Ivan returned home from school at two-thirty in the afternoon.
Seeing Vikas Mehra's familiar car outside, he recognized it instantly, having spotted it parked at their house many times before.
After briefly asking about everyone's well-being, Ivan went to his room to freshen up and then joined them for lunch.
Ishan Singhania, Myra Singhania, Vikas Mehra, and Arya Malhotra were already seated at the dining table.
While eating, Ivan said casually, "Something very strange happened at school today."
"My friend Zoya's companion Twinkle was telling me about her brother. Exactly ten years ago today, he left home one night and never returned."
Ivan paused, glancing at the faces of the people sitting at the table.
"Twinkle said that in appearance he looked exactly like me—as if there was not a single difference between the two of us."
A heavy silence descended upon the room.
The food stuck in the throats of the three men—Ishan, Vikas, and Arya—and they suddenly shuddered with a jolt.
Myra knew nothing about the secret shared by those three men.
Myra asked Ivan, "Son Ivan, did that girl Twinkle mention the boy's name?"
Ivan replied, "Amardeep, the name of that boy was Amardeep."
Ishan was already panicked, but he was not letting anyone see his nervousness.
Growing even more anxious upon hearing Ivan's words, he thought, "Perhaps that boy was Amardeep, whom I killed ten years ago."
"But how can this be possible? We had killed that boy right in the middle of the road and fled."
"We hadn't even buried his body anywhere, so why hasn't his body been found by his family to this day?"
"Did someone steal his body? After all, how can this be possible?"
Vikas and Arya also thought with panic, "How can this be possible? Ten years have passed, has that boy's body really not been found by his family to this day?"
"We hadn't even buried that boy's body, so how is this possible?" They were thinking all this while utterly terrified.
After finishing lunch, Ivan went to his room, and Myra rose from her seat and walked toward the kitchen to tell the servants to clear the dining table.
Seizing the opportunity and out of fear of getting caught, Ishan, Vikas, and Arya decided not to stay inside the house.
The three of them quickly came outside and gathered near Vikas's car.
Vikas took the driver's seat and sat in position to drive.
Right beside him, in the front passenger seat, sat Ishan, whose face had turned pale with fear.
And Arya sat alone and terrified in the back seat.
They climbed inside and pulled the doors shut tightly so that Myra or Ivan upstairs could not overhear them.
Therefore, they began speaking in low, panic-filled whispers.
Vikas whispered in a mixed tone of panic, "This is mind-numbing madness. Ten years! A full ten years!"
"Did anyone ever find the remains of that boy? We threw his body in that hut and left it right there!"
Ishan stopped him with a sharp, stern voice, "Which hut? Has the fear of that night completely ruined your mind?"
"We killed him in the middle of the road and fled!"
Arya cut in, his eyes wide with shock and terror.
"No, Ishan, get a grip on yourself! You killed him on the road, yes, but Vikas and I carried the body away and threw it inside the hut."
"You were standing right behind us, watching everything in heavy terror. Have you forgotten everything out of fear?"
Vikas Mehra showed anger and said, "Your mind is the one that's ruined!"
A sharp, muffled argument broke out inside the car.
Their voices were low, yet they were fighting desperately to hide their dark secret.
Amidst this fierce argument, a jolt of old memories pierced through the fog of Ishan's panic.
The terrifying memories of that dreadful night rushed back, dispelling his confusion.
As his memory refreshed, Ishan's breath caught in his throat.
He remembered everything—how he had killed that boy in the middle of the road, and how Vikas and Arya had lifted that lifeless body and thrown it inside a nearby deserted hut.
While he had stood trembling in the back. Due to severe shock, he had forgotten this fact, but it was all true.
With a pale and trembling face, Ishan grabbed Vikas's arm and whispered in fear, "Stop! Vikas is right... I remember now."
"You both lifted the body and threw it into the hut. I was standing right there, paralyzed with fear. That terror just made me forget..."
As the truth came to light, a suffocating silence settled inside the car.
Finally, they had remembered the right place.
Meanwhile, Ivan was resting on the bed in his room.
Ever since hearing Twinkle's words at school, a restlessness had arisen deep within him.
Those words echoed repeatedly in his mind: A boy who looked exactly like me... why was there not the slightest difference between Amardeep and me?
Where did he disappear ten years ago?
His thoughts drifted back to the events of that morning.
"I initially assumed Uncle Vikas was just shocked to see me, but why that kind of reaction? Why that heart-wrenching scream?"
"Did they know Amardeep personally? If they knew Amardeep, why didn't they tell me about it in the morning?"
"Or they could have told me even while eating lunch. If they knew about Amardeep and didn't want to tell me about him, why would that be?"
After racking his brain for a moment, Ivan thinks, "Did they commit murder? Is Amardeep really dead?"
Looking down at Vikas, Ishan, and Arya inside the car below, he says, "What do you guys think?"
"The boy whom Ishan killed 10 years ago, has he returned to take revenge?"
"Has that same boy taken over Ivan's body to kill Ishan?"
Hearing this, Ishan becomes quite distressed.
Vikas continues, "Perhaps if the boy's ghost has really returned for revenge, it might have been living inside Ivan's body for a very long time."
"Maybe it was slowly transforming Ivan's entire body to look just like him, and now he looks one hundred percent like the boy Ishan killed 10 years ago."
Arya says, "Can he kill both of us too?"
"Even though both of us didn't kill him, only Ishan did; but we helped Ishan too!"
The three of them were trapped in the shadow of terror at that moment, their hearts beating wildly.
Ishan speaks in a crying tone, "Is there no way to escape this?"
Vikas takes a deep breath and says, "I don't know. For now, we should go to that hut and see if his skeleton is there or not."