Restart- 5

Riya blinked her eyes, once, twice, three times, letting them adjusting to the unfamiliar surroundings.

It was a hotel room, she knew hotel rooms. When Neel died, well, not really, she could not say in her apartment. It haunted her, the silence, and giant four walls. She also needed to be closer to her informers, so she had hunted for hotels. All were dingy and disgusting. Not that Ravi Lodge was better, but it was tolerable. Even with the broken locks and shady people.

A voice inside her whispered she was rambling, and the inner monologues stopped. She looked at herself- she was lying on a bed, her hands and feet were tied. Her clothes were bloody and ruined, and she could feel a bit foggy- must be the blood loss.

Of all the criminals and thugs she had discovered in her police career, and her ex gets to shoot her first.

She looked up at the sound of footsteps, and Neel stood there, looking unsure. Riya looked for the gun and found his hands to be empty. He hovered, his face scrunched up in questions.

“Are you okay?”

She chuckled in response, gesturing at the stomach wound, “Well,”. He was uncomfortable- looking at his feet, shuffling, and she had to remind her brain each moment that even though it all looked, familiar, it was not. It would be too easy to pretend that everything was right, fall back into known circumstances.

But she don’t get to have it easy. She had too many sins.

“You fought me.” Neel’s words brought her to reality, “You were reaching for the gun. It was an accident.” He shook head, “Did you want to catch me for your team, or what?”

She agreed with the first part- not that it was about his feelings (if there was any), but her injury would have done his purpose no good. He needed her whole and hearty. But his question brought her to a junction- she had learnt a lot of ways of lies and deception, maybe try some of them on him.

“I would never hurt you.” She tried to sound as sincere as she could, even though her insides burnt.

He looked convinced, but not entirely. “Then why did you struggle?”

“I,” Riya looked down, sighing, “I am really not sure. My team mate was there, you had a gun. You fell on me . . “

“That chit of a kid kicked me!” He interrupted indignant, to which she nodded.

“It all just happened so fast. I was not really thinking.” Sighing again, she looked at him apologetically, ”I am so, so, sorry. You could have been seriously hurt.”

He took steps towards her until he was sitting beside her on the bed, “Hey, it’s alright.” He paused, almost reaching out to touch her hair and she steeled herself internally, “Maybe it was for good. You team mates won’t know that we are in this together.”

She smiled, and it vanished soon as he engulfed her into a hug. She was not sure if he bought it or if there will be tests ahead to prove her loyalty, but she needed to play this game. Until she can escape, or inform her team.

“So, are you going to remove the binds?”

Chotu rushed into the conference room of ETF as the seniors stood around the table, making strategies for what was next. Once they all reached, including folks from IB, reached ETF, they threw into the task as if it was the last thing they would do. Director Kapoor had gathered every employee in the bullpen and had ordered till ACP Mukherjee was not found, none is going home. Everyone was doing something- going over CCTV footage, looking for cars or vehicles which crossed the area during their mission, the addresses, old and new, where Neel might take her. They also looked for private doctors, small dispensaries or hospitals- in case Riya was more injured than they thought, he might have taken her for medial attention.

“I am not sure, it must have hit her stomach but I am not really sure . . . “ Shree was almost in tears as Rahane grilled him on the shooting. What they got from him was Neel fell on Riya when he had kicked in his knees, and then the gun went off. If it was stomach or a flesh wound, Neel with whatever medical information he had could take care of her. If it hit any major artery, she might not have much time and in that case, they needed to look for a body and a fugitive.

Rahane could not bring himself to think that.

“Ma’am, Sir.” Chotu greeted them all and they turned towards him, “IT team of ETF and IB are checking the footage. There was a white van which was parked near Shree’s van. It was parked in such a way that we did not see any numbers or man, but time stamp said it rushed minutes before we all ran towards warehouse.”

“It’s him.” Sameer looked at others, “What kind of white van was this? If it had any specific type of mark we can pin point where in the city he might have bought it or rented it.”

“I told them to print them.”

“Good job.” Chotu nodded at the praise, but also knew this if nothing came out of this, this praise wont matter.

Aisha turned to Rahane, “How can a white van park near Shree’s van and none saw it? Not our men, not yours?”

“The color looked like IB van, actually.” Chotu supplied. The Director’s glared intensified and Rahane stood up straight.

“Is there something on your mind, Director?” His tone reminded her a lot like Riya’s- quiet and growly as if telling the other person to back off. He might have picked it from her, and the thought of her friend made her angrier.

“I was wondering whether it was some part of plan which was not disclosed to us.” She looked at her team, “Plan to let Neel take Riya away.”

“Excuse me?” Rahane was yelling at this point. This was insane, he was also worried about Riya but this accusation was baseless.

“How can IB miss a white van? IB? How did Neel even know what van to pick so that he could be close to us? How much he knew anyway?” Aisha ran a hand through her hair, “Tell me if this is a plan. If she knew it and she was on it . . .”

“Director, I will insist . . .”

“if she was not, tell me that too. Because she has suffered enough!” Her sudden rise of tone, the room went deadly quiet. Sameer looked at the two, almost intervening but deciding not to. This was a battle of ego and ranks and he could not interfere into it.

Rahane stared at the female for a few moment, exhaling slowly to calm his own temper down, “Director Kapoor, I know it’s hard to trust me, but this was not a plan. We had no idea about Sahay pulling that stunt. I would not risk Riya like that, trust me.”

“I don’t.” She crossed arms over her chest

“Too bad.” Enough of this bullshit, Rahane stood taller, towering over the other woman to intimidate her, “If you don’t co-operate, you and your team are off this case. I can handle it.”

“Don’t you dare threaten me, or my team.” Aisha stared right back, not even slight bit of worried about his rank, his intimidation or his warning which he can actually pull off in a second, “You put us on this case, because you wanted her to work for you. You try to pull us off, be ready cause I will hound you and your team till the end, which pretty sure you don’t want now that your last hope, Sahay, is on the line.” The two glared at each other in anger and pure hatred after the speech ended. This argument was taking time, and yet the Director could not move past it. Could not trust the other team to save the only person ETF cared about- Riya.

“Why should we?” Arjun asked quietly, and all the eyes followed him. He had not said one word since they had arrived, his sharp eyes observing everything and yet, his mind was unable to process how things went south so fast. His heart won’t stop hammering and he knew they all needed to team up and find her, but the bitterness did not allow him to. He disliked the man and his guts- when Riya said she was done, he managed to drag her back. Put guards around ETF to follow her around, and when Haqqani was captured and about to be send back to his country, dropped her like she did not matter. He was in here for his agenda and nothing else. Why this whole thing won’t be a plan of his? Making them run circle but just like all the time, him pulling the strings.

There has to be some explanation of this madness.

Rahane sighed in tiredness at another round of accusation, “ACP Rawte . . .”

“You are here for your work. All you wanted was Neel Sahay. Did she even matter to you?”

“I understand your emotion.” At the words, Arjun’s carefully neutral expression snapped, his eyes blazing fire.

“You know no fu*king thing about my emotion.” With that, he walked out of the room, banging the door shut on his way. The sound made all of them jump, a tensed silence following. Chotu and Shree looked at each other in anticipation, beside them Sameer cleared his throat.

“Things are tensed right now,” The other two looked at the senior officer, “and we may not trust each other. But we want Riya back and Sahay in custody. For that, we need to put this differences between us and work together.”

The IB agent and Director looked at each other, and Rathore internally sighed to himself. Their looks spoke about a momentary truce, and it was enough for that moment. Giving a nod to Aisha, he left the room to look for his friend, hoping his words will put him in focus to bring the missing team mate back.

Aisha’s phone rang and she took a look at it. Raghu sir started speaking the moment she picked it up, and just when she felt herself crumbling all over again, the old man’s words soothed her, at the same time rejuvenated her with his quick actions.

“What do you need?”

She pinched the bridge of her nose, “I don’t know. It’s just so . . . “

“Focus. And tell me.”

She thought for a moment, “They had to be in the city, not even two hour had passed.”

“I will shut down the city until she is back. Now tell me, what else you need?”

Before Aisha could answer that, Rahane roared into his phone, his entire frame shaking.

“Two hours passed and now you call me?!:

Riya tried to sit up straight, not really feeling any pain but a discomfort and heaviness all around. Neel rushed to help her and she gave him a strained smile, hoping he would be fooled.

His smile at her said she probably succeed.

Each moment he would look at her or even touch her, all she wanted was to shut her eyes or just push him away. Scream at him, expletives and questions. Accuse him or breaking her to the extent that nothing mattered to her anymore. For making her animal. But she swallowed those all, and smiled. F*cking smiled.

He kept a plate of food in front of her and she tore a piece off a bread, “Tell me. What happened?”

Neel took a deep breath, adjusting his glasses, then sighed as if he had made his mind. Then, he launched into the story.

“I did not really know at first what was happening. I used to visit Googly, you remember right?” She nodded, and he continued, “One day, an older man introduced himself to me. Told me he was from a private company, that he was impressed with my tech skills. He would be there every time I won a hacking competition, or just to talk me about his plan. A hypothetical idea to collect data from people and push his own brand to the correct consumers.”

At her doubtful eyes Neel clarified, “The words, which if I look back now, sounded shady did not it? But I thought that was a cool idea. I always liked private, you knew that.” She nodded at it. Many times he used to rant at her and Aisha that they were wasting time in government.

“Who was the man?” Riya asked softly. The former gave her a look.

“It’s obvious, isn’t it Ri?” He sighed, “Haqqani, of course.” He looked away for a moment, before remembering something and frowning at her.

“What do you know about Haqqani? And how did you meet IB?”

Riya thought for a moment before answering, trying to build a proper story, “IB was looking for Haqqani. They were looking at his past travel history and found he was here, in Mumbai. Found you. And then they came for me.” Giving a remorseful sigh, she looked at Neel, “I did not know what was going on. I looked at their evidence and they said you were involved.”

“It was not like that.” He said quickly. She nodded, her head hung low.

“I was still dealing with your . . . “ At her pause, he squeezed her hand in support. She curled her other hand, trying to stay calm, “and they just came. Told me you were into it. They probably thought I was involved, I don’t know.”

“I contacted you.”

“I thought I saw a ghost.” They both remembered the first time after years they saw each other. He had hacked Raghu sir’s phone and she saw him in a children’s park, and bolted the moment her mind registered he was alive, “I ran. And before I could process you were back, they came. They also knew you were alive, that you were in the city.”

“This is the reason I want to leave.” Neel stood up abruptly, pacing the room in panic and frustration, “They got him, Haqqani. And that bas*ard will pull me into it. I am not saying I was not involved, I was stupid to follow that loser. But I don’t deserve jail for that. Or worst, death. I am not going to be accused on treason.”

At his words, she frowned, “Why would you be charged with treason?”

His pacing stopped, his eyes staring at her calmly for a few moments before asking her, “Do you know why I was recruited, Ri?”

She had given way more than she should, and it was time for his story. She shook head, and Neel prepared himself.

She would wait.

Rahane yelled at his phone so loud that everyone in the bullpen could hear his roar.

“The hell, man?” Only in that moment Rahane realized he never got around to know the former’s name, and that pesky thing just added fuel to his anger.

“Are you done with yelling or you want something.”

Aisha quickly cut the call and signaled him. Unable to take his frustration anymore, he put the phone on speaker.

“Start.”

“The van which took her from the warehouse location crossed through state highroad before moving into city. From city, I could track his way. I have sent you the location, you will find the van.”

“We know this already, tell me something else.”

“Who is he?” Aisha whispered at Rahane, but it was loud enough that the man on the other side of phone inhaled sharply.

“He don’t know my name.” He answered, “My name is Niraj. He knows me as ACP Riya Mukherjee’s IT guy.”

Suddenly Aisha realized where Riya would go with her phone, or some devices from crime scenes and crack them. Shree was bound by protocols, she would just ignore them. Sometimes she knew, other times she ignored it for the sake of case at hand.

Rahane’s face momentarily softened at his words, but then his brain remembered what was going on and the irritation came back, “What else you have?”

Niraj muttered something under his breathe before replying, “I am trying to track her.”

“Neel made her took off all her comms and tracking devices.” Aisha replied.

“I gave her something else. It’s still with her. But the problem is,” Both of them tensed in anticipation, “it’s not giving me any signal. It’s either broken, or something is jamming the signal.”

“You still wear it.” Neel’s finger traced the black beaded bracelet around her wrist, and she stared him. He had left her on anticipation of his side of story, and she was trying very hard to not to push him.

“It’s my second chance.” She replied softly, then fixed him with a look, “Your story, please.”

He looked away, trying to get his story straight or express them properly, Riya could not tell. Then he turned to her again, and she knew the time has arrived.

“Haqqani would arrive sometimes with a puzzle for me to solve. Hacking into that site, change settings to that server. It was like a game to me, and whenever I cracked it he would be please, praise me to no end. I really thought it was like a long recruitment process, but I just did not know for what.”

“Once, he made me hack into a server so that he could get live footage of the area 24/7. I later realized it was the private meeting room of Ministry of Finance.” Riya frowned at this turn of story, unable to see where it was going, “I was shocked. Spoke to him about it, still hoping maybe he was linked to government, somehow. I did not know. Maybe foolish hope.” He shook head in sadness, “He just laughed at my questions. And in that moment I knew I was screwed.”

He turned to her so fast that she moved back in reflex, “Those small projects? Those hacking? He was just using me to make a network to monitor the government 24/7. Surveillance on the fuc*ing government, who would think so, eh? I was just shocked, speechless. I had no other way but to curse at my stupidity. Like how can I not see which fu*king network I was penetrating, eh?”

“He would just threaten me after that. Do that, or else I will leak these to cyber cell. I just followed his trail. The one day, he told to meet me another place. I got out, and I am still not sure what happened next. When I woke up, it was another day and I was away from the place I knew.”

“Where were you?”

“Up in North east. It was like a bunker, sometimes a small house. We used to change set ups frequently.” He remembered those cold nights with strangers and shivered, “There were other people too.”

“Who were they?” She asked immediately, then chastised herself for sounding so suspicious. Like interrogating him. He also picked up on the tone.

“Police, eh?” She shrugged at it, smiling a little.

“We never interacted. Some looked from here, some were clearly from another country. They did their work, I was mostly in my room, with the techs. Haqqani was in contact through phones, sometimes he dropped by. He had a handler there, who would arrange everything and co-ordinate with him.”

“What you did?”

“Finish what I started here. Thanks to him.” Neel answered bitterly, “Created an entire network. Hacked each and every piece of server so that I will have the footage and classified documents. I had live footage of each and every minster, their PA, hell, even clerks. I knew ideas which were created on paper, I followed the meetings, I observed the important things and sent those to . . . “

“Haqqani.” Riya finished for him, feeling his gaze on her, “Magician, they used to call you, right?”

His entire frame went rigid, taking in her cautiously, “How did you know that?”

She came out of her thoughts, shrugging, trying to show it did not matter to her, and yet his confession made her dizzy, “During the briefing we were told.”

“I did it. I am admitting to you.” He replied, desperate to make her believe. Riya did not understand if that was because she mattered to him, or because he knew if she was suspicious of him, he would not be able to get out of this mess, “But I am not the mastermind that fu*ker Haqqani made me in front of IB. He forced me. He faked my death and took me away from here, from you.” His eyes pleaded for her to believe, “Why the fu*k I would support a terrorist? What would I get from that?”

That was a good question actually, which nobody thought before. And that, one single thought, made Riya question everything that she knew, again.

Holding both of his hands as she squeezed softly, she asked, “So, what exactly is the plan here?”

The next 24 hours passed in a blur for IB and ETF.

They found the white van, and the blood stains inside confirmed it was what they were looking for, only confirmed by Liza when she tested it, which turned out to be Riya’s to nobody’s surprise. The teams searched through 10km radius from the dumping site, went through each and every roads and house, and found nothing there. Then Rawte had a thought that if Neel ditched the van there, he had to take another way of transportation as he was carrying another person who, most likely, not in a position to walk.

Then they started to look for other vehicles- most probably a cab or auto. They even found one, and the CCTV footage showed Neel buying medical supplies- cotton, antiseptics, pain killers and gouges. He then vanished, and even though they had a location, it was not a place where they could get anything from CCTV or asking questions.

Neel Sahay had chosen a red light part of city to hide.

Arjun came back from a long and tiring meeting which resulted into nothing. It was evening time, nobody had eaten anything or gotten any brink of sleep since the abduction. Standing inside his cabin, he looked at the ceiling, breathing erratic as he went though the last few hours.

Then he turned towards his table and threw everything on the floor with one sweep of hand.

ETF employees and core group rushed to see what the sound was all about, but nobody dared to get inside. ACP Rawte was generally an amicable man, but when he was in temper he would make everyone’s life hell. The shouting was the worst, his glared made everyone feel they would turn into ashes.

And of course, this situation has left everyone on edge.

Arjun did not know how Riya had went through this. How she did it. She had witnessed her lover’s death and went through the loneliness, the thirst for revenge, and the betrayal. And look at him, one day had passed and he could not handle it. Could not stop his mind to going to worst case scenarios, could not stop his temper tantrums and function like a damned adult. He was the second in command, he should step up. But look at him, pathetic and such a mess.

And all this even when they had such tumultuous relationship.

Or maybe, the regret is what making him so upset. The dread that he had missed the chance, again, waited, again, and this might be the last time. This could be the end and just when he had realized and accepted what his heart wants, it was taken away from him. A part of his brain knows that Riya has suffered worst, and she was a fighter. A survivor. And when she had accepted and tried to move on, decided she would put this to an end, there is no way she could give up. But its the injuries that made them worried.

Rahane told them that Neel would keep her alive because he needed her, and Arjun did not know if that was a good thing. How much qualified he was to take care of a gunshot wound? What if he don’t realize and because of his stupidity her injuries become serious. What if . . .

What if . . .

He felt a hand on his shoulder and saw Sameer standing beside him, “I feel useless.”

“We all do.” Patting him, the former sighed, feeling the tiredness and tension all at once, “But we can’t afford to crumble now. Whatever thoughts you have, good bad or ugly, throw them in the back of your mind and lock that shit. Because we need to be strong now. We need to bring her back and end this once and for all.” His tone went angry and Arjun felt his dark thoughts and helplessness going away, “This revenge saga has stretched on for far too long.”

Arjun looked at the mess on floor he has created, then hardened himself mentally. Further breakdown can wait. Sameer was right, they all needed to be on best shape for this situation. Director was already having a row with Rahane, handing him and his bunch. ETF’s responsibilities lies on him.

Then, the door was knocked twice before Chotu came in, “I had an idea.” At the seniors expression, he continued, “I think we need to activate her informers.”

The ETF team and Rahane stood in the conference room, “Why will they help her?” Sameer asked them all, “That partnership did not particularly end well.”

“I told him the same thing.” Shree nodded in agreement, “After . . . Jamal, what was his name?”

“Junaid.” Rawte spoke up, staring at the empty seat opposite to him before shaking himself off, “She did not help Junaid, and later had to arm twist her informers for helping in cases. Chotu, why you think they will help?”

Rahane did not know much, but he picked up along the lines of conversation. He had an idea Riya had an impressive network, which she used to bring IB to her, but did not know the story of it. If she had burnt the bridge there, he wondered why ETF was thinking to use them to find her. Why would they help?

“I think we should contact them.” Chotu was confident. Rahane decided to ask him why, and the commando turned to look at him.

“Do you know how cops and informers function, Sir? It might look like one sided, but it’s not. Co-dependence. We give them money, or threats. They work for both sides.”

“But won’t they be relieved when the connection is broken? They won’t have any loose ends, they can go ahead with their lives with no worries.”

“We are their support in their dark times. In case something happens. We use them, they use us too.” Chotu turned to his team, “Let me try. It’s better than nothing. They know each nooks and corner in that area, if Sahay is here, they will know.”

“We don’t have anything to lose.” Arjun agreed, making the former’s chest swell. The Director frowned at him.

“You sure?” At his nod, she nodded back, “Fine then. You try to talk to the informers. Take Sameer with you.”

The team saw the duo walk out of the conference room.

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