So here I am, moonstruck lover turned action hero—Superman plunging through the air, Jaz Bond dropping into the villain’s lair. (Perhaps I could write my Jazternama as a comic strip, ensure the first bestseller after the apocalypse.) For a moment, I lie stunned on the ground. Not from the fall, but from the sight of the two vans parked in a bay under the wall. The first has its back door open—a stack of boxes lies beside it on a pallet. It’s the second one, though, that leaves me agape: white and compact, a blue stripe runs across its side, as sharp as a laser ray.

Ever since Colaba, I’ve had to keep my doubts tightly bottled, accept the notion of finding Karun as an article of faith. I allow myself a moment of jubilation at this evidence I’m closing in. More good fortune: wooden crates prop open the large metal doors of the loading bay. I slip inside—almost immediately, another door blocks my way. This one isn’t padlocked, it just bears the familiar electronic locking mechanism. Will the Devi’s powers work so far from her domain?

I swipe the card through the slot. Not much happens. The lock makes an anemic whirring noise, which quickly fades.

I try again, with a silent prayer to my Laddoo Queen, showering her with all the sweets in the world. This time, the lock whirs more enthusiastically and opens with a click.

A bare bulb illuminates the passage. Boxes of supplies line the walls—I tear a few open, and find bottles of water, tins of baked beans, tomato soup, fruit cocktail. There’s no can opener, so I take some deep swigs of water to try to cure my sudden hunger pangs. (All I’ve been offered since morning is the glass of “nectar” I turned down.) A large chamber ahead houses even more boxes, containing not only foodstuff, but also such essentials as blankets and medical kits. I count at least a dozen small doors, all identical, built into the walls—metal-forged and tightly sealed, they resemble the hatches in a ship. The one I try opens when I pull down and twist the lever handle, which is fortunate, since just then, the sound of someone wheeling a cart comes from the corridor ahead. I barely have enough time to scoot through the door and squeeze it shut.

Groping around the wall, I find a light switch, which turns another naked bulb on. The room around me, little more than an alcove, is crammed with so many boxes that I almost don’t notice the steps leading down. The level below turns out to be much more rugged, like a cave shoveled out of the ground. Chunks of rock protrude right through the roughly slapped-on plaster in spots. A central opening leads to a multitude of peripheral pods, ones in which any attempt at finish or décor has been abandoned, and a burrowing animal might feel quite at home. Most contain cots, complete with mattresses and pillows, a few the odd table or chair. In one, I even spot a television set sitting unplugged on the ground.

Could this be a post-apocalyptic colony, for survivors to wait out the nuclear winter? A fine crush of dirt drizzles down on me as I walk around. I try not to make too much noise, lest I bring the whole place (and with it mankind’s future) crumbling down.

I retreat to the safety of the upper alcove. There’s no way to tell if the person I heard still lurks outside the heavy steel door. I turn the lever, count to three, and cautiously poke my head out. The chamber is deserted. I hop out, then continue along the passageway, until it ends a short way down at the double doors of an elevator. I blow on my card and rub it between my palms, hoping the Devi’s magic hasn’t been all used up. I’m in luck—a single swipe, and the doors part, as if the elevator has been waiting patiently for me on this floor all along.

Judging by the buttons numbered all the way up to twenty, the construction has an ambitious way to go. The “G” level surely swarms with Khakis, so the choice is between the numbered floors. I decide to start at the top and push four (will the elevator pop out of its sleeve since the building ends at three and a half floors?). The doors close and we begin to rise—how ironic that I was falling into danger just a few minutes ago. I try to channel the steeliness of Superman, the sangfroid of Bond. If only I’d made some excuse to stop by Guddi’s room and retrieve my gun.

The doors open without warning on “1.” To reveal not a battery of leering trigger-happy Khakis, but a waiter manning the entrance to a banquet hall. The strums of a sitar invite me out, lulling away any notions of danger lurking around. After the concrete and bare earth in the basement, I’m surprised by the feel of carpet under my feet, the sight of green and gold birds (peacocks, I think) taking flight on tapestries. The lushly planted garden visible through the large picture window seems particularly incongruous, given the building’s fortress-like exterior. It takes me a moment to realize I’m gazing at a blown-up photograph.

“You’re just in time, sahib,” the waiter says with a bow. His turban tilts towards me, as flamboyantly plumed as a cockatoo’s comb. “We were wondering if anyone else would make it for lunch.” He unhooks a metal-detecting wand from the wall. “I hope you don’t mind, but we have to check anyone new.” He scans my body—I guess I wouldn’t have gotten away with the gun after all.

Inside, more peacocks adorn the walls. I half expect a posse of Khakis to leap out from behind them and surround me with weapons drawn. Instead, I notice some of the diners are women—even a few children run around. However, I can’t spot Karun—at least not in my quick visual sweep of the room. “This way, sir,” the waiter says, and ushers me to an empty place at a round table. “They’ve already cleared the buffet, but I can bring your food here if you tell me what you’d prefer.”

“Dosas,” the man seated next to me recommends, pointing at the remnants on his plate. “The chutney’s fresh and spicy today—Devi ma must have decided to donate some of the coconuts she gets.” I nod to the waiter, who closes his eyes to convey the astuteness of my choice, then gracefully withdraws.

“You’re new here,” my neighbor remarks. “I didn’t realize the van was still bringing people in.” He introduces himself as Professor Das, from the microbiology department at Kalina. “I’ve been here almost since the beginning, so I can answer any questions you might have. For instance, in case you’re wondering, the food here is great, as you’ll discover in a minute.”

The dosa is very good, the potatoes redolent with tamarind and curry leaf, the wrapping crisp enough to shatter into pieces as I dig in. So good, in fact, that I wonder if this could all be a meticulously arranged setup—the Khakis masquerading as diners, the potatoes drugged to knock me out. Will I wake up in Bhim’s lair, my body stretched on a rack, my digits clamped in thumbscrews? There’s little recourse if that’s to be my fate, except to eat up.

Professor Das introduces the others. “That’s Dr. Jayant from Lohan Chemicals beside you, and next to him, Dr. Sethi, one of Mumbai University’s premier mathematicians.” I realize, as he goes around the table, that I’ve hit the Noah’s Ark of techies—surely this has to be where Karun is housed. Behind Dr. Deepender, the mechanical engineer from IIT whose hand I reach out to shake, are the rows of banquet tables. Is Karun at one of them, his back towards me, his face obscured?

The thought fills me with an urgency to scan the room more thoroughly for him. I interrupt Das mid-sentence, saying I need to make a quick trip to the bathroom. Even though he clearly points it out, I wind through all the tables on the way there, as if confused about the location. But my search disappoints—I don’t find Karun.

“You must try this lassi, Dr. Pradhan,” Das says upon my return, and pours me a glass from a jug. More drugs? I wonder, but it’s so refreshingly cold that I take several gulps. “So tell me, did they pick you up, or did you heed the call?” I’m not sure what I should answer, so I reply I was picked up. Das nods understandingly. “Just like most of us. Some complain about it, but I tell them to see it as an honor, that we’ve been chosen as the cream of the crop.” He looks pointedly around as he says this, as if aiming his words at the table at large. “Safe and well-fed in the middle of a war—what more could one want?” As if on cue, the waiter delicately lays another dosa in front of me with a pair of tongs.

So far, the other diners have stared down impassively at their plates, but now Dr. Sethi breaks their silence by asking what I do. Obviously, I must be a scientist if picked up by the van, but with so many fields represented at the table, I have to answer carefully, to avoid being exposed. I finally settle on geologist, giving my institution as the University of Lucknow, which I hope will be obscure enough. “I didn’t think they even had a geology department,” Sethi says, frowning at me. Das quickly interjects to say he’s heard they just started one. I nod in vigorous agreement—who knew?

The large monitor suspended above the buffet table blinks on before Sethi can pepper me with more questions. “It’s Bhim,” Das whispers. “He likes to address us whenever he comes to the hotel.” The face that fills the screen looks nothing like the blood-spattered visage I remember from the grainy video of the Haji Ali massacre, or the one spouting rabid exhortations to violence on the nationwide rath yatra. Rather, it is calm and clean-cut, the eyebrows neatly trimmed, the hair carefully coiffed. Could he be tripping on his Emperor Ashoka persona again?

“My friends, I hope you’re having a nice afternoon.” His manner is congenial, his voice so soothing, it’s almost mellifluous. He announces that the refurbished gym has opened on the second floor, that more laptops will arrive shortly, though the internet remains down. “Don’t forget the roof garden—there’s no better way to start your morning than a walk there. And afterwards, you can come have a dosa—we’ll start serving them for breakfast as well since you like them so much.”