Knowledge was a poison. The secret of Project Agni burned inside Harsh, a radioactive core of terror and awe. Every container he unloaded now felt like it could contain a piece of the missile itself. Every foreign sailor looked like a spy. The ghost's silent observation was no longer just enforcement; it was a countdown to his eventual silencing.
The crushing labor, the squalor of the chawl, the disdain of the other loaders—it all took on a new, sharper edge. He wasn't just being punished; he was being stored. Kept on ice until he was no longer useful, or until he became too dangerous to keep alive.
The despair that followed this realization was deeper than any that had come before. It was a void. What could he possibly do? Expose Swami? Go to the authorities? He would be dead before he finished the sentence, and the project would simply move to a new, more secret location. Inspector Sawant was an honest man, but he was one man against an empire that now included the Indian military-industrial complex.
He considered running. Disappearing into the vastness of India. But to go where? And to do what? He was Harsh Patel, the wharf rat. He had nothing and was nobody.
The days ground on. The fever had left him weaker, and the work seemed harder. One afternoon, tasked with moving a series of heavy engine blocks, his body finally gave out. His foot slipped on a patch of oil, and the full weight of a block landed on his left hand, pinning it against the steel deck of the ship.
The pain was instantaneous and blinding. A white-hot explosion that shot up his arm. He heard, more than felt, the sickening crunch of bone.
The other loaders gathered around, not with concern, but with a grim, practical recognition. Injuries were part of the job. The foreman pushed through the crowd, his face annoyed.
"Get him to the clinic," he barked at two other men. "Stupid clumsy fool."
The company clinic was a dismal room with a dirty cot and a disinterested medic who glanced at the hand, already swollen and purpling, and shrugged.
"Crush injury. Probably broken. Nothing to do but wrap it and wait." He sloppily bandaged the hand, gave Harsh two painkiller tablets, and sent him back to the chawl.
The pain was a constant, throbbing agony. But worse was the helplessness. He was right-handed, but his left hand was crucial for balancing loads, for gripping, for the brute mechanics of his survival. He was now even less of a man, an even more useless unit of labor.
That night, as he lay on his cot cradling his ruined hand, the ghost appeared in the doorway. He didn't enter. He just looked at the bandaged hand, his expression unreadable.
"The foreman says you are now a liability," the ghost rasped. "Productivity has dropped."
Harsh said nothing. What was there to say?
"The empire has no use for broken tools," the ghost continued. His dead eyes held Harsh's for a long moment. Then he turned and left.
The message was clear. His time was up. The anvil had fallen, and he was the metal that hadn't been strong enough to be shaped. He was just… broken.
He lay in the dark, the pain in his hand merging with the deeper ache of total defeat. This was how it ended. Not in a blaze of glory or a clever counter-strike, but in a squalid room, forgotten and broken.
He must have finally fallen into a fitful sleep, because he was awakened by another soft knock. He expected the ghost, returned to finish the job.
But it was Dr. Desai again. His face was grim in the weak light.
"Let me see," the doctor said, his voice gentle but firm. He unwrapped the clumsy bandage and examined the hand, his fingers probing gently. He frowned. "The metacarpals are shattered. This needs an X-ray. Proper setting. Or you will never use it properly again." He looked at Harsh. "The company clinic will not do this."
"Then it won't get done," Harsh whispered, the words thick with despair.
Dr. Desai was silent for a moment, studying him. He saw not just the injury, but the resignation, the utter defeat in Harsh's eyes.
"Your father was a man of principle," the doctor said quietly. "He believed in the dignity of work, of building something honest. He would tell me that, often, over tea." He began re-wrapping the hand with a clean bandage from his bag, his movements precise and careful. "This place... it takes that dignity away. It tries to make you into nothing. But it only succeeds if you let it."
He finished the bandage. "I cannot fix your hand here. But I know a doctor at JJ Hospital. A good man. He will see you tomorrow. I will tell him you are my nephew." He handed Harsh a slip of paper with a name and time. "Do not be late."
Harsh stared at the paper, then at the doctor. "Why are you doing this?"
Dr. Desai picked up his bag. "Because a tool should not be discarded just because it is broken. Sometimes, it just needs to be repaired by a better craftsman."
He left, leaving Harsh alone with the slip of paper and a flicker of something he hadn't felt in weeks: a fragment of hope.
The next day, he went to JJ Hospital. The doctor there, a friend of Desai's, took X-rays, confirmed the breaks, and set the bones properly in a plaster cast. The pain lessened almost immediately, replaced by a dull, manageable ache.
As he left the hospital, his arm in a sling, he felt different. The cast was not just a medical device; it was a symbol. It was proof that someone, somewhere, still believed he was worth fixing.
He stood on the busy street, the city swirling around him. Swami had tried to break him on the anvil of the docks. He had shattered his body and his spirit.
But as he looked down at the white plaster cast, he realized something.
Anvil's don't just break things. They also shape them. They temper them.
He had been under the hammer, beaten down to his very core. But he was not destroyed. He was still here. And he had something now that he didn't have before.
He had a perfect, undeniable reason to be off the docks. He had time. And he had a friend.
The broken tool was about to be repurposed.
He started walking, not back toward the docks, but toward the train station. He had a visit to make. It was time to talk to a doctor about more than just a broken hand.
It was time to learn about the empire's weakest point: its people.
(Chapter End)