heyy heres chapter 5! hope its long enough, hope its not boring too.... im sorry i needed to settle some things before the real conflict began(:
Chapter5
That evening, rhea went to sleep rather earlier then usual, being tired from the visit to the doctors and dinner outside at her favourite Chinese restaurant.
Bani, however, was not nearly as lucky; as soon as she got home, her co- worker ,Avi, had called her and told her that the dry run they were running on their latest systems administration program had failed horribly. There was some catch with the administration of the service sector in the hotel group that they were designing the programme for. The programme basically tied loose ends and ensured that every aspect of a business can run smoothly and in tandem with every other aspect. Therefore, it was of utmost importance that the dry run, that is, the trial , of their programme, proceed without any hindrance because before they administered the programme to the company itself, they had to ensure that the whole show didn't come collapsing around their ears.
She spent all night rectifying the programming and trying to find the glitch in the system that everyone else was unable to catch. The project was for Chopra group of Industries, which specialized mainly in hotel chains, and therefore it was of utmost importance that the service sector runs smoothly.
After many trials and tribulations, at 4am in the morning, bani finally managed to fix the problem, which turned out to be the lack of a tiny code at the end of a major sequence for a particular feature of the programme. Frustrated with the oversight by her subordinates, she summed up the report on the delay faced in the dry run and submitted it to Mr Vijay Chopra, who was the head of the company itself, along with a request for an extension for the dry run to the next day. Upon the reception of a prompt reply (as Mr Chopra was currently in London for another project, and there it was an adequate time for replying emails), bani printed out all the amendments she had made to her programming, prepared her daughter's school bag and lunch for the next day and fell asleep upon the couch, ensuring that an alarm was set for 7am so she could get to work on time to initiate the dry run.
At seven o'clock, she awoke from a deep sleep thanks to the irritating buzzing of her alarm clock. She got ready for work and also ensured that rhea was also ready for school before setting rhea off on her school bus and driving herself to her office.
"Avi! " she said shrilly, as she stormed into her office. " HOW could you make such a mistake? I thought you were above such mishaps, but I guess I was wrong wasn't i?! what type of sick joke is this, how could you miss this sort of BASIC code?! I was up all night thanks to those THREE keys you did not press while summing the programming up!"
"Bani, calm down!" said Avi, who was shocked to see his best friend in such a state. " I know it was a mistake but the program went through the whole team for analysis before the dry run, it cannot be blamed upon one person! Besides, you were the only one who did not check it because you took a holiday yesterday!"
Bani realised how wrong she had been about avi. Still she knew that he wouldn't mind, he knew her too well to think that she had any ill intentions about screaming that way. He probably already knew how stressed she must be. " im sorry, Avi, I overreacted. I agree, it wasent all your fault alone. But still, im really upset today, I had exactly 1h of sleep last night!" said bani, distraught.
"its ok, bani, calm down! You need sleep. Go, shoo shoo. Into your cabin! Sleep until we need you. The glitch is fixed now, I will take care of the dry run, I know where to find you if anything goes wrong." Said Avi, grabbing bani by her shoulders and steering her into her cabin.
Bani was too tired to even attempt to refuse, and went without another word into her cabin. She flashed Avi a thankful smile before she shut the glass double doors to her cabin, and was met with a cheeky grin and a wink.
She went straight to her desk and lay her head upon her table, with her eyes still open. They fell on her very own nameplate, that said "Bani Dixit, President, Rhea Programming Consultancy"
How long she had strived to bring her company to this point of success…..thinking about the past 5 years of her struggle, she fell asleep without her own realisation.
An hour later, bani awoke with a start. She had dreamt that someone was trying to harm her rhea, that someone clad in black was lifting her child high up into the air and dispite her protests was taking her child far far away. She couldn't see his face but there was something about him……she couldn't place it. She awoke, and memories about her child's friend came flooding back. " Oh NO!" she thought, as she looked at the time. Rhea's recess is going to end soon! How will I see him now?!"
She ran straight out of her office, ignoring the curious looks of her collegues and drove straight to her daughter's school.
When she got there, there was a traffic jam in front of the gate of the school, causing her to be trapped abot 50m from the ice cream vendor outside the gate. She could see her daughter from her car, she could recognise her orange jacket. She squinted her eyes further to try to see who was next to her, and lo and behold, she saw a black clad tall man offering her daughter ice cream! "So her friend was a real person after all!" thought bani. "Oh rhea, im so sorry!"
There was something odd about this man however. He did not seem threatening, in fact he seemed oh so familiar. She could not place it at all but somehow she knew she had known him, as though in a past life.
The traffic jam continued for another 15min and by that time the recess bell had rung and rhea was long gone, as was the mystery man in black. Bani promised herself that she would look for this person the next day, and drove back to her office to ensure that her dry run went well.
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