by Mukul Deva
* * *
In the control room, Ravinder too was studying the secure zone; his attention, however, was not on the party moving behind Chance. He was searching for some other movement. Any other movement.
“Come out, come out.… wherever you are,” he muttered aloud. “Whoever you are…”
That reminded him. He needed to find out if … His eyes continued to track the monitors as he reached for his mobile. “Where is Ruby?” he asked when the surveillance team leader answered.
“In the hotel, sir. Haven’t you met her yet? She went up with Mr. Thakur and Mohite, sir.”
Ravinder went still. He couldn’t breathe. Suspecting was one thing. Having it confirmed was another. He did not know when he ended the call.
Somehow, he’d kept hoping that Ruby would not be involved in something so heinous. Now, no room for doubt.
Why, Ruby? Why?
His heart began to spin.
Not now. Right now you have a duty to perform.
From somewhere within, a quote from the Bhagavad Gita echoed through him:
And do thy duty, even if it be humble, rather than another’s, even if it be great. To die in one’s duty is life: to live in another’s is death.
“I know you well, Ravinder. I know you will always do the right thing. Just trust your instincts. It will all work out in the end.” Simran’s words from two nights ago returned to him. He no longer knew how this could end well, but he was determined to take charge.
On the monitors, he began to scour the seventh floor. It lay still and silent. But he knew. She was out there somewhere. Waiting for the right moment to strike.
“Ruby, come out, come out…” He did not know when his lips moved. “Come out, come out … wherever you are.…”
His ears did not hear them.
His eyes remained riveted on the monitors.
His hands now held a gun.
The hide-and-seek game had turned deadly.
* * *
Satisfied with what she was going to do and how, Ruby withdrew both weapons from her belt and calmed herself. Her eyes stayed riveted to the monitor, watching for any change in the deployment of the men she meant to ambush.
Chance’s party now had reached the stairwell between the two floors.
Perfect. Ruby forced her metabolism to slow down, but her adrenaline had peaked. Her body now was craving to catapult forward.
She knew the next few minutes would be her last. But it was okay.
Mom is waiting. She … they … are banking on me. I will not let them down.
Drawing another long breath, she again stilled her nerves and started to turn.
That was when the third man behind Chance looked up, an inadvertent glance, not even aware that the camera was directly overhead, in front of him. But it was and he had looked straight into it.
He was dressed like Sir Geoffrey Tang and made up like him, right down to the slightly graying, long sideburns and pointed goatee. But he was not Sir Tang. Having traveled with him for a week, Ruby knew the British MP. Enough to know this man was an impostor. He was too … young …
Yes! That was it.
Ruby held back. She began to reexamine all thirteen men behind Chance. Then the subterfuge became obvious. Despite their clever makeup, she now could tell they were not the delegates; they were decoys. As she intensified her scrutiny, she noted the weapons carried by the decoy-delegates. Concealed, yes, but each was carrying one.
Ruby’s mind changed gears.
If these are decoys, then where are the real ones?
The answer came with a snap.
In one of the other conference rooms on the eighth floor.
Her mind began generating a new plan.
If that guy had not looked up, I would have flown right into their trap.
A new feeling of respect for Ravinder swept through her. One hell of an adversary.
Like father, like daughter? But he does not want me.… Stop!
Think!
The minute they launched the decoys, hadn’t they also given her an open playing field?
Every tactic has a weakness: the more daring it was, the more crucial the weakness. That was the nature of the beast.
Ruby could not see any security personnel on the eighth floor. She knew they would be there, but not many. A lot of guards on a supposedly abandoned floor would have been a dead giveaway.
Adapt!
Ruby reevaluated. If the decoys had been deployed, then they knew she had penetrated the secure zone, no other reason.
Now the decoys had crossed the seventh floor and were continuing down. Ruby watched Chance peel away at the landing and head for the control room. She waited till he pushed open the door and entered. The door began to swing shut behind him. The corridor was clear.
Now!
Strike!
Ruby raced out, headed for the stairwell on the far side, away from the control room. She was moving silently, as fast as her feet could carry her. Straight for the eighth floor.
Going for the kill.
* * *
The control room door was swinging shut behind Chance when Ravinder saw Ruby charge out of his room. Pistols in both hands, she was sprinting down the corridor. He knew her destination. That she was moving away from the decoys showed that she had seen through them and spurned the bait.
He ran out of the control room, shouting at Chance to follow him. As they ran, he explained. A few words were enough. The two put on a burst of speed, knowing that the delegates now were in mortal danger.
They were passing the elevator when its door pinged open and a harried Mohite stepped out. He was about to say something, but Ravinder pulled him out of the way and dived into the elevator with Chance behind him. Chance stabbed at the eighth-floor button, frantically willing the doors to close. They took forever. Then it began to rise, slowly and sedately as always. The two men inside strained to be unleashed.
The doors pinged open and they dashed out on the eighth floor.
Not a soul in sight. Only a deserted corridor.
* * *
Ruby raced up, taking the stairs two at a time. She was in peak condition, but her breath nonetheless burned through her lungs in short, ragged bursts. But her mind was sharp and focused. Her fingers were curled around the triggers of the Hi-Power Brownings, itching for the delegates to appear in her gunsights. Nothing else mattered.
She arrived a split second after Ravinder and Chance. She heard the ping of the elevator doors before she saw them. Swiveling, she changed direction, heading for the two smaller conference halls across the floor. It had to be one of those two rooms.
Chance saw her blur of movement and shouted. The two turned and chased after her. Despite those daily hours in the gym, Ravinder was not moving as fast as he wanted to. The younger, fitter Chance began to pull ahead. But he too was not moving fast enough. Summoning up his reserves, he ramped up the pace.
Suddenly Ruby spun around and fired. Twice. Then she was off again.
Both shots went wide, but they’d forced Chance to drop. Coming up from behind, too fast to stop, Ravinder blundered into him. By the time they got up, the distance between them and Ruby had increased.
* * *
Ruby was flying, her feet skimming over the carpeted corridor in long, flashing strides. As she skidded around a corner, she spotted Ido Peled standing at the door of the conference room on the right and knew the delegates had to be behind it. Like a linebacker, the tall, fair Peled stood with his back to the door, his weapon in hand. He tensed as she charged around the corner and came at him full tilt.
The body armor and baseball cap must have confused Peled. He’d seen Jennifer wearing those just a while ago. So he hesitated a second before bringing up his gun. That fraction of time cost him his life.
Ruby fired the unsilenced gun in her right hand, for its longer range and accuracy. The shot boomed and reverbrated, spurring on Chance and Ravinder.
Peled was dead before his body hit the flo
or.
Chance, now within range, raised his weapon and fired, twice. The first bullet buzzed past Ruby’s head and thwacked into the thick wooden door of the conference room. The second hammered into Ruby. Jennifer’s jacket limited the damage, but the high-velocity shock made her stagger. Still, she managed to throw open the door and charge into the conference room. She hit the door hard with her heel after she sprinted inside. It slammed shut behind her with a bang.
That was followed by more bangs, sharper, louder, and so close together that Ravinder could not tell how many shots had been fired.
Then Chance was at the door. Without checking his stride, he shouldered it in and ran inside.
Ravinder burst in hard on his heels.
* * *
Chance ground to a halt, the pistol in his hand still half-raised. He froze; the slightest move and Ruby would put a bullet in his head; her weapons were up and smoking. Ravinder again blundered into him.
Ruby’s left-hand pistol was pointed straight at Chance’s head. Her face was alabaster. Frozen. Immobile. Bereft of emotion. Only her eyes hinted at the turmoil inside her. Tiny seething dots, tense with concentration.
She was about eight feet away, her chest heaving, but the Brownings in her hands were rock steady. The weapon in her right was placed against Senator George Polk’s head. And now no charm or smile on his face, just sheer panic. A low, almost inaudible keening sound crooned out of him.
Raj Thakur, Ghazi Baraguti, and Prince Ghanim Abdul Rahman al-Saud lay in grotesque poses around the conference table; they had been the closest when Ruby stormed in and opened fire. It did not matter to her. Every delegate was fair game. And she had gone for the headshot with all three.
Thakur’s body had slipped to the floor. The top half of his pristine white kurta now bright red with blood. Baraguti was half in his chair and half across the table, rising when he stopped a bullet. Thick treacly blood was seeping out from his head and onto the teak tabletop. With his face blown away, there was nothing regal about the Saudi prince now. Bits of blood, brains, and bone were sprayed across the other delegates—all frozen in horror. Gun smoke furled in the stark room.
For one tiny but endless second, everything came to a standstill.
“Ruby, don’t do it. Please.” Ravinder’s voice broke the frozen tableau. He was having trouble speaking; he could have sworn it was Rehana standing in front of him. “Don’t! It’s over. No one else needs to die.”
“No, Father, it’s not.” Ruby’s voice was pitched high, as though drawn from a tightly strung wire. Her face a grim mask. “It will never be over till our people are allowed to live in peace and with dignity. The killing has to stop.”
“That is why they are here. To stop the killing.” Despite her fiery posture, he could sense an uncertainty inside her. Somehow he had to keep her talking. As long as she is talking, her guns will stay silent. His mind lanced out, seeking the right words.
“No,” she intoned, “they are not here for justice. They will sell us out, the way they have always done. This summit cannot go on.” Still that same high-pitched Rehana-like tone, flush with emotion. “Our people cannot be sold out any longer.”
“But no need now for more killing, Ruby.” Ravinder’s voice had taken on a softer, neutral but firm negotiator’s tone. As he spoke, he inched slowly to his right, trying to ensure Chance was no longer in his line of fire.
“Stop that, Father.” Ruby gestured with her weapon. A sharp flick. “Don’t move.”
“Fine, I won’t.” Ravinder slowly raised his left hand, palm forward, in a placating gesture. His right was at his side, still holding his revolver. “Don’t you see how pointless all this is? The dust will never settle … neither for the Palestinians nor the Jews … not until they sit down and talk.” Ravinder pleaded, “Drop your weapons. I promise I will do everything possible to defend you in court.”
“No, Father, I will not be taken alive.” He heard the sorrow in her voice, but her tone was steady, though he also sensed flecks of indecision.
Ravinder now knew he would be able to talk her down.
“Ruby—”
Without warning, the door flew open and Mohite burst in with a gun in his hand. His eyes widened as he took in the scene. His gun hand began to rise.
Ruby’s eyes narrowed into sharp slits.
“No!” Ravinder yelled.
But too late.
BOOM! POP! BOOM! BOOM! POP!
Ravinder’s cries were drowned out by gunfire.
Both Ruby’s weapons had blazed into action, the soft pop of the silenced one submerged by the booming roar of the other.
The gun in her right hand had remained planted right against the senator’s head. It disintegrated, spraying the table with chunks of bone and blood. Some of it sprayed onto the faces of Yossi Gerstmann and Ghafar al-Issa, the Jordanian, across the table. Both recoiled. Someone else screamed. But the continuing roar of gunfire drowned it out.
The gun in Ruby’s left hand missed its mark. Instead of shooting out Chance’s throat, it caught him high on the collarbone, just above the upper lip of his body armor, and spun him to the left. Ruby’s gun had meanwhile moved on to Mohite. The bullet slammed into his face and made the back of his head into a bloody fresco all over the door he had just raced through.
* * *
Simultaneously, Chance jerked up his gun hand and fired. He got one shot off before he too was hit. But as his body took the hit and spun to the left, he fired again. Both bullets took Ruby in the middle of her body. And once again, the body armor shielded her. But the double blows delivered at this close range threw her backward. And Chance kept firing till his clip ran out.
* * *
As Chance spun to his left, Ravinder’s field of fire cleared. His hand came up like a flash, and the gun in it thudded to life. Once. Twice. Thrice.
In the confines of the conference room, the boom of gunshots was endless thunder.
The terrorist was down. And still.
* * *
Ravinder watched Ruby being thrown back as bullets pounded into her. She hit the wall behind. Then slowly slid to the ground. For a moment she lay still, and then slowly curled up in a fetal ball.
Now the Rehana-like harpy who had terrified them vanished. Ravinder saw only the little girl who had once loved pink frocks and lollipops.
The pistol in Ravinder’s hand felt like a block of ice, but heavier … much heavier. He did not know when his hand let go, and it hit the carpeted floor with a thud.
Then someone moaned, and reality struck like a sledgehammer.
Ravinder the cop then stepped forward and kicked the guns away from Ruby. And Ravinder the father knelt beside her.
The door blew open, and a horde of security people rushed inside.
* * *
Kneeling beside Ruby, Ravinder was oblivious of the hullabaloo around him. He had zoned out. The cop had done his duty. He had been made to walk the hardest path that his karma could have called for, and he had not flinched.
But the cop was no longer there. Only the father.
Ravinder wished he were dead. He wished he had not fired. He wished he had been the target for Ruby’s guns. Not the delegates, not Chance, not Mohite—just him. He would have paid the price eagerly.
Ravinder cradled Ruby in his arms. As he did, her eyes flickered open. She was alive, but barely. Ravinder sensed time was abysmally short, and he wanted to be with his little girl. For one last time.
Ruby opened her mouth. She seemed to be trying to say something, but only frothy bubbles of blood emerged.
With her eyes, Ruby beckoned him closer. He went. Now his ear was against her mouth. The low whisper, when it emerged finally, was drawn out, barely audible.
“Jasmine told me … that whenever … she was sick … or hurt … you would always … hold her … and put her to sleep.”
He nodded. Even if he had tried to reply, he knew he couldn’t. Everything in him had choked up.
“I am … h
urting … Daddy.” The words emerged in broken gasps. “Will you … put … me to sleep … Daddy … please?”
Ravinder managed to speak, a bare whisper. “Yes, princess.” He knew his Ruby needed him to … for this one last time. “Of course I will.”
Ravinder could feel her slipping away. Never had he felt so helpless. He held her close. Really close. And he could feel her breath mingle with his; it felt cold, like her blood, which soaked his shirt. Her lips closed in on his cheek. For a moment they were one again. Father and daughter.
The pressure on his cheek tightened. Then lightened. And Ruby lay still in his arms. Cold. Lifeless. Heavy. Empty. As empty and cold as the void inside him.
But he could not let go of her.
By time they managed to get Ravinder to release her, the light had faded from Ruby’s eyes.
His precious princess was gone. Again. And this time she would never be back.
THE DAYS AFTER
With five delegates dead, there was no hope that the peace summit would proceed. The surviving, shell-shocked men departed within hours.
People—those in the know and those who would make decisions and could influence change—knew that the dust would never settle … at least not anytime in the near future.
Till sense and compassion took hold. If it ever did.
* * *
Safely ensconced in Muridke, Pasha was thrilled to hear of the carnage. And the fact that the British had trained Ruby made his victory all the more sweet. How gratifying, after all, to kill an enemy with his own sword. And it was also poetic justice, since Pasha believed that it was the British who had destroyed the Ottoman Caliphate and were primarily responsible for the plight of the Palestinians. After all, it was on their watch that Israel had crushed the Palestinians.
Pasha was jubilant when he shared the news with Saeed Ahmed, the LeT supremo.
“We must extract maximum mileage from this,” Ahmed asserted.
“True,” Pasha agreed. “Operations with such massive propaganda value rarely happen.”
“Also use this opportunity to strengthen our ties with Hamas. There is much we can do for the jihad if we work together.”
“What do you have in mind?”