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The entire mission was planned as if it were of the utmost importance to national security. Both the ‘soldiers’ chosen out of the group of six were known for their bravery, their skill in climbing to awkward places, and their steady nerves under fire.

The best time suggested by the strategists in charge of planning was between 11 and 11:30 pm, when there was a lull in pedestrian traffic along the busy streets of the capital city.  Stealthily, over three days, all the required equipment was smuggled to a central departure area which was close to Ground Zero, the site they had decided to target.

The night they suggested saw a large yellow moon hover low on the horizon, with no clouds in sight!  The mission was on!

Rucksacks secured on their backs, the two commandos started out after the ceremonial fists bumps with every member of the team. They approached the row of small shops, each with its shutter locked shut. The target was the largest, most ostentatious of the lot. Outside the shop, they stopped, and upon a mutually arranged signal, the team went to work!

Cans of fluorescent paint were uncapped and expertly, in three minutes exactly, the front of the shop was ‘re-decorated’! Two names (Savita and Ravi) separated by a large pink heart appeared on the shutter, and before anyone around raised the alarm, Ravi and his bestie melted away into the night.

The next morning, at 9 am, Savita’s father was bewildered when he arrived to open his tyre shop. (256 words)

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Day after day, she came into Flat 8 at almost 11 am, and let herself out of the flat 45 minutes later. 

For those 45 minutes, she whirled around like a tornado: cleaning, sweeping, rearranging, putting back, dusting, possessions that were not her own, that she could probably never afford! She repeated this feat on five floors, seven times each day. In this building alone.

Her work was spotless, her reputation sterling! So all those flat-owners, her “masters and mistresses” in absentia, trusted her with their house keys, their messages to the watchman or postman, their errands from corner shops, the bakery, the flour mill, the laundry. She was general factotum-cum-secretary to several ladies of the building,

Shantabai was one of a dying breed in the city – trusted housemaids whose existence meant the ladies who worked jobs to ensure the mortgages on their flats were paid regularly had the luxury to keep their jobs going!

Until last week. Thursday afternoon, to be exact. For that’s when Shantabai’s overworked, 36-year-old heart gave way, the strong-willed, square-jawed Amazon was felled by a cardiac incident on the landing between the third and the fourth floor. Discovered by conscientious delivery-men, she was transported to a clinic. 

Anxious visitors, well-dressed ladies congregated at the clinic, milling around, not knowing who to speak to! One question was paramount in their minds – when would she resume her duties?

            Their interest gradually waned. By the fifth day, no-one from the building was around, not                   even the watchman, to see the ambulance drive off, followed by a lamenting group—                           Shantabai’s husband and two kids being consoled by various aunts and uncles and cousins. (274 words)

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17        For the savvy entrepreneur he had become, life was just a series of business opportunities that allowed him chances to pad his bank balance (the cash component he kept hidden away from prying eyes, like every self-respecting businessman of his category did!) and get one step closer to his dream house!

            These days, his brainwaves came from more sources than ever before, since he was connected to the Net via his i-phone, his tablet, his laptop and his stationary desktop! He kept his ear firmly to the ground, and in that very James Hadley Chase mode, was rewarded with nuggets of information that people paid money to hear.

            One day, when he walked sombrely on a beach early in the morning, he suddenly caught snippets of conversations the matrons and their paunchy husbands exchanged as they walked in the opposite direction.

“Such a shame …”

“I couldn’t bear to look ….”

“There must be something we can do …..”

He understood that somewhere in the world something had occurred to shake the collective conscience of the public – to shame or to revulsion or to horror!

Aircrash! Robbery! Page 3 scandal! Corruption uncovered in high places!

His mind raced! Absently, his phone sprang to his hands and he checked CNN!

Soon, he smiled with satisfaction! Beaches, he concluded, rightly, as it happened, were very convenient places for consciences to be exploited! En masse. Involve an event on any coast and watch sales figures rise vertically!

Now that the world’s conscience was freshly pricked by the young child found dead on a beach far away, he knew his “I Do Care” T-shirts would sell like hot chai! (275 words)