“There is a flood alert you know! Looks like the road ahead is under water now. You still want to go that way?” Geeta asked Ishaan.

Ishaan started his motorcycle. “We’d be home before you knew it.”

She put the helmet on and made herself comfortable on the pillion seat. “My dad will kill me if he sees me with you.”

“My mother will kill you if she sees me with you!” Ishaan smiled.

“Same difference.” Geeta laughed.

They took a left turn from the main road.

“A lake? I thought we had a road here.” Ishaan exclaimed. They were riding the machine on a submerged road. It was seven in the evening and there was a slight drizzle. Wherever they saw, they saw only water.

“I’m scared” Geeta clutched his shoulders.

“Me too” He told her.

“Shameless pig. You are NOT supposed to say that. You are supposed to tell me that I shouldn’t worry; that I’d be home before I knew it; blah blah blah.. Yadda Yadda Yadda”

The bike stopped.

“Now what?” she asked him.

“Looks like we gotta walk” Ishaan tried restarting the bike.

“Perfect. What a romantic getaway! Here we are… in the middle of a large lake – with the assumption that there is a road underneath. I can feel it by the way. I love walking any way” Geeta mumbled.

He looked her sympathetically. “Slow down. Slow down. Take it easy. Things happen. This is a challenge and we have to face it. Maybe there is something in it for us”

“In this?” she asked him.

“Yes. Why not? For starters, there is this invaluable concept called – Experience.”

“And?” she probed him.

“Well, who knows? It might be quite useful in future.”

“The experience of walking like this? I don’t think so. I don’t think I am getting into another situation like this ever again. Keep that etched on your mind.”

“Listen” he suddenly stopped walking and stared at the deserted car in front of him. Geeta listened. She could hear nothing but the ripples of water.

“I hear nothing” she whispered.

“Shh” he motioned her to be quiet and gently knocked twice on the window of the car.

For a minute everything was quiet. Then a couple of eyes rose to the window sill and stared at them.

“My God!” Geeta screamed, “There is something in there! Alive!”

The eyes simply stared at them nonchalantly. Life was fast draining out of those eyes. They had to act fast to rescue the dog.

He desperately looked around to see if there was anything he could use to open the car. All he could see was water. It felt as if they were standing right in the middle of an ocean. The thin line separating the road from the lake had long since submerged. Now it was just a plain sheet of water extending to the horizon. It was as deep as fifteen feet at places and as shallow as three inches at others.

“The water level could be rising!” Geeta sounded a word of caution, “Let’s get help!”

Ishaan shook his head. “The puppy won’t hold till then. It is deprived of Oxygen. We got to get him out immediately.”

“Your bike!” Geeta suddenly remembered, “Tool box?”

Ishaan would have hugged her right there if he had time. He just made a mental note of it and waded towards his bike. The spanner greeted him warmly. “Eureka!” he shouted.

“I can’t break the front windshield. I shouldn’t break the rear window either because the puppy might get hurt. I should break open the navigator side window.” He talked to no one in particular. Geeta nodded. She knew Ishaan talked mostly to himself and normally didn’t expect anyone to respond.

He walked slowly to the other side of the car in knee deep water. He paused for a moment when he reached the edge of the car. He didn’t know how deep the water was – in front of him. He didn’t want to take any risks.

“Careful” Geeta shouted.

Ishaan climbed on the bonnet of the car and looked inside. He couldn’t see the puppy. It was pitch dark. He took his chances and hit the window glass with all his might. The glass cracked. It took him nearly five minutes to break open the window.

“Don’t open the door of the car” Geeta cautioned him.

He nodded. It would be like opening the floodgates of a dam. If the puppy was on the floor of the car, the force of water could hurt it.

Methodically he removed all the protruding spikes of glass from the window and called out – “Hi” unsure of whether the dog had been conditioned to respond to such calls.

It didn’t.

“Tommy!” he tried various names. There was no response. He took his mobile phone out and switched on the light. It didn’t help much. He could see that the seats were empty. The light could not illuminate the floor of the car.

“I am going in” he declared.

Geeta gasped. “NO! Too dangerous. There may be a flash flood. See the water level is rising. Let us get out of here. It is too risky Ishaan. Let us go!”

He shook his head. “I can’t let it die here.”

“And I can’t let you die here.” Geeta was furious, “Get moving. Remember! It will be really difficult for me to cross this wretched stretch alone!”

He stared at her, “That is what it is all about, huh? You’re worrying about crossing it alone!”

She smiled, “At the grassroots level, everyone is selfish.”

He examined the window, the horizon and his girlfriend, “Sigmund Freud?”

“What?”

“I mean, have you been reading Freud these days?”

“Yes I am. But that is not the point. And you have just wasted a couple of minutes. The flash flood is nearer now than it was earlier – if at all there is one!” Geeta firmly told him.

He didn’t reply. He knew Geeta would kill him if he didn’t save the puppy. All this talk was for the sake of talking. She knew he wouldn’t let go of the puppy. She didn’t want him to either.

The drizzle intensified into a steady downpour.

“What if it bit me? I am sure it is under severe psychological stress” Ishaan again talked to himself.

“The latest Rabies injection has only one dose. Don’t worry about it. My father will administer it free of cost for you!” She clarified an important fact to Ishaan.

He took a deep breath and squeezed into the car. “Ouch. Shucks man!” He examined his leg. It was a deep cut. Blood was gushing out.

He wasted no time and quickly located the terrified puppy in a corner. It was just days old. Whoever left it there, he could skin them alive.

There was a big roar. “Ishaan”, Geeta cried! He looked back at the horizon. There was a sheet of water coming towards the car.

“Get out of here, NOW” He shouted.

Geeta froze. She was not sure where to go. She had to take a split-second decision.

Ishaan kicked open the door on the other side and swam across the incoming water. In a minute he was outside the car with Geeta.

The wall of water was very close. They didn’t have enough time to escape.

“Climb up the car and hold on to the luggage rack” he shouted.

It hit them with a feverous intensity. They could not withstand the force and were swept off the car. Ishaan gripped the rack as hard as he could and prayed God. He could not breathe.

“Geeta, can you marry me?” He asked her sipping a hot cup of black coffee. The suddenness of the proposal almost threw her off the chair. When she recovered she told him “I can. But will I or will I not is the question.”

It was water all around him. His chest became heavy.

“Stop preaching me English lessons yaar. I am serious. Will you marry me?” He asked again. She bit her lip and told him in no nonsense terms – “Sure”.

He was losing consciousness and continued to swing alternatively between reality and forced introspection of his life thus far.

“Wow! She is cute.” He exclaimed when he saw her at the CoffeeDay outlet. “That is right” agreed Shyam.
“I want to talk to her.” Ishaan declared and boldly made his first move. “Hi, can I buy you a cup of coffee?”

He was desperate for oxygen. He gulped down some water involuntarily.

“Look there is a snake here” Ishaan was thrilled. The snake was not. It just grazed away. He chased it but couldn’t catch it. He was caught by his mother though. A very intense round of spanking followed. He swore he would never again chase anything in his life… a rule he did not break until he ran into Geeta, and the run morphed into a mighty chase to ensure they walked together for the rest of their lives.

There was a light; quite bright it was. More like a halo and it was growing – all pervading – engulfing Ishaan. He was beginning to enjoy it…

He looked in complete disbelief at his score card. His was the worst performance in the class. At this rate, he would not be considered for any of the campus interviews. He went to his room, locked himself up and cried the whole afternoon.

The light suddenly shrank. Then there was a sudden rush of air into his lungs. He couldn’t believe it. He could breathe again. He regained consciousness and lunged for more air as his head emerged from the water.

He opened his eyes and looked around. The water level had risen by a foot. His bike was nowhere to be seen. He looked up at Almighty and offered a prayer to him. He was given a preview of death.

And then he remembered.

“Geeta!” the sheer intensity of that shout could have killed his ailing lungs. He didn’t care. “Geeta” he shouted again.

Water replied with its characteristic ripple – very innocent, gentle and breezy.

“What happened to the puppy?” Dr. Mehta asked Ishaan.

“No idea. I remembered about the puppy only after being rescued from the flood. By then, it was not in my hands. Guess they both are together!” Ishaan replied calmly.

“It’s been almost a year, Ishaan. You need to move on.”

Ishaan looked at the doctor. He could see that the doctor’s eyes were moist. They stared at each other for some time. There was no reason to prolong the conversation. It was a tragedy they had to cope with. One lost his girlfriend and the other, his daughter.

They met on the same day every month; had the same conversation and had tea together.

“Thanks for the tea, Sir” Ishaan told the doctor and traced his steps back home. The road was silent and calm. The horizon was clear. He stopped for a moment. Nine months ago, it was on the same spot that he lost the most precious thing of his life – his life.

The End.

These days the genre itself is dying but Adventure Games were ruling the cyberspace ten years ago. People who are into AG cannot feign ignorance about the baap of all such games - Sierra's King's Quest series.

I grew up on a staple diet of KQ - It has become an integral part of my life - KQ 1 to KQ 8. And then the series died!! (KQ 8 was nothing to write home about. It was the weakest link of the series IMO)

KQ fans all over the world rejoiced when some hardcore fans came up with a KQ 9 game. (This was not an official sequel.) However Vivendi, who bought the rights of KQ series from Sierra - slapped a legal notice on the developers of KQ 9 and they promptly obliged by shelving the project.

This was a huge huge huge disappointment to KQ fans. Moreso because neither Vivendi nor Sierra has any plans of continuing the KQ series. They could have let the unofficial KQ 9 as it is.. or accord it the official status. But no! They decided to bury the project instead.

I sincerely believe it is a temporary setback for KQ 9. I am pretty confident that the same game would undergo minor changes and see that light of day - as perhaps Rozella's Quest (Notice the Z - Copyright issues with "S")

Anyways, if you are a KQ buff and if you hated the very old EGA interfaces of KQ2 to 4, (KQ1 was later remade as a VGA game) smile! Anonymous Game Developers Interactive (AGDInteractive.com) has rewritten KQ2 and released the VGA version in 2002. (I caught it on the net only yesterday!) This version uses the KQ5 Mouse interface instead of the KQ Text Entry interface and is full of lovely music and takes place in a painstakingly developed world of Koeyna. It has an expanded storyline and 85% of the puzzles are either new or radically restructured.

This game is also not an official remake of KQ2 and they aptly call it a Tribute to KQ2 - because that is exactly what it is. The entire game is about 120MB in size. (46 MB game + Music pack + Voice pack).

It can keep you glued to your outdated PC for days if not weeks. (It is a very primitive game in terms of graphics. So even your 486 - if you have one - can run this game very well.)

I just wonder - Why Vivendi didn't bring this site down!! Vivendi has plans of offering a Collectors Edition of all King's Quest games on Amazon. Wonder who will buy KQ2 original when KQ2VGA is available free on the net.

Hoping that KQ 9 will pass all these hurdles and land up in my PC one fine day.

Till then! O King Graham, thou shalt be a little more careful!