The man in his early thirties had a square-jawed face and a graceful demeanor. He sat at his desk, his eyes intently focused on the wide, thin, and curvy monitor as he clicked on the keyboard. The only sounds that could be heard were the clicking sounds of the keyboard and the mouse, along with the constant spinning of the ceiling fan. The four walls were cleanly furnished and painted white, providing a tranquil environment.
"Argh, I missed the configuration data again," he exclaimed in frustration. "I'll try again. I can't give up now." He began coding in multiple scripts, using numerical symbols and upper and lower case letters that flashed on the screen. Except for taking bathroom breaks and eating two meals, he had been working on hacking into the mainframe of a military nuclear program. However, a ping kept appearing at the last window, blocking his progress for the past twelve days.
Once again, he failed. Feeling enraged, he tossed the keyboard onto the monitor and yelled, "Just let me in, you piece of crap!" Then he rushed out of the room and went straight to the washroom. After taking a warm shower, he returned to the cubicle and picked up a small glass bottle. He opened it and popped five pills into his mouth, crushing them with his teeth and swallowing them down. "Too bitter!" he winced.
Instead of getting back to hacking, he sat on the floor in the lotus position and meditated to calm his mind. As he chanted "Om-mmmm!" repeatedly, he performed seven sets of Kundalini Yogic poses. Once his mind became tranquil, he ended with the "Om" chant.
This time, he decided to try an alternate means. "Hmm, that'll work," he said with a cold grin as he searched through bundles of cards and picked one out.
He pulled out his mobile phone and dialed a ten-digit number. "Hello! This is Abimanyu Jindal," he said in his thick Indian accent. "May I speak to Sofia Gomez?"
"Oh, Abi, this is Sofia. It's very unexpected for you to call me at this late hour," she responded, clearly interested.
The two chit-chatted on various topics, and the conversation became heated. Seizing the opportunity, Abhimanyu asked, "Can you do me a favor?"
"Sure, anything for you if... you take me to a nice dinner," giggled Sofia.
"Agreed. I'll take you to a nice restaurant," Abhimanyu replied. "Invite me to your lab as an additional senior scientist. I believe my C.V. is more adequate for the post. What do you say?"
"Just send it to my email. I'll make it work immediately," she responded.
After flattering and chatting with her for another minute, Abhimanyu cut the line. His smiling facade changed to a determined smirk. "Ma, Pa, just wait a few days. I'm going to exact your revenge by burning this entire world," he exclaimed, clenching his hands.
Beneath the facade of an innocent-looking polymath genius lay a deep-seated hatred for all of human civilization. This story takes place twenty-five years ago when Abhimanyu was just five years old. He lived with his parents and his younger sister Bala in a small, peaceful village called Kang Krishnapuram, nestled in a reclusive valley between the Himadri and Himachal ranges of the great Himalayas.
The village had a population of only three hundred and fifty-four people, all of whom still followed old Hindu customs and practiced yogic Kundalini. Legend had it that if one achieved enlightenment while practicing Kundalini, they would enter a new realm of magical surrealism. Though no such cases had been reported, the villagers still held on to this belief. They domesticated animals, practiced agriculture, and harvested crops from the rich soil that surrounded them. Thus, they remained isolated from the rest of the world.
However, everything changed on the beautiful night of Buddha Purnima, the full moon night of May 21st, 1978 according to the Gregorian calendar. After dinner, every villager gathered under the tall banyan tree to practice their Kundalini yoga.
Abhimanyu vividly remembered the cheering and commotion when the old village chief, Arinandana, achieved enlightenment. A white halo materialized around his head as he levitated in a cross-legged, lotus position. In the end, the white halo absorbed the sanguine moonlight and entered his forehead, transforming into a crescent white tattoo. His body emitted a blaring red light and materialized into a thick pillar high above in the sky. To everyone's surprise, he transformed, attaining youthhood again. His hunched-back posture straightened, his skin radiated with vitality, and his gray hair turned black as ink. His eyes appeared to contain an ocean of serenity.
Amidst the clamor, still hovering in the air, Chief Arinandana opened his eyes and announced, "Om namah shivai!... My dear friends, listen carefully." He further added, "We are the only descendants of the Hidden Kundalini Clan. As you have already seen with your own eyes, the legends of Kundalini are true. So, let us all practice diligently. According to our customs, since I have achieved my first awakening, I must visit the peak of Mt. Everest and offer my gratitude to Lord Shiva, the destroyer. Farewell, my friends!" Then he flew away unskillfully, as it was his first time flying.
This event changed the air around the village, but the light pillar also attracted unwanted attention.
A week later, the quiet village was shaken by the sound of twenty-five choppers flying overhead. The villagers gathered outside, watching as the choppers landed and over a hundred troops wearing full military gear disembarked.
Despite being peaceful people, they welcomed the troops in the local Sanskrit tongue as their guests. But instead of a peaceful interaction, the troops started terrorizing them. They shot the uncle who spoke to them and captured all of the villagers by force.
Ten scientists in white aprons disembarked from another chopper and began conducting illegal experiments on each villager, becoming increasingly inhumane with each passing day. The villagers banded together to resist the ill-treatment and fight for their freedom.
Unfortunately, their resistance led to their demise. Two weeks later, almost all of them had died from excruciating experiments. The leader of the troops, a beautiful lady with a goldfish tattoo on her left wrist, ordered after a month: "Since the person we are looking for is not here, just kill them all and let's leave this wretched place."
After a month of physical and psychological horrors, the remaining one hundred and eleven villagers were lifeless husks. The only surviving child was five-year-old Abhimanyu. The troops took them all out to an open field.
The leader shouted in Sanskrit, "My bad! If you want to blame someone, blame the person who lit the flame on Buddha Purnima day. Alright, everyone, I'll give you one last chance at mercy. Run for your freedom." She pulled out her revolver and fired into the sky, signaling the start of a deadly game of hunting.
The poor villagers scattered, screaming the word "Freedom" all around. Within ten minutes, the troops shot all of them in their vital regions. Little Abhimanyu was shot in the chest. The invaders left shortly afterward in their choppers.
Two hours later, a young man dressed in saffron linens descended from the sky and landed in the village. He was Arinandana, the village chief. As he looked around, he didn't see a soul. Focusing his Chakra power in his third vertical eye, he zoomed in on his vision and spotted multiple familiar cadavers. "Oh no! What happened here?"
He searched for a survivor, and after some effort, he found Abhimanyu. Touching his head, he uttered, "Even though his body is dead, somehow his soul is still hanging on in this corpse. Let me see his fate." He uttered a Vedic chant, and a saffron cusp of energy gathered on his forefinger. "This happened all because of me. I offer you all of my vitality to revive him. Only the soul stands at the top, the body is just a vessel; heal!"
He tapped his forehead, forcing his kundalini chakra into the five-year-old's corpse. He opened the barrage of time using his karmic sense and saw multiple flashes of Abhimanyu's future. However, after a minute, a transcendent voice thundered in his ear. "Begone sinner!" The sacred karmic thread was severed, and he vomited out three mouthfuls of blood.
Abhimanyu regained consciousness and breathed a sigh of relief. Meanwhile, Arinandana's health rapidly declined as if trying to balance the scales of natural law. After two and a half hours, Abhimanyu's vitality was restored, and he was overjoyed to see Arinandan still alive, albeit barely.
"You saved me, Grandpa Ari?" Abhimanyu asked, his worries fading in the old man's presence.
"Listen carefully, my boy," Arinandan said. "Do you remember the story of Vishnu Avatar that I often tell you?"
Abhimanyu nodded with a smile.
"I have seen your future, and I know that you are the Vishnu Avatar of this Kaliyug," Arinandan said. "Do what you need to do, and you will understand soon enough." With those words, Arinandan breathed his last breath and transformed into a blinding white light that shot up into the sky and turned into a star.
Abhimanyu was snapped out of his reverie by his grandfather's voice. He clenched his hands tightly and muttered to himself, "If I am the Vishnu Avatar, then I will destroy every life in this world and end the Kaliyug. Isn't that why misfortunes follow me everywhere I go?"
The next day, Abhimanyu was accepted as an additional senior scientist at the Major League Union Bunker, a secret facility funded by hundreds of nations to investigate supernatural and surreal phenomena on Earth. This group had been responsible for spotting the white light above Abhimanyu's village twenty-six years ago and the subsequent massacre. Abhimanyu was welcomed warmly by the group, led by Sofia, the woman who had helped him gain entry into the organization.
Little did they know that they were inviting trouble.
As they shook hands and exchanged pleasantries, Abhimanyu suddenly gripped Sofia's hand tightly, causing her to scream in pain. "Sorry, I'll make this painless for you," Abhimanyu said coldly. He then breathed in a set of patterns and activated the Agni Chakra, which triggered a magical transformation. A crimson cobra-shaped light emerged from his body, covering him in a thick layer of crimson flame, incinerating Sofia in the process.
The people in the bunker were thunderstruck and ran away in horror as the alarm for a red flag chimed. The military guards were quickly alerted, but their bullets had no effect on the man with the flame. He continued to incinerate everyone in the bunker until the last soul was gone.
Abhimanyu made his way to the final checkpoint, the Nuclear Code Chamber, and deactivated the Agni flame. He then inserted a pen drive into the mainframe and began typing on the keyboard attached to the main supercomputer of the bunker.
After fifteen minutes, Abhimanyu shouted with a smile, "I finally did it! Bahahaha! Chief Adinandana, I finally did it!" An automatic female voice echoed, warning of the release of all the nuclear heads on land, sea, and space orbiting the Earth. Abhimanyu gave the signal to turn it off within a closed window of seven minutes.
Abhimanyu walked out of the bunker and found himself in a large desert. He lay on the sandy ground, facing the sky, and waited. Soon, the nuclear bombing began all around the world.
As he saw a rocket flying straight toward him, he shut his eyes and muttered with a smile, "What a beautiful day!"
Kaboom!