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The night is eerily silent. Astral usually would pick up on quiet conversations reserved for private bedrooms and the sounds of tires rolling softly over pavement as they head home around this time, but he hears nothing. It’s as if someone has hit the mute button on Heartland City, and all that remains are the blinding lights, scorching his vision a little too brightly to be welcoming.
It’s not unusual for Astral to be out around now, while Yuma has tucked himself into a ball on his hammock and dozed off. He doesn’t mind staying in (it gives him a chance to catch up on the adventures of Esper Robin), it’s just that he learns many things while out and about like this, some things that he feels he shouldn’t rely on Yuma for answers to. He’s seen people in dark alleyways, making foreign noises, people atop their houses, jumping off the edges as if to fly like Astral is, and people exchanging currency, handing each other small bags of unknown substances with sleights of hand. It all makes for a rather weird worldview, but Astral supposes he still has much to learn about humans, with all their strange facets and such.
A faint glint amongst the shining lights catches his eye, and he shifts his direction to go towards it with vague interest. It’s coming from Heartland, specifically a skyscraper with a small, flat heart-shaped roof stationed towards the center. As Astral gets closer he makes out a figure sitting with their legs dangling off the edge, and Astral wonders if he’s going to be witness to another untimely death tonight. He gets closer still, though, and eventually he recognizes blond hair, flecked with teal. Kaito sits on the edge there, watching the rest of Heartland with eyes like a dead fish, with breaths that come to him as if they’re a chore.
Sometimes, Astral wonders if it’d be possible for him to will himself into human existence. He’s already visible to Yuma, but there are so many more people he wants to meet, to talk to on his own. Sure, there are a few people capable of seeing him, but Astral’s not sure he wants to associate himself with someone like Tron on the basis of sight. It’s times like now, though, that the thought of un-concealing his presence comes to mind, if that were possible to begin with. He hasn’t tried, but still.
And so, he sits beside Kaito, saying and doing nothing but watching the landscape with the other nearby. The bulbs of Heartland’s gigantic spotlights still burn his eyes, but Kaito doesn’t look away from them, so Astral doesn’t, either.
They stay like that for some time, enough time that a barrage of thinly veiling clouds has passed overhead and floated away to expose the moon. Kaito sighs as he lays his gaze upon her beauty, and Astral can swear he sees her own turn melancholic as Kaito’s grip on the edge of the building loosens. “Kaito.” He feels himself whisper, reaching out to place a hand on his shoulder, expression dropping when his hand goes right through. The other’s grip continues to lessen.
“Kaito.” Astral says aloud, more aware of his own words now. He attempts to grab him by the wrist, but again, his hand phases through Kaito like he’s only thin air. “Kaito, stop.” He repeats, balling his hands into fists as the other smiles a small, weary smile up at the moon. She looks away, tears welling up at the corners of her eyes.
There is nothing I can do, Astral realizes. If Kaito dies here, then Astral will live to see it, and that will be that. There is no reassurance he can give, even if the other could hear him-- there are no words of solace to offer to begin with. He almost looks away in spite of himself, in spite of his guilt and sadness to see Kaito go this way of all ways, but Astral forces his gaze to not waver from Kaito’s own, still fixated on the moon. He wants to see it with his own eyes, in a morbid sort of disbelieving way.
“Kaito.” He murmurs once more, and instead of reaching out for the other this time, he places his hand gently in the space above the other’s, holding it meticulously in the air so it doesn’t pass through. He doesn’t expect any sort of response to his attempt at holding Kaito’s hand, but as if the ethereal warmth of Astral’s hold has taken effect, Kaito’s head whips around to the side. Though he sees no one there, the warmth does not leave, and instinctively he grasps the rooftop ledge once more. Astral smiles, ever so slightly.
He knows Kaito did not see him, but soon after their exchange (if it can even be called that) the other retreats back indoors, back to where his brother is sleeping and his father is plotting. Astral realizes that there will be a time in the future in which he faces Kaito once more, just like when they dueled inside the Key, but he does not wish to bypass such a thing. Yuma’s spirit of creating relationships through dueling has likely spread to him, he thinks with a soft look in his eyes.
He sits atop the building there for a few minutes more, watching the moon in silence before he returns home. Heartland’s bustling sounds are quiet now, but they are there nonetheless.