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they looked like tiger stripes. His hair was matted, almost in dreadlocks and he carried what looked like a small trident in his hand.
     If the woman had looked like she could dish out violence, this newcomer took it to a whole new level. He rolled on the ground, evading a blow from one attacker and casually slashed him in the back with the trident, sending him down, and even before he had fully gotten up from the roll, he had implanted the trident in another man's stomach. In no more than a couple of seconds, he had killed or maimed two of the giants, and stood facing the remaining two, a smile playing at the edges of his mouth.
    'Want to dance, dear daityas?'
    The two men rushed at him, blades glistening in the dark. The woman intercepted one, sliding on the ground, her legs wrapping around his, sending him down as she gracefully rolled on to one knee, and brought her blade down in one smooth move. When Aaditya looked up, he saw that the last man in black was also down, lying at the feet of the man with matted hair. He felt a surge of panic as the man walked towards him now, bloodied trident in hand, but the woman came between them, gently shaking her head. The two of them entered the flying vehicle and in an instant, it had taken off and disappeared from view.
    Aaditya moved to a corner of the grounds and slumped behind a fallen oak tree. Getting into the odd scrape in school was one thing. The violence he had witnessed was of a totally different nature. Sitting there among six dead or dying men, he fumbled for his phone, wondering if he should call the police.
    What would he tell them? How could he explain what he had just witnessed? That was when he saw the glowing cylinder lying a few feet away from him. He picked it up gingerly and was about to take a closer look when he heard another flying vehicle approach. It was a different ship, black in colour and shaped like a saucer. One of the men writhing on the ground seemed to be in contact with the pilot and said, presumably into some communication system, 'They got away. We need help.'
    If help was what they were looking for, they did not get it. Some sort of beam flashed from the ship, and one by one, the men lying on the ground were incinerated, reduced to ash in an instant.
    Aaditya lay hiding behind the tree, not daring to breathe. When he heard the sound of the ship receding, and got up to see a clear sky, he ran faster than he had in years to his bike and sped home.
     
    ***
     
    Aaditya breathed freely only when he was back home. He saw on his phone that he had four missed calls from Supriya, but she was the last thing on his mind right now. He went into the bathroom, standing under the shower for what seemed to be an eternity, trying to calm himself down and to come to grips with what he had just seen. It was clearly not a gang fight, gangs did not arrive on the scene in flying vehicles. What the hell had he seen? He changed and dumped his dust-covered clothes, remembering to take out the old squadron patch.
    That was when he saw the cylinder in his trouser pocket. He had totally forgotten about it in the chaos, and now he took  a closer look. It was perhaps eight inches long and an inch in diameter. It was totally transparent, and what was most striking was the viscous liquid it contained. Milky white and thick, the liquid occupied about half of the cylinder. Aaditya put it on his bedside table, figuring that whatever the cylinder was, it was by no means the weirdest thing he had witnessed tonight.
    Aaditya had all but given up drinking after his accident, but now he felt like he needed a stiff drink. Not having anything stronger than Coke at home, he poured himself a large glass of that and downed it in one gulp. When he put the glass down, he saw that his hands were shaking badly. He sat down on the sofa, closing his eyes and leaning his head back. His arms hurt from the fight, and his right leg was in a world of pain from the kick he had delivered. He had