The door of the Defense & Strategic Studies department slammed shut behind Taimur Abbas with the force of a rifle report. At six-foot-two, with sharp Kashmiri features and an intensity that seemed carved into his very bones, he moved like a storm barely restrained. His military boots struck the floor with a clipped rhythm—anger given sound.
In his pocket, the rejection letter from the Inter Services Public Relations (ISPR) department felt like it was made of lead. Taimur didn't need to read it again. The words were seared into his mind.
"Excessive kinetic strategic thinking."
Kinetic. As if that was a flaw.
He scoffed, muttering, "Right—because God forbid someone actually thinks about winning wars."
He'd graduated top of his class—double majors in Strategic Studies and Political Science. 4.0 GPA. A thesis dissecting the military doctrines of Salahuddin Ayyubi with such surgical precision that one professor jokingly called him a 'time-lost war minister.' He'd simulated the Crusades in ten different strategy models. He knew where Baldwin should have been flanked and where Ascalon should have been razed.
But the brass didn't want brilliance. They wanted obedience.
Taimur passed by portraits of decorated generals, their bland expressions a silent judgment. He crumpled the letter and hurled it at a trash can. It missed, fluttering to the floor like a wounded bird.
"I hope your battlefield tactics are better than your aim," he muttered to himself.
By the time he reached his dorm, the anger had calcified into something colder, resolve. He shoved open the door. The room looked more like a command center than a student's space.
Maps of 12th-century Syria and Egypt covered the walls, annotated with timelines, battle formations, and siege diagrams. Sticky notes plastered the corners like colorful wartime dispatches.
Horns of Hattin – Phase II: Left Flank Collapse.
Siege of Ascalon – Optimal breach points (south wall, dawn).
His desk was a shrine to obsession. A modified Crusader Kings III campaign ran on the screen—Taimur's custom mod: Salahuddin's Empire: Unbroken. His empire stretched from Tangier to Sindh. Mamluks patrolled the Mediterranean. No Crusader kingdom had survived beyond 1182.
"This is what they're afraid of," he murmured, taking a seat. "Someone with a spine."
He adjusted his glasses, flexed his fingers, and dove into the game. He micromanaged a siege outside Jerusalem, deploying engineers to undermine the southern wall while flame-slingers harassed the enemy towers. Victory was near.
Then the game glitched. Richard the Lionheart's avatar twisted grotesquely, pixelated and corrupted. A blinking error message filled the screen:
[SYSTEM ERROR: Temporal coordinates corrupted.]
"What the hell?" he whispered, frowning.
His laptop let out a high-pitched whine and abruptly shut down.
"Even you're rejecting me now?" he muttered, slamming it closed.
Irritated, he walked to the kitchenette and poured himself instant coffee. Bitter and scalding—perfect. He flicked on the TV, needing a distraction.
News from Gaza. Again.
Airstrikes. Rubble. A child's shoe in the debris. Taimur's jaw tightened.
"Nothing changes," he said under his breath. "Centuries of power... and we still beg at tables set by others."
Then the anchor's voice shifted—breaking news. Israeli warplanes had struck a mosque mid-azaan. The screen showed grainy footage of a minaret collapsing. The muezzin's voice—Allahu akbar—cut off in a burst of static.
Something inside Taimur snapped.
He hurled the mug at the TV. The glass exploded in a spray of sparks. The screen went black.
So did the world.
A thunderclap echoed inside his skull. Light vanished. There was no transition—just nothingness.
He gasped awake to the smell of blood and shit.
The world had color again—but it was drenched in violence. A battlefield stretched before him, chaotic and alive. The sky was scorched bronze. Arrows arced overhead. Men screamed in Arabic—not the clipped modern accent he knew, but something older, more primal.
He stumbled, choking on the stench. Beside him lay a dead horse, its stomach split open, steaming in the cool morning air. Flies buzzed greedily over its flesh.
"Yallah! You sleep in battle, bedouin?!"
A soldier in chainmail seized Taimur by the collar. His face was streaked with soot and blood. The emerald sash across his chest—Zengid. Without question.
The man raised a mace.
Instinct took over. Taimur twisted away. The mace crashed into the dirt. His hand found the hilt of a fallen shamshir—elegant, curved. His fingers tightened.
The soldier attacked again.
Taimur parried. The blade shuddered, metal screaming against metal. He ducked under the next swing, pivoted, and—without conscious thought—slashed across the man's gut. The soldier dropped.
Dead.
Taimur stood frozen, chest heaving.
That... wasn't a simulation.
He turned slowly, absorbing the battlefield. Dozens of corpses littered the field—Zengid and enemy alike. In the distance, a rider cut through foes like a divine storm. His voice carried over the chaos.
"Hold the ridge! Protect the wounded!"
The man's movements were precise, economical. When an enemy lunged at him, he parried, disarmed, and dispatched in one motion.
Taimur recognized the technique.
No.
It couldn't be.
The rider dismounted, directing troops with swift commands. His face—sharp nose, intense eyes, lips pressed in grim focus—matched every manuscript Taimur had ever studied.
Yusuf ibn Ayyub.
Not yet Salahuddin. Not yet Sultan. Just a commander. But unmistakably him.
"God," Taimur whispered. "This is... 1168. Northern Syria. Before Egypt. Before everything."
His heart thundered as Yusuf approached, offering a waterskin.
"You fight well for a scholar," Yusuf said, eyes narrowing at Taimur's strange clothes.
"I... I am Taimur. From beyond the Hindu Kush. A traveler."
Yusuf frowned but nodded slowly. "The Assassins ambushed us. They knew our route."
"They'll try again," Taimur said quickly. "At the caravanserai. Poison in the stew. Lamb."
Yusuf froze. "You speak prophecy."
"I speak preparation."
By dawn, Taimur's warning proved true. Poisoned meat. Two Assassins captured. Interrogated. Confirmed everything.
Yusuf studied him in the firelight. "You are either a spy... or a miracle."
Taimur smiled faintly. "Let's just say I'm... overqualified."
[SYSTEM NOTICE: Temporal Synchronization Complete.]
[Primary Objective: Stabilize Ayyubid Timeline.]
A glowing interface shimmered in the corner of his vision, unseen by all but him.
So it's true. A system. Like in the novels. Except this wasn't fiction.
As Yusuf motioned him toward the camp, Taimur looked out over the war-torn hills of Syria and whispered:
"All right, history. Let's begin."