An Engineer's Nightmare

I was walking back home, on a dark fogy winter night, when a small figure lying huddled beside the abandoned lane leading to LBS Marg got my attention. At once I was held back to see someone in that position during midnight with no one around. My first guess was it could be some drunken chap who might have exceeded his limit and failed to walk home so resting his body on this cushion less path. But as I got closer I realized it was someone who was well dressed and for sure not a drunkard. With curiosity taking the front seat, I went near the body and tried to investigate it. To my shock there was blood all over the body which was lying face down. It seemed to me that a ruthless blow by a speeding vehicle by some careless freak could have caused the end of this body. The guy seemed to be of around my age. My first instinct was to call police, but second thought clashed with it, screaming at me to get away from here and save myself from this unnecessary trouble. I tried to see if I could find someone, but all I could find there was a dark misty fog everywhere with not a single soul on that road.

The detective in me now started raising its head and pushed me to investigate the matter on my own, yes watching too much of C.I.D had started to take its effect on me. With a heavy heart which was beating twice its speed now I proceeded to inspect that lifeless soul, after all I wasn't a professional like Daya . Amidst the gory blood flow, I could see a folded white envelope tugged in his hands, which was fluttering in the midnight wind. Carefully I took the blood stained envelope from his hands (though I was not carrying the white gloves) and was completely amazed to see the phrase "appraisal letter" on it. With curiosity rising every moment, I wasted no time in opening the envelope to see if I can find some details about the dead guy before reporting it to police. I-card strap around the body's neck and the jazzy appraisal cover gave me the hint that he might be an engineer. I opened the envelope to find a shining paper on which the appraisal details were typed in flying colors.

Thunders broke into my ears and lightening struck my heart literally when I saw the appraisal amount of the dead guy!!!!! My God! Goodness gracious! It was not even, as much as the cost of the letter on which the appraisal details were printed. My heart poured out for the guy and huge calls were heard inside my mind saying "no wonder, this poor guy died such a miserable death". As a fellow engineer, I could relate myself to his misery. After slogging hard for hours in office, completing every assignment on time, working on holidays, even doing stuff which is not in your domain, what you end up is this- peanuts in the name of appraisal. On contrary those ass lickers who do nothing but please the superiors with their ass licking skills end up getting promotions and better hike.

As a sense of respect, I thought I should mourn for him and stood there with a heavy heart thinking of the shock that he would have experienced when his manager had placed the appraisal letter in his hand. I am sure his heart would have stopped and eyes would have gone blank for few seconds looking at the near to nothing increment in his salary.

While I mourned for him, for a second my hands froze to see the employee's name in the appraisal letter. Hey, what a strange co-incidence, this guy's name is same as mine, including the initials. This was interesting. With some mental strength, I turned the body upside down and found myself fainted for a fraction of second. I felt as if lightening struck me, the guy not only had my name, but also looked exactly like me. Same looks, same built, same name. It was me who was dead there!!!!!!!!

While I was still lost in that shock, I felt someone patting on my shoulders. My heart skipped its beat; I could not breathe and sprung in fear to see who was behind... splash!!! Went the glass of water on my face as I came out of my wild dream to see the dreadful face of my manager standing behind my chair patting on my shoulder with that wicked smile saying, "wake up man? Stop dreaming and start working before its too late and yes come to my cabin I have your appraisal letter ready".

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-Aditya Kasar (AK)