Nikhil and Priya walked to the bus stop from school everyday, took a bus to the campus and then walked back home. Theirs was what you could easily describe as a happy idyllic life peppered with simple pleasures. They lived near the beautiful city of Mangalore on the KREC campus. Every Saturday evening, along with their parents, they would ride a bus into town and head straight to Ideal cream parlour. Priya would always have the Sandy nuts and Nikhil the Chocolate dad or Gadbad. On Sundays, sometimes they would walk to Surathkal beach and while Nikhil and Priya played in the water, their parents would watch the sun set. They would walk back to campus chatting and eating the kadle puri they bought from the only seller that sold anything on the beach.

It was 1992 and cable TV was just coming into India and into Nihil and Priya's home as well. The whole family was looking forward to it with repressed glee. The cable guy had been promising to come for a long time and finally after a two week wait he landed up one bright Sunday morning. Little did they know that the black cable would bring a lot more into their life than Star TV.

Nikhil was in the tenth standard and his was a life of discipline. He was woken up every day at 5 AM and studied until 7 AM. Then both the kids got ready, had breakfast and left for school. They were back home by 3 PM, slept for an hour and then went out to play. They got back by 5 PM had coffee and tindi and then it was study time. Whether they liked it or not, they were at their books between 7 PM and 9PM after which they were bundled off to bed.

TV screwed all this up. The kids were constantly watching TV now and their mother was worried. If Nikhil didn't study hard enough, he wouldn't get into a good college and their dreams of him becoming a computer science engineer would be dashed. So their TV viewing was restricted to half an hour every day. The kids were none too happy with this though. They rebelled, screamed, kicked and scratched but their parents didn't give. Nikhil suddenly turned from being a sweet tempered kid into a demon.

One day, the kids didn't come home at their normal time. At 5PM, Lakshmi their mother was frantic. She took a bus to their school and was informed that they left as soon as classes were over. She came back to campus and went to each of their friends' houses but they weren't to be found. Hysterical, she came back home around 7PM hoping to find them. And there they were smiling and chatting with each other watching TV. Their faces were calm and serene. "Where have you been?", Lakshmi screamed. "Oh! we were around", Priya told her mother. They was a certain calmness in her voice that seemed very odd to Lakshmi and sent a chill up her spine. "What do you mean you were around? You can't just go off like this somewhere without letting me or appa know where you're going. Just wait till he gets home, you're in for the hiding of your life!". The kids simply looked at each other and smiled.

This happened for the next month intermittently. The kids simply wouldn't turn up and this sent their mother into conniptions. Finally one day, she decided that she needed to punish them. She got the cable TV connection disconnected. The kids, as usual came home and sat down to watch their evening cartoons only to discover that it was not to be. And then it happened. Nikhil turned purple with rage. "How dare you cut the connection off, you bitch!", he screamed at his mother. "Who the hell do you think you are? You can't control me, you don't own me!", so saying, he drew closer to her menacingly. "I'm going to teach you a lesson you'll never forget", he said as he grabbed her arm and started twisting it. Lakshmi trembled with fear. Were these really her kids? What had happened to the kids with the sweetest demeanour in the world? "Anna!", Priya screamed at Nikhil. "Don't do anything rash. He will tell us what to do. Let her go". Nikhil's face suddenly turned calm. He smiled at Lakshmi, a smile that sent shudders up her spine. Suddenly her son seemed very alien to her.

When Prakash, their father came home that night, Lakshmi told him all. He was furious. He went to the kids rooms woke them up and beat them as he had never beat them before. While they were getting beaten up, the kids just looked at each other and smiled. This made Prakash more furious and he simply beat them more and more. Finally Lakshmi couldn't stand it any more and pulled Prakash away from them. Talking to each other later that night, they decided that they needed to take the kids to the doctor in the city the next day.

The next morning when Lakshmi, feeling apologetic, went to wake up the kids, she saw that they weren't there. They had sneaked out at night. At 11 AM, they were back. Prakash who had taken off from work that day was out frantically searching for them. They came back to find Lakshmi sobbing in the kitchen. Priya, came to her and gently ran her fingers through her hair. "Amma, what's wrong? Why are you crying? Don't worry. We'll make it all right for you. You'll never cry again. NOW!!!" she screamed to Nikhil who was standing behind her. Nikhil quickly wrapped Nylon rope that he had around his mother's neck and started strangulating her with all his strength. Priya joined her brother and pulled at the rope. Lakshmi looked at the kids. The kids looked at the horror in her eyes, and simply pulled harder at rope. Lakshmi slowly started twitching all over and her eyes were closing. After 15 minutes of pulling at the rope, she started turning blue and fainted. "Priya, here, take this knife and cut her throat, make sure she's dead". Priya took the butchers knife and cut her mother's throat almost down to the spine.

They heard Prakash's scooter outside and Nikhil said to Priya. "We need to take care of Appa". Half an hour later it was done.

The kids blood soaked started walking from their house towards the beach. They came to a dense thicket and stood there. Waiting. Soon 5 other blood soaked kids joined them. Then out of the dense undergrowth, out walked a TV. It had two arms, two legs and one eye that kept a watch over them. It also had a benign smile on it's face. A smile so captivating that it made one think that everything was right with the world.

"Well done", it said to the kids.