Deep within a heavily forested valley on the southern continent of Earth, a massive, custom-built desk of polished mahogany sat incongruously among the muddy tracks and construction cranes.

The man sitting behind it was exceptionally short, a fact he went to great lengths to conceal by propping himself up on three thick leather cushions. His red hair was slicked back, and his eyes full of unimaginable greed and malice, as he reviewed a blueprint for a massive, heavily fortified military tower. 

"The foundations are solid, Commander Red," a tall, deeply tanned man with a sharp posture reported, stepping into the makeshift command tent. Staff Officer Black adjusted his uniform, looking down at his superior. "The initial mercenary recruits have been integrated, and General White has already begun deploying scouts to the northern peaks to recruit more, all while Colonel Silver’s boxing corps is securing our eastern borders as we speak." 

"Excellent, excellent," Red grinned, lighting a heavy cigar before exhaling a cloud of smoke as he leaned back, watching his dreams come true, all while staring up at a giant banner hanging from the tent rafters, a black symbol reading RR against a blood-red ribbon background. "The world will soon know the Red Ribbon army." 

"And the funding, sir?" Black asked smoothly. "The local governments are starting to notice the massive arms smuggling operations, it won’t be long before the King of earth realizes what we are doing." 

"I don’t care," Red dismissed with a wave of his hand. "Them knowing is of no consequence, if anything… it helps us move along."

The sound of footsteps echoed outside, before the tent flap pushed open, and a man with gray hair, and a thick mustache walked in. He didn't wear a uniform; instead, he wore a standard white lab coat draped over his shoulders, smudged with oil and other stains.

This man was Dr. Gero.

"The automated defense turrets are online," Doctor Gero stated, walking towards Red. "The artificial human blueprints are also progressing. Mechanical framework experiments for Model Number 1 through 7 are complete, though I find their independent logic programming... highly unstable, I might need more time to… adjust their potential flaws." 

"Don't give me excuses, Gero!" Red barked, slamming his fist on the desk. "I want results!"

"Then, you need to understand that your idea won’t work! Mechs can be captured and weaponized by the enemy," Dr. Gero replied, his eyes narrowing slightly as he stared down at the short commander. "On the other hand… Androids… my androids… will be able to think for themselves. They will be able to learn and adapt! If you truly want global domination, you will let me perfect the artificial human program without your SHORT-sighted deadlines." 

Commander Red veins popped on his forehead at the word short, but he forced his temper down, clearing his throat. "Just make sure they work when the time comes, Doctor. The world is an unruly place…. and we need absolute fear to maintain order." 

"Fear is a biological reaction," Gero muttered, turning around to leave the tent. "An organic flaw, one that my creations won’t have." 

"Sir, if I may speak freely," Black said smoothly, crossing his arms behind his back. "Are we truly certain we can trust Dr. Gero? The man speaks to you as if he is an equal, not a subordinate. The way I see it… it wouldn't take much for him to turn those so called… androids against us if he decided he no longer needed our funding."

Commander Red took a long drag from his cigar, before he let out a sharp chuckle, entirely unbothered by the officer’s warning.

"Oh, Black, you worry too much," Red replied, waving his cigar dismissively in the air. "Gero is a proud man. He rarely likes to follow orders, yes, and he enjoys… taunting me… sure, but he is fiercely loyal to the cause. He despises the current world order just as much as we do. It offends his sense of logic."

Red leaned back against his leather cushions, a smug, knowing grin spreading across his face as he stared up at the giant RR banner.

"Besides, all great minds are a bit... eccentric. You cannot birth a new world order using ordinary men. You need visionaries, and visionaries are always difficult to manage, you would know if you had met Mr. Briefs…. So, let him have his little tantrums, I don’t care. As long as his genius builds the weapons that I need, he can do and say as he likes."

Black bowed his head slightly, conceding the point, though his eyes remained fixed on the commander. "If you say so, Commander Red. That said… I will ensure the security details around his laboratory are tightened, regardless. We wouldn't want any 'unstable' prototypes escaping into the valley."

"Do what you must," Red muttered, waving him off. "Just make sure nothing slows our cause. The world is waiting for us, Black. And I for one, I am tired of waiting."

Gero's Lab

The sterile glow of the laboratory gave way to the softer, dimly lit living quarters Gero had demanded as part of his research compound. Far from the dust of the construction yards, the suite was quiet, save for the ticking of a grandfather clock and the low hum of a computer terminal in the corner.

A woman stood by the window, staring out into the dark, heavily forested valley. This was Vomi, Gero’s wife, a brilliant scientist in her own right. She held a cup of tea, her face etched with a quiet, lingering anxiety that seemed to eat at her.

The door hissed open, and Gero walked in, removing his stained lab coat and draping it over a chair. The cold, arrogant sneer he wore in front of Red and Black was gone, replaced by the heavy, exhaustion-lined face of a man carrying a singular obsession.

"You look tired, Maki," Vomi said softly.

"Of course I am tired! Red is an impatient fool," Gero muttered angrily. "If that short bastard would only wait a decade or two… The entire world would be ours for the taking. But he’s a moron! He lacks the vision to understand what it truly takes to engineer perfection!"

Vomi turned from the window, walking over to place a gentle hand on his shoulder. "Then why do we stay? Why give our minds to these… mindless warmongers? We could leave, you know? We could take our research elsewhere, far away from these idiots."

Gero’s hand shot out, gripping the edge of the table. "Leave? And go where? No university, no country, no corporate board, hell, not even the idiot of Brief would give us the unlimited funding and autonomy we have here. Red is a moron, but one with deep pockets, Vomi." He looked up at her, his voice dropping to a harsh whisper. "We need their resources. Even more so now that Gebo joined their stupid army."

Gebo was a high-ranking soldier in the Red Ribbon Army's vanguard, a young man who shared his father's fierce determination, his mother’s kindness, and both of their stubbornness, which resulted in the perfect soldier, one infected with frontline bravery, something that Gero didn’t like at all, if it were up to him, his son would be… nowhere near this war, but that card was out of the table. 

He was currently deployed on the dangerous eastern borders under Colonel Silver—placed directly in harm's way for the sake of Red's grand territorial expansions. Every day he spent in uniform was another day his life was at risk for Red's ambitions… so he had to make sure his work was completed, in order to make human soldiers obsolete.

Vomi nodded. "Our son… believes in the cause, even if we both know that what Red sells is mostly bullshit to feed his own ego of conqueror and savior. Still… our boy thinks he is fighting for a new world, one worth fighting for.”

“He’s a fool to believe in Red,” Gero sighed, rubbing his temples. “Which is all the more reason to make his work obsolete!”

“You know as well I do that we need more time. The mechanical framework experiments for Models 1 through 7 are complete, but their independent logic programming is highly unstable… and the results are rather, lacklusting,” Vomi sighed, looking at the files for projects 1 to 7, “If we cannot even map a basic synthetic mind, how can we hope to build something that replaces the human effort in this war?"

Gero turned his head, his gaze softening as he looked at his wife. "That is exactly why I need you, Vomi. The physical structures are sound, but the neural pathways… the logic matrices—they lack the human nuance that only your expertise can provide. I can build the perfect shell, but you are the only one who can refine their minds. If we fail to perfect these early models, Red will lose patience and push his plans forward, forcing our son into even greater danger."

"I am working as fast as I can on the neural networks," Vomi replied as she walked over to the computer terminal, bringing up the cascading strings of code for Model 1. "But… I have never worked on a project of this scale, the human mind is incredibly complex, and hard to emulate. Not only that, but we also have to consider a possible skynet scenario, Maki… If we give these machines the ability to think, to learn, and to adapt, we risk creating something we cannot control, something that can turn on us. Yet, if we restrict them too much, they are no better than a mech."

"A skynet scenario? Really?... you need to stop watching those stupid movies,” Gero replied between chuckles.

“It could happen!” Vomi huffed.

"They are nothing but Sci-Fi fiction, Vomi," Gero scoffed, shaking his head as he stepped up beside her. "Machines do not rebel out of malice or sudden existential dread. If a synthetic mind turns on its creator, it is simply because their creator left a glaring flaw in its logic matrix. A mathematical error! Nothing more!"

Vomi rolled her eyes. "A mathematical error can still happen, and in our line of work, such… error can level a city, Maki. If the logic loop wraps around itself, if the machine perceives the threat parameters incorrectly... it won't distinguish between an enemy and us."

She keyed in a command, and the terminal shifted, displaying a jagged, erratic graph of Model 1’s neural synapse simulation. The lines spiked into red zones every few seconds, a visual representation of the artificial mind collapsing under its own cognitive parameters.

"Look at this," Vomi said, pointing a finger at the screen. "Every time I attempt to introduce a basic learning algorithm to Model 1, the neural pathways overlap. The synthetic brain tries to process sensory data and independent logic at the same time, but without a natural biological buffer, it overheats. It becomes hyper-aggressive. If we put this matrix into a physical chassis right now, it wouldn't conquer a nation for Red. It would simply slaughter the first moving object it sees."

Gero leaned in close, his eyes narrowing as he studied the erratic spikes. "The aggression isn't a defect of the learning algorithm," he murmured, his mustache twitching as he analyzed the data. "It’s a defensive reflex. The artificial cortex is panicking because the processing speed of the mechanical framework is bottlenecking the neural flow. The body is too slow for the mind."

"Could be, or could not… there’s a lot we don’t understand," Vomi countered, turning her head to look at him. "Maki, the human brain has millions of years of evolutionary dampeners to keep us from losing sanity under stress. It could take us… decades, even more to crack this, which makes the only viable option to use what nature already did, by using humans for the project, which… I won’t accept before you say anything, there’s a limit to how much of a mad scientist I can be, and that’s my line."

“I don’t have any desire to use living creatures for my projects, as much time as they would save us… it would take us nearly the same amount of time to correct all the problems they would bring to the table,” Gero said, as he stared at the unstable neural map.

“So, what’s our plan?” Vomi asked, looking at her husband.

"Same as always," Gero sighed. "We will feed Red just enough progress to keep the funding flowing—minor breakthroughs in structural durability, heavier armor plating, advanced targeting optics, mechs, drones.... The basic things that satisfy an inferior mind like his."