I woke up. Looked at the clock. It's 8 am! Where is Pochamma? Where is Nagamani? Where is Babu, my milkman? OK. Everybody took leave. What a day! Went through my routine. Freshened up. Something feels different. What is it? Oh I am not hearing the usual birds chirping. It's silent. Deafening silence. I remembered that its day after Janmashtami. Everybody in the colony must be resting after yesrday's fun packed active bhajans, keertans n food n fun. way into midnight. I picked up phone to call my Amma. There is no signal. Cursed service provider again. It's almost every fortnight we lose connection with the world! Switched on TV. Still blank screen. No satellite connection. Great!
Now I decided to go to the near-by village n get some milk. Perks of leaving Urban lifestyle behind n getting into partial retirement stage. How about getting some breakfast too? Great idea. Picked up car keys stepped out of my beautiful country style home. Still, Something is not feeling right. Took few steps. Found few birds dead in walkway. Oh poor things. That's why no wakeup chirping in the morning. How come all dead same time? Is it the heat? Yesterday the temperatures rose to 55 degrees as per news channels. Dam it. No point fools like me planting trees n moving to natural living methods. There are millions who are destroying environment everyday! When do we humans learn? Got into car n switched on radio as usual. No sound. Started driving towards Zupalli, our nearest hamlet. Started making mental notes to call Kanna, my daughter, call gas company for refil, again, complete my annual report n submit to my boss, n buy supplements. That's enough to take care of the day.
I stopped abruptly n stared in front of me. NO ROAD! What? I see no road n buildings in front of me. Is it some sort of trick? I got out of the car. Slowly walked on the road. Checking every step cautiously. A few steps, I saw sky. Huh?!?!? Sky on earth? It felt as if I am standing on edge of a mountain n looking down into the valley. However what in front of me is not a Valley but bottomless drop. I picked up a pebble from roadside n threw. It just dropped into the whatever you call it in front of me. Dropped n disappeared. I am shocked n scared.
I turned my car n drove back home. I realised there is no one on the roads. Morning walkers, joggers, dog walkers. No one. As I drove past villas, I started honking. We have a no honking rule in our colony. My idea is, someone will walk out of their house at least to scold. I was right. I started seeing people walking out of their homes. A few. I saw couple of my friends. Felt relieved. Stopped at the junction so that I can share my findings.
We gathered at the junction. Everybody started talking at once. About the silence. About the eerie feeling. About dead birds in their walkways. Dead pets. Loud noise in the night. I got everyone's attention n told them about my unfruitful trip to village n the drop. Everyone became silent. Suddenly someone noticed that there are few people missing. Why didn't they come out? Quickly we walked towards nearby Rao's house. His main door was locked. One of the neighbours peeped through window n told us that Rao is in sofa in front of TV n not moving. We took liberty, broke his door n went inside. Rao was dead. Shocked, we moved on, Next stop, was Mrs Sucheta's house. A Navy commander's wife, well educated, kind hearted, jovial, and a new mother. Through windows we found no one down stairs. Mrs Ragini rang the bell n bangged the door. Mrs.Ruby found the main door unlocked n we all went inside. Together we all walked upstairs. We found Sucheta in her bedroom. Holding her mobile, with baby in her lap. It's apparent that she has been crying. Looking at us she started crying again. Ragini stepped towards her n took her hands into hers. "Last night I heard a noise. I thought Anuj (baby) will wake up n cry. But he didn't. He is not even moving. He is motionless. I am trying to call ambulance n Everyone of you. But phone is dead". We realised that the baby is dead. We left a couple of women to be with Sucheta n walked out of the house. We need to find out what's going on. Fast.
All of us went to committee office. Few members took records n started taking attendance. Another couple of people took the task to visit absentees' houses. Everybody started frantically searching their devices for some connection or information. Suddenly Mr.Anant barged into the office. He was been missing throughout the time. He got news!
According to him, he saw a post on FB from ISRO, just before the big noise. He downloaded the video. It says, earth has broken into pieces. WHAT????
According to the post, ISRO started losing contact with it's satellites. Last image it received from one of the satellites showed earth breaking into six pieces. The message is sent out in hope that there is still some way to contact people n inform them of the situation.
Where are we? How big is our chunk of land? How do we survive? Is my daughter in UK on this piece of earth or where? Am I ever going to see or talk to her? I started crying.
I heard "Bhaavayaami Raguraamam" M.S.Subbulakshmi's crisp voice. My morning alarm. I opened my eyes. This time really woke up. It's all a dream! A very bad dream!
Lying on bed, covered in sweat, heart beating like crazy, I started thinking. Eventually, is this how mankind going to end up? Destroying earth? Is there time to stop the damage? Drilling earth, for what not, sucking all its layers, creating vacuum, damaging it's nature,, destroying forests, polluting waters, generating irrelevant piles of undesolvable - non perishable - toxic material, . . . much more.
I got out of bed. With new determination. However small it is, every step I take from now onwards, I consciously make sure that it is in the welfare of Mother Earth n benefits me.
