Chapter One: Dismissal of shimmer

Chapter Two: Fixation with Shimmer

Chapter Three: Observation of shimmer

Chapter Four: Validation of shimmer

Chapter Five: Retrieval of Shimmer

Chapter Six: Impediment to Shimmer  

Chapter Seven: Possession of Shimmer

It was in the wee hours of the morning of just another regular day that Chanakya Rao, just another regular first-year student at the up-and-coming Plaksha University, awoke in a sweat, his clothing drenched in it, thirsting for water.

He estimated that the current must had been out for quite some time, and he was a victim of the sweltering Punjabi nights.

He got off his bed, walked two steps, and stretched his hand forward in the dark to clench his bottle, but found instead only an empty shelf. Thirsty and frustrated, he was about to throw his bed in the air, and a tantrum at his roommate for misplacing it (the bottle), when he suddenly remembered he’d kept it on the study table so that he’d be able to access it without getting up.

He walked back, sat on the bed, and extended his hand toward the table, when the tip of his finger tipped the bottle over. A sudden surge of adrenaline gripped him and in less than a second, the dark room was adorned with perfectly clear outlines, his weary muscles had become tense, and his focus had been fixed on the falling bottle, beneath which was now his palm. The bottle fell into his palm perfectly, and an unnecessary fight with his roommate had been avoided.

Now, with energy flowing through his veins, he could no longer return to his dreamless sleep. He grabbed his phone and checked the time: ‘07:35’.

He usually set his alarm for ten minutes before class, as his sleep was as dear to him as life itself, and he felt something as trivial as a college grade unworthy of demanding its sacrifice.

But, now, he had no choice. He put the phone in his right pocket, along with the room keys, put the bottle in his left armpit and had a bag of Chickmangaluru coffee powder in his left hand. He opened the room, and locked it from the outside. Then, he proceeded to the pantry and brewed himself a nice cup of proper South-Indian coffee.

He was just about to sit on a chair there to drink the coffee, when he decided to go up to the roof to sip on it while watching the sunrise. He took the day’s newspaper, rolled it, and placed it under his armpit. He went by lift to the 9th floor, and then used the stairs to get to the terrace. The weather was terrible, but the skies were pretty clear. He found an unfinished wooden shelf sturdy enough to support his weight, and dragged it toward the east railing. He placed the coffee cup and the newspaper on a long slab of concrete next to the railing, and made himself comfortable on the shelf.

AccuWeather estimated sunrise in 7 minutes. He, like every other self-absorbed millennial, took out his phone and started scrolling through Instagram. 7 minutes later, he got off the shelf and leaned on the railing. The clouds parted, and he felt the sunlight on his face. A rather pleasant experience, he simply closed his eyes and allowed himself to feel the experience for 9-10 minutes.

He opened his eyes, which took a second or two to focus, and then looked down upon the (nearly, currently) 5-acre piece of land he was to call home for the next four years. He saw the ground, with two football goalposts, a farm, a tennis court and adjoining it a volleyball and a basketball court as well. And there ended the campus, in its current preliminary phase of construction.

However, beyond the volleyball court lay a swamp. It was initially just a huge man-made depression into which all construction waste was thrown, but over the years, given the good rains and the fertile soil, it had transformed into a weed-infested swamp.

The water there was sparkling, and it hit his eyes. He was about to avert his vision, when something caught his attention. There was a strong wind in the area, and all the water was moving, and hence all the other shimmers were short and irregular. But this one, and only this, was constant. The colour also seemed off; the others were white, but this one seemed golden, almost yellow. Chanakya pondered over it for a minute, then dismissed it because he thought that some construction worker must have accidentally dumped some steel there.

“All the time, every time. Every single time we’ve been asked to go and play volleyball, every single time, you’ve had to take a shit. Actually, it’s not even volleyball. You just like to shit. You shit before lunch, you shit after lunch, a shit before class, another shit after class. I’m starting to think you just like to keep touching your butthole”, echoed Vaibhav’s rather angry voice from outside the third toilet stall on the 5th floor of the hostel.

It had been three weeks since Chanakya had sipped that coffee on the terrace, and a monotonous routine had set in. To be fair to Vaibhav, Chanakya, while born with a rather unfortunate constitution, had only worsened its functionality by acquiring the sin of gluttony, and his routine did seem to involve an unnatural frequency in shit-taking.

Chanakya could rectify this by restricting his gluttony, but given that he did not smoke, drink or commit adultery, he felt he was allowed this one vice. Additionally, his State-Board background meant that every abuse necessitated a comeback.

“Your mother liked it when I touched her butthole”, said Chanakya.

“My mother would have called Mahila helpline even if you got with visible distance of her, you ugly retard”, said Vaibhav.

“You and I both know that’s not true, or else you wouldn’t be alive right not”, said Chanakya.

“Oh yeah, you gay shit? How’s that?”, asked Vaibhav.

Chanakya washed his butt, got up, wore his shorts, opened the door, faced Vaibhav, and said, “Because, Vaibhav, I AM YOUR FATHER”, and then washed his hands.

The duo then descended to the ground floor via the fire escape, as the lift was out of commission. They proceeded to the volleyball court through the football field and the farm, where 8 people had already started a game. The two split into different teams, and the score was reset to love-all.

Chanakya played with minimal power, as the volleyball court lacked a covering, and balls were prone to go outside and into the swamp, where they were near-impossible to recover. However, after his team lost two matches in a row, he started to receive ridicule for the perceived feebleness with which he played the sport. Angry, he got into position. The serviceman from the other side shot the ball, and it fell right onto the area Chanakya was assigned to cover. He interlocked his fingers, and then hit the ball with all possible might he could muster. It went up in the air nearly 40 metres, and then crashed with a loud thud on the other side of the fence. While everyone was astonished with the might, they were also angry with the fallen ball, as it was the last in their possession.

Chanakya and two of his volleyball compatriots were assigned the task of retrieving it. Doing so require them to squeeze through a rather narrow opening through the fence of the tennis court, trek to the side of the swamp on the outside, locate the ball, throw the ball over the fence, and then trek back to the opening. Given his physical state, Chanakya wouldn’t have fit through, but he had an uncanny ability to pull his stomach all the way in to the extent he looked malnutritioned, developed over years and years of doing it when talking to attractive women.

He trekked over to the swamp with his phone’s flashlight on, and then split up with his friends to cover the entire ground. He had focused his flashlight on the ground but he thought he saw something move out of the corner of his eye. So, he turned his flashlight in that direction, when a single ray of golden light bounced back through a narrow slit enclosed by a mesh under a pile of rubble, covered on all sides by knee-deep water. Now, this had caught his attention. He sought to venture there, but Lord knew what creepy-crawlies lay in that water. There was no way there but through the swamp.

Chanakya was thinking hard about his possible options when came a voice, “We’ve got the ball, meet us near fence”. Chanakya was thinking hard, and had only registered that there was a message, but not its content, so he shouted back, “Huh?”, to which came the reply, “We’ve found the ball, you fat gay elephant”, to which Chanakya replied, “Alright, I’m coming. Don’t get your knickers in a twist”. After photographing the pile, he joined his friends.

He then played one match of volleyball and left. He went and had dinner, and then went to the room right below his own, 406. He chatted with friends, watched Netflix, played CoD(M), and again, took a shit. But throughout the evening, all he could think of was the shimmer.

Even in his sleep, he was plagued by the shimmer in his nightmares; no matter how far he extended his hand, no matter how long he stretched himself, the shimmer seemed as though it crept further away from him, and even with the ever-expanding distance between the two, it seemed to infinitely illuminate every space it touched. Chanakya woke up with a sweat, his clothes drenched in it, but now he thirsted not for water, but for answers.

It was five in the morning just the day after Chanakya had detected that golden ray in the swamp. Rare to see a soul awake at this hour, impossible to find one active. But there stood Chanakya Rao, with a small, one-zip, 10-L bag slumped over his shoulders. He descended the stairs, greeted the guard, and made his way to the opening in the fence.

He crossed the fence and trekked his way to the swamp. He kept his bag on the ground and unzipped it. Out came four XXL Ziploc’s, a couple dozen rubber bands, some safety pins, a flashlight, a change of clothes, and some rope that he’d ever so graciously ‘borrowed’ from the pile of construction material that lay outside the to-be-built ‘Residential Block 2’. He covered both his shoes with a double-protective layer of the Ziploc(s), tightened it with the rubber bands, attached it to his pants with the safety pins, and then switched on the flashlight.

He rotated the flashlight to the heap of rubble, and then saw the single beam of golden light being reflected back. Every instinct in his body warned him against venturing into the swamp, for fundamentally, human nature is such that it rebels against the unknown. Yet, with all the mental might he could gather, he forced his right leg into the swamp.

‘Plop!’

And then Chanakya froze. The silent morning remained silent no longer. It was filled with the chirping of the crickets, the brushing of the weeds, the sound of air bubbles being released from the soil into the water, the pounding of an aluminium sheet against some wood, and the shifting of the slime under his feet. Chanakya stood there in silence for nearly ten minutes, completely blank, not a thought in his mind, simply listening intently to every single sound that emanated from his surroundings. Then his left leg also stepped into the swamp,

almost automatically.

‘Plop!’

This second plop freed Chanakya from the trance that he was in, and he shook his head and slapped his face to feel awake. Flashlight in hand, he waded for nearly 20 metres before he finally found the heap. He took a moment to scan his surroundings, then switched off his flashlight and turned on his phone. He opened the camera and switched it to night mode. With as much focus as the app allowed, he placed it against the mesh and started clicking pictures. He then opened his gallery, and to his wonder, he saw, as clear as the morning sun that had now lit up the sky, a bar of gold as big as his phone.

Excitement got a hold of him, and he took two steps back and violently pushed his shoulder against the pile of rubble to loosen the mesh. His shoulder impacted a brick, breaking it, but in the process, bringing down the pile of rubble with a thud. Chanakya luckily escaped its impact. The mud in the rubble fell down to mix in the water, while the dust became one with the wind.

Chanakya started coughing severely because of the sawdust. However, he knew the importance of keeping the discovery a secret, and so, with sawdust in his neck and his eyes, he made it out of the swamp, slung his bag over his shoulder, trekked back to the opening in the fence, and washed his eyes and face with some tap water nearby. When he got all of it out, he flung his bag onto the ground and let out a cry of excitement.

“Is that Gold? Is that Gold? What if that’s gold? Nah, it can’t be gold, someone would have spotted it already. It’s in a bloody dump, gold isn’t found in dumps. But didn’t some guy in the UK find some old gold relic in some dump near his home? Maybe my luck’s good. Maybe I am god’s chosen. Nah, there’s lots of people better than me. If God had to choose someone to give gold to, he would definitely not choose this sinner. But maybe this is my chance at redemption? Maybe my years of sincere prayer when I was a kid had an effect on his design for me? Maybe?”

Chanakya’s mind was filled with such thoughts. For half an hour he paced about the volleyball court, his mind filled with opposites, an infinite number of situations playing out in it, all the way from investing that money and retiring as a billionaire before 30 to being stung by a scorpion when sifting through the pile of rubble. Some improbable, but none less significant.

He finally glanced at his phone and found the time to be 7:30 AM. He was completely muddy and his clothes were torn, and he had to clean himself up before his classmates saw him and started asking questions. He slung his bag over his shoulder and headed back to his room.

It had been nearly five days since Chanakya had bruised his shoulder. He finished all his classes for the day and hurriedly made it back to his room. He used the lift, got to the fifth floor, opened the door, and doubly locked it from the inside. Then, he opened his laptop, opened his SecureSafe, opened his photos, and viewed the brick of gold. He sat there for a whole ten minutes looking at the gold from every angle possible. Then, he searched online for ‘how to know if something is gold or not only from photo’. He clicked on the sixth page of results. He had already been through almost all of the relevant results, but to no avail. He knew he was looking through bullshit now, but some hope was left in him that he could finally find an article that provided him with the answers he required. An hour passed by, and he was now on the twelfth page, and gold had completely disappeared from the articles, replaced by ‘Camel Pageants in Qatar’. Chanakya finally gave up, dejected. He placed the laptop on his study table, and slept on his bed. He had just started crying, when someone rattled the door handle outside.

“Who is it?”, Chanakya shouted.

“It’s me.”, came Ayush’s voice.

“What?”

“Open the door.”

“First you tell me what.”

“I’m going to Manauli to cut my hair. Wanna come? We’ll have something to eat on the way.”

Chanakya contemplated this proposition, and then agreed to it.

“I’ll wear something proper, give me five.”, Chanakya replied.

Chanakya wiped the tears from his eyes, put on some better clothes, and unlocked the door.

“Shall we?”, Ayush asked.

“We shall”, Chanakya replied

The two then laughed, Chanakya forgot his troubles, and picked Vaibhav up on their way to Manauli. They had their hair cut, ate a wide variety of street food, and were on the way back home, when a banner caught Chanakya’s eyes: “Gold appraisal from only photo. Only such talent in Punjab. Come to see this and get your gold appraised. Location: Behind 24/7, Sector 82”.

Chanakya checked the location of the 24/7 in question, and saw that it was within walking distance. He told his friends he was hungering for a Subway sandwich, and that he was going to have one. Chanakya walked it to Sector 82. There, he searched for a while before he found the shop in question, on the ground floor of a two-floor building that looked half-built, and entered it. There were 8 people already in the queue. An hour later, a rather attractive assistant beckoned him inside a cabin, where he was greeted by the face he saw on the banner.

“What can I do for you?”, the man asked in Hindi.

“Hi. I was looking through some old photos that my dad had taken way back when with one of those actual Nikon cameras, and came upon this photo. When I asked him about it, he said it was a photo of an actual brick of Gold someone threw into the Tirupati Hundi. I don’t believe him at all, and now we only have the photo, so I’d like you to tell me if it’d real or not by looking at it, which is supposed to be your area of expertise”, Chanakya replied in Hindi.

“Sure. Where’s the photo?”

“Here.”, Chanakya showed the man the photo on his SecureSafe gallery.

“Oh yeah, this is gold”, the man replied in an instant.

“How do you know?”

“Can’t you see the hallmark there in the corner. Very faint, but very visible. Zoom in, would you?”

Chanakya zoomed in, and, as predicted, there was the faint outline of a hallmark.

“Can’t a hallmark be faked?”

“It can, but I fail to see why anyone would spend so much money just to throw some fake gold into a Hundi.”

“Are you sure?”

“I cannot be absolutely sure, but I’ve been doing this job for more than a decade now, and it is very rare that a customer has returned to complain.”

“So, what you’re saying is, you’re not sure?”

“I’m saying I’m 95% sure. Whether you want to consider that 5% probability or not is up to you. Time’s up. Please pay the receptionist 800 rupees on the way out.”

“But……”

“NEXT!”

Chanakya paid the woman and caught an auto back to the university.

After signing in, he made his way to his room with only one thought in mind: “95% sure it’s gold. Now Imma has to get my hands on it. But how?” The how reverberated in his mind as though the sound of two pebbles had been flung against each other in an enormously wide chasm.

It had been nearly six days since Chanakya had made up his mind to retrieve that stuck piece of gold. Midterms were then going on for all batches, and everyone was busy with their last-minute studies, and not a soul was to be seen on the grounds. Chanakya had anticipated this, and had studied enough to pass all his subjects in those six days. While passing was not good enough, at the time, given these ‘extracurriculars’, he felt it was sufficient.

He finished all his classes and returned to his room. With the same items he’d packed as the last time he’d ventured into the swamp, he ventured into it once more. However, unluckily for him, there had been heavy rains in the last couple of days, so the swamp was filled with water that had mixed so completely with the mud that Chanakya couldn’t actually even see the bottom. It could have been neck-deep. If it was and his shoes got stuck in the mud, he would be, literally, dead in the water. However, these were all secondary considerations in Chanakya’s mind. Greed had overcome him. He quickly put on the Ziploc’s, flashlight in hand, and placed his right leg in the water. After half a minute, all the soil had finally parted and his leg had found sound footing. The water level stood a couple inches beneath his crotch. He switched on his flashlight, then waded into the water and towards the heap. There was no shimmer. He had completely changed the pile of rubble. There was no longer any mud or dust on it, all of it had been removed because of his stupid push and the rest had washed down with the rain. The cardboard that was present inside had completely withered away, and the laminate on the wood that was behind the mesh had started to chip. There was an overarching structure of concrete poured over welded TMT bars that had somehow penetrated a broken door in the middle. The heap was porous, Chanakya knew this, but before the push, there was a mesh from where he could view the gold. Chanakya desperately searched for another opening, and finally found a teeny-tiny hole on the other side. He could not view the gold, but the golden ray that bounced back through it was unmistakable. However, the entire heap had seeped almost a foot into the ground than last time, and the soil had completely captured it. Chanakya tried to upheave it with his own hands, then with a wrench he found lying around, then with a rod, then using a combination of rods as a lever, then a shovel, and, finally, out of desperation, even the rope he’d bought, which broke into two. Chanakya was extremely careful during all this to not close even the tiny hole that allowed him to see that shimmer. He knew that there was no way he could uproot the heap in his current state. He would simply have to wait for the winter and the soil to start to dry up. But what if someone else, someone stronger, found his heap before the soil dried and retrieved the gold? Chanakya wasn’t going to leave that to chance. He found a distinctive red board lying around and fixed it into the soil with all his might. He then took a photo of the heap again, and marked the location in his own memory. There were maybe two dozen heaps in the swamp, but only one worth nearly half a crore. He then made his way back to his room, took a shower, changed his clothes, and disposed of the Ziploc’s. He then researched how to make soil dry faster. Most articles talked about sunlight and ventilation, but one caught his eye: Using Builder’s Lime. He wore his shoes, went to the market in Manauli, found a chemicals’ shop, bought eight kilos of Builder’s Lime, evaded campus security upon his return, and then hurried to the swamp and mixed it in its entirety with the water. It was going to take some time to have its effect, but definitely shorter than waiting for winter. But Chanakya knew that even when the soil got loose, he still lacked the power and physique necessary to uproot the TMT bars from the ground. No, in order to retrieve his gold, he was going to have to give up even the one vice he had allowed himself (gluttony) and incorporate into his life that which he had tried to achieve innumerable times, but never succeeded: a routine of daily exercise. He would have to lose all his excess weight and turn all the fat he had into muscle. He would have to train his entire body to be used to withstanding extremely heavy pressures, and lifting very heavy weights. He would have to work extremely hard, and even give up on the current duration of his sleep. But with nearly half a crore hanging in the balance, Chanakya deemed every sacrifice worth it.

It had been more than two months from when Chanakya had vowed to sacrifice everything necessary to be able to get in shape to retrieve his gold. He had given up all prepared food, and consumed only dairy products (for protein and calcium) and raw fruits and vegetables. He had also limited his sleep duration to a strict six hours. He had started to exercise for more than six hours a day, and now was able to lift weights exceeding one hundred kilograms with relative ease and also run for miles without tire. He had somehow managed to burn all the fat he had accumulated over eighteen years with a highly intensive two-month plan. He had sacrificed and sacrificed and sacrificed. But not in vain. Already, seeing his muscular figure, he’d begun to be approached by attractive ladies, for whom he no longer needed to pull his stomach in. Rather, they would try to get their hands on his abs. He had been chosen to participate in an intercollegiate volleyball championship, for winning which he received a substantial cash prize. Money was already rolling in. But what was not, was an opportunity for retrieval. The university’s second phase of construction had begun in early December, the site for which was right next to the swamp. Citing the safety of the students, the college had completely cordoned off the area and closed the opening. When the students complained about how difficult they’d made it to retrieve the volleyball, the administration had the fence raised and extended perpendicularly to cover the entire swamp, but had left the swamp itself open. However, Chanakya had spent much more time in the dirt and mud of the swamp than the administration. He knew of a longer, muddier path that led to the swamp that shadowed the current outer fencing. However, this route was rather risky, as it was also used by the Security Guards to do their rounds. Every day, before dinner, in the evening, Chanakya peered out his room’s window with a pair of binoculars he’d bought with the prize money. He recorded when the guards did their rounds. Luckily for him, it was not irregular. He had found a nice gap between 07:20 PM and 07:40 PM that the route was clear. For the past week, he had tried the route four times and had timed how long the entire retrieval operation would take. He had unsuccessfully tried to shift the boulder which would not budge because of one rod that was firmly in the way. If Chanakya could somehow break that, then the operation was a success. Chanakya had studied metal cutting the past week, and had “borrowed” an extremely expensive metal cutting set from the university’s Maker’s Space the previous day. He had tried metal cutting another iron bar of similar width, which took 8 minutes. Accounting for that, and the duration of his trial retrieval operations, the entire plan took 26 minutes. But, Chanakya was sure that, under the pressure, he’d be able to do it within 20. That day was the first exam of the end-term exams, and tomorrow was the most difficult exam for both batches. This meant the route would be completely empty.

Now, to the story:

Chanakya paced about his room uncontrollably with a book about Python in his hand. His roommate only assumed the anxiety of the exam had gotten to him, and had offered a Snickers to calm him, which our strong-willed protagonist had graciously refused. An alarm rang with the ringtone ‘Hard Work’ at 7:10 PM. Chanakya dismissed it, slung his bag over his shoulder (which he’d already packed), and headed out of the room. He made his way to the start of the route near gate two, and waited two minutes for the guard to leave. He sprinted to the swamp, and reached there in five, but when he came there, he saw that the swamp was completely covered in aluminium sheets, not just above, but on all four sides as well. It wasn’t open. There was another Security Guard sitting outside one door that had been welded onto the sheet, and a stall nearby that looked like it was for sanitization. Chanakya just stared at it blankly, in bewilderment, for a few minutes, and then proceeded to check out the entire perimeter. The entire swamp area had been cordoned off from all sides with aluminium sheets that had been fastened to the ground using steel rope and welded together pretty strongly. Chanakya heard a creak from the side from which he’d approached the swamp, and walked there to investigate. He saw that the door had been opened, and a woman in full protective gear exited it. The guard hurriedly closed the door, and the woman removed the sort-of medical helmet that covered her head. Chanakya now saw her clearly, and it turned out to be one of his Biology professors.

“Ma’am?”, Chanakya blurted.

“Who is that? What are you doing here? You’re not supposed to be here? Who allowed you in here?”, asked the Security Guard in Hindi, rather menacingly.

“It’s alright, it’s alright. Calm down.”, the professor told the Security guard in Hindi.

“What are you doing here?”, she asked Chanakya, “It’s not safe for you here. Where’s the security guard at gate 2?”

“I just had to get some quick samples of concrete for a private experiment I’m trying to do for a project”, Chanakya replied, “Why isn’t it safe for me here?”

“What are you trying to do with concrete?”

“I don’t know. My team member was actually going to do the experiment.”

“Who’s your team member?”

“Vaibhav. And, again, why isn’t it safe?”

“There’s a female Giant Indian Cobra that has laid her eggs in this area. One of our guards spotted the snake crawling into a crevice near here and brought it to our attention. When we investigated it, we found the eggs. We informed the state Forest department, and they’ve tasked us with studying the cobra’s gestation and behaviour. It's a three-month project. We’ll be releasing the cobras into the wild after they’ve grown a bit.”

“Why not relocate them?”

“We want the study to be as close to nature as possible. The cobra has chosen this area, so we will study it here itself.”

“Have you shifted the heaps in the swamp somewhere else?”, Chanakya asked, his heartbeat growing faster, and his arms growing heavier, wanting to pull his entire body down.

“No, we’ve just fenced it. It’s all there as it is. You can get your concrete from near the pit at the library. I’m going to send out a mail telling everyone to avoid this area when I get back to the office, I’m going to also increase security. Do not be seen here again. I will have to take strict disciplinary action against you, and you will be suspended if seen here again. It’d for your own good.”

She then beckoned the Security Guard to escort Chanakya back to Gate 2, and Chanakya rushed back to his room, pulled the cover over his face, and sobbed inconsolably for the first time in a very, very long time.

It had been about two months since Chanakya’s plans were foiled by a slut cobra. Chanakya had cried inconsolably on the day they were foiled, but he was now a man of strong will and character. The very next day, he had approached his biology professor and enquired if there were any positions available to study the cobras under her. While she was reluctant, she agreed to let him work an internship under her if he demonstrated sufficient drive and knowledge. Chanakya had researched all there was to about Cobras, all the way from habitats to the molecular structure of their venom. He had collated all his findings in a concise, two-page document (as was instructed by the professor), with all the appropriate references and citations the week prior. He had actually gone to the Library and physically opened a book to find out about snake behaviour.

The judgement of Chanakya’s document was that fated day.

The wee hours of the early morning of 03rd March, 2023:

Chanakya awoke in a sweat, his clothes drenched in it. His entire body laid absolutely still on the bed, in the same position from which it was suddenly jarred awake. Chanakya finally gained control of his limbs after about half a minute, and seated himself on the edge of the bed. He placed his hands on his head and his elbows on his thighs. He was parched, but didn’t require water. The only thought in his head was the meeting with the biology professor. Now, Chanakya thirsted for validation. He lay under the covers once again and tried to sleep, but was woken abruptly by his alarm at 07:00 AM. He dismissed it, went running, took a bath, had some milk, and proceeded to class.

He finished all his classes for the day by 05:20 PM, and headed straight to his meeting, which was to take place at her cabin at 05:40 PM. They met, greeted each other, and she asked him to take a seat. They chatted about the weather for some time, and how he was finding her classes, and then she removed Chanakya’s paper from her drawer. Chanakya’s heartbeat elevated, his senses amplified, and his eyes darted towards the paper.

“It’s actually a much better paper than I was expecting. You’ve really put some effort in it. I’m impressed. I’m happy to have you working under me, but we only have a couple weeks left for our research, so just consider that.”

Chanakya was relieved. He slumped back into his chair and kept his arm on the armrests. He looked her in the eye and said, “I’m happy to help however I can.”

“Well, that’s wonderful. Why don’t we go to the tech team and make you an official intern badge, huh?

“I’d be delighted, ma’am.”

Chanakya got his badge, and the two made their way to the swamp. There, the professor explained the entire recording process to Chanakya, instructed him on the safety precautions, and showed him exactly where the snakes were. The swamp had been completely lit up with lights that mimicked the sun, and also the intensity. It varied day and night as well. To Chanakya’s relief, they were in a heap far, far away from his own. The two then exited the swamp via the hinged door, sanitized themselves, and started chatting on the way back to Gate 2. Chanakya was smiling ear-to-ear, and the professor was also happy to have someone accompany her.

“Oh, and one last thing”, said the professor, “You will only be allowed in the research area when I’m with you. Safety reasons, or else I open up the university to liability if something happens to you. You understand, right?”

“Right, yes, yeah, sure. Liability. Got it, thanks.”

Chanakya was dejected but did not lose hope.

Almost two weeks passed and Chanakya assisted her with every bit of research she asked him to. He assisted her so well, that she encouraged him to apply for a coveted international scholarship worth $50,000 and even provided him with four recommendation letters for it, including her own.

Finally, in the late afternoon of 16th May, Chanakya was with her in the swamp when the guard shouted from outside that there was an important message for her. The two exited the swamp, and she took her call. Something serious must have happened, for she told Chanakya to record the standard observations himself, and that she had something very important to do. She hurriedly got in her car, and left the university.

Chanakya knew that opportunity doesn’t knock twice.

He removed his protective suit and sprinted to the maker space. He stuffed some metal cutting equipment down his pants and fastened it tightly to his skin with duct tape. He sprinted back to the swamp, donned his protective suit, got inside, removed his protective suit and cut through the duct tape with his nails. He assembled the metal cutting equipment, located the heap that had his red marker, cross-verified it again against memory and the photo on his phone, and started melting the rod. 8 minutes later, the rod no longer was one. With a plank of wood nearby, he shoved the red-hot iron aside, and, with all his might, uprooted the heap. The entire heap came tumbling down the other side, but a piece of glass cut his forearm. He then stomped on the fallen debris, fell to his knees, and started sifting through it like a madman, when he felt something smooth under his palm. He grasped it and yanked it out of the rubble, and then fell with his back on the ground when it came free. His back pained, but when he saw what was in his mind, he sprung to his feet and let out a soft scream of joy. In front of his eyes, in the palm of his hand, was a rather heavy 1-kg brick of gold. He bit it to see if it was real, but it was not. He chipped his tooth. Thinking it might just be cheap 12K gold, he charged up his metal cutting equipment once more and used it on the brick. The thin layer of gold gave way, and inside it was entirely copper. The melted brick flowed down the iron platform, and caused a huge fizz when it dropped into the water. Chanakya was dejected. He donned his PPE, left the swamp, and threw the PPE away. He went up to the terrace of the hostel and cried and cried for nearly three hours. He let out several shrieks of pain, and broke three fingers punching a wall. But that physical pain was nothing compared to what he felt. He climbed onto the cement and contemplated jumping when his phone vibrated. It was an email from the trust that administered the $50,000 scholarship confirming that he was now a recipient. Chanakya put his phone back into his pocket and admired the shimmer of the moonlight over the clouds. He called his parents, and then somehow arranged for and distributed sweets to the entire population Plaksha. He went to sleep a happy man (having revisited the swamp and returned all the metal cuttinging equipment), and never in the duration of his four-year course did he ever again wake up in a sweat.