ATHER OCULOS
-SANSKAR BIHADE
It was December 2011; the city of Mumbai was as cold as it could get. This year the winter was stronger than ever, kids tucked in their beds with heavy blankets, people devouring hot soups and coffees to comfort themselves, the Christmas vacations approaching, and the streets covered in fog, and in the fog lingered someone, someone who terrorized the city of Mumbai. His name traumatized people, his appearance terrified them, his intentions killed them! He was called as the Red Man, who was sure to make the place blood red, wherever he appeared. Tales had it that he was immortal, tales had it that he was attacked uncountable times, tales had it that he survived every blow of it, tales had it that he would still come hunting, tales had it that he wouldn't stop until his never-ending hunger ends. He was known for murders, cold blooded, kids, teens, adults, senior citizens, he spared none, once he had chosen the one, there was no looking back. The police were on red alert, citizens lived in constant fear of the Red Man, and he swiftly kept preying, one after another.
Anish was a silent kid, he still wasn't a teen yet, but his older brother was, who constantly encouraged Anish to be open and make friends. He had a normal life, a happy nuclear family, he was decent at studies, he was good boy, if you will, but he was scared, scared of the Red Man, scared as every other person across Mumbai.
It was 22nd December, middle of the night, Anish was asleep in his bed, across the room was his brother, on his bed. The brothers had a separate room, they weren't particularly rich but were contempt. The windows were closed, the fan made a constant creaking noise on the lowest speed, the noise irritated his brother, but he can't speed it up, due to the cold. He woke up at midnight, thirsty. Sat on his bed, looked at the creaking fan and let out a sigh, he stood up and walked to the bed of Anish, he looked over if he was asleep. Apparently, Anish had nightmares, making sleep difficult for him, he saw the Red Man every night. Anish was asleep, the low light from the window peeking in made it visible enough for his brother to move around. He walked out of the room, across the dark hallway in dead silence, over to the kitchen, he switched the lights on and poured himself some water in a glass, he drank it in a sip and walked out of the kitchen switching off the light.
He was a step away from the drawing room, as he saw a shadow on the sofa across the room, he stood there frozen for a moment. It was dark, he was hardly able to see anything. He breathed heavily, as he realized the shadow is actually a person sitting on the sofa, not just his eyes playing tricks. Terrified, he sprinted back two steps into the kitchen, and turned the lights on. It was visible now, it was Anish sitting on the sofa in darkness. His brother took a deep breath and asked, "Another nightmare?"
"Yes." Anish replied in a sleepy voice.
"You want some water?" his brother asked.
Anish slowly nodded his head. His brother went back to the kitchen as he asked, "What did you see tonight?"
"Something is wrong." Anish replied.
His brother fetched the water and started walking back.
"He is here." Anish said, sounding like he was high on drugs.
"Who?" his brother asked as he walked into the drawing room.
"He is here; he is right beside me!" Anish said, his voice breaking, he was scared.
"There is on one here." His brother was just a few feet away from the sofa as he froze, a crippling shiver went down his spine, he ran out of breath and his heart started pumping, he could hear his heart beating. He didn't move a muscle, his eyes wide open, as he saw a person stand up right beside the sofa. He couldn't believe his eyes, but whatever it was, he knew that it wasn't any good. He opened his mouth and shouted, but his voice box was silent, he strained to get some sound out of his mouth. Horror went down his brain as he saw a mysterious figure standing beside his brother and himself frozen and unable to speak. He forcibly moved his mouth hoping to call out for help, his parents were just a few meters away in an adjacent bedroom. He was paralyzed, his mouth moving, eyes popping out, his hand trembling as he realized that he was the Red Man. It didn't take him long to understand the situation, who could possibly be inside your house at this hour.
The figure lifts his right hand up and a hammer he held was visible in the low light and his intentions, visible on his presence. He swiftly placed a nail on Anish's skull, right in the middle of his cranium with his left hand, and in a full-fledged swing, he hammered the nail into Anish's head. Blood gushed down and poured all over. Anish struggled to breath and didn't move a muscle, and before he knew, Anish was dead. His brother stood there, watching his brother get killed with him drowning in horror.
Mumbai 2021
"Varun! Hurry up!" Nagesh exclaimed as his son Varun, as always was running late for school. "You don't want to get your mother and father late for office! Do you?"
"Coming!" 12 summers-old Varun shouted as he came out of his room, dressed for school.
"Make it fast! I need to get to my office before the boss arrives!" Varun's mother Madhvi exclaimed.
"I know! We work in the same office!" Nagesh replied turning to Madhvi.
Madhvi made this disappointed face, she makes every day, waiting in the car's front seat for her beloved husband and clumsy son.
Madhvi and Nagesh work at a reputed MNC, they both earn some solid figures and Varun is a sixth grader, showing evidence of upcoming adolescence.
"This morning, the Mumbai police has found another body of an 11-year-old kid in an abandoned garage on the outskirts of the city, this kid, who goes by the name, 'Nakul Kayande' was reported missing two weeks ago!" the radio announced as the Nagesh drove across the town.
"Another dead kid found! This news shows up every second day! And why on earth do they think it is a good idea to broadcast it in the morning!" Madhvi ranted.
"To be honest, these killings are interesting, do you think that the Red Man is back?" Nagesh asked.
"Don't talk about such things in front of Varun!" Madhvi was concerned.
"Yes, I think that Red Man is back!" Varun added from the back seat, as he scrolled on his mobile.
"You were literally 2-year-old when the Red Man stopped with his attacks! There is no way he is back. This is just some another criminal." Madhvi replied.
At 2 pm, Varun takes a rickshaw to return home, and has two hours of alone time every day, until his parents return at 4 pm. He usually watches some movie or some adult videos in his lone time but that day, 28th November, he wasn't feeling particularly fit. He mysteriously caught fever, and he was too tired to even stay awake when he returned from school. He put down his bag, pulled out his tie, loosened up some buttons on his shirt and stood under the fan which was full throttled. He was sweating and found it hard to even stand upright. His vision blurred as he fell unconscious on the carpet, in the middle of his drawing room.
'THUCK! THUCK! THUCK! THUCK!' someone knocked the door loudly. Varun gasped and woke up from his sleep in reflex. He held his head and clenched his eyes, as he returned to his senses. He shakily stood up and walked to the door, he opened it and to his surprise, there was no one on the door. He walked back in and checked his phone, it was 3:05 pm. His head was aching and he felt peculiar all over. He only saw one answer-sleep, and so he just decided to rest.
He slept through all the evening, his parents brought him some paracetamols.
Nagesh does ghost writings on the internet, he writes gory, violent stories on some website. He is always awake till midnight, the house they live in is a 3 BHK, one room is specified for Nagesh and his stories. Varun isn't allowed inside the room as Nagesh always has a bunch of bloody, violent photos of crimes or some freaky designs of some demons or monsters scattered on his work desk. And his stories, as Madhvi quotes, are 'Traumatizing! Even for an adult.'
Madhvi strictly follows an eight-hour sleep schedule, so Nagesh has roughly two hours every night to work on his stories. Madhvi does not like Nagesh's hobby, she never did. When Varun was 6-years-old, he went through some on his father's photo albums, and he couldn't sleep for weeks. This particular incident made Nagesh limit his hobby. Since then Varun is afraid of the dark and shadows.
Nagesh's writing room is dark, he has the lights adjusted to get him in the 'mood' for writing horror and gore. On that day, he was too worried about Varun, he thinks that Varun's eyes played tricks on him and his childhood trauma kicked in, giving him the fever. He was too lost in his mind, blaming himself, he couldn't focus on writing. It was already 1 am, and he hadn't even written anything. His eyes were strained; he was sleepy and 'THUCK! THUCK! THUCK! THUCK!' someone knocked the door loudly. Nagesh stood up in alert and slowly walked to the door, he was clearly very sleepy.
"Who is it at this hour?" he said to himself and reached the door and peeked out through the peephole. There was a crowd of kids outside in their porch, they all had pitch black eyes, all of them looked into the peephole from the outside, as if they knew that Nagesh was looking through it. Nagesh gasped as took few steps back, he was shocked. He started sweating, he rubbed his eyes and looked out through the peephole once again, only for the kids to just disappear this time. In a split of a second he bashed open the door, there wasn't a soul out there, just the cold and crickets chirping.
"I should just go to sleep." He said to himself and went to bed.
The next morning, Varun was even worse, he was all sweaty and his body burning.
"We need to take him to the hospital!" Madhvi exclaimed.
"Yeah, we need to, I think we should take the day off." Nagesh said as the couple sat beside Varun on his bed.
"Mom, last night I saw something." Varun said weakly, his eyes still closed.
"What was it baby?" Madhvi bent over.
"He was standing in that corner." He pointed his hand across the room, eyes still closed. "He said that he wanted my help. I denied him, I told him to go away, but he got angry." His voice was breaking now.
The couple looked at each other stunned and concerned.
"He got bigger! His arms lengthened and he went on all fours, he was huge. He hurt me!" he was barely able to speak.
"Did he hurt you?" Nagesh asked.
Varun sat upright without opening his eyes, his parents were shocked. He slowly took off his shirt, and to Nagesh and Madhvi's surprise, there was a plus sign carved on his skin right in the middle of his chest. It looked pretty bad, the wound was no small.
Madhvi gasped as Nagesh rushed to get some band aid.
"What is happening to him?" Madhvi was in tears as Nagesh tore the band aid.
"If this is what I think it is, you won't believe me!" Nagesh replied.
"Don't give me horror story for God's sake!" Madhvi got furious.
"Then who do you think did this to Varun? Some school bully?"
"Could be! But I don't believe in your stupid ghost theory! Maybe his childhood trauma of the shadow is back! What if he hurt himself and is making up a ghost story now?" Madhvi was confused and scared and blank, she like Nagesh didn't knew what to do.
After bandaging Varun, they put him to bed and left his room.
"I have something to tell you!" Nagesh said.
"What?" Madhvi was worried.
"Last night someone knocked the door, I looked through the peephole, there were a bunch of kids in the porch, and they all had creepy black eyes. But then when I looked again, they were gone!"
"Don't get started!" Madhvi exclaimed as she took a seat on the sofa.
"I am not lying!" Nagesh said as he took a seat beside her.
"You know right, I do not like your story pranks! I never even liked your stories! I hated them even when we were in college, and I allow you to still do it because that is pretty much the only thing you like." Madhvi argued.
"Listen to me now! I see some creepy kids in the middle of the night and our son has a wound on his chest and his body is burning!" Nagesh was getting furious.
"Just keep your theory out and get Varun to the hospital." Madhvi furiously stood up and walked to the bedroom to get dressed. It was morning 7 o'clock as he three left for some nearby clinic.
"What do you think it is doctor?" Madhvi asked.
"The wounds are not done with knife or some pen. It is probably some rusted iron, or maybe even a pointy wood piece. It surely isn't very normal I would say." The doctor replied.
"So what might have caused it?" Nagesh asked.
"Something that isn't very commonly found. Some weird weapon I would say and to be honest, it is very dangerous. You need to keep a track of him! Who he meets and who could have done this, and with the new series of disappearances and killing of children, I would be more cautious. Overall the wounds aren't something to worry about, the fever is normal, it would take three days normally, just keep him safe." The doctor explained.
"It can't be the serial killer right? No one broke into our house last night! Until you opened the door and let someone in!" Madhvi ranted.
"Oh really! You mean I am psycho now!" Nagesh was driving the car.
"Yes! You are!" Madhvi exclaimed.
"Listen to me, I know a guy, who can tell if this is some ghost thing." Nagesh calmed down.
"Oh please no!" Madhvi sighed.
Nagesh and Varun were in Varun's room, Nagesh was giving him the night dose of his medicines. Madhvi was in the kitchen, doing the dishes, it was 8 o'clock in the night, Madhvi was just finished with the dishes as "THUCK! THUCK! THUCK! THUCK!" someone knocked the back door. In a reflex she turned to her right, she was just a few inches away from the door. Their house has a backyard and distinguished walls, so some person showing up in the backyard, can be considered trespassing.
Nagesh realized the knocking noise and sprinted to the kitchen in a heartbeat. Madhvi's hand was on the handle, a few degrees away from unlocking the door, as Nagesh shouted, "Don't open!" and showed up in the kitchen.
"What?" Madhvi took her hand off the handle.
Nagesh slowly pulled her back and peeked out from the window on the left of the door, it was rectangular window, the backyard light made everything visible.
The couple were stunned to look outside the window. A chill went down Madhvi's spine, she started breathing heavily, they saw a kid right outside the window, staring at them, with tar black eyes.
The kid kept staring creepily, the couple was frozen, their hearts pumped as the light in the backyard started blinking, and switched off.
"What was that?" Madhvi asked, her voice was shaky.
The lights in the backyard showed up again and the kid was not there.
"I told you so!" Nagesh said.
"Who was the guy you were talking about?" Madhvi asked.
Madhvi was ridiculed by the idea of a haunting, but seeing the black eyed kid herself, she was left with no other choice and decided to follow Nagesh's lead. If Nagesh's theory was correct, she can't risk anything, not especially her child's life.
"Hello!" Tanishk said as he entered the house.
"Hi, myself Nagesh Rathore." Nagesh introduced himself as the gentlemen shake hands. "And this is my wife, Madhvi."
"Nice to meet you!" Tanishk said, nodding his head.
"I actually saw your ad on some website, few months back, it said you conducted exorcisms and curse removals and stuff." Nagesh asked.
"Oh yeah! I do all of that. And now that we are on this scene, I think I should let you know the steps in which I conduct these rituals. Firstly, I will examine the victim, I would diagnose what exactly is the problem, then we may or may not apply a protection spell and then finally, we will find the solution." Tanishk explained as all of them were sitting on the sofa.
"Should we get going?" Nagesh asked.
"Yes!" Tanishk replied.
All of them walked to the Varun's bedroom. Tanishk didn't even touch Varun and asked, "What happened that made you call me?"
"He had a wound on his chest, out of nowhere, and we saw some children with pitch black eyes." Nagesh explained.
"Kids with black eyes you say?" Tanishk seemed to have caught a link.
"Yes." Madhvi replied.
"I think I know what this case is, but to know the situation better, I would like to perform some rituals with his hairs and his blood. I have experience, I can take his blood sample." Tanishk quickly got to work, he pulled out a syringe and took some of his blood and used a scissor to cut a few hairs.
He moved aside the sofa, removed the carpet and sat down, his bag had everything he needed. He pulled out a peculiar looking lamp, but some oil in it and lit it, he took the blood, poured it in some china bone bowl. He dipped his index and middle finger in the blood, chanted something and drew a circle on the floor, he dipped his fingers in the blood again and chanted something again as he drew a star inside the circle. He took the hairs and 'THUCK! THUCK! THUCK! THUCK!' someone knocked from inside Nagesh's work room loudly. All of them turned to the room in reflex.
"Do not answer it! They are trying to distract us." Tanishk said.
He held the hairs on the lamp to burn it.
'THUCK! THUCK! THUCK! THUCK!' loud knocks came from the master bedroom.
Madhvi was tensed, she sat beside Nagesh on a sofa as they watched Tanishk do his thing.
He lit the hairs and placed them in the middle of the star, "Introduce yourself!" he announced.
'THUCK! THUCK! THUCK! THUCK!' someone knocked the main door.
In a reflex Tanishk turned to the door and pointe at it as the knocking continued. "Open the door! Follow him!" he said.
Nagesh sprinted and opened the door, the kid standing at the door ran away laughing in a creepy way. The entire house suddenly drowned in a weird dankness, Nagesh chased the kid as he kept running across the streets in the sun. After a few minutes, Nagesh lost track of the kid, he panted and heard loud knocks, he held his head and clenched his eyes in agony, he fell on his knees and sighed relief as the pain disappeared, and he opened his eyes to find himself in their drawing room, kneeled down beside the blood figure.
"Good job." Tanishk said. "I know who he is and what he wants."
Madhvi and Nagesh sat on the sofa with Tanishk opposite to them.
"Black eyed kids, a form of post human. When a human dies, they become spirits, or post humans, there are uncountable forms of post humans and one such is black eyes kids. They move in troops, they select their target, hunt it down and forge themselves back into humans." Tanishk exclaimed.
"Come back to human form?" Nagesh asked.
"Yes, they are kids, they want to get their life back, they had aspirations, they had dreams." Tanishk replied.
"What can we do?" Madhvi asked.
"There are multiple solutions, one of them is giving them a new host." Tanishk replied.
"Host as in what?" Nagesh asked.
"We cast spells to get the black eyed kids leave you alone and giving them another host, this means to lead the black eyes kids onto a new kid. If nothing is done, Varun will die, using this solution, some other kid will die instead of Varun." Tanishk answered.
"No, that is just inhumane. We can't do that!" Nagesh straightforward denied.
"Well, another solution is exorcising the spirit that is eyeing on Varun, these are kids, so exorcising them is easy but, sometimes it could be impossible." Tanishk out forward the second solution.
"How do we exorcise it? And who is it?" Madhvi wondered.
"His name is Anish, he was killed a decade ago by the Red Man, if you think about it, exorcising Anish is impossible. He was murdered, we would have to kill the murderer to do so…" Tanishk explained as Nagesh interrupted him, "…but, no one knows where on earth is Red Man!"
"Exactly." Tanishk agrees.
"What do we do then?" Madhvi asked.
"What is something Varun is afraid of?" Tanishk asked.
"Shadows and darkness, he has a long history!" Nagesh replied.
"Fear! The black eyed kids are using it to break your son. Once they have him broken, he is a bottle without a cap. So the other day he says he saw a monster who attacked him?" Tanishk said.
"Yes." Madhvi confirmed.
"We can go to the darker side and give Varun the power to overcome his fear of shadows. Once they discover that he isn't vulnerable to shadows, they will move on for their next selection." Tanishk explained.
"Taking powers from the evil?" Nagesh asked.
"Precisely. This is a much harmless process, this will save him, it will surely kill some other kid, but luckily you won't know who he is, it won't be on your conscious." Tanishk said.
"We can do that." Nagesh said.
"I can feel it; they do not like where we are going. They are coming for you!" Tanishk exclaimed as the master bedroom's door banged loudly from the inside. Madhvi and Nagesh gasped.
"Listen! They are coming for you!" Tanishk exclaimed as all the doors and windows of the house started banging loudly. "Do not resist! I will take care of everything!" Tanishk shouted.
Nagesh's room's door busted open as a bunch of black eyed kids marched out shouting at a weird pitch. The backdoor broke open and more black eyed kids flooded the house, they were all shouting and screaming and laughing hysterically. The main door opened up and another bunch of them joined in.
Nagesh and Madhvi were scared to death, they froze and the whole house started rotting around the corners, it started going dark, all the kids marched towards the couple as Tanishk disappeared, all the walls fell, the roof dissolved into air and the couple was surrounded by hundreds of kids who kept shouting and laughing. The couple was on the ground, in the middle of nowhere. They were suffocated, unable to do anything, they just hold onto each other as a single kid floated from the crowd, he flew high, the couple looked at him in horror. He was Anish, he looked down upon both of them and shouted, "LOOK INTO MY EYES!" his voice was shrill!
Nagesh and Madhvi floated too, like they had lost control of their body. They went up and floated next to Anish, both of them couldn't even move their heads, they were just hanging in the air, like corpses.
"LOOK AT WHAT I HAVE SEEN!" Anish shouted, his voice only gets shriller.
All the kids on the ground laughed and cheered and shouted. Amongst the chaos, Nagesh and Madhvi were paralyzed, they wanted to break free, but their bodies were just corpses now, they saw everything, they strained to even move their eyeballs.
"I WILL HAVE TO HUNT!" Anish shouted, "TO SURVIVE NOW!" his voice was agony for both of them. "INNOCENTS ONLY DIE HERE!" blood rolled down Anish's eyes, his voice mentally strained both of them.
"YOUR SON WILL SEE WHAT I HAVE SEEN!" Anish looked up and shrieked. With a sudden jerk, they couple fell down and hit the ground, their skulls cracked, still paralyzed they looked around as the kids still surrounded them and laughed hysterically.
Both of them bled and fell asleep.
"AAAH!" Nagesh woke up with a jerk in the drawing room, beside the blood figure, Varun was lying on the blood figure, and Tanishk was sitting on the sofa, watching TV. He turned around to look at Nagesh, he was bleeding, his clothes were all blood red, his head ached, his muscles pained and his vision was blurry.
"What is happening?" Nagesh said in low voice, turning over to Madhvi as she woke up too, bleeding, and damp in blood all over.
"You have some things to catchup. Take a breath, I will explain everything." Tanishk returned back to the TV.
Madhvi reached out to Varun's leg as said, "What is happening to him?" she was worried.
"I said I will explain everthing, watch the TV for now." Tanishk said.
"People are coming up with theories that Red Man has returned! What do you say on this?" the TV anchors talked.
"There is a possibility, because the last news we heard on Red Man was that some teenager stabbed him in the face with a metal glass! Then he fainted and no one knows where Red Man disappeared!"
"So you do think that he is back?"
"I can't say anything firm man, this new killer s just picking on kids!"
"Whoa! That is a nice point! We will return to this conspiracy theory real soon after a commercial break, this is Anurag Bhat with Shivam Tiwari and you are watching…" Tanishk switched off the TV abruptly.
"The world is crazy! And it only gets crazier!" Tanishk said as he stood in front of the family. "There are few things I haven't told you about. Let me start one by one, you just heard about the guy who stabbed Red Man in the face with a steel glass, well, that was me. He killed my brother right in front of my eyes, and if you haven't guessed it yet, Anish is my brother, the same black eyes kid who wants Varun."
Nagesh and Madhvi were blown out of their senses.
"For years, I researched on bringing him back, eventually I discovered that his post human is a black eyed kid. I studied who they were, and how do I reach them, I learned exorcism, I learned spells, and finally I got a hold of my brothe, for years we hunted for an ideal vessel, in the way, I killed or say emptied a lot of kids. The recent disappearances and killings of those kids, it was me. But every single time, I failed, I just couldn't get my brother to be inside the vessel. But finally I found you, you think you called me up? No! I was one who advertised myself on your PC, because I knew you would need my help." Tanishk explained.
"You planned haunting my son!" Nagesh said weakly.
"I did. And as it turns out, I have succeeded." Tanishk explained his sinister plan.
"What did we ever do to you?" Madhvi was in tears.
"I never said you did anything! But whatever, goodbye, I guess? Your son is ready for the final ritual; you don't need to be here for that." Tanishk stood up and walked to the Nagesh and Madhvi.
"No man! Don't do this!" Nagesh's voice was breaking.
"Yeah, whatever." Tanishk pulled out a gun and shot both of them in the head and he stood in a corner. The entire house was dark, with a single lamp still burning beside the blood figure and Varun lying on it.
'THUCK! THUCK! THUCK! THUCK!' the main door knocked loudly.
Varun woke up and opened the door, it was Anish on the door, with pitch black eyes. Anish gasped and took a few steps back. Anish entered the house as Varun, stills scared kept moving back. He suddenly bumped into a man behind him, he turned to find a shadow, the shadow that has been his nemesis for years. The door closed with a loud THUD! Tanishk watched it from a corner, now Varun and Anish were standing on the blood figure, a few inches away from each other. Varun kept looking at the shadow in horror as a chill went down his spine, a dankness drooled over him as the shadow got bigger and its arms lengthened, and it dropped on his fours. Varun froze, the shadow picked up its right arm and stabbed Varun in the chest, right across the plus sign it had carved. Varun shrieked in a shrill voice as did Anish. The shadow pulled its arm out and walked back inside Nagesh's work room. Varun stood there, shrieking in a shrill uneasy voice with Anish, Varun finally gave up and fainted, as Anish held him from behind. Anish gave out an evil hysterical laugh, as both, Varun and Anish fused together.
And on the ground, right in the middle on the blood figure was Anish, in the body of Varun. He stood up, and looked at Tanishk.
"Brother?" Tanishk asked slowly.
"Brother." Anish replied slowly.
Tanishk walked to him and Anish held his hand and both the brothers walked out of the house, forever.