Today only the crazies are on the street, the old Sadhu angrily thought to himself and he decided to hop away to someplace quieter. That of course was not so easy in a city like Delhi, but he already had an idea that seemed quite obvious to him: Since all the crazy people were running away from the hall, this had to be the place were there were no more people left. Resolutely he grabbed his sign and hopped along, arm outstretched, the leg bent in an angle.
“The Botanical Gardens have been built by the British in 1912!” the schoolmaster was lecturing to his bored group of pupils in the park.
“In this flower bed, you will see a very rare example of the Musa Velutina, the rose coloured dwarf banana, which normally only grows in...”
At this moment a top loaded, brightly painted truck came crashing through the brushes at high speed, turning the dwarf banana into jam and without breaking its speed even in the slightest was cutting across the meticulously delicate English lawn.
“I can’t hold on any longer!” Sherie howled in despair at Gerd, who himself had trouble to somehow claw at the wooden chair in some way or the other. He looked ahead. Mahatma was just about to gallop under one of the banners that were hanging across the street from one side to the other announcing the music festival in bold letters.
“Oh no!” Gerd shouted at Sherie. “Heads down!”
RIPPP!!!
The banner had got tangled up in the wooden polo chair and had been completely torn off its posts. It was now trailing like a flag behind Mahatma. Sherie was still grabbing onto the chair, but Gerd lost his balance and was sliding down the back of the elephant, desperately waving his arms about. In the last second he caught hold of a piece of the banner and was holding onto that. Like a clock pendulum he now was swinging wildly at Mahatma’s side.
“Is the madman still following us?” Bear shouted, throwing nervous glances over his back shoulder. A hollow thump stemming from Rajnesh’s car jack answered that question. In panic Bear lost his steering and the tuc-tuc was veering dangerously to one side. Arthur could barely manage to hold on. Again Rajnesh had closed up on them, close enough to land a second blow.
“Will you get off of me, you stupid bird?” Number One was desperately trying to kick at the totally panicked chicken, which was flattering around inside his tuc-tuc, thereby scratching his face bloody. He had a very hard time not to loose sight of Rajnesh.
Number Two came shooting out of a side alley into the street. Guileless pedestrians jumped aside in fright, gesticulating and swearing behind him.
“Get out of the way!” Sherie cried frantically. Gerd was swinging about on the ragged banner, his fingers already totally numb. The elephant blindly headed for a parked limousine in which two old men were sitting. If he would not yield soon, then...
“Get out of the way!!!” Sherie cried again as loud as she could.
The tuc-tuc started to lurch dangerously, as Rajnesh managed to jump from the speeding motorbike over to Arthur and Bear. Clinging to the roof rail with one hand, he was swinging his car jack at Arthur, who was crouching inside the tuc-tuc afraid to get hit. Bear looked behind. “Where is he, where is he?”
“For God’s sake look ahead!!!” They were careening straight into a parked limousine.
As Shaki, in his heavily lurching truck came chasing around the bend heading full speed into the park, the laws of gravity were taking hold. The over loaded truck started spinning out of control and smashed through Connaught Place.
“Get out of the car, quick!” Bábaa ordered calmly, as he saw the crazed elephant coming head on, a wildly swerving tuc-tuc from the right followed by a second tuc-tuc, a third coming from the left and the truck spinning around its axle heading straight at himself and Hermann.
“Oh, Shiiiit!” everyone yelled at once, Arthur, Bear, Gerd, Sherie, Rajnesh, Number One, Number Two, Shaki, Bábaa and Hermann followed by an extraordinary loud bang, that was still heard in the outer suburbs of Delhi reverberated from the walls of houses surrounding Connaught Place.
Silence. Somewhere one could hear a dripping sound onto asphalt. Then very faintly, a moan.
Finally the old Sadhu Sitharam had reached the wide empty space in front of the hall. Yes, it was peaceful and quiet here. Happily he first put up his sign and then himself, trying to free his mind from this entire nuisance. At this moment a side door of the hall sprang open and a throng of black and yellow clad people came pouring out. The one who seemed to be their leader, looked obviously rather disturbed, since all the while a very fat man was trying to kiss his hands. He bumped into the old Sadhu making him loose his balance and he most certainly would have come to a fall if he had not at the last moment taken his second leg to uphold himself.
“Uuups..., dammit” Sitharam cursed under his breath. The disturbed fellow helped him up onto his feet again. “Oh, I’m so sorry! Are you hurt old man?” he asked the Sadhu emphatically. “Thirty years I have not spoken a word... and then you come along!” Sitharam barked at him.
As to why exactly it was, that, hearing this, everybody around started to break out in cries of jubilation and praise. Sitharam had no clue whatsoever.
6. K’un-Sa / Tibet
Wu tightened the collar around his neck. It had become severely cold after sunset. Out here on the airstrip of the small military airbase in the middle of the mountains, Wu was exposed to the freezing elements. Nervously he checked his watch again and again. General Li Xiao’s plane was about to land any moment. He took a seat on an upturned kerosene barrel. He still felt dizzy. After all the altitude was 14.700 feet, and it had gotten to him. One of the soldiers brought him a cup of steaming green tea. He thankfully closed his fingers around the paper cup. At the same moment he could hear the sound of airplane engines in the distance. The general’s plane was coming closer. At first two small lights, the landing lights of the aircraft became visible, getting bigger and bigger as the plane was doing its final approach.
With a roaring noise the military aircraft touched down and rolled to a halt.
“Ni Hao, Comrade General! Had a pleasant flight?” Wu gave a military salute as the commander appeared inside the open door.
The general curtly tipped his peaked cap and looked at Wu fretfully. “Well yes, so ...? Where is Wu? I’ve been told that Wu would pick me up!”
Wu started to slightly roll his eyes. General Xiao’s inaptitude to distinguish Asian faces…He had almost forgotten about this embarrassing flaw. “Ehm, Comrade General, Wu is waiting for you over at the barracks, I’ll just go and fetch him!”
He made an about turn, ran over to the small wooden barrack, closed the door behind him, counted to five, opened it and ran back towards the general, who by now had stepped down the small gangway.
“General Li Xiao. Welcome in Tibet!” He called at him. The general frowned, looking him up and down suspiciously, eventually accepting the fact that this must be Wu.
“Good evening Wu. Who was the man, who came to welcome me?”
Wu gave a sigh of relief. Again he had successfully avoided that the general had lost his face.
“Ah, only my deputy, I, ehm, had to make a phone call! Come now general, it is very cold!”
Both men climbed into a car waiting for them on the tarmac.
“Unfortunately I have brought bad news from Beijing!” the general said, as they were climbing up a mountain pass surrounded by total darkness. “The Committee is not convinced that we are facing an invasion by the Exile-Tibetans!”
“Well yes, if you really trying to get your head around it…” Wu pussy footed it around the subject.
“Exactly!” the general exploded, “That is totally irresponsible! Only these bloody civilians are to be blamed for this! I tell you, under Mao...”
“Of course, comrade” Wu interrupted him, trying his best to keep Li Xiao’s rage in check,
“Does that mean, our manoeuvre has
been cancelled?”
“Oh no!” There are still enough old soldiers like myself around, who share my opinion. Our troops will be a little downsized, less than we had hoped for. The manoeuvre will take place.
You know what Confucius has to say about a situation like this?”
Wu shook his head. “Sorry to say, no I don’t”
The general sighed: “That’s a pity, me neither.”
They had reached the small military outpost. Wu, who himself had just arrived the night before, showed the general his quarters, carried his luggage up to his room and bid him a good night. Half an hour later there was a knock on the general’s door.
“Jin-lái!” Li Xiao snarled, he had already snug into his favourite pyjamas (the one with the cute panda bears) and had gone to bed. He was browsing through the ‘Secret Erotic Memoirs’ of Deng Xiao Ping, a work consisting only of a couple of pages and exclusively given out internally to deserving party members. The door opened, a man in uniform entered and saluted.
“General, it’s me... Wu!”
Li Xiao put down the brochure and got himself up.
“What is it, then?”
“I was going to get some preparations done, for the manoeuvre and so on...”
“Ah, very good of you!”
“Well, in order to do so, I would need some information about troupe strength, strategic objectives, timeframes and so on...”
The general went to his briefcase, snapped it open and retrieved a small binder on which in bold red letters the words: ‘TOP SECRET’ were written. “There you go, you’ll find everything in here. Must have it back by tomorrow!” He pressed the folder into the man’s hand, the man saluted, wished him a good night and left.
Ten minutes later as Li Xiao was savouring a peculiar passage of the memoirs of the great party leader, there was another knock on the door.
The door was opened, a man saluted.
“General, it’s me... Wu!” said Wu trying to suppress a grin, catching sight of the panda bear pyjamas, “Sorry to disturb you. I thought I’d start to make some preparations. Could you please give me details about timeframes and troupe strength?
The general stared at Wu aghast. Then he slowly sank down on his bed. “Oh damn...!”
7. Delhi / India
Bábaa and Hermann had managed to get out of the car just in time, all around them a scene of total destruction. The limousine had been squashed under the elephant’s weight. Mahatma was now sitting on top of its roof and his small eyes were squinting alarmingly at the surrounding chaos. From the left and right side, tuc-tucs had smashed into the car rendering both into objects resembling accordions, a third tuc-tuc had also crashed into the metal melee; a chicken was flying around, hysterically clucking and flapping. The top loaded truck had tipped over in full speed and had skidded into the limousine from behind. Everybody tried to scramble out of his or her wrecked vehicles, groaning and whining.
Hermann’s posse was encircling the scene of the accident, his soldiers jumped out securing the area against any curious bystanders.
“Alright then!” Bábaa announced in a loud voice when all the participants had somehow gotten to their feet. “We are going to introduce some sort of professionalism here. It has come to my attention, that in Bombay there had been some competence issues. First of all... everybody who has a score to settle with the foreigners, step over to this side, if you please!”
With a broad gesture he pointed to his right. Rajnesh, who seemed a bit disoriented, Shaki, Hermann, Number One and Two, followed this request, limping and moaning.
“Two are still missing!” Bábaa searched around. “Did anybody see the two freelancers from Bombay?”
“We’re here!” a familiar voice came from behind the parked army vehicles.
“Let zem through!” Hermann ordered his soldiers and instantly a gap appeared for Babu and Willie who joined the group of killers.
Bábaa clapped his hands in anticipation. “Excellent! May I ask our foreign guests, and Sherie of course, to assume a position directly in front of us!”?
Bear looked around. In view of the soldiers surrounding them, it seemed they had no other choice. Gerd who had fallen onto the hood of the limousine tried to stand up still swaying to and fro. “Hello Bear! Hi Arthur!” he greeted them both in a quivering voice.
Sherie slid down from the roof of one of the tuc-tucs where she had landed and went over to the other three, limping with pain. “Hello guys!” she moaned.
Bábaa with an air of contentment put his hands on his hips and positioned himself between the two groups. “Well done! Now, to make sure that everybody from the group on my left...” he pointed at the group of killers, “…will get the right person owing to him from the group on the right...” he pointed at Sherie, Bear, Gerd and Arthur, “we will take our turn one by one in a civilised sort of way, okay? How does the saying go? Age before beauty..., Hermann if you would be so kind as to begin.”
Hermann tipped his beret and advanced. “Thank you very much!”
His legs spread apart he positioned himself before the foursome and stretched out his hand.
“My autograph... pleeze!”
Arthur, Bear and Gerd gaped at him in wonderment.
“Say what...?” Bear finally asked.
“That’s what he’s rambling on about ever since. No idea what he wants!” explained Sherie shrugging her shoulders.
Hermann took a step forward towards Arthur, drilled two fingers up his nostrils and lifted him up. “My autograph, you hef stolen my autograph!” he hissed angrily.
“Ouuuch!” Arthur moaned balancing on tiptoes. “I hab’ naa idaa what ya maan?”
With his free hand he patted Arthur down, finally he reached into his breast pocket, pulling out a postcard-sized piece of paper. “And vat, if you pleeze, is zis zen?”
“Haw shald I knaw, let ga af ma, dammat!”
Hermann pulled his fingers from Arthur’s nose, whereupon he immediately slumped down onto the asphalt.
Triumphantly Hermann held the piece of paper up in the air. “Nice trick. You beguile me to confide in you, write down my address on a piece of paper and you thought I would not notice...” he turned the card around, “... zat it is the back of my autograph!” With these words he held up the personalised picture of the Fuehrer, for everyone to see.
Bear was astounded. “That... that was nothing but a stupid misunderstanding, we give a flying fart about the Fuehrer!”
“But I don’t!!!” Hermann cried out, adding in a malicious tone: “Under normal circumstances I vood hef you executed on ze spot. But on the one hand you have done me a great favour and on the other...” he nodded towards the gangsters, who were patiently waiting for their turn,
“... on the other hand, I vood not vant to spoil ze fun for zese gentlemen here. Sharing is caring, is it not?”
“Pardon my stupid question, but what kind of favour are we supposed to have given you?”
Hermann grinned. “This young lady here...” all eyes fell on Sherie, “has been kind enough to inform me about your plans concerning the Golden Biker. As it happens I still have a score to settle with said gentleman. Since you vil now be shall we say, ‘indisposed’ you vill allow me to give him your regards before I put him up against the wall.”
Bear shook his head in disbelieve. “Well done, Sherie!”
“Are you out of your mind???” Arthur exploded.
“He was torturing me. What was I supposed to do?” Sherie defended herself.
Bábaa stepped away from the group of killers and joined them. “Easy now, ok? You don`t want to part ways in anger, do you?”
He grabbed Sherie forcefully by the arm and pulled her away. “Oh, by the way, Hermann, as you can see, my car is useless. Would you mind if I tended to some personal matter inside of o
ne of your trucks? No need for everyone to watch...”
Hermann happily pointed to one of the army trucks. “Pleeze, be my guest, a pleasure to be of service to you! May I offer you a lift, afterwards?”
Bábaa smiled obligingly. “Very kind of you!” He pushed Sherie along. The soldiers grabbed her, and forced her to climb into the back of a truck. Bábaa followed. From the bed of the truck he once turned around looking back at the group of gangsters. “Gentlemen, here our ways must part. It was a pleasure working with you. Get home safely... and well, yes it would be nice of you, if you would not kill those foreigners right here, in front of all these witnesses. Thank you very much!” He gave a friendly nod all around and closed the cargo hold of the truck. Seconds later a shot tore through the silence. Arthur, Bear and Gerd gasped for air.
Arthur’s head flew around in panic. “Was that... did he really...!?”
Bear and Gerd just stood petrified.
The door of the truck opened and Bábaa reappeared, holding a smoking gun in his hand. His eyes searched for, and found Hermann. “Thanks for waiting. I’m ready now!”
“YOU BRUTAL SWINE!!!” Gerd yelled beside himself, trying to run after the starting vehicle. But before he had made two steps he was brutally pulled to the ground by four hands. His head hit the asphalt with a bang.
“No reason to get impatient!” Babu snarled, pushing the barrel of his gun into his forehead,
“It’ll be your turn next!”
Willie yanked him up at his collar. “Say good-bye to you friends now. It’s time for us to be on our way, as well!”
“Well?” Babu expectantly looked at Bear and Arthur, “You’ve got any last departing words for your pal here, before our ways will part? In English please, yes? So we all can share this together.”
Bear was the first to find his words “Hey Gerd, I am sorry I laughed about your Ice Capade.
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