"The Whispers of the Forgotten"

Date: 11th December 1976

Location: An unknown mansion... and Mumbai's decaying streets.

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The room trembled with every thrust.

Andarin gripped Meera’s wrists above her head, his body crashing into hers with brutal, rhythmic violence.

The ancient bed beneath them creaked dangerously, each sharp sound swallowed into the mansion’s hollow, rotting walls.

The air was thick — filled with the musk of their bodies, the sting of sweat, the raw music of Meera’s moans, echoing like a siren song down the blackened halls.

Andarin’s mouth twisted into a wicked grin, feeding off every broken sound that tore itself from Meera's throat.

He loved it — loved how she fought at first, gasped for breath, and then slowly, so slowly, melted into his cruelty.

Her back arched beneath him, her legs trembling against the bruising power of his thrusts, her nails clawing helplessly at the sheets.

The heavy slap of flesh meeting flesh filled the room, the brutal collision of his hips against her thighs, her back slamming the wooden headboard again and again.

Outside the cracked windows, the mansion loomed silent, abandoned... but inside, the ghosts themselves must have stirred, drinking in the savage symphony of pain and pleasure.

Andarin’s hand slid down her flushed body, gripping her hair, pulling her head back to bare her throat.

He licked along her skin, tasting her terror... and her need.

A low, dark laugh rumbled from his chest when she cried out louder — no longer from fear, but something far more dangerous.

Something that made his blood burn.

"Scream for me," he growled against her ear, voice thick with possession.

And Meera obeyed, the sound of it shattering the suffocating air, bouncing off every decaying corner of the house.

In the brief moments between his thrusts, Meera's mind flickered back—

—to the photograph she had found.

A life she didn’t recognize.

A memory trapped in time.

She had to get out.

She had to know the truth.

Gasping between kisses, her voice barely a whimper against his chest, she whispered:

"Tomorrow... can I go outside? Please..."

Andarin only smiled again, slower this time — a cruel, loving monster savoring his prize.

He kissed her again, deeper, leaving no promises.

Only hunger.

---

Meanwhile, deep within Mumbai’s sleeping veins...

Araav stumbled through the rain-wet streets, the city's neon lights bleeding into rivers at his feet.

Bottles clinked in the gutter.

An old Hindi song whispered from a radio shop’s broken window, a ghost from another time.

Tonight he had drowned himself in liquor.

Tonight he had let himself remember.

His brother's face swam in his vision — laughing, alive, fearless.

Until the night he wasn't.

Until the night they found him cold and broken, another body swallowed by a case too dark to solve.

A "syco" they had called the killer.

A phantom who left no trace... just silence.

Araav slammed a fist into the side of a rusted car, his chest heaving.

"I should have been there..." he whispered, voice cracking.

"I should have saved you."

Tears blurred the dirty world around him, and that's when he saw him—

A man, standing utterly still across the street.

Long black coat.

Hat pulled low, face hidden.

Araav wiped his face, blinking hard.

The man crossed the road without a sound and dropped a small, cracked card at Araav’s feet.

When Araav looked up again—

The street was empty.

Fingers trembling, he picked up the card.

There was nothing on it but a single address, scrawled in shaking handwriting.

No name. No explanation.

Almost sleepwalking, Araav followed it — down crumbling alleys, past howling stray dogs, into the dead heart of the city.

And there it was:

The Mansion.

A monster of stone and wood, forgotten by time.

The iron gate hung from one hinge.

Dead vines clawed the rotting facade.

And in the highest window—

For just a second—

Araav thought he saw a figure watching him.

Or maybe it was just the drink.

Maybe it was just the memories.

The wind howled through the empty halls, carrying with it the scent of wet earth and something fouler — something old, something wrong.

The door creaked open by itself.

And Araav, without understanding why, stumbled inside.

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