The Cursed Shell

36

They were in a yacht named Wendigo which was on its way cruising from the southern Indian coast to Sri Lanka.

Brute had done exactly what Dhawan had said in that message-

The actual appointer of the assassin is Joshua Lamb. Tell Dunkirk and Stain about it. I am leaving this phone with Crunchy, so that you can find Crunchy's location by tracing this phone. And yes, once during a mission, RAW had fixed a tracker in my thumb which can be traced by CoFFe. Ask Dunkirk to trace me. The tracking code of the tracker fitted in me is 4768. Right now, there are a few men standing behind me. I am sure they are sent by Josh.

It was surprising that Dhawan's location was found to be away from the coasts of both the countries in the Indian Ocean.

"Whoa!" Dhawan exclaimed after Josh slapped him. "Never expected such a tight slap from you. Do you go to gym? You palms are pretty strong."

"Can't you see this?" Josh shouted pointed towards the screen of his phone.

"Yes, I can see this!" Dhawan shouted. "It's nothing more than toxic water, you moron!"

Josh again slapped Dhawan in the way he did a few seconds ago. "Can't you see this? It's the white water. It's the milky ocean. It's the Kshir Sagar!"

Dhawan remembered Mr Lamb stating about Kshir Sagar, the milky ocean, the place where the Samudra Manthan occurred.

Dhawan tried to stop, but burst out laughing.

"What?" Josh took his phone back.

"You - you really believe this?!" Dhawan kept laughing. "You mean to say that the Gods fought for the elixir on this toxic water!"

"This water is not toxic", Josh said.

"C'mon Josh," Dhawan somehow stopped laughing, "I never expected you to say this."

"So you want more proof?" Josh asked.

"Yup", Dhawan said.

"I'll show you soon," Josh said and started walking towards the exit of the room.

"And yes," he stopped and turned towards Dhawan, "one thing I'm already telling you is that you'll not even try to kill me today."

"Do you think I would hesitate to kill you?" Dhawan smirked.

"Yes you will," Josh said, "and you'll get that soon." And then he went out of the room.

'I can't sit idle like this,' Dhawan thought to himself. 'I know what he's doing. And I must stop him.'

He ran his eyes all around the room. "How to escape? How to escape? How to escape?"

"Yes!" he cried when his eyes fell on a sharp tilted spear hung on the wall in front of him. It was tilted at almost ninety degrees. He could easily cut the tied rope from his hand with that spear.

Dhawan pushed himself ahead with the help of his non-plastered foot's toes which could barely touch the ground. Josh had pulled his shoes out as it isn't considered good to enter a holy place with shoes, boots, slippers or any other footwear in Hinduism. Each time he pushed himself, his wheel-chair propelled for almost a feet.

'Just a few metres more', he thought.

Dhawan was going in the correct direction with the correct speed. 'I'm gonna make it!' Dhawan thought, smiling gleefully.

Suddenly, he caught a great speed. 'How? I'm not even pushing myself anymore!' he thought.

Soon he realised that the room was slightly sloped. Anyone can imagine how fast any object would be while sliding on wheels.

Dhawan tried to stop the wheel-chair by his barely ground-touching foot. But it was impossible as the wheel-chair was already in a great speed and his tiny toes were useless in the situation.

He found that the situation was much worse than he thought when he looked ahead and realised that the spear was pointed towards his forehead and was sharp enough to pierce through his skull.

"Aaaaagh!" he closed his eyes and cried after all the possible efforts he could do. He was counting each second. These could be the last seconds of his life. It was weird but he was waiting for that time to come when the spear would stab on his forehead. He thought that it would pain just for a second and then everything would be black and no pain would be felt ever-after. He waited and waited and waited.

'Why is it taking so much time?' he thought. 'Am I already dead? It's possible that I got a sudden cardiac arrest after I realised that my death was inevitable.'

He was dead, according to him, and he could still feel and think. He had just realised that afterlife was, in fact, not a myth at all! It was just like I'm dead but I'm still not dead. I'm living! Now he started believing everything which he thought was a myth.

'The belief that soul never dies is true,' he thought. 'The belief that there is an afterlife is true. The belief that Gods are real is true. The belief that Hell and Heaven are real is true...wait a second. Hell or Heaven? I am in Hell or Heaven? I should open my eyes to check out.'

He slowly opened his eye-lids. His vision started coming back. Although it was blurry, he could locate where he actually was. 'Hell or Heaven?' he thought. Soon he realised that he was neither in Hell nor in Heaven when he saw the sharp pointed spear just one inch away from his forehead. He was still alive!

'But how?' he thought.

He realised that his toes had stopped the wheelchair as they were pressed on the wall on which the tilted spear was hung.

"I'm alive!" Dhawan shouted gleefully with the largest smile he could ever fit on his face.

He managed to push himself a little away from the wall by applying more pressure on his toes. He had used his toes enough. He could see his toe's skin a little red. He tilted his body upward along with the small front wheels of his wheelchair in air with the support of his toes. He could do this easily as the slope helped the back wheels of his wheelchair to stay at their position instead of sliding backward. Finally, his tied hands could reach the sharp tip of the spear. He cut the rope on his hands with that spear. After he was done, he slowly came back on the floor. He pulled his wheelchair aside by sliding his shoes and bent down and opened the ropes tied on his legs.

He stood up and exhaled gleefully. He took the spear in his grip and started walking towards the door of the room. "I'm coming, Josh!"