The Terrifying Journey and an Empty Room
1511 Words
Seeing that tiny plastic doll lying discarded on the cold ICU floor made the veins in Prachi’s head pound violently, as if they were about to burst.
Under the eerie red and blue glow of the medical monitors, the smear of fresh blood on the doll’s face looked like a grotesque, horrifying smile. Prachi’s trembling hands shot forward, snatching the doll from Deva’s grip. For a second, her lungs simply stopped working. This wasn't just any doll. Tied around its neck was a faded blue ribbon embroidered with a small 'P'. It was the exact same ribbon Prachi had tied around her daughter’s favorite toy just two days ago.
"No... no... this is impossible!" A raw, agonizing scream ripped from Prachi’s throat. The dam finally broke, and tears streamed uncontrollably down her face. "This is my daughter's doll, Deva! She was holding this exact doll when I left the apartment!"
Deva’s jaw locked. The momentary flash of panic in his eyes was instantly incinerated by a lethal, bloodthirsty rage. He realized instantly that the enemy wasn't just after Rishi; they were systematically destroying everything connected to him. And Rishi Malhotra's greatest weakness was Prachi.
"Seal the entire hospital! Nobody gets in or out!" Deva roared into his wireless earpiece, his voice booming with authority. "I want CCTV footage of every single inch of this building, right now! And get my black SUV running in the portico. Move!"
Dr. Vansh, who was still frantically inspecting the ripped cables behind the empty bed, suddenly yelled out. "Deva! Prachi! Look at this!"
Both of them whipped around. Vansh pointed behind the primary monitor to a hidden, portable power bank and a cleanly sliced ventilator tube. "He wasn't killed! Someone intentionally hacked the monitor to trigger the flatline alarm just to keep us occupied at the door. While we were trying to break in, they transferred Rishi to a portable life-support system and... and they took him out of here alive!"
"But how?!" Prachi screamed, bordering on hysteria. "The door was locked from the outside! We were all standing right there!"
Deva’s dark eyes darted upward, locking onto the massive AC ventilation grille near the ceiling. The heavy screws had been removed, and the metal grate was hanging loosely by a single hinge.
"The ventilation shafts," Deva hissed, grinding his teeth. "They had the hospital's blueprints. And whoever the hell this is, they know exactly how and where to hurt us."
But Prachi didn't care about Rishi or the hospital anymore. Only one horrifying image was looping in her mind—her innocent four-year-old daughter, completely alone in that empty apartment.
"My baby..." Prachi bolted blindly toward the door. "I have to get home! They’re at my house!"
Deva lunged forward, grabbing her arm in an iron grip. "You are not going anywhere alone, Prachi! You're in no condition to drive. I’m taking you."
A split second later, the two of them were sprinting like madmen down the hospital corridors. Bypassing the slow elevators, they took the stairs, leaping down multiple steps at a time. Down in the portico, Deva’s armored black SUV was already idling. Deva shoved Prachi into the passenger seat and vaulted behind the steering wheel.
The heavy tires screeched violently against the asphalt as the SUV tore out of the hospital gates, slicing through the dead silence of the night. Deva pushed the speedometer past 140 km/h. Blurring past red lights and empty intersections, the vehicle became a black missile on the deserted roads.
The silence inside the cabin was suffocating, broken only by Prachi’s ragged sobs as she buried her face in her hands, her entire body trembling violently.
"What is all this, Deva?" Prachi cried out, lifting her tear-streaked face. "Who are these people? What do they want with my little girl? She’s just an innocent child I got from an orphan—"
"That child didn't come from an orphanage, Prachi!" Deva barked, his knuckles turning white as he gripped the steering wheel. The brutal truth in his voice hit harder than the speed of the car.
Prachi froze completely. "What... what do you mean?"
Keeping his eyes locked on the dark road ahead, Deva took a heavy breath. "Four years ago... the night you found that baby crying next to an overturned, burning car on the side of the highway. That wasn't a tragic accident, Prachi. It was a hit."
Prachi felt as though she had just been thrown from the speeding car. "A hit? But... the police told me it was an accident. They said a tire blew out..."
"Because that’s exactly what the police were paid to write," Deva’s voice was flat, yet utterly terrifying. "That car belonged to the younger brother of the city's most lethal underworld boss, 'Rana'. Rishi was just building his empire back then. To eliminate the competition, Rana ordered a hit on Rishi. In retaliation, Rishi burned Rana’s entire syndicate to the ground overnight. That same night, Rana's younger brother was trying to flee the city with his wife and their one-month-old newborn. Our men chased them... and their car lost control and went off the cliff."
Prachi’s eyes went impossibly wide. A violent shudder ripped through her spine. "You're... you're telling me that my daughter... is the niece of a mafia boss?"
"Yes," Deva confirmed grimly. "When Rishi found out there was a baby in that wreckage, he personally drove you past that exact route. He intentionally stopped the car right there so you would see the child. He knew you were a doctor; he knew you wouldn't let a baby die. In a single night, he bought the law, the police, the paperwork—everything—just so you could legally adopt her. Rishi saved her life and gave her a mother in you. But we made one mistake. We left Rana alive. He’s been underground for four years... waiting for the perfect moment."
Prachi’s mind went completely blank. The deep, dark secret she had been living with for four years had just manifested into a terrifying reality. Her sweet little girl carried the blood of a mafia empire, and now, the ghosts of the past had returned for vengeance.
SCREEECH!
Deva slammed the brakes right in front of Prachi’s apartment building. The moment the car stopped, Prachi threw the door open and sprinted inside.
The sight in the lobby stopped her dead in her tracks. Both night guards were lying unconscious on the marble floor, blood pooling around their heads.
"Take the stairs, not the elevator!" Deva yelled from behind, instantly drawing a heavy Glock from his holster.
Prachi kicked off her heels and sprinted up the concrete stairs barefoot. By the time they reached the seventh floor, her lungs were screaming, but a mother's sheer terror refused to let her stop.
When she reached her apartment, Prachi froze.
The front door was wide open. The heavy deadbolt had been violently smashed from the inside.
"Riya!" (Prachi screamed her daughter's name as she charged inside).
The apartment was entirely trashed. The sofa was overturned, and glass vases lay shattered across the hardwood floor. Prachi sprinted straight for the bedroom. The door was slightly ajar.
With violently shaking hands, she pushed it open.
The lights were off, illuminated only by the faint glow of the streetlamps filtering through the window. Prachi’s eyes darted immediately to the small bed in the corner.
The sheets were crumpled and violently pulled back. But the bed was empty. Her little girl was gone.
"No... my baby! Riya!" Prachi collapsed to her knees, sobbing hysterically, letting out a raw, agonizing wail that tore from the depths of her soul.
Just then, Deva, who had entered the room with his g*n drawn, locked his eyes on the large vanity mirror across the room. He walked over and flicked on the bedroom lights.
As the room flooded with light, Prachi raised her tear-stained face and looked at the mirror. Scrawled across the glass in thick, dripping crimson blood was a horrifying message.
"A four-year debt. An eye for an eye, blood for blood. Your precious Rishi Malhotra stole my family, Dr. Prachi. Now, if you want your lover's heartbeats back... return my child to me. And if you want your daughter to live... bring me the last beating piece of Rishi Malhotra's heart. I will be waiting."
Resting right beneath the b****y message on the vanity table was an old, black, disposable flip phone.
A suffocating, deathly silence filled the room. Prachi’s tears instantly dried up, replaced by a dark, terrifying void.
And then... shattering the eerie quiet of the empty room, the black flip phone's screen lit up.
Ring... Ring...
Both Prachi and Deva’s eyes snapped to the vibrating phone. The merchant of death was on the line.
- Writer
