New Story: Shamisha - Part 4

Damn Machines

Suddenly a message flashed on my computer screen: “Are you the One?”
“The one? Which one?” I asked. It was strange for someone to message in green (but considering the growing concern for environment and increasing trend to ‘go green’, I took it as a fad).
The screen flashed again “I mean, Are you Shanu?”
“Yes.”
“Run”
“Run. Where? Why?”
“This is the problem with you researchers. You ask a lot of irrelevant questions. Run. There is a danger to your life.”
“Danger. What kind of danger?”
“Is there a need to probe on every thing? Just run.”
“But where?”
“Again a question. When will your kind learn the lesson? You are wasting time. Run anywhere. Just move out of your office. We will send backup team to protect you.”

I left the chair immediately and scanned the floor for my immediate boss. He was nowhere to be seen. I took a deep breath and started to run (Well it was actually a rushed and cautious walk). There was a sense of déjà-vu in the way the entire episode happened. Probably I had seen some movie/serial with the same plot. Yet I was in no mood to risk my life and hence continued to move on as directed. The elevator area was empty and as I waited for my ride to ground floor a silly thought struck me: ‘What if someone is trying to make a fool out of me?’
‘No way.’ I answered myself.

As the elevator door opened, a big muscular man moved out of it.
“Are you the One?” he asked me.
“Yes” I answered feeling relieved that an able man has been sent to rescue me.
“It was nice meeting you.” There was something wrong in the tone. “Goodbye” and he took out a pistol (don’t ask me the variant. I do not know any one of them). I was scared and wanted to scream but nothing came out of my mouth. Suddenly the door of the other elevator opened and someone said “Duck”. As I ducked, a bullet flew over my head. And in a moment, the small place turned into a mini battlefield with bullets flying everywhere. In the midst of all these, I somehow managed to hear a “Run”. ‘Run!! But where? I can’t dodge all these bullets to run either to the elevator or to the stairs.’ I thought it was better to ask for a clarification.
“Run where?”
“Again a question!!! Urgh…. Jump from the window.” My rescuer reacted. He was a man with decent built but somehow I was not convinced that he was the right choice to save me from the clutches of that evil, muscular man (especially not after this advice).
“Jump from the window. Are you mad? This is 9th floor. I do not want to die.”
“You will die anyway. Jump and that is your only chance to survive. Believe me. I’ll follow you there.”
“I have no doubt that you will follow me to the next world.”
In the meantime, the evil man was closing in on my escape route to the window and so I decided to take this chance (After all there are a few examples in which people miraculously survived a 9 floor fall). And as I made my way through to the window, I remembered my family, friends and God for the last time. As I took the plunge, I was caught by a pair of mechanic hands which put me in an aircraft. Suddenly another figure leapt from the window which was caught by the same mechanic hands and put into the aircraft. And then we flew.

“Who was he?” I asked my savior.
“He was T-1295: The Terminator.”
“A terminator?”
“Well, he is an assassin machine who blends with the human: An intelligent move by machine’s leader ‘Skynet’ to put moles in the humans and stop our resistance.”
“Wait a minute. Are we fighting machines? But those were a part of our mythology.”
“Yes we are fighting machines. I am Marcus Wright. I too am a cyborg but am fighting for the human cause.”
“This is going way over my head. Why they want to kill me?”
“Because you are the One.”
“Hey man. I am no Neo or John Connor or Sam to fight evil machines. Why is their targeting wrong?”
“It is not your marketing research problem. They have targeted the right guy. You hold the key for our resistance.”
“I do not understand anything.”
“Prime. I think we have come far enough. We can take some rest.” And suddenly we landed and the aircraft converted into a robotic giant.
“Who the hell is he?”
“My name is Optimus Prime. I come from Planet Cybertron. I am here to protect the humans against the evil alliance of the machines and Megatron.”
“Now, who the hell is Megatron?”
“Your entire life is dependent on asking questions?” Wright asked me.
“No, my livelihood depends on asking questions.” I chuckled “But who is Megatron?”
“Megatron is an evil who is responsible for economic crisis in our planet.” roared Prime.
“Okay. Calm down. But you said that you are fighting machines and both of you are machines. So it is essentially a fight between machines with humans caught in between.” I spoke as if I was giving a ‘terrific’ insight.
“Please do not make comprehension of an easy fact so tedious.”
“Okay. I will not do that again. But thanks for helping me anyhow.”
“It was good that you do not come with any baggage. It helped us a lot.” commented Prime.
“Baggage?”
“Well, in all previous instances, the supposed saviors had a girlfriend or ‘soulmate’ and much of our resources were utilized in saving them from danger. Not this time. It is a good personal decision from your side. Given the economic recession in both our planets, our budgets are severely constrained. We are equipped to save only one. Your decision helped us a lot.”
“I hope what you were saying is true. It is a big booster for me personally.”

After few lighter moments, we came back to original topic.
“Why are they targeting me?”
“As I said you hold the key.”
“Key for what?”
“Key for our resistance. You will be the one who will inspire people to give up most of their dependency on machines. This will be a big blow to them and their plans.”
“But I am dependent on machines. How will I inspire people to abandon usage of machines?”
“It is your destiny. Oracle told us so. Further we recently got hold of a translated transcript in which you were arguing with a friend over the usage and dependency of machines. That was insightful.”
“That was way back in 2003 and that was a fun discussion.”
“Whatever be the case you are destined to bring in that revolution. We learn that somehow Skynet has got hold of that transcript and is after you.”
“But why today?”

“Because today on 10th July 2009, Decepticons, the community led by Megatron is hitting the Indian screen again in Transformers 2: Revenge of the Fallen. And what can be a more opportune moment for the machines to flex their muscles than this?”

P.S: A product of boredom and frustration