The Cobras

Reavan and Ashura have a conversation over dinner at Reavan's house. Yes, Ashura finally made it out of his comfort zone, or should I say, his comfort zone had expanded to more than that of his house.

The topic of discussion is very much a food for the mind that the sumptuous dinner cooked by Reavan or the mess he had made out of kitchen in ensuring that everything is in accordance with the taste of Ashura, seems so insignificant. But well, who the time to think about that too?

Ashura starts enquiring, "So, what is it all about? you said you had something to discuss with me."

"Well, I met up with an informer from the Cobra gang" Reavan replies, hearing which Ashura drops down the bread he was chewing. He just lost his appetite as something more interesting has stirred him up. Ashura's mind goes from anger arising out of his concern as in didn't I tell you to not meddle with the cobras? to that of, now, its too late to stop him, maybe I should follow him and accompany him through out this investigation, as I have a chance of saving him from death.

Reavan continues, "According to Eliana, the gang started around two years back, and is the one that is most feared by all the other criminal gangs and is unknown to the  cops. At least that's what Aron was trying to achieve and he was successful at, until Jane messed it all up."

The Whispers getting hyper excited said, "Aron, that's it Aron! He is your-" 

"SHUT UP!" Ashura had to yell at the innocent Reavan who swiftly moves towards Ashura to ensure he's ok. 

Ashura is fine, he apologizes, Reavan continues, "Aron recently got mad after knowing that Jane had ended the life of Jaish too. Which, according to him was totally unnecessary reason being that Aron had personally taken care that these two, that is, the father and daughter starve for a few days to have tried to unnecessarily involve in their matters and mistakes of killing Ria, he then had let then go with a promise that they would not utter a word about this to anyone, and thus they were missing for a few days after Ria's death."

"Eliana, told you all this?" Ashura interrupts, Reavan resumes, "No, partially but I could fill in the gaps. Now, the main thing that I was curious about was the location of the cobra gang's base. Upon asking which, Eliana felt a bit uncomfortable but told me about the palace like place that is present near a forest in Southern aspects of the city." 

Ashura thinks, a perfect location to carry out whatever one wants to. No one would track or suspect anything in such a place.

Before Reavan utters another word, Ashura asks him, "So, is this guy, umm, Aron right? was he your comrade before?" Reavan hesitantly answers, "Yes, but we were more than that, he was my rival and also a dear friend. I don't understand why he lost his track..."

LOST HIS TRACK?! Ashura now knew clearly who his brother was, it was Aron, who was also Billie's ex, Jane's boyfriend (Billie and Jane are the same person, implying Aron never betrayed her trust) Reavan's best friend and also the criminal who led the Cobra gang. Ashura comments, "Well, I should stop him now. It seems like it's my duty"

Reavan is confused on what he just heard, but he leaves it at that. But as if he is Ashura's father, he states one thing, "You are not allowed to come with me to the site of investigations, if we accidentally end up in a situation where my car has to be taken directly to the crime site, I want you to stay in the car, is that clear?!"

Ashura who had finally decided to pick the bread and eat stares as if he was the mice who was caught stealing the same, with his face consuming the cheesy layer while his eyes stare upwards from a face that's looking downwards. He then puts his bread down, still chewing, gives out a nod. 

Reavan says, as if he's is the person in command, "Good!"

**************

At the very same time, Aron is in his bed rolling over it unable to focus or concentrate, a lot of things had gone out of his hands ever since his lover Billie joined the crew. Sometimes, he felt that that she was over doing it, and this time it was unbearable to have not thought of consequences. Maybe she hadn't come to her right senses yet, which she had lost when Aron got arrested.

Aron's mind and heart were having a full fledged war. The mind which led the Cobras said "it is for good that she got caught, it doesn't matter if she tells them everything, it doesn't matter even if they know that I was involved, as it doesn't matter anymore coz Reavan already knows. I don't care about others." 

The heart said, "She had done a lot for me, I love her, and I know for certain that she wont rat me out. Even though this is the case, I don't want her to get hurt or tortured, I cant bear her undergoing the same."

This had been going on and on for days, ever since she was arrested, then he suddenly gets a thought, that changes his actions and mind. "Who is the one supporting Reavan, there is no way that he could alone solve it all." 

He then runs towards his princess's room. Searches all over her room for anything that might be a diary or a journal or even her case files. He finds nothing, he then goes through his phone for all the messages that she had sent, he finds nothing. 

He then jumps onto his bed out of frustration that the jerky movement leads to a sticky note that is stuck on the cot above his head falls over his face. He unconsciously looks over it and finds her handwriting. 

He immediately gets up to search for any other clues she might have left. He finds another sticky note mentioning her meet with Reavan and whom again? A kid of fifteen, Ashura. 'Yes, that's it! That kid! there is something about him that tells me to be warned about' he wonders. 

He then calls his men to gather information about the kid, good for Ashura, they get nothing. Those nincompoops don't seem to know about world records and stuff, lucky escape for Ashura.

"That's all, looks like I have reached my limit here" Aron starts contemplating....

************

Reavan after getting permission to search the palace of Aron and also to shoot Aron at sight, with the help of Eliana as a witness, he enters with his team and his colleagues too. Breaks into the main gate and stands beside the door when shooting begins, it's full of bloodshed and injury, everyone is falling on to the ground enemy and team mates apart. 

Reavan escapes all this bloodshed, manages to reach Aron's room through multiple obstacles of people, who try to kill him in order to stop him from meeting their boss. 

He finally enters it, as he faces his final obstacle which is a crossbow that is darted and ready to automatically fire at the person who enters through the door. Reavan realizes the unusual click offered by the bow to be that of the same, but he is too late to dodge the same. 

He somehow manages to get hit in place other than his vitals, but this in turns reduces his movement and speed. He slowly walks to the desk placed in the center of the room, Aron is nowhere to be found, all that he sees is a neatly folded letter, with a hint of informality. 

He just picks the letter, folds it into his pocket. He couldn't afford to stay conscious for long before which he has to retrieve his members and also protect his own life. He calls for back up at his location and asks the others to retrieve.

They return back to their vehicles while Reavan is taken to the hospital to remove the arrow from his torso. He couldn't remove it with the thought that it might cause to much loss of blood and that he might end fainting, also what if he wrongly pulled it out injuring the nearby organs? thus he decided to limit his movements and go to hospital as fast as possible. He anyway got to know that the mission was a failure ever since he couldn't find Aron, the mission was thus aborted and him, as a leader ensured that every member of his crew was alright. 

**************

Once everything seems fine to Reavan and when he feels he is ready to listen to what the letter has to say, he finally opens the letter which act as a messenger to convey Aron's feelings....

it thus began, "Hey budd. hope you have been well, I am so sorry to have heard the news of Ria and frankly, I am too ashamed to face you anymore. Reason being that I myself was an indirect cause for it, the death occurred due to the negligence of my underlings, all I had asked them to do was to keep an eye on her and her movements, those idiots ended up seeing her slip by the rock in the falls as she tried to snatch her phone back from my people.-

- I know how you might be feeling now, I clearly understand how much you might hate me now, I promise you one thing, when I feel that my time has come, I will get caught by you, and wont hesitate to even be killed by you. The truth is, I want to be killed by your hands.-

- I am sorry that it turned out this way between you and I, although, frankly, I didn't kill the culprit for which I was arrested, nor did I command Jane Billie to kill Jaish. This doesn't mean that I am blaming Billie for it all. If she is at fault so am I, as I was incapable of stopping her I thus would whole heartedly accept any kind of punishment that you would like to give me.-

-it's alright, I have nothing to fear and no one to protect, all I had was Billie, she too was taken away. My goal in creating the Cobra gang was to ensure that the crimes in this city reduces, I decided that I would become the king of criminals and thus stop them from doing the same to create a more merrier tomorrow for all our kids.-

-my conversation or should I say, the monologue of the criminal I was assigned to arrest was a very good eye opener for me, had he not told me what he did that day, I still might have been a cop running here and there to catch all the criminals whose rate has been ever rising. It might not have reduced to the level that it has now.- 

-You might not know who and how, but I truly know the amount of criminals that I have kept in check myself. By the way, the Abandoned street was not my base, but it was Billie's that's why she was the only one who could come out of the place while others whoever went ended up going missing, or dead. Well because of her scaring people, we could easily transport whatever we needed via the subways that connected the street to other different places.- 

-Another truth is, though I might now be a black-listed criminal, I feel awkward and yet proud that I have never taken the lives of innocents until now, I promise I wont too, but it doesn't matter as I might as well be dead before you find me next or in fact, you yourself might have killed me.-

-I guess I have told you about it all, no, wait, the very reason I created the gang was,  due to a thought that had gotten deeply rooted into my mind which said, "criminals end up escaping by mending the very laws that they were said to break, sometimes money does the magic, though they are definitely guilty, by hiring the finest lawyer, they can always get away from their crime. Why go that far? They could even bribe the judge. A more simple solution is to burn the evidence found from its roots or planting a fake evidence which ends up proving the actual criminal to be innocent and forging evidence as to make someone else suffer."-

-I thus decided, that one has to dry up the weed by themselves becoming one of them, so that all that will be left is one weed that kills off all others thus making the job of the farmer's easy. And since I don't have a family, I decided that I was the one who was most suitable for taking up this job. Do you think that I overstepped my mother's will? I hope I didn't.-

-Well, time up, guess you might be arriving here soon, got to go. Hope you don't get hit by my cross-bow, pretty sure will survive even if you it, but anyway, take care. Also, take care of this Ashura kid, who knows what may happen in the future?" 

Reavan, who was filled with sympathy and was tearing up suddenly felt a bolt of lightning travelling through his spine as he read Ashura's name. He got to know that his final chance at capture of Aron was by baiting Ashura. Well, it was too much of a risk to take, but irrespective of baiting or not, it was clear that his next target was Ashura, who knows what information Aron gathered about the kid. 

Just to be sure, Reavan decided to tighten the security of Ashura's house. He then rested on his bed as the anesthesia finally took over his nervous system. Ashura then enters into the room where Reavan was admitted, both Maya and Ashura stay back for him until he wakes up, taking care of whatever the nurses and doctor's demand. After all, he is waiting to let Reavan know that Aron is his elder brother....