The bee which almost killed an elephant

Kerala is known for its temples and their annual festivals. All the temples in a particular locality will have their festivals scheduled at almost the same time resulting in an annual festival season. It is the healthy competition among the temples to outperform each other in festivities that results in those grand extravaganzas. No festival is complete without caparisoned elephants and the raging panchavadya. "Make hay while the sun shines" - the sun does shine on pachyderm owners during the festival season. Bigger the pachyderm one owns, higher the demand for you. During the season, elephants are either transported in a lorry or they walk from one temple to another.
Mahadevan, the elephant owned by Pillachettan was pretty much busy in the festival season of 1993. He was a pretty big tusker and was renowned for his looks. His mahout was Kumaran. They made a good team as Mahadevan would carry a drunk Kumaran safely on his back when they are travelling and in return Kumaran would give Mahadevan extra ration of his favourite food, jaggery.
On one such travel, they started pretty late in the day and decided to walk through the night. Our hero, Achayan, a Physics teacher in an English medium school was in his early 30s and was a proud owner of a Java bike - 1981 model. He was an expert when it came to bikes and he used to adjust the "flute" of the silencer to ensure that his bike delivered musical, loud and rhythmic thuds.His Java-1981 model was envied for its sound. Achayan like a stereotype Malayali was an occasional drinker who managed an occasion every evening. On that eventful night Achayan was at the club, played rummy, had brandy & beef and was on his way home. It was around 11 in the night and the omnipresent silence was broken by those loud thuds the Java made - Dhud.. Dhud.. Dhud..
Achayan was comfortably doing 50kmph. The cool breeze blowing on his face complemented with the balmy brandy in his veins had rendered him in a state where his reflexes were a bit slow, eyes half shut and his mind a shade drowsy. Little did Achayan know about Mahadevan, dreaming about his next ration of jaggery, walking ahead of him. Though Kumaran promptly corked his toddy bottle, he forgot to attach the red, circular cycle reflector to that rear position of Mahadevan's thigh which would have been referred to as "bum" had Mahadevan been a biped. Mahadevan, the cheerful being that he is, was keeping good pace occupying in full, a lane of the two lane road. The night was quite dark and Achayan cannot be blamed for not spotting Mahadevan despite the dim glow that his Java-1981 model lavishly supplied. Achayan was enjoying his ride, when all of a sudden he collided against Mahadevan's rear.
As Achayan lost control of his bike, poor Mahadevan lost his sphincter control. For Mahadevan, Achayan on the bike resembled a bee trying to find a way up through his bottom. Surprised, shocked and frightened, poor Mahadevan started on an involuntary run. The quick pace at which the events turned out caught Kumaran unawares and culminated in him being thrown off from Mahadevan's back and a yelling Kumaran landed flat on the road with a thud. Mahadevan continued his run and stopped only when he saw a light, which happened to be coming from a vacant petrol bunk. Pappachan, the night shift employee in the bunk, was taking advantage of the lack of customers and was blissfully sleeping. Probably as an expression of reprieve on having survived an attempt on life by a bee, Mahadevan let out a basso trumpet. Few things can be described as more scary than to be woken up by a trumpeting elephant. Unlike Mahadevan who started a run on a similar life attack from a bee, Pappachan fell unconscious, only to be woken up 3 days later in the hospital.