The Lost Battle
The dense forest was filled up in total darkness. He found it difficult to get through it despite he knew the forest very well. He was now struggling to breathe. A desperate run up the hill and the gallop from the ridge was enough for one of his severely cramped legs to break. But still he did not stop, he was running continuously, he was running to get away from them. He was running for life.
“Father, why are we afraid of them?” he had asked his father. “Father, why are we living in a terror, when we too kill others? Aren't they just like us?” Yes! Even they are cruel; himself, his father, all of them. There were days when they went on a killing spree with their entire gang out in the open.
“Son, we kill to survive. But they do this for greed. They were not like this before. A day came when greed took over each one of them. And now it’s just the greed that’s talking. They are invading us and driving us out of our homes. They are not even sparing the young”
Suddenly a bullet came from nowhere and hit him at his other leg. He fell down with a loud thud. Blood oozing out of the opening like a gush of stream. He got up, he had to run. But his running now was more of a limping. He was scared. He just could not gauge how many of them were behind him. He saw a big thick bush nearby. He gave an extra push to himself and went inside to hide.
The attackers were really strong. They had equipped themselves to kill. He cannot forget the day his father was killed mercilessly in the broad daylight. And yet he could not do anything. He wanted to fight. But his father’s frantic shouts to run away, had made him a mute spectator to the massacre. Now it all made sense to him. The attackers had grown strong over the years beyond his imagination, which his father had understood. His father had to give himself to the attackers that day so that his father could save him and his family.
He could not make out whether it was the tears in his eyes or the exhaustion, but his sight was getting more and more blurred. A brief pause in his run had made his legs give up. Now he was not able to even stand. He could sense that they were nearing him. But he could not understand how are they able to find him in the pitch dark forest despite him being in a dense bush. Suddenly he realized that he had made a fatal mistake. The bush was actually an ambush, a trap cleverly laid to get him. There was nothing he could do, but wait.
Within minutes, he saw them covering him from all sides. One of them, with a gun, was just inches away from his head. He knew his end had come. His moist eyes were showing the signs of his defeat, his foolishness to not only get him killed but also push his entire family in their clutches. He cursed himself for the stupid act of him going out in the open and attack one of them, when he was supposed to be in hiding and save his family. The fit of rage had taken toll. Anger had overcome sanity.
The two smoking barrels were now pointed on his head. The sound of the motor blades was deafening, the same motor blades with which they had chopped off his father’s head. He closed his eyes and remembered his father’s words
“Son, the time has come for us to understand that we cannot fight them anymore. We need to be careful at every step. They have become too clever and too strong to be defeated. I might not live long enough to protect each of us. It’s you, who should take care of the family and protect.”
He had failed miserably. His father’s sacrifice went in vain.
Finally the trigger was pulled. Greed took another life. Now they are just 1411 left, waiting to be killed in their lost battle. Why are they in such a situation? Is it man’s greed for money, the insatiable eagerness to show off or is it just his fetish, a plain fetish to over-power one of the most powerful beings of this planet? Even they are waiting for an answer.
