Kismat aur Hum

23.

- Haniya -
After I had finished praying, I heard Dua call for me downstairs. Arriving downstairs, Umar looked ready to go somewhere. "I'll be off now." He said, looking at me and Mehr. I nodded, and him and Mehr walked towards the door. I waited in the living room while I waited for Mehr.

Mehr walked into the living room, fixing her dupatta. I stood up, "he left. What are you doing here?" "I decided to wait for you." She smiled, and we both walked upstairs and into our rooms. Again, I couldn't sleep no matter how much I tried. I decided to draw some of my sketches and maybe even start a design. I had the material and time.

Three hours went by, and I was so busy sketching that I forgot everything was happening around me. 'This baby blue dress will be for Mehr, and this lavender one for Asfa,' I thought while coloring in my final designs. I had finished and looked happy with my final designs. All of a sudden, I felt thirsty, I reached out for my water bottle, but it was empty. 'Great,' I thought. Getting up, I grabbed my dupatta and bottle and headed downstairs to the kitchen.

As I entered the kitchen, I didn't bother turning on the light since the night light was enough, and I was too lazy to do anything. As I went to refill my bottle, I kept hearing tapping sounds. I looked around inside, 'Nothing looks wrong here.' Gathering up some courage, I peeked at the backyard. Nothing looked out o the ordinary.

Just in case I looked at the entrance, the door was locked, and there was nothing wrong there either, but I noticed none of the guards were there. 'Weird.' Shrugging off the thoughts, I walked back into my room. As I tried working on my designs, I hust couldn't concentrate, I kept hearing a few clicks sounds, and then all of a sudden, I heard a loud *thud.*

I ran to the closet window and looked outside. Our room faced the backyard. I could see three or four men jumping into the backyard. By the way, they looked and dressed. They were definitely not Malik's men. Anxiously, I needed to do something. This didn't look right. They were still a few steps away from the back door.

Running into Mehr's room, she quickly got up, "Api, what's wrong?" "No time, i think a few men are trying to break into the house. I tried calling the police, but I'm getting no signals." Mehr getting worried, picked up her phone and checked. "Me neither." She said, looking anxious now. "For now, let's get everyone into Asfa's room. It's the furthest room." She nodded. I told her to go to Asfa's room and wake her up while I went to get Taha and Dua.

I quickly ran to Taha's room since it was nearby. Walking him up, Taha woke up confused, I told him to quickly get to Asfa's room, and I briefly told him what happened. He listened to each word, "What about you, api?" "I'm going to get Dua first." "Let me come to, no. I need you to be safe." Taha nodded and ran towards the room. I was about to run downstairs when an idea popped into my head. 'Let's give it a shot,' I doubtfully walked towards Asfa's room.

"Where's Dua?" "She's in the back area, in her room. But right now, i need to save you guys, too." I said as I looked through the wardrobes.
"I have an idea. It's a little risky. " they all carefully listened to me. "Mehr, is there anything close by, other homes, shops?" "There is a aunty who lives two blocks down. Her son is in the army." I nodded. I quickly opened the window and looked down, there was grass. I went over the edge and threw a few blankets and pillows. The distance from the arch to the ground was short. "Listen to me carefully. See the arch outside the window. You are going to stand over there and jump. I need you all to run over to where Mehr said."

They were hesitant at first but listened. Just before Mehr came up to me, she quickly handed me a key. "This is the spare key to bhai's study. There's a gun on the third shelf. Just please lock the door after you leave." I thanked her and ran towards his study, I found the gun exactly where she said it would be. I quickly locked it and made my way downstairs.

I was on the last step when I heard the men in the kitchen. I ducked under the staircase, going the other way to Dua's room. Since Dua had exams lately, she would spend most of her time in the small room downstairs. She said it was quieter there. I ran up to her door and quickly twisted the know to open the door. Dua was startled to see me. "Api?" "No time Dua, get up, we need to leave." "What's wrong?" "Let's move." She quickly ran out of her room. Holding her hand, we ran towards the staircase.

Almost about to get to the staircase when one of the men saw us. "There are two." He screamed, getting the attention of another man. They were approaching us. We started running upstairs. "Dua, get to Asfa's room, and jump down from the window," I said as she ran ahead. One of the men started shooting, causing Dua to fall. I quickly ran to her, helping her get up. "Where did you twits think you're going." One of them grabbed dua by the shoulders. While someone had held my arm.

"We should just burn these two with the house." One of them laughed to his other. "The boss wi be happy with that." He agreed. While they were busy talking to each other, I managed to take out a pencil from my pocket. I quickly stepped on the foot of the person holding me, causing him to fall back in pain, and stabbed the hand on Dua's shoulder. "Dua, run." I screamed as the men started getting up again. "But api, you?" "Just run Dua," I shouted back. I quickly loaded the gun and shot the ground near the men, I hadn't really ever used a real gun. I would quickly look back to make sure dua had left. When I was sure, I ran towards the room when I was shot. I fell because of the bullet hitting me, slowly leaning on my arms, I steadily got up, gun still in my hand. I aimlessly shot, hoping to hit anything.

My aimless shooting caused the light bulb to be shot, making the hallway dark. Taking this advantage, limping, I quickly opened Malik's study and locked it.  With the little relief that I could be safe in here, I collapsed on the ground, the wound was heavily bleeding, and my shirt was covered in blood. I needed to stop the bleeding. I took off my dupatta and covered my wound with it. Now I couldn't even move with the wound.

Outside, I could hear the men screaming, "she hasn't jumped outside." "No sir, there's a blood trail, and it's leading over there." Then I heard men trying to open the door, "that witch must have locked the door." After a few attempts, I heard someone else speak, "Let's just shoot it down." "Leave it, let's just do what we planned to do, and it's the perfect opportunity. She's shot, and she won't be able to move."

The noises retrieved from the door, and I crawled to the desk. There was an old landline phone on the desk. Managing to sit kn the chair, I tried to reach out the phone, I didn't know any numbers, and my phone was left in my room.

I looked around the room, anything to help me. I couldn't jump out the window since the window was stuck. I couldn't really leave since those men were outside. I started smelling something, like rubber burning, it slowly started getting smoky and the study slowly started to fill with smoke.

Frantically, looking around his desk, looking for anything of my use, anything that can work. A piece of paper fell while I looked through the things. Picking it up, I dialed without thinking. 'Let's hope this works'

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Thought?