Summer, 2007 — Northern Pakistan. A low booming echoes outside the barred window. The streets empty by evening, cloaked in silence. Soon enough, the days become alive with screams, gunshots, and blasts from outside, as militancy sweeps through the region.

Twelve-year-old Marleen and her headstrong cousin, Naima, are forbidden from leaving the estate. But as the summer advances, Naima, desperate to escape an unhappy childhood, becomes increasingly reckless and secretive. Marleen, eager to belong, follows her lead.

When a boy with a troubled past enters their world, everything shifts.

In the absence of Babajan, who is away contesting the National Elections, The Chess Society is formed. What starts as juvenile amusement, the result of mischievous children’s minds, becomes a social structure of strategy and power, away from the world of adults. The games gradually take a darker, more macabre turn, mirroring the escalating violence outside.

Week by week, Marleen fights for her place within the hierarchy, until one final act, meant to prove herself, pulls them from the sidelines to the centre of what they had been witnessing as protected bystanders.