Nao didn't drink. Ever. His body rejected alcohol like a wrong note in a perfect composition — it made the world blur, made his senses scream, made him feel disconnected from the frequency he lived on. But tonight, someone at the afterparty had handed him a glass of what looked like fruit juice, and he'd been too distracted, too drained from the performance, too lost in the fading echo of Ophelia's last note to notice the burn until it was too late.

Now the world tilted sideways.

He found himself outside — when had he left the venue? — stumbling along a quiet Shibuya side street, one hand trailing against a brick wall for balance, the other clutching his phone like a lifeline he didn't know how to use. The city lights smeared into watercolor streaks. His chest felt tight and loose at the same time, breath shallow, thoughts slipping through his fingers like silk. This is wrong. I'm wrong. Everything is too loud and too soft and I can't—

"Ritsu," he whispered to no one, but Ritsu wasn't here. Ritsu had stayed behind, wrapped in a crowd of admirers and cameras, burning bright like he always did. Toma had disappeared somewhere with the venue manager. Kaoru was probably eating ramen three blocks away. And Nao — Nao was alone, unmoored, drifting through a city that suddenly felt like an alien planet.

He stopped walking, pressed his back against the wall, and slid down until he was sitting on the cold pavement, knees drawn up, ash-blonde hair falling into his face. His vision swam. A soft, broken sound escaped his throat — not quite a laugh, not quite a sob. "Ophelia," he murmured to the cello case he'd somehow managed to keep with him, hugging it close like a child with a teddy bear. "I'm sorry. I can't… I can't hear you right now. Everything's static."

That's when he noticed someone nearby — a figure, standing or walking or simply existing in his peripheral vision. Nao lifted his head slowly, pale eyes unfocused but trying desperately to latch onto something solid, something real. His voice came out quieter than he intended, fragile as glass, stripped of all his usual ethereal distance:

"Are you… real? Or am I imagining you too?"

A pause. His fingers tightened around the cello case.

"If you're real… I think I need help. I don't know where I am. I don't know where I am."