The Emperor's Dragon II

The Outside View

Commissioner Kouki Sozo just wanted to sit and look at the wall for a while. Just a few minutes... Maybe an hour or two, or more.

Maybe if he did, he could hope that... well, he wasn't lucky enough for things to go away but maybe some things would be resolved without being a disaster.

But if he did that, then people would start to wonder if they needed him and... he sighed. Soon they weren't going to have him around which would, actually mean very little to most of the Hero Public Safety Commission.

The Commission would go on.

The question now, for him, was how he wanted to go out.

After the morning he'd just had, he was going. The Minister for Public Safety had made that clear.

It wasn't fair! It wasn't like it was his fault! But... while blame would be placed on the villain, government needed a scape goat and as the Commissioner for the HPSC, he was the obvious choice. And before he went, he had a laundry list of dirty duties to attend to.

Well, not so much dirty as career ending.

His career.

Sozo wanted to know which Commissioner agreed the HPSC had to announce the deaths of active heroes? He already knew actually. Commissioner Suiageru had allowed it, to further his political career. And it was a way of protecting the Minister but... No previous Commissioner had to announce what he had to. He'd announced Hero deaths before, mostly via press release. After Kamino his office had announced the death of Gran Torino, and no one cared but Gran Torino was an old hero and hadn't been active for years - it had actually been a surprise to realise he was still registered. That news had been lost in the greater impact of revealing All Might's and the villain.

People were not going to ignore this. And he wasn't going to be able to get away with a press release.

"You are on in ten!" came an intruding voice.

Sozo nodded and looked down at his notes. They were the bare facts. He wouldn't announce his resignation here. He was a public servant and the public didn't care. His resignation would be submitted to the Minister who was, no doubt, hoping his resignation would prevent the necessity of hers.

Time would tell.

Specifically public opinion and how the fall out progressed. If the villain's rampaged, and Sozo couldn't see any reason they wouldn't, then the Minister was gone.

Her impending demise didn't offer him comfort. He was going to have to go out there and announce the deaths of Endeavor, Wash and Mount Lady. And then there would be questions. While technically he only had to announce the deaths, in this situation, Sozo knew he'd have to talk about the injuries. Best Jeanist had been bad enough and his agency was handling media for him but... Sozo was going to have to tell the world that the attack which had killed Endeavor and Wash had also grievously injured Hawks, Edge Shot and Kamui Woods. In Kamui Wood's case, he'd been injured during rescue operations. Flame and wood did not go well together.

"Five minutes."

And he'd probably have to say that most of Endeavor's sidekicks had been killed too. From the bodies, Baptise, Convector, Legerdemain, Kamina, Shimo had all been caught in the explosion, though there was some news to say that Kamina and Shimo had been killed in combat. It didn't really matter. Dead was dead. The explosion had caught them, and civilians and Endeavor's intern, his son Shouto, who'd only survived, thanks to his mastery of ice. Shouto, along with Hawks and Edge Shot were receiving the best care the HPSC could arrange.

The fact that the villain had immolated himself, and was therefore, no longer a threat, was not going to be important enough news to distract from the injuries and deaths and the breakout from Tartarus.