61 Taarini Mentors

A Black clear-coat Jeep Wrangler dashed through the desolate roads of Bangalore. Late night was the right time for testing the limits of your car's speed and manoeuvrability in this city, as the car raced past the peaceful streets.

Faizal looked at the figure, who was driving the car while simultaneously working with the mobile phone seized from the member of the Mumbai Mafia Alliance, as he spoke with a pleading tone, "Elder brother, can you not play with the phone while driving? The speed has already reached 120km/hr (75 miles/hr), how about I dri... LOOKOUT!"

A small stray dog suddenly ran into the middle of the road and when it saw the glaring headlights of the car, it froze as it cowered in fright. Faizal and the others instinctively closed their eyes as they did not want to see the bloody scene.

Aditya tossed the mobile in the air which landed accurately in Faizal's front shirt pocket as he pulled the hand brake in a flash. The rear pair of wheels lost traction with the road immediately pulling the car in a horizontal direction. Aditya's eyes became focused for a second while a lazy smile hung on his face as he rotated the steering wheel deftly towards the left side of the dog while simultaneously balancing the drift and throttle play adroitly.

Screeech!

He guided the car into a beautiful 360-degree spin causing splendid arcs of tire tracks forming on the road as he stepped on the accelerator and sped off as if nothing had happened. The place where the dog cowered was precisely beside the exact junction where the arcs of tire tracks of the rear and front wheels intersected thus forming a small void zone around it thereby saving it from harm. The dog ran away when it discovered that nothing happened to it.

Aditya took the mobile from Faizal's pocket and continued to tweak it. He did not have a shirt pocket on his t-shirt so he had tossed into Faizal's at the last moment. He was trying to see if his basic hacking skills were practically applicable or not. Aditya of the 'other' world had already succeeded in participating in F4 Spanish Championship driving a Tatuus Formula 3 car, manoeuvring at maximum speeds of 186 miles/hr dexterously. This small stunt was pretty easy for the current Aditya as one had to take his dominant calculative abilities into account along with his professional driving experience.

As to why Aditya was fiddling with the mobile while driving, he discovered that he could multitask effortlessly whenever he activated 'Sensifull' so he simply tried it. He figured out that as long as he didn't close his eyes or looked back, it did not matter if he focused on his phone or the road. Every object which appeared in his range of vision was paid attention to and given due priority without a single detail being neglected. So there was not a single chance of Aditya being absent minded or diverted when this ability was activated.

Aditya turned to look at the white faces of Faizal and others as he suddenly felt a kind of evil satisfaction. He was tempted to give a loud, wicked laugh but restrained himself and asked his new subordinates with a 'concerned' expression, "Are you guys alright?"

Faizal and others looked at Aditya and what they saw was not a concerned expression but an evil smile. It was lucky that everyone had strapped themselves with seat belts. Even with that, they felt that all the contents in their stomachs were pushed into their throats during the drift. The poor captive with a broken leg was just tossed in the back. God knows if that poor soul had one broken bone or multiple as they heard a cracking sound from the back during the drift. Luckily that fellow had become unconscious directly from the injury.

Their hearts stopped for a beat as they began to complain to their Big sis in their minds for throwing them to this anomaly. A few years of their life span seem to have been shortened with the fright they had received just now. Dhanush even went to the extent of thinking that it would have been better if Aditya had just run over the damned dog as the matter would have simply ended with them feeling pity for the poor dog instead of feeling nauseated and dizzy.

"We...we are fine, elder brother," Faizal stuttered as he tried to put up a smiling face but ultimately failed as he looked like someone, who is afraid of injections, had been injected on his buttocks with a giant injection while a beautiful woman looked on. You try your best to act normal but in the end, you fall short.

Aditya smiled brightly when he saw this expression and continued to fiddle with the mobile. He looked at the time and found that it was 11:00 pm. He had already sent a message to Hamsa that he would be late today and to sleep without waiting for him.

"Why did Ms Taarini want us to come to Neela Palace?" Aditya asked as he tossed the phone back to Faizal.

"She only wanted you to come to Neela Palace, you are the one dragging all of us along," Faizal muttered under his breath.

"What?"

"No...Nothing, I heard from elder brother Munna that a huge investment region is been opened for extensive development in Bangalore city so the Chief Minister (elected head of the state/ province) had invited all the big wigs in real estate sector for an informal meeting for celebrating this news." Faizal leaked everything he knew.

"Oh," Aditya nodded as he asked again, "Why in this late hour? Isn't evening better?"

"Elder brother Aditya, you don't know how the rich and affluent class live in this city," Faizal explained, "The only time they would like to come out is either late night or early morning, they absolutely hate the congested traffic and unwanted public attention. So, most of them meet during these times especially if it is a large gathering of elites."

Aditya nodded as he asked again, "Why would Ms Taarini want me to come? What would I do with these high society elites with fat pockets?"

Faizal hesitated a little but still revealed another piece of 'insider' information, "Elder brother Aditya, most of the people in our core are conjecturing among themselves that Big Sis wants to train you as a successor to her otherwise why would she personally start teaching you martial arts since last week? So, I assume she might want you to get used to this circle sooner rather than later."

Faizal continued with a trace of blame in his eyes as he said, "Also, according to Elder brother Munna, you have started to affect the balance of power by destroying so many small gangs in Bangalore that many are itching to make move against you. So, this might be Big Sis's way of protecting you by displaying to everyone the level of importance she places on you which will frighten most of them."

Aditya coughed as he rubbed his head awkwardly. The past week had been pretty eventful for Aditya as he took down 2-3 small gangs on an average, every night. With the number of people he had injured, an orthopaedic ward of a global multi-speciality hospital might not be enough to fit all of them. Taking down gangs felt like tasting blood to Aditya, he enjoyed it immensely. It was like he got a vent to release all the stress, tension and frustration these past few months since his parents went missing.

He could break these people's bones with a clear conscience as not one of these bastards were worth feeling guilty about. Though not all of them were notorious and sinister, almost everyone was engaged in matters which were unethical and unjust so Aditya felt justified when he crushed those gangs. Well, the truth was pretty simple, Aditya got addicted to breaking bones.

Though he might look calm and restrained, the fact that his blood started boiling with excitement and his heart starts pumping blood frantically whenever he hunted these gangs was an undeniable fact. Even Faizal and Munna were shocked at Aditya's zeal and speed in the demolition of crime groups. Aditya felt that every bone he broke was a step which brought him closer to his parents.

Even he, Aditya, never knew that he had this violent gene in him which seem to be blossoming slowly but steadily. He even began to doubt whether his passion for racing and speeding was also a by-product of this characteristic. Aditya did not even think about controlling this as he knew what his goal was. The scene when he couldn't kill Rana was still fresh in his mind. Especially his mind and thinking evolved since he started training under the tutelage of Taarini. He recalled the night when Taarini had asked him to come alone, that was a very 'memorable' night...

"You shall address me as a mentor from today onward when there is only two of us, understand?" Taarini stated icily as she looked at Aditya who was sporting a bloody mouth along with a swollen face as he lifted himself up with great difficulty. Aditya looked at her and nodded, "Yes, mentor."

Taarini had a chilly countenance as her brows slightly relaxed and she gave a curt nod and walked out of the arena and placed the staff back on the stand. She wore a black solid tank top which was sleeveless and had a V-neck with matching dry pair of tights. Aditya noticed her legs and shapely thighs but after getting beaten until his face was swollen, he did not have the mood to appreciate her beauty but was filled with passion to learn how to fight from her.

He had thought that he would be able to handle Taarini even if he was not able to defeat her. This confidence that he had developed through beating many people was smashed to smithereens. Only today, did he know that he was like a kid coming top in middle school and thinking he could beat a university student in knowledge.

Well in Aditya's defence, he did not use any of his abilities in order to get the real feel of Taarini's martial prowess. Aditya smiled bitterly when he remembered the first time when he saw Taarini was when she beat the shit out of ten robust and powerful men.

Sweat trickled down from her head as she took a knife with a unique design as she started practising some flexible movements at high speeds. If Aditya did not have his superior mental abilities which could 'calculate' the position of the knife at any given point of time just by looking at her shoulder movements, it would be almost impossible for a normal human to catch a sight of the knife which seems to have become invisible since Taarini started moving.

Aditya was shocked to see her thin but shapely arms which radiated vigour and strength as she made circular slashing motions sometimes while triangular slicing movements at other times. After some time, she threw another similar knife at Aditya as she said, "the art form that I am about to teach you is called Pekiti-Tirsia Kali, a close quarter, infighting combat oriented system against multiple opponents based on the use of a blade. This knife is called a Kali and this martial art originates from the Philippines and was taught to my elder brother when he served in the army." There was a small flicker of emotion when she mentioned her elder brother which vanished immediately.

Aditya took a deep breath as he held the knife tightly with resolve as he nodded.

"You shouldn't hold the knife so tightly, it will restrict the flexibility of your arm movements."

"Oh, okay."