kind of mountains he had seen were certainly not to be found anywhere in the Indian heartland. The closest one could find them was in the Himalayas. If indeed they had been there, flying to Delhi meant a one-way flight of more than one thousand kilometres at least. All his knowledge of flying and planes was now being exercised as he did some quick calculations.
Travelling that distance in less than twenty minutes meant flying at over twice the speed of sound all the way. That was if indeed they had been at the closest possible location to Delhi. No fighter aircraft could sustain Mach 2 for such a period of time and still have the endurance to cover such a long round trip. He corrected himself- no aircraft that he knew of. If anything, this experience was showing him that there were many things he had not the foggiest idea about.
Kartik must have guessed what he was thinking about.
'They say you're quite an aviation buff. Flying is my life, so I can imagine how curious you must be about the vimana we're in. Too bad I can't tell you too much.'
Aaditya had heard that word before,
'Vimana? Doesn't sound like something the CIA or Americans would call their planes.'
Kartik seemed to mutter under his breath, as if regretting having spoken too much. After that, there was no more conversation.
The monotony of the flight began to get to Aaditya. He felt his body loosen up as the stress of the last few days drained away, and he was soon nodding off. He dreamt he was in a fighter plane under fire, and was being buffeted violently from side to side as it narrowly escaped exploding shells. When his head hit the seat behind him hard, he woke up with a start. It had not been a dream.
The craft was undertaking drastic maneuvers, swerving from one side to the other. There were loud explosions outside. Fighter pilots wore special pressurized suits to protect their bodies from the effects of pulling such maneuvers which often put pressures several times that of normal gravity on the body-G forces as they were called. But even in his shorts and T-shirt, he felt no major impact of G forces. However, he had little time to contemplate how the builders of this craft had managed yet another seemingly magical feat.
'What's going on?'
When there was no response, he shouted louder.
'Dammit, what the hell is going on!'
Kartik answered softly, but the tension was apparent in his voice.
'We're under fire.'
'Who? The freaks that you fought on my roof?'
No response. After a second, Kartik exclaimed, 'Is your mobile on?'
Aaditya remembered that he had turned it on when it had been returned to him.
'Oh God, that's how they are tracking us!'
Aaditya felt Kartik's hand reach into his pocket and take out his phone. Just then the craft shook more violently and he heard Kartik scream. Then there was silence.
'Kartik?'
No response.
Aaditya took off his blindfold. It was utter mayhem around him. Kartik lay slumped in his seat, blood oozing from his head. His seat belt was undone, and Aaditya guessed he had reached over to get the phone when the craft had suffered a near hit, and he had slammed his head against the wall. Aaditya looked frantically around, trying to see what was happening. The raised canopy gave unrestricted visibility, and Aaditya saw three dark shapes in the distance. As they came closer, he thought he recognized them as the saucer shaped craft he had encountered earlier.
With Kartik out cold, they would be a sitting duck. He had no idea how this craft worked, but at least he was no stranger to flying planes. He looked at the cockpit in front of him, searching for the controls. He was flabbergasted. There seemed to be no flight controls-no joystick, no thrust controls, nothing.
He looked over at Kartik and saw an earpiece tucked into his left ear. He plucked it out and placed it inside his own left ear. Within a couple of seconds, he heard some transmission. He could not be entirely sure but the voice seemed to belong to the ash-covered monster who had knocked him out.
'Are you there? Please acknowledge.'
Aaditya looked behind to see the three saucers circling him. They could have shot him down at leisure but perhaps they wanted to capture the craft he was in. They had him boxed in, one on either side and one behind and slightly above his position.
'Hi…this is Aadi. Kartik is out cold and we are surrounded by enemy craft. What the hell do I do?'
There was an ominous silence before he got a reply. 'We have a problem here. Now, I'll try and keep you alive. Just don't try and be a hero.'
So, surrounded by enemy craft, and in one he had no idea how to fly, Aaditya finally got a chance to live his dream of being a fighter pilot. At that moment, he would have happily traded all his flying dreams for a lifetime attending Donkey's classes and dealing with impossible assignments on Economic History.
FIVE
Aaditya didn't know how high he was flying so it was hard to judge distances, but the three pursuing craft were now bracketing him, one flying on each side of his craft and one directly behind him-on his six o'clock, as fighter pilots would say. His craft was now hovering in the sky. He was far from calm but realized that if they had wanted to destroy him, they would have done so easily by now. Instead, it looked like they wanted him to surrender. A new voice came over the headset. He had not heard this voice before. It was deeper than either Narada's or the ash-covered man's voice.
'Aadi, I gather that you are not new to flying. We have retrieved your NCC records, and you've got hundreds of hours in microlights and gliders.'
'Fat lot of good that will do me now.'
The voice that responded was slow, deliberate, and if he was trying to calm Aaditya down, he was beginning to succeed.
'The basics are no different, just the user interface is. Now tell me, your father was a fighter pilot, was he not? So you grew up around pilots and fighters, and the exploits of IndianBader on the Internet tell me that you know your way around fighters.'
Aaditya had no idea how they knew all this about him, but it helped to calm him.
'What's your name? If my life depends on you, let me at least know who I'm talking to.'
'My name is Indra. Now, as you may have gathered, they don't want to shoot you down. They will box you in and perhaps more of them are on the way to capture you. Look behind you, do you see the red tipped vimana behind you?'
Aaditya turned around and said he did.
'That is the vimana of Maya, who I gather you have already met.'
Aaditya remembered the snake-eyed man and shivered in spite of himself.
Then it struck Aaditya. 'How do you know who's behind me?'
'Because I am on the way. I should be there in less than five minutes.'
Aaditya let out a sigh of relief. Help was on the way, but how the hell would he get out, if Kartik could not be revived? Indra helped out, sensing his predicament.
'Look in Kartik's right ear. There is a small round plug there. Place it in your right ear.'
Aaditya did so, and for a second was struck by an intense headache. He gasped in pain.
'What was that?'
'Don't worry, it's calibrating to your brain.'
