Satjelia village, 5:15 a.m.
The sky was still the colour of wet ash when Medini stepped out of the forest-guest-house, barefoot, hair tied in a messy bun, carrying nothing but a cloth jhola and a smile that could power a small town.
She knocked on the first door.
By 5:45 she had visited twelve homes, drunk six cups of thick red tea, and filled three notebook pages with problems:
"Malaria medicine finishes in two days."
"Cyclone warning comes too late."
"Children don't know how to tie a proper knot for the boat."
By 7:30 half the village was following her like ducklings while she handed out laminated emergency-contact cards, taught basic CPR on a rice sack, and promised every household a "Green Guardian" box if she won.
Sindhu left at dawn with eight honey-collectors and two forest guards, carrying a dozen hand-made sensor buoys painted bright yellow.
Out on the water he showed them how to tie the buoys to bamboo poles.
When a four-metre crocodile surfaced twenty metres away, the buoy screamed like a siren.
The men's eyes went wide.
By noon they were teaching each other how to make more.
AJ marched straight into the forest range office, laptop under one arm, drone in the other.
"Sir, imagine tourists paying to watch tigers on live stream while your department gets instant poacher alerts."
The officer, who had been fighting poachers with one jeep and two rifles for twenty years, stared at the drone footage of a tiger yawning in 4K.
He signed the permission form without a word.
Madhu worked alone.
He walked the length of the village canal, tested the water with a cheap TDS meter, winced at the numbers, and quietly set up his floating purifier at the mouth where river met canal.
Children gathered.
He explained in broken Bengali how the bacteria inside would eat poison and give them sweet water.
An old woman patted his cheek and called him "bhalo chhele".
He nearly cried.
Manu and Vishwakarma finally emerged at 10 a.m., yawning, hair full of sawdust from last-minute modifications.
They carried their survival kit like proud parents.
Within an hour they had built a working water filter from mud and mangrove roots, erected a storm-proof shelter using only vines, and accidentally started a village-wide competition to see who could assemble it fastest.
The judges watched everything from the broadcasting room (a converted school classroom lined with monitors).
Dr Anahita Saha sat in the centre, notebook open, pen moving like a scalpel.
"Five criteria," she said, voice ice-cold.
"Interaction. Affordability. Aesthetics. Environmental harmony. Room for improvement. Ten points each."
She clicked to Madhu's feed (close-up of the boy knee-deep in muddy water, explaining bacteria to wide-eyed children).
"Interaction: 8. Affordability: 4. Aesthetics: 3. Environmental harmony: 7. Room for improvement: 9."
She wrote the numbers without emotion.
Professor Jagadish leaned back, arms folded.
"Viability to the masses is key. The project the villagers trust most will win. Simple."
Mr Bonbehari Ray said nothing for a long time.
Then, quietly:
"If their machines hurt the forest, or scare the tigers, or make the deer run farther from the water… they lose.
Humans here are animals too. We forget that at our peril."
The red light on the main camera glowed.
Every word was being recorded for the live global broadcast that would air tonight.
Outside, the village buzzed with new hope and new toys.
Inside the darkened room, three judges wrote numbers that would decide futures.
Satjelia village schoolroom, 9:30 p.m.
The single bulb flickered.
Five plastic chairs in a half-circle.
Three judges behind a wooden table like a tribunal.
Outside, cicadas screamed louder than the ceiling fan.
One by one the contestants were called in, given thirty seconds of praise and three minutes of surgery, then sent back into the night.
Madhu's turn.
He walked in clutching the feedback notebook they'd handed everyone, knuckles white.
Mr Bonbehari Ray spoke first, voice low and flat, the way the river speaks before it swallows a boat.
"Your floating box blocks sunlight. Baby fish need light. Crocodiles use the canal to move between ponds. One of them bangs his nose on your machine, he will remember. And he will come back angry."
Madhu opened his mouth; nothing came out.
Professor Jagadish raised a gentle hand.
"Easy, Bonbehari-da. The boy's design is clever. Dissolved oxygen levels in the canal rose 38 % in twelve hours. Dysentery cases will drop before the week is out. That is real."
He turned kind eyes on Madhu.
"But Mr Ray is right. The forest does not forgive clumsy footprints. Make it smaller. Make it transparent. Let the river breathe."
Dr Anahita Saha had not looked up from her notebook once.
Now she did, and the temperature in the room seemed to drop five degrees.
"Interaction: 7.
Affordability: 3.
Aesthetics: 2.
Environmental harmony: 5.
Room for improvement: 10."
She closed the notebook with a soft snap.
"Commercially, it is dead on arrival. Too expensive for villages, too ugly for resorts.
But the core idea is… salvageable."
She leaned forward, and for a moment her smile was almost maternal.
"Come intern with us at the Institute, Mr Madhusūdana. Six months in our prototyping facility, unlimited budget, and I will personally mentor you.
We'll turn your science-fair project into something the world will pay for."
The offer hung in the air like smoke.
Madhu swallowed.
"Th-thank you, Doctor. I'll… think about it."
He bowed and stumbled out into the night, ears ringing.
When the last contestant left, Dakshraj gathered all five of them under the banyan tree.
The judges watched from the veranda, faces unreadable.
Daksh's voice was soft but carried like a temple bell.
"Tonight's final task—no scores, no cameras.
Talk to each other.
Not as rivals.
As pieces of the same puzzle.
How does Medini's emergency network warn Sindhu's crocodile buoys?
How does Madhu's clean water feed Manu–Vishwa's shelter gardens?
How do AJ's drones protect Medini's seedling sites?
You have one hour.
Convince each other that together you are unstoppable.
Because if you can't convince yourselves…
the forest certainly won't."
He walked away, leaving them in the circle of lantern light.
Medini spoke first, voice small but steady.
"I'll start. My kids can plant mangrove seedlings… but if the water stays poisoned, they die in a month. Madhu-bhai, I need your river alive."
Madhu looked at his hands, still smelling of canal mud.
"Then I need Sindhu-di's buoys to tell me when crocodiles are near the purifier so I can pull it up at night."
Sindhu grinned for the first time all day.
"And my buoys need Manu–Vishwa's solar panels that don't die in salt air."
Manu and Vishwakarma bumped fists.
"We'll make them float and crocodile-proof."
AJ raised his drone controller like a toast.
"And I'll live-stream every success so the whole world sends you money instead of sympathy."
For the first time in weeks, Madhu laughed (short, surprised, real).
Under the banyan, five strangers started sketching on the ground with sticks, voices overlapping, ideas catching fire.
On the veranda, Anahita watched the monitors, expression unreadable.
Mr Ray stood beside her, arms folded.
"They are learning," he rumbled.
Anahita's smile was thin and sharp.
"Good.
The forest likes fast learners.
It eats the slow ones."