Slowly, she retreated to the previous block, and turned down the road that paralleled the one the survival station was on. Three businesses down was a restaurant where most of the dining had been done at tables spread under a tattered awning along the sidewalk. She sat at a table in the back corner, where she could watch the street and be able to hide quickly if anyone showed up.
Okay, now what? she wondered.
When she’d left the boarding school, she’d been sure that finding Kusum and Sanjay would not be a problem, but now that she was here, surrounded by the reality of the city, the task seemed impossible. While Sanjay had said the plan was to find someplace where they could watch the survival station, there were far too many buildings in the area. He and Kusum could be in any of them.
What do I do now? What do I…
The world was so quiet, so very quiet. And dark. And warm. And—
Her head jerked up, her eyelids shooting open. For a second she had no idea where she was.
Restaurant. Mumbai.
Right.
She blinked several times. She’d fallen asleep in the chair.
How stupid can you be?
She scanned the street to make sure she was still alone, then paused.
Is that someone shouting?
She sat up and cocked her head.
Definitely. Several people, in fact.
She eyed the street again. Still empty.
Relax, she told herself. The yelling wasn’t on her street. It was coming from a few blocks away. She narrowed her eyes, her slowly waking mind sensing that the location should be important.
A few blocks away…a few blocks…
Her brow shot up. The survival station.
As if on cue, she heard the roar of multiple engines coming from the same direction. Wanting to see what was happening, but knowing she had to be smart about it, she went over to the door leading to the inside part of the restaurant. Thankfully, it was not locked. Beyond was a single room with a small kitchen on one side and a couple of tables along the other. There was also a door in the back, exactly what she’d been hoping for.
She undid the locks holding the back door in place, and carefully opened it. The area behind the restaurant couldn’t quite be called an alley. Though open to the sky, it was barely wide enough for two people to walk down shoulder-to-shoulder — if they could get over the boxes and trash that filled much of the space. Jabala decided to give it a try, and was pleased to find that after the first stack of rubbish, the area beyond was relatively clear.
The passageway did not go all the way to the end of the street, ending instead at the back of a building Jabala thought faced the street leading to the survival station. If she could get inside, she should be able to see what was going on.
There were three windows on the old and weathered back wall, one on each floor. The ground-floor window was closed, but the one right above it was partially open. The wall had plenty of notches, so climbing up to the window was not much of a challenge. It did take some extra effort, however, to push it open wide enough for her to climb through.
Inside, she found herself in a storage room packed with stacks of dresses and suits and boxes. A window was on the opposite side, overlooking the street, but it was blocked by several bundles of cloth.
Jabala carefully moved the bundle at the end just enough so she could see outside. The survival station’s gate was wide open, and she counted eleven soldiers wearing blue helmets with the letters UN large and white on the sides. They stood armed and ready right outside the gate, their attention focused on the city.
Suddenly, several of the men looked back toward their base. When one of them shouted something, the soldiers split into two groups and moved to the sides. A few seconds later, a truck with a dozen more soldiers rumbled out of the gate and onto the road. As soon as it was gone, the men on the ground moved back into place.
Something was definitely going on.
Jabala leaned closer to the window to try to see more of the survival station. That’s when she heard the floor creak behind her.
Sanjay’s first instinct was to get everyone out of the city right away, but several of the people they’d rescued were elderly and needed more rest before attempting to hike out of Mumbai. So they took them all to the building where Prabal was waiting.
“Everyone stay inside,” Sanjay instructed them. “And, please, remain quiet at all times. We will wait until the sun goes down again before we leave.”
Most were still in a state of semi-shock, from both their sudden imprisonment and subsequent rescue. A few wanted to know exactly what was going on. Sanjay promised to tell them everything after they were safely out of the city.
He and Kusum were getting ready to lie down themselves when all hell broke loose over at the compound.
“What’s going on?” Darshana asked, bolting up from where she’d been trying to sleep.
“I will check,” Sanjay said. “Make sure everyone stays quiet.”
Sanjay headed up the stairs to the roof, Kusum right behind him like he knew she would be. As they peered out at the survival station, Sanjay noted several soldiers moving around as if they were searching for something. Then, from behind one of the buildings, a man in civilian clothes stepped out and began running toward the front gate.
There were several shouts as a handful of soldiers moved in and encircled him a few car lengths from the gate. Though Sanjay couldn’t hear anything, he could tell a conversation was going on. The man tried to run again, but two of the soldiers grabbed him. The man kicked and yelled as the soldiers turned him around and started marching him back to the holding area.
Seeing the man’s chest heave with a cough, Sanjay realized what was going on.
“It’s the ones from the other holding area,” he whispered. “They must have found the hole in the fence.”
One of the guards shoved the prisoner hard. The man stumbled forward several steps before falling to the ground. As they jerked him back up, there was blood on his face.
“Oh, God,” Kusum said under her breath.
“I should not have cut the hole,” Sanjay said. “I should not have done it.”
For a moment, neither of them said anything, then Kusum pointed toward the back gate.
“No,” she said. “Look.”
Huddled behind a couple of the vehicles were two men. Even from this distance, Sanjay could tell one was considerably older than the other. Only two guards were on the gate, as most of the other soldiers had moved toward the shouting at the center of the compound.
The younger man peeked around the vehicle, said something to his companion, and the two of them moved across a small open space to the backside of the guard hut. Kusum sucked in a worried breath, but the men timed their move well and the guards did not see them.
The old man picked something off the ground and handed it to the younger one. A few words passed between them, then the younger one cocked his arm and threw the item toward the main part of the compound. Though Sanjay and Kusum couldn’t hear the object land, it was clear the guards could. They both turned as one toward the noise, the guard nearest the hut taking a couple steps away from the fence.
The younger man threw something else in the same direction as before. This time the guards came together, talked, and one started cautiously walking in the direction of the sound. His partner followed him for about ten paces before stopping, his back to the gate.
“They are never going to make it,” Kusum said as the younger man peered around the side of the hut, clearly intending to try sneaking out the opening.