Vimana (19 page)

He saw four drones close in on Kartik from behind even as the young Deva downed one more drone. Aaditya's vimana screamed in towards the melee, firing a volley of four astras at extreme range at the four drones. Three hit while the fourth drone aborted its attack to evade the astra.

'Kartik, don't think you could grab all the kills yourself.'

'Join the party. Hold the drones while I get to the bloody Asuras. As usual, the cowards are holding back.'

Aaditya was now close enough to see the nearest Asura drone. To his surprise, the drone looked just like an F-22 fighter, painted entirely in black. Another drone to his left looked just like a Su-30, again painted in black.

'So that's why they were chasing all those high-performance fighters. They've engineered their drones based on our designs.' Aaditya said to himself.

He moved his vimana right behind the F-22, still using his clenched good luck charm like a joystick. He could see the drone just a kilometre ahead, and as he focused, a red circle appeared on his cockpit screen. He had been trained in using the optically guided aiming system for the vajra by Kartik countless times and now he was putting all those lessons to use.

He moved his head slightly to target the drone, and the red circle followed his gaze. When it was on the drone, Aaditya fired two bursts from his vajra. Blue streaks reached out towards the drone. While the F-22 rolled away from the first streak, the second caught it on the right wing, causing it to explode in a bright fireball and then disappear in a mist of flame and sparks. The Su-30 was trying to get on Aaditya's tail, but he took his vimana into a tight roll that brought the drone right in front of him for a fleeting instant. Another burst from his vajra and the drone exploded. He finally took a look at his display and saw a dozen red dots disappear.

Indra and the reinforcements had arrived.

As Indra and the drones accompanying him cut a swath through the Asura drones, Aaditya saw that Kartik was now headed straight for the Asura vimanas, which had not yet joined the fray. The Asuras fired several missiles at Kartik, but he destroyed a couple with his vajra and evaded the rest. His first volley of astras brought down two Asuras. Aaditya now raced to help him. Kartik had come off on top in the first volley but it was still just him against six Asuras.

One of the Asuras was trying to maneuver behind Kartik when Aaditya caught him with a burst from his vajra, slicing the Asura vimana into two before it exploded. Now with five versus two, and given the huge superiority the Deva vimanas had, the odds were more than evened. Aaditya loosed two astras to destroy another Asura before he saw the red-tipped vimana scream towards Kartik.

'Maya.'

Kartik had just destroyed another Asura and not noticed Maya coming in behind him. Aaditya fired an astra but Maya rolled out of its way, continuing his relentless approach towards Kartik. At less than a thousand yards range, Maya fired two missiles.

'No!'

Aaditya watched in horror as both of them hit Kartik's vimana and the craft briefly glowed bright red before exploding in a huge fireball. Then, as Aaditya had by now seen several times already, the explosion seemed to collapse upon itself till a single, incandescent spark remained. The spark glowed as bright as the morning sun for a moment and then there was nothing.

His mind a red mist of rage, Aaditya closed in on Maya. One of the Asuras was trying to cut him off, but in his anger, Aaditya smothered him with no less than six astras. Maya had seen him, and began a rapid dive towards the ocean. Aaditya was now no more than five hundred feet behind him. He fired two astras, but to his frustration, Maya swerved and evaded both of them. Aaditya realized that in his rage, he was not focusing and was shooting wildly. He stilled his mind and brought up the optical sight for the vajra.

One burst just missed Maya, who by now was moving his vimana in a series of tight turns as he descended towards the ocean in a spiraling dive. The other seemed to have clipped an edge of the saucer shaped vimana, but Maya kept continuing his descent, though he was now wobbling a bit from the near miss.

Aaditya glanced at his display to see that he was no more than three hundred feet above sea level. He slowed down, otherwise he would have slammed into the ocean, and then watched open-mouthed as Maya continued his dive.

What the hell was Maya doing?

Then, in an instant, Maya's escape plan became clear. The water churned as through the blue-white foam a dark shape emerged. Aaditya watched as a giant sphere of some sort emerged and a gap opened in its side where Maya's vimana entered. Aaditya fired several bursts from his astra, watching the blue streaks track in on the giant black submarine. To his chagrin, gun ports on the sub's side spat out streams of red light that intercepted his weapons. Then, as he watched in frustration, the sub slid under the water and disappeared from sight.

Aaditya pulled up from his dive to take stock of the situation. There were no more red dots on his display, but there were also only a handful of blue dots left. Indra pulled up alongside him and he soon heard the Deva over his earpiece.

'Aadi, let's go back. Our work here is done.'

Indra's voice sounded strangely subdued, and Aaditya asked the question on top of his mind.

'Kartik?'

He was met by silence, so he persisted. 'It's only been a few minutes since he was hit. He told me we could recover you Devas if we had a couple of hours. Come on, what can we do?'

Indra was silent, and then he simply said, 'Let's go back. There's nothing more we can do here.'

His was mind in turmoil, rebelling at the thought of abandoning Kartik, yet hoping against hope that the Devas had some solution up their sleeves. Aaditya followed Indra and the remaining drones back to their base.

When they landed, Indra disembarked and walked to the conference room without saying anything to Aaditya. Aaditya found the Devas all silent, staring at the display in front of them. CNN was reporting that there had been at least five thousand confirmed deaths from the tsunami, and the death toll was only likely to rise as the full extent of the disaster revealed itself. Tanya was in a corner, her eyes red, as if she had been crying.

Indra sat down soundlessly next to Shiva, betraying his emotions with a simple touch on Shiva's arm. Shiva just sat there, and as Aaditya entered, for the first time, he thought he saw tears well up in his eyes. Aaditya still did not entirely understand what had happened and still harboured hopes that Kartik could somehow be revived. After all, the Devas seemed to be indestructible, didn't they?

Brahma was the first to speak. 'My heart cries for all the souls lost in Hawaii and for our Kartik.'

Aaditya was still in a daze. 'Kartik told me that Devas had a couple of hours in which they could be revived. Surely you can do something?'

Nobody spoke till Shiva walked up to Aaditya and put his arms around him. 'Thank you for what you did today, and for trying to save Kartik. We are warriors and for us, loss is something we must learn to deal with, but for now, let me go and grieve with Durga for the loss of our son.'

Shiva walked out slowly, and Aaditya felt tears streaming down his face. Having seen the evil that Kalki was capable of, he was now convinced that his father could never have served such a monster. His mind kept replaying the dogfight, wishing he had reached sooner, wishing he had at least managed to destroy Maya when he had the chance.

'We have an incoming audio message.'

Ganesha's words got everyone's attention.

'Play it.'

On Brahma's command, a section of the giant holographic screen turned blank and Aaditya heard a voice that he realized with a shock he had heard before.

'Greetings, Father. Hello my enemies, old and new.'

It was Kalki.

***

There was pin drop silence in the room as Kalki's message continued.

'Many ages ago, you began this war against me. I never started any aggression against the Devas.  If only you had let me do as I saw fit with the humans, with my creation. You began that war, but I will finish it. What you are seeing today is but a small preview of what I have in store. I will have what is rightfully mine. This world and its inhabitants will be shaped as I see fit, and you will be able to do nothing but watch. Save yourself more loss and grief, and go back to that pretentious alliance. Humans are my offspring, and I will watch over them, better than my own father watched over me.'

Aaditya saw even the normally unflappable Brahma flinch as the message ended.

'Why don't you just nuke his base?'

Vishnu answered Aaditya. 'We considered that. First, if he is underwater, there's no telling we'll get him, and if he retaliates in kind, then billions could die on Earth. We could not risk destroying this world again. Second, even if we succeed, what would we say to the humans? Why would they trust or believe us if we unleash a nuclear war on their planet?'

'So, what do we do?'

Brahma was now pacing the room, his hands folded behind him. 'It is a peculiar stalemate. We cannot get him in his lair, and he cannot get us. But we cannot just wait to see what new evil he has in store.'

Aaditya remembered what Kalki had said in the message he had sent through Maya. 'Does he know where our base is? Why doesn't he attack?'

'Because we still have one trump card.'

Aaditya waited for Brahma to explain, but Indra brought up a display on the screen. It showed the Earth, with dots orbiting it.

'Satellites.'

'I don't understand.'

'Aadi, when we returned here, we had our satellites crisscrossing the Earth to offer us near total surveillance. But when Kalki returned, we quickly took out each other's satellites in a space war that humans were oblivious to. Since then, neither of us has our own satellites up in space. Kalki is thus blind outside of his short term sensor range of his vimanas and his base.'

'Are we as well?'

Indra smiled.

'So Kalki thinks.'

Ganesha pointed to several of the dots circling the Earth that were now blinking.

'I've hacked into several of the US and Russian spy satellites and put in a couple of our special sensors into them. The humans don't even know it, but through them, we get twenty-four hour coverage of the Earth. Every time an Asura vimana takes off, we know.'

Indra tapped the screen. It showed a video of a missile in flight, and then disappearing as a bright blue light connected with it.

'1968. That was the year Kalki discovered our base. He launched four nuclear missiles. We saw them the moment they took off, and we intercepted them. The US and Russia also picked them up and put their strategic forces on alert. Ganesha had to mess around with their computers so they thought it was a malfunction in their radars. Otherwise, the Cold War you humans talked of would have turned very hot.'

A chill went down Aaditya's spine as he realized the implication of what he had just heard.

'He launched four waves of vimana strikes. Again, as soon as a single vimana took off, we were ready. We ambushed and slaughtered them. He doesn't know how we did it, but he knows he cannot attack us here.'

'So, what do we do?'

Brahma sighed.

'If only we knew the secret to Kalki's base. If only we knew how to break through his defences. If only we could get even a small glimpse into what's happening inside his base.'

Aaditya realized that as omnipotent and powerful as the Devas seemed, they were as clueless as he was now. They disbanded, planning to meet the next morning.

Aaditya had a rough night. He kept thinking of Kartik, of his last conversation with the young Deva. Not able to sleep, he called Tanya, and the two of them sat near the hangar, both gripped with despair and sorrow at Kartik's loss. He held on to Tanya, and she tried to comfort him, but she knew the guilt he felt would perhaps heal only with time.

At about four in the morning, when Tanya had finally fallen asleep with her head on his shoulders, Aaditya fell into an uneasy slumber, his mind a jumble of thoughts. The dogfight, Kalki's message, the stalemate the Devas found themselves in, the sudden spurt of tsunamis, Kalki's reference to his father, Kartik's death. All the disjointed thoughts swirled in his mind, as he tossed and turned, and then he had a sudden flash of clarity.

When Tanya woke up, Aaditya debated whether or not to tell her about his plan. At first, sure that she would refuse, he decided that he would go straight to Brahma, and if he agreed, then try and convince Tanya. However, when he saw her looking into his eyes over breakfast, he realized that he could not do that to her.

'Why are you looking at me like that?'

Aaditya just smiled and asked Tanya to join him for a walk. They walked all over the base, covering the length and breadth of the hangar, then walking to the underground chambers where some of the Devas slept and where their research and production facilities were hidden away. Aaditya brought Tanya to a bench overlooking a repair area for vimanas, where Indra's vimana was currently being tended to by two robotic mechanics. Over the dull hum of the machines, Aaditya told her what his plan was.

Tanya refused outright. Then, when he told her the full story, she fell silent. She held on to his hand, as if unwilling to let go, as if afraid that once he left, she would never see him again. Finally, she kissed him and held him so tightly it felt as if she would crush him. Then, she simply let his hand go. She kept sitting there, staring into nothingness, as Aaditya got up and began his long walk to the conference room to meet Brahma.

'Are you out of your mind?'

Aaditya had guessed that Brahma would not welcome his plan, but even he was surprised at the outright rejection from the elder Deva.

'What other choice do we have? Did you yourself not say that the only real way to find out a weakness in Kalki's base was to get someone inside?'

'And why should Kalki ever believe you? Why would he not just kill you as a possible spy?'

Aaditya thought about that for a second. He had not yet told anyone other than Tanya about the message he had got from Kalki, and even now, he was not sure he should be revealing it to the Devas. He was less worried that they may question his loyalties, but that if they ever got to know that Kalki himself had reached out to him, they would never let him go. And with that would disappear any chances of his ever getting to know what had really happened to his father.