"Who is Arya?" The man with the gun demanded. He had that look on his face that said-'I'm a runaway criminal and I don't care if I had to go behind the bars again.' All the eyes in the room turned towards me.
'Why are they betraying me?' I thought. My heart sank. But I don't blame them either. Those thugs do look like they'll really kill everyone in this room if they didn't tell them about me.
The man tossed the Principal aside who fell with a loud thud, his head smashed into wall and he started bleeding. Few students ran to his side for help. Some screamed as they saw this. The man didn't care about anything and he walked towards me. All the students cleared the way as the guy came closer. I wanted to run away.
'What have I done? I don't even know this man. Why is he looking for me?' I thought. But I very well knew it was otherwise. Because the people I don't know, the ones I've never met before or the ones with whom I never even had a conversation in this small two months and few weeks of my existence are actually the ones who search me and spew nonsense like they know me and so on and so forth. It's just that this time there's a little degradation in the quality of threat.
After all, comparing with the monstrous Becky, these thugs at least look human and threaten in a human-like way. I was worried that one of them would turn into a dragon or whatever goddammed creature Becky was.
But still, I am a human and this man here has a gun. I can still pretty much die from a bullet just the same as I would by a monstrous attack.
"Are you Arya?" The man asked, now standing right in front of me.
"Yes" I answered.
"Where is he?" He asked.
I had no idea what he was talking about.
"Who are you talking about?" I asked as politely I could. But he didn't seem to like it. He kicked a chair in my left and started yelling.
"What? You don't know what I'm talking about? You don't know that you stole a BILLION DOLLAR PROJECT!" He shouted. He walked back and grabbed a table and threw it at me. "I'll make you remember what you did."
I intuitively dodged the object. My head started to think of countermeasures. Who is he talking abo..wait a minute...project? Does he mean Mayur?
Seeing him go crazy all the students ran out of the room in a commotion. I, too, took this opportunity and ran away. I saw Chester coming towards me.
"Why are you runn..." Before he could complete his words, I grabbed him by his collar and made him follow me.
"Don't go that way if you want to live a little longer." I said
"What do you even mean by that?"
"Look at all of them, do I look like I'm joking?" I pointed at all the students who were running away from the class like they saw the devil.
"Our Principal's been hurt and he's bleeding." I told him.
All the eight men started chasing after me. "Stop or I'll kill you, you wench." One of them shouted.
I took a sharp turn and heard a gunfire. 'These guys actually fired!' I started panicking.
"Why are they looking for you?" Chester asked.
"I'll tell you later. Don't follow me or they'll kill you." I said. "I'll lure them out of the school. You go and call the police."
"Arya, they can kill you too. I'm coming with you."
"Don't worry. They need information from me so they won't kill me. JUST GO!" I said and was grateful that he finally did as I said.
I started running out of the school. I saw the the watchguards at the door: all dead. Five men were lying there, all dead. Their heart had been pierced with bullets. Their blood was flowing out of their body like water from a broken glass.
I held my breath. 'Did they all die...because of me?' I found it hard to breathe and froze where I was. I heard those men shout behind me. They were closing in on me. I snapped back to my senses.
Just then, a black BMW stopped in front of me. The door flew open and I saw Mr. Mark inside. He looked past me, at those men.
"Get in." He said .
"But the others..."
"Don't worry. They'll leave this place once you're gone. They're after you."
I didn't had time to be calculative. I got in the back seat, and sat beside him. He told the driver to leave immediately. But the car was attacked by bullets. Outside, the man with the gun shouted, "Nothing can stop me from getting to that boy! Remember that!"
And just like that, their image faded into distance. For few minutes, Mr. Mark was silent. I was grateful for his help, but it bothered me a bit. How did he know what was going to happen? His entry was like he had known that the school will be attacked today.
"Are you okay?" He finally broke the silence.
I nodded.
"Those watchmen outside the school gate...they died because of me, didn't they?" I asked. I felt suffocated. I looked at Mr. Mark to tell me that I was wrong, that they didn't die because of me, that all this was a misunderstanding.
"Yes." He said and I lost that last bit of hope as well.
"But it doesn't matter now. No matter whose fault it was or if it was because of you or not, they are dead now and nothing can change it. You have to get you head straight and focus. We didn't get rid of the problem, we've just delayed it a bit." he said.
He paused for a minute.
"Where is he?" He asked and this time I knew who he was talking about. But how does he know that Mayur is with me?
The car stopped and the driver said, "We're here."
I looked out of the window and a chill run down my spine. It was the same place where I found the door to the facility.
"Why are we.." My words got stuck in my throat.
"Come, There's someone I'd like you to meet, Arya." he sighed. "Even though you are just a kid, you managed to piss off the richest man in this country, I'll give you that." He chuckled and looked me in the eye. He had this weird look that made me want to punch him.
But I had no choice but to do as he say 'cause I was pathetically at the losing side of the bet. The door opened and he walked in. I took a deep breath and followed him.