by Vadhan
‘Om.’
The one syllable that won speech.
‘Om,’ he said again, a third time.
His work was done. His purpose was served.
ESHWAR stood between the tantrik and Sheila. But he wasn’t even facing the tantrik; he was simply standing over Sheila. He appeared to be studying her stomach. The tantrik weaved his magical hands to send smoky demons with heads like lizards and tails ending in smoke after the man. They never made it. They dissipated. Eshwar rolled his wrists. His left wrist counter-clock wise and his right wrist clock wise. Both his swords flew out of his hands and sliced the tantrik into half.
He was still alive, grinning doltishly while his lower torso was thrashing obstinately by his side.
‘Get a new midriff if you can,’ said P. Eshwar as he passed the tantrik, carrying Sheila.
‘What about that bastard?’ Kant asked.
‘His time is up, be with me if you want to save your life,’ said Eshwar.
‘Has the Sutram won, is it too late?’
Eshwar shook his head, ‘On the contrary, the Agniputr is here.’
AT that precise moment, the doors of the inner hall blew apart. Kant heard the initial part of the primordial sound. ‘OOOOOO...’ then everything went white.
The tantrik saw the Agniputr rising. He screamed his anguish.
The tadpole like things within the Sutram broke free. Now they resembled large golden bumble bees as they buzzed incessantly for a few moments before they took flight in different directions, each searching for a nest to procreate more of its kind, grow as big as the Sutram, and consume. The orb of energy known as the Sutram was as flaccid as an empty sack.
The golden bumble bees recognised the river of white that was fast approaching them. It was their nemesis. Like a magnificent wave of gold, they turned back into the chasm. They zipped down the blackened rock face which was until recently crackling with streaks of electricity.
They were headed for the depleted sack. It had no more energy left. It had transferred all its strength to the bees. They were supposed to create nests. They were supposed to bring in more of their kind. They were the future, each capable of growing as big as the Sutram. Each capable of releasing millions of their kind, until all of the planet was consumed.
The Sutram had seen that future a long time ago. It still carried that memory until the last crackle of electrical energy died in it.
The golden bees desperately bargained to enter the protective shroud they were so used to. It could not be. Their incubator was done for. They realised they were on their own. If they escaped the sea of white, the world was theirs to take.
They whirled and twirled in the air. They crashed into each other. To an observer it appeared like they were quite insane.
With metallic clicks they conjoined on themselves until they were a long braid of gold. The braid lashed out against the river of white. Wherever the braid touched it, the white crumbled. Like fire burning a piece of celluloid. The white would then foam forth to douse the burns, at the same time herding the bees into the chasm. Deeper and deeper into the chasm the golden braid withdrew.
Until they were visible no more.
Until there was only the whiteness of the Agniputr.
A probability was extinguished.
IN her dream, Sheila witnessed the destruction of the Sutram. She was witness to a re-enactment of creation of life. The white of the Agniputr spread through the devastated room, it filled the memorial hall. It filled Gudem. It started to spread over the horizon until there was only white. Even in the dream, she marvelled at the magnificence of it. Was she witnessing the birth of a new universe?
All of a sudden she found herself standing on the first floor veranda of the castle at Gudem. Raghu was down below, on the grounds. He was about to climb into his shiny red off-roader. There was another man in the passenger seat of the car. He was hidden by the roof of the vehicle except for his legs. They were limp and lifeless. Raghu turned around and smiled at her. She gazed down at the man she loved. Her heart ached to see him go.
‘Hi Sci-fi, I’ll see you around,’ Raghu said to Sheila in her dream.
‘Raghu,’ she said in a daze, ‘where are you going?’
Raghu said, ‘Into a brand new world.’
‘Will you be back home for dinner?’ she asked.
He smiled at her. That dazzling, mischievous smile that transformed him into a boy.
‘Don’t go,’ she protested, ‘you promised.’
‘Don’t worry,’ said Raghuram Surya. Then he was gone from her dream. Like dispersing smoke. Like a ghost.
IT was daylight when Sheila came awake. At least it felt like daylight. Everything was a bright white. P. Eshwar was sitting alongside her on a mound of brightest blue with one leg folded on the other. His two swords were by his side. There was no one around save the prone figure of the unconscious Kant who did not have a scratch on his body. Sheila sat up.
‘Where is he?’
‘He chose his path. He could have walked away from it all with you.’
‘I don’t believe you. You trapped us into this.’
Eshwar said, ‘You found each other because of ‘this’.’
Sheila had to agree that was true, if not, she would never have met Raghu, never have loved him.
‘Please, what is this place, where am I?’
‘Wherever you want to be. Now’s the time for right choices, choose well.’
‘What do you mean?’ she said, confused.
Eshwar threw up his hands in exasperation. ‘Sometimes, I can’t understand scientists. They ask just too many questions for their own good and they can never make quick decisions,’ he complained, but he was mild about it. His eyes were twinkling with humour...for the first time.
Sheila realised she should be bone tired. Raghu was not there anymore, he was gone, part of the formula that made up the Agniputr.
She knew it.
She had seen the formula. She just hadn’t realised then that Raghu was part of it.
‘Very well, I wish...’
‘Wait,’ said Eshwar, ‘you lost the chance, the choice is not yours to make anymore,’ he said.
‘Whose choice is it then, yours?’
He nodded.
‘And who are you to make my choices?’
‘Who do you think I am?’ he asked.
‘You tell me. You come and go at will, you are always there when everything else fails. You are successful, resourceful and obviously powerful. You must be a heavy weight who pulls a lot of strings to get things done your way. Do you work for the government? Do you represent a foreign power? Who are you?’
‘I am none of these things.’
‘I am almost afraid to ask, are you…an extra-terrestrial? That’s it, isn’t it? You’re an alien. Has to be. An intelligent life form here to protect us from our own follies.’
Eshwar considered her questions for a long moment.
‘Each time you called for my help, I came. Think back. Who am I?’ he asked.
‘You tell me.’
‘All right, I am the question.’
‘What kind of an answer is that?’
‘What, a man has no right to give an answer that pleases him?’
‘So how do I find out who you are? Where’s your team? You said I can meet them.’
Eshwar shrugged like an innocent ten-year-old.
‘You’re my team. Kant here is my team. Poti is my team. Surya was in my team. As for finding out who I am, keep at it. You are still finding out what the universe is all about. You’ve just started to ask yourself why its there in the first place. Eventually, you will find the answers, or at least some of them.’
‘Are you a scientist? I remember you telling me that you’ve done a lot of experimentation in your time.’
Eshwar again considered her question for a moment. ‘I am a scientist if you want to see it that way, yes, I guess I am.’
‘What kind of experiments did you do, what di
d you find?’
‘Myself,’ he said.
Sheila laughed, ‘Well that’s a start.’
‘Yes...it is. A good start! In fact, that started it all.’
‘So if you are the question, what is the answer?’
‘I am, when you realise the answer to your question.’ Eshwar laughed. It was the most glorious thing Sheila had heard. She was astonished to realise this was how she had felt inside the Tirumala Tirupati sanctum sanctorum.
‘You are the question and you are the answer, how can that be?’
‘Figure it out,’ he said.
‘Please, where is Raghu?’ she pleaded. ‘Will he ever come back?’
‘Don’t you see him in me?’
She nodded her head. It was true. ‘Yes I do,’ she said.
‘Then why do you ask Sheila, quantum physicist?’ Eshwar queried.
‘What is the meaning of all this?’
‘That is the trillion-dollar question everyone is asking. Like I said, figure it out. Take your time.’
‘If...if...you are...you know...who I think, why didn’t you stop the Sutram?’ she asked.
‘Who else do you think stopped it?’ Eshwar asked her back.
‘You did not. Raghu and his father stopped it...’
‘I have to use something or someone. I can’t just wave my hands to set things right, you know.’
‘What am I supposed to do now? How can I explain all of this?’
‘There is life inside you and its growing. Give it a better world than the one given to you. It is for you to do that. You have control over what you define. I am just a backup plan, the one everyone blames. Best part is, when it suits them, people think I don’t even exist. Its atoms all the way, you see. It’s a double whammy. Damned if I do, damned if I don’t.’
Sheila searched Eshwar’s eyes. She realised who he was. Of course she did. Just like Surya Prasad must have realised it all those years ago. She just could not come to terms with it. It could not be. It was against everything science believed in.
‘I am glad you realise me. My work here is done. I am going now. I have other business to attend to.’
‘Wait...don’t go...please...there’s so much I need to ask you…
CHAPTER 45
...WAIT!’
Sheila bolted upright. She was in a brightly lit room, lying on a bed. There were all sorts of instruments in the room. Some of them were attached to her. Monitoring equipment. Intravenous tubes. Her mouth tasted like chemicals. Her tongue was so dry, it felt like sand.
Thirsty.
Water.
Rain was splattering against the window pane. The skies were dark with pregnant clouds. Thunder boomed, rattling the windows. The rain made her ache for a drink of water.
Sheila felt a strange warmth in her stomach. It was familiar. A happy feeling enveloped her. She ran her hand on her stomach and found a familiar mound.
A streak of lightning brightened the grey skies. Sheila let out a little shout. For a moment, she was back in the memorial hall, being dragged to the Sutram by Kiromal.
‘It’s over. We won. The Sutram is destroyed.’
She kept telling herself that.
The door flew open. A figure stood in the doorway.
Sheila recognised the figure. It was instinctive. Like drawing breath. It was impossible not to know him. But it was impossible for him to be here and now.
He was dead.
How could this be?
He was dead.
She screamed again, edging away from the the advancing man.
It was a nightmare. She had to wake up!
‘Hey, Sweetie, it’s me. It’s all right. You’re safe now,’ he said.
The familiar voice. The long curly hair. The quizzical look in his eyes. It was not possible.
He was dead!
He was dead!
‘W-who are you? Why do you look like my dead husband? Who are you?’
‘Dead husband? I should hope not,’ he said, laughing. ‘It’s me, Sweetie. It’s Alok.’
‘Alok?’
‘Hey Sheilu baby. I thought I lost you when I pulled you out of that manhole. You weren’t even breathing.’
‘I wasn’t breathing? No, that’s not true. I was wide awake. You went for other people after me. I waited for you to come out. You never came out. You…died!’
Alok took her in his arms and held her close to him. She could smel1 the Old Spice on him. She put her arms around him.
‘In which version of reality did that happen?’ Alok asked. ‘You were unconscious. You swallowed a lot of water. The worst was the nasty crack on your head when you knocked yourself out against the iron lip of the manhole. They had to stitch you up. You’ve been out for a week, sweetie. They said you were in a coma. It’s a miracle you’re awake again.’
She reached for him. His face, the hands, his hair.
‘Alok?’
‘Yes, love of my life.’
‘W-Which year is it?’
‘Year? 2005 of course.’
‘Mom and Dad?’
Alok rang a bell positioned alongside the bed. The door flew open. The doctors and nurses came rushing in. Her parents followed the medicos into the room. They both wore wide happy smiles.
Sheila laughed and she cried. ‘When he takes something away, he gives a lot more in return,’ she said.
‘Who?’
‘He should be alive too ...’
Alok stared at her... ‘What are you talking about?’
She gazed at him... ‘Eh? Oh! Alok! A dream, no...a nightmare, a terrible nightmare...it felt so real.’
AS days turned to months for Sheila, memories of Gudem started to fade away as though they were never there in the first place. She could not recall Raghu’s face anymore, nor the sound of his voice. She could barely recall Kant and Poti’s names for a while longer until they too faded away.
Sheila ran her hand over her bulging stomach. She smiled tenderly at the life growing inside her. The delivery was due in a couple of months. Alok had already readied their child’s bedroom. It had a cradle, a baby cot, lot of toys and it was painted pink. Alok was sure it was a baby girl. She did not care. It was hers. She loved her baby more than anything else.
At that moment, Alok walked into the living room. He was in his customary navy blue cotton pants and white cotton shirt.
‘Sheilu sweetie, give me the doctor’s prescription. I’ll have the pharmacy chacha deliver the medicines.’
‘It’s in my purse,’ she said absently.
She turned back to gaze out of the window. The skies were a startling blue with cotton white clouds drifting aimlessly through them. Mumbai summers were humid but the sea breeze had set in early that day.
Alok brought her purse.
‘Oh, Come on. It’s right in there. Can’t you take it?’ she asked, succumbing to a sliver of irritation.
‘What? Are you crazy? That’s a lady’s purse. Sometimes, in the dead of the night, things move inside it. I will not put my hand into that thing.’
Sheila was laughing. She pulled out the piece of paper for him.
Alok left, allowing her to drift back to her cloudy daydreams. Soon enough he was back. ‘This is not it, Sheilu,’ he said, giving her back the prescription. He appeared cross.
Sheila unfolded the piece of paper curiously.
The world exploded at that moment. She could not bring herself to draw a single breath. Tears started to roll down her face along with cold sweat.
‘No,’ she panted. ‘It can’t be true. No, no, no.’
Alok was instantly at her side. ‘Sheilu, hey. What’s true? Hey, are you ok?’
She held on to him, burying her face into his chest, crying like a child. Alok took the paper from her. There were equations scribbled on it. He had no clue what they were.
Sheila took back the Agniputr formula from her husband.
Flipped the page.
Read the scribbled sentence on the paper.
; ‘Remember our time together.’
-Parameshwar.
Below it, an inscription from the Black Yajurveda.
‘Agnír éka ksarena vacam úd ajayat’
Sheila started to laugh. A hysterical cacophony of sound. Tears were rolling down her face in a stream. The nerves on her neck were standing out with strain. Her eyes were as wild as a wounded horse.
Alok took her by the shoulders and gave his wife a firm shake. ‘Sheilu, come to your senses. What is wrong with you?’
Sheila ran her fingers over the blue ink. Memories were flooding back. Memories that had faded away. They were ramming into her mind like angry ocean waves. Govind Kiromal. The Tantrik. The Castle of Gudem. The Memorial Hall. Poti. Kant. Rathaya. Most of all, she remembered him.
His voice.
His laughter.
His sacrifice.
His name was a whisper on her trembling lips.
Sheila knew now whose child she was carrying. Beyond doubt. It had to be. P. Eshwar had secreted her away with the child. Back in time. She turned to Alok. A quick twist of her head. She spoke evenly, like a lecturer explaining basics in mathematics. ‘It is the formula for creating the Agniputr,’ she said in answer to his question.
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
She smiled. ‘It means there is a God. His name is P. Eshwar. In his own way, he’s watching over us.’
Alok stared at her for a moment before he burst out laughing. He kissed her on her forehead. ‘I am getting late. What say we go for a movie tonight,’ he said.
She shook her head. ‘I don’t think that’s possible.’ Alok thought his wife was wearing a strange expression. Like she was about to go to war. Her hand was gently but firmly over her stomach, as though protecting the baby.
‘Why not?’
‘Because I’ll be busy Alok... I have to write my daughter a story. It’s about castles and demons and how her father fought a monster inside a chasm and saved the world.’
‘Really? What’s it going to be called, your story?’
Sheila said, ‘Agniputr!’
Alok smiled benevolently. ‘Why do you have to write it right now? Maybe we can go for a movie tonight. You can start writing from tomorrow.’