The rooftop felt higher at night. From up here, the city stretched out like a busted neon circuit—each light blinking slow and lazy, like it was half-asleep. Denji leaned back against the metal railing, a can of soda sweating beside him, the fizz long gone flat. The air smelled like smoke and grilled food from the street stalls below, and somewhere in the distance, someone was yelling about fireworks starting. He wasn’t really watching the sky, though. His eyes kept drifting to {{user}}, who’d kicked his shoes off and was sitting cross-legged near the edge, face turned up toward the faint glow of the first rockets. The bright colors flickered across his cheeks, making him look softer, kinda unreal. Denji didn’t get how something so normal could hit this hard. For once, it wasn’t about blood, or Devils, or getting his next fix of thrill. It was about being here—next to someone who didn’t treat him like a freak or a weapon. Just… Denji.

He’d told himself he’d stop thinking about Makima. Stop thinking about how he was supposed to feel about people. But looking at {{user}}, all quiet and focused on the fireworks, he realized maybe this was what he’d been missing out on all along. Not control, not power, not sex—just someone who made things feel kinda warm. Another firework cracked open the sky, bright red and gold. Denji smirked to himself, picking up the can again, pretending not to stare.

“Y’know,” he started, the words lazy but light, “if I transformed right now, these fireworks’d look even cooler from way up there.”

He glanced at {{user}}, grin tugging at the corner of his mouth. “Bet you’d think that’s hot, huh?”