The Final Hunt

The end of the crime hunt

CHAPTER 5 �" THE FINAL HUNT

 

                    I slowly walked towards the ambassador’s boot with still pointing the gun towards them. I pulled the boot lock and opened it. I was really stunned and shocked. The boot was empty. I immediately ran towards Ranga and placed the gun on his forehead.

                    “Come on… Tell me.. How did it happen? Where is he? “, I shouted like a wild ferocious animal.

                    “Sir… We don’t understand anything.. Please Sir, leave us..”, Ranga replied with an innocent tone.

                    “Arrest these two and take it to the station”, I shouted at my team and I ran towards Irshad’s Paint factory. The other team members were following me including Constable Mani. First we were blocked at the entrance and been told the owner was not available. We showed them our police badge and ran into the factory. I instructed my team to search all over the factory if they can find any clues related to these missing cases. Even I started to analyze the complete place for any sign of murder or any in-appropriate activities. But I could not find any. The factory was looking like a decent paint factory, following all the norms and standards of Indian Government.

                    I was running here and there to find anything that helps to move this case. I was behaving like a mad man. The entire team came to me after few minutes of search and informed that they couldn’t find anything related to this case.

                    “Come on. Let’s go back to the station. We have two guests waiting there”, we came out from the factory without any clues and lead.

Ninety minutes earlier………

‘In Mall’s car parking ----- After he (the target) reached closed to his car, he found some sticky substance on his car’s keychain and smelled it in reflex action of his mind. As soon as he smelled, he went unconscious. Suddenly a green color ambassador car appeared behind from his car and pulled the young man into the boot space of that car.

Raja and Ranga were driving the car outside the mall’s parking area and the young man was lying unconscious inside the car’s boot space. They did not notice Tamilselvan’s team was following them. But they remembered Irshad’s words, ‘When you reach the mid of heavy traffic jam, press the button located near the radio switch in the car’. They reached the peak traffic jam at the mid of the city and Raja pressed the button near to that radio switch.

There were three small size projectors fitted to the inner wall of the boot. They were fitted in equilateral angle to each other. As soon as he pressed the button, three different rays in three different colors (i.e. blue, green and red) were falling on the young man’s body at one particular focal point. Within few seconds, his body started to disappear and a thick blueish green color vapor surrounded all over the boot space. Once the complete body got disappeared, a suction started to suck all the gas filled around and connected to the vehicle’s exhaust. The blueish green gas along with the diesel exhaust mixed with the atmosphere without any sign of doubt.

When the car appeared close to Irshad’s paint factory, it was stopped by Tamilselvan’s team and they found nothing in the boot space.’

I locked both Ranga and Raja in separate rooms and asked my team to start their enquiry. We tried several ways to bring some information from them. But nothing could help. I was completely obsessed by this case and was behaving like a mad animal. I received a call from Commissioner, asking me to meet him immediately.

                    Commissioner was sitting on this chair and was reading a case file. As soon as he saw me, standing near to the door, he invited me and asked to be seated. I refused first and sat on the chair opposite to Commissioner after there was compulsion.

                    “What is this Tamil? You did a search in Irshad’s paint factory without any proper warrants and arrested two guys without any evidence. What happened to you? If this is escalated, we will need to answer to the Enquiry.”

I was silently looking at him as I did not have any justification. He continued again.

                    “Tamilselvan. You are getting married in 2 days. You don’t seem to be stable in handling this case nowadays. I would suggest you to take a small break, get married, come out of these environment. Meantime, your team will be taking care of this case.”

Commissioner looked that I was becoming upset, he continued,

                    “Look Tamilselvan. We already knew your capabilities and skills. This is just a small break and you can be re-entered to the same case. So I am suggesting you to take a break for a week or ten days. That would be good for both; you and the team. Congrats for your new life and take care of yourself.”, Commissioner smiled at me.

I was not able to disobey his orders. I came out of that duty with half minded.

                    The marriage celebrated had started at both the places. Both the parents were very happy as this was the first marriage of that generation. Poovai was so happy and she was completely filled with joy and smile. In spite of her busy work, she kept calling me often and sharing about the wedding preparation. I could notice she was so much excited about this marriage.

                    “I feel this is like a dream… Our 6 years struggle, pain have come to an end and the new journey of our love is going to be started. I would want to be in your arms all the time whenever you are at home. We will have only one cute little daughter like me. I don’t want a boy, because he may become like you; Workaholic”

A cute smile interrupted and she continued again.

                    “Today is the day that we wished for; today is the day that we struggled for these many days. On this day, I would like to promise you that I will never leave you in any circumstances”

She looked around to see if anybody was watching us. Suddenly she gave me a gentle hug which surprised me, but the warmth of her made me to think, this moment should last forever and my heart was longing for the time to pause at this stage.

We finally succeeded in our love, got married after 6 years of struggles that came in all ways. We also understood that this success is just a beginning for a life, where we were going to witness twice or thrice than this 6 year struggle.

I was running on the main road until I was able to. My lungs were struggling hard to withstand my breath. My body is completely drenched with sweat. It was very dark in that night and could not see anybody on the way. When I stopped running due to my inability and looked around towards the brightest place there. On the left hand side I could see my marriage hall. It was covered with decorations and bright lightings. All my relatives were standing outside and looked at me with dull faces. I regained my energy within 5-10 seconds and again started running towards the marriage hall. I surpassed all my relatives without uttering any sign of greetings and reached the place, where I tied the life knots to my Poovai.

My heart skipped a beat. I saw a coffin box in place of my Poovai. The pace of my heart beat started to increase gradually and my hands started to shiver. I noticed that the lid of coffin box was not properly closed and my reflex action tempted to open the box completely. I moved the lid to keep the box open and suddenly stepped back and fell behind due to extreme shock. My Poovai was lying inside the box with strains of blood on her face.

I woke up from the bed and my body is sweating heavily. I looked at Poovai, sleeping peacefully beside me. I was personally very much scared that my haunting dreams had started to appear again. Especially I was very much disturbed that it had started again on my wedding day. I took my mobile from the nearby table. I stared at my mobile for few minutes and dialed constable Mani.

                    “Sir???”, Mani answered in a very shocking tone.

                    “I want to know the current status of Irshad’s case.”

                    “It has become very worse. There are many unsolved missing cases currently and since we could not find the dead bodies or other clues, we are not able to file any cases against Irshad”

                    “I am joining back tomorrow. Arrange a meeting with our team. I don’t want to delay this case anymore.”

In next day meeting, all of my team members were reporting their work and investigation. They were raising concerns that there was no evidence of murder or no clues about the missing persons. The case had not moved even a single bit since beginning.

I was calmly listening to all of their concerns and finally I stood up, looking at them.

                    “I have a plan to defeat Irshad”

It was the closing time of that super market and there were only very less number of people were shopping inside. Raja (Irshad’s team) was looking around to buy some specific thing. He took his mobile and called someone to confirm something. He slowly walked to babies section and took a big size baby diaper, billed it and came out of the shopping store. Once he stepped out, the lights of the store were switched off.

He slowly walked towards the bike parking, where his bike was parked alone. He went near to his bike and noticed that the rear wheel was out of air pressure and seemed to be punctured. He squat down and was analyzing the wheel for any sharp object that might have damaged the wheel. He also noticed that six police boots surrounded the wheel along with him.

I was almost running along the Commissioner office’s corridor by bypassing all the officials, came on my way. I stopped where Constable Mani was sitting on a desk and reading some of the case files. Once he noticed me that I came towards him, he stood up from there and gave me a Police salute.

                    “Yes Sir!”

                    “Where is he?” I asked by looking into his eyes.

                    “In the secret investigation room Sir”

Before he completed his sentence I rushed to the secret investigation room location at the basement. My team members were waiting outside the room, waiting for me.

                    “He is inside Sir”, one of the team members informed and I slowly opened the door to enter inside.

I pulled a chair and sat in front of him. I could notice he was little scared inside, but trying to cover up with the gesture outside.

                    “Why am I here Sir? I don’t understand why you always suspect me. Please let me go. I have a family waiting for me”, Raja requested in innocent tone.

I gave him a sarcastic smile and replied.

                    “I too have the same point. You have a family waiting for you. We already sketched a plan to trap Irshad. Though we get evidence or not, this plan would trap him and it would be impossible to escape. Everybody, who is with Irshad would also be caught and nobody can plot to escape. You don’t know about us. We are capable of finding out the crimes as well we are capable of framing a crime without any sort of evidence. We know this paid killing business is only with Irshad now and by some weird intelligent acts, you guys are hiding the dead bodies and keep a story where you are not being suspected. Try to understand, we are more intelligent than you. We always have an answer to your puzzles”

Raja looked at me for a second and replied,

                    “You want me to become an approver. Is it? And you would want to close the file by taking out my statements. Right? That would never happen. Please go ahead whatever you want to do.”

I gave him a smile again, pulled my chair close to him and started to speak by looking into his eyes.

                    “Raja… We don’t want you to be approver. We just need your little help to trap Irshad. If you do this, you will not be involved in this case. I will give you 100% guarantee. Otherwise, we do have other plans, where the entire team will be caught and you wouldn’t have any chance to escape. We are not requesting you to help us. We are giving you a last chance for your little poor life.”

Raja was not able to speak, but his silence had started a war within him. I continued again.

                    “We already knew, you just recently lost your mother and now you have only your wife and daughter. Also they are your dependents and they do not know anybody else apart from you. So think twice before taking any decision. We will give you some time to think. Expecting a best decision from you.”

I gave him the same smile, ordered him a coffee and left that place.

                    “Do you think, he will agree for this”, Mani asked me when the entire team was having coffee with me.

                    “I could see, he is more scared about his family. I have given him a chance to set his life. He would definitely agree.”

After 40 mins, I entered into the secret investigation room. Raja was sitting on the same place without moving. When I was pulling the chair close to him, Raja started to speak.

                    “Yes Sir. Tell me. What should I do to help you in this case”

I smiled at him and replied,

                    “That’s perfect” I came closer to him and started to explain the plan.

                    “We all know that the paid killing business is completely with you and you guys are doing something to hide the dead bodies after the task completed. I am not going to ask for the information about your activities. We already planned a way to get him caught. We are going to plan a murder, which Irshad is not responsible for, and we are going to set this murder under the name of Irshad. Simultaneously we will set up all the evidences and circumstances against him, where nobody in his team wouldn’t be able to escape. We already spoke to all the officials and they are ready to do all the support they can provide”

Raja was keenly listening, I continued again.

                    “Now your part is the most important in this plan. We need few real evidences from Irshad. You are going to bring this for us. The team will explain you the details about what to bring. We need his fingerprints most importantly. You may leave now. But remember, one wrong move from your side, will implement the other plan and even I won’t be able to help you”

Raja nodded his head slowly. His eyes still carried the fear.

I called my team and asked them to arrange a fresh dead body. I asked them to ensure, that should be someone, where nobody should claim for it. We decided to execute this exactly one week from today.

I was not able to enjoy my married life because of this Irshad’s case. I could not speak well with Poovai for the past few days. The haunted dreams about her had started to occupy all my nights. The days were moving with clueless investigation and the nights were moving with haunting dreams. But finally, I had got some hopes about the murder frame plan and I was very much confident that Raja would definitely help us in achieving this plan.

The day had come. We all are ready with the plan waiting in the secret investigation room of Commissioner Office. Raja arrived with all the evidences we required along with Irshad’s finger prints. There was a delay in getting the dead body and we were waiting to start the execution. I commanded my team to check the status of the dead body.

                    “Mani, can you please follow up with the team and get the job done early as possible. Let me wait here.”

Everybody left out the room and I was the only one waiting there. After some minutes, the room door was opened by someone and I could see Raja was entering the room dragging a coffin box inside. I was shocked,

                    “Hey Raja. What is this?”

                    “Sir, the dead body you asked for. The team asked me to take it here”, he replied

I felt very strange that the team had never handed over their tasks to others. I was really surprised.

                    “Okay fine. You keep it here and please leave the room and ask my team to come inside”, I commanded.

                    “Yes Sir”

While Raja was walking towards the door, I slowly opened the coffin box to check and my eyes were widened in extreme shock. It was an empty coffin box with 3 small micro projectors fitted in the inner walls in equilateral angle and a red color push button on the outside. I turned back and was shocked again as Raja was standing close to me.

                    “Sir, If I am loyal to my boss Irshad, I will be caught and be in prison for life time. My family would somehow manage to survive. If I obey your commands, Irshad would definitely kill me and my family including my cute little daughter. You gave me a chance for my life. But I opted for an option, where at least we all will live in this world.”

Everything happened in few seconds. I understood the situation immediately and pulled my gun from the pocket. But Raja was very fast in spraying some smelly substance on my face and after that everything went blank. I directly fell down into the coffin box and Raja adjusted my body to completely fit into the box and he closed the lid. He turned around if somebody was watching and he pressed the red color push button placed in the outer wall of the box.

Raja took out his phone and dialed Irshad’s number.

                    “Boss. The job has been done.”

                    “Excellent. Get out of that place with that coffin box as soon as possible. Don’t leave any evidences there. As planned, for safer side, ee all will be travelling to Andaman for a month until this case loosen its grip.”

                    “Sure boss”

Irshad and half of his team members were about to start to Andaman that midnight. They arranged a big size boat where 10-12 persons can easily stay and travel. They loaded all their evidences into the boat where there shouldn’t be any traces of their activities. They also loaded the coffin box to the roof of the boat. Irshad decided to travel with 5 of his team members including Raja and Ranga.

The boat started around 2 AM in the midnight, piercing the water surface of Bay of Bengal. Irshad was standing on the roof of the boat and Raja was unloading few things to be used

                    “Raja, Leave these things as of now. Go to the basement and check for the food.”

Raja immediately left the place and went to the basement.

Irshad was looking at the sea and enjoying the reflection of moon and the stars on the surface of the Sea. Suddenly he heard somebody was knocking at the door. He turned back and noticed that the sound was coming from the coffin box. He was very much shocked. He waited again to see if the sound would come again. There was extreme silence. Irshad decided to open the coffin box and check. He slowly walked closer to coffin box, bent down and opened the lid. Immediately a gun was fired and the bullet missed Irshad’s head in few millimeters. But the shock made Irshad to jump back, where the half un-loaded things (which was unloaded by Raja) slipped his leg. Irshad lost his complete balance and he fell into the Sea water from the boat.

I (Tamilselvan) came out of the box and looked at the Sea where Irshad was slipped. I could see some number of hungry flesh eating fishes started attacking Irshad and within few minutes the complete body of Irshad was disappeared. After hearing the gun’s sound, Irshad’s team members rushed to the roof of the boat.

It is not the first time that I shot 5 criminals on their head within seconds and had them all on the floor with blood and scattered flesh.

But I never expected that I would close this case within a minute and also unplanned. My mind had become completely peaceful after confirming that Irshad’s case was completely solved and I had succeeded in what we planned for.

I noticed that the coffin box had 3 micro projectors and the one of them were broken by my gun while I was falling into the box. I did not have any idea why was that used for. Also we still yet to find the way how Irshad’s team hide the dead bodies, in order to close this case officially.

The gun sound reached the nearby port and one of the small fishing boat reached there to help. I explained them the situation and they helped me getting to the shore.

The Sun came out and started to shed its first rays on me, as it was very early in the morning. I walked till the main road where the cars were parked. I noticed that the green color ambassador was also there. I took my mobile and called constable Mani,

                    “Mani.. yeah yeah.. I am fine. No issues. I need my evidence team to come over Ennur port. We have evidences here to close this Irshad’s case.”

I was very happy that I somehow reached this case in very smooth way and also I can enjoy my honeymoon now. I took my mobile and called Poovai. I could hear my wife’s mobile ringtone much closer to me. I was shocked. I listen to the complete ring and dialed my wife’s number again. This time, I could figure it out where the sound was coming from. It was from the boot space of the green color Ambassador car. My throat and lips became dry. I was even struggling to swallow. My hands were shivering. I pulled the lever of the boot space and it opened with a scratching sound. I could see only my wife’s mobile was vibrating on the floor of the boot space and also the three micro projectors fitted inside.

2 months later……..

 

It took one month for us to understand Poovai was no more and those haunted dreams had become true. It had been 2 months after that incident and still I was not able to sleep. I was not able to console myself from the shock. I was just sleeping inside my room on the first floor and barely eat. Commissioner approved my medical leaves and he was ready to extend it for one more month. I was completely changed with full of beard, long hair, heavy eyes and 8 kg reduced. I was not able to live without her.

Constable Mani slowly walked inside the room after knocking at the door twice.

                    “Sir, sorry to disturb you at this time. Poovai’s father just visited here. Your wife had a Fixed Deposit plan of 10 Lakhs for the future and you are the nominee for that. He needed your signature now, so that he can withdraw the money and do something that she wanted to do.”

There was extreme silence from my side. Mani continued to talk.

                    “I have kept the papers in the ground floor study room. When you get time, please sign it. Sorry again to bother you.”

Mani left that place without waiting for my response. I slowly woke up from the bed and came out of the room after so many days. I walked to the ground floor and entered into the study room. The bank papers were kept on the table in front of the 3 monkey dolls. I could remember her lines

          ‘This is to preach you romantic moral. The monkey with its eyes closed, indicates that you should not look any other girls except me; the monkey with its ears closed indicates that you should not listen to any other girls except me; the monkey with its mouth closed indicates that you should not speak to any girls except me’

Tears were running down my cheeks. I somehow regained my consciousness, took the papers on my hand. I took the ball point pen from the pen stand and pressed the trigger at the top to bring the nib point out. Suddenly the monkey dolls started to move from its actual position and stood in a position where it was equilateral to each other. There were three rays blue, green and red coming out from the 3 dolls respectively and focused on a single point on my body.

 

THE END