Mikey had spent two months with the Defectors.
Unbeknownst to them, their victory at Jöten had already reached ears they would have preferred remained deaf.
TWO MONTHS AGO
Payne Morrison limped through the sterile halls of a government building in Sector A, his body still wrecked from the docks and the crash into the ocean. Stitches pulled with every step, the gauze beneath his coat damp with slow-bleeding wounds. His jaw was locked tight, his cane clicking sharply against the polished floor, each sound echoing far too loudly in the silence.
He had been summoned here. By who, he didn't know. And that uncertainty crawled beneath his skin worse than the pain in his ribs.
The office he entered was dark—too dark. Only a single circular light glowed above, silver reflections skating across the glassy roundtable. The corners were swallowed in black.
Every chair was filled with brass from the Council. But none of them spoke. None so much as twitched. Their stillness was uncanny, their faces pale and damp with sweat. One bead broke free, sliding down a man's cheek and falling onto the glass with a sharp plink.
Payne scowled. "Who the hell called me in here?"
Silence. Wide eyes. Frozen faces.
"I said, who the hell—"
The sliding doors whispered open behind him.
Bootsteps.
Unhurried.
Heavy.
Payne turned and his gut clenched.
Mako strolled in, white Director's coat hanging loose, unbuttoned halfway. His cap sat crooked, his hands buried in the pockets of black slacks, boots thudding with arrogant rhythm against the chrome.
His yellow eyes glowed unnatural in the dim light, like a predator's watching from brush.
"Woahhh, Payne?"
Mako's sing-song voice grated instantly.
"You call me in here? 'Cause if you did…"
He drifted close, leaned down, his grin vanishing as fast as it came. His voice dropped into a hiss.
"I. Don't. Listen. To. Bugs."
Payne bristled, glaring daggers at him.
"I didn't invite you, you fucking idiot. I got called here too."
Mako's mood snapped again—unnaturally fast, like a child flipping masks. His grin returned, wide and disarming, but hollow.
"Ohhh! You should've led with that, buddy!"
He clapped Payne on the shoulder like they were old friends.
"Scared me for a second, haha!"
Payne shoved his hand away, disgust burning in his gut. He turned to the table, refusing to give them the satisfaction of his fear.
"Who called us here?"
His gaze stayed locked on Mako, neither man blinking.
The Councilmen twitched. Finally, one of them shifted, fumbling at his tie. His throat bobbed as he forced words out.
"L-Ludovico, sirs…"
Both Payne and Mako froze.
Payne felt his blood run cold.
"Wh—what?"
Even Mako's grin faltered, his voice lowering to something rawer, unsettled. "He's not here… is he?"
The man at the table swallowed again, eyes darting wildly as if searching for escape. His voice came out in a broken stammer.
"He's… he's here. Right now."
Mako's yellow eyes widened, his body stiffening like a cornered animal.
"Shit."
Payne turned instinctively, scanning for the nearest exit—any way out—when he saw it.
A shape.
Two faint, burning eyes in the corner, where the light didn't reach.
Red.
Watching.
Payne froze mid-step, his throat clamping shut.
The pressure in the room shifted, suffocating, like all the oxygen had been drained away.
From the darkness, a figure stirred.
Slow.
Purposeful.
The red eyes rose higher.
And higher.
And higher still.
The towering frame emerged piece by piece, the shadows reluctant to let go. Shoulders that nearly brushed the top of the light's edge.
A body built of something more solid than flesh. Payne could only guess at the sheer size by where the glow of those eyes ended—six foot ten, maybe more.
When Ludovico finally straightened to his full height, the Councilmen flinched in unison, as though the air itself had commanded it.
Payne's pulse thundered. His cane slipped in his grip, his hands clammy. For once, he wasn't just angry. He was terrified.
Ludovico stepped forward.
Every breath rattled the room. Every step landed like an earthquake.
He stopped at the edge of the light.
His face remained drowned in shadow, but his frame was revealed—hulking, statuesque.
Shoulders broad enough to blot out the glow above, a chest that rose and fell like the shifting of a mountain.
His hands—hands large enough to close around a man's skull and crush without effort—hung loose at his sides with unnerving calm.
His skin, what little could be seen, was olive and weathered, as though carved from stone.
His uniform was not like the others: his Director's coat was streaked with black through the white, his cap fully black, and a long dark scarf coiled around his neck, draping behind him like a shroud.
The sight alone froze Payne where he stood.
Even Mako, who had swaggered in moments ago, now seemed stiff, like a child summoned before his father.
Mako approached first, his voice stripped of its usual mocking lilt.
"Ludovico. Why have you summoned us?"
It wasn't fear. It was reverence—respect sharpened into submission.
Payne, slower, dared to speak.
"Ludo—"
"Quiet."
The voice was a seismic wave.
Deep, resonant, impossible to ignore.
It filled every crack in the room, left Payne's knees buckling before he even realized he had bowed.
His heart hammered so violently it hurt.
Ludovico placed his massive hands behind his back. His silhouette towered, still refusing the light.
"I will address you later."
He moved toward Mako.
The ground didn't shake, but it felt like it should.
"Speak, boy," Ludovico said, voice low, steady, devastating. "Why have I summoned you?"
Mako swallowed, still standing—barely. His lips trembled, but he forced the words out.
"Because… of Payne Morrison's failure at Jöten."
Ludovico grunted, the sound a rumble that vibrated in bone.
"His failure? Was it his alone? Did he not call for your aid?"
Mako twitched, shoulders tightening.
"Brother, I—"
"Did he," Ludovico pressed, cutting the air like a blade, "or did he not?"
"…He did."
"Then why," Ludovico's tone did not rise, did not waver, but grew sharper, colder, "did you cast him into the sea? Leave him to die?"
Mako's mouth opened, then shut. His eyes darted. Finally, he confessed.
"…He called me a child."
A second grunt.
Anger—barely leashed.
"You've lived for nearly three centuries," Ludovico said, disdain heavy in every syllable, "and still you cannot master your pride? Morrison was correct. You are no better than an infant."
Mako's composure cracked.
His eyes lit with electricity, bolts arcing wildly off his frame, scorching the chrome floor.
"Why does it matter? They are insects! They will never win again!"
The red eyes in the dark flared.
The room seemed to shrink.
Ludovico's presence pressed down like gravity itself.
"They were never meant to win."
His voice cut through the lightning like water drowning a flame.
"And yet they did. Those 'insects' defeated us."
Mako's rage rose hotter, sparks clawing up his arms.
"It was only two hundred of them! Nothing more! This victory gives them nothing!"
Ludovico did not move.
He only raised one hand.
Slowly.
Deliberately.
The hand—massive, gnarled, dwarfing Mako's face—rested gently against his cheek.
"Baby brother," he said softly.
Mako blinked, confused.
Then two fingers extended.
SLAP.
The impact detonated through the room like a bomb. All glass shattered at once—the table, the walls, the light overhead.
The Councilmen ducked, shrieking, shielding their heads.
Payne flinched on the floor, arms over his skull.
Mako's head snapped sideways, his jaw breaking audibly.
Blood streamed from his mouth.
He fell to his knees, clutching at his face as the bones clicked and crunched back into place unnaturally fast.
His breath hitched.
His eyes were wide.
Ludovico stood unmoving, hand lowering, eyes glowing like embers through the shadow.
"They have everything now," he said, voice steady, merciless. "You gave them the one thing we have denied them for centuries. The one thing they must never touch."
His voice hardened, booming against the walls.
"Hope."
He took a step closer, towering over Mako's kneeling form.
"Do you forget Father's teaching?"
His tone sharpened into something cold, rehearsed, absolute.
"Hope is the weed that strangles control. Hope is the end of all order. Hope is the only thing that can bring our ruin. And you…"
He leaned forward slightly, the glow of his eyes flaring.
"…you let it bloom."
Mako trembled, finally understanding.
"I… I am sorry, brother—"
"I do not care for your apologies. I do not care for your cults, your worshippers, your petty games."
His voice cracked like thunder without volume.
"I care for my city. For my Council. And I will not tolerate failure again. Do not forget, Mako… you are replaceable."
Mako lowered his head, shame burning through his rage. For the first time in centuries, he felt small.
"I… I won't fail you again, brother."
Silence.
Then Ludovico's reply, low and chilling.
"I know you won't."
Ludovico paced toward Payne, each step like a hammer blow against the steel floor. The weight of his presence crushed the air, making it hard for anyone in the room to breathe.
He loomed above the bowed figure of Payne Morrison, shadow devouring shadow.
"Stand," Ludovico said.
His voice was calm—calm in the way an ocean was calm before swallowing ships whole. It carried through every corner of the chamber, leaving no place to hide.
Payne scrambled shakily to his feet, legs trembling.
"Y–yes…?"
Ludovico studied him with glowing red eyes that pierced through the dark like coals buried in ash. "I will ask the same of you that I did of Mako. Tell me," he said, "why I summoned you."
Payne's throat worked.
"Because… I failed."
Ludovico's pacing slowed, his hands clasped behind his back like a general surveying a battlefield.
"Incorrect."
His tone was as sharp as a blade's edge.
"It was not your failure alone. Mako also displeased me."
Payne's heart jolted.
His knees nearly buckled.
Ludovico tilted his head ever so slightly, eyes narrowing.
"Did you think I was blind to your pathetic, obvious attempt to undermine the Chancellor?"
The words cut through Payne like cold steel. He swallowed hard, lips parting, but no defense came.
"I care nothing for the Chancellor," Ludovico continued, voice deepening. "He is a figurehead. A mask. Kael may play at guarding him, but he is irrelevant. My Council is not his to govern."
He stopped pacing.
The silence stretched, suffocating.
"No, Morrison," Ludovico said, his voice a rumble from the pit of the earth. "My anger with you lies elsewhere. In your failures. And your pride."
Payne's breath caught.
"You stripped Jöten of half its guards out of arrogance. You allowed not one, but two Defectors into high positions in my Council. And the boy…"
Ludovico's eyes burned.
"You spared the son. Why?"
Payne stammered, body trembling.
"I–I believed he could be useful, to the Council, Sir."
Ludovico's nostrils flared. He leaned closer, his shadow falling over Payne like a curtain.
"You lie. You spared him because you wanted control. A taste of power that will never be yours."
Payne's eyes darted to the ground.
"You are Secretary of Defense because of your skill, because of the blood you spilled as a soldier. I believed you loyal. I believed you strong."
Ludovico's tone sharpened.
"But I see now. You are nothing but pride wrapped in flesh."
In a blur, Ludovico's massive hand engulfed Payne's head and lifted him effortlessly off the ground. Payne kicked and clawed, but Ludovico held him as if he were no heavier than a feather. His skull felt like it would crack under that palm.
"Pride," Ludovico said, each syllable reverberating like thunder, "is the most poisonous sin. Worse than greed. Worse than lust. It rots a man from the inside until nothing remains."
He dropped Payne to the floor like discarded meat.
Payne gasped for breath, chest heaving.
"I respect the Defectors," Ludovico went on, voice low but cutting through the chamber like fire through dry grass. "Fools, yes. Doomed, yes. But they fight without end. They endure. They bleed. They suffer. And still they rise. They have earned my respect."
He leaned forward, those red eyes burning inches from Payne's bowed head.
"You, Morrison… have not."
Payne's body trembled uncontrollably.
"You will prove yourself to me again."
Then Ludovico's massive hand landed on Payne's shoulder. His fingers, thick as steel rods, dug into the man's flesh.
"Do not speak," Ludovico said, voice flat, merciless. "Do not scream. Or I will end you here."
Payne's jaw clenched.
Tears welled in his eyes.
He nodded once, shakily.
The pressure built.
Ludovico's grip crushed bone and muscle beneath his fingers.
Payne's breath hitched—every nerve on fire.
He wanted to howl, to collapse, but he bit his tongue until blood filled his mouth.
Then Ludovico pushed deeper. His fingers sank into Payne's flesh as though molding clay.
The fabric tore.
Then skin.
Then meat.
Payne's vision blurred. His teeth chattered with the effort of holding back a scream.
Tears streamed freely down his face.
And then—slowly, with deliberate cruelty—Ludovico wrenched Payne's arm from its socket. The ripping was wet and ragged, muscles tearing, tendons snapping one by one.
The agony was unholy.
But Payne did not scream.
His body convulsed, every vein in his neck bulging, but still he held his silence.
At last, Ludovico tore the arm free, the sound a grotesque symphony of bone and sinew parting ways.
He held the limb for a moment, then dropped it to the steel floor with a sickening clang.
Blood pooled at Payne's feet as he writhed.
"Good," Ludovico said, wiping his hand on the jacket of a trembling Councilman who all but threw the garment into his grasp.
He turned toward Mako.
"Double the Outland sweeps. Send your Zodiacs."
Mako, blood still drying on his lips from earlier, bowed his head. A grin flickered.
"Yes, Brother."
Ludovico paused at the doorway. He cast one last look at Payne, who knelt in a puddle of his own blood, face pale, body shuddering violently.
"Oh, I almost forgot," Ludovico said, tone almost casual. "You may speak now."
The chamber exploded with Payne's scream—raw, guttural, ripped straight from the soul. He collapsed, thrashing, the agony finally given voice.
Ludovico left without another glance, his heavy steps echoing into silence. Mako trailed after him like a shadow.
And in the darkness of the Council chamber, Payne Morrison writhed alone, his screams clawing at the steel walls long after Ludovico was gone.