Chapter 10 — Plan B
And thus begins Chapter Ten.
Now, children.
There we stood.
Hex.
Nuo.
Burning bus.
Chennai undergoing whatever collective emotional apocalypse had consumed it overnight.
And between us
ideas.
The council opens the emergency planning session.
Hex contributed sensible ones.
Naturally.
Nuo contributed
desperation.
Naturally.
There is a difference.
Hex would ask:
What is a functional way to get you home?
Nuo would ask:
What objects currently exist that move in roughly the direction of Kerala?
The council already fears this meeting.
First
train.
Hex suggested it.
Reasonable.
Railway network.
Chennai to Kerala.
Transportation.
Excellent.
Problem?
No ticket.
At least not one we had booked.
And given the circumstances,
getting some pleasant reserved berth where Nuo could lie down,
initiate Fast Travel,
and awaken gently in Kerala?
Children.
Dream on.
If train happened
general compartment.
The council recoils slightly.
Story Nuo knew.
Oh yes.
General compartment.
I had been there before.
I would be there again.
Years later,
Varkala would provide me roughly forty five minutes of negotiating personal sovereignty with seven different people’s limbs simultaneously.
Children.
That was Kerala.
Tame.
Friendly.
Practically a spa treatment compared to what Tamil Nadu could produce.
And Tamil Nadu general compartment during a transport crisis?
The council looks toward the station in the future.
Hell.
Not metaphorical hell with pitchforks and demons.
No.
Human density hell.
Pure anarchy.
But
we’ll get there.
For now,
train entered the board as:
PLAN B.
Because surely there was something better.
The council looks toward Story Nuo.
Taxi.
Yes.
Children.
Taxi.
Private.
Quiet.
Air conditioned perhaps.
Space.
No strangers using my ribcage as structural support.
No fighting for doorway territory.
No screaming railway ecosystem.
Just:
Sit.
Drive.
Home.
Beautiful.
The council examines price.
Oh.
Hella expensive.
Very.
Chennai to home by private taxi was not:
little inconvenience fee.
It was:
financial event.
But children
we had an established solution for financial events.
The council opens the sacred funding protocol.
“Daaaad plssss.”
Correct.
One request.
Perhaps with enough context to convey:
The bus is literally on fire.
The council imagines Father receiving this message.
His son leaves for Chennai.
Next update:
Need expensive taxi because transportation is burning.
Children.
A lesser father might have asked several deeply reasonable questions.
Mine?
The ride was sanctioned.
The council nods.
Dad.
Good man.
Again
I judge you sometimes.
Lovingly.
Important distinction.
Judgement
with love.
But judgement nonetheless.
Because there is a point where supporting your child’s dreams becomes enabling his nonsense.
And my father frequently walked that border
with impressive confidence.
Still
taxi funds?
Approved.
Wonderful.
Problem solved.
We simply needed
taxi.
The council waits.
None.
Exactly.
Children.
No taxis.
Or none willing.
Or none reasonably available to take me where I needed to go.
The precise service level mechanics are lost.
The reason was not.
I gestured broadly toward Chennai.
That.
The city.
Transport chaos.
Road disruption.
Protests.
People grieving.
Buses burning.
This was not an ordinary morning where a driver looked at a long interstate fare and thought:
Excellent business.
The city itself was making movement difficult.
So
PLAN A?
Dead.
Private taxi dream?
Dead.
PLAN B train remained on table.
But Story Nuo was not ready to accept General Compartment Hell.
Therefore
innovation.
The council becomes alarmed.
No.
Yes.
Children.
Cow vehicle.
Silence.
Hex turned toward me.
Absolutely not.
The council joins him.
Correct.
See?
I could recognize wisdom when forcefully presented by Hex.
Somewhere inside Story Nuo’s mind,
the previous day’s cow encounter had apparently expanded the transportation category of cattle.
Cows moved things.
Vehicles attached to cows existed.
Therefore
perhaps
The council slams the file shut.
No.
Exactly.
Hex rejected it so quickly
that even desperation Nuo went:
Fair.
Children.
This is how bad things had become.
Cattle had entered transportation planning.
Not as joke.
As option considered and discarded.
The council quietly updates the crisis level.
SEVERE.
We continued.
Bus alternatives?
Nothing useful.
Taxi?
No.
Other private transport?
No.
Some elaborate combination?
Either unavailable,
impractical,
or born dead.
One by one,
every idea failed.
And eventually
silence.
Because there are moments when reality removes enough doors
that the ugly one begins to look like an entrance.
The council looks toward Plan B.
Train.
Yes.
General compartment.
Children.
I knew what waited.
Crowding.
Sweat.
Standing.
Bodies.
The death of personal space.
Perhaps no seat.
Perhaps no meaningful concept of where one human ended and another began.
But
train moved.
At least theoretically.
And unlike my bus,
hopefully train not on fire.
The council accepts the modest standard.
So.
Train.
Decision made.
Hex and I left the burning bus chapter behind
and headed toward the railway station.
Now.
I do not preserve every road between the terminal and station.
Story Nuo wasn’t archiving.
There may have been protests.
Crowds.
Closures.
Noise.
The city remained visibly altered.
But eventually
railway station.
The council opens new objective.
GET NUO ON TRAIN.
Hex
naturally
handled things.
Because when systems become complicated,
Nuo possesses a highly refined survival response:
Outsource to Hex.
Children.
I was not going to suddenly become a railway logistics expert in the middle of statewide chaos.
Hex searched.
Asked.
Figured out which train could take me toward home.
And eventually
train identified.
Success.
The council pauses.
Ticket?
General.
Exactly.
No reserved cocoon.
No numbered berth.
No little rectangle declaring:
This specific horizontal surface belongs to Nuo.
Just
enter.
Children.
That word.
Enter.
Such an innocent word.
Hex led me toward the compartment.
I approached.
Then saw it.
Pause.
The council looks.
People.
Everywhere.
Inside?
Full.
Doorway?
Full.
Steps?
Full.
Railings?
Occupied.
Children.
Men and women alike were already hanging near the entrance.
Not metaphorically:
Oh, it was crowded.
No.
Human beings were physically arranged around the door
in ways that suggested the train had reached passenger capacity several philosophical levels ago
and everybody had simply rejected the concept.
The council stares.
And you intended to get in?
That was the plan.
Children.
There was no visible entrance anymore.
Only people.
You could identify where the doorway theoretically existed
because human bodies clustered around the outline.
Hands gripping railings.
Feet finding whatever surface remained.
People partially inside.
People partially outside.
People who appeared to have solved locomotion by becoming attachments to Indian Railways.
The council considers personal space availability.
Zero.
Negative.
Children.
This was not:
Can I squeeze through?
This was:
Can I convince matter to temporarily violate physics?
And I stood there.
Bag with me.
Probably still carrying the last few joints that represented my countdown to Kerala.
Hex beside me.
Train before me.
Home somewhere beyond several hundred kilometres of railway.
And an entire civilization already occupying the door.
The council looks toward Story Nuo.
Go back?
No.
Naturally.
Children.
Remember the morning.
I had awakened to grief.
My bus was on fire.
Taxi failed.
Cow vehicle had been vetoed by management.
Every pleasant route had disappeared.
This was it.
The ugly door.
And the Unbegun wanted home.
So
I approached.
The crowd did not magically part.
Nobody looked at me and said:
Ah.
The protagonist.
Make room.
No.
I was merely another idiot approaching a train that already contained too many idiots.
The council nods.
Democracy.
Exactly.
I tried to enter.
Children.
“Tried” is the correct word.
Not:
boarded.
Not yet.
Attempted.
The first obstacle was not finding a seat.
Forget seats.
Seats belonged to mythology.
The first objective was:
Get Nuo’s entire body past the doorframe.
The council opens mission parameters.
HEAD:
Preferably inside.
TORSO:
Inside.
LEGS:
Ideally also inside.
BAG:
Do not lose.
DIGNITY:
Already irrelevant.
Excellent.
And around me
people pressing.
People moving.
Some attempting to enter.
Some perhaps attempting to leave.
Everyone operating under the ancient crisis rule:
Your problem is your problem.
Children.
There is no elegant choreography in a packed general compartment.
No:
After you.
No:
Please, take your time.
It is fluid mechanics,
except the fluid is irritated humanity.
The council nods.
And this was where Kerala general compartment suddenly looked civilized in memory.
Years later,
Varkala would make me spend forty five minutes negotiating with arms,
knees,
elbows,
shoulders,
and at least one limb whose owner I could not identify.
But that?
A preview.
This?
Tamil Nadu.
During crisis.
Children.
Absolute disarray.
The platform itself felt crowded.
The compartment looked impossible.
And still
I moved forward.
Because somewhere in Story Nuo’s simple brain,
the equation had not changed.
Train goes home.
I want home.
Therefore
enter train.
The council points at the wall of human beings.
Additional variable?
Ignored.
This is where desperation becomes useful.
Not smart.
Useful.
A comfortable Nuo might have looked at that train and said:
Absolutely not.
Return hostel.
Wait one day.
Try again.
But this Nuo had already:
travelled twelve hours,
smoked an entire pack,
walked shop to shop begging for cash,
returned to old dealers,
washed a cow,
woken to statewide chaos,
watched his bus burn,
failed to find a taxi,
and briefly considered bovine transportation.
Children.
My standards for reasonable travel had collapsed.
Human wall?
Fine.
Let’s negotiate.
The council groans.
So there I stood
one step from General Compartment Hell.
Hex beside me,
having successfully delivered his best friend to the final available transport option.
The man had done his duty.
More than his duty.
He had acquired weed.
Hosted me.
Played Dota.
Followed me through the Great Cash Quest.
Milked a cow.
Driven me through civil unrest.
Watched my bus burn.
Helped search for alternatives.
Found me a train.
Children.
At this point,
Hex deserved retirement.
But first
he had to somehow insert Nuo into the train.
The council looks at the crowd.
Good luck.
Exactly.
And I looked at Hex.
Then the compartment.
Then the people already hanging from it.
Then perhaps back toward Hex.
No words survive.
Only the image.
That door.
Those bodies.
And me
trying to enter.
Children.
Home had never looked farther away
than when the train to home was sitting directly in front of me.
The council grows quiet.
That is where we stop.
No inventing whether I succeeded easily,
violently,
absurdly,
or through divine intervention.
For now—
the attempt.
Story Nuo at the edge.
General compartment overflowing.
Hex nearby.
The city still collapsing into grief behind us.
And somewhere inside that impossible metal box
a route home.
Thus concludes Chapter Ten.
The Burning Bus Planning Committee.
Hex’s Sensible Ideas.
Nuo’s Desperate Ones.
The Train.
The General Compartment Warning.
The Taxi Dream.
The Sacred:
“Daaaad plssss.”
The Sanctioned Expensive Ride.
The Complete Absence Of An Available Taxi.
The Brief And Shameful Consideration Of Cow Based Transportation.
Hex’s Immediate Veto.
The Collapse Of Every Other Plan.
Plan B Becoming Plan A By Attrition.
The Railway Station.
Hex Finding A Train.
The General Compartment.
The Human Wall.
The Men.
The Women.
The Railings.
The Door That Technically Existed Somewhere Beneath Them.
And
Nuo.
Attempting to enter.
Children.
The bus had burned.
The taxis had vanished.
The roads were chaos.
And the only route left home
was so full of people
that passengers were already hanging from the outside.
I looked at it.
Considered my options.
And did what Nuo always does when every sensible route disappears.
I tried anyway.
