Seize Her And....

Chapter- 43

The Shield of Love.

Pihu has been living a very peaceful and uneventful life for as long as she can remember but now she can feel it, the change, a shift in the atmosphere, in her surroundings. It's an uncanny feeling.  She should have been happy at how Vulcan ran towards her, how he felt at ease within her embrace, but where is that? All she feels is this restlessness, this tension buried deep within herself, as if the man who hugged her wasn't fully 'Manik'. As if her subconscious knows something about this event but isn't ready to accept it. She is certain she had some weird visions, some random glimpses of people she has never seen before. 

She takes a deep breath and keeps looking outside the window. Although its not empty, the room has pin drop silence. On the huge king sized bed lies the unconscious figure of Vulcan. A saline drip is attached to his left wrist. The bullet has been taken out. Turns out that she is the only one who could touch him without making him die a thousand deaths, because when Arjun mistakenly touched his hand while injecting the anesthetic medicine, he hyperventilated.  This incident was surprising for Teressa but wasn't as unexpected for the others. Pihu observed how  the three men remained equally expressionless, as if they knew it beforehand.  Hence when she feels a presence beside her she utters the inevitable,

"Seems like you guys know a lot about him and his situation. If you don't mind I would like to be a little enlightened." 

Arjun looks at her face, that hasn't revealed any signs of emotions after Vulcan urged her to touch him. He takes a deep breath before saying,

"I knew you would worry, you would want to know. See, scientifically you can call it a split personality disorder.  You can say that this personality has been within him from the day he was born, and it has been dormant for ages now but a few events, a few people and a few references have been triggering it since the day he left the Nagpati Mansion a few years back. Don't think he never tried, he tried really hard to fight against it. He tried to keep his original personality intact, the goofy, happy go lucky man he used to be, failed to build any imaginary happy stories anymore. So the man you are seeing right now is the other person, the one that grew up silently in the darkest pit of his subconscious. For some reasons it sees you as the only person who doesn't pose a threat to him. I can't explain more than this right now. But if you truly want to know more than this you have to find out the reasons yourself." With this said Arjun crosses his hands over his chest looking out at the cloudy sky.

Frowning, Pihu looks at the unconscious figure of  Vulcan, even while asleep his face looks pained, his eyebrows furrowed. She slowly turns her face to Arjun and asks,

"You can answer me in an easy yes or no. When you started you said 'Scientifically', do you think there is another explanation to the things happening to him, something that's beyond science?"

Arjun closes his eyes at this question but he can feel her penetrating gaze over him, he takes a deep breath as he speaks, "YES". His eyes slowly move towards her face. He can see the wires of her brain already working hard to find out the many answers behind all these inexplicable incidents.

"Don't be so hard on yourself Pihu. Let it unfold automatically. Move with the flow and you'll reach to the answers of all of it. I promise." He adds before slowly turning around and heading towards the door.

At the door however another pair of grey eyes inspect him like a detective. 

"She is a smart one, isn't she?" Ritwik asks him.

"Yeah, that she is. And that's what makes this whole ordeal even difficult for me, for all of us. Now that I stand here I truly wish that she wasn't that smart." Arjun says drowning deep into his thoughts. Ritwik looks at him for few more seconds before smiling knowingly and uttering,

"Welcome to the club of the one sided lovers. Seems like I have another member all ready to join my club. Don't worry brother, we'll survive." Arjun comes out of his trance and smiles back at Ritwik, shaking his head.