I’m Euphorkive, a psychology student who firmly believes that overthinking is actually a love language. While most people watch movies for the plot, I’m over here treating every fictional character like a high-stakes case study, dissecting their motives and probably giving them a diagnostic code they didn't ask for. Currently, my heart (and my drafts) are in a total Akshaye Khanna and Ranveer Singh era. There’s just something about their brooding intensity that makes my brain go into a complete meltdown.
I’m fr surviving textbooks, iced coffee, and the existential crisis that comes free with studying the human mind. Psychology fascinates me because people are layered, contradictory, and beautifully complex, and that’s exactly what I love exploring in my writing. I adore morally grey characters, intense emotions, flawed love, and the kind of stories that make you pause and go, “oh.”
Welcome to my headspace! 🤍
✮⋆˙ Requests are opened, sweethearts!🤍
MASTERLIST ₊˚⊹♡
i. Khairiyat - Rehman Baloch x Daughter!Oc [Completed] ✮⋆˙ Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6
ii. Darkhaast - Rehman Baloch x Daughter!Oc [Fluff with Angst Ending] ✮⋆˙ Part 1 Part 2 Part 3
iii. Mehbooba - Rehman and Uzair x FMC! [A Reverse Harem Fanfiction] ✮⋆˙ Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4
iv. Gehra Hua - Rehman Baloch x FMC [Found Family Trope] ✮⋆˙ Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6
v. Deewana Deewana - Uzair Baloch x FMC [Dark Romance] ✮⋆˙ Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5
vi. Paaro, Oh Meri Paaro - Dhurandhar OCxOC ✮⋆˙ Part 1 Part 2 Part 3
vii. Samjhawan - Major Iqbal x daughter! oc [Fluff] ✮⋆˙ Part 1
viii. Ghana Kasoota Lage Se - Danish Pandor x oc! ✮⋆˙ Characters Part 1
ix. Khuda Bhi - Hamza x oc! ✮⋆˙ Part 1
vii. Requests! ft. Dhurandhar
✮⋆˙ Reader finds herself going into the Dhurandhar universe as Uzair Baloch's wife ❤︎
✮⋆˙ Rehman is struggling on Instagram and fighting away his teenage daughter's crush ❤︎ ❤︎
✮⋆˙ Rehman is finding a daughter-in-law ❤︎
✮⋆˙ Rehman and his daughter's british boyfriend ❤︎
✮⋆˙ Rehman is struggling with his bengali wife ❤︎
I’m so sorry for the complete silence over the last few days, I was completely buried under a mountain of assignments and responsibilities. It’s been a lot, but I’ve finally made it back to the surface. YAYYY!
To celebrate being back, I’ve officially started dusting off and working on some of my unfinished fics. I want to get those moving before I dive back into the pending requests in the index. Thank you all for being so patient and wonderful while I was away.
I’ve missed you guys so much! Stay tuned for updates soon.
changed a few things in the third chapter of Khuda Bhi. hate and anonymous SICK messages alr here😭
people need to understand that I’m not even disrespecting anything. it’s just the written version of what we saw in Dhurandhar guys. pls keep this respectful. I’m not removing my fanfic because nothing, NOTHING there is disrespecting anything, not the tragedy, not the victims and certainly nothing.
❝ He was a storm born of blood and lies, and she was the silence that finally taught him how to breath—Two worlds colliding in a city that only knew how to break beautiful things.❞
% ★ ₊˚ In the grit of Lyari, a mute woman finds a strange sanctuary in the Sher-e-Baloch’s favourite soldier. but as the sweetness of their love deepens, the cracks in his identity begin to show. she soon learns that Hamza isn't just a dangerous man, he is a beautiful lie, hiding a truth far more lethal than the streets they roam.
This story includes mature themes such as graphic depictions of sexual encounters, strong profanity, potential intense violence or gore, and profound emotional distress. Readers are advised to exercise discretion before continuing.
☆⋆｡𖦹°‧ jaskirat singh rangi / hamza ali mazari . x ruhina gurnaaz (oc)
chapter 03
The air in the Haveli felt different tonight. it didn't smell like the usual charcoal and grilled meat, it smelled like rot. i stood in the corner of Rehman’s study, the shadows hiding the flint like coldness in my gray eyes.
Rehman was leaning over a map, his face illuminated by a single lamp. across from him sat Khanani, the middleman whose smile always looked like a fresh wound.
"Shirani Sahab thinks these crates are going to the frontline in the mountains," Rehman muttered, his voice low and gravelly. "He thinks he’s arming his brothers."
Khanani chuckled, tapping a finger on a logistics manifest. "And instead, they’ll be sitting in Major Iqbal’s armory by Friday. the Major is paying a premium for the irony, Rehman. you’re a rich man."
I felt the ink on my skin turn into ice. this was the betrayal. Shirani Sahab, the man the Baloch looked up to as a pillar of resistance, was being bled dry by the very man he trusted. and Iqbal, the man who had turned Lyari into a graveyard, was getting the bullets.
"Uzair and Hamza will handle the transport," Rehman said, looking up. His eyes landed on me, filled with a pride that made me want to vomit. "My boys don't miss a beat. They’ll move the shipment through the old Quetta routes."
I nodded, my facade smoothly locked into place. "Consider it done, Bhai."
And soon i found myself in a familiar warehouse. the warehouse felt like a tomb, the air heavy with the metallic tang of old grease and the crushing weight of the intel I was carrying. i didn't look at Aalam. i couldn't. i just stared at the flickering orange glow of a streetlamp through a cracked window, my mind racing through the logistics of Rehman’s betrayal to the Baloch.
"It’s not just a payday for Rehman anymore, Aalam bhai," I said, my voice low and dangerous. "Iqbal isn't buying those crates to tighten his grip on Lyari. He’s stockpiling. He’s moving pieces toward the border."
Aalam shifted in the shadows, his silence urging me to continue.
"He’s planning something big on India," I rasped, the words tasting like copper. "he’s using Baloch ammunition, the very stuff Shirani Sahab thinks is for the liberation, to fuel an offensive across the line. if those crates cross the border, it’s not just a gang war. It’s a massacre. And it’ll be our own people’s iron that will be killed."
I felt the familiar, cold alertness of Jaskirat take over, pushing the Hamza persona into a dark corner of my mind. my pulse was steady, wired for the hunt. I was an Hindustani first, a soldier second, and a human being a distant third.
"The timing matches the troop movements we’ve been tracking," I continued, my hands clenching into fists. "Rehman is the architect, but Iqbal is the executioner. I’m the one driving the lead truck, Aalam bhai. I’m the one handing over the keys to a war."
Aalam stepped into the sliver of light, his face etched with a weary grimace. "You need to stay alert, Jaskirat. one slip, one moment of distraction, and we lose the window to intercept. which brings me to the other matter."
He paused, his eyes drilling into mine. "I know you’ve been seeing a woman. Ruhina. I didn’t want to spy, believe me—but it’s my job to make sure the man Hindustan sent in hasn't been compromised by his own heart. You’re a recruit on the edge of a precipice."
The mention of her name felt like a physical blow, a sudden flash of jasmine in a room filled with rot. i didn't defend myself. i didn't explain. to do so would be to admit how much power she had over the man standing in front of him.
Falling for Ruhina wasn't just killing Hamza, it was slowly suffocating Jaskirat. Every second I spent resting my head on her lap was a second I wasn't watching the shadows. She was the peace I didn't deserve, and in this game, peace was the ultimate liability.
"The mission comes first," I said, my voice flat, devoid of the warmth I had found in her apartment.
I didn't wait for him to lecture me on the cost of service. I walked up to Aalam, my hand heavy as I patted his shoulder, a silent, grim pact between two men who had traded their souls for flag, for our Maa.
I left the warehouse without looking back. As I throttled the bike, the roar of the engine drowned out the lyrics that usually haunted my rides to her. there was only the cold, hard steel of the mission and the looming shadow of the border.
I was alert. I was ready. But as I rode past the street that led to her, the silence from her window felt louder than any explosion Iqbal was planning. I was saving a country, but in the process, I was murdering the only version of myself she had ever loved.
The vibration of my phone against my thigh was like a jolt of electricity, snapping the thread of my thoughts about Aalam and the border. I pulled the bike to the side of the road, the gravel crunching under the tires as I flipped the kickstand.
It was Uzair.
"Hamza, where the hell are you?" Uzair’s voice was strained, the usual bravado replaced by a frantic edge. The background noise was a chaotic symphony of clanking metal and revving engines. "Get to the docks. Now. Rehman Bhai moved the timeline up. We’re moving the crates to Khanani’s godown tonight."
My grip tightened on the handlebars until the leather groaned. "Tonight? The deal wasn't supposed to go down for another week, Uzair. What changed?"
"I don't ask the old man why, and neither should you," Uzair snapped, though I could hear the confusion in his own breath. "Khanani sent word that the routes are clear tonight, and Iqbal wants the steel in his hands before sunrise. Don't leave me hanging here, brother. I’m already at the pier."
The line went dead.
I sat there for a moment, the engine ticking as it cooled. My mind was a whirlwind of tactical calculations. A week. I was supposed to have a week to coordinate with Aalam, to set the trap, to ensure the Bureau was ready to intercept the shipment before it hit the border.
Khanani was spooked, or he was being clever. By accelerating the move, he was cutting the legs out from under any surveillance.
I kicked the bike back to life, the roar feeling like a snarl. I didn't have time to warn Aalam. I didn't have time to think about the 'why.'
As I sped toward the shipyard, the salt air beginning to sting my eyes, I realized the doomed feeling wasn't just a premonition anymore. Falling for Ruhina had made me soft, but the urgency of the mission was giving me a hard reality check that Jaskirat wasn't ready for. I wasn't ready for.
I had to get to those docks. I had to see exactly what Iqbal was planning, and I had to do it while looking Uzair in the eye and pretending I wasn't the very man sent to destroy everything he believed in. the silsila was no longer just deep, it was a riptide, and it was pulling all of us toward the edge.
The scent of the shipyard, a thick, nauseating mix of rotting fish and diesel, clung to the air as Uzair and I pulled into the yard of Khanani’s godown. the heavy iron shutters were half rolled, casting long, jagged shadows across the concrete.
But it wasn't just Khanani’s men waiting. Standing near a blacked out SUV, his posture as rigid as a bayonet, was Major Iqbal.
The moment he saw us, his face didn't break into a greeting. It soured. He checked his watch, the movement sharp and impatient.
"Where is Rehman?" Iqbal’s voice was a low, dangerous rasp that made the hair on my arms stand up. He didn't look at the crates we were hauling, he looked through us. "I thought Sher-E-Baloch himself would be here to finalize the transfer of Shirani’s iron."
Uzair stepped forward, his usual swagger dampened by the Major’s presence. "Rehman Bhai had to stay back at the Haveli to manage the scouts, Major. He sent us, his most trusted, to ensure the delivery is handled."
Iqbal’s lip curled in a sneer. "Trusted or not, you are children playing at a man’s game. Rehman’s absence is a lack of respect. Or perhaps," he leaned in, his eyes like cold flint, smirking. "khair, won't say it. it will hurt."
I stayed silent, my face a perfect sheet of ice. Inside, my heart was a riot. Iqbal being here meant the timeline wasn't just moved, it was critical.
"Before we move a single pallet," Iqbal said, turning toward the dark interior of the warehouse, "you need to understand why I am moving this shipment tonight instead of next week. I do not tolerate leaks."
He gestured for us to follow.
The air inside the warehouse grew colder as we moved deeper into the shadows, away from the stacks of ammunition. In the center of a cleared space stood a heavy, steel surgical table, illuminated by a harsh, clinical white light that felt out of place in the grime of the shipyard.
Lying on it was the spy, my fellow spy, stripped bare, his skin pale and slick with sweat. he was bound tightly, but it was the incisions that caught my eye. dozens of tiny, precise horizontal cuts had been made across his torso and limbs. through each one, a thin, high tensile cord had been threaded, weaving through his flesh like a morbid embroidery.
Major Iqbal stood at the head of the table, holding the ends of the cords gathered into a single, thick rope. He looked at us, his expression one of bored academic interest.
"Rehman thinks he knows power because he can order a hit in an alleyway," Iqbal said, his voice echoing against the corrugated metal. "He doesn't understand that true power is the ability to unmake a man while he is still forced to watch."
He didn't wait for a response. Iqbal took a slow, deliberate step back, putting tension on the rope.
The effect was horrific. As the cords tightened, they began to saw upward through the incisions. I watched, paralyzed behind my mask, as the spy’s flesh was literally pulled apart from the inside out. It wasn't a quick tear, it was a slow, agonizing separation. The man’s mouth was open in a silent, jagged scream, his vocal cords likely already severed or exhausted.
Uzair turned his head away, his breath coming in sharp, shallow hitches. I couldn't look away. I had to witness it. I had to look into the eyes of a man who was being unspooled like thread, knowing that he was a mirror of my own future if I slipped.
"He tried to send a burst signal," Iqbal said, giving the rope another steady tug. The sound of skin reaching its breaking point was a wet, sickening snap. "He thought he could warn his handlers in Delhi about the Shirani shipment. He thought he was a hero."
Iqbal let the rope go slack for a moment, leaning over the dying man. "Now, he is just a lesson in why we are moving the timeline. The shipment stays here. I will not have my plan for the border compromised by ghosts and heroes."
As we walked out, the silence of the docks felt heavier than the torture. My skin felt too tight, my own flesh crawling with the phantom sensation of those cords.
[F E W D A Y S L A T E R]
"I can't believe it," Yalina whispered, her hand covering her mouth as she looked at Ruhina. "My brother? The one who barely says two words and looks like he wants to fight a wall? Him?"
Ruhina sat right next to Yalina, her cheeks a soft shade of pink. She looked like a quiet angel sitting beside the storm of Yalina’s excitement. Every time Yalina nudged her shoulder or let out another giggle, Ruhina would give a shy, radiant smile that made my chest tighten.
I, however, was not giggling.
I sat across from them, slumped back in my chair with my arms crossed over my chest. my jaw was set, and I was staring at the space between them with a look that could only be described as a sulk. I wasn't just annoyed, I was genuinely irritated that Yalina had claimed the seat that rightfully belonged to me.
I wanted to be the one sitting next to Ruhina. I wanted to feel her shoulder against mine, to be able to reach over and lace my fingers through hers under the table. Instead, I was stuck on the other side of the wooden divide, watching my sister fangirl over a relationship I was still trying to wrap my own head around.
"Stop looking at her like that, Hamza," Yalina teased, noticing my dark expression. She leaned in closer to Ruhina, intentionally blocking my view just a little more. "He looks like a grumpy toddler who had his favourite toy taken away, doesn't he?"
Ruhina peeked at me, her eyes dancing with amusement. She raised her hand, giving me a tiny, secret wave with just her fingers, a silent acknowledgment of my misery. oh, my gorgeously adorable girlfriend.
"I'm not sulking," I rasped, my voice sounding even deeper because of the actual sulk I was in. "I just think the seating arrangement is inefficient."
"Efficient? wow," Yalina laughed, her joy echoing in the small space. "The great Hamza is jealous of his own sister. Who would have thought?"
I looked away, staring out the window at the busy street, but I couldn't hide the flicker of a smile that threatened to break through. despite the danger, despite Aalam’s warnings and Iqbal’s brutality, seeing Yalina this happy, and seeing Ruhina safe and smiling beside her, made the weight of everything feel a little lighter.
The cafe's warmth lingered on us even as we stepped out into the cool Lyari night. Yalina was still buzzing, her eyes bright with a secret that seemed to make her glow. Before she climbed into the back of the blacked out SUV waiting at the curb, she pulled Ruhina into one last, rib crushing hug, whispering something that made Ruhina hide her face in her hands.
"Be careful, Hamza bhaiya," Yalina said, her voice dropping for a second as she looked at me over Ruhina’s head. Then, the mischief returned. "And try not to look so miserable now that you finally have her back."
The bodyguard held the door open, the heavy thud of it closing signalling the end of our brief bubble of normalcy. as the car pulled away, the silence of the street settled over us, broken only by the soft, rhythmic pitter patter of a light drizzle.
I didn't wait a second longer. I reached out and pulled Ruhina flush against my side, my arm wrapping securely around her shoulders. She let out a soft, melodic breath that sounded like a giggle, her head naturally finding its place against my chest.
We started walking, our footsteps synchronizing on the wet pavement. For a few blocks, we didn't need signs or words. The feeling of her small frame tucked under my arm, protected from the rain by my jacket and my body, was enough. I felt a rare, genuine laugh bubble up in my throat.
As we neared the corner of her street, Ruhina slowed her pace. She pulled back just enough to free her hands, the streetlights reflecting in the raindrops caught in her hair.
‘Are you coming home with me tonight?’ she signed, her eyes searching mine with a hopeful tilt. ‘Or is there more work? The late-night kind that makes you look like tired, the next day?’
The smile on my face faltered, just for a heartbeat. I caught her hands, rubbing my thumbs over her knuckles to keep her warm.
"Not tonight, jaan," I said softly, the drizzle dampening the tattoos on my neck. "I’ve been called to Khanani’s warehouse. Rehman Bhai and Uzair are already there. They’re calling it a celebration, though nobody’s told me exactly what we’re celebrating yet."
I pulled her back into the crook of my arm, resuming our walk.
I continued, my voice low. "It’s business, Ruhina. The kind I can’t walk away from."
She didn't sign a protest. She just tightened her grip on my waist, her head resting back on my chest as we turned the final corner.
We walked on, two figures blurred by the rain, one a girl who lived in the light, and the other a man heading back into the heart of the fire, wondering what kind of celebration required a warehouse full of ammunition and a traitor's smile.
The drizzle began to turn into a steady mist, clinging to the sleeves of my jacket as I pulled her closer for one last moment. I leaned down, pressing my lips to her forehead, my eyes closing as the scent of jasmine and rain filled my senses. I let my lips linger there, a silent vow pressed against her skin.
In the quiet of that embrace, my mind drifted to a place I usually didn't allow it to go.
I found myself imagining her, not in her usual cotton suits, but in the vibrant, heavy silks of a Punjabi bride. I could almost see the chooda, the ivory and red bangles, lining her slender wrists, clinking softly as she signed my name.
I imagined her draped in a deep crimson saree, the gold embroidery catching the light, looking like the desi dulhan I’d never be allowed to have.
She was my jaana, my life, but that vision was a dream meant for a man who wasn't a ghost. Ruhina never spoke of religion, she existed in a world of silence that felt more spiritual than any ritual I knew. And I was Hamza, the Baloch soldier, or Jaskirat, the Sikh spy.
Two identities, one woman, and a thousand walls between us. my god, i was going insane.
"Goodnight," I whispered against her skin, finally pulling away, "meri jaan."
I didn't look back. I knew if I did, I wouldn't be able to leave. I walked with quick, purposeful strides back toward the cafe. the softness of her forehead was replaced by the cold leather of my bike’s handles.
I kicked the engine to life, the roar shattering the quiet of the street. I sped off toward the docks, the dim lights of Lyari blurring into streaks of orange and blue.
[I am choosing to skip the depiction of the massacre. As an Indian, the pain of this tragedy is deeply personal and still burns my heart, revisiting it in detail feels too heavy to bear.
Please understand that this is strictly a work of fiction. I hold the utmost respect for the victims of the real-life tragedy and in no way intend to diminish their memory. My goal with this book is to experiment with the Dhurandhar duology by exploring the story entirely through Jaskirat’s perspective, uncovering the turmoil, the guilt, and the hidden thoughts behind those grey eyes.]
I had managed to stumble out, offering a fractured, stammering excuse about checking the perimeter, my face a frozen mask of a smile that felt like it was cracking my skin.
The ride to the river was a blur of red lights and reckless speed. By the time I reached the bank near Aalam’s warehouse, the world was spinning.
I didn't sit, I collapsed. I lounged on the damp earth, my back against a rusted pillar, a bottle of cheap liquor gripped in my hand like a lifeline. The rain had stopped, but the air was heavy with the smell of silt and the distant, mocking salt of the sea.
"They went in," I rasped, the liquor burning a path down my throat that didn't even touch the fire in my chest. I looked up at Aalam, who stood like a silent sentinel in the dark. My eyes were bloodshot, swimming with a mixture of raw grief and a jagged, terrifying rage.
"Hamza, listen to me—" Aalam started, his voice low and steady.
"LISTEN TO WHAT?" I roared, slamming the bottle into the mud. I stood up, my legs unsteady but my gaze fixed on him like a predator. "Mere ghar mein ghuske maara unhone, Aalam Bhai! Mere ghar mein!"
The words ripped out of me, not from Hamza, the Baloch shadow, but from Jaskirat. The deep cover identity, the years of blending in, the tattoos, the language, it all stripped away in that one scream. India wasn't just a mission parameter. It was my home. My motherland. Meri Maa. Meri Bharat Maa.
And they had bled it white while I was busy counting crates of ammunition for a border skirmish.
"How did we miss this?" I whispered, my voice breaking as the rage turned into a suffocating guilt. I paced the riverbank, my hands tangling in my hair. "We were so focused on the ammunition, on the border movements, on Iqbal’s games... we missed the boats. We missed the heart of it."
Aalam reached out, grabbing my shoulder to ground me. "We didn't have the specifics, Hamza. The intelligence was fragmented. You did your job—"
"My job?" I let out a harsh, bitter laugh, tears finally blurring my vision. "My job was to protect them! And instead, I sat at a table with the men who funded the bullets. I smiled at Rehman while he celebrated the so called fucking victory."
I looked down at my hands, the same hands that had tucked a jasmine flower behind Ruhina’s ear just hours ago. They felt filthy. Everything felt tainted. The peace I had found in her arms now felt like a betrayal of every soul lost across the border.
The guilt was a weight, but the rage was becoming a weapon. My focus shifted, the shattered pieces of Jaskirat knitting back together into something much sharper and far more lethal.
"No more playing the long game, Aalam," I said, my voice suddenly, deathly quiet. I looked at the dark water of the river. "I’m not just an observer anymore. I’m going to dismantle this. Every cell, every godown, every man who touched those crates. I’ll burn the infrastructure from the inside, and I’ll start with the men I call 'brothers.'"
The mission had changed. It wasn't about espionage anymore. It was personal.
There was only the ghost left, and he was hungry for blood.
The rain had returned, a cold, relentless downpour that mirrored the chaos in my head. I didn’t remember the ride, I only remembered the desperate need to find the one place where the world didn't smell like blood.
When Ruhi opened the door, she flinched. I was a wreck, soaked to the bone, smelling of cheap liquor and old grief, my eyes wild and unfocused.
She didn't ask questions. She reached out to pull me in, but the moment her warmth touched my skin, the gravity of my failure turned my bones to lead. I stumbled, my weight dragging us both down. We collapsed onto the floor of her small entryway, the door clicking shut behind us as the world outside vanished.
"I failed, Ruhi... I failed them," I choked out, the words thick with a sob I couldn't suppress. I buried my face in the crook of her neck, my hands clutching the back of her shirt as if I were drowning. "It’s over. Everything is over. I couldn't stop it."
My mind was screaming at me, the spy's instinct telling me to shut up, to keep the secret, to protect the mission. But Jaskirat was breaking. The voice of the news reports, the screams, the realization that my home was burning while I sat in a warehouse in Lyari, it was making me go crazy.
Ruhina didn't move to push me off. Despite how heavy I was, she shifted until she could cradle my head against her chest. she began to rock me, a slow, grounding motion that started to pull me back from the edge of the abyss.
Then, she pushed me back just enough to look into my eyes. Her own were swimming with tears, but there was a new, fierce clarity in them.
She began to sign. Not the quick, casual signs we used for tea or the weather, but something heavy, rooted in a past she had never let me touch.
‘I was not always Ruhina,’ her fingers danced, trembling but certain. ‘Before this silence, I was Vyara Negi.’
I froze. That name. It wasn't a name from Lyari or the plains of Sindh. It was a name from the hills. My hills.
‘Shimla,’ she signed, and I felt a phantom chill of mountain air. ‘I was a pahadan baby girl. My mother was all I had.’
She told me about the accident, the screech of tires in the mountain fog, a drunk driver, and the sudden, horrific end of her childhood at four years old. she signed about being stolen, moved like a piece of cargo across the very border I had been sent to guard. she told me about the cells. about the men who didn't want a little girl's prayers or her screams.
When she told me how they had broken her vocal cords, torturing a child’s throat to keep her quiet, leaving the wounds to fester and scar until her voice was strangled into a permanent hush, I felt a rage so cold it threatened to sober me instantly.
She had escaped at fourteen, running until her lungs burned and her feet were raw, eventually finding herself a ghost on the streets of Lyari. She told me about the old woman who had seen her, a dying soul reaching out to a lost one, giving her a roof and a new identity, Ruhina Gurnaaz.
She pulled a small bottle of pills from her pocket, the plastic rattling in the quiet room.
‘I’ve been taking these for two years,’ she signed, a flicker of raw hope in her tear-stained eyes. ‘I’m trying to find her again. I’m trying to find Vyara. I loved my voice, Hamza. I remember singing to the mountains. I want to sing again.’
I looked at her, and the world seemed to tilt on its axis. I was a spy sent here to protect people like her, yet I had been living among the monsters who had made her this way. She was from my soil. She was a piece of the home I was currently mourning, and she had been suffering right under my nose while I played my double games.
Falling for Ruhina was no longer just a liability, it was a reckoning. I pulled her back into me, holding her with a desperation that transcended my mission. We were two orphans of the same war, two fragments of a broken country clinging to each other in the dark. I wasn't just Hamza or Jaskirat anymore, I was a man who realized that to save her, I would have to burn every bridge I had ever built.
The smoke from my cigarette curled in the stagnant air of the office, weaving through the light like a silver snake. I sat with my legs crossed on the mahogany table, the heels of my boots scuffing the expensive wood without a flicker of remorse. I wasn't the man who had sobbed on a kitchen floor a few nights ago anymore.
In the lair of a predator like Jameel Jamali, I was the cold-blooded shadow. my black pathani felt like armor, the coat and trousers sharp, dark, and unforgiving. I had pulled my hair into a half up bun, tight enough to pull the skin at my temples, making my grey eyes look even more angular, malicious and knowing.
Jameel paced, his bravado leaking out of him like air from a punctured tire. i watched him over the glow of my cigarette, my expression unreadable but lethal.
"You’re thinking about the next election, Jameel Sahab," I said, my voice a low, gravelly rasp that cut through his frantic thoughts. "But you should be thinking about the next week. Rehman isn't just a gangster anymore. He’s a brand. And once he stands on that political podium, he’s going to erase everyone who knew him when he was just a butcher. Starting with you."
Jameel stopped, his face pale. He looked at me, the loyal lieutenant, and saw a reflection of his own greed, but sharpened into a blade. "He wouldn't dare. I have influence—"
"You have history," I corrected, flicking an ash onto his desk. "And history is what politicians bury. If you want to keep your chair, you need to break his legs before he ever reaches the stage."
I saw the moment the fear turned into a desperate, stupid kind of courage. He was a power hungry man, and I was feeding him the exact flavour of poison he craved.
"You're right," Jameel breathed, his arrogance returning as he convinced himself this was his idea. "Rehman has grown too big for his skin. And if we’re doing this, I know just the man to bring into the fold. SP Choudhary Aslam. He’s been itching to put the Baloch brothers in the ground. He’ll love the idea of an alliance that gives him the green light."
I let a slow, predatory smirk tug at the corner of my mouth. I didn't care for Aslam, and I certainly didn't care for Jameel, but they were the hammers I needed to shatter the world Rehman had built.
"Aslam is a dog on a short leash," I said, tapping the cigarette. "Let’s see if he’s ready to bite."
We didn't draw maps or mark targets, not yet. For now, it was just the scent of treason in the air. As I looked at Jameel’s smug, delusional face, all i felt was a dark satisfaction. I was setting the fuse.
I stood up, adjusting the sit of my coat, the cold alertness of Jaskirat humming under my skin. I had a war to start, and when the smoke finally cleared, I’d be the only one left standing in the ruins, if I didn't burn along with them.
ah, as someone who just sits in my own silence all the day, i am very bad at comedy and writing comedic scenes so if i do include something like that in the next chapter, kindly bare with me lol.
People are always left wondering as to why the gods have blessed Asuras with boons and wishes, they are always asking “Why did they choose to let them have what they wanted even when they knew their lack of dharma?”. These are valid points but we miss one small thing— the law of Karma. It is absolute.
The asuras and rakshasa got boons cuz they did the penance/Tapasya to get it. The gods do not discriminate amongst the doers, if you are good or bad it doesn’t matter as long as you do the deed. They got rewarded for their hardwork. The scriptures are trying to teach us through their examples that it doesn’t matter what you think of yourself or what others do, the law of karma is indiscriminate and consequential and even the gods are bound by it.
And then the same gods unite to eliminate the very evil they blessed when it acts negatively and uses the rewards to harm. That fruit of their karma eventually manifests in the form of their annihilation at the hands of divinity.
No one escapes action. This is what the Gita tells us.
❝ He was a storm born of blood and lies, and she was the silence that finally taught him how to breath—Two worlds colliding in a city that only knew how to break beautiful things.❞
% ★ ₊˚ In the grit of Lyari, a mute woman finds a strange sanctuary in the Sher-e-Baloch’s favourite soldier. but as the sweetness of their love deepens, the cracks in his identity begin to show. she soon learns that Hamza isn't just a dangerous man, he is a beautiful lie, hiding a truth far more lethal than the streets they roam.
This story includes mature themes such as graphic depictions of sexual encounters, strong profanity, potential intense violence or gore, and profound emotional distress. Readers are advised to exercise discretion before continuing.
☆⋆｡𖦹°‧ jaskirat singh rangi / hamza ali mazari . x ruhina gurnaaz (oc)
chapter 02
The warmth of Rehman’s house was a suffocating kind of comfort. As Uzair wrestled with little Faisal on the rug and Ulfat insisted on piling more kababs onto my plate, I felt the phantom itch of Jaskirat’s skin. To them, I was the saviour of the Baloch. To me, I was a man living inside a hollowed-out identity, waiting for the structural collapse.
"You're quiet, Hamza," Rehman remarked, his eyes heavy with affection. "Thinking about Arshad Pappu?"
"Thinking about the future, Bhai," I lied smoothly. "Now that the LTF is on a leash, we have space to breathe."
"Good," Rehman grunted, leaning back. "Because a man who doesn't breathe eventually chokes on his own shadow."
I left an hour later, the sounds of their laughter following me out into the humid Lyari night. I needed the wind. I needed the roar of the engine to drown out the sound of being called son by a man I was destined to bury.
The rain in Lyari didn't wash anything away, it just turned the grit into a thick, suffocating sludge. i rolled my eyes at the sky, the first few drops hissing as they hit the cherry of my cigarette. i didn't care about the soak. i mounted the bike, the engine’s roar a lonely sound against the downpour, and headed toward my apartment road.
The world was a blur of charcoal grays and oily blacks until my eyes caught a flash of white.
A girl was sprinting through the rain, her white suit clinging to her petite frame, turning translucent against the downpour. she was fast, but the two men trailing her were gaining, their heavy footfalls splashing through the puddles with a predatory rhythm.
I didn't think. I didn't calculate, just kicked the kickstand down before the bike had even fully stopped.
I ran.
The rain lashed against my face, turning my gray eyes into flint. I cut through the side alley, my boots finding traction where theirs slipped. I wasn't just a man running, I was a hunter reclaiming his territory.
"Hey!" one of the men barked, reaching out to grab the girl’s dupatta.
She let out a sharp, choked gasp, not a scream, but a sound of pure, stifled terror, and stumbled.
I hit the first man like a freight train.
The impact was visceral. I felt his ribs give way under my shoulder as I sent him spiralling into a stack of rusted crates. I didn't stop to watch him fall. I pivoted, my fist connecting with the second man’s jaw in a blurred arc of motion. The crack of bone was muffled by the thunder, but I felt the vibration go all the way up my arm.
He hit the ground hard, blood mixing with the rainwater instantly.
"Get up," I rasped, my voice a low, dangerous growl. "Get up so I can kill you."
They didn't stay. One look at the dead look in my eyes was enough. They scrambled back, dragging each other through the mud and disappearing into the darkness of the neighbouring street.
The silence that followed was heavy, broken only by the relentless drumming of the rain.
I stood over the space where those two cowards had just been, my knuckles throbbing with a familiar, dull heat. The adrenaline was beginning to ebb, leaving behind that hollow, clinical coldness that Jaskirat used to survive.
I turned my head. She was still there.
She was pressed against the brickwork, her white suit soaked through, looking like a ghost caught in the downpour. Her honey coloured skin was pale, and those large, light brown eyes were fixed on me with an intensity that felt like a physical touch.
She didn't move. She didn't speak.
I took a step toward her, but stopped when I saw her flinch, just a tiny, fractional movement. I raised my hands slightly, showing my palms, letting the rain wash the blood off my skin.
"You're safe now," I said, my voice barely audible over the drumming on the tin roofs above us.
She watched me for a long beat, her chest still heaving. Slowly, as if testing the air, she moved her hands. It wasn't just random movement, it was deliberate. Precise.
She lifted her right hand, her fingers forming a shape, then another, moving through the air with a fluid grace that seemed to defy the chaos of the street.
Years of training in the field, hours spent in windowless rooms learning to read every movement, every code, every silent signal, clicked into place in the back of my mind. It was sign language, but it was flavoured with a regional dialect I recognized from the Quetta border.
R U H I N A
She paused, her eyes searching mine to see if I was just another man looking at a mute girl like she was broken. I didn't blink. I followed the transition as she continued.
GURNAAZ
She lowered her hands, her shoulders dropping an inch. She looked at me expectantly, a small, fragile silence stretching between us.
"Ruhina Gurnaaz," I spoke the name aloud. The syllables felt strange on my tongue, too soft, too clean for a man who spent his days shouting orders in a warehouse.
The change in her was instant. The terror didn't vanish, but it was eclipsed by a sudden, brilliant spark of recognition. She didn't come closer, she was still wary, still keeping that careful distance but her lips curved into a slight, genuine smile.
It wasn't the smile of a victim. It was the smile of someone who had finally been heard.
She looked at me with a newfound curiosity, her head tilting slightly as if she were trying to decode the man who understood a language the rest of Lyari ignored. she didn't see the gangster. She saw someone who spoke her silence.
I didn't smile back. I couldn't afford to. But I nodded once, a sharp, silent acknowledgement of the person behind those honey-colored eyes.
"The rain isn't stopping, Ruhina," I said, my voice steady. I pointed toward my bike, then toward the end of the road. "I’ll walk you to your block. Stay a few paces behind if you want. But you’re not walking alone tonight."
She didn't protest. She just tucked her damp hair behind her ear and stepped out from the shadow of the wall, falling into step a few feet behind me.
We walked through the downpour, a spy with too many names and a girl with none she could speak. for the first time in a decade, the silence wasn't a mission requirement. It was a conversation.
The walk to her apartment block was a quiet trek through the deepening sludge of Lyari. I kept my pace steady, the roar of my bike idling as I walked it alongside us, a heavy metallic barrier between her and the rest of the world.
Every few steps, I’d catch her reflection in the rain slicked shop windows, a small, white shadow following the man who spoke her silence.
When we reached the crumbling entrance of her building, I stopped. "You're home," I said, the engine’s rumble vibrating through my boots. "Get inside. Lock the door."
I expected her to nod and disappear. Instead, Ruhina stepped in front of the bike, blocking my path. She reached out, her hand hovering near my damp sleeve, and made a sharp, insistent tugging motion toward the stairs.
I hesitated. "I have to get back, Ruhina."
She didn't budge. She pointed at my soaked jacket, then at her throat, making a shivering motion. She was telling me I’d freeze if I didn't dry off. She looked at me with an expression so stubborn.
I sighed, cracking just enough to let her win. I parked the bike and followed her up the narrow, dimly lit stairwell.
Her apartment was small, smelling faintly of jasmine and old paper. It was a sanctuary, tucked away from the rot of the streets. As soon as she closed the door, a small, white blur streaked across the floor.
Ruhina’s face lit up as she knelt down, scooping up a cat that looked as unique as she was. It was a snow white creature with strange, tight curls of fur, like a living cloud and deep, sapphire eyes.
Ruhina looked at me, her eyes dancing with pride. She gestured to the cat, then held her hand near her chest, mimicking a heartbeat. Rescued, her hands said. Then, she pointed at the cat and made a motion like she was picking fruit from a bush.
"Blueberry?" I asked, testing the name.
She nodded vigorously, a soft, silent laugh shaking her shoulders. She held the cat out toward me, the creature looking at me with a judgment that felt far too human.
"She has curly hair," I muttered, reaching out a hesitant, scarred hand. The cat didn't hiss, it just leaned its head into my knuckles, its fur feeling like damp silk.
Ruhina watched us, her expression softening into something so warm it felt like a physical heat in the room. She gestured for me to sit on the small wooden chair by the table, quickly moving to a tiny stove to put on a kettle.
I sat there, a fucked up and brutal man, dripping rainwater onto the floor of a mute girl’s kitchen while a haired cat stood guard over my boots. It was absurd. It was dangerous.
Ruhina didn't waste time. She moved with a quick, light efficiency, tossing a dry towel toward me before kneeling back down to the white, curly-furred creature at her feet.
"She’s a Selkirk Rex," I said, the towel draped over my head as I watched her. "Rare. Especially around here."
Ruhina looked up, her honey coloured eyes widening in genuine surprise. She smoothed the cat's strange, springy fur and then her hands began to fly, her movements sharp and expressive.
‘You know her kind?’ she signed, her head tilting with that curiosity I was beginning to realize was her default state. ‘I found her behind a dumpster in the shipyard. She was tangled in plastic and shivering. I thought she was just a very dirty kitten, but the curls never went away.’
I watched her hands, translating the fluid motions instantly. "I’ve seen a lot of things in a lot of places, Ruhina. Not many of them as soft as that."
She smiled, a small, private thing, and lifted the cat to her face, rubbing her cheek against the white fur. she signed with one hand while the other supported the cat. ‘She doesn’t have a voice either, so we understand each other perfectly.’
She set Blueberry down and walked to the small stove, her hands moving again as she spoke through the silence. ‘You didn’t have to follow those men. Most people here just look at the ground when they hear someone running. Why did you stop?’
I leaned back, the mask tightening. I couldn't tell her that my life was a series of calculated interventions. I couldn't tell her I was a ghost playing a gangster.
"I don't like people taking things that don't belong to them," I said, my voice gravelly. "In Lyari, you either hold your ground or you get buried under it."
Ruhina turned back, holding two steaming mugs. She set one in front of me, her fingers lingering near the ceramic. ‘You speak my language well,’ she signed, her eyes locked onto mine, searching for the crack in the armor. ‘Most people who know it only know the basics. You... you speak it like it was your first breath.’
"It's a useful skill," I replied shortly, avoiding the depth in her gaze. "In my line of work, knowing what people are saying when they think no one is listening is the difference between life and death."
She didn't look intimidated. She just stood there in her damp white suit, the steam from the tea curling around her face. ‘Well,’ she signed, her movements slowing down, becoming more deliberate. ‘Thank you for listening tonight. Even if I didn't say a word.’
I took a sip of the tea. It was strong, sweet, and scorched my throat. I looked at her, really looked at her, without the filter of Yalina's descriptions or the mission's requirements. She wasn't a pure-hearted child or a victim to be pitied. She was a woman who had built a world of jasmine and curly-haired cats out of the wreckage of her past.
For the first time since I’d crossed the border, I wasn't looking at a target or a tool. I was just looking at Ruhina.
"The tea is good," I muttered, looking down at the dark liquid.
Blueberry hopped up onto the table, sniffing at my sleeve. Ruhina reached out, her hand hesitant, before she gently tapped the back of my scarred knuckles to get my attention.
‘Stay until the rain lets up,’ she signed, a soft, insistent light in her eyes. ‘The streets are too loud tonight. It’s better to be quiet for a while.’
I didn't argue. I just sat in the silence she provided, a man of a thousand lies finally resting in the only truth he’d found in years.
It became a routine I couldn't break, a glitch in my programming. Every few nights, after the meetings in the smoke filled backrooms of Lyari or a tense standoff at the shipyard, I’d find my bike drifting toward that crumbling apartment block.
Ruhina was always there. It was as if she could hear the specific growl of my engine from three blocks away. By the time I reached her door, the kettle was already whistling.
I’d drop my jacket on the hooks, kick off my boots, and slide down onto the floor. I was too big for her delicate furniture anyway. I’d sit with my back against the base of her worn sofa, legs spread wide to accommodate the space, while Blueberry curled into the crook of my knee like she owned me.
Ruhina would sit directly across from me on the rug, her honey coloured skin glowing in the soft light of a single lamp. She’d interlock her fingers over her knees, leaning forward with that wide, almond eyed curiosity that made me feel like I was the only person left on earth.
"Rehman’s getting restless," I muttered one night, staring at the steam rising from my mug. I found myself telling her things I didn't tell Uzair, not the secrets, but the weight of them. "He thinks he’s a king, but he doesn't realize the crown is made of glass. One wrong move and the whole thing shatters."
Ruhina didn't move, her gaze locked on mine. She didn't have to sign for me to know she was listening to the cadence of my voice, not just the words.
"And Yalina... she wants to top her exams," I continued, a ghost of a smile touching my lips. "She thinks the world is waiting to give her a degree and a high rise office. I don't have the heart to tell her the world doesn't give anything away for free."
Ruhina slowly reached out, her fingers dancing through the air in the dim light.
‘You carry everyone’s world on your shoulders, Hamza,’ she signed, her movements soft and rhythmic. ‘When do you get to live in yours?’
I looked at her, the facade feeling heavy. "This is my world, Ruhina. Dust, blood, and debt. There isn't much else."
She shook her head, a stubborn set to her jaw. She pointed to the tea, then to the cat, and then she gestured to the space between us, the quiet, the safety, the absence of violence.
‘This isn't dust,’ she signed. ‘This is peace. Even if it’s only for an hour.’
She reached out, her small hand hovering just inches from my scarred knuckles. She didn't touch me, not yet, but the heat radiating from her palm was more grounding than any oath I’d taken to the Bureau.
"You're a strange girl, Ruhina Gurnaaz," I rasped, my voice sounding foreign in the stillness. "I'm a man who breaks things for a living. You should be running away, not making me tea."
She just tilted her head, her light brown eyes reflecting the lamp light like amber. She didn't look afraid. She looked like she was seeing right through the ink and the lies, searching for the man who spoke the language of the silent.
I stayed like that for a long time, manspreading on her floor, venting the frustrations of a double life to a girl who couldn't speak back, but understood me better than anyone who could. We were just friends, a gangster building a sanctuary out of thin air while the rest of Lyari burned outside the window.
But as I looked at her, I knew the friendship was a lie too. You don't look at a friend and feel the urge to burn the world just to keep them warm.
The doom wasn't coming from the streets. It was coming from inside that room.
I reached for my pack of cigarettes, then stopped, remembering the way she’d crinkled her nose at the smell the last time. I tossed the pack onto the coffee table instead.
Ruhina noticed. She always noticed. A soft, knowing glint appeared in her honey coloured eyes, and she shifted, unlinking her fingers to reach for a small sketchbook she kept near the sofa.
‘You’re restless tonight,’ she signed, her movements fluid and calm against the backdrop of the hum of her small refrigerator. ‘Your mind is back at the shipyard. Or maybe further.’
"It's just the noise, Ruhina," I lied, leaning my head back against the sofa cushions. "It never really stops. Even when it’s quiet, I can hear the gears turning. Everyone wants something. Rehman Bhai wants loyalty. Uzair wants blood. Jameel Sahab wants power."
I looked at her, my gray eyes tracing the delicate line of her jaw. "And then I come here, and you don’t want anything."
She set the sketchbook in her lap and looked at me for a long beat. Then, her hands moved, slower this time, as if she were choosing her words with extra care.
‘I want you to breathe,’ she signed. ‘Just for a minute. Without thinking about who is watching.’
She leaned forward, her petite frame closing the gap between us on the rug. She reached out, her fingers grazing the edge of my sleeve where the Baloch ink peeked through.
She didn't flinch at the sight of the tattoos, the marks of a life she should have been terrified of. Instead, she traced the outline of a scar on my forearm with the tip of her index finger.
It was a light touch, but it felt like a brand. I didn't move. I didn't pull away. I just watched her, the shell of my facade feeling more like a cage than a shield.
‘Is it painful?’ she signed, looking up at me, her almond eyes searching mine.
"Not anymore," I rasped. "You get used to the pain. It just becomes part of the skin."
Ruhina shook her head. She took her sketchbook and flipped to a page where she had drawn a small, intricately detailed bird with a broken wing, perched on a branch that was beginning to blossom. She pointed to the bird, then to me.
‘Even the things that are broken can find a place to rest,’ she signed.
She then moved her hand to her throat, her fingers fluttering over the skin where the medicine had tried, and failed, to mend the damage. ‘I know what it’s like to be trapped inside yourself, Hamza. But when you are here... you don't look trapped.’
I let out a breath I didn't know I was holding. The intimacy of it was more dangerous than any gunfight. I was a spy, trained to manipulate emotions, but she was doing something far more lethal, she was offering me a mirror.
I whispered, my voice thick. "Most people use words to lie. You use silence to tell the truth."
She smiled then, that slight, shy curve of her lips that made my chest ache. She reached over and nudged Blueberry, who had fallen asleep against my leg. The cat let out a tiny, indignant chirp and stretched, her curly white fur brushing against my hand.
‘Blueberry thinks you’re okay,’ Ruhina signed, her eyes dancing with a bit of mischief. ‘And she’s a very good judge of character. She only likes people who have a quiet heart.’
"My heart isn't quiet, Ruhina," I said, looking away from her and toward the window where the Lyari rain was starting to pick up again. "It’s a riot."
She didn't respond with signs. Instead, she moved from her spot and sat right next to me against the sofa, her shoulder brushing mine. She didn't say a word, didn't make a gesture. She just leaned her head against my arm, a silent anchor in the middle of my storm.
I sat there, frozen for a second, before I slowly let my arm settle around her, pulling her just a little bit closer. We were just friends, I told myself. A gangster and a mute girl, hiding from a world that would never understand either of us.
But as I felt the steady rhythm of her breathing against my side, I knew the lie was dying. I wasn't just Hamza, and she wasn't just a girl I saved. We were two ghosts haunting the same room, waiting for the light to finally find us.
The air in the room changed. The label of being friends was still there, hanging between us like a thin veil, but it was starting to fray.
I looked down at the top of her head. Her hair smelled like jasmine and rain, a sharp contrast to the metallic scent of the shipyard that usually clung to my skin. I could feel the heat of her through my shirt, a reminder that under the codes and the missions, I was still a man made of flesh and bone, a man who still had heart, doesn't matter if that same heart was rotting in pain.
Ruhina shifted, lifting her head from my shoulder. She looked at me, her light brown eyes searching mine with a terrifying amount of clarity. She didn't sign. She didn't move. She just leaned in, closer than she’d ever been, until I could feel the ghost of her breath against my jaw.
The silence was deafening.
I should have stood up. I should have made a joke about Uzair or mentioned a fake run I had to do for Rehman. I should have protected her from the monster she was inviting in. But Jaskirat was tired, and Hamza was hungry for something that wasn't blood.
I reached out, my thumb grazing the honey toned skin of her cheek. She didn't flinch. She leaned into the touch, her eyes fluttering shut for a heartbeat.
"Ruhina," I whispered, the name a jagged prayer.
She opened her eyes and slowly, with a deliberate grace that made my heart hammer against my ribs, she raised her hands one more time.
‘I know you’re not who they think you are,’ she signed, her movements tiny, restricted to the small space between our chests. ‘I know the soul you’re hiding.’
The breath hitched in my throat. My hand dropped from her face to her shoulder, my grip tightening instinctively. "You don't know what you're saying. You don't know what I've done."
She didn't look away. She reached up and placed her small hand over my heart, her palm flat against the fabric of my black shirt. ‘It’s beating for me right now,’ her eyes said. ‘That’s the only truth I need.’
She stood up then, not to leave, but to bridge the final gap. She stepped between my spread legs, her knees brushing the rug, and leaned down. She pressed her forehead against mine, her eyes closing.
I wrapped my arms around her waist, pulling her flush against me. The friendship snapped like a dry twig in a storm. I buried my face in the crook of her neck, breathing her in, feeling the silent, rhythmic vibration of her heart against my own.
"I'll burn the world for you, Ruhina," I muttered into her skin, the vow tasting like ash and honey. "I'll turn this whole city to dust before I let them touch you."
She didn't respond with signs. She didn't have to. She just tightened her hold on me, her small fingers curling into the hair at the nape of my neck.
Lyari sirens wailed and the gangs sharpened their knives, but inside that tiny apartment, the spy had finally come home. We were doomed, I knew it the moment I felt her lips brush against my temple but as Blueberry watched us from the corner with those wise sapphire eyes, I realized I’d rather burn with her than live in the cold without her.
I let the tension bleed out of my frame, my knees finally giving out as I slid further down until I was resting my head in her lap. my cheek pressed against the soft fabric covering her stomach, and I felt the hitch in her breath, not from fear, but from the sheer weight of me finally letting go.
I wrapped my arms tightly around her waist, my face buried against her, seeking the only warmth that didn't feel like it would scorch me. I was a man who lived by the blade and the bullet, yet here I was, clinging to her like a drowning man to a life raft.
Ruhina didn't hesitate. She leaned over me, her small frame curling around my head as she hugged me back with a strength that surprised me. It was a fierce, protective embrace, as if she were trying to shield me, from the world. ironic, isn't it?
Then, I felt her fingers.
They were cool and light as they moved through my hair. she caressed the strands with a slow, rhythmic tenderness, her touch trailing over the nape of my neck and tracing the line where the ink of my tattoos met the skin she loved. every stroke of her hand felt like she was smoothing out the jagged edges of my soul.
I closed my eyes, my breath levelling out as the smell of her jasmine scented soap filled my senses. For a moment, the names, Hamza, Jaskirat Singh Rangi, didn't matter. the blood on my knuckles from the fight in the rain felt distant, washed away by the steady, quiet thrum of her heartbeat beneath my ear.
‘Rest,’ her touch seemed to say. ‘The world can wait.’
I tightened my grip on her waist, pulling her even closer, my forehead resting against her as I let the silence of the room settle over us. I knew this was a borrowed peace. I knew that tomorrow I’d have to put the mask back on, look Rehman in the eye, and plan more destruction.
But as her hand continued to move through my hair, shielding me from the ghosts of my own making, I let myself believe the lie. Just for tonight, I wasn't a spy or a gangster. I was just a man resting in the lap of the only person who had ever truly seen him.
The darkness behind my eyelids was the first true rest I’d had in a decade.
I felt the steady rise and fall of her breath against my cheek, a rhythmic anchor that pulled me deeper into the heavy, velvet pull of sleep. My grip on her waist loosened just a fraction, my muscles finally surrendering their constant, hair trigger alertness.
The ghost of her fingers continued to trail through my hair, a soft, repetitive motion that acted like a balm to the jagged static in my head.
Ruhina didn't move. She stayed perfectly still, adjusting her weight just slightly so I could rest deeper against her, her arms never leaving their protective curve around my shoulders.
I just drifted into a deep, dreamless void, anchored to the earth by the scent of jasmine and the quiet, steady heartbeat of a girl who loved a ghost. Under the watch of a cat and the dim glow of a single lamp, the most dangerous man in Lyari finally let go.
I was asleep before the tea in the mugs had even turned cold.
With Ruhina, days felt like the beginning of a song. I started finding excuses to be in her orbit during the daylight hours, risking the eyes of the syndicate just to watch her exist in the sun.
I would pulled my bike to the curb, the engine idling in a low, rhythmic thrum. A few yards away, near a crumbling brick wall, Ruhina was crouched down. She didn't see me yet.
She was focused entirely on a stray kitten, her fingers moving with that same delicate grace she used to sign my name. The kitten was tiny, dusty, and terrified, but as Ruhina whispered to it with her hands, it leaned into her palm.
The sunlight caught the light brown of her irises, turning them into liquid gold.
Tu agar meri, toh zamaana tera
Tu agar meri, main hoon tera
I leaned against the handlebars, my gray eyes softening. I was a man who had surrendered his heart to a mission long ago, but looking at her, I realized the mission didn't own me anymore. She did.
Then one day, we were in the small courtyard behind her building, hidden from the prying eyes of the main road. I was sitting on a low stone ledge, and Ruhina was lounging with her head in my lap, her wavy black hair spilling over my knees like silk.
I reached out, my calloused fingers plucking a stray jasmine flower from a nearby vine. I tucked it behind her ear, the white petals stark and beautiful against her honey skin. She looked up at me, a playful, tender smile tugging at her lips. She reached up, her small hands framing my face, and pulled me down just enough to press a lingering, warm kiss to my forehead.
Betaab-sa mohabbat ka tu inqalaab hai
Mera jahaan teri baahon mein khwaab, khwaab hai...
I closed my eyes, letting my thumb trace the line of her jaw. In her arms, the world wasn't a battlefield, it was a dream I never wanted to wake up from.
Gehra hua, gehra hua
Rang aashiqui gehra hua
When the city got too loud, I’d take her on the bike. She’d climb on behind me, her petite frame tucking perfectly against my back, her arms wrapping around my waist as if she were holding onto the only solid thing in a shifting world.
We rode through the winding veins of Lyari, the wind whipping through her hair and catching the scent of her jasmine perfume. I just revved the engine, feeling the steady beat of her heart against my spine.
She couldn't tell me she loved me with her voice, but as she squeezed my waist and leaned her cheek against my shoulder while we flew through the neon-lit streets, I heard her perfectly.
Tu agar meri, yeh hawayein teri
Tu agar meri, saari raahein teri
I looked at our reflection in the shop windows, the man with secrets that could break everything and the girl in yellow and adorable eyes, and for a split second, I forgot that the song would eventually have to end. I just kept riding, deeper into the melody, deeper into her.
They are so adorable, it's literally killing me. also darlings, i am kind of sorry if this felt too fast lol. there will be so much going on in this fanfic so i wanted their relationship to have already been developed by the time we reach the mid of it. thanks for always being patient with me, darlings. mwah xx
I sat with my anger long enough
Until she told me
Her real name was grief
Rehman grieves the son he lost and the family he was slowly losing. Ulfat reminds him that sometimes the burden of pain shared can make the scales tilt if only towards the right side of bearable.
Part One | Part Two
2. Agraja | Brothers
Not only had my brother disappeared, but - and bear with me here--a part of my very being had gone with him.
Rehman Dakait is gone. Uzair Baloch mourns the man who had been his older brother, his protector and his father in all things that mattered.
3. Aitbaar
Et tu Brute? Even you--- my dearest?
Hamza Ali Mazari was the third fucking bullet, Rehman Dakait never saw coming. And yet, can the weight of betrayal break the bond that had already been built?
4. Maqbool | The Dakait Queen
A knife? Are you flirting with me?
Rehman Dakait has finally met his match. Question is whether he can survive the war which is raging in his kingdom and his heart?
5. Love Thy Nemesis
Whatever our souls are made of, yours and mine -- are completely fucking different. Explode.
Rehman has bitten off more than he can chew. He really should have known better than to fall in bed with SP Chaudhary Aslam.
6. Omnia Vincit Amor
They married each other as a deal, but if they had a chance again, they would marry each other for love.
Zaraa Vadvaani and Rehman Dakait had entered into this relationship with no expectations at all, contended to stay together in relative peace. Fate, on the other hand, had different plans.
7. Hiraeth
Grief is all I have left of you, so that is all I'll hold on to.
A snapshot of Ulfat after Rehman.
8. Winged
What good are wings without the courage to fly.
Exactly what it says on the tin. What if everyone in the Dhurandhar universe had wings?
9. Bound In Your Bones
You and I are bound. Even Death won't separate the love we have shared.
Rehman Dakait and Uzair Baloch are cousins. The older one took in the younger when the latter's parents died. They lived together and worked together. At least this story would be easier to digest by the world.
Part One | Part Two
10. His Father's Son
The word "father" rotted in my mouth
Hamza Ali Mazari had expected a lot when he came to Lyari. What he didn't expect was to feel this acute sense of envy on seeing Rehman Dakait and his son.
❝ He was a storm born of blood and lies, and she was the silence that finally taught him how to breath—Two worlds colliding in a city that only knew how to break beautiful things.❞
% ★ ₊˚ In the grit of Lyari, a mute woman finds a strange sanctuary in the Sher-e-Baloch’s favourite soldier. but as the sweetness of their love deepens, the cracks in his identity begin to show. she soon learns that Hamza isn't just a dangerous man, he is a beautiful lie, hiding a truth far more lethal than the streets they roam.
This story includes mature themes such as graphic depictions of sexual encounters, strong profanity, potential intense violence or gore, and profound emotional distress. Readers are advised to exercise discretion before continuing.
☆⋆｡𖦹°‧ jaskirat singh rangi / hamza ali mazari . x ruhina gurnaaz (oc)
chapter 01
"Fuck."
I muttered it under my breath, the word lost in the humid, grease thick air of the warehouse. i leaned my back against a rusted shipping crate, watching the absolute circus unfolding in the center of the floor.
Uzair and Donga were at it again, wrestling like a couple of starved street dogs in the dirt. their boots kicked up clouds of grit that caught the jagged beams of sunlight filtering through the corrugated roof. Uzair had Donga in a headlock, his face turning a manic shade of purple as he let out that jagged, crazy laugh of his.
"Yield, you son of a bitch!" Uzair roared, his muscles straining against his sweat soaked shirt. "Yield or I’ll tell Rehman Bhai you’ve been skimming the haul."
"Go to hell, Uzair!" Donga wheezed, trying to plant a knee in Uzair’s gut.
I didn't smile. I didn't move. Every time I closed my eyes, I still saw the stones.
I still saw Rehman Bhai at Cheel Chowk, his face splattered with blood that wasn't his, slamming those weight stones down onto Babu Dakait’s face over and over again. i remembered the sound of bone giving way, the way the flesh popped under the pressure, turning the king of Lyari into a heap of unrecognizable meat in front of the whole world. that was the price for Naeem’s life. that was how you become the Sher-e-Baloch.
"Give it a rest, you two," I called out, my voice cutting through the sounds of their scuffle with a cold, easy authority. I didn't have to shout. In this room, when I spoke, people tended to listen. "Rehman Bhai is coming down any minute. If he sees you two rolling around in the dust like children after what happened at the Chowk, he’ll give you something real to cry about."
Uzair let go instantly, rolling to his feet. the manic grin didn't leave his face, but he straightened up. he wiped his palms on his jeans and sauntered over to me, throwing a heavy, brotherly arm over my shoulder.
"Always so serious, Hamza," Uzair joked, poking a finger at my chest. "Relax. We’re the kings now. The throne is ours."
"The throne is Rehman Bhai's," I corrected him, stepping out from under his arm.
I looked toward the office stairs. Rehman Bhai was coming to discuss the elections. the PAP was looking for a third win, and they needed Rehman's power broker authority to make it happen. after Cheel Chowk, no one was going to vote against the man who crushed Babu Dakait’s skull with his bare hands.
The air in the warehouse felt heavy, charged with the kind of power that usually ends in a massacre. I was the one Rehman looked to now. I was the one who saw the stones fall and didn't look away.
The heavy iron doors of the warehouse groaned open, and the humidity of Lyari seemed to retreat before Rehman Bhai’s shadow.
The silence that followed was absolute. Uzair stood like a soldier on parade, all that chaotic energy tucked away behind a mask of rigid loyalty. i didn't move from my spot by the crate, but I stood taller. i felt the weight of the silver watch on my wrist, a gift from the Bhai, ticking like a heartbeat.
Rehman walked in, the dust swirling around his boots. he didn't look like a man who had spent the last week crushing a rebellion, he looked like a statesman. but we all knew. we all remembered the stones at Cheel Chowk.
He didn't go to the office. He walked straight to the center of the floor, his eyes scanning the men until they locked onto mine. A ghost of a smile, sharp as a razor, touched his lips.
"Hamza," he said. It wasn't a question. It was a summons.
"Bhai," I stepped forward, meeting his gaze.
He reached out and gripped my shoulder, a heavy, trusting gesture that made the air in the room shift. the other men saw it. Uzair saw it. I was the favourite. i was the one who didn't flinch when the blood sprayed.
"PAP is nervous," Rehman began, his voice a low vibration that commanded the room. "They want their third term. they want the seats, the titles, and the money. but they know they can’t get a single vote in Lyari without my say-so."
He turned me slightly, moving his hand on my neck, forcing me to look at the map pinned to the warehouse wall.
"The opposition is trying to stir up the students. They think rallies and posters can stand against the Sher-e-Baloch." He chuckled, a dry, dark sound. "Hamza, tell them what we do with people who try to stir up my streets."
"We remind them that the ground they’re standing on belongs to you, Bhai," I said, my voice steady, professional. "We don't break the rallies. We let them happen. Then we make sure the leaders realize that Islamabad is a long way away, but Lyari is right here."
Rehman squeezed my neck, a hard, proud shove. "Exactly. Logic. Strategy. That’s why you’re staying close to me for this one. Uzair can handle the enforcement, but I want you in the meetings with the party reps."
I felt the heat of the favor. It was maddening, the way his approval felt like a drug. I was rising higher than Naeem ever could have, filling a hole left by a dead son.
"I'll be ready, Bhai," I muttered.
"I know you will," Rehman said, finally letting go. He turned to the rest of the crew, his face turning back into a mask of stone. "Check the hardware. we’re moving tonight. i want the PAP banners flying on every corner of Cheel Chowk by dawn. anyone who tries to tear one down... well, you know where to find the stones."
The meeting dispersed like smoke after a gunshot. the men scrambled to the crates, the air suddenly thick with the metallic clatter of hardware and the bark of orders. Rehman Bhai headed up to the office, his heavy footsteps echoing on the iron stairs, a sound that always felt like a countdown.
I stayed where I was, letting the tension bleed out of my shoulders.
"Hamze," Uzair’s voice drifted over, dripping with that familiar, chaotic heat.
I didn't have to turn around to know he was grinning. He sauntered over, leaning his back against the same shipping crate I had claimed, bumping his shoulder into mine. he smelled like sweat and cheap kerosene.
"Rehman Bhai’s going to have you wearing a suit and sitting in those fancy PAP offices soon, Hamza," he joked, nudging me. "You’ll forget all about us grease monkeys down here in the dirt."
"I'm not wearing a suit, Uzair," I muttered, pulling out a pack of cigarettes. I offered him one.
"Yeah, well," Uzair said, taking the smoke and leaning in so I could spark his lighter. The flame flickered between us, lighting up the jagged scar on his jaw. "The way he looks at you... it’s different. he doesn't just want a soldier. he’s looking for a brain. and God knows Donga and the rest of these idiots don't have one between them."
He took a long drag, blowing the smoke toward the ceiling. His chaotic energy was back, the rigid soldier from the meeting having vanished the second the Bhai was out of sight.
"You're his right hand, Uzair," I said, looking at him. "You’re the one who keeps the streets quiet."
"I’m the fist," Uzair corrected me with a sharp, toothy grin. "You’re the whisper in his ear. Don't think I don't see it. But hey," he threw a heavy arm around my neck, pulling me into a mock headlock for a split second before letting go. "Just don't get too high and mighty. You still owe me for that drink at the tea stall."
I laughed, a short, rough sound. Despite the blood on our hands, Uzair was the only thing in this warehouse that felt human. He was the brother I’d earned in the trenches of Lyari.
"I'll buy the drinks tonight," I said, straightening my collar. "But I’m heading out first. I want to see the vibe at the student rally before we start putting the banners up. I want to know exactly how loud they’re planning to shout."
"Go on then, Mr. Strategy," Uzair waved me off, already heading back toward Donga to start some new trouble. "Just don't let any of those pretty student girls talk you into a revolution. Rehman Bhai wouldn't like the competition."
I turned away, the smirk fading as I hit the exit.
The heat of the Lyari sun slammed into me the moment I stepped outside—visceral, suffocating, and honest. I needed to get away from the smell of the warehouse. i needed to find a reason to keep the mask from slipping, because lately, the air inside was getting harder to breathe.
I kicked my bike into life, the engine a familiar roar between my thighs.
The heat at the rally was different from the warehouse. it wasn't the stagnant, greasy heat of machinery and gunpowder, it was the sharp, dry heat of a thousand bodies pressed together under the sun.
I leaned against my bike, the engine still ticking as it cooled, and watched them. doctorate students. these weren't just street kids throwing stones for the hell of it. these were people with books in their bags and fire in their eyes, protesting against the PAP with reasons that were—honestly—too valid for comfort.
They were shouting about rights, about the very things politician's authority tries to surpress.
“Targets,” a cold, silent voice whispered in the back of my mind. “Identify the leaders. Mark the agitators.”
I ignored it. I stayed Hamza.
Suddenly, the crowd shifted, and a girl broke through the line of protestors. she was young, spirited, and looked completely out of place in the middle of the brewing chaos. she scanned the street, her eyes landing on me. she didn't hesitate. she didn't look at my blood stained knuckles or the hard set of my jaw. she just saw a baloch man standing by a bike, and she ran straight for me.
"Hamza Bhai!" she called out, her voice desperate but trusting.
I froze. My hand, which had been reaching for a cigarette, stopped mid air. she didn’t even know me. she hadn't a clue that I was the shadow of the man she was protesting against. but she said my name like it was a prayer she’d been saying her whole life.
"Hamza Bhai, you have to help us," she panted, reaching me and grabbing my sleeve with a familiarity that made my skin prickle. "They’re going to bring the police in. the doctorate students, they’re just asking for their stipends, for the library funds the PAP redirected. It’s not right. you’re Baloch, you know how hard we have to fight for every scrap."
She started rambling, detailing the whole matter with a fierce, frantic energy, telling me about the corruption, the missing funds, the way the local PAP leaders were squeezing the life out of the university. she spoke to me like I was her blood. like I was her protector. like she was my sister and she’d just come home to tell me about her day.
And then it happened.
The world around us, the shouting, the heat, the Lyari grime, smeared into a blur. for one terrifying, heart stopping second, the girl in front of me didn’t have a Lyari accent. her voice softened, the pitch changed, and the face shifted.
I wasn't looking at a stranger named Yalina.
I was looking at Jasleen.
My sister. back in Pathankot. the girl who used to pull my sleeve the exact same way when she wanted me to walk her to school or protect her from the neighbourhood bullies. The Hamza Bhai she’d just shouted felt like a ghost of the Jassi I hadn't heard in years.
It was the first real crack.
The wall of Jaskirat Singh Rangi, the steel plated, mission first operative didn't just bend. It fractured. Jaskirat, the broken young man in Pathankot who lost his sister and father, eventually losing his own life's authority.
A sudden, agonizing warmth flooded my chest, a maddeningly protective instinct that had nothing to do with the mission and everything to do with a memory I was supposed to have buried.
I looked at the girl, Yalina, and for the first time since I crossed the border, my eyes weren't clinical. They weren't tactical. They were just hurting.
"Slow down," I rasped, my voice sounding foreign to my own ears. I reached out, my hand hovering near her shoulder before I pulled it back, terrified I’d break the illusion. "Slow down, behen. Just tell me who I need to talk to."
She smiled then, a bright, relieved thing that looked so much like Jasleen it made my stomach turn.
"Stay behind me," I told her, my voice dropping into that protective, heavy tone. "I'll handle the police. Just stay close to the bike, Yalina."
She nodded, trusting me instantly. She had no idea she had just reached into the chest of a ghost and found a heart that was still beating.
Yalina didn't just talk, she poured the truth out like it was a burden she’d been carrying alone. every detail about the stipends, the local PAP goons, and the way the university was being bled dry came out in a rush.
She kept calling me Bhaiya, that simple, trusting word hitting me like a physical blow every time it left her lips. she had no idea that the man she was leaning on for protection was the same man responsible for the shadow hanging over her streets.
I walked her all the way to her doorstep. The walk was quiet on my end, my mind a war zone, but she didn't seem to notice. she was too busy feeling safe.
"Thank you, Hamza Bhaiya," she said, her eyes bright with a relief that I didn't deserve. "I knew a baloch wouldn't turn his back on us."
I just nodded, my throat too tight to offer anything more than a rough Stay inside before I turned away.
I didn't go back to the warehouse. i couldn't. i rode until the noise of the city became a dull hum, eventually pulling over near the outskirts where the salt air from the coast started to bite through the humidity. i leaned against the bike, lighting a cigarette with trembling fingers, and as the smoke filled my lungs, the heat finally cracked.
The flashback hit me like a freight train.
It wasn't Lyari. It was the courtyard of our home in Punjab, the air crisp and smelling of fried sweets and marigolds. It was Bhai Dooj.
"Jassi! If you touch that thali before I'm ready, I’m telling Ma!" Harleen shouted, her voice high and commanding as she tried to arrange the sandalwood paste and the lamp.
"Oh, please, Harleen! You're just slow!" Jasleen fired back, her laughter ringing out, that same, spirited, chaotic sound I’d just heard from Yalina. she was darting around the courtyard, her dupatta flying behind her, intentionally trying to mess up Harleen’s perfect arrangement just to see her older sister's face turn red.
They were a whirlwind of chaos. Two sisters, one bossy and one a firebrand, both of them orbiting around me.
"Bhaiya, make her stop!" Harleen huffed, turning to me with an expectant look, while Jasleen slid behind my back, using me as a human shield.
"He’s on my side today, Harleen!" Jasleen teased, pulling at my sleeve, the exact same way Yalina had pulled at my sleeve an hour ago.
I remembered laughing. I remembered the weight of the tikka on my forehead and the sweet taste of the coconut they pressed into my mouth. I remembered the feeling of absolute, uncomplicated peace. I was Jaskirat Singh Rangi, and my only mission in the world was to make sure those two girls never stopped laughing.
The cigarette burned down to my knuckles, the sting of the heat snapping me back to the present.
I was standing on a dirt road in a country that wanted me dead, wearing the name of a man who didn't exist.
“She isn’t them,” the cold, clinical voice surfaced, cutting through the grief. “She’s a distraction. Focus on the PAP. Focus on Rehman.”
"She called me Bhaiya," I whispered into the wind, my voice breaking.
The mission was still there, cold and unwavering. But as I kicked the bike back into gear, I knew I was compromised. I wasn't just Jaskirat, and I wasn't just Hamza. I was a man haunted by the sister and mother he’d left behind and the one he’d just found in the middle of a war zone.
The next day, the heat in the warehouse was stifling, but the air in Rehman Bhai’s office was cold. Static.
Bhai was leaning back in his heavy leather chair, staring at a stack of PAP campaign posters like they were a personal insult. the Sher-e-Baloch didn’t like being a subordinate, and i could see the tension in the way his jaw was set.
This was the play. Jaskirat knew exactly how to dismantle a man’s ego, but I had to let Hamza say the words.
"You look like a man who’s tired of carrying water for people who don't know the weight of the bucket, Bhai," I said, leaning against the doorframe. i didn't wait for an invite. i walked in and tossed a folder of PAP’s redirected fund reports, the ones Yalina had told me about, onto his desk.
Rehman’s eyes shifted from the posters to me. "The PAP is the path to the third term, Hamza. It’s the path to the center."
"Is it?" I let out a short, dry laugh. I walked over to the window, looking down at the warehouse floor where Uzair was barking orders. "They need Lyari. they need you. but look at these reports, Bhai. they’re taking the money meant for the university, for the stipends, for the very people who swear by your name. they’re skimming the cream and leaving you with the sour milk."
Rehman leaned forward, his eyes narrowing. "They think they’re clever."
"They think they’re using a gangster to do their dirty work," I said, my voice dropping into that deep, manipulative rasp. "They think the Sher-e-Baloch is a tool they can put back in the box once the ballots are counted. but you aren't a tool, Bhai. you’re the architect. why be a broker for their power when they should be begging for yours?"
I saw it then, the flicker of pride, the spark of resentment that I knew how to fan into a fire. Rehman hated being looked down upon by the suits in Islamabad.
"They want a third win," I continued, pacing the room. "But maybe they should realize that the win doesn't belong to the PAP. it belongs to the man who holds the keys to Cheel Chowk. If you stop the gears, the whole machine breaks. they need to know that they don't own you. you own the ground they’re standing on."
Rehman picked up one of the PAP posters and slowly, deliberately, ripped it in half. The sound of the paper tearing was the loudest thing in the room.
"You're right, Hamza," he murmured, a terrifyingly calm smile spreading across his face. "They’ve forgotten who I am. they think they can use the lion to hunt, then keep the meat for themselves."
He looked at me, and for a second, I felt that sickening surge of trust. He trusted me more than his own blood.
"What do you suggest?" he asked.
"Make them wait," I said. "Delay the banners. let the student protests grow a little louder. let the PAP realize how loud Lyari can scream when the Sher-e-Baloch isn't there to keep it quiet. let them come to you on their knees, begging for the peace only you can give."
Rehman laughed, a deep, guttural sound that made the hair on my arms stand up. "my son. you see the board before the pieces even move."
I nodded. If I pushed Rehman to defy the PAP, i wasn't just helping him, I was creating a rift. I was destabilizing the very foundation he sat on.
"I do it for you, Bhai," I lied.
"I know you do," Rehman said, standing up and clapping a hand on my shoulder. "Get Uzair. tell him to pull the boys back from the university rally. let the students shout. let’s see how Islamabad likes the noise."
I walked out of the office, my heart hammering. i had just protected Yalina’s rally by using Rehman’s own ego as a shield. I had saved my sister for another day, but I had just tightened the noose around everyone else's neck.
I was playing a dangerous game, and the lines between the mission and my heart were starting to disappear in the smoke.
[ 3 Y E A R S L A T E R ]
Three years had turned the restless girl from the rally into a woman, but the way she yapped hadn't changed a bit.
I was sitting on the edge of the chair in Yalina’s bedroom, a space that felt like a different universe compared to the blood slicked floors of the warehouse. the air here smelled of old paper and the rosewater she used. it was quiet, save for the frantic pace of her voice as she paced the small room, waving a hand at the stack of medical textbooks she was supposed to be studying.
"I’m telling you, Hamza Bhaiya, Abbu has lost his mind!" she huffed, throwing herself onto the bed. "Two more today. One is a cousin from Quetta who smells like goats, and the other is some businessman's son who looked at me like I was a piece of property he was bidding on at an auction."
I leaned back, a faint, weary smile tugging at my mouth. "Goats, Yalina? Surely he wasn't that bad."
"Worse!" she groaned, burying her face in a pillow before popping back up, her eyes wide and pleading. "I have two years left of my degree. I’m going to be a doctor, remember? that was the promise. but Abbu… he’s getting pressured. he thinks a daughter's safety lies in a wedding contract, not a stethoscope."
She looked at me then, her gaze sharpening with that same spirited fire I’d seen the day I pulled her out of the crowd. "You have to talk to him. he listens to you. Everyone in Lyari listens to the Sher-E-Baloch’s right hand. If you tell him I need to finish my studies, he’ll back off."
I looked away, my chest tightening. Three years of being her Bhaiya. Three years of playing the protective brother while the man I worked for consolidated a kingdom built on the very corruption she hated.
"Jameel Sahab is just worried, Yalina," I said, my voice rough. "The streets aren't getting any kinder."
"The streets are fine because of you," she countered instantly, her voice dropping into that sweet, maddeningly trusting tone. "I’m not afraid of the streets, Bhaiya. I’m afraid of being locked in a house where my only job is to make tea and wait for a man to come home."
She crawled to the edge of the bed, reaching out to tug at my sleeve, the same gesture, the same bone deep familiarity that still, after all this time, sent a fracture through the steel of my heart.
"Don't let him do it," she whispered. "Please."
I looked at her small, determined face and saw the ghost of Harleen again, staring back at me from a life I’d murdered to get here.
"I won't let him," I promised, the words coming from a place deeper than any mission protocol. "You're going to finish your degree. I’ll handle your father."
She beamed, a bright, adorable smile that lit up the room, and for a second, the weight of the world felt like nothing.
"I knew it," she chirped, her mood flipping back to its usual yapping frequency. "Now, tell me, did Uzair really try to drive a truck through that gate last night, or is Donga just making things up again?"
I settled in to listen, the Hamza in me soaking in the normalcy, while the Jaskirat in the back of my mind counted the days until the foundation finally gave way. I was her hero, her brother, her shield.
And I was the lie that was going to destroy everything she loved.
"Uzair is an idiot," I muttered, "but yes, he actually did it."
"You know i have a best friend now, Ruhina," Yalina continued, her voice dropping into a softer, almost reverent pitch as she leaned her chin on her hand. "I’ve told you about her, right? I’ve known her for six months now, and Bhaiya, she is just... the sweetest soul in this entire godforsaken city."
I didn't say anything. I just reached for my lighter, flicking it open and shut, the rhythmic click-clack the only sound accompanying her monologue. I kept my face a mask of bored, older brother indifference, but I didn't tune her out. I never did.
"Ruhina Gurnaaz," she repeated the name like it was something precious. "She can’t speak, she’s mute but she doesn’t need to. Her eyes say more than most people do when they’re screaming. She’s absolutely adorable, Hamza Bhaiya. The way she tilts her head when she’s listening to me yap... she never gets tired of it. She just smiles, and it’s like the whole world goes quiet for a second."
I watched the smoke from my cigarette curl toward the ceiling. A mute girl. In a place like Lyari, silence wasn't just a trait, it was a survival mechanism. Or a tragedy.
"She’s so tiny, too," Yalina went on, her hands gesturing wildly now. "Like a little bird. But she’s so strong and she’s always helping everyone in the building. I brought her some of those sweets Ma made last week, and you should have seen her face. She looked like I’d given her a mountain of gold."
Yalina paused, looking at me as if she expected a comment, a joke, or even a grunt of acknowledgement.
I stayed silent. I didn't react. I didn't ask how a girl like that survived the streets we ran, or why her name sounded like a poem in a place that only understood prose. I just sat there, letting her words wash over me.
"You're not even listening," she huffed, though there was no real heat in it. she was used to my silences, she took them as a safe harbour to dump her thoughts into. "But you’d like her. Everyone likes Ruhina. You can’t help it. She’s just... good. Pure good."
Pure good. The words felt heavy in the room. There was no pure good in my world. There was only Rehman’s shadow, the weight of the responsibility and the lies I told every time I breathed.
"She’s coming by the university tomorrow to bring me some notes," Yalina muttered, finally settling back onto her pillows, her energy winding down. "I wish the world was full of Ruhinas instead of businessmen and their goat-smelling sons."
I crushed the cigarette out in the glass tray, the embers dying instantly. I didn't tell her that in our world, the Ruhinas usually got crushed by the businessmen.
"Go to sleep, Yalina," I said, my voice low and gravelly as I stood up. "I'll talk to Jameel Sahab about the proposals. You just focus on your books."
"Thanks, Bhaiya," she whispered, her voice thick with sleep.
I walked out of the room and headed down the stairs, the name she’d mentioned, Ruhina, already beginning to fade into the back of my mind along with the rest of her daily updates. I stepped out into the dark, humid Lyari night, focused only on the ride back to the warehouse.
The evening air at Rehman’s residence was thick with the scent of slow-cooked lamb and expensive tobacco. the tension of the last few days, the torture, the livestream, the standoff with Chaudhary Aslam, had evaporated, replaced by the heavy, golden glow of victory.
Rehman sat in his armchair, the king back on his throne. He looked tired, but his eyes were bright with a terrifying kind of pride.
"Eat, Hamza," he commanded, gesturing to the spread before us. "A man doesn't break the LTF on an empty stomach."
Uzair was already tearing into a piece of naan, his face still bruised from the weapons run, but his laugh was as loud as ever. He bumped my shoulder with his elbow, nearly knocking the glass out of my hand.
"He didn't just break them, Bhai," Uzair grinned, his eyes gleaming with that manic edge. "He made them watch. You should have seen his face when we had those officers on the floor. Cold as winter. I almost felt sorry for them. Almost."
I offered a small, sharp smile, playing the part. "They needed to know that Lyari doesn't belong to the police. It belongs to you, Bhai."
Rehman reached out, his heavy, calloused hand landing on the back of my neck. He didn't just squeeze it, he held it, a grounding, possessive weight.
"Naeem is gone," Rehman said, his voice dropping into a low, emotional rumble that made the air in the room feel dense. "But the heavens didn't leave me empty handed. You’re more than a soldier, Hamza. You’re the spine of this family."
Beside us, Ulfat moved through the room like a quiet ghost of grace, placing a hand on Rehman’s shoulder. She looked at me, her eyes soft and filled with a maternal warmth that made inside of me wanting to scream. To her, I wasn't an operative, I was the boy who kept her husband alive.
"Let the boy breathe, Rehman," she chided gently, though she leaned down to press a hand to my cheek. "He’s done enough for ten men today."
Little Faisal, Rehman’s youngest, was perched on the rug at our feet, playing with a toy car. He looked up at Uzair, who was making a ridiculous face with a mouth full of rice, and let out a high, bubbling giggle. The sound was so pure, so detached from the blood we had spilled just hours ago, that it felt like a hallucination.
Rehman looked down at his son, then back at me and Uzair. The three of us, the Lion, the Fist, and the Shadow.
"This is what we fight for," Rehman muttered, raising his glass. "A Lyari where my sons can walk like kings. To Hamza. The son who brought me home."
"To Hamza!" Uzair roared, raising his bone-dry glass.
I raised mine, the silver watch Rehman had given me catching the light. I looked at the family gathered around the table, the adoring wife, the giggling child, the loyal brother, and the father who loved me. It was perfect. It was fluff. It was a beautiful, doomed lie.
I was the viper in the cradle, and as I watched Faisal laugh, I realized I wasn't just destroying a gang. I was destroying a home that had finally started to feel like mine.
I LOWKEY CRIED. THE FEMALE LEAD WILL BE INTRODUCED IN NEXT CHAPTER MY LOVESS.
And why is it dying btw? Thoda reflect bhi kar lete hain? Some people are leaving because they have a life outside Tumblr. They have commitments, priorities, dreams to fulfil, a job. So it’s completely understandable and reasonable.
But some people are leaving because of unnecessary, unwanted, childish, cheap drama? So maybe think about why the ‘fandom is dying’. Maybe let’s all grow tf up so that people don’t leave the fandom??? It is dying because it is becoming exhausting.
Let’s all go back to the basics?? Write fics, read fics, like, comment, repost, talk to each other, send normal reqs, be kind??? Yk?? Kinda?? Like?? The?? Purpose??? And?? Point?? Of?? This?? App???
Ye saari fuckery toh school mein hoti thi bhai 😭 lmao how miserable. We’re all better than that
This is a fictional work inspired only by the characters portrayed in Dhurandhar. It does not reflect or represent the real-life actors or any real individuals. the story contains mature themes, explicit content, strong language, and violence for narrative purposes only. Nothing depicted is intended to endorse real-world behaviour. reader discretion is advised.
The dim light of the study cast long shadows across the mahogany desk, but the center of the room was anchored by the steady, rhythmic sound of Shree’s snoring.
She was a small, warm weight in Iqbal’s lap, cocooned in a pale silk blanket that rose and fell with her breath. Her thumb was hooked loosely near her lip, and her dark curls were plastered against Iqbal’s chest, dampened by the afternoon heat.
Dr. Aris, a specialist Iqbal had flown in under a non disclosure agreement that carried the weight of a death warrant, adjusted his glasses.
He had spent the last three months observing Shritika, sometimes from a distance, sometimes through the high resolution feed of the nursery cameras, and occasionally during the rare moments she allowed him to check her vitals.
"It is a complex manifestation of Post-Traumatic Dissociative Regression, Major," the doctor began, his voice barely a whisper to avoid disturbing the child. "In common parlance, as you’ve noted, it’s referred to as Little Space. But in Shritika’s case, the trauma of the accident was so absolute that her psyche didn't just retreat, it fractured and froze."
Iqbal’s hand, resting on the small of the girl’s back, didn't move. He watched the doctor with a clinical, unblinking intensity. "Explain the permanent aspect. you mentioned she could slip."
"Physiologically, she is four. chronologically, she is growing. but neurologically, she has anchored herself at the age of three, the last moment she felt safe before the world broke," Dr. Aris explained, leaning forward. "However, my observations show she isn't locked in. She is fluid. This is what we call Involuntary Age Regression. When she feels overwhelmed, scared, or even exceptionally loved, she slips deep into that three-year-old headspace. It is her armor."
"And when she is out of it?" Iqbal asked, his voice a low vibration that made Shree stir slightly in her sleep.
"She doesn't truly leave it, major. she just becomes more lucid. you may see flashes of a four year old’s logic, or even the shadows of the older girl she would have been. but the little space is her default now. It’s where her brain processes the world. If you try to force her out, if you demand she grow up, you risk a total catatonic collapse. her mind simply cannot handle the grief associated with her chronological age."
The doctor paused, glancing at the way Iqbal’s fingers mindlessly stroked the edge of the child's blanket.
"She has chosen you as her primary caregiver because you represent the anchor. In her mind, as long as she stays small and you stay big, the loud scaries can't reach her. she might have moments of clarity where she remembers her parents or her life in India, and in those moments, she will be terrified. she will slip back into the little space almost instantly to protect herself."
Iqbal looked down at the snoring girl. He thought of the way she giggled at fish and the way she screamed at thunder. He wasn't looking for a cure; he was looking for a manual.
"So, she stays like this," Iqbal stated. It wasn't a question.
"For the foreseeable future, yes. she may physically grow into a woman, Major, but mentally and emotionally, she may always require the care, the language, and the safety of a toddler. she isn't broken, she is just preserved. you aren't just raising a daughter, you are guarding a moment in time."
Dr. Aris stood up, packing his notes. "I will leave the updated dietary and sensory protocols with Adil. Just remember, for Shritika, the little space isn't a choice. It’s her survival. as long as she is in your arms, her brain believes the accident never finished happening. you are the only reason she can sleep this soundly."
Iqbal didn't stand to see him out. He simply tightened his hold on the sleeping girl, feeling the soft warmth of her cheek against his heart.
"I understand," Iqbal murmured to the empty room.
He didn't care if she never grew up. In a world of shifting loyalties and violent ends, her permanent innocence was the only thing that felt real. He adjusted the blanket over her small shoulders and waited for the sun to set, content to be the mountain she climbed to hide from the sun.
The silence that followed the doctor’s departure was heavy, but it didn't last. against Iqbal’s chest, the silk cocoon began to stir. a small, rhythmic hitch in her breathing signalled the end of her nap, followed by a long, theatrical yawn that ended in a tiny, high pitched squeak.
Shree shifted, her small hands blindly roaming upward until they found the familiar texture of Iqbal’s jawline. her eyes fluttered open, dark, liquid pools that seemed to catch every stray spark of light in the room. there was no fog of sleep in them, only an immediate, radiant recognition.
"Papa," she cooed, the word vibrating softly against his skin. She didn't try to climb down. Instead, she leaned back just enough to look at him, her petite face lighting up with a wide, toothy grin that made her cheeks bunch up into perfect, round apples.
She reached up, her tiny fingers tracing the faint, silver scar near his temple with a reverence that felt far older than her years. "Papa.. wake up too?"
The change in Iqbal was instantaneous and terrifying to anyone who knew the major. the predatory tension in his shoulders, the posture that usually signalled an imminent execution, simply evaporated. his features, usually set in a mask of grim, obsidian hard resolve, melted into a look of such profound, raw vulnerability that it felt like looking at a different man entirely.
He leaned down, pressing his forehead against hers, closing his eyes as if her presence were a physical balm. "I’m awake, Little Starlight. I was just watching over you."
By the doorway, two household staff members who had been waiting to clear the tea service froze. they stood paralyzed, the silver tray rattling slightly in their hands. they had seen the major break men with a whisper, they had seen him stand unmoved in the face of absolute chaos.
But seeing him now, kneeling mentally at the altar of a four year old’s giggle, his voice dropping into a honeyed, protective murmur, was a sight that made them shiver. it was the sight of a man who had finally found his one true weakness, and it made him more unpredictable than ever.
Iqbal’s hand, large enough to cover her entire back, smoothed the silk blanket over her shoulders. he didn't look at the staff. he didn't look at the door. his world had shrunk to the size of the small girl in his arms.
"Papa... hungry," Shree whispered, her voice retreating into that soft, ethereal coo that signalled she was slipping deeper into her little space after the disorientation of the nap. she tucked her head back under his chin, nuzzling into the scent of his cologne. "Yellow crackers? And mango?"
"Whatever you want, Shree," Iqbal murmured, his thumb brushing a stray tear of sleep from the corner of her eye. "The whole world is in the kitchen if you ask for it."
He stood up, carrying her with a fluid, effortless grace that made it clear he never intended to put her down. As he walked past the shivering staff, his eyes flickered to them for a microsecond, the cold major returning just long enough to ensure they stayed silent.
"Adil," Iqbal called out as he stepped into the hallway, his voice returning to a low command that nonetheless carried a new, paternal warmth. "Fetch the fruit. the little mistress is ready for her snack."
Shree let out a bubbling giggle, her hands locking tightly around his neck. To her, the world was simple, there were the big scary people and then there was her papa. and as long as she was held this tightly, the scaries didn't stand a chance.
Iqbal sat in a low, cushioned wicker chair, Shritika perched on his lap like a fragile bird. with a silver paring knife, he sliced the golden sindhri mango into perfect, bite sized cubes, his movements as precise as if he were disarming a device.
He offered a piece to her, and Shree took it with a delighted squeal, her small sticky fingers occasionally brushing against his pristine cuffs. he didn't flinch at the mess. he simply watched her, his obsidian eyes tracking every gummy smile and every hum of approval. when she finished, he wiped her face with a damp silk cloth, his touch so light it was almost ethereal.
"Garden?" she whispered, her eyes widening as she looked toward the sprawling green lawn. "Papa, grass? Please?"
Iqbal didn't say a word, he simply stood, tucked her into the crook of his arm, and walked down the marble steps. the moment his boots hit the gravel path, he felt her squirming with excitement. he knelt, placing her down on the lush, manicured grass that Adil had ordered to be watered thrice daily to ensure it remained soft for her sensitive feet.
The second her bare toes touched the cool green blades, Shree let out a trill of pure, unadulterated joy. she didn't just walk, she exploded into a clumsy, high kneed run, her white silk kurta fluttering behind her like a butterfly’s wings.
Iqbal stood back, his hands clasped behind his back, a silent sentinel in a sharp black waistcoat. to any observer, he looked like a commander surveying a battlefield, but the softness in his jaw told a different story. He watched her chase a dragon fly, her giggles drifting through the humid Karachi air like dandelion seeds.
Around the perimeter, the guards shifted uneasily. They were used to seeing the major's shadow cast over maps of the city's underworld, seeing it fall over a little girl playing tag with the wind was a psychological whiplash they couldn't quite process.
"Papa! Look! Fast!" Shree shouted, spinning in circles until she grew dizzy and tumbled onto the grass with a soft thud.
Before she could even think of being scared, Iqbal was there. He didn't rush, he moved with a predatory grace that collapsed the distance in seconds. He reached down, his large, calloused hand hovering just over her head.
"You're a very fast, Shree," he murmured, his voice a low, soothing vibration.
Shree looked up at him from the grass, her chest heaving with exertion, her face flushed a healthy pink. She reached up, grabbing his thumb to pull herself back up. "Papa run too?"
The mental image of Major Iqbal, the most feared man in the province, running through a rose garden was enough to make the nearby staff drop their gazes in sheer terror of witnessing such a thing. But Iqbal simply looked down at the tiny, petite girl who had successfully dismantled his entire life’s philosophy.
"I am right behind you, Shree," he settled, his voice dropping into that velvet tone reserved only for her. "I will always be right behind you."
Satisfied, she let out another bubbling coo and took off again, her small footprints invisible on the grass, but permanently etched into the heart of the man watching her.
The next morning arrived with a soft, golden light that filtered through the sheer silk curtains of the west wing. Iqbal had spent the last hour in a state of intense concentration that rivalled any tactical planning session. he was sitting on the edge of the bed, his large, scarred fingers moving with surprising delicacy as he worked through Shritika’s dark curls.
He had successfully managed to pull her hair into two small, slightly lopsided ponytails held together by pale pink ribbons. Shree sat perfectly still, her petite frame leaning back against his chest, clutching a stuffed elephant. when he finished, he turned her around, and she caught her reflection in the long mirror.
"Ponies!" she shrieked, her innocent joy bubbling over as she shook her head to feel them bounce. She turned and threw her arms around Iqbal’s neck, burying her face in his shoulder. "Papa made ponies! Pretty Papa!"
Iqbal’s lips quirked into a rare, genuine smile as he lifted her effortlessly. "Only for the prettiest starlight. Now, come. There is someone I want you to meet."
He carried her to the second floor, past the long galleries of cold marble, to a room that had remained locked during the first few months of her stay. he pushed the heavy doors open, and the scent of sandalwood and fresh marigolds immediately filled the air.
In a corner of the vast mansion, Iqbal had commissioned a small, exquisite Mandir. It was a sanctuary of carved white marble, glowing softly under the light of a few flickering diyas. In the center sat a beautiful idol of Krishna, dressed in vibrant silks that Adil had discreetly sourced from across the border.
Iqbal sat on the silk rug before the altar, settling Shree into the crook of his lap. the little girl’s eyes went wide, reflecting the dancing flames of the lamps. she seemed to sense the sacredness of the space, her frantic giggles settled into a quiet, ethereal curiosity.
"This is Krishna, Shree," Iqbal whispered, his low baritone echoing softly against the marble. "He was a little one, just like you. And he was very, very loved."
He took her small, soft hand in his and guided her to perform a simple pranam. Then, closing his eyes, Iqbal began to recite a Krishna mantra. He spoke the Sanskrit words with a slow, rhythmic precision, making sure she heard every syllable. he wasn't just reciting, he was anchoring her to a part of herself that the accident had tried to steal.
Shree watched his lips move, her head tilted. She didn't understand the theology, but she understood the peace. She began to mimic him, her tiny voice a faint, stumbling whisper. "Hare... Krishna... Hare..."
She giggled halfway through, leaning back to look at his face, but Iqbal simply tapped her nose gently and continued. He sat there for a long time, teaching an ancient mantra to his hindu daughter in the heart of a city that often forgot how to be this kind.
When the prayers were finished, Iqbal reached for a small silver bowl. Inside were pieces of fresh mishti doi and crushed almonds.
"Prashad," he murmured, offering her a small spoonful.
Shree’s eyes lit up as she tasted the sweetness. She cooed, leaning into him as he fed her, her little ponies bouncing with every happy wiggle. "Sweet! Papa, more sweet!"
"In a moment, Shree," Iqbal said, his gaze lingering on the idol and then back to the girl in his arms. he felt a strange, quiet resolve. the world outside could scream about borders, religion, and war but inside this room, under the watchful eyes of a marble deity and a man of iron, Shritika was simply a child who was home.
As she finished her snack and began to trace the patterns on his sleeve with a sticky finger, Iqbal realized that this room was the only place in the mansion where he didn't feel like a Major. He just felt like a father.
⋆˚☆˖°⋆｡° ✮˖ ࣪ ⊹⋆.˚
A year had passed, and the mansion had transitioned from a military outpost to a cathedral of soft edges. major Iqbal, the man who once moved through the world like a sharpened blade, had become a student of stillness.
For Shritika’s fifth birthday, there was no grand ballroom, no clicking cameras, and no political allies. Iqbal refused to let the world gape at her. instead, the west wing had been transformed into a soft and ethereal dreamscape. hundreds of white and peach silk balloons drifted across the ceiling, their ribbons trailing down like willow branches.
Shree was a vision in a hand stitched peach lace dress, her dark curls gathered into her signature papa-made ponies. despite being five, she remained petite, her movements possessing the clumsy, endearing grace of the innocent mind she inhabited.
She spent the morning flying. she would climb two steps of the grand staircase, shout "Papa, wings!" and launch herself into the air. every single time, Iqbal was there. he didn't just catch her, he held her as if she were made of spun glass, his large hands spanning her back, grounding her.
Sisna, the twenty-two-year-old university student, moved through the room with a calm, grounding energy. She was the safe shadow. while Iqbal provided the strength, Sisna provided the structure for Shree’s fractured mind.
"She’s in a very bright headspace today, Major," Sisna remarked softly, adjusting a tray of small, soft fruit tarts. "The routine is working. She feels entirely invincible in this room."
Iqbal looked at Sisna, his expression neutral but his eyes showing a sliver of the respect he reserved for very few. "She is invincible here. As long as these walls stand, nothing reaches her."
Iqbal knelt on the plush white rug, a small, velvet-wrapped box in his hand. Shree scrambled over to him, her bare feet pattering on the silk, and plopped down into his lap. She didn't wait; she began tugging at the ribbons with a toothy, determined grin.
Inside was a small, gold locket. On the front was a delicate engraving of a star, inside, a tiny, high-resolution photo of Iqbal and Shree in the garden.
"Star!" she cooed, her bright eyes shimmering as she stared at her 'Papa.' she didn't understand the value of the gold, only the faces inside. she leaned forward, pressing her sticky, mango-scented cheek against Iqbal’s stubbled jaw. "Papa... stay? Always?"
The sight was enough to make the household staff, standing at the periphery, almost shiver. the Major didn't just soften, he became unrecognizable. he closed his eyes, his breath hitching for a fraction of a second as he wrapped his arms around her, burying his face in her neck.
"Always, Little Starlight," he whispered, his voice a low, vibrating vow. "Until the stars themselves go out."
From the balcony above, the atmosphere was different. The staff watched the way Iqbal’s hand trembled slightly as he stroked her hair, a man so powerful he could move mountains, yet so captured by a child that a single tear from her could bring him to his knees. they saw the major disappearing, replaced by a man who looked like he was finally breathing for the first time in his life.
Sisna watched them both, her professional mind noting the absolute, symbiotic bond. She knew the little space and psychosis was a shield, but as she watched Iqbal feed Shree a piece of birthday cake, she wondered, Who is the shield protecting more? The girl from the world, or the man from his own darkness?
The afternoon sun was streaming through the high windows of the west wing, turning the dust motes into dancing specks of gold. it was a rare, quiet saturday, and the mansion felt less like a fortress and more like a home.
Iqbal stood at the center of the soft white rug, his hands pressed over his eyes. His voice rolled out in a playful, exaggerated rhythm that bounced off the marble walls.
"Eighty-nine… ninety…"
He caught the quick patter of bare feet on the polished hardwood, followed by a muffled giggle and the faint swish of heavy velvet curtains near the balcony. He already knew her hiding spot, glimpsing the edge of her small, peach toned toes peeking from under the fabric.
"Ninety nine… one hundred! ready or not, shree, papa is on his way!"
He spun around, his features twisted in mock bewilderment. across the room, Sisna perched on a squat ottoman, struggling to conceal her smirk behind a hefty textbook. she observed as the man who commanded the city's shadowy underbelly meandered aimlessly about.
"Where on earth could she be?" Iqbal mused aloud, his voice a rich baritone laced with that teasing, melodic lilt reserved just for her.
He approached a delicate porcelain vase on the side table, inspecting it with a straight faced stare. "Is she hiding in here? no, far too cramped for a little princess."
Next, he ambled to the oversized leather armchair and delicately lifted a small silk pillow with two fingers, peeking underneath as if a child might fit under something so tiny. "Not here either. Sisna, have you spotted my star? I think I've lost her."
Sisna shook her head, her eyes sparkling with mischief. "No trace of her, Major. Perhaps she flew away?"
From behind the curtain, a light, effervescent laugh burst out, making the velvet drape tremble wildly.
Iqbal paused, then advanced toward the curtain with the grace of a stalking cat, deliberately letting his boots squeak on the wooden floor to give a subtle hint. "What's that noise? bhoot? Or just a tiny mouse?"
He arrived at the fabric and didn't yank it aside. Instead, he prodded it lightly at chest level. "Could it be… a massive, fluffy cloud?"
"Nooo!" came a muffled, joyful squeal from the other side.
Grinning, Iqbal seized the edge of the thick curtain and swept it open with a dramatic flair. "Aha! I've captured the—"
He faltered, staring at Shree, who stood there with her hands clamped over her eyes, fully immersed in her world where invisibility worked both ways. She quivered with glee, her uneven pigtails bouncing wildly.
"Found you!"
He knelt down on the spot, casting aside all remnants of his authoritative major persona. Shree peeled her hands from her face, her eyes sparkling with victorious glee.
"Papa slow!" she squealed, darting forward to pounce on him.
Iqbal toppled backward without resistance, his sturdy body landing gently on the carpet as she clambered atop his chest. He exhaled a playful sigh of surrender, his arms wrapping around her small form to keep her steady. He paid no mind to the creases forming in his fine shirt or the likelihood that Jaffer was monitoring the scene on the cameras, utterly baffled.
Drawing her nearer, he nestled her head beneath his chin and inhaled deeply. She carried the sweet scent of the mango from her lunch and the faint lavender that Sisna wove into her hair.
"You're far too skilled at this, Shree," he whispered into her locks, his voice laced with an unexpected vulnerability. "I might have to call it quits, my five year old ninja is outpacing me."
Shree nestled closer, her tiny hands softly caressing his cheeks. "Papa don't be sad. Shree stay. No hide anymore."
A warm, bittersweet twinge stirred in Iqbal's chest, the sort only she could awaken. He took her hand and brushed a kiss across its palm, his eyes losing their hardened edge until the stern Major vanished entirely.
"Promise?" he whispered, his tone intimate and hushed.
"Promise," she chirped, dissolving into fresh giggles as she slumped back against him.
From the corner, Sisna observed the scene, her heart a swirl of weight and warmth. She watched Iqbal's fingers thread protectively through the girl's curls, seeing him not as a soldier, but as a father who had at last been reclaimed.
Iqbal let out a rare, booming laugh as he finally managed to catch Shree’s wriggling wrists, pinning them gently against the rug to end the tickle assault. he was slightly out of breath, his hair, usually a silver and black masterpiece of grooming, now standing in messy tufts where her small fingers had been clutching.
"Enough, enough. you’ve defeated the commander," he panted, his eyes crinkling with a warmth that would have stunned his enemies.
With effortless strength, he scooped her up and stood, settling her petite frame against his hip. He walked over to the oversized velvet sofa where Sisna was already waiting with the remote. As he handed her over, he lingered for a second, pressing a lingering kiss to the top of her head.
"Papa needs to step away for a bit to handle his 'important duties,' Shree," Iqbal whispered in his warm, intimate tone. "Mind Sisna while I'm gone."
"I'm always on my best behavior!" Shree exclaimed cheerfully, her playful energy lighting up the room as she leaped onto the couch.
Sisna met Iqbal's gaze with a calm, affirming smile, her casual demeanor masking a mix of wariness toward the stern major and admiration for his deep affection for his daughter. "We'll manage perfectly, Major. We've got a crucial appointment with that blue robotic cat."
Iqbal adjusted his waistcoat, his authoritative persona settling over him like a protective shield, even as his eyes lingered fondly on Shree. Sisna grabbed the remote and switched on the TV, filling the space with the lively Doraemon theme song.
The stale air inside the unmarked van reeked of oil and perspiration, trapping four seasoned operatives in its confined shadows. The faint light from a tablet cast harsh lines across their hardened features, these were no ordinary hoodlums but former soldiers who snapped to attention at the mention of Iqbal's father, whom they revered as The General.
"The Brigadier's orders are firm," the leader rasped, his voice rough as shattered stone. "The Major's lost his way, fixated on a child who's not even his kin. He's abandoned the cause, the legacy, all of it. We're here to set him straight."
A demolitions specialist among them glanced at the timer on their array of ear splitting blast devices. "We have got the timetable down. Adil and Jaffer, the so called inner circle, are too wrapped up in guarding that little girl to spot us. they believe they have locked down the estate, but they overlooked that the General knows those mansion plans better than his own blood."
"We're bypassing the entrance," the leader added, tapping a thermal image of the west wing garden. "The General's intel says the girl follows a daily routine out there, unprotected and barefoot. She's the chain dragging the Major down. We'll place the charges by the garden wall."
On the screen, a small heat signature flitted about, the little girl, Shritika.
"The leader's words were a lie, his gaze unyielding and icy. 'The objective isn't just casualties,' he said. the general aims to shatter her resolve, to revert her to that primal fear from when Iqbal discovered her. He wants her to weigh so heavily on the Major that he'll have no option but to cast her aside. But…" He hesitated, testing the heft of his pistol. "If the explosion hits too near… if she doesn't make it… the General calls it a kindness. A fresh start for his son."
"And what of the Major?"
"if he interfere, he'll face the harsh reality of turning a stronghold into a vulnerability. we strike at first light. as the sun glances off the Mandir's windows, we'll unleash the tempest."
The van plunged into darkness as the tablet powered down. In the quiet, the only noise was the metallic snap of a gun being prepared. Beyond, the mansion loomed serene and luminous under the moon.
AAHKSKSKSKSK FINALLYYY THE WRITER'S BLOCK WAS LOWKEY KILLING ME.
should i make it Kiraz part 2? or do we want an happy ending??
Hamza as the Badshah of Karachi actually adopting a little baby? I might just go berserk but I love hot men who are dads so you’ll have a Hamza x Dad fic series coming soonnnn!!!
