It has been 4 years since I saw them. Last time I saw them, when I came out of my lab, when my mother had been admitted to the hospital. They were happy for the fact that they saw me after this long span of time but, sad too for I never became a son that they wished to be. I was so engrossed in my research, that I left them long back twenty years ago. They were unhappy, but it was never their fault that they were my parents; it was my fault that I was their son. My Senior Research Supervisor professor Gaurav Bakshi had backed me since I was 20, for 14 years he stood by my side, even though people called him Mr. Mole, no matter for what reason. He was the only and the most supporting pillar of my research and soon I was going to complete my research and present it before the world that called me crazy….HAAA…Haaaaa…HEEEEEEEEEEEE.
What irritated me since the last two years was that, after all these eighteen years of hardship and turmoil, it took me a whole two years to stabilise the final structure of the last chromosome. Different patterns, different stabilisers, most modern graphic inclusions did never help in this case. And then finally from thin air itself I got the structure designed while I was bathing and they say scientists should not bathe because it might remove the urge from their current frame of mind to develop anything…What pathetic rubbish and to hell with the person who coined it!!!
The yellow coloured glowing demonstration samples kept in the cooling chamber were looking beautiful. And three days later she was going to be showcased in front of this world, which would no more remain handicapped once she was spread among the people. And in between all this excitement, I was thinking of an appropriate name for her, when Prof. Bakshi came into the lab. He asked for the patent sheets for my work as he wanted to do a final check on it and told me to sleep as the next three days were going to be hectic. We celebrated my birthday as well as the success of the research on some vodka and some salty cracker nuts and then I went off to sleep, handing over all the patent papers to Bakshi to recheck. While sleeping I dreamt of me standing in front of the delegation of the WSST(World Society of Science and Technology) and presenting to them my work and then suddenly all the people in the world suffering from different kinds of handicap problems were being healed and their loved ones hugging each other and crying…happily…It was very wonderful and among the crowd I could see my parents calling me and leaving everything aside I ran towards them and my Dad hugged me and my Mom pecked me on my cheeks and tears rolling from their as well as my cheeks…….not only because I was successful in my research but also due to the bigger fact that they got their son back and I got my parents….It was the best dream I ever saw in years or should I say in my whole life and soon it would no longer remain as a dream but a reality etched upon my heart…I love my family and for the first time in my life in twenty years I said God protect them because I only have them and they only me, so dear Lord please take care of my family and Good Night…Sweet Dreams…
Next day I got up late, it was too much vodka yesterday night and due to that I got up at ten in the morning compared to the four I got up, whenever I slept in my whole life. I had to go along with Bakshi to a meeting regarding the presentation of the research material. The meeting was scheduled for 2 p.m. and I had to travel all the way from the inner parts of Worli to the Science Commission Centre in Futuralis Dome at Bandra. I just don’t know how to get there and I had no worries about it, as I had Prof. Bakshi with me, so I just had to wash myself up and then have some food, no matter what it was and then report to Prof. Bakshi. So after all these stuffs I went to Bakshis’ chamber to get back the rectified research papers, but there was something wrong…Bakshis’ chamber was locked, the Digi-bar confirmed his departure time as 9.00am. In the morning. That was weird, he never would leave anywhere without telling me about where he would go, but today it was all wrong and also today he had to submit me the rectified research papers…It was all wrong and that too it happened at the very wrong time. I checked with the lab guards and they told me that Bakshi had just gone for a routine check-up with the transport officials and that he had asked them to tell me that I rest for some time, so that I get mentally prepared for the meeting. For a second I felt that I had lost everything and that everything was deceiving me, however after hearing what the guard said, I felt quite fine. When I told him that I didn’t want to rest, they told me that Bakshi had a talk with the delegation via phone and they seemed very much tough, hence Bakshi had asked me to rest so that I don’t get tensed up during the meeting. I came inside my chamber and opened my personal cooling chamber and took the Sample vial from the special unit cell and gazed upon it and then kept it inside still mesmerized with its yellow coloured beauty. I sat on the chair near my desk and then started surfing the internet and the guards came in and brought me some coffee and then switched on the air-con. And I sat there surfing the internet and also looking at the clock-pad on the wall, drinking coffee and then just for a while leaned back on the chair, slightly my mind dozing off into some kind of trance. The visuals surrounding me, the smell of the coffee, the chill in the air and my mind full of excitement, it all got mixed up to develop a real good mesmerizing effect on my mind…I began to dream once again….
This time it was slow, I saw myself surrounded in dense fog and some shadows approaching me. I could not see their faces and the next thing I saw was that they were heading towards a place that looked somewhat like the personal sample cooling chamber of my laboratory. I started walking towards them but I was moving at a very slow speed towards them, I was technically moving, yet I was still there rock still, I started pushing myself ahead and started shouting at them but I myself could not hear my sound. And to my horrors, they took the serum sample from the cell container and placed it on a portable coolant case and walked off, grinning at me and I…stood there helpless and then BANG!!! I could feel a bullet piercing every inch of my brain, tearing skin, bone and flesh and with the time standing still, I fell down all covered in my own blood……I….was still breathing but….once again….helpless…motionless and now all down….technically dead…but still awake….AWAKE….A-WAKE…A----WAKE…WAKE--UP…WAKE-UP…WAKE UP, WAKE UP VERMA….came the sound and I woke up but something was not right in this world too. I woke up in the electrolysis chamber…I was not supposed to be here, yet I was here…The sound from the speakers were familiar…It was Bakshi…
“Hi, there Verma, slept too much boy…we had to go for the meeting and you are sleeping…utter crap….or should I say utter foolishness boy…” I looked at my watch to find that it was 4.00p.m. in the afternoon, How the hell did it happen, this was all wrong….I slapped myself to make sure that I wasn’t dreaming then Bakshi spoke, “Hey Verma, you are not dreaming, you indeed are awake, but you know Verma, things never seem the way they look actually. You put on twenty years of your life on the serum research and me; I never put in even twenty days!!! Still today I own the research credits and you get yourself stuck like a moron in some chamber…weird life man”. “What the hell are u speaking Bakshi and why the hell am I here, open the door, I need to get out…Open up somebody, Open the fucking door…Open it up…” I shouted. On this Bakshi shouted, “Shut up Verma!!! You are here because it is me who works behind everything…What u thought, I would put a whiz kid like u for research without a cause…without a profit!!! You were just a host for me…or you can say something like a puppet…all work and no play or should I say better, All Fool and no sense at all. So here I put on a deal…either you can rot your filthy life as a dead experimental sample in some medical college or else we can join hands for a much better monetary benefit, we have got bidders from all over the world for these samples, so we just need to play cool so decide…And before you speak, have this too, the research is all set to be patented by WSST in my name and I have to specify the name of an assistant, so I can suggest your name and for starters I can give you a cool sum of 100 billion bucks, How is that now…” I saw in his eyes the greed I was not able to see twenty years back…It was Gods’ punishment to me, I had put my parents away, their love, everything for my own selfish prosperity and today that very same selfishness was standing in front of me, holding a knife on which stood my entire fate….There was no looking back…From the glass walls I could see the guards looking at me like wolves ready to tear me apart, their guns all unlocked and loaded, ready to spit out their metal slugs…I had to decide after all I had to make sure that no other child in this world will ever face such a situation…I had to make it sure…If it had to end then it had to end perfectly and if darkness has to go completely, then you must be a part of it to destroy it completely, so that next time there should not be a next time…And with a tear from my eye dropping on the floor I said, “You win, after all its money you want, they want and technically speaking me too…so I am in….”
I walked along with Bakshi to his personal chamber, guards following us everywhere and even he had some of them positioned in his chamber. We sat near the main table and he told me that how he had planned this many years back and that yesterday night and even today both my vodka and coffee were spiked so that he would get enough time to fondle with the research material without my presence. He asked me to wait until tomorrow afternoon at 3.00p.m., when he was scheduled to go to Berlin for presenting the research materials to the main delegation at the WSST HQ. He had booked a ticket for me too, in order to accompany him and asked me to pack the research materials and the vials into the special casing coolant boxes. He left the building by eight in the evening and I…well sat there in the room where the packing was meant to be done, The guards gave me the new access codes to the coolant chamber and even gave me the packing boxes and left me alone there, but still spying with the cameras installed on the ceiling corners just like a vulture preying on its victim…I thought indeed Bakshi was right, I was the most foolish smart fellow ever born anywhere, actually because I never thought about anything other than my research stuff and today I was all alone sitting in a room ready to face my hard work of twenty years to be snatched away from me by a class one cheat and in the end being smacked upon my face the label of being the most foolish person on earth…Haaa…Heee. But now I was going to do the biggest of all my foolish antics, probably I was going to redefine foolishness. I thought of what would be the best possible way to end this all and then my foolish mind came upon this foolishness in one sense, yet brilliant idea. I looked up towards God and prayed to him that, “Whatever I did was all wrong, I went onto create life without realising it’s true meaning and what I got was a lesson for everyone that; they must understand life before trying to emulate life itself” and by praying this to God, I thought of my parents for one last time and wished that I should have never been born to them and that whatever I did wrong to them, Lord please forgive me and I closed my eyes…I went and sealed the chamber door and then unplugged the gas pipe meant for the sample heaters from its plugging hole and then opened the cooling chamber and took out the case and opened it and placed each of the ten vials on the desk. I spread the research papers on the table and poured on them, the vodka from Bakshis’ shelf. I took the lighter from his desk and also his golf club that he had left here to play when he ever got bored and technically speaking today I was going to play it, possibly was going to strike a hole in one shot and then……….
I struck them off…I smashed all the vials and the remaining samples with the golf club and moved like a frenzy beast through the room covered by the sample remains that got splashed over me when I broke off the vials, I went on smashing everything I saw, glass, wood, metal and then…I saw the guards approaching the chamber, they tried to open the door but in vain, then they blast it open with the high frequency breach bombs that they carried with them always in their pouches whenever they felt the need for emergency and now it was CODE RED….BLOODY RED and now they rammed towards me in full force all set to put me down, but me too was all set…The gas still on and the lighter in my hand and the last dialogue on my tongue, “SEE YA IN HELL”…I lit it, it got reacted with the gas and the reaction came in fast, real fast……
BOOM!!!
Everything from bone and flesh to glass and metal, everything ripped off and there were all fireworks everywhere….and I fell like a stone almost eighty feet down onto the ground half-burnt and all smeared with the sample solutions…my vision started to blur in front of me, I could hear sirens and wailing people but no idea where I was, whether I was alive or not, I started rolling back and had no clue where I was heading to and then just like something washed of the gutters, I got washed off into the drains and then my brain dimmed off….
I don’t remember when I got up but I knew where I was, I was still in the drainage waters floating on some branches and plastic waste, all heading to the recycling plant in full force. For a second I thought this was hell and I was going to face the Devil soon for all my antics, but then I saw the city lights and heard the recycling plant siren and also realised that I was able to move my hand and also my legs, I wasn’t feeling that cold even though it was the rainy season and I tried to wade myself off to the mud patch near the banks of the drainage waters. I tried my best but still I couldn’t get there and then I started shouting for help and I saw somebody standing near the banks of the water and that guy pulled me up by throwing in some rag clothes and pulled me over to the land. And before he could ask me that, whether I was fine or not, he ran away on seeing my face and kept on yelling, “Bhoot…Bhoot”. I just could not make it out why he said so and before I could think more it started raining and I was almost naked with some pieces of cloth stuck on my skin and burnt flesh due to the heat and solution sample, I tried to remove it, but it was way too painful and I was almost dead tired, my entire body was aching and despite it raining heavily. I felt quite hot and pathetic of all, I could feel my skin getting peeled off itself and it all started to feel rough and I smelled weird…With nowhere to take some shelter from the rain, I took a plastic tarpaulins sheet from the garbage dump and wrapped my body in it. I still felt too hot and was literally sweating even though I was sitting beneath the roof of the backyard of a building or something. I then decided to wrap it over my waist, so that I could hide my nudity off and sitting there I observed that the skin on my legs were partially burnt with some cloth and plastic traces on them. And when I looked upon my hands, I saw that they were all dark green in colour with small speckles emerging over them and those speckles they were very hot, something kind of hot steam coming through them. I didn’t know what was happening with me or what was I getting converted into but I was damn sure that this was something too weird and gave me my answer to why that beggar ran off on seeing my face. I searched the alley for something reflective enough, so that I could see my face on it, but I never got anything and in my utter despair, suddenly I fell and in the water puddle I saw my face….Oh my God, Shit…Oh God…I was not even close to what I used to look like….that beggar was true…I was some kind of ghost…a living ghost…or else how could I survive that blast in the science lab…this was something else…, “My face….Oh my Lord…Why…why me…Why lord…why….Oh God you could have killed me..why dear Lord…why…” and I sat there crying, in the rain…the city night life swallowed my cries, all wet and desperate I cried and I felt even God didn’t care about it and I couldn’t do anything but just cry and between this commotion of mine, I heard someone else cry…Suddenly a mugger pulled by the alley where I was and he held a knife in one hand of his and the other hand he was dragging a girl, probably in her early teens inside the alley. He tried to pull off her clothes and in vain tried to tear them off with his knife, like a beast prowling on the innocent…I asked him to stop it and in return he asked me to shut up or else he would cut my tongue off…I still moved towards him and tried to push him by his leg, but he much more stronger than me kicked me on my face…and in a fit of rage I yelled, “You got a mother at home, then if you are that hungry, go fuck her, asshole”, on which he slapped that girl and came at me brandishing his knife and swished it at me and in self-defence I tried to stop him by my hand and the next thing I felt was that something trying to push through the speckles on my hand and suddenly with a blast and some real, heavy green light, he got slammed off to the electric pole on the other side of the road…How did I do that…even I didn’t know how it happened, I could feel immense heat erupting from those speckles and I felt it coming out of my entire torso and head. That mugger took for his heels and I saw that girl running off from the alley and just by the bend of the road, she looked back at me….Even in this immense pain I could see her lovely face looking at me, probably saying thank you and I felt in my mind, a sound, a different, yet sweet and feminine sound saying ‘thank you’ And She ran off and I sat there yelling in pain, unable to get up, confused and then with a big bang, I felt immense heat erupt from my body with a flash of green light and everything surrounding me in the alley got all fired up and I realised I am able to stand up…
I stood up and in the light of the street lamp, I looked at myself, I was all different, physically weak but all green with speckles over my hand and face spread in an uniform fashion…What was I…How did this happen…Why the hell did it happen to me…Out of which technically speaking, I had the answer to only one question-Why; to some extent…And the answer…the answer was somewhere hidden in the mugging attempt incident that went all bad for the mugger and real lucky for that girl, some moments ago…I felt much more better than what I felt earlier tonight…And for the first time in the whole day…I smiled…technically speaking I grinned because, even though I was no more Krishna Verma, I was turning out to be something better, something bit weird, yet something much, much more powerful…The night began with a new cause and every cause should have a reason to it and also attached to that reason must be a solution…I had the perfect reason-Bakshi and I, myself, was probably only half the solution and the other half I knew……I would find it in this city itself…A City Unknown…Dark…hiding the solution in the hollow depths of its…… Shadows’….HAAAAA…….Probably, Science was all turning itself into some other form….Realistic as Usual….Yet Fictional……………Haaaaaaaa……
