ArHi FF! The Cult [Completed] - Page 74

Chapter 23:

"Did you have to be such a dick back in there?" Khushi says blandly once we are back on the road. Keith snorts behind the wheel while Shukla turns around from where he is sitting in front seat and looks at Khushi like a disapproving parent. I refuse to acknowledge that so I do my best to ignore her. But ignoring is difficult when she is sitting half a feet away from me in a fast moving vehicle.

And I blame sitting for a long duration without much to do. "What? I was being brutally honest," I reply carelessly.

"Brutal - being the key word," Khushi replies, abruptly. "You could have been...smoother, I suppose."

I chuckle easily now. "People are more cooperative when I have my bitch face on. It helps us to move forward in our investigation and not waste anymore tax money." I turn and smile at her - all teeth and no humor. She rolls her eyes at me.

"I did tell you before Saini will not have all the details. But I am surprised he knows this much at all." Khushi frowns.

"You didn't know your father was a gambler?" Shukla asks, surprised.

Khushi's frown deepens. "I knew he was a gambler but I had no idea his compulsion would drive him to take catastrophic yet dumb decision which f**ked us over."

It is strange to see Khushi curse but I guess the situation demands for it. "You know, one month ago I wouldn't have cared much about your ancient rituals and all that jazz but now, it seems like even most ridiculous sounding Amar Chitra Katha stories end up being seriously shitty to the point - it actually starts affecting political and social scenarios. Go figure."

Khushi opens her mouth for an obvious rebuttal but Keith beats her to it. "Who are we meeting now?"

"A couple, actually. Nanda and Kusum; I took over the role of high priestess from Kusum and Nanda was my mentor." Khushi's answer induces a hush around us.

"It still sounds funny every time you say high priestess', you know?" I jibe. Khushi lets out a sigh of annoyance but ignores me for the rest of the ride while Shukla and Keith snicker but don't pile on to the taunt.

Silence is my new lover and I thoroughly enjoy it for the next two and half hours.

*****

"I will ask them all the necessary questions, okay?" Khushi says when we are three minutes away from the couple's home.

"No." My answer is immediate.

"They will be more cooperative if I do the talking Arnav. Let me lead." Her voice is urgent.

"Why should we trust you?" I ask her directly. She looks hurt and her lips form a straight line. I know it's below the belt warfare but her actions have told me otherwise.

"This isn't about trust Arnav," she says recovering quite fast. "It's about getting information. I have had my reasons for not telling you things upfront. I don't have to tell you my biography Arnav so that you can pick and choose what you want. I told you everything that I thought was necessary for you to solve this case even though I wasn't legally bound to do so."

"Yeah, you did us all a huge favor." I reply, annoyed.

"Of course it was a favor, you jackass. The first time you came with the case I could have refused to help you but I did. No one from the community but me knows about Nanda and Kusum's whereabouts. I could have hid this from you and see you prance around for a decade and not get anywhere with this case. But I didn't. I apologized for my previous discretion and that's that. So please stop being bitchy for next twenty minutes and allow me to talk." Khushi breathed noisily once she was done. I merely raised an eyebrow.

Shukla knocks on the door while the rest of us look expectantly. "If you cannot get straight answers from them within first five minutes, I am taking over this interview. Clear?" I say gruffly.

"Fine," She huffs but doesn't contest further.

"Is that you Khushi?" A woman asks the moment door is opened. What's with the ignoring the three of us are getting? We are not even wearing our uniforms for f**ks sake.

"We need to talk," Khushi says walking, rather pushing inside making the older woman stumble a little by the door. Keith smiles at the woman brightly, bringing out his boyish charms while Shukla and I stutter behind them slowly. "Is Nanda home?" Khushi asks steering the group towards a door opening to study and settles herself on the sofa.

An elderly gentleman walks inside the study and surprise registers on his face when he sees the four of us. "I guess shit has hit the fan, huh?" He smiles and takes a seat behind the table.

I love him already.

"It's thirty years of murders we are trying to solve and the possible influence on the political and corporate friendship dating back to a decade and half." I reply. Khushi is surprised but she doesn't say anything. I take it as a win.

"You are two decades late in the game ACP Raizada." He allows himself a small smile and at my raised eyebrow he shrugs. "I've seen you on local TV couple of times and you were mentioned in newspaper few weeks ago when you are attacked in university building where Khushi works." I chuckle at his response. "Yeah, I keep tabs on her," he thumbs at Khushi and smiles at her in a fatherly fashion. It's hard not to like this man.

"I've heard the song of being late and strategically wrong already so we can move on from that." I reply casually. "Do you know who is operating this new cult that's following yours?" I ignore my earlier commitment to Khushi in allowing her to lead when I see an opening that's useful to me. It seems like Khushi has understood that and is voluntarily holding her tongue. I think the two of us make good partners. I hate it when my mind makes a drastic change in direction of thinking especially in critical moments like these.

"When the cult began, it was with a washed up small time politician's son. Well the man wasn't a politician but a secretary to an MLA who got involved in some silly deal with the opposition party. The man was fired - for good reason if I may add, and the opposition played him like a cheap violin player on a railway platform. The son got pissed and decided to avenge his father's humiliation and resulting suicide." Nanda stops for a moment and accepts the coffee mug from his wife's outstretched hands.

"We have heard a bit of this already." Khushi interjects after taking a sip of coffee. "Also that he knew my father and my father's gambling ways."

Nanda nodded. "Your father, Gupta, was a compulsive gambler and that man took advantage of that."

"What's his name?" Keith interrupts. Nanda looks up, confused. "I mean, everyone calls him "man" or "son of politician's secretary" or something else but never his name. Don't you know his name?"

Nanda smiles and shakes his head. "His name was Chandra. I don't know his last name but yeah - Chandra."

"The name sounds familiar," Khushi frowns and looks at Kusum. "Doesn't it?"

Kusum nods and says, "He was your father's best friend outside the community. There were never strict rules to speak or make friends outside our community in hindsight seems like it would have been an amazing idea." The bite in her tone makes Nanda and Khushi wince.

"I have met him, haven't I?" Khushi asks Nanda.

"You were very young when he came by to our locality with your father for the first time. Yes, you have met him on several occasions. He worked at the race course and took advantage of your father's drunken loosing state and collected information. I don't think Chandra meant to go ahead with building a cult but the information Gupta gave him, gave him an idea; a solid foundation to establish himself." Nanda explains the past to Khushi.

"Establish to do what?" Keith asks. Nanda raises both his eyebrows not understanding where Keith is coming from. Keith elaborates. "In olden times your cult was about redistribution of power and establishing yourself as political manipulators for a large sum of money which I believe was source of income for the entire tribe. With the kind of society we live in today, even to establish a connection with political party one needs to have certain background to do the biddings of the said party. If Chandra is indeed the root of this cult, why hasn't anyone heard of him?"

Nanda holds Keith's eyes for a moment and smiles. "It's because you know him by a different name." We wait for him to continue and surprise us.

Surprise was an understatement.

"You all know him as Bramhanada Swami now." Nanda says with a glint in his eyes and an edge in his voice. The silence following his statement is dense. My heart jackrabbits in my ribcage and I break into a cold sweat. This isn't good. Pieces of old puzzle falls into place and my gut clenches at the implication of it.

"f**k." Keith exclaims.

It's a shared sentiment, by the looks of it.

I run my hand across my face, suddenly tired. Khushi slumps and Shukla looks annoyed.

"That ashram is the cult behind all this?" Keith continues. As if remembering something he adds, "But we didn't find anything connecting between the victims and the ashram in the first place. Even Ranvir was not connected to the ashram. Then how...?"

Nanda motions Keith to stop. "You have to see this whole thing differently. Treat the ashram as a mafia family, then you should start getting some answers."

"And by studying victims," Shukla adds.

"If Chandra is following our cult's ancient agenda, then the victims and the things the victims were involved in should start giving you answers." Nanda supports.

"Like Suman - Arjun's mother. She was an anthropologist who was studying the cult and I guess she deduced exactly what you are saying and was killed to stop that line of thinking." I have inkling that Suman was probably killed for the work she was doing but had no idea how far had she unearthed this ashram's true nature. "This is where the ashram differs from cult and reacts like mafia or an organized crime syndicate would." Nanda gives me a thumbs-up.

I lean back and let Shukla and Keith take over the interview. They have dozen more questions and Nanda answers them to the best of his knowledge while Kusum chimes in from time to time. Khushi notices my sudden silence and gives me an inquisitive look. I smile softly in response and she lets it be.

Fifty minutes and another cup of coffee later, we are back on the road. It's a four hour drive and Shukla is behind the wheel. Keith and Khushi discuss our dinner plans along the way, both arguing merits and demerits of their favorite eating joints along the highway.

The unrest within me makes me tune out the chatter around me and I lower the window in the backseat and allow the cool evening air to soothe me.

"You are awfully quiet since half way through the interview," Shukla says. I don't reply immediately. I turn around from window and see Keith and Khushi looking at me in worry.

"Well, several years ago Anjali was living in that Bramhananda ashram and she has mentioned on several occasions that she was a part of the ashram's inner circle. She said she quit that ashram because at one point she stopped believing in the core ideology of the ashram." I say softly.

"That's not unnatural Arnav. People realize that they didn't sign up for whatever the ideology that was sold to them but was executed differently and quit. It happens in ashrams all the time," Khushi placates me.

"Remember that morning when Anjali came by station and had a freak out when she saw Vimal's crime scene photos?" I ask.

Shukla nods while Keith says "Yeah, I heard," to which Khushi also nods.

"I think that day she recognized it was the handiwork of the ashram she once belonged to." I say slowly to a stunned audience.

Yes, we are truly f**ked.