The Third Squad

by V. Sanjay Kumar

  “The city will never admit that the chawl has more character and local flavor than the skyscrapers.” This statement gets a small cheer.

  “The Parel chawl is in a mill area, a place that saw real industry that made real products. Now all these fancy buildings have white-collar workers who do not know how to do an honest day’s work. They come in fancy cars, these young kids, and they cannot even change a lightbulb.”

  “Some of us took to drink and others snorted things. Why? No idea. Why not? Maybe because that allowed us to sleep well. No, we are not cynical, but we become a little defeated after we hit forty. At fifty we are looking at our children and counting the ways in which they are different from us. That gives us hope.”

  Nandini walks back with the group as they board their bus. “I’d even be happy to raise a child in this atmosphere,” she tells them. “There is glitz, there is charade, there is glitter, and there is sham—it all coexists, and it’s messy, like life. Did you see the kitsch inside each home? Have you witnessed anything like it before?”

  The leader of the group speaks to her quietly. “Actually, one of the highlights of this visit was supposed to be meeting your husband. I promised them they would meet an encounter specialist. So sad he was away. I hope he wasn’t on another macabre assignment.”

  Nandini laughs. That is all she can do. She has no idea where Karan is. Her calls went straight to voice mail. She visited all their haunts last night, hiring a taxi and spending hours searching places she thought he might be. She was initially calm, very calm. She was sure she would find him. But when she didn’t, it began to hit her hard. She called Ranvir and he sounded worried. That wasn’t a good sign.

  “He’ll get in touch with Munna and Tapas,” he told her. “I am sure he will.”

  “What exactly happened yesterday?” she asked him. “Could you please tell me the truth?”

  He told her exactly what happened and she listened quietly.

  “Mr. Pratap,” she replied when he was finished, “I have never supported what my husband does and he knows it. But after last evening, whatever he did, I am proud.”

  Ranvir didn’t reply. He himself was conflicted for once. He needed time to sort out this messy affair in his mind. If only this bloody Tiwari would cool off for a bit.

  * * *

  The second day passes by slowly. You have found a hideout and you drop off to sleep for a while in the afternoon. Nandini comes to you in your dreams.

  “Karan.”

  She is standing behind the door. You have shut your eyes. You can do this. In your right hand you hold a gun. Your left hand reaches for the door latch.

  “Karan!”

  Squeeze the latch, slowly but surely. Take aim two inches above that perfect mouth. Say her name as you do it. She will widen her eyes.

  “Karan!!”

  The door squeaks as it opens slowly. You open your eyes. She stands framed, beautiful as ever. You squeeze the trigger and hear a dull click.

  “Very funny,” she says as she peeps into the dark room. “You have a call from a man called Evam.”

  She shoves a phone into your left hand and leaves. The door shuts and an unknown number glows in the dark.

  “Hello?” you say.

  “Where were you yesterday, Karan?” asks Evam.

  You trace your face with your fingers. “Dr. Madness,” you whisper.

  He laughs. “Man with a gun. Can we meet?”

  The simple question vexes you and you hesitate. “Can’t we just talk on the phone?” You suspect everyone right now.

  “No, it is better we meet.”

  “Fine,” you reply.

  “Good,” he says, and he hangs up. Why did he even call? Perhaps they were tracing your location. You don’t care because your movements were quick and obscure. You could lead sniffing dogs to their death.

  You dream of lunch at home as your mind wanders. You have lost your sense of taste. You laugh a lot at the table. Your wife stares at you, wondering, wanting to join in.

  “Karan!”

  Your hand holds a fork and your plate is empty. You drop it and take a deep breath and the smell of agarbattis makes you sneeze. You turn to look at the shrine in the corner. There are fresh flowers. She has prayed.

  “Karan, about yesterday.” She looks at you and you brace yourself. “Was he a bad man?” This unfailing question is the arbiter of reason in your marriage. Your answer is the glue.

  You don’t have to force yourself to nod. She sighs. For once you had made a decision she would have been proud of. Shouldn’t you tell her who this dead fellow was? You will yourself to stop justifying what you have done. Your boss Ranvir Pratap must have gotten the message—you still need a good reason to kill.

  * * *

  The third day is difficult because you are tired and yet you have to be constantly on the move. Your movement has been random thus far but you realize there is a pattern setting in. Someone will inevitably pick up your scent in the next day or two. Every mind is trained, Ranvir would tell the team. Thought has a pattern, a signature, and a trace, he would say.

  Your phone is giving you trouble. You keep it switched off but you are so restless, wanting to get in touch with Nandini, Tapas, Munna, Ranvir, Evam, your stillborn daughter. You start convincing yourself they cannot get to you and that you are finally anonymous, a true Mumbaikar at last. And so you go back to sleep.

  * * *

  You join a group that is out on a nighttime Heritage Walk led by Nandini. Walking after dark with a professional like Nandini is a different experience.

  “My friend asked me if I was the type that is constantly outraged. She said she meets people who are always expressing their dismay about the city.”

  “Does it come with age?” someone asks.

  “I guess so.” She stops suddenly and laughs at something. “Stand still. Look.”

  There are two street dogs and they are both interested in each other. The places they sniff make you want to gag.

  “Drag your eyes away from Animal Planet. Look back here. Tell me, what do you see?” She points to a shadowless spot. Is that a trick? You look to the source of light, a single street lamp above.

  “It is quite late,” someone says. “And this street has people milling about.”

  “What people? I don’t see anybody.”

  The hair on the nape of your neck stirs for some reason. Damn, the road is deserted, the sidewalk bare, and the sky? No clouds, no breeze, and no personality. This could be a film set.

  “You are making faces, did you know that?” she says, placing her hand upon yours, acknowledging you for the first time.

  You rub your hands on your thighs. A car is coming around the bend, preceded by its lights.

  “We should get out of the middle of the road. Now. Why don’t you step aside?”

  She jumps up onto the sidewalk. The lights swerve and travel across the wall, straightening into your face. Blinding beams, white light that dances and makes colored circles in your retina. Then it’s gone. You catch the tail end of the light. The car has a police license plate.

  She rubs her eyes. “Are you there? I can’t see.”

  “Still standing.”

  “You didn’t even try to come to me. What’s wrong with you?”

  You had been dreaming of mountains, grasslands, flowing water, and a weak sun; it feels like the onset of winter. You are rubbing your hands again.

  “Karan, walk with me.”

  “Do we have to hold hands?”

  “Just for a while.”

  “Nandini?”

  “Yes.”

  “How did I end up like this?”

  * * *

  You wake up now, rubbing your eyes. It’s still Day Three. You switch your phone on briefly and you receive a message in code. It’s from Lookout. We must meet in person. He mentions a place in Gorai Beach, an unmarked shack that you know. You set off in a roundabout way. It will take you two hours to get there.

  On the t
rain you have an out-of-body experience. One part of you exits the crowded compartment and clambers onto the roof, catches the overpass railing below the Dadar bridge, vaults onto the road, and goes home. Someone stamps your foot with a heel for dreaming and not moving. You look him in the eye till he turns to stone.

  At the shack you lose it, you completely fucking lose it when you see Lookout and Different. The two of them are there having taken a dare, having flouted every written rule to meet you. There is no holding back. All the months you have spent together with these two you hardly spoke, never had a drink, a chat, or a night out. And yet it didn’t matter. You could feel what you never felt before and perhaps they did too because you actually hugged each other. It was awkward. They wouldn’t let go for a while. Who was to say that you were Aspies? You were happy to stand there looking—not at each other, but just looking around. Occasionally you smiled, laughed, or shared a cigarette. It was a strange constellation in the dark on the beach with wind and sand, salt and sea, and perhaps some ghosts you had set free. Nobody was there to take anything away from you at this moment. Tapas had brought what you liked—red meat, tenderized, cooked medium. Munna had a bottle of spirits that had no label, fittingly. You sat down, the three of you, threw your heads back, and drank from the bottle till the last drop. Someone shouted later that night, someone sang, and a dog or two came by to check your litter and settle in the wet sand.

  Day Four: Encounter ThiRty-four

  The next morning you woke before sunrise, as you were trained to, and Tapas and Munna convinced you that the right thing to do was to go meet Nandini. Nobody can stop us, they said. You observed their faces in the half-light and you saw them for the first time. You felt a kinship and the feeling was warm, fuzzy, and comforting. This was foolhardy but it was the right thing to do and so much in keeping with what you had done at the airport.

  “How long will you run?” asked Munna.

  “Who are you running from?” asked Tapas.

  “It’s risky,” you replied. The decision was taken, and as you sat in the jeep with the two of them and headed south, you had no more questions.

  Cool air rushed past as you ate up the miles. You peered out at the empty streets. You occasionally looked behind as well to see if you were being followed. And you imagined what Nandini would be wearing today besides a slight frown.

  * * *

  Between the suburbs of Khar and Bandra the highway department had created one-way streets and roundabouts to tackle the traffic jams. The three of them were in a jeep and the morning sun had broken through as they entered Khar, heading south. Munna in dark glasses was driving and Tapas was next to him in the front passenger seat. Karan was in the middle of the backseat and his gun was with him as always.

  They turned onto a one-way bylane. Ahead, on the left side of the road, they spotted a colleague. He was bare-headed and was waving at them. But how did he know they were in the jeep? That question came just as Munna dimmed the jeep’s lights and slowed down. The man was carrying a folded newspaper with him.

  “Move it!” shouted Tapas. “Something’s not right, damnit!”

  Munna gunned the gas, but the jeep struggled to gather speed. Out of nowhere a large SUV threw on its high beams and tore directly at them from the opposite side. It had obviously been lying in wait. Two staccato bursts of gunfire suddenly erupted. Glass flew from the jeep as the windscreen shattered. Behind it Munna lost his dark glasses, his eyes, and some part of his head. Tapas lost his teeth but gained a strange smile. There was a splatter of fluid onto Karan’s clothes. He was sitting erect and miraculously he was unscathed, not even a scratch. And so he survived the gunfire. It seems he did not realize what he did thereafter: without thinking, he took his gun in hand, looked into that den of the SUV’s lights, and let off two shots—one where the driver would be, and the second one next to him where the shooter might be.

  Munna must have fallen like a rag doll onto the steering column, as the jeep swung sharply left. The vehicle smashed into a handcart that was reserving a spot between two parked cars, then climbed onto the sidewalk. The SUV continued to scream ahead and slammed head-on into a passing car. The car’s driver had no safety equipment—no air bag or seat belt. He took the steering column in his stomach, the windscreen in his face, and part of the engine block in one knee, momentarily losing consciousness. Meanwhile, one of the assailants flew out of the SUV and landed on top of the car’s hood. He lay there and leered. He had a hole in his head. Stuck inside the SUV was the driver. A neat cavity was drilled through his nose bridge; the back of his head was missing.

  Karan claims he does not remember what happened next. At the hospital, a bystander would later emerge from sedation to tell the story. He said what Karan did would give him nightmares for the rest of his life. Karan had jumped out of the car and fallen awkwardly. He had scrambled like a primate, pounced on a third occupant from the SUV, and pulled him apart with his hands. And then Karan sat down on the edge of the pavement and did not move.

  “Catatonic state,” said a doctor who quickly arrived at the scene from his nearby apartment. Karan emerged from this state within minutes, asking for biscuits and tea. He only had a few bruises and scratches. But he was drenched in other people’s blood, and had skin under his fingernails.

  They used brute force to bend metal and towel-covered hands to pluck away glass before lifting the injured driver from the unfortunate car. He was mumbling incoherently, but someone caught a sentence: “They were coming down a one-way.”

  An ambulance arrived and a paramedic dealt with him and then turned to treat Karan. He was gone. It seems he waited for the injured man to be placed in the ambulance and then disappeared from the scene. They checked for him at his residence, just in case. He had not shown up.

  But he did call. Karan rang home and spoke to his wife Nandini, finally. It was a very brief chat in which the meaningful remained unsaid. Nandini the brave lady sat down and cried. He asked her why. She said she was crying because he never did. “One day I will,” he replied.

  She had some parting words for him which she hoped would keep him alive: “Don’t trust anyone.” It was futile advice and she knew it because Evam had told her this when they met, when she complained that Karan was naive. “Trust comes naturally in the Aspie world,” he said.

  * * *

  The department asked Parthasarathy for an explanation. He had none. The entire building was in shock. They were trained to routinely handle emergencies, but this was different. The description of the incident seemed a little fantastic. When the details emerged Partha shook his head and said, “This was not supposed to happen.”

  “Exactly what do you mean, sir?” they asked him.

  “All of it,” he replied.

  Some people were puzzled that Karan got away unhurt. Others wondered at the fact that he could look into those bright lights, keep his eyes open, squeeze out shots between two moving cars, and be so accurate. What kind of man sits upright and stays calm when a meteor-like vehicle is hurtling into your face? And then he shoots only two bullets.

  Rumbles were heard at the most senior levels. People were more concerned with who the perpetrators were who set this up. Was this an inside job? Two of those in the SUV were from a gang that was linked to Abbas. But this still looked like an inside job because only the khabari network could have tracked the jeep with Ranvir’s team.

  Partha was given the task of informing Ranvir. Ranvir, who was still on medical leave following his coronary scare, did not react immediately. Nobody expected him to show too much emotion yet he was expected to retaliate somehow. He asked to meet the chief of counterintelligence—alone. He was granted an immediate audience. The two men had a frank discussion and after an hour or so agreed that they would deal firmly with Karan. It was an informal agreement influenced by Mishra’s view that the police force wasn’t a family franchise. “Dons can be paternal,” he said. “But we cannot. That would be repeating the mistakes of ’83. But if you feel
that Karan is ‘special’ and has some disability, then I can take a different view.”

  Ranvir thought that over and finally said, “He and the others are no different, and they are as good as any cops I have ever worked with. To give them ‘special’ dispensation would be a travesty.”

  Partha was asked to handle the Karan issue on his own. He was reluctant. “I fear he might disregard instructions again, in light of his recent behavior. There is a risk without Ranvir supervising.”

  “What’s the risk?” asked the chief.

  Partha tried to explain: “We’re concerned because he’s acting unpredictably. He attacked that man literally with his hands, remember?”

  “But the doctor who did the postmortem said he died out of fear, from a sudden rush of blood to the head, correct?” said the chief.

  Partha nodded. “A technicality. The doctor also said that the man who died had only one testicle.”

  “Oh shit,” said Mishra. “Fucking shit. I know where that points.”

  Partha prattled on: “The meltdown we feared has happened. Karan is clearly under severe stress and needs to be reined in.”

  “So who’s in his line of fire now?” asked the chief.

  “Perhaps he’s looking for a villain in all this. He is obsessive and compulsive and while people like him are supposed to be unemotional, how can we be so sure that what has happened to his team will not influence his actions? He must be confused. He needs closure.”

  “Could closure for him come from one last assignment?” asked the chief. “I don’t see him coming in on his own otherwise, and honestly, I would hate to hunt him down. After all, he is still one of us.”

  “I spoke to Evam,” said Partha. “I asked him if another encounter was the solution. And he said something interesting. He said, If you consider routine to be a destination, then Aspies are habitues. An encounter is Karan’s comfort zone.”