Vipe

“Quick hand me the lasso”

“The train is too fast, you will not be able to hold on to it!!”

“We still need it don’t we? Otherwise we die anyway so now give me the rope!!”

“Aye aye captain”

Marty pushed on the gas and brought the van parallel to the train. The rear mirrors that the train used were trained to look at threats coming from far away so were always at an angle, so the trick to slip by it undetected was to start from the tail end and run dangerously close to it and parallel to it so as to avoid being in the line of vision of the mirrors.

If the drivers noticed any threat in the engine they pulled on a rope which sounded a bell in the wagon with the guards in it who then became alert and acted upon the threat with extreme prejudice.

Dan looked for something to hook the lasso to. He found a metal rod welded to the tank in front of him to which he can hang on to. He signaled Marty to go a little to the front so that he can hook the lasso to it. Marty pressed on the gas again and pushed the van to its limit and they reached the tank. Dan took an aim and threw the rope onto the protruding rod. It quickly latched on to it and Dan got pulled in with it. The van still ran parallel to the tank. Dan’s legs started hitting the ground under him, the rod was too low and the rope was longer than he estimated. He lugged on the rope with force and pulled himself up. The air hitting his face was brutal. It felt like a thousand needles piercing on the face.

He pulled himself to the rod and finally felt the ledge of the tank under his feet. Randy pulls the pipe from the back of the van and slides open the door and screws one end to one of the containers in the back of the van and throws the other end to Dan.

Dan slowly climbs up the smooth surface of the tank with the rod as his support under his feet. He barely reaches the cap closing the tank. He pushes hard on the cap and opens it. Before he can secure it to replace it later, it flies off.

It was the year 2076. Unlike many had predicted, the apocalypse did not come in the form of an Ice Age, but instead it went the other way round. The drought started in 2057 with more than 80% of the countries in the world not receiving any rains. With that came shortage of food, which led to widespread famine. more than 60% of the species of the animal kingdom went extinct. All political structure fell into a disarray and people formed groups to survive now. Only a few reservoirs of water were now left throughout the world. There were no more trees, no more crops and humanity was on the brink of extinction. It is on times like this that people hungry for power seize the opportunity.

Vesil started controlling a small neighborhood in Manhattan and expanded from there to now control the entire of North America within a span of 19 years. There were many wars and a lot of good people died trying to protect the democracy of the nation, but failed. Dan was a part of that war as well. One of the few to escape after being imprisoned and tortured by Vesil’s troops.

In the engine room the drivers were eating their sandwich of beets and onions, when one of them suddenly sees a glint of the cap that flung off shining in the angled mirror. He gets up and looks backward and sees the van running right beside the train and Dan on the train trying to siphon off water into a container on the van. He leaped for the rope tied to the bell and started pulling on it violently.

“Uh Oh Dan, looks like we are gonna have company!!”

“Alright we need to get atleast two containers to have enough water until the next train arrives. Time me I will hold them off as long as I can.”

“Alright Marty boy, calculate time left for Dan”, shouted Randy.

“Already did he has about 10 mins left before the soldiers reach the tank and the containers will fill in about 12 mins!!”

“You have about 2 mins of fight off time in about 10 mins Dan”, conveyed Randy back to Dan.

“Alright, 2 mins ain’t so bad!”

About 15 soldiers started running towards the tank section as soon as they heard the bell ring. They bore Commander Vesil’s mark on their uniforms. They were led by Captain Shaw. Shaw was a cunning man. He was a petty thief before the Vape began, who would even kill someone for a few dollars. His notoriety grew once the Vape started and he soon became one of the biggest mass murderers in North America. One day he went to loot in a department store in Vesil’s area. He held the counter boy at gun point and that was the exact moment when Vesil entered the store too.

“Do you know whose store you are robbing?”, asked Vesil.

“Does it matter as long as its a store and has food in it?”, replied Shaw without even turning his head.

Vesil was impressed and made Shaw his right hand man. Shaw grew in his duties and was now entrusted the most important duty of them all - transport of water to the capital.

Shaw ordered the troops to hurry up.

“If even one of those assholes escape, I will flay the skin out of your backs!!”, he roared.

Randy shifted the tube to the second container now.

Two soldiers climbed onto the platform on which the tank rested. They started towards Dan.

Dan started counting.

“Five Four Three Two One”.

He pulled a thin wire he had installed before they came and they tripped and fell off the tank and the wire snapped with their weight. Three more came on to Dan charging with batons in their hands. Dan grabbed onto the oncoming baton and pulled the soldier with it and pushed him off the tank. He used the baton in his hand now to throw the next soldier off the tank as well.

The third soldier was trying to take the tube from the mouth of the tank, before he could get hold of the tube, Dan threw the baton in his hand  onto him, throwing him off the tank.

Shaw came onto the tank now.

When Dan saw him he recognised him immediately. They had a history, back in the prison. Shaw was one of the prison guards who tortured him. His mind raced through images of Shaw flaying him, knocking him around, threatening him.

For Shaw Dan was the man who escaped from his prison. He had hurt his pride.

This trip just got personal for both of them.

“Second container is done, I am pulling back the tube, Dan come on in, time to go!!”, shouted Randy.

But he saw Dan lunge forward knocking two other guards in his way towards Shaw. They started dealing punches to each other. Randy picked up his catapult in the back of the van. He started aiming at the soldiers trying to help Shaw and knock Dan out.

One of the soldiers was able to knock Dan on his back, and Dan almost lost his footing but grabbed on to a handle on his left and pulled himself back up. Shaw seized the opportunity and hit his face with the baton.

“I want this man captured and alive!Do not knock him over”, shouted Shaw

“And I want this man dead so better not come in my way”, shouted back a glaring Dan

Randy saw that Dan was outnumbered. He saw a patch of soft sand coming up in front of the van. He aimed at Dan’s foot and fired his catapult. Dan stumbled and fell off the train onto the sand patch.

He got up and started running back towards the train to get back on it, but the train was too fast. He and Shaw looked at each other like enemies who were sure that their paths would meet again.

The van pulled out and came by Dan.

“It was my call!!”, shouted Dan holding Randy’s collar

“Live today, fight tomorrow brother!! now let’s go, we have some thirsty mouths waiting for us.

The van pulled into one of the towns abandoned after the Vipe. There was no sign of any life whatsoever to be found anywhere.

Marty honked thrice, and about 100 people appeared from the houses which just minutes ago looked like empty shells.

They were all wearing clothes that were dusty and patched. One person from each household came forward with a small vessel to get their quota of water. Small children looked at them with smiles.

They did not play much anymore since playing meant drinking more water. Life had all come down to making smart water choices.

Half a container of the water was given to Pastor Givens for the vegetable farm.

Dan went afar from the group, his chest heaving of anger.

The sun was setting far in the west and the golden rays from it highlighted the Capital. the place that Dan knew that someday he would have to go back to, to take his revenge and to free the nation of its tyranny.

For now his people had water to drink and he had plans to make.

Home

"Well with the downsizing going on in the company. What do you think our chances are?”, asked Rahul.

“I don’t know bud, let’s take it as it comes”, replied Adarsh.

Rahul went to his cubicle and tapped on the “Ctrl+Alt+Del” button to log in to the system. There was an email from his manager - a meeting request to meet him in his office at 4pm. He hated 4pm meetings. There was always work to be done which meant he had to stay back until 8-9pm to finish it off. He now did this almost 3 times a week. He has been working at InfinitySo in Los Angeles for five years now.

He remembered times when he used to be a different person from what he is now. He used to believe in a god. Believed in his religion. Loved his parents. He could do anything for his friends. He remembered how they would drink half a beer bottle each in the night and drive around town at midnight feeling the cold night air hit his face in Hyderabad. He used to go home everyday looking forward to what his grandmother cooked that night. He loved reading books. Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, Sidney Sheldon's books. He used to get lost in the world they created seeing the characters take a life of their own in front of his eyes. Then came the final year of his Bachelor's. He did not have a job yet because of the recession era, so he decided to study further and gave the GRE thinking that going to the USA will be his shortcut to make more money. Due to the recession his college did not really have any jobs or assistantships to offer so he ended up borrowing most of his fee in loans and then he got into InfoSo and slowly paid off his loans in five years. There was little he saved in this time.

Even though that burden got lifted off his shoulders, he was a different person now. He did not speak much to anyone anymore. Hated almost everyone. Did not read much and drank almost every day to go to sleep. He was not really in touch with any of his friends from college. They sometimes called him to hangout but he preferred staying back home with a glass of scotch and some TV. He was just a skeleton of the person he once used to be.

The calendar app on his monitor suddenly filled the screen notifying him that it was 4 pm and time for him to go meet his manager. Sam was his manager for the last three years. He really liked the previous manager, who gave him only work enough to fill his week and let him go off back home by 6 pm at least. Since Sam stepped in afterwards, life hasn't really been that smooth.

He knocked on Sam's office door.

"Come on in Rahul"

"Hi Sam"

"Sit down Rahul"

Rahul pulled the chair back and sat on its edge hoping to take his assigned work and get started on it as soon as possible so that he could go back home and get his drink in his hands.

"So what did you want me to work on Sam?"

"Ohh well you are doing fine on your current task Rahul, I did not really have any new work to assign to you today. I called you in for something else today."

Sam was a social person, but he never called people to talk about something other than work. Rahul wondered what his discussion would be about.

"As you know with the new acquisition we are forced to cut down our personnel"

"But Sam I have worked for the past five years at this company and worked really hard"

"And i am not refuting that Rahul, you must understand that it has been a really tough call for us but we have decided to let you go. But don't worry we have a really good severance package lined up for you."

"I don't believe this. What am i supposed to do now?"

"You are an intelligent person, you will figure out something Rahul. Think of this as an opportunity to do something new now. We are really sorry about this but my hands are tied. You have to understand"

"Until when do i have?"

"Actually this is kind of urgent to streamline our company in a focused direction so we need you to vacate your cubicle by the end of this week"

"End of this week! I do not even have another job in hand yet and my visa will lose status if i do not have another job within the next one week!!"

"We are really sorry about this Rahul but you gotta understand my point of view"

The least thing Rahul was interested in right now was to understand his point of view. The company decided to streamline? Without him? His mind raced thinking about what he was gonna do and how he was gonna cope with this? He really needed a drink right now.

"Can i leave now? I gotta get back home"

"Sure Rahul, i will definitely recommend you in your next job, feel free to give my reference. Have a good rest of the day now", said Sam smiling.

He went to his desk dazed and unable to believe what had just happened. His entire life turned upside down in the last ten minutes. Adarsh peered over his cubicle wall and asked

"What did you get? I got the new acquisition merge design project !! Wanna get dinner since we are gonna be here late anyways ?"

"I actually did not get a project because because..", he choked and took his keys and stormed away.

He got into his car and sped away to his apartment.

There was no more scotch left. He had finished the last peg last night. He took his wallet and walked to the bar which was about a mile away from his house.

He ordered a pitcher of fat stout ale and finished it in about 15 min and then he drank another and then yet another. He was trying to shut the fear of having no job by drinking it out.

Then Adarsh stepped into the pub and saw him and came and slid into the seat opposite to him.

"I was worried about you man! I am sorry about your job but you will be alright dude, it's not the end of the world"

"Well its easy for you to say, you are not the one without a job!"

"Look i am not trying to console you or anything, what happened to you was horrible and i am gonna miss having you around. But i am here as a friend now."

"Sorry man, i am not myself and this beer has really fucked me up, can you drop me at my house?"

"I came on my motorcycle. Will you be able to sit on the back seat?"

"Haha it was what we always used to do back home!! Let's do this!!"

They went out to the parking lot and rahul hopped behind Adarsh on his bike. Adarsh tried going slowly at 25 mph to make sure Rahul did not fall down.

"Hey Rahul I just remembered that I left the door to the office open when I opened it in the evening to let some air in. Do you mind if we stop by there first?"

"Alright!"

Once they reached there Rahul wanted to take a leak so he said he would come in too. Suddenly something struck Adarsh.

"Hey do you wanna thank Sam for the kind offer he made you today ?"

"What do you mean ?"

"Follow me ! Trust me you are going to enjoy this "

Adarsh went behind the office building. He looked around and found an empty trash can lying there he brought it by the wall and laid it down to make a step out of it. He got onto it and pulled himself to the window he had left open. And then turned back to help the very drunk Rahul up.

"Why are we going this way dude?"

"You'll soon know dude."

After helping Rahul up he led him to Sam's office and went over to his desk opened his top drawer.

"Your toilet bowl awaits you sir !!"

"Dude I can't do this !! I will be fir ...."

It suddenly struck him. He unzipped his pants and did what he had to do while Adarsh stood guard outside and after he was done they ran out the way they came, this time closing the window behind them.

"I feel good.. No in fact I feel great dude!!"

Adarsh revved up the speed and soon they reached a bridge and the cool breeze hit Rahul's face reminding him of the night strolls he used to take back home.

"So do you have something saved up to last while you are off the job?"

"Yeah I have enough to last some time .. "

He got up on his feet behind holding Adarsh for support to feel the full force of the cool air as he remembered how they did it back home.

"And are you planning to end your lease as well?"

"Its gonna end this month anyways. I don't think I will renew it."

"What then where are you gonna go ?"

Rahul closed his eyes and tilted his head back and all the faces of his friends and family came streaming in front of him. Every small event of his life played in front of him on a screen with thousand different parts all playing at once.

"I am going home."

John and Robbie visit the Great Wall of China

John and Robbie stood facing the wall. It was the tallest wall they had ever seen in their lives.

“Dude is this the Great Wall of China?”, asked Robbie.

“Hmm looks like it.”, said John

“Do you think this is where we will find the gem?”

“But why would the gem be in China?”

“The old man did point us this way though”

“Maybe the old man did not see which way he went”

“It’s worth looking anyways now that we are here”
‘Yeah man!! I always wanted to peer down from the great Wall of China. Did you know that it is the only man-made object visible from the moon?”

“Hmm I didn’t know that. That’s pretty cool, but it also kinda makes sense. You know how, if you can look at a person in a mirror, the person can also look at you in the same mirror? This must work the same way!!”

“You are an idiot Robbie!! come now, we do not have time to waste!!”

They started towards a door they could see a few feet away. When they reached it, John signaled Robbie to have his hex ready. Both of them took a little of the golden hex dust from their pouches in their hands.

With the hand with the hex dust on his back John knocked on the huge wooden door. A chinese guard slid open a panel in the door and peering through the slot, he looked at Robbie and John.

“What do you want? Why are you here at this time of the night? The wall opens for tourists at 6 am in the morning tomorrow.”

“We are not tourists. We are here to get an important item stolen from us”, said John.

“What item? Go to the cops if you have been robbed. There is no one on the wall now.”

“No, you don’t understand, we cannot go to the cops for this, and some very reliable sources have informed us that it is here that we will find what we seek!!”

“Like I already said, come back at 6am!!”, shouted the guard and shut the panel.

“I did not know you knew mandarin!!”, said Robbie

“I don’t”

“You were conversing with the guard in Mandarin!!”

“Really? Hmm these powers we got work in weird ways! I guess we can understand any language we want and converse in it too!!”

“That’s so cool bro!! We should totally go to Mexico the next time!!”

“That sounds like a good idea!! Now for the task at hand! Stand back !”

John lifted the hand in which he was holding the hex dust and uttered a hex and threw the hex dust at the wooden door. The door swung open with a bang.

Inside the old guard lay on the ground surprised, unable to comprehend what happened.

Before he could react to them entering, Robbie used his hex dust to knock him out.

“That will keep him sleeping for the next two hours!!”

“Good, now let’s go find the gem!!”

They found a set of stairs nearby and climbed it to reach the top of the wall. The wall stretched for miles on either side.

“Whoa dude!! Come look at this!!”, shouted Robbing peeking from the edge of the wall.

“That looks so cool. Wish I had my phone to snap a selfie now, but I think I left it back at the inn!!”

“Wait I have mine”, said Robbie, and dished out his phone. he opened the camera app on it and turned it the otherway around so that the back camera was facing them both. They arched back, put on a shocked face and took a selfie.

“I will have to wait till we get back to post this!! I have no bars here!!”

“yeah i guess it can wait, just make sure you don’t lose your phone!!”

Suddenly a glint of red caught their eye from the far end of the wall, but not really on the wall. it was like a firefly floating in the air just beside the wall.

They started running towards it hoping to find what they were looking for. After all the old man did say that a light will show them the way. They kept running for a few miles, but the light never seemed like it got any nearer. After about an hour, they sat down to rest.

“I don’t think we are heading in the right direction”

“Look, the light is going down!!”

“They started running towards the light with double speed now and soon reached a place, where the light just sat now at the base of the wall.

“What should we do now? Jump over?”

“I don’t know!! I did not put up that light!!”

“Well maybe we should mark this spot, and go back down the stairs we came up from and walk back in this direction!!”

“That will be too late, we only have about ten minutes now before we will be pulled back, we gotta get to the gem before that!”

“Damn” shouted Robbie and kicked a stone in the wall, and shouted with pain.

“Robbie look!!” said John, pointing towards a staircase which appeared at the base of the stone that Robbie kicked. It was going down into the staircase.

 

They both descended down the stairs. It was damp and dark. Both of them took some more of the hex dust in their hands and looked around trying to find some light.

Robbie found a torch hooked to one of the walls. he used his hex to light it and led the way deeper into the hollow in the wall.

 

After some time, they came to reached a huge room. Suddenly a snake slithered past their feet. Robbie shrieked out of surprise. John asked him to stay quiet. In a distance a small stone suddenly shone in the light from the torch.

“There it is, on that raised platform up front!!”, he shouted.

“Good! Now let’s fetch it and get the hell outta here”

Robbie started running towards the stone before John could stop him, and no sooner had he tried to lay his hands on the stone, he was flung to the far end to a wall in the room. he landed with a thud.

The sorcerer stood right by the stone now.

John immediately tried casting a spell but before he could do it, the sorcerer vanished into thin air.

Suddenly he felt a hand grab his shoulders and pull him back. He was then flung to a corner, but it was not the same room he was in before anymore. This room was brightly lit and had only one door shaped opening through which he could see Robie getting up dazed in the other room. he tried running back in through the opening but just crashed into it, like there was some invisible wall there. He tried to put a breaking hex on it, but the hex dust just hit the wall and fell down as if it was just sand.

 

he shouted out to Robbie to try and get him out of here.

“Robbie!! Can you hear me?”

“Hey John, where are you dude?”

“I am in a room sealed by some invisible wall. can you follow my voice and try to free me?”

Before Robbie could do anything, the sorcerer appeared again and uttered a spell pointing his index finger at Robbie. he slowly lifted his finger and suddenly as if grasped by invisible hands, Robbie was being lifted in the air.

“Did you think it was that easy to steal my gem?”

“Your gem!! You stole it from us!!”

“Fool!! it had always belonged to me. Only I can harness it’s true power to reign over this world!!”

“Well hard luck dude because john and Robbie are here now to stop you!!”

“Haha .. Let’s see what you can do.”

the sorcerer pointed his finger towards the wall from which John was looking and it suddenly turned like a rippling wall of liquid.

John tried and he could now step through it.

Next the magician flicked his other wrist and dropped Robbie to the floor.

Both of them took some of the hex dust in their wrists and started putting hexes on the sorcerer.

But none of them reached the sorcerer, simply disappearing in mid air.

Now Robbie picked up the torch that fell down nearby and lunged towards the sorcerer.

While they were grappling with each other John quickly jumped on the gem and grabbed it. On his signal both he and Robbie got off the sorcerer.

“You better give me the gem!!” bellowed the sorcerer in anger!!

Joh briefly glanced at his wristwatch and raised his hands in the air and started counting:

“Five Four Three Two One! Adios Amigos!!”

They were encircled in green gas cloud and before the sorcerer could reach them or do something, they vanished into thin air!!

And suddenly they landed with a thud on something hard.

They opened their eyes and found that they were lying in the grass somewhere off the highway. Their pal hovered over them trying to shake them to consciousness.

“Hey man!! Where is the sorcerer? did we lose him? Is the gem safe”, asked Robbie.

“You idiots! what are you blabbering about? Do you’ll remember nothing about what happened last night?”

“We were fighting a sorcerer to retrieve the gem man!!”

“No you idiots!! You got stoned from the weed and started asking the bartender which way the sorcerer went. he thought you wanted to go to the restroom and pointed you’ll towards it. But instead you’ll got out and ran all the way to Chinatown. Here you got into an alley and started kicking at a wall talking to some guy on the other side something which made no sense. Then you climbed the wall and jumped over to the other side, threw some sand at the guy and ran shouting and laughing towards the sidewalk. You took a photo there, and kicked open a manhole and jumped into it. The ran about 5 miles in it. grabbed a stone lying around, jumped and kicked about and got out from there and jumped into a truck which did not know you’ll where in it. When the truck driver stopped by this highway to take a leak, he noticed a stench coming from the truck, he found your phone gave me a call that he was gonna dump you’ll here and drove away!! I just reached here.”

“Wait a minute if you just reached here, how do you know all this?”

“It’s because instead of taking a photo you left the camera in video mode and even though there was no video to see, your voices were heard pretty clearly. I had stopped following you and went to ask the cops to retrieve ya'll after you jumped into the manhole!! I just informed them that I found you’ll as well”

 

“Damn dude, it all seemed so real!!”, said Robbie scratching his head.

“Yeah man, weed does really take you places”, said John getting to his feet

“Yeah but I must say, this really felt like a damn good adventure, we should do it again sometime” smiled Robbie and they got into Timmy’s car and drove back to New York.