Having slept for most of the day in proper asur fashion, Akasur and Chamund greeted the beautiful Lanka evening with great spirit.

They sat perched on a high wall, not looking down and in possession of two large wooden mugs full of soma stolen from the ruins of the classiest tavern in upper Lanka.

They talked of many things in their lives, recounting tales humourous and otherwise, laughing generously at each others jokes. They remained largely truthful until the soma started getting the better of them. Both fell from their perch and landed with a thud on the street side. In front of them, shops did brisk business and nobody paid them much attention.

Early on in the demon-slaying career of Sri Rama, the prince of Ayodhya went to a swayamvara. He had to string a bow (allegedly Shiva’s) to win a princess’ hand in marriage. In his boyish enthusiasm, he overdid it and ended up snapping the divine instrument in two.

“Oops!” he said under his breath as all of Mithila cheered for him and Sita’s cheeks reddened.

Somewhere far away, the divine triumvirate of Shiva the destroyer, Vishnu the caretaker, and Brahma the creator were watching this live by means known only to them.

Batman wasn’t particularly happy about the fact that he had a desk job at the Justice League Watchtower (an orbiting space station). While Superman and the others got to go out and duke it out with asteroids and maniacal galaxy conquerors, he sat in front of the big screen and did ‘research’ (mostly googling). He resented the fact that his finer detection skills were going waste.

Something moved. In the room. Behind him! Batman ticked off the Flash in his head. It couldn’t be him. He was in the kitchen, visible in one of the screens. Besides, this was something bigger, lumbering and with nothing of the Flash’s swiftness.

There are only so many ways in which you can say ‘old man’. None of them entirely inoffensive. Alezor had an extremely eventful century and a half behind him. He had stood up for truth and justice and things like that. He had battled whatever forces had appeared evil to him in their time. He was an inspiration to good beings in his world and beyond (or so he liked to believe).

“You,” Screamed Reema, “are a hypocrite!”

Paras considered the accusation for a moment. A hypocrite is someone who says something but does something else, or doesn’t do what he says. The meaning was open to interpretation. He kept quiet. He didn’t consider himself old enough to judge.

Reema screamed again, “You say you love dogs. But you wouldn’t let Bozo near Rohan.” Paras gave her a what-the-heck look. “Bozo could swallow Golu alive and not even burp.” Paras pointed out. Eleven-month-old Rohan seemed to agree (He never protested to anything much anyway.).

Over time, Rohan Mishra had resigned himself to people rubbing and pinching his face. He found it very annoying. And though he didn’t know much about law, he was reasonably sure he couldn’t sue them for violating his personal space. Not yet anyway.

I must really do something about this language thing, he had often told himself. A furrowed brow just wasn’t enough.

Desperate times usually call out loud for desperate actions. Rohan did too. But perhaps the reason no one ever listened to his cries was because he tended to do it too often. The calling-for-desperate-actions thing that is. He felt alone, without a hope (usually when he wasn’t busy watching TV or eating.).