“Congratulations!” The professor’s booming voice reverberated through the packed classroom. “You’ve failed with flying colours!”
The sarcasm in his voice pierced through the feigned indifference in Rabin’s countenance. He took a glance at the maths answer script hanging loosely between the thumb and index fingers of Prof. Sen’s outstretched arm.
Marks obtained: 2
Full marks: 25
Snatching the paper from the professor’s grasp, ignoring the muffled chuckles and condescending stares of his batch mates, he hurriedly went back to the last bench with the script in hand. The red markings on the front page seemed to mock him silently for his apparent lack of intelligence.
Rabin’s eyes filled with tears.
****
Rabin Nandy had come to Kolkata with a dream. A dream of studying computer science engineering at a government college of good repute.
Having been the topper of his school in Birbhum for most of his student life, there was immense pressure on him to perform well in the state-wide undergraduate entrance examination.
While Rabin cleared the cut-off score with ease, his marks were not sufficient to gain admission to the elite government colleges. Coming from a poor family, he also lacked the financial means to attend top private institutes.
Anxious and dejected, Rabin spent many sleepless nights and almost gave up on his dream when, suddenly, a chance vacancy in a government college reignited his ambition.
Successfully securing his place as an undergraduate student of the Computer Science and Engineering department in the spot admission round, Rabin packed his bags, took the blessings of his proud parents, and set out for the bustling metropolis to make history. A distant uncle — a widower working as a chemist in a pharmaceutical company in the city — had graciously agreed to provide him accommodation in the damp garret of his dilapidated two-story house.
While things began smoothly, a significant realisation dawned upon Rabin after a couple of weeks in college. He was finding it very difficult to follow some of the classes. Although he took notes diligently and attended every lecture without fail, he still found it hard to grasp some concepts. Interacting with the professors after college hours helped to a certain extent, but he could somehow sense a growing gap in knowledge developing between himself and his peers.
Most of his batch mates were born and brought up in the city and had studied in reputed private schools. While they were generally helpful and friendly towards him, Rabin suspected that they could never truly accept him as one of their own. A few passing comments behind his back, albeit whispered to avoid his attention, had quickly reinforced this suspicion. Having resolved to stay out of their way, barring urgent necessities, Rabin explored the lush green campus and marvelled at the variety of vegetation in his free time.
His uncle was a busy man, hardly having any spare time for his nephew. He spent most of his time either in the pharmaceutical office or in his personal laboratory on the ground floor, experimenting and verifying the efficacy of newly marketed drugs. But even amid this busy schedule, he tried his best to make Rabin’s stay as comfortable as possible.
So at the end of the day, it turned out that although Rabin was eating and sleeping better than he ever had in his nineteen years of existence, he still lacked something in his city life that he had taken for granted till that point — companionship.
After grappling with complex equations and a growing feeling of loneliness for almost three weeks, he suddenly found an unexpected friend in this seemingly foreign land. Or rather, it was his friend who found him.
One Saturday morning, while trying to wrap his head around partial differential equations on his bed, Rabin found his concentration broken by a sudden high-pitched trill from across the terrace. Looking up, he was greeted by a black cat with deep green eyes crouching at the terrace boundary. Its forward-facing ears, relaxed posture, and wagging tail were indicative of a playful attitude. It was staring at Rabin through its slitted pupils, tracking every subtle change in his posture. Under the rays of the morning sun, the cat’s gleaming ebony fur was a marvel to behold. For a moment, Rabin lost himself in the green eyes of the majestic feline, only to be brought back to reality by a series of meows.
Taking out a biscuit from a nearby container, Rabin broke off a small piece and threw it towards his furry guest. The cat, following every action cautiously, eyed the biscuit for a few seconds before jumping down from the boundary.
Finishing the offering in two bites, it looked up expectantly for another serving.
Meow. It spoke. Give me more.
Rabin chuckled.
He chucked the remainder of the biscuit across the terrace, watching as the cat ran towards it with glee, munching it down in no time at all.
And so, with this chance encounter, Rabin at last found some company.
As the days passed, their bond grew stronger. The cat soon grew accustomed to Rabin’s routine, appearing on the terrace whenever he returned home on weekdays. It purred, rubbed its scent on its newfound friend, and made the garret its home. Rabin treated it to leftovers from his meals, petting it lovingly as it voraciously gobbled down its food. Pretty soon, the cat became an integral part of his otherwise monotonous life. He named it Nishi — a Bengali synonym for night.
****
As Rabin trudged along dejectedly through the narrow alley leading to his uncle’s house, the weight of his failure loomed large over his head.
2 out of 25, he murmured to himself.
He had scored the lowest in his batch.
Although this was only the mid-semester examination, Rabin knew that mathematics was an integral part of his undergraduate course. If he wanted to excel in his course, he had to excel in maths. No matter what it took.
Unlocking the front door with his key, he slowly made his way to the stairs leading up to his garret.
On reaching the bottom stair, however, he was forced to stop.
Turning his head to the right, he found his uncle’s laboratory door ajar. A peculiar thing indeed. In his three months’ stay, Rabin had always found the door under lock and key in his uncle’s absence. A wave of curiosity flooded his brain, and he felt an indomitable urge to enter the room and explore its contents.
After a moment’s hesitation, he cautiously squeezed through the opening like a thief.
The room was dimly lit by the sun’s rays falling through the cracks in the ancient window frames. Numerous wooden shelves lined the walls, each filled with vials and containers full of medicine.
His uncle’s workbench below the window was filled with flasks, beakers, chemicals, and a Bunsen burner. Amid this mess, his eyes fell on a black notebook in the centre. It was open to a certain page, and a labelled, transparent glass jar, filled to the brim with minuscule tablets, rested atop the creamy white paper. The label read Sample ID: 420-4-U.
Upon closer inspection, Rabin found his uncle’s handwriting on the page. Although the writing was quite rushed, he could decipher the following message.
Sample ID: 420-4-U
Codename: Intelligentsia
Observations: Current sample composition working well for rodents. Test subjects showing increased cognitive abilities approximately 5 hours after ingesting two tablets. All vital signs normal. Increased brain activity lasting for sixteen hours. Results promising. Phase II testing on Rhesus monkeys recommended.
Optimal dosage (subject to change): Two tablets per twenty-four hours.
Rabin’s heart skipped a beat. His mind had already started racing, joining invisible dots and thinking about the infinite possibilities of this ground-breaking drug. Before he knew what he was doing, he found himself reaching and grabbing the glass jar. With shaking hands, he opened the lid, took out a handful of tablets — not too many, in case his uncle noticed — and closed it carefully. Sliding them into his shirt pocket, he cautiously made his way through the door, up the stairs, and into his room.
For five whole minutes, he sat on his bed — his heart pounding violently in his chest — and stared at the tablets he had stolen. The tiny white tablets, lying innocuously, looked deceptively mundane against the colourful bedsheet. He had managed to pull out thirty pills from the bottle. Enough to last a fortnight.
Inside his mind, a storm was raging.
Will they be safe for consumption? When should I take them? What if there are side effects?
But eventually, his curiosity got the better of his apprehension, and he decided to take two pills before going to sleep that night. Keeping the pills in a plastic container on his table, Rabin went downstairs for his lunch.
Nishi came in the afternoon and found his two-legged friend rather distracted. His touches lacked the affection, and his smile lacked the warmth. It was almost as if he had lost interest in his feline companion. Eating his fill and basking in the sun for a couple of hours, Nishi finally departed in the evening with a couple of annoyed meows.
As night approached, Rabin’s anxiousness became palpable. After dinner, with shaking hands, he took out two pills from the container. Praying to the Gods to safeguard him from potential complications, he swallowed the pills whole.
For two hours, he tossed and turned in bed, unable to sleep in excitement. But eventually, his exhausted mind sought refuge in sleep.
When Rabin woke the next morning, it was 6 AM.
Quickly recalling the incidents of the previous day, he shot up in bed, testing himself for any physical or mental change he might have undergone in his sleep. To his dismay, he soon realised that he felt no different than any other morning in the last three months.
Getting out of bed, he slowly walked onto the terrace. A fresh breeze brushed against his face, and he found Nishi cuddled in one corner. In the stillness of the morning, under the vast expanse of the blue sky, Rabin realised his folly.
Of course the pills didn’t work on him. What did he expect? He thought to himself, a smile forming on his lips.
It was Saturday, and he resolved to start working on his maths skills right after breakfast. With the previous day’s humiliation in college still fresh in his mind, he sat down with a book and a copy at 7, determined to improve.
After a while, however, Rabin was astonished to find how easy it all seemed. He soared through the practice problems without breaking a sweat, finding patterns he had never noticed before. It was as if the equations were speaking to him, guiding him furtively towards the correct solutions. In the next half an hour, he completed the entire exercise without a single mistake.
Rabin’s heart hammered against his chest in excitement. He looked at his own copy in disbelief. The realisation slowly dawned upon him.
The pills — they were working!
He leapt up in joy. Running to the terrace, he picked up his beloved Nishi and showered the cat with kisses. Dazed and confused at this sudden show of affection, Nishi tried in vain to protest, but soon resigned himself to his fate. Running back to the garret, Rabin grabbed a handful of biscuits and fed his feline friend with all the attention that he had lacked the previous day. The cat munched away, happy at this sudden turn of events.
For the next ten days, Rabin continued taking the pills as prescribed.
The significant increase in his cognitive abilities didn’t go unnoticed in college either. His professors regularly complimented him, with some going so far as to label him a genius. His batchmates, though initially in denial, finally came to the realisation that his intelligence was beyond their reach. They flocked around as sheep flock around a shepherd — asking for notes and singing his praises. From an apparent outcast, he had become the centre of attention.
Yet amid this meteoric rise to fame, Rabin sensed one troubling change growing within him with each passing day.
He was becoming apathetic.
He spent most of his days either reading or studying, and paid very little attention to the people around him. The things that meant the world to him just a few days ago now seemed distant and unimportant. He lost interest in nature, in human relations, and most surprisingly, in his first and only companion, Nishi. Whenever the cat tried to get close to him, he shooed him away and tried to discourage him from disturbing his studies. He eventually stopped feeding him, keeping the terrace door closed to prevent his unwelcome obtrusion into his room. The cat, baffled by this sudden turn of events, continued to visit the terrace in the hopes of reconciliation.
One morning, Rabin suddenly woke up to a strange sound in his room. In the soft rays of the morning sun falling through the open window, he felt something moving on the floor. Sitting up in bed, he was greeted by a strange sight. Nishi, running around on the floor, playing with what appeared to be tiny pieces of a white object. Rabin’s gaze turned instantaneously towards the terrace door, and he found it ajar. In a flash, he remembered that he had kept it open last night to allow the cold wind to flow through the garret.
Rabin grew annoyed at his own mindlessness.
Nishi! He shouted, getting up from bed.
The cat looked up, momentarily pausing his games to greet his two-legged friend with a meow.
Bending down to pick up his furry intruder, Rabin suddenly froze.
He had realised what the white objects were.
They were his pills!
Nishi had climbed on the table, upset the plastic container with his pills inside, and had been playing with the tablets for God knows how long. The pills, coated with dirt, lay scattered all across the floor.
Rabin flew into a rage. Picking up a book from beside his pillow, he hurled it full force towards the unsuspecting cat. The projectile missed its mark — thanks to the feline reflexes passed down over thousands of generations — but left an indelible impression on its target.
Nishi, letting out a shrill cry, leapt towards the terrace door in fear.
But Rabin wasn’t done yet.
Frustrated with his miss, he picked another book and threw it once again across the terrace. Needless to say, he missed his target again.
Nishi scampered towards the boundary.
Before jumping up and disappearing, the cat looked back and stared at Rabin with his large green eyes. Eyes filled with surprise, pain, and a feeling of betrayal. Even from all the way across the terrace, the stare pierced through Rabin’s soul.
After the cat went out of sight, Rabin slumped in his chair.
He was scared.
Scared at the sudden explosive rage that flowed through his veins. Scared at how he lost all his senses in his determination to punish the poor cat. He had never felt so much anger before. He never even knew he was capable of so much rage. It overwhelmed him. It felt like a primal emotion stirring after years of dormancy.
He was quick to realise that the medicine had produced this reaction. The pills, while enhancing his cognitive functions, were hindering the limbic system of his brain, thereby reducing his control over his emotions.
Taking a deep breath, he hid his face in his palms. A thousand thoughts raced through his mind.
Was this the price of his intelligence? Intelligence that prevented him from appreciating the beauty of the world around him? Intelligence that made him attack innocent, helpless creatures? Intelligence that closed the doors of love and compassion?
Was this intelligence truly worth achieving?
Hot tears streamed down Rabin’s cheeks. Nishi’s innocent green eyes flashed before him. In his short-sighted attempt to achieve success, he had hurt his closest friend — his only friend. That was absolutely unacceptable.
He promptly made up his mind.
He would improve without the help of the pills. Intelligence without love and compassion was not the type of intelligence he desired.
Picking up the tablets from across the floor, he flung them across the terrace boundary into the adjacent pond. As the white globules sank into the water, Rabin felt liberated.
He had already decided on his next course of action — finding Nishi and making amends for his foolishness.
Hurrying down the stairs, he slipped on his sandals and rushed into the alley, determined not to return until he found his beloved cat.
****
As the clock struck seven, Rabin’s uncle scribbled on the creamy white pages of the black notebook in his home laboratory. Within minutes, the page read as follows:
Sample ID: 420-4-U
Codename: Intelligentsia
Phase II Test Report: Rhesus monkeys turning aggressive after continuous ingestion for two weeks. Losing control over their limbic system. Fighting over trivial issues and seriously injuring one another. Tablet discontinuation recommended.
Conclusion: Drug not marketable. Needs further research and modifications.
No sooner had he finished the report than he heard his nephew dashing down the stairs and rushing out the main door.
“Rabin,” he shouted, coming out of his room to see what the matter was. “Where are you going so early in the morning?”
