This letter was found in its entirety in a bunker fifty-one meters below the rubble of Chateau Trebuchet, alleged summer home of the infamous Contessa Von Wicked. It is the only known document to have survived the fire
My beloved Julia,
Allow me to begin by admitting a strange and savage joy upon discovering that my team of highly skilled assassins failed utterly in their task and that your cold, black heart still beats within your exquisite bosom. You will, of course, be relieved to know that your messenger was granted a swift and painless death. Although I despise sentiment in all its forms as the hypocrisy of the weak-minded, you, my Angel of Destruction, have always been my Achilles' Heel. You are my wound, the only one I have ever acknowledged as my equal, my dearest rival. And inevitably, you betrayed me, for in your heart of hearts you understand as well as I that our vast superiority marks us for a lonely destiny. There can be only one who rules in the natural order of things; power cannot ever be truly shared. And it is because of my fierce and consuming love for you and because of my acknowledgment that you bow to no master that I must regretfully re-iterate that there can be no mercy for you.
And yet, the giant robots, the plasma cannons, the secret undersea laboratory, none of that ever really mattered to me. There was a time when I could have been content with merely the utter destruction of my enemies and their lives' work as long as you were by my side, my valkyrie. But along the way, this all changed. Do you remember the night we crushed The Council of Heroes for Justice? We made love in the rubble of their mountain stronghold. Your face glowed in the light of the flames, with the light of our triumph. It was that very night that our love resulted in a magnificence that transcends you or me; the night our son was conceived. You would be so proud of our son, Julia! His genius outshines mine, and his penchant for cruelty has displayed a flair more creative and elegant than even yours. He is always learning, plotting, scheming. Just before his eleventh birthday he orchestrated a bloody coup d'etat that placed his puppet Junta in control of a small South American country. It is in moments like these that I wish that I had not poisoned my father. How he would have beamed with pride at his grandson's talent for the family business. My Queen of Ruin, our son is so much greater than the sum of our parts. He shall supplant whichever of us survives our precious little war and shall stand stride the globe like a colossus! He shall cleanse the earth with fire and with blood! His name shall be whispered with terror for a hundred-thousand years! Don't you see that all the time I spent in the lab developing death rays and energy gauntlets, all the time I spent in the field training my Elite Commando Corps and my Android Asssassin Squad was time spent to make our son smarter, better, fitter to take his rightful place as absolute monarch of the universe? But perhaps you too foresaw our son's terrible destiny and realized that there could be no mortal feebleness of mercy or sentimental attachment in one who would take his place as a god among men. Perhaps that is really why you abandoned me, abandoned our son.
How painful is the memory of the day you left. When we fought each other in warmechs above the fiery caldera of Mt. Brimstone, you took more than my left eye and my power crystal, you took my heart. How could you have ever believed that I was capable of loving Lady Deathblast? How could I ever have anything but utter contempt for my inferiors? She was never a replacement for you. Don't you understand that when you declared war on me that I lost the will to live? The petty intrigues, murders and destruction of national economies no longer interested me. The wedding was a ruse to goad you into action. Why else would I hold it in the gardens of our summer home, the Palace of Despair, knowing you knew every pitfall, poison gas trap and every flagstone that triggered a giant boulder to crush uninvited guests and solicitors? My darling, I am no fool, I knew well that the man-eating siberian tigers that prowled the grounds recognized you as their mistress. I remember that you planted the belladonna, hemlock and white oleander that even now grace the gardens. I expected nothing but ruthlessness from you. I knew I could die happy if my agonizing screams could serve as a lesson to our son that there can be no quarter between enemies, that war can only truly end in the total annihilation of one party. And you delivered vengeance in exquisite, elegant style, you were a vision of righteous rage, the embodiment of slaughter! But when it came time to deliver the coup de grace, you missed. It was in that moment that I realized that I was your greatest weakness as you were mine. It is with no small amount of regret that I say you should have killed me when you had the chance.
Such passion we have for each other! It is enough to consume us both in a terrible conflagration. But I cannot allow our weakness to consume our son. Our petty desires are a failing of superior beings and an obstacle to our grander destinies. Were it simply a matter of you or me, we could end all this strife and retire to a small palace in the alps with a couple of devoted eunuch slaves. But there is more at stake than the two of us. Even now, I am in the final stages of a campaign that will lead to your eventual destruction. But fear not, darkest shadow of my heart, none of my henchmen will dare sully your terrible beauty by attempting to harm you. I have claimed you for my own. I shall be the one to send you to your damnation (should such a state exist). And I want you to know that when my bare hands encircle your lovely neck and I throttle the last breath from your body, that it is, finally, an act of love.
Your eternal enemy,
Herr Doktor Von Wicked, PhD, PsyD, MD, JD, DDS
(your Robert)