As Samir Tawfik lay on an office floor at Georgia Tech, awaiting a death blow from a sword, he asked his assailant one question over and over.
Why?
Last week, Kshitij Shrotri, a man with an advanced degree from the university, allegedly stood with what police described as a katana -- a Japanese samurai sword -- over a severely wounded Tawfik.
"I have to kill you," Tawfik recalls him saying. "Why," Tawfik asked. "I have to kill you," came the response.
Tawfik asked again, but he told the AJC on Wednesday that Shrotri would not explain himself. Instead, Tawfik said, Shrotri stabbed him in the leg and within 2 inches of his heart, severely cut his hand and slashed his neck.
Tawfik, a Tech researcher who attended the same aerospace engineering school at the university as Shrotri, said he knew his attacker only well enough to recognize his face. He said he could not understand why this man was positioning a sword on his neck.
"He was about to slaughter me," Tawfik said. "And, of course, you cannot reason with a killer."
Georgia Tech police responded in time to save Tawfik. Summoned by a report of a robbery at the Weber Space Science and Technology Building, several officers surrounded Shrotri. A police report obtained by the AJC documents what happened next.
The police pointed their guns at Shrotri, as Tawfik lay on the floor, an arm raised to ward off a blow. They ordered Shrotri to drop the bloody sword, but he refused, yelling, "He ruined my life. ... You will have to kill me."
One officer then squirted Shrotri with pepper spray, and another tackled him. That officer, Robert J. Turner of Griffin, got Shrotri in a bear hug, but Shrotri still gripped the sword. Turner, 29, was cut on his right hand before Shrotri was disarmed.
Tawfik was taken to Grady Memorial Hospital, where he underwent surgery. He's been recuperating there and is in stable condition. He was well enough Wednesday to talk with the AJC by telephone.
Both he and Shrotri had a history at Tech's School of Aerospace Engineering. Tawfik, 39, is a post-doctoral research fellow there, and that is where Shrotri, 32, earned his Ph.D. before moving to Delaware last year.
Shrotri left Atlanta soon after an incident in September that brought the two men together briefly. Another police report obtained by the AJC documents that encounter.
They were both at a dance organized by the Turkish Student Organization, according to the report, which was obtained, along with the report of last week's attack, with a request under the Georgia Open Records Act.
According to the September report, Shrotri became incensed when he saw a woman he liked dancing alongside Tawfik. Shrotri yelled in Turkish and then pushed Tawfik several times.
The woman later went to police and considered filing a protective order against Shrotri but decided that would only aggravate him. Instead, police and the Tech dean's office asked him to stay away from her, and he agreed, the report said.
During interviews with the police, Shrotri said he had "romantic feelings" for the woman. "He said that he was yelling at his friends for not keeping Tawfik away" from her, an officer wrote.
Both Shrotri and the woman, whom the AJC is not identifying, told police they had met in 2005, had studied together and had been exchanging e-mail. Based on an interview with the woman, an officer wrote that "Shrotri has never sent an email that made her feel threatened."
Tawfik also was interviewed by police in September. He told an officer that he heard Shrotri yell "I told you not to do this!" at the woman. The officer wrote that Tawfik believed Shrotri had an "obsession" with the woman.
Tawfik didn't file charges, but told police that he did want the incident documented.
On Wednesday, Tawfik told the AJC that he was only a witness at that September dance and that the woman whom Shrotri yelled at was merely a familiar face on campus. He said he could not understand why Shrotri would come after him five months later. He didn't do anything to the man at that dance, he said, adding it was others who subdued Shrotri.
"I was only a witness," he said. "I'm at a party. I'm watching a guy chasing a girl around and yelling at her. That's what happened. ... I witnessed that guy stalking a woman at a party. He's a stalker."
Tawfik said that when he was at that dance in September, he knew nothing about the ongoing e-mail exchanges between Shrotri and the woman. He said he didn't even recall seeing Shrotri at the event until Shrotri began yelling, sending the dancers scrambling to their seats.
"They freaked out because this guy was a nut case," Tawfik said. "He appeared out of nowhere."
Shrotri appeared at Tech again Thursday, this time allegedly armed with a sword.
Shrotri was charged with aggravated assault and battery. He waived a first-appearance hearing Friday and is scheduled for a preliminary hearing later this month in Fulton County Superior Court.
Tawfik said he is focused on his recovery. He said he hopes to regain at least partial use of a hand that was badly cut by the sword.
Despite his injuries, Tawfik said he bears no grudge against Shrotri and is uninterested in the man's fate.
"I don't care about him," he said. "He's gone. He's going to jail. He's going to whatever. I don't care," Tawfik said.
"What I care about is myself ... my trauma."
