Chapter 8: Home Coming
Vikram sat in a crowded intercity bus rattling its way toward Gorakhpur, a remote city nestled in the heart of eastern Uttar Pradesh. The vehicle—paint faded, seats hardened with time, rearview mirror cracked—lurched over the uneven road as if held together by willpower and rust-resistant paint. Every pothole produced a synchronized jolt that traveled through the floorboards and up the spines of its tired passengers.
Dust streaked through the half-open windows. It settled on foreheads, mixed with sweat, and clung stubbornly to shirts damp from humidity. A child cried quietly in a corner as his mother fanned him with a folded newspaper. The scent of roasted peanuts mixed with smoke from beedi cigarettes hung in the motionless air.
Vikram barely noticed. The discomfort held no meaning after what he had endured. This was not pain—it was nostalgia.
To his left, outside the filmy windowpane, the farmlands of Purvanchal rolled past in shades of golden yellow and earthy green. Tall sugarcane waved in silent rhythm; wheat stood proud, ready to be harvested. Distant figures in colorful clothing bent low over the fields. Occasionally, a bullock cart passed lazily on the road, pulled by animals as slow and patient as the land they worked.
He felt it then—a strange stillness inside him. The landscape was the same, unchanged by time or turmoil. Unlike cities scarred by war and betrayal, this land had quietly endured.
Nearly 15 hours later, the bus finally rolled into the Gorakhpur bus stand just as the sun dipped low on the horizon, throwing long amber shadows across the dusty streets. The moment Vikram stepped down onto the cracked cement platform, a wave of familiar smells greeted him: wet earth, fried bread sizzling in cast iron pans, diesel fumes clinging to exhaust pipes, and the sharp tang of rusted iron.
The station bustled chaotically. Street vendors shouted out their specialties—piping hot tea, savory snacks, bottles of flavored soda. Conductors called out destinations. Porters weaved between rickshaws and carts, balancing bulky luggage on their heads. Hawkers displayed sweets made with ghee, while barefoot children darted between lines of departing buses.
Blending in with the crowd, Vikram wore a simple khadi kurta and loose cotton pajamas with worn leather footwear. A sturdy canvas bag rested across his shoulder. He scanned the plaza. Usually, he would have hired a bullock cart to reach his ancestral village—Gola was only three kilometers away. But all carts were fully loaded, either with sacks of grain or entire families returning from market day. Seeing none readily available sparked no irritation in him.
He adjusted his strap and started walking.
Walking three kilometers meant nothing to a man whose physical capability now far exceeded that of professional athletes. Even as twilight approached, his body moved with the ease of a man raised in shadows and trained in war.
Soon, the town's chaos receded into serene countryside. The paved road turned into a dirt path, lined with eucalyptus trees that swayed gently with the occasional breeze. The soft rustling of tall grasses accompanied his footsteps.
On either side stretched a labyrinth of farmlands. Paddy fields shimmered as water reflected the fading sunlight. Farmers guided wooden ploughs pulled by oxen, their bodies silhouetted beneath pink-orange skies. Above him, birds began their evening flight home; their calls echoed across the open landscape. The air was clean—fresh with the smell of moist soil, dung-cakes stacked neatly near homesteads, and distant cooking fires spilling wood smoke into the sky.
For a long moment, Vikram let himself feel it—home.
Then, his attention snapped to something unusual.
From far ahead, a woman's voice rose sharply—strained and desperate. It carried through the fields like a crackle of electricity torn from the wind.
His enhanced senses immediately locked in. It was not a vague cry—it was a cry for help. His internal skills snapped into effect. Based on the location of the sound, he estimated the voice was coming from around 500 meters away, tucked behind the dense rows of sugarcane fields.
He wasted no time. Removing his bag, he placed it carefully beneath a neem tree that bowed toward the path. He pulled a scarf from his bag and wrapped it tightly around his mouth and neck. Camouflaging his identity had become second nature. Within seconds, he sprinted off the road and into the field.
His movement barely stirred the grass. With each bound, his body avoided resistance, flowing through narrow gaps between foliage. Within half a minute, he had covered nearly 300 meters. He could now hear the situation with painful clarity.
A woman screamed again, followed by mocking laughter—in familiar voices. They weren't ordinary passersby, nor petty thieves. These were habitual predators, comfortable cloaked in entitlement.
Words floated clearly now through the thicket: violent, crude, filled with arrogance only power can breed. The voices spoke of dominance, of impunity, of ownership.
As he approached silently through the cane, the scene became visible.
Four men surrounded a young village woman. She was being held down—one man held her arms, another pressed her legs. Two others stood nearby, unbuckling their belts. She wept and twisted beneath them, her salwar torn at the shoulder and stains of mud smeared on her cheek from struggling in the dirt.
Vikram didn't wait for thoughts. His instincts, honed into deadly accuracy, leapt into motion.
Stepping out from the green stalks, he revealed himself to the group. The startled men froze at first, caught between confusion and disbelief. But insult quickly overtook hesitation.
One man, clearly emboldened by a life without consequence, stepped forward with a sneer. He dared Vikram to leave. Another warned that they had powerful connections. In the blink of an eye, they considered him an intruder—and next, a threat to be eliminated.
Vikram revealed a small dagger from inside his kurta. It had been forged in Karachi—a keepsake from another life, built for precision. He didn't speak.
He moved like a shadow.
The first man collapsed immediately—his throat slit cleanly. Blood soaked into the earth before his muscles registered what happened. The second died from a stab directly into his heart—his eyes wide as he fell. A third tried to run, but a horizontal slash across his chest brought him to his knees before he too gave out on the ground.
Three bodies fell in as many seconds.
Only one attacker remained—frozen, his legs trembling. He dropped to his knees, pleading for his life. In broken words, he declared his lineage. He claimed privilege—his father was a sitting Member of the Legislative Assembly. He begged Vikram to reconsider, to spare him out of fear of political backlash.
Vikram stepped forward.
He placed his hand gently on the youth's shoulder. In that instant, a memory stream unlocked—fragments rushing into his consciousness.
The man was indeed Abhishek Tiwari, son of MLA Mukesh Tiwari—a corrupt strongman known for his ties to bribery, illegal property grabbing, and violent suppression of dissent. These four men had a history of abusing their position. The covered-up rapes. The college threats. The beatings. Vikram saw it all in blinding clarity.
He acted without hesitation.
With cold efficiency, he slid the dagger under Abhishek's jaw, silencing him permanently.
Then, the woman stood quietly at the edge of the cane field, unsure whether to flee or collapse. Her breath came quick; her eyes widened with disbelief.
Vikram approached slowly. His scarf dropped to reveal his face.
He asked her in a gentle voice where she was from. She whispered her answer: Gola village—his village. Surprised, he told her he too was from Gola and mentioned the name of his father.
Recognition flashed in her eyes. She introduced herself as Jyoti Sharma, daughter of the local temple priest—a man Vikram remembered from his boyhood as someone who placed sacred ash on his forehead during festival mornings.
Vikram instructed her to return to the road. He would manage the rest. She offered a nod of gratitude and disappeared, unsteady but safe.
Alone now, Vikram knelt beside the bodies.
He held a hand over each corpse, watching as the System activated.
Each body dissolved into particles of white light—collected cleanly into the data plane.
> [+10 Gamer Points]
> [+10 Gamer Points]
> [+10 Gamer Points]
> [+10 Gamer Points]
His running total now stood at 20,040 G.P.
He had, at one point, used 500 of those to buy a product in Pakistan that had altered his mission in ways no spy handler could have predicted. Every point spent had proven itself—events unfolding like dominoes with surgical precision.
Vikram stood up quietly.
In the distance, the village waited—the same as always, yet entirely different.
He walked slowly toward it, not with the urgency of a man returning home, but with the quiet tread of one who carried justice like an invisible sword.
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