Brutal

4

The man looked not one bit different from the other people traveling in the bus. His sleepy eyes and unshaven face suggested of a man who had been traveling for a couple of days. He would often doze off when the bus glided over plain roads. He no longer thought himself as the same professional he was a decade back. I am ageing. So it actually happens!

His name was Raman. At least that's what his bosses called him. His actual name was lost somewhere in the numerous aliases he had used in a life spent doing black ops. His Allahabad job was one of his last ones, he hoped. He was touching fifty and it was time to use his savings to buy a house in some unknown corner of the world and vanish. He wanted to marry, and maybe have children.

But, a lifetime of murders had sullied his dreams. In his sleep, he would often see himself running scared, trying to evade a masked pursuer carrying an HK417, a beast of a rifle stolen from his secret cabinet. No matter how fast he ran, the assailant always managed to corner him. Like a soldier rendered immobile in the battlefield and bereft of any hope, he would lie back on the ground looking into eyes of the enemy. Scary, emotionless eyes with no trace of any hesitation or remorse, with a soul long dead. Who are you? I have seen your eyes. I... I know you. As a burst of light emanates from the muzzle of the gun, he would wake up, finding himself drenched in sweat.

No, this had to change. He wanted to dream of women. Of lush green meadows and horses. Of beaches.

He sighed.

This might be possible to achieve, but only if he completed his final assignment successfully. He wished it would be as easy as his Allahabad hit, which had been a routine job for him. His source had already placed his weapons kit on the roof of the apartment building. Hidden inside a torn cardboard carton. All he had to do was assemble the rifle, fire and take it apart.

There was no rush of adrenaline. No feeling of pride in his achievement. The range was not the most challenging for him. His best to date had been a 1.7 kilometre hit in North Waziristan in Pakistan. But still, hitting a target from more than a kilometre away was not a usual occurrence in the sniper fraternity. How many? Maybe a few dozen in the whole country had that capability.

His escape was also a simple affair. As per the plan, the hatch door inside the elevator was kept open by his source. After climbing on top of the elevator car, he had remained hidden there for about half a day. The decoy of moving the manhole cover while entering the building, had worked perfectly as planned. Policemen are so predictable. When the panic had subsided, he came out of the building wearing a "Press" tag and ID supplied by his accomplice. He had left the Barrett M107 long range rifle and ammo above the lift, to be picked up by his accomplice.

He looked out the window and caught an eyeful of lush greenery in the valleys below. Ambala is only a few hours away.

He felt surprised at how things from the past begin to surface in the mind once we have so much time at hand and nothing to do.

Memories from his training days in the army came into his mind, making his lips curl into a smile. He had begun his career as a naïve wannabe soldier from Laporiya, a small Rajasthani village. A drill sergeant had once meted out severe punishments to him for refusing to charge like a zombie on his command. You will be the first one to get killed in a war, the man had said. But he couldn't help it. He wanted to think and plan carefully before going for the kill. That was not a desirable trait for a foot soldier.

Many years later, he had felt sad to hear that the sergeant had been killed in the Kargil war. But I did outlive you, sergeant.

Over time, his amazing marksmanship skills earned him a reputation in his regiment. He was happy there. He got time to strategize and plan before hitting a target hundreds of meters away. Just when he was dreaming of a long career in the army, a minor felony earned him a court martial. Bloody sons-of-bitches. He had sold off a couple of 9 mm pistols bought from the Central Ordnance Depot at Jabalpur to some shady civilians. A lot of army guys did it – buying non-service pattern weapons at dirt cheap rates from the ordnance factories and then selling them in the black market at higher rates. The punishment, if caught red-handed, was reasonable compared to the profits people like him made. Unfortunately, in his case, the bosses decided to create an example of him. He got a rigorous jail term and lost all claims to his pension corpus. He had suspected it all along, but the feeling came to surface only on the day of his sentencing. That the army was not the place for him. There was no respect for real talent. Bunch of losers.

He looked out again. The bus had entered Ambala city. So, the next phase begins.