Chapter XXIII: Alarippu gone astray.
0430hrs, 9 November 2013, Kanaka Nagar, Bangalore, India.
"The movements of Alarippu relax the dancer's mind and thereby her mind, loosen and coordinate her limbs and prepare her for the dance. ..Alarippu is most valuable in freeing the dancer from distraction and making her single-minded." T. Balasarawati
"Please do the needful." Common, yet antiquated Indian English saying.
"So, they want us to check out this Sudhir person." Mina was with Amy on a "special" assignment in India. They were in a rented apartment across from their target, watching the place for any activity. Raye, Lita and Serena were somewhere in China, doing their thing.
The news about the stolen Russian nukes had sent off a scare in that part of the world, and a massive search conducted by China, Russia and the United States for any missing nuclear weapons was underway. Pundits in the United States said at least the weapons that the US had or was disposing of were secure and didn't have a bad habit of appearing on boats, paid by black marketers. And, they said, at least we didn't start shootouts around nuclear weapons as well (it had been reported that an argument between individuals on the ship is what caused the explosion).
"Yep, Sudhir Reddy," Amy said, reading off the dossier on him "That's his name. Ah, he was born in 1984, went to school here in Bangalore, then joined with the Nakanishi Corporation after graduating college and has been working customer service there ever since. Suspected of contact with terrorist groups in India that are planning an attack on Japanese interests in the area."
"That must be a terrible job," Mina commented. "Doing customer service all day long? No thanks."
"He's been offered a raise and promotion just this last week. He took it as well."
"But why are we monitoring him them?" Mina asked. "He doesn't have a criminal record, he has no link to terrorists, just some very sketchy information that says he may or may not be chatting on forums with a potential wannabe terrorist. That's not much to go on. "
"That we know of."
"That we know of, but the reasoning behind Luna sending us here is really…dumb." Mina played with the zoom feature on her camera. "Because Intelligence said so. Who the fuck is in charge of Intelligence? Aren't we the ones who get the intelligence? Or are we just assassins?"
"Took you that long to figure it out huh?" Amy said. She put a finger in front of her mouth to tell Mina to be quiet for a second. She activated a program that would stop audio and video transmissions from coming out of the area for a little bit so they could talk in peace.
"Mina, ever since this program started, ever since we got blown up at Hikawa temple, ever since they told us we couldn't go back and see our parents, that they had given us up to the state, I've known something has been up. I can't put my finger on it, but I'm close to something."
"Like…?"
"I got into Kawasaki's email account. He's been talking to some people from the Nakanishi Group about the healing fluid and the marketing potential and blah blah blah. That's not the weird part. I did some checking up on the people we've had to take out, and every time, the Nakanishi group comes in and takes over their operations. Their stock has shot up over three hundred percent in the last three months."
"Wait, so we've been working for the Nakanishi Group? And the people we've killed…they weren't supporting terrorism, or dictators, or black marketeers, or evil people at all?"
"I don't know. There's no definite proof of any of this though, Mina." Amy looked through her camera at Sudhir's apartment, but there was still no activity. "It could be one big coincidence. I mean, Nakanishi is the only group that can manufacture the healing solution in quantities that we can use. And they had been planning many of these mergers for months, maybe years."
"But you don't believe that for a second, do you?"
"Of course not. But this is merely idle speculation, I don't have any proof of their intent. Unless…"
She looked at the apartment. The light had come on, and she could see Sudhir walking about, talking to somebody on his mobile.
"I have an idea," she said.
"What idea?" Mina asked.
"We're going to ask some questions."
"But they told us not to approach him, only to observe him for a twenty four hours period and…"
"Well, if we're working for Nakanishi, then he's got to have done something to piss them off. And he might have some info we can use to blow this entire thing open. Plus, we have about ten more minutes before Artemis figures out that it's not his computer screen that's fizzing out on him and starts asking us questions."
Amy and Mina left the apartment and crossed the street to Sudhir's apartment complex.
"Goddammit," Amy cursed after they had made it safely across. There wasn't a lot of traffic, but an auto rickshaw had come out of nowhere and surprised them. "If I ever see one more auto rickshaw that close to me…"
"Tell me about it," Mina agreed. "You got your weapon on you?" She checked the handbag that she was carrying. The trusty Glock 26 lay inside there.
"Yep, got mine too," Amy said. "Let's get in there."
Sudhir's apartment was on the fifth floor, accessible only by key or if someone buzzed you in. Thankfully, Amy overrode the electronic lock and accessed the stairwell in no time.
"Did you time me, like I asked?" she asked Mina on their way up the stairs.
"It was about seven seconds on that one."
"Dammit, so close to beating my record."
Amy and Mina reached the fifth floor and started for Sudhir's apartment, the last one down the hall, to the right, number 512. As they approached, they could hear him arguing with somebody on the phone.
"Mercy, look, I'm sorry that all of this happened, alright? No, no, I'm just as scared as you are, but taking this promotion was the right thing to do. Yes, even after they beat me up and left me for dead. I don't have much choice in the matter, and besides, if it makes D.D quake in his slippers, that makes me happy." Mina and Amy couldn't understand them because it was in Telugu, but they got the gist of it.
"Well, looks like we have a lovers' quarrel," Mina said.
"You would know a lot about them, wouldn't you?" Amy replied, smiling a bit.
"Oh yes I would. Am I knocking or are you?"
"I got this." Amy knocked on the whitewashed wooden door.
"Sorry, I have to go. I probably pissed them off again and now they want to have a chat with me. Okay? Bye. Bye."
Sudhir put the phone down and started toward the door. He unlocked it, but did not remove the chain, just in case. He saw two women there, one with blue hair, and other with blond, but covered up with a dupatta in order not to attract too much attention.
"What do you want?" he asked pensively.
"We just want to talk," Amy said to him kindly.
"Yeah, right," he scoffed. "We can talk right here. And no funny stuff like you did last time."
"Mr…Reddy?" Mina still couldn't believe that was a popular name down here in South India. "Look, we're not with the Nakanishi Group."
Immediately, he started to close the door. "I can't be associated with you if you're doing what I think you're doing."
Amy put her foot in the door jam and winced in pain when Sudhir tried to close the door on it.
"What did you do that caused all of this?" she asked, concealing the pain. "You must have upset the Nakanishi Group or else you wouldn't have been so scared if we mentioned their name."
"Just go," he said insistently. "Please, if you know what's good for you."
Amy looked at Mina. "Looks like we're going to do this the hard way."
While they weren't nearly as strong as Lita, Mina shoved her shoulder against the door, knocking Sudhir back. Both Amy and Mina then hit the door again, snapping the chain off the wall and opening the door.
"Alright, then," Amy said, grabbing Sudhir by the arms and dragging him to a couch. "Tell us what you did to the Nakanishi Group that's got them all riled up."
"You first," he gasped, trying to recover the wind knocked out of him.
Mina looked at Amy, then spoke to him.
"We're with the Japanese Government," she said.
"Heh, never would have guessed that," Sudhir replied. "You're English is pretty good. Can't tell you apart from some of those Americans I have to deal with every day. What branch?"
"Doesn't matter," Mina continued, trying to downplay her slight British accent. "We were sent to…observe you due to intelligence stating that you might be in contact with terrorist groups."
"Well, it depends which side you're on," he sarcastically replied. "And anyway, it's not a terrorist group, it's only one person who may or may not be involved in some grey area stuff."
"Alright, we've told our part, what's up with you?" Mina folded her arms and looked at Sudhir intently.
"Fine. I got in trouble with one of the higher-ups in the company when he came down here. I sent an email to…" He trailed off.
"Spit it out Sudhir," Amy said intently. "Otherwise we can't help you."
"I'm getting to that. I discovered a Nakanishi tracking program on a US Representative's computer, a Georgia Clemens. For whatever reason, she's under surveillance by the Nakanishi Group in America. I did not think she was aware of this fact, and so I sent her an email telling her of the situation she was in. Shortly thereafter, I was beaten up by some hired goons."
"Do you know who hired them?" Mina asked him.
"Yeah. It was a Nakanishi company head who oversaw the entire thing, personally."
"What's his name?" she continued to interrogate him, being gentle but firm.
"Well, I don't think that's his real name, but everyone calls him 'Jadeite.'"
Amy looked him up on her tablet computer she was carrying with her. "He's the head of Nakanishi Asia. A very effective worker and had increased the Nakanishi Group's hold in Asia by over three-hundred percent in the last ten years."
"So, you pissed off one of the heads of one of the most powerful corporations in the World," Mina said. "And he just let you go? With a little beating? Come on, you can do better than that. I would at least have killed you and dumped your body in an acid bath."
"Hey, I don't know!" Sudhir protested. "Maybe you should ask him."
"I'm finding all of this hard to believe," Amy joined in. "So, you find that Nakanishi is spying on members of the American Congress."
"Yes, that's what they were doing."
"And you alerted one of them to your findings." Mina and Amy were circling now around Sudhir, trying to see if he was the real deal.
"Yeah, I did that."
"And then they find out and beat you up over it," Amy said.
"They did."
"So why are you still working for them!" Mina asked. "If you're so mad at his corporation, then why haven't you quit and gone to the media or police or something like that?"
"They…they promised me a raise and a promotion if I didn't rock the boat anymore," Sudhir replied softly.
Amy and Mina stood back and let Sudhir catch his breath from the interrogation. This guy was the real deal.
"Alright Mr. Reddy," Mina said. "We believe you. We're trying to get the full story ourselves."
"Yeah, whatever." Sudhir picked himself up and staggered to the refrigerator in his kitchen, taking out some purified water.
"Hope you guys haven't been drinking the water," he said to them casually. "You'll get sick if you do."
Mina looked at Amy. She had brushed teeth with some of that water last night.
"Uh…no," Mina replied.
"Well, that's good to hear. Many of the foreigners come over and they don't know what to do, so many of them get very unwell."
"That's…yeah." Amy tried not to snicker at the horrified expression on Mina's face.
"Anyway, that's the reason I'm in trouble with Nakanishi," Sudhir said, coming back out of the small kitchen. "I don't know what Jadeite is up to, but he left for Japan a month ago and hasn't been back since."
"Is there anything else that you might have seen?" Mina asked, wondering if the growling coming from her intestines would cause more than just discomfort.
"Well, some guy from the Chinese Consulate in Mumbai would sometimes come by to ask my boss, uh Dilip Desai on how…"
'Wait, 'some guy'…?" Amy interrupted. "Would his name happen to be Hao Chung?"
"I think it was Zhong, but yeah, that's the guy."
Mina and Amy looked at each other again. "What the fuck…?" Mina muttered.
"Why was a member from the Consulate coming to meet with a Japanese company?" Amy paced up and down the main living room now. Mina sat in a chair, staring intently at Sudhir, who was drinking the glass of water he poured.
"Well, my boss always said that it was to promote cooperation between China, India and Japan, but I think it was something different."
"Like…?" Amy's mind was racing a mile a minute.
"Well, I think…it's really stupid."
"Go ahead, try us." Mina had heard worse. Especially regarding the entire pill issue with Lita. Stupid hypertension.
"I think he was having a secret relationship."
Mina and Amy both did a face palm. "That is pretty stupid," Amy replied.
"But I think it's…"
"…it's a fourteen hour drive from Mumbai to Bangalore," Amy said, "And why would he meet your boss at work, in plain sight, in the middle of the day, to have a relationship like that?! In a more open society, yeah, but not here."
"Do you think it's something other than them being lovers?" Mina asked, now more sarcastically.
"Okay, he might be giving information to Chung…Zhong…whatever, that might have to deal with our operations here."
"So he's giving information to the Chinese then."
"I don't fucking know! Besides, I haven't seen Chung in at least a year! What's he got to do with anything with Nakanishi?"
"More than you might think," Amy said. "Anything else? Like where we can find him? And how do you spell his name again?"
"He lives on company housing near the Manyata Tech Park, and it's spelled D-i-l-a-p D-e-s-a-I. Now, If you would leave me alone now and let me try to pick up what remains of my life, that would be nice."
"Fine, have a nice day…morning." Mina and Amy left, shutting the door behind them, leaving Sudhir wondering how he was going to explain all of this if Nakanishi found out again…
"Well, that was certainly interesting," Mina said, looking around the street to see if anyone had seen them go in. The street was starting to get busy, with more vehicles of every type starting to make their way down the street; trucks, buses, auto rickshaws, cars, motorbikes and even cattle driven carts.
"I didn't know people still lived like that," Mina stated, looking at a man slowly tapping a cow with a switch down the road.
"Maybe they know something we don't," Amy noted. "Come on, we have to go to see this Dilap Desai."
"Hello?! Hello?!" Artemis came back on their secret service type earpieces connected to their eyepieces.
"Yeah, what is it?" Mina said. "We're in the middle of something."
"You went out of contact for about twenty minutes there," he said. "What happened?"
"Nothing special. But we might have a lead on a contact." Amy was trying to keep everything as vague as possible.
"Ah, where did you get that information?" Artemis asked.
"The same place where you got yours to send us on this observation," Mina replied.
That wasn't very appealing to Artemis. "Oh, so we're going to play that game, are we?"
"Yeah, we are. I need a background check on a Dilip Desai. He works for Nakanishi Group, India, in Bangalore if that'll help you narrow down your search results."
"Fine, I'm looking it up." Artemis went to type the name into the computer by his workstation. He was back on the ground now, stranded in a hanger that the JASDF has reserved for the SAILOR support personnel. Luna was helping out the other team, and so he was stuck with sheparding these two around Bangalore.
"Uh…spell that."
"D-i-l-i-p D-e-s-a-i," Amy spelled out.
"…a…i. Got it. Looking now."
D.D's file was accessed through the Nakanishi Group server in Bangalore, then was transmitted directly to both Artemis' computer and Amy's HUD.
Artemis started reading the file out loud to Amy and Mina, who were simultaneously reading it as well. "Alright, he's forty years old, holds a degree in Business from the IIT-Delhi. He's…interesting…"
"What does that mean?" Mina asked. She was referring to a police report that had stated that he was an agitator for several radical groups during the 1980s before he went to college.
"According to this report, he still keeps in contact with some of his old militant group friends, although it's very low key," Artemis said. "He's no longer involved in protest activity or radical groups, having moved to a job within the Nakanishi Group, India, several years ago and being promoted to project manager for the entire CSR division."
"Well, he's a pretty good contact if you want to find some information out about Nakanishi…" Mina said.
"…Or if you want to know some people who are willing to put together a militant group," Amy finished.
"Artemis, where's the exact address?"
"It's near the Manyata Tech Park, on 1st Main Road. Sending location now." He sent the location of the house, still not knowing what was going on. But he figured that if the girls knew if something was up, he wasn't about to interrupt them when they were on a lead.
"I have it. Let's go Mina."
There was scooter outside the apartment that they were using as a home base, and in true Indian style, Mina climbed on a started it, while Amy climbed on the back.
"How do these guys do this?" Amy said, trying to sit sideways in the seat before giving up and sat facing forward.
Since it was now 0500, the call to prayer for the sizable Muslim population went out, with the imam chanting the prayers to Allah, as required the five pillars.
"That always gives me goosebumps," Mina noted. "It's kind of cool, actually." She started up the scooter. "And…we're off."
She sped off, her eyepiece HUD giving the directions and Amy clinging on for dear life.