*Thud*

  "MOTHER(MOTHER)"

  Expecting a remedy from government was indeed ludicrous, letting civilians fight for a spot in cantonment when such a calamitous unknown disaster is looming above their head seems akin to throwing themselves in front of a tiger willingly whereas the government higher ups probably already sealed themselves up in a personal bunker.

  Shraiyen's mother was devastated by the announcement, losing the strength in her legs she fell on the floor covering her mouth as she mumbled to herself, "Oh God! Tell us what we should do."

  On the other hand Sharvyn's mother having a tight grip on the nearby chair couldn't utter even a single word as she looked at the screen.

  Both their fathers had a grim look on their face, realizing there was not much time to spare if they wanted to reach cantonment and avoid intense crowd, they would need to depart immediately, but the thought that was restricting them to act was - safety of their own children.

  Trying to reach a place which would soon be overwhelmed by a swarm of people, they would be concerned with their own safety disregarding the condition of others.

  Who has never even seen a riot? As soon as something arises that concerns their own life, protesters start running, in the process trampling over their own mates. And considering the current situation, there is no hope of people being considerate with each other. Their sole objective - ensure one's own survival and reach cantonment. "Crisis doesn't reveal character—it scrapes away the lies. Even saints eat their own in the dark."

  So now the question looming in their mind was, whether to take the most expensive risk of their lives and depart for cantonment or go their own separate way.

  Each second they were wasting was an individual minute instance that slipped right through their hands like sand grains, each passing second causing additional delay in their arrival.

  Pressurized by time, mental pressure formed through the current danger looming above their head,lack of plan, inability to take action after forming a decision, their children's lives hinged on a single choice

  ........."We are going (Let's go hurry)"

  Few breaths of crying and silence from others ended at once as both fathers reached a unified decision even without talking it out.

  Their decision? Head towards cantonment as fast as possible.

  "Hurry where honey? *sob* " Shraiyen's mother asked controlling her emotions.

  "To the cant where else?"

  "Bu...but-"

  "There is no other choice, I already considered it, if we will take our sweet time to draw out another escape plan from here and it fails, we would already have lost the chance to seek refuge in the cant."

  "Hmmm... You are right, kids move fast, let's go."

  "Is this the right course of action? My guts are screaming something will happen......but father is right there is no time, being with everybody else......I'll have more than enough time to escape even if anything happens. For now let's roll with their plan." Shraiyen's thoughts were debating with themselves as he saw the following scene unfold.

  A slight pinch in his forearm snapped him out of his inner thoughts, looking down he saw a small amount of blood pouring out as Shailani's nails had dug a little into his hand due to tightening grip, although Shailani was not crying her eyes were fixed on her mother, her eyes filled with intense worry and fear, even being ten year old she knew that the situation they currently were in was of life and death.

  If uncertainty and fear had a smell it would be, a metallic smell, that filled the dining room where they currently were in.

  "Through what should we travel? Your car or bike?" Shraiyen's mother inquired

  "Although I haven't sent my car for maintenance for past two years it would be better to travel through it, since my bike would hardly be able to accommodate three people let alone us four." Shraiyen's father was a car enthusiast, till now he only had managed to buy a premium edition Mercedes W124 and was saving money to buy other vintage cars, although he preferred not to drive it much, the car was in peak condition even without any recent maintenance.

  By now Sharvyn's family had also talked it out with themselves, and had decided to head towards cantonment.

  "We don't want to intrude anymore and hence we will take our leave as we also need to arrange a means of transport."

  "Hm? arrange? Don't you have your company's car?"

  "Actually...yesterday as soon as I left office a cat pounced and broke my car's windshield and thus i dropped it by my office for repair and was dropped off by my colleague."

  "HAH........just what is wrong with their family."

  After a little contemplation Shraiyen's father decided to save face of their years long relationship as fake as it was "Take my bike, it can handle three people max, we don't have time to loose, now all of you hurry up, and remember don't take anything with yourself expect your phone."

  Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings.

  Saying this Shraiyen's father proceeded towards their garage with Sharvyn's father following behind him.

  "Brother....will be alright? Nothing bad is going to happen right." Shailani looked at her brother with teary eyes trying to find comfort through his brother's answer.

  "Do not worry, nothing is going to happen, even if something happens I'll protect you, now go take your phone and come at the main door, remember don't take your toys."

  "Alright" saying this Shailani went upstairs to retrieve her phone.

  Dog oblivious to the current scenario was roaming around each person in that room as she came towards Shraiyen wagging her small tail Shraiyen picked her up and held it gently in his hand, stroking the ears then the head.

  "Sharvyn let's go, I'll take your dog as I'm going by car, take care of yourself, I suspect there also will be those animals on loose."

  "Yeah Yeah, let's meet inside cant if we both are lucky hehe."

  .....

  [9:43 A.M]

  As Shraiyen's mother opened the main gate she saw actual chaos unfold, till now they could only listen distant scream, panicking and sound of vehicles going at high speeds but when she finally opened the door and took a look outside she saw every person either running or driving towards a common direction, a road that will lead towards cantonment the fastest, as these people ran they were panicking, some were crying and some were huffing some shouting "Oh god save us". While those who drove by were not stopping no matter what obstacle came, for the first time Shraiyen's mother saw a guy get flung across the road by a high speeding car. She was in disbelief, at every passing second she prayed for this just to be a dream, to accept this as reality was too wild.

  Soon both the car and bike were out, Shraiyen Shailani and their parents were in the car with a dog and Sharvyn and his parents somehow adjusted on the bike.

  "Try not to crash my bike, it's very precious to me." with this final taunt Shraiyen's father departed.

  "I know how to drive a damn bike you son of a bitch." mummering this he also released the clutch, following behind their car and evading the running pedestrians.

  Instead of following other vehicles and people Shraiyen's father decided to take another route, one would assume it would be a shortcut, but not quite so, taking three to four extra turns won't be called a shortcut, but the reason he took this route was because there would be far less crowd and traffic than the straight highway road leading towards cant.

  And his intuition was right, very few people on this road were going in the same direction as them, everyone else was either running or driving past them with a sense of questioning in their eyes directed at them.

  "Father drive fast, the announcement was done almost half an hour ago." Shraiyen couldn't hold his frustration anymore and said one of his thoughts as calmly as he could.

  "YOU have no right to tell me what to do, because of YOU I had to give my bike to your 'friend's family', because of YOU there was this much delay, announcement was made half an hour ago? why do you think it took us half an hour to depart? HUH? Tell me? It was because of YOU, if only you had not utilized your precious brain to invite your dear friend to our house during the time of emergency, there had not been this much delay, I might even had come up with a better plan than to rely on the cantonment safety. And among all this you sure took your sweet time to make their dog tag along us in our car HUH??"

  "This guy has fucking lost it, there is no point saying anything to him." Shraiyen did not respond, instead he ignored his father and said, "Mother turn on the local radio, there might be some information regarding our nearest cantonment."

  "You are right, let me set up the channel."

  "Brother through which road are we going? Everyone else seems to be going in the opposite direction."

  "This is sort of a shortcut, you should start memorizing streets soon, this shortcut will allow us to bypass traffic and merge onto the highway at a midpoint, from there I assume only two kilometers would remain to reach cantonments entry point."

  "THIS ISN'T A FUCKING PICNIC-SHUT UP." Shraiyen's father agitated by the situation shouted.

  As he was about to continue shouting the radio finally connected, "Civilians this is defense military announcement, our cantonment's first and second entry point have been closed, they were the ones closest to Ashwanta Hospital, this is an announcement that in three minutes we will start open firing on citizens as per the central government's order, we request you to move away from our entry point number two as fast as possible, we don't seek unnecessary bloodshed and would prefer to refrain from recreating the scene from entry point number one. Entry point three will be closed in five minutes and our last entry point, number nine has exceeded the number of refugees thus is now closed, civilians approaching from opposite side of Ashwanta Institute kindly move towards entry point eight, keep in mind you are responsible for your own safety, government is not liable, civilians at number two got attacked by other civilians."

  There was complete silence in the car now, except for the dog wagging her tail, Shraiyen's father had increased the speed by 10km/hr.

  ....

  [9:52 A.M]

  Cutting through traffic and crowd they had finally reached the divergence that joined this 'shortcut' to the highway, only two kilometers remained to reach entry point nine.

  As expected the highway was jammed with cars, bikes, buses, vans, a large portion of crowd was running past these vehicles, some were screaming, some were stepping on the cars destroying their windshield in the process.

  Finally Shraiyen's car connected to one of the highway's lane, this lane was unexpectedly less jammed as there were mostly bikes here meaning Sharvyn's parent following behind had an advantage here, now with Sharvyn's parent overtaking their car and taking the lead, they traveled almost one more kilometer as this narrow lane finally started to merge into remaining ones.

  "Civilians this is defense military announcement, our cantonment situated near Ashwanta Institute has now also closed entry point number three at 9:49 A.M due to increase in violence among civilians, now as the designated three minutes are over we ask the civilians who are harming others to move away as we will now being open firing, this is a side announcement, entry point number eight is now also closed as refugee limits have exceeded. Entry point four will close in less than three minutes, your safety is in your hand, we are not liable for your life. *Bang* *Rat-a-tat-tat*" With this new announcement local radio went silent again.

  "We don't have much time, we can't stay stuck like this here, from our side two entries have already closed, by the time we will reach there chances are point seven would have closed too with only two entries open." Right now Shraiyen's parents could be seen panicking inside the car and Sharvyn's parents could be seen talking with themselves on the bike, as currently they both were stuck in the web of static traffic, the whole highway was echoing with pointless honking of countless drivers, some had come out of there vehicle and quarreling with each other while a few were trying to pressure the ones in front by bumping a little into their vehicle.

  Shraiyen was observing all of this while stroking the back of dog, Shailani was looking at her brother and she was holding her brother's shirt by the corner. As Shraiyen was looking outside the mess unfolding infront of his eyes, he just by pure luck looked back and what he saw, threw off all his calmness and composure, with all his energy, as fast as he could, took hold of the dog, shouted at the same moment "FATHER MOTHER TRUCK, JUMP RUN OUTSIDE FAST"

  "Skronk-crunch-screech-smash-shatter-rrrrrr"