Part 2: Epilogue

Kirishima looked at his friend's body. No one had touched it, after the medics had made their pronouncement. Bakugou was dead. Given the spittle on his lips and the pained expression on his face, which accompanied the hand shaped burns, he had not died easily. The special forces officer couldn't say he was surprised at that. What surprised him was the announcement that he had been killed by a quirk. There was no way Katsuki would have let someone close enough.

Except someone obviously had gotten close enough. The burns were too hand-like to be coincidence.

Kirishima forced himself to look away from the body as a sheet was draped over it. He looked around instead. The damage was something he expected. It told him that whatever else had happened, Bakugou had not gone down easily. And there was another body there. The medics had spent even less time looking at him. It belonged to the fire villain Dabi, the Leader of the League.

Except… the means of his death was easy to see. The small bullet wound was surprisingly precise and the evidence was pointing to Bakugou wielding the gun. His fingerprints were on it after all. But that didn't explain anything.

Why was Dabi dead? Why was Bakugou dead? Who else had been here?

They'd checked for cameras. There were none. Instead they'd found some holding pens away from the ring which was probably where the Noumu had been kept. There were papers in Dabi's office but so far nothing incriminating and they had picked up a couple of unfortunate villains who had come to work.

But nothing made sense.

Kirishima looked over to a different group. They had a reader here. She was looking around like him, but her eyes were unfocused. More than that, her eyes were not normal. She was using her quirk. Kirishima wasn't sure exactly how it worked but he knew that it would allow her to hopefully see what had happened. That's what readers did. Readers were new in the Police force. They had come into place with the integration of heroes when a proper study of quirk potential in law enforcement had been made.

He didn't feel too hopeful when she shook her head but he wandered over to listen anyway. He had his Special Forces uniform on. No one questioned his presence here.

"There's a lot of interference," she said.

"It's a very public location," her handler said. Readers generally had someone they could rely on because sometimes they got disoriented from what their quirk told them.

"There's that," she agreed. "There were four people here," she continued. "Dabi, ExplodoKill and two others."

"Who were the others?" her handler asked quickly, no doubt realising that was what all the officers wanted to know.

"That's the problem. One feels as if it is everywhere, but it's mostly there," she explained pointing to what looked to be a pile of ash.

Kirishima moved over to it, and gently poked it with his boot. He jumped back when the ash moved, revealing what looked to be a face. "Evidence!" He yelled, looking down at it.

It as definitely a face, but twisted and not normal. Not that there was a set normal these days. Some quirks moved facial features around a lot. Tokoyami was an example of that. He had a beak instead of a mouth.

Several forensic people rushed over. They cleared the ash away. Kirishima saw bits of what had to be brain matter poke through it. And an eye. He didn't recognise it exactly but he knew the pattern. "Noumu," he muttered.

They heard. "Sir?"

"It's a Noumu," Kirishima told them. The memory of the last one he'd seen coming to mind. He wasn't the only officer to be surprised.

"It's everywhere," the reader said, loud enough to be heard. They were all at the bottom of the ring. It had surprisingly good acoustics. Her voice travelled.

"Shit," Kirishima said. "He exploded it," he added the words.

"Sir?"

"ExplodoKill," he said Bakugou's vigilante name. "He must have exploded the Noumu," he explained, gesturing around them. There were black gobs of ash everywhere.

A couple of the officers looked sick. They looked around, seeing the evidence of what he'd said.

"That would be right," the reader said, nodding. "But because he's everywhere, he's covering the presence of the last one. The last one only became important after it was dead, and their presence is subdued."

"What do you mean?" Kirishima asked. They needed to know who that last person was.

The woman looked at him. "I can feel the fourth person," she said, "but I don't know who they are. Whoever they are, I haven't felt them before and their presence is muted. If the... Noumu, you called it?"

Kirishima nodded.

"If the Noumu wasn't there, I might be able to properly sense the fourth person."

And that would allow a picture to be drawn. Generally readers could either see what they sensed, or they could describe the people well enough for the sketch artists. "Just do your best," Kirishima said. The reader knew what they needed. He didn't need to remind her.

"Yes, sir," she replied.

He nodded, and looked away. He knew who Bakugou would say had been here, if the vigilante could talk.

Imoku Kakurete.

Katsuki had been going on about the independent politician for years. But there was no evidence linking Kakurete to the League, and this was definitely the result of Bakugou finding Dabi. Kirishima hoped Bakugou had been happy when he died. He'd taken out a Noumu and Dabi… the Special Forces officer hoped that gave his old friend peace.

From the expression gracing Katsuki's frozen face, Kirishima didn't think it had.

Except… whoever that forth person was, the one who had killed Bakugou, it wasn't Imoku Kakurete. The man was on the campaign trail. He had an alibi. And no matter what Bakugou said, there was no link between the almost fifty Kakurete and the should be late twenties Midoriya besides Izuku Midoriya's now deceased Mother, who had been one of Kakurete's campaign team.

The conspiracy theory wasn't a real one, at least not outside of Bakugou's mind.

Kirishima looked over at his captain.

"This should be interesting for the League," he said conversationally. With their Leader dead, who knows what would happen.

"Chaos," Captain Shirei said shortly.

"Maybe," Kirishima replied. "They obviously didn't expect ExplodoKill but the League has always been quick to recover."

"The League has never lost a leader who had ten years experience," the Captain countered.

Kirishima nodded but he wasn't convinced it would be chaos. He just had a feeling. "We'll deal with it though," he assured his captain.

"We have to," Shirei told him. "It's our job."

And really, no matter the mess here, that was the final word on the matter.

-afop-

TIME FOR CHANGE!

Yatou Rida last night claimed an unexpectedly narrow victory in the national election. While his party has wrested control of the House of Representatives from former Prime Minister Kiyoshi Takenaka's party, their majority is slim.

The victors of the night are the independents. Lead by Imoku Kakurete they have taken control of a record 70 seats in the House. This gives the incoming Prime Minister Yatou Rida a majority but it is not secure and he would be well served by courting the Independents. However, the election results make on thing very clear, Independent Representative Kakurete does not need the support of any party, as his constituents have returned him as their Representative by the largest margin ever seen by any candidate. He won a huge 70% of the vote in his electorate, which makes him the most secure Representative in the House.

Yatou Rida will be able to form a government, but the narrowness of the result should serve as a warning to him that he needs to truly represent the people. It is assured that the Independants, lead by Kakurete will be reminding him of that, which just proves that Kakurete is a true hero to the Japanese people.

Imoku smiled at the paper. The article was rather flattering, and it wasn't even written by one of Phoenix Wave's assets. He'd already sent his congratulations to Yatou and commiserations to Takenaka. Both men had accepted them with good grace though Imoku could tell Yatou was disappointed about his majority. Imoku had reminded him that he had a majority.

No one really wanted a minority government, but if it came to it, he had assured Yatou that he could be relied upon. The new Prime Minister was smart enough to realise that his support would come with conditions. But that wasn't anything Yatou needed to worry about yet. He had a majority, because even a slim majority was a majority.

Still… Things could change in politics. And they could change quickly.

Imoku looked over to his desk, where there were several files. So long as Yatou remained tractable, he wouldn't need them but he did like to have insurance. The best bit was Yatou didn't even know the potential scandals existed, so he couldn't mitigate against them.

Though if Yatou did well, maybe Imoku could increase that majority. After Masami experienced being a Shadow Minister for a while, he could probably remind her why she had gone into politics and pull her over into independence… especially if Takenaka demoted her…

The election was a demotion in and of itself, but if he appointed a different Shadow Foreign Minister and returned her to the back bench then… Yes, she'd become an independent quickly enough.

Imoku smiled. That was the future and that path wasn't decided, but there were so many possibilities and he had time to pick between them all.

-afop-

Captain Shirei looked around the small storage area. It had been brought to his attention as part of the murder investigation for Shouta Aizawa. The current theory was that the former underground hero, turned private investigator had possibly been engaged in some illegal hero work when he had been killed. Said illegal work was with the now dead vigilante who called himself ExplodoKill, real name Katsuki Bakugou who had been wanted for questioning on the Mustard Midnight double homicide. The Captain wasn't a fool. Questioning would have lead to an arrest, and then another warrant for Dabi's arrest, which probably would have gone nowhere.

It was very tempting just to say that since they were all dead, the case was closed except… They had managed to match genetic material from the Noumu at Dabi's fighting ring to blood samples taken at the cemetery where Aizawa and Candidate Toogata had been killed.

The Noumu was dead but there was one person unaccounted for in the fighting ring. The person who had actually killed Bakugou. He might have been a vigilante, but everyone deserved justice.

Which was why the case couldn't be closed and why he was here.

Investigations had found the storage area, and a warrant had been granted. Though they had also gotten permission from Hizashi Yamada, former hero Present Mic, who had also been on the storage rooms rent payment summary, to enter here. Hizashi had told them that the storage was for things he and Aizawa had used when they were heroes.

There was nothing illegal with that. Heroes had been able to keep some of their gear. Especially Hizashi. His voice modulation equipment was primarily for public safety and no one had wanted to take some of the keepsakes from heroes.

Now he was looking at the boxes of stuff. It had been well packed but the forensics team had gone through it looking for evidence. They hadn't found anything much, except some fingerprints. Most came from Shouta but there had been a cheer when they found some from Bakugou.

It established the link between the former underground pro-hero and the vigilante. Hizashi had claimed that they'd never met here but obviously they had. The radio presenter had admitted that he knew Shouta had been talking to Katsuki and possibly working on something but he was being tight lipped on what.

Given ExplodoKill's artefacts had been found earlier, it wasn't hard to figure out what. The only question that remained as if Aizawa has shared the vigilante's delusions.

So far, they had found nothing to support that. The boxes just contained Shouta's old hero gear and some files from cases he'd taken soon after reintegration. Nothing illegal, nothing out of place.

But Captain Shirei had a feeling that they were missing something. After all, something had lead Aizawa to be in that cemetery with Candidate Toogata, and something had then murdered them. It had been a horrific scene, almost as bad as Dabi's fighting ring. The Captain had expected gore at Dabi's fighting ring. He had not expected it at a suburban cemetery. He was just thankful that no one from the public had been caught up in that.

That there were victims were bad enough but it would be worse if they were innocent. Given that there was history between Aizawa and Toogata, he knew that there was a reason they were dead.

Infact, that could be the reason Sir Nighteye was dead as well, or at least related to it. They could all be involved in some sort of conspiracy.

Captain Shirei shook his head. They should have just reintegrated. They would have been happier then. Not dead but he guessed some heroes couldn't let go of the past. There was ample evidence of that.

He looked around the storage room. They had to be missing something. He examined all the boxes, running his eyes over them. None of them had false bottoms or anything like that. They were cardboard. Captain Shirei's eyes moved over the walls. He looked in the corners, examining them carefully. There was nothing lurking there but… He felt his eyes narrow. There was a tiny mark on the floor.

That wasn't anything special, he told himself. The floor was cheap. The storage people made their money from rent, not from fixing marks on the floor. Except his eyes kept going to it, tracing out the mark as it ran all the way to the back wall. Wait! That was it. The mark went under the wall. That wasn't right.

Captain Shirei tapped the side walls. They were hollow. They lead to the storage rooms on either side. He tapped the back wall. The sound was different. Just a bit, just enough to mean he couldn't dismiss his thoughts about the mark. He kept tapping his knuckle against the wall. It sounded different in places.

That could mean that the boxes on the other side were packed up against the wall but it wasn't right for that. There were hollow areas under where other bits had sounded solid. That wasn't right for a well packed room and when he tapped in the corner… The wall moved.

Carefully Captain Shirei applied more force. The wall slipped and revealed that it wasn't a wall at all. It was a board. Particle board, made to look like one of the internal walls. He pulled it away, slipping it against the floor and looked behind it.

His eyes widened. There were photos there, pinned up against a backing board, with string linking them in what seemed to be random patterns. He put the concealing board down and stepped back. There was enough room to do that, and suddenly the way this room had been packed made sense. Only a few boxes had been hard up against the back wall. They would be quick enough to move so that Aizawa could look at this.

Captain Shirei recognised a case board when he saw it. The strings were colourful and connected to photos of people he recognised. Dabi, Mustard, Himiko Toga, Kurogiri, Ujiko… All the major members of the League. Tomura Shigaraki's picture was there too, as was All For One's. There were black marks around their images, the same with Mustard's and Ujiko's…

The Captain knew it meant they were dead. Aizawa had been updating the board.

He looked at the strings. They all lead to one person. The Captain lifted his eyes to the top of the board, looking at the image.

Even with all the strings attached to it, so many strings that it almost concealed the image, he recognised it. Imoku Kakurete. The Representative Kakurete.

Captain Shirei breathed out and just stared for a few moments before he shook his head. "Aizawa, you fool," he muttered.

The underground hero should have known how dangerous it was to go up against politicians. And going up against one like Kakurete, who was both popular and influential… that was suicide.

The Captain reached out and unpinned the photo. He put the pin back, placing it slightly higher, through the question mark that had been over Kakurete's image. He was careful to make sure he didn't disturb the strings as he put the picture in his pocket. Then he looked at the board, nodding to himself when he saw there was no outline to give away that there had been a photo there. He could only do that much modification without risk. If he moved anything else, then his fingerprints might come up. Best to be careful. .

"I found something," Captain Shirei called. That brought the forensic team running.

They skidded to a halt at the door and he heard them gasp when they saw the true back wall of the storage unit. He turned away from it as several team members rushed in.

This was just more evidence for the case… a case that appeared would not be solved today.

He had a feeling it would not be solved any day.

-afop-

Despite being dressed in prison orange, Yū Takeyama was still filled with rage. No one was taking her seriously. No one saw the danger and no one was doing anything!

She had felt a slight regret when informed of the woman's death but she had gotten in the way! Why didn't anyone understand that? The woman, Inko, she'd been told, had just gotten in the way. She shouldn't have interfered. No one had interfered when Shinji had been killed. They'd simply watched. They'd let the League do what they want.

They'd let him burn.

Yū took a deep, shuddering breath at the thought. He'd screamed and screamed, and screamed and no one had done anything. She could still remember it.

The police never hunted for Dabi. They knew who killed Shinji. They knew who it was, but they always claimed they couldn't find Dabi. They couldn't find the League!

That's why she'd acted. She'd had to act and she couldn't find Dabi but she'd found something even better. She'd found the man who destroyed heroes. She found the man who had made it so that Dabi could walk away. It was all his fault! He was the one who had killed heroes.

And yet, she was the one in prison. She was the one lying on a lumpy bed, with a quirk suppressing anklet as the waited for her trial.

At this time of night the prison was quiet. If Yū concentrated she could hear the tread of the guards but they were faint. At night they relied on cameras.

It was because of the quiet that she heard the whisper of noise from the far end of her cell. Yū pretended to be asleep but she looked down there. The back of her cell was in shadow but it was darker now, and swirling?

She was hard pressed to keep her eyes mostly closed. Someone stepped out of the shadow, confirming her suspicions that the swirling was a warp gate.

Kurogiri, she identified the quirk user. And the person who had come… a woman. Blonde hair and yellow eyes. Himiko. Yū knew all the League's main members. The blonde looked around, spotting her on the bunk before she smiled as someone else emerged from the warp gate.

"You can sit up you know," Toga told her. The villain knew she wasn't sleeping.

Yū opened her eyes and sat up. The warp gate closed but before she could move, the second person crowded close to her. Yū lashed out, hitting them, but it was like hitting concrete. They didn't even grunt and Yū felt something grab her wrists, bringing her hands together and hauling her upwards before turning to face Himiko.

The woman smiled at her. Yū kicked out. She couldn't reach Himiko and while she felt herself impact with whoever was holding her, they didn't react. She was sure she'd kicked between the legs, and that was painful, even if it was a woman holding her.

"You aren't going to be able to escape," Himiko told her, as she drew a large hunting knife. "Oh wait!" the woman giggled to herself, putting the knife down. She patted down her clothes looking for something.

"What are you doing here?" Yū hissed.

"You can speak normally," Himiko said as she continued to pat her clothes. "Ah, there it is," she said eventually, reaching a hand into one of her pockets to pull something out.

Yū recognised it as a camera.

"The rest of the cameras have been disabled," Himiko told her, pointing to them with her free hand before she fussed with the one she'd brought, and set it on the side of the basin so that it was pointed at Yū.

"What? That's impossible!" Yū growled. She had a bad feeling about this. She struggled harder. Someone had to hear her right?

Himiko chuckled. "The boss is really pissed at you," she told Yū. "He's gone all out."

"What?" Yū gasped. The boss… who the fuck did that mean? Dabi? Except she'd heard he was dead. Who? "Help!" She screamed.

Himiko gestured at the thing holding her. Yū was surprised when it slammed her into the wall. She shook her head, as her vision wavered. Not much had been able to hurt her.

"You can scream all you want, but no one is going to hear," Himiko told her. "And unless you are screaming for me, it will just annoy me," the villain added.

"How?" Yū managed to say.

"Forcefield," Himiko said, pointing to something in the corner.

Yū knew what her cell looked like, even in the dark. There wasn't meant to be anything in that corner so she had to take the villain's word it was a forcefield. It probably was. No one had complained at her yelling.

"You pissed him off," Himiko said conversationally, "so now you have to deal with the consequences," she added in a singsong voice. "The guards are bribed. Your fellow inmates aren't going to say anything, and it will be worth their while do remain silent, and the cameras are all corrupted. Except for this one," she added happily, reaching out to pat the camera she had brought. "He wants this one… And I have the entire night with you."

"No!" Yū shook her head. "No, that's not-"

"Not what?" Himiko asked, cocking her head. There was a cold fire burning in her eyes. It did not fit what Yū knew of the League member.

"It's not right," Yū managed to say.

Himiko shook her head. "You don't get to decide what's right or wrong," the villain told her. "And you hurt him."

"Who?!" Yū objected. She had targeted Imoku, not the League's boss. She'd gotten some stupid civilian woman who was enamored of the politician. It hadn't been her intention but there were always casualties in war, and that's what this was. A war against the League. One she was fighting alone.

"Imoku liked her," Himiko said as if that was all the explanation needed.

"What? Imoku?" How did Imoku know Himiko?

The villain smiled at her. "Imoku hates you," Toga told her. "And when the boss hates something, he destroys it. You killed her and he liked her." The villain's voice took on a sing song note as she explained. It made the entire situation unreal.

Yū knew she hadn't been the smartest hero. On that score, Kamui had been far better, but she wasn't stupid, especially when the information was presented so blatantly. Toga had definitely said Imoku and the boss in the same sentence. She had referred to them as the one being… A hundred little things suddenly make sense and she could see the way the politician had manipulated them all. "I wasn't after he- Argh!" her sentence was broken off when Himiko flung her knife at her. It sank into her shoulder.

"You hurt him," Himiko said again pointedly, coming close and wrenching her knife out. She grinned. Her teeth were white in the gloom. "And he's given me the entire night to make sure you regret it."

-afop-

Izuku stood alone in his office. He was looking out at the city. The lights were bright, and from his vantage, he could see all the way into the suburbs where the streetlights illuminated smaller laneways and houses. He couldn't see the houses, but he could see dark patches where there were parks and other areas. It was a beautiful sight. Dark but with dazzling highlights. He felt his lips stretch into a smile as he watched it.

He had come in early. Very early, before dawn. Hesho knew he sometimes did and his executive assistant would be here if Imoku let him but he didn't. That was take away from the quiet. It was a time just for himself, when he could work, and think without interruption. He had completed some papers earlier but had moved to stand here some time ago. His office lights were off, making it mesmerising, just watching the way the lights moved.

He took a deep breath, blowing it out in a sigh before taking another. Izuku touched his fingers to his cheek, not surprised to feel the tears there. He bit his lip as emotion threatened to overcome him. If anyone could see him now… His business rivals, any of the other Representatives, anyone from the Underworld… Izuku snorted. They would never believe he was their boss.

But this was time for him. He had everything he ever wanted. Unquestioned control over the government, with no one even realising it. Commanding control over the business world, with most companies following his lead without knowing why. Undeclared control over the underworld, though with the recent losses in the League, that control would be tested soon. He knew it, and he was looking forward to the games and manipulations required to ensure his victory.

He was the Leader of Japan in every way that mattered, much like Sensei had been before him.

No. Izuku's lips quirked. That wasn't right. Sensei had ruled from the shadows. He was… It was wrong to say he was afraid to be seen, because Izuku knew that wasn't the case. Sensei was just more circumspect with his dealings. Izuku was more open. At least, officially. That was accurate.

He was the Leader of Japan, in every way that mattered.

No comparisons to the past were needed because the past was the past. This was now.

And now, he had to decide where he wanted to go, what he wanted to do.

Heroes were gone. They would remain gone. It had taken the new Prime Minister, Yatou Rida all of two weeks to come around to his view. The man had been fixated on the idealism of heroes but within two weeks of becoming the Prime Minister, he had learned the economics of heroes. It probably helped that Izuku had instructed the Treasury to ensure he got the figures laid out very clearly on that. There was no need to confuse the man.

That being done, it didn't matter what anyone who still took their lead from other countries thought about Heroes, they would only gather those attracted to the romanticism of the idea. Those who were grounded in reality, thankfully a larger percentage, would not give in to purely romantic ideas, especially when the economics were so bad.

Opening quirk usage to the general populace had led to a huge boost in earnings. The Government made money from the licence fees. They made money from the fines issues when someone used their quirk illegally. They just made money, which was feed back to the police and military to ensure they had the tools needed to take down those few morons who thought they could be a villain. There were always those who acted at random.

Heroes were gone. What remained of the League would be under control in the next few months, and removed enough from him that they were no longer a liability. It meant he could now pick a new direction, a new future to pursue.

Izuku frowned. It was an odd thought. What did he want?

There was no answer forthcoming from his mind. Or rather the answers that came were small, petty little things.

His phone pinged, distracting him. Izuku glanced back at his desk. In the predawn darkness it was hard to see but he could make out a small swirl of deeper darkness. It disappeared quickly, leaving a small package on his desk. He felt his lips quirk. He knew what it was.

Himiko had spent the night educating Yū Takeyama. Imoku moved to his desk and picked up package Kurogiri had delivered. He sat in the darkness, and opened the phone. There was only two applications left on the phone. One to make calls, and the other to take the video. He taped the video app. There was only one file. Six and a half hours long. Himiko had been thorough. The phone was almost out of charge though. He closed it, and put it in his breast pocket, buttoning up the fabric. Now was not the time or place to watch it.

But it was one of his desires and it was one he would savour.

What else did he want from the future? He wasn't sure.

Izuku sat at his desk, ignoring the gloom around him. He sighed. Fulfilling All For One's goals had been easy, and he had, over the last year, fulfilled his own goal. Taking down Bakugou was… It shouldn't be the only thing he wanted. He knew that.

So if his heart had no goal, he had to deal with this logically. After all, even when his heart gave him direction, he had to use his head to get there.

Firstly, he wanted, no needed to maintain his power. On the official front, Yatou was in his pocket, as were enough of the independents, so he could keep Yatou in power, or not as the situation demanded. The opposition was in the process of selecting a new leader, and he knew all the candidates, so that was in hand. In the underworld, though Dabi, and several more of the League's acknowledged leaders were dead, he controlled those who were loyal, and they would ensure that the new selection would obey him, without ever knowing who he was. In that, he would be very much like All For One. Izuku anticipated a challenge there, but it wouldn't take long.

Which meant his power was secure. He'd always have to guard his power but for the moment, that could be a secondary task. He needed something to focus on.

Quirkless rights was a vague thought, except he'd already seen to that. He'd done it in the aftermath of the Hero's Reintegration. He'd introduced the legislation into Parliament then to show Heroes what true Heroes should have been fighting for, rather than the glory that they strived to achieve. He'd found several people who had already been working for Quirkless rights and, after the Legislation was passed, legislation that was named after Izuku, he had ensured that those people were awarded several accolades in recognition of their truly heroic work.

Again, quirkless rights was not something that required his whole attention.

What he really needed was a challenge!

But what?

International affairs? He could probably get himself appointed to the UN but what did he want with other countries? Some were already beginning to follow Japan's lead. They were dismantling their Hero systems. Others never had hero systems to begin with. Others were sticking to them. It would be their loss. It was not his job to dictate to other countries what they should do.

Izuku snorted at the thought. His job was just Japan.

He looked over at the window. It was still dark outside but the sun would be rising soon. Maybe he should start looking for a successor. One of the reasons All For One's vision had been achieved was that he had thought about the future. He was wise enough to know that his time was over.

Izuku knew his time was not yet over, and it was too soon to teach someone. In another twenty years, he'd do it then. In the meantime…

What? Gather wealth? Gather influence? He had all of them, and he was not so foolish to desire absolute control. He was not a tyrant. There had to be some dissent or else people resented their government. You could not save everyone if they were all fighting against you.

Maybe he should blacken Katsuki's reputation further. Except his former childhood friend had done an impressive job of that without too much input from him. He'd needed Bakugou to take out those of the League who were a liability. His old friend had taken out Compress before he was ready but that had been a minor hiccup. He'd now taken out Twice, Ujiko and and Dabi and that was roughly when he wanted. Katsuki had done that, and had taken out Mustard as well. Izuku hadn't needed him gone but sometimes sacrifices had to be made. But Bakugou had done his work in such a way that his reputation was also ruined.

No one had cried at Kacchan's funeral, not even his mother, who had simply looked tired and resigned. The Police were actually pissed Bakugou was dead, since it meant they couldn't prosecute him.

Everything there had gone to plan. He'd go so far as to say perfectly to plan.

Izuku sighed deeply before he rose again, moving to the window.

The sun was rising and his office afforded him a brilliant view of it. Izuku watched the light crest the horizon. It spread out in a brilliant line just before the sun peeked above the land. The line contracted into the burning disk of the sun as it lifted higher.

Izuku sighed again. It was more relaxed this time. He didn't have to decide today. Or tomorrow. For the moment, it would be business as usual. He was sure something would come up. All For One always said he mustn't lose heart.

Izuku smiled at the sun. He wasn't Tomura, who didn't know what to do with his victory. He still had things to do. There were still policies that would be made better. There were still people who needed to be saved. Maybe though, things were not as consuming as those events that had gone before, but there things to do and he was sure, in time, inspiration would come, for something greater. Something he could use to ensure that everyone remained saved.

He had to be positive, because when he was positive, good things happened. Izuku had enough examples of that. Heroes, the League, and Bakugou.

All he had to do was be patient. Something would come. Something always did.

He would be ready.

-afop-

The End

-afop-

Epilogue note: I can see some questions now :D Is Captain Shirei on Imoku's payroll? That's up to you. He might be, and thus he's protecting Imoku, or he might not be but knows that the board would be destroyed if it had anything about Imoku on it, so he's waiting to collect better evidence. You can decide.

-afop-

Fic note: The first part of the fic involved a bit more politics, but in the second part, Izuku behaved a bit more like a traditional villain, because his enemies were conspiring against him and we know what that means.

Where to now for Japan... Well, I foresee them becoming a super power based on the sensible use of human abilities and then on wards... All because of Izuku's leadership. He won't be becoming the Prime Minister of Japan as he is an independent and it would look very, very odd even if he could become the PM. He could, because he could convince everyone in Parliament to vote for him and that's really all it takes, but then there would be some suspicion of mind control and he's worked hard to avoid that. Plus I think he's a bit busy!

The next couple of chapters are a wish fulfillment chapter and an alternate version of the end scenes.

Thank you for reading. And if you haven't left a review, feel free, no matter how long it has been. They are always appreciated.