Everything in Delhi is going fine. Everyone's sleeping easy, waking up easy, having a good time. Nothing's gone wrong in ages.
But one morning, Dogsy and Napu wake up and — the birds that come to their window every day? Gone. The whole sky is empty. Not one chirp anywhere in Delhi. No parrots, no pigeons, not a single bird in sight.
Dogsy's favourite little sparrow, Mithoo, taps on his window every single morning at six o'clock. Today — nothing. No tap, no chirp, no fluttering wings. Just silence.
Dogsy shakes Napu awake. "Napu! Come here, quick!"
"What, what happened?"
"Napu, there's not a single bird out there!"
Napu looks outside. "Oh — you're right. Where did they all go?"
They rush to call their friend Bytes, the little tech-mouse, who shows up rubbing his eyes, round glasses still crooked.
"What's happening this early?" Bytes yawns.
"Bytes! Every bird is gone!"
"Every bird? Even the annoying crow who wakes me up every day screaming outside my hole?"
"Even him."
Bytes blinks, suddenly wide awake. "Okay, NOW I'm worried. Any idea why?"
"No idea," Dogsy says. "Let's find out!"
"Wait, wait," Bytes says, pulling out his tiny notebook and a pencil half his size. "If we're doing this properly, we need a detective name. I vote for 'The Bird Squad.'"
"We don't have time for—"
"'Team Feather Finder'?"
"Bytes."
"Fine, fine. Let's go."
The three of them head out. Down the road, they run into Sheru the street dog, sniffing around a lamppost like he's lost something.
"Sheru! Did you see anything? Where'd the birds go?"
"There was some strange music playing last night," Sheru says. "I heard it. And right after — all the birds just started flying toward it. Like they were in a trance or something." A trance, he explains, is when you're moving and awake, but not really thinking for yourself — like your body's following something else's orders instead of your own.
"Toward the music?" Napu thinks.
"Which way?" Dogsy asks.
"North," says Sheru. "Also, does anyone have a biscuit? Detective work makes me hungry."
Bytes tosses him one from his tiny bag. "On the house."
So they head north. A little further, they run into a cat, sitting very properly on a wall like she owns the whole street.
"Hey, cat auntie! How are you?"
"Great, obviously. Look at me," the cat says, licking a paw. "Now tell me — where'd all the birds go yesterday?"
"That's what we're trying to find out!"
"I saw a huge light over Connaught Place," the cat says. "Every single bird flew straight toward it, like something was pulling them. I would've followed, but I don't do 'flying.' Not my style."
"Alright, that way then!"
A bit further, up in a tree, a squirrel is sitting, munching away on something that might be a biscuit and might be a small pebble — hard to tell.
"I remember something fell near that tree," the squirrel says.
"What fell?"
"No idea, go look! I was busy eating."
Bytes zooms over and finds a small shiny piece on the ground. He pulls out his tiny magnifying glass, squints at it dramatically for a full three seconds, and announces: "Whoa — this looks like a piece of a drone!"
"A drone?" Everyone's confused.
"Don't ask me why, ask the drone," Bytes shrugs.
Further along, they meet a very old pigeon — practically ancient, barely able to hear. Bytes fits a tiny hearing device on her, adjusting it twice because the first time it just plays static.
"Grandma pigeon, what happened?"
"I'm so old, I can't hear a thing, don't know anything," she says. "But this much I know — a big, shiny bird-shaped thing flew way up high, and every single bird went chasing after it. Foolish young birds. In my day, we didn't chase shiny things."
"Thank you, Grandma pigeon."
"Also I'd like that hearing thing back at some point. It's quite nice."
The team hops on their scooter and heads north. Soon, an old fort comes into view. The walls are way too tall — there's no way in.
"Great," Bytes mutters. "Case closed. We tried. Let's go home."
"Bytes."
"I'm just saying, that's a very tall wall."
That's when Napu gets an idea. Napu doesn't just talk to snakes — he can talk to water creatures too!
He walks up to a turtle floating lazily near the fort's edge. "Turtle, is there any way into this fort?"
"Oh, sure," the turtle says, without even opening his eyes. "There's a tunnel underwater. Swim through it, and you'll come out right inside the fort, in a little pond. Been there for years. Nobody ever asks me anything, by the way. Nice to be useful for once."
"Now THAT'S an idea!"
"Wait, we're swimming?" Bytes says, looking down at his tiny paws. "I'm a mouse. I sink like a rock."
"You can wait here and guard the scooter," Dogsy grins.
"Finally, a job I'm qualified for."
Dogsy and Napu dive straight in, swim through the tunnel, and pop up inside the fort, dripping wet and slightly out of breath.
Inside, there's a giant glass room. Hundreds of birds sit inside it, singing a sad song. In front of it, a young man waves a stick in the air, like a music conductor leading an orchestra that doesn't want to be there.
"STOP RIGHT THERE!" Napu shouts. "Drop that remote!"
The boy spins around, startled, and drops it with a clatter.
"I'm Dogsy, and this is Napu. What is all this?"
"My name is Kavi," he says, clutching the remote again. "I built the greatest bird orchestra in the world. My tune makes every bird obey me, and no one is taking them away."
He presses a button. The glass door locks with a heavy clunk, and the sad song grows louder.
"You used a drone to control them," Napu says, spotting the matching silver panel on the remote. "Then you locked them up."
"They belong to my orchestra now."
"They belong to themselves," Dogsy replies.
Kavi raises the remote to play the controlling tune again. Dogsy barks one sharp order through the glass. Every pigeon drops to the floor, every parrot flies high, and the bigger birds beat their wings together. The sudden rush of air rattles the glass room so hard that Kavi staggers.
Napu dives, catches the remote and presses the release switch. The door slides open.
Every bird bursts free, flying into the sky in one giant joyful cloud. Kavi runs for the underwater tunnel, but the old turtle is waiting at its mouth with six extremely serious frogs. He turns back and finds Dogsy blocking the other door.
Outside, Bytes — who has been guarding the scooter very seriously this whole time — nearly falls over as the sky fills with birds. "THEY'RE FREE! Wait, did I do that? I feel like I helped." He says this with total confidence — very smug, meaning extremely pleased with himself over something he barely had anything to do with.
Dogsy and Napu hand Kavi over to the police. The officers arrest him for controlling and imprisoning the birds. They seize the drone, the remote and every recording of the tune so it cannot be used again. Kavi will answer for what he did in court; calling it music does not make captivity harmless.
That evening, Dogsy sits on his balcony, and right on time — tap, tap — Mithoo lands on the windowsill, chirping like nothing ever happened.
"You're late," Dogsy laughs, and Mithoo just chirps louder, like she's telling him the whole story herself.
And that evening, the Delhi sky fills up with birdsong again — plus one very smug mouse telling anyone who'll listen that he "guarded the scooter like a hero."