The desire of prestige angle I find intriguing as it's a major part of the reasoning behind why A&S had to go. I find it odd and even hypocritical that one of the apostles was the messenger of doom considering there's a handful of accounts depicting the apostles as arguing amongst themselves over of all things, prestige. They were arguing over who was the greatest amongst themselves even up until the night Christ was detained.
To add to the hypocritical aspect of it, and also I should mention a lack of empathy, was the very fact that Peter off all people had to be the bearer of bad news. If anyone would have been empathetic to the mentality behind A & S' actions, you would think it would have been Peter, right? He was the apostle known to fly off at the handle which may have been a result of him being the oldest and maybe he felt as such he had a responsibility to stand up where the others would be more reserved. That likely was a result of him being concerned about his prestige amongst the other disciples, or at least his reputation. Another thing is Peter's actions when around Jews and Greeks which the accounts recorded make him look like a two faced snake. He'd converse and associate with Greeks, so long as no other Jews were around. That's another case of him being overly concerned with his reputation and Paul had to call him out on it.
I don't know man, makes you wonder some days.
edit post: Maybe Peter was the perfect candidate as someone who appeared to be the instrument of vessel of death, or at least the messenger because he would have had no qualms about A & S having to go considering he appeared to not have extracted the rafter from his own eye. Who better than someone completely unaware of his own flaws.
To be fair though, what was recorded is only a glimpse of what probably happened. Just a snapshot of the events that Acts provides an outline for us to picture.