Happy Reading Lovelieess!! <3
AUTHOR POV
The air in the basement smelled of rust and old rainwater. Concrete walls sweated under the glare of a single tube light, its faint flicker making the room pulse like a slow heartbeat. Two guards stood by the steel chair in the center of the room, its legs bolted to the floor, its occupant breathing in short, ragged bursts.
Raghavendra Devrai watched the man before him bleed.
Bhujang Reddy.
Even now, even tied, even defeated, his eyes held that same unshakable arrogance that had taunted the Devrais for twenty years. He had made an empire out of disruption—land scams, extortion rings, contract violence.
But for the past 15 years, he had stayed one step ahead, as if fortune itself indulged him.
But not today.
Today he sat barefoot, wrists zip-tied behind the chair, shirt torn, lip split open like a cut fruit. Blood dripped down his chin, tracing a lazy line to the concrete.
Raghavendra exhaled slowly. "Any last words or any shipment I should know about?"
The rival lifted his head with effort. Blood smeared his lower lip, but the smile was intact.
"Always the gentleman," he rasped. "Even now."
Raghavendra didn't reply. He only tilted his chin, signaling the guard if needed.
Bhujang laughed, breathless, painfully amused. "Twenty years, Devrai. Twenty. You burned my world to ash."
"Your world was always ash," Nikhil said evenly.
"Maybe," the man conceded, then coughed. "But I always told you... I had something for you in return. A gift."
Nikhil's eyes narrowed. He'd heard that line before, in different contexts, different warnings. They had never known what it meant.
For a moment the man looked like he might spit — another insult, another bluff — but then he let out a low, satisfied laugh. A laugh with weight, like he's been waiting years to use it.
"You really think..." he coughs, chokes, recovers, "...that I spent fifteen years building ports and papers?"
His smile widens, delirious but triumphant. "No. My real cargo was much more... human."
"Get to the point," Raghavendra snorted with finality in his tone.
The man looked up again, pupils blown wide, voice thinning but still sharp enough to cut.
"I kept one thing you could never buy back," he murmured, savoring the words, "blood."
Raghavendra stepped closer, tone quiet. "What did you do?"
The rival's smile widened—bloody, triumphant, cruel even in defeat.
"All these years," he whispered, "you mourned a daughter who never died."
The guard's baton paused mid-air. Nikhil's breath caught. Something cold and furious slid into the room, like fate itself had entered.
"Where...?" Nikhil managed, voice shaking with rage.
Then louder, erupting – "WHERE IS SHE?"
He grabbed Bhujang by the collar. The man let out a satisfied chuckle and pushed his chin forward, exposing the chain around his neck—a tiny brass key hanging from it.
Nikhil tore the chain off. Bhujnag didn't resist. The metal clattered softly as the key hit his palm. On the side:
M-1410
The man's voice stuttered now, each word costing blood.
"Mahadev Lodge... Shivaji Road... Pune," he breathed. "Deposit locker..."
His eyes shut for a moment, then opened for one last flicker.
"You'll find her," he whispers, satisfied. "Just don't expect her to be the same girl you lost."
His head dropped forward. Silence returned.
Raghavendra stood there for a long second, eyes fixed on the man who had just detonated a secret fifteen years old.
"Nikhil," he called out to his son.
"I'll go and confirm." Nikhil replied to his father, understanding fully what he wanted to know.
Raghavendra looked his son in the eye, nodding at him once in approval, before he added, "Don't tell the others yet, they know only if and when it's true."
"Sari appa,barthini." his son replied. (Okay dad, I'll go and come.)
Nikhil gripped the key harder in his hand as he turned, and headed outside. His footsteps echoed against the damp concrete, fading with distance.
When the room finally settled, Raghavendra let out a breath he didn't remember holding. The basement smelled of rust and old water, but now there was something else beneath it—an undertone of something dangerously close to hope.
Fifteen years was a long time to train a heart to forget.
He placed a hand on the cold table beside him, steadying himself against a world that had just shifted without warning. A child you buried in your mind, mourned in your bones, did not simply return. Not in stories like his. Not in lives like theirs.
And yet—
"She never died."
The words replayed, steady as a pulse.
Upstairs, the heavy metal door clanged shut. Raghavendra straightened, mask settling back into place as he gestured for the guards to clean the room. A leader again. A father only when no one was looking.
**
Outside, Nikhil crossed the gravel lot toward the idling SUV. The night air was cold enough to bite, but his blood was running too fast to feel it. He pulled the door open, slid into the backseat, and snapped the seatbelt across his chest.
"Airport," he told the driver. His voice was level, but the muscle in his jaw trembled once before locking still.
The car rolled forward, tires whispering over wet asphalt. City lights blurred past the window—gold, white, red—and somewhere between two signals he finally let silence settle long enough for the shock to register.
A sister. His Sister. Their sister.
Not a myth, not a gravestone, not a photograph that was never printed. A living person. Fifteen years without knowing her name, her voice, her face—fifteen years she lived without theirs.
His phone vibrated once. A message from operations: Charter cleared. Wheels in forty.
Nikhil typed back a single word: Proceed.
The SUV pulled into the private terminal. Men in navy uniforms rushed to unload luggage that Nikhil had not even seen packed.
As he crossed the tarmac toward the waiting jet, another thought threaded quietly through the controlled urgency:
If she's alive... what did those fifteen years make of her?
The cabin door shut. Engines spooled. And for the first time in a very long time, Nikhil Devrai felt the unfamiliar weight of fear coiled beneath his ribs—fear not of losing, but of finding.
—————————–——————————————
FLASHBACK - 15 YEARS AGO
Nikhil was fifteen then.
Old enough to understand celebration, not old enough to understand why people thanked gods for daughters as though they were miracles.
The Devrai house had been glowing for a month—curtains washed, carpets beaten, silver polished to mirror brightness. Relatives floated in and out with sweet boxes, priests came at odd hours to chant shlokas.
Everyone whispered excitedly about the first girl born into the family in three generations. People called her Lakshmi. Some meant fortune. Some meant blessing. Everyone agreed the house felt lighter with her in it.
Her twin brother was healthy and loud from the start, a squirming red fist of indignation. He cried with authority. She didn't. She watched with big eyes and blinked slowly, as if considering the world before accepting it.
His father walked around with the kind of pride that didn't need to be spoken aloud; it was in his posture, in the way he looked at the world as though it had finally given him something he hadn't dared request.
His mother cradled both of them in her arms like they were her biggest blessings.
The brothers hovered around her more than they admitted.
Nikhil pretended he wasn't that excited, yet he always ended up leaning over her cradle to fix her blanket, and holding her in his arms as she fell asleep and looked at her as if she were unreal.
Thirteen-year-old Abhinav and Aditya argued about whose nose she had.
Vikas tried to make her fist wrap around his finger.
Vedant smiled brightly whenever she was placed with him, Two-year-old Tejas simply poked her forehead and laughed when she blinked at him.
Their parents watched, amused, never asking them to stop.
For thirty days the house breathed in unison with two tiny lungs.
Then, on the thirty-first night, everything shifted.
She began wheezing—shallow, uneven breaths that didn't match the slow blink of her eyes. The nurse on night duty tried steam, then saline, then checked her chest twice before telling their mother to get ready.
At the NICU doors, Nikhil remembered one thing with perfect clarity:
the tiny pendant on her chest, the one their grandmother had tied with a red thread, and his own ring—threaded onto it the night she was born because "she should carry something of yours."
The last time he saw her, she had both.
The nurse disappeared with her beyond the glass.
Hours later, the doctor walked into the waiting room. No file, no rushed instructions, no urgency left—just the slow, heavy breathing of someone preparing to ruin a family. His father stood. His grandmother whispered a prayer mid-verse.
"There were complications during transfer," the doctor said. "She arrested on table. We attempted revival. She didn't respond. We're sorry."
Silence landed before grief did. Men stared into space. Women wept into sarees.
His mother didn't faint, didn't scream—she just stopped moving, like someone had unplugged her.
When his father finally managed the only question he had, it wasn't even a proper sentence—just, "Can we...?"
The doctor looked down, and that was the answer.
"We advise against viewing. We tried surgical revival and she was very small... and it's not how you want to remember her."
There was no body.
There was no last look.
Just paperwork, and a folder no one wanted to touch.
They went home without her.
They told the boys that evening.
Aditya asked three times if they were sure—like maybe hospitals could make mistakes.
Abhinav didn't ask anything; he just stared at the floor, shoulders tight, jaw clenched, his cheer evaporating into something colder and sharper.
Vikas sobbed so hard he hiccupped, swearing through tears that he'd grow up and make sure that "nobody's baby dies again, ever."
Vedant looked into every cradle and corner for her but didn't know how to frame the absence into words.
Tejas didn't understand and wandered off holding a stuffed elephant.
And her brother—the surviving twin—wailed without pause, angry and inconsolable, as if some part of him recognized the severing without language.
Nikhil ,the eldest, did what no one asked of him—he pulled his brothers close, told them it would be okay, that babies go to gods when they can't stay here, that their parents needed silence right now. He said it like he believed it. He didn't.
They named her surviving twin Advik that evening—the one who is unique, unmatched. A name chosen as a shield.
Nikhil never forgot how small the newborn boy looked in her arms—not fragile, just incomplete, like a story missing its beginning.
The house grew quiet for weeks. The baby was loved, treasured even, but every festival that year had gaps in its symmetry—one cradle instead of two, one anklet instead of a pair.
Eventually, grief folded itself into the walls like old paint, and life went on.
******
Present.
A soft ding pulled Nikhil back into the present. A flight attendant passed, lowering window shades and offering water. He took the bottle but didn't drink.
Fifteen years, and the world had just informed him that the funeral they held was for a child who never died.
He rubbed his thumb over the brass key in his palm, feeling the engraved numbers like braille.
M-1410. – It was her and Advik's birthday, May 14th 2010.
If she was alive, she had lived an entire life without them. A life shaped by strangers, by a world they hadn't chosen for her.
And somewhere in this city, she had lived all those years without them.
He remembered Bhujang's satisfaction, that part sat in his chest like cold metal.
The engines lowered pitch as the jet began its descent. The seatbelt sign lit again with a chime.
The pilot's voice crackled through the cabin:
"We will be landing in Pune shortly. Cabin crew, please prepare for arrival."
Nikhil straightened, tucking the key safely inside his jacket. The city lights below stitched themselves into grids—alive, indifferent, waiting.
The plane dropped through the clouds, and for the first time since the basement, he let himself whisper the thought he hadn't dared voice aloud:
If she's alive... she's fifteen.
And until he saw her with his own eyes, nothing—papers, files, dead men's confessions—would be enough.
.........
The wheels touched down with a soft jolt, rubber hissing against runway. Taxi lights streaked past in blue and white. By the time the jet rolled to a halt near the private terminal, two black SUVs were already waiting at the foot of the stair truck.
The cabin door opened. Salty Pune air rushed in.
Two Devrai security men flanked Nikhil the moment he descended the stairs. They didn't speak; they didn't need to. The protocol was already in motion.
"The car is ready, sir," one said once they reached the tarmac.
Nikhil slid into the back seat. The door shut with a muted thud.
"Mahadev Lodge, Shivaji Road." he instructed.
The driver nodded and pulled out. The convoy moved in formation—two cars, clean windows, no markings, authoritative without announcing themselves.
Pune blurred past—flyovers, neon-lit shops, signals blinking red to amber to green. After they cleared Yerwada Bridge and slipped into the older lanes, the first guard's phone buzzed.
"The site is cleared," he reported. "No civilians inside. The manager is contained."
Nikhil leaned back, closing his eyes for half a second. His pulse was too steady — that fake calm that came right before something significant had the chance to break you.
As they neared the location, he unlocked his phone, fingers briefly hesitating as he opened the message board for a certain contact. Anjali.
He typed slowly, deliberately:
Nikhil : Landed in Pune for an emergency. Busy for a while, I'll let you know when I'm back home.
Anjali: Okay. Take a few deep breaths, alr? You get tensed when you don't:)
Nikhil: Mhm, will do. Go to sleep, it's late.
Nikhil's jaw released. It was stupid how that grounded him more than anything else had in hours.
He locked the phone. Pocketed it. And did as he was told, a few deep breaths as he prepared himself for what was to come.
--------------
Mahadev Lodge sat above a line of old hardware stores—signboards faded, shutters half-painted, the kind of street where no one asked questions because they had their own.
Inside, the manager stood stiffly by the desk, sweating, hands clasped, pretending he didn't know exactly who Nikhil Devrai was.
The guard held up the chain with the small brass key. "Deposit lockers."
The manager nodded rapidly and led them down a narrow corridor into a storage room lined with dented metal lockers from the 90s. Numbers stenciled in black.
Nikhil stepped forward and scanned until he found it:
M-1410
He fit the tiny key into the lock. It turned with a hesitant click, and the door swung open.
Inside was no more than a blue file folder, a plastic pouch, and a small USB stick, in a fireproof box. He took the box and headed back into the car.
"The HeadQuarters," he told the driver who started the car towards the assigned location.
Devrai Office, Pune
The sedan rolled into the underground parking of the Devrai tower just as dawn was staining the sky a dull blue. Two guards opened the doors before the engine fully died, and another officer was already waiting near the lift.
"Welcome sir," the man greeted, voice brisk, eyes flicking to the sealed evidence case Nikhil carried. "We've cleared Conference Room 3."
Nikhil only nodded.
Upstairs, the building felt like a different species of awake — quiet yet humming with computational intent. Doors slid. Security glass unlocked. No one asked unnecessary questions.
Inside the Conference Room , a small team rose to their feet as he entered.
He placed everything on the stainless steel table: the file folders, the hospital records, the USB drive and the documents.
For a fraction of a second, Nikhil's pulse misfired.
He set it down gently and stepped back.
The chief analyst glanced at him once. "We'll begin validation." Each member of the team took one item each, of their own expertise as they began to check if it was real or not.
So he waited.
Waiting was something he was good at — years of boardrooms, negotiations, stakeouts, acquisitions. But this wasn't waiting for a deal to close. This was waiting for a reality to rewrite itself.
Through the glass, he watched the process unfold:
Passports authenticated by one team, the hospital files were checked by another.
The USB was decrypted and copied. Three files were in there.
Suddenly, the video projector flickered to life as it played the first footage –
A hospital stairwell – timestamped the exact hours Nikhil was in the hospital when she was sick. The camera angle was sharp enough to catch faces, muffled enough to make the air feel stale. A nurse in scrubs clutched her files like armor.
A man stood between her and the exit, a pistol visible at his hip. Nikhil recognized that man, he was one of Bhujang Shetty's underlings who had suddenly climbed levels 14 years ago. Ranga.
Audio crackled alive.
"Nin maglu manele iddale thane?" Ranga asked, tone conversational in the worst way.
"Nice house... easy to get into." (You're daughter is at home right?)
The nurse jerked as though slapped.
"Please—don't say that— what do you want from me?"
Ranga drew the gun, not pointed, just shown.
"Switch my sister's baby with the Devrai kid. One infant for another. My sister's kid is dead and they have two. It isn't fair. They already have enough anyways," He snorted, "Nobody asks questions and your daughter grows up."
The nurse's breathing hitched audible through static.
"She's only four—"
"Exactly."
She nodded vigorously, as her tears fell to the ground.
Someone in the conference room swore under their breath. Another shifted in his chair, discomfort crawling up his spine.
Nikhil's pulse thudded once, sharp and uninvited. He didn't look away.
The clip ended.
After a pause, the guy at the computer looked at him and said, "The second clip,sir."
The second file opened on the NICU corridor. No audio, higher angle.
The nurse entered the frame, hands shaking, removing one tag, lifting the breathing infant, placing the motionless one in the surgical tray meant for transfer. Her mouth moved constantly—prayer, apology, God knew what.
Ranga never entered the NICU. He only watched through the observation glass — detached, arms folded, as though overseeing inventory movement in a warehouse.
An analyst muttered under his breath, "Jesus Christ..."
Nikhil's jaw tightened just once. The Devrai baby was swaddled in the blanket he remembered. The pendant cord was visible before the cloth covered it.
The clip ended.
"What's the last clip then?" he asked under his breath.
The third video loaded with wind distortion across the mic. Rooftop of the hospital, night-shift lighting. The nurse stood near the parapet, shoulders shaking, mascara streaked.
"I did what you wanted, now what do you want from me?" Her voice cracked halfway through but she held her ground.
Ranga didn't answer immediately. He took a slow step toward her, the kind of step that made the analysts in the room unconsciously tense.
"Illige mugithu ankondiya?" he asked, tone flat. "Ninge thumba gotthu." (Did you think it ends here? You know too much.)
Shanti's breath hitched.
"Nanu mathadalla. DevraaNe — I have a child, please—" (I won't talk, I swear to god-)
"I know," Ranga cut, unmoved. "Which is why you did as you were told."
She clutched the railing now, desperation bleeding into anger. "You said no one would get hurt."
He finally met her eyes. "No one important."
The words landed harder than the wind.
No dramatic threats. No explanation. Just a final step forward and a shove—quick, efficient, like closing a file he was finished with.
Her scream snapped through the mic for a fraction of a second before cutting off below the frame.
Security arrived moments later, running to the edge, shouting into radios. Ranga was already gone.
The clip ended. The projector went black. No one in the conference room spoke.
Nikhil said nothing. He pressed two fingers against the table once, grounding himself. He had imagined a thousand versions of how the girl might have lived. He had never imagined this.
More time passed. DNA processing completed. Records from 2010 were cross-verified. Devrai archives pulled the original death certificate. Overlay scans exposed mismatched serial numbers.
All the team members huddled near the chief analyst one by one as they gave him their reports.
Finally, the analyst pushed his chair back and called for him.
Nikhil entered.
The chief didn't pause. "Sir, the child registered as deceased that day belonged to a different mother. The Devrai daughter—"
He paused only to verify the final sheet before continuing:
"—did not die."
The room stayed brutally silent for a few seconds. Even computers seemed to hush.
The analyst added, "Details found in the second folder indicate current identity, address, school records, and guardians. All consistent."
Nikhil stared at the papers in his hand, as he read the report.
His breath caught at the next section—passport copy. A teenage girl stared at the camera, expression tired but composed, eyes sharp. Same jawline. Same eyebrows. If someone had drawn Advik as a girl, it would have looked like that.
He set the photo down, but his fingers lingered on it for a moment longer than intended.
He stepped out into the hallway, closed the glass door behind him, and pulled out his phone.
The call connected in two rings.
Raghavendra answered. "HeLu Nikhil." (Tell me, Nikhil)
For a second Nikhil couldn't speak.
Then, steadying his voice, he said, "Appa... she's alive."
Silence. Heavy, not disbelieving, but processing.
"Confirmed?" his father asked, voice low.
"Yes," Nikhil whispered, because anything louder felt wrong. "All documents verified. It's her."
Then his father exhaled — not in relief, not in joy, but in disbelief that had weight.
"Come back with everything," Raghavendra finally said, "We will discuss here, not over the phone.
The line clicked off.
Nikhil lowered the phone but didn't move for a moment. His throat felt tight, unfamiliar. Grief had been simple — static, one-note. But this... this was a resurrection.
He blinked once, composed himself, then returned to the team.
"Pack everything," he instructed. "We leave in ten."
They nodded.
Only when they walked ahead did he allow his jaw to tighten, just once, before the mask slid back on.
For fifteen years the Devrai family had trained themselves not to imagine her. Not to ask. Not to hope.
And now she was real. Alive. Fifteen.
A/N : Hi yallz, how do you like it so far??
Also yes, Anjali is Nikhil's girlfriend. We'll mostly be having romantic arcs for the elder ones right now, and move onto the younger 4 later coz they are literal kids, and I genuinely do not have high school romance planned for them so yeah!
So dw, until they find their match the love stories of the elder ones will keep yall going:)
Please leave me your opinions and comment alot for faster update 😋!!
Lots of love, Mariqa 💝
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