Wild Kombereis

It was a blast; the din wasn’t unusual. How long would this continue? This question will remain a mystery until and unless the Tigers of the wild and the Dons of the wild stopped their hatred of each other. Sepha panicked and shivered at the mention of the word ‘bomb’ by her mother. She heard the loud explosion which was very near. “Somebody from the family might have died” she thought. Her body became numb and she was choking. Her mother held her right away and took her inside the bedroom. Just then a knock was heard. Her aunty came and cried “your uncle hasn’t come back yet.” “Let’s wear as many clothes as possible. We will tie our waists with scarfs. Then we will go out and stay outside the house” her mother suggested. Her mother started searching for dresses that could be worn one on top of the other. She gave Sepha a lot of old clothes. After that they tied their waists with scarfs and went out slowly towards the lawn. After a silence of ten minutes they heard a strident clamour. Then the sound of kicking and banging of doors were heard. The Dons were breaking the door of her uncle’s house which was just near the main road leading to Myonnmar. They ransacked the house. After sometime footsteps were heard approaching towards her house. Fear gripped three of them. They wondered whether they would show sympathy to them or not. Sepha imagined that she had been taken away by the gunmen and left after being tortured molested and raped as it usually comes in the paper every now and then. Today she would be that unlucky victim. Everyone was to have their turn and ultimately her turn had come. She knew it as something in her could sense it from a long time. Might be it was her frequent premonition about this event that brought them there. They approached towards them and stared angrily ‘Wild Kombireis’ is about living with-- riots ambush combing operations mental torture fear stigma dreams beauty innocence etc. Sepha is a mystique woman from a mystique land as she sporadically goes into a trance like situation and utter mystical words. Amidst all the chaos she loses her lover Nongpok after a short stint of affair. The story also shows the sense of alienation she goes into as she ventures into FOI where the future of a country is groomed. As she waits for her depression to be treated and live a better life she unknowingly unearths the truth about Nongpok which subsequently leads her to live a life of stigma and disgrace forever. “Shoot her genitals and let her live a barren and disgraceful life. That is her punishment for loving the wild.” They pulled up her dresses but she didn’t feel anything as her existence would have no meaning at all. She was blank. Just two shots and she lay in a pool of blood.