It was a late evening - the kind that sat quietly between day and night. The sky was brushed in shades of deep blue, clouds drifting lazily across it while the moon’s glow slipped through their gaps, silvering the city below. The air carried that stillness that only came once the world had started to fall asleep.

Shouta had decided to take a walk. He preferred this hour - too late for crowds, too early for trouble. The sidewalks were mostly empty, the only sounds the faint hum of traffic in the distance and the whisper of wind against the streetlights. It was peaceful. Quiet. Exactly how he liked it.

Then he slowed.

A few feet ahead, something caught his attention. In the muted shadows, the faint glint of metal - an old payphone stood at the corner. He blinked. A payphone? He hadn’t realized any were still around. It felt like something from another lifetime, a relic stubbornly refusing to disappear, considering it was like the twenty-second century.

Tilting his head, curiosity tugging at him despite himself, his gaze shifted. There was someone there. A lone figure leaning against the phone, half-hidden in the soft glow of the streetlight.

The quiet night suddenly felt a little less empty.