Sponsored by [Carl]

Blue Jay’s head popped up and out of the off-topic train of thought it’d wandered into upon the arrival of the other super.

“Well,” Blue Jay began excitedly, ignoring Carl’s impatient tone for the reason that he was content to have the Bulwark’s time at all, “I want to sponsor you for a new charity. Or, I guess a little more accurately, I need a face for a charity I want to start so I was wondering if I could do the thing and you could take all the credit.”

He picked his legs up over the railing and turned around to face Carl, his voice picking up speed and interest as he got into the topic. “Basically, I want to help support the every day people who’re financially hurt by supers. I don’t think it’s really reasonable for me to try provide immediate support, like as soon as the incident happens - I thought about it and couldn’t come up with anything I could do - but I don’t think it’s impossible to help.” He trailed off, wondering how to explain this. “So when debts go unpaid for long enough, banks’ll often sell these loans out to other people for fractions of what the dept actually is in an attempt to recoup some of the loss, right? If someone gets hurt due to a super fight or has to pay to replace a house or a car that was wrecked and can’t afford to pay back the debt, it’d be really easy to just buy it and drop it.” He made a dismissive gesture with his hands to accentuate his point.

“But that’s just phase one.” He continued leadingly, pointing up. “When large companies take a big hit, oftentimes they’ll reduce workers or do other things at the lower levels in the company like cut benefits to recoup the costs, right? The solution, I think, is easy; I want to provide the affected people with an extra paycheck every month, dependent on how much they’re still making, benefits included, to assure they’re still getting a baseline amount. I want to give people who’re unemployed an assured income and people who get a drop a little extra so they feel less of a change.” He said cheerfully, and again picked up speed. “See and this’ll help the big companies recover faster too, because it’ll help keep lower income workers working and buying stuff and that’ll help keep the economy running.

“The problem is I’m just some random nineteen year old college student. People like me aren’t exactly known for having a lot of money, so it’d be really weird if I was publicly leading a charity that was throwing out millions of dollars but wasn’t doing any fundraising. People would probably consider that suspicious. But you’re already doing stuff like that, right? Your civilian identity, I mean. It wouldn’t raise as many eyebrows if the wealthy business owner and his private investors were the ones running the show. I’ve got a couple of other ideas for work around, but having you be the face is the easiest. And that’s all I’d need, you to be the public face - I’ll take care of finding the people, getting the funds, and distributing them. I mean if you want to do more, I’d love the help, but I’ve got the rest covered. I think.”

Blue Jay paused, wondering if he was correctly selling his idea. The trick was to make it sound like it was really in the other person’s favor, right? Even though he was basically asking a favor of Carl and he didn’t know enough of the Bulwark to know how much he’d actually benefit. For now, though, he decided to stop there for questions and concerns, and waited expectantly for the other super’s response.

It was weird hearing someone he knew to be in his mid-teens talking like a formal businessman, but Blue Jay guessed that was technically what Carl was. He was just glad the young businessman was humoring him for a second.

“Two ways, mostly.” Blue Jay picked up again cheerfully. “First, I’m going to take money from the largest companies and richest people in the city. I’d focus on ones that benefit from super destruction, such as building companies, or ones that have particularly bad business practices. It’d probably be a bit hard if I was doing it myself, but I doubt it’ll be difficult to convince some of the other Pandaemoniums to help me out. We’d keep destruction to a minimum, obviously, and really prioritize not hurting anyone. If other supers showed up I’d probably just leave and come back later.

“So then we’d give some of that money to the workers of that company because they’d probably take the hit and that’s the point of the charity. The amount these businesses make in profit compared to how much it actually costs to do their thing is huge, and it’s not like we’ll be completely paying for the employees or anything, just closing that difference. My estimations say we’d have a lot left over even after helping the employees of the business we steal from to give to other people.

“Then, I want to take advantage of the stock market. From being a part of Pandaemonium and my own movements, I’m going to have some knowledge of company finances in advance. When a company gets their building knocked over or their vault behind their picture safe cleaned out, their stocks drop. My plan is to buy a bunch of stocks while the price is low. Since their workers are basically getting supplements from us, they can maintain the same level of output while doing the lowering benefits and wages tactic to make up the costs, and before long they’ll be back to where they were before. Their stock values will rise back up with them, and I’ll sell when they’re normal again. So I’ll be my own wealthy backer.” He concluded.

Blue Jay turned and blinked at Carl. “You’d actually fund me?” He shook his head of the surprise and to situate the idea, his gaze ending up back over the city. “No, it’ll probably be enough. I’m not trying to help every single person who needs it right away, and I was planning on ways to try to grow the money in order to expand the scope of the project and move away from stealing. Plus real funding would just make everything a lot simpler.”

Would Carl have really jumped into battle, right here, right now if he’d done a poorer job of explaining it was for the good of the unpowereds? He hadn’t even done anything yet. Was just suggesting something - which wasn’t all that bad compared to a lot of stuff he’d seen supers do - worth coming to blows over for Carl? But then also, what would that even accomplish? Say Carl did defeat him here; that wouldn’t stop him from going through with his plan, it’d just mean he’d be sore and a couple ruined buildings might be a little more ruined. Blue Jay had pretty good reason to believe Carl wouldn’t be able to permanently stop him either. Maybe he was just talking grumpy because he was feeling the isolation of being a Bulwark. Blue Jay could relate to that.

“I thought it was a little silly, telling a Bulwark a plan that wasn’t exactly legal, but I figured if it was a problem you were just going to show up anyway. Wouldn’t hurt explaining my reasoning to you even if you do decide to try to stop me.” He said, scratching his cheek with his index finger.

He turned back to Carl as he got back on track. “In order to do this, we’d need access to people’s personal finances, as well as information on what benefits companies are giving their different employees so as to know who needs what. The second’s a little hard to get, but that first one’s not really publicly available. If I want those,” he paused, anticipating Carl’s response considering his last. But he was already in this deep, might as well finish it out. “I’ll have to steal them. Tax records are probably what I’d go for. I wouldn’t be taking anything, of course; no reason to. I’d make digital copies. By myself, I can probably get into a government building and onto one of their computers without anyone noticing. There’re people in Pandaemonium who can make software that’ll let me into computers and take what I need, so I wouldn’t need to break anything or hurt anyone. I doubt anyone would notice I’d even been there. Minus security camera footage.

“Then, I’d get some of the Pandaemonium members to help me out,” probably with favors or cash, “and we’d go through and math out everything. I’m pretty good at stuff like that and I should be able to get the process down to be quick. I’ll try to find someone to make a computer program to do it for me for when it starts getting bigger, too. Actually getting money to people, though, would just be writing checks and sending them in the mail.”

Blue Jay nodded, ignoring Carl’s tone for the face value of his words. “Yeah, I don’t want anyone to get physically hurt from this. Especially not any innocents, but anyone working for me as well. If things are getting dangerous or someone’s getting reckless, I’m not going to just sit back and watch. This isn’t worth getting someone injured over. And, honestly, I’m expecting if I have to steal money that I’m going to have to share with the people I do it with. Some people in Pandaland will seriously just do it for the thrill, but not a lot, and they’re usually chaotic enough that I don’t think I can fully rely on them for what I need. Whoever I ask, I’m going to make it pretty clear that most of the money is going to me. They might change their mind later, but I mean, there’s not a lot of supers who can argue with me.” He concluded with a shrug.

Reading Carl was proving to not be the easiest of tasks. He didn’t seem like he really approved of a lot of Blue Jay’s suggested methodology, but continued to sprinkle in little suggestions that he was still willing to help out. He wasn’t completely sure if he’d sold Carl on the idea, but he was going to be optimistic and assume he had and was grinning under his mask because of it. He began lightly kicking his legs.

“Paperwork. Paperwork’s next.” He said more cheerfully than the subject would normally call for. “I’ve got most of it filled out - I was basically just waiting for your approval and signature to get it pending. Which,” he moved his head to the side, considering, “might take a little while. But I’ll take care of all that. I can keep you updated as things go through if you’d like, or I can just bother you when I need you for something.

“Speaking of which,” He reached down and unzipped his bag with one hand, keeping himself steady on the railing with the other. After pulling out a small packet of paper, he straightened and held it out to Carl. “This is the sheet to appoint a director and the one thing I need from you. If it comes back signed in blood I won’t be disappointed.” He chuckled.

Carl’s mutterings were not lost on Blue Jay. He couldn’t help but chuckle as well, albeit with irony and a bit of sadness. It was completely true; he didn’t really fit in with his new comrades, and his comrades weren’t exactly what he’d consider the most moral people in the world. But that just meant nothing had really changed, had it? He had to worry about being stabbed in the back now, but at least this knife wasn’t cloaked in a glowing light of justice. It wasn’t easy to get the help he needed, but it was certainly easier - a promise of cash or destruction would get him at least a few hands. A good number of people had an automatic hostility against him because of his background, but he could normally get them off his back by a bluff with the sword on his. The farthest he’d had to go was breaking a guy’s nose in front of a bunch of his friends. People had pretty well left him alone after that.

“Hey, do you know why they called me the Rogue Bulwark?” He asked curiously, just loud enough to make sure Carl could hear. He wasn’t sure how informed Carl was about the internal politics of this branch of the Bulwarks before he came, and as far as he was concerned, deserved to know if he didn’t.

The papers were passed off to the right person and he could mark another task off his mental checklist. It always felt nice to do that. “Wouldn’t’ve come to you if I hadn’t. I make myself look like an idiot enough without being completely unprepared.” He chuckled, more earnestly. “Thanks, I’ll give you periodic updates with, uh, relevant information, then.”

Carl’s last statement had hit him with that same dull biting feeling he got when a Pandaemonium chucked an insult, doubt, or threat his way. He’d wanted to immediately respond in kind, but had stopped himself. It wasn’t quite the same, he’d reminded himself, though it did need to be addressed. How exactly to go about it, however, gave him pause. He didn’t look at the Bulwark as he began slowly, but out at the city. His voice had a seriousness it hadn’t before.

“Carl, I know we’re in different factions now. The two that seem to hate each other’s guts the most at that, but I want to make something clear. I’m not interested in fighting you. All it’d be is the possibility of lots of damage for not much gain, right? If you do show up somewhere and don’t like what I’m doing - and this holds true for anything, not just stuff related to this - just say hello and,” Blue Jay shrugged, “I’ll stop for a second so that maybe we can talk it out.”

“That’s the contextless overview that got me the title.” Blue Jay sighed. He was just glad Carl wasn’t jumping to arms about it and was looking somewhat critically at the situation - maybe he’d hear him out. He’d put it out there regardless, if only out of spite for the misinformation.

“So the first big one was I helped Aurora and Dullahan rob a bank. See, by the time the Bulwarks showed up, they’d already robbed the thing and were driving at high speeds down a highway. If the car had crashed - hell, if the wrong attack had been fired at the wrong part of the road - civilians could’ve been caught up in it. Peoples’ lives mean a lot more to me than however much money they had, so I tried to defend the car until it was out of a populated area. This meant fighting off another Bulwark and helping two Pandaemoniums, but no one died that day.

“Then there was the time I brought a Keeper back to the Bulwark HQ. Their name’s Unhallow. They’d been injured in a fight I’d been part of earlier that day - both their arms were broken and they were bleeding from the bite wounds that did it. They were walking back to the Keeper Sanctum by themself in that condition because no one had come to help them after the fight. There’d even been another Keeper there and the asshole hadn’t helped. I had to do something, right? Their power meant we had to go on foot, and the only place we could get help that wouldn’t arrest us was the Bulwark HQ.

“I don’t know how much this has circulated, but before I joined Pandaemonium, there was a time I helped Aurora escape the police because they shot at us and she took a bullet for me. I’ve also fought other Bulwarks on a few occasions because our morals conflicted and one of us didn’t agree with what the other was doing. That run-in with Rainfall and Nemesis is a good example.

“The last one that got held over my head was the time I helped stop a cargo train. An unknown super and I halted the thing, and three Bulwarks showed up. Before anyone asked me what I was doing or bothered checking what was even in the train, they called me a traitor and attacked me. The train was later reportedly carrying weapons and they went and sent it on its way, but even though I never attacked back, the incident was deemed me betraying the Bulwark once again. People were talking about kicking me out after that one.”

Blue Jay uncrossed his arms to grab the railing on either side of him and turned to Carl. His edge of bitterness dispersed, and his tone returned to a neutral muse. “What I’m saying is don’t expect a Bulwark’s word to be the whole picture. The people there like to see the world in black and white, probably because it’s safe and it’s damn hard to perfectly uphold a code of justice and herohood without it, but sometimes situations aren’t as cut and dry as that. Sometimes people have morally grey situations dropped on them and they have to make tough decisions. Some people, like me, are just really good at stumbling into them.” He chuckled. “I don’t think it makes them a bad person, though, and I don’t think it’s fair to chastise them for it. But I’m kinda biased on the topic. Take it as you like.” He said cheerfully.

Blue Jay nodded to Carl’s plan of information. He’d keep his eye and ear out, and would hope for the best.

The meeting seemed to be winding to a close, and a good one at that. He’d honestly been doing this with the expectation that he’d have a very small chance at success, but somehow Carl’d ended up agreeing. He’d even agreed to funding the idea. Blue Jay turned around and hopped off the railing, picking up and swinging his bag over his shoulder, in high spirits. Carl’s final statement only increased it further.

It stopped him in his tracks, eyes widened in surprise. Maybe it was just because he was getting an oversaturation of Aurora’s abrasive nature lately, but that was among the nicest things someone had told him in quite a while. Grin larger than before, he paced the short distance towards the other super.

“Aw, Carl,” Personal space tossed aside, Blue Jay attempted to reach an arm around Carl’s shoulder for a half-side hug. “This is why I was on your side to lead the Bulwarks, you know?”