The black van stooped at the gate of an old butcher house. it was abandoned since years. People consider it unused by his owner but it wasn’t right. It was being used by Victor, not to butcher animals but his enemies, to butcher the people whom his men kidnap. Victor had his own ways to use that abandoned butcher house.
Balbir got off the driver seat and went to butcher house door. It was a big shutter as you see at a big factory.
Shyam also stopped car some yards away and got down with his own plan. He took the gun his hand and remembered Charmi’s words.
“Don’t afraid to use if you feel the need.” She had said while giving him a made in India pistol.
Balbir opened the shutter. For any common men that turn the handle to open that shutter was impossible. At least two men needed to do it but Balbir wasn’t human. He was like a giant with a mammoth frame.
He upped the shutter and got back into the van.
As van entered inside the shutter started to go down but before it was closed again Shyam had slid inside. Perhaps that speed was favour of Charmi’s training.
Van stopped inside. Balbir got off. He went to the backside of the van and slapped the back door three times.
It was signed for men inside. The back door of the van opened wide. He came out of the van and breathed the frightened air of the old butcher house but it wasn’t fearful for him. he was used to breathing in there.
His eyes travelled around for a while and then rested inside the van to give a special sign to Michele. He was his sidekick.
Perhaps Michele was waiting for it, as soon as he got signal he pushed Anjali out and came out following her.
Anjali’s mouth was tapped. Her hands weren’t tapped but she didn’t try to use them as she knew she wasn’t able to fight any of the men standing in front of her.
She knew to attack them was nothing but foolishness. She wasn’t enough to fool to risk her child. if the baby wasn’t with her she would surely have tried to fight back.
Her eyes looked around, out of curiosity. Many hooks were dangling to the ceiling, from the size of seven to twenty-eight. For a small rabbit to the biggest deer and wild bores.
Which huck would they use for me? She thought.
Perhaps that size of twenty-four as her weight was sixty kilos.
And my baby? She shivered on her own thought. She didn’t want the answer but she knew they would hang her baby on the hook for the rabbit.
The answer made her knee water. She felt as if her legs weren’t able to bear her weight. She struggles to keep herself on the feet.
“Tie her with a chair.” She heard a sharp voice.
Victor had just come out from one of the room doors and now he was standing near a table on which some big knives were laid covered in the blood.
Anjali had seen him before. She knew him but as his boss not as Victor.
As Victor he was fiercer, all his features looking wicked. His eyes menacing, his voice ghostly and his face ugly. Not only Anjali but many people in Chandigarh knew him, even some politicians and police officers too but as Virpreet, not Victor. To know him as Victor means you are near your death and now Anjali knew him as Victor. She was almost near to her death. But how would it be wasn’t decided yet? It was up to Victor.
She shouldn’t eavesdrop that day. She thought. If she hadn’t heard his private call she shouldn’t be in that butcher house.
Anjali knew Victor would surely find her, the matter was the only time. But she hadn’t expected it the day when she would have her child with her.
Anjali had done two mistakes. One she had eavesdropped Victor and second, she warned Archana about Victor’s plan.
She wouldn’t have done so but she was attached with Archana as she was a handicapped girl and sometimes she chat with Shyam instead Archana. All the chat with fluent English with no spelling mistake was done by her but as Archana so Shyam didn’t know her.
“Haven’t you heard?” Victor looked at Harris, “I said tie her.”
For him Victor’s voice was the order of his god, he gave the child into Balbir's hand and headed to Anjali.
Anjali didn’t resist as she knew if she will resist Balbir would kill her child. The worry of her child made her weak, unable to use her strength. She remained lifeless and let them tie her body with a chair.
“Anjali, Anjali, Anjali…” Victor came ahead.
Shyam was hidden behind a fake wall just some steps away from them. He saw Victor, six feet tall with all the wickedness within. No one can say him, human, his all features were of a demon.
Shyam glanced over Michele and Harris he saw a child in Balbir's hand. He wanted to face them but he knew it wasn’t useful until Balbir has the child in his hand.
And then Shyam heard Victor’s words, “Anjali, why so much trouble dear?”
Oh! God! He thought. She is Anjali. The girl who called Archana to warn her about Victor.
Shyam felt he should help Anjali as Anjali had accepted enmity with Victor only to save his Archana. He owed her help.
He still didn’t know who that Anjali was but he wanted to help her and to do so he needed a plan. A plan which could save the child and Anjali. His mind started to work fast. He searched his surrounding and the plan flashed in his mind. His eyes caught a big plastic bottle laid in one of the corners.
The plan in his mind wasn’t possible to think for a tutor who keeps a pen in his hand and teaches lessons of non-violence but three months in the dark caller and Charmi’s training had turned him in someone else. His brain was working on a violent plan which wasn’t his feature or maybe he was changed so much that the tutor inside him didn’t exist anymore.
He carefully crawled to the bottle, without making the slightest noise. He hoped it would have diseal but his hope cheated him. the bottle had the smell of diesel but it was empty.
He cursed with an angry mind.
What should I do now? He thought.
What would Charmi do if she were me?
And he felt as if charmi was standing in front of him, telling him what to do. Not actually telling but showing him. Charmi stared the bottle for a while and then she took it and headed towards the van parked in a clearing.
“That’s it...” he smiled, “thanks charmi..”
Shyam got his answer. He took the empty bottle and slid behind the fake wall again.
“Oh! Charmi! You help me even if you aren’t near me.” he thought but he wasn’t aware that charmi wasn’t far from him at least not as far as he was thinking.
When the interrogation ended and Shyam set out for Gujarat the head ordered Charmi to take two best men and follow him as he hadn’t trust on Shyam yet. He believed if Shyam is innocent he would go to Gujarat and if not he would try to contact his comrades.
When Shyam jacked the car and follow the van, charmi and two men were following him. They hadn’t seen Anjali’s kidnapping so they had mistaken Shyam as men of Victor.
Shyam reached the van, he laid flat on the floor and slid under the van with the bottle. He fumbled for diesel pipe. Luckily he got it and filled the bottle with the diesel.
He slid out under the van and hid again behind the fake wall. He reached to his pocket and smiled as his hand got what he wanted – his lighter. It was in his pocket, perhaps the luck was with him.
With lighter, his hand felt the touch of cigarette pocket and the same moment his lips longed for its warmth, his lungs hoped for tobacco smoke but he rejected all the urge of his limbs as his mind had another drug installed – drug of death.
He knew that day wasn’t to feel the heat of the cigarette but the day to feel the heat of the butcher house.
When he returned where Anjali was tied with the chair the chair was empty. Anjali wasn’t there, nor anyone else.
He heard voices from overhead. He looked up at the stairway. He understood they had taken her near slicing machine to torture her. They would have kept the child near that machine and they would be harassing Anjali to know everything from her.
Shyam sprayed diesel on the floor and over the wooden chair on which Anjali was tied before a while. The hall was soaked wet with the diesel now, only two stairs to go upper floor, one on the left side and another on the right side. Shyam reached left side stairs and took out a cigarette.
He pressed it between his lips and lit up the cigarette with his lighter. He started to step stairs, very carefully, without any noise. As he reached the last step he threw the cigarette at the floor and crouched on the stairs, hiding himself safety panel of stairs.
As soon as the cigarette hit the ground, the ember caught diesel and fire rushed around the floor, trying to devour everything. The wooden chair was on fire.
He knew the overhead voices were coming from the right side so whoever will come down will come through the right stair. He was safe at left stair.
Michale and Harris were enjoying the pain of Anjali but Balbir wasn’t as foolish as them. He felt the smoke and shouted, “fire, fire at the downside.”
Hearing his voice Michale and Harris looked at the stairs to see smoke coming in clouds.
“Check it,” Victor ordered.
Balbir put the child in butcher cart and headed down the stairs.
Anjali hadn’t seen that smoke as she was unconscious till now due to the torture of Harris.
Shyam’s gun was aimed at right stairs. As he saw Balbir’s first leg on the stairs he shot. It blasted Balbeer’s knee. He lost his balance and stumbled, rolling down the stairs he fell directly into the fire.
The bullet hadn’t killed him but the fire did. It covered around him like a python and devours him without mercy. His cries in pain disturbed the deadly calm of the butcher house.
But in no time his cries ended and the deadly peace was back again.
And the next moment the air was filled with gunshots. The bullets were coming from the floor but that time it wasn’t as Shyam’s assumption.
Christy had come from the left stair. Before Shyam noted her, she shot him. it caught his shoulder. He wasn’t any criminal nor he was any police officer. He had nothing to do with bullets and that was why he didn’t fear of bullet as he didn’t know how dangerous they are.
The pain burned inside his shudder, reminding him the day when he was of twelve years and he had mistakenly stepped on a Scorpian. The bite had the same pain.
He cursed Christy in Gujrati and fired at her. Christy couldn’t understand his language but the bullets had no barrier, they passed through Christy’s breast, making small holes in her jacket. She collided to the ground.
“Michale. Agent Malik has come.” Victor shouted, “My doubt was right. He has killed Simon and now he is behind us.”
They mistook Shyam as agent Malik, and it was good for Shyam. The fear of agent shut them off and the same thing opens Shyam up.
“Boss, you leave,” Michale shouted, “we will handle him.”
Victor hadn’t stepped back in life. That was the first time.
He knew Simon was best of the best and if the agent had killed him then it wasn’t easy to kill the agent.
“What are you thinking boss?” Harris said, “Balbir and Christy are down. You should leave now.”
For Harris Victor was his god. Viktor had got him from the gate of an orphanage and from that day they were with each other. Victor had full trust in him and that was why he escaped when Harris told him to do so.
*
Charmi had got into the building but she wasn’t inexperienced like Shyam to enter through the front door. She had entered through the back door with her two men equipped with M-11.
The gunshots among Shyam and victor’s men told her Shyam wasn’t victor’s man. She understood Shyam had come there to take revenge on Victor.
*
Shyam looked down to see remaining of the Balbir's body. The fire had almost devoured him. Shyam got down the left stair and went tiptoe to the right stair to spook enemies.
*
Charmi along with her tow man equipped with M-11 entered from the back and they ambushed upon Viktor’s men who were keeping watch over the containers. Many kidnapped girls were inside those containers.
The freezer containers of the butcher room were filled with girls. Three of victor’s best men were there to keep watch but Charmi’s men had M-11 which could fire 120 rounds in minutes.
Still, charmi had to lose both of his best men to kill those three as they have the best hiding places. No one was in sight but Charmi didn’t want to take any risk. She hid behind a container and called the chief to send help.
The chief told her the help would come from Ambala. Charmi knew if they come by air still it would take time, starting time of helicopter and reaching may take twenty minutes.
She slid the phone back in her pocket and opened the freezer container.
*
Believing Michale and Harris, Victor had escaped, he went to back door to quick escape but the luck wasn’t with him. When he reached the back door, Charmi and his men had ambushed on there. He had to hide not to be caught in the gun fires. He saw three of his best men falling.
He saw two men with charmi were also down and charmi was alone but he didn’t attack her. He had heard charmi talking with her boss.
Amabala wasn’t away and he wanted to escape. As soon as charmi entered in the freezer container to help girls inside, Victor escaped through the way charmi had entered.
*
Shyam went upstairs through right stairs. Michale and Harris were waiting for him. They were ready to shot him but as Charmi’s men used their M-11, it caused chaos and unbearable sound which spooked them. They lost their attention for some seconds and Shyam made that seconds his momentum. He came in clear and shot them through the chest.
He went near Anjali. Her eyes were about to close. She had suffered beyond her capacity. The third degree isn’t a thing for a common girl like Anjali.
Shyam kneeled beside her, watching her blood covered face with sympathy. Blood was oozing from her nostrils. They had hit her in the nose, all over the face with no mercy. He shivered by her condition.
When he killed Michael and Harris, he had felt guilty but after watching the pathetic condition of Anjali his feeling changed.
“Shyam, save my child.” She pointed at the cart in which Balbir had put her child.
“I’ll...” Shyam said, looking towards the metal table on which the cart was laid.
“Why they…” Shyam opened his mouth to ask why they were torturing you. But Anjali's hand fell, her neck twisted sideways and her eyes shut closed.
She was dead as if waiting for him to come and rescue her child. Shyam saw a unique happiness over her face, among the unbearable pain. The happiness was for her child’s rescue. Before dying, she knew her child was safe now.
Shyam wiped tears and went to the cart. He saw the child. It was the same child, with pulpy chicks and full lips, beautiful round eyes and all the features same as his dream. He was seeing Anjali's child in his dreams.
Shyam scooped the child and went down the stairs. He also took back door to escape.
When he passed near the freezer room charmi was busy in rescuing girls and making them calm as they were frightened. She noticed Shyam going. She shouted but Shyam didn’t hear her shouting because the frightened girls were crying and running helter-skelter.
Shyam left the butcher house and headed to the way he saw first, unaware that charmi was inside, saving the captured girls as the fire inside the butcher house was getting again on.
***
To be continue...
