0x2000300

Location: New Delhi

Just as the ball had returned to its owner’s hand, an SUV, clearly an import, flew in through the door. It landed and braked right in front, blocking any input-output in the area. Four armed men jumped out of it.

Bansal could only stare. They all wore black, body fitting jumpsuits, armored to the teeth, black masks covering their faces. Onboard, they had all varieties of artillery. They had two rifles each, one assault and the other a specific one to each of them. On their belts they wore magazines to their weapons and something that appeared to be a spray can.

And the SUV . . .

The man who had emerged from the backseat rushed towards the door, followed by another one who appeared to be covering him. Surely, when a few guards from the outside tried to come in and do their jobs, the man in the back shot them to instant deaths. The man up front stuck something that looked like a big spanner with a hinge in its middle in the center of the door’s path. The doors were apparently closing, which was to be subdued due to some personal reason of these thugs.

The one who had been riding shotgun aimed his rifle up and fired a round. Everyone instantly ducked. People were screaming and holding on to their near and dear ones. Neha pulled the object of her affection to her side.

‘Nobody move!’ screamed the leader.

The remaining guards came running with their guns pointed at the intruders. And then Justin Bieber lunged out of the vehicle screaming “Y’all got punk’d!” and everyone had a big laugh repeatedly confessing to the camera about getting punk’d like an idiot.

Just kidding. The guards who came towards them aiming their own guns at them were simply shot to death. 

Radhe, who had been riding shotgun and had fired the inaugurating round skywards, looked around, and found what he was looking for. A man in his 40s, spectacles, stubble, expensive Armani suit, the manager. He walked up to him and grabbed him by the collar ‘How you doin’ Mr. Bansal?’ With that he produced what looked like a syringe from his pocket, ‘Sweet dreams!’

The blue in the syringe disappeared as soon as it perforated Yash’s neck.

‘No! Why are you doing this?!’ Yash pleaded, the tranquilizer already taking effect.

Radhe was calm as day ‘Apparently our employer does not like you very much. Oh, I almost forgot, she told me to tell you,’ he scrunched up his face a little, trying to remember the exact words, ‘right, “Dalix Aklanis”, whatever that's supposed to mean to you.’

Yash’s eyes went red with rage and fear alike. ‘Wh . . . Who . . . sent you?!’

‘Don’t know, just know I gotta do this . . .’ Radhe dragged him up to the front door where the once resisting guards were now sleeping with the peace of death. Yash finally passed out. Radhe threw him out the door where he tumbled down the stairs and came to rest on the road, his body splayed like a used rag.

Karim pressed the harness which had been holding the door open in its center, to which the device buckled. The doors immediately closed.

Radhe turned to the terrified customers. Apparently his latest action with the manager was quite a turn on. ‘Dear guys and gals, we are here to rob your bank. Please remain seated until the “robbery” sign is switched on.’

All his crewmembers laughed wildly. Neha clutched Jay’s arm tight. Real tight. Jay looked at his watch.

  8:00:18

He calculated that the uninvited guests had gained entrance at exactly at 8 o’clock. How punctual of them.

The thieves now came towards them. ‘Oooo!’ Radhe cooed ‘Lovebirds, I like that.’ He then turned to the rest of the crowd squatted on the floor and said ‘Please people, if you do not want us to send you on a one way trip to meet your favorite god, follow that guy.’ He pointed to Madhavan who started walking towards the stairs. Nobody could move, possibly due to the gripping fear. Madhav pointed his gun up and fired a shot, to which the roof barfed out some cement and concrete, ‘Next one in somebody’s brain!’ All the helpless hostages started to stand up and walk towards him, keeping their distance from the beast. Jay got up too, Neha close behind. He tried to stay behind the army man with the frozen account who, despite his occupational merits, looked equally scared.

Madhavan was joined by Karim, who had been busy dragging the security analysts out of their cubicles; both of them escorted the good-as-dead people up the stairs to the third floor. Anil and Radhe tailed them, watching their every move.

The morning employees consisted of mostly the receptionist, the manager and a few in the account management, most of whose offices were on the ground floor, so the rest of the building was empty right now. The hostages were taken to the third floor. There were desks lying in the middle of the floor.

Just like she said, thought Radhe. The woman on the phone had given clear cut description about this place, and till now, all of it had turned out to be correct.

‘. . . Now listen very carefully, we roll tomorrow morning at 7:00. On the left side of the bank, there is a back alley at some distance, near that park with the overgrown foliage. Go there and you will find a black SUV with all the required gear including watches in it. It’s all very easy to use, so put it on as quickly as you can and familiarize yourself with the rest of the contrivances. At 8:00 sharp by the clock provided, drive through the front door, and block the entrance with it. The door is programmed to get locked as soon as the computer senses something fishy going in, stick the metallic harness, the one that looks like a spanner with a button in the middle, in the door before it does. Eliminate all the guards. The manager usually lurks near the reception at that time. Say the word “Dalixalkanis” to him, and use the exact same word. I will text it once this conversation is over. After that, drug him and throw him out. I never liked him. That pig. Anyways, remove the harness, the door will close. Take all the hostages to the third floor, you will spot a door to the right. There will be many desks inside. Remove them and . . .’

The desks were removed by Karim and Anil. ‘So people, be my guest and have a seat.’ They all obeyed, and started dropping to the floor one by one. Radhe nodded to Anil, who took off a black bag which had been hanging from his waist. Joshi tried to steal a peak and saw . . . grenades.

The four men started to take out one grenade each and handing them over to the hostages. Just as they did so, they removed the pin, ‘Sorry guys, but we don’t want you trying anything funny with your hands while we work our magic,’ said Radhe.

They came towards Jay and Neha. ‘I have something special for you two . . .’ Saying this, Madhavan handed over a grenade in their hands in such a way, that Jay’s left and Neha’s right hands together held one grenade, and so did his right and her left hands. ‘Never let go of each other.’

  -/0/-

  0x2000301

The woman who had assigned them the job was keeping an eye on her four investments through the screen. So far they had acted according to plan. Just the part with Neha and Jay was a bit exaggerated.

It was now time for stage two.

  -/0/-

  0x2000302

The onlookers had called the cops as soon as they had made head and tail of the scenes being played out in front of them. The famous thief-proof bank, Le Fort, was being robbed. The cops had surrounded the entire perimeter of two blocks. They had tried to get a view of what was going in the bank. But to their dismay, they had discovered that the hostages were being held on the third floor.

Third floor, the one with tinted glass.

The head of the police department, Akhilesh Sawant, was trying to figure out what to do. He had faced many trying situations in his 21 year long career, but he had never seen anything quite like this.

The thieves had obviously planned the event well; surprise attack and using the bank’s own infrastructure like the tinted glass were an exceptionally good example of that. They had even timed it well enough for most of the bank to be empty. Even the doors of the bank had clamped shut on the first sensor’s indication that something bigger than a human had gained unauthorized entry. Sawant vowed to give the men inside a pat on their backs after he caught them, dead or alive.

The manager of the bank, though injured with the fall, had still been breathing when the cops got there. He had been dispatched to the nearest hospital, the Arihant, just across the street, immediately.

Sawant was preparing a strategy for his men to combat the situation. Of course, a thorough knowledge of the battleground would have been a great help. That is exactly why he had preferred to come down himself to this place.

He had ordered down the floor plans of the bank from the Municipal Department. The blueprint of any building, before it was built, had to be verified by the Municipality for structural validity and illegal construction. Once Sawant had the print, he could, and would, formulate a plan to tackle these lunatics who had challenged him.

Sawant prided himself on his record. Unlike other (read most) Indian cops, he was not corrupt. And unlike other (still read most) Indian cops, he had put quite a few folks behind the bars instead of the other way round. And unlike other (you got it, most) Indian cops, he did not have a very good record of sucking up to his superiors. What’s wrong is wrong; no special treatment for any banged up guy who claimed to be some minister’s love child.

‘Sir!’

Sawant turned in the direction from where he had been acknowledged. It was the trainee he had sent to fetch the blueprints. ‘Did you get it?’ Sawant barked. ‘Yes Sir’ was the prompt reply from the young and aspiring Khaki wearer with a stomp of his right foot.

Sawant looked at his empty hands. ‘And . . . ?’

‘In the car, Sir.’

‘Why?’ Sawant shouted again, ‘a piece of paper was too much for you to carry?’

‘Well Sir . . .’ he hesitated for a moment, but continued ‘I don’t think you will like this.’

Sawant looked taken aback by the comment. He started stalking towards the car.

  -/0/-

  0x2000303

The man that the world knew by the name Yash Bansal woke up suddenly. He was flat on his back on a hospital bed. He looked up and saw the cracks on the white ceiling. He looked around and saw a needle in his arm, connected by a thin pipe to a clear plastic pouch suspended from a stand. He tried to get up. His head was badly aching from the fall, but it didn’t matter currently. Your own self is the least significant thing in this world, understand? he had been told when he had taken up this profession.

And his profession was not managing a bank.

He fumbled through to the nearest phone he could find. He found one near the stairwell. Quickly placing the device to his ear, he started typing in the unlucky thirteen digit number he had been made to memorize – although it wasn’t that necessary – when he had joined this distinguished job of his: 1800 78737 6682.

     -/0/-

     0x2000304

‘Welcome to Telebrands India, choose wisely, live well. Press 1 for placing an order. Press 2 for . . .’ a computerized woman’s voice started off. Bansal quickly pressed 7 followed by a 4 and a 6.

 ‘Welcome to the Slicer-Dicer extension of TeleBrands India. Press 1 to . . .’ the female voice set off again.

Oh shut up bitch; Yash pressed the code 697.

The mechanized tone was replaced by a human one, ‘Welcome to TeleBrands India Slicer-Dicer FAQ helpline. How may I help you?’

Yash did not say anything; she was not the one who could help him, his situation was already FAQed beyond that. He punched in 791 onto the buttons.

The young lady’s monitor displayed the alert message. She had already seen that the number that had been used to connect the call to her was different from the one that usually did. She looked around to see if anyone had noticed the small orange rectangle containing the SOS code typed by Yash on the bottom right of her screen. No; everyone was busy attending calls like a regular call center. She glared at the code; it was a pretty high ranking and dangerous one. She spoke into the mic attached to her headset, ‘Please hold one minute while I patch your call.’

The voice silenced off.

There were two clicks, a pause, then a third click.

The other side of the line began to ring.

"Yash Bansal" braced for impact.

  -/0/-

 0x2000305

  2012-2-9, 04:50:24; CET

1 hour 5 minutes 19 seconds ago

Location: Lucerne && New Delhi

Charles was buried neck deep in work, as always. And as always, he was doing it all by himself; no help from anyone he could call his assistant. Every now and then he would take a break to massage his neck, looking out the window on his left, overlooking what he knew was a clear blue stretch of water, which currently appeared black. Ignoring the weight of the platinum halo on his right ring finger, he set back to work.

The phone in his lonely office began to ring. Strange, he thought, one of the few men in the world who was aware of this telephone's number. Most of the calls to this particular phone were patched through the network. Excusing himself from the current file, he picked up the receiver and waited quietly.

‘Code in . . . Prof zero nine seven eight!’ Bansal’s voice sounded pleading.

Charles fed the unique employee code into the computer in front of him. He saw the caller’s profile, and was quite impressed by it. This was a high ranking person, not as high as himself, of course, but still, high.

‘Response . . . Mike’ he said ‘This is a secure line. I hope you established contact because you had some serious problem. What is your status?’

Bansal narrated the events at the bank. A frown came on Charles’ face.

‘You called me because the supposed bank you were supposedly managing is supposedly getting emptied out?’

It was Bansal’s cue to use his greatest weapon, which he had been had been saving for the appropriate time.

Couldn’t be more appropriate, thought Bansal.

He gave the intel about the reference about “Dalixalkanis” made by one of the thieves.

The man on the other side fell silent. After 3 long seconds, gathering his wits he said ‘Get to field, I’m sending the agents.’

  -/0/-

  0x2000306

Location: New Delhi

Akhilesh Sawant, head of the police department, pride of whatever honest people were left in the country, was performing the most likely human action in this kind of situation.

Scratching his head.

The young trainee cop whom he had sent to bring the floor plans of his current battleground had not returned empty handed as had first appeared. In fact, he had returned a bit too full for Sawant’s taste.

The bank had 14 official and authentic floor plans, each of them showing the bank in a different light. The visible bank, the part above the ground, was exactly the same in each of them. But the basement had a different draw in every paper he picked up. On one it was in the shape of a circle, another showed it as a rectangle, still others showed square, “L”-shaped, “T”-shaped and many other close convex polygons. He had seen the signature of the builder on the drawings and now had ordered to call down the signatory.

Which one of these did he sign? Moreover, did he sign any of them at all?

The date was of 2-24-2007 on each of them, when the bank was renovated for the second time, when the old white and green Banque de Reims logo was replaced by the bright red, gold and black Nexus Bank’s. No records prior to this were found. The signatory was Sawant’s only hope now. ‘Sir!’ a fellow cop called. Sawant looked towards him. ‘Find him?’ The cop hung his head low. ‘The man was killed in a car accident on 26th of February, same year.’

What?! The trainee cop was having a hard time believing his ears. Two days after he apparently signed these? What are the odds?

He lost his train of thoughts when, out of nowhere, six black SUVs, looking not the least bit Indian, parked in front of the hostile area.

But the cops had enough presence of mind to register that the SUVs closely resembled the make of the car inside the bank right now.

  -/0/-

 0x2000307

Izna looked at the commotion unfurling at the distance. So far, every little action had been as Jay had plotted. If the same success rate followed through till the end, it would be her best birthday ever.