The Emperor's Dragon

Investigating the Unknown

"What are you doing, Yoshisato?" Avulynu asked, with a touch of disgust in her voice. He was poking at the mask thing they'd had to surgically remove from the last prisoner.

He looked up at her, his orange eyes wide. "Have you seen this thing?" he asked.

"Of course I have!" Avulynu replied. "It's disgusting."

Yoshisato shook his head. He had neon green hair that clashed with his eyes and Avulynu privately thought that he enhanced the look. His quirk was known as Visibility. It was one of those odd quirks that was almost perfectly useless. He stood out. In every situation, you could spot him. In the dark, he glowed slightly so that he could be seen. In a crowd his colouring would change to the most contrasting he could. So in the general drab colours of Tartarus, he was usually brilliant green, or orange or sometimes fluorescent yellow. There was a particular shade of orange that Yoshisato avoided if he could, the shade that prisoners wore. She hadn't heard of him being mistaken for a prisoner, since he didn't work in that block but it had to be a risk.

"It's fantastic," he told her. There was a note of awe in his voice.

"What do you mean?" Avulynu asked, even though she didn't really want to.

"I mean it's fantastic," he repeated. "The actual way it functions is amazing."

Her silence told him to continue.

"The outer casing is just armoring and protection for the mechanisms. It's those mechanisms that are awesome." He pointed at the mask-like device. "It's a combined respirator, drug injector that is self cleaning, and monitors the drug levels to keep them stable in the patient. Frankly-" Yoshisato shook his head. "We aren't going to be able to do half as well at maintaining his vitals as this thing did."

Avulynu blinked. "It's that good?" she asked softly.

He nodded. "It's that good. If it hadn't been on a villain, this thing, or rather bits of it, would already be in commercial production. I really wonder who made it for him 'cos..." He shook his head. "If they aren't a villain, then they could revolutionise medical tech."

"Hmm," she replied. One thing the public was only peripherally aware of was that any villainous proceeds of crime were generally confiscated and used by the HPSC. As a Commission, they were funded by the government but extra funding was always appreciated. Since this device had come off a villain, it was fair game.

"I know that look," Yoshisato said.

"You are going to register the artefact, aren't you?"

He nodded. That was the procedure. The prisoners may never be getting out of Tartarus but their personal belongings were catalogued and registered just like a normal prison. Some thought it was like taking trophies but it was just part of the procedure. Sometimes those belongings weren't actually theirs anyway and so could be returned to the rightful owners. At other times, well... it didn't happen often but sometimes they could be used for the greater good.

"Put a special note in about the mask. I'm sure there will be those willing to investigate," Avulynu told him. Unspoken was that he might get a bonus for reporting it, especially if it was as good as he said it was.

"I'll do that," Yoshisato agreed. "This thing is too good to let it go to waste."

She chuckled. "I'm sure someone will get around to telling him too," Avulynu told her colleague.

He grinned. "Yeah, at least something good will come from him.

"And won't that be just the final nail in his coffin?" she asked. Villains generally hated to be useful to the general public and, so making them useful, even in a small way was fun.