Swati leave the hospital and head back home.
23rd December 2012 1:30 PM | Swati’s Residence, New Delhi
Two identical coins with the symbol of Pakistan engraved on one side and the number five on the other.“What next?” questions Arjun, putting back the coins on the dining table.
“Either Billal himself was from Pakistan or he received money from there. There is no point jumping to conclusions without knowing where his dead body is. Ankita or Akif took his papers back home. We need to find them as well,” says Swati in a concerned voice.
“I think I should follow Ankita from the thirteenth morning and look for clues,” replies Arjun
“If Ankita had left Billal’s papers in hospital, the staff would have traced them by now. We need to find out who took the pages from the writing pad. Ankita or Akif? For that you need to visit Ankita right where you left her on the evening of the twelfth,” explains Swati.
“Also, if Ankita could figure out the reason why Billal overdosed...” adds Swati after a pause.
23rd December 2012 3:15 PM | Swati’s Residence, New Delhi
Arjun lies down on the bed while staring at the digital clock.
“I don’t know how long you will need to chase Ankita in order to find Billal’s papers, but do not exceed 5 hours,” says Swati as she gazes at Arjun. With a smile, Arjun nods his head, closes his eyes and steps out as a soul.
Arjun steps out of his body. Seeing her cover his body with quilt, he is touched by Swati’s gesture of care. For a minute, he waits and gazes at Swati until she walks out of the room.
Arjun glides through the wall and enters the kitchen. He spins back in time and glides up in the air.
12th December 2012 5:20 PM | Aditya Hospital, Green Park, New Delhi
Arjun returns to the same room as a soul. Billal’s dead body rests on the bed and Ankita is busy having a heated discussion with Akif. Ankita disconnects her phone.
“I don’t know. I will examine him tomorrow morning. I am leaving for home now,” Replies Akif. Arjun witnesses this moment once more
Ankita steps out of the room and this time Arjun follows her. She reaches the lift and presses the down button. While waiting for the lift she starts fiddling with the papers on writing pad and mutters, “Ohh!! Shit!”
Ankita runs back to Billal’s room and turns over his dead body. She lowers the corpse’s pants and underwear and pulls out a plastic bag from his rectum. A plastic bag wrapped in faeces with a minor crack in the lower corner, which is leaking white powder.
A feeling of disgust gathers within Ankita and while she holds her nose with one hand, she keeps the packet aside in a surgical tray and writes on the writing pad: ‘Packet with illegal drugs found in patient’s rectum. Possible drug: Heroin’
Ankita calls Akif on his cell again “The patient had drugs in his Rectum.”
“What??” replies Akif, in a strained voice.
“Yes, and one of the packets seems to have leaked. I am not surprised that he overdosed now,” acknowledges Ankita as her hands and ears turn red.
“Wait, let me come back to the hospital and
see to it,” replies Akif and disconnects the call.
Fifteen minutes pass by. Akif comes running back into the same room.
“Did you tell anyone yet?” asks Akif while bolting the door from the inside.
“No, not yet. It’s time we call the police,” says Ankita.
“Wait, we don’t know what is in the packet. Also, it is now too late to notify the police. Their first question will be why we didn’t notify them in the afternoon itself, and why were we so negligent that the patient died,” explains Akif with a worried look on his face
“Both of us will have a hard time explaining it to Police. Let’s send him directly to the morgue and tomorrow morning we’ll notify the police that we received a dead patient yesterday. Let the police discover the drugs and claim it as a drug overdose if they think of a post mortem,” continues Akif while breathing heavily.
Ankita pauses, in two minds and visibly stressed. As Arjun remains in the room listening to all this, he sees the uneasiness in her eyes, a moral dilemma.
The next moment Ankita closes her eyes, takes a deep breath and replies in a tired voice: “So what next?”
“Can you arrange a pickup with the mortuary van and meanwhile I’ll get the drug sample tested,” asks Akif in a gentler voice.
Without uttering a word, Ankita takes out her cellphone and dials a contact. Vigilantly, Arjun quickly steps behind her and looks for the name she has dialled.
7:00 PM - Ankita gets call from the same number again. “We are waiting outside.”
Without uttering a word or calling anyone else, Ankita quietly opens the door while Akif pushes the stretcher to which they had shifted Billal’s dead body. Both silently bring the body to the outside gate of the Aditya Hospital.
Fog layers the street. Just alongside the busy lane is a Maruti Eco, a white car with a broken tail light and scratches on the side door with lines written beneath the rusted scratch in English: ‘Sabzi Mandi Mortuary’.
A middle-aged driver with grey hair gets out of the car and quickly opens the rear door, while Ankita and Akif push the stretcher to the van. The Driver hands over some pages to Akif on which he writes, “To be kept in custody until further notice.”
The Van disappears in the fog while Akif and Ankita continue to stand on the pavement beside the street.
“Don’t worry, I’ll call police tomorrow morning as soon as I get confirmation on the drug report,” reassures Akif.
Ankita rolls the pages of Billal’s report up and stows them in her bag. With a tired voice she replies to Akif, “I’m heading home now.”
7:45 PM – Ankita boards the ladies compartment of metro and Arjun continues to follow her. The Metro is still crowded with people and Ankita can’t remove the worry from her face. A teenage girl accidently knocks Ankita’s shoulder with her leather sling bag, pleading to Ankita hastily, “Oh. So Sorry!” To which Ankita doesn’t respond.
40 minutes pass by. After changing metro at Connaught Place, Ankita reaches her home in Mayur Vihar, an apartment on the fifth floor in a group housing society. Arjun continues to follow her.
She knocks at the door and Arjun opens it. A moment of surprise hits Arjun’s soul who has now encountered his physical self in the past. His pulse starts to race and he recalls the same moment being on the other side.
Ankita walks in without uttering a word. For a moment, the physically present Arjun looks into the open emptiness, while his spirit from the present continues to gaze at his face.
“Yes, he can’t see me.” thinks Arjun. He recalls his own thoughts at that instant.
“Did Sonali come for cooking yet?” Ankita questions without looking at Arjun.
“No! Not yet.” Arjun shouts back as he fiddles with the cushions on the sofa and searches for the TV remote.
“Why do you have a fan running in the lobby?” asks Ankita, while rubbing her arms which are still covered with her overcoat.
“Oh! I accidently spilled some water on the floor, so I switched it on for a while,” replies the physically present Arjun, while scratching his head.
Ankita slams her handbag on the drawer cabinet in the lobby and heads to the bedroom. While she continues to take off her white overcoat, she loudly asks, “Did you get the groceries list I messaged you on WhatsApp?”
“Everything except bread, it was out of stock in Gupta ji’s Shop,” replies the physical Arjun, sitting on the sofa, watching TV.
Arjun’s Soul follows Ankita to the bedroom but before he enters the room, he sneaks a peek in Ankita’s open handbag.
A set of A4 white pages rolled together. Arjun’s soul is not sure, but he has a vague idea that the pages were Billal’s report. The next moment, he follows Ankita into bedroom hoping to get confirmation of this.
A snapping sound causes him to turn around to look into the lobby with the chest of drawers once more. Ankita’s bag had accidently fallen on ground and the pages had fallen into the top-most open drawer.
Arjun’s soul steps into the lobby and looks across the corridor. With a curious mind he wonders, “Is there anyone else here?”
The physically present Arjun walks into the lobby and closes the drawer with the pages still in them. He then picks up Ankita’s bag and places it back on the drawer cabinet from where it had fallen. Arjun switches off the fan and walks back to the drawing room area to watch TV again.
Arjun’ soul remains in the lobby, plagued with curiosity. While staring at the drawer he wonders, “Even if I contemplate the handbag fell down because of the ceiling fan, it wasn’t open when I gazed at the chest of drawers a moment ago.”
The clock Strikes 9:00 PM and Arjun realises that it’s time to head back to Swati’s Place. He takes a quick look across the Lobby and then rises up in the sky, passing through the ceiling. As the sky is thick with dust and Smoke, Arjun takes a quick look across the city to search for a landmark. From a distance he could see a flyover above the Yamuna expressway.
“Was there someone else in the house at that moment? Sonali hadn’t yet arrived, and I don’t remember my physical self-opening the drawer in between.” Thoughts start to bother Arjun as he starts flying over the bridge, which is jammed with cars.
At the flyover’s Delhi end, Arjun rises higher up in the sky and looks for Qutab Minar, tracing Swati’s Residence.
He reaches Swati’s House, staring at the same wall-clock in the kitchen and slides forward in time to the moment when he left as a soul. The next minute, he slides into his body and wakes up.
23rd December 2012 7:15 PM | Swati’s Residence, New Delhi
With half-closed eyes, Arjun stares at the clock. From a distance, he could see lights switched on in the other bedroom. Arjun curiously gets up, puts on his slippers and drags his tired feet to the other room. Alongside the Wooden Cabinet, Swati is sitting on the bed gazing into it. On one side, she had clothes properly folded and ironed. She pulls out a plastic hanger and carefully wraps an ironed shirt around it before sliding it into the cabinet.
“I have a lot of stuff to talk about,” says Arjun slowly.
“Can you make soup for both of us? Meanwhile, I’ll arrange my clothes,” replies Swati.
Ten minutes later, Arjun and Swati sit at the dining Table. Arjun gazes into the soup bowl and continues to stir it with his spoon. For a minute, he recalls his past few hours.
“Billal had heroin packets hidden in his rectum,” he says steadily.
Anxiety grabs Swati and she asks in curiosity, “What??”
“Akif hasn’t confirmed it yet but nobody is going to hide salt or detergent up there. Likely, the dead-body is still hidden in the Sabzi Mandi Mortuary. It was sent there by Ankita that night.”
“And what about Billal’s reports?” asks Swati.
“The reports are at my place, in the cabinet in our lobby,” replies Arjun.
“Guess we discovered a lot then,” says Swati slowly.
“Akif must have received a threatening call as well which is why he went underground. He knew th
ey would come after him if they were not able to get further details from Ankita. Ankita accidently left the report pages along with the mortuary sign-off sheet at home. She could have guided them to Mortuary, but not the coffin where Billal is being kept. Neither Ankita nor the mortuary knows that the dead body is Billal’s, so they would have simply assigned him a number mentioned on the sign-off sheet along with the report. No wonder they are holding her in captivity,” says Arjun in a worried voice.
“Winter often brings a lot of unnamed dead-bodies who die sleeping out in the open. It is less likely that the Kidnappers would have got any information from the mortuary. But Swati would have clearly guided them to her place where the reports are,” replies Swati.
“A strange thing happened when I was in the lobby.” says Arjun, looking down.
“What happened?” Asks Swati.
“I followed Ankita back to our residence. When she entered the lobby, she left her bag on the drawer cabinet. I looked into the open bag and the reports were there. A moment later I followed her into the room. To my surprise, the bag fell on the ground and the report pages landed in the first open drawer, whereas the bag landed on the floor. My physical self was there; he ran towards the bag and carefully picked it up, and he also closed the drawer. The ceiling fan may have tipped off the bag but who opened the drawer is still a mystery to me.”
“Do you remember living the same moment as your physical self on the thirteenth of December?” Asks Swati.
“I vaguely remember it. The cook came around at 9:00 PM that night. And there was no one else other than Ankita and me in the apartment that night. Not even a stray Cat,” recalls Arjun.
“Perhaps we can ignore it for now. You can always revisit to confirm,” Asserts Swati.
“It’s is also possible that Ankita doesn’t know where the reports are,” Arjun continues.
“So, what shall we do next?” Asks Arjun
“First, let’s get the reports. We need to confirm if the mortuary still has the dead body or not. It’s time you start chasing Ankita from the moment when she was kidnapped. Let’s find out where she is being kept in the city.”