-Prologue-
It was silent, the only noise being the white light that buzzed softly above the two figures facing each other. The two figures sat at a metal table, in a white room with a mirror window, who on the other side two more figures stood watching intently.
"What'll you think he'll do?" one of them murmured to the other.
The second one shrugged. "Who knows? Maybe he'll take it in a good way and brush it off." he narrowed his eyes. "And rethink this whole plan."
"You know he won't do that, Pat."
Pat sighed. "I know, Paul. Just trying to be positive."
"That won't do us any good," Paul muttered under his breath. The two turned their focus back to the two in the room.
"So," one of them spoke first, looking through a file in his hands, "let's get started." He was a burly man, middle aged, with piercing green eyes and slick black hair. He wore a one-of-a-kind black and red uniform with a gold pin that read R.L.
The figure across from him let out a bored yawn. "You're the boss."
Red Leader narrowed his eyes at him and looked back at his file before speaking again. "Tord Larrsun, I've known you and admired you for a quite a while, I practically raised you. Your are my apprentice, and I want you to succeed as much as you do."
Tord suppressed to roll his eyes, not being fazed by the praise. He knew what this was coming to.
"But," Red Leader continued, "you are very unpredictable, and the council demands to do something about that."
Tord seethed at the mention of the counsel. He hated them with a passion. They had no confidence in him and no belief that he would make an excellent leader. He was much younger, he had been invited to one of the council meetings, being Red Leader's apprentice and all. They were explaining their plans for their world domination and communist rulings. As Tord had listened to them, he thought their plans were idiotic and could only take control over a small country. Of course, he told them that. That had not gone well. They had said they didn't want to hear the words of a "child." That had almost set Tord off; if Red Leader hadn't stopped him. He didn't understand the meaning of a council, he worked better with his plans alone.
"They especially paid attention to your last 'incident'," Red Leader continued, breaking his train of thought. "Which we did not expect at all, or did we know about your giant mechanism."
Tord smirked. Of course they didn't. They never paid no attention to his inventions anyway. Now look at what came out of the hands of a "child."
"And we can see that you've clearly failed when you didn't come back with it and came back...damaged. And speaking of which, I am not fully comfortable with your robotic arm."
Tord visibly rolled his eyes this time. He was referring to his scars and the loss of his eye. But he didn't really understand the arm. He thought it was a good show of power and menace. Already common people who saw it turned coward.
Tord leaned back in his chair, crossing his arms. Just get to the point.
As if reading his mind, Red Leader cleared his throat to speak once more. "Even though I have raised you and taken you in as the next heir, I have come to a decision. Even though you've successfully completed all the assignments I've given you, being the top of your class, sadly...I have to evict you of your position."
"Oh?" Tord raised a brow. "Why is that?"
"You too…" he paused, thinking, "weak."
Weak. The word echoed around him, taunting him. Just because of one failed mission, they think I'm too weak and damaged to any more. Just you wait, Red Leader.
"Weak?" Tord echoed. "May I have a clearer definition?"
"It's not you who are weak in general, It is your 'friends' that make you weak." Red Leader pushed three wallet-sized photos towards him, familiar figures on all of them. Tord peered at them lazily. "But it did catch our interest when you attempted to kill them, which you also failed to do."
"Ha!" Tord exclaimed. "I never failed, 'cause I never intended to kill them. Besides, I couldn't care less about what happens to those lowlives."
Red Leader narrowed his eyes at him skeptically. "Hm, I see." He paused, inspecting Tord. "But you almost killed one of them...the one we think you care about most." He took two pictures away and left one.
Tord stared at it, thoughts racing in his head. "What makes you say that?" he questioned cooly.
"Well, it's the first thing a Red Soldier learns: dispose of what makes you weak. And in this case, you tried to kill him, trying to dispose of your weakness." Red leader leaned forward and lowered his voice. "Because I admire you, I will give you this advice: Instead of getting rid of your weakness, make that weakness into a strength."
Tord blinked at. A strength..? Hm..I've never thought about that. He could be useful to me.
Red Leader cleared his throat to change the subject. "Anyway, about your departure…"
His words were drowned out as Tord put his focus to his robotic arm, pushing the bright blue circle in the palm of the hand. He felt energy pulse from the connected nerves of the artificial arm.
"...we will give a fake name, fake location, everything to hide your identity…"
His mechanic arm started to heat up, almost burning his side. He carefully hovered his arm beside him.
"...we are deciding if we should erase your memory of the whole thing so you can go back to your 'friends' and have a normal life."
As if I would go back to them. I'd have them come to me..
"..So it is time to say your goodbyes to your most trusted soldiers, you might not ever see them again-"
Suddenly Tord lunged forward and grabbed him by the neck with his robotic arm, the hot metal clamping on his skin. They both fell to ground, wrestling to try to get on top of each other. Tord managed to get both hands on Red Leaders' neck, choking the life out of him.
Tord smiled and chuckled maliciously. "You were right about me being unpredictable," he hissed in his ear. "Just much more than you thought, Red Leader."
Red Leader managed to scowl at him, rage and hate in his green eyes. "Y-You ba-astard-"
Tord's smile widened and pressed harder, the metal steaming against his neck. He watched his Leaders' pupils turn to pinpoints as the life was choked out of him. He finally went limp in his hands, his head lolling to the side.
Tord let go slowly, cautiously standing up. He looked back at the mirror wall, only seeing himself, but he knew Paul and Pat were there, watching him. He smirked at them smugly. He knew whatever he did, they would always follow him, no matter what. He reached down towards the lifeless body and grabbed the gold pin that read R.L.
The door to the white room opened and Paul and Pat emerged, walking straight towards Tord.
"S-Sir?" Paul stuttered, his gaze flickering to Tord and the dead body. "W-Why-?"
"I would've never became the Red Leader as long as he was alive," Tord growled bitterly, kicking away the body. "This was the only way."
Pat cleared his throat. "W-Well, I guess there were other ways of handling this...I guess this was an easier way."
Tord rolled his eyes. He walked past them, quickly exiting the claustrophobic room.
"Wait! Tord!" Paul called out, racing after him. "What are you going to do now?"
Tord didn't look at him, keeping his gaze straight ahead. If his plan was going to work, he needed everything out of the way. He needed the council dead. He needed every trace of them gone. He also needed every one of his weaknesses destroyed.
"I'm going to make my weakness my strength."