History Fanfic / Dominoes

* SpotTheThread: Despite being in emotional turmoil, Shinichi manages to partially notice that Yuusaku's own actions contradict the rationalizations he gives for abusing Shinichi in chapter 9: Yuusaku's reasons for considering Shinichi "useless" apply just as much to Hakuba, whom Yuusaku has given inclusion to every step of the way. The only difference between the two is Shinichi's journalism, which happened in ''response'' to Yuusaku's decision to exclude Shinichi, and thus, despite Yuusaku's attempt to use it as a dodge, isn't actually acceptable as an explanation for why Yuusaku excluded him from a young age. Throughout Yuusaku's abusive TheReasonYouSuckSpeech there are other obvious contradictions between Yuusaku's words and his previous actions, but Shinichi wouldn't know about them (yet) because they happened in private conversation between Yuusaku and Hakuba. All of this implies that Yuusaku is lying through his teeth and picking reasons that are as hurtful as possible because it conveniences his goals for Shinichi to feel powerless.

* AllForNothing: [[spoiler:Shinichi cooperates with Kaitou KID to get back the thumb drive he stole with the records pertinent to the child kidnappings. After all the drama and suffering, Yuusaku [[MindControl Mind Controls]] Shinichi into giving it to him during his FauxAffablyEvil TheReasonYouSuckSpeach in chapter 9.]]

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* CoolLoser: Shinichi implies that he is seen as is this. Despite single-handedly running a fairly famous and accredited news site, semi-regularly being in the news himself for his scoops, easily being the greatest soccer player in the school, and being considered quite handsome, Shinichi believes the student body of Teitan High thinks Ran is too good for him, that they all expect Ran to break up with him for not being good enough, [[spoiler:and that everyone he knows will hate him for breaking up with her and automatically take her side,]] all of which implies that Shinichi doesn't really have any friends in school.

* BystanderSyndrome: A particularly ironic example. The five teenage superheroes who act as secondary protagonists are being trained to be active problem-solvers in any conflict--but they're are standing aside, permitting, and even ''reinforcing'' the abuse of someone they claim to care about because their boss and his sidekick have assured them it's all ForTheGreaterGood.

** The morality of ''Detective Conan'''s policy of deception ForTheGreaterGood is deconstructed as well by inverting the premise of the story from Shinichi keeping secrets from everyone into everyone in his life en masse keeping secrets from Shinichi. Because of the resulting extreme power imbalance and greater opportunity for control to achieve the desired secrecy, the deception and manipulation that ''Detective Conan'' treats as acceptable tactics and never really morally examines ends up causing corruption and abuse of all sorts.

** Another prominent example is [[spoiler:the death of Kuroba Toichi at the hands of Kudo Yuusaku, the Night Baron]], which was covered up and blamed on KID. In fact, Kudo Yuusaku's characterization in general has leaned more and more towards this as the story goes on, with him performing the role of a hero while exhibiting the traits of a villain; the only functional differences between Yuusaku and the obvious villain role manifest from a difference in position. Since he already has a considerable amount of privilege and official control, Yuusaku has no need to commit major crimes to attain that. Instead he commits moral wrongs within the permitted limits that he himself helped to create, and when he does commit crimes, he hides the information from the public and finds a way to rationalize them as ForTheGreaterGood to the few who know. As an authority over crime, he and ISHA as a whole also get to frame themselves as the heroes as long as they can keep the general populace content with their authority, and anyone who stands against them can be labeled villainous. Despite his position of legality, Yuusaku and the supervillains in the story still use many of the same tactics; Yuusaku steals objects and evidence from his son and pressures him into situations that deprive him of agency like KID does, and covers up felonies under the facade of perfectly legal authority like the Crows. In fact, Yuusaku's done pretty much everything known to be on KID's rap sheet and more.

* ForTheGreaterGood:

** [[spoiler:In chapter 11, Yuusaku pulls this again, stopping the Irregulars from destroying the Meta-Nullifiers during the black hole crisis by claiming that ISHA needs them. In doing so, Yuusaku puts possessing these nullifiers over the safety of nine million people, choosing not only to leave all of the superheroes in the city depowered during a time when as many options as possible are desperately needed, but to render any attempt to [[GondorCallsForAid call for backup]] fundamentally pointless, because the backup will be made as powerless as the Irregulars as soon as they come near the city. As far as the Irregulars and Yuusaku know, this leaves four normal teenagers as Tokyo's only defense against the growing black holes that threaten to erase the city and millions of people from existence, and they have less than two hours before the entire city is gone. Hakuba's only remaining solution? Find cause of the black holes and destroy them. That cause being a ''terrified child'' whose powers are going out of control due to her being experimented on against her will. Notably, Shinichi even mentally addresses how TheNeedsOfTheMany would cause the Irregulars to kill the child and how that might even truly be ForTheGreaterGood, but unlike ISHA, Shinichi can't morally accept that. Despite his best efforts, it happens anyway.]]

* InappropriateRoleModel: Yuusaku has apparently saved the world a bunch, but he also unfortunately has no scruples with acting like a controlling, emotionally manipulative, calculating {{Jerkass}} when it conveniences him, especially (and ''constantly'') to his son; an integrity-less behavior that his sidekick, Hakuba, has clearly internalized into his psyche as unquestionably right and begun to replicate with those around him, particularly (again) with Shinichi. [[spoiler:When the abuse gets to the extent that even Hakuba begins to question Yuusaku, Yuusaku delegitimizes the feelings of guilt and injustice that Hakuba is motivated by as "childish." If this man was ever capable of making decisions with at least fair ''consideration'' of morality, it's clear he isn't capable of that now and is functioning on unsettlingly extreme ForTheGreaterGood policies.]]

* NotSoDifferentRemark: Shinichi's narration chapter 10 heavily implies that this is now his opinion regarding Ran and Yuusaku of all people. Early in the chapter Ran is horrified to discover [[spoiler:Yuusaku's more open and obvious abuse]], but Shinichi directly compares his relationship with Ran to his relationship with his abusive father multiple times throughout the rest of the chapter. Because Ran bought into Yuusaku's BigBrotherIsWatching [[LockedOutOfTheLoop And Locking You Out Of The Loop]] [[ImplicitPrison And Into A Life You Hate]] ForTheGreaterGood ideology when it came to Shinichi, what had been a healthy and equally supportive partnership (the only healthy, open, and supportive relationship to speak of in Shinichi's life) devolved into a one-sided, oppressively restrictive, neglectful and emotionally abusive relationship whose effects are directly comparable to the abuse Shinichi gets from his father and Hakuba, with Shinichi spending the first story arc dreading Ran's presence as much if not more than Yuusaku's. [[spoiler:After Shinichi finds out the Irregulars' and Yuusaku's secret identities,]] Shinichi's frequent comparisons all but state that Ran's choices and condescending view of him transformed this sole healthy relationship into an outright mimicry of Shinichi's relationship with said abusive father, just with the abusive undertones communicated through Ran's [[CondescendingCompassion more gentle wording]]. Tragically, Ran appears so deeply oblivious to the effects and implications of her choices in the context of Shinichi's [[ParentalNeglect neglectful]] and [[ParentalAbuse abusive homelife]]--whose conditions she has ignorantly chosen to replicate and reiterate--that ''unlike'' Yuusaku, she legitimately doesn't realize she's caused any damage until she finally tries spending time with Shinichi again and realizes that, like with Yuusaku and Hakuba, he no longer wants to be around her.

** Shinichi is cold, snarky, sarcastic, aloof, cynical, and calculating, but beneath the mask of composure is a deeply emotionally wounded and damaged teen who's had to suffer under the abuse of arguably the most powerful man on earth, and not only has no one been willing to help him, but those who've noticed have turned a blind eye or even supported this treatment under the assumption that his father has [[ForTheGreaterGood good reasons for this cruelty]]--and those individuals include Shinichi's own ''girlfriend.'' Even worse? Shinichi's a ''psychic empath,'' making emotion regulation and mental stability even harder to maintain than normal and making him arguably ''much'' more vulnerable to that kind of emotional and psychological damage. However, Shinichi's control over his own emoting is usually so convincing that even Hakuba deluded himself into thinking they weren't doing ''that'' much damage, only realizing this was a self-delusion once he sees a rare instance of Shinichi's rigorous emotional suppression slipping.

* SuperpowerMeltdown: [[spoiler:What the "monster attacks" really are: kidnapped children experimented on until their metahuman abilities go wildly out of control.]]

* AccompliceByInaction: The Irregulars, in the face of Yuusaku's increasingly obviously abusive behavior, do absolutely nothing to help the victim besides deliberately isolating him--partially because the majority aren't thinking of it in the context of abuse, as the superhero authorities have told them that this treatment is ForTheGreaterGood. [[spoiler:Chapter 9 basically destroyed any subsequent plausible deniability in terms of them not realizing that this is abuse, and while the issue temporarily splits the Irregulars in chapter 10, they have so far failed to actually do anything to end their complacence, failing to bring it up again after parting ways that night and then functionally acting like nothing happened to disrupt their group throughout the rest of that and the subsequent chapter. The only acknowledgement to what happened comes from Ran after she steps away from the group to talk to Shinichi alone for a short while, and her words lead Shinichi to the conclusion that Ran stood aside and let this happen without thinking it was wrong because she's adopted Yuusaku's condescending perspective of Shinichi as a "weak little fool" and burden, whether she's willing to acknowledge that or not.]][[labelnote:*]] As she thought Shinichi had no powers, this does ''not'' speak well for her (or any of the Irregulars') ability to make moral decisions for the non-powered civilians the Irregulars work to protect.[[/labelnote]]

* DoubleMeaningTitle: Dominoes are a hobby game in which small tiles called dominoes are set up in long lines at regular intervals so that when pushed, the preceeding domino knocks the following domino over, which knocks over the next, and the next, and continues down the successive line. It is a handy physical demonstration of cumulative cause-and-effect chains, from which the name of such circumstances derives (a "domino effect") as well as the concept of DisasterDominoes. A "Domino" is also [[DominoMask the name of the type of mask commonly worn by superheroes in comics and cartoons.]] In effect, this means the title can be interpreted as both "Masks" and "Consequence Chains."

* MoralMyopia: The story is told within a Superhero AU in which the teen superheroes are varying aware that they are self-righteous integrity-less accomplices to abuse functioning on some fluffed up version of MightMakesRight, and their mentor mentally assaults his own son and has a recognizable special voice he frequently uses to tear him down. They're opposed by an anarchistic vigilante thief out to reclaim a blood debt incurred after said mentor apparently killed his father and covered it up. Everyone involved except the Mentor is framed as a protagonist, not an antagonist (and the Mentor is only an exception because he has yet to have his own perspective represented); the only outright villains are the Crows.

** [[spoiler: Despite Hakuba swearing Yuusaku doesn't enjoy hurting people and actually loves Shinichi dearly, Yuusaku says a lot of nasty things about Shinichi even when it seems absolutely unnecessary even by Hakuba's assumptions of his motivations. In chapter 10 Yuusaku compares Hakuba's own upset at Yuusaku's actions to "Shinichi's dramatics" and thus childish and beneath Hakuba. Keep in mind: Hakuba was upset because Yuusaku had taken his child abuse against Shinichi UpToEleven, and even in the aftermath of ''that'' Yuusaku can't muster up an ounce of decency or verbalized respect for the son he appears to have [[HeroicBSOD completely emotionally broken]], talking down about Shinichi ''even then,'' with no one but Hakuba, his supposed confidant, around to necessitate any kind of facade.]]

* SurprisinglyRealisticOutcome:
** The superheroic tendency towards secret identities and the subsequent dishonesty about their lives destroys the vigilantes' relationships, moral standing, and integrity in the eyes of those they aren't honest with.
** The Superheroes' constant "Greater Good" mentality at the expense of the same individual over and over again causes this person to distrust them due to how willing they are to abuse him. Their impeding his investigation into the kidnapping of fourty+ children causes him to see them as unjust and begin to sincerely regard them as antagonists.
** Yuusaku tells the Irregulars that revealing their secret identities to Shinichi would put Shinichi in danger. Of ''course'' this backfires. The stupidity of this is somewhat justified by the implication that Yuusaku is only saying this as an excuse to get the Irregulars to cooperate while hiding his real reasons for [[LockedOutOfTheLoop locking Shinichi out of the loop]]. Given that this is so supremely stupid that it never works out even in non-deconstruction superhero stories, it's unsurprising that the story [[PlayingWithATrope plays with the fallout of this choice]] by initially [[NeutralFemale leaning into the cliche]] of the ignorant person getting kidnapped to target the heroes and then [[SubvertedTrope subverting]] this when it's revealed [[spoiler:Shinichi plotted his own "kidnapping" [[TheDogBitesBack as a trap to draw out the superheroes]] and [[MistreatmentInducedBetrayal confirm the truth behind their manipulative lies.]]]]
** The openly manipulative but ultimately more respectful KID gains an alliance with Shinichi that the manipulative and abusive Irregulars lost. [[SarcasmMode Who knew that simply respecting another's inherent worth and capabilities would make them more willing to cooperate with you?]]

* MexicanStandoff: The night of Shinichi's first encounter with Tequila, Night Baron and KID meet on a roof and set the parameters of one: if Night Baron informs Aoko of KID's identity, then KID will expose Night Baron and the Irregulars to Kudo Shinichi. [[spoiler:For some reason, Hakuba and Yuusaku decide to execute their leverage anyways and reveal KID's identity to Aoko with little to no plan in place to prevent their retaliatory exposure to Shinichi. The promised retaliation destroys the StatusQuo for good, along with the paultry remains of what was left of Shinichi's relationships with Yuusaku and all of the Irregulars.]]

* NoOntologicalInertia: Implied to be true of some StatusEffect metahuman abilities, but averted for physical ones. Aoko using a wave of water to smother the Fire Giant results in a ecological disaster for Downtown Tokyo. However, [[spoiler:because Yuusaku claims to think Shinichi is the cause of the Pandora Effect, the disappearance of Pandora is why Yuusaku posits that Shinichi is dead in the post-Part 1 interludes.]]

* NoOntologicalInertia: Implied to be true some StatusEffect metahuman abilities, but averted for physical ones. Aoko using a wave of water to smother the Fire Giant results in a ecological disaster for Downtown Tokyo. However, [[spoiler:because Yuusaku claims to think Shinichi is the cause of the Pandora Effect, the disappearance of Pandora is why Yuusaku posits that Shinichi is dead in the post-Part 1 interludes.]]

** Aoko's BlackAndWhiteInsanity is beginning to descend into this territory. By chapter 10 the story has completely illegitimized the "good" reasons Aoko has used throughout the earlier chapters to justify her moral judgement towards others, and she does ''not'' react well. Her supposed motivations of "justice for Kaito's father and protecting other children from loss of family" is challenged by the revelation that she's joined the side that [[spoiler:not only killed Kaito's father and left Kaito to suffer but also lied about it and denied his family closure]]. As Aoko had previously snidely referred to the forty-some injuries and four deaths that occurred during the Night Baron and KID conflict as "numerous counts of manslaughter" and used this to help justify her [[TheScapegoat scapegoating]] KID for all of her problems, Aoko struggles to even handle this new information, as by that logic [[spoiler: the Overseers she's idolized and joined are a culpable party in those charges now, a culpable party that also deliberately framed one of the victims for the deaths and got away with it]]. On top of this revelation, Yuusaku simultaneously demonstrates his FauxAffablyEvil AbusiveParent status ''right in front of the Irregulars,'' [[MindControl Mind Controlling]] Shinichi [[AllForNothing to hand over his evidence]] and give up his autonomy while telling Shinichi that he's functionally useless and doesn't deserve the respect or care Yuusaku gives to others in the room. By chapter 10, Aoko's left pinwheeling desperately for reasons why Shinichi (and, by his proxy, Kaito) are the bad guys but unwilling to abandon or reflect on her reasons for feeling this way, deliberately dodging valid criticisms against her stance on the issue by firing off barely-related redirections and ad hominems. On the whole, Aoko so far demonstrates a tendency to seek refuge in a deliberately simplistic view of the world around her and [[TheScapegoat scapegoating]] and [[StrawmanFallacy strawmaning]] the antagonists in her life that may upset this view, with the implication being that this is because she doesn't want to face the more complicated and emotionally challenging reality. The resulting rejection of the reality of moral nuance appears to be her way of protecting herself from painful self-reflection.