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polysyndetonaddictsupportgroup · 4 months ago

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did every hero really follow endeavor's plan during the jail break? I've never watched bnha, but I always figured there were more heros then Japan knew what do with. Was endeavor really just that worried about how the fight again AFO would go? and did AFO have the league with him? or other prison escapees? Given eraserhead was so entrenched?

As a preliminary matter--yes, it was way more than AfO. The League basically did what they did during the USJ arc and subcontracted their violent attacks. They needed a big force to first get AfO and everyone else out of Tartarus, and then they made it very clear (via loudspeaker and also fucking tweet) that they would all be very peacefully retreating while all those criminally insane and violent motherfuckers went that other direction. Ball's in your court as to how you want to tackle it.

AfO was the biggest threat, by fucking far, but it was far from isolated to him. It was the entire League of Villains + Their Very Special Friends. It was the kind of force that would be required to make the entirety of Tartarus fall for the first time in history. So the heroes had plenty to keep them busy.

And as to whether Endeavor was that scared about the next fight with AfO... Yeah.

I think bnha does a good job at establishing that All Might and AfO just exist at entirely different levels than every other person alive. Their fight leveled a decent chunk of Kamino. And I think that's kind of power and devastation is hard to conceptualize as like, people in a world where we don't have to worry about superhero fights. (as a side note--Sukuna's Big Fight in the Shibuya arc from JJK did better than any other fight in media to really capture the sheer cosmic horror of being caught as a bystander in one of those fights).

But endeavor saw it. He was there for AfO’s and All Might’s last fight. The gods were fighting. Everyone else was just an ant.

He is facing the villain that ultimately took down All Might. All Might won Kamino, sure. But he didn't get up again after. He was permanently and irreversibly taken out of play. And Endeavor has spent the last year feeling like he was struggling to be even half of what All Might was with two hours of productivity a day. He was so consistently voted to not be able to compare to All Might that he bought a wife and had four kids about it, all of whom hate him actively.

He does not think he is winning this fight. He is Japan's number one hero. The responsibility is going to fall to Midoriya Izuku to him. He is the best they have left, and the fight that would be coming was one that already nearly killed All Might, the one guy he has never ever been able to compare to. And when he really looked himself in the mirror and asked if he could stop AfO, the answer was no.

And it wouldn't just be AfO if he came back to power. It would be his followers--and he was liable to get more than just the current League of Villains roster. It would mean more Nomus. They could barely handle one Nomu--how could they possibly handle the Nomus, and the LoV, and AfO?

And the answer that he came to was that they couldn't. Not without All Might.

He thought he was sacrificing Yokohama for every single other city AfO was going to level if he had time to grow in strength again. He thought that if they threw absolutely everything they had at him while he was weak, then maybe they could contain him and the League before entire cities fell.

So. That's why he came to that decision. Why did every hero fall into line?

So what’s key to what happened here was it was this complete structural breakdown at exactly the wrong time.

Structural Flaw #1: Transportation

Was it every hero in Japan that responded to Endeavor’s order? No. But not every hero in Japan was available. Any heroes out of the immediate area were too far away to do shit.

But it's a massive crisis. Heroes would commute from all over if they could--but it's not about desire, it's about time and resources. With how imminently emergent the threat was, a lot of far-away heroes would need something like a jet to even conceivably get there in time.

Who is sending the jet?

Let's pin down what heroes could, conceivably, get there in time. Very few heroes are in walking distance. How do heroes typically get from Point A to Point B?

Hero society in bnha is an agency model. There is no communal pool of resources--you have what your agency has. You have a jet to transport you if your agency has the money for one, and I’m pretty sure only all might had that (he has since had it dismantled and the parts repurposed for the sake of the environment. He only had it to begin with so he could quickly respond to imminent threats. All Might thinks there's more than one way to save the world and saving the environment is part of it). Like. We even saw Endeavor flying fucking commercial.

But let's just assume, arguendo, that some agencies have jets. It would have to be the very top agencies to possibly afford it.

All of whom are shown in canon to mostly operate out of the same area. So they're going to have to send the jet somewhere else to get more heroes. Now any travel time is doubled. If they do send it out, how many people are they realistically getting? Are these heroes in multiple different cities? That's more travel time then. Maybe we just land the plane in Kyoto and whoever gets on in the twenty minute period while they're refueling is who is coming back. We'll hand them parachutes and kick them out the plane door over Yokohama. Okay. Good plan. Go team.

Who is sending the jet?

Like, who is physically making the call to send the jet? Who do they call? Do they just start ringing around their buddies and seeing if they have other plans? The city is on fucking fire and we need people fighting now, so the big name heroes don't have time to organize transport with other agencies. They’re not even thinking of that right now. Make it a sidekick's job.

They are all on fucking strike.

Fuck it. Fine. Make it an admin's job. There has to be some kind of office staff who can work a telephone who's available.

Who is thinking to send the jet?

Admins are not making strategic calls about where the company jets go. There would have to be some kind of protocol in place or someone with the authority to send the jet would have to think of it in the moment. And I guarantee you this would not be the case.

Because this is a society where they have canonically semi-privatized public safety and put people in direct competition with each other over it.

ASIDE: The Economic Structure of Heroics and Why It Sucks

I have an economic structure. You must listen to it. I promise it is relevant. This is why it takes me forever to do things it's because i get too deep into the weeds and have to explain the fucking economic structures underpinning the analysis for my nonsense to make sense.

How the fuck do heroes get paid?

I have no idea if canon ever tells us because to be so for real with you guys I have not watched this show in years. I haven’t cared about canon since the Shie Hassaikai arc. The fucking YouTuber arc broke me. I literally never watched it again. If they ever explain to us how heroes get paid I do not know and I do not care. I refuse to go back to canon. Everything I found out about canon after the Shie Hassaikai arc, I learned against my will. The ending to this story was so fucking stupid and I only have a scattered knowledge of the details but I’m still right. If canon ever tries to explain it then please do not tell me, I refuse to learn more things about this show.

But I still like poking around the potential economic structures based on the part of canon that doesn’t cause me psychic damage. So here’s the thought process for the economic underpinnings of hero society in the pez universe.

From canon, we know it can be an enormously lucrative profession, we know that it involves some degree of private interests (re: merch lines), and we know that there are some people who cannot have merch lines (Underground Heroes, e.g. Eraserhead), so there also must be some kind of public funding aspect to it as well. So. Who the fuck signs your paycheck?

Sources of Funding

a. Public Funding

There must be some kind of official governmental budget for heroics. Like. They are very much a public service. There would be no way to have a fully private heroics force without government funding. What else are you supposed to do, fucking Venmo heroes after they save you? Do they put your kitten back in the tree if you don’t have enough.

In my mind, there's public funds allocated to heroes as part of a city's budget. That funding is allotted based on the number of employees in a given entity balanced against the confirmed acts of heroics of that same given entity. There’s a base salary level and that can be increased based on how successful you are, but salary isn’t exclusively what this fund is for. The heroic entity (an individual hero or an Agency) is effectively receiving grant money from the government to run their agency. You put it into salaries, gear, office space, everything. The government is basically investing in heroes, and it’s investing more in heroes who are shown to have a greater positive impact on society.

It involves overly complex calculations regarding the scaled difficulty of a given bust/rescue/act and ranking of the villain (if there is one) and the overall public benefit for the service rendered. You get bonuses for having a lower average property damage, for contributing to community building projects, that kind of thing. It is Complex. There is a lot of paperwork that has to be submitted to strange and vaguely threatening government accountants. When Mirio and Izuku start their agency, they will burst into tears multiple times trying to figure it out once filing season rolls around, bundle all the paperwork in a Massive Tears And Shame Package, mail it off to the shadowy powers at be, and then get a perfunctory notice that they are getting a ludicrous amount of the city budget allotted to their dinky little agency for the upcoming fiscal year because they are Big Fucking Heroes and enormously good at what they do and it reflects in their stats. They will then lay on the ground of their haunted fucking office and stare at the ceiling for a very long period of time.

But this puts the heroes in competition with each other. Your public funding is chained to your stats under this model. There's only so many criminals out there--you've got to get the right numbers or it cuts into how much of a slush fund the agency is working with.

It's sort of an insane model for a public servant position, but I think it matches with what canon shows us. Imagine having firefighters pitted against each other. like, having a competitive model for public safety raises extreme concerns about how it incentivizes public servants to act.

But this isn't canon's model. It's my guess as to how canon works based on the hints i can remember and my own mental illness. So why do I think canon suggests a model like this?

It's because 1) canon does establish that heroes are in competition with one another and 2) this kind of model would likely be necessary due to the level of autonomy that heroes have.

The literal first fight we see involves heroes in competition with each other. Kamui Woods is doing a big Ultimate Move, and Mount Lady rushes in and steals the show. Like. that is crazy behavior if we are looking at this through the lens of a typical public servant. Imagine you're trying to get directions from a park ranger and a different park ranger kick flips in with a map and a desperate need for you to get your directions from them instead. You call poison control and they’re beating each other in the head over who gets to tell you you’re dying.

Still, on its own, the competition isn’t dispositive, because the private income streams (we'll get there) would incentivize competition even if public funding wasn't based on it. But the level of autonomy that hero offices exhibit also suggest some kind of competition model.

Heroics agencies are not run like a typical police force or fire station. With most entities that function as first responders, they respond to some kind of centralized force (like 911 call centers) and they have highly regulated resource distribution. Like, police forces are restricted to a specific jurisdiction. Within that jurisdiction they have multiple districts and officers typically stay in their district. They're not going to a different fucking city because they think the crime is cooler there.

But Endeavor does exactly that. He's like "hello, son who hates me. Let's go to Hosu because I want to fuck with the hero killer for street cred. won't you come along. It is non-optional" and todoroki says "i hate you father and will abandon you on our father son trip to set a serial killer on fire with my mind. it will be for mildly gay reasons."

These agencies aren't a centralized public service. They are all just off doing their own thing. They're not responding to specific areas as allotted to them by the city--they just fuck off and do whatever. Like, there's probably some coordination between agencies as to who is covering what patrol, but it likely would be more out of courtesy than formal requirement. People wouldn't step on each other's toes nearly as much if there was more of a structure to this.

Typical public agencies who receive funding in accordance with staffing and budgetary needs have more structure and formality than is exhibited in canon. Heroics Agencies act like they're all independent contractors. They probably function like grant money recipients, where they're all fighting for the same pool of funds. You have to write in and show why you deserve that money when that's the case. They're in competition with each other.

Like, is this definitively the structure in canon? No, of course not. I have no fucking idea what, if anything, canon has going on. But it definitely fits with canon.

b. Private Income Streams

We know from canon that it can't just be public funding. Izuku alone probably paid for the Mighty Agency private jet with how much fucking all might merch he bought. Canonically, heroes have merchandise lines, branding deals, commercials, everything. All Might had fucking movies made about him. Those are all extremely lucrative income streams--and likely where the richest heroes get the biggest brunt of their income.

In order to get this kind of income, you are necessarily in competition with your fellow hero.

Public attention, spending money, screen time, all of it--it's a limited resource. You have to be the person who gets to the fight first, who does the big move, who saves the day. If it's someone else? Then that's another kid buying their action figure instead of yours. Heroics is heavily commoditized in canon, and that inherently invites competition.

2. Distribution of Funds

So now that we have a theory as to where the money comes from, how does it get paid out? Based on canon, it comes down to a structure of (a) Independent/Underground Heroes and (b) Agencies.

a. Independent/Underground Heroes

I can't actually remember if the word "independent" is said in canon or if I came up with it, but I think canon implies its existence. It's basically the same thing as being an underground hero, but you're still a Spotlight hero. I also cannot remember if the underground/spotlight thing is canon or fanon or what I’m sorry I haven’t watched this show in years.

Independents are spotlight heroes without the backing of an agency. They just go out every day with the clothes on their back and a dream. They have no support staff, no back up, and no one to help them if things go sideways.

It is not a popular employment option.

Part of it is because it's that much harder to fund being an independent. Like. Say you're just out of high school and you decide to strike out on your own as independent. You're still spotlight, so you can have a merchandise line, and that'd be a nice income stream while you're just starting out.

How the fuck do you start your own t-shirt line?

How do you make contracts with the manufacturers? How do you make and copyright the design? how do you sell the stupid things? Do you try and get them in Walmart? Do you start an Etsy? Your own website? do you call your mom and cry when you have 500 ugly t-shirts with your face on them that no one wants to buy and they're taking up all the space in your studio apartment.

Agencies have preexisting structures in place to help launch these kinds of options, which is one of the reasons why they're so attractive for baby heroes just starting out. The only reason why Mirio has merchandise is because he decided that he didn't care and didn't need to make merch and Izuku came after him with feverish crack addict energy because he cared and he needed Lemillion merch like. yesterday. All Might ended up getting his agency to start a lemillion line. Mirio gets the profits with a reasonable fee to the Mighty Agency. To this day he suspects that Izuku is 70% of his sales but Izuku denies this fervently, like a liar (he actually has a small but very devoted fanbase who rabidly support him and buy all of his merch. he would cry if he knew this. Still. Izuku is his biggest fan and buys literally every single piece of new merch in triplicate.).

Underground heroes are in the same boat as independents but they don't even have the option of a merch line. They exclusively get public funding unless they're backed by an agency, which none of them are because agencies have a tendency to fuck them and their busts for the sake of the spotlight. All underground heroes are bitter and culturally opposed to agencies.

On that note:

b. Agencies.

This is where by far the most heroes would end up. But an agency is like thirty dudes with the same joint bank account. How does the money get there and get distributed out?

i. Public Funding in an Agency Context

Take the above model. How do you attribute public funds based on personal statistics if there's no single person? Does everyone get their own check? But that wouldn't make sense--this isn't just for salaries, it's for funding the actual heroics itself.

Everyone under the same agency would be counted together for the purposes of funding allotment. If Sidekick A managed 300 busts last year and Sidekick B man managed 350 busts, then congratulations, The Big Hero Hero Agency made 650 busts last year, here's a check made out to the agency, figure out what you want to do with it.

But what about incidents that involve multiple heroes from the same agency? Let's say that The Big Hero Hero Agency is involved in a big bust. It is Sidekick A's baby. They have spent months doing this. This has been blood, sweat, and tears. When the day comes, they are joined by Sidekick B, Sidekick C, and Big Hero himself. Sidekick B has been helping Sidekick A for the past three weeks on this case. Sidekick C got called in the day-of to help.

Big Hero showed up for the last twenty minutes of the fight when they were mostly done with everything.

So. You're filling out the post-arrest paperwork. For funding and for public statistics, you need to make sure to properly account for who gets credit for the bust. It has to be one person--if you had everyone individually credit themselves for the bust, then it looks like you've resolved four incidents instead of one under this financial model. it's artificially inflating your numbers for public funding. that's fraud. Who should get the credit: Sidekick A, Sidekick B, Sidekick C, or Big Hero?

Well, there's nothing stopping Big Hero from writing their own name. So let's go with Big Hero. He helped.

This was one of the big sources of the sidekick strikes: a lot of agencies had an absolute policy of attributing successes to the name hero if they touched the case at all, because there was no rule against it. It was better for the agency, after all--unrealistically high numbers on the biggest name meant the agency as a whole appeared more successful.

So there were a lot of heroes artificially inflating their stats with things that were more properly credited to their sidekicks. Which made it all the harder for sidekicks to leave because their stats were shit because their boss was taking credit for their work.

ii. Private Funding in an Agency Context

But that’s just public funding. How would agencies distribute private income streams?

Big Hero Agency is proud to announce its newest line of Big Hero Action Figures, featuring the Entire Big Hero Team, now retailing for $39.99. Get it now from a store near you.

So. An agency is selling an action figure line featuring Sidekicks A, B, and C, as well as Big Hero himself. We’ll round up to an even $40. How do we split up the cash?

You can’t give everyone each $10. You have to first pay the suppliers, the advertisers, the trucks that shipped the toys to the store, etc. Then you have to pay back into the agency to fund miscellaneous expenses—the stationary, the insurance, the coffee in the fucking break room. Everything. By the end, there’s only $4 of profit left over. Not great, but hey—they’re selling a lot of toys. So if they each get a $1, then it should add up quick.

Right. But. If you think about it, people are only really buying it for Big Hero. He’s the best hero of all of them—his name is on the agency, and just look at how much higher his stats are. So it’s only fair that he gets $3.70 a toy and the rest of them can get $.10 apiece. Don’t worry, it’ll add up quick.

Not all agencies would have been like this. But a lot of them would be. Money is a hell if an incentive to screw people.

END OF ASIDE.

With all that in mind—why would they feasibly have a structure to fly in help from other heroes far away? That’s their fucking competition. Sure, we have team ups, but they’re all either well in advance or in the heat of a moment. If they are in the heat of a moment, half the time the heroes resent it because they just stole their fight. They’re gonna what—pay the exorbitant jet fees to fly in someone who’s just going to steal their hard work in the eyes of the public?

Okay, but what about situations like this? Massive emergencies where you need more people?

Those haven’t ever happened before. They had All Might.

So. The heroes on the ground calling in help are out. What about the heroes who are close enough to make it there by ground transport? No one calls them, they just show up out of public need. How are they getting there?

Trains are out. All the trains into the area are shut the fuck down. We are not giving the freshly escaped villains a bullet train to the rest of the country. Same thing for buses. No fucking bus driver is making their regular route into a fucking battleground.

Private transportation it is. Anything more than a few hours out of the area is completely out of the question. Like, good ol’ Manuel from Hosu City and all his buddies? Not making it. The wild wild pussycats? Watched this on TV from their mountain home. Gran Torino? On FaceTime with All Might, who is watching the fight with Midoriya Inko’s hand gripped in his left and Bakugou Mitsuki’s hand gripped in his right. Gang Orca? Twelve hours away and on a fucking island so he needs a boat AND a car to get there. Or he just fucking swims.

But there has to be at least some hero that saw this happening and heroically climbed in their Mazda sedan to make the three hour car trip. Why didn’t they go to the fight in Yokohama instead of the one against AfO?

Frankly at that point those literal children were visibly doing way better than the actual heroes were faring and any heroes showing up went where they were most needed and uh. It wasn’t by the kids.

If we have the agency model as given to us by canon, then that means there is a decentralization of resources. If you want to utilize your public defense force in the case of emergencies, then you need a way to fucking get them to the emergency. Canon does not have that. This is a huge structural failing that only wasn’t a disaster sooner because most emergencies required one guy and he had his own private jet. So most heroes in the country never had to even consider if they would listen to Endeavor’s order because they were completely cut off and useless at the time.

So. Now the analysis has been narrowed from all of Japan’s heroes to just the ones in the immediate vicinity of the fight. That’s still a fuck ton of heroes. This is a heavily populated area with a bunch of heroes around. You can’t go outside without tripping over a hero.

Most of those guys were on fucking strike.

Structural Flaw #2: Over-Reliance on and Abuse of Sidekicks.

The vast majority of the workforce had to be sidekicks. Like, just from a business model perspective. Even the smallest agencies we saw had 2-3 sidekicks. Endeavor’s agency had at least double digits, and I think Idaten was at over a hundred or something. We were probably looking at, conservatively, a 1:10 ratio of heroes to sidekicks.

All those guys are on strike.

Okay. But not all of them, right? Idaten already settled and got their sidekicks back. That’s like a hundred guys.

Except the Strike was not isolated to the Tokyo/Mustufasa/Yokohama area. Idaten sent out a lot of their sidekicks to other regions to help alleviate some of the strains of the strike. (As a note, this was not the Idaten sidekicks crossing the picket line. Them picking up the slack for other sidekicks still striking would have helped minimize effects on the public. However, the agencies of the striking sidekicks would have reaped no benefit from this under the compensation structure outlined above. Idaten would have gotten the credit for everything their sidekicks did, so the other agencies would still be bleeding from this while risk to the public was slightly alleviated. Idaten’s entire function in this strike was to set an example for quick settlement and minimize public harm. There’s this entire sub-analysis on Idaten’s internal culture and how it intersects with broader heroics standards that I won’t get into now this is already way too long.)

Idaten is at 1/10 capacity. It has like, ten guys, all of whom have been working say, thirteen hour shifts (voluntarily—again, it was a decision made to try and minimize the public safety risks of the strike while still allowing their colleagues their best chance at improved conditions) daily for the past month.

All of those ten guys responded to Tartarus before Endeavor made the call.

To understand the exact nature of the breakdown, you really have to see the chaos of how exactly this unfolded.

The LoV and their merry band of criminals hit Tartarus. The heroes do not realize at this time that they intend to let everyone out, give them transportation, and point them straight towards the mainland. They think that they’re just there for AfO. That’s still a huge crisis that needs to be shut down immediately, so they call out all of their best. Endeavor responds. Hawks responds. Eraserhead responds. Mt. Lady, Kamui Woods, Miruko—everyone in the vicinity who could conceivably respond show up. For a second, it looks like it’s going to end here.

Once the LoV get AfO out of his cell, the entire tide of the battle turns against the heroes. Now everyone’s out. All of those horrible, terrible villains. Tartarus has fallen. They have to make hard decisions. The high ranking, very powerful heroes who are most likely to break the line on Endeavor’s decision? They’re already at the fight by the time he has to make it. It is chaos and something they cannot easily leave.

The LoV’s picked right now because they knew that the heroes were operating at less than a tenth of their regular capacity. They picked right now because they knew the system had structural faults, and if they hit them just right, it would all come down on the heroes’ heads.

But the sidekicks broke strike lines to respond, right? Why do they all go to endeavor’s side?

For one thing, it wasn’t all of them who showed up—maybe a third of them were not even in the area any more. It wasn’t malicious, or intentional, or anything like that—they were off visiting their families for the first time in a long time or taking vacation. All of them had spent the past few years being completely overworked and abused by their jobs. They just weren’t there.

So now we’re down to 2/3rds of them who can even try to show up.

A lot of it wasn’t actually made as a reasoned choice. For many of them, they ended up where they did because of all the chaos.

So you’re a sidekick. You’re on strike. The entire world has gone to shit. How do you normally find out about the world going to shit?

This is a competition model streamed through individual entities. There’s no central command structure. Your agency calls you.

Well, your agency either fucking fired you or they cut you off completely during strike negotiations. This time, you find out through the news when the story breaks. Now what?

You frantically try to get in touch with your (ex) agency. Who is picking up the phones?

No one. That was your fucking job before you went on strike.

I used to work at a government public-service type deal, and let me tell you, they abuse the fuck out of non-unionized workers. You are doing everyone’s job. No one ask why we don’t get more support staff because they have unions. Like. I had a law degree. I was hired to be a lawyer in that office. They had us all doing the jobs of four people, and by that I mean it would be the literal entire job description of another fucking position in that office and we were all expected to just do it too.

Unions incentivize treating workers right. The absence of them opens the door to the opposite.

Why the fuck would agencies hire more people to lighten the load on the sidekicks and let them focus on actual heroics? Just make the sidekicks do everything. What are they going do, complain? They’re a dime a dozen. Hire more of those fresh faced kids with no standards just out of school.

You know when you had a job where you’re like. This fucking place is going to fall apart without me. But they treat you as disposable and easily replaceable and you’re like “okay bet” and so you leave and you find out from the people left behind that it actually fucking fell apart without you and you’re just like :o

Yeah. So that happened.

There has been a massive break down in the function of heroics offices for the past month and change because the sidekicks were not there. They were the ones who actually did most of the day to day handling of the office. They were the ones coordinating transport and figuring out the actual mechanics of who would be deployed where in a crisis. All those things that would be super helpful now? Yeah, those guys aren’t there, and they’re locked out of the fucking offices and can’t get in to un-strike for the sake of societal crisis.

But they know where the fight is. It’s on the news. Why don’t they just show up?

Where’s their gear?

Who owns it?

Heroics support gear must be an enormously expensive thing. It would have to be provided by the agency itself. Literally the only reason why Mirio has gear is because 1) all might would NEVER let his pseudo step son run around without proper support so the man would have bankrolled it himself if needs must and 2) the UA support class has a stipend each year where they can make support gear for active heroes and those heroes get it for free in exchange for free advertising for the students trying to kick start their careers, so he is decked out in THE most experimental bullshit from Hatsume Mei Industries (I have this entire side plot where the support class this class year low key became a sort of religious cult haha not really it’s just a joke it’s not really a joke and power loader is afraid every single day when he comes to work he is afraid under the iron clad rule of Hatsume Mei’s weird girl energy and they all decided Mirio was the Tabula Rasa, a figure of prophecy, and I just cannot get into that right now it’s too long it’s too long already. But it’s so fun).

All those sidekicks on strike lost valuable time trying to get back into their agencies so they weren’t showing up to an S-class villain fight in their fucking jammies. Then, when some poor admins figured out what was going on and let some of them in, everyone was frantically gearing up and getting in whatever transport van they were pointed at. Some of them didn’t know they werent reporting to Yokohama until they were already at the other fight. There’s was so much chaos and confusion that very few people had a clear idea of what was happening.

With the sidekicks, some of them never made it, some of them just got in a van and went wherever it took them, and some of them chose to obey Endeavor’s orders. Some agreed with the decision. Some disagreed but deferred to his experience. With how the Sidekick Strike had left their infrastructure, very few sidekicks were able to respond fast enough to make any real difference.

Now for the last possible demographic: the heroes that weren’t on strike and weren’t initially deployed to the Tartarus Prison Break. Why didn’t any of them go to Yokohama?

Structural Flaw #3: All Might was that one kid doing the entire group project for like forty years and some of these people are having to be heroes for the very first time and realizing that they don’t actually want to risk their lives to save people they just sort of liked the idea of this job.

It may be a bit too specific to be a structural flaw but I’m counting it anyway.

So, just to give a bit of a recap: We consider every hero alive in Japan as a candidate for Endeavor’s order. The vast majority of them are too far away to do shit, and there’s no centralized transport network to get them there faster. Toss in those who are dealing with personal medical issues or are away on vacation or just can’t come for some reason or another, and you’ve lost most of the heroes in Japan as respondents. Probably ~80% of potential heroes are culled from this alone.

So we have, generously, 20% of Japan’s heroes left as potential people to respond. ~90% of those are sidekicks on strike. They’ve got hours before they make it to any fight, because of the aforementioned structural breakdowns.

Now we’re down to 2% of Japan’s total heroes.

Some of that 2% were first responders to the initial Tartarus prison break. All the big name heroes in the area. But there can’t be that many top heroes—so let’s say 0.2% of them were at the initial fight.

Now we only have the remaining 1.8% of heroes to analyze.

There have to be a percentage of those who agreed with Endeavor’s call as a tactical decision. If they show up to any fight, they’re going to be obeying his order.

So we only have the ones who disagreed with his call left to look at.

These are small-time heroes. All of the big names are already at the fight. So they are less likely to have flashy Quirks, be especially talented, or consider themselves to have an especially large effect in the grand scheme of things. They have likely spent their entire careers living in a world with All Might.

It has never actually been down to them.

Think of Uwabami. Momo did her work study with her.

Her hero outfit is a fucking evening gown. She spent the entire work study doing commercials and meeting with her fans. She explicitly invited the young heroes that she did because she thought they were cute enough to be in commercials with her.

Now, she’s had some good if minor moments helping rescue civilians. It’s not that she’s never saved anyone.

But all of the top heroes are already committed to the fight against AfO. The current Number One Hero just ordered all her colleagues to report there. And Yokohama has a lot of S-Class villains en route.

And what the fuck is she going to do to stop them? It’s just her. Half of those villains took All Might to stop the first time. She is not fucking all might.

Is this a hero likely to go to Yokohama completely on her own to fight *checks notes* literally the entire prison population minus one guy? The worst guy, albeit. But one guy.

These are all heroes who have never had to be the actual thing standing between society and destruction. There has always been someone more powerful or capable or heroic nearby. Until recently, there has always been all might.

This isn’t to malign them. A decent percentage of them are legitimately well meaning about being a hero. They do good. But when it came to the big, blowout fights, they have always, always, always been the heroes evacuating civilians in the background or performing rescue in the aftermath. It has never been them who had to stand up and do the fight itself.

Every single one of those villains represent a big, blowout fight. And this hero trying to decide if he’s going to obey Endeavor’s order? They are one guy. And they’re not sure if they could even beat one of those villains alone, let alone all.

The reason why no one disobeyed Endeavor’s order was because, frankly, at the end of the day, they did not want to die.

Endeavor’s order signaled to everyone that there was no guarantee anyone would show up to Yokohama. It actually put good odds to the opposite. If you decided “fuck that, I’m going to Yokohama” then you’d likely be doing it alone.

What Class 2-A did was considered a death sentence. People who didn’t know them and their bullshit were shocked that they all made it out alive. These were the worst villains their society had ever faced and it was all of them at once (minus that one guy).

The heroes who were in a position to disobey endeavor didn’t actually think it’d make a difference if they did. They’d just… lose.

Most if not all of these heroes made the decision to become heroes during all mights era of peace. Everything just had lower stakes. Crime was less frequent and less serious. The big fights always had someone there who could handle them, because All Might was there. They’d fight the odd mugger or purse snatcher and help put out fires and go home at the end of the night. They’re heroes. That doesn’t mean they’ve ever truly had to grapple with a life or death fight.

If they went to Yokohoma, they thought they’d die. So they might as well respond to a fight that has a chance. Even if they feel ashamed as they do it. Even if they think Endeavor made the wrong call and wanted to go to Yokohama instead. All Might wasn’t there anymore. And they were afraid.

But there is one thing that Class 2-A had going for them that gave them an advantage over these heroes. And that was the fact that they are all medically insane.

It’s that they were together.

It’s a decentralized heroics structure. If you have a large agency, you are necessarily a top hero because no one else would be able to get that many people to agree to work under them. So you’re already at Tartarus and this isn’t a decision you had to make.

Maybe you’re independent. Maybe you have a small agency with 2-3 people. There is no preexisting centralized line that you can use to try and gather more people to go to Yokohama with you. You’re stuck with your immediate colleagues and maybe a few other heroes you’re close enough with to have their number. You really don’t have time to try and ask around to see if anyone else wants to go to Yokohama instead—you need to pick a battle and get there yesterday.

What good is 2-3 people going to do in Yokohama? You’ll just get massacred and it won’t have made a difference. At least if you go to stop AfO, you’ll have a chance at doing something that mattered.

Maybe you disagree with Endeavor but you defer to his training and experience.

Maybe you don’t go at any fight at all. Maybe you’re afraid. Maybe you became a hero in a time where you had a symbol of peace, and you realize you can’t keep doing it in a time without one.

I think there’s a small subsection of heroes that quit in the aftermath of Yokohama. Because they wanted to disobey endeavor’s order, and they thought they’d just die and it wouldn’t matter, and then dawn came and a bunch of school kids had managed what they were too big of a coward to do. I think the fact that they fell into line when their hearts told them they shouldn’t made them seriously doubt whether they were good enough to be a hero.

But they were alone when Endeavor made the call. And it felt like certain death. And—yeah, it sort of felt that way to Class 2-A when they made the decision to respond. But they weren’t alone when they did it.

They were together. And they always felt braver when they were together. Together, they could make miracles happen.

#pez dispenser debris #me with fictional worlds: where is your city planner I just want to talk #none of the heroes were happy at the thought of abandoning Yokohama #Yokohama didn’t happen because the heroes actually all got together and said ‘fuck those guys let ‘em die’#it was an absolute implosion of the heroics structure that they’d spent their entire careers working on #in my mind there’s a heroics organizational reform bill still making its way through the Japanese government in an attempt to correct the #structural failings that led to Yokohama happening. Aizawa keeps getting calls for his fucking kids to speak to the government about the #issue. and he’s like ‘absolutely not someone will tell them to do a flip and they will do it and cause a public incident’#no one said it out loud but everyone was sort of terrified that one of them would die at Yokohama #you could choke on the fear during the ride over #but they didn’t know what else to do. Yokohama needed heroes and all they had were them #but when you think of Yokohama think of all the big boss fights during bnha #not afo but like. overhaul. now think of fighting a few dozen of him at once. it’s. it’s not great odds.#the idea of just responding alone in the face of that is a nonstarter. and the decentralized nature of the system meant it was borderline #impossible to get the support needed to make a defense feasible. but class 2a had each other. and that was all they needed.#going to Yokohama the next day and it not having been a bloodbath was the biggest relief of those heroes lives #endeavor had never had a good relationship with shouto but he went to him in the hospital after and genuinely thanked him #I have this mental image of Iida. concussed four times over running on fumes and slightly delirious. desperately trying to keep it together #just a little while long. he has a list of the injured who need immediate evacuation. and his classmates. some of them need to be taken to #a hospital immediately. he made a list of their medication allergies. please ensure everyone is taken to the same hospital. he doesn’t think #he could bear it if they were scattered about. and he needs to help coordinate the transports of the villains from where they’ve been #containing them. and one of the Idaten sidekicks is like. Tenya. it’s okay. you did amazing. you can relieve command now. they’ll take it #from here. and he just says. okay. and he sits on the curb and cries. he asks them if one of them could call his brother. he’d. he’d really #like to come home if that’s okay. just for a few days. he just. he wants to go home. like the aftermath of that scene was kind of brutal to #process because on one hand they had all done so amazing but on the other they were so painfully young. a lot of them broke down in the #aftermath. kirishima got embarrassed because he started crying and asked mr Aizawa to call his moms. like once the adrenaline crashed it #all sort of hit them. they had all been so brave but also they were kids and they really really wanted their parents now if that’s alright #they know they’re heroes now and they have to be brave but also can someone please call their mom. please please please they just want their #mom. it was sort of a punch in the face for the full heroes to get there and see just how young these kids were. like these weren’t they’re #colleagues. these were kids who they didn’t protect. it hurt.

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mc-tums-fog · 2 months ago

Text

Under The Desert Sky

Pairing: Elliott Marston x GN! Reader

Chapter II: When Clusters of Stars Tell Stories

Chapter Summary: Every action has a reaction, that’s what you were taught at a young age. You just never figured your actions would cause Elliott Marston to have this kind of reaction.

Content Warnings For This Chapter: Period-Typical Racism (Mentions against the Aboriginal people and Native Americans)

Notes:

Wrote this chapter immediately after the first, and was proud with it initially. But now I'm not too sure. Did some minor rewrites but still, not too sure. I think that's just me second guessing myself, plus figuring out the exact order of events for the next chapters. I'm trying to trust the process gang.

Read on Ao3 or below the cut:

It took you about a week since the conversation between you and Elliott to notice a pattern and figure out what the catch was.

No, he didn’t lower your pay. Come payment day you found that it was the same as in the last two weeks. No, the workload hadn’t suddenly increased. It was like the other times, and you had already gotten used to it at this point. No, the men didn’t try their luck with getting back at you somehow. Comments and looks here and there, but it didn’t seem like they were going to carry out anything big. The only notable difference was how Coogan did his best to not talk to you, when he could help it. Not like you were complaining.

But maybe some of those things would have been more preferable. Because when you realize what the catch was, how minor and inconvenient it would be to others, it quickly spiraled your mind with questions that had no answers to them.

Elliott Marston would take any opportunity that he saw fit to interact with you in some way.

The first two days, you paid no mind and thought it was even reasonable. You had gotten into a fight with one of his men after all. You figured this was just his way of making sure it didn’t happen again, or to show you “who was boss”. On these first two days, he was observing you more often than he had previously. Even coming up to you to talk about the work you were doing and going to be doing. This was something he did during the first few days of working for him, where he was directing you, but then he made his men give you orders after some time. If it was just this, you probably would have brushed it off.

But the third and fourth day was when you started to question his behavior. Sure, he’d watch you from afar, come up to speak about the work, same as before. But then there would be a few times throughout the day that he’d just… started talking to you.

At first, you thought he was just mulling to himself aloud. You never really caught into it on the third day, with being focused on your work. It was the fourth when you noted he said something when you walked by him to do another one of your tasks. You paid it no mind. It wasn’t until you had walked past him again a second time that you completely registered that he was talking to you. Not to himself . To you . And only then did you register how irregular that was. In the past, if you happened to walk by him, he wouldn’t say anything. Just a quick look and go back to whatever he was doing. Unless the heat was really getting to you, you never recalled him doing this before.

“I’m sorry, did you need me to do something?” You weren’t exactly kind in your tone like you were previously whenever you asked that question, in case you didn’t hear one of the workers on the ranch talk to you the first time. So, you figured he wanted you to do something, and you didn’t realize since you were so focused.

From his front porch leaning on one of his pillars, he studied you for a moment. Once again wearing that unreadable expression, which was even harder to see under his hat.

“You don’t seem to pay much attention to your surroundings when working.”

You didn’t know what to make of that… statement? It didn’t sound like a question, but you weren’t sure what kind of observation that was, besides an obvious one.

“I pay attention when something or someone needs my attention.” Was all you could offer, wanting to end the conversation soon.

“From what I was told, it seemed like the men didn’t need your attention when talking among themselves earlier this week.”

You didn’t even try to hide your annoyance when he said that.

“I was giving the two Aboriginal women you have on your grounds attention. He only got my full attention after his comments about my family,” You wiped off some of the dirt that had been forming on your clothes. Not like it mattered; they would get dirty again. “Was that all, or may I get back to work?”

Was it a bit stupid and dangerous to give him mouth even after he was gracious with allowing you to stay? Sure. But you couldn’t really give a damn. You wanted to earn your paycheck, and the sooner you could get through the days, the sooner you’d get it.

You expected him to continue on whatever else he had on his mind just to irritate you and regain control of the situation. Instead, he gave a quick, dismissive nod. And so, you left, wanting to put that interaction aside and focus on what you had left to do.

But it didn’t stop with that. From the fourth and fifth day he continued to do this every time you walked by him. He was still doing his previous routine of watching you from afar and coming up to you directly to tell you what to do. But now he would add these small comments if you happened to be nearby while doing your work. It wasn’t even about the fight at that point. He would make comments about anything. The particular gun he carried in his holster that day. Deserters that were still on the loose. The Australian land in general.

You gave curt replies because you just wanted to stay focused on your work. But even with the small amount of replies you did give he would somehow make do and continue on with whatever he was going on about. And not totally wanting to push your luck into waving him off without the risk of your job security, you decided to listen. You figured, if he was the one to initiate the conversation in the first place, then he shouldn’t be mad if hardly any work managed to get done that day. Plus, he was always on his porch when talking, and if the sun was angled right and you were standing in the correct position, the shade would cover you up. So more for your benefit, you listened.

…Admittedly, you found some of his topics interesting to listen to. In some ways that statement on being a student was correct. He sounded intelligent with what he had to say. Whenever he talked about America, he was correct on a number of things. But some areas you knew he wasn’t.

And maybe it was a mistake on your part for the following events that would occur, but you decided to contest the stuff he was wrong about on the fifth day.

“The tribes did uphold those treaty deals.” You said in response to how America would often negotiate treaties among the different tribal groups. “The only reason some of them were broken was because the army kept infesting their lands.”

He must’ve not expected you to say anything at all that weren’t just replies to end the conversation, as he looked at you with just a hint of being surprised.

“Where did you hear that nonsense?”

“That nonsense ,” You gave him a look. “I witnessed. When working on one of the farms in America the owner became close with one of the tribes nearby. They would make trades, giving them crops for some herbal medicine for his animals that got sick.”

You leaned one of those pillars facing more away from Elliott, who had been sitting nearby on a chair.

“The head of that tribe would come and talk about a treaty that had been going on that the military kept breaking. He wanted the farms’ owner to be a witness to one of these meetings, and I came along as I would often be the one making the deliveries to the camp.”

You shook your head as you looked down. You hadn’t noticed that Elliott stopped what he’d been doing, cleaning his gun, and gave his full attention to you.

“Didn’t matter though. The military didn’t listen to our testimonies of our firsthand accounts, where we knew they didn’t break it. They were disrespectful the whole time. The tribe was forced to move once the military took over it. Then the farm went to shit because they couldn’t get the medicine for the animals.”

You thought about the farmer and the tribe’s leader. You hoped they, and their families were doing good while you were down here. It was never easy for you to make connections with other people, with how they treated your parents. But they were one of the few that showed kindness to your troubles.

“The owner of the farm never got help from the military?”

You looked over at Elliott. For once, you could hear just the slightest indication of an emotion that wasn’t stern. He sounded like he cared about whatever happened to him.

You snapped out of that observation and shrugged. “Sometimes they tried to provide some medicine, with the exchange of us giving them some crops. But it didn’t work as well as the herbal medicine, so he stopped dealing with them all together. Didn’t make the army men happy but I don’t think he really cared all that much.”

He looked down, his brows furrowing a bit to the point where you could see a line forming between them. It was an indication he was in thought of the story you told. You noticed how he would often do this, trying to dissect and think about what it was people had said to him, and particularly with you. In a strange way, you found this… respectable, was the best your compliment for him was going to get. Most people don’t take the time to fully process what they or others say to them. Unless it was in the heat of the moment when he was having a quick and rushed discussion, he still took the time to consider what he was going to say, or what others said.

And you realized it wasn’t just in his words that he did this. You realized how he would do this for his actions. The way he moved had a certain precision about it. Even in a frazzled state that you would sometimes see him in there was still somehow an air of thought that surrounded his movements. You could see how he became a ranch owner and a skilled gunslinger; with the few times you saw him using his gun before. It made sense. In his line of work, he couldn’t afford to be careless.

You hadn’t realized how you were staring intently at him mulling this over until one of his men called you over for help getting control over a wild horse they found and wanted to tame. You blinked as you looked over, and quickly rushed from down the porch, wincing a bit as your ribs were still in pain. You must’ve spent too long in the shade because you instantly felt your face heat up as you jogged away from the porch and into the sunlight.

The sixth day followed this similar format, where he would talk to you by his porch when you were nearby. Whenever you did, something about it made you feel like you could challenge him a bit more. And for whatever reason, he allowed it, and would challenge you back. In this back and forth you would learn a few things more about his country and him with yours. He would learn about the city life you had, and he would talk about the ranch life. You didn’t know what to make of these conversations after the first few times.

And you found yourself doing something you hadn’t expected yourself to do at the start of the seventh day.

You made conversation with him first.

It was early enough in the morning, and you were already getting ahead in some areas, thanks to working a bit longer in the evening prior. You put some water on your face and noted Elliott leaving his home to check on his horse. He did this every morning, he never wanted anyone else to take care of his steed, Maverick as he called him.

But as he was walking down the steps and to the stables, you felt like his appearance was off. You couldn’t pinpoint how though. From where you were standing you were a great distance away from him, but even so, you could still tell something wasn’t right. As the sun got a bit higher, casting more light onto the ranch, and onto him, it suddenly hit you.

He wasn’t wearing all black attire. His vest was a deeper shade of a maroon.

You tried to think if he always had a vest like that. With how busy you were with your tasks, you could never really look at him all that much, other than when he was talking to you. Or when you could catch some conversations between him and his men. But at those times you could only recall him wearing something black. Sometimes it was a full black coat with a vest and white button up to contrast it. Other times it was just his black vest and white button up. Rarely did you ever see him without a vest. If he did always have this one, you never noticed until now.

So, you felt like you had to make a comment on it. It was rational to you. Besides, you already had to go and feed the animals that were close by anyway.

When you walked by carrying the scraps for the livestock while he was still tending to his horse, you said something.

“I thought you only dressed like the grim reaper.”

He stopped brushing his horse’s hair and looked over at you. His look of confusion was clear as day. You clarified as you kept feeding the animals.

“I didn’t think you even liked any other color other than black is what I mean.”

He took note of his vest now and seemed to ponder further with what you said.

“I’ve worn this vest before.” He replied.

“Well, I’ve only seen you wear black. I never noticed this vest.”

“Really.”

You didn’t catch how he didn’t frame it as a question, or how thoughtful he sounded. You were more focused on the idea that he could like other things, how implausible that seemed.

“I’m not sure how you could mostly wear black, when the sun is so damn hot.” You said it more to yourself than to him, trying to rationalize a common thought you had about his choice of clothing aloud.

“It’s proper attire that suits my character well.”

“For a funeral maybe.”

You didn’t realize how much you had gone back and forth on this singular topic on something so small. You didn’t even realize that as you were working, he would follow you to finish this conversation. Which delved into a conversation on what you liked to wear, which was whatever was practical, you were never too picky growing up. That led to him rationalizing that his clothing was practical in getting to his weaponry quickly. That led you to asking about what shooting a gun was like, and him explaining how even being an expert he still found himself closing his eyes as a reaction whenever it went off. Which made you think about the times that you did see him use his gun, and he was right.

Throughout the morning it went like this, him following you around with you never phasing in doing your work. At times he would need to leave and would excuse himself. But then he’d get back right to wherever the two of you left off. By midday you didn’t realize how exhausted you were. A bit odd, since you’ve never gotten tired this quickly before. By the afternoon, when it was time to send out letters by one of the workers who were already going into town for a supply run, he let you know the payment you were sending to your family and gave you the leftover percentage to you personally. Noting it was the same, you were going to help the rest of the workers in loading up some crates for their journey. But before you could, Elliott stopped you and told you to get into some shade because the last thing he wanted was to drag another worker out of the sun.

You didn’t realize this was the first time he allowed you to have a break. Because if you did, it would’ve been a bigger deal. But you were exhausted. So, you went to the lodge and crashed out for some time.

Upon waking up, you could see that the sun had started to go down. You tried to get your bearings on why you went to bed earlier than usual when you could hear two men talking outside to each other, as one of the windows was partially open. They seemed like they were in the middle of a conversation when they came near the lodge.

“-y arm must’ve pulled something when carrying the crates,” The voice, you could recognize to be Dobkin, groaned. “Should’ve gotten the rookie to do it.”

You immediately knew he was talking about you. He’d called you that before, with how you were one of the newer workers for the ranch, despite now being here for a couple of months. You were about to ignore it when the other voice, you placed to be O’Flynn, spoke next.

“If you did, you’d be cuttin’ into Mr. Martson’s ‘buddy’ time.” He snickered.

You perked up at that. What did he mean by “buddy time”?

“If the rookie has time to be talking with Mr. Marston, then the rookie can take the time to actually do some work.”

You had been doing work. That’s all you have been doing for these past few months. In your still tired state, you wondered why he would even phrase it like that.

“You think it’s odd too, right? How they talk to each other?” O’Flynn asked. “I mean, that weasel beats the shit out of Coogan, and Mr. Marston doesn’t do anything about it.”

“It’s none of my business what Mr. Marston decides to do.” Dobkin responded back. He groaned again. “Christ this arm. Let’s go find a bottle.”

“All I’m saying is,” O’Flynn said as Dobkin’s footsteps were walking away. “Either Mr. Marston is planning a proper funeral or a wedding.”

Their voices grew distant, and you thought about what they said. You knew O’Flynn was just being a little shit saying that last part. But your conversations with Elliott did give you a pause. You really thought about it for a moment as you laid on the cot, looking up at the ceiling.

The past few days he had been observing you more and interacting with you. He sought you out to talk to you, as if he wanted to. And you realized that didn’t make any sense. Here you are working at his ranch even after beating up a man and not holding back when speaking either. How was it that you were still standing and breathing even? As best as you could with your ribs.

And more importantly, you had engaged with him back. You talked with him. Today you even talked to him first. Why?

You rubbed your eyes, your face not hurting as much when you touched it. It didn’t make sense to you. His behavior toward you and yours to him. You tried to rest further. But as the others would come in and rest as well, as much as you closed your eyes, it was hard to sleep with the lingering questions still in your mind. It had gotten well into the night, but you decided that you couldn’t sleep and put on your work outfit just so you had something warm to be in when outside.

You went back to the spot you were at the last time you gazed at the stars, only you stood up this time, as if it would get you closer to them.

They were still as beautiful as ever. And while they brought you a sense of comfort, they couldn’t answer any of the questions you had. But even if they could, it’s not like they would know what to do in your shoes anyway. They could just be there to listen, and you figured that satisfied you enough. That, and you could simply appreciate their beauty.

It amazed you on what you’d missed out on. It was the one thing you could give Australia credit for. You’ve never seen anything like this. You didn’t even think you would ever see something like this.

You stood there, for how long you weren’t sure, just basking in the starlight. You thought about making this a thing to do every night, just looking at the stars. Though you worried it would end up losing its beauty, if you had too much of one good thing. Suddenly, your ears picked up the precise footsteps coming from behind. You could easily recognize them, and it brought you back to your dilemma and questions.

Like last time, he took the place by your left, only not as towering as he was when you were sitting down like before. Upon leaning his arms on the fence’s wooden planks, he nodded to himself in satisfaction. Then he looked out to where you had been looking, right at the stars.

He didn’t rush to say anything like he had when this first happened. He took the time to let the quiet set back in before he could break it. Which of course, he did eventually.

“You know, I’m not paying you to stargaze.” He spoke.

Of course he had to act like this was above him too.

“I’m not telling you to.” You replied back, not even looking at him.

“You couldn’t tell me what you could get paid for any-” He started to go on before you cut him off. You decided that the only way you were going to get answers to your questions was from him.

“Why have you been trying to talk to me?”

He seemed to act like this was the first time you were blunt with him, as if you hadn’t been talking to him bluntly ever since last week. It annoyed you even more. So you made that clear.

“Don’t act like you don’t get why this confuses me. You’re smarter than that. I beat up one of your men, I talked back to you when you tried to talk to me about it. And even if this was to just uphold a deal with my cousin, you still go out of your way to try to talk to me when neither of us have any reason to.”

You finally looked over to him. “Why?”

He didn’t say anything at first. Despite being in the dark, without his hat on, and being about three feet from him, you could make out his face. Once again, he kept studying you and seemed to be contemplating what he was going to say next. He turned his head back to the stars and seemed to be contemplating them as well. Like the answer was up there.

You didn’t sense any heaviness in the silence like the last time you both talked under the stars. You’d almost call it peaceful. At least, there were no warning signs yet of anything dangerous to come. So, you waited. And eventually he spoke.

“My mother used to talk about how the stars told stories.”

You gave him a quizzical look.

He must’ve seen your reaction, because he let out a very light chuckle. You realized then that this was the first time you heard any kind of laughter coming out of him. Or even a broader smile than his cocky smirk he would have on from time to time.

“Sounds completely ridiculous right? But she wasn’t wrong. Certain stars have formations that if you really looked closely enough with the right materials, you could see them. They’re called constellations. Each one relates back to a character in a story rooted in Greek mythology.”

You looked back up to the sky. Personally, you couldn’t see anything distinct about them, besides that they were all beautiful. You saw some clusters that were brighter than others, sure. Nothing that told you a story though.

“I always found that interesting,” He continued. “That if you observed and interacted with the stars long enough, they would tell you a story.”

He looked over at you, causing you to look over to him as well.

“I would like to know yours. And I hope you’d like to know mine.”

It was the first time he said anything like it was an offer, rather than a demand. Like he was giving you a say in the matter. And it was said in the same tone that you briefly caught when claiming that you didn’t have the right to make that judgement about how he wasn’t better than anyone.

It sounded like sincerity, if you had to give it a name.

You had already thought he knew enough, what he needed to know before hiring you. That your family was in financial trouble, and you were the only one who could work and could do the work well. That was it, the gist of what your cousin said, though including more of the circumstances on why you were the only one working. You didn’t even think he wanted to know more. But you also found yourself more focused on the latter half of what he said. How he hoped you would get to know him.

And you really hadn’t thought you would want to get to know him more. Why would you? You felt like he made his character and who he was pretty clear.

But then again…

You realized just how much you were engaging back with him. The details you remembered about these past conversations between the two of you. You talked to him more within the past week than you had within the past months since you’ve been here.

Did you want to get to know him more?

Something about that question made your heart miss a beat. But you couldn’t explain why.

You looked back up to the stars. Like they would have an answer for you. Something. Anything. You tried to clear your head and with whatever thought popped up, whatever your gut instincts were telling you, you would go with it. You couldn’t see how your choice would screw you over if he was giving you the option.

And so, after taking a moment, that’s what you did. You went with whatever came to your mind first. With the stars being witnesses to it.

#elliott marston #quigley down under #elliott marston x reader #alan rickman #mcwrites #my internal vibes are off since like a couple of days ago but eff it we ball #i have to do this for the gang (thats you guys)#luckily my classes are nearly done and I will be able to have a break for the summer unless I get hired for a job sooner #which im all for I need money #also hearing how ao3 had like a data scrap incident where someone used it to put it into a.i generated machines or whatever and people #are saying to keep fics limited to registered users and likeeee i know it would be beneficial to do that but also #why do I have to cave for the a.i bros that dont have the patience or will to learn how to write #screw them bro i want people to see my writings #unrelated lowkey im thinking of instead of using gifs for these posts (as fun as they are) I wanna make like an art banner for this fic #it wont be specific for the chapters just something overall #but idk yet maybe I could do that when its fully finished and I make a post about it linking all chapters #anyway done yapping hope you enjoy but also dont be afraid to keep me humble

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