Pain.

All-encompassing pain.

Pain ached all over Arjun's body like sea waves ebbed and flowed, making his consciousness hazy. Arjun moaned and thrashed all over. In his haze, he heard a concerned male voice.

"Bhumi, how is he?"

"His fever is high, and he cried in pain all day. Where were you when I needed you most?" He heard a sad female voice speak threateningly.

"I went to the old lady's place to ask for medicine, and she gave me this herbal paste to apply on his forehead," the male said urgently as if to stop the female from further rant.

The female cried: "Useless husband, you should have told me about this earlier."

He heard a running sound and a warm touch on his forehead. Something sticky applied to him, and it felt cold.

The pain faded in a few moments. Arjun heard people talking, but it felt distant. His body, ravaged by pain, left him tired of body and mind, and he welcomed sleep.

Rooster crowing somewhere nearby and light rays of the sunrise peeking through the room woke up Arjun, but sleep and the suffering left him disoriented.

"Where am I!" He muttered.

The room he was lying in was made of mud and the roof was thatched, like most of rural house in India. He got up into a sitting position and felt weak but ignored this feeling and looked around in confusion. There was no furniture or anything remotely like modern appliances present in the room.

Further observation allowed him to understand that what he considered a room was, in fact, a house of a size of 100 square feet.

Arjun moaned in frustration as he felt something was not right but could not figure it out. He cocked his head, widened his eyes and said in an agitation. "Where are the lights, fan, stove and other things?"

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"Shit! Where am I?"

Recently, he heard on the news that kidnappers take their victims to deserted rural places as hostages. Only after receiving a ransom amount they free the victims from captivity, but that was not possible. Even though his family can be considered middle class, his parents cannot raise any substantial amount of money to pay the kidnappers.

Arjun scratched his head and looked at the entrance of the house - the door was wide open and not locked. Obviously, no self-respecting kidnappers would be so inept. He further looked around to find out something that would solve this puzzle and spotted a few clay pots near a traditional stove that used wood as fuel.

This made him more and more puzzled. Arjun walked unsteadily to a pot and opened its cover; the aroma of fresh porridge wafted at him. "Rice porridge!" Arjun mumbled.

He heard a voice behind suddenly, which made him jump fearfully.

"Boy! When did you wake up?"

Arjun turned and was ready to confront the person to ask some questions. He widened his eyes, stared at her and promptly forgot all the questions that needed to be asked.

"Hmph," the lady snorted.

Arjun peeked at the person at the entrance with bulging eyes, a gaping mouth and finger-pointing, but he couldn't speak a single word. He tried to open his mouth again to say something, but words stuck in his throat.

"Boy, I know you are hungry. Porridge is ready," the lady said in a nonchalant tone and unconcerned with his odd behaviour. This showed she had rich experience in dealing with dullards.

He awoke from reverie and croaked like a frog; "Why are you topless?"

The Lady put her hands on her hips, rolled her eyes and shouted, "Aiyo! This big you are, and you want to drink breast milk instead of porridge".

Arjun was shocked and embarrassed, but the lady was bossy and totally unconcerned about nudity. He took several deep breaths to calm down his chicken heart, but he looked more and more like a tomato suffering from severe constipation. After a few seconds, he felt calmer and inspected the bossy lady.

Actually, now he looked carefully, the lady was not topless. She was wearing a saree without a blouse, but her bosom was so voluminous it couldn't be hidden, and his vision zoomed to it.

"Boy, you are five years old, and I stopped lactating a few years back. So no milk," she said with her last trace of patience.

"Five years old," he repeated like a parrot.

The lady looked really pissed whether or not Arjun was ill, she was prepared to smack him on his head.

Arjun hastily looked at his hand and legs. They were thin, with short legs and hands. "Why am I small?"

This was likely the last straw that broke the camel's back. He gasped and promptly fainted. After all, one cannot endure so many shocks in a day.