Tag time

Once upon a time, there lived a king, the Black King. One day he was wandering around his kingdom secretly, when he spotted Madhavi. The Tag Genie had been busy making her confess a lot of things. Like a chivalrous knight, the King volunteered to comment and he too was tagged in turn. And thus began the chronicles of the Black King and the Tag Genie, which you little children might have read as the tales of Vikram and Betaal.


The genie was perturbed when he had a good look at the king. "Say, king, there are many scars on your body --- pick out a scar and tell me, how did you get it?", he said. In reply, the Black King had a smile on his lips: "This scratch you see running down my thigh: thats the oldest one. I had jumped off a roof just as one of my friends decided to move a rusted piece of tin lying around. We were looking for our cricket ball, actually. And then that tin can landed right below me, and tore through my thigh". The genie was very happy to know that... "Aha!", he remarked, "first blood!".

"My dear king", he went on, "you've already shed blood from a wound made by iron!". The King hadn't understood why he was asking the obvious. "Yes, of cou..." he began to say, and before he could finish, the Genie shrieked, "Which means I can look into your thoughts... hahhaa... lets play a game of occlumency and legilimency, shall we?". Before he knew it, the king found his vision blurred. The genie was running around inside his head, randomly picking thoughts and memories.

"Lets see... what does your phone look like?... hmm, Nokia 6610: pretty nice and efficient... lets look at your room... oh empty walls all around your bedroom? Tsk tsk... such a shame: almost like your mind, how come most of it is turning blank around here? Oh I see something... your company's laptop, is it? And the desktop picture here is... oh come on! The company logo, for God's sake!!"... and the Genie stopped ranting. The King was glaring at the Genie, and the latter was cowering. "My apologies, O great king", said he, "I didn't know that you were a skilled Occlumens as well!". The king's glare didn't go away for a long time.... and the genie decided that it would be in his best interests to keep shut for some time.

The cold and foggy night drifted across as the King continued to walk, firm and sure footsteps echoing across the blogdom. "Do you believe in gay marriage?", the Genie asked suddenly. The king was not caught off guard. A moment later, he answered: "What do you mean 'believe'? If you mean whether I think gay people should marry each other, the answer is yes --- I don't care". The Genie was getting puzzled... this King was a very difficult one to figure out, and he didn't want to venture inside the King's mind again. "All right, I give up", he confessed: "Tell me, what do you want more than anything right now?". The king thought for a moment. "More than anything, RIGHT now? Hmm... a sweltering humid summer night with a fan thats whirring overhead as I sit on my bed and type on this laptop: I want an ice cream: nice chocolatey with little nuts and crispies sprinkled over it. And I want to lick and chew it, and when that little smudge spreads across my cheek, I want to reach out and go Sllurrrpppp... aah! Thats what I want! :)". As the king finished describing, he could sense the Genie to be lost in thought himself, picturing that little creamy milk smudge on the cheek. He suddenly shook himself and regained composure.

"Hmm.. okay... looks like you're a tough one... lets try the rapidfire round", the Genie proposed this time. The King was ready. He said, "Shoot!"
- What time were you born?
- 2:00 a.m.!
- Are your parents still together?
- Yes!
- The last person who made you cry?
The King faltered before he answered this one. "The regular readers or subjects of the kingdom of black will perhaps be able to guess this one. But all I can say is, I don't blame anyone for making me cry. It was me, for being such a fool to believe in it all --- I made myself cry. No-one else!".

The Genie thought he had a chance this time, of catching the King off guard. "Oh no-no-no, no long answers! Come, lets resume our little game". The King nodded his approval.
- What is your favourite perfume/cologne?
- Old Spice aftershave!
- What kind of hair/eye color do you like in the opposite sex?
- No preference: black is just fine!

The Genie was nodding this time. "Yeah, I can see... you've got jet black hair and brown eyes yourself!". The King grinned, "I thought you were asking questions?". The Genie said, "Oh, yes yes... right! So, what was I saying?". The King replied, "I think you were about to ask me what I am listening to right now, and the answer is 'Ajeeb daastaan hai ye... ' sung by Lata". He hummed on... "Ye roshni ke saath kyun, dhuaan utha chirag se?". And it was then that the Genie suddenly realised something and spoke up, "Hey, you've been looking inside MY mind!!". He went ballistic, "How could you look inside the mind of a genie, that too the best of them... ME???". The King said, with a twinkle in his eye, "What can I say, I'm the king! :)".

The Genie was desperate now. He asked in earnest, "Do you get scared of the dark?". The King questioned back: "I'm the Black King... should I even be?". "Oh, okay... but at least, do you take or like pain-killers?", the Genie asked, hoping to find one chink in the armour. "No, I don't take them: I can choose not to feel pain, and I rule my body with my mind!", came the firm reply. The question of love and romance should at least stump him, thought the Genie, and played his trump card: "Are you too shy to ask someone out?". The King was not falling for the trap. Pat came the reply, "No, I'm not... I've changed myself. Being shy doesn't help one bit. If I like it, I'll fight for it and get it".

The Genie was crestfallen now. No-one had survived his barrage of questions this far. "Okay, so if you could eat anything right now, what would it be?", he asked. "Why, your head seems tempting!", said the King... and the Genie was aghast! "Please, please tell me... who was the last person you made mad?", he asked, hoping to find some support from somewhere. "Oh a friend of mine, she was down that day and I consoled her at first and then pulled her leg for a long time. She was mad at me, but she had also forgotten her worries. She thanked me later for doing so" --- the King replied. He had seen through the Genie's plot here. And the Genie, in a final act, asked, "So, is someone in love with you right now?". The King was smiling as he saw the Genie drift away. He told to the fleeting shadow, "I wish someone was... there's no-one that I know of, who's in the romantic love with me". And thus the Tag Genie was banished from the Kingdom of Black, where the Black King reigned happily ever after. :)

My apologies for the rather unusually long post --- I just had to mould it differently. Thanks for surviving this far.