Chapter 15: The Oven
The backlash from the Puppalaguda farm attack was immediate. Satya Kumar pulled strings with the Home Ministry to find out who was giving orders from inside the jail.
At 3:00 AM, the alarm bells in Central Jail didn't ring—they screamed.
Arjun woke up instantly. The heavy thud of boots on the concrete corridor echoed like thunder. It wasn't the regular night patrol. This was the Flying Squad.
"Raid! Everyone up! Stand by the wall!"
Shiva sat up, his eyes wide. He looked at the loose stone in the floor where the Nokia 1100 was hidden.
"They brought dogs," Shiva whispered, hearing the snarls. "If they find the phone, they add five years to your sentence."
Arjun moved fast. He pried the stone open and grabbed the phone. He popped the back cover, ripped out the SIM card, and snapped it in half.
But the handset was still there. Metal. Detectable.
The boots were right outside Barrack 6.
Arjun ran to the rear ventilation window. He didn't hesitate. He shoved the phone through the rusted mesh, pushing it hard until it fell into the sludge of the drainage ditch outside.
Plop.
The door crashed open. Ten officers stormed in with batons and a German Shepherd.
"Strip! Now!"
Arjun turned around slowly, raising his hands. He was calm. He held the two pieces of the broken SIM card hidden under his tongue.
They tore the cell apart. The dog sniffed at the loose stone, but the phone was gone. The officer got in Arjun's face, furious.
"We know you're talking to the outside," the officer hissed. "We'll catch you."
Arjun didn't blink. "Good luck, Sir."
The next morning, the prison yard was tense.
Arjun sat on the bench, spitting the plastic pieces of the SIM card into the dust.
"We are blind," Shiva grunted. "Mallesh is waiting for orders. Without the phone, we are cut off."
"The phone was a toy," Arjun said, his eyes fixed on the main gate. "We need a pipeline."
He watched a rusted blue Tata 407 truck rumble through the gates. It backed up to the soot-covered building in the corner—the Bakery. The driver hopped out, lighting a cigarette, while prisoners started loading crates.
"That truck," Arjun said. "It goes in and out every day. No checks."
He stood up.
"We're taking the bakery."
Getting the transfer was easy. Nobody wanted to work in the hellish heat of the ovens. The Warden signed the paper without looking up.
By noon, Arjun and Shiva walked into the bakery.
The heat hit them like a hammer. It was forty-five degrees inside. The air smelled of burning wood, sour yeast, and unwashed bodies.
The man in charge was a lifer named Gowtham, known as 'Pandi' (Pig). He was a massive, sweating mound of fat sitting on a plastic chair near the only fan. He was eating a bun while twenty prisoners worked in miserable silence around him.
"New labor?" Pandi grunted, wiping crumbs from his mouth. "Grab the flour sacks. Move."
Arjun didn't look at the sacks. He looked at the bread on Pandi's table. It was flat, hard, and gray.
Arjun walked up to Pandi and picked up the bun. He squeezed it. It didn't bounce back.
"Garbage," Arjun said, tossing it back onto the table.
Pandi stopped chewing. He stared at Arjun.
"What did you say?"
"I said it's garbage," Arjun said, his voice cold and echoing in the large room. "You're stealing the sugar. You're stealing the oil. And you're making this place smell like a sewer."
Pandi stood up. He towered over Arjun, his face turning red with rage.
"You have a big mouth, kid. Do you know who I am? I run this block. Now pick up that sack before I break your legs and throw you in the oven."
Pandi reached out to grab Arjun's collar.
Arjun didn't move. He didn't flinch.
Shiva moved.
It was a blur of motion. Shiva stepped in, grabbed Pandi's outstretched arm, and twisted it violently.
CRACK.
Pandi screamed as his shoulder popped out of its socket.
Before Pandi could fall, Shiva grabbed him by the throat and lifted him off his feet. He slammed the big man against the hot brick wall next to the oven.
Pandi shrieked as the heat singed his skin.
The twenty workers stopped. The mixers whirred in the terrified silence.
Arjun stepped closer to Pandi, who was gasping for air in Shiva's grip.
"You don't run this block anymore," Arjun whispered. "You don't even work here anymore."
"The... The Warden..." Pandi choked out.
"The Warden wants bread, not excuses," Arjun said. "You're going to the Warden right now. You're going to tell him your asthma is acting up and you need a transfer to the cleaning unit. You're going to scrub toilets, Pandi. Because if I see your face in my bakery again..."
Arjun nodded at the roaring fire in the oven.
"...you won't walk out."
Arjun signaled Shiva.
Shiva dragged Pandi to the back door and threw him out into the dirt like a sack of garbage. Pandi scrambled away, holding his arm, terrified, running toward the administration block.
Arjun turned to the workers. They were frozen, expecting the new boss to be worse.
"Clean this mess up," Arjun ordered, his voice sharp. "Scrub the floors. Fix the dough. From today, we make real bread. If the quality drops, you answer to Shiva."
By 2:00 PM, the bakery was transformed. The floor was swept. The bread coming out of the ovens was golden brown and soft.
The blue truck backed into the loading bay. The driver, Dass, hopped out. He looked for Pandi but saw Arjun standing there, cool and composed despite the heat.
"Where's Pandi?" Dass asked.
"Transferred," Arjun said. He handed Dass a crate.
"Dass," Arjun said, his voice dropping. "You have a drop at the Government Hospital."
"Yeah."
"My man Mallesh will be at the back gate. Give him this crate." Arjun tapped the wood. "And if he gives you a package to bring back... put it under your seat."
Dass looked at Arjun. He felt the shift in power. He didn't ask questions.
"Understood, Bhai."
Arjun watched the truck leave.
Inside a loaf in that crate was a letter for Mallesh. The logistics line was open.
"We have the money flowing," Arjun said to Shiva, watching the dust settle. "We have the communication."
He turned back to the bakery.
"Now we need a brain. Someone to count the cash."
"Nanda?" Shiva asked.
"The Auditor," Arjun nodded. "Bring him here tomorrow. He's done being a victim. It's time he worked for a winner."