Rahul Khanna

“W-What are you saying?” A minister at the meeting asked me. I was standing, while others were sitting on the ground upon a red cloth. In front of us all sat Keshav Arora, the Prime Minister and the leader of the party.

I narrowed my eyes at him and replied with a sense of pride, “Well, what I mean was that we can attack Mr. Utkarsh, the most fragile part of TES, who lives in Kahanapur. Though he is a part of TES, he doesn’t take part in most of the missions of TES. The last time he was seen was in the attacks of the ‘Black Day’.”

“But, what doe--”

“Lemme finish, sir,” I cut that man. “As I was saying, we can firstly kidnap him with our police forces, and we can stamp a case or two on him. With that done, we would start torturing him to confess the things he didn’t do. TES would surely come and attack the jail. They’d set him free, and that’s how they’d come into the limelight again, and under the radar of the police.”

“But, is Mr. Utkarsh that special that TES would come running and even after seeing this simple trap, would intentionally jump in this trap, just to set that one man free?” Someone in the meeting asked.

I turned rightward and looked at that man. Then, I replied, “Surely they would. At last, who would not come to SAVE THEIR DEAR BROTHER?!” I had a devilish smile on my face as I told them, “Utkarsh… UTKARSH SETHI will become our target.”

Everyone had a bad feeling about it. They all turned their heads towards each other and started muttering something within themselves. “He’s such a devil.”

“It can surely help in our plans, but to use his brother and go personal…”

“I think it’s superb! We’re gonna strike back with this!”

Everyone had a different opinion. I tilted my head down and smiled. “I rocked the meeting this time. Half of the party is with me, and when I will make Keshav do it, the whole party is gonna be on my side!”

Radhika Khatri

I pushed the door and walked inside the dark room. I moved my right hand upwards and pushed on all the buttons on the switchboard which was on the right side of me, on the wall. With all the lights and the fans turned on, I looked at the desk at the center of the room, which was facing all the other desks inside the blue-and-white painted room. I smiled and thought, “This is the first time I’m leading an investigation. Gotta give it my all.” I walked inside the room and sat at the desk at the center. “Kartik must have felt like this too, and that’s why he gives it his all every single day.”

Suddenly, I heard some more footsteps and turned towards the door on the left. Richa, wearing her usual red-and-black outfit, and Sonia, wearing a white coat-suit along with a black shirt, entered. “Good morning,” The two said together.

“Good morning,” I replied with a smile. They walked inside and sat in front of me.

“As usual, most of the seats are empty,” Sonia commented. “By the way, did Kartik and Prakash reach Kahanapur safely?”

“Yep,” I replied. “They called me yesterday, saying that they’ve reached safe and sound and have booked in a hotel.”

Richa nodded. “Great. But, has the tipper not contacted them until now?”

I shook my head. “I hope he does it soon. At last, I’ve given them a time of just a week. If there’s no update, I’ll call them back. At last, we can’t play blindly on just a phone call.”

Richa replied, “Yes.”

“So, should we start?” I asked. The two nodded and we started our discussion. “I guess that before he went on his holiday, you all were working on the connection between TES and the politics, right?”

“Yeah, it was our job to find out some connection,” Richa replied. “And, we found out that even though eighty percent of victims were politicians, most of them were a part of ‘Aapki Apni Party’, the opposition party this time. It lost the election the last time too, and even before that. They had some good men on their side, but many committed suicide at the last minute. It’s even named as the ‘Cursed Party’ among normal citizens.”

“It means that the leading party, ‘Bhartiya Tantrik Party’, has some connections with TES, right?”

“The refusal of PM helping us is also an evidence that BTP has connections with TES.”

“But, none of them is a solid evidence that BTP is with TES.”

“If we were to talk about solid evidence, we still can’t prove that TES does exist, right? At last, most of the evidence from the ‘Black Day’ is destroyed.”

“I guess that even between general citizens, TES sends out some of its men to take care of the evidence whenever it does something.”

Sonia spoke up, “The Cornea Division of TES does that. It’s a bunch of people who somehow takes care of information and evidence of TES.”

I narrowed my eyes at her. “What’s this ‘Cornea Faction’?”

“Didn’t Kartik tell you?” Richa asked. “TES is divided into four divisions--Cornea, Iris, Retina, and Nerve.”

“Oh, lemme check.” I opened a folder on my desk and turned the pages inside it. Then, I stopped at one of them and started reading.

Suddenly, the door opened and I turned my head leftward towards it. I looked at a woman, wearing a navy blue coat-suit, raising a hand towards me and two men, wearing white kurta-pajamas, walking inside. I stood up and they looked towards me. They joined their hands and gave me a slight smile. “Namaste.”

“N-N…” I joined my hands too and said, “Namaste, Mr. Keshav Arora.”

“So, you are the leader of The Suiciders Defence Group, huh?” Mr. Rahul asked me.

“S-Sir--” Before I could have said anything, he started blabbering.

“The city is in danger, and all the defense group has are girls!” HE said. “It would have really helped if there were some men too. But, no doubt Mr. Kartik looks so energetic.”

“Stop it,” I said.

“Eh? Didja say something?”

“I said stop it. Some men are gone, and the others died. So, we’re the only ones here.”

“I don’t wanna hear your non-sense, daughter,” Mr. Khanna said slowly. “Just tell me where that motherfucker Khandelwal is.”

“Gone for now.”

“He’s a woman deep inside too, I guess. Running away like a little brat is gonna--”

“Sir, please come to the point,” I was irritated by his talks.

“You’re fired,” He replied. “Good to hear that, right?”