Chapter 5: The Invisibility Cloak and the Inner Scar

The Ghost in the Rain

The air in the car was thick with their shared failure. Rohini and Robert were already miles from the empty field when the alien tracking device in Robert’s hand began to shriek. It was a high-pitched, metallic howl, flashing a frantic, insistent red.

“Ma’am!” Robert gasped, clutching the device like a live wire. “Signals! They’re spiking! Right here, right now!”

Rohini slammed the brakes, tires chewing gravel. They had stopped beside a low, rocky embankment, facing a familiar, deserted stretch of plain.

“What are the coordinates? The vessel vanished, I assumed it was departing,” Rohini demanded, peering into the growing gloom.

“They’re local. Hyper-local,” Robert stammered. “The target is within fifty yards.”

Rohini’s eyes narrowed, pure scientific curiosity overriding her disappointment. “It’s cloaked. Robert, search the perimeter. We missed something fundamental.”

They stepped out. The evening had turned ominous, and a low, rolling drum of thunder echoed across the plains. A heavy, bruised sky promised a downpour.

Then, a sudden, blinding crack of lightning split the sky. In the instantaneous, searing blue light, the very air where they had been standing seconds ago seemed to shimmer and contort, a momentary distortion before fading again. A soft, cold rain began to fall.

As the drops descended, they did not fall smoothly to the ground. They clung to an impossibly vast, dark shape that slowly became outlined against the gathering darkness. The high-tech cloaking mechanism, designed to repel all detection, could not repel water. As the rain saturated the object, it revealed a colossal, obsidian vessel, a mountain of silence perfectly settled on the field, its immense silhouette defined by countless clinging raindrops.

Rohini stared, rain plastering her hair to her forehead, a shock that bordered on reverence gripping her. “We found it,” she breathed, utterly astounded.

The Architect of Despair

Back in the ruined shed, Doga worked with grim, concentrated focus on the life-support chambers. Sharmila, basking in his smooth, effortless competence, handed him tools, eager for approval. Mouni, however, was sinking into profound, jealous isolation, kept at bay by Doga’s subtle emotional distance.

“Are you sure we can trust him? He’s too charming,” Mouni whispered to Sharmila.

Sharmila didn't even pause her work. “He’s amazing, Mouni. He’s working so hard.”

“Thank you, Sharmila,” Doga purred, ruffling her hair with a fatherly tenderness that made Sharmila beam, tightening the knot of resentment in Mouni’s chest.

The hope in the shed was dying with every failed attempt—the third, the sixth, the tenth, the fifteenth.

Mouni, utterly broken, leaned her head against the cool glass of the chamber she called "Mom." “Mom, please. Please wake up,” she whispered. Doga and Sharmila, meanwhile, shared a light joke, their easy, careless laughter grating on Mouni’s raw nerves.

When the next attempt failed, Doga and Sharmila laughed again, a sound of frustration and easy camaraderie that snapped Mouni’s brittle sanity.

“Stop laughing!” Mouni shrieked, her voice tight with consuming grief. “My family is dying in front of us, and you act like this is a game!”

She unleashed a violent, uncontrolled wave of purple energy. It smashed not Doga, but the glass of her "mother's" chamber. Sharmila gasped in horror as the chamber monitor shrieked, showing the pulse flatlining.

“No! No, please!” Mouni wailed, trying to cradle the head of the still figure. “It was an accident! Doga, do something! She’s dying!”

Doga walked slowly to the chamber, but simply stood, a dark shadow, watching the final, agonizing flatline. The monitor turned a steady, cold gray.

“Doga, please!” Mouni begged, choking on tears.

Doga waited, letting the silence settle like concrete. Then, his voice flat, final: “Mouni. Your mother is gone.”

A Lie Forged in Loss

Mouni’s wail consumed the shed. Sharmila rushed forward, trying to offer comfort, but Mouni pulled away violently.

“Don’t touch me!” Mouni roared.

Sharmila recoiled. “I didn’t do anything, Mouni.”

Mouni spun on her, eyes blazing with irrational, targeted rage. “It’s your fault! All of this is your fault!”

Sharmila started to protest, but Doga cut her off with a sharp, warning shake of his head. He looked at Sharmila with such intensity that she instantly obeyed, nodding slowly, her eyes filling with confusion and tears.

Mouni continued her desperate work. Doga approached her quietly, his voice a manufactured gentleness. “Sharmila is not to blame for this.”

“You came here to tell me that?” Mouni’s voice was venomous.

“No. I came to tell you a story. About a boy who found his parents, only to find them dead. All his years of searching, all his dreams, shattered in an instant.”

Mouni’s rigid posture eased slightly. “Is that… my story?”

“No. That is my story.”

“Who killed them?”

“I’ll tell you when I decide you’re ready.”

But the final hope was already slipping away. Sharmila, desperate to redeem herself, was working with intense caution, yet while moving a heavy, crucial wire, her hand slipped. She accidentally severed a life-sustaining pulse cable connected to Mouni's "lover."

Mouni screamed, racing back. The figure inside thrashed violently as oxygen failed. Mouni watched her final hope die, dissolving into raw, panicked tears. “Please! Not you! Don’t leave me too!”

Sharmila collapsed beside her, apologizing hysterically. “I’m so sorry! It was an accident!”

Mouni slowly turned, her face numb, the hate solidifying. “You did this on purpose. You killed my mother. Now you killed him. You will kill them all.” She swung her hand and slapped Sharmila hard across the face. “Get out! I never want to see you again!”

Sharmila staggered back, heartbroken, and walked out of the shed into the whipping wind.

Doga watched her go, a cold, satisfied smirk playing on his lips. Control achieved. He walked to Mouni, wrapping her in feigned sympathy. “Don’t let this break you. We need to save the rest. I’m here to guide you now.”

Mouni looked up, the hatred in her eyes a terrible reflection of her sorrow. “You told me someone killed your parents. Who was it?”

Doga paused, delivering the carefully constructed lie that would seal his control. “It was Krrish.”

Mouni’s face hardened, sealing the inner scar. “Then I will help you. We will get revenge for your parents.”

First Contact and a Selfie

A fierce wind tore through the dark streets as Sharmila walked alone, utterly adrift and sobbing. A kindly beggar approached her.

“Hello, little one. Are you lost?”

“My father went on a long trip. I’m going to find him,” she replied, clinging to any shred of familiar kindness.

The beggar smiled, a terrifying, chilling warmth in his eyes. “Would you like me to take you to him?”

She took his hand and followed him down a dark, deserted alley. A shiver ran down her spine. “This place is scary.”

“Just a little further,” he assured her, leading her to a corner. “Wait here. I’ll be right back.”

She waited, confused. A figure appeared from the direction they had come. It was a constable.

“Little girl, what are you doing here alone?”

After hearing her story and seeing the fresh bruise on her cheek, the constable spoke gently. “We’re going to the hospital.”

Meanwhile, a fierce argument was raging inside Vikram’s car, miles away.

“This is why your classes are empty! You can’t even prove the existence of aliens!” Pooja was incandescent with rage.

“That’s unfair! We saw the ship!” Vikram protested.

“Haa,” a small, echoing voice agreed from the back seat.

Pooja snapped at Gayatri. “Why are you agreeing with him?”

“I didn’t say anything!” Gayatri retorted.

Vikram instantly pulled the car over. They all tumbled out. “Show yourself!” Vikram shouted.

Jadu shimmered into view, sitting calmly on the back seat.

“It understands us,” Vikram whispered, dumbfounded.

“How do you know our language?”

“Rohit,” Jadu replied, its voice a soft, echoing chime.

“Who is Rohit?”

“My friend.”

Pooja and Gayatri immediately cornered Vikram, all opportunism. “Hold on. What’s our benefit? What do we get for helping an alien?”

Vikram was floored by their strange priorities. “My goal was contact! What do you two want?”

“A selfie!” they demanded in unison.

Vikram sighed, accepting his team's strange priorities, and agreed to help Jadu find Rohit.

Bedside Convergence

At the hospital, the constable, unable to secure a children's bed, placed Sharmila in a general ward and handed her over to a kind nurse.

The nurse smiled. “I’m your nurse now. You tell me what you need.”

Sharmila’s gaze drifted to the next bed, drawn by the stillness of the person lying there. “Sister, who is she?”

The nurse glanced at the pale, unconscious figure. “That’s Priya. She’s in a coma. We don’t know much about her, only that she’s the one Krrish risked everything for.”

Sharmila gazed at the gentle, silent woman in the next bed, completely unaware that, after being cast out by the manipulator Doga and the traumatized Mouni, she had landed right next to the person at the epicenter of the entire Krrish crisis. The key to everything lay unconscious, just inches away.