Yes out that fucking portal God fucking damnit.

"Yoon Chul-san-shi, I—I'm afraid I need to take a break."

"...yeah, me too. It's always an honour working with you, Kang Jaeha-shi," he says, bowing. "I'll take the victim, you can go rest."

Jaeha goes after the support tent and gets some of the backlash-stabilising pills that are available to all espers there. He downs them with water then sits down and waits for his nerves to calm down.

Nightmare's only just shown up, and he's got a whole night ahead of him. He might need noise-cancelling earbuds.

Nightmare appeared in Korea this time, for a coincidence (unless it specifically planned it so that it'd sync with Jaeha's schedule and maximally fuck him up), which means that Jaeha's shift ends before sunrise, and he immediately teleports home.

The timing means that Tae-gun is still home, asleep.

Oh.

When Jaeha left in the evening he loved Tae-gun. Now, though, he feels... empty. He feels empty, and Tae-gun is the only thing that can fill that void. He doesn't bother to shower, just takes his clothes off and collapses on their bed.

Which rouses Tae-gun from his sleep but only by enough that he can snuggle up.

Oh this feels nice. This is the first nice thing he's felt since he left yesterday.

It had been a long, long time since he'd last been so backlashed he felt actively suicidal. He still has procedures for when this happens, he won't kill himself on impulse, but it still feels absolutely awful, and he doesn't think he could hold out for very long; the only reason he survived his manifestation was because his family physically prevented him from doing it (and also because he didn't have enough motivation to fight them about it).

He can't lose Tae-gun. He can't ever, ever lose him. He can't survive without this.

They decided that regardless of whether or not Tae-gun was going to join Jaeha doing Nightmare they'd try to sync up their schedules so that they could guide each other better (meaning Tae-gun would try to go for international dungeons more often) but since Nightmare appeared just last night they haven't had time for it. Tae-gun could have just pushed himself awake until Jaeha arrived, but Jaeha asked him not to, so instead he just stayed up until 3AM before finally going to bed. But this means that they can sleep together now, which will do a reasonable amount of guiding by itself.

Will Jaeha be able to sleep? On the one hand, he's dead on his (metaphorical) feet, especially given that he'd been awake all day long already before Nightmare showed up; on the other, despite everything, Nightmare did get to him and he kind of needs to make sure Tae-gun is really here and solid in his arms.

He'll compromise by holding Tae-gun until he physically cannot stay awake.

When he finally wakes up, Tae-gun is nowhere to be seen.

...no. No no no no where'd he to where's Tae-gun his Tae-gun he jolts awake and jumps off the bed and loses balance hard enough to come crashing down onto the floor and tries to get up—

And Tae-gun rushes through the door riding an ice board looking scared. "Hyung? What happened, why are you on the floor, what—"

As soon as Tae-gun is close enough Jaeha pulls him into a tight hug.

"What—hyung, what happened, you're shaking—"

"Don't leave me. Please. Please stay. Please don't leave me, Tae-gun-ah, please—" He can't bear to pull away can't bear to look at Tae-gun's face what if Tae-gun looks disgusted what if he's too clingy what if he's feeling awkward what if—

He hugs back, just as tightly. "It's okay, hyung. I'm here. I'm not going leave. I'll stay with you." What the fuck, this might be the first time he's ever seen Jaeha—he can feel wetness on the skin of his back. He pulls away to look at Jaeha's face. Is—is he crying?

Yes. Yes he is. "Don't look at me, Tae-gun-ah," he pleads, turning his face away. "Don't, don't, I don't want you to see me like this—" He's pathetic, he's so pathetic, he's making such a mess of himself and he can feel Tae-gun's worry for him, Tae-gun's love, and he feels like a pitiful worm for ever doubting it even for a second, for ever letting Nightmare get to him, for ever letting it plant even the tiniest seeds of doubt, but if Tae-gun sees how pathetic Jaeha is he'll surely leave—

"Hyung. Hyung, look at me. Jaeha-ya."

He can't say no. He can't ever, ever say no. He turns his face, reluctantly, but he fixes his gaze somewhere around Tae-gun's chin.

Good enough.

Tae-gun kisses him. "Jaeha-ya. I love you."

Oh, God, he can't keep looking, he needs to hide his face in Tae-gun's shoulder again, not that that'll help to hide his sobbing in any way. 

Tae-gun is here, Tae-gun is real, Tae-gun is his, Tae-gun loves him, he said so, Jaeha can feel it too, if there's anything that's real it's how much Tae-gun loves him, Tae-gun will never leave him, Tae-gun must never leave him, there is no Jaeha without Tae-gun, without Tae-gun he's just a hollow, empty husk, he's not even half a person, he's nothing without Tae-gun—

"Let it out, hyung. I'll be here for as long as you want me to be."

That's just making him sob harder and hug tighter, this is too much for just one person to handle, not even one person, just the tiny pitiful unperson he becomes when he's backlashed.

He lifts one hand to cup the back of Jaeha's head and run his fingers through Jaeha's hair, petting him soothingly and just being physically present for his Jaeha since he seems to need it so much.