The Mansion

All his life, Bobby had heard a lot of peculiar things about the Mansion. It was haunted as per the villagers. The only bits of Sameer found were his headless corpse…eyes wide with indescribable terror…. a young hiker couple, disappearing without a trace.

And of course, perhaps the most infamous incident of all. Akshit's suicide.

Akshit hadn't talked ever since he had gotten lost in the jungle...Only his eyes spoke... And they spoke of pure unadulterated fear. The villagers were further shaken up when he killed himself a few days later. They had found his body hanging in his room, with a self-made knot.

Akshit was also a known addict. Bobby and the police had dismissed his case for a hallucinogen. Bobby himself had never touched a drink in his life. He had taken a whiff of a cigarette once but had hated it so much, he had publicly sworn to beat up anyone who would dare smoke near him.

To be very fair, The Mansion, in the old photographs at least, did look like it was designed keeping a B-tier horror movie in mind. It was a solitary structure and the only building in the otherwise secluded area. A place you would definitely expect to find dead bodies disposed off. The nearest human dwelling was a village about 50 kilometers away. 

It was built as a hideout by the Revolutionaries in the 1700s in the midst of the Great forests of the Western Ghats. The woods around it were(Bobby rolled his eyes) said to be roamed by a headless man riding a dead horse, brandishing a curved sword in one hand and the decapitated head of their victim in the other.

 The jungle was kind of eerie though, Bobby admitted grudgingly. He had driven past it numerous times and had felt a strange kind of dread. Eerie and scary enough to inspire the scary legends, he thought.

Nevertheless, whenever the villagers would sit down and discuss demons, spirits, and other supernatural beings that haunted the jungle, Bobby would just roll his eyes. He doubted that with the amount of demons, spirits, and other supernatural beings that haunted the jungle, they would be able to do a good job of properly haunting anyone. They were more likely to haunt each other over territorial disputes. The jungle wasn't big enough for all of them to have haunting permits and right to property after all.

Bobby also thought that the villagers were illiterate folk and would believe anything if told dramatically enough. He had seen enough frail old men flashing the beam of a torch onto their tobacco-stained teeth and telling everyone squatting around them, of how they had come across a demon in their childhood while everyone hung on to their word by word. He snorted.

He finished his morning tea and decided to get started on his report, which he would have to present to his editor. This would be his make-or-break piece, and he couldn't afford to be casual with it. He had a theory that the Mansion and the woods around were a hideout for the smugglers. But a hideout for what? Could be for arms, drugs, gold, or all of it. But he needed proof. And today would be the day he would get it.

He locked his house and stepped inside his car. He took a deep breath and drove off.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------::

Splat. He had slipped . He had hit his head on the concrete and he was sure it would be a concussion. Trying to fight the dizziness, he tried to get up but cried out in pain. A bullet had grazed his arm.

BANG. Another missed him narrowly.

Head throbbing and arm bleeding, He hurriedly made his way into the jungle, hoping to find refuge in the thick cover of the trees.

He had to save himself somehow. He wasn't afraid of dying nor did he care if he did. There was no one to mourn him and that was one thing he was thankful for in his line of work.

He navigated his way through the trees. He could hear the sounds of twigs snapping beneath him as he tried to ignore the pain from his wounds and made his way forward, as fast as he could. His long-held suspicions had been confirmed. The mansion was a hideout for drug trafficking. Law enforcement had been least concerned.

They were probably hand in gloves with the traffickers, He thought bitterly.

His boot got entangled in a root but the fall was short and abrupt. He landed on his hands and knees, upon hard roots and soft soil. He was heaving. A streak of vomit flew out of his mouth. He could not go any further. He took out his phone. This needs to come out, And I need to make sure of it in case I don't make it.

Hoping against hope he wished for some network coverage but he was sure it would be all in vain. He had been checking regularly for network coverage, all evening . He had been satisfied to find it strong enough and had been checking regularly as he was making his way down to the mansion as stealthily as he could.

Oddly, the network had gone out as soon as he had stepped within a kilometer of the mansion. Even more strangely, his phone's touchscreen had begun to malfunction as well. He remembered the sheer irritation he had felt while he had been trying to shoot a video of the men, as they were verifying their stock.

"No better location than this, I told you ", one heavily built man with a beard was saying.

His phone was lagging and suddenly restarted on its own.

And this was where everything had gone wrong.

The phone played its Restart tone and in the thick silence of the surrounding jungle, it was no worse than a truck horn.

The men had immediately drawn their guns and had started firing in his direction. He had immediately tried to flee but had slipped over the damp, moss-covered concrete path.

Step out of it . He got himself back to the emergency at hand. He went through his gallery and cried out in dismay. The video hadn't been saved. No. No.

He wasn't afraid to die. However, he would die for nothing. He looked at his phone in dismay.

They should have caught me by now, where are they? Is it some twisted game they are playing?

He got to his feet. He had lost a lot of blood. Hopefully, that didn't bring bugs or predators sniffing after him.

Yet, now that he thought about it, where were all of them? The silence was almost deafening. There wasn't even a cricket chirping away. He could feel his instincts drawing up. Something's wrong

The blood loss was giving him shivers. Or was it just the adrenaline pumping inside him? He could not see properly too. Was it the concussion?

Or was a mist drawing up in the forest?

He felt cold suddenly. He was sure this wasn't due to blood loss or any injury. The temperature had dropped considerably in the past few minutes.

He heaved himself up with his uninjured arm and Got back to his feet. I have to get out of here alive. I have to bring this truth to the public

His vision wasn't great to begin it. The concussion hadn't helped. And now the mist on top of all it.

He made his way forward, trying to find his way through the mist, hoping that he did not end up back at the mansion. It was then he saw it .

Something was moving in the darkness. He wasn't able to make it out. It seemed like a tall figure and made no sound at all. It was as if it was walking on the air itself.

It was getting colder by the moment. He could feel his body freezing up, shying away from the biting temperature.

The figure was slowly starting to become visible now. What was it? He squinted. Looks like a man on a horse. They make no sound. Not even a clop of hoof .

The man had noticed him as well. He had stopped dead in his tracks barely 5 yards away. Bobby suddenly felt sick once more. He remembered what the villagers used to say..…

It has to be my head. The concussion is giving me hallucinations. For the man on the horse did not have a head at all. His dizziness was exacerbated by a foul smell of what could only be rotting flesh. He also realized, panicking that the rider held the heads of the men from the mansion by their hair in his left hand.

He stepped back and his leg caught over a thick root.

He looked right at them and with a sinking heart realized that he had their undivided attention. The horse had an eye hanging out its socket and the other one was red. Glowing red. Evil seemed to be emanating from it. Its skin seemed to have melted off, showing the bone white in some parts.

The man on top of the foul creature was not moving at all. If he had a head, he would have been staring at him.

His heart threatened to burst through his chest. He tried to move, but his body had given up completely. The cold had frozen off his movements. Cold and fear.

After what seemed like an eternity, the headless rider made some movement. He threw the heads, with what looked like distaste, and brandished a curved sword out of his scabbard, stained with fresh blood.

Then he made an even more surprising movement. He got off his ride and instantly materialized in front of him. He then turned over the handle side of the sword to him.

What does he want? Is he offering me his sword?

The headless man just stood there in that position. It didn't seem bothered at all. Bobby hesitated, he stood up shaking and, took the sword. He saw the rider turn to dust.

His eyes rolled back into his head as he saw images.

He was fighting the redcoats with his sword. He had lost his musket and this abandoned weapon was all he had. He could not allow it. The villagers were his own. The redcoat would pay for what they had done

The redcoats had been bringing in opium and someone among their ranks thought it would be a good idea to give some to the locals in the village. Soon entire village had developed a taste for it. When they could not find it, they ran amok, slaughtering each other. The redcoats found the situation hilarious. Seething, he had gathered seven of his trusted men and decided to ambush them in the new mansion that had been built in the jungle.

But the redcoats had known that they were coming. Someone, in his ranks, had been a traitor. His entire party had been ambushed and slaughtered in the jungle.

Slashing and parrying, he tried to retreat, but they were too many for him to handle all by himself. They subdued him and took him to the mansion. They forcefully bent him over the deck's railing and with one clean stroke decapitated him.

But he was not the one to give up so easily. Not even death would stop him. His spirit came back and found its headless body just lying there, waiting for the vultures. 

The body rose again. He picked up the sword and stole a dead horse off the mansion's stables and bound the corpse to his energy as well. 

Together, the horse and the rider went ahead to fulfill his vengeance. In the morning, the British authorities found twelve decapitated bodies. 

He would keep the jungle clean of these drugs, and for all of eternity, he would roam.

Bobby gasped and opened his eyes. He picked up the scabbard and put the sword back into it. He tied it around his waist. He looked over at the dead horse. He remembered the quote from Bhagwad Gita.

Now I am become death the destroyer of worlds.

He mounted the horse and rode off into the mist. The jungle was now his.