The problem

The highly classified intelligence procured by Shira turned out to be spectacularly mundane.

Hugo kept his eyes fixed on a scratch in the wooden table as Yuri read the list aloud. The grand, systemic community issues tackled by the previous year's seniors consisted of: insufficient recycling bins in the shopping arcade, ambient noise pollution from the weekend farmer's market, and messy bicycle parking at the mall.

Hugo slowly blinked. He ran the data through his mental processor. A bicycle parked at a forty-five-degree angle instead of a ninety-degree angle was a minor spatial inconvenience. It did not constitute a societal collapse.

"What were the grades for these?" Yuri asked, her red highlighter hovering over the paper.

Shira took a delicate sip of her iced tea. "Most of them averaged a B-plus, though a couple managed an A-minus."

Mina leaned across the table, the fluffy sleeves of her sherpa jacket brushing against the napkin dispenser. "Wait. If they already did all the legwork... what if we pick one of their topics? Do you think they'd let us look at their old research?"

Shira set her glass down, the ice clinking softly. A serene, practical smile touched her lips. "It would certainly save us a lot of time and unnecessary effort."

Hugo looked at the three of them.

Mina was actively advocating for intellectual recycling. Shira was elegantly endorsing the theft of past labor. Yuri was nodding slowly, her highlighter tapping against the table as she calculated the efficiency of the shortcut.

For all their intimidating, high-tier social status, their core philosophy aligned perfectly with his own: minimum input for maximum output. If there was a shortcut to be exploited, they were going to drive a bulldozer straight through it.

Concluding that the project's trajectory was now firmly set on autopilot and no longer required his active processing power, Hugo slid his phone out of his pocket. Under the cover of the table, he opened the municipal bus service app.

He needed to calculate his extraction time. If he mapped the bus schedule now, he could seamlessly detach from the group the exact second Yuri closed her binder.

He typed in his stop and scrolled down the digital timetable.

18:00... 19:00... 20:00... 21:00.

Hugo’s thumb stopped swiping. Below the 21:00 timestamp, the screen was completely blank. A solid block of negative white space. He refreshed the application. The data remained unchanged. The bus service for his residential sector simply ceased to exist after nine o'clock at night.

His eyebrows pulled together a fraction of a millimeter.

"What's wrong, Hugo?"

Mina’s voice cut through the background hum of the restaurant. Hugo looked up. Mina was peering over her glass of melon soda, her bright eyes tracking the sudden halt in his posture.

The tapping of Yuri’s highlighter stopped. Shira shifted her gaze toward him.

Hugo tapped his phone screen once to lock it, then set it on the table.

"Nothing," Hugo stated, keeping his vocal tone entirely neutral. "I was just observing something strange. The bus route for the northern residential district completely stops at nine."

Yuri let out a short, dismissive breath, returning her attention to the binder. "Isn't that obvious? Residential neighborhoods are dead zones at night. Foot traffic drops to zero, so the city cuts the routes to save money. No one commutes out there that late."

Hugo looked at Yuri. He looked at the waitress carrying a tray of dirty dishes past their table. He looked out the massive glass window toward the station plaza, where dozens of storefronts were advertising their weekend hours.

"Stores and restaurants operate until ten," Hugo pointed out, his voice a steady, factual hum. "Including this one. If the buses stop at nine, how do the wage workers living in the residential district get home?"

Yuri’s red highlighter paused halfway to the paper. She blinked, her sharp grey eyes losing their focus for a split second as her worldview suddenly encountered a blind spot.

The silence stretched across the table.

Yuri adjusted her wire-rimmed glasses, her shoulders stiffening slightly. She gave a slight, indifferent shrug. "They probably just drive."

Hugo looked at Yuri, whose confident assumption hung in the air, completely disconnected from the reality of minimum-wage logistics.

"You all work part-time in retail," Hugo stated, shifting his gaze across the table. "Do your shifts ever keep you past nine?"

Shira gently smoothed a crease in her white skirt. "We specifically ask for morning and early afternoon shifts. It interferes less with our studies, so we've never really had to worry about the evening travel."

Hugo nodded slowly, processing the variable. "And the employees who take over for the closing shifts?"

Shira paused. Yuri’s highlighter hovered motionless above the paper. For the first time all morning, a complete, uncalculated silence fell over their side of the booth. The sheer magnitude of a problem they had never personally experienced suddenly materialized right in front of them.

Next to Yuri, the oversized sherpa jacket rustled aggressively.

Mina was actively shrinking into her seat. Her brightly painted fingernails were picking nervously at the condensation on her melon soda glass, her eyes darting between the table and the window.

Hugo watched her posture collapse. "Looks like you have something to say, Mina. "

Mina winced. She looked at Shira, then peeked cautiously at Yuri from beneath her eyelashes. She let out a long, heavy sigh that ruffled her bangs.

"Okay, please don't be mad," Mina started, her voice dropping an octave. "But... last month, I saw this limited-edition jacket online, and I was running a little low on funds. So, I secretly picked up a Wednesday closing shift."

Yuri’s posture instantly snapped rigid. "You what?"

"I thought it would be fine!" Mina defended quickly, waving her hands. "But closing took longer than expected because the register jammed, and by the time I locked up and ran to the station... I missed the last bus by two minutes. The digital board just went entirely black."

Shira’s perfectly polite smile vanished completely. The soft, elegant aura she usually projected hardened into genuine, chilling concern.

"I was stranded at the bus stop in the dark," Mina mumbled, sinking lower into the leather booth. "I panicked and had to call my mom, crying at nine-thirty, to come pick me up."

Yuri dropped her red highlighter. It rolled across the table, leaving a faint pink streak on the wood. She pressed both hands against her temples, her sharp eyes flashing with a mix of disbelief and protective panic.

"Why would you do that, Mina?" Yuri demanded, her voice rising above the ambient noise of the restaurant. "You know it’s not safe to walk around the commercial district alone that late! That’s exactly why we always coordinate our schedules to commute together!"

"I know, I know!" Mina whined apologetically, hiding her face behind her hands. "It was just a one-time thing! I swear I never did it again. I didn't tell you guys because I didn't want to bother you with my own stupid mistake."

The emotional weight at the table spiked. Yuri was lecturing, Mina was apologizing, and Shira was offering a stern but gentle reprimand about the importance of personal safety. The dynamic had shifted entirely from a sterile academic debate to a very real, very loud display of high school friendship.

Hugo watched the drama unfold for exactly three seconds.

Tap. Tap. Hugo knocked his knuckles twice against the hard wooden table, the sharp, hollow sound cutting directly through the emotional crossfire.

Three pairs of eyes snapped toward him.

Hugo didn't smile. He didn't offer Mina a comforting platitude about her traumatic night, nor did he validate Yuri’s safety concerns. He simply leaned back, pointing a single finger at the notebook in front of Yuri.

"That confirms it," Hugo stated, his voice ringing with the dry, satisfying hum of pure efficiency. "We have identified a localized public issue—the termination of the nighttime bus service."

He looked directly at Yuri.