Kalkoot- The Lost Himalayan Secret

by S Venkatesh

  Images of Egyptian mummies, men buried alive as punishment in ancient tombs; of ancient texts that said that not only minds and bodies, but even souls, could suffocate; running from chamber to chamber for centuries, stuck in this tunnel; waiting for deliverance, but hearing only echoes from the walls; of having as company only his own voice from centuries past, and his rotting flesh and bones . . .

  Was he going mad?

  ***

  Along the stream near Yumthang, Wednesday, 11.15 p.m.

  Damini had perched herself at a height on the hill directly abutting the stream, opposite the ledge.

  The Maestro and his team were almost directly below her on the bed of the stream. They were trying to anchor a giant ladder on the bed of the stream.

  The bright moonlight, coupled with the floodlights from the Maestro’s team, gave Damini a clear view. She counted a total of twelve people, including men armed with machine guns and grenades.

  The Maestro’s party had started using ugly machines to drill holes into the icy surface of the hill in order to get footholds to ascend to the ledge.

  From a distance, Damini could hear the sounds of thunder as the temperamental weather once again started to play its tricks.

  Amidst the still mountains, the drilling machines made a deafening noise which fused with the sound of thunder, almost as if signalling the impending arrival of hell’s fury.

  ***

  Inside the Cave, Wednesday, 11.25 p.m.

  An image flashed through Sameer’s mind in a brief moment of lucidity.

  When he had joined Bancroft Cohen, they had made him undergo a series of medical tests. One test in particular came to mind now: the hearing test.

  ‘This won’t take long,’ the stern-looking, middle-aged lady had said. She had reminded him of his school headmistress.

  The room was soundproof. Sameer remembered feeling very still that day. His mind was not chattering, and he had been able to concentrate like never before, almost savouring the beauty of the silence. In the hearing test, he had been able to discern the most intricate and nuanced of sound frequencies, prompting the lady to remark that he seemed to have the hearing of a man, a bat and a dog all put together.

  For a second, crouched in the cave, Sam thought that he had finally lost it. Why, of all things, would this memory come to his mind as he was struggling to stay alive?

  And then it struck him.

  He was hearing something.

  Maybe he was hallucinating. His knees and hip were hurting badly, the pain seemingly penetrating right through to the core of his brain. There was no way he could hear clearly through all the pain and the wooziness.

  All the same, a tiny part of his mind told him that maybe he really was hearing something. Mild, faint, almost inaudible, but real nevertheless.

  ***

  It was such an insignificant sound that he could hear it only if his mind was absolutely quiet. The slightest hint of anxiety or excitement, and the sound got drowned out.

  It was almost as if it was designed to be heard only when he had achieved a state of complete stillness of mind, free from chatter and baggage from the past.

  The ninth and tenth verses now made sense.

  Verse 9

  He who survives the torrent of fear and gets past the ocean of despair

  Keeping at bay the ever-lingering insanity

  He shall find the rhythm of stillness

  And finally hear the sound of his heart.

  Verse 10

  Silence is the language of the gods

  Silence is the deliverance of the soul

  What is inaudible to a layperson

  Is audible to the seeker who is one with the silence.

  For a few seconds, Sam remained silent. Absolutely silent. No trace of thought, no trace of emotion.

  And he heard it again. The sound was coming from his right.

  Gone again.

  Again, Sam waited, his mind still, primed to receive.

  And he heard it again. It seemed like a tiny drop of water falling, unmistakably to his right.

  His mind’s ear followed the sound; it was directly next to his right shoulder.

  ‘The rhythm of stillness.’ Sam steadied his nerves, and concentrated.

  A light ‘tttp’. A drop of water hesitatingly dripping.

  He gingerly tried to move his right shoulder, keeping the rest of his body still. It was a superhuman effort. The shortage of oxygen, the stiffness from hours of crouching and the weight of his mind’s meanderings all seemed to weigh on his shoulder.

  All he could manage was to expand his shoulder muscle towards the source of the sound, but that was progress nevertheless.

  It took another fifteen minutes, and ten iterations, and the tip of his shoulder was now close to the source of the sound.

  Sam’s body ached from the effort, but he paid no attention to that, his mind absolutely still.

  He inhaled with difficulty, the lack of oxygen constricting the passages of his lungs, and exerted a final push with his shoulder muscle.

  His muscle touched what seemed like a hollow stretch of wall directly adjoining the source of the sound.

  The wall moved, slowly at first, then progressively faster, parting with a grinding sound, until it revealed a wide passage beyond.

  CHAPTER 47

  Inside the Cave, Wednesday, 11.40 p.m.

  Sam could barely control a gasp of wonder as the passage led into a massive chamber.

  The sanctum of the Gupt-Kandara.

  As he reflected on how he cracked the last Agony—by hearing the ‘inaudible’ sound in the dark, claustrophobic tunnel—Sam felt a surge of respect and admiration for the Yogyaveer who had designed and created this impressive series of tests.

  This chamber was much cooler than the rest of the Cave. The chemiluminescent rocks, combined with reflected light from the walls, gave off an almost ethereal glow.

  The chamber’s ornately carved walls, pillars and platforms were adorned with the most intricate of paintings and sculptures.

  Sam squinted as he drew closer. There were images of royal courts, kings and battles, but there were also images from the lives of common people—harvests, festivals, travels, markets and the like.

  A complete, uninterrupted narrative of the history of India, conveyed through the most beautiful of artefacts dating back to ancient times. The treasure that the Yogyaveer had spent seventy years guarding.

  Bani would be thrilled, Sam mused, as he stood there for a second, bowing, thankful for everything.

  There were two mini-chambers leading off the main sanctum, one each to the right and the left. Sam stepped into the one on the right.

  It had many alcoves set into the wall. Some of the alcoves contained modern books on a wide range of subjects, including mechanical and electrical engineering. Sam had a ‘aha’ moment; so this was how the Yogyaveer had kept up to speed on latest technical developments and designed the Great Agonies.

  As Sam peered into one of the alcoves, he saw that it contained what seemed like series of old books with intricate lettering, written on dried palm leaves.

  He stepped closer and looked at one of the books. The lettering was in Sanskrit.

  He realised with shock that he was probably looking at one of the oldest books in existence—a manuscript of one of the Upanishads.

  ***

  Sam left the books behind. He knew Bani would be disappointed, but the experts and the archeologists could follow him and do their bit later. Right now, what he needed was the Prativisha.

  Now that he had overcome the Agonies, he found himself besieged with a fresh sense of foreboding.

  Should he hand over the Prativisha to the Maestro in return for Ananya? Or should he help save the dying tens of thousands in Delhi?

  Would he end up helping a monster who wanted to bring the world to his knees? Or would he end up sacrificing the life of the only woman he had truly connected with?

  Sam found himself turning his mind
away from these thoughts as he stepped into the other mini-chamber, the one on the left.

  ***

  This mini-chamber felt even cooler than the sanctum. There were many alcoves here, but instead of books, each alcove contained a mushroom, encased in a glass container. Was this the mushroom from which the antidote was extracted? Sam did not know, and he did not want to die trying to find out.

  Water was steadily dripping into the alcoves from the rocks. An automatic watering system, Sam observed, that might have been designed to keep this mini-chamber cool. He also noted that the chemiluminescent rocks seemed to emit light of a different colour here than from the rest of the cave.

  Clearly, the mushroom was grown in this cave under controlled conditions.

  In the centre of the mini-chamber were a series of wooden boxes.

  Sam gingerly opened one of them, half-expecting to be poisoned by a pathogen.

  The boxes contained a fine powder. Probably concentrated extracts from the mushroom.

  The Prativisha—the antidote to KaalKoot. The only thing that stood between the world and its destruction through the bio bomb.

  Sam sighed. He had finally found what he had come for.

  Now there was nothing that remained between him and the toughest decision of his life.

  He would have to choose: between the woman whose quest had got him this far, and the lives of tens of thousands of people in Delhi.

  ***

  Sam walked in to a passage leading out of the sanctum.

  To his surprise, the passage abruptly led out of the cave and into the open mountainside.

  Sam peered out. He realised that he was on a ledge. This was the same ledge that he had seen earlier in the journey; the ledge that appeared like a balcony and was atop 300 feet of smooth, slippery rock.

  There was a pillar on the ledge, around which a thick rope was tied. Presumably the rope could be used to rappel down the hill.

  He had never been so happy to see a rope before.

  He checked his pockets, intending to take out his satellite phone to call Damini.

  Unfortunately, he didn’t have it with him. Along with his rucksack and flashlight, it must have fallen off when he was dodging the stepping stones.

  ***

  11.50 p.m.

  One hundred feet away, Damini was staring at the ledge incredulously.

  Aided by the floodlights that the Maestro’s team had put up, Damini had a pretty clear view of both the stream and the rock face opposite, notwithstanding the strong winds and sounds of thunder.

  Her surprise at seeing Sam emerge onto the ledge was quickly replaced by alarm as she realised that he was directly in the line of sight of the Maestro’s party. They had powerful machine guns, and Sam would be an easy target for them.

  Sam could not see Damini. There was no way she could signal to Sam without catching the attention of the villains.

  If the villains shot Sam, they would be able to get up to the ledge and access the Prativisha. And then there would be no hope for Ananya and the thousands dying in Delhi.

  Damini was perched on the hill at a height of about 120 feet, directly above where the Maestro’s party was standing near the stream bed.

  Right below her was a large rock which was poised somewhat precariously on the hill. If she exerted a superhuman effort, aided by her machine gun, she might be able to pry the rock loose and let it fall down to the river bed.

  Unfortunately, the only way she would be able to do that would be to use her full body weight on the rock. That would mean that she, too, would accompany the rock on its downward journey.

  ***

  Damini had only a split second to decide, but she knew exactly what she had to do.

  The guilt was gone, replaced only by the clarity of purpose.

  It was time to put her life on the line. Yet again.

  We become what we repeatedly do.

  Putting her life on the line. That was what she did. Repeatedly.

  Maybe she was not such a monster after all.

  Damini did not hesitate even for a second as she did the unthinkable.

  ***

  It all happened pretty dramatically after that.

  The large, precariously poised rock got dislodged from the hill, thanks to Damini’s efforts, and fell onto another rock below with a deafening crash.

  That rock, in turn, got dislodged, and fell further down the hill, crashing into a series of boulder-like rocks that were loosely wedged.

  That was when nature intervened.

  The sky, already reeling with the deafening roar of thunder, was suddenly overrun by a cloud which burst right above the stream, inundating the hills off Yumthang with rain.

  The falling rocks, aided by the torrent of rain hitting the hill, loosened the boulder-like rocks, and like the proverbial snowball gathering momentum, the entire complex hurtled down the hill in a matter of seconds, gaining weight as it moved.

  ***

  Damini heard the thunder sounding more urgent, felt the full impact of the first rock dashing against the second, and knew that she had helped trigger off a mini-landslide.

  She registered the stream below coming closer, as if rushing to meet her, before her head dashed against the falling rocks.

  ***

  From atop the 300-foot-high ledge, all Sam could see was a series of rocks hurtling down the hill, accompanied by the deafening sound of thunder. As he craned his neck, he saw the equipment of the Maestro’s crew.

  He did not know that Damini was in the vicinity.

  Sam did not want to be in the firing line of the Maestro’s men. He retreated into the Gupt-Kandara. He would wait there for Damini’s people to arrive.

  ***

  The last thing the Maestro saw before his skull was crushed was a gigantic rock hurtling towards him at tremendous speed. This brought back to his mind a distant yet distinctive memory from his childhood in his family’s mansion in eastern Europe.

  The image was of his alcoholic father, whip in hand, murderous rage curling his lips, and his mother, wailing, clinging, pleading, suffering as she had done for years. And he, watching from the cupboard, feeling helpless, really helpless, wishing fervently that he could be the master of the universe so that he did not have to be helpless again.

  And then the rock was upon him, and the world went dark.

  EPILOGUE

  Thursday, 3 a.m.

  It had been a busy night for the ACG, the Indian Air Force and the Army.

  The rains in the hills off the Kandara had stopped as abruptly as they had begun.

  Damini’s handiwork had eased matters for the Army team from Lachung. With six people crushed under the landslide and the remaining seriously injured, the Maestro’s team was in disarray. It took the Army’s team just a few minutes to subdue them.

  Unfortunately, they could not find Damini’s body. It had most likely been swept downstream by the river.

  With the skies having cleared up, helicopters from the Indian Air Force were able to fly right up to the ledge exiting the Gupt-Kandara and air-lift Sam, along with as many boxes of the Prativisha as were available. The Prativisha, as well as samples of the glass-encased mushrooms from the alcoves in the Gupt-Kandara, were flown to Delhi in Indian Air Force jets.

  Sam sighed. With the Maestro dead, there was no prospect now of bargaining for Ananya anyway. The burden of having to make a tough choice had been taken away from him by the turn of events. But along with it, any hopes of finding Ananya had also died.

  How he wished he could meet Ananya again somehow. Just once. And tell her how he really felt about her.

  If only he had done that when she was still around. Maybe none of this would have happened.

  For the first time in seventeen years, Sam held his head in his hands and cried.

  ***

  A crack team in Delhi, comprising some of the world’s best doctors, microbiologists, bacteriologists and disease-control specialists, quickly analysed the antidote and split
the powdered concentrate into the optimum number of doses so that maximum number of people from the stadium could be treated.

  Unfortunately, despite being in concentrate form, the dosages would be enough only to treat around a thousand patients. They would have to be reserved for the foreign dignitaries and senior Indian officials.

  The Army battalions maintaining peace in the stadium had to manage an uphill task. For the first time, they were dealing with tens of thousands of innocent, sick people who were also getting progressively desperate, paranoid and delusional.

  ***

  Thursday, 3 a.m.

  From one of the mobile phones that had been retrieved from the Maestro’s crew, Mini was able to trace the GPS location history to a warehouse in an industrial complex near Mumbai.

  The Chief, mortified that he had ignored Damini’s pleas, ordered a whirlwind raid on the Mansion, from where the rest of the Maestro’s crew were rounded up and a visibly relieved Ananya and a dazed Professor Bavdekar were freed. Ji-hoon Kim, unfortunately, had left the country on Monday night after meeting the Maestro, so he could not be apprehended.

  The Chief would put in his papers after this whole episode, citing his ‘unforgivable error of judgment’ and ‘letting down the best agent that he had ever worked with’ as the reasons for his resignation. This would mark his permanent retirement from active intelligence work of any sort.

  ***

  Thursday, 7 a.m.

  Scientists determined that the antidote would be effective only if administered up to forty-eight hours from the time of infection. After 6 p.m. on Friday, anybody who had not been injected with the antidote would die.

  The antidote was first administered to members of the government delegations. As the deadline to administer the antidote was closing in fast, it seemed like the rest—the hoi polloi—would have to die.

  That was when Professor Bavdekar, who was by now in Delhi, drew upon his encylopaedic knowledge of Himalayan plant life and observed that he had come across a mushroom growing in the Kumaon hills that was strikingly similar to the glass-encased mushroom in the Gupt-Kandara from which the antidote—the Prativisha—had been extracted.

  Helicopters were quickly dispatched, and sure enough, large swathes of land were covered by the mushroom. The relevant compounds were extracted and administered to the affected people.