The controlled chaos of the shipyard was a mask. Beneath the shouted orders and the revving engines was a cold, efficient purge. Harsh understood now. He wasn't witnessing a panic; he was witnessing a retreat. Swami was cutting off the infected limb to save the body, and Inspector Sawant was providing the tourniquet.
His own survival depended on becoming part of the purge. He kept his head down, his stench-covered body just another anonymous worker loading the very evidence of the crime onto trucks. Each crate containing a piece of the Agni guidance system felt like a coffin nail for his hopes. He was helping them bury the truth.
He worked near a truck that was being filled with documents from the admin office—file cabinets, boxes of papers. His heart leapt into his throat. Among them was the grey safe, its door hanging open, empty. His folder was gone, now in the hands of Ravi Pandey, but its original home was being disposed of. He had to see what else they were destroying.
A foreman barked at him and another loader to grab a heavy metal strongbox from a nearby jeep and load it into the truck. The box was unremarkable, but it was handled with a care that the sensitive missile components weren't even afforded. Two of Swami's personal enforcers watched, their hands resting lightly on the pistols tucked into their waistbands.
As they hefted the box, the latch, weakened or faulty, sprang open. The contents didn't spill, but Harsh caught a glimpse inside as they quickly slammed it shut and threw it into the truck.
It wasn't filled with rupees or gold. It was filled with medical files. Thick, organized folders. And on top, he saw a name he recognized on a tab: Sharma, R. (Son: Leukemia, London).
Dr. Desai's ledger. The web of debts. The empire's true currency of control. Swami wasn't just destroying the evidence of the missile; he was destroying the evidence of his leverage. He was cleaning house, tying up every loose end.
And loose ends didn't just include files.
A new, more immediate terror seized Harsh. Sharma. The foreman who had given him the combination. The man whose son's life hung in the balance. If Swami was erasing the evidence, he would erase the people connected to it. Sharma knew about the shipyard, about the safe. He was a liability.
Harsh had to warn him. The compulsion was immediate and irrational. He had gotten the man into this; he couldn't let him be silenced because of it.
He dropped the clipboards and melted away from the loading area, slipping back into the maze of scrap and hulls. He moved with a desperate energy, his broken hand a throbbing reminder of his fragility. He had to get to the company housing colony. Now.
He avoided the main gate, instead scaling a quieter, more broken section of the fence, tearing his clothes further on the razor wire. He ran through the scrubland, not toward the station, but toward the grim colony of homes.
The Sharma residence felt different. The air was too still. The usual faint sounds of life from the other apartments were absent. It was as if the entire building was holding its breath.
He didn't knock. He pushed the door. It was unlocked.
The sight inside would be seared into his memory forever.
The small living room was overturned. A chair was broken. A cup of tea had been spilled, leaving a dark brown stain on the floor. Mrs. Sharma was on her knees, weeping silently, her body rocking back and forth. And in the center of the room, sat Mr. Sharma.
He was alive. But he was broken in a way that had nothing to do with bones. He sat on the floor, his back against the sofa, staring at nothing. His face was a mask of utter devastation. In his hand, he clutched a piece of paper.
He looked up as Harsh entered. There was no surprise, no anger. Only a hollow, unbearable emptiness.
"They came," Sharma said, his voice a dry rasp. "After the newspaper came. They knew it was me. They knew I gave you the combination."
Harsh's blood ran cold. "Your son... is he—?"
A terrible, broken sound escaped Sharma's lips. It wasn't a laugh or a sob. "No. They did not hurt him. They showed me this." He held out the crumpled paper. It was a fax. From a hospital in London.
It was a notice of immediate termination of treatment for Master Rohan Sharma. Due to non-payment of outstanding fees. Effective immediately.
"They told me the money would stop if I ever spoke," Sharma whispered, the paper trembling in his hand. "They told me a man in London would make sure no other hospital would take him. They told me my son would die in pain, in a foreign country, and it would be my fault."
He looked at Harsh, and the emptiness in his eyes was worse than any accusation. "You promised he would be safe. You gave me your word."
The words were a physical blow. Harsh had promised. He had vowed to use his hidden money. But his money was inaccessible, hidden in a false account, and Swami had moved with the speed of a predator. He had attacked not the man, but his most vulnerable point. He hadn't broken Sharma's body; he had extinguished his soul.
"I... I will get the money. I will—" Harsh stammered, the words sounding pathetic, meaningless.
"It is too late," Sharma said, dropping the fax. "The treatment is stopped. The damage is done. You used my son's life as a weapon. And you lost."
Harsh stood there, paralyzed by the man's quiet despair. He had been so focused on the grand game, on toppling the empire, that he had forgotten the human cost of each move. He had seen Sharma as a pawn, a "weakest link," not as a father. His victory in stealing the documents felt ash-like, a monstrously selfish act.
He had wanted to be a king. But kings, he realized in that horrifying moment, decided who lived and who died. And he had just gotten a boy in London killed.
The sound of a car pulling up outside broke the silence. A door slammed.
Sharma's eyes met Harsh's, and for a second, a flicker of the old man emerged from the void. "Go," he rasped. "Now. Through the back. They have come for you."
Harsh didn't hesitate. He turned and fled through the small kitchen and out the back door, just as the front door burst open.
He ran without looking back, the image of Sharma's broken form burned onto his retinas. He had the proof. He had sparked the scandal. But the price had been a child's life.
The ghost had been right. The ocean was vast and cruel. And Harsh had just learned that sometimes, winning the battle meant drowning something precious to stay afloat.
He was free from the shipyard. But he was shackled by a guilt heavier than any chains Swami could forge.
(Chapter End)