Chapter 1

It was a very dark and cloudy night. Dixcy was a lonely figure walking on the streets in the middle of the night, eating a banana. Eating bananas will increase your weight, they said. He walked past a couple of donkeys, a few stray dogs and a few stray ummm… lady dogs eying the males of their species. Everything looked quite still, content and quiet. And then suddenly out of nowhere there was a gun shot. In that very still, content and quiet night it felt like a loud fart in a meditation room. Even the dogs showed their awareness by barking and howling. And then came the footsteps. And from nowhere a man came into Dixcy’s view. He was not an Indian. He was hurt pretty bad. His shirt had a large dark stain and it was spreading all the time. He came to Dixcy and collapsed. Dixcy impulsively extended his arms and caught the falling body and cushioned its fall. The man was quite old. He was panting and trying to say something. Dixcy could hardly make out the words.

“I don’t have much time. But there is a task that needs to be accomplished. The good name of the Bush family depends on it.”

Note: It all came out amidst gasps and panting. But for smooth reading of the reader it has been depicted as a plain statement. (That is why the author has a rightful claim as being the most reader friendly author in the world.)

Dixcy was in shock. He just didn’t understand what he was supposed to say. So he just said, “Cool”.

“It’s the Clintons, I know it. They want to embarrass us in front of the world. It’s about the coming elections.”

“Cool.”

“My father and I were staying in the hotel ‘wherethehellisit’. They must have kept us under surveillance. So this evening when my father went to toilet, they came in our room. Room 666. My father always thought he was a bit of a devil. Anyway, they attacked us and kidnapped us. They must have used chloroform. When I woke up, I heard them talking to the hotel staff on the telephone. So that they could tell them the secret which will bring embarrassment to our family and party.”

“But if they were talking to the staff, the public already knows it, don’t they?”

“No, no. They were having a hard time getting through IVR. Those stupid fools were looking for ‘If you want to embarrass Bush family press …’. I managed to get out. But I was found out. And they shot me. Do this dying man a favor. Go to the hotel…”

“Where the hell is it?”

“Yup, that’s the name.”

“No, no. Where the hell is the hotel?”

“How the hell do I know? Can’t you see from the name that even the owners don’t know where the hell is it?”

“Then how do I find it?”

“Just tell the cab driver.”

“But if even the owners don’t know where the hell is ‘wherethehellisit’, then how the hell will a cab driver know?”

“How the hell do I know that how the hell the cab drivers know?”

“Oh just leave it. After I reach the hotel what am I supposed to do?”

“After you get there, go to room 666. There is an attached toilet to the room. Just go inside and…”

“And?”

“Flush the toilet.”

“Flush the toilet?”

“Flush the toilet.” Confirmed the old man.

“That’s it?”

“What do you mean ‘That’s it’? You don’t want the hotel staff going around in public and saying that the men from Bush family don’t even flush the toilet after they have used it!”

“Oh, I think you are right.” Suddenly a sense of purpose was filling Dixcy’s heart. “I will do it. I will do it even if I have to die for the cause.”

“Thank you, son. May god never let your toilet remain unflushed. The good name of the Bush family rests on your shoulders.”

And the old man’s body went limp leaving Dixcy with a sense of achievement. To be trusted by somebody with the good name of his family was a thing to be proud of. He laid the old man down.

“You fool, you didn’t even ask me for a key!”

Dixcy almost suffered a heart attack due to the shock. He took the key from the old man who then seemed to die again. Dixcy triple checked that the old man really was dead. And then ran for the nearest cab stand.

But there was another gunshot. The bullet missed Dixcy by mere inches. He stood where he was, absolutely still. A man suddenly came out of the darkness, just like the old Bush had. He had a gun in his hand. Dixcy identified it as a German mouser, a big, deadly weapon.

“You were watching us” said Dixcy.

“You are a bright kid.”

“No, it’s only that I have read too many thrillers. Why did you wait for so long?”

“I may be cruel but I am not so bad as to ruin the final melodramatic moment of an old man. Put your hands on you head and turn around.” The man was advancing towards him now.

Suddenly Dixcy became aware of what was in his hands. A banana peel! If he could just drop it in the assassin’s path. He dropped it while raising his hands and turned around. In the pitch dark night and the noises made by the dogs; the assassin missed the event altogether. Dixcy heard a ‘thud’ and a lot of swearing. He grabbed the opportunity and ran for his life. To his immense relief he did not hear another gun shot and found a cab right away.

“Take me to ‘wherethehellisit’.”

“Right away, sir.”

The trip took a long time. Dixcy tried to notice the road signs and remember the route. But there was absolutely nothing on the roads.

“How do you remember this route to ‘wherethehellisit’?” he asked the cab driver.

“How the hell do I know that, sir.”

“All right, all right.”

He reached the hotel. He took out his wallet to pay the cabbie and found an unnaturally large amount of money in it. He paid off the cab and almost ran through the main lobby up the stairs to the 6th floor. But he just couldn’t find Room 666. He went back to the reception.

“Where is Room 666?” Dixcy asked the receptionist.

“In the basement, sir.” Said the receptionist in a way which suggested that he actually wanted to say “Where else you idiot?”

“In the basement!”

“Yes, sir. You see it’s the devil’s number.”

This time Dixcy ran down the stairs and promptly found 666. It was the only room in the basement. His hands were shaking with excitement. After all you don’t get the chance to smash an international scandal every day. He fumbled with the key but managed to open the door. He immediately found the door to the toilet. He opened it and froze then and there.

The assassin was standing there with a very small Liliput in his hand. The toilet smelled very foul indeed. Sweat broke out all over Dixcy. He had not seen the assassin properly in darkness. He was short but heavily built, dark and bald. His black eyes were as cold as ice. Merely looking at them gave Dixcy the chills.

“My cabbie knew a shortcut.” The assassin smiled.

“Back there you had a Mouser.” Dixcy said nervously.

“Yes. But when I slipped I dropped it. Couldn’t find it in the darkness. I had this small toy with me. But it was in a secret pocket in my underwear so that, you know, nobody finds it. But it makes the underwear very tight. It took me all the time in the world to get it out. Otherwise I would have shot you there itself.” He sounded a bit embarrassed. “But I can finish off the job now.” He smiled. A cold cold smile. The smell was getting fouler by the minute. Dixcy found it very suffocating.

“The only thing I have not yet decided is whether I shoot you and let you die humanely or kill you with this smell.” Said the assassin. The smell would soon become strong enough to kill a person. A normal person.

“How can you stand this smell?”

“I have been thoroughly trained for any situation.”

Right, thought Dixcy. He must have been made to lie down while the whole country farted in his face. That would have certainly trained him for this situation. But his own situation was becoming quite desperate now. He had to find a way soon. But if he tried to run from the smell, he would be shot dead. And if he didn’t, due to the smell he would drop dead. He took a gamble.

“Hey, look there.” He pointed over the right shoulder of the assassin.

“Don’t even try it kid. I am superbly trained. If somebody tries that over my right shoulder I know he is faking.”

“Oh, then look there.” This time Dixcy pointed over his left shoulder.

“What’s that?” the assassin was startled. He looked behind his left shoulder.

At that moment Dixcy dived forward in Rugby style at the assassin’s midriff. But he might have got better results if he had tried to tackle a brick wall. The assassin simply caught him and hurled him away in the corner. Now he was coming towards Dixcy again. Dixcy frantically groped around him and threw a wad of toilet paper at the assassin. To his astonishment, the assassin gave a cry of terror and dropped his gun. Dixcy took the gun and quickly walked down and flushed the toilet. He sighed with relief. He had averted a big international scandal. The smell started to clear away. Now that he was relatively safe, he thought the men from Bush family do shit very smelly.

The assassin was still shouting in terror. He was curled up in a corner and looking at the wad of toilet paper as if it was a bomb. Dixcy picked up the wad. The assassin stopped shouting but was still looking very nervously at it.

“What the hell just happened?” Dixcy wondered aloud.

“Don’t you throw that at me again. I am allergic to the tissue paper.”

“Oh. But then, err, how do you wash your, you know…”

“Aren’t there any clothes in this world!”

“Oh, got it.” Dixcy was enjoying this now. “Say I throw this at you again, just for kicks?”

“Don’t. You b******, a****** ….”

The voice seemed vaguely familiar to Dixcy.

“You b******, a******, stop shouting in your sleep.”

Dixcy woke up with a start. It was Shikhandi.

“You idiot, you ruined all our sleeps.”

Dixcy saw Marvin and Ramlal had also woken up. Dixcy was drenched in sweat.

“Take this towel” said Ramlal.

“What the hell were you dreaming about?” – Shikhandi.

“wherethehellisit” said Dixcy.

“This is your room, you idiot.”

“No, no. I was dreaming about ‘wherethehellisit’.” And he narrated his dream. “You see I just averted a major international incident.”

“By flushing the toilet?”

“By flushing the toilet.”

“Oh god, just go back to sleep, will you? And for god’s sake stop reading those cheap thrillers.”

“Hey, Ok. I am sleeping. Don’t you say a thing about my collection.”

“Collection? You call these cheap paperbacks a collection? Your dreams have made a bloody insomniac out of me.”

“You think you have problems? Look at me…” – Marvin.

“Oh just shut up Marvin. Go back to sleep.”

“As if sleeping will make life any easy.”

Shikhandi took deep breaths. Seemed to regain a bit of control. “Now that everything is sorted out, I think we should go back to sleep.”

Everybody agreed, went back to their beds. Shikhandi switched off the lights.

“You didn’t think about me even in your dreams. Nobody wants me. Life…”

“Shut up Marvin.”

“Yes, you just want me to lie on my bed and think about this miserable life of mine, don’t you?”

“Yes, please do that.”

“Fine.”

And this is the story of these 4 people and their adventure. Shikhandi, Dixcy, Ramlal and Marvin – The Robot.