Aishwarya Mahurkar works as a Senior Content Analyst. She enjoys writing for leisure and filling up every nook in her house with books she accumulates from her habitual reading. Her submitted story is dark with characters that are darker. There is promise of mystery and mayhem. Says Aishwarya, “A story written to stray from my usual, Thin Lines was a test for me to push my limits and try something different. From humour to drama to serious suspense, I wanted all of it to be a part of this story.” The segment below is an excerpt of her writing where protagonist Alex confronts his first enemies with the assistance of his brother.
THIN LINES
(an excerpt)
Aaron just sighed. His anger had turned into plain exasperation and he was tired. How stupid could anyone get? How could anyone get into a damned situation like this? How? He was contemplating banging his head on the wall and decided to verbally vent, instead.
“How could you be so stupid? A fool’s child would have avoided a heroin package like that. A moron would have known what could have happened. How can you be my brother and still be so stupid?”
“I think you forgot to call him a bloody idiot.” Sheela was staring daggers at him now, too.
“Okay, okay. I know I screwed up, I should have seen this coming. I really should have. But well, I didn’t?”
“By working with masterminds such as ourselves, Kiddo. I might just take pity on you, offer some help. I don’t know about your brother, though.”
Aaron shot Alex one long glare. “I don’t think I have a choice. Some elder sibling contract I had to sign at the time of Sir Idiot’s birth. Though, I’m pretty sure I could wiggle out of it.” He caught Alex’s smile, “I’m telling Mom and Dad as soon as they come back, by the way,” and felt a little better when he saw the grin slide of his brother’s face.
Alex was breathing easier now. If there was a way out of this, these two would know how. There was absolutely no one better. He knew Aaron and Sheel went way back. Way back to when Aaron was part of the Police Force’s ‘special department’, and no one, not even Alex, knew what it was about. Then some crap had gone down and they’d had to shut it off. He always imagined his elder brother doing some Tom Cruise-ish, Mission Impossible kind of thing. He never found out; both Aaron and Sheela took their cop-job very seriously. Both of them, currently, being on their two-week leave made life much simpler for him. It gave them a guilt free leash to do what they had to.
He turned his eyes on Sheela now. “So, what’s been happening?”
She gave him one bland stare before turning back to see Aaron pacing. “They’ll wake up soon, Ron, we’ll get more answers then. Stop the walking, you’re making me dizzy.”
No more had she mentioned it when they heard a groan. Grinning cheerfully and wiggling her eyes into an I-Told-You-So manner, she walked up to the waking biker, “Thirsty?” When he desperately nodded, his parched throat feeling like old sawdust, she happily poured melted-ice-water over his head. “Better now?”
While he choked and spluttered, Aaron pulled up a chair opposite him, watched the others slowly, groggily wake and got started. Questioning prisoners, finding out answers was one of his most favourite parts of an operation. He almost rubbed his hands together in glee, reminded himself that his brother was in mortal danger and began.
Prisoner 3 didn’t like the glint in his eye. It was like a tiger’s, just waiting to strike. Nor did he like the fact that the girl seated next to him was now playing carelessly with a butterfly knife.
Alex smothered a grin when he saw the prisoner trying to gulp air in fear. The others were still groggy, but they’d be up soon. Very soon. The van driver who’d gotten shot twice was still out like light though, but he too would be up soon enough.
“So,” Aaron stretched lazily, “let’s start with the easy questions. What’s your name?”
Prisoner 3 swallowed again, “Jack.”
“How old are you, Jack?”
“Seventeen.”
As old as Alex, Aaron thought. He’d spill fast. “What do you do Jack? Do you go to school?”
“I used to, dropped out recently.”
“Why?”
“That’s none of your business.”
“You want me to carve you like a lantern, Jack? I’ll give you a smiling face,” Sheela interjected, giving him a quick wink.
Wide-eyed, now shivering a little, he looked away from Sheela to Aaron and said, “Mom and Dad got divorced, she left and there was no one to bring in the money for fees.”
Reminding himself forcefully that this young boy would have shot his brother without a qualm, Aaron continued. “Why exactly have I had to tie you up to a chair and scare you senseless, Jack?”
“I’m not scared.”
Sheela snorted, “Yeah? You’re doing a pretty good impression of it, sweetie. Let’s try again. Why are you here?”
“‘Cause you darted me, since I could have beaten that little squirt behind you to pulp.”
Aaron looked him straight in the eye. “Who sent you to beat this little squirt behind me into pulp?”
“Not gonna tell you.”
Sheela sighed. Every time. “Okay. Listen kiddo. This knife could do a lot of things to you. Trust me. But I won’t do just anything, I will cut an artery, watch you bleed to death and enjoy it. It’s going to be painful, since I never get it right the first time,” she turned to Aaron, “but hey, you’re really good at it aren’t you?”
“Yeah, but you need practice. Use little Jack.”
“Okay!” She smiled brightly. “Last chance Jack.”
***
When young Jack just stared back, eyes trying hard to be defiant, body quaking, Sheela put on one of her super-evil smiles. She lifted his wrist, slid the knife across so it gave one shallow little slice that was more like a paper cut. When he squealed like a baby, she laughed the ‘Mandark laugh’ from Dexter’s Laboratory. She loved doing that.
Aaron mentally rolled his eyes. He was surrounded by over actors and Sheela would have stolen no Oscar. He was amazed that people even fell for crap like this. But hey, it worked.
“Okay, Jack. That hurt, right? Trust me, she’s got more of that. But since you’re my brother’s age, I think we’ll give you another chance. What say, Sheel?”
She pouted. The sulky expression hadn’t completely slid of her face when she said, “Yeah, I guess. But if he lies…”
“If he lies, we continue where we left off. Okay, Jack? Now, who sent you?”
Jack looked around shiftily, his eyes moved from the prisoners on the left to the right, sweat was a steady trickle down his brow. Aaron knew he was scared, but he’d spill soon. He knew, sometimes, silent waiting was the best.
“He said it was wrong. Said you were the peop—” Jack shut up immediately at the exclamation that came from his accomplice at the left.
“Don’t do it Jack, these a**holes are pansies. They won’t do sh*t to us. Don’t say anything!”
Aaron got up, kicking his chair back, frustration apparent on his face. “Yeah, a**hole? Think we won’t do sh*t to you? Huh? Alright, come one. Come on and I’ll show you how pansy we are.” He pulled him up by the collar, dragging him out of the living room as the boy yelled in shock and fear.
“Pansy huh? Does this look pansy to you? Does it?” They could hear Aaron yell from the outside.
“Oh God, no. NO NO NO!”
The gun shot was as deafening as the silence that followed.
“ALEX. Come here right now; bag the damn idiot’s skinny-a** body.”
When Alex walked in, white-faced with a little green tinge building its way up in his cheeks, Aaron guessed he was going to be sick. But what Alex saw made his heart do one hard thump.
“He isn’t dead. I darted him again. Light dose, the gun shot was for effect. Dump the idiot in one of the bedrooms for a while.” Aaron winked. Man, it felt good to overact.
When he swaggered back in, it was all Sheela could do control the laugh bubbling in her throat. What a ham! But she’d laugh at him later, now it was business.
“So Jack, you were saying?”
Jack’s eyes were only focused on Aaron. “You k-killed h-him?”
“If you don’t want to go where he is, kiddo, you better hurry up and spill. I’m getting really tired of this.”
“If I tell you, will you let me go? Free?”
“If you tell me, I might. Now get to the damn point.”
“Okay. Alright. See, we don’t know who’s on top of the chain, the big guys we got no clue of. They’re all anonymous and sh*t.” His accomplice sitting on his side whimpered. The driver was waking up. “They’ll kill us if they find out about this. They OD the people that make mistakes.”
Aaron could feel pity now. Along with the anger, the frustration, he could feel pity. “Who do you report to? Who gave you the message to come here?”
“Me and my gang, the ones on the bike, we were sent my Pink Floss. The van guys, we were told to work with them, but I don’t know who sent them. All the gangs have different coordinators.”
“Yeah, and this gang won’t be spitting out our guts and loyalties like the damn kid. Right, Michael?” Michael happened to be the driver who was too groggy to respond.
“Don’t worry buddy, we’ll make you ‘spit out your loyalties’ later. Now we’re speaking to nice Jack, so hush.” Sheela was really curious to find out what kind of character called itself Pink Floss. “Go on Jackie boy.”
“Yeah, so Pink Floss, PF, she lives in the East Side. She’s got a house with her boyfriend. He whacks her around though, pretty often too, and she keeps throwing him out. But they made up recently, she should be home now.” He looked at them hopefully, as if willing to rid them by sending them off to ‘PF’s’ happy abode.
Sheela wanted to be out too, the whole questioning thing was Aaron’s gig. She liked the field. “So Ron? Head to where Pink Floss gets whacked?”
Aaron looked out, it was dark, around 4 A.M. he guessed. No way was he going to leave Alex alone with these slimy assholes. He needed a place to keep them safe, safe till all the juice was squeezed out and all the ‘loyalties spat’. “No, we wait till morning.”
