Professor Nair found the old typewriter in the back of his grandfather’s study, buried under yellowed manuscripts and dust. Its steel frame was heavy, its keys worn smooth by decades of use. The faded label on the front read: Empire No. 5 – 1932.
He hadn’t meant to start using it. But when his laptop crashed days before his book deadline, desperation drove him to feed a sheet of paper into the antique machine.
First Words
The typewriter resisted at first. Its keys stuck, its ribbon dry and brittle. But as Nair forced the first sentence onto the page, something strange happened—the machine seemed to wake up.
By the third page, he wasn’t the only one typing.
Clack-clack-clack. Pauses. Then: CLACK. CLACK. CLACK.
Nair froze. His fingers weren’t on the keys.
The typewriter hammered out three words:
TELL MY STORY
The Previous Owner
Nair’s research revealed the truth. The typewriter had belonged to his grandfather’s younger sister, Leela—a journalist in pre-Independence India. She’d vanished in 1942 while investigating a colonial scandal. Her last article was never published.
That night, the typewriter wrote on its own again:
THEY BURIED THE TRUTH
Nair’s blood ran cold. The paper slipped from the roller, revealing something that hadn’t been there before—a faded press photo tucked inside the machine. It showed British officers standing beside a freshly dug pit.
The Final Draft
For three sleepless nights, Nair worked as the typewriter guided him, its keys sometimes moving under his fingers as if possessed. The manuscript grew, revealing corruption, murder, and a cover-up that had lasted generations.
On the fourth morning, he found the last page already typed:
"Now you know. But they’re still watching. Burn this."
As Nair reached for the manuscript, the study door slammed shut. The temperature dropped. The typewriter’s carriage shifted violently, spelling one final warning:
TOO LATE
Outside, a car engine growled to life.
Nair grabbed the pages and ran.