The new Farabis arrived before dawn, not in a triumphant parade, but in quiet columns—boots on dust, eyes forward, kit packed tight.
They did not come alone.
A district lorry rolled into the yard behind them, its suspension complaining under the weight of locked wooden crates. Two policemen sat on the bench beside the driver, rifles across their knees, faces blank with official duty.
Ahmed Khan was already waiting at the Canal Bungalow steps with a clipboard. D'Souza stood nearby, half-asleep, still smelling of warm valves and solder. Mary D'Souza watched from the clinic veranda like a hawk deciding whether these men would become protectors—or problems.
When the lorry stopped, the senior policeman jumped down and cleared his throat.
"By order of Deputy Commissioner Harrington," he announced, carefully formal, "arms are issued to the Sandalbar protection units under strict inventory, audit, and return conditions."
A second man produced a thick ledger tied with red tape.
Every rifle had a number. Every bayonet had a number. Every box of ammunition had a seal, and every seal had a signature.
Ahmed glanced at the ledger, then up at Jinnah.
Jinnah did not touch the book. He merely nodded once.
"Proceed," he said.
The crates were opened one at a time. Enfield rifles—cleaned, oiled, and stamped. A small quantity of revolvers, issued more grudgingly. Ammunition counted aloud in front of witnesses.
The police sergeant's finger traced each line.
"One rifle per sanctioned post," he recited. "Any additional weapon must be explained in writing. Any discharge must be logged. Any missing round will be questioned."
He looked at Ahmed as if daring him to argue.
Ahmed smiled politely. "There will be no missing rounds."
The sergeant's eyes slid to Jinnah, and his tone softened without him noticing.
"And the Deputy Commissioner requests that Mr. Jinnah understand: this is cooperation, not delegation. The district will inspect the registers weekly."
Jinnah's reply was calm, almost bored.
"Inspection is welcome. Discipline does not fear paper."
Good, Bilal's voice murmured inside his mind, satisfied. Let them believe the ledger controls the gun. In reality, the discipline controls the man.
The Three-Man Pattern
The recruits were not deployed as a crowd. They were broken immediately—cleanly—into three-man teams, the same pattern that had already proven itself.
One soldier: the senior Farabi—steady hands, rifle discipline, the "roof man."
One wireless assistant: trained to handle the WWI field sets, to send short signals without panic, to keep the air clear for emergencies.
One medic: not a doctor, but trained well enough to stop a bleed, treat fever, stabilize a mother in labor until Evelyn's team could arrive.
Ahmed called the names. Mary called the medical assignments. D'Souza checked the wireless men personally, making them tap out a test phrase until it came out clean.
Jinnah's order was precise:
In villages where a stronghold was already built—the rifle would stay with the senior man. The other two would remain unarmed, because the brick walls were the weapon.
In villages where the stronghold was still only lines on a plan—Harrington's conditions allowed an exception: each member of the three-man team would carry a gun. Not for bravado, but because open villages invited night raids.
The men understood. The rule was not about power. It was about terrain.
By sunrise, the teams were gone—jeeps, bicycles, and fast walking columns—spreading out like a net tightening over fifty villages.
Only then did the next system wake up.
The sun had barely risen when the wires began to hum.
From the brick strongholds of fifty villages, Farabi operators began tapping out Morse messages, while runners arrived on bicycles with satchels full of crumpled paper. By noon, Ahmed's desk in the estate office was buried—pages torn from school notebooks, ration cards, even bark smeared with charcoal.
Ahmed stared at the pile as if it might move.
"It is a flood, Sir," he said. "A flood of words."
Jinnah picked up a few slips at random. Raw handwriting. Bad spelling. Honest panic. Shameless jokes. Requests. Complaints. Gratitude.
He placed them back gently, as if they were evidence.
"Filter them," he ordered. "Categorize them: grievances, questions, greetings… and absurdities. We go live at six."
You built the ears, Bilal murmured. Now you're building the mouth.
Jinnah did not react. His face remained neutral, but his mind was already turning: if people believed the box could hear them, they would stop whispering into the wrong ears.
1) The Crown's Greeting
At exactly six, the red light flickered on.
Abdullah Shafi leaned into the microphone, his voice smooth now—less afraid of the machine.
"This broadcast is presented to you with the good will of the Crown, for the prosperity of the people of Sandalbar."
It was the legal line. The line that satisfied Lahore. The line that prevented nervous men in offices from imagining rebellion where there was only administration.
Abdullah moved past it quickly, like a man stepping over a puddle.
"Havildar," he said, turning slightly. "We have received mail."
Balvinder's grin could be heard through the microphone before his words.
"Mail? This is not mail, Maulvi Sahib. This is a mountain! It seems everyone in Punjab learned to write overnight!"
2) The Djinn Question
Balvinder picked up the first slip, squinting like a giant trying to read a child's secrets.
"This one is from… Baba Ghafoor in Chak 96. He asks…" Balvinder paused, savoring it. "He asks: 'Oye Balvinder, Sister Mary said you are a Djinn. Is it true? Do you eat fire? And can you find my lost buffalo?'"
Inside the studio, Sohni stifled a giggle. Abdullah rubbed his forehead. "Havildar, please tell the good Baba that it was a figure of speech."
Balvinder leaned into the mic like a cannon deciding to become a storyteller.
"Figure of speech?" he roared. "No! Tell him the truth! Yes, Baba Ghafoor! I am a Djinn of the Heavy Artillery! I eat coal for breakfast and drink diesel for lunch! And if your buffalo is hiding, tell it Balvinder is coming, or I will turn it into a goat!"
Across fifty villages, laughter broke open like a sealed pot.
Even the newly added villages—the ones still half-suspicious, still watching Sandalbar like an outsider watches a rich man's promise—laughed despite themselves. Not because they believed in djinns, but because the voice on the radio sounded like their own dera: loud, ridiculous, familiar.
And familiarity is the first form of trust.
3) Proposals and Invitations
Balvinder grabbed another letter, eyes widening theatrically.
"Oho! This one is serious. It is for our little bird, Sohni."
He read out the young man's proposal—four acres, two oxen, an arrow through the heart. Sohni turned red and hid her face. Abdullah rescued the moment with a calmer announcement: an invitation from elders, a wedding request, a promise of feast. "And she accepts," Abdullah declared, warm but firm. "But she will come with her father… and perhaps a Djinn for protection."
Sohni's father and uncle—present, visible, steady—were not decoration. They were a boundary. The villages would understand that this was not a girl being taken by power; it was a family being placed under protection.
4) The Medical Command
Then the tone shifted.
Abdullah handed a stained note to Mary D'Souza.
Mary stepped forward. When she spoke, the room changed. Her voice had no entertainment in it. It had instruction.
She read Karam Din's letter—two years of stomach fire, a sick son, a fear that all of this might be "government talk."
Mary did not argue with faith. She did not insult the man's fear.
"It is not magic. It is science. And I will prove it."
Then she did something sharper than a promise.
She called a unit by name.
"Farabi Unit 4 in Lalianwala… are you listening?"
In Lalianwala, the Farabi beside the receiver straightened like he'd been slapped by duty.
Mary issued the order on air—find the man, put him and his son on the supply truck, send them to the clinic.
And across the villages, people understood something new:
This box did not just speak.
It reached.
5) Sign-Off
Balvinder wiped at his eye—half laughter, half something else—and boomed a final line about djinn powers, weddings, and medical orders.
Abdullah closed with the proper phrase again—good will of the Crown—then the click, the silence.
But the silence did not end the broadcast.
It started the night's conversations.
Inside the studio, Jinnah stood and looked at Mary.
"That was risky," he observed.
"He needed help, Sir," Mary replied.
Jinnah's eyes held a thin glint of approval.
"I know," he said. "And by saving him, you validated the entire system."
And now, Bilal added quietly, satisfied, every village will test you. Not with rebellion. With need.
Jinnah turned slightly toward the window, where the night lay over Sandalbar like a dark cloth.
"Let them test," he said, almost to himself. "We have the ledger. We have the wire. And now, thanks to Harrington's conditions…"—his gaze hardened—"…we also have the gun."
Not as a symbol.
As a responsibility.