Written by Sudha Ramnath and Mithila Peshwe
__________
June 2025
Unnikrishnan
The Parambikulam police station stood deserted. I was alone, seated at the battered wooden desk, a wave of sentimentality washing over me. Absentmindedly, my fingers traced the grooves and dents—silent witnesses to the passage of time and duty.
It was hard to believe I was retiring. Thirty-five years of devoted service in the police force—years in which I had not let a single criminal escape. My unwavering record had earned me the nickname “Unbeaten Unnikrishnan.”
Yet, to my dismay, a jolt of humiliation surged through me—sharp and sudden—at the thought of the one case that had eluded me: the murder of the Forest Conservator. My sole failure.
I walked into the records room, located the file, and brought it back to the table. The folders were coated in dust, but the memories they contained were vivid—etched in clarity.
I remembered the sting of mockery in the voices of my fellow inspectors as they called out “Unbeaten Unnikrishnan” with derision in their eyes. I remembered the shame when the village rose in protest, calling me a dictator for laying a hand on Adiyan—a mentally disturbed tribal man. The newspapers had branded me “Authoritative Unnikrishnan” for what they deemed high-handed brutality.
The memory was searing. I could still picture Adiyan in this very room, crouched low on his haunches. His hair and beard were wild, matted with dirt. His tall frame was twisted into a feral posture, his eyes gleaming with unhinged madness. Yet, behind the tears—just for a moment—I had seen something: a glint of sly calculation. A flash of something dark. A fleeting, malevolent smile.
With a weary sigh, I pushed the file away.
The case lingered in my mind, a relentless obsession. I had clung to the hope that, one day, I would unravel the mystery and reclaim my dignity—not in the eyes of the public, but in my own. Alas, it remained a sore wound, refusing to heal.
April 2010
Adiyan
I scratched at the scab on my leg, swatting at the fly, one of many, that hovered over my wounds. Battered and beaten I limply raised my head as an angry voice and face materialised over me.
“Ethe? Vattano? Ezhunne!”
A kick landed on my back and another one making me curl into a ball.
“Wake up, you rascal!“
It was Muthu, the sweaty and scowling constable. I pushed my palms on the craggy floor, trying to sit up when a dark, heavy heeled boot landed on my hand crushing it, shooting a bone-crunching pain through my arm. I looked up dazed, begging him to let go.
“This is your last chance. Confess or I’ll break every little bone in your body.” A heavy, rough palm smacked me across my face.
“Don’t, please…” with a hoarse voice I pleaded but Muthu, sadistic as he was, did not stop his assault.
“Muthu! Leave him.” Unnikrishnan, the inspector barked through the open cell door.
“Get up, collect your belongings.”
As painful as it was, I propped myself up using the wall and followed them outside the dank cell.
“We are letting you go…for now.” Inspector Unnikrishnan harrumphed as Muthu slammed the table, almost splintering it. Unnikrishnan, chose to ignore us both, shut the file close and left the police station without a second glance at me. I stood there, my senses dulled over the last few days, slowing repeating his words in my head.
I’m free to go!
I dragged my bruised body across the threshold, breathing in the damp, musky air, savoring each breath. A few locals scrambled up from their perches at the tea stall and rushed to hold me up.
“Oh look at you, what have they done..”
“Such monsters…”
Rounding it up with a few expletives, the gathered crowd towed me ahead towards the village away from the police station that sat squat in the centre with the village on end and the forest on other.
I glanced back towards the police station. Little flames danced across my eyes as I wished upon it to burn down, just like they…
Unnikrishnan caught my lopsided sneer as my eyes met his for the last time. Unbeatable eh!
I could feel a shudder setting in, my body quaked with the tremors. I bit my tongue hard to regain control. Leave him! He had said and that was one favor I would return.
I thanked the villagers profusely but pleaded to take a different path that led me to the forest.
Hours later, I found myself in front of the bungalow – the Forest Conservator’s, cordoned off heavily with tape.
A racking wheezing sound emerged from my chest, slowly turning into a husky chuckle until I was shaking, holding my belly that ached with every laugh.
They think a tape would keep me away when closed doors and windows couldn’t.
24 March 2010
Unnikrishnan
I still hadn’t finished my first chaya for the day when Muthu’s call came through.
I received the details of the murder and tore through the dense jungle, finally arriving at the secluded forest bungalow—enclosed by towering walls that barely kept the relentless forest at bay.
Muthu stood outside the bedroom where the conservator’s body had been found. The victim had been alone in the bungalow that night. The caretaker had called saying there was no response to the calling bell.
Muthu explained that they had to call in a local carpenter to break down the sturdy doors, which had been locked from the inside. The victim had spent the night alone.
He lay facedown on the floor beside the bed, his cervical vertebrae shattered in a savage attack. It was evident—the murderer had seized him in a headlock and violently wrenched his head, snapping it with brutal force.
I inspected the windows and found only one, untouched and draped in cobwebs. A small air vent sat high up on the wall, too narrow for any human to slip through. There was no conceivable way for an intruder to have entered.
I was utterly baffled.
The conservator had amassed plenty of enemies. Whispers of corruption swirled—taking bribes, turning a blind eye to tusk smugglers, shielding illicit liquor rings, even orchestrating murders when payments fell short.
I was certain I would track down the culprit, beat the truth out of him, and force a confession.
A CCTV camera mounted high on the wall caught my attention. I demanded the footage.
****
To my dismay, every one of his enemies had airtight alibis. Perhaps one had hired a killer to do the job.
The CCTV footage revealed a tall, disheveled man loitering around the outer walls.
Muthu circulated the image, and the local arrack shop owner identified him as Adiyan—a tribal wanderer who had surfaced in the region only recently, loitering in the jungle’s fringes. He was towering and broad-shouldered, yet carried an air of unsettling madness—his gaze vacant, his lips slack, his movements jerky. He constantly scratched at a wild nest of filthy, matted hair.
We brought him in. Gave him a thorough beating. Locked him up.
He whimpered like a child, muttering incomprehensible gibberish. We had nothing—no proof he had entered the locked room, or even the bungalow and certainly had no motive. For all we knew, he was just a drifter who had stumbled into the frame.
The news soon spread like wildfire, and I found myself right at the center of it. The locals rallied and arrived in swarms in support of Adiyan, a seemingly vulnerable person who had, in a short time, endeared himself to everyone with his gap-toothed smile and his wordless language.
The stakes were raised against me. But I knew, with the certainty only a seasoned policeman possesses, that Adiyan had murdered the Conservator.
But how?
How?
How?
23 March 2010
Adiyan
I stared at the window, its dusty glass almost translucent. The dark silhouette of the forest conservator moved across the window. The entire village was attending a Theyyam dedicated to Rajah Mahabali. He was alone, drunk, and delirious. There were rumors abound of his latest conquest – bringing a gang of tusk smugglers to justice, the news had claimed. Little did they know that he was in cahoots with all that happened in the forest. But nobody dared to raise suspicion. Someone had dared years ago, and he was squashed like a pesky bug. Not just him but his entire settlement. Little fires danced across my vision. And I my tiny, supine form wracked with tremors.
It was time to quench my bloodlust.
I swiftly padded across the pebbled path that led to the bungalow and climbed up the pipe in a flash of a second. The window was bolted closed and tight. But I knew of the little loophole. A Cheshire grin spread across my face as I aimed for it.
********
Dirty, stinking pig!
I prowled in the shadowy corner of the room, waiting for him to stir awake. There was no fun in toying with him when he could barely recognize his head from his toe.
Slowly, his pot-belly gurgled loudly.
Hmm, he is hungry!
I saw him lift himself from the armchair, untangling his thick limbs and totter to stand. I keenly sensed the moment when he saw my shadow, growing larger by the second, until I revealed my form.
His eyes stayed rooted on my face as he gaped at me in utter shock. The musty smell hit my nose before he realized that he had wet his pants.
How pathetic! This is turning out to be more fun than expected!
His face contorted with fright, as I clutched his face tight. One swift move, a crunch as his neck snapped, lolling like a rag doll. Dropping him on the ground in his fluids, I raised my leg and brought it down with brutal force. The sound of his spine breaking in two was music to my ears.
I etched the scene in my memory… right beside the one that I avenged tonight.
Ten years ago
“Adi, come on, run!” I heard my uncle shout hysterically from outside our shanty. It was dark outside, might have been late in the night. As I groggily emerged from the ramshackle hut, he grabbed me close.
“Listen carefully, you have to run, deeper in the forest, where the sun does not touch the ground.”
I nodded, barely registering what he was blabbering.
“But Kochachan, won’t you come along?”
“No, Mone, I need to take care of something.” He pushed me away.
I sprinted into a run as I heard a commotion around our settlement. Barely a few steps into the edge of the forest, I felt the heat before I turned around to see a little fires slowly engulfing my home and each hut in our settlement. I heard a scream, all too familiar, before it was silenced.
Too scared to make sense of what was happening, I ran deeper into the forest.
Scourging and scavenging, I kept moving ahead until the towering trees loomed overhead, blocking the sun. I had reached the place my uncle wanted me to find. But what now?
Before the thought finished, I could sense shadows moving towards me. No, not shadows, these were men. Too pale, thin and gaunt, they resembled the dead rather than the living.
“Come here, boy. Don’t fear us…yet. We are not ghosts. Simply a long-forgotten tribe – The Odiyaan.”
The leaves rustled, and a few more forms emerged… Animals of all shapes and sizes. Bulls, goats, and the sneakiest of all…cats!
I stared at the cat, mesmerized as it grew bigger and bigger taking a monstrous form – Half human, half feline.
I never felt so excited before; my body shook with tremors.
“Can you teach me how to shift?”
========
Glossary:
“Ethe? Vattano? Ezhunne!” – “Hey, rascal, wake up!”
Theyyam – Religious dance, native to Kerala
Kochachan – Uncle
Mone – Son or addressing a small boy endearingly
Odiyaan – a cult clan, believed to be shape-shifters through the practice of Oti Vidya.
