“Please try to hurry up. Our commander is losing patience with us,” said Ajit.
“I will try,” said Klaus. “Hopefully I’ll remember where I was. Ah, yes. I departed back to Argentina a few weeks after the Syrians arrived. I was a medical doctor, did not serve that great of a purpose. I told them that if they needed me, I would come. Received a call in 1978. Said they were ready to embark. Chose North Sentinel as…”
Klaus began coughing. “Excuse me. They chose North Sentinel due to its proximity to the Indian mainland, where the final mission will occur, and its remoteness. It was also the site of a remarkably well-preserved minor temple. The delay in finalizing the mission was caused for several reasons. The first one was the complex military plans that had to be drawn up. That was subject to great debate, as I am sure you can imagine. The second one was that if the shift was not done correctly, great problems would arise. Imagine a football pitch. A nice historic one, like the Frankenstadion. Not that you Indians know anything about football. Every now and then a game from your national league would be picked up by our antennas. All I can say is that you should stick to cricket. But I digress. Think of the thousands of games that were played on that field.”
“Can we please shoot this idiot?” asked Rishi. “Tired of listening to his babbling.”
“I am sure he is almost done,” Ajit said.
“Imagine that you had the ability to choose a game, any game that has been played at the stadium, to watch it again in 3D. You would not notice any deviation from the original. But imagine at moments, players from other games would suddenly materialize on the pitch and begin playing. Imagine all games that had ever been played at that stadium occurred at the same time. First, imagine the other players as ghosts or holograms, so they could run through each other. But then imagine that some of them begin to materialize, so they would collide and interact with each other. Imagine the chaos of that. That is what was happening with improper shifts. That explains the mysterious archaeological sites, where it appeared like objects from different periods merged together. And that is why Allah decided to flood the earth, saving only Nûḥ and his family. After the flood, the shifts stopped until we rediscovered it. Precise calculations, based on astronomical and other data, were required to avoid this.”
Klaus covered his mouth as he began another coughing fit. “Can I have some water? All this talking is making my throat dry. Ajit threw him his canteen, and Klaus gulped down several mouthfuls.
“Thank you.” With his foot Klaus drew a swastika in the dirt, a row of circles above it, and an arrow pointing from the swastika to one of the circles. “This is what happens. The circles represent periods of time that have been saved. The one that the arrow points to is the only one that is in flux, the other ones, imagine they are frozen. Nothing changes in them. When the arrow is moved, all other circles are destroyed. But sometimes they are not all fully destroyed. That is what one needs to avoid.”
“What does the swastika represent?” asked Ajit. “And what—”
“The swastika represents a swastika. And my time is running short. We departed for North Sentinel on a U-boat that had been used to smuggle Germans to South America. Eight men in total. Six Germans, five veterans and a younger man, and two Syrians. Long journey over. We did not originally dock at the island, stopped about a kilometer off shore, and landed on the island via a lifeboat. We were greeted by a group of natives on the beach waving bows. They were led by a … man with a jagged scar on his chest. I went up to him … showed him the swastika his father had… given me … years ago…”
“God, I can already feel it… It’s happening … too fast.”
“What is?” asked Ajit.
“Zakir is buried in the cemetery… Proper … Muslim burial. Mein Gott. Mein Gott! … I am sorry. Too late. Forgive me. Forgive me, Lord.
“Let me tell you a story,” Vimal said. “Last summer I visited my son and grandson. They live in London, so I don’t get to see them that much, but it is probably for the better given the direction this country is heading. It was my grandson’s 9th birthday so I took him to Hamleys to pick out a gift. It is a colossal toy store, seven stories, with everything that you can imagine. Beautiful wooden soldiers, hand-carved chess sets, model trains, board games, anything a young boy could want. But did he want any of that? No, boys today are not interested in those sorts of things. Rohit, my grandson, ran and picked out a cartridge from a bin. Had no idea what it was. Cost twenty pounds. But it was my grandson’s birthday, so I bought it for him.
“As soon as we got home, he ran to his room and stuck the cartridge into some device connected to the TV. I asked what he was doing. He looked at me like I was an idiot and told me that he was about to play a video game. Some Tom Clancy game. He’s an American author, tried reading some of his stuff once, complete jingoistic rubbish. The game opened with a group of American soldiers in some jungle in Africa. God knows what they were doing there, but they seem to get their nose everywhere. Even the Andamans.
“So I watched Rohit control a soldier maneuvering through the jungle like a total idiot. Whenever some enemy appeared he would press a button and no matter where he was shot, he would fall down and blood would pour out of his head. After walking through the jungle for a few minutes he came to a house and entered it. But there was a bad guy (bad guy’s probably the wrong term, considering they were fighting the Americans) hiding against the wall, and the soldier Rohit was controlling died. I told Rohit that I was sorry that I wasted twenty pounds for a few minutes of mindlessness. Again, Rohit looked at me like I was an idiot and told me that he would just start again from the last checkpoint. So he pressed some buttons and there he was, standing outside the door to the house. That is what Klaus’s story reminds me of.”
“So you are saying you think there may be some truth to what Klaus told me.”
“Are you really that fucking dense? Please … I am sorry. It has been a long day for all of us. What I was saying is that Klaus’s story is fiction, like something you would find in a video game. In real life, when you die you do not get a second chance. You cannot create a checkpoint or some magical token that will allow you to get a redo. When you die, unless you reach moksha, you will be reborn depending on the deeds you did in your life. And Klaus will not go back to 1943. I would not be surprised if he returns as a snake or as a spider, or perhaps even a bhoot, as he was a wicked man. Now, there is nothing to worry about. You stated that you did not find any facilities to create bombs or chemical weapons on the island. The bomb and HazMat squads will confirm when they do a thorough search of the island. This is not our problem anymore.”
“But he seemed sincere.”
Vimal gritted his teeth. “Of course he came across as sincere. Just because he thinks he is telling the truth, doesn’t mean he is telling the truth. The man lost most of his family in the war. He wanted to see them again. He joined up with a bunch of crazies as they gave him hope. Just like how you see some crazy guru having a bunch of destitute followers. He gives them hope.”
“But this is not just a bunch of crazies,” Ajit said. “They must have spent millions constructing that bunker. Plus, I saw the remains of the temple. And a room filled with strange relics. Klaus’s story checked out.”
“His story doesn’t check out. It makes no fucking sense. The artifacts are probably a bunch of rubbish. They will make a good donation to the local government museum. And the fact that there is a temple there doesn’t mean a god damn thing. There have been Hindu settlements here since the Chola dynasty, probably before that.” He paused for several seconds. “You didn’t know that, did you? You really don’t know much, if you are to believe in time travel. ”
“Have you read the Mahabharata? About how King Revaita travels to some different world to meet Brahma but when he returns he woke up in a different era. It’s in line with what Klaus was saying. The world of Brahma would be the world of the Jinns, they are immune to the shifts. So when Revaita returned to his world, a shift had ta
ken place. That —”
“Of course I’ve read it. But it has no relation to Klaus’s story. I’m tired of listening to all this fucking nonsense. I’ll tell you what, if I wake up and it is 1943 and I am a small child, when we get back to our time, I will listen to you. Won’t make a difference, as it is too late for the Germans to win the war.”
“I don’t think you understand how it works. I saw a—”
“You’re right, I don’t understand how it works because Klaus is a lunatic and it is hard to understand a lunatic. And I hope you are just tired and not a lunatic yourself. Go to bed. I bet in the morning your senses will have returned to you. It’s almost four, way past my bedtime. Take tomorrow off. We will both feel better after a long rest. Let’s head home.”
Vimal and Ajit sat in the backseat of a town car heading south on a narrow road overlooking the sea. They were making the thirty-minute journey to a gated military compound where most of the senior officers lived. About ten minutes after they passed the outskirts of Port Blair, they saw a police checkpoint in front of them.
“What is that?” asked Vimal.
“A checkpoint, sir” responded the driver, Agni, a burly vet.
“I can fucking see that, what for?”
“I do not know sir, maybe they are looking for drunk drivers.”
“No one is out on the roads this late, the bars all closed at two. Stop the car.”
Agni stopped the car about twenty yards from the checkpoint. Vimal looked out the window. There were four police cars, lights flashing, forming a barricade completely blocking the road. Several cops stood outside, guns in hand, staring at the car. One of them caught his eye. Kashim!— the deputy commissioner he encountered earlier on the beach. This was not good.
“Turn around now!” ordered Vimal.
“Sir, look behind you.”
Two more police cars were stopped about twenty yards behind them. Several cops were setting up a spike strip. Vimal glanced at the forest to his left. Too dense to drive through and, in his age and shape, he doubted he would be able to outrun the cops, no matter how poorly conditioned they were. They were trapped. Between the impenetrable forest and the water. The water.
“Drive the car into the ocean!” Vimal ordered.
“What?”
“Do it or we will all be dead.”
Agni hesitated for a few seconds before accelerating the car off the cliff and into the sea. Vimal heard the sound of gunshots before feeling the impact of the crash. He was stunned briefly but soon recovered. The fall was only fifteen feet. He looked around. Ajit and Agni seemed to be coherent.
“OK, here is what is going to happen,” Vimal said. “I’m going to break the window. We will swim out of the car and each head to different locations. Our Glocks are semi-waterproof so we should be able to fire. We will fire, duck down underwater, swim to another location, and repeat until we can make a clear dash to the beach. We will regroup there.”
Vimal unbuckled his seatbelt, raised his pistol, and slammed it onto the center of the window. Ignoring the shattered glass, he propelled himself through the window, fighting against the torrent of water rushing in. With a few powerful kicks he managed to escape, but had to come up for air just a few feet from the car. He looked at the cliff, seeing five cops on it, looking out at the sea. With the full moon, they would notice him shortly. He tried to hold his pistol steady, but the turbulent waters made it difficult. He noticed blood pouring out of his chest and stomach. Must have cut himself on the window glass. Would attract the sharks. He had to be quick.
He aimed his pistol, focusing on Kashim. He fired a quick burst of three shots. Missed. The cops began running around in panic. No discipline, this was good. Fired another burst of shots, saw a man collapse and fall over the cliff. A volley of return fire came from the cliff. He ducked underwater, swam as far as he could, and resurfaced. He looked around, seeing Ajit and Agni about twenty feet away from him. They should have separated more, dammit. Four men left on the cliff, including Kashim. He fired several more shots. Gunfire continued from the cliff and Agni and Ajit’s location. Another cop fell down.
He saw the three remaining cops flee into the distance. Time to move. He swam to the shore and collapsed on the sand, completely out of breath. He looked out on the water and saw Agni wading through the surf, holding Ajit.
“What happened?”
“Shot in the chest.”
“Think he’ll make it?”
“Unless he gets medical attention, no. With it, not sure.”
Agni reached the shore and dropped Ajit.
“Your radio still works?” asked Vimal.
“Think so.”
“Radio this in. The cops may be able to intercept our transmissions, but we need to take the risk. I’ll take care of other business.”
“Yes sir.”
Vimal walked over to the cop who fell off the cliff. Blood poured out from a wound in his shoulder, dyeing the sand and his khaki uniform a dark red.
“Why are you trying to kill us?”
No response.
“Answer me!”
“I do not respond to people like you,” answered the cop.
Vimal kicked the cop twice in his balls.
“Answer me, you filthy Muslim suaar!”
Again, the policeman offered no response.
Vimal pointed the gun towards the cop’s head.
“Answer me or I will shoot you.”
The cop began to laugh. Vimal readjusted his aim and pulled the trigger twice, watching blood gush out of the cop’s stomach as he screamed in pain.
He returned to Agni, kneeling down beside Ajit underneath a rocky overhang.
“What’s the news?”
“They said they would come out here as fast as they can. But at this hour that may be a long time.”
It would probably be a long time, thought Vimal. Not to mention that he wasn’t sure who he could trust in the Navy anymore.
“I guess we sit and wait here. Good as any place, protected from fire from the cliffs. They will return, I am sure of it. We’ll take turns keeping watch.”
Ten minutes later, Agni scampered back under the overhang. “Half a kilometer away, to our right, twenty men are descending the cliffs…”
“Kashim’s men?” asked Vimal.
“Believe so. We can flee to the water, worked pretty well the first time.”
“No, I’m bleeding so the sharks will be all over us. Not to mention that I’ve exerted myself more in the past hour than I did all of last year. Plus we can’t leave Ajit. He’s still holding on. Try to cover us with sand. But if they see us, which they probably will, don’t try to fight them, we need to bide time. Keep them talking.”
“Hello, Admiral.” The raspy voice echoed throughout the overhang. “You can get up now, we can see you perfectly.”
Vimal and Agni got up from under the sand. Surrounding the overhang were twenty men, armed with pistols and assault rifles
“What happened to Ajit, he’s dead?”
Vimal nodded.
“Such a shame, such a shame.”
“Tell me what you want Kashim.”
“I told you earlier that you need to address me—”
“I don’t address Katwas with respect. Especially those who are murderers.”
“You are not one who should be lecturing others on murder. But I will ignore it. You do not understand the politics of these islands. It doesn’t matter what insignia you have on your jacket, or what medals and ribbons you wear on your chest. You do not run these islands. Neither does the Lieutenant Governor, neither—”
“And neither do you.”
The sound of gunfire filled the still night air.
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The Last Sentinel Page 6
