"Oh, sure! I have a practice routine now even. Lots of exercises to get it to like muscle memory, so I can snipe things. And they're planning more training, DRT certs and stuff, but the power is what makes me special and worth the rest, right? Guiding in between practice works pretty good. Uh, it feels like you're under a lot right now..."

"Yes'm, a little bit.  I uh, understand that I'm a bit more compatible with your current partner?  So I figured I'd leave myself under load, to absorb your backlash better."  Tim will, unless Wendy objects, guide his potential business partner to a waiting autotaxi.  To be interesting to others, you must show interest in them.  "What certs are you most looking forward to?"

"-I mean, you really don't have to. I have, er, meditated on it and decided I'm doing fuckall except guiding for this confluence. It's just... Not worth the risk, I don't think. But guiding is fine as long as, y'know, professionalism. As for certs, I dunno. There's a lot. The Vanguard folks say everyone going into a dungeon should have a basic DRT, first aid, firearms, and firefighting cert. The firefighting is to get used to structural and environmental hazards and wearing heavy gear. Apparently. I am gonna be more Worf than Geordi..."

"I can't exactly blame you for it.  I'm planning on, er.  Being more active, during the confluence.  But I've had more than, what was it, two weeks?  To get used to my power.  They're right about the certs, I had most of them already from my job.  Er, my old job."

He pauses, then squeezes her hand.  "It's...well."  He sighs.  "D'you think you can promise to not judge me for a minute?"

"Uh... Okay? Not sure what this's about but yes, no judgement unless you're going to admit to, like, being a ku klux klan member or something. -Oh, scuba! I'm looking forward to scuba cert. Ignore me, yes, no judgey."

He chuckles a little bit.  "I'm just - bad at saying things, sometimes.  And I don't think they'd want me, anyway.  Anyway.  I just think that everyone should be able to benefit from my power, so, I took on the backlash for you?  But really, you're kind of an excuse to get an extra dose on the people who need it, you know?  I mean, not that you're just an excuse, but you know what I mean?"

"Hmm... I will ponder this for a minute. I have a response, but. Words. Blarglsnarfle."

"Yeah.  They're always getting me in trouble, too."  He reaches over with the hand further from Wendy, as though to hold her hand with both of his, then aborts the motion.  As requested, he shall Await Input.

"So, savior complex kills, and not just the martyr. I think oligarchs and companies pulling scammy shit is the worst, but... No, that's unrelated, forget that. Like, my mom and me, we poor. Food stamps and cheap brick apartment and hand-me-down raincoat poor." She taps the rumpled green object on the seat next to her. "...So when I looked into pro guiding money rates I freaked the fuck out. You know what money is? It's giving a shit juice. Not perfectly aligned with what people want, but, you want fresh food? Uber eats, converts money into someone giving a shit to get you your burrito. Want video games? Better place to live? Vacation? Money money money. I have a point here, I'm getting to it..."

Pause.

"...And the thing about 'with great power, comes great responsibility'? Nobody ought to be obligated to give things up or undergo hardship without due recompense. Corporations dodging tax laws, sure, fuck 'em. But Joe Engineer who poured years of his life into specializing in a very specific field and who is damn good at, at, repairing electrical substations or something? He deserves his two hundred grand salary, yeah. And espers, who are way more specialized than that - it's not fair that some people get cool powers and many others don't. Or that some people get shit powers and shittier backlash that kills them. But it's also not fair to expect people to do things just because they can. Paying people with rare capabilities is how society collectively says 'this is good, we want more of this'. So fuck you, pay espers, we may not deserve it but we also don't deserve to be denied! If Superman in those old comics demanded to be well paid for all his savioring he'd be doing nothing wrong, and maybe even good by motivating people to get their shit together! If nothing else you can donate to charity once you have your own shit together! ...Er, not you, the general 'you'."

He hums along, nodding at points.  "Yeah.  You're not wrong.  And, I almost have my shit all the way together?  I did have to take out a, uh.  Pretty sizable loan to set up my facility.  But it's pretty close to paid off, so."  He shrugs, looking a little uncomfortable.  "I don't - just take the highest bidder?  My power's better on recent injuries, so local first responders who got injured the same day can sometimes get a slot.  Espers get priority, espers who can guide me get it basically free, since they're enabling everyone else."  His body language tightens up a little bit.  "It's really not fair.  But I - I just don't have it in me to be all about the money.  Even if it would get me out of debt a couple months faster.  You know?"

"-Oh, sorry, I got sidetracked into the money and didn't even say the original thing which was: Don't burn out? Don't exist only to help other people. It's a bad pattern, I think. And, um, using my coming as an excuse to backlash yourself more seems... Indicative of some kind of trend that may or may not be entirely healthy. But who the hell is? ...Entirely healthy I mean."

Awww.  She cares!  Also, I'm a little tired of having people talk to me about burnout, it's fine, I literally just play video games all day on healing days.  While I try to not fall asleep.  "It's not exactly a hard job, and - so, there was this one guy who came in, a dungeon monster, uh.  Messed up his foot.  It was really, really bad.  He was probably going to be able to walk again, but he wasn't going to be doing much more than that.  And, because of me, he's made a full recovery already.  And it's just - really satisfying.  When someone comes in like that, and walks out under their own power.  I'm never going to get tired of that."  He grins a little at Wendy.  "I'll be careful about burnout, I promise."

"Great! It kinda hits a little close to me because I decided not to do any dungeons, which uh, it does hit me with some guilt, you know? I oughta be stickin' it to the evil magic cores! But also, no. Just no."

Yeah, it sure is a choice.  I don't think it's one I'd make, but I'm not her.  Uh.  Shit.  What's something nice and true.  "It makes sense that you don't want to right now.  You don't want to go swimming in the ocean when you haven't even dipped your toes in the kiddie pool."

"And any snooty busybodies who say I have to or it's my duty to go die in a dungeon can eff off~," she sing-songs cheerfully. "I'll do that when I'm dang well ready and not before. I'm not a hero. I'm just a sci-fi writing nerd with a shiny little railgun power."

Well.  Definitely not a choice I'd make.  My response would have been 'get ready, fast'.  I guess it probably does make sense to not want to do your first dungeon during a confluence.  "Well, as long as you don't go all-out today I think we'll be fine.  Railguns are supposed to be pretty powerful, right?"  Or at least they were in that one show I watched.

Their conversation has brought them to the gun range, complete with an ambulance on standby outside.  One of the drivers recognizes Tim and waves.

Reminders of special arrangements still make her flush with shame, a bit! but, like, okay. Deep breath and they can go in and she can remind herself of the argument she just made.

"Yeah, the idea is a tiny projectile and massive velocity, which I can do and what seems like pretty efficiently, for piercing tough armor. I mean maybe I can be talked into doing something near the end. If there's any dungeons that really need armor piercing or my anti psychic thing specifically and I have a solid guard. But I am just. I'm not ready. I'm scared?"

Is she...embarrassed?  Did I embarrass her somehow?? Is she embarrassed about being scared???  "Well, maybe someday you'll find an esper who can give you a defensive power."  He grins down at her a little bit as he gets out of the car, gently tugging her along with him.  As she gets out, he murmurs into her ear.  "My first ever real dungeon, I was scared shitless.  I was so nervous I puked for twenty minutes before I went in.  I hadn't been like that since my first tournament."

"...Yeah. Shit's real. You can talk big and think you'll handle it, but when it actually happens... Though, it's not even... I'm trying not to think the world revolves around me. I wanna stay, in my self-identity, kinda just some girl, on some level... If that makes sense. Aaaaanyway. Tournament? Martial arts?"

"Yeah, the same way.  I know it's going to change me, but - I don't want to change too much?  Anyway.  Yeah.  Jiu-jitsu, mostly.  I was on the wrestling team, but I didn't really love it quite as much.  Felt too fake."

"I have negative fighting and martial arts experience, awful at sports in general really, or maybe I never really felt like actually trying, so you're obviously way ahead of me there. In addition to the testosterone-based steroid regimen... I bet it's real handy with super strength though. Habits or practice or however you say it?"

Are they awayyyy from the obvious visible signs of Expensive Shit and Other People Making Arrangements Around The Espers pleassssse.

Well, if she's picking up the pace, Tim's willing to lengthen his stride to match hers.  He fumbles for a moment with a key, unlocks the door, and holds it for her.  He's picking up on a bad vibe but isn't really sure what to do about it or what happened.  "Well, kind of?  The thing about grappling is that it's all about biomechanics.  And the super strength...kind of helps with that, it lets me do stupid stuff that would only work for another brick-type esper.  But I can't really use my super strength on a training mat, or you run out of partners real fast.  If I buff someone else, I can, but even then it's easier to get in a bad position and get someone hurt.  I've had to go back to striking, and I didn't do nearly so much of that growing up.  Not zero, but."

While he chitchats, he's leading Wendy to one particular section of the range.  If she's familiar with what a rifle range looks like, it's clear that this one has an incredibly heavy-duty backstop relative to normal.

Only in the last few days! She should talk to someone about how heavy the backstop is. And the dangers of richochet. Conveniently, someone is right here.

"Huh. I was thinking like, action hero stuff I guess. Like that one acrobat esper? ...I'm not going to be doing any high power shots unless you want a cool demo maybe but I was told - and agree - it's a good habit to know what the backstop is exactly. How thick's that concrete, like, and is there rubber matting to cut down on ricochets and so on."

"Oh, there's tons of action hero stuff, too, I'll show you sometime I'm not so, uh, tired.  We've got about five feet of concrete behind this section of range, plus ballistic blocks in front of that.  I have, uh, a really big pistol that I can only fire with my, er, augment up.  Messed up my wrist pretty bad the one time I forgot, and I'll never do that again.  As long as you're not shooting something that'll take out a tank, you should be fine."