No.

"Four hundred and eighty-thr- double check your numbers -" He's kind of clinging to Yutaka's arm.

The numbers are not usually how I would describe it but they are correct numbers.

"What the fuck. What the fuck. What the fuck. What the fuck. What the fuck. What the fuck. Wh—"

Haru buries his face in Yutaka's shoulder. "I thought I was so fucking clever. Oh, what if several people wish for - four hundred eighty three -"

(Kyubey relocates to Haru's shoulder.)

"Fuck—what—factors—affect potential, is there a way to increase it, how—"

Potential can change over time within a particular person. Chiyako might be much stronger next year, for example, if she survives. Some things that humans think of as mental illnesses can make them stronger. I do not have a way to make potential stronger.

"Fuck."

"We shouldn't even have assembled the kids, if we're that far off - poor kids, we just scared them for nothing -"

"Well, shit. What do we even... do now."

"We tell 'em we're gonna think of something else, and then we try like hell to do that."

"...yeah. Okay." They can grab the string again, floating midair from where they let go of it, and... break the news. He supposes.

And yes, of course they will all be whisked back into their beds before anybody notices them missing, they're not going to get in trouble, they did good just coming out to this meeting and they're so sorry and they will think of something -

Haru waits alone in the park, for the half a moment it takes for Yutaka to come back. Kyubey's slipped off into the darkness.

When Yutaka's back he looks so, so tired. He half-collapses into Haru's arms, clinging tightly.

Haru clings back no less intently. "I thought maybe it wouldn't work but not like that -"

"Fuck. Just—why. What the fuck is this witch. How is it—how does it take—"

"It's just eaten - so many people. I guess. - take me back to your place? It's cold."

"Yeah. Of course." It's not far.

Haru kisses him and goes into a room by himself to write.

Kyubey's sure a fucky little alien. He needs to ask it some more questions.

Is it worth him becoming a magic rock this - this loop - at all? If he has another idea, a free variable wish that doesn't require kidnapping any children might matter. If he doesn't have another idea he can always wish malaria gone at the last minute. Maybe the day before, to get a little practice maneuvering and doing magic without costing too much in grief seed upkeep.

...the sex was incredible. If he needs to read this fact cold at the end of February at least he can let the bare information that it was incredible make it through the transition, even if the experience of it will be lost to oblivion. Till Yutaka takes a vacation loop and Haru wishes all his memories back for the occasion, not even trying to leave an optimized March behind on the off-chance of defeating Walpurgisnacht.

He's not in love yet, he thinks, but he might wake up that way in the morning, or discover it halfway through lunchtime, it doesn't feel very far off.

Four hundred and eighty three.

Four hundred and eighty three. 483. 四百八十三. And he's a six. A six. He could spend all night here sobbing over this notebook about every bookstore and pawnshop and neon sign and theater and train station, every tiny uniformed schoolchild and every shiba inu and every tourist and every little old obaasan and every cherry tree and every stray cat, and he might get all the way to seven or eight. Four hundred. And eighty. Three. But hey, if he enlists Chiyako she gets it down to just 481! Piece of cake!

Future Harus should not gather the kids without a really good reason to think that'll actually work. It'd take every potential wisher in Japan and a few more on top of that to kill that thing. Which is not, in fact, out of the question. They'll have time. Time to refine their pitches and learn where everybody lives and -

Time for Yutaka to do that. Haru would take this burden from him but he can't, can he. If he wishes that he were the one looping, then any idea he ever has which wants his own wish as a free variable is kaput. Haru still had a higher number than any of the kids.

Not that he has an idea right now.

He pads tiredly out of the room. "D'you have pajamas for me?" he murmurs, once he finds Yutaka.

Yutaka's in his bed, under the covers, poking at his phone. When Haru asks, he points at the neatly folded clothes on the bedside table on Haru's side of the bed. "—would you prefer me to wear pyjamas to bed? I forgot to ask..." Yutaka's torso is bare.

"No need, I just find it comfier." Pajamas on. Under the covers. Snuggle. Sigh.

Snuggle. "Sleep, or do you wanna talk about it?"