NeoDhaka
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🕯 NIGHTFALL – MIRPUR SECTOR 9, NEO-DHAKA
Neon lights flickered like dying fireflies across the broken sign that read:
"ChaKuttir Adda" — the last tea stall in a sector nobody walked into unless they had something to lose, or nothing left at all.
Shohan leaned back in a rusted plastic chair, his slipper tapping lightly against the concrete. Steam curled from his glass of dudh cha, untouched. His eyes — half-lidded, unreadable — were watching everything. Everyone.
Three gangsters were seated at the opposite table.
Not ordinary thugs — Frame-levels.
Each one wore their color:
The Silver Maw rep, Jashim, in mirrored glasses and tech-threaded sleeves.
Fire Wife Naila, in crimson red, nails like knives and a gaze like fire.
And from the Hollow Sons, Razeeb — thick-necked, silent, his voice rarely heard because fists spoke first.
They weren't here to drink cha.
They were here for Shohan.
He took a slow sip. "You all came. Cute."
Naila's laugh was dry. "You told each of us you had something on the others. That's not just cute, bacha. That's suicidal."
Shohan didn't flinch.
Instead, he pulled out a single torn page — crumpled, aged, and bloodstained — from his satchel. He dropped it on the table. The wind shifted. Everyone froze.
No one touched it.
> "That," Shohan said calmly, "is a copy of the deal signed during the Khulna Interframe Summit. You remember that little ceasefire your bosses love to deny existed?"
> "It's fake," Jashim snapped.
> "It's real," Naila said quietly. "I've seen the original."
Razeeb didn't speak. He just stared at Shohan, fingers twitching.
Shohan smiled.
> "Here's the problem," he continued. "That document proves two of your Frames worked with outside foreign funders. If this leaks, both your gangs burn for treason. But if I burn it quietly..."
> "What do you want?" Jashim growled.
Shohan stood.
Not fast. Not aggressive. Just... like it was time.
He looked over the city skyline, past the crumbling rooftops and distant buzz of surveillance drones. Then he turned to them and spoke softly:
> "There's a kid. Name's Rafi. He's ten. He's hiding in the Korail ruins. And all three of your Frames just put a price on his head — without knowing why."
Naila's eyes narrowed. "That kid... he hacked a channel?"
Shohan looked her dead in the eye. "No. He's not a hacker. He's a witness. To something you don't want anyone to believe even exists."
> "And you care because?" Jashim's voice was sharp, suspicious.
Shohan smiled. Not like a hero. Not like a savior.
Just a boy who'd made up his mind a long time ago.
> "Because Rafi didn't lie.
Just like me."
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🌃 FLASHBACK – 24 HOURS EARLIER
It started with a message. A whisper in a crowded market. A boy with no shoes and a burnt chip in his hand.
Rafi.
Shohan found him hiding behind a broken digital prayer board. The boy was thin, shaking, eyes wild. He'd seen something.
> "They killed them," Rafi had whispered. "They erased them like files. I saw it."
Shohan didn't ask who. He didn't need to. The Frames were cleaning up something. A glitch. An event.
And this kid — no family, no network, no "use" — was the one piece left.
Shohan hid him. Covered the trail. And then did what only he could do:
He invited three of the deadliest Frame runners in NeoDhaka to a tea stall.
And told each one a different lie.
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🧠 BACK TO PRESENT – TEA STALL
Shohan could feel it now — the shift.
The trap wasn't what he told them.
The trap was how little he told.
All three of them now had just enough doubt. Enough confusion. Enough paranoia to call off the hunt.
And when they walked away, they'd take that poison of uncertainty back to their Frames.
The kid would be forgotten in the chaos.
> "You're insane," Jashim said, stepping back.
> "You're lying," Razeeb growled.
> "No," Shohan said softly, walking into the smoke. "I never lied.
I just never told you what mattered."
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