Chapter 2 – The Basket of Guavas

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📖 Chapter 2 – The Basket of Guavas

The wheels of the wooden cart screeched as the ugly man pushed it through the narrow lanes beyond the wedding hall. Firecrackers burst in the distance, drowning out the faint thumps from inside the fruit basket. Beneath the heap of papayas, bananas, and guavas, Tom struggled against ropes biting into his wrists. Every breath was suffocated by the scent of overripe fruit mixed with something harsher—acid. The cloth beneath him was wet, and when it touched his skin it burned like fire.

The man wheezed as he dragged the cart through the midnight crowd. His body shook with spasms. Patches of skin bubbled, oozing yellow-green liquid that hissed when it dripped onto the stones. Yet his strength did not falter. He muttered in a cracked, monstrous voice, half human, half beast:

"Soon… soon he will be mine… the cure… the cure is inside him."

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By the time he reached the small railway station, the night had grown darker. A single bulb flickered above the ticket window, casting long shadows across the cracked walls. The platform smelled of rust and coal smoke. A stray dog whined and ran away the moment the ugly man stepped onto the cement.

The fruit basket rocked. Tom shifted inside, trying to scream, but his voice was swallowed by cloth. A muffled sound escaped—just enough for a young porter nearby to frown and step closer.

“Arrey bhaiya,” the porter said, peering at the basket, “itni raat ko kahan le ja rahe ho itna bada tokra? Kya hai isme?”

The ugly man froze. His breath rattled in his chest. His red eyes gleamed in the lamplight. For a moment, the porter thought he was looking into the face of something not human.

The man’s lips peeled back, revealing yellow teeth corroded at the roots. Acid dribbled from the corner of his mouth, sizzling against the ground. His voice came out thick, guttural, like a growl crawling up from a pit:

“Gauvas…”

The word sounded wrong, dragged out, monstrous.

The porter laughed nervously and stepped back. “Theek hai, theek hai. Lagta hai bazaar ke liye le ja rahe ho.” He hurried away, muttering under his breath about drunks and madmen.

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The man heaved the basket into the corner of a third-class train compartment. The train groaned, steam hissing, and with a long whistle it began to crawl forward. Through the barred window, the wedding lights in the distance flickered like dying stars, fading as the train rattled into the black countryside.

Inside the basket, Tom’s heart pounded. His throat ached from screaming into cloth, his wrists raw from ropes. He shifted and something hard pressed against his cheek—a rolled sheet of paper, old and brittle. Blindly, he nudged it open with his bound hands. Through a small tear in the fruit covering, a flicker of station light revealed what it was.

A poster.

The edges were curled and stained, but Tom could just make out the words:

“MISSING – Experimental Subject #47. Dangerous. Infected with corrosive virus. Report immediately if seen.”

The poster showed a crude sketch—half-burnt skin, hollow eyes, twisted mouth.

It was him.

The ugly man.

The monster carrying him away was not a stranger to the world. He had once been hunted, known, feared.

And now Tom was trapped with him, hidden among guavas, rattling into the endless night.

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⚡ For your 5k–9k word target, I can keep expanding with:

Slower pacing: more sensory details of the train, passengers, Tom’s inner thoughts, flashbacks to the wedding.

Dialogue tension: suspicious passengers asking about the basket, the ugly man replying in his monstrous voice.