This post has been published by me as a part of the Blog-a-Ton 26; the 26th Edition of the online marathon of Bloggers; where we decide and we write. To be part of the next edition, visit and start following Blog-a-Ton. The topic for this month is 'That Last Night'.
Does it happen with everyone sometimes, that you know you have to do something but your mind just doesn’t allow your body to do that? I know my work here is done; I should just get off this bridge and wait. But I am unable even to get up. No, I am not physically hurt. I am perfectly fine, but instead of getting off the bridge, I am narrating this stuff. I have been having nightmares from past few months. I am not even sure of the reason for this. Everything is going good in my life. By the lords grace I have been doing the righteous things all throughout my life. I have always been sure of my destiny and my beliefs. That is the reason for what I am today, that is the reason for the love I am getting from my people. That is the reason for my existence. This wretched sense of doom, I am not sure why my lord is making me go through this, but who has the power to understand his will completely. I have lived by the book and have been as virtuous and as righteous as any human can possibly be. I have become so revered by the people, for my courage and efforts to protect the righteous from the hideous that I have children all over the world named after me. It is not that I am attached to any kind of fame. It is my duty to protect the weak and fight against the corrupt evil forces. I have been fairly successful in my efforts and am loved so much because of it, but I am not attached to any of this. For the past eight years I have never worried even of death because death would just send me to heaven, the abode of the lord.
When I was young, I loved the warmth of the morning sun. The rays fell softly inside my room. Whenever I was on bed and the bright sunlight woke me, I knew I was moments away from my mom pushing me out of bed to get ready for school. I never thought about it then, but it was one of the most pleasurable things in the world, my mom waking me up for school. Though I didn’t much like school, I liked my mom cajoling and waking me up.
The river beneath the bridge is gleaming and shining under the beautiful full moon. It is wide, deep and doesn’t seem to end on both sides of the bridge. I don’t much like being alone with nature, I feel unsure and maybe scared. I would have loved to talk to my mom and get reassurances from her, but she is no more with me to comfort my uneasiness. Though I would say she has shown me the direction out of which I have paved my way of life and could reach the juncture on which I am now. I would not have reached these heights and gained so much of acclaim in the community if she hadn’t instilled the right belief structure in me.
I remember sitting on the beach with my uncle one day and being overwhelmed by nature. My uncle used to say, if the whole universe was as big as the beach, then relatively we are as insignificant and equal to a speck of sand. No, actually he had said earth was a speck of sand in the beach and he had asked me to think of how small and insignificant humans are in the nature’s plan of things. I didn’t show any emotion in front of him, but on hearing it I think I got scared. I was very young then. I couldn’t sleep properly that night. I am not sure why but I hated what he told, it made me very much unsure of things.
Later I went to my mom’s room and wriggled in beside her. She had not slept yet. I was scared and I asked her about us being so insignificant in nature. Then I had the best conversation of my life. She told how wrong my uncle was and how he is going to hell for spreading all these lies. She told me how the earth was made and how we were center of the universe, of how we had pre-determined destiny and how we would go to hell and heaven, about what these heaven and hell are, what they do to people in hell and about the path to heaven by living righteously as per the book. From what all I heard that day, I knew I had control on things, I was in control and there was a plan for each and every human. I was not as insignificant as my uncle told. I knew how to live; I also knew how I will be judged. I was reassured in the meaning of life. I slept well. I should say it gave me beliefs and made me stronger. It just removed the weight of uncertainty off my shoulders. Now I was certain, I was certain of reaching heaven. When the path is shown so clearly, achieving it just becomes a question of character and perseverance of the individual.
That conversation feels like a long back now. I have lived a virtuous and pious life. Still this incident which took place few months back, though I know I did the right thing and I don’t have an iota of remorse for what I did, It is giving me a horrible feeling of doom.
I remember as if it was yesterday, I was visiting this place on one of my work related trips. I was staying in a popular tourist hotel. In the evening while taking a stroll, I came across a stand-up act in the banquet hall of the same hotel. I went in hoping for few good laughs. But that wretched soul was just talking corrupt things polluting the minds of the people sitting in the hall for some cheap laughs. I saw them laughing at his jokes whether they agreed or not, they just didn’t want to be left out is what I think. I was about to leave with a bad feeling in my heart for what the world was turning into, that is the time he started to talk about my beliefs.
That evil wretched animal didn’t have anything sacred in his life. He made fun of everything that I believed to be sacred, around which my life, death and each of my breath revolved. The profane creature compared the grossest of the things to the pure and sacred holy things which I and all my people believed in. I was outraged, I could not contain myself. After his show, I followed him to his room. I slid into his room before the door closed behind him. He was surprised to see me inside and was about to ask me something, but I couldn’t contain the building rage in me and hit him hard on his face. He rolled onto the ground. Before he could collect himself again, I hit him hard again and shoved the half conscious piece of shit onto the armchair. I was going berserk with anger and was muttering how wretched and horrible his soul has become, how if he could not spread virtue or righteousness among the people, he had no right to pollute them and how he had no right to live.
In my rage, I must have been muttering loudly on how the beliefs and faith has built people, gave them reason to live and performed miracles, of how sacred it is and how it needs to be protected against profane creatures like him. How could he dare insult the sanctity and sacredness of my faith. My rage hadn’t had subdued and the bleeding shit hearing my angry words turned his lips into a smirk and asked me, “You think your beliefs and your faith is true, you possibly can’t know it for sure and the world has so many people with so many different beliefs. All of it can’t be true. If yours is true you are lucky, if theirs is true, you are fucked my friend, you are badly fucked and that too for an eternity”. He didn’t know when to shut up, he must have been thinking he still is on the stage and was being funny. I couldn’t take more of his shit. The rage just took over me and I slit his throat with the knife lying on the table and I did that in a flash. I couldn’t stay there for long. I had to abort my work plans; I called my contacts and got out of that country and back.
This incident has remained with me throughout. It is not that I am remorseful. I am pretty sure I am not. I don’t think his last words also have much effect, but there is a sensation of doom which has slowly sunk in to me and I am not motivated for our cause anymore. I am not able to be as motivated as before. My work in the past eight years was so glorious that I was too precious for my leaders and I have been the chief planner for our various achievements. I have been off the field for two years now. I was too important to be risked in an on field job. But today I wanted to be here and I am here against my leaders will. I have done everything as per the plan. I have planted enough explosives to take down the bridge. I have wired it perfectly. I just have to wait for the train to come close enough so that there is no way the driver can stop the train before the fall. Now I just have to get off the bridge and wait for the train. I can detonate the bombs using the wireless remote as far as a kilometer. But it looks like I don’t have control over my body anymore. I am sitting motionless on the track and I am unable to move out to safety. I can hear the noise of the approaching train. I have just given up trying to move. Now I think I will wait for the train right here and blow up the bridge when the train is near enough. The approaching train is close enough now. It has entered the point of no return zone. I have to just press this button. The time has come. May the powerful almighty take me in his abode.
Next day in Newspapers: Terrorist’s plan to blow the bridge foiled. The dead terrorist remains unidentified. Explosives laden around the tracks have been taken into custody by the police. The investigation is ongoing and the police are unsure why the bombs didn’t explode. The police suspect that the plan failed as the train hit the terrorist before he could press the button on the remote.
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