A bomb and a surprise

A Story by Archit

Read on to find how John saved the world!

John was roaming in the streets, looking for someplace to stay for the night. ‘Ah’, he thought,‘ I think I will have to spend the night on the streets again.’ He was looking around for another option when his eyes fell to an unlocked shop. ‘This will have to do’, he mumbled to himself. He went inside and scanned the shop. It looked like a pawn shop. He was searching for somewhere to sleep on when he saw a spherical object. He didn’t know why it was different from the other things in the shop but his instincts told him to go see what it was. It was slightly bigger than a basketball and was made of iron. On the bottom of it was the company’s name- Hugh Electronics. On the top of it was a timer counting backwards from 10 hours. Now if we had seen that timer, the first that would have come into our minds would be- a bomb. But our fellow John was so poor that he had neither seen a movie nor read a newspaper in his whole entire life. Sure he did know what a bomb was, but nothing more. So when he saw the timer, he thought of it as a new kind of clock and kept it where it originally was and went to sleep on a table.

When he woke up, he expected people screaming ‘Thief Thief’ and police taking him to the police station. He sat up, rubbed the last tendrils of sleep from his eyes and saw that the place was just the same as it was the previous night. He realized that shop had been abandoned by its owner. Thinking it as his good luck, he began to examine the shop. He remembered about the strange thing he saw the other night and took it out. The timer now showed 5 hours. Surprised, he thought of showing it to his homeless friends. They always liked to hang around a famous coffee shop. When he went there, most of his friends were there. He called them and told them what had happened the previous night. When he showed them the timer his fiends looked shocked. When he asked why his friend, Jack, handed him the newspaper without saying anything. Since John didn’t know how to read, he asked Jack to read it for him. The news was about the several bombs that had exploded in many parts of the world- China, Brazil, Spain, Egypt and Australia. It seemed that a bomb had exploded in each continent except Antarctica and North America. And they weren’t any typical bombs too. They contained a genetically engineered virus which if released would kill anyone who inhaled it. And the object John was holding looked just like all the other bombs that had exploded. John was horrified to hear this. The timer now showed 4 hours. Everyone realized the obvious fact- they had four hours to save the world.

The first thing they did was to inform the authorities. John sat down and thought of the sheer brilliance of this plan. The bomber had placed a bomb in each continent so that the effect would affect the whole world. John lived in Washington, which is near the border of Canada. So if a bomb exploded here it would affect both Canada and America. Just then FBI came, took the bomb and were about to go when John requested to go with them. They refused, saying that he was not allowed to go there. John insisted saying that it was he that had found the bomb and had every right to go with them. In the end they gave in, allowing him to come with them. But they had only one condition- he had to follow their every command. John agreed, not caring about the condition laid down by the FBI. While on their way, suddenly the car in front of them flipped, landing upside down. The car of FBI skidded to a stop, lurching all the passengers forward. Most of the men of FBI were unconscious. But John surprisingly was alright. He got out of the car, and walked around in a daze. Just then a ray came and two humans literally came out of the light.

Well they looked like humans except for one thing- their skin was purple. They stood near John and spoke in a hollow voice ‘Bow down to the masters of universe you primitive being.’ John fearing them, bowed. ‘We the Extrompolians,’ they said, ‘tried to save you from destroying earth. We sent signs in the forms of Northern Lights to you but alas, you failed to decipher it. Earth is the only planet in the Milky Way galaxy where life can exist and it was going along pretty well until your race came along. We watched you evolve and expand. We thought that maybe a king has come to rule over earth. You did prove us right but only literally. You expanded by cutting down forests and killing wildlife. And then there were the Romans who made killing into a sport. They killed thousands of people for fun. The more progress you made, the more the earth suffered. Our people decided that this madness had to end. But I and my brother opposed this. We told them to wait for mankind to put things right again. But you have not stood up to our expectations. Our court punished us to do the task for it was us who had opposed them in the beginning.’ Hearing this, John got furious. He said, ‘I don’t represent the whole mankind! And by doing this, do you think everyone would be satisfied? What about people like us, who haven’t done anything? What about environmentalists who campaign for the betterment of Earth? And why punish the whole mankind for mistakes of few? Eh, tell me why?’ Hearing this the Extrompolian got sad. He said, ‘We know that a lot of innocent people have to die, but we have no choice. But I came here to tell you that you can escape from here. Come with us.’ John got even madder. ‘Do you think that taking me away will change anything? Even if I go with you don’t you think I will die of boredom? I don’t think that you know that man is social creature. It cannot exist alone. So I would rather die with my own people than live with strangers.’ ‘As you wish.’ saying this, he disappeared in a flash. John walked back to the car, woke the personnel of FBI and took a look at the timer. It showed 1 hour and 30 minutes.

John along with FBI, were back on their way. When they reached the headquarters of FBI, half an hour had gone. The bomb was immediately taken up to bomb disposal unit upon arrival. The head of bomb disposal unit looked at the bomb and said ‘This bomb is very complex. It will take time to figure it out.’ First they took a sample of the virus and tried to make a medicine for it but failed. Then they tried to diffuse the bomb. After some time, they succeeded in opening the bomb. Inside was a mess of wires and 3-4 containers that contained the virus. The head told us they can’t take a risk by taking out a wire for if it is not the right wire the bomb could explode in front of them. He also ordered an evacuation so that if it should explode, the least number of people would be affected. John did not care about the evacuation; he knew he was going to die. And for him, that mattered the most. John half-heard what the bomb disposal people were saying. He was thinking to himself ‘Well John, this is your life- brought up in a family that was way below the poverty line, same conditions in teens and adulthood, and then finding a very dangerous bomb that would kill him.’ He sighed, thinking about his fate. He was asking to God- ‘God why? What did I do?’ He was so deep in thought that he did not acknowledge the question asked to him by the FBI. The head of the bomb disposal unit shook him roughly out of his day-dreaming and said in a loud voice ‘Mr. John, I suggest you snap out of your day-dreaming and focus on the things at hand.’ John nodded and took a look at the timer. 15 minutes! John was about to ask for permission to go when Harper (head of bomb disposal unit) said ‘Mr. John I suggest you stay here with the bomb while the rest of us evacuate.’

John looked shocked. ‘Are you going to leave me here while the rest of you run away?’ he spoke in a barely audible whisper. Hearing no answer, John repeated the question much louder now- ‘ARE YOU GOING TO LEAVE ME HERE TO DIE WHILE THE REST OF YOU RUN AWAY? Harper shifted uncomfortably ‘Mr. John’ he said, ‘you were brought here on one condition- you have to obey our commands. So it would be better if you just obey our orders.’ John gritted his teeth but unfortunately he couldn’t do anything as he was bound to his word. So he just turned away crossly. But what he couldn’t see was Harper trying not to laugh behind his back. Suddenly the timer started beeping loudly, signaling the last 10 seconds. Tears fell from John’s eyes. Harper couldn’t control it any longer. He burst out laughing. The timer gave a loud beep and then turned off. John looked incredulously at the timer. It showed 00:00!

He turned to look at Harper and saw that everyone was laughing. Harper said ‘Happy April Fool’s Day, Dummy!’ John stared at Harper, a billion thoughts buzzing in his mind. He knew that today was 1^stApril a.k.a April fool’s Day but he had never expected something like this to happen. He asked slowly, without a hint of smile on his face ‘How?’ Stepping forward, Harper said ‘You see John, we had all planned this. We knew that you were going to sleep in that abandoned pawn shop and find the bomb. We knew that you were going to inform the authorities after you find that it is a bomb so we hacked into FBI’s database and when you called, the call came to us. We knew that you would insist to come with us so we let you. As for the so-called alien, it was nothing but one of our guys painted purple. We were pretending to be knocked out when you woke us in the car.’ Hearing this John smiled a little. But he asked ‘Why me? I mean why did you choose me for this prank?’ ‘Well John’ Harper answered, ‘We have eyes and ears everywhere. One of our informants told me that you seemed unhappy the last few days so we decided this prank to lighten you up. After all our mission is to give happiness to the world!’ Well first you must be free to give happiness to the world Mr. Harper’ said a heavy voice that seemed to be coming from behind the door. Out came a black suited man who looked like a real agent and not a fake one. He held up an ID and said ‘Agent Alex Khusainov, FBI’.

Harper looked stunned. He asked angrily ‘What is the meaning of this?’ ‘This means this Mister Harper’ Agent Alex said holding up a pair of handcuffs. ‘Well what will you arrest me for eh?’ he said quickly. ‘Well first of all I have recorded all the conversation in a tape recorder and secondly we have Mr. John as our eyewitness which is more than we need to give you life imprisonment’ he replied casually. ‘Well I am sure John will not testify against me in court especially after this lovely surprise.’ Harper said. ‘Well why don’t we let John decide whom will he support?’ Alex asked. John was confused. Should he support his friend or support justice? After some thinking, he said ‘Harper what you did was wrong so I am going to support Alex in this case.’ Soon after that Harper was arrested and John walked out again in the daylight, thinking about the bizarre events of the day.