Rizwan stood up with anger and astonishment. Rahman stood up and held his sister through her shoulders. Rizwan uttered,

“What was in the drink?”

“I guess something poisonous,” Khattab suggested.

Rahman said,

“Somebody go and call Hannan.”

Omama continued to vomit even more. Rizwan declared,

“No, we need to go to the hospital first.”

“What about our meeting with Hannan?” Khattab asked.

“Just forget it,” Rizwan said. “Let’s go!”

Few minutes later, the entire family was inside the car with Khattab, who was driving the vehicle. Rizwan was sitting behind with his daughter who wasn’t feeling well at all.

“What do you think it is?” Khattab asked.

“I’m sure that it was poison. The poison was in everybody’s glass, but only she was the unfortunate one who drank it.”

“But why did it happen?” Khattab asked.

“Obviously, because of Hannan.”

“Yes,” Rahman added.

“He wanted to harm us all,” Rizwan continued, “like his son.”

“Oh, come on! Why would Hannan do that? I mean, why would he want to harm you, and especially Omama? What does he have against you all now?”

“What do you mean?”

“Come on let’s face it, he has no benefit from it. Your father never left a huge property behind, so you can fight for it. Your father’s donated property was all that was left behind, and Hannan already stole it.”

“No Khattab, this guy was always against us. We exiled him, he was not able to return for several years, now that he has returned, he has returned for vengeance. He is back for blood.”

“Yes,” Rahman aagreed. “And he just earned Omama’s blood.”

Within fifteen minutes, they reached the hospital. Khattab parked the vehicle outside in the hospital’s parking area.

*************

Next day, Jafar along with some aged woman was walking inside the garage.

They stopped as they reached the bed. Jafar said to the woman,

“This is the baby you are hired to look after.”

“Okay, I want to confirm once again that is it just for two years.”

“Yes.”

“So, I have to look after this baby for two years? And what’s his age?”

“He is one year old; at least that’s what I’ve been told. Look, you are not allowed to ask how I found him.”

“Okay,” she agreed.

“I’ll pay you every month and he will be in your custody as we agreed.”

“Okay, what’s his name?”

“Harun.”

Meanwhile at Rizwan’s house, Alia was all alone in the house. She was sitting on the sofa of her room. Her eyes were left open with shock and despair as she had just learnt about her daughter from her son through a phone call.

She stood up and tried to distract herself by reading the prophecies and making something positive out of them. She went to the closet and took out a paper on which the prophecies were recently written.

1. A dark period will come to this family.

2. Tariq Yasar’s grave would be crushed.

3. Rizwan’s daughter will see a lot of pain and torment in her life.

4. A two-faced person will illegally capture the land that belonged to us once.

5. The first phase of mischief would be different than the last phase.

6. A kind person will see several owls in a single night.

7. A guy wearing gold would betray one of the brothers.

8. Presumed dead will return and make situations worse.

9. One among the two brothers will get imprisoned for life.

10. Rizwan’s son will bring an end to the mischief.

Instead of finding some hope,

she felt even more hopeless and was feeling a little more miserable.

*************

That evening at the hospital, while Rizwan and Rahman were standing and waiting outside the operation theatre, the doctor finally came before them. They both walked towards him. The doctor took off his glasses with disappointment and said,

“Look, we tried. We tried really hard, but unfortunately we couldn’t save her. I’m sorry; your daughter has passed away.”

Rizwan was left with shock and agony. Rahman was however, not very shocked. He was expecting this already; he had turned just furious and was not moving.

Rizwan sat on the chair and he started crying out loud. His voice was quite loud and all the people in the corridor turned their attention towards him.

Tears were also coming out of Rahman’s eyes but he was trying to pull himself together and he walked towards the exit of the hospital. While he was walking, he remembered the moments with his sister how they used to go to school together, how they used to play together when they were kids and lastly, how he was upset when she got married. All the memories were coming altogether in his mind.

He wiped his tears off and finally left the hospital.

Meanwhile inside Jafar’s garage, he was sitting on a chair and on a table right in front of him was a huge set of two guns and several bullets. He was polishing the weapons with a piece of cloth. He was feeling quite excited, but at the same time he was terrified as he knew that Rahman and his father would find him one day and would have their revenge.

That instant, he heard knocking on the garage door. He was a bit startled and he considered the fact that anyone trying to get his revenge must be here. This garage was very confidential and he was confident that nobody knew of this place. He stood up and said,

I just hope that it won’t be the cops.

He picked up a gun and loaded the chamber inside it. He walked slowly holding the gun, preparing himself for crossfire.

As he opened the small door next to the entrance, he saw his own hired assistant standing outside. He felt relieved and came outside asking,

“Yes, what is it? What’s the progress?”

His assistant came towards him and said,

“I found this paper at Rizwan’s house. I think these are the prophecies you were looking for.”

“How did you get inside?”

“Surprisingly, the house’ door was left open and no one was inside.”

“Oh, yeah! They must be crying at the funeral.”

“I guess so!”

Jafar read the list of prophecies in his heart,

1. A dark period will come to this family.

2. Tariq Yasar’s grave would be crushed.

3. Rizwan’s daughter will see a lot of pain and torment in her life.

4. A two-faced person will illegally capture the land that belonged to us once.

5. The first phase of mischief would be different than the last phase.

6. A kind person will see several owls in a single night.

7. A guy wearing gold would betray one of the brothers.

8. Presumed dead will return and make situations worse.

9. One among the two brothers will get imprisoned for life.

10. Rizwan’s son will bring an end to the mischief.

“Oh, dear lord!” Jafar uttered as he finished reading the prophecies.

“What is it?”

“None of your concern,” he replied rudely as usual.

His assistant left him and walked back towards his bike.

Jafar folded the paper very carefully and said to himself,

I’ll keep this with myself. And, I’ll see how these would occur. I shall challenge these prophecies one after another and then inherit the entire family’s wealth.

He then, went back inside and shut the door.

*************

One Week Later

Rizwan, Rahman, Khattab, Maqsood and Zakariya were sitting at Rizwan’s house’ guest room. They were sitting face to face on the sofas.

Rizwan began the conversation,

“Look, we all are equal in this. This is our family war. We are now forming a squad as planned before, and we are going to catch Hannan and his son by, hook or by crook. Maqsood here has agreed to help us and we need him because he knows all the whereabouts.”

“What about the police?” Khattab asked him.

“No, Uncle Khattab!” Rahman said raising his voice with anger, “The cops will not resolve anything. We need revenge.

I want to see Hannan dead right in front of me.”

“No Rahman, watch your language,” Rizwan said politely.

“No, Uncle Rizwan!” Zakariya interrupted getting enraged. “Enough with this language bullshit.” This man killed my wife and my son; he doesn’t even deserve to be called a human. I will kill this beast with my own hands.”

“We don’t know for sure about Harun. He might be alive.”

Rahman answered back along with Zakaraiya. But their words were not understandable. Khattab tried to stop the arguments by calming Rahman, but he was unsuccessful. There was shouting all around, but Maqsood stood up and exclaimed,

“Listen to me, all of you please!”

There was sudden silence as they weren’t expecting him to speak up. Anyways, he gave his point,

“Family of Tariq Yasar, I want you to realise something. If we won’t cooperate with each other and form unity, then we would never be successful with our mission. We all have agreed that we have to catch Hannan along with his son. Now, how we are going to deal with him, through cops or with our own hands, this is what needs to be decided. We can either form a consensus through voting, or we can simply obey Mr Rizwan, who is the head of the family.”

“Okay, I agree,” Khattab said.

“I agree with you one hundred percent,” Zakariya said, “Except that there would be no dictatorship law here. We need to solve this with votes and opinions.” Rizwan spoke up,

“Look, I’m not going to act as a dictator, I have mentioned earlier that we all are equal. We are going to decide first of all, how we are going to approach him.”

“Okay,” Maqsood answered.

“I’m going to ask first and you’ll raise hands, how many among you prefer involving cops?”

Only Khattab raised his hand.

“Okay, how many prefer taking the law into our own hands?”

Rahman, Zakariya and Maqsood raised their hands.

“Okay.”

“What’s your opinion?” Maqsood asked Rizwan.

“I am on both sides, but since majority have voted for fighting without police therefore, I have to agree on this.”

Rahman said,

“Can I talk now?”

“Yes.”

“Now, that we have agreed on this, we need to divide responsibilities. I have just talked to a person who has acquired some stuff illegally. Therefore,

I will ask him to arrange five weapons.”

“Is he a reliable person?” Rizwan asked.

“Come on, Rizwan!” Khattab said in between their conversation, “How can you recommend something that’s illegal? These weapons will get us behind the bars.”

“No, they won’t!” Rahman answered, “This guy can also arrange some grenades. After we are done, we will simply destroy all the weapons in a blast, so there would be no evidence. This entire attack must not take more than thirty minutes, or else the cops would be there and they would arrest us all.”

Khattab changed the mode of conversation by pointing his finger towards Maqsood, saying,

“You know what guys, I don’t trust this man. He conspired against me and asked two men to crush your father’s grave. He then, kidnapped the baby; you guys tell me how can you trust him? What if he’s a spy? Just simply

misleading us.”

They all looked at Maqsood as they were influenced by

his question.

Maqsood said in his defence,

“If you don’t want me in the team, then its fine, I will give you the address of Jafar’s residence and leave. You can call me if you need anything.”

“No, you can stay,” Rizwan said to him and then looked at Khattab. “Just leave it, we’ll handle him later.”

Rizwan then changed the mode of the conversation,

“Alright Rahman, your job is to arrange the weapons. You and Maqsood are going to lead us to their houses. Khattab you will have to make sure that no one’s following us and keep an eye open for the cops.”

“Right,” Khattab answered.

“Zakariya, you will have to arrange the van. And you will drive it.”

“Okay,” Zakariya responded.

Rizwan then said after wiping off his sweat,

“I will be the one who will step outside the car first. I will go and knock on the door of the house.”

“It’s a garage.”

“Yeah whatever, anyways, the moment Hannan and Jafar step outside, you guys will begin your fire on my signal.”

“What about the kid?” Maqsood asked.

“What kid?” Rahman asked.

“The baby, last time I stepped outside the garage, the baby was inside.”

They all went silent. Zakariya raised a question,

“What if Jafar puts a gun on Harun’s head and threatens us to kill him, unless we let him go.”

They all were left speechless as they realised that the situation was very tough.

Rizwan said after a long moment of silence,

“I know, how we can handle this situation.”

to be continued...