Patang (20 page)

And just like that, just in time, and ever so gracefully, PARI swished around the balloon like a rocket circling a planet, giving the cheering crowds a wonderful view of the ‘HONDA’ logo amidst a flying flock of AR-generated geese. As PARI dodged the birds and the floating lumps of cumulus clouds, Sakshi took her eyes off the skies for one second to find Ken Hoshino’s face lit up with a bright smile.

Sakshi was in seventh heaven. Her geeky friend held her tense shoulders and jumped up and down. ‘You did it! You did it!’ he kept shouting.

Sakshi had dismissed the first shriek as someone cheering for her, but as more and more people began to scream, she couldn’t help but turn towards her audience. They were not shrieking in delight…these were screams of horror! What on earth was the matter with them? What were all of them looking at? What had scared them so much? She looked in the direction at which everyone was pointing and her eyes fell on the large screen.

‘Oh my God!’ Her friend exclaimed in a trembling voice. ‘Wh-what is that?’

And then Sakshi saw it: right at the centre of the ‘O’ on the brand’s logo was stuck, in a disgustingly grotesque and twisted
manner, the naked body of an old man, his face contorted beyond all recognition. As Sakshi’s slack, trembling fingers lost control over the throttle, PARI decided to take a closer look at the corpse. She banked a little to the left, crashing mercilessly against the animated flying geese before shooting directly towards the old man’s bloody body and piercing his chest with her long, sharp control antenna, just as Armstrong ended his song, crooning for one last time, ‘What a wonderful world!’

27

Rathod stood at the edge of the ground and ran his eyes over the entire area. The event had been happening in a section that covered approximately a third of the ground. The IIT campus wasn’t far from here. He saw a balloon in the distant sky, sticking out like an ugly red pimple amid the bright blue firmament. Rathod frowned, and as he looked around, his frown only deepened. The place was an absolute mess. The entire ground was teeming with people, all wanting to gawk at the fifth victim of the Patang Killer. The media had been very quick and efficient in spreading the word. The police had set up cordons and were trying to do their best to ward people off, but it was quite evident that more backup was required. Rathod was reluctant to walk straight to the crime scene as it was nearly impossible to navigate the crowd and reach the cordon. There had to be another way somewhere – the police had to have set something up. Rathod began to circle the area in search of a clear passage.

‘Hello, sir! Here, this way, this way!’ Rathod heard a voice above the din of the crowd. He looked around to see Aditya waving his hands in the air furiously. Rathod walked towards him.

‘Come this way, sir!’ Aditya said, indicating a cordoned-off passage.

A constable raised the rope as Rathod and Aditya ducked below it and crossed over to the other side.

‘What happened here?’ Rathod asked Aditya.

‘Looks like murder. Apparently the victim was an old man, around 60 years old. His…’

‘Wait a second – what do you mean “apparently”?’

‘Well, I haven’t seen the body yet.’

‘Why?’

‘Has no one told you yet?’

‘Told me what?’

‘The body is up there.’ Aditya pointed towards the balloon. Rathod was so surprised that for several seconds he couldn’t speak. ‘Up there?’ he finally asked in an incredulous tone.

‘Yes, sir.’

‘You mean…on that balloon?’

‘That’s right, sir. Taped to it.’

‘What the hell?’

Aditya hesitated for a moment, looked around to check if anyone else was within earshot, and then said in a low voice that sounded particularly ominous, ‘Just like a kite, sir.’

Rathod wasn’t surprised. He could now appreciate why the media had been so quick to speculate about this particular murder. As it is, when a serial killer is operating in a city, all murders are usually attributed to him, irrespective of whether it was committed by him or not, but this…no…this was something else. This had Tony’s name and MO written all over it.

‘How do I get to see the body?’ Rathod asked.

‘I’m not sure yet, sir. I think they will be bringing it down soon.’

Rathod looked around and saw Prashant Kulkarni standing with his team, their eyes fixed on the balloon. Prashant was one of the best forensic experts in the force, and Rathod had worked with him on several cases. A bright and dedicated individual, he commanded tremendous respect amongst his colleagues. Rathod walked up behind him and cleared his throat.

‘Oh my God! Chandrakant Sir?’ Prashant seemed pleasantly surprised.

‘How are you, Prashant?’ Rathod asked as he shook his hand.

‘I’m fine, sir. How have you been? It’s so nice to see you.’

‘What a mess, eh?’ Rathod gestured towards the balloon.

‘Oh yes, tell me about it. I was just telling the team that there’s no way the girl could have planned the entire thing.’

Rathod looked at Aditya once and asked Prashant, ‘What girl?’

‘Oh, haven’t you heard?’ Prashant said. ‘It seems the body was discovered by a young girl from IIT.’

‘Skywatcher?’

‘No, not a skywatcher. Apparently, this girl was flying some sort of a mini-plane or something which went and hit the balloon, piercing the body and killing the man instantly.’

‘Plane?’ Rathod asked. He had no idea what Prashant was talking about.

‘You know, one of those remote-controlled planes that one can fly from the ground?’

‘I see. But what was the man doing on that balloon?’

Prashant laughed and said, ‘No idea. That’s all I’ve heard so far.’

‘What’s this I am hearing about the Patang Killer then?’

‘Aah, that’s bullshit. People say all sorts of things.’

‘So, you guys are waiting for the…’

‘…body to be brought down, yes. I refuse to go up there… heh heh…’

‘Where’s the girl?’ Rathod asked. He knew it would take a while for the body to be brought down, and he was in no mood to waste time.

A few minutes later, Rathod found himself standing a few feet away from a teenage girl clad smartly in a pair of jeans and a white shirt and presently being questioned by an officer. He watched the girl closely for a minute. Then he asked Aditya to wait, walked up to the officer and spoke to him briefly. The officer nodded and said something back. Rathod returned to where Aditya was standing and said, ‘We’ll have to wait for five minutes.’

‘What do you think?’ Aditya asked, pointing at the balloon.

Without looking at it, Rathod remarked, ‘Difficult to say. Let me speak to her first.’

‘Yes, but this is crazy, don’t you think?’

‘You bet!’Rathod agreed. ‘I’ve been dealing with criminals for almost 20 years now, but I haven’t seen anything like this before.’

‘I don’t think anybody has seen anything like this before!’

Rathod looked around at the ground. The crowd was swelling by the minute. Shaking his head in frustration, he turned towards Aditya and said, ‘By the way, I know what Tony’s “clue” meant.’

‘Really? You figured it out?’

‘Yes, see here.’ Rathod looked around and then carefully took out the kite-shaped flake from his pocket. He spread out the flake around the joint and showed it to Aditya. ‘See?’

‘Oh my God! This means…’

‘…that he has an accomplice!’

Rathod was surprised to see that Aditya didn’t seem convinced and looked at him doubtfully, as if he didn’t agree with his logical explanation of what the clue meant.

‘What happened?’

‘Nothing, sir…it’s just that…’

‘What?’

‘If Tony had an accomplice who has now gone on a killing spree, why would he tell you?’

‘Well, he hasn’t told me that in as many words. But he
has
left me a clue. It’s like one of his…’

‘Puzzles?’

‘Yes, exactly.’

‘Yes, but do you think
that’s
what the clue means? I mean, you can’t be absolutely sure, right?’

‘Well, yes, it’s a hypothesis, but a very plausible one.’

‘Umm…I’m not so sure, sir.’

‘Well, then…what do
you
think the clue means?’ Rathod’s voice carried a slight tone of irritation.

Before Aditya could respond, they heard another voice: ‘Sir?’

Rathod looked around to find the officer who had been questioning the girl now looking at him. ‘Everything all right, sir?’ he asked, in a tone that suggested that everything was not all right. His eyes had found the small kite-shaped flake in Rathod’s palm. Rathod quickly put it back into his pocket and hesitated for a moment. Then he said, ‘Yes, yes, absolutely…are you done?’

For a few seconds, the officer didn’t respond. He looked at Rathod curiously and said, ‘Well, we tried speaking to her, but she seems to be in a state of shock, which I think is quite natural, given the circumstances and her age.’

‘So she hasn’t said anything?’

‘Nothing at all, except that she wants to speak to her father. You are welcome to try and talk to her. I’ll come back in some time.’

‘Thank you, officer.’

Rathod and Aditya walked up to the girl, who seemed really shaken up. She was sitting on a chair and staring blankly at the ground. It was quite natural for her to feel that way, Rathod thought, especially given the fact that she was not outside the cloud of suspicion yet. He looked at Aditya and made a gesture, suggesting that he lead this time. Aditya nodded understandingly and took a step towards the girl.

‘Miss, I’m Inspector Aditya, this is Mr Rathod. We’d like to ask you a few questions, if you don’t mind.’

A slight shiver of terror shook her body for a second, but the girl didn’t reply, nor did her expression change. Rathod watched her closely. Her lips were trembling. She was clearly in a state of shock. Aditya glanced at Rathod and made a second attempt. ‘Miss? Are you all right?’

There was no response. Aditya looked helplessly at Rathod, who nodded, suggesting that he was going to take a shot. Aditya took a few steps back and Rathod walked up and sat down in the empty chair beside the girl, looking around with a sigh. After a pause, he said, ‘Beautiful, isn’t it?’

The girl still didn’t reply. It was as if she had turned into a block of stone.

‘All this greenery?’ Rathod continued.

Very slowly, the girl raised her head and looked at him. Aditya noticed that she had tears in her eyes. She simply kept staring at Rathod, who now turned towards her and smiled. ‘You know, I had read somewhere that there’s a reason why we like watching greenery. Experts say that since the very beginning of mankind, for several million years, we saw nothing but greenery all around us. Hence, our eyes have sort of become accustomed to seeing green. It’s a phenomenon called “imprinting”.’

The girl kept staring at him as Aditya watched from a
distance with great reverence. It was an absolute pleasure to see the master at work!

‘Even now, when we see green, our mind dances like that of a child’s. All our weariness washes off, our troubles suddenly don’t seem to bother us anymore, and we feel…happy! We feel safe! It’s a psychological thing. Happens with us all the time.’

‘Imprinting?’ the girl asked.

Aditya breathed a sigh of relief. A soft smile appeared on his lips.

‘Yeah, imprinting,’ Rathod nodded.

The girl was silent for some time. Then she asked, ‘Are you from the police?’

Rathod thought for a few seconds and said, ‘Yes.’

‘I’m in trouble, right?’

Rathod smiled. ‘What’s your name?’

‘Sakshi Kanwar.’

‘You see, Sakshi, in this country, we have a provision in the law that says that an individual is innocent until and unless it has been proved beyond any reasonable doubt that he or she is guilty. So, no, you are not in trouble. So far, you’ve simply been a witness to the discovery of a murder victim. In other words, you are just what your name says you are.’

Sakshi smiled softly. She seemed to relax a little. ‘I called my dad. He’s on his way to Mumbai. He…and his lawyer,’ she said.

Rathod smiled, ‘That was an intelligent thing to do. Now, I assure you, I’ll keep you out of harm’s way until your father arrives. All I ask of you is to tell me what happened here today.’

Sakshi thought for a few seconds and then said, ‘There was an event being held here this morning. The IIT annual robotics championship. I had made a drone – it’s like a flying…’

‘I know what a drone is. You designed it yourself?’

‘Yes. Designed, developed and assembled.’

‘Very impressive. Please continue…’

‘I was flying the drone around and it had a camera fitted to it. I was projecting the POV of the drone live on that large screen over there. The crowd…everyone was going crazy…’

‘I’m sure they were. So you took your drone up to the balloon?’

‘Yes.’

‘Why?’

‘I…I just wanted to impress everyone – the judges…the sponsors.’

The balloon was now being brought down. A quick glance towards it told Rathod that Honda was probably one of the sponsors.

‘Please continue…’

‘When the drone got closer to the balloon, the camera caught a…disturbing visual…’

‘Can you describe it for me?’ he asked gently.

Sakshi looked like she couldn’t, but Rathod waited for her to say as much. Perhaps knowing that the man meant well, she gathered all her courage and made a gallant attempt –

‘An old man…he was stuck to the balloon…I’m not sure how…but he was up there…and he was…n-naked…’

‘Did you recognize him?’

‘No…I’ve never seen him before. I swear!’

‘I believe you. What happened then?’

‘I…I lost control…my hands and feet became numb…and I don’t know how…’

‘Yes?’

‘The drone…it…it turned towards the man…and…’ Sakshi covered her face with her palms.

‘All right, that’s enough. You’ve done very well.’

Rathod and Aditya exchanged glances. The first officer had returned by now and Rathod told him everything Sakshi had said. The officer told him the body had been brought down, and Rathod set off to investigate, with Aditya in tow.

‘Do you believe her?’ Aditya asked.

‘Do you have any reason not to?’