The press had limits.
Vikram knew it.
It was safe, predictable. But small. No power passed through it — no real money, no officials, no merchants. Only paper and sweat.
If he wanted reach, he needed the streets.
So he started walking.
Not aimlessly. He mapped them in his head — Gali Barfiyan, the lanes near the spice market, the Muslim quarters, the alleys behind the grain sellers. He watched who sat where. Who shouted. Who got silence.
He watched the boys who didn't run when the constables came. The men who didn't carry goods but always stood near those who did. The women who whispered to rickshaw pullers and sent them off without lifting a basket.
That's where the real city moved.
He worked slow.
A hand on a porter's arm when he pretended to trip. Three seconds. Connection made.
An apology to a shop boy while adjusting a parcel. Three seconds.
He offered to help stack wood for the tea man. Just for a moment. Three seconds.
In three days, he had seven new minds.
The orbs were rougher out here. More chaotic.
Intermediate Street Navigation
Beginner Theft
Elementary Threat Detection
Beginner Gossip Control
Some of the names made him pause.
Gossip Control came from a beggar woman who hadn't bathed in weeks. Her mind was sharp. Her skill set wide. She knew which houses cooked mutton twice a week. Who had a son in the constabulary. Which shop owners cheated on their wives.
He copied her orbs. Gave one to a kid in his press network.
Within a day, the boy started asking better questions.
He started offering information.
Vikram didn't praise him.
He just nodded and passed a leftover roti down from the ledge. The boy grinned and disappeared into the crowd.
By the end of the week, his Delhi map wasn't just streets.
It was nodes.
He had thirty-seven minds in the press sector.
Now fifteen in the outer streets.
He began noticing how fast he could think.
How long he could walk without tiring.
How no face surprised him anymore — he remembered too much now.
One night, as he sat on the mosque step near Chitli Qabar — pretending to tie his chappal — two constables passed.
One glanced at him, looked away.
But the other paused. A second too long.
Vikram felt it.
He'd been seen.
He didn't know by who. Maybe not even by name. But something about him had caught the man's eye.
Later that night, he returned to the press.
Everyone was asleep.
He went to the one thread he'd added that day — a chai boy who served near the police post. He reached into the mind, now at rest.
He dug through the day.
And found it.
The constable's name: Hariram.
The chai boy had heard him mutter to his partner, "That boy — the tall one — he walks like he owns the street. Doesn't beg. Doesn't blink. Watch him."
Vikram pulled back.
No panic.
Just a reminder.
He wasn't invisible anymore.
But it was fine.
The street was watching.
And now, so was he.