Tarun Singh wasn’t there anymore.
He had left behind something worse than absence— an unnatural silence that clung to the torture room like damp air before a storm.
The man who had once been the pulse of their group, its stubborn conscience and burning heart, was now nothing more than a heartless machine ready to spill the blood of his own friends.
The room reeked of rot.
Not metaphorical rot. Real rot.
The thick, suffocating stench of bodies that had died gasping beneath the polished cruelty of BLC’s system.
It crawled into lungs and settled there.
Farhan Qureshi had almost joined them.
He hadn’t. Not because the system spared him— but because Yug, Rishabh, Kritika, and Vivek tore him out of its jaws.
Now he could barely stand.
Yug and Kritika supported him from either side, his weight pressing into their shoulders, his hands trembling against them as if unsure whether he was still alive.
His breathing scraped out of him in shallow drags.
Then he stopped.
Mid-step.
His fingers tightened.
He turned.
Slowly. Carefully.
As if afraid the movement itself would break him.
His eyes locked onto the figure hanging behind him.
Recognition flickered through the haze.
His lips parted, dry and cracked.
The words dragged themselves out of his coarse throat.
“Sahil… sir?”
Yug and Kritika turned instinctively at the same time.
They saw Rishabh already walking.
He moved without urgency.
Without hesitation.
Calm wrapped around him like armor.
His hands were folded behind his back, posture straight, steps measured, as though he were walking into a classroom instead of a chamber soaked in suffering.
He stopped directly in front of Sahil Malhotra.
Up close, the sight was worse.
Sahil’s jaw was forced open unnaturally wide.
A thin tube of acid protruded from his mouth, threatening to spill death down his throat with the smallest mistake.
His eyes were wide— no defiance left, only raw, animal terror.
Rishabh’s hands rose.
He gripped Sahil’s face and pulled his jaw even further apart.
Sahil’s body jerked.
Pain flared through him, but he couldn’t scream. The acid tube still sealed his voice, still held his life hostage.
And that was exactly what Rishabh was removing.
He didn’t rush.
He didn’t comfort.
He slid the tube out with meticulous care, millimeter by millimeter, each second stretching tight as wire.
One wrong move and the acid would flood downward— one tremor and it would be over.
Every second felt like a ticking bomb.
Finally—
The tube came free.
Rishabh stepped back and placed it aside as if setting down a pen after finishing a sentence.
Sahil collapsed against his restraints, coughing air into his lungs like a drowning man breaching the surface.
Freedom lasted one breath.
Then he broke.
“Please… take me out of here.”
No smile.
No authority.
No teacher’s dignity.
Just a man unraveling.
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry for every— everything I’ve done. To all of you.”
His voice cracked.
Tears cut clean streaks down the dirt on his face. He shook as if the apology itself might split him open.
“I’m begging you… I’ll not do anything.”
The room listened.
No one interrupted him.
No one comforted him.
They watched.
Amusement flickered across their faces— not loud, not exaggerated— just enough to make his desperation look smaller.
Then suddenly—
Rishabh spoke.
Louder than anyone else in the room.
“Fine. We’ll free you.”
The words sliced through the air.
Vivek, who had been sitting at a distance, panting heavily on a chair, froze mid-breath.
His head snapped up.
He stood abruptly, disbelief written across his exhaustion.
Yug’s grip on Farhan tightened.
Kritika’s eyes narrowed.
Farhan looked from face to face, confusion flooding him.
He couldn’t read what was happening.
The silence shifted.
It wasn’t empty anymore.
Rishabh turned slowly toward his friends.
He simply gestured for them to help him.
And in that gesture, something far more dangerous than mercy began to unfold.
——————————————
The voyage continued.
Fourteen floors above the earth, beneath a ceiling too high and too silent, the child kept walking.
The corridor stretched endlessly before him— marble reflecting the sterile white lights overhead, each step echoing louder than it should have.
His bare feet left faint, uneven smears behind him, thin lines of red that marked his passage like a fragile signature no one cared to erase.
“Father… father?”
His voice was soft— not weak, but worn.
It carried hope that was thinning with every repetition, hope that cracked just slightly at the edges each time the word left his mouth.
The guards stationed along the walls did not move.
Not a shift of posture.
Not a cough.
Not even a glance exchanged openly.
The child’s hands trembled as if the air itself were cold, though the floor was warm beneath him.
His fingers curled and uncurled nervously, as if gripping onto something invisible— maybe a memory, maybe a promise.
His breathing came shallow, quick, but he did not stop.
“Father…?”
The word drifted farther this time, dissolving into the polished emptiness of the hallway.
Two guards stood farther from him, near a structural column where shadow cut across the white light.
Their whispers were low, almost swallowed by the building’s mechanical hum.
“What’s this kid doing here?” the first murmured, his eyes following the small, uneven steps.
The second guard didn’t answer immediately. He checked his gun instead— metal sliding with a clean, deliberate click.
“The guards at the entrance had informed us not to interfere.”
A rule delivered.
A conscience silenced.
The first guard exhaled slowly, gaze lingering on the blood staining the marble.
“Hmm… let it be.” A pause. A flicker of something almost human in his eyes.
“He’ll never find his father anyway.”
Ahead, the child kept walking.
Each door he passed looked identical— sealed, silent, indifferent.
He called again, softer now, as if afraid the building itself might swallow the sound.
“Father…”
No answer came.
Only the hum of electricity in the walls.
Only the rhythm of his fragile footsteps.
——————————————
Farhan sat slumped in the chair, breath shallow but steady, while Vivek knelt in front of him with trembling hands.
A strip of cloth, soaked in ethanol, dragged across torn skin.
The sharp scent filled the room.
Vivek pressed harder, trying to stop the thin, stubborn line of blood that refused to dry.
“…and us?” Vivek’s voice was low, uneven, as he finished what he had been confessing for the past several minutes.
“Though we survived… we were full of injuries.”
Farhan stared at him, eyes wide— not from pain, but from disbelief.
“Sahil sir… did this?”
Vivek didn’t answer immediately.
His jaw tightened. His hands faltered for a second before he forced them steady again.
“Yes,” he breathed. “That’s what your ‘sir’ did to us.”
He was supposed to focus on the wound. Instead, his gaze kept drifting— drawn against his will— to the sight unfolding a few feet away.
Kritika, Yug, and Rishabh stood over Sahil.
Sahil hung moments ago like a carcass.
Now he sat upright, still bound by the last of the barbed wire that had been wrapped around his feet to suspend him upside down.
Thick rubber gloves covered their hands.
Pliers gleamed under the flickering light.
Metal scraped against metal as wire was gripped, twisted, and slowly pulled free from torn flesh.
Sahil did not move.
Not even a flinch.
Rishabh finally broke the silence.
“But you have to help us.”
Sahil lifted his head slightly.
His eyes narrowed.
“What— what kind of help?”
“Simple,” Rishabh replied, calm and almost polite. “All you need to do is help us. In any way. Until all of us get out of this building.”
Kritika didn’t look up from the wire she was uncoiling.
“Even if you have to fight, you will. And when we get out of here…” she tugged the metal free with a soft, wet sound, “…we mind our own businesses.”
One last strand remained.
Rishabh gripped it.
His eyes did not blink as he pulled.
And then Sahil’s face changed.
The pain vanished.
The weakness evaporated.
In its place appeared that same warm, disarming smile— the one that could make you forget what he was capable of.
“And what if I don’t?” he asked, almost amused.
Yug and Kritika had removed their gloves, placing their pliers down without ceremony. They didn’t even grant him the dignity of eye contact.
Rishabh answered for them.
“You know there are guards in every corner. And you…”
He pressed the wire back into Sahil’s exposed foot.
Just slightly.
Then, in one swift, brutal motion, he ripped it out.
Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
Sahil’s scream tore through the room.
The smile shattered instantly.
Rishabh stood, calm as ever, setting the pliers aside like the matter was settled.
Sahil looked up at him differently now— he had miscalculated the room.
He pushed himself up, limping toward the medicine cabinet, voice hoarse and furious. “Where’s the tetanus shot, d*ckheads!?”
The tension didn’t break.
It shifted.
Kritika moved toward Vivek and placed her hand firmly over his shaking one.
Without a word, she took the ethanol-soaked cloth from him and pressed it against Farhan’s wound with practiced steadiness.
Vivek hesitated, then stepped aside, swallowing hard.
He couldn’t stop looking at Sahil.
And Sahil couldn’t stop looking back.
Rishabh spoke again, tone measured.
“So. We’re in deep trouble.”
From the corner of the room, Yug grabbed two blood-soaked garments— Farhan’s suit and Sahil’s discarded clothes— and tossed them across the floor.
“The lifts aren’t working,” Yug said. “And this isn’t any everyday malfunction.”
Sahil’s clothes fell at his feet as he found the injection he was looking for.
Without hesitation— without care— he stabbed the needle into himself and injected the tetanus shot, jaw clenched.
“Then it’s a BLC lockdown,” he muttered casually. “No one can get in. Or get out.”
The words sat heavier than the blood in the air.
Vivek’s voice cracked.
“What— what do we do then?”
Farhan answered before anyone else could.
“Wait.” His tone was eerily steady.
“That’s all we can do.”
Kritika pressed the cloth harder against his wound, making him inhale sharply.
“But Tarun would be back any time… to kill us.”
Farhan’s eyebrows lifted at the statement, but he didn’t question it.
Rishabh voiced what everyone was thinking. “Then why didn’t he do it beforehand?”
Yug found a bottle on the table— clear liquid inside. He twisted it open and was ready to take a long gulp.
“Because maybe,” he said, swallowing, “he wants us to act.”
Silence.
Heavy. Thinking.
Calculating.
So intense that it made the room hold its breath.
Yug took a mouthful— and immediately spat it out across the floor, the very next moment, breaking the silence.
“What the hell is this!?”
Rishabh didn’t even glance at him.
“This is an opportunity.”
Yug pointed at the bottle, disgust written across his face. “No, what is—”
“Let’s prepare for anything that may come,” Rishabh cut in.
Kritika and Vivek helped Farhan into his suit. The fabric stuck slightly against drying blood. Vivek’s eyes kept drifting back.
Sahil was still watching him.
Unblinking.
“Prepare to get out of here,” Rishabh finished.
Sahil, now wearing his pants, rummaged through the cabinet, scattering medicine strips and bottles onto the floor in search of something useful.
“Even if it means…” Rishabh inhaled slowly,
“…that we need to fight back. Against anyone.”
The room moved all at once.
Rishabh was the first to head for the door.
“I’ll go upstairs. Will try to find anything useful.”
Yug followed, still wiping his mouth.
“I need to wash this taste out…”
Kritika grabbed Vivek by the wrist before he could freeze again, both following Yug.
“We’ll try to find if there’s a possible exit.”
They left.
The door closed.
And suddenly, the room felt larger.
Only two remained— old teacher, old student.
Sahil Malhotra.
Farhan Qureshi.
Farhan walked toward the medicine cabinet slowly, his left hand hanging uselessly at his side.
He looked down at it with quiet frustration.
“I need to do something with this…”
Behind him, Sahil finished buttoning his shirt, pulling the sleeves up with deliberate calm.
He walked in the opposite direction— towards the emergency exit.
Farhan cleared his throat, trying to break the silence that felt like a blade at his back.
“But, Sahil sir… what are you really—”
The metal door slammed shut with a hollow thud before he could ask his question.
Farhan turned.
The room was empty.
Only the faint echo of footsteps descending.
And Sahil’s voice— distant, casual, almost playful— floated back through the stairwell.
“I’m nearby, kiddo.”
——————————————
Rishabh only had to climb to the twenty-third floor.
The emergency exit door groaned softly as he pushed it open, and the sound dissolved into silence.
What waited beyond wasn’t another torture chamber. It was something colder.
The space resembled a laboratory— but not one born of chaos.
It was organised with almost surgical precision.
The air felt sterile, sharp with the faint scent of antiseptic and metal.
White lights hummed overhead.
Every surface gleamed.
No stains. No clutter.
No visible guards. No workers.
Just stillness.
That unsettled him more than noise ever could.
He stepped inside, each movement measured, deliberate.
His senses sharpened instinctively— ears tuned for footsteps, eyes scanning reflections in steel cabinets, breath steady but shallow.
Nothing. The entire floor was empty.
And then he saw it.
Metal shelves lined the walls from end to end, stacked with glass vials arranged in perfect rows.
Syringes lay organised on stainless steel trays.
Labels weren’t scribbled— they were printed.
This wasn’t a makeshift stash.
This was infrastructure.
BLC wasn’t just power.
It was preparation.
Rishabh’s gaze moved slowly across the room, absorbing it all.
Morphine bottles. Antibiotics. Compounds he had only read about in restricted medical forums.
And then others— names he barely recognised, some whispered about in bans and regulations. His pulse didn’t quicken in fear.
It sharpened in fascination.
For a brief second, the boy who loved science—the one buried beneath fear, violence, and survival— surfaced again.
Curiosity replaced tension.
Analysis replaced emotion.
He approached the first shelf.
Without speaking, without hesitation, he began selecting vials— not randomly, but methodically.
His mind sorted them by function, by scenario, by consequence.
Pain management first. Not just for bruises or cuts— but for wounds that could cripple.
That could kill.
He moved to the next shelf.
Alertness enhancers.
Chemicals meant to stretch the limits of human wakefulness.
His fingers paused over one vial.
Modafinil.
Not something that should be sitting casually in a private storage facility.
The implications were louder than the hum of the lights above.
He placed it into his bag.
The next section was different.
Physical enhancement.
Halotestin.
His jaw tightened.
An anabolic steroid so difficult to obtain it bordered on myth outside black markets.
Beside it— methyltestosterone.
Banned in most places. Including India.
For a moment, Rishabh didn’t move.
This wasn’t underground experimentation.
Supply chains that ignored laws.
An empire that didn’t just fight— it engineered advantage.
The lab no longer felt clinical.
It felt strategic.
A storage space not for healing— but for sharpening weapons.
And that was exactly what he intended to do.
As he continued collecting vials, the initial awe dissolved into something colder.
Banned substances weren’t hidden here.
They were common.
His hand reached the next shelf— and stopped.
One vial rested slightly apart from the others. Not hidden.
Not highlighted. Just… separate.
Epinephrine.
His fingers hovered over it.
Not an enhancer.
Not a steroid. Not a sedative.
A trigger.
A chemical that didn’t build strength— it demanded action.
Fight or flight distilled into liquid.
A forced choice. Immediate. Unforgiving.
In the sterile quiet of the room, the weight of that single vial felt heavier than all the others combined.
Epinephrine wasn’t about preparation.
It was about commitment.
Rishabh stared at it, the reflection of white lights glinting off the glass.
Once used, it couldn’t be undone.
Once triggered, the body wouldn’t negotiate.
Neither would fate.
The hum of the lights seemed louder now.
The silence tighter.
His fingers remained suspended in the air— one breath away from crossing a line that didn’t allow retreat.
——————————————
Farhan fastened the last button of his blood-soaked shirt with his right hand, fingers steady despite the tremor running beneath his skin.
The fabric clung to him— stiff, rusted with drying crimson— an unspoken reminder of the Rathore brothers and the nightmare they had carved into him.
His left arm hung useless at his side.
He had swallowed the painkillers dry.
They dulled the fire but not the truth— the arm was gone to him.
So he had made it useful.
A steel rod ran along the length of it, strapped tight from shoulder to wrist, forcing the limb straight.
At the rod’s edge, near his palm, a blade gleamed— fixed, exposed, merciless.
If the arm couldn’t move, it would cut.
If it couldn’t punch, it would pierce.
A weapon born from damage.
He flexed his jaw, forcing the memory away— the Rathores’ hammers, the sound of bone giving in, the terror that still lived somewhere deep in his spine.
Not now. Not again.
Sahil and Rishabh were alone outside.
That was enough to move.
He opened the door.
And stopped.
Two silhouettes stood inches away, filling the doorway like a wall built from flesh and tailored cloth.
Their posture was identical— shoulders squared, hands relaxed, feet planted with military precision.
Their shadows swallowed him whole.
Farhan slowly lifted his gaze.
Bronze.
A ‘B’ badge pinned to each suit.
Harnesses crossed their torsos, and from them hung heavy hammers— iron heads catching the dim light like executioner’s tools waiting for a signal.
Grey streaked through their hair.
Age had touched them, but it hadn’t softened them.
Identical faces.
Identical stillness.
Recognition didn’t arrive gently— it struck him like a bullet through the sternum.
Uday Rathore.
Pratap Rathore.
The twins.
For a second, the corridor felt smaller.
Air thinner. His pulse louder.
He exhaled through his teeth.
“Ah sh*t,” he muttered, a ghost of sarcasm clinging to the words.
“Let’s not do this again—”
He never finished.
Uday moved first— a precise left jab.
Pratap mirrored him— a right.
Perfect synchronization.
No wasted motion.
No hesitation.
The blows landed together.
Impact detonated across Farhan’s face and chest, snapping his head back as the force lifted him clean off his feet.
The world tilted— then shattered— as his body crashed into the tray behind him.
Metal clattered.
Syringes scattered.
Glass vials burst across the floor in a sharp, chemical rain.
He hit hard.
The Rathore brothers didn’t advance in rage.
They stepped forward in rhythm.
The fight had begun— again.
——————————————
The basement of BLC lay in a suffocating half-darkness, the kind that swallowed sound and stretched shadows into uneasy shapes.
Vehicles stood in disciplined rows— some still warm from recent use, others entombed in dust, forgotten by time.
The air smelled of metal, oil, and something faintly stale.
Among them rested an ambulance.
It stood apart without trying to— its white paint dulled to grey beneath a thin film of neglect, its tires slightly deflated, its windshield clouded by weeks of stillness.
This was the same ambulance Farhan had brought in.
The same one no one had touched since.
Silence wrapped around it like a shroud.
For a long moment, nothing moved.
Just the oppressive quiet of a place never meant to be occupied for long.
Then—
A shift.
From the back compartment, where patients were usually laid out under sterile lights and desperate hope, something disturbed the stillness.
A faint scrape. Subtle. Almost easy to dismiss.
The ambulance trembled.
The rear doors rattled once— sharp and contained— metal brushing against metal as if something inside had leaned against them.
The sound cut through the basement like a blade.
Another jolt.
This time slower.
Intentional.
The handles twitched.
For a heartbeat, the basement seemed to hold its breath.
Then, with a strained creak that had not been heard since the vehicle was last used, the rear door pushed outward from within.
It didn’t swing open all at once.
It opened gradually— inch by inch— like resistance was being overcome from the inside.
Someone was there.
Someone who had been there since the start.
——————————————
The door to the sixteenth floor creaked open under Yug’s push.
He stepped in first, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, his brows knitting in disgust.
“I don’t know…” he muttered, voice low and strained. “But that was not water.”
Behind him, Kritika stormed in, dragging Vivek along by the wrist.
The force of her grip pulled him off balance for a second before he steadied himself.
As they moved forward, Vivek’s gaze dropped to where her fingers clutched his palm— tight, urgent, almost desperate.
His heart thudded louder than the silence around them.
Slowly, hesitantly, he tightened his hold.
His fingers intertwined with hers.
For a fleeting second, the chaos outside that handhold faded.
The fear, the exhaustion, the endless floors— they blurred.
Then, all of a sudden, Kritika yanked him forward harder.
He blinked back to reality.
Her voice cut through the stillness.
“This is the same. Just an empty floor.”
The space around them stretched wide and hollow— unfinished walls, dim emergency lights humming faintly, the air stale and unmoving.
Every footstep echoed too loudly. Too exposed.
Vivek swallowed.
“Then let’s go down, again.”
There was no confidence in it.
Just survival.
Kritika didn’t respond.
She pulled him forward, Yug already leading the way toward the emergency exit staircase at the far end.
The green exit sign flickered faintly above the heavy metal gate.
Yug reached it first.
His hand moved toward the handle.
And—
SNAP!
A metallic tang split the air.
An arrow slammed into the gate inches from Yug’s fingers, the vibration ringing sharp and vicious.
The steel door quivered.
So did Yug’s hand.
He froze.
His fingertips hovered a breath away from the handle, trembling.
Behind him, Kritika’s grip tightened instinctively around Vivek’s hand.
Vivek squeezed back without thinking.
Just shared panic.
Slowly—.too slowly— the three of them turned.
At the far end of the floor stood a man.
Long hair falling loosely over his shoulders. Calm posture. Bow still raised.
The same long-haired man who had brought Tarun to the hospital.
The same one from the bank's CCTV footage.
His face wore an almost gentle smile.
An eyepatch covered one eye, dark against his composed expression.
Recognition flickered faintly first in Kritika’s eyes.
Her lips parted. “You…?”
The word barely left her mouth—
And another arrow flew.
It grazed her ear, slicing through skin before embedding into the metal door behind them with a brutal clang.
Kritika flinched sharply, a hiss escaping her lips.
A thin line of red trailed down her neck, a drop falling to the concrete floor.
The man lowered his bow slightly.
“Who asked you to speak?”
Arjun Sethi said calmly, a smirk on his face.
His tone wasn’t loud.
It didn’t need to be.
He rolled his shoulder once, relaxed— almost casual.
The bow dipped further. Guard lowered.
Not because he couldn’t shoot again.
Because he didn’t need to.
Silence pressed in, suffocating.
And then came footsteps.
Measured. Unhurried.
From behind Arjun, another figure emerged into the dim light.
Tarun Singh.
He stepped forward without expression, his face carved from something colder than anger.
Yug’s breath caught.
Vivek felt his pulse slam against his ribs.
Kritika’s fingers went rigid in his hand.
Their bodies began to shake— not from the arrow. Not from the blood.
From him.
Tarun didn’t look at Arjun.
Didn’t acknowledge the bow.
Didn’t glance at Kritika’s wound.
His eyes locked onto Yug.
Nothing else existed.
Arjun let out a soft chuckle, the sound echoing lightly in the vast emptiness of the floor.
“Oh,” he said, amused, “what’re you waiting for?”
Tarun didn’t respond.
He walked.
Each step echoed heavier than the last, boots striking concrete in a slow, deliberate rhythm.
His gaze never left Yug’s.
Arjun stepped slightly aside, giving him space, a smirk tugging at his lips.
As Tarun passed, Arjun patted him lightly on the back— almost playfully.
“Let the show begin.”
——————————————
Rishabh’s fingers hovered over the vial of epinephrine, the glass cool and unnervingly smooth against his skin.
The fluorescent light above him flickered faintly, buzzing like a dying insect, stretching the silence thinner with every pulse.
He could hear his own breathing— measured, careful, as if the room itself would retaliate at the slightest disturbance.
Then—
Footsteps.
Distant at first.
A faint echo ricocheting through concrete.
Ascending.
From the emergency staircase.
Rishabh didn’t think.
He reacted.
His hand snapped forward, scooping the vials from the metal tray.
The sudden movement betrayed him— one slipped. Then another.
Glass clinked violently against tile, the sharp sound slicing through the corridor’s stillness like a gunshot.
His heart lurched into his throat.
He dropped to his knees instantly, palms scrambling across the cold floor, gathering the vials before they could roll into the shadows beneath the cabinets.
Each second felt borrowed.
Each breath felt loud.
Rishabh steadied his shaking hands and slid the vials into his pocket.
As he rose, something caught his eye.
Papers.
A thin sliver of white peeking from the slight opening of a cabinet door directly in front of him.
It shouldn’t have mattered.
But it did.
Curiosity tightened around him like a noose.
He reached forward slowly and pulled the cabinet open just enough to slip his hand inside. His fingers brushed against a file.
Thick. Bound. Official.
He pulled it out.
Medical Reports.
The label was clean.
Professional. Routine.
He opened it.
The first page showed charts— blood panels, hormone levels, neurological scans.
Employee IDs.
BLC bodyguards.
Rishabh’s brows furrowed.
He flipped to the next page.
The language changed.
“Test Batch 7 – Tolerance Response.”
“Subject 14 – Cardiac instability observed.”
“Subject 19 – Aggression spike. Uncontrolled.”
His pulse thudded harder.
This wasn’t routine screening.
These were trials.
He turned another page.
Photographs.
Bruised skin.
Veins unnaturally distended.
Pupils blown wide.
A man restrained to a chair, jaw clenched so tight the muscles looked carved from stone.
Notes beneath read statements nothing less than disturbing—
“Adverse reaction irreversible.”
“Mutation in muscular density— unstable.”
“Termination required.”
Rishabh’s stomach twisted.
These weren’t protective employees.
They were test subjects.
The pages grew darker as he flipped.
Graphs spiked violently before flatlining. Reports marked in red.
Signatures at the bottom of each document— authorized.
Some survived.
Very rare survived.
Most didn’t.
The footsteps were nearing now.
He swallowed hard but couldn’t stop reading.
Another file slipped loose from the stack. Thinner. Labeled differently.
Sedation Protocol.
His eyes scanned quickly.
Benzodiazepine administration.
High dosage. Deep sleep induction.
Standard procedure?
No. Not a chance.
There was something else printed beneath the clinical jargon.
A heading.
"Contract #1022"
The words seemed heavier than ink.
Rishabh’s fingers tightened around the file as he opened it.
The first page wasn’t a medical chart.
It was a name.
"Owner – Jindal Banks and Services."
He froze.
He read further.
“? Subject administered benzodiazepine dosage calibrated for prolonged unconsciousness.
? Vital suppression ensured.
? Incident staged as cardiac failure.”
His vision blurred for a moment.
He blinked hard.
This wasn’t any ordinary medical treatment.
This was a proper, well-thought execution.
He flipped the page.
Authorization.
"Client: Akshita Jindal.
Relationship to subject: Daughter."
The air felt suddenly thin, as if the oxygen had been siphoned from the room.
Rishabh read the lines again.
And again. Hoping he had misunderstood.
He hadn’t.
The death of the owner of Jindal Banks and Services wasn’t natural.
It wasn’t a rival.
It wasn’t an accident.
It was commissioned.
By his own blood.
His grip trembled— not from fear alone, but from revelation.
BLC wasn’t what it claimed to be.
On the surface, they were elite.
Corporate. Protective.
A fortress for the powerful.
But beneath that polished exterior, it was a purely illegal organisation.
They conducted experiments on their own guards.
They tested harmful drugs without mercy.
They disposed of the unstable.
They fulfilled contracts.
Contracts that included killing.
Rishabh felt the pieces rearranging in his mind with horrifying clarity.
Bodyguards weren’t just shields.
They were weapons.
And BLC wasn’t a security agency.
It was a marketplace.
A place where loyalty could be bought.
Where death could be outsourced.
The silence that followed was suffocating.
Rishabh closed the file slowly, the sound of paper brushing against paper echoing far louder in his ears than it should have.
Contract #1022.
A daughter ordering her father’s death.
A company executing it under the guise of medicine.
His pulse steadied— not with calm, but with understanding.
This wasn’t just corruption.
This was infrastructure.
Carefully built in front of the world.
Meticulously hidden deep in the shadows.
Rishabh stepped back into the shadows, the truth burning behind his eyes.
BLC didn’t protect power.
They manufactured it.
And if contracts like #1022 existed—
Then how many others were there?
——————————————
Tarun was already in motion before the dust from the previous strike had even settled, his presence cutting through the chaos with ruthless precision.
Yug was yanked by the collar and hurled into the concrete wall with a force that made the entire floor tremble.
Kritika was caught mid-step and slammed flat against the ground, the impact echoing sharp and hollow.
Vivek barely had time to brace before Tarun drove his forehead forward in a brutal headbutt that sent him staggering back.
It was efficient. Clean. Controlled.
And yet— controlled a little too carefully.
They rose.
Slowly, painfully, but they rose.
From a distance, Arjun’s amused expression faded into something narrower, more analytical.
His eyes lingered on Tarun longer than necessary, watching the margins of each movement, the restraint hidden between the blows.
He understood violence the way a musician understood rhythm.
And something here was off-beat.
The next second, the trio retaliated— not recklessly, but desperately synchronized.
Kritika slipped behind Tarun and locked her arms around his shoulders, anchoring him, Vivek lunged from the front, gripping his forearms, forcing him into place, and Yug stepped forward, inhaled deeply, and drove his fist straight into Tarun’s core.
Yug put everything into that punch.
Every humiliation. Every loss. Every ounce of borrowed courage.
The impact landed clean.
Tarun felt it.
Not enough to stagger him— but enough to register.
His muscles tightened, and in one fluid motion he tore himself free, shoving Kritika and Vivek aside as if they weighed nothing.
His fist came up again, drawing back with terrifying clarity, aimed directly at Yug’s face.
Yug didn’t move.
He took a slow breath instead.
A faint smirk touched his lips.
“This is how you do it.”
The punch landed squarely.
It should have dropped him.
It should have folded him to his knees instantly.
But Yug didn’t flinch.
Not a step back. Not a gasp. Not even a blink.
Tarun’s fist remained suspended for half a second longer than it should have.
He withdrew it slowly, his gaze lowering to the streak of blood across his knuckles.
Yug still stood there, eyes steady, face pale but unwavering, as if pain had been momentarily erased from his vocabulary.
And that stillness— unnatural, stubborn, almost defiant— dragged Tarun somewhere else entirely.
A memory cracked open.
The first time they met.
Vijay’s fist cutting through the air.
Tarun stepping in without thinking.
Taking the blow meant for Yug and Rishabh.
Standing unmoved. Unbroken.
The roles were reversed now.
For a fraction of a second, Tarun wasn’t here.
He was back there— back when protection had been instinct, not weakness.
But Yug wasn’t built to carry that illusion for long.
His body betrayed him.
His legs buckled suddenly, and he dropped to his knees, breath shattering out of him in a broken exhale.
Kritika and Vivek caught him before his forehead could hit the ground.
Tarun’s eyes widened slightly.
Something flickered across his face—.something dangerously close to emotion.
“Oi, Singh! It’s not fun anymore, man.”
Arjun’s voice sliced through the moment casually, like he was bored of a game.
Tarun blinked, snapped back, turned.
Arjun stood at a distance, bow resting loosely in his hand, frowning with exaggerated disappointment.
“Just get them cornered. I’ll do the rest.”
On the far end of the floor, unnoticed by most, a small figure had stepped out of the stairwell.
A child.
Eyes red from crying, scanning faces desperately, searching for someone familiar.
His gaze fixed on the two men in suits— Arjun and Tarun— and something inside him stirred.
The last time he had seen his father, he had been wearing a suit just like that.
Hope didn't calculate danger.
It ran toward familiarity.
The child began walking toward the commotion, small footsteps echoing softly against the marble floor.
Tarun moved again, faster now, harsher.
He drove forward with relentless momentum, fists swinging in swift arcs, forcing Yug, Kritika, and Vivek backward step by step until their backs hit the corner.
No gaps. No escape routes.
Each attempt to slip sideways was cut off before it began.
Behind them, Arjun lifted his bow with deliberate calm.
He drew an arrow and aimed— not at them— but at the ceiling above their corner.
The string released with a sharp twang.
The arrow embedded into the roof.
And then came the ticking.
Soft at first.
Then unmistakable.
The child had started running now, panic and innocence tangled together as he stumbled forward.
He tripped just a few steps before reaching them and fell hard— right near Yug’s side.
There was a long, shrill beep.
And then, the very next moment—
BOOM!
The explosion tore through the air.
Concrete cracked.
The ceiling gave way in a violent cascade of debris.
The corner where the trio stood began collapsing inward.
In that fraction of chaos, Tarun saw him.
The child.
Small. Helpless. In the blast radius.
Time fractured.
Tarun surged forward instinctively, diving into the collapsing space.
He grabbed the child first, pulling him against his chest, then with a swift, calculated sweep of his arm he shoved Yug, Kritika, and Vivek out of the impact zone.
They tumbled aside, scraped but alive.
Tarun’s delay cost him.
Chunks of concrete tore across his back as he shielded the boy, fabric ripping, skin splitting beneath the debris.
He didn’t react. He didn’t hesitate.
When the dust settled, Tarun was still kneeling.
The child was in his arms.
Alive.
Tarun exhaled shakily, lowering the boy to his feet.
He remained on his knees, hands resting gently on the child’s shoulders.
The chaos around them seemed distant now, muffled.
He looked at the crying face in front of him and smiled.
A soft smile.
A forgotten one.
He wiped the tears from the boy’s cheeks carefully, as if afraid his touch might hurt him.
“Don’t worry,” Tarun said quietly.
“Nothing will happen to you as long as I’m here…”
The words barely left his mouth when the boy’s body went limp.
It wasn’t dramatic.
It wasn’t loud.
Just a sudden collapse.
A dull thud against the floor.
Tarun froze, his brain refusing to analyse the sudden shift in the air— but it had to work.
His eyes followed the fall slowly, refusing to understand.
Then he saw it.
The kid's breath wasn't audible anymore.
The marble floor was now stained, wet with blood— the blood that was pooling around the child's head.
An arrow had pierced through the kid's skull— the arrow head visible on one end of the head and the rear on the other— like his head was the bullseye.
The child, who was never supposed to be a part of this, had lost his life as soon as he accidentally stepped into the wrong world.
Tarun’s hands trembled as he reached forward, lifting the boy again, shaking him gently— like a brother trying to wake someone from sleep.
“Hey… hey…”
His voice cracked.
“Get up… the prank’s over now.”
Blood stained his palms.
Warm. Fresh.
Behind him, Arjun approached with unhurried steps, smiling faintly.
“Oh look what happened,” he said lightly.
“The three didn’t die just because you wanted to save this brat.”
Tarun’s breathing grew uneven.
Tears streamed down his face, blurring everything.
The vessels in his eyes ruptured from the strain.
Red mixed with clear.
Arjun’s tone remained almost conversational.
“I had to kill him, Singh.”
Tarun’s lips trembled.
He bent closer to the child, voice dropping to a whisper.
“Kid… get up.”
No response.
“Kid… get up.”
Arjun stepped closer, placing the bow aside. “Remember what we were first taught? There is no place for emotions here.”
Tarun’s tears turned crimson red as they flowed harder, staining his cheeks.
“Boy… it’s not funny anymore,” he pleaded weakly. “Get up… please.”
His voice wavered, rising, breaking apart under the weight of something far older than this moment.
“Please… b—”
The word caught in his throat.
He swallowed.
And when he spoke again, it wasn’t to a stranger.
It was to someone he saw in the kid— a person buried deep in his past, his heart.
“B— brother…”
The realization shattered whatever composure remained.
The tears, now blood, poured without restraint.
His grip tightened around the lifeless body as if he could will warmth back into it— the sould back into it.
His chest heaved violently.
Then the sound came.
Raw. Primal.
Tarun, yet again, broke into innumerable pieces that he had hardly just gathered back together.
A scream that ripped through the broken floor and echoed into the hollow spaces beyond.
“Brother!!”
——————————————
03:59:33 PM.
