Sengupta and his team already knew that they were racing against time but they hardly had any idea of how bad the things had gone. After retrieving some footage from two cameras, Rohan shivered at the horrific scenes. They had hours of footage to watch! Rohan unable to put up with it...switched seats with Saraswati and started observing the live camera. Saraswati was however very calm. She only uttered, "We will need medical backup right away. Tell them to keep some anti-drugs ready!" to Sengupta.
"How about painkillers?" Sengupta asked while setting up a call.
"She might be numb already given the amount of drugs she has consumed and the level of torture inflicted on her!" She replied softly.
Sengupta's throat went dry as he wiped away tears from his eyes without anyone looking.
Meanwhile, Rohan was awestruck. "The nerves this woman has!" Rohan mumbled.
"What are you doing?" Saraswati screamed at the top of her voice.
"Huh?" Rohan was baffled.
"The location is shifting can't you see?" she asked him.
"Shifting?" Sengupta gasped.
"Yes...oh...I have some very bad news for you!" she murmured.
"Has there been any good news till now? At this point, it's just news!" Sengupta sighed.
"Well...looks like they are heading for the dock," she susurrated.
"What dock?" asked Sengupta. He was too burdened to keep a straight mind at the moment.
"The Kolkata Dock...seriously where you at?" she said under her breath.
"But, doesn't Kolkata have many docks? Which one were they heading for?"
"Garden Reach," Saraswati stated calmly.
"Are you sure?" he asked.
"Well I am positive. Seems like they are taking advantage of all haunted places. Anyway you should know Garden Reach is usually deserted."
"Now, that is very bad news!" he yelled out.
Saraswati sighed. Sengupta called up his team at Kolkata and explained the situation. His voice had a hint of panic. The dock was to be sealed right away without anyone knowing. But they had to let them get to the dock first. Otherwise, they wouldn't be able to catch anyone in the act.
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Sharmishtha could hear a lot of noise outside. She knew they had moved her to some other location. "Not to worry!" She thought. Sengupta and others would still arrive by tracking her location. But did they also keep the other girls with her? She was too dizzy to ponder upon this thought. Her eyes were slowly shutting down as she was slowly losing her consciousness.
"Shyra!" she heard someone calling her name. Rey? Is he here? No. She might have been dreaming. It felt like Rey was standing somewhere nearby yet far away. "Shyra?" another voice! Is it Baba? Her eyes teared up. She wanted to hug him. Little by little, she was feeling as if everyone was there. "Shyra" a harsh voice. Maa? "I am sorry. I married into this dysfunctional family where everything was wrong! But he made me happy, he made me feel loved until you were born! So I hated you! But...I guess...I just hated my own decisions! My decision of having you even though I could already feel how bad it would have been for you! My decision of sending you away! I made your life miserable! I am sorry that you had to bear with this. I was young and immature...so I inflicted my pain upon you. I am sorry. I know that you might not be able to forgive...but I had to say this! And from the bottom of my heart, I truly wish you all the love and happiness in the world! My child, you are remarkable, you are kind, you are beautiful! And one day you're generosity and your innate goodness will come back to you! One day you will only walk the path of eternal joy and feel no pain! And that day, forgive your mother! Today I can truly express I love you and I am grateful that I had the good fortune of having you! Love, Maa." The voice uttered every word that her maa had left her with for the last time.
"Di?" her brothers! "We love you. You are our pride and joy. Don't mind anyone. You are so brave! So brilliant! When we grow up we will be just like you! We promise," the last words she ever heard from her brothers! Slowly all of them Rey, Baba, Maa, her brothers, Rajiv, Roy, Rohan, Sengupta everyone seemed far away as if it had all happened a long time ago. As if she was standing in a distant place and watching them slowly move away! "Shyra" she heard one last time.
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Sengupta made up three teams for the search operation! One locked down the dock, another to search around Sonapur and the other one to dig up the city just in case the girls were not with her. But it was very likely that they had girls in the dock. Obviously, they wouldn't be selling just one woman!
As police started digging up. The place became a war zone with both parties firing at each other. The traffickers seemed quite adept at it too. Meaning they had done this many times before! Sengupta got shot twice before eventually killing off a coup of criminals. Nothing could stop him today. He ordered his teams to be consistent at not give up any moment. This was by far one of the biggest search operations! They had to succeed.
As Sengupta watched his officers getting killed right in front of his eyes. His built-up rage was now boiling up like lava waiting to escape the volcano. After three hours, they finally found the girls. But to their surprise, they found way more than twenty girls in the storage vans of the dock. Many girls were found in Sonapur waiting to be shipped. The police arrested a few dozen people and killed off about fifty in their ongoing operation.
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Following the instructions from Saraswati, Sengupta headed straight up for Sharmishtha. As per footage, they deemed her to be in an unconscious state with a short woman standing nearby. Her face was not visible. Upon arriving, he couldn't see much as it was completely dark. He lit up a torch and started swinging the light around to ward off any potential danger. But the room was empty with a chair in the middle. There she was, all bloody and tied up. Her face was looking down with her long hair covering the rest of her. Shivering and crying, Sengupta slowly approached her. "Shyra?" he called out softly. There was no response. The medical team was already on alert. Upon learning that the room was clean, they arrived as soon as possible. Sengupta had cut off the ropes. They slowly tucked her onto the emergency bed. Sengupta was still staring at the horrible state of his friend. Little by little his body was losing strength. He did not seem to be there until a nurse screamed, "We need CPR. Quickly! She has no pulse. She isn't even breathing!"
"Should we get adrenaline?" someone asked her. As the medical team were hurrying up to try and save the presumably dead person, Sengupta fell to the ground. He was feeling dizzy and breathless. His mind was lost in the memories of their childhood and his heart was perhaps too heavy with the grief that those memories, that very friend, everything was gone! With a snap of a finger, he felt like the world collapsed around him. He couldn't hear anything anymore. He couldn't respond to Rohan or Roy asking for information through the earpiece. He was too bound into his thoughts to think of anything else. An immense feeling engulfed him that he could not identify! Perhaps it was anguish, perhaps it was anger, perhaps it was love or perhaps it was regret! Anger and regret of not being able to save a friend, and the anguish of losing someone! Whatever it was, it was useless for it could not ever bring back what was lost! So perhaps it was some worthless feelings!
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TO BE CONTINUED!