Redemption of Royals (Royal #1: Book 3) | ✔

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The downloading and installation lasts about thirty minutes. Once I'm all set, the rest is a child's play. I extract Yara's source code through a zip file and start working on him. Taranya was right. He has gotten better at expressing himself with more than five basic emotions. It's nothing significant, but he's adapting, and I'm impressed by his ability to observe and incorporate the behaviour within himself so fast. All that's left is working on his graphics. But I'm stilted by the bandwidth limit of the modem. It's slow and can barely process high definition graphics.

Though I don't give up.

I work slow.

But I continue working.

Work is my escape. It's the only place where I'm in control of every action, every reaction, and every result. Technology is powerful, and it isn't shy to share it with you. If you have the smarts, technology offers you tools you'd never grow tired of playing with.

The sun goes down. I don't bother with it until the darkness creeps in around the room. Getting up, I switch on the lights and make my way back to the desk. On the side, I open up the dark web and get in touch with the professor. We work side by side. He helps me out when I hit a dead end, I offer suggestions when he's stuck. Our relationship is weird. We only reach out to each other when we need help with whatever we're working on. Nothing else. Never seen each other, don't know the names of, and wouldn't even bother to find if anyone of us goes missing. He calls me a freak, because I'm absolutely crazy about computers and I call him Prof Barnes, because that's what he asked me to refer him as. We've no way of confirming each other's identities and we prefer that.

I exit the chat window with a "Later" when I hear the main door creak open. Turning around, I watch as Yuvraaj swats off the hanging wires and cables, his large figure taking up the entire doorstep. He straightens up once he's inside and dustes off his slacks and white shirt, looking around the room with a grimace before his eyes fall on me.

"It stinks here." He brushes a knuckle over his nostrils.

"There's an open gutter right beneath that window." I point to my right.

His nose scrunches in disgust. Straightening his suit, he removes a handkerchief from his pants and cleans his long fingers. "Anyway, let's go," he beckons me with a wave of his hand.

I turn my chair around and resume working. "There's a chair in the janitor's closet if you get tired of standing." I say nonchalantly.

"Rudra, Taranya is worried. You disappeared last night, and she hasn't heard a word from you since then. You've some responsibilities towards my sister. If this how you were going to treat her, shouldn't have married her." He grits out.

"She'll understand." I mutter, ignoring the voice in my head that screams I'm fucking up the progress I've made with Taranya. But I can't listen to it now. I'm not prepared to go back and face- No. If I can't talk about it in my head, I can't confront it in reality. I need to be here. I need to work. I need to escape my past.

"Yes, she will." He adds softly. "That's how she is. But you can't sit here and expect everything to get right out there. He's not going away until you send him, forever."

My fingers work faster on the keyboard, desperate to drown out his words.

"You need to face your past, Rudra. You need to believe in your strength, in the man that you've become despite all that you went through. It's your chance to prove yourself that you have walked out of that dark room, both mentally and physically."

I don't respond. I can't. My eyes stay glued to the screen as it continues scrolling down the more lines of code I add.

"You're a lot stronger than him, Rudra. It's time you make him pay back."