The Royal Signature

Chapter 5

Once back at Ranadev, Ashwin and Rina went to the canteen which Major Kiran had asked them to use for their midday meal. It was 5pm and they hadn't eaten since morning, but neither of them had much of an appetite. Rina had a coffee and Ashwin had a carton of litchi juice. Thankfully the canteen had his favorite brand. They sat at a secluded table.
"Needless to say this must be completely off the books and it should be done cleanly to avoid the involvement of local police.", Rina said.
"Which is exactly why the two LFI spies tailing Nitish are more than enough to work with. I have spoken to them. Sanjay pulled some strings and made me talk to them directly. They have given me a location. We shall head there right away. More people would attract attention. We both have to be the ones who talk to Nitish. I even spoke to their boss and he thankfully understands the gravity of the situation and has given us a free reign. "
"The guy who is seen giving cash to the head of the GIO is also seen giving cash to Naveen.", Rina said, thinking aloud. "He must be an operative or a middleman newly recruited by Listan to carry out all these tasks. They did not risk using any of their older operatives as they know all of them are under constant surveillance by out intelligence agencies."
"Yep. It also shows that they are running low on manpower as they have to use the same person everywhere."

They finished their drinks and set off for Nitish's residence. It was in mainland Gramyll. It was an hour's drive away. They preferred to wear the baggy old faded clothes given by the Major rather than their original formal ones. On the way they stopped at a shop and bought caps and oversized hoodies which would help in hiding their features. The sky suddenly turned gray and overcast.

One kilometer from the location, they walked into a large cricket ground. It was empty and no one was playing. In the far corner diagonally opposite to the entry point were two hooded black figures. Upon spotting Ashwin and Rina, they moved closer towards them until they met in the middle which oddly reminded Ashwin of captains of two contesting teams meeting in the middle for the toss before the match. One of the LFI guys was a bearded man and the other was a tall woman. After it was verified that both parties were genuine, which was decided by looking at photos they sent each other, the planning began.

"Kindly refer to us by our call signs. I am 'silky' and she is 'milky.' ", the man said. "Nitish lives in a small rented apartment on the third floor. Flat 301. It has two sec cams in the outer courtyard but no more in the corridors except on the floor on which the target lives. Third floor has four cameras and all eight flats of that floor are occupied by top GIO members. One guy sits all day in one of the flats and monitors the camera feed in real time. Any unknown person on that floor and they are record it live and send the feed to friendly news channels that claim the mere appearance of that person to be proof of 'government harassment' and 'infringement of fundamental rights'. The news channels show it in such a way that the person who arrives on that floor is there to murder them and that starts a nationwide outcry among pro GIO lobbies. "

"That is all the security they can afford.", milky began. "Their biggest weapon is bureaucracy and they know that the law cannot or will not touch them here thanks to the copious amounts of corruption in the state governments and also to some pro Listan politicians in Merrowall. My point being that if we keep it quiet and conceal our involvement, we can do anything we want with them. One more thing, the security guard of that apartment is also on their side. He sees any unknown person enter the building and they are alerted even if that person does not go to the third floor."

"Damn you people know this guy inside out.", Ashwin said.

"So what do you want to do?", silky asked.
"Kidnap him and take him to a safe house.", Rina answered
Ashwin nodded. "We first thought of interrogating him here but obviously that is not possible. I am assuming we cannot break into the house where the camera monitoring guy lives and silence him before the others are alerted without creating a mess. Can Nitish be lured outside alone somehow?"