SILENT AS THE DEAD: A Deadly Cyber Chase Begins Read online

  “Alive.”

  “Please send me the name, picture and address.”

  “You’ll get it in minutes. His name is Grass. You need to find out whether he is still in Calcutta or has left already.”

  “We’ll find him sir wherever he goes, please don’t worry.”

  Jacky said, “My technical assistant will send the detail to your number. Once you’ve got the detail, please let me know.”

  “Sure sir.”

  Slowly but definitely the anger was forming like the would-be-rain clouds outside. The moment Jacky woke up and received the bad news the fury started to take a distinct shape. Grass had betrayed him! It was unbelievable. Grass had stayed as a partner of Jacky’s underground human traffic cell for long. He had been assisting him for a decade and knew the rule. How did he betray? How did he hatch a blackmailing plot? He had to check it first.

  Jacky called up Philip, his technical assistant. Phillip was an obedient and efficient boy, after completing the computer science master he joined Jacky’s company as the system manager.

  Phillip responded quickly, “Yes sir.”

  Jacky said, “Phillip, I told you to maintain a confidential file, remember?”

  “Yes sir. I’m maintaining a separate database for that and arranged them alphabetically.”

  Jacky was fuming, “Don’t use those bloody technical words, I told you before. I’m not impressed. Note down a name – Grass. Get every detail about him and send that to Mustafa. I told Mustafa it’d reach within minutes.”

  “Sure sir, without any delay.”

  The line was cut off before Phillip tried to impress him more.

  Jacky was thinking fast – who had planned this? Not Grass of course. Grass was a good organizer – had been running his crime syndicate for long. Jacky had invested a good amount of money in sex trade and human trafficking and Grass had been managing this quite efficiently in the eastern region.

  Sometimes Grass had tried to be ambitious – Jacky noticed that. But that was not like this – setting a trap for a gentleman like him, a would-be-parliamentarian! Did Grass try to do it alone or was it a bigger trap with some powerful mind behind? A political conspiracy?

  The mobile was ringing. It was Mustafa.

  “Got it?” Jacky asked.

  “Yes sir, it won’t take much time.”

  “When can I expect you to come back?”

  “Well, we’ll have reached there by half an hour. I have just checked my local source. Grass is in his home at present, he lives in North Calcutta near Sonagachi. The place is crowded so we’ll wait until he goes to his office – it’s walking distance but the locality is comparatively uninhabited. He’ll go to his office at around seven. We’ll pick him up from his office. Today is Sunday, so we expect no crowd on the road. I hope it’ll be smooth. Is there anything else sir?”

  “Yes, I was thinking about his laptop. Can you bring that from his home?”

  “It’s not a problem sir; I’ll send people over there in police uniform. If we get any computer, hard disk or pen drive – we’ll confiscate everything and take them in our custody.”

  Mustafa was talking like an administrative officer who was supervising the whole government administration. Actually it was like any other big city – in Calcutta there was a parallel administration run by the underworld mafia dons.

  “Very good, Mustafa. Bring him in to my anti chamber.”

  “Camack Street office sir?”

  “Exactly.”

  Jacky was calculating very fast – “From last night to today’s morning. Not a very long time gap. Hopefully every material is still in Grass’ custody. If Grass passes it to someone what will be the next step?” While Jacky was thinking his face wore a ghastly look.

  He would retrieve the material somehow. But who was behind it? The question started haunting him.

  4. Sunday, 6:39 AM, Yelagiri

  It was a strange place near a hill.

  “It’s reduced the distance - in reverse way – between you and me – this binary age – we’re far away by now …” a song was playing slowly in the background.

  It was raining in and around Chennai. A damp and wet Sunday morning was also unfolding very slowly in this suburb.

  The hilly place was near Yelagiri around two hundred and fifty kilometres from Chennai. This highland was a tourist attraction but tourists generally avoided this part – it was opposite Nature Park. There was a waterfall few kilometres away. Yelagiri hill was another twenty kilometres from this warehouse.

  A fat young man was listening to what Jacky Sen said to Mustafa and Philip. He was not in the mood of taking in the beautiful greenery outside. His world was replete with computers, programming code and strange-looking electronic devices.

  It was a large stockroom where the man sat before several computer monitors. He sat like a supreme commander and he was watching movements of each monitor periodically. He was strongly built fat man with a deep cut mark on his chin with hair growing out of his ears, nose and every visible part of his fat massive body. He was not only deplorable looking but he appeared spiteful.

  It was difficult to say how old he was – may be between thirty-five and forty.

  He threw his head phone on the table in anger and typed very quickly on the keyboard. In a flash of second a transaction had taken place. When he was transferring money to an anonymous foreign bank account he made a grimace of disgust. Next he dialled a number through his computer.

  The line connected him anonymously to Calcutta,

  One hoarse voice replied, “Yes Sammy.”

  “Sheet, I told you repeatedly not to take my name. Have you got the money I’ve just transferred?”

  “Yes, tell me what to do.”

  “Send your men and eliminate Grass at once. Want the address?”

  “No. I know that. What’s happened?”

  “Jacky has come to know everything. He’s sending his men to catch Grass. Before that we should reach and kill that bastard.”

  “What about his laptop? If they get it, they will do a forensic.”

  “Let them do. They can’t trace me. Forget about it and please send your men to eliminate him first. We’ll talk later. We have no time.”

  “Okay, Sammy.”

  “Don’t take my name MOTH... (mother-fucker).” He hissed like a venomous snake.

  The fat man was keying furiously. Grass had spoiled everything; he should have killed the girls and the middleman in one single mission. He tried to do that part by part like a soap opera. Dry chicken’s sheet!

  How Jacky Sen had come to know about that? Someone must have informed him! Sammy was tracing out the Jacky’s call log. He hacked the Telecom operator’s database in a flash of seconds and found the call log that started much earlier in the morning. Somebody called up Jacky and woke him up.

  The monitor fitted on the left corner of the wall flashed the full text transcription. He sashayed his chair to the left side of the room and read the whole conversation and while he was reading he cursed Grass repeatedly.

  He grumbled to himself absent-mindedly, “Yes, here it is. Oh, sheet. It was that bloody middleman.... KI CHA.. (cunt-of-a-whore)!” He was cursing Grass furiously. He understood everything. Grass’ men killed the first target. Then the second target reached the spot and found the dead girl. He suspected something and decided to tell Jacky Sen everything.

  “What a fool. You ass-hole!” He was still cursing him while whispered, “If I could kill that son of a bitch.”

  He sat still for a while. It seemed a good plot was slipping out of his hands in Calcutta. But before that, now, he had to tackle another emergency situation in Mumbai. He had to take care of it first. It was more urgent.

  “I am a reckless pig.” He muttered while he was keying furiously. The looks of three monitors were changing with his fast-and-furious typing. Now he was busy typing few usernames and passwords.

  The monitor in the centre position displayed a social media account of D
iana Lamar – a respectable society lady of Mumbai and a famous anti-aging artist specialized in prosthetic make up. He logged into her account and started reading her private messages. He’d to solve this problem today, before afternoon; otherwise it’d be too late. And that would bring genuine danger for him.

  “Oh, sheet, she is about to meet the police commissioner in the afternoon. I have to stop her. At any cost.” Sammy typed quickly while he was thinking aloud. It was his habit speaking his thoughts aloud when by himself regardless of hearers.

  The room was sound-proof so no one was there to hear what he had just muttered.

  Recently Sammy befriended Sarika – daughter of a reputed industrialist, settled in Mumbai, through a social media site using a fake account and for that he took help from Diana. Sammy introduced himself as Sarab Mehta – a young entrepreneur. For that he had to change his look and created a fake social media account.

  When he had met Diana in Mumbai and told her to do some prosthetic make up for his ugly face Diana was surprised. Generally people didn’t come to her with such strange personal request. But it was her profession and trade secret. She worked for money. And she had really one weakness – money. To her it was sweeter than honey.

  Sammy offered her lot of money and she agreed – doing it happily. After all, money had greater pulling force than gravity!

  Sammy met the girl – Sarika; for several times in different destinations with that prosthetic handsome face and a newly adapted name Sarab Mehta.

  From his early experiences Sammy knew few eternal truths about the girls. You had to know their vulnerable points and extract some family discontents first. There were always some. Girls were always neglected in family – rich and poor alike. In this male dominated society, most of the girls faced discrimination. It was in the Indian-family-gin. Then it trickled down to the other sphere.

  Most of the girls had some grudges against their parents. In three-four meetings Sammy extracted those disgruntlements. Then he took her side and started giving support. It was a psychological war. Sammy knew – you had to win her hearts first then you moved down towards her body. It was a strategically-thought move and it bore fruit.

  Sammy was a good talker, not like his GURUJI, but he could convince anyone in his school-days. He talked to her at great length and knew her weak points. There had been a strain between her father and mother. Her father was too busy as jeweller exporter to give her time. Her mother was too busy with her kitty parties. She had been alone and tried to seal that gap with the help of sexual adventures.

  It was a common trait of higher society. Everybody was alone. The basic instinct was like an open-cesspool.

  He convinced Sarika and they went to many chic restaurants in the first half of their courtship. Finally they had met in a five star hotel.

  Much to his astonishment Sarika was quite expert in sexual acts. She made the first move. She guided him inside her. She grabbed him and made him cum twice. Then she rode her like a cowboy. Her endless sexual mania exhausted him. He was not at all interested in sex. He had other great intentions to fulfil. His one-and-only aim was her money.

  Sammy took some intimate photographs in between. It was much later that he would send her those photos with a request: ‘Please donate me ten million for a noble cause or these intimate moments would be public property’.

  The girl – Sarika took offence. She had truly loved Sarab for his big organ and the way he had splurged money. Her other boy friends hadn’t done these before. And they didn’t get that rock-hard-big-gun.

  Later she became adamant and furious; she told everything to her father. They registered complain to police. Her father was a well-known jewellery exporter and had got some good connection so he used his all influences and Mumbai police tried to catch Sammy frantically. They tried their best to locate that fake social media account of Sarab Mehta and failed to trace it. After that they published photos of his prosthetic face in local media and announced an award. Naturally it didn’t work at first. Only two people – Diana and Sarika saw him closely with that changed-face. And Diana alone saw his original face.

  They had retrieved tons of CCTV footage with that handsome prosthetic face in the vain hope that somebody would come forward other than Sarika. It didn’t work. Sarika couldn’t help them. They asked her about him in great detail but all that she could remember was a big ugly looking dick and she cried for losing that great toy. The police team interpreted it differently.

  One day Diana saw the picture in a newspaper advertisement and approached police on her own. That invited real trouble for Sammy – the cracker. Diana came forward and tried to help Sarika as they had known each other for long.

  Now today she was about to meet the police commissioner in the afternoon and then she was supposed to meet the investigating-team.

  Sammy was reading her private messages and thinking, “I can’t allow you to do that Miss Diana. You won’t talk. Not in this life.”

  Sammy was watching her friends list and whispering, “Who is your best friend lady?”

  As he was keying on his keyboard, he mumbled softly and continuously, “Yes, this guy – Rajat Kapoor. A well established businessman. Married and straight. He has been clandestinely meeting Diana in a resort for more than two years. They met in a party two years ago. What a sordid life! It shouldn’t continue like this.” Sammy was making face and whimpering, “Today in the late morning Rajat will be going to meet you Miss Diana, before you meet the commissioner.”

  Sammy hacked the social media account of Rajat instantly. Before that he had made a good amount of research about Rajat Kapoor. Rajat would always send Diana a private message through his messenger and they used to meet in a particular resort.

  “So it must look like a message coming from a messenger. I’ll do that too. I’ll do that, no problem Miss Diana. I can do that. I am the best social engineer this world has ever produced!” Sammy was whispering talking and singing while he wrote a small code that would be attached with the secret message.

  This code would replicate the look to convince Diana that it had been sent by Rajat using a messenger tool.

  5. Sunday, 7:09 AM, Calcutta

  Grass was in good mood.

  Early in the morning, it was dark till then; Peter came and handed over the video. After that Grass got the message from his men. Everything went on smoothly. One girl was killed instantly. His men killed Peter on the same spot after that. He was being updated by his men continuously. The killers told him that Peter was talking to somebody. His last talks.

  "THOK DIA NA THITHAK? (Have you finished them off properly?)", He asked his men in Hindi.

  "THOK DIA BOSS, DONO KO. (We've killed them both.)" came the reply.

  Another girl flew to Delhi last night. She had been saved – but temporarily. Grass thought, “We’ll track you baby. If you don’t come, we’ll go to Delhi, no problem.”

  Peter’s brief case – full with money – again came back to him. Now it was blood-stained. But that was a small amount. Once he mailed the video to a bizarre-looking mail address, his bank account jumped to a new height. Grass was really happy.

  Everything was running smoothly except one girl flew to Delhi. Around seven he saw the clouds hovering in the sky. He used a filthy word. He hated rain. It’d spoil his whole business. He also hated wet rain-soaked Calcutta. It looked pathetic, like drenched old dog. He came to his building material supply office as usual and started reading news paper. Had they written anything about the weather? Was it going to rain whole day? He was curious about the days forecast.

  It started raining. Grass – a middle aged, puckered face frightful thin man – watched it in disgust. He was cursing the rain. He didn’t imagine it was going to be his last rain!

  It was raining when the three young boys pulled in their motorbikes to his shop and stopped.They didn't cut the engines.

  It was still raining when one of them came close and shot him at point-blank range. A young killer in his tw
enties.

  The other assassins were waiting on their motorbikes; they waited patiently for the sharpshooter to come back. The first bullet went straight through Grass’s left eye. Last evening Grass went to an eye specialist and he told that the left eye was myopic having power minus seven. The bullet levelled it. The other bullet went through the middle of his forehead. The assassin did not take any chance so he pumped more bullets throughout his left chest in a circle, emptying its chamber.

  They were three hired goons – riding two motorcycles with empty number plates. Probably they didn’t want to take any chance. So they kept one motorbike as standing and kept the engines on. When they came, Grass did not even consider taking a casual glance at them. This part of North Calcutta, including one of the biggest red light districts of Asia – SONAGACHI, was his territory and he had been controlling it for last twenty five years.

  It was beyond his imagination that someone in a cold rainy morning could have come and sprayed bullets on him. It was just – unthinkable.

  He was not prepared for them. He did not guess there had been a dark and silent move of death behind him. It took shape suddenly. He had planned to kill both the girls, including Peter – he gave the Supari and told his men to kill everyone but he had never bothered to save his own ass.

  Death had become his Shadow!

  One month ago while he was drinking in a room inside SONAGACHI, he received a call with ID withheld. Someone asked him straight, “Do you supply school girls to Jacky Sen?”

  Grass was stunned but shot back with a loud slang, “Who are you, MOTH... (mother-fucker)?”

  The voice sounded mechanical, “I have a very good proposition and I need your help. If you assist me, you will earn ten hundred thousand at one go. Think about it!”

  Grass fumbled as he was searching for words. Ten hundred thousand – the amount reverberated inside his mind’s eye and he took some time and he thought he was dreaming. Ten-hundred-thousand-at-one-go was not a small amount. Was it a bad joke?