The Cage Of Power

By Keerthana Prasanth

Akay was a man who couldn’t be chained because he was the chain. He thrived on control. As a police officer, his badge wasn’t just authority; it was immunity. He was feared, revered, and above all, unquestioned. But beneath the crisp uniform and hard eyes was a man driven by cruelty, one that bled into every relationship he touched.

Then came Diva soft-spoken, hopeful, and tragically human. She saw what others couldn’t: a flicker of buried tenderness behind his brutal mask. She believed love could reach the man buried beneath the monster. For a while, it seemed possible.

But love wasn’t a cure. Akay’s violence wasn’t reserved for criminals; it seeped into his home, his words, his hands. He was cold, manipulative, and terrifying. Diva held on longer than she should have, hoping he would change, but pain became her answer each time. The day she left was the day she chose survival over hope.

Breaking free wasn’t easy. His grip was tight, his shadow long. But as the distance grew, so did her strength. She rebuilt, piece by piece, and eventually met someone who loved her the way Akay never could with gentleness, safety, and truth. When he proposed, she said yes without hesitation. Her past was behind her. Or so she thought.

Akay didn’t let go. He never let go.

To him, Diva’s happiness was the reason. Her joy with another man is intolerable. He watched from afar, his obsession growing like a wound that wouldn't close. She had chosen peace. He chose revenge.

He used his badge to orchestrate a plan one designed to destroy her fiancé. A fabricated crime. A forged narrative. A trap no one could trace back to him. But rage has a way of unraveling the most calculated plans. The more he tightened his grip, the more it slipped.

Then came the wedding,a celebration streamed live for the world to see. For Akay, it was a countdown. Unable to contain his fury, he confronted Diva’s fiancé mid-ceremony. His mask cracked before millions. The rage, the violence, the raw hatred—it was all captured. The clip went viral. The legend of Akay the officer crumbled into a monstrous truth the world could no longer ignore.

With his name now synonymous with brutality, Akay was suspended, arrested, disgraced.

But disgrace didn’t mean defeat.

In a final, desperate attempt to reclaim dominance, he grabbed a woman from the wedding crowd Ganga, a distant relative of Diva. She barely understood what was happening before she was thrown into his car and driven into the heart of a nightmare.

Ganga’s family didn’t come for her. Frozen by fear, they did nothing. She was abandoned. But in a strange twist, the only person who reached out was Akay’s mother, a woman who, despite being the root of his legacy, refused to let another soul be broken under his hand.

She gave Ganga shelter. Food. Silence. Kindness. She couldn’t undo the horror, but she tried to offer warmth. It was the first time Ganga felt seen after the abduction. Until Akay came back.

Years had passed. Prison had hardened him, not humbled him. He returned not as a man, but as something worse calculated, soulless, and more dangerous than ever.

Ganga’s fear reignited the moment she heard the gate creak. His first act back? He killed her dog, the one creature she had bonded with and ordered her to cook it for him. The message was clear: nothing was hers. Not even her grief.

Each day, she became less of a person and more of an object enslaved to his whims. When she discovered she was pregnant, a flicker of light returned. But Akay extinguished it with a single look.

“No child will weaken me,” he hissed.

He demanded an abortion, not out of fear of responsibility but fear of vulnerability. He couldn’t love. He could only own.

Not even his mother was spared. When she tried to protect Ganga again, Akay orchestrated her death an “accident” no one questioned. His final tether to humanity was gone.

Now, the mansion was a tomb.

Ganga, once filled with dreams, now lived like a ghost. Her parents had turned their backs. Her protector was dead. Her unborn child was erased. She had tried to end her life more than once—but each time, Akay found her. Each time, he punished her harder.

Her body bore bruises. Her soul carried the scars.

Akay, meanwhile, ruled his crumbling world with unchecked cruelty. He beat a servant senseless for brushing against his car. His possessions were sacred. His word, law. Outside, he looked like a king. Inside, he was a rotting throne built on fear.

In that cold house, power was worshipped. And pain was the only language spoken.

Ganga sat in the shadows, trembling, eyes swollen. Every scream she heard echoed her own. Every day, she waited not for rescue, but for an end.

And still, Akay whispered the same words:

 “Power is everything. Any pure soul without power is none.”

Akay shone like a bright moon, its light cruel and unyielding, casting shadows over all beneath it. He had the power to taunt, to degrade, to break a woman without even needing chains because to him, she was already bound. His wealth was his weapon; money was power. The ultimate power. It was a force that could never be diminished, a force that ruled everything in his world.

His feelings weren’t for people; they were for power, for control. Akay was a man devoid of loyalty, commitment, or love. He saw Ganga not as a woman, but as a mere object, a toy to play with, a mat upon which he could wipe his dirt. She was a slave nothing more than a vessel for his desires and needs.

Each time he spoke to her, his words stung like poison. “You’re just a slave,” he would sneer. “A chained dog. I’m your master. You’re nothing but a puppet.” His voice was cold, and the hate in his eyes was unmistakable. “Don’t ever come near me. I hate commitments.”

He would remind her of the cruelty in his past, as if it were a twisted badge of honor. “My mom tried to chain me with her love. But she didn’t know that I gave her a peaceful death,” he said with a sickening laugh that reverberated not just in the walls of the mansion, but through Ganga’s very soul.

There was no escape. Nowhere to run. No one to save her. Living with a beast who had murdered his own mother, his own unborn child. A man who took joy in destroying everything that was pure, everything that might have once been human inside him.

One day, while Ganga was bathing, Akay's voice echoed through the house. He called her to come and welcome his guests. When there was no response, his temper flared. "Answer me!" he shouted, his voice thick with anger.

Still, there was silence. Ganga, lost in her moment of solitude, didn’t respond. And that silence was enough to send him over the edge.

In a fury, he stormed through the house to find her. When he reached the bathroom, the sight of her unclothed, vulnerable set him off even more. “What did I tell you? This was not the time!” His words lashed out like a whip.

Fear gripped Ganga’s heart. She was trembling, helpless, as he raged. She couldn't hide, couldn't shield herself from him. The shame, the humiliation, the terror of facing him like this they were all too much to bear.

With a roar, Akay pounded on the door, then smashed it open with his bare strength. He saw her, exposed, vulnerable bleeding, yet still trying to protect herself. But there was no escape.

“Get out!” he ordered, dragging her by her hair, pulling her away from the bathroom. She stumbled, her body weak from exhaustion, from the pain of living through hell every day. It didn’t matter that she was bleeding, that she was crying he didn't care. All that mattered was his control, his power, his satisfaction.

He dragged her into the living room where his guests waited. Her naked, trembling form, covered in shame and pain, was nothing but a display of his cruelty. She cried, not just for the physical pain, but for the loss of her humanity, for the years stolen from her.

Her body was a broken reflection of Draupadi stripped, humiliated, and exposed. But where Draupadi had Krishna to protect her, Ganga had nothing. No one was coming to save her. She was alone in this hell, and Akay was the monster who made it his mission to destroy her soul, piece by piece.

The guests were taken aback by the scene before them, their shock evident as they looked on. But the friends of a man like Akay had long since lost any sense of decency. They ogled at her, their eyes filled with a disturbing hunger. Ganga, trapped and helpless, felt her body become nothing more than an object in their presence.

Akay, consumed by his fury and his need to assert his dominance, decided that she would be punished for defying his rules. In his twisted sense of justice, he allowed his friends to do as they wished with her. The pain, the violation, the humiliation all blurred together for Ganga, leaving her numb.

She couldn’t remember much after that. The world around her became a haze of confusion and agony. When it was over, she was left alone, cold and bleeding, lying on the floor in a broken heap. The weight of the ordeal seemed to drain her of everything she once was. 

Ganga was deeply humiliated as a woman, a human, and a soul. After the incident, she wanted nothing more than to bury the world in her anger. But she was helpless without money or power, she couldn’t fight Akay. She questioned the existence of God. As a child, she had believed God was the savior, but now she wondered: If God existed, why would He let her suffer? No gods, no humanity only money could buy power.

She realized the harsh truth: power, not faith, ruled the world. Akay's power was built on money, the same thing that controlled everything. She had no wealth, no status, no influence, she was nothing. Anger burned within her, but it was smothered by a crushing helplessness. She knew she had to find a way to gain power, or she would never be free.

For the first time, Ganga hardened her heart. She would no longer wait for a savior. To survive, she needed power. She would find it, no matter the cost.

Ganga did not sleep that night. Her heart burned with rage, humiliation, and a thirst for revenge. As the morning sun rose, Akay and his friends woke up, unaware of what awaited them. Ganga rushed to serve them hot tea, but it wasn’t just any tea, it was mixed with her urine. Hidden beneath their drunken haze, they couldn't detect the difference. They drank it eagerly, like it was ambrosia.

Their lustful eyes lingered on her body as she smiled inwardly, her mind already planning her next move. The fire of vengeance burned bright within her, and she served them dish after dish, each one more exquisite than the last. Akay and his friends indulged, oblivious to the true nature of their feast.

Little did they know, it would be their last supper.

Ganga prepared a feast like no other, an unusual combination of insects, snakes, spiders, and her own waste, all transformed into an oddly delicious presentation. Her heart swelled with satisfaction, for she found joy in tormenting them in a way that was entirely her own, different from the cruel revenge they had shown her.

With a twisted sense of triumph, Ganga handpicked the juiciest apples from the tree in her yard. She crafted a pie, blending the sweetness of the fruit with a touch of apple seeds hidden inside. As she served the pie to Akay and his friends, her face glowed with a gleam of happiness, knowing that her revenge had finally been executed. It wasn’t just about retaliation; it was the freedom she had longed for, the release from her past torment.

Ganga served the last piece of pie. Akay and his friends tasted it, savoring the final bite. Ganga, watching them, laughed loudly. Her laughter echoed through the walls of Akay's mansion. Akay, startled by her sudden reaction, grew furious. He rushed toward her, wanting to silence her. In a fit of rage, he struck her, beating her with a nearby flower pot. Ganga fell to the floor, blood streaming from her wounds. She lay still, the pain surging through her body, but her eyes remained defiant.

Akay wanted to kill her, but she remained still. Her eyes burned with the fire of vengeance, a silent promise to bury him down. He watched as she lay there, suffering in pain, yet a smile played on her lips one of victory. Despite the agony, she was fully aware of what she had done. Akay and his friends would soon die before her. 

Could she escape the consequences? Yes, she had planned this meticulously. She had no family, no connections, nothing left to lose. She had made her decision and executed it. One by one, Akay and his friends collapsed, their bodies succumbing to the poison. They died right before her eyes.

Ganga murmured, "I know this is not the real punishment you deserve, but I am not a monster like you. I am human. But I have to kill you to free myself from the cage of power."

Her last seven minutes of life flashed before her eyes, moments spent preparing the climax of her life, and the destruction of the monsters who had tormented her. She had been a slave, with no power, no choice. Yet her heart remained strong enough to fight back.

She knew she was powerless, with no freedom in Akay’s mansion. But the apple tree nature's savior had become her ally. She had snuck the seeds inside and brewed a potion for the fearless Akay. She waited for the right day to execute her plan. Today was the day. The day of her victory.

She knew there was no escape. Nowhere to go. No one to save her. But she chose to embrace death, for she understood the world she lived in. Society would never punish the man who had destroyed her. They would punish her for committing murder. So, she chose death. But as she witnessed the death of Akay and his friends, those who had tormented her, destroyed her life, and caged her freedom she realized they, too, were punished.

The first sin of man came from an apple. But Ganga chose the same apple to punish sin with another sin.

Now, Ganga could die peacefully. She waited for the system, for God to bring her justice, but no one came. Finally, she decided her own fate, her revenge. Ganga took her last breath, a sense of quiet satisfaction filling her as she watched the painful deaths of the monsters who had tormented her.

A girl with vision died as a girl with no other choice but to embrace death to free herself. 

Not every woman gets a Krishna to save her. Not everyone can get out of her shackles.

Not every victory has a smiling face. Some are meant to remain suffering.

Only the ultimate savior, Death, can save them from the cage of power.

               The end

By Keerthana Prasanth