The Brightest Fell Read online

  “Shut up. And I was literally doing my job. What’s your excuse?”

  “I don’t need an excuse. I was there to help my friend.”

  “What I’m curious about,” Jehan said, sitting gingerly down on the couch and massaging his injured wrist. “Is how you managed to infiltrate the sanctum in the first place.”

  “Afreen took us inside. As her clients,” Laihan piped up, rolling to his side to face Jehan. “We found her in the outer hall minutes after we entered the club, kinda dazed and acting really strange. Rito knew her from her college days, so she recognized her straight away, despite all that weird makeup.”

  “I asked her what was wrong,” Rito continued, sitting up on the bed. “But she didn’t seem to care. One of the attendants came up to us and asked if we’d like a suite with the girl.” She shrugged. “We thought it’d be a good idea to talk to her in private, get to know what the matter was.”

  She looked over at Laihan, who grimaced. “She was too far gone to tell us anything useful. But we knew they’d injected her with something at the door, so we thought maybe it was because of that. She just kept smiling and agreeing with whatever we said. She didn’t seem to be in any pain, but...” he shuddered.

  “She seemed fine in the car,” Abhijat frowned.

  Rito lifted a shoulder. “I don’t know what happened. We waited a while in the suite for the drug to wear off, you know. Asked her to shower and change, cause we thought the water might help.

  “But nothing seemed to be working, so eventually, we left the room. Thought we’d try to find a way out. Some kind of a back door or something, or maybe we could sneak Afreen out as a client. We weren’t really sure, but we knew we couldn’t leave her there. We had no idea what they’d given her, or what kind of side effects it might have. She needed a doctor.”

  Laihan nodded. “We were just about to go back out into the hall when this random dude at the bar tried to grope Afreen. He was drunk, and he seemed to recognize her. We tried to ignore him, but he was a persistent motherfucker, so Rito kneed him in the groin.”

  She grinned. “He tried to punch me, but his aim was off and he hit poor Afreen instead. God,” she shuddered. “There was so much blood.”

  “Hmm. That’s probably what caused the drug to lose its effect.” Jehan glanced at Abhijat. “Sudden, intense pain, remember?”

  “Your turn,” Rito said, her eyes narrowed. “What were you two doing at that club? And why in the name of God are you dressed like that?”

  “For camouflage, I’ll bet,” Laihan chimed in before Jehan could answer. “It’s really quite impressive. I wouldn’t have recognized you if it weren’t for Rito. Shit. Why didn’t I think of that?”

  “Cause all the tacky makeup in the world wouldn’t help you pass for a teenager,” Rito quipped. “I can’t believe you agreed to this, Abhi. This is ridiculous. Not to mention dangerous. He’s the damn prime minister, for heaven’s sake.”

  “I didn’t,” Abhijat snapped, trying to glare at all three of them at once. This proved to be quite difficult, so he focused on his sister for the moment. “I didn’t agree to any of this. And just for the record, you’re all out of your fucking minds.”

  Laihan cocked his head at Abhijat. “So, what were you doing at the La Fantome?”

  “If you say you have a thing for glitter-drenched teenagers, I’ll have to disown you,” Rito warned.

  Abhijat could feel the veins throbbing in his temple. Rito’s lips started twitching, and he had to resist the urge to smother his sister with the pillow she was giggling into.

  “I was tracking a suspect, who might’ve been responsible for the fire in the PM’s office,” he said through gritted teeth.

  He didn’t realize his mistake until he heard her suck in a sharp breath. “You mean...you mean to say that fire was deliberate? An assassination attempt?”

  It was too late to backtrack now. “It might’ve been. We aren’t sure of anything yet, but we have to explore all possibilities.”

  “Don’t bullshit me, Abhi. Did Qia know about this? How could she keep something like that from us?”

  “The more relevant question here, I think,” Jehan interrupted astutely. “Is did you manage to find the guy you were looking for?”

  Abhijat thrust his hands into his pockets and walked over to the window overlooking the crowded streets of Weritlan. The city was almost as chaotic as Qayit, if not quite as chic. “We did.” He pulled out his phone. “I just received word that Sajal was arrested from one of the suites in the sanctum. Just like you’d said,” he glanced over at Jehan.

  “He was caught during the raid that followed our departure. He’s currently in custody, being processed by the local police. The NIA will take over soon enough, take him back to Qayit for questioning. If I’m lucky, I’ll get to have a go at him before we leave the city. It won’t be easy to convince Vyas, though.”

  “He will find himself thoroughly convinced, before the day is out,” Jehan assured him. “You really think you’ll be able to get anything useful out of this guy?”

  “I do, if his initial reaction is any indication. Apparently, he’s naming names already, and the interrogation hasn’t even started yet.”

  Jehan arched an eyebrow. “And who has he named?”

  Abhijat hesitated, glancing at Laihan and Rito on the bed.

  “Oh, come on,” his sister needled. “We’ve already seen the prime minister wearing glitter eyeshadow. Nothing can possibly shock us now.”

  “We’re immune to astonishment,” Laihan agreed.

  Abhijat looked uncertain. “This case is still under investigation. This is classified information.”

  Rito turned to Jehan. “You outrank him. Can’t you order him to tell us what he’s found? My brother’s annoyingly anal retentive.”

  “I agree. And I’m pretty sure I can,” Jehan nodded solemnly.

  “Fine. But if Ruqaiya asks any questions, it’s all on you,” Abhijat pointed an accusatory finger at him. “This hasn’t been verified yet, but I learned from a source that Sajal – that's the guy I was chasing – has named Badal in connection with the fire.”

  “Shit,” Rito muttered. “Is there anything that bastard isn’t involved in?”

  Abhijat frowned suspiciously at his sister. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  She turned to Laihan and shrugged. “Tell him, dude. He might as well know everything if he’s going to investigate this fricking mess.”

  Laihan nodded and pushed himself up on an elbow. “I’d done quite a bit of research on the La Fantome club, for an article I was writing for my website. The thing is, that club is owned by a shell company, which is in turn held, through several offshore subsidiaries, by the former deputy PM’s only daughter.”

  “And her husband,” Rito added.

  “Wait, isn’t Badal’s daughter married to Rinisa’s brother?” Abhijat exclaimed. The conversation between Jehan and Rinisa he’d overheard on the day of the swearing-in ceremony rang in his ears.

  “She is,” Jehan grinned, looking positively gleeful. “This is gonna make the meeting in Eraon even more fun than I’d expected it to be. Once the La Fantome scandal breaks...well, that’s another sword I can dangle over Rinisa’s head, isn’t it?”

  “The point is, we need to remove Sajal from police custody and get him to Qayit as soon as possible,” Abhijat said. “The local authorities can’t be trusted, not when people as powerful as Badal and Rinisa are involved.”

  Laihan nodded. “Much of the local police force is definitely in their pocket. A section of the state bureaucracy is too. Quite frankly, I’m surprised they cooperated as much as they did.” His gaze rested on Jehan. “Although I suppose they had to, since the prime minister’s safety was involved.”

  Abhijat looked over at Jehan, who reclined on the couch, looking peaceful and ingenuous. He wondered if Fasih had taken that fact into account, that his presence at the club would force the hand of the local authorities, compel them to raid the
premises of the La Fantome. He wondered if that was one of the reasons why he had gone there by himself.

  “But I don’t understand,” Rito said, turning to Laihan. “Why would Badal do all this? What could he possibly have to gain by it? Why risk his position as deputy prime minister of the country to run a – a trafficking ring? He would’ve been prime minister in another couple of years. It doesn’t make any sense.”

  “Well, I don’t think losing the position of deputy PM was part of his plan,” Jehan said, his head tipped back and eyes closed. “In fact, I’d bet he was counting on becoming prime minister rather sooner than expected.

  “As for the rest, well, I certainly do think he has a special interest in the Amven drug. After the terror attacks on the metro stations, he was one of the most vocal advocates for using the drug on the captured suspects, despite knowing exactly how volatile and unreliable Amven is. And I don’t think he was solely motivated by the desire to curb terrorism.”

  “Really?” Rito bristled, glaring daggers at Jehan. “I thought it was our father who was forcing you to use Amven against the wishes of the vaunted QRI.”

  “He was, but he was far from being the most insistent faction,” Jehan said matter-of-factly. “Badal, on the other hand… How did he even manage to acquire such a large sample of one of the older Amven prototypes? Large enough to keep more than fifty people drugged over a period of weeks. Even if he’d somehow gotten his hands on the formula during his time as deputy PM, Amven isn’t cheap to manufacture. He must have had substantial funding.”

  “You suspect foreign interference?” Laihan asked. “You think Maralana’s involved, don’t you? Maganti’s been waxing poetic about the potential of the Amven drug for almost half a decade now. I don’t think there’d be anyone much happier than him when it finally becomes available for largescale commercial use.”

  “You’re a perceptive man, Mr. Ajera,” Jehan smiled. “It’s a possibility, yes. But we still don’t know who bankrolled the metro station blasts. Once we know that, I suspect all the other pieces of the puzzle will fall into place.”

  “You don’t believe it was domestic terrorism?” Rito frowned.

  Jehan snorted. “Let’s hope not. If our homegrown separatists had that kind of ammunition, we’d have another civil war on our hands.”

  “That’s precisely what I thought when news of the attack first broke,” Laihan said, nodding.

  Resting her chin on her palm, Rito gazed down at him. “I’d say you two were long lost twins, if he wasn’t too pretty to be related to you.”

  “Good burn,” Laihan nodded appreciatively. “Still, nice as this has been, I do have work tomorrow.” He pushed himself off the bed. “See you later, kids. I’ll check up on Afreen on my way to work in the morning. You wanna come with?”

  Rito nodded. “I’m not leaving Weritlan until I know for certain she and the children are gonna be okay.”

  “I’ll drop you off, then.” Jehan rose to his feet, holding his injured hand close to his chest. “I have a plane to catch in the morning, anyway.”

  “Where’re you off to?”

  “Waimar. Can’t keep Rinisa waiting, can we now? We have an impending water crisis to avert, after all,” he said cheerfully. “And if I can catch a hold of her before the news about La Fantome breaks, I’ll have the exquisite pleasure of rubbing salt into her wounds as she bleeds money from every pore.”

  “And in the meantime, I’ll settle for the very crass pleasure of making Sajal bleed his guts out for all the trouble he’s caused me.” Abhijat bared his teeth in a shark-like grin.

  Laihan shuddered. “I can’t imagine why you two don’t get along.”

  Chapter 9

  “I have to admit, he’s good.” Ruqaiya sat back in her chair, bringing a steaming cup of coffee to her lips. “Rinisa looks like she’s swallowed a frog and can’t throw it back up.”

  They sat together in her spacious office at the Parliament House, surrounded by pristine white furniture littered with multi-colored writing pads. She offered him a coffee, but Abhijat declined, his gaze fixed on the wall-mounted television opposite her desk.

  A news anchor was talking brightly to the camera, explaining the intricacies of the settlement reached between the governments of Eraon and Ishfana, ending a decade-long dispute over the ownership of the Vanya dam.

  The scene shifted, the camera zooming in on the site of the dam, where the prime minister stood on a makeshift podium, along with the chief ministers and deputy chief ministers of both the states.

  He was talking into a microphone, pausing every now and then to smile beatifically down at the press corps gathered a few feet away. He was not the best public speaker, but Abhijat had the sneaking suspicion that he was playing up his natural shyness for the benefit of the cameras. And it was working.

  The hesitance and awkwardness that might’ve been off-putting in an older, more experienced politician, just made him look sincere and earnest. If Fasih was playing the role of the reluctant academic dragged into the world of politics, he was playing it beautifully.

  A stone-faced Rinisa stood beside him, next to a stoned-looking Henna Sameen. The CM of Ishfana, along with his deputy, stood on the other side of Jehan, looking disgruntled, yet vaguely impressed.

  A round of applause greeted the end of Fasih’s speech. The camera panned out to show a huge gathering of the citizenry, beyond the cluster of reporters who stood closest to the politicians, trying to get their attention.

  Jehan leaned in once again – almost awkwardly – to thank those who had come out to witness the official signing and ratification of the Vanya water-sharing agreement, prompting the crowd to cheer even louder than before. Rinisa looked like she was itching to punch him.

  “Didn’t think he had it in him,” Ruqaiya said, looking away from the TV screen to settle her piercing gaze on Abhijat. “But I have to say, he’s managed something in less than three months which we couldn’t accomplish in over three years.”

  “Only because he doesn’t give a damn about the consequences of his actions,” Abhijat ground out, turning off the TV with a flick of the remote.

  She smirked. “You know, the more I see him in action, the more I think that that mightn’t be such a bad thing after all.”

  “You want him to do your bidding, then take the fall when consequences come knocking on the door?”

  “Well, he seems to be doing that anyway, doesn’t he?” she shrugged. “With or without my input. I just believe in the optimization of resources.”

  Abhijat shook his head. “Fasih isn’t a hammer in your toolkit, Qia. He’s a fucking loose cannon. Just cause he’s hitting your enemies now, doesn’t mean he’s in your control. As likely as not, he’d take a shot at us first chance he gets.”

  “Is this about what happened in Weritlan?” she raised an enquiring eyebrow.

  He braced himself, breathing deeply. “You knew he was developing the Amven drug...you and my father.”

  “Of course we did. It’s public knowledge.”

  “Is it? Which parts of it exactly, Qia? The fact that he was testing the drug on himself, building up resistance to it? Or the fact that it can be used to basically hypnotize people, turning them into puppets that’d follow orders without question?”

  Ruqaiya shook her head, leaving her seat to pace along the length of the office. “Don’t be ridiculous, Abhijat. No drug can turn a person into a puppet.”

  “Can’t it? Tell that to the kids being sold to the highest bidder at the La Fantome club. They’re using the drug to make prostitutes now, what’s to say they won’t use it to make soldiers next? Start another civil war–”

  “That’s not possible.”

  “Why? Because you say so?”

  “Because the Amven drug was specifically designed to curb the instinct for violence. To make people less aggressive, more affable, more…benevolent.”

  “What? That makes no sense. How’s that even possible?”

  “It’s not.
Or, at least, it hasn’t been, so far.” She sighed, perching on the edge of her desk, gazing down at him. “Look, I know what you’re thinking. You’ve been kept in the dark and you don’t like it. You feel like you can’t trust us anymore–”

  “It’s a little more than a feeling–”

  “But,” she cut him off, pressing her hands down on the off-white tabletop and leaning into his space. “It wasn’t my intention to mislead you. And it’s not like I know all of it myself. This is classified information, buried over the years under layers upon layers of red tape and PR drivel. But I do know this. Amven can never be used to inflict violence.

  “And as for Jehan testing the drug on himself,” she bit her lip, looking away. “I suppose I wouldn’t put it past him to have an agenda behind that. I guess you might’ve noticed by now, he has an agenda behind everything he does, and most of the things he doesn’t do. But…he was fifteen when he started developing Amven.”

  “And it never occurred to any of you to ask yourselves, why a fifteen-year-old would want a drug that can turn people into mindless robots?”

  “Because that’s not what it did. Or not what it was meant to do, at least. Tell me, Abhijat, have you ever tried shouting at Fasih?”

  “What?”

  “Or made any aggressive movements when he wasn’t expecting it?”

  “I’m not in the mood for mind games, Qia. What does that have to do with anything?”

  “Humor me, Abhi. In those situations, how does Fasih typically react?”

  Abhijat groaned. “Steps back. Recoils. Cringes away. As any civilian with a modicum of sense would do. It’s called self-preservation. What does this have to do with anything?”

  “Preserving himself from what, though? Fasih may be an anorexic weakling with the body mass of a sixteen-year-old schoolgirl, but he’s not an idiot. He’s the prime minister of the country, surrounded by bodyguards at all times. He can’t really think you’d hit him. If you injured him in any way, you’d be in prison in the blink of an eye. And he knows that as well as you do.”