"I'm not already?" she wonders, wryly. "I'm kidding, I know what you mean. I'd love to, but haven't had the opportunity yet."

"'M sure you could. Next time sunbae goes, but maybe even without 'im?"

"Does he do that often? I've been avoiding the news lately. It seems like that would be kind of..." Suicidal! With his backlash, especially! What the fuck, Tae-gun!

"Sometimes," he says, doing a so-so gesture with a hand. "More than he ought to. But that's everything, with hunny gunny—ahh, with sunbae."

"Hunny gunny," she repeats, delighted.

He giggles and hiccups. "'Scuse me." More wine. "Don't say that in front of him. Or do, he doesn't hate it, he just gets embarrassed."

She cackles. "Of course he does. I love it. That's amazing. Is that just you or like, is that a nickname??"

"Oh that's everyone. 'S 'cause he's really cute. He's got a resting bitch face and newbies always get intimidated but then they get to know 'im and he's a softy."

"Was I supposed to be intimidated by him? Oops. Missed that Quasar memo," she muses, wryly. "Maybe it's the knowledge that I can just melt whatever ice he makes, but, like. He's pretty obviously an idiotic self destructive softie?"

"So self-destructive," Woo-young sighs. He yawns enormously and hiccups again, then clonks his forehead on the table. "Such an idiot." He turns his head to the side to rest his cheek on the table and grabs another piece of their nearly empty sushi platter. "I've been trying so hard... hmmmm..."

"Yeah. Speaking as someone with more pride than sense, he is definitely a kindred spirit. So, uh, sorry?"

"Maybe you'll be the best person to deal with 'im. He keeps... throwing himself at stuff. Works himself to the bone, refuses to get a partner on principle like a dumbass." Hiccup.

"... What principle????" she wonders, astonished. "Ugh - don't tell me, it's not actually my business, and I think the thing he needs is space and patience more than anything else. Like a, a deer. Or a rabbit. Heh, in English that'd be hunny-bunny."

He snorts then stars giggling. "Yeah I can't tell you, just ask 'im, or, no he wouldn't say. Idiot." Sigh. "Good luck with him. You're gonna need it, he's a tough nut to crack."

"Thank you, he certainly is." Whether that's to 'idiot' or 'tough nut to crack' is an exercise left to the reader. Wine sip. "It's going to be so hard not to call him hunny-bunny though. Because that's totally him, shy little bunny with a resting bitch face and ice knives."

"Yyyyyup." He sighs again. "...I worry for him. He's... I've seen his physicals. It's not... not pretty."

So, the ordinary thing to do here is overshare a little because you're drunk, but for Hye-jin, who is not drunk but is competently pretending to be at least a little, it's calculated. All of what she's saying is true! This is what Ideal Drunk Hye-jin would be doing! But it's calculated.

"It's really, really not. I'm - sort of torn between wanting to get him in a good space so he feels safe to go find whatever partner he wants - be free, little bunny! - and also general protectiveness? But like. That'll be soooooo awkward long term. 'Hi honey, how was your day,' 'Good, barely even acknowledged my simmering resentment of your guild, what about you,' 'Oh, you know, didn't get myself killed pretending I'm a space alien, but there's still time.'"

"Well, you can't be friends with all of your partner's friends," he says, reasonably, then hiccups again. "He'll have to get used to it."

"Well, yes, but... Maybe it's different here." She kind of doesn't think so, anymore. "I guess I'll have to at least work to be cordial."

It's very obvious she doesn't want to be.

"Hey, you're cordial to me, that's like, half the battle. ...one percent of the battle. .......something, I don't know what our headcount actually is right now. Hmmmm..."

"It's not the individual people I'm worried about? I'm sure they're all lovely. It's just the... overall expectation and entitlement of things from me. Come, be friends, do it for the guild, so on, and. I'm so sick of that."

He sits up straight suddenly as if shocked. "Who's saying that? I'ma fight them."

"The - Quasar president? You're going to fight your own guild's president??" She snorts. "Well, good luck, let me know if you need backup??"

"Oh, him," he says dismissively, and lays down in the table again. "I already yelled at him. Yelled a lot, that dumbass. 'M surrounded by dumbasses, hmm."

"You -" she starts, then stops. "... you fought the president???" For her??? He barely knows her!! That's very much risking his job, holy shit! That's - that's -

No one's ever done that for her before????? It was all platitudes and sympathies and empty words and - everything else that made her want to flee Japan.