Argh.

"Yeah."

Send.

They receive a reply reasonably promptly: this is perfectly fine and acceptable, with the caveat that if Jaeha is not clearing dungeons on the regular he will be paid as if he were an esper on retainer rather than an active one. He can just pause scheduling on the app and resume whenever he feels up for it.

Once again: argh.

"You don't have secret gambling debts you took out six mortgages for or anything, right, this is fine?"

"...even before I was an esper I had a lot more money than I knew what to do with. The amount of stupidity it'd take for me to need money would sink a small country."

"Oh good." He sends back a checkmark emoji and puts the phone aside. Snuggles invisibly.

Jaeha is having a lot of trouble feeling happy about this. ...well, something that approximates that when backlashed, anyway.

The thing is, he doesn't really understand what's happening well enough to feel safe resting any weight on it, it feels like he might lose this at any moment. He doesn't understand what Haru is feeling and he doesn't know why Haru is feeling it and given how much of a production this is turning out to be he can't help but catastrophise about how much Haru is willing to take before he gets fed up.

"You okay?"

He can't even PRETEND WELL ENOUGH what is the POINT of him.

"Yeah, I'm fine."

"Do you want me to pretend I believe you, because I can do that."

Ugh ugh ugh ughhhhh.

"Can you make yourself visible so I can hide my face."

"I can actually see myself all the time so if you put your face on me I can't see your face, but sure." Visible.

Yeah well it still feels weird to hide his face in air even if the air is solid and shaped like Haru so he'd just rather hide his face in Haru's neck.

"It's just—difficult to—feel like a burden, I suppose."

Pet pet pet. "I'm still embarrassed about how I conducted myself at my own parents during my awakening, so, like, that's understandable, but - you'll be better able to take care of yourself if you're better taken care of, long run."

"Hmm, yeah." But parents have—should have—a duty of care towards their children that Haru does not have towards him.

Pet pet. "If it helps I have been underindulging my 'go be a kickass superhero' impulses due to slow guiding issues for years and you are improving the situation from that angle."

Oh.

Right. That's right. He is providing value. There is a thing that Haru is getting out of this. For a moment he'd just—forgot, somehow. Even if he's not doing dungeons, Haru isn't just doing a lot of stuff for him.

"That does help," he admits.

"Oh good." Haru kisses the top of his head.

Jaeha shouldn't feel safe, though. That isn't enough. If it's just the compatibility, Haru might find someone else more compatible. If it's just the money, he'll be making stupid esper money soon, too. Jaeha needs to figure out some other way to keep this man. Jaeha needs Haru to like him. He needs to be someone Haru will like. Which isn't news, it's not like that's not what he'd been doing, but—Haru's seen right through him, and Jaeha hasn't even told Haru everything about his backlash or powers—

(he needs to not think about that right now)

—so he needs to make sure Haru needs him. He needs to be perfect for Haru.

...he's not starting off on the best possible foot but he can figure it out. He has to.

Haru's up bright and early the next morning to fling himself into hostile pocket dimensions which can't detect his presence and evacuate their victims and then attack them with artillery. Nobody can hear him if he says "yippee-ki-yay, motherfucker" once or twice.

After his first one he pops back home - the teleport ration is a very good feature of the Quasar membership - and flings himself into Jaeha's arms instead. "I'm home, didja miss me?"

As expected, Jaeha did not really do... much... this morning. Cricket isn't even awake yet to come insult him. It was just him and his thoughts, waiting for Haru.

Well, him, his thoughts, and his plan to figure out how to become someone Haru will never want to leave.

"I did," however pathetic that may be, "quite a bit."

"I missed you too." Smooch. "Dungeon was one of the weirdly pretty ones, do you wanna see the pictures? It had gravity-defying waterfalls!"

Backlashed Haru is really cute.

...he keeps thinking this exact same thought about all Harus. Haru is just really cute.

"I'd love to."

Haru wiggles out of his shirt for skin contact reasons and snuggles up and produces pictures! Waterfalls and fairy-dragon looking monsters and all. "It was dangling eighteen people upside down by their ankles, so it was obviously a jerk, but I feel bad about killing them sometimes, you know?"