Heroes R Us by Mainak Dhar

to lose patience, and put on his sweatshirt, ready to start on the journey back to his home. As he stepped on the curb, he saw a black Sumo parked a few feet away to his right. He kept walking a few paces, and then stopped to turn around. There was no reason that this had to be the black Sumo Mishti had described being chased by, but he figured that there was nothing to be lost by waiting a few more minutes. So he sat down near the car and waited, pulling the hood of his sweatshirt up around his head to keep out the cold wind that was now blowing at a brisk pace.

    He couldn't believe his luck when a few minutes later, three men walked over to the car. They were the same men he had seen the previous night, and if he had any remaining doubts about their identities, their conversation was a sure giveaway.

    'Which bitch did you guys fancy?' asked the big man with the bandana around his head.

    'I liked the one in the jeans and the white top. The one with the long legs' responded one of his friends, a smaller man, who was holding a can of beer in his hand.

    They all laughed and passed a few vulgar comments about the women they had seen in the mall that night, when the big man pointed to a woman walking towards them.

    'While you've been lusting after everyone you see, I've been making a plan.'

    When his friends asked, he said that the woman was alone, and her car, a Honda, was parked just a few feet away. He outlined a plan to follow her till the highway and then force her car off the road in a dark spot. Arnab was sitting just a few feet away from the men, and their conversation had made his blood run cold. It was one thing to think about these criminals in an abstract sense, but quite another thing to see them as flesh and blood people, calmly planning a rape as if they were planning a family picnic. He felt anger build up within him, and stood up to confront the men. Just as he stood, the woman the men had been discussing got in her car and drove away. The men rushed into the Sumo to follow her.

    For a second or two, Arnab stayed rooted to the spot, not knowing what to do. Then, distraught that he would lose them again, and even worse, that his inaction would enable them to attack another victim, Arnab started running after the Sumo.
     
    Arnab didn't think much of it at first, but after a few seconds, he realized what was happening. He was chasing a car on foot and keeping up! He had no idea what speed the Sumo was driving at, but by any stretch of the imagination, he was running faster than any man should. As he tried running faster, he realized that at full tilt he was actually travelling a bit faster than the Sumo and was steadily gaining on the car, which was now perhaps no more than a dozen feet ahead of him. Feeling the wind blow into his face at high speed was hardly comfortable, but the hood helped a bit, and the sheer adrenaline boost of the chase made him forget everything but catching these men. He stumbled on a rock and fell by the roadside, wincing in pain as his elbow hit the ground. His glasses were knocked off his face, and he cursed himself as he tried to find them, knowing that without his glasses, he would not be able to do much, no matter how fast he ran. That was when he noticed something that blew his mind. He could see clearly without his glasses! No, more than that, despite the near pitch darkness of the stretch of road leading to the highway, he could see everything as clear as daylight. All the objects he saw had a bit of a green tinge to them, of the sort he had once seen displayed on a Night Vision scope on some Discovery documentary, but he could see them crystal clear without needing his glasses. What sort of magic was this? The sound of the Sumo making a tight turn into the highway brought him back to his senses, and he put his glasses into his pocket, as he resumed his pursuit, determined not to let the men get away.

    As he pushed himself, Arnab saw that he could run even faster and now