ArHi FF - Aftershock: Chapter 9, Pg 26, 23 September - Page 11

Originally posted by: segad

Glad you are continuing the story. Anjali is a piece of work in this story. wants to have her cake and eat it too.

My guess is the teflon coated jha's are trying to take this company down too?

Thanks. Anjali is over ambitious :) that's all I can say for now. Jha has his own agenda for sure.

Originally posted by: Ms.KKN

Iam extremely glad to have found this story...!! :)

It is not only a unique storyline but also has a realistic approach.. I love it!! :)

Great going Ishtar.. Looking forward for the next update :) Plz p.m me when u do it next.. Id love to share my views :)

Cheers! :)

Thanks for dropping by. :) I shall PM you when I update next.

Wow. You can sure tell a story. Seems like the long ago feelings are still there for both of them. Looking forward to the story unfolding...

Originally posted by: saomom

Wow. You can sure tell a story. Seems like the long ago feelings are still there for both of them. Looking forward to the story unfolding...

Ah, thank you. Feelings don't go away that easily.. :)

read 6 chapters in a go nd i am intrigued...liking this Khushi a mature nd a bold one with a secret agenda..looking forward to read more.

Originally posted by: shijinareneesh

read 6 chapters in a go nd i am intrigued...liking this Khushi a mature nd a bold one with a secret agenda..looking forward to read more.

Khushi doesn't have a secret agenda really...she is as confused as she looks...

Chapter 7:

The thing is, when life seems to go on autopilot, it takes that very moment to devolve into a huge pile of mess. Khushi and Arnav had managed a degree of semblance with their previous personal lives with what that had transpired between them. The debacle of dinner was never brought about and Khushi had forgiven him when he had come in the next morning to her office with a box of cookies and an apology. She had swallowed her hurt along with memories that had surfaced and accepted his apology. She however couldn't bring herself to eat the cookies - her favorite so had easily offered it to her team without touching even a single one. A needle seemed to have stuck in her heart knowing Arnav still remembered her favorite cookies. It wasn't that much of a big deal but it did prick her the entire day. By the end of the week the mild animosity between them had been reduced to polite indifference and except for nodding at each other during meetings or when they passed in corridor, nothing much was said.

And it took one phone call to bring the makeshift peace down to the ground.

"Hello," Khushi garbled on the phone, head shoved beneath the pillow. She felt like she had fallen asleep only minutes ago. The voice on the other end of the line seemed urgent and words kept pouring without a pause. She blearily pulled her head from under the pillow and groaned when her she saw the time blinking in deep red - 2:43 AM. It wasn't even an hour since she had collapsed on her bed and there was already a new emergency to tackle.

"Hello?" She said again, her eyes slowing regaining their focus. "Who is it?"
There was a pause from the other end. "It's Nathan," the voice, Nathan said. "I am five minutes away from your apartment. Meet me outside." He said and hung up.

"Huh?" Khushi mumbled, not yet fully recovered from the words or the sleep. She remembered the urgency of his voice when she had received the call and giving him benefit of the doubt, she got up to throw some fresh clothes.

By the time she stepped out of her apartment building, Nathan was already there, car door open and engine running. Without stopping to ask him any questions, she just slid in.

"There was an accident in of our warehouses. We are meeting Arnav and few others there," Nathan said after driving for few minutes in silence. Khushi looked stricken.

"Was anyone hurt?" Khushi asked, recovering quickly. "What happened?" She asked without pausing.

Nathan stepped on the pedal. The eerie city lights unnerved him and the empty roads put him slightly on the edge. But they did give him enough motivation to breeze through the streets, his German car a mere blip in the long empty road.

"No, no one was hurt. We lost a decent sized shipment that was supposed to go out this week, damage to property and the onsite research lab had to be quarantined." Nathan thinned his lips containing anger and frustration that was building up.

Khushi looked out of the window and breathed slowly, collecting her thoughts. This is exactly what she was worried about. It wasn't an accident by the looks of it. Senior management didn't get out of bed in middle of night if there was an accident. The protocols were different - their private security team, risk and mitigation team and a truck load of lawyers would be the first to arrive at the situation. This incident however screamed of something else. Either Nathan didn't know what exactly had transpired or he was waiting for Arnav to give her the details.

"It wasn't an accident, was it?" She asked, breaking the silence in the car. They were still good fifteen minutes away from the site - docks, a small yard owned by Raizada Industries for mass export of fertilizers and grains.

Nathan shook his head. "I will let Arnav tell you this Khushi. I am sorry you had to find it out this way."

"Find out what?"

"Our company's dirty laundry." Nathan said without a hint of humor. Khushi couldn't blame him.

When Arnav diversified from his primary domain of fertilizer manufacturing, no one took notice. It wasn't new for a fertilizer company to get their hands dirty every once in a while and venture into other prospects and in-demand domains in agriculture industry. Arnav had first purchased lands from people surrounding his manufacturing unit and had sub-let to them same people for a good profit. Offering them infrastructure like a school, small hospital with basic facilities, water pipes to the village - had gotten him to their good books. The factory had provided employment to people during off season, thus bringing about a good income to the poverty stricken families. He didn't dissuade from the fact that he never had ulterior motives to his ministrations. But he had honesty in accepting them and turning the deal to a transaction with both the parties equally placed in it. Arnav wanted the land. A farmer wanted his independence. No one was asked to give away their lands against their will. Arnav's lawyers made an offer. While some agreed, many didn't want to be part of that transaction. Many of these farmers relented when Arnav offered to buy grains from their directly at a price higher than that of the middle man. Without the hassle of a middle man and regulated markets, the farmers started seeing profits higher than what they would have received otherwise. They still hadn't let go of the lands but had agreed to utilize the resources as provided by Arnav. The resources ranged from simplistic tools required in farming to seeds and pump sets for drip irrigation. Arnav's decision to export grains wasn't a decision he took casually. It was thought, analyzed, calculated and a dozen scientists along with accountants had given him a chart depicting the profits.

When Khushi had seen Raizada industries annual report the year when they started exporting food products, she was surprised into silence for several minutes. Arnav's investments had started showing up slowly in different parts of the industry - organic fertilizers, livestock feed, grain packaging unit etc. It was when he bought an office in ship yard, she understood the extent of his plans. He was an ambitious man and was achieving everything he had told her he would by the time he turned thirty five. She had believed them to be dreams of an energetic teenager dreaming about doing a lot of things with his first love. She had felt stupid to think that he was anything but cotton brained planner. Arnav had put his head down and worked for every little dream he had promised her he would achieve. She was conflicted between elation and longing.

The first time she saw it was by sheer accident. A small newspaper that had less than ten thousand circulation had done a large spread on growing use of genetically modified seeds to maximize the yield. With increase through put, farmers made a profit and in turn the corporations that owned or sub-let the land made profit. However no one had taken the quality of food grain ingested by people into account though the small print of the companies did tend to sweep it under a generic carpet. A small group of independent scientists, farmers were dead set against using modified seeds and protested against the big corporations who were imbibing the farming community. The newspaper went ahead and gave a large account of issues that were collected in international journals and private publications, and demanded government to form an investigative board to look at the companies that sold seeds to the farmers. It was a nifty catch 22 situation where government in itself was semi-dependent on companies like Raizada industries to generate the output and provide it a subsidized rate. Odd fires had started when government ignored slowly growing protests from small groups. The fires were just a start. Things never got out of hand but were meant as a reminder of capability of a group of people who wished to remain within certain moral boundaries. Khushi had wondered how long it will be till a person would say "f**k morality" and actually do something neither of the parties can ever recover from.

"What are you thinking?" Nathan's voice brought her back to present. She had never stopped reading about Raizada industries and she felt an attack on him was a long time coming. Unless it had happened before but was ensured it never got out.

"This isn't the first time, is it?" She asked without looking at him. She didn't want to see conflict in his eyes or lie outright.

"Yes," Nathan said quietly. "It would be disastrous if the word got out so they were all labelled as minor incidents and we didn't involve police."

"But you still got them investigated?" Khushi asked, turning to look at Nathan as he fixed his eyes on the road.

"Arnav thought we should, you know?" He stopped for a moment as if he was filtering his words. "He thought it could be an inside job." Nathan didn't need to spell it out for her. Coup inside an industry was a common occurrence but destroying property that could potentially bring down market value was silly unless the player was a large one and had ulterior motives.

"Is it?" She asked, curious.

Nathan shook his head. "It's a classical set up, you know?" He said waving his hand around. "If I were to take over this company, I would do exactly this; bring down share prices, pin Arnav as bad administrator for clients and make up some anti-government shit along the way."

"That seems do-able," she said nodding. She thought exactly the same. "Are you sure that's not what is done here? There are at least half a dozen people I know how actively want Raizada Industries for themselves."

"Are you one of them?" Nathan asked sharply.

Khushi's face hardened. "If I was, I wouldn't be so obvious." She snapped.

Nathan sighed and waited out for Khushi to steam it out. "There has never been an escalation of accident," he said, speeding through traffic lights and ignoring Khushi's indignant yell. "This is the first time a research lab is hit. Each time it's our shipment or some merchandise that was recently purchased. If there were human causalities, it would have been over a long time ago. Arnav would be fighting lawsuits upon lawsuits while the company tanked. Whoever is doing this don't want company to go down. What they want is-"

"They want attention." Khushi finished.

Nathan nodded. "Few weeks ago during senior management retreat of the company who are the largest supplier of raw materials for the fertilizer companies were poisoned."

"How were they poisoned?" Khushi asked.

Nathan smiled sadly. "The water they drank came from the lake where they have been dumping chemical waste. No one knows who switched the water bottles they carried with them to the retreat."

Khushi let out a snort. "How did they figure that out?" She asked. Noting Nathan's confusion, she clarified further. "How did these people know that they were poisoned by water?"

Nathan grimaced. "They left these people a note."

Khushi stilled at that.

"It's not just us you know? Several companies have been hit. No one is reporting to police because of the repercussions it will bring. It's not good Khushi." Nathan said.

Khushi winced at that. She knew exactly who these people were and what there were capable of. Arnav had no idea what he was dealing with. She had been tracking these people and their activities for close to a decade now. She knew their agenda, propaganda. It had taken her years to track them and with time, pattern seemed to emerge. She knew their targets, people and corporations they wanted to bring down. There hadn't been a great catastrophe because of them but they were just an inch away from bringing down several corporations in single strike.

She wondered if this is how rebellion against corporation would look like that would mark as the moment which brought about a dystopian future that everyone was scared to imagine about.

Or was it simply another facet of eco terrorism.

"We are here." Nathan said.

Its all getting to the point,isn't it?Though,khushi is here for revenge,she has been looking things differently..those who are actually the main people doing everything,tracking them...but now concern lies will she tell this to arnav when she is doing so much of tracking towards them.

These accidents in the agriculture industry go very deep and the repercussions are now being seen.. Is Jha the brainchild of this... The background work being done by khushi is the saving grace.. Its her sole focus which will direct us to the culprits!