THE COMPANY ISLAND

The Company Island

Xicheng station, Beijing, China, 08:37 PM (CST)

Just after leaving the office of Tishi Corp, a 5 ft. 8 inch tall man, wearing black t-shirt jeans was waiting for transport at Xicheng station. He was eagerly waiting for the bus as it was raining heavily. Suddenly a gun shot was fired. The man was shot dead.

Witel Corporation, Powai Headquarters, Mumbai, INDIA, 09:30 PM (IST)

Mr.Kumar was alone in his office, working on the promotion techniques for the newly launched Witel Wi-Fi products. Kumar, a decommissioned, ex-army intelligence officer with a 6 ft tall, athletic body turned 38. He was the head of Product Promostions at Witel telecom.

Shyamsundar, the peon, as always knocked the door of Kumar’s office.

“Sir, today is your birthday. Why don’t you have a party and enjoy?” He tried to divert him from work.

"I'd rather work. You can leave, I have some work to finish." Came his expected refusal.

Just as he was about to go back to work, his cell phone chimed with a notification. It was text from his wife asking him to come home soon. His wife, Richa was a housewife and a beautiful mother to their seven years old daughter, Radhika. He ignored it to focus on his work but seemed like he wasn't meant to as his cellphone disturbed him again. This time around, it was a text from his friend, Kadam Pal who was a 30 years old IPS officer working under the Crime Branch, asking him to reach his place sooner than usual as he had a night shift. Realizing that he won't be left alone to work in peace as its his birthday, he decided to leave for home. It was raining as he left the office and drove his Honda back home.

There was a cross road signal near Kumar’s home and as usual, he was waiting for the light to turn green. Tapping his fingers on the steering wheel, his attention went to the digital hoarding which showed an advertisement of Witel Corporation. That immediately brought a smile on his face. He turned his head away with the lingering smile when the owner of his family's favorite ice-cream parlor waved at him.

As he reached home, he realized that his family and his friend were waiting for him. They greeted him a 'Happy Birthday' jingle and he couldn't feel anymore blessed than he did in that moment.

Unknown location, China, 10:00 AM (CST)

The conference room of Tishi Corp. was as silent as a crypt. It was safe to say that one could hear a pin drop. The Chairman, Boss Xiu had lost his temper which wasn't a surprise as it was his usual demeanor. The sales were declining with each passing day which proved the incompetency of Tishi Corp. to compete with Witel Corp.

But originally, the primary reason for his anger was his inability to provide funds for a terrorist squad whose leader was his cordial acquaintance. All was not fair at Tishi Corporation.

“If you can’t speed up, slow the others down.” The Chairman shouted.

Kumar’s home, Mumbai, India. 9 AM

"Sweetheart! Come on, wake up." Kumar was trying to wake his daughter up.

It was a bright Sunday morning and as per tradition, the family was supposed to enjoy ice-cream at their favorite parlor. As soon they freshened up, they headed towards the ice-cream parlor to enjoy their routine. Co-incidentally enough, Kadam Pal also joined them in their merriment. They all left for home after awhile.

“KIRI…..my tea.” Kumar called his wife Richa 'Kiri' sometimes.

Suddenly, his phone rang.

"Kumar......please help. Heeellp!" A helpless female voice was screaming in pain when he answered the call.

Kumar immediately sprung into action and traced the location of the phone. He even contacted Kadam for help. While Kadam was away from the location, Kumar sprinted towards the place for help.

Upon reaching the site, he saw a girl at gunpoint. Before he could make sense of anything, more people rushed in with guns.

"Surrender yourself or prepare to lose your family." One of them said.

Sharp-witted Kumar took no time in understanding the trap which was laid to lure him. Since the mob was coupled with guns, he decided against taking some action.

“Get in the car. Now!” Someone ordered. Kumar quietly dropped his phone on the ground and followed the order.

Meanwhile, Kadam's car was blended in the traffic. He tried to call but no one answered. After a while when he finally reached the location, he saw the phone on recording mode. Immediately, he understood the situation. He called the roadblocks to enforce a high alert across all the checkpoints. Every police jeep was allocated the task of looking for Kumar. FM Radio stations, Television channels and other social media tools were activated and the news spread like wildfire.

Kumar was not just a normal civilian before Witel. He was an intelligence officer in the army. He held critical information. All the safe houses in Pakistan got alert and every movement in external modules were under radar. But nobody noticed a small fishing trawler holding a low profile, leaving from Colaba, Mumbai and heading towards Sri Lanka.

Radhika was slept on the floor after crying for hours.

“Richa you should rest. We will find him anyhow.”- Kadam tried to handle the moment while holding a food parcel for Kumar’s family.

But the fact of the matter was that nobody had a clue about what had happened.

11 Days later, somewhere near Philippine Sea.

“Mr. Kumar! Can you hear my voice? Can you see my face clearly?” Kumar opened his eyes and saw a Chinese doctor giving hand signals for the eyes and ears.

“Who are you? Where I am? What is this place?” Kumar started questioning frantically.

"Welcome to Company island, Mr. Kumar." Boss Xiu, the Chairman said.

Kumar was feeling intoxicated. He wasn't able to stand up and mind his balance. He wanted to know how long had he been passed out. The team of doctors left him alone in the room with the Chairman to wonder about his unanswered questions. After a while, he felt a little better.

"Kumar, don't worry. You are our permanent guest now. Let me give you a tour." The Chairman said.

While taking the ride around the island, Kumar tried his best to get the idea of the size and location of the island. The only thing he got was that there was no water surrounding it. Instead, he only saw a big wall covering the boundary of the island.

"Kumar, this place is completely isolated from the main land. The R&D team works here and for our trade secrecy, there are no communication facilities here." The Chairman said.

The car stopped near a five floored building near a park.

“Kumar, this is your job place. You will do the same work of product promotion for Tishi Corp.” Xiu announced.

He called a lady named Yu Yuan. Yu, a young, beautiful and energetic employee of Tishi Corp. was newly recruited as someone shot one of Tishi’s employee dead in China.

“Hello Mr. Kumar! I am happy to work with you.”- Yuan directed Kumar to the production bay, where all were working on new advertisement and promotion ideas.

Kumar still felt dizzy but thought against letting anybody know.

“Kumar, I am leaving now. If you need anything then ask Yuan. But don’t even think about escaping this place. You are very intelligent and since I respect you, I am telling you that the location of this island is 2000 kms away from the main land. It is better if you forget about your past life. Goodbye.” Boss Xiu said before leaving.

Never the one to lose hope, Kumar decided that he will escape from here but before that he needed to make a precise plan which required him to collect information about the location of the island, the security arrangements and the loopholes in them.

The only transport he knew of came once a week to deliver the necessities and left with the data collected from the island to transmit to the main land.

Kumar’s Home, Mumbai, India. 02:35 AM

Radhika was sleeping next to Richa. Suddenly, the doorbell rang. Richa being a light sleeper, heard the doorbell. Squinting her eyes, she saw the time and thought about the person who came knocking at such a ridiculous hour. Being alert, she grabbed a .44 magnum with three loaded bullets and peeked through the door eye. It was Kadam with two other guys. She visibly relaxed and opened the door.

“Sorry for the disturbance, Richa. I know its not the right time but this is something urgent." Kadam said.

"Its alright. Please come in." Richa welcomed the group.

The two companions seemed familiar to her.

"Richa, meet them. He is Arora, Wing Commander of the Air Force and he is Tomar, Commander of the Indian Navy." Kadam introduced which made me Richa recall that they were old friends of her husband's.

She nodded her head at them in acknowledgement.

"We are not the only ones shocked, Richa. When they learnt about the incident, it took even them by surprise. The Defense Secretary has decided to intervene and he gave a green signal to the Unofficial Operation to get Kumar back." Kadam tried to continue but he saw tears in Richa’s eyes.

“Gentlemen, coffee please.” Richa wiped her tears and offered. “So is there any break? Or any input from sources?” She inquired.

Kadam looked at Arora.

“Please.” Richa prompted sensing their hesitation.

“Richa, we have no clue as of yet. But we are sure that he is not in India or Pakistan. We are eyeing on China, Mexico and Russia." Arora tried to explain.

As if on cue, Kadam took charge, “Richa we are waiting for a breakthrough. If you notice anything abnormal, please inform us. Anything.” Richa nodded and requested them to stay at the place as the next day was Sunday and she was to follow the family routine by taking her daughter out for ice-cream.

Sunday morning, Ice cream shop, cross road, Mumbai.

"I will have my favorite, Vanilla. My father will pay for it when he will be back from the office." Radhika said to which the shop owner meekly agreed. He knew of the situation and felt sorry for the poor girl.

"God is great, everything will be fine." He said to Kadam.

And in that very moment, it seemed like God heard their prayers when Radhika excitedly pointed at the hoarding.

"Look, its my father's work!" She exclaimed.

Everybody turned their faces around to look at the Digital Hoarding. And sure enough, the same advertisement was playing. But the only difference was the fact that it was not of Witel Corporation. It was for Tishi Corporation. Kumar proved his intelligence by using the same promotion technique for Tishi group so as to give a hint to Kadam about his whereabouts.

Kadam and his friends rushed towards the car while Richa could not thank God enough for the much needed direction in solving the case.

Company Island, somewhere near Philippine Sea.

Everyone at Tishi Corp. was ecstatic as Kumar was promoting projects and increasing sales in the Indian market in a mere span of 2 months.

Kumar, however was feeling unwell and had asked Yuan to arrange for a doctor's appointment. After quite awhile, Yuan took him to the hospital. Kumar explained his problem of dizziness to the doctor.

The doctor and Yuan both smiled and informed him that it was pretty common in Company Island due to the frequent occurrence of earthquakes. Kumar, though unconvinced chose to dissolve the matter but he kept thinking about it as there wasn't even a single crack in the infrastructure even though it wasn't built to defend earthquakes.

"I need fresh air." He said to Yuan. " Can we go to the beach on the island?" He further asked.

"We cannot cross the wall in daylight as per Security rules but at night, we can cross from point 78 where all the lazy guards will be sleeping." She said.

After finishing work, Kumar asked Yuan to join him on the adventure. On the way, he told her about his wife and his daughter as his eyes got misty.

"Kumar, I don't know why they are doing this to you but let me know if you want to escape. I will help in whatever way I can." Yuan said.

They reached the wall and as expected no guards were there. They jumped past the barrier. But to their ultimate shock, there was no sea shore. There was no sea. Only an iron railing!

Kumar looked at the water under the moonlight and suddenly a realization hit him.

"We are not on land!" He exclaimed. Yuan stared at him in confusion.

"Go back to the office. I will be back before morning." He said and Yuan complied.

Kumar took no time to get the idea. It was a huge floating rectangle platform and everything was planted to look like a mainland. He completed a complete round of the island (the platform) to realize that it was unbelievably huge. A mass of approximately 1200 meter width and 3000 meter length was floating. He rushed to find the control room, stole some papers and ran back to the office.

After analyzing those papers, he came to know that there were two nuclear powered propellers as the main source. The whole island's power supply was controlled by the central station tower.

And there also was one chopper hidden for any emergency escape.

The company island was actually not going anywhere. The main purpose it served was to hide the terrorist group and for that, they kept circulating the island in a radius of 100 kms. The current location was around 600 kms from Taiwan. The speed was mere 3 km per hour and that’s why the movement was almost unnoticed.

The only thing left to think was a way to communicate this information to Kadam.

The Ice cream shop, cross road signal, Mumbai.

Kadam had installed CCTV cameras near the shops to record every moment of the digital hoarding and started his daily analysis. Suddenly, one day the shop owner called Kadam.

“Sir, some marketing people from Tishi are distributing new plan leaflets. I think you must read this.”

Kadam immediately rushed and asked for the leaflet. Tishi Corporation had launched a new product. A group sim card scheme as a gift to family and friends. This gift scheme was launched under a special regional promotion programme. There were 4 sim cards at the price of one. The first sim was named as Bahadur (the brave), second sim for wife named as KIRI (Kumar used this name for his wife), third was named as The sweet baby (Radhika), and the fourth was named as Mitra (the friend).

The last line of the leaflet was in local language- 'Har Kadam aapke saath, Tishi aapka dost' (every step with you, your friend Tishi).

Without a doubt, Kumar had designed this. Kadam quickly called for a meeting at Kumar's place.

Richa, Kadam and the two military men gathered around to plan and figure out Kumar's location.

They decided to watch the all CCTV footage again. In one of footages, they found a new promotion ad titled- “Its a long distance. I walk some steps and you walk the rest.” The sim card plan was for long distance calling at half price. They decoded the message which meant that he was somewhere far and steps will have to be taken to rescue him. But the location was unknown.

The Witel Corp. was going down as Tishi was launching a new plan almost every week. The newly launched plan was called 'The Vietnam Stories' for people who want to talk for hours. The offer was- 'Stay safe in house, talk for hours and run your business'. Kadam was clueless this time around but Tomar and Arora cracked it. They told Kadam that Vietnam safe house (safe place in Vietnam for Indian secret services agents) was setup by Kumar himself when he was in the army, to run the business of agents. They didn’t waste a moment and called up The Defense Ministry to ask for a list that includes commandos, weapons, transport and a standby support from the Vietnam army as well. They headed towards Kumar’s home to give the good news. And the same night the entire team fully equipped left for Vietnam.

Company Island, somewhere near Philippine Sea.

Kumar could only hope that his friends were able to decode the message. He had made a plan B as well. Yuan was with Kumar in this escape mission and that was the biggest source of help he could get.

And the day came. Kumar thanked Yuan for her support at the dinner they had together for hopefully the last time. The Island cafe was closing down after they came out. The time matched and it started.

BOOM!

The first blast happened in the main building. The guards rushed to the building.

The second blast happened in guards vehicle compound and the third in the weapon area.

The guards were not prepared for any of this. Kumar rushed to the emergency chopper roof, hidden behind bars. Two guards were stationed there. He waited for some time and then he fired. He was a sharp shooter and that day, he passed the test again. He filled the fuel tank to the brim and was waiting in the chopper for Yuan’s action. Yuan started the roll. 30 serial blasts in island, including the missile bay. Surface near the air missile system got destroyed. She fired a flare as signal. Kumar saw it and flew away. Unfortunately one blast was near the nuclear engine that leaked tiny amount of radiation and nuclear safety system got activated. The signal went to mainland headquarters. They sent a team for maintenance, but they were unaware of what had happened.

Kumar was flying low which was eating up more fuel. He decided to land in Manila, Philippines. In some time, bypassing radars he landed and got caught by local authorities. He demanded to take him to embassy and after knowing the situation they released him in no time and provided better transport facility and a radio unofficially.

"Romeo to base... Romeo to base…do you read me…….. ?"(Radio beeped) Kumar remembered the entire setup of the safe house and was trying the main frequency.

"Romeo to base... Romeo to base…do you read me…?"

"Alpha…hear. Do you copy…?" Kumar couldn’t stop his tears after listening to the reply.

Alpha was Arora’s voice on radio.

"Romeo landed on safe house...Over and out."

As the information was successfully transmitted, Kadam texted Richa. Richa was speechless. It was not easy for her to control the emotions.

The company island

The nuclear maintenance team reported the escape to Boss Xiu. They contacted PLA (Chinese army), and informed them everything. China issued the navy alert to the CV-17, a huge aircraft carrier to search and destroy operation. Every civilian aircraft was ordered to land.

Kumar landed near the safe house. One black car picked up Kumar from the safe house. Kumar, Kadam, Arora and Tomar left the safe house and rushed to the port as they already had cancelled the plan A of flying to India. At the port they hired a small boat like any other tourist. Other people of team as per the plan took flight for false play. That was the only flight in air. Chinese jet forced it to land on ground. The members of the team bought time by their tactics. Meanwhile, the boat stopped in the middle of the shore and they tied the boat owner before giving a signal. A submarine in a form of a giant fish came above the surface. Plan B.

The PLA who forcefully made the plane land failed to find anyone they were searching for onboard.

Simultaneously, the other part of the plan was successfully executed when the submarine came under the protection of Vikramaditya.

After a while, the team reached India.

-------x-------The End---------x-------