THE MONSTER MAN Part 2

Bratish woke up at a very late hour of the night. He was still lying on the floor of the bus. He is feeling dizzy and a nerve twisting pain on his face. He stood up slowly holding the seats of the bus. The dead bodies are still lying here and there within the bus. He slowly walked forward to check what is wrong with the his face. He crossed the bodies slowly, and walks up to the engine of the bus, there he tried to look at his reflection on the rear view mirror of the bus. He is taken aback. There is big cut mark on his face which diagonally along his face. He could not believe that he is looking at his own reflection. He is looking like a horrible blood thirsty monster. He rush out of the bus and came on the road. He started running on the desolate street.

In the morning there was a chaos at the junction of Dalhousie. The bus is standing still at the same location with the dead bodies inside the bus. Though city police took over the whole scenario, but there are a lot people who could not believe, that some brutal murderer is walking free in the city. Many of them are happy that the murderer has done quite a good job by killing those criminals who swar in the city in the night. The reporters are busy getting the bites of the people who have first spotted the bus and the dead bodies. Aisha is standing in corner of the pavement and is observing the whole scenario. She is an investigative journalist and was sick and tired of covering bogus news about the scavengers in the city and daily petty cases of burglary and rape cases. For her it was a moment of change in the city and she felt relieved that there is at last something to look up to. She stubbed the cigarette in her hand and walked towards the bus. Since she has a small structure it becomes easy for her to be at places where normally people get caught. She stealthily got up into the bus.

The bodies have already been taken away for postmortem by the police. She looked all over the spot. Blood spilled all over the place, suddenly something got her attention and she bent down to get a closer look of the object. She saw there is broken ink pen lying on the floor of the bus. But there is also something else lying beneath the rear seat of the bus. She tried to reach the object with a lot effort her hand reached the object she dragged it from beneath the seat. A money bag, she opened it and found few money and an identity card with a photo of Bratish. She again stealthily gets down from the bus and meets her photographer friend who is now standing in the same corner of the pavement.

-Look what I have found.

-What?

She shows him the money bag.

-you got a lead of the murderer?

-Yeah!

-Lets move on from here got to discuss.

Bratish reached his home at the break of the dawn. He is scared of the consequences that he has to face now. He has put a bandage on his face in order to stop the bleeding from the injury on his face. He cannot decide what to do next, because cannot go there on the street with this horrible look of his. He never have been late in reaching his office. But today he has another option than to stay back. Suddenly the bell rings and it grabs his attention. He is scared to open the door. Who can this be?

-Bratish are you inside?

Its Mr. Guha, but why has he came, Bratish can imagine the worse, might be the news is out by know and every body in the city knows who is the murderer. Bratish tried to get up from the chair of his dining table but sits down again with a severe head ache which he had after he reached his flat.

-I am inside Mr. Guha.

-have you heard of the news?

-What news?

-There have been a murder in Dalhousie near your office.

-Mr. Guha I have a severe head ache can we talk about this later on?

-Shall I call a doctor?

-No no there is no need for that, I can manage.

-okay.

Bratish got relieved. But he can understand that it wont be easy to hide there for long. He has to decide that whether he should stay there or shall he leave. Because if he stays there he will also put his neighbours life into risk, after all he knows the fact that he is not a normal human being, so if the police and the authorities get hold of him they will be suspicious about the others living near him and there life will become miserable. No he cannot be that selfish, these people has helped him a lot. They are his friend, philosopher and guide. He gets up from his bed with great effort as his head is bursting out in pain. He goes inside the bedroom and brings out a suitcase which was kept beneath his bed. Then he left the flat wrapping himself in shawl.