Face-Off

G

unshots and screams drowned the din that was created in the stadium. As Major Ahmed peeked from the fresh opening which had been created in the wall he saw that there were two terrorists who were firing blindly at a group of civilians who were trying to flee towards the other side of the road. As he was observing them he felt a warm breath down his neck. He quickly turned around and saw a child standing there in torn clothes. The child was oblivious of the situation and was looking somewhere on the other side of the road.

Suddenly a bullet went past his ear and struck the wall opposite him. He ducked in time as he could see terrorists preparing to shower bullets on him. As he was looking about to find shelter he saw something moving on the road. The child had run away from the spot towards the main street. Major was helpless as he wanted to save the child but at the same time he did not want to risk coming out. He looked up from the same opening and saw that the two young militants were eying the child. However he was surprised to see that none of them had shot the child so far.

It was enough. Indians had kept Kashmir for too long. It was time to blow apart their major towns and teach them a lesson. Umar and Yousuf were trained militants and had been deployed to carry out attacks on public places. They had planned two long months for this attack and had almost succeeded in planting the bomb at the stadium. But their plan was foiled when they were spotted by a few of the guards. They had somehow managed to get inside an abandoned building and were firing at the civilians so that they can somehow plan their escape.

It was a clever ploy because it kept the military at bay and they were safeguarded from having a direct encounter. However they could see that a lone officer had managed to scrape his way though their bullets and was now hiding just behind the walls outside the building. They did not want to leave their vantage point as with the number of force surrounding them they would become sitting ducks. They tried firing at some of the civilians who were stupid enough to expose themselves but they soon became restless and decided to shoot at the officer. As they fired a single shot a little boy came out of nowhere and started running towards the bag of explosives. They were now in a quandary whether to shoot the harmless child or not. Both of them were married and had kids so the idea of killing an innocent child did not seem right to them. But the fact that someone was tampering with their explosives was totally unacceptable.

Yash was very happy to have come to the stadium with his father. It was very nice to see so many people at one place. However it was very weird when people started shouting. He could not understand the reason why some people were dancing. But it looked pleasant and he started dancing with them. Soon he could soon see that not everyone was interested in dancing and some people were running out of the gate. He heard some crackers playing outside and it got him really excited. He ran towards the crowd that was moving out and towards the sound of the crackers.

He was relieved to see that not everyone was interested in the crackers and he could enjoy them all by himself. As he moved towards the nearby lane the sounds became much prominent. On the other side of the lane he could see a bag lying. It was surely the one having crackers as he could see a toy gun similar to one that he had at home tucked in the bag. However the child was attracted to the bag as it was very colourful. He ran towards the bag but soon came across a bearded man who was also eyeing the bag. He did not want any competition so he ran towards the bag elated that he had claimed it finally.

The major, both the terrorists and the child were killed in the crossfire that followed.