Perhaps five minutes of sandwich assembly later, Carol has more of her shit together.  She's eaten a meal.  She's been guided for twenty minutes.  She's no longer ready to pick a fight at the drop of a hat.  "Sit down, puppy.  I'm getting better.  I'm just pissed that I didn't thank you for what you've done for me.  Since you fed me, I'm going to feed you right back."  What's a good hand-feeding option.  Fried rice is out.  I don't want to put another goddamn sandwich together.  Pad thai is mostly noodles, that's out.  Hmm.  Crab rangoon?  Yeah, that'll work.  "Okay, Tim.  Open your mouth."  Does he like crab rangoon?

No idea!  Never had one before.  Aaaaaahhhhh opening wide!

These are so good!

Okay.  You didn't know that he liked those so much.  Because he has clearly never had them before, he looked so confused by them.  So you're not mad that he didn't tell you, you're mad that you had no idea.  So you're mad at yourself.

Cognitive dissonance is one of the key skills required for dealing with psychological backlash.

"Wrap your arms back around me.  Cheek against my waist.  Good, that's plenty tight."

Carol carefully and deliberately hand-feeds her puppy partner the rest of the crab rangoons.  He makes little pleased noises, which annoy her annoy her by making her realize she could have been getting this satisfaction all along.  When the crab rangoons are all gone, she goes back to scritching him.  By the time she's scritching, she's only a little annoyed about it, at levels which don't require deliberate redirection.

In another forty minutes of scritching, her back is achy but her backlash is down to zero.

Tim's very emotionally drained.  It was difficult, but worthwhile.  The sectors Carol cleared thanks to him let the DRT locate the core.  Timothy Bartholomew Delgado would not self-describe as well-suited to performing emotional labor, but his checklist carried the day.  His backlash is zero but he's exhausted anyway.

"Hey.  I think that went really well.  You did really well, Carol."

"I've never had a guiding session go that well before.  Usually I have to cut out early, or let it go chronic before I get guided again.  But that worked.  I...it was fucked up, what I said earlier.  Nobody ever tried that with me before, Tim.  Whenever I pick a fight, sooner or later someone fights back.  But not you."  Why I have tears in my eyes, I don't want this.

"Oh.  It just seemed like the thing to do.  If anything I do means I'm trying to fight, I need to let you do as much of the decisionmaking as I can, right?"  I just want a nap.

"It worked.  My back is killing me, do you mind if I..?"

"Of course!"  Tim reluctantly lets go.

And Carol jerkily kneels at his feet.  Ow.  My stupid spine.  At least this irritation is all mine.  "I spent so much time with you sitting at my feet, it only felt right I should take my turn.  We talked about more aggressive guiding strategies, and you wanted to wait until we saw how we'd work when I was under heavier backlash load."  Gaze up at him through her eyelashes.  I should have been able to give him this earlier.

"Do you want to discuss your boundaries, Tim?"