Editor’s note: Newslaundry is the first news organisation to track down and interview the recalcitrant Richard Dawkins, head of the dreaded CRISIS, Confederacy of Rationalists Indoctrinating Science In Society. We take no responsibility for, nor subscribe to, the views expressed by the members of CRISIS. In our view, as in the view of G-20 and the UN, CRISIS remains very much a terror organisation. Reader discretion is advised.

“Not long to go now,” says Ramos, paddling the choppy waters furiously. “Your friend will live. Gangrene is nothing to be scared of.”

I give the one-legged Ramos an angry stare, that soon mislays its venom. The brows lift a touch, the eyes rearrange their shape, the eyelids their gather. And now I look sad and pleading. It is difficult to maintain one’s anger when what one really is, is not angry but, rather, terrified. Abhinandan, my colleague accompanying me, is sure to lose his right leg because of gangrene. I have malaria. And a nasty gash on my right arm. The bone is visible. Our supplies are exhausted, we haven’t eaten for two days, our canteens are empty, our blankets are soaking wet, and our spirits are all but about to whoosh out of us. The vultures are waiting.

We might end up giving an arm and a leg for all our troubles. What were we thinking, the two of us, when we agreed to our Editor Madhu Trehan’s suggestion? We should have known better. But we didn’t. The carrot she dangled got to us. “You two will create history,” she had said. “My sources are watertight. Expect a few Ramnaths if you can manage this.”

I expect nothing short of a miracle if we can come out of this alive.

“There,” cries Ramos then blows a kiss at the low-hanging clouds above. “I have done this a million times but every time is just like the first time.”

Ramos has seen land.

Soon we arrive at Genovesa, an island that is part of the Galapagos clutch – the territory controlled by the terror organisation CRISIS. It is from the Galapagos that they operate, these atheists and rationalists who are out to destroy the civilised, God-fearing world. We have come to interview Richard Dawkins, the head of CRISIS. He has never been spotted, leave alone interviewed, ever since he escaped from Cambridge seven years ago. Legend has it that he was in the middle of delivering a lecture at the Biochemistry Department, on Comparative Genomics and the Theory of Evolution – which is a softer way of saying that he was on a recruitment drive – when, courtesy a tip-off, he learnt that Scotland Yard were five minutes away from Tennis Court Road. He flapped shut his MacBook, raised his fist, and moonwalked out of the auditorium shouting “Viva la evolución!”

Dawkins supposedly landed a month later in Ecuador that soon issued a red-corner notice against him. He managed to escape from Ecuador, too. For seven years no one knew where he was. His YouTube videos were the only leads to go by. Until, that is, the singer Madonna bought a pet parrot for her son Mercy. The first words the parrot uttered were “Hello, Dawkins, my old chum. Welcome to Genovesa.” From there on it was easy. The parrot, Madonna discovered, had been smuggled out of Galapagos. In her excitement, she disclosed this charming titbit to her Karmic instructor Deepak Chopra who, while discussing the finer aspects of Quantum Yoga, whispered it to Deepa Mehta. Deepa in turn divulged it to her pre-partition friend Madhu Trehan. Between the parrot and Madhu Trehan, hence, lay five degrees of separation. And, much to our woe, between Madhu and us, one. “Anand, Abhinandan,” she had said to us three weeks ago, “If I wasn’t the 84 years that I am, I’d have elbowed you lot and taken this up. But you two are half my age and unburdened with the exigencies of withering memory. Where was I? Yes. Go and find Dawkins for me. And remember, the parrot always speaks the truth. Always.”

Indeed. We have travelled 16,700 km over hell and high-water just to find that out.

“Careful,” shouts Ramos as he clears the dense undergrowth for us with a machete. “Those berries are poisonous.”

I loosen my fist and throw the berries away and prompt Abhinandan, who has been my food taster on this arduous expedition, to spit them out. He does so, and in the process enters into a coughing bout like his mentor.

The forest is alive with birdsongs the likes of which we have never heard before. Things slither around us constantly. The sound is upsetting and exciting at the same time. Raindrops fall on giant leaves, making them clash like the cymbals of a drum kit. The earth is well cushioned with dead leaves and our feet sink in, sometimes shin-deep. Last time we saw such wonderful exhibition of Mother Nature was in the Hemant Birje and Kimi Katkar starrer The Adventures of Tarzan.

He is waiting. And so are his two beagles, that now come charging down at us.

“No, Taleb; no, Chopra,” shouts Dawkins, “Come here, boys.”

As his beagles whimper and return to their master, we get a good look at the man himself. Dawkins looks the same as he did seven years ago. It is as though the stress that comes with planning acts of terrorism around the world hasn’t affected him at all, just that the elbow patches of his tweed jacket have gone threadbare. He greets us with a polite nod of the head and welcomes us inside his modest thatched hut.

We are eager to begin. Dawkins understands. “Let me not keep you. The USS Nimitz usually begins despatching its tomahawks at supper time. Which gives us an hour at best. Fire away.”

Abhinandan is first off the block. “Prof Dawkins,” he asks, “How much damage was caused to your stronghold, the Galapagos, by last month’s drone attacks? The Saudis think they destroyed the islands of Fernandina and San Salvador.”

Dawkins turns pensive. “I won’t deny the damage has been considerable. Our two commanders, Sam Harris and Lawrence Krauss, have had to abandon Fernandina. But Santa Cruz and San Christobal escaped the Saudi fury.”

“Sam Harris is here?” I ask.

“No. I sent him to Isabela. We need to set up a new command centre there,” replies Prof Dawkins.

“Will you retaliate?”

“Of course, we will. Darwin-willing, victory will be ours.”

“The world has united against you. America, Europe, China, India – and pretty much every member of the G-20 – have stated that CRISIS needs to be annihilated.”

“The knives are out. We know who our enemy is. Brace up for good news in the coming months.”

“But Prof Dawkins, the moderates in these countries have abandoned you, especially after CRISIS attacked and laid siege to the Burj Al Arab hotel last week.”

“First of all, thanks be to Darwin. Look. Our objective is terror. It comes naturally to us. We are logical and rational. And meticulous.”

“Indeed. 3 CRISIS teams laid siege to Burj, entered all its 202 rooms and deposited The Origin of Species in the topmost drawer of the writing desks.”

“I’m proud of what we did.”

“You say this casually. It was harrowing for the occupants.”

Prof Dawkins laughs. “Yes. I saw it on CNN.”

“189 people were so traumatised they had to be put on life support. President Obama rang up the Emir and vowed his cooperation in destroying CRISIS.”

“We are ready and waiting.”

“Pakistan says it won’t hesitate to deploy its nuclear arsenal if needed.”

“We will not be deterred.”

“Even by nuclear threat? The SAARC group of nations, of which Pakistan and India are members, has passed a resolution condemning you. They say some of the verses in The Origin of Species are hateful and lead to violence and corruptibility of the mind.”

“Which ones?”

Abhinandan flips open his notebook. “This one, specifically. Chapter 2, verse 7: It may be said that natural selection is daily and hourly scrutinizing, throughout the world, every variation, even the slightest; rejecting that which is bad, preserving and adding up all that is good; silently and insensibly working, wherever and whenever opportunity offers, at the improvement of each organic being in relation to its organic and inorganic conditions of life.”

“And what about this one?” I ask, “Chapter 7, verse 12: As many more individuals of each species are born than can possibly survive; and as, consequently, there is a frequently recurring struggle for existence, it follows that any being, if it varies however slightly in any manner profitable to itself, under the complex and sometimes varying conditions of life, will have a better chance of surviving, and thus be naturally selected. From the strong principle of inheritance, any selected variety will tend to propagate its new and modified form.”

“But this is true,” cries Dawkins.

“It isn’t, according to 98% of the world’s population. Your journals, notably The Journal of Evolutionary Biology, through which you propagate your hateful ideology, have been banned in the USA,” counters Abhinandan.

“What also doesn’t help,” I add, “are your periodic flash mob attacks at shopping malls, with CRISIS recruits throwing hundreds of copies of The Descent of Man in the air, shouting ‘Darwin is Great! Darwin is Great!’”

Prof Dawkins picks up a Gilson pipette from the side table and flags it threateningly. “There will be no let-up in the activities of CRISIS. Last month we carpet-bombed Kansas and Oklahoma with 600,000 copies of God is not Great. Hitchens would’ve been proud.”

“Your action has turned the US senate against you. The Republicans are up in arms. There have been candlelight vigils all across Wichita and Kansas City. Fox even has a price on your head.”

“Exactly what we want. This evolution will be televised.”

“But Professor,” I plead, “You will have to yield. CRISIS will have to yield. You are up against 7 billion believers. You will be crushed.”

“Or so you think. We shall never surrender. Galapagos is just the beginning. As we speak, CRISIS members are terrorising hundreds of university campuses in Europe and America, giving lectures on The Theory of Evolution and The Big Bang. Thousands of young impressionable minds are getting to know us via the social media. We will soon turn them into wide-eyed bombers and dispatch them to carry out the will of Darwin.”

“What have you promised them – as an inducement, I mean?”

“72 books. First editions. Unopened.”

“Darwin?”

“Of course. Darwin, Hitchens, Gould, Penrose, Russell. What more can a terrorist want?”

At this point, Prof Dawkins looks at his watch squeamishly. We get the hint.

“Thank you, Prof Dawkins,” I say and get up to shake his hand.

“May Wallace keep you safe on your return journey,” says Prof Dawkins kindly.

“Yes, good luck, Anand,” whispers Abhinandan with a smile. “Say hello to Madhu when you meet her.”

I am astounded. “Wait a minute,” I say to Abhinandan. “Why are you wishing me luck?”

“Because I have decided to stay. I am joining CRISIS as of this very moment.”

“What!”

“Yes. I’m too tired, Anand. And it’s not that I didn’t try. I went to temples, I prayed at churches; I even offered chadars at Nizamuddin, for crying out loud. I did this for a decade. But look at me. I remain a bachelor. There is only one explanation. God doesn’t exist.”

“But-?”

“No buts, bro. You carry on. And you must-”

“Watch out,” cries Prof Dawkins as the first of the tomahawks lands a fair distance away.

We throw ourselves on the floor. The sound is deafening. As I unplug my ears and open my eyes a minute later, I notice that I am alone. Prof Dawkins and his new recruit are nowhere to be seen. CRISIS has won a heart.

So it is true. These atheists will never surrender. Like turtles on a lonely island, they crawl towards their deaths, and manage to live much longer than we think they will. C’est la vie.