The next morning, Rajendra's office smelled faintly of turmeric and panic. The turmeric was from the chai. The panic was from Ricky Fernandes, who was pacing in front of his desk like a caged peacock in a Hawaiian shirt.
"Boss, you're killing me. Five hundred Sony Walkmans? Last month. Two hundred Levi's 501s? Last week. Now you want fifty professional-grade reel-to-reel tape recorders? And not just any—you want Nagra recorders? The ones the BBC uses? Do you know how much a Nagra costs? It's like strapping a Mercedes to your shoulder!"
Rajendra leaned back, sipping his chai. "I need pristine audio quality, Ricky. For the national heritage project."
"National heritage my left foot! You're starting a bootleg radio station! Are we recording dying languages or making disco mixes for the Politburo?"
"Both require good equipment," Rajendra said, deadpan.
Ricky threw his hands up. "And the shipping! 'Send to remote villages in Odisha, Bihar, and the Nicobar Islands.' Boss, the Nicobar Islands are where ships go to be eaten by giant crabs! I have a cousin in Port Blair. He says the locals are lovely but the logistics are a nightmare wrapped in a cyclone."
"That's why I pay you the big bucks, Ricky. You're the Director of Non-Standard Procurement. This is non-standard. Procure it."
Ricky slumped into a chair, his dramatic energy spent. "Fine. But I'm charging a hazard bonus. And I want it in writing that if I'm eaten by a giant crab, you'll name a pressure cooker after me. The Ricky Deluxe. It whistles 'Hotel California.'"
"Deal."
As Ricky slunk out, muttering about crabs and Nagras, Shanti walked in. She looked at the retreating back of the Hawaiian shirt. "Was he crying?"
"Just expressing his artistic temperament. What's up?"
"The folklorist. Professor Iyer from St. Xavier's. He's agreed to consult. He's… enthusiastic. He brought three trunks of equipment and a pet parrot that knows tribal curse words."
"A parrot?"
"It's green. It keeps saying 'Your methodology is reductive!' in a perfect imitation of the Professor's voice. I think it's his dissertation critic."
Rajendra rubbed his temples. "As long as he gets the recordings. Set him up with a budget and a minder. Make sure the parrot gets sunflower seeds. We don't need a cursed bird on our hands."
The day lurched forward. A meeting with the construction foreman for the new factory on Indumati Patil's land. The man, Kulkarni, spoke in grunts and pointed at concrete slabs as if they had personally offended him.
"This column is two millimeters off," Kulkarni growled, pointing to a perfectly vertical pillar.
"Two millimeters? In a five-acre factory?"
"Two millimeters is a canyon! The spirit of the building will be lopsided! The machines will vibrate! The pressure cookers will whistle in the key of despair!"
Rajendra decided not to argue with a man who believed in the emotional well-being of concrete. "Fix it. However you need to."
Next, a call from Prakash Mehra. The director was in a state of ecstatic anxiety.
"Shakuniya-ji! The film is a blockbuster! The distributors are begging for more! They want a sequel! Pyaar Ki Jeet 2: Electric Boogaloo!"
"I don't think that's the title, Prakash-ji."
"No, no, but the spirit! The spirit! We must strike while the hero is young and his hair is voluminous! I have a script idea—the same lovers, but now they are rival pressure cooker salespeople! The drama! The steam!"
Rajendra gently steered him toward a more traditional romantic plot, hung up, and felt a headache brewing behind his eyes.
He was saved by the soft chime of the System. A message from Vex.
Vex: Nutrient paste delivered and administered per your operative's report. Vesperae subject is stable. Psychic dampening field is holding. New behavioral note: Subject has developed an interest in the "Sounds of Nature" cassette. Particularly Track 3: "Babbling Forest Brook." He has requested if "the water singer has a mate." I have no data on the marital status of recorded hydrological features.
Rajendra stared at the message. Kael, a vampire alien from another dimension, was wondering if a tape-recorded stream was single. It was so absurd he almost laughed.
He typed back: "Please inform the subject that the brook is a solo performer. But we will look for duets."
He then checked the Medi-Pharm update from Dr. Chaudhary. The first large-scale batch of Formula K-7 antibiotics was ready, bottled, and labeled with MANO's new "Arogya-Seva" (Health Service) logo. It looked legitimate, life-saving, and profoundly boring. Perfect.
It was past sunset when Ganesh appeared, looking more rumpled than usual.
"Bhai. The Karjat headman. Patil's cousin. He's back. And he's brought friends. Not stick-wielders. Politicians. A local panchayat member and a man from the zoning office. They are 'inspecting' the greenhouse. They say the structure is 'unnatural' and may be affecting the village's sacred geography."
Rajendra sighed. "How sacred can the geography be if they were trying to sell it for a petrol pump last year?"
"Sacred is flexible, bhai. It bends toward the wallet."
"What do they want?"
"A monthly 'community development fee.' Plus jobs for twenty relatives. And they want the greenhouse blessed by their temple priest. With a special, expensive ceremony."
Rajendra looked down at the nano-ring on his finger. An idea, both terrible and wonderful, formed. "Tell them we agree. We will have a blessing ceremony. Tomorrow at dusk. We will provide the priest."
Ganesh blinked. "We don't have a priest."
"We will by tomorrow."
That night, Rajendra stood in the empty mill warehouse. He focused on the ring. He needed a convincing holy man—someone who looked ancient, wise, and vaguely mystical. The ring flowed over his hand, up his arm, and across his body in a shimmering wave of silver. It was a bizarre, ticklish sensation, like being dipped in warm mercury.
Minutes later, he stood before a cracked full-length mirror. Staring back at him was a stooped, elderly sadhu with a long white beard, ash-marked forehead, and tattered saffron robes. The ring had restructured his clothing and even created realistic-looking wrinkles and age spots. He poked his own cheek. It felt like his cheek.
He practiced a raspy, pious voice. "My children, the earth spirits are pleased with your offerings of… job quotas and cash."
It needed work.
He concentrated again. The ring reshaped, and he was himself once more, standing in his regular clothes. The transformation had used noticeable energy—he felt a slight drain, like after a long run. The ring's manual had warned about mass shifts. Turning into a car was probably out. But a sadhu? Doable.
The next evening, as the sun dipped behind the Western Ghats, a crowd gathered at the edge of the Karjat greenhouse. The headman, his politician friends, and a gaggle of villagers stood expectantly. Shanti was there too, arms crossed, one eyebrow raised so high it threatened to escape her forehead.
A hush fell as a figure emerged from the tree line. It was the sadhu, moving with slow, deliberate steps, a brass kamandalu (water pot) in one hand. The ring had even fabricated the pot. It was empty, but it looked authentic.
The sadhu reached the group, his eyes half-closed in spiritual detachment. He raised a bony hand.
"I have communed with the devatas of this land," he intoned, his voice a magnificent, gravelly whisper. "They are not angry with the… clear walls and strange waters."
The headman puffed out his chest. "But the vibrations, Guruji! The unnatural growth!"
The sadhu fixed him with a piercing gaze. "The vibrations you feel are not from the greenhouse. They are from your own discontent. The earth spirits say you have taken three bribes this month and lied to your wife about the price of a new goat."
The headman's jaw dropped. The villagers tittered.
"To purify the land," the sadhu continued, "you must make an offering. Not of money. Of labor. You and your friends will volunteer one day each week at the greenhouse. You will learn the sacred work of growing healing herbs. This will balance the energies. Refuse…" The sadhu's eyes seemed to glow faintly in the twilight. "And the next monsoon will fall only on your roof. And it will be frogs."
There was a long, stunned silence. Then the headman, thoroughly out-mystic'ed and publicly shamed, nodded meekly.
The ceremony concluded with the sadhu sprinkling "holy water" (from the kamandalu, which Rajendra had filled from a hose) around the greenhouse. The crowd dispersed, buzzing with talk of the powerful new sage.
As the sadhu shuffled back into the trees, Shanti caught up to him. She didn't say a word, just looked him up and down, her eyes narrowing.
The sadhu winked at her.
She shook her head, a slow smile spreading across her face. "You," she whispered, "are the most ridiculous man I have ever met."
The sadhu—Rajendra—grinned beneath the beard. "It worked, didn't it?"
He melted into the forest, and a few minutes later, Rajendra emerged from the other side, smoothing down his kurta. The ring was back on his finger, slightly warm.
He walked back to the car where Ganesh waited, the older man's face a mask of awe.
"Bhai… that was…"
"Efficient," Rajendra finished, sliding into the passenger seat. "Let's go home. I need to check if a vampire alien is still dating a cassette tape."
Ganesh started the car, muttering under his breath. "A pressure cooker king, a folk song pirate, a smuggler, and now a shape-shifting sadhu. What's next? A talking dog?"
"Don't give the System any ideas," Rajendra said, leaning his head against the window, finally allowing himself to smile. For a moment, the tangled web of empires, aliens, and bureaucrats didn't seem so heavy. It just seemed… lively.
And in a castle far away, a lonely Vesperae listened to a babbling brook on infinite loop, quietly hoping the singer would someday introduce itself.