[ D day - 3 ] [ 60 H :59 M :30 S ] [ home town ]
Vikram hoped his father would listen to him, but chances are low.
Thankfully, there's one person who absolutely listens to him as long as he asks for it …
Ofcourse, with some extra cash.
His brother Vinod is right at that age where one is short of cash and in over abundance of energy. So, he could probably move his brother to do his bidding, and take preventive measures at their home.
Thus, he called his brother, and gave him a list of orders.
Ofcourse, along with the associated pay and emotional blackmail about his latest girlfriend.
The latter is just to make sure his brother does it stat, rather than take his time.
"First, get iron grills for all the windows, along with the strongest meshes. All the glass windows must be changed to the strongest fiberglass windows, which could resist even a tiger if need be. If they don't have fiberglass windows, then get the thick steel windows.
Change all the doors in the house, to strong steel ones. Think of it like this. There are going to be demonstrations in the city soon. Despite that no one could understand nothing about the portals, all the religious leaders in the city will act and tell people it's a sign from their own religion.
Also, the government or military could move, and it will become a semi curfew state, if not a lock out. Fill up as much on dry food as possible. Enough to not need to go out for six months or more, if you could.
You could rent a car, I will transfer you money. Vinod ! I expect a status report every hour, and send me what you collected thus far every hour. Your next month's pocket money depends on this." Vikram said to his brother.
"Then.. Can I get ten thousand ? for next month, that is? " Vinod asked, just kidding. That's more than enough to take his girlfriend out to movies, a classy dinner and shopping.
"As long as you send hourly updates, and do everything I said, Yes. Ten thousand it is." Vikram promised.
Anyway, the money is going to be useless by next month.
After that, he called every bank he knew for a personal loan, and sold off all his stocks and mutual funds, meagre as they were, and sent the cash to his brother.
Vinod was in shock when he saw one lakh rupees transferred from his brother.
He called his brother back.
" Vikram ! have you gone mad or something? " he wondered at his brother.
" The money is for groceries, and hardware. Every part of the house must be covered in iron. Think of it like this. We are living in an old house, and there's a famine in the forest.
You remember the time we stopped for an hour waiting for the tiger to cross the road ? you remember wondering if the glass of bus doors could hold on if the tiger chose to attack ?
We need every surface of the wall covered, and groceries dry goods stocked for as much as you could collect. Don't forget to collect sugar, salt and cleaning supplies.
Also, every last paisa of the cash I sent you will be spent on acquiring materials. If you even think of skimming it off, your wallet will be empty next time, and mom will know her daughter-in-law far too early." Vikram threatened his brother.
He did not need to do this much, as pandemic is not a distant memory. Yet, he's going to insist on it.
"Fine. Every paisa of it. I got it. … Vikram…! Do you know something ? " Vinod asked.
" Yes. If you want to know, accomplish what I said perfectly. The information could not be given out to reckless people." Vikram said officiously.
"Fine, brother! You promise me to tell me what it is. I promise I will definitely do everything you asked for today." Vinod promised.
However, Vikram did not tell him.
Vinod is the cat that would get killed for curiosity. He could bear anything in the world save for missing out on juicy gossip. He would probably climb mount everest and dance on it in his underpants if Vikram promises to tell him the secret dating information about his favourite movie star.
That's how damned curious his brother is.
As long as there is promise of this piece of news being revealed to just him alone, he will do everything Vikram asked for to the last tee.
Conversely, it's also why Vikram did not tell his brother about the portals. With his curiosity, he would gather all his friends and attempt to enter a portal, and try to shoot a youtube video.
Sure enough, this would be a good viewer bait. However, if what he is guessing is correct, then the beginning animals in the state capital would be apex predators.
Not because it's a state capital, but because once upon a time, it used to be a savannah amidst a series of mountain ranges. The city is new, with measly six hundred years of history. I.e. it was infested with lions, tigers and animals that could fight either of those to death.
Yes, six hundred years counts as new. Usually most established cities were there for thousands of years, while most villages were also usually established for hundreds of years. That's the way of it in an ancient country.
Vikram shook himself so as to not go on random thoughts now. The portal would be reappearing any time now.
He went to the welding shop to buy tools for hunting. Though it's illegal, they would still sell such tools here under the name of agricultural tools.
If you sharpen the blade enough, you can kill men, if you let it be moderately blunt, you can harvest crops. That's how it is.
So, there's plenty of strong iron to be molded into sabers, talwars and otherwise as long as he wants it. No one would even look twice at him, for they will assume he is either a coconut harvester, or toddy harvester. You need at least knives of this size to cut off the strong wooden fruits.
And if he keeps it wrapped, it would appear just like the crow bar used to dig land, which every family keeps in the villages. Had he done a similar thing in the state capital, he would be definitely stopped as long as a policeman sees him and be asked to reveal his tools.
The villagers gathered where the portal was, discussing its disappearance while it's gone. The local policeman who was dispatched took one look at the disappeared portal, then left to report the occurrence.
Thus, by the time the portal appeared, there's no one around. Vikram was able to enter the portal all too easily.
The moment he entered the portal, he froze in shock.
He recognized this location.
It is a valley with rocks spread all over, and plenty of foxes running around all over.
He knew its name. It's called fox hole.
A theory emerged in his mind as he looked at the foxes.
The appearance of Sparrow was not a coincidence.
Others may not know, but their own family has been here for a while. So, Vikram knew the history of their village. Once upon a time, there were far too many bandits and mountain tribes disturbing peace in the land.
They all used to take refuge in this forest. For the longest time, the army couldn't hunt the bandits at all. Then, a young general figured it out. The forest is full of sparrows.
No matter where they enter the forest from, the people of the forest could see their exact path from a high location as a straight line due to sparrows forming a disturbed cloud over their heads.
It is only then the king opened his eyes, and sent all his army to encircle forest, and hunt the bandits.
Once the bandits were hunted, he established a village so the forest could be monitored.
It used to be a village of hunters and gatherers in their early days.
Most villages around here are named after some or other kind of animals or trees.
Fox hole is the nearest village, so much so, when the town expanded it became a part of the municipality.
By this rule, the next animal would be a monitor lizard.
Vikram shuddered.
Monitor lizards famously used to climb walls of a fort, and could smash a man's head to paste with their tail bash. Moreover, he has seen a monitor lizard break a stone into two with its tail.
However, foxes …!
Well, at least, they are cute and small, so he was not frightened to go near them. Though, it's a pity to kill them. They look very innocent. However, what needs to be done, must be done.
He retrieved his saber and swung.
And missed.
Missed!
Missed !
Vikram held his talwar at the ready, neither too loosely, nor too tightly, standing in the pose of assassin's creed warrior he had seen.
Doesn't seem to be the right posture, as his knees are starting to hurt, but the foxes have become very active around him as he stood still.
He swung only when one of the foxes bit into his toe.
The head is separated from the body of the fox cleanly. A white light rose from the foxes body.
[ agility gene fragment 0.1 ]
Vikram swung his blade frantically at the remaining foxes. He injured five, while twenty ran away.
He killed all five. All dropped the same fragment.
[ night vision gene fragment 0.1 ]
Damn it ! if only he brought something to create smoke. He cursed himself for his stupidity.
He had no idea what sort of commotion happened in the world while he was playing hide and seek with pretty little foxes.