The Legend of Prometheus

After arriving at the reception of the Velvet Vista Apartments on a sunny Sunday morning, Ganesh switched on the monitor to check the CCTV footage of last night. A slender man tanned from the exhaustion and experience of twenty years, Ganesh was a seldom speaking, humble, but confident flesh whom you could pass by unnoticed on a busy street even after knowing him. Right from the time he arrived at the apartment’s premises, something abnormal was bothering him. Whether it was the unusual crescendo of the silence, the eerie unhappening of the crows’ caws, or the unprecedented absence of Iftikhar Sahab at his balcony, he didn’t know. He looked at the sun. It was shining bright and did not hint at anything unsettling. Ganesh shredded his doubts and took his seat to view the recordings of last night. He fast-forwarded the matrix appearing on his screen to 2x. The lethargy of last night dancing in his eyes was preventing him from glancing at each frame cautiously. But he had mastered the art of coming over it quite well in twenty years. A quarter-hour passed by with nothing happening until something disturbing in one of the frames flashed past his eyes. It was lightning-quick, but surely nothing like usual. At least Ganesh’s eyes knew this from their experience.

Maximizing the particular footage to view it slowly, he slightly fidgeted in his seat, his hands holding and re-holding things on the table. As the footage played in reverse, fear seeped through his eyes opening them wide, sweat trickled down his temples, and the anxiety clinching him from the inside leaned him forward. In the footage, the moonlit verandah of the sixteenth floor remained silent for a long, until the cracking of a door was heard. Ganesh ran his eyes through the screen to detect the smallest hint about which door it was. But he didn’t have to wait for long. A shadow emerged from the corner-most room of the left corridor carrying a dagger-like object and headed towards the common balcony lying at the northern end of the verandah. It pierced through the enveloping darkness on that end to and fro for some time and then suddenly, vanished behind the outlining walls. Ganesh’s mind was baffled at the figure’s disappearance, recalling that there was neither a staircase nor a lift attached near the verandah’s end. A few minutes passed with blended emotions of disbelief and fear until the footage came into motion again. A figure similar to the first one came from the left and zoomed right in front of the camera. His face was veiled in the dark owing to the absence of light, but was covered with something like an eagle mask. As Ganesh’s eyes remained wide open, the footage flickered for a moment, before finally coming to an undecipherable static.

***

Around thirty years ago, in a Christian school in Kottayam City, Kerala, Ms. Elenor Menon was teaching about the timeless classic of Prometheus and the war between Olympians and Titans.

“The ten-year war famously known as the Titanomachy, was fought between Titans, the older gods, and Olympians, the newer gods, for dominion over the universe. Prometheus, a titan who had the power of foresight, anticipated Titans' defeat and thus sided with the Olympians led by Zeus along with his brother Epimetheus. After defeating the Titans, Zeus gifted Prometheus and his brother Epimetheus with the task of creating humans and animals. However, after being created, when Zeus asked mankind to offer sacrifices to Gods from their feast, Prometheus tricked Zeus. He used the meat of an ox and incised it in half. One portion was stuffed with rich fat of the animal but covered with an unappealing belly, while the other portion comprised of useless bones apparelled in a thin layer of fat. When presented in front of Zeus, the king of Gods chose the second portion enticed by its look. Hence, the fat-rich part of all feasts went to mankind, while the bones started being sacrificed to God. When Zeus found this out, he was enraged. To punish mankind, he took away fire from them and hid it in the Caucasian mountains. Prometheus couldn’t see the suffering of mankind, which now shivered with cold and fear of wild animals in the dark. Hence, with the help of Aeschylus, daughter of Zeus, Prometheus stole the divine fire from Mount Olympus and gave it to mankind. There was light on earth again, and mankind flourished. When Zeus saw glares of fire down the Mount Olympus, he became furious again. And this time, he punished Prometheus, cursing him to have his liver devoured by a giant eagle every day till eternity. Some believe it is still being eaten somewhere far away from mankind’s reach”.

“Is it bad for mankind to use things that belong to gods?”, a young kid asked Ms. Menon abruptly in between her lecture.

“It is not bad Yuvan, but how Prometheus did it, that was certainly bad”, Ms. Menon thought she had soothed the child’s curiosity, but the storm occurring deep within his thoughts concealed that she was wrong. Yuvan didn't reach school for the next two days, claiming at home that he was going through migraine. His parents were also perplexed witnessing the abrupt sickness caught by his child. And on the third day, a headline came in the local newspapers of Kottayam, that a teenager named Yuvan had been missing since the last night.

***

15 hours earlier…

“Hello, yes Priti. Yeah, please keep the patient on the dose of propofol throughout the night. He needs unconsciousness right now to avoid the natural pain of surgery. Yes, don’t worry. Just keep checking the heart monitor for normal rhythms, and notice any signs of leakage in his IV line. I will join the hospital early tomorrow”. Doctor Hansram Mehta, a resident of the Velvet Vista apartments since the last five years, hung up the phone and lit his cigarette as usual to sideline the tension of his work. Turning off the lights as he stepped towards the balcony to smoke, his attention fell on the mirror beside his bed. Although it was dark enough for anyone his age to notice, he saw something abnormal standing behind him. He was about to turn behind when the mysterious figure moved with lightning speed, making Dr. Hansram almost scream. The shadow looped a sharp metallic wire over the doctor’s throat, choking him with an extraordinary force. In the struggle to break free, Dr. Hansram’s body inclined backward towards the captor and stooped low, his feet now flailing involuntarily against the ground. And it was then that he saw the mask of the mysterious figure. It was a furry black mask shaped like an eagle with a long, golden beak and pitch-black eyes. Dr. Hansram shivered with revulsion upon seeing him in the eyes. The figure said in a whispering tone, which the doctor struggled to hear. “See my face doctor, so that you can say to God when you reach him, that Zeus is back again to kill the descendants of Prometheus. The fire, will be kept alive, and it will be kept divine”.

A few moments before losing control over his breath, Doctor Hansram experienced an unparalleled pressure on his throat, as the figure slit it open with the pressure of his grip, oozing a dark stream of blood across the floor. Within seconds, Dr. Hansram’s body fell to the ground with a thump. The eagle-masked figure kept staring at the dead body of the doctor. His tranquil, dark eyes revealed satisfaction, but the darkness outside revealed that there was yet something unfortunate to come. It bent down on its knees and took out a small glass tube of kerosene oil from its pocket. Waiting a few seconds, it tilted the tube and poured the liquid all over the doctor’s face. The cigarette which was in Dr. Hansram’s mouth a few minutes earlier, was still lit and fuming. The figure gently took up the cigarette from the ground, looked closely at its smoldering end, and then flicked his finger through the embers towards the doctor’s face, which lighted up in flames.

***

Six years ago, in some ancient cathedral of Kerala, a man walked up the stairs to face a crowd of around a hundred young faces. As the crowd’s murmuring settled, he began speaking.

“Good morning, everyone. My name is Yuvan, and I will lead you on this journey that will separate you from the barriers of normality and mediocrity chaining the entire world. You all have been selected through rare processes, or phenomena to be precise, because phenomenon is the law of nature that ensures perfectionism, while process is just the deed of a man, full of errs. You all have been selected because of a divine confession somewhere deep within you, which believes that the current world order has become rotten, and there’s a need for a new world order. In this phenomenon, all your devices have been intercepted till the smallest piece of information for extracting your inherent ideology, to the extent that you can throw them now. It's better not to own that device with such information at the stake of being misused. Also, you will be given new modern devices to stay connected to this project and hear our orders. The project will be called Project Prometheus! SAY IT LOUD!!”. The man screamed with charisma on the stage, and the crowd returned it.

“PROJECT PROMETHEUS!! PROJECT PREMOETHEUS!! PROJECT PROMETHEUS!!”.

As the slogans settled, the man continued in a cold tone.

“The end is near. The world you know, is about to change. Hail Zeus for he is the only real god. Like Prometheus sinned by gifting mankind what it was never supposed to get - the divine fire, the existing world order needs to be eradicated of humans who are attempting to reach Godkind. But this phenomenon will take time. I need to expand the team to a reasonable number that can strike the nation all at once and be able to hold the objective of Project Prometheus firm and unshakeable. Keep your faith etched within your heart and mind, till the time comes!”, the man completed his sentence and the crowd erupted with slogans like thunder.

***

It was 4 PM, seven hours since the police had arrived and encircled the Velvet Vista apartments.

“The dead bodies have been identified, sir. One is of Ms. Natasha, a thirty-year-old primary school teacher, the second is Mr. Iftakhar Ansari, a renowned Urdu poet, and the third dead body has not been confirmed yet though Ganesh, the caretaker of Velvet Vista Apartments claims it to be of Dr. Hansram, a resident in this apartment for the past five years, and a senior faculty at Amartya Hospital. The face had burnt brutally”, Inspector Prashant Rai told his senior ACP Vignesh Venkatraman standing in the compound of the Velvet Vista Apartments.

“The dead body is not of Dr. Hansram Mehta. The fingerprint analysis confirms the body to be of Vijay Mhambre, a name registered in Telangana’s criminal database two years back. The forensic team had just called”, said Inspector Vasu after disconnecting the call. He was a recent recruit in the Hyderabad police.

Ganesh, the caretaker of the apartment who was standing next to Inspector Vasu screamed in shock, “But how is this possible, it was the room of Dr. Hansram Mehta where the dead body was found!”.

“That means the killers wanted to do something else with Dr. Hansram, or his dead body. We are yet to find Dr. Hansram. By the way, considering the dead body to be found here, was Vijay Mhambre a resident of this apartment, Ganesh?”, asked Prashant.

“No sir, the apartment currently has no one of this name”, Ganesh said looking down.

“Currently... means there was someone of this name before?”, asked Vasu.

“No sir”, said Ganesh, and controlled the fumbling of his lips assuming no one noticed it.

In a split second, Prashant jerked Ganesh’s hand from behind and held him by his neck.

“Do not try to hide anything. I hope you have an untainted life so far. Don’t ruin it for yourself to hide some facts that may not even involve you right now, because we will find it today or tomorrow when it will surely become a problem for you”, Prashant whispered to Ganesh fuming with agitation, and Vasu held him back.

Ganesh uttered all that he had held within him for long, “Sir he was a very mysterious man. He left the apartment around a year ago. I thought I would also become a suspect in his death so I was afraid to reveal it sirji! I am sorry”.

“You have already made yourself a suspect by hiding this fact from us. Now tell the truth or I will send you to jail!” shouted Prashant.

“Sir he left the apartment around a year ago. While he was here, room cleaners reportedly found packets of illegal drugs like MDMA, marijuana, and opioids in his room, often the remnants of the previous night. A fight occurred one day between him and his neighbors. The neighbors complained about loud screams heard from his room at night, probably under the effect of these drugs. This happened regularly, and one day under the residents' pressure, we had to remove him forcefully from the apartment. His condition was very traumatizing, but the residents were unforgiving and threatened to leave this society if he remained. Hence the security held him by hands and legs and threw him outside the gate of the Velvet Vista apartments. What happened that night no one knew, but the next day he was nowhere to be found. Some claim to have seen some men get off a van and take him with them.”, Ganesh said in one go, still shivering with his mistake of hiding a fact.

“It’s strange. If it has been a year since this incident happened, why would someone bring him back where he resided one year ago and kill him? Unless…”, Vasu said and stopped, looking at Prashant.

“The kidnappers around a year ago were the same group of people who committed the murders in this apartment last night! And he somehow belonged to that group”, Prashant said very calmly except for the last sentence, which made him almost scream.

“It is possible, although we can’t confirm that. Anyways, what do the recordings tell Vasu? Any leads?”, asked ACP Venkatraman.

“None sir. The recordings went through a static three times last night as if they were using some electronic instrument to jam the CCTV. It went static once before they entered the rooms of the targets, once before they were supposed to exit, and once in the midst of all this. The first time nothing abnormal was seen when the cam went through static. It just looked like a temporary glitch after the camera was on again, but during that duration, the murderers were already inside the rooms of their targets. The second time when one of the attackers left the room of Dr. Hansram, the cam went through static again as the figure reached the end of the verandah. It looks like someone was already there in the vicinity of the CCTV cam for the entire duration in which this event was carried out, to aid his team in getting in and out in perfect stealth. His timing just happened to be out of sync when the static happened for the second time. When they were all about to exit, it looked like one of them wanted to give us a message. He came in front of the camera and showed his face, covered with something like an eagle mask. This was the last time the cam went through static again for a few minutes, after which nothing was seen. The only things we know from the recordings are that they carried a dagger-like object, they committed three murders after entering the rooms of their targets, and they wore eagle masks. It looks like they belong to some... cult”, said Inspector Vasu.

“What about the dactyloscopy reports? Any fingerprints identified?”

“No sir, all that the forensic team has discovered so far from the objects of the crime scene, is that they used some greasy substance in their gloves to conceal the fingerprints”.

“Blood sampling? Toxicology report?”

“No, sir. The blood reports show the absence of any abnormal chemicals or drugs in the blood. Except for one thing”, said Inspector Vasu.

“What’s that?”

“Sir we all know that the murders have been committed with some dagger-like object, as is clear from the crime scene. Although it is true, the blood reports show something in addition to this. Their blood contains traces of a special type of sedimentary rock, called the Caucasian or Cenozoic rock, found in the mountain range of Caucasus, stretched between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea. They are one of the oldest known rocks, of origin around 5 million years ago”, Inspector Vasu said as explained by the forensics team.

“Fine. Collect all the shreds of evidence and seal this apartment, Vasu. Prashant, you take force as much as required and search for anything close to a stony Cenozoic weapon, in a circumference of around two kilometers. The attackers must be afraid to carry it with themselves if it's as ordinary as a dagger”, ACP Vignesh Venkatraman said and was interrupted by Vasu.

“Not ordinary dagger sir. A dagger made of Caucasian stone, the same stone where Prometheus had his liver devoured, by Zeus’s eagle”, said Vasu and began regretting interrupting an ACP.

But he was surprised to see everyone, still looking at him.

“Say again Vasu!”, said ACP Venkatraman.

“Sir Prometheus was punished for gifting mankind the divine fire that belonged to Zeus. So, Zeus punished him to have his liver devoured forever till eternity, at the Caucasian mountains”, Vasu said again as instructed, now realizing the gravity of what he said.

“So, the killers’ ideology and way of committing crime resonates somehow with the historical reference of Prometheus. That’s why the eagle masks, and daggers made of Caucasian stones. But the question is, why have they killed these three fellows only? Prashant, you take Vasu and find the weapon in the nearby circumference. I am leaving for the headquarters. I have a meeting with DCP sir. Let’s meet at 8 PM today”, ACP Venkatraman said the former part grinding his teeth in anger, and then left.

Vasu asked Prashant, “Why sir is abnormally obsessed with this case? Never saw him like this before.”

“It is because his promotion is due, and it all depends upon this case.”

***

Inspector Vasu, Inspector Prashant, all constables, and all SIs gathered at the Telangana police headquarters at 8 PM for a meeting headed by ACP Venkatraman.

ACP Vignesh Venkatraman continued, “This is an unprecedented situation. You all might be thinking that this murder happened only in Hyderabad, but similar murders have also been reported in some cities of Kerala and Tamil Nadu, where the CCTV went blank before the murder was committed. As I called on all of the state police headquarters today to take cognizance of any similar incident, I don’t know how many such incidents were not even considered just because they were thought of as normal murder. If they are a cult that believes in some ideology, we know that they will plan another attack anytime soon. What we don’t know is their place and time. But we can’t let go of that opportunity whenever it strikes, which if missed, might dismantle the entire team I have built over the past four years. DCP sir is furious over this failure. We don’t have any substantial evidence so far that can help us catch the murderers. But by backtracing the background of those three people who were murdered, we have established a link between them to identify the reason for the killings; a common thread that unveils the possible objective of the murderers. Inspector Rashmi, please tell the team of your findings on this case so far”. ACP Venkatraman took a sip of water as he completed his initial brief.

“Sir the first dead body was of Ms. Natasha, a thirty-year primary school teacher at ‘Samaveshan’, a Dalit-only school with the motto of समता ज्ञानस्य आधारः or ‘Equality is the foundation of knowledge’. The second dead body is of Mr. Iftakhar Ansari, a famous Urdu poet known for his revolutionary work ‘Mazāhamat’ which means resistance, written in the context of the ruling regime. The third missing person, Dr. Hansram Mehta, was in the media headlines two years ago for his contribution to the longevity pill in collaboration with doctors from Cambridge University. It was a pill that could increase the lifespan of mankind and extend a person’s natural death by around a decade. All these people were doing something good for mankind, but it’s not only that. If we see a deeper thread common between these lives, we also find that these people tried to defy the orthodox principles entrenched since ancient times. Be it defying the caste system through ‘Samaveshan’, challenging the authoritarian and extremist government through ‘Mazāhamat’, or taking the right of death from God by longevity pill, these deeds are probable to have enraged this old-school orthodox cult because of which they decided to eradicate them. Our communication with other state headquarters confirms this fact, where also the victims were of a similar background”, Rashmi completed her brief and took her seat after an indication from Venkatraman.

“The objective of this cult still poses some questions. How is he choosing his targets? Many people around the country and the state are doing good things, but why did the killers zero down on only three of these? Also, where is Dr. Hansram taken and why Vijay Mhambre was killed are also unanswered.”

Digvijay, the cyber security lead of the Telangana police spoke, “Sir answering the latter part, it is probably done to gaffe us. In recent few years, we have found that killers often do something unpredictable with the first crime, just to tangle the police in some trivial questions, while they carry out some other attack, often on a larger scale. Vijay Mhambre may have been killed for any reason which we should find out, but he was left in the apartment only to gaffe us, I assume.”

Rashmi followed next, answering Venkatraman’s former concern.

“The targets are chosen from different fields probably because the killers want to instill fear in all domains of society. And it is logical to think so, if someone wants to carry out a crime at a level they have, considering the reports from adjacent states, they will target distinct fields in the beginning, so that everyone in those fields may fear attempting to do what the ones who were killed did.”

Venkatraman nodded. As he was about to continue his briefing, he saw Constable Saleem enter the hall, panicked and gasping. Saleem rushed through the meeting and leaped up the stage as if tipped with something urgent and tragic. Coming close to ACP Venkatraman, he whispered something into his ears.

Venkatraman’s expression unfolded from vagueness to surprise, from surprise to anger, and from anger, to utter despair and hopelessness.

“What were the constables in charge of the apartment since morning doing?”, screamed Venkatraman.

“I don’t know sir! I just had a call from one of them! They weren’t there at the reception when it happened”, said Saleem almost crying.

“Senior Inspector Prashant and Inspector Vasu, go along with Saleem, he will explain to you what happened along the way. Keep sending me inputs as soon as you reach there. I will continue with the meeting. It’s time to teach these bastards a lesson”, Venkatraman said angrily and banged his fists on the podium.

As Saleem, Vasu, and Prashant were about to exit the Central Chamber of the Telangana Police Headquarters, Rashmi stood up and asked.

“What happened, sir? If we are supposed to know?”

Venkatraman kept staring at Rashmi as if intimidating her for questioning a senior officer. And then with a sense of despair again taking over, he said.

“Ganesh, the caretaker of the Velvet Vista Apartments, is murdered by someone. Other than the residents, it looks like we weren’t the only outsiders in the apartment this morning.”

***

As a dozen police Scorpios sped through the roads of Hyderabad towards Velvet Vista Apartments, media headlines all over the local channels live-streamed a video claiming to be threatened by some unknown criminals.

In the video, inside a cave dimly lit with bonfire, a man’s face-burnt dead body was hung upside down, caped in a doctor’s apron, and surrounded by twelve gunmen in eagle masks. The leader spoke in an unclear voice muffled by the mask.

“Mankind is about to face its worst redemption in the past few centuries. The sin, it has committed, is unforgivable and unforgettable. In the attempt to leap itself, it has probably forgotten its limits and crossed the line where mankind ends and Godkind starts. Twenty-two thousand seven hundred years ago, when Prometheus was punished for stealing the divine fire from Gods, mankind realized its limits. And now many years later, it's time to make you pathetic creatures realize again that you can never leap ahead of your destiny. All such rebels who have made the grave mistake of attempting to touch Godkind will be sent into a destined, inescapable, and cosmic sleep, trapped within the gigantic screams of the pain experienced moments before their death. And it's just, the beginning…”

 

In one of the police jeeps, Vasu said to Prashant, “It is undeniably the body of Dr. Hansram.”

“It cannot be. It is not possible to take someone so easily out of an apartment when the night shift is on”, Prashant retaliated back.

“It is indeed possible sir. I asked Ganesh if there was anything specific about Dr. Hansram through which we could identify him, just in case his face had been dilapidated beyond recognition like Vijay Mhambre’s. He told me that one of his legs had been crushed in an accident, because of which he limped. In the footage, one of his legs is actually shorter than the other, because of which the rope is not tied at the ankles, but rather slightly below it!”

Prashant looked at Vasu for a moment and then at his phone screen. His eyebrows dilated and his breath fell short, as he saw the face-gnashed dead body of Dr. Hansram. These monsters have considered the police a plaything! Vasu thought, realizing the scorn they had shown in bringing their victim out of a posh apartment and killing him with such brutality. He nodded looking at the road ahead. A road that signified to him that this case was simply not going to end easily.

In the Telangana police headquarters, the meeting was halted as everyone was looking up to the live stream of the ‘Eagle’ cult on the hall’s projector.

The masked man continued.

“This was just a beginning, an origin of a new cosmos ready to breathe again and engulf the rotten, begotten, older, and ordinary one that existed until yesternight. We will launch another phase very soon, and the attack will be on a much larger scale, right at the heart of this country. Stop us if you can!”

As the police caravan reached the Velvet Vista apartments, Prashant stormed into the reception.

Inside, the face-up dead body of Ganesh, the seldom speaking, humble, but confident caretaker of the Velvet Vista apartments, was lying on his chair, his forehead pierced open with a gunshot and his body surrounded in a pool of blood.

“Call all the residents down in the premises right now!”, Prashant screamed at the other caretaker.

“Sure sir. Also, sir, the entry and exit gates have been sealed on orders from the Hyderabad police station. Since then, no one has escaped this apartment. Give us two minutes to announce for residents to come down.”, said the caretaker.

“Check them thoroughly for anything potentially harmful, and let no one escape. Vasu and I will check inside the building. If the apartment has been sealed since the incident happened, then it means that… the killer is among us”.

***

Inside the Telangana police headquarters, ACP Venkatraman continued with the meeting.

“Does anyone have to share anything regarding this video, or should I continue?”.

 Chaos, fear, anger, and anxiety seeped through the meeting hall, erupting the hall in a crescendo of murmurs. After a pause that lasted a few seconds, ACP Venkatraman continued.

“I have two things to share. One, they have threatened to attack the heart of India, possibly indicating the target site to be Nagpur. However, the precise location of the attack site is not something concrete like in usual terror attacks, but rather vague and unpredictable, which can be anyone’s house. Hence Inspector Rashmi, choose a strong team that will join you in Nagpur for counter operation. You will lead them. The killers are adamant about challenging us, and we cannot miss this shot. Inspector Prashant and Vasu will join you there, once they are freed from their responsibilities from here”.

Rashmi nodded and clenched her fists, realizing the gravity of the responsibility and a sensation of anxiety surging within her.

“Secondly, I know this location from where this video was streamed, and I guess most of you who carried Operation ‘Red Sky’ two years ago in Hyderabad have realized it. I will lead the team tonight and encounter them. Considering increased patrolling in the city, I assume they will stay tonight at the same place where they streamed the video. But before launching this operation, we will ask the airport, railway, and road authorities to halt all flights, trains, and vehicles tonight, and seize the Hyderabad borders. Either these bastards will be eliminated tonight, or the city will witness its darkest hours of bloodshed tomorrow. And I will have no guilt in doing that!”, Inspector Venkatraman finished his brief and braced his composure, falsifying his inner despair.

***

Inspector Prashant took up the charge of wings one to four, while Inspector Vasu took up wings five to eight. The residents were brought to the premises, and their clothes were thoroughly checked. Nothing abnormal was found yet. The night had struck again, and the moon shone brightly above the rooftops of the Velvet Vista apartment. The clouds occasionally enveloped the moon, causing eeriness and fear to settle temporarily. Ganesh’s dead body was lying in the open premises, with its forehead torn apart by the gunshot.

Prashant took up the stairs and reached the first floor. Everything up here looked normal, the residents beneath were looking upto him, and the darkness ahead was transcendental. He stepped into it.

Vasu began skimming through the first floor of wing five.

Meanwhile, ACP Venkatraman arrived at the Ramagundam coal mine, the same place that witnessed the lethal Operation Red Sky two years ago. From the glimpses of the live-streamed video, it was clear to him that the streamers were present here during the streaming. ACP Venkatraman had provided the weapons himself to his team just before leaving the headquarters, to ensure that no last-moment failures occur.

“Team, take positions!”, screamed Venkatraman, and a team of fifteen police officers circumvented the Ramagundam coal mine from outside.

Slowly and steadily, the team led by ACP Venkatraman leapfrogged ahead, placing each step with the caution of not making any noise One sub-team provided the cover while the other sub-team moved. Within minutes, they had zeroed down outside a small cave-like space, cramped with rocks. The surroundings were silent until now, but Venkatraman indicated his officers to stay still in their positions unless they received an order from him, allowing himself to listen for the slightest hints of human existence.

And within seconds, it happened. A clacking sound was heard from inside, as if ammunition were being loaded. It was followed by a man’s voice, probably ordering something to his team. Finally, footsteps were heard, as if a horde inside took position! One of the inspectors suggested the ACP for waiting until their arsenal strength was determined, but Venkatraman was in no mood to wait. He ordered at the peak of his voice that echoed in the Ramagundam coal mine like raging thunder,

“CHAAAARGE AND ENCOUNTER!!!”.

As soon as the Hyderabad police charged through the rocks, a shower of gunshots was fired at them as if the enemies were waiting for the police. The team took cover and few got injured in the opening fire only. In the darkness, the enemies’ faces couldn’t be recognized much, except they were in eagle masks.

Venkatraman screamed “Their masks confirm it is the place from where the video was streamed. Just take wise use of cover to strike back.”

“Sir we are at the right spot, but probably not at the right time. It looks like our hosts were waiting for us as if someone tipped them about our movements! How is it possible?”, one of the officers standing behind a rock adjacent to Venkatraman questioned. Venkatraman didn’t have an answer to this, so a brief pause followed.

The firing was intense, and the continuous rounds proved that the enemies were equipped more strongly than the police. In the few minutes that followed, the team led by Venkatraman went on backfoot to absorb the momentum the enemies had. The darkness engulfed their vision. Gunshots roared through the cramped space, amplifying upon echo. This resulted in an acoustic illusion of infinite rounds being fired. The enemies were tough, and the battleground was tougher. Any normal person standing there would retch owing to scarce oxygen and migraine from virtually amplifying gunshots. The morale of the Hyderabad police too was shaken long before. Now, it was just cracking with every thump of gunshot.

As the firing momentarily halted, the Hyderabad police came out of covers to shoot. But something unexpected happened, and the entire force of Hyderabad police lay dead like a deck of cards, in just a few other seconds. Their guns only triggered, but didn’t fire a single shot, and as soon as the entire team was in the open, the ‘Eagle’ cult shot them down. But one man remained, still standing and facing the ‘Eagle’ cult.

Venkatraman controlled his running breath, and said, “I did as you told Yuvan. Now let me go!”

One of the eagle-masked men took off his mask and looked ahead.

“Good job, Venkatraman. You can go. But if you leave in this condition, people will probably have suspicion. Hence, I am sorry, for what I am about to do next”, the man kept his demeanor unchanged and raised his arm. And with a mild smile, he shot two shots straight at Venkatraman, one on his arm, and the other on his thigh.

Venkatraman fell to the ground and screamed in excruciating pain.

***

An hour had passed, yet Prashant and Vasu hadn’t found anything unsettling. Rooms through rooms were searched, and everything was normal. Prashant had finished searching his wings and was coming down through the verandah of the top floor of wing eight.

Two more rooms were left for Vasu. As he stepped into room 514, the penultimate room on the top floor of wing four, he heard a voice from the adjacent room; as if a mirror had shattered. He came out of the room, now standing in the verandah, dimly lit with a halogen bulb. Outside, it had started to rain. Panic had seeped through the veins of the Velvet Vista residents long ago. The night was becoming sinister with every passing second. Since the rooms Vasu was standing in front of were the innermost on the floor, the voices of the residents standing on the ground were also not audible to him. Gathering all his confidence, he took out his gun and stepped inside the last room, Room 515.

He switched on the lights to witness everything was normal here, except the dresser mirror. The mirror had fallen and shattered on the ground, possibly owing to strong winds. At least this was what Vasu thought. Some clothes and blankets were lying unfolded on the upholstered bed. A book was lying upside down on the table. The washroom was latched from the outside. Still, Vasu decided to check it once to find anything of interest. As he opened the latch, he felt enormous pressure on his palms. The door had moistened in the rainy season causing friction against the latch. He entered the washroom, stepping through the watery floor, indicating that it was recently used.

“They don’t even use wiper!”, Vasu grinded his teeth angrily.

His eyes suddenly fell on something unsettling, which momentarily stopped his breath. A bucket was half filled with dark red liquid, which he thought to be blood. However, a red detergent colorant was kept on the wall rack, seeing which Vasu gasped a sigh of relief. Finding nothing of concern, he returned to the room, latching the washroom as it was.

As he turned to face the room, his eyes stuck momentarily. The main door was now shut, although he recalled that he hadn’t closed it.

“Door hinge probably”, Vasu said to himself and continued investigating other things. He opened each drawer in the dresser table, ending up with some normal pills, keys, and magazines. The laptop was lying unfolded on the study table, and some articles on the downfall of certain world economies were opened. As Vasu approached the door, something clicked in his mind. Something was abnormal here. He had seen something unusual here and in the thoughts of doing what should be done next, he missed what was it. Yes! He remembered it now. The cover. It was the cover. The cover of the book lying upside down on the table. It was an eagle!

As Vasu turned to take a glance at the book, the pyramid of clothes lying piled on the ground moved, and a man burst from within it. He struck his right hand which was carrying a dagger with enormous force onto Vasu’s forehead, tearing it apart and gushing a stream of blood all across Vasu’s face. The intensity with which the man struck him paralyzed Vasu for a moment, but he composed himself soon to avoid graver circumstances. As the man was about to strike again, Vasu threw his hand with a speed that surprised even himself and held the man’s attacking hand. He threw his right hand into the air and struck the head of his pistol right in the man’s eyes, leaving him in immense pain. The dagger fell from the man’s hand and he collapsed on the ground. Vasu jerked him from behind by his collar and choked his neck with his wrists, placing his pistol at point blank.

“Who are you? Tell me otherwise I will shoot you and frame it as an encounter”, Vasu ground his teeth in anger and yanked his attacker with even greater strength.

“You won’t be… able to extract… anything out of me. I can die… happily instead”, as the man completed his sentence, something cracked within Vasu’s forehead.

He gripped his pistol tightly and shot out the right ear of the attacker.

The attacker screamed as blood spilled across the floor, and so did the residents of the Velvet Vista apartment, hearing a gunshot from wing four.

“I won’t let you die easily for sure, so better tell whatever you know”, said Vasu.

“I will tell you anything, please don’t shoot”, the attacker pleaded now, seeing Vasu float out his hand randomly in the air.

A few minutes later, Inspector Vasu, Inspector Prashant, and the attacker were all in the open ground of the Velvet Vista apartment.

***

“We were recruited by Yuvan around a year ago…”, the attacker continued.

“…by ‘we’ I mean the members of the Hyderabad zone. The project was called Project Prometheus, chaired by Yuvan in the past five years, which is the very age of this idea. The idea was simple, we had to stop mankind from attempting to leap up to the level of Godkind. If we brought any leads or possible victims of this operation, our position would rank up in the hierarchy. You may ask if we were recruited a year ago why the attack was done now. Although the build-up for the team in Hyderabad was completed around six months ago, Yuvan was not ready to carry out the killings. He wanted to strike the entire nation all at once. So, he waited for five years to expand his network across all states. You might have heard news of similar killings across a few states yesterday. But you might not know that at least one such killing occurred in every city of Southern India yesterday night, concluding phase one of Project Prometheus. You can imagine the intensity of the idea and the conviction our leader had”, the attacker coldly said and kept staring into the void ahead.

“What was your role in the killings yesterday?”, Inspector Prashant asked.

“I only gave the leads to Dr. Hansram, Ms. Natasha, and Mr. Iftakhar higher up in my hierarchy. I read about Natasha on the internet and came across the other two names while talking to Ganesh at a nearby tea stall a few months back. Witnessing an abandoned storehouse here, I found this apartment as the perfect hideout during my first venture. Although the original idea was to stop mankind from attempting to taste Godkind, the retaliation after each phase was even more important for complete dominance. This was what Yuvan kept repeating in all the meetings. That is why I kept waiting here for retaliation after murdering Ganesh, knowing that you would come here soon, vacate the buildings, and start a search operation. I had planned to shoot you all”, the attacker calmly said.

“Who was Vijay Mhambre? Why was he involved in yesterday’s killings?”, asked Vasu.

“Vijay Mhambre was recruited in the Hyderabad zone of Project Prometheus around a year ago. He was a drug addict and was thrown out of the Velvet Vista apartment right when the recruitment of the Hyderabad zone had begun. We would return to our homes late at night after carving out the plan, suspecting increased checking during the day. Those days, our leader Yuvan had come to visit Hyderabad to finalize the state army of Project Prometheus. One night while we were en route home, Vijay accidentally came in front of our leader’s car, which was passing by the road adjacent to the Velvet Vista apartments. Seeing his mental condition, Yuvan recruited him into Project Prometheus considering him to be easily brainwashed”, the attacker said and for the first time, moved his eyelids and rested them at Prashant.

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Prashant was almost baffled by this strange stare. Controlling himself, he asked “But why was he killed, that too in Dr. Hansram’s room?”

“I am also not aware about it much, because my job was only to signal whether the attack can be carried out here. Although I was not directly involved in the killings, I was connected with them through a pager to signal dire situations. As far as I trust my instincts, when the operation was completed, a fight erupted between them, with Vijay on one side and the rest on the other. One of them contacted Yuvan, and then later they all killed him. I have two more things to share before we wrap up this conversation”, the attacker said while constantly staring at the moon.

“So you will decide when this conversation ends, huh?”, Vasu angrily said and pointed the pistol on the attacker’s forehead.

Prashant ordered him to put it down and signaled the attacker to continue.

“One, that Vijay Mhambre started healing since he was recruited. Although it was a good sign for himself, it was a bad sign for our leader and Project Prometheus, because he started questioning things. He had started to become a rebel, and on the night before yesterday, he expressed his willingness to drop himself from the project. However, Yuvan admired Vijay for his knowledge about drugs which was useful in planning several killings. Hence to keep making use of his knowledge, Yuvan tricked him. He knew that if Vijay became a part of Velvet Vista’s killings, the guilt of killing someone and being alone for the rest of his life would haunt him, and hence he would prefer to stay with them. Hence Yuvan only needed to force him to be a part of this single killing, which he did by threatening to kill her mother, Vijay’s only support in a family that has discarded him and his mother. But then, something unexpected happened.

Vijay countered Yuvan in the same meeting in a much enraging tone by saying that he had already leaked information that could get the police to reach Yuvan after a week. Nobody could think what it was that would take a week to become public. Vijay claimed he would only stop it if nothing happened to his mother and he would be set free forever from Project Prometheus. Now this was a deadlock. Vijay agreed to become a part of this plan because her mother was at stake. Yuvan didn’t kill his mother because for him everything was at stake. Something happened on the night phase one occurred which enraged Yuvan and made him doubt Vijay both about his claim of having leaked some information and his ability to contribute to this group, hence he had him killed. It was probably an ethical dilemma that Vijay would have faced. But if you can trace what it was that Vijay claimed to have leaked, you may catch Yuvan.”, the attacker only completed the first part, and it was already when Prashant felt the ground slip beneath him.

“And what was the second part?”, Prashant asked.

“Someone from your team was giving us the tip of your every movement. And you wouldn’t wish to hear his name. It was Vignesh Venkatraman, Assistant Commissioner of Police, Hyderabad.

“WHAT?”, screamed Vasu.

“ARE YOU IN YOUR SENSES!!”, screamed Prashant.

Before they could react to anything else, the attacker broke the rope in one go, which he had been loosening since the time he was tied. He seized the gun from Vasu’s hand and reversed its barrel. Opening his mouth, he put the gun into his mouth and pulled the trigger! Blood splashed out from the other end of his throat and within seconds, another dead body lay on the grounds of the Velvet Vista apartments.

***

ACP Venkatraman was summoning a press conference outside the Telangana Police Headquarters at 3 AM, after receiving medication for the gunshots.

“Sir sorry for sounding rude, but in the Ramagundam coal mine incident, why everyone else was killed but you…”, a reporter asked and was interrupted by the ACP.

“Before you take the blame on yourself for asking this question, let me explain”, Venkatraman tried a smile but didn’t complete it.

“The Eagle cult, or the members of Project Prometheus as they call themselves, wanted to give a message. Hence after they disarmed me, they didn’t kill me. These madmen wanted a living witness of the wrath they brought upon in the Ramagundam coal mine”.

“Sir so how do you justify the fact that Hyderabad police failed? If you are accepting the enemy’s strength to be better than your arsenals in today’s encounter, what message will the Hyderabad people get?”, a reporter asked fuming with wrath.

“Let this be the last question of today’s press brief because I need some rest now. But since this question is an important concern to address, so allow me a few minutes. The people of Hyderabad need not fear because after such close combat, although an utterly unfortunate one, I have a good sense now of how to outclass them in our next and final encounter. Now coming to the reason for this failure, although I take full responsibility, this statement needs little elaboration. From the video they had streamed, we had a good estimation of their strength both in terms of numbers and arsenal. We formed a quick response team to counter them tonight itself because we knew they wouldn’t move foreseeing a heavy patrolling tonight. From the video, the location was clear as well. But right when we fled from our headquarters to the Ramagundam coal mine, someone from our team who was not a part of this encounter leaked the intel about this operation. And I am quite confident about their names, and announce their dismissal from the Hyderabad police unless official orders for reversal come”, said Venkatraman and sensed a wave of murmurs burst among the media persons.

“Sir who is he, name him!”, someone shouted.

“He is not one, as far as I assume. To be precise, I cannot assume to be one even if it is not, and risk all future operations. In my opinion, two people from the Hyderabad police who were not a part of this operation at the Ramagundam coal mine leaked the intel about it. Hence under my full responsibility and conscience, I have decided to expel Inspector Prashant and Vasu from the team considering their alleged involvement in the Ramagundam coal mine incident”, said Venkatraman, concluding the press conference.

 

As Venkatraman finished the brief and got up, a throng of a few dozen CRPF men tore through the media gathering and halted coming in front of Venkatraman.

Venkatraman kept looking at them unable to sense the rationale behind their presence here, and then said.

“I think you are mistaken, jawans. We haven’t called the CRPF personnel here, as we don’t need it right now. Things are still in our hands.”

“You are mistaken sir. It's an order from the center. You are under arrest.”

***

The team led by Inspector Rashmi had arrived in Nagpur, the heart of India. The Nagpur police had accepted Hyderabad police’s request to aid them in this counter-insurgency operation, as Hyderabad’s police knew the criminals and their modus operandi better. It had been a week since the Eagle cult had shaken the country from its foundation. ACP Venkatraman was arrested after Vasu and Prashant informed the DGP about the happenings in the Velvet Vista apartment, who in turn requested the center to take things into their hands, before a loss severe than the Ramagundam coal mine occurred in the state. The Ramagundam coal mine had become a shameful spectacle, and posters of Venkatraman were being burnt across the country. Chaos and anger had seeped deep into the veins of the common masses. Nagpur was just a naked witness to it.

“Amidst all these protests, it will be much easier for Yuvan to carry out the attacks. We don’t even know who are the targets. We have nothing to differentiate between protestors and members of the Eagle cult, who would probably be acting to protest before murdering their target. And Yuvan is just three hours before carrying out the attack. How will we stop it, ma’am?”, asked Anando, the intern in the cyber security team of Hyderabad police, his heart pounding with panic. He was specially brought here to counter the technicalities of the crime Yuvan had sworn to commit.

“Don’t worry, because we can’t afford to. We can’t lose control of our minds getting overwhelmed by emotions, or else a big tragedy can occur. Venkatraman caused the Ramagundam coal mine incident, and people are here burning his posters all over the country, who was their hero a few moments back. Let’s try not to prove to be the second Venkatraman, right Anando?”, asked Rashmi looking firmly into Anando’s eyes.

“Yes ma’am, as you say”, said Anando, sidelining all the clutter of emotions that had fogged his conscience until then.

Rashmi continued, “The list of prime targets is finalized and we will stick to their safety only, at all cost. One or two constables are present in civilian clothes right outside the house of each member of this list. The attack couldn’t be outside this list, that I am sure of. And neither can it be possible under the nose of my team members, members of the Hyderabad police force, that also I am sure of”. She felt a surge of goosebumps as she spoke the last line.

Rashmi and Anando were present outside the house of Biju Sriratnam, the music maestro from Uttarakhand who was present in Nagpur for a classical concert. Similarly, the combined police forces of Hyderabad and Nagpur had scattered across the city guarding the houses of thirty celebrities, who were the supposed targets, ranging from Atharv Dhiman, the rising star of Indian football to Mr. Kaushlendra Nath Kapoor, the retired evergreen actor of ’80s.

Nagpur had been burning in flames since the Ramagundam incident happened. People’s trust in the police was shaken long ago. Protestors had come up on the road to show their dissent to the police; a dissent which lay on a spectrum of two extremes – peaceful protests with banners in both hands on one side, while carrying burning wood logs to burn down the police stations on the other. Stone pelting also became common at police stations after the incident. By the time the police would come out to take action, the protestors were already on a run. The entire police strength that was supposed to counter phase two of Project Prometheus was simply halved, owing to efforts lost in handling the protestors. Inspector Rashmi checked her watch and tried to hide the fact that her heart was pounding much faster than before. But it was evident from her face, and anyone who read her understood it, including Anando. The watch had just struck 11 AM, and only one hour was left in the attack.

Somewhere away from all the chaos in the city, a desktop was opened in one small messy room in Nagpur. A seven-year-old boy had just opened YouTube to search for cartoons before his mother called him for lunch. A typo in his search made a mysterious channel appear at the top, which was being premiered live, and only a dozen people were watching it. The boy read the title and thought hard to recall where had he seen this name before, as news was not his cup of tea. At least he remembered to have heard it from his father. A name that was involved in the biggest spectacle of the country. The title read:

List of targets in Project Prometheus Phase II – by Vijay Mhambre.

***

Vasu and Prashant had also arrived in Nagpur to aid Rashmi and her team, as the decision of their dismissal from the Hyderabad police was reversed by the DGP.

While they were on the flight, Vasu asked Prashant a question that had been churning in his mind for long, “Why do you think Venkat sir went against the team he was building over the years at such a time when the country relied on him the most?”. Prashant laughed a little at Vasu’s apparent despair with his dismissal and explained to him calmly, “Well Vasu it’s a tough call to say it right now, but I assume his promotion lay on one end, pleading to be fetched in the short span left for him in the force, while a painful and unglorified death lay on the other side as threatened by Yuvan. And a man his age with so many regrets about himself in life would often choose the first one”. Completing his hypothesis, Prashant left Vasu in a long and deep duration of silent contemplation.

It was a bright afternoon and mild breeze was accompanying the scorching sun. Rashmi saw a police Scorpio speeding towards her. Soon after it halted a few steps away, Vasu and Prashant stepped down and Vasu waved at her. Probably it was not the right time to wave, he just realized and put his hands in his pockets.

“We will join Raghu who is guarding the house of Ms. Katheryn Evans, the south Indian author of the bestseller historical fiction Anno Domini, staying at Wardha Road. He is missing the presence of an Inspector there”, said Prashant as he shook hands with Rashmi. Raghu was a constable in the Nagpur police and had helped the Hyderabad police in getting acquainted with the new city.

The clocks were just fifteen minutes from touching noon, and it was then that the conversation was abruptly distracted by a phone call. It was Vasu’s phone, at whom Prashant elbowed and said, “I told you when you joined Hyderabad Police to get your ringtone changed, then only your recruitment was possible in the police. And you haven’t done it yet”. Rashmi chuckled while Vasu picked up his call.

“He... Hello... Am I talking to Vasu, sir?”

A child’s voice was heard at the other end.

“Yes, who is this?”, said Vasu.

“Hello sir, I got your number from the Hyderabad police’s website. I know something which might be of interest. My father keeps telling me about the ongoing news of Project Prometheus, whose headlines frequently appear in the news these days. From there I came to know the name of someone called Vijay Mhambre. I was scrolling YouTube this afternoon when I came across a mysterious channel. I have sent you the link to the channel that is streaming a scheduled video right now. It's about the targets of Project Prometheus Phase 2. And the voice is of someone who is claiming to be, Vijay Mhambre.”

Vasu disconnected the call thinking it to be from some childish tech nerd. But as he placed the phone in his pocket, words by the mysterious man who shot himself in Velvet Vista apartments in Hyderabad rang through his ears. But if you can trace what it was that Vijay claimed to have leaked, you may catch Yuvan. Vasu was about to open the link sent by the child on his phone when he got interrupted by yet another call. This was from one of his colleagues who was guarding a nearby vicinity. And in picking up that call, he realized a grave reality, that the clock had just struck noon.

“Hello, Vasu… this is Inspector Abhiraj from the Dhantoli area in Nagpur. A bomb blast has taken place in a nearby house, around 2 kilometers from our location. We are sure that the Eagle cult was somehow involved in this, and it has begun its attacks. But the most worrying part for us right now is that no one is guarding that area… which means that our list of targets… is not so accurate!”.

“What was the name of the person who was the prima facie target in this blast?”, asked Vasu almost yelling.

“He is Dr. Jitendra Mohan Das, the veteran professor of Mathematics retired from IIT Bombay, who was working on the Cosmic Equation if you remember… the equation that could derive the pattern universe follows in its every creation and destruction”, said Inspector Abhiraj, and was surprised to hear a long pause at the other end.

Vasu disconnected the call and opened the channel told by the child on his phone. Prashant and Rashmi came close to peek at his screen. In the video, a man in a black jacket and denim jeans was sitting in a dark room with some early morning light falling on him through the window, turning his body into half-light and half-shadow. His face beneath his eyes was covered with a black mask. Claiming to be Vijay Mhambre, the man continued in a heavy voice.

“By the time this video is being streamed, Project Prometheus Phase II has already begun. I couldn’t risk scheduling it earlier at the cost of notifying the Eagles and having them change their plans. If you can stop them, it will only be through this video, as I had carved out the list of thirteen targets in phase two of Project Prometheus myself. The list goes on as follows. The first person to be killed in this phase is a ten-year-old child prodigy of chess Divyansh Dhar, whose aspiration is to build a deterministic AI supercomputer that can play with 100% unparalleled historical accuracy and defeat the strongest chess grandmasters born or unborn. If he can achieve that, he will also be the first in the world to solve the P vs NP problem, which says that if a machine can pick a solution for some problem and verify it to be correct, it cannot necessarily find the solution using an algorithm. A chess machine can presently pick a move out of n moves and verify it to be best by comparing among each other, but if it can find a move that is 100% best in the current position using an algorithm, then it will solve the P vs NP problem. It will pave the way for the birth of machines that can not only predict but inform about the outcomes of the future by analyzing the current present, which can be thought to be the snapshot of the chessboard. Hence mankind will come one level closer to, Godkind.”

Vasu was no longer interested in hearing anything more from this guy, as his first prediction about the targets was also wrong.

“This is some random guy faking to be Vijay Mhambre and earning followers. According to the blast in Dhantoli, the first name should have been Dr. Jitendra Mohan Das”, said Vasu as he minimized the YouTube app on his phone.

But something clicked Rashmi’s and she took the phone from Vasu’s hand. Ignoring Vasu’s surprise, she opened the video again, but instead of resuming it from where it was paused, she started it from the end. The man’s voice resumed.

“The thirteenth and the last name who will be attacked in this phase is Dr. Jitendra Mohan Das, the Maths veteran professor who is a few months close to having derived the Cosmic Equation, an equation that the universe follows in its every creation and destruction”.

“Fucking hell… He is Vijay Mhambre!”, words slipped out from Rashmi’s mouth as she looked at Prashant. Within seconds, she reversed the video a bit more to hear about the eleventh target. As Vijay revealed the eleventh name according to his order and the second name according to the Eagle cult’s plan, they freaked out in horror. All three of them.

***

Brahmadatta Bhatnagar, a resident of Nagpur had recently developed DeepChain, a hyperledger like BlockChain with the only difference that it was centralized. He had been working on this idea for a long knowing that the value of Bitcoin was nearing its end considering its periodical halving over the years.

Brahmadatta was the second target. Although his location remained hidden most of the time owing to the use of Tor which hid his IP address, the Eagle cult was far stronger in its planning. After days of constant tracking on Tor, they had finally located his presence in Nagpur when his kill switch momentarily failed due to an error while connecting to IRC, exposing his IP for seconds. Though his connection to the VPN was restored, the Eagles were already watching his room.

Prashant sped toward the third target’s house as claimed in the video while Vasu and Rashmi reached Bramhadatta’s last known address from his social media links. He did not use a photo on social platforms nor had he uploaded his address anywhere. The only photo people claimed he had in the world, was on the lock screen of his personal laptop. He shared this information himself in one of the remote podcasts he had given years ago.

Outside his house, fierce protests were happening against ACP Vignesh Venkatraman. Nagpur police were present here till a few minutes ago until they realized their strength was far less compared with the protestors, and the water cannons and lathi-charge they had thought of as effective tactics were easily outplayed way strongly by the horde of angry masses. Blazing torches were in the hands of the protestors, seconds away from burning houses and vehicles. A man shouted a slogan while rolling a burning tire on the road. A young college student surrounded by his friends set fire to an empty police station. A woman in her thirties lay down the poster of ACP Venkatraman on the road and flamed it. Rashmi and Vasu saw all of it and were momentarily scared for their own lives, considering the possibility of the protestors having seen them on television. But coming back to the responsibility they had at hand, they quickly stormed through Brahmadatta’s house, shocked to realize it was latched from the outside. As they entered in, they also realized they were too late.

***

A man was gagged with a face-length cloth, his hands tied behind a chair. Vasu quickly set him free while Rashmi closed the main door and provided him with a glass of water.

“Tell us everything, who did this to you? Were the eagles here?”, asked Rashmi, pre-assuming he was Brahmadatta, as no one else seemed to be present in the house.

“Yes, my name is Brahmadatta, and I am the founder of DeepChain. The eagles were here. They appeared to be protestors in normal masks instead of members of Project Prometheus in eagle masks. They injected me with a drug through my veins, claiming that I would die within an hour. They roped me so that I could not escape the effect of this drug, whatever it was. I have already started feeling weak. They left... just a few minutes ago.”, Brahmadatta spoke.

“We are calling an ambulance; you need to be hospitalized”, said Vasu, his glance falling temporarily on Brahmadatta’s laptop.

Rashmi took out her phone and started dialing for the ambulance.

“Ma’am they are very dangerous, I won’t stay alive. You better go and save the next target. I will be fine if I have to”, Brahmadatta said.

“Don’t worry, nothing will happen to you”, replied Rashmi.

And then all of a sudden, Vasu kicked the man who was claiming to be Brahmadatta so hard that he fell on the ground along with the chair.

“Vasu, have you gone out of your mind?”, screamed Rashmi.

Vasu aimed the pistol right at the man and asked Rashmi to look at the laptop. It was the lock screen, with Brahmhadatta’s photo on it. The man they were facing was certainly not Brahmadatta.

“I don’t know anything, sir, they just asked me to pretend to be Brahmadatta. I was protesting peacefully outside. They have carried the owner of this house somewhere else, which I swear not to know. I didn’t even know whether his name was Brahmadatta or something else”, the man pleaded mercy while still lying on the floor.

“But why has he not killed Brahmadatta like all other targets?”, asked Rashmi.

“They wanted to set an example by giving him the most brutal death and streaming it in front of the whole nation. At least this was what I heard. They said that he would be killed in a fashion similar to how Prometheus was devoured on the Caucasian mountains, and the whole nation would watch. I could understand none of it”, said the man as he had heard.

“We need to know his location at all costs, from where this stream will happen”, said Vasu.

“Do you know anything else, where they carried him? Tell us anything you remember right now or you can be jailed for hiding the truth from us”, Rashmi asked the man.

“This was all I knew, except for one important thing. The leader of them, whom everyone called Yuvan, asked me to call his number if anything wrong happened”, said the man, his words fading as he realized he forgot to call that number as the preceding events unfolded.

“This cannot be possible, all members of the Eagle cult use pagers to contact each other”, said Vasu.

“Which means that this number is of… Brahmadatta!”, Rashmi said, almost shouting.

Vasu immediately opened his phone to track Brahmadatta’s phone number, although the possibility of it being tracked was close to one in infinity. Brahmadatta kept the location, IP, and MAC addresses masked most of the time. Rashmi had assumed it already and claimed there was no use to track via phone number. She insisted Vasu send it to the cyber security team of Hyderabad police. But when Vasu spoke next, she was also taken aback.

“The man is a genius! He has switched on his location and all his addresses moments after his house was intruded. We have his live location. It’s a construction site of some Ambrosia Mall under progress, in Wardhaman Nagar, Nagpur”, said Vasu, his eyes reflecting both confidence and responsibility.

“It’s also probably the last time when we can catch Yuvan. It's now or never”, said Rashmi as they both ran towards their Scorpio parked outside.

***

Ambrosia Mall was an under-construction mall with over sixty stories being built in Wardhaman Nagar. The construction was halted there partially owing to heavy rains and flood alerts, which would ruin any work done for the day. On the sixteenth story where reinforcement was still under progress, a group of eight armed men in eagle masks were setting up a camera to start the stream, and in the center was a man tied to a chair crying for help. A man who founded the most disruptive technologies of the modern era, the DeepChain; a new-age blockchain technology aided by the power of AI.

“Why haven’t you killed me bastards?”, screamed Brahmadatta.

One of the eagles standing nearest to Brahmadatta was polishing a chainsaw. After a pause of a few seconds which felt like pitiful ignorance to Brahmadatta’s question, the man immediately turned towards him and threw a full-fledged punch on his face with brass knuckles. Brahmadatta spat blood on the ground but still dared to look the attacker in the eyes. The attacker wasn’t satisfied yet as if irritated to be disturbed during his job. He stooped low on the other side and threw up another punch right through Brahmadatta’s cheek, swaying his face a hundred and eighty degrees. Brahmadatta momentarily lost consciousness in these two blows, but he was still able to listen to the attacker, quite distortedly.

The attacker placed his forefinger on his lips and said, “Stay calm. Better for you”.

Swinging himself from half-consciousness to half-blackout, Brahmadatta kept thinking of some way to escape from here. He recalled it well enough that he had turned on the location of his phone when he saw the video of Vijay Mhambre sent by one of his close allies in YouTube, anticipating a high probability of the Eagles coming to his home and abducting him. He assumed they wouldn’t kill him unless he told them the secret of mining the entire universe of DeepCoins, which was mined only 0.02% until then and could ensure enormous fortune in years to come. But he also remembered it well enough that nowhere in the house did he mention the phone number, nor was it available on the surface web. And wherever it was on the dark web, the police would never find it. Despair and exhaustion had made sleep more luring for Brahmadatta than consciousness, and he was about to lose his senses. Just then, he heard footsteps of someone approaching from behind, crushing the residue of rocks occasionally under his feet. As he tried opening his eyes, he saw all the eagles step aside to acknowledge the approacher’s presence. He didn’t take time to realize who the visitor was.

As their master, Yuvan came in front, the eagle who had knocked Brahmadatta earlier handed him the chainsaw, bowing down his head in respect. Yuvan was a slim, tall but muscular man in his mid-thirties with enough stamina and tactics to defeat four men his age at once in physical combat. Over the years, he had mastered the art quite well foreseeing its need when the time comes. He had a sharp jawline and blue eyes hooded under docile eyebrows. But the cold demeanor he carried most of the time, hid the ocean of his thoughts and inferences behind every stimulus perceived, turning his docility into absolute demonism. The eagle mask he was wearing right now was just adding to the diabolical aura Yuvan always had.

Holding the chainsaw with both his hands, Yuvan inspected it for a while and then came close to Brahmadatta, almost whispering it in his ears. 

“You have tasted mortality for too long. It’s time to face the divine sleep now; a sleep that will make you realize where you erred, in attempting to touch Godkind. You will be punished now, just like Prometheus was punished daily, and the entire world will step aback fearing this fierceness of the cause-effect relationship. You err, you die, simple as that. The graver the error, the graver the death”, Yuvan switched on the electric chainsaw that began whirring its blades, as he let out a vice chuckle echoing through that empty story of the Ambrosia Mall.

“You might be thinking why I have not yet asked you the secret to mine DeepChain. And the answer to that is because I already have it. It took the longest to intercept your system since we heard about the disruptive technology you brought to the world. It took around a year to bypass all your confidential documents and directories, but now we have the key to mine all of DeepCoins through your system at once, which the restraint of your ethical dilemma didn’t allow. The grandeur of wealth DeepChain can generate will help us reach our objectives much earlier, we just have to wait for global economies to fall and accept DeepChain as their only rescuer. So now, you are only good for this world to set an example. Start the stream, Eagle8”, shouted Yuvan as he brought the electric chainsaw right toward Brahmadatta’s stomach. Brahmadatta screamed with horror envisaging the nerve-cracking pain before it actually seeped through his body. However, when moments passed and nothing happened, Brahmadatta realized that he was still screaming at the top of his voice. Even the voice of gunshots that roared one after the other while the chainsaw was brought down, didn’t make his position alter even slightly. He was shouting so loudly that he missed the sounds of the gunshots, and tears had started coming out of his eyes. Coming back to his senses. Brahmadatta saw Yuvan lying on the floor with his hands bleeding, and an intense round of fire had already begun between the eagles and the cavalry of Nagpur and Hyderabad police.

Reaching Ambrosia Mall just moments before finding a liver-opened Brahmadatta, Vasu and Rashmi were waiting behind the pillars to strike at the right time, ensuring that the stream hadn’t started. It was mandatory to ensure because had the stream started, encountering Yuvan meant that the army of eagles watching the stream remotely would get signaled that the police had breached the under-construction mall, making things tougher for them. When it was ensured, Vasu quickly sent a message to the Hyderabad police signaling to carry out the plan they had discussed minutes ago in the jeep.

As they saw Yuvan raise his arm to kill Brahmadatta, Rashmi glanced at Vasu as if coming to a common consensus of who would do what, before striking a bullet at the camera which was about to start the stream while Vasu shot a bullet right at Yuvan’s hands. As the eagles aimed at Vasu and Rashmi, twenty policemen stormed the sixteenth floor of the mall and took positions. Now, intense firing had already begun and the echoes of the gunshots were quaking the Ambrosia Mall from its foundations. From the morale of both sides, it was clear that either of them had death sealed as their fate today. Between two rounds of firing, Yuvan quickly took cover thinking to utilize the moment to inform his next course of action to his army. As he took out his pager behind one of the rocks, Vasu ran through the covers and kicked through the rock Yuvan was hiding behind, thrusting Yuvan across the ground for a few feet. As Yuvan got up, he threw his hand to get a grip on Vasu’s hand which held the pistol. The brawny physique of Yuvan was far more muscular than Vasu, and Vasu realized it with the single grip of Yuvan that almost paralyzed his hands. Gun fell from his hand, and Yuvan quickly utilized this moment to overpower Vasu. He jerked Vasu towards himself, lifting him off his shoulders, and smacked him like a toy flat on the rocks below. Vasu felt his spine tear with pain, and the wound on his forehead that he got in the Velvet Vista apartments became afresh. Before he could get up, Yuvan knelt and kneed Vasu’s shoulders, pinning him to the ground. He choked Vasu’s throat with one hand and took out his pager with another hand.

“You think you can outwit me? Neither can you restrain me here nor will Project Prometheus collapse”, said Yuvan grinning, his face tremoring with wrath.

Vasu felt his senses go numb as the grip on his neck tightened. Blackout was looking inevitable, and the sounds around him were fading abnormally. However, a grave reality struck him right then, that he couldn’t let go of this moment. If Project Prometheus had to be stopped, it was now, or never. With every ounce of strength surging within him, Vasu quickly held a stone with his free hand and thrashed in on the pager, breaking it in parts. He flung the stone right towards Yuvan, but Yuvan held it again with the other hand. He swung Vasu’s hand along with his right on the ground, fracturing Vasu’s knuckles. Vasu screamed with pain once again, while Yuvan held up another piece of rock and positioned it high above his head, eager to break Vasu’s head apart.

Meanwhile, away from the covers, the firing was still on. Five out of eight eagles were dead, while nine of the twenty policemen had died. It was then that Rashmi noticed something unusual. The firing on their side was on even when the enemies had taken cover. Witnessing this, her eyes quickly gazed out from the covers on the horizon, to glance over other buildings, and she got what was wrong. She equipped her pistol with a binocular and shot down two snipers in the adjacent buildings, who were making the job tougher for the police. Now it was three against eleven, and all three of the eagles collapsed to the ground as soon as they left cover.

For Vasu, it was impossible to change what was destined for him in the next few seconds. Yuvan had raised his arm to gnash Vasu’s face with a rock, his hands were pinned under Yuvan’s knees, and prayers were all he had. As Yuvan was about to rip apart Vasu’s forehead with the rock, he felt his hand was locked.He looked behind and saw Rashmi, who had gripped Yuvan’s arm between the crook of her shoulders, her eyes almost closing with seething pain that came with the efforts required to restrain someone as muscular as Yuvan. When Yuvan realized her presence, he quickly yanked his hand forward, throwing Rashmi across the rocks. But the time that Yuvan gave was enough for Vasu to retaliate. He seized the fallen rock as his left arm was set loose, and smashed it on Yuvan’s forehead right between his pitch-black eyes with every ounce of strength left. Yuvan screamed with searing pain and collapsed on the ground. As Vasu and Rashmi got up and composed themselves, Yuvan jerked with unimaginable speed and took hold of the pistol that had fallen from Rashmi’s hand. Yuvan aimed the gun at Vasu and pulled the trigger, while Rashmi screamed in horror. However, almost parallelly two more shots were fired from behind; shots fired by constable Saleem that ripped open Yuvan’s chest and distorted the angle of his shot. Though Yuvan’s bullet aimed at Vasu's chest missed him and passed through his shoulder, constable Saleem’s bullets fired from behind pierced through Yuvan, rendering him dead on the spot.

Everyone kept looking at the dead body of Yuvan for the next few seconds, allowing the moments to absorb the nerve-cracking tension of the past hour. Everything was at a standstill now, like a calm after a storm. A few buildings adjacent, a bird chirped through the distance. A blood drop fell from Vasu’s shoulder and splattered against the ground. A car honked hundreds of feet below stuck on the roads of Wardhaman Nagar. It was Vasu who broke the silence and screamed at Saleem under the effect of the gunshot that missed him right through his shoulder, “What have you done Saleem, we had to arrest him alive!”.

“Sir you wouldn’t be left alive if I hadn’t”, Saleem felt the apparent rudeness behind his words but didn’t regret saying it. He was proud of something he had done for the first time and was shivering with the tremor of the shot and intensity of the moment.

“He is right, now stay laid and let me call an ambulance”, said Rashmi looking at the cloudless horizon glimmering brightly ahead. Its glow reflected intensely across the sixteenth floor of the Ambrosia Mall as if concealing the horror witnessed moments ago within its tranquil embrace. Meanwhile, the leader of the criminal group Project Prometheus, the murderer of eighteen lives and the seemingly undefeatable enemy of mankind Yuvan Arora was lying lifeless chest open on the ground.

***

Media headlines all over the nation started covering the news that the mastermind of Project Prometheus was dead, and all the eagles were arrested from the rest of the locations which Vijay Mhambre narrated in his video. Although prima facie it looked like all the work was done by encountering Yuvan at the Ambrosia Mall, nobody anticipated the efforts it took for the joint police force to make it happen until Inspector Rashmi scheduled a press conference at night.

“The entire nation can sleep in peace now, as the members of Project Prometheus including their mastermind Yuvan are dead or underground for the time being. Before claiming anything we don’t deserve, I apologize for the losses we encountered during the past few days, including that of Dr. Jitendra Mohan Das, Dr. Hansram Mehta, Ms. Natasha, Mr. Iftakhar Ansari, and fourteen other innocent lives.

We all know that Yuvan was killed in an encounter in the under-construction Ambrosia Mall. But to make it happen, we also signaled our teammates led by Inspector Prashant as we reached Yuvan’s location to contact Eagle1, Yuvan’s second and deputy leader of Project Prometheus, to keep the operation on. The only person who knew Eagle1’s contact and their codeword was Venkatraman, in front of whom Yuvan had contacted Eagle1 earlier. Through ex-ACP Venkatraman we were also informed that Yuvan used a 50 MHz modulator while talking. The last thing we needed to do was to mirror the IP address of the ISP nearest to Ambrosia Mall, while we connected to Eagle1. This planning was enough for us to convince Eagle1 that Yuvan had contacted him to keep the operations on even though the police abrupted the stream. At the same time, it was the police who urged him to do the same so that all alleged members involved in phase two of Project Prometheus could come to the location where the police were already present, and get arrested. Through that call, Eagle1’s location was also compromised, after which the local police arrested all the members from that location on our intel, which was the headquarters of Project Prometheus in Kottayam, Kerala”.

After finishing the press brief, they all traveled back to Hyderabad and reached there before the dawn of the next day.

Two days later, the media headlines were still so occupied with the ‘Project Prometheus’ incident that it appeared it had all happened hours before. Vasu was given a compulsory leave of a few days considering his exceptional contribution to the Hyderabad police’s counter operation and more importantly the need for proper medication.

In the evening, Prashant and Rashmi were walking out of Telangana police headquarters after meeting the newly appointed ACP, when Prashant asked her.

“Are you free for coffee tomorrow, Rashmi?”, Prashant asked.

Rashmi laughed and said, “Will tell tomorrow, I couldn’t get a proper sleep since this entire incident began”.

“Sure, but just before leaving, I have one more question. Do you believe in the story of Prometheus and Zeus whether it happened for real, or was it just a myth?”, Prashant couldn’t hold the curiosity he had in such mythological stories ever since he was a child.

“Haha, let’s leave this also for tomorrow, Prashant? Probably you also need proper sleep right now.”, said Rashmi, realizing a few seconds later that Prashant was still looking at her face.

“I promise to tell you my opinion about this tomorrow, okay? But I surely believe that it is nothing wrong of mankind to attempt to touch Godkind unless it has to be taking someone else’s life, unlawfully”, Rashmi chuckled at the last word considering their own profession, having only received a nod from Prashant.

The next morning, while Rashmi was sipping her usual expresso with biscotti and going through news on her laptop, an unusual article popped on her feed – “Hercules, the man who freed Prometheus from Zeus’s Eagle during his Twelve Challenges”. For a fraction of a second, a thought flashed across her mind, a name to be precise that she had forgotten in the past few days. It was Vijay Mhambre, the man without whose help it was impossible to kill the Eagles. Out of the thirteen targets of phase two, Vijay was able to save exactly twelve through his timely information. After being lost in her thoughts for a few seconds, she took out her phone and messaged Prashant –

“Evening, 7 PM today. Autumn Leaf Café”.

As her fingers typed across the screen, her face depicted a moment of serenity she was enjoying, that allowed her the time to be amused by nature’s coincidences in her otherwise busy schedule. After all, she had the answers to both the questions Prashant had asked her the previous day.

***