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“Dude you cant be serious!! This thing is highly illegal. No! Im not getting into this” Lleyton said

“Okay feel free to go and lead the life of your father’s”

Finally, we managed to convince Lleyton.

Next day, all the four of us rode in our Activa’s and Dio’s to a shady and a dirty internet parlor in the middle of the densest part of the town to set up our trap. Nirvan had prepared the phishing page with such perfection that even the people who created the original would have been proud of him.

He was grinning with pride. He stopped by to admire his master piece and explained us the details about the page.

Finally, the page was uploaded.

And the wait began, for the rich fish to bite our bait.

LLeyton often said the rich make their money by illegitimate means. He believed that all rich people are villainous deep within themselves. That was the hypocricy at its best, but who cares. All we wanted was the money in their account, so that we can be where they were. We had agreed that we would take only a small amount from every person so that it wouldn’t affect the victim much and wouldnt evoke a huge controversy. Everyone had agreed to this strategy of mine,  reluctantly. They wanted to extort huge amounts when they had a chance.

We found our bitch ass. After 3 days of uploading it.

Name              : Pankajdas

Account No   : 550984

Bank Balance: $33,008,131

Our prey, Mr Pankajdas had a whopping 33 million dollors in his swiss account. Bastard was hiding it from the holy souls at the I-T department. When people acquired huge cash through illegitimate means, which they couldn’t spend it all in a single day, they stacked it in a bank abroad. And by some stroke of luck and destiny we had found such a shark.

We stared at each other in awe. 33 million dollars, at our mercy. Possibilities flashed before my eyes, a car my dad always wanted, jewellery my mom always wanted, not to mention my education loan.

“Perfect! This guy has earned it through illigetimate means, he won’t lodge a complain with the cops” Nirvan said sounding so proffesional that it seemed like he had done this more than once.

“What do we do now?” asked Lleyton

“We need a bank account, Dhawan; you arranged what I had asked right?”

“Wait a minute! What had you asked?” i asked, I didn’t know about this leg of the plan at all.

“I could manage an account, but only in Rio”

“Rio? As in Brazil?” I asked, shocked

“Perfect! Give me the details” said Nirvan to Dhavan. Dhavan handed out a sheet of paper which had the banks name and a hell lot of numbers.

“How much are we transferring?” I asked

All the three looked at me. I realised it was the whole 33 million.

“What the fuck?” I shouted, which attracted the attention of the cyber café owner.

“Fuck up dude! If we are doing this we are diving into it with our both legs. We can only do it once before the cops find out. We can’t afford to miss out on this oppurtunity”

I kept watching as all the money was transferred to a bank with a un-pronounciable name in Rio

We walked out of the cyber after everything was done.

“Dude don’t be upset” said Lleyton, who just a week back was chickening out on the whole idea

“Its god sent!” Nirvan exclaimed

“Whatever dude. I don’t give a fuck. Ill get myself mentally prepared for the prison life”

“Yeah dude watch prison break, that will be of some help im sure” joked Dhavan joining others in their hysterical laughter.

“Dude im fucking serious here”

“Chill macha! We are criminals now; there is no ctrl+Z button. Half of the population is criminal in some way or the other. And don’t worry, ive planned it in such a way that the asshole from whom we stole this wont even realise that this is gone until 3 months from now” explained Nirvan trying to console the only sane one in the group, me.

“All we have to do now is go to Rio!!”

The next week all of us chartered an aircraft to Rio de janairo and off we went to Brazil to live the dream.

The four of us were thrown into the van, blindfolded.

“LLeyton” I cried “is he dead?” I asked the other two. No reply came from them as I grabbed my left arm and tried to stop the blood from flushing out.

“This is your entire fucking fault” yelled Dawan. The voice sounded very angry. Nirvan hadnt opened his mouth throughout the entire incident. I prayed that he hadnt gone deaf.

Finally, after, like what seemed an hour, the van stopped. The door closing our compartment in van opened. Our blindfold removed.

The van was parked at the edge of what looked like an abandoned airstrip. As the menian tried to carry me, a beautiful learjet landed on the runway and made its way towards the hanger. As Dawan and Nirvan were violently forced into the aircraft, LLeyton and I having no choice were carried through the hanger and into the aircraft.

As we entered we saw a big, fat man sitting on a luxurious seat. Giving all the vibes of being blue-blooded. We sat, without making a sound, nor asking questions.

“Get the medic in” the fat man talked politely into his cell. A beautiful nurse arrived in no time and dressed up my bullet wounds for the time being to stop the bleeding. But, the pain still persistent. I had always seen the actors getting hit by bullets in the movies,and wondered how painful it really was, expecting that some day even I would be shot, they hadnt faked the pain very well, it was inexplicable. The rest of them kept watching as she moved towards LLeyton and checked his pulse.

“He is alive” she said, bringing a huge sense of relief in all of us! Dawan started crying again.

The aircraft took off with the four of us and the fat guy a shortwhile later.

The fat guy finally asked us the question.

“Where is the money? Where have you guys hidden it?” he asked us in the politest way possible. I dug through my pocket and found the penny.

——-* *——–

Four months ago…

*Here comes the money*

*Money Money Money!!*

*Money Money Money!!*

“Amazing song! whoever has sung it!” LLeyton said.

“You bet! Dunno about the song but the lyrics appeal to me” I said.

College was done and dusted. We were at our usual adda ‘amoeba’. We had managed to get a B.E in computer science from a little known donation college. And as expected we were lying jobless without any placements spending our parent’s money and just doing what unemployed men, like us, do the best.

Lleyton readied himself for the run up, with the huge bowling ball supported on his three fingers.

Nirvan came back finishing his turn and resumed the topic in discussion, MONEY.

“Why don’t you fuck faces stop crying and do something about it, or just shut the fuck up!” he said. He was the smart guy among us. He had made most of abosorbing the computer science skills in areas which it was really required. Hacking, piracy, and cracks you name it and he had a script or a program always up his sleeves.

Me and Dawan do a chorous “Oh yeah, you got any idea geek?”

“Hell yeah! Unlike you pussies, I dare to think beyond the rotting degrees we possess.” said a proud but stupid Nirvan. Actually he was right.

“So tell me Niravana whose comp do you wanna fix today?” I joked as others joined me in the laughter

“Siddharth my man, are you ready for this? Cause I really have a solid plan” and he flashed a DVD and threw it at me.

UNETHICAL HACKING was boldly written in a very poor handwriting on it; I turned it over and saw the infinite number of scratches on the DVD

“Did you use this on a sand paper or something” I asked Nirvan and threw the DVD back at him.

“We all know a thing or two about hacking. So let’s put it to use. We find a shark, and rob his bitch ass off.” He answered smugly. He started spelling out his master plan.

“Its actually easier than you people think it is. All we gotta do is first design a webpage like that of a well known bank and replace it with the bank’s webpage. This must be attempted at an unknown internet parlor. That way we are off the cops’ radar. What say?”

And again we all go in chorous, “Balls to you and your grand plan!!”

“Get lost dude, we can actually be charged with felony or land up in jail.” I said coming forward.

“Pussy! All fuckin pussies! I guarantee this will work, the DVD was passed on to me by a guy who bought a Honda civic without having to sweat a drop.” assured Nirvan.

“And besides, how long can we spend our parent’s money? We arent even bothering to attend interviews. I guess we are the only 4 guys of our batch who still don’t have a job”

“Don’t worry macha! Ill take care of the money, ill talk to my dad” said Dawan. He was the son of a multi-millionaire who owned a pharmaceutical and cosmetic product chain spread whole over south of India. The company had also made its marks in certain South American and African nations in selling their products.

I retrospected the idea. How long should we depend on others. I certainly don’t wanna earn sitting behind a desk for 12 hrs a day, nor did I want Dawan’s dad’s money. Thinking out of the box had always worked for humanity since the beginning of civilisation. We were thinking out of the box to employ the vulnerabilties of cash transactions of people who had serious money on them.

“Let’s do it” the words came out of my mouth involuntarily. A huge grin appeared on Nirvan’s face. Lleyton was still worried “you’ve gone insane too?” he shouted and laughed at the same time. Judging by the silence he realised we were serious

Run Siddharth! RUN! I kept telling myself.

I saw LLeyton, Nirvan and Dawan running with me.

Running! Like how a deer tries to escape from its predator. It was a hunt taking place. We were being chased on the streets if Rio di janeiro. I could feel my cell phone juggling in my pocket as I ran. I dug it out and hoped that this helps us save our lives

“Polícia! ajuda! estamos sendo perseguidos” I screamed. I managed to call out for help in portugese, with whatever grip I had over the language.

“O saldo é zero atualmente. Recarregue a fazer uma chamada” came the reply, a lovely female voice. This voice is usually heard when a mobile subscriber has run out of balance.

“Thanks a lot!, lady on the phone! Keep running!” I yelled at my mates

“Son of a bitch… couldn’t you have just recharged your god-damn phone. Stingy bastard” shouted LLeyton, almost bursting into tears.

We ran as we approached a narrower lane.

“Cock up and run” I said as my anger on myself and LLeyton engulfed me along with the fear of losing our lives.

BANG! BANG!

My heart skipped a beat as two bullets were fired nearby, whizzing past us. We didnt bother to see from where it came. But we knew from whom it came. We kept running, trying to keep in pace with our heart beats, beating away in full vigour and rate.

BANG!

Another one. But, this time followed by a huge shriek of pain. As I stopped and turned to see the person wounded,

BANG!

Something bit me. I bent as the muscle tearing pain of the highest magnitude overwhelmed me. Blood oozed out of my right calf. I saw LLeyton lying motionless just a yard away. Nirvan and Dawan also remained motionless standing with both their arms above them, Dawan crying like a kindergarten kid on his first day of school. We waited for them to come. We wanted to call truce. The pain was now becoming more pronounced and excruciating, the bullet from the rifle in their hands had passed straight through the muscles of my right leg before being stopped by the resistance offered by the strands of my ligaments

A couple of mean looking, dark skinned, muscular men walked up to them. Undoubtedly Indians. Dawan shivered, even as a cold chill rose up my spine. We waited in anticipation, praying that we stayed alive. The Indians walked slowly towards Nirvan stepping over LLeyton’s body as if he wasnt to be seen to them. The hand rose and a hard slap landed on Nirvan’s face, before we could say a word, from the palm of one of the Indians. Almost knocking him unconscious.

“You think it’s this easy? Run away and you can live a dream?” mumbled the menian, as blood trickled down from Nirvan’s ear. The menian raised his arm for another blip.

“Please dont! Dont! “cried, Dawan stepping away in fear with his arms still held high.

“How much do you want?” I yelled, trying to stand up, pain getting to its untolerable levels by now, as I gave up and fell to the ground.

“The same amountu you stole from him” came the reply in a strong Kannada accent from the other menian who hadnt spoken till now

“I mean how much to let us walk free? Accepting bribes isnt new for you guys”

BANG!

This time, my left arm! Pain! I forgot the pain in the calf as the new one soared to new levels of agony.

Dawan and Nirvan panicked.

“Why the fuck do we want him alive? Isnt it enough if we spare just one of them?” asked the kannadiga to the other menian.

“He specifically mentioned that he wanted all the four alive, but I guess 3 is good enough” he said as he gave a smirk towards the motionless body of LLeyton

Suddenly a flashing light blinded us. A green coloured van with neon headlights arrived.

“Shove them in” mumbled the kannada-accent man.

“Tume pata nai tumne kisko goli maara! I’ll make sure you spend the rest of your life rotting in a jail. You bloody…” I yelled still writhing in pain.

“hindi gottila” laughed the guy as he lifted the body of Lleyton’s and threw him in.

Ctrl+H and the history popped open. I checked as to what Adi was upto over the past few hours.
Facebook, Orkut, Google.
A student’s average browsing activity, didn’t surprise me much. But definitely made me think. Screw it, I had an internal to think about. So I stopped thinking about Adi and got ready to go to college. Soon I left the room, and headed to the college.
Adi was standing at the corner of the exam hall. I couldn’t make out as to what he was doing, but seemed as if he was about to piss in his pants. Maybe he finally realized his mistake of having to stay awake the whole night before the internal and not study.
“Wassup macha!! Prepared huh?” I asked Adi. This probably is the safest question to ask a classmate as you know what the other is going to answer. Just as I thought… Adi replied,
“Macha screwed da! This one’s gone, haven’t bloody studied anything da.” I might have given the same answer if anybody else had asked me (yeah, i had prepared completely for the test).
Exactly at 9, the test began. Somethings never get delayed. Poor Adi. He must have prayed a thousand times to the god wishing the test gets delayed if not postponed. God just doesn’t seem to listen to desperate people under difficult circumstances.
There was one question in the question paper which instantly grabbed my attention.
*Briefly explain the different sections in a foundry with their specific purposes.*
“Shuck! What in the blue hell is a foundry? Oh yeah, was supposed to study in the morning. Adi!!”
My answer read something like this ” Foundry is a place where welding is done. In foundry metal pieces are welded. Welded metal pieces can be used for….” blah blah. I’m one of those who would rather write crap than nothing at all.
A while later, all the internals got over. This meant one thing, PARTY! Adi and myself headed to J Cubz and treated ourselves to some Romanov vodka. We stopped after a couple of shots.  Somehow both of us managed to go to our room. Massive headache forced us to reach for the bed at 7pm.
I know, not the greatest of the celebrations after a series of tests. But then, we weren’t the most happening people on earth either.
I woke up in the middle of the night. Adi was at the computer again. Discreetly i looked into the monitor. I was right. I called Adi.
“Adi!”
Adi didn’t respond.
I called him again.
The expression on his face didn’t change. He couln’t sense my presence. I patted upon his shoulder, again no change.
Now I slapped him one hard on the cheek.
He looked shocked.
“What the hell happened? What am I doing in front of the comp da?”
“Shut up! Don’t act as if you don’t know.”
“Huh? I seriously don’t understand.”
“Your a clever chap. You are Sahil. Look at the comp da. Your logged on as Sahil”
“What the…I have no clue how this happened! I don’t remember this at all.”
Confused?? So was I.
The End.

“Macha that Rohan was trying to flirt with Rhea da!” claimed Adi.
“You know what?You remind me of Devdas and Forrest Gump da. Your a dejected lover like Devdas with brains of Gump. Are you crazy?! He probably was just trying to cheat.” I yelled.
Adi then went on to convince me as to how he loved Rhea and blah blah. He also told how people do crazy things in love (crap). At this point I felt like laughing at his face, but I tried hard and controlled myself. There is something wrong with him. I knew it.
I’ll have to find out more about Sahil.
I messaged Rhea when we got back to our apartment. Of course in the absence of Adi.
“hey Rhea” I typed, “sup?”
“Advaith! OMG! Looong tym since u msgd hw u bin?” came an instant reply
“nvr bin better :) so hwz lyf?”
“osm! Im luvin dis coll! Hw did u do in d internals?”
The same old boring conversation would have been fueled if I had replied “not bad hw did u do?” but I had no patience. Let me cut the chase “I hrd bout dis NRI guy frm adi…hu is he?”
“ohhh so dis bout him uh?”
“adi has bin acting very unusual lately…lets catch up near the canteen tom…sharp 11…wht say?”
“hmmmm sure cya de…gtg ttyl J”
TTYL. Don’t know why people use those stupid SMS lingo when they don’t mean them.
The following day I met Rhea and enlightened myself about the happenings between them and more importantly about Sahil. She told me how good a charmer Mr Sahil was.
She told me as to how eagerly she had been waiting for the NRI to meet her after a week. And after half a precious hour, we got into talking about Adi. Have to say, I myself was bored out of my mind listening to her talk about the NRI. No wonder poor Adi was pissed that badly. And she again started off about Sahil..
I interrupted her, “Did you talk to Adi lately?”
“Hmmm. Maybe a week or so earlier. I don’t remember properly. Why are you asking?”
“Just like that, anyways gotta go. Have to study for tomorrow’s internal.”
“Bye.” And we left. I was certainly sure of one thing, the NRI had successfully wooed Rhea. I decided not to talk about this to Adi.

Once upon a Love story
I later went to our room.
As I was searching for my ear phones Adi walks in.
“Dude I’m going to bed”
“Ok dude. Do as you please”
Put on my earphones. The first song apocalyptica-nothing else matters. Sweet. I raised the volume and started solving math for the internals tomorrow. After sometime I dozed off.
In the morning,
*bol bol why u ditched me*
*zindagi bhi lele yaar kill me*
*bol bol why you ditched me WHORE!*
What an awesome song to wake up to. Adi repeating the lyrics made it even worse. I looked at my watch. 7.30am. But, when did I fall asleep?
“dude do you mind” i said pointing towards the speakers.
“oh sorry macha…sleep” replied Adi as he turned down the volume of emotional attyachar. There had’t been any lack of the attyachar hes given me lately.
“dude ill leave. Cya in coll” saying that Adi left, before I could ask him about his preparation for the internals.
I woke up and walked towards the computer. Good thing Adi had forgotten to switch it off. I had to check my mails.
Right then it struck my mind. I searched for the ctrl key on the keyboard. Ctrl+H.

Adi and I stayed in an apartment near our college. We didn’t like the god forsaken campus hostel, which looked like it hadn’t been maintained ever since it was built. Staying alone with a close friend away from your parents, away from responsibilities, at age 18 is the dream of every teenager in Bangalore. The possibilities of doing crazy things were vast. But to do crazy things, one should be crazy. Which we sadly weren’t. We were just a couple of nerds who had slogged their ass off right from 10th to reach a reputed engineering college.

I cant forget the sleep deprived self of mine by-hearting organic chemistry, solving physics problems, getting lost in integral calculus, and finding myself in stereo isomerism. That was our world. No TV, no internet, no social interaction, no recreation, and sometimes no food. The only false hope of a kickass life in undergrad courses kept the zeal in us alive.
I remember Adi trying hard to convince Rhea to join the college he was planning to join. Like me, he too wanted to get out of our town and join a college in Bangalore. The silicon capital of India. The city with maximum number of engineering colleges in the world. And he succeeded in convincing his love. And the three of us were the only (un)lucky ones to join this top college from our town.
“Damn da! I just can’t concentrate. Goddamn Americans! Can’t they just mind their business?” screamed Adi. He just didn’t care about the internals the next day. All that he was bothered about was Rhea and his flirtatious FB friend Sahil, or as we called him shuckin NRI.
Adi succeeded in distracting me from my studies. Apparently the NRI would use all his charm at her while he chatted with her at 1200 hours IST.
I said “Chill da! Maybe they are family or something.” I know, it sounds utterly lame.
But i was trying to calm Adi. This would just not help as Adi was highly insecure when it came to Rhea and moreso when it came to her charmer FB friend.
“SOB won’t even accept our friend requests!” and blah blah went on Adi
“Relax macha. Why in the blue hell do you want him as your friend? Now are you gonna flirt with him?”
“Hell no, are u retarded or what?” shouted Adi. He then went on to tell me how he wanted to talk to NRI about him and Rhea, and politely ask him to get out of her life.
The next day started off at 4.30am. Both of us got up early to finish off the lessons that we had skipped the night before. We managed to somehow finish all the important lessons. However all our efforts seemed waste once we were in the college premises.
“What is clausius-mosatti equation?” asked Vipin, the nerd from our class. Adi and me saw eachother’s face as if we spoken to in korean. He shot us with another question “What is Bragg’s law?”
“Which chapter are those from da? Is it in electrical at all?” I asked.
“Relax da. I was just playing around. Its from physics.” assured Vipin.
“Shuck!! Thank god.” came from both of us.

The scene in the exam hall was a little different though. The exam itself was quite easy, and I was pretty sure both me and Adi would score distinction.
After 45 minutes into the exam, Adi started acting as if he were uncomfortable with something. He was constantly making sudden movements. He kept gazing at Rohan, the guy sitting behind Rhea. For a neutral viewer, it would have seemed as if Adi was interested in Rohan than Rhea. The invigilator might have shared the same opinion, cause exactly two minutes later she asked what he was upto.
“Nothing madam. I was just wondering what the time was?”replied Adi.
Luckily she left him with a warning.
I shouted at Adi after finishing the exam.
“What in the blue hell was wrong with you?”
Adi’s reply left me shocked.

“Dude, it’s the American guy” said Adi
“What?” I asked
“Dude the NRI guy”
I realized it was about her again. Rhea. It was all Adi could talk about in recent times and needless to say I was getting a little annoyed.
And this time it was bang in the middle of electronics class. I loved electronics. May be because it was only the first semester, but the complexity, the circuits, the logic, the components gave my brain the much needed exercise.
“Dude, are you listening?” barked Adi looking rather worried now
“ummm….yeah. Yeah, what about the NRI?”
“He’s all she can talk about these days. Apparently he has told her everything about himself”
“dude chill. He might just be a  friend. You know her since..like what?..1st grade?”
“No he is not just a friend. Definitely a big flirt. Why else would he choose to talk to someone he doesn’t know from 3000 miles away?”
“Relax dude. Let’s talk about it later” I tried to get back to concentrating on Amplitude modulation, which the teacher was explaining with greater vigour and volume now.
“He is from bishop wools and it seems he knows you”
Shuck AM, he knows who? “he knows whom?” I blurted
“You. It seems he has seen you in PACE classes you used to attend”
Ahhh..the PACE classes. Yeah I am quite famous there. All nerds are.
“oh I see” I replied
“dude we have to find out who he is”

If you still didn’t understand what this is all about lemme explain in detail.
Rhea was the girl of Adi’s dreams. Both knew each other since they were in…which grade was that again?…ahh yeah 1st grade. But was Adi, Rhea’s guy of her dreams? Sadly, no. The guy was deep into the black hole of the best friend zone and there was no way he could get out of there. But Adi had no plans of moving on. Jealousy was one feeling he had got used to very well. A casual “hi” from a guy would instantly turn him green. And now there was a more dangerous nemesis for him. ‘The NRI dude’ armed with loads of charm, a US accent, education from bishop wools, and a FB account.
And who am I?
My name is Advaith.

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