You know what? You know what?

You know what?

He's gonna try using Haru's superpowers. The ones he has even without magic.

Yutaka's gonna try notebooking.

Okay, now that he's decided this he can ignore it completely for a week, right—

No, obviously not, because, ughhhhh, Haru is going to make his wish tonight, and Yutaka wants to at least have made an attempt at getting this sorted before then. But he doesn't even know how to begin. If nothing else they're gonna have dinner, like, almost right after school. He could, in theory, go into time stop for this, but that feels... kind of wasteful.

...meh. Fuck it. He'll tell the AV guys he's not feeling too good today, and then he's gonna sit on the rooftop and grab one of the empty notebooks he got for Haru and see if he can get anything going with it.

Rooftop. Notebook. Pen. Go.

He doesn't... actually... have any idea where to start.

Haru said, what was it that he said, start writing down his stream of consciousness and if anything seems weird he writes more about that? Well what if everything seems weird. He's not a normal guy. That's, like, his whole thing. Is he meant to just write forever. Is that what he's dooming himself to do here.

He's procrastinating, and he's not even doing it very effectively.

You know what, he's gonna light a cig. He hasn't been smoking very often recently at all, mostly because he uses smoking to deal with his anxiety and the majority of his crises recently have been in Haru's presence and it would've been rude, but he feels like it might help, here. Click, puff puff puff, inhale, exhale.

Ahh, that's the ticket.

Hmm. He should've gotten an ashtray in his buckler. Note to self. Maybe he should write that on his notebook. Note to self: get an ashtray in the buckler.

...or he'll just write that on his phone. That's smarter. Ain't no way he's gonna remember to check his notebook for reminders.

Actually, you know what, he'll write on a laptop instead. He hates handwriting. He's gonna ask Haru later about why he writes by hand but for now Yutaka can just type.

He's still procrastinating.

Grab the goddamn laptop and start typing, you moron.

Mmk. So. Typing. Stream of consciousness. Why is he here.

He is here because he wants to notebook and get Haru's superpowers. ...oh that was straightforward, lmao. He thought he was gonna dance around the subject more than this. Yes, he's anxious about Haru making a wish, but also he wants to be so so sexy for his Haru and if he managed to make this notebooking thing work he'd be so so sexy. Incredibly sexy. The sexiest. No one should be more sexy for his Haru than he is. Underline that "no one". Haru should have eyes for him and only him and no one but him. Haru should love him and only him and no one but him. ...add a highlighter to that because he might want to go back to it later, that made his stomach feel funny.

Haru should be his. And if he makes this notebooking thing work, Haru will be one step closer to being his. Underline.

But if he's gonna make this notebooking thing work he's gonna need to actually do some object-level work and not just jerk himself off on the meta. He's typing a lot of shit and none of this shit is the shit that originally motivated him. He's still procrastinating. Why is he procrastinating.

He's scared of Haru making a wish.

...ow, writing that hurt, what the fuck.

He's scared. He's scared because if Haru makes a wish then Haru is going to go fight witches, and if Haru fights witches then they might hurt him, they might kill him. Not that doll witch, though; he murdered that witch with extreme prejudice already. No, it wasn't in his territory, but does he care? He does not. That witch was pulverised and good fucking riddance, if he ever catches a whiff of its familiars he will obliterate them. Fuck it extremely much, fuck it for daring to consider the possibility of hurting his Haru.

He's scared because every time he thinks about Haru getting hurt it makes him want to kidnap Haru to Bondi Beach and forget about Tokyo. Because he, he, he...

...he doesn't want Haru to fight Walpurgisnacht. He wants to just keep Haru safe. He wants to keep Haru safe somewhere far, far away from all of this shit, in case even if he fails, if he dies, at least Haru won't. And, who knows, maybe if he dies that'll reset the month, too, he doesn't know, he doesn't know and he doesn't want to rely on it and he doesn't want Haru to fight Walpurgisnacht. He doesn't want to see Haru die again. If Walpurgisnacht destroys Tokyo, Yutaka can redo the month, but he doesn't want to see it, doesn't want to—

—he can't write this part down because he wants to forget it but the image comes to his mind's eye, unbidden and unwelcome. Surrounded by the familiars, stopping time to get past them and attack the witch, steering clear of its attacks, and it was fast, too fast, and he had to keep doing it, keep stopping time and then rewinding and then stopping and then rewinding, over and over and over trying to find the best path, they had seeds and the seeds weren't enough, over and over and over, watching a magical die and rewinding to save them, stopping time to get them out of the way, it was too much, too much, too many people, and they wouldn't coordinate, they wouldn't work together, Yutaka couldn't see most of them, and then when he wasn't looking Haru was gone. Haru was gone, there was—all that was left of Haru was an arm and a part of his body, and Yutaka didn't have any more magic—

He doesn't want to go through that again. Ever, ever again. He doesn't want Haru to die. He doesn't want Haru to die. He doesn't want Haru to die and he especially doesn't want to see Haru dying. If Haru's going to die because Tokyo will be destroyed then, then Yutaka will reset the month. But Haru dying there, right next to him, right where he can see—

Well, that's selfish as all fuck, isn't it.

Are there any other legitimate reasons for him not to want Haru to become magical, beyond his personal trauma?

If Haru fights, Yutaka will definitely be spending a very large portion of his attention to making sure he personally lives, even if that'll cost them a shot at winning. But that's something to be discussed with Haru, and is furthermore an issue with fighting the witch a lot more than just becoming magical.

If he becomes magical he will need to fight witches to survive. But he loves fighting witches and loves being a superhero and Yutaka is very good insurance.

...Yutaka's got nothing more.

He rereads all of that. There's another bit highlighted, but—that can be later. The central problem he'd been having seems... solved. He feels a lot less conflicted, and like he has actual things to bring up with his Haru.

God fucking damnit it worked.

He hates himself so much.

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