"Buried in deep, scarred by evil. The roar echoes; defeaning the ears of brutality."
The night was dark. So dark that it could swallow every hope from the heart. But even the darkest of nights could not extinguish the flame burning deep inside my heart. I felt a warm feeling in my heart as if every cell of my blood was boiling with an immense rage. A rage that could melt every foe, every adversity, every fear. And, I was not alone in feeling that.
Hundreds, maybe thousands, felt the same fear I was feeling right now. And, every day they say the same thing that I wanted to say to myself. "It is going to be okay."
I clenched the gun firmly in my hand. The barrel is pointing at the head of a poor guard. "BANG!" The guard fell on the ground. The sound was a roar. A roar against brutality. A roar against injustice. A roar against evil.
Guards ran hither and thither. Guns clocked, bullets fired. Blood spilled. The silence of the night bowed against the might of the roar. The villagers ran and attacked their foes with their hands, sickles, sticks, and spears. Women threw spices in their eyes. Children threw stones and mud.
I ran towards the house. Bullets sprayed all over the place with a deadly angst. I countered it with my gun. Bodies fell, and gunpowder simmered in the air. I looked for the faces that were my target. But, they didn't appear. Petrol and fire danced with each other as screams were their music. The old house was not a happy audience. It soon began to deteriorate, with the wooden doors turning black. I ran outside as the terrace fell behind me.
The sky screamed, and even he could not control his pain. The tears flowed, drowning the fire, leaving ash and churned bodies behind.
"WHERE ARE YOU HIDING, SARLA? YOU COWARD!" My voice thundered.
I looked around. There was nothing but death all around.
"Sir. You go. We will manage here." A villager patted my shoulder.
I wanted to speak, but a scream halted me.
"SURAJ!!!"
I looked around like a madman.
The sound of a hastily dragging jeep and a bullet echoed.
I ran towards the outside and saw that Sarla, Mukesh, and Venkatesh were hastily escaping. Sumeet was tied in front of the jeep, and Kanchan was screaming.
I spotted a bike nearby and kick-started it.
The storm and rain blurred my vision, but my eyes stayed locked on the fleeing jeep, its tires splashing mud behind like a wounded beast trying to escape.
"Sarla!!!"
My voice tore through the storm.
From the jeep, Sarla laughed, cold and wild, and hurled a grenade toward me.
I swerved just as it exploded behind me, the blast shaking the earth and throwing mud into the air.
I pulled out my gun and fired.
One bullet shattered the back glass.
Another pierced the tire.
The jeep lost control, skidding violently before flipping over with a deafening crash.
Sarla, Venkatesh, and Mukesh rolled out onto the muddy ground.
I ran forward as bullets rained toward me. I fired back and hit Venkatesh in the leg. He collapsed with a scream while Sarla and Mukesh fled deeper into the rice fields.
I rushed to the overturned jeep, desperately searching.
"Kanchan!"
Nothing.
She wasn't there.
Panic clawed at my chest as I searched everywhere.
Then I saw Sumeet lying in the mud, unconscious.
My heart pounded like war drums.
"Kanchan!!"
I screamed with everything I had.
Then, faintly, from afar—
a voice.
I ran.
And there she was.
Kanchan lay in the field, soaked in rain and blood, her body trembling, her breaths shallow. Blood spread beneath her like a red shadow.
I dropped to my knees and pulled her into my arms.
"No. No, no… nothing will happen to you. You'll be safe. You hear me? You'll be safe!"
My voice cracked.
She smiled faintly, weak as a dying candle.
"It's okay… no need to cry…"
Her voice was barely a whisper.
"People like me… we don't have much love for life. Sometimes death feels kinder than living."
Her trembling fingers brushed against my hand.
"But… you tried. No one ever did."
Her eyes softened.
And then—
they stilled.
Her heart stopped.
The world stopped.
I screamed.
A scream so raw it felt like it tore my soul apart.
It echoed across the endless rice fields—
until a bullet pierced my back.
Everything froze.
I turned.
Venkatesh.
He was limping toward me, gun in hand, madness in his eyes.
I rolled to the side, raised my gun, and fired.
The bullet tore through his other leg.
He fell, screaming into the mud.
I stormed toward him and kicked him hard across the face. Blood spilled from his mouth.
I grabbed him by the collar, my hands shaking with rage.
"Why did you let your daughter die?! You are a stain on the name of a father!"
Venkatesh coughed, then smiled weakly.
"She was a whore."
His voice was poison.
"She slept with you. She stained my honor. My only regret… is that I didn't kill her myself."
Something inside me broke.
I screamed.
"She was not a whore."
My voice trembled with fury.
"She was my love."
And then I stomped on his face.
Again.
Again.
Again.
Until rage became the only thing left inside me.
Then I emptied my gun into him.
Every bullet.
Every ounce of grief.
Every fragment of love.
Into the man who called himself her father.
I ran toward Sumeet.
The left side of his face was badly scarred, his skin torn and burned by the violence of the crash. Blood poured from his head, mixing with the mud beneath him, and with every passing second, it felt as though his soul was slipping further away.
"No… no…"
I dropped to my knees beside him and placed my ear against his chest.
His heartbeat was there—
but faint.
Weak.
Dying.
Fear wrapped its cold hands around my throat.
I screamed for help.
My voice cracked against the storm, but the empty fields gave me nothing in return.
I lowered my head onto his chest and let out a broken cry.
How could I let him die?
How?
He had stood beside me through every fire, every wrong decision, every battle I chose to fight. Never once had he questioned me. Never once had he stepped back.
He was more than a colleague.
More than a partner.
He was my brother—the kind of brother blood does not create, but fate does.
The kind you know will stand beside you even when the whole world turns its back.
And now he was slipping away.
Just like everyone else.
God had a cruel habit of taking everything I loved.
Everyone who cared for me.
Everyone I tried to protect.
One by one, like punishment written into my destiny.
Kanchan.
And now Sumeet.
No.
I clenched my fists so hard my nails cut into my palms.
No.
I would not let this happen.
Not again.
I would not let God defeat me again.
I screamed into the rain, into the sky, into the silence of a world that had taken too much from me.
I screamed until my throat burned.
Until my body gave up.
Until I collapsed onto the muddy ground beside him.
Then—
faintly—
a sound.
Voices.
Footsteps.
People.
Coming toward us.
Help.
I forced my heavy eyes open.
Shapes moved through the rain, villagers rushing toward us.
For the first time that night, hope did not feel like a lie.
Maybe… today, God had chosen mercy.
The rain began to soften.
The storm that had swallowed the night slowly loosened its grip.
And through the dark clouds, the first pale rays of morning touched the earth.
I lay there, broken and exhausted, as strong hands lifted me.
As they carried Sumeet.
As they carried me.
Back toward the village.
Back toward whatever remained of life.
The sounds reached me before sight did.
Footsteps coming and going.
People whispering.
Women grinding herbs against stone, the soft scrape echoing like an old village prayer.
I slowly opened my eyes.
Pain struck my head like lightning.
"Lie down, Suraj."
A calm voice pulled me back.
"You need rest. You had a severe fever last night. It has gone down, but the headache will stay for a while. I removed the bullets and sealed the wounds. Don't move too much, or they'll open again."
A man sat beside me, gently caressing my head like an elder brother. He tilted a small bowl and let a few drops of bitter herbal decoction fall into my mouth.
It tasted like medicine and regret.
I swallowed and forced my lips to move.
"Where is Sumeet?"
The man's face grew heavy.
For a moment, he said nothing.
"He was in a very delicate condition last night. Many of us thought he wouldn't survive."
My chest tightened.
"But he did."
The breath I didn't know I was holding escaped me.
"He is still unconscious. We are giving him blood, and he is weak… but he will live."
They were not the sweetest words.
But they were enough.
Enough to stop my heart from breaking again.
If Sumeet had died…
I think I would have followed him.
The man stood up and casually tossed a gun beside my pillow.
I frowned.
Before I could ask, he leaned forward, picked it up again, and pointed the barrel straight at me with the enthusiasm of a child holding a toy.
"Can you teach me how to use it?"
I stared at him.
"First, point that thing away from me, or you'll have to seal a brand-new hole in my body. Then maybe I'll consider it."
He quickly lowered it, embarrassed, and dropped to his knees beside the bed.
"Please. I promise I won't kill anyone."
He paused.
"…I mean, I will kill someone. But after that, I swear I'll never touch a gun again."
Despite the pain, I smirked.
"Well, that sounds legally suspicious. Who do you want to kill?"
His face crumbled.
Tears filled his eyes.
"The man who killed my whole family."
His voice trembled.
"Sarla."
I let out a dry laugh.
"Apparently, half the country wants to put bullets in him."
He grabbed my hand tightly.
"No. Only I will kill him. He is mine. He is my culprit."
For the first time, I looked at him properly.
He was much younger than me.
Too young.
His face still carried innocence, but life had already carved wisdom into it. His hands trembled with fear and helplessness. His eyes were wet with grief—
but behind those tears burned fire.
A dangerous fire.
The kind that does not warm.
The kind that consumes.
And suddenly—
I was looking at myself.
A younger version of me.
The same rage.
The same hunger for revenge.
The same foolish belief that justice could be loaded into a gun and fired into the chest of evil.
I knew that fire.
I had fed it.
Once, I believed guns and bullets were the answer.
That blood could balance pain.
That revenge could heal grief.
But my true weapon was never a gun.
It was the pen.
Truth.
Law.
Words.
Yet I crossed that line once.
Because trauma makes monsters look like heroes.
And once you step across that line, life never lets you return the same.
I lost everything.
And gained nothing.
The price of revenge is never paid in bullets.
It is paid in pieces of your soul.
And the bill is always higher than life itself.
I looked at the boy kneeling before me.
No.
I would not let him become me.
I would not let another soul drown in the same darkness I did.
I looked into his eyes.
He turned away quickly, as if hiding them could hide the storm inside.
I reached out and patted his shoulder.
"What's your name?"
His voice broke as it came out.
"Ranjan… Ranjan Kumar."
I nodded slowly.
"Listen, Ranjan. I know it sounds strange coming from me… but violence is not the answer."
He didn't look at me.
So I continued.
"Today, you kill someone because he wronged you. Tomorrow, someone else kills you for revenge. And then another. And another. It doesn't end, Ranjan. It just grows… until it devours everything."
The room felt heavier with every word.
"I've killed people."
Silence.
"And I can tell you this… it doesn't bring peace. Not the kind stories promise."
I clenched my fist against the bedsheet.
"It brings pain. Guilt. Fear. Misery. You don't sleep better… you just learn to live with nightmares."
His fingers trembled.
I leaned slightly toward him.
"Once you hold a gun, you think you control it. But slowly… quietly… it starts controlling you."
My eyes fell on the weapon lying nearby.
"It looks light, easy to carry. But people have been crushed under its weight."
He finally looked at me.
Tears, anger, confusion… all tangled together.
"Sarla is your culprit. I won't deny that. And yes… he will answer for what he did."
My voice hardened.
"But you don't have to become him to punish him."
I raised my trembling hand, stained faintly with dried blood.
"These hands… they're meant to save, to build, to protect. Don't turn them into tools of destruction."
I took a breath, slow and heavy.
"This body… these wounds… this blood…"
I glanced at the soaked cloth beneath me.
"This is the price I pay every day for crossing that line."
A faint, bitter smile touched my lips.
"I thought my reasons were different too. Maybe they were. Or maybe I just convinced myself they were."
I looked straight into his eyes now.
"But I promise you this—justice will come. Sarla will answer for everything he's done. His end is not far."
For a moment, it felt like the storm inside him might calm.
But storms don't die that easily.
They explode.
Ranjan suddenly stood up, his voice tearing through the room.
"You don't understand! No one understands!"
His chest heaved.
"The pain I carry every day… the fire I keep buried… only I know what it does to me!"
Before I could react, he grabbed the gun.
"Ranjan—"
Too late.
He turned and ran.
Out the door.
Out into the world.
His tears trailing behind him like rain chasing a storm that refused to stop.
And just like that—
another soul stood at the edge of the same abyss I once fell into....