Commander Leopard

"Are you doubting me? I swore my loyalty to the queen by becoming a cyborg before anyone else!"

- Leopard, showing his loyalty to Maetel and Promethium.

"Listen up, everyone! I'm human. Although I've given my right arm to Promethium, my heart is still human! Rise up, everyone! Slay the cyborgs!"

- Commander Leopard to the remaining humans and starting the rebellion.

"I still want to be human! I was born on this planet! I'll die on this planet! As a proud La Metallian."

- Commander Leopard

Leopard Error Franken-bach, or simply Commander Leopard, was a recurring character in the Leijiverse. He is the commanding officer of La Metal and a loyal soldier to Queen Larela, later Promethium, but would betray her to save humanity. He was also the elder brother of Dr. Fara. He was the secondary antagonist in Queen Millennia and the secondary antagonist turned anti-hero/ supporting protagonist of Space Symphony Maetel: Galaxy Express 999 Side Story.

He was voiced by the late Kazuyuki Sogabe in the television series, Shigeru Chiba in the film and Yasunori Matsumoto in the side story.

Appearance
He is a tall man with blonde hair and blue eyes. He is mostly seen wearing a beret and in his military uniform.

Personality
He is a loyal and honorable man who serves Queen Larela with respect and her goals. He seems to be great friends with Bernbarrel, shown to have many conversations and loyal to each other throughout the series.

Episode 1
While the 999 is under attack, Leopard is seen watching it in one of the battleships. One of the machine soldiers reports to Promethium that has regained communication with Leopard. Promethium orders the soldier to connect the commander immediately, Leopard tells the queen to let him “send my joyous note for Lady Maetel’s safe arrival”. Promethium tells him that the 999 was attacked by an unknown individual, Leopard received the report, he checked the enemy unit’s identification code and determined it to be the Death Shadow, which the ship belongs to the famous space pirate Captain Harlock, an outlaw who rebels throughout the galaxy. Maetel says that she has heard of Harlock who fights on his own convictions. Leopard questions the traveler in which she replied: “Isn’t there some other coward who attacked the unarmed #999?” This angered Leopard as he swore his loyalty to Queen Promethium by becoming a cyborg himself. After forgiving Maetel about doubting him, an alarm goes off, a machine soldier reports to Promethium that the radar picked up a group of unidentified flying objects, revealing to be a meteor shell attack. Leopard goes back to his post and will destroy the meteor immediately. Leopard tells Bernbarrel to relay the order to all units and heading back to La Metal.

Episode 2
As Maetel tries to get a response, Leopard’s voice is heard and reports that he detected the second wave of meteor shells on his radar and will be standing by in the airspace. Maetel tries to order Leopard to move the defense force to not let them get any closer to La Metal. But Leopard tells her that he and the Space Panzers only take orders from Queen Promethium. Maetel tells that her mother is dead, but Leopard doesn’t believe her and thinks of it as a bad joke before leaving the call. When Maetel heads to the Machine Palace to find a stronger defense system, Leopard appears on the screen and says they’ll need Promethium permission to activate it. After revealing to have survived from the meteors, Promethium tells all of the Space Panzers in sixty seconds she’ll activate the arc barrier and orders them to retreat from the airspace immediately. Leopard is seen angrily by Promethium’s appearance. As the Space Panzers arrive at La Metal, Bernbarrel asks Leopard about the strange young boy named Nazca, telling that he escaped during all the commotion with the meteor shells. As the commander learns this he replied “I’d like to see this kid. If we catch him, of course.” As Nazca sets a bomb in a room where Promethium sleeps, Leopard and Bernbarrel sneaks up behind him and snatched the device from the boy. Leopard questions Nazca on what was his goal, telling them he wants to find the real Promethium and kill her.

Episode 3
After restraining the boy, Maetel gets out the machine, opening her eyes reveal to have inherited all of her memories and declared to become the queen of La Metal. Leopard and Bernabrrel take Nazca away to imprisoned him again. Bernbarrel asks the commander to shut him up, Leopard replied that he is disappointed about the boy who tried to kill the queen was easily captured. Nazca then hits Bernbarrel with a tool ranch, causing him to release the screaming boy. However, one of the machine guards grabbed Nazca, Bernbarrel walks up to the boy and asks him what was he thinking. Nazca smirks at the soldier, causing Bernbarrel to punch the boy’s stomach, falling unconscious. By the time Leopard and Bernbarrel arrived at the city, the rebels managed to attack and killed some of the machine soldiers and reported to Promethium about the incident. Maetel once again questions Leopard’s loyalty and responds he will take orders from anyone but the highness. He also tells the queens that he was called for support while escorting Nazca but was forced to take the boy along. Maetel then asks who staged the attack, before Leopard leaves the call. Leopard and Bernbarrel investigate the attack, Nazca appears with a harm weapon and pointed at the Space Panzers. Bernbarrel tells the boy that the energy cartridge is broken and knocking him out again, but leaves him behind. Later, Leopard and Bernbarrel and approaches Nazca and his group and tells them to find shelter. As Oliver was about to tell Nazca about Leopard, the commander slaps him and tells the two to take the boy to shelter. As Maetel arrives at the city, Leopard and Bernbarrel set off the bomb destroying the ship. But revealed to be a trick Maetel enters out from the other ship. Tess attacks Maetel but was killed by the machine guards and Oliver asked Leopard to do the same to him. Maetel questions the commander why he killed the boy, he responds, “I was just finishing her job. I was disposing of the leaders of the rebellion.”

Episode 4
Later, The Space Panzers are seen chasing after Harlock and his crew through space. As Tochiro stops and turns the ship around to face the Space Panzers to fire on them with the main cannon and forgets it’s been for ages, Leopard whether why they aren’t shooting. Bernbarrel tells him that they are out of energy for their cannon, but still facing them. Tochiro tries to fire at the Panzers’ airship, Leopard orders his men to fire at the outlaws, but Bernbarrel was against the idea since Harlock was human, the commander has shown to not care he was human and he wouldn’t use and prepares to attack the Arcadia. As they fire at the outlaws, Tochiro charges straight through the unknown dimension to get away, Leopard enrages and demanded what happen. One of the soldiers said they jumped into a wormhole, Bernbarrel ask the commander if they should go after them, Leopard denies the idea as they don’t know where they end up. Leopard and Bernbarrel go back to La Metal and reported what happened to Promethium, as the commander suggests he can not chase the pirates through a wormhole, saying it would be suicide. Furthermore, Bernbarrel also tells her that they damaged their airship during the first wave attack, doubting that they are still alive. But Leopard questions the queen why they after Harlock, but Promethium responds: “Don’t ask too many questions.” After leaving, Leopard furiously punched a wall, calling Promethium avoiding telling about capturing Harlock a cheap trick and remembering killing Oliver. Bernbarrel tries to calm him down and patient about the situation, saying: “She said the time has not yet come”, as the commander is aware of it.

Episode 5
Leopard and Bernbarrel are seen in the empire’s balcony, Bernbarrel asks the commander what they should do about the situation, Leopard suggests they can’t do anything about it and too early to make a move and can’t act against Promethium’s command. Shown in a flashback, Promethium orders Leopard and Bernbarrel to gather all remaining humans on La Metal together. The commander asked the queen what she will do with them, Promethium claims she will have “mercy” on them, granting them all the chance to mechanize themselves. Leopard argues that there are many who do not want to be mechanized, Promethium shows him that the total mechanization of the planet is nearly completed, saying that, “It is the Queen’s mercy to free them from agony.” Leopard and Bernbarrel decide to stay quiet about and endure this for now and wait for the right time. During the “cleansing” occupation, a machine soldier reports to Leopard about the attack at F-Block, seeing being attacked by Nazca. The commander and Bernbarrel arrive, but looking at the attack, this causes Leopard to remember humans civilians being forced to become a machine along with Tess and Oliver being killed. Leopard kills some of the machine soldiers and starts the rebellion, having fed up with Promethium and the empire’s reign. Leopard tells Bernbarrel and the Space Panzer to cooperate with Nazca to annihilate the machine soldiers and communicate news of the coup to all cities. While questioning her on how to save La Metal and killing her own mother, Commander Leopard appears and tells Maetel about wanting to kill Promethium for himself. Maetel protests him about both humans and cyborgs will be extinct and his method is the same as Promethium. Leopard then asks Larela to come and lead him and the others to victory, but the latter replies that he never listen to a word she said and betrayed her many times, before flying off. After the fight, Leopard takes Maetel as a hostage, planning to threaten Promethium to kill her daughter. Before he could kill Maetel, he releases her upon Promethium’s arrival.

Episode 6
Having Promethium handcuffed, she taunts him saying he will realize how foolish and incompleteness he is. The commander replies back at her saying, “Then how does it feel to be betrayed by someone incomplete?” While Promethium was making her speech about humanity’s agony and surviving to the rebellion, she sets down one of her palaces, killing her clone as she tried to convince the human rebellion. Leopard checks the body, announcing to everyone that Promethium is dead and La Metal’s been freed from her reign. However, the defense system is activated and starts to eliminate everyone. As people started to flee, Leopard orders Bernbarrel to take the citizens to safety while he leads the Space Panzers to stop the defense system. Once he gets to the airship, he orders his soldiers to destroy the central control system in order to stop the outer shell functioning. But one of the Panzers says it will destroy the entire planet, Leopard responds, “Attack like you’re going to destroy the planet,” and claims it’s the only to get back for humanity, before opening fire onto the palace.

Episode 7
As the planet being destroyed, Bernbarrel reports to Leopard that they won’t be able to save everyone in ten minutes. After the core separate, Leopard orders the Space Panzers to deploy all ships to rescue everyone that was left behind.

Episode 8
While celebrating, Bernbarrel reported that they can maintain the surface temperature while Larela’s energy remains, it will only last for a month, the planet will freeze once again. Leopard asks how long will it take to get to Heavy Melder, Berbarrel tells him it’ll take three months.

Episode 9
While building a new city, Bernbarrel asks Leopard what they should with Death Shadow parked outside the city as they are ignoring their orders, the commander tells him to leave them alone if they’re showing no signs of violence. Later on, Leopard is reported to the system room, asking if the energy is running short. But Bernbarrel says it’s the opposite, as energy is increasing, making it at this rate. At night, one of the soldiers asked Leopard about ordering spare parts for the fleet, which he denies. But the soldier also said that the supplier from Heavy Melder is present, surprising Leopard. Leopard goes and demanded who contracted the supplier, revealing to be Maetel. Back at the palace, Leopard questions Maetel about ordering the spare parts and increasing the energy, Maetel says yes to him as she purchased fuel from Heavy Melder. Leopard angrily charities Maetel as he claims she has no place on la Metal for her and suggests that she must leave the planet. As the alarms goes off, one of the soldiers reports to Leopard that the energy is leaking out at the rate of one percent per minute in the storage facility. Due to the computer's controls not responding, someone must close the energy supply value manually, in order to stop the leak. However, if a living touches it, they will die. Leopard volunteers to do so, but as he was stopped by Bernbarrel, the energy leakage is subsiding by Arina, who was sen turning the values, sacrificing her life to save everyone.

Episode 10
Leopard and Bernbarrel meet Maetel and Harlock about Promethium being alive and the accident she caused at the energy storage facility. Bernbarrel denies the fact Promethium was alive as he saw her being killed when La Metal was collapsing, but Maetel tells them about her fight with the queen, revealing to be another clone. Harlock suggests for them have a defense force, but Leopard angrily denies it as he claims, “I won’t listen to advice from a pirate, nor will I accept any orders from you!” The commander then questions Maetel about how she’ll continue to act queen of La Metal and tell her and Harlock to leave the planet. After Maetel and Harlock left, Leopard gives Bernbarrel a hard drive which contains the organization list for the defense force. The soldier questions the commander as to why he chasse them away and agrees with Maetel’s arguments, which Leopard claims that Maetel has fought enough battles already and it’s their duty to protect La Metal now that they're in charge. Later on, Bernbarrel reports to Leopard about they received a request for assistance from the 999. The commander asked him about the Space Defense Force, which the latter claims they cannot intervene since where they were at are a neutral area between the Galaxian and the Andromeda forces. Leopard then orders Bernbarrel to let all fleets take off to form a defense line. During the airship battle, the Space Panzers arrive to help Death Shadow, using them as a decoy.

Episode 11
As they are winning against Promethium’s army, Leopard planned a group of mercenaries gathered from the Heavy Melder planetary system. Harlock tells Leopard to retreat from the battle as his airship took a heavy hit, but ignores him and doesn’t want to hear it from pirates. While the machine army retreats, Leopard calls Harlock to tell him that he and his team are going to chase after them and take good care of La Metal. Having defeated the machine soldiers, they took many damaged upon fighting the cyborgs. After getting back to La Metal, Leopard makes a speech to the citizens of Miyu that Promethium’s army has been defeated and will not stop until she eliminated from the galaxy. But is soon attacked by a surviving machine soldier, firing at everyone. Leopard kills the cyborg but is shot by it in the chest, causing him to fall to the ground. As Leopard uses his last breath, he tells Maetel his battle has ended, dying in the process.