Prompt-O-Rama

The Dying Man's Deed (Prompt: missing)

"You... will... regret... don't." 

thump.

Sevu collapsed in a heap, unable to say another word. His eyes remained fixated on the little shanty that was his home. The field was a canvas of cracks, parched by the lack of water and without as much as a blade of paddy or for that matter even a weed. A hot, dry wind swept the dust from the surface of the earth, sending a pall of dust in Sevu's direction. He laboured to move his head away, panting so hard, his breathing set off its own swirl in the opposite direction. Blood trickled from his nose, still throbbing after it took the savage punch. He finally turned to look at the ungodly face of Edward who was now straddling him. Edward was silhouetted against the sun shining right behind him. Sevu snorted. "You... are like... Rahu. You've eclipsed... the Sun. But it...usually... doesn't last." 

Edward tilted his head sideways and clicked his tongue. "The irony, Sevu. You could've lived to see a thousand crescents and here you are, dying halfway through, all for one acre of land. I'll spare you even now. Sign the deed and your life is yours."

"I won't let you have even an inch. Your tannery will ruin the soil and poison the groundwater. And I'll never let that happen when I am alive, or for that matter Edward, dead." 

"Bastard!" Edward laughed. "This is what I like about you, you peasant. Even now, you can conjure a good joke. If there is nothing you can do when alive, what can you do when you're dead? Come on. Give us the land, we have a house and a job as a mason ready for you. Plaster walls, and live to be a hundred. Why do you want to be dismembered and your parts buried all over the land that you treat as God,only to be feasted upon by the soil and all the chemicals that will seep in? Is that the kind of death you want? All for this little thing that's yours?" 

"That's morbid. I will give you the one little thing that's mine," Sevu said in resignation. Edward smiled, got off Sevu, and squatted a couple of feet away. 

"Let me help myself up," Sevu said and moved his left hand, already tucked under his posterior, a little further in. He sat up with great difficulty, his legs sprawled clumsily, his back hunched and his face and eyes drooping. He gently lifted his head, worked something inside his mouth and even as Edward watched on in eager anticipation, spat on his face. "That little thing's for you." Those were his last words as a rain of blows from an incensed Edward sent Sevu's life force fleeing through his nostrils. 

"Idiot. All I need is a thumb impression," Edward turned Sevu over and froze. He looked at the deed and then at Sevu and wailed in agony before slumping into a clumsy squat. 

As the sound of sirens got louder in the background, Edward sat staring at a crumpled note that Sevu had tucked into the hem of his veshti all along. "The left thumb goes to the police." With it was a receipt for a registered post sent to the inspector of police that morning. 

And by the side lay Sevu's four-fingered left hand.

---

Note: veshti is a type of waist cloth.