Vimana (16 page)

The next few minutes passed in a blur of congratulations and smiles, but when Aaditya was back in his room, he finally got time to reflect on what he had done. He had killed two beings- Asuras or not, they were living things whose lives he had snuffed out in an instant. Tanya must have sensed what was on his mind, and she came into the room, sitting down behind Aaditya.

'You know what they say about being careful what you wish for.'

Aaditya turned towards her and held her hands. 'As a kid, I had once asked my dad how he dealt with it, especially after the bombing runs he had done over Kargil during the '99 war with Pakistan. He told me what drove him was not just protecting his country but the men who flew with him and counted on him. He said that he wished nobody ever fought wars, but since men do wage war, he wanted to ensure all his boys made it back home.'

'I thought you wanted to fight to avenge your father.'

Aaditya had told her nothing about Kalki's message, so he just nodded.

That evening a small celebration had been held in Aaditya's honour in the club, and he found himself bombarded with congratulations. He met Durga after some time, and she explained that she had been away on a mission in Africa. Narada slapped him on the back, while a visibly drunk Shiva kept referring to Aaditya as 'my new brave warrior'. Of all the Devas, only Brahma seemed to sense that there was something else on Aaditya's mind. The elder Deva sat down next to him, a glass of Soma in his hand, as Aaditya watched Shiva and Kartik on the dance floor.

'Aadi, this is what you wanted, isn't it?'

Looking into the Deva's eyes, Aaditya realized it would be better to stick as close to the truth as possible.

'Brahma, killing others does bother me, but I've also been reading up on Kalki. Is he really the villain I was told he is?'

Brahma averted his eyes, as if not wanting Aaditya to see his reaction.

'Aadi, to a father a son can never be a villain, but sometimes even the most loving father must realize that his son has gone too far down the path of evil to be redeemed. In a perverse way, he is man's creator, not the benevolent god of your religions, but given human predilection for violence, perhaps that is not entirely surprising, is it?'

Brahma left Aaditya alone. After some time Indra came up and sat wordlessly next to Aaditya. He said to nobody in particular, 'The first one you kill is the toughest. After that, it's much easier.'

Aaditya asked the Deva general the other question that was on his mind.

'Indra, if we know that Kalki keeps creating mischief like this, why don't you just warn human governments and make contact with them? Sure, your technology is far ahead of ours, but if the major powers knew what was going on, and sided with you, Kalki would really have no plan.'

Shiva had come down to join them, and he passed a shot glass to Aaditya.

'Now drink a man's drink before I answer. Here's some Tequila.'

Aaditya usually never had anything stronger than beer, other than the night when he had gone and plastered his bike on the fender of a bus, but he did not want Shiva to stop talking. He felt the tequila burn its way down his throat as Shiva downed a shot himself.

'Aadi, do you think we haven't tried? Your bloody governments are just so greedy and power-hungry, sometimes I wonder if we should just leave them to Kalki's tender mercies.'

Indra raised a restraining hand, but Shiva was either too agitated, or too drunk to notice. 'In 1947, we established contact with the US government and set up a meeting.'

Despite feeling a bit tipsy, Aaditya sat up straight at the startling revelation. 'What happened?'

'The bastards ambushed us, hungry for our technology and weapons. Brahma had wanted for us to go in person. I was more cautious, having seen how humans have been over the ages, and sent a stripped down, captured Asura vimana with a Gana at the controls. The Americans shot it down, and what they got spurred on a lot of their advances since then in the areas of stealth and electronics. That was at a place called Roswell. Since then, we have decided to be more cautious.'

Aaditya digested what he had heard. He had heard and read about the infamous Roswell incident, where an UFO had supposedly crashed in the US, and since then, had been the subject of much conspiracy theories and countless books and TV programmes.

Just then, Ganesha burst into the room.

'Big problem, folks.'

As he motioned with his right hand, a giant holographic display appeared in the middle of the room. Aaditya saw that it was a breaking news telecast on CNN.

'As we have been reporting over the last few minutes, a major earthquake measuring 7.9 on the Richter scale has occurred in the oceans off Japan's east coast. A tsunami warning has been issued throughout the coastal area, and we are awaiting more details.'

An earthquake and tsunami had battered Japan just a year ago, and Aaditya wondered what new horrors this one would bring to that nation. He heard Indra mutter to himself, 'Kalki, what the hell are you doing?'

Aaditya asked Indra what a natural disaster had to do with Kalki.

'Perhaps everything,' came the Deva's enigmatic reply.

***

NINE

The next morning, Aaditya was awakened by a knock on the door. He saw that it was still only five in the morning. When he opened the door, Kartik ran more than walked in.

'Sorry to barge in like this, but come with me.'

Seeing Kartik's expression, Aaditya didn't argue much and followed him to the hangar. When he saw that Kartik was walking towards his vimana, he finally asked him what he was doing.

'I'm flying to Japan, and I thought you'd like to come along. I may need someone to watch my back.'

'Japan?'

'Yup.'

With little more by way of explanation, Kartik climbed into his cockpit.

'Come on, I'll explain on the way there.'

Aaditya got into his vimana and followed Kartik out, both of them climbing to high altitude and then setting a course for Japan.

'Hey Kartik, what are we supposed to be doing there? The tsunamis are still continuing from the last news reports I saw.'

'That's exactly why we are going there. We picked up some Asura vimanas flying near Japan just after the first quake struck, and Brahma wants us to take a closer look.'

Aaditya remembered Indra's words and asked Kartik how exactly the Asuras were involved.

'We are not really sure, but as your people say, once is an accident, twice may be a coincidence, but three times in a row is a premeditated plan.'

Aaditya was not able to ask much more as they soon found themselves over Japanese airspace. Their displays were cluttered with green dots representing relief helicopters and aircraft that were streaming towards the disaster zones. But there were no signs of any Asuras.

'Kartik, should we go lower?'

'There will be dozens of relief choppers around, and I don't want to be seen. Besides, if there are Asuras around, we'll pick them up.'

'Holy shit! Did you see that?'

Kartik had obviously been seeing exactly what had caught Aaditya's attention and the young Deva whistled.

'So our old friends are capable of learning new tricks.'

Aaditya looked again to make sure that he had not imagined it. Two red dots had appeared on his display for a few seconds and then disappeared. Then they did it again. The mystifying bit was that the Asura craft had seemingly come out of the ocean and then again disappeared into it.

'Kartik, can our vimanas go underwater?'

'Not these ones. We do have craft that can operate under the oceans, and so do the Asuras, but it looks like they're launching and recovering their aerial vimanas from an underwater craft.'

'Can we track their submarine or whatever it is on our display?'

'No. I've already asked Ganesha to have one of our satellites take a look, and Vishnu is on the way in one of our own underwater craft, but I imagine by the time he gets here, the Asuras will be long gone.'

'What are they doing here?'

They waited for a few more minutes, circling the area, but got no further sign of the Asuras. Kartik asked Aaditya to follow him and turned west. Aaditya's display indicated that they were headed towards Thailand.

'Aadi, here's a geography quiz. Name a few famous Thai islands.'

Aaditya was puzzled at the question but decided to play along. 'Phuket, Krabi. Let me think, Koh Samui maybe. Can't think of any more. What does that have to do with anything?'

By way of reply, Kartik took his vimana into a dive, and Aaditya followed, breaking through the thick cloud cover. He was soon flying at no more than 10,000 feet altitude and could see the green-blue waters of the ocean below them, along with scattered islands.

'Aadi, ever heard of a place called Hong Island?'

'No, should I have?'

He could hear Kartik chuckle, clearly enjoying the suspense he was building up.

'Slow down next to me, and look down.'

Aaditya did as he was told, and looked down to see a small brownish-green island, virtually indistinguishable from the dozens of similar islands scattered around it.

'Kartik, what am I supposed to be looking at?'

'That, my friend, is the island of Hong off the Thai coast. If you want to know more, catch me if you can!'

With that, Kartik suddenly accelerated his vimana and streaked away towards their base. Aaditya had initially thought that these flying antics and games were a ruse to train him. Over the months, he had come to realize that of all the Devas, Kartik was a bit of a prankster and loved to fool around. That suited him just fine. He accelerated and was soon just behind Kartik.

As Kartik's vimana turned sharply to the right and then to the left, Aaditya matched him move for move. Kartik took his vimana into a roll, to try and turn the tables on Aaditya, but he was ready. As soon as Kartik's vimana pitched up, Aaditya slowed down to a near hover and rotated his vimana, and when Kartik had completed his roll, Aaditya was right where he had been- on his tail.

Aaditya could hear Kartik grunt in frustration and the Deva took his vimana into a steep dive. Not willing to give up now, Aaditya followed.

What are you thinking, Kartik?

With Kartik continuing in a straight line, it suddenly came to Aaditya what Kartik's plan may be. Kartik brought his vimana to a sudden halt, the craft pitching up violently as it lost speed. He had hoped that Aaditya would overshoot him. Instead, Aaditya's voice came over his headset, 'Bang, you're dead!'

Guessing what Kartik was planning, Aaditya had slowed his own craft down drastically, so that when Kartik stopped, he easily stayed behind him.

Before they could continue their games, Indra spoke through their headsets. 'I know you must be enjoying yourselves, but I had sent you to do some work. Now please get back if you're done.'

Suitably chastened, Aaditya and Kartik flew straight back to Kongka La.

When they got out of their cockpits, Aaditya saw a new expression on Kartik's face, one he had not seen before. When Kartik asked him a bit stiffly to go and check what Ganesha was up to, he wondered if he had done something wrong. He was on the way when Narada caught up with him.

'Terrible business this. First the quake and then I heard about the Asuras you tracked. By the way, don't worry about Kartik, he'll be fine.'

'What's with him?'

Narada smiled.

'He's a fine pilot but a poor loser. We all were watching on our displays how you flew circles around him today. I guess this is what happens when the teacher realizes for the first time that the student has caught up.'

Aaditya found Ganesha as usual propped up in front of his screens, eating something. Lakshmi was sitting next to him, staring at some data. She nudged Ganesha and spoke in hushed tones, 'He never loses a chance to make a buck, does he?'

When they saw Aaditya enter, she explained, 'I keep tracking which shell companies Kalki may be using to fund his activities and also pay his human cronies. Guess what? Just before this quake, one of his firms had invested heavily in shares of firms that supply water purifiers, emergency rescue equipment and also some housing firms in Japan that have traditionally got reconstruction contracts. As you can imagine, their stocks will climb sky high now, and he'll make a killing.'

Aaditya sat down, fascinated at the various levels at which this battle was waged, but he had other, more immediate concerns on his mind.

'Ganesha, everyone here seems to think Kalki has something to do with this quake, and Kartik said that some godforsaken place called Hong Island would give me clues. What's that about?'

Ganesha laughed, struggling to keep himself from spitting out the food that was in his mouth.

'Kartik will always be up to his tricks. I tell you, that brother of mine can never give a straight answer when he can have some fun making you work to get it. I need you to Google something.'

Aaditya inserted one of the control plugs in his ear and brought up a holographic display in front of him with a web browser open.

'Now Google "Hong Island UFO" and tell me what you see.'

Aaditya did as he was told and read through the first couple of search results. Then he turned to Ganesha, half smiling. 'Is this a joke? I got some trashy tabloid articles about how a UFO washed up on Hong Island after the 2004 Tsunami. But it's garbage. The articles claim there were two dead aliens inside.'

Ganesha raised an eyebrow in mock anger. 'And what's garbage about so-called aliens? After all, your alien could be my cousin.'

'Ganesha, come on, you must have seen this crap. Along with those alien bodies, they supposedly found a naked American woman whom they had been performing sexual experiments on, a McDonald's Happy Meal and some porn. Who would believe this stuff?'

'Nobody would. That was the whole idea, and these tabloids printed exactly what we fed them.'

'What?'

Ganesha turned towards Aaditya, offering him a sweet.

'You see, that evening, a craft did wash up on the beach at Hong Island. A few local fishermen saw it, and called some clueless local cops. But before any other authorities could get there, we had taken a look at it and destroyed it. But since word had gotten out, Narada and Tanya did their usual masterly PR and fed the tabloids such junk that nobody would believe it.'