The Man Who Wasn’t There
The power returned after exactly seven minutes.
Anika counted every second.
When the lights flickered back on, the apartment looked unchanged—no broken locks, no overturned furniture, no sign of intrusion. That disturbed her more than chaos would have. Someone had been there. She could feel it in her bones.
Her bedroom door was now fully closed.
She hadn’t touched it.
Anika didn’t sleep that night. She sat on the couch with a kitchen knife in her hand, the adoption file open on her lap, replaying every detail again and again until dawn stained the sky a dull gray.
At 6:12 a.m., she made a decision.
If official records didn’t exist, she’d find unofficial ones.
By noon, she was standing outside the city records office—an aging concrete building that smelled of damp files and forgotten crimes. Inside, behind a counter cluttered with yellowing folders, sat Inspector Devraj Iyer.
He was retired.
Officially.
But retired cops still had habits. His eyes scanned people the way others scanned exits.
“What do you want, Miss Rao?” he asked, before she even spoke.
Anika stiffened. “Do I know you?”
He studied her face for a long moment. Too long.
“No,” he said finally. “But I knew someone who looked like you. Long ago.”
Her grip tightened around the folder. “I’m looking for information about a murder. Around twenty-six years ago. Near Rao Industrial Estate.”
The name did it.
Iyer’s jaw clenched. His fingers stopped moving.
“That place burned,” he said. “Along with everything in it.”
“People survived fires,” Anika replied. “Records too.”
He leaned back slowly. “Not that one.”
She slid the photograph across the counter.
The scratched-out face stared up at him.
Iyer’s face drained of color.
“Do you recognize him?” Anika asked.
“Yes,” he whispered. Then louder, sharper: “You shouldn’t have this.”
“Who is he?”
Iyer looked around, then stood and locked the door behind the counter. The click echoed like a gunshot.
“That man,” he said, “officially never existed.”
Anika felt cold.
“He was reported dead in a robbery gone wrong. Case closed in forty-eight hours.” Iyer’s eyes hardened. “But he wasn’t robbed. And he wasn’t the only one who died that night.”
He pulled out a hidden drawer and placed a thin file on the desk.
CASE STATUS: SEALED
Inside was a crime scene photograph.
A body sprawled on the floor of a small house. Blood smeared the walls—not splattered, but written, dragged in streaks like someone had tried to crawl away.
Anika swallowed hard.
“That’s my father,” she said, though she had never seen him alive.
Iyer nodded. “Name: Arjun Rao. Textile accountant. Clean record. No enemies. At least, none that showed up on paper.”
“What about my mother?”
Iyer hesitated.
“She was the witness.”
Anika’s heart slammed against her ribs. “Witness to what?”
“To fraud. To embezzlement. To men who wore suits by day and carried knives by night.” He closed the file. “She disappeared before she could testify.”
Anika’s voice shook. “And me?”
Iyer looked at her, something like guilt flickering in his eyes.
“You were found crying beside your father’s body.”
Silence swallowed the room.
“She hid you,” he continued. “In a cupboard. Wrapped you in a towel soaked with her blood so the dogs wouldn’t find you.”
Anika’s stomach turned violently.
“Who killed him?” she asked.
Iyer didn’t answer immediately. Instead, he reached into his pocket and handed her a card.
On it was a single sentence, handwritten:
Trust no Rao.
Before she could ask what it meant, the office phone rang.
Iyer picked it up.
He didn’t say a word.
His face went pale.
Slowly, he placed the receiver down.
“They know you came here,” he said quietly. “You need to leave. Now.”
A crash echoed from the back of the building.
Footsteps.
More than one.
Iyer shoved the sealed file into Anika’s hands. “Go through the fire exit. Don’t look back.”
“What about you?” she asked.
He gave her a tired smile. “I’ve been dead to them once already.”
As Anika ran, a gunshot rang out behind her.
She didn’t stop.
She didn’t scream.
Outside, hidden among the parked vehicles, she finally collapsed—gasping, shaking, alive.
Her phone buzzed.
A new message.
He shouldn’t have helped you.
Attached was a photo.
Inspector Devraj Iyer.
Lying on the floor.
Blood pooling beneath his head.
Another message followed.
You were never supposed to survive either.
Anika stared at the screen, tears burning her eyes—not from fear anymore, but fury.
They hadn’t just stolen her past.
They had murdered everyone who tried to protect it.
And now, she understood the truth that changed everything:
She wasn’t searching for a killer.
She was the last loose end.
