"Akanksha! Akanksha! Wake up!"
"She is not in her senses maam. We will have to admit her in a facility."
Meena was helpless. Watching her daughter writhing in front of her, she couldn't do anything but agree with the medical professionals.
She knew she was betraying Akanksha. But she had to do it. "Ok, where do I have to sign?"
The light was dimming and brightening before her. "Where am I?" Akanksha looked around, everything looked hazy. She tried to lift her arms, but they were not in her control, she was chained.
"Leave me! Let me go!"
Akanksha couldn't understand what was happening to her. Last she remembered was seeing her mother's brother after so long. And she had started shaking uncontrollably looking at him and fallen down.
And now she was chained.
A man was approaching her bedside. He was wearing a white dress. He was coming closer towards her. She didn't know what to do, she screamed loudly.
"Nurse! Please continue sedating her, otherwise it will stress her out."
"But doctor, how long? How long can we sedate her like this? It's been 3 days."
"Please sedate her, until she calms down."
Akanksha felt a weariness sweep over her. And she felt herself going into an abyss, deep below and she reached a wall with a door. "Thud!"
She opened the door. She saw a younger version of herself sitting on the floor, scared, looking at someone above. It was her uncle. He was telling her an Egyptian story of pyramids and pharaohs.
Slowly she felt like screaming as she saw her uncle touch her private parts. With his one hand on her mouth and the other on her vagina, he continued the story of the Egyptian girl who screamed and got burnt.
The Egyptian girl, her uncle told her, was a little girl just like her. There were many little girls in the ancient Egyptian building. And every night, tribal men would pick one of them as part of the ritual. Dancing around the bonfire, they would each take the girl with them to the tent. The girls had been warned not to scream, because that would anger the Gods above.
One day it was the turn of the little Egyptian girl. She didn't want to go with the tribal men. She was naughty, her uncle said, with a smirk. And then, as the men approached her, she screamed loudly and ran. They ran behind her, and burnt the Egyptian girl's tongue to punish her.
Akanksha saw her younger self shudder at the story as her uncle continued to finger her vagina.
She started flailing her arms trying to protect her younger self who sat there crying and silent, but failed, as her hands felt too weak now. It was then that she saw the nurse was back piercing her with a needle again. She was now trapped, and tried to scream, but her voice was voiceless, just like the Egyptian girl who screamed!