Estella
was delighted when members of her family first noticed the halo over
her head when she was about ten years old. Like many achievers, she
had started early. Initially it was quite dim and not easily
noticeable. She had worked hard to get it. Everyone at home had
enquired how she had got it. She had proudly mentioned that she had
saved the neighbourhood cat from the large dog down the road.
She proudly wore her halo and held her head high. It was the
“Family” halo and no one in the family did anything to surpass
her achievement and snatch it away from her. It went on increasing in
brightness as she did more deeds. But her friends could not see it as
it was visible only to family members.
Around 12, they noticed a second and dim halo over the first one.
Family members had difficulty in noticing it as it was faint and
hardly visible in the brightness of the Family halo. But friends who
could not see the Family halo could see it. It was the Friendship
halo. People enquired what she had done to merit the new halo. But
she did not brag about her activities. She continued doing what she
did and this halo too grew brighter and brighter as days passed.
When she was about 14 years old, another fainter halo appeared. This
was the “City” halo. She had now managed to scale up her
activities to the extent that they affected the entire city. Like
earlier, her previous halos shone bright and the new one was not
visible easily to family and friends. But everyone else in the city
could see it. Soon she had a “State” halo too.
At
16, she went national. Very few persons had five halos. It was
almost as if she was carrying a bright set of rings of the Tower of
Hanoi on her head. She became an instant celebrity. TV channels
rushed in to interview her and newspapers ran articles on her. After
all a “National” level achiever was hardly to be ignored or
sneezed at. People flocked to take her autographs. They wanted to
take selfies with her.
With all five halos in full brilliance, she embarked on her next
mission at 18. She wanted to go international. She managed to hack
into the computers of the Air Traffic Control of the largest
international airport in the world. She fiddled with their software
to incorporate differences between actual time and position of
aircraft and the ones used for tracking traffic. Now the heights,
distances, directions and speeds were all different from their actual
place is 3-D space. The adjustments made ensured that several pairs
aircraft would be at the identical place at the same time. In the
next fifteen minutes, nearly 8 mid-air collisions occurred, involving
airlines from 9 different countries and people of over 20
nationalities. Though deft handling by the pilots involved averted the disaster, her effort and ingenuity were noticed and rewarded. And her “International’ halo appeared instantly.
Not dim, like others initially were. In full brightness.
Oh, I had forgotten to tell you, her first halo had appeared when she had
slit the throat of the dog that was troubling the cat, as had subsequent ones. With half a dozen
halos, she wondered what she had to do get the coveted bright horns
over the last halo. She decided she need to read more about the
Mongol chiefs, German and Ugandan dictators, and the like to get some
inspiration for the future. In future she would join this worthy
crew – Estella had no doubt about that.
She decided to get a job in a virology lab. It was empowering to
have the fate of the world in her hands. She had the means to get the
world down to its knees. Last year, in 2019, she joined the lab. And the rest,
as they say, is history.
She now has the brightest pair of halo horns ever.
***
