LOST IN THE EMPIRE
PART 8

“Well, luv, this isn’t exactly how I imagined spending the night with you,” Terry rumbled as he drew the blankets over the two of them, not just to shut out the cold, but the whispers floating over the grass from where Cort and Rachel lay.

Deidre could feel him start to settle in with his back to her, so she flipped over and slipped her arm around to hug his torso, spooning up against him until the rough pelt of wool had settled around them in a cozy cocoon. Terry had taken his chest-plate off so that the red tunic underneath was all that covered him. She couldn’t help herself: laid her palm flat upon his shoulder blade and caressed downward, feeling small muscles in his back react, release. She could feel Terry sigh under her hand as if that were all he needed to make the final settle.

Both of them lifted their heads at the sound of Rachel’s outburst “don’t you even think about it, Cortland Wells…!” Deidre couldn’t help the giggle and Terry shook his head. Cort quieted Rachel and their whispering was lost in the sounds of the slight breeze riffling over the plants and trees.

“Well you did tell her to talk to him,” Deidre murmured. Terry then chose to disrupt the comfortable set of the blankets by turning to face her, stretching out full length, his head propped up by a hand. She could tell by the set of his shoulders he was about as far from sleep as she was. Moonlight chose to rim odd angles of his face. She stared up at him, studying his face in fascination. “Besides, it’s too late to regret how we spend the night together. There was that little matter of a cave on the side of a Peruvian mountain,” she added, grinning. “Just like old times!”

“I remember. And the fact that you took advantage of my heroic efforts that night to steal off doesn’t make me feel any better,” Terry groused. “First you, now Cort.”

“Can you blame him though? I mean, this is all so…wild! It was one thing to see all the machines and hear you and Rachel talk of it, it was another to actually land in the middle of it.”

“It figures, Nolia. I had a feeling you wouldn’t see entering the movie at the beginning as a negative.”

“No,” Deidre sighed. “All those burly Romans in their skirts, being so…oooo, so Roman…” she broke off with a laugh as Terry groaned in disgust. “I do see the bright side of this, though. I couldn’t imagine a more fantastical way to really ‘excavate’ time and learn the culture. I was happy with the idea of going in for one brief moment in time, but this,” Deidre waxed rhapsodic. “But this…this is like…pulling an artifact out of a test pit and being transported into the actual village. Yeah, landing at the beginning definitely has its positive side.”

“Nolia…Nolia, this isn’t…” Terry had been trying to interrupt, but Deidre’s thoughts were spilling out, thoughts that had been pooling in the back of her mind since the first rush of their crisis had passed, thoughts she had tendered as she and Rachel sat waiting for the men to find them. “Nolia, this isn’t really Rome. You have to know they took liberties with-known history. ”

“Oh, I know, but, boy, did they do such a great job at making us believe!”

“Am I going to have to put a rope around you, too?” Terry asked.

“Sounds kinky. Is that all you have in mind?”

“No!” Terry laughed in spite of himself. “Look, I can’t have you, or Cort, or Rachel wandering off, distracted by a…a cultural oddity or some such nonsense. You can’t take on the mission by yourself, Nolia, not here! The danger here is getting caught up in the illusion…one of the…,” he hesitated, memories of his own giving him pause, “one of our earlier attempts involved a retriever who got so caught up in the film…we don’t know what happened…but because we weren’t cautious about where we entered, how long we stayed, they…for all intents and purposes…disappeared into the film.” He slid down until was resting his head on his outstretched arm. “It’s not a good thing we’re here at the beginning, that Cort went wandering off without checking with me. It’s not just that we have to keep up with Max now. It’s that we are in danger of being…subsumed? Taken in by the illusion. That has to stay first and foremost in our minds. This is only a movie.”

Terry had curled his free arm around her, his breath warm on the side of her face, his deep voice soft in her ear. Heat from his body sealed in the warmth from the wool blanket and she could feel the lids of her eyes grow heavy.

“Promise me you won’t go where I can’t find you, Nolia,” she heard him ask, in one final moment of lucidity. “You may not believe it, but the thought of losing you on that mountainside scared me. Losing you here…when we don’t know if anyone can come…I don’t think I could take that.”

Not just words of a man worried about more than what unruly assistants would do: words of a man just this side of afraid to open himself up for damage. Deidre used little muscles to press closer to Terry, to wriggle under that much more coverage of the blanket, that much more to assure him of her presence. When her face came level with his, she could see him open his eyes briefly and she kissed his nose. “I promise,” she told him, softly, and then closed her eyes.

^ * ^ * ^ * ^ * ^

Cort closed his eyes, remembering, thinking. She was right about it, right that he had had to complete the full scenario of his movie first. If he had been taken...before...he would, yes, he would be wondering if Herod had killed Ellen. There was, actually, not much doubt that he would have, and not knowing who she was, killing her would have meant nothing to him. The dynamics of everything would have changed utterly.

But...still.

"Rachel," he continued thoughtfully, "I understand that, but you spent time with me...after...you cared for me and I, I... loved you...before the warp. Are we just to stuff the General in the warp without... anything...with no knowledge of who we are? Is there any way at the end of Gladiator for something we can do?"

"It's different, Cort," she explained. "He dies. There is no 'after' time for us to deal with him, not like with you. We must take him from that tunnel before he gets to Cicero if we can."

"I don't know," Cort said, shaking his head. "Something about it doesn't sit right with me. Just...doesn't."

She lay back beside him, cuddling close, her arm over his chest, not feeling in the least reassured, determined to stay at his side as much as humanly possible. Blinking back tears, she held him even more closely. What was that old saying? "Those who love give hostages to fate." Yes, that was it. Oh, God, how very true it was. She heard the quiet murmurings as Terry and Diedre talked nearby, but was too lost in her own thoughts to discern their words. This man had become infinitely precious to her and she'd already come so close to losing him. Her body shook with a sob she couldn't repress and he turned, facing her, taking her face in his hands.

"Rachel? Darlin'? What's wrong?"

"I..I...can't lose you," she stammered. "I just...can't."

"Oh, Rachel," he said, kissing her wet lashes. "I will be with you...always. I promise."

He walked among the ripened seed heads of wheat, letting the fingers of his left hand trail lightly as he moved. Stopping, he lifted his face to the sky, then smiled. Ah! How good that felt! How he had longed to DO that for years now! No other being in the world knew what it meant to him to do that. Not even...Alicia. She thought she knew him, knew what made him tick. He liked that. Let her think that. Snapping off a particularly large seed head, he ran it through his tightened fingers, sending the individual grains scattering. He laughed softly, watching them, satisfied.

He was, indeed, happier than he'd ever been. Going through the warp was nothing to him, his superior systems completely unaffected by the stresses that were so hard on lesser beings. Again he smiled, wondering how the little priest had fared without his capsule. Too bad he hadn't been able to witness that for himself. Still, just the thought of it was...pleasant. And, now, here he was in the opening minute of Gladiator. That was all he needed.

The rest would be a piece of cake. Devil's food cake.

Dawn came and Maximus, arising, went to check further on his men. As he walked he moved his shoulder in a circular motion, attempting to ease the deep ache that had settled there after yesterday's battle. Tipping his head, he let the scattered snowflakes settle on his face. Damn Germanium weather! Made it so much harder for his troops. He cast his thoughts back to Spain, to the olives and the scent of his wife's herb garden in the sun. Soon, my Love, soon, he promised, stopping to scrape a thick layer of mud from the bottoms of his boots.

Two hours later he was just heading back to his own tent when the praetorian came with the summons from the Emperor. Following the man toward the complex of elaborate imperial tents that served to bring as much of the civilized atmosphere of Rome as possible into the wilderness, he thought of Marcus' words to him. "There is always someone left to fight." He sighed. How did herb gardens fit in with that?

His mind whirled as, within the hour, he approached his own tent. Pausing just at the entrance, he gripped the tent pole with both hands, pressing his forehead against the smooth wood, closing his eyes. His wife's face floated there behind his lids, the breeze lifting her long, black hair. A thick, heavy block seemed to have settled in his chest, pressing on his heart, his lungs. Nearly three years. And...now?

Marcus had meant it when he'd said that about always someone left to fight. Only this time he hadn't referred armed foes on some far-flung frontier, this time he meant the politicians of Rome itself. A shudder took him and he bit down hard on his lip. He knew nothing of that kind of battle. He wanted to know nothing now. Smiling lips that turned and spoke deceit when you looked no more. Promises made for the convenience of the moment, never with honest intent. Self always for the sake of self alone. This? Instead of Spain?

Cicero became aware that his General was just outside the tent and pulled back the flap, intending to assist in his entrance. He was shocked when he saw Maximus' face. "Sir?" he said, his voice filled with concern.

Maximus opened his eyes, his hand gripping Cicero's upper arm in acknowledgement of his presence, he moved past him, shedding his cape, unbuckling armor as he went. Cicero caught the cape before it floated to the floor, lay it quickly atop a chest, and began to help Maximus with his buckles and straps. It was obvious that the General had only one goal in mind, the little chamber behind the veil where his family altar was set. When the armor had been removed and he had on only a simple tunic and leggings, he pulled back the veil, stepping into the small space, sinking gratefully to his knees. He knelt there a long while in silence, breathing deliberately slowly, deeply, letting the peace of it settle over him before he lifted one of the candles and lit several others. He watched as the flames sent flickering shadows over the small figures arranged there...and then he began to pray.

Sid frowned horribly. Mud. It was on his shoes, on his impeccably polished shoes. He'd tried to keep to the areas where dried grasses still remained, but the blasted battling troops had churned nearly everything into mud. Just ahead of him through the trees, he could see Marcus Aurelius sitting on his mount, surrounded by praetorians, as the battle began to reach its height. Wise old bird, he thought, staying up the slope well out of the way. Moving carefully, both to avoid detection and mud, he circled to the right. He wanted to watch Maximus in action. He felt like a schoolboy on the first day of summer. Well, not that he'd ever BEEN a schoolboy, now had he?

Where WAS he? Ah, there! Maximus lay on his back in the mud, several of the disgustingly unkempt and overly furry wild folk chopping at him. Sid leaned against a pine, watching intently. He had seen this scene countless times, but this was different. Now he was IN it and the excitement he felt in being present caused an almost bubbling sensation in his nanosauce. He forgot all about his team, not even caring for the moment if they were present here, too, or not. His full attention was centered on watching the General. Maximus turned, twisted, fighting desperately, blocking blows, landing his own, gaining his feet at last. If he hadn't been so filthy, he would have been, Sid thought, magnificent. He cocked his head. Well, even in spite of his state of total uncleanliness, the man WAS rather magnificent. He'd have to give him that. But, he frowned, something was missing. What was it? Ah! The music! That was it! Always before when he'd watched this battle there had been the soundtrack. The music told you when the tide of battle turned, told you that the Germanians had become dead meat and the Romans would soon be sending the lot of them off to Valhalla or wherever it was dead Germans were wont to go. Now...there were only the sounds of the battle itself, harsh, sharp sounds that rang most unpleasantly on the ear. He must remember to bring Hans Zimmer along next time. Then he chuckled. There would BE no next time, now would there? This was Maximus' last roll in the mud.

The dog. He'd always wondered what happened to the dog. There it was, mud-caked like its master, snarling, growling, latching its teeth onto a German arm. Perhaps if he watched carefully he could discover what became of the beast? But, no, despite his extraordinary eyesight and concentration, the dog was just there one moment and gone the next. He sighed. Ah, well. Then he watched the Roman 'mopping up' procedures.
The light faded and Maximus could only be seen in the reflected red and orange glow of scattered flames. When the General raised his sword, finally proclaiming victory, Sid clapped soundlessly. "Bravo!" he murmured softly.

Still leaning against the pine, he reached into his pocket, withdrawing an amazingly compact device considering all its capabilities. He pressed a few keys, waiting as a reading soon appeared on a small screen. Hmmm? Cort was not present in this scene though there were some vague traces that he had been here earlier. So, they DID end up toward the beginning of the film. He was probably not far behind them. He caressed the curved edge of the device with one finger. And they did not have the advantage of one of these. He smiled. Of course, this was the only one in existence, now wasn't it!

As he watched Maximus seek out his embedded sword, he mused upon coming events and on where his team would have gotten themselves to by now. When Cort had been in the operating room in Emerald City, he had had a tiny tracking module implanted in the little priest. His lips curved into a smile as he thought how very much Rachel would hate that had she any knowledge of it.

His team was in the next day, fully aware they had stringent time limitations to do what they must so they could follow when the praetorians would ride out with the bound Maximus.

^ * ^ * ^ * ^ * ^

Because of Deidre’s never-ending curiosity – “hunting rabbit” as she liked to call it – it seemed rather fortuitous that she had run across a veritable gold-mine of information about the disciplinary routines of the Roman army on the internet. But also, because of this information, Deidre had slept restlessly, troubled by the exchange Terry had with Cort about rustling horses. The life of a soldier in the Roman army had been harsh, with any misstep towards perceived cowardice punished rapidly and without question. After just a couple of hours asleep, she could not but help wake a grumpy Terry with whispered plans of her own.

Dawn was a mere sliver of light over the forest when they began rolling up their blankets. Deidre reminded them of the research and they began to quickly plot out the day. They had only to get through the day, Terry said, before the chaos of the Emperor’s death erupted. The ruin of yesterday’s battle was all but put away now; the real battle, the nastier, more covert one had yet to take place, and they needed to be ready to take advantage of that.

“You need to report to the tribunes and soon, Terry…just continue your story from yesterday…tell them our supplies were lost in the confusion and our horse ran away. That you have a soldier under your protection and he’ll need supplies as well,” Deidre urged. They had collected beneath a small copse of trees on the hill, high enough to view the endless stretch of tents, row after row, a tidy grid-pattern marching endlessly over the distant roll of land. Their position was well out of the mainstream of business, but that would soon change as more people rose to generate another day. Tumbrels of goods were already making way past checkpoints into the heart of the Roman rank.

Terry hesitated. “I’d much prefer that we stay as far away from the main camp as possible,” he argued, as they knelt in their small circle.

“We won’t run off,” Deidre enunciated.

“Cort and I will stay over there,” Rachel said, pointing toward the camp followers. “Since we’re low rank anyway, not much is going to be expected of us. You’re the big shot in this scenario,” she said, pointing to the armor Terry had put back on.

“We can take whatever else we need at the last minute,” Cort said.

Terry turned and gazed at Deidre for a moment, thinking.

“If nothing else, you can get a feel for where everything is,” Deidre offered, nervously.

Terry’s eyes took on a certain glint, his head tilting the same way it had when he was observing her predicament on the mountainside. Deidre found herself really hating it when he looked at her that way. Like he was plotting something and wasn’t going to spring it on her until she was completely unprepared.

“Right, then. You come with me,” he finally told her. “Cort, Rachel, you go do whatever it is that foot soldiers do while their commanders are taking care of business. I need Nolia to tell me what we need.”

“But…but I…” Deidre gasped. What the hell was he thinking? She looked over at Rachel, who only shrugged… then grinned mischievously.

Oh, fine!

“You’re my slave, are you not? I’m going to need help with carrying things,” Terry replied, a shadow of a laugh appearing around his mouth. “Don’t look so shocked, Nolia. You wanted to immerse yourself in Roman culture. Then, let’s go!”

Cort and Rachel disappeared over the hillside toward the slave camp while Terry urged her down to follow a well-worn trail through the grass into the main camp. Soldiers moved between the orderly rows, their numbers increasing the more they reached the center. Deidre followed in the wake of Terry’s purposeful stride with as much speed as she could muster, trying to adopt a subservient attitude while not falling too far behind. Which was not easy, considering Terry’s energy and length of muscle.

The morning morphed into a rather interesting spectacle of culture, indeed, as Terry warmed up to the role of Roman centurion and Deidre fell into a rather haphazard caricature of a servant. She had been privately worried that their story of lost goods would not pass muster to any guard worth his salt, but it seemed everyone took what Terry had to say and do as perfectly natural, a stranger come up out of nowhere to ask for things and excuse odd behavior. If she had not been so intent on making sure she played the part, Deidre would have been amazed at how easily their ruse got them through the checkpoints and consultations. Instead, she found herself contemplating the vagaries of being “in” the film and what it must have been like to be “on the set” of the film…she began to understand some of what Terry had mentioned the night before. It was all too easy to forget: this particular reality, a false reality, was only as it had been established by the creators, incomplete in its portrayal, only there to accomplish certain goals. Even the urgency with which even re-enactors would imbue the reality was missing. It was, in short, reality for appearance’s sake.

This curious conundrum nearly led her to become lost amid the row of tents, growing ever more bold as they went about, testing her sprouting understanding by forgetting to remain as Terry’s shadow. It was an incident that Terry took full advantage of by chastising her severely in the middle of one lane, loudly enough to cause people to peek outside their tents. Recovering his temper, he handled her a bit roughly then, almost shoving her all the way through the camp toward the supply train and horse corral. Deidre played along as though a slow-witted, biting on her hand to keep from laughing outright when Terry paused for one moment to wipe his face in frustration.

And so it was that they found themselves speaking with those who had piled the plundered armor, weapons and horses, gathered up the remains that could no longer be claimed by those killed in action. She pretended once or twice not to understand some of Terry’s commands to carry something, or stand in a certain place. Had to pretend to find something interesting on the ground to remain in character; else, blow the whole charade with an obnoxious chortle. When all was said and done, they found themselves with three horses (to be gained later,) several pelts of animal skins, blankets and other sundry linens, canteens, baskets of grain and other foods, and the accoutrements for a tent that might fit the four of them in rather close quarters, but would provide some kind of shelter in a pinch. And the tribune guarding the pile was all too happy to give Terry his weight in extra swords and javelins with the caveat that the number be recalled should be needed.

When they climbed the hill and reached the spot where they had slept, Deidre could no longer hold it in. She fell to the ground, laughing soundlessly at first, and then letting her voice tell Terry just how amused she was. He knelt down as if to chastise her again, but he was really doubled over as well.

“If this is what you’re going to be like for the rest of the journey, I may beg Sid to take us sooner than needed,” he said, when he regained his breath. “You’re something else, Nolia.”

“Aw, now, you should know by now how cooperative I am when it comes to being among soldiers, especially Aussie ones!” Deidre chided. “I do think I gained you some extra sympathy, though. You didn’t catch the look the tribune gave me when I acted like I didn’t understand what “pick up” meant. That alone won you the extra horse. You should be thanking me.”

“Should and want are two different things. Thank you…and I’ll be letting you know what I want later,” Terry retorted, giving her a comic leer before standing up to continue their trek to find where Cort and Rachel had taken roost for the day.

Terry’s premise that keeping just beyond the edge of the action was the safest buffer for keeping out of trouble was bearing fruit, or so Rachel found. Few of the participants in the great panoply before them asked any questions or deviated from tasks they had in mind for themselves. She and Cort chose a little sheltered ridge in the hillock at the far edge of the camp followers where the pines seemed the thickest, huddling under their blankets and eating from the stash of dried meat and fruit they had brought with them. They settled into a drowsy contemplation, listening to the sounds of the camp, the horses. They had been hesitant to start a fire amid the trees at first, but after an hour or so of shivering, despite their body heat, the shelter of the ridge was not enough to protect them from the heavy winter air, a damp cold that managed to penetrate the layers. Cort broke down and cleared a space to start a small fire, gathering up stone to create a hearth. The flames chased away some amount of the seeping cold. Still, it was no hardship to sit curled up next to Cort under the layers of blankets.

The sunlight drifted out of, behind, thick cloud cover, and for hours it seemed as if there were no change in the day. Movement in the camp was busy. Rachel’s thoughts drifted, too: like watching a computer simulation, and hovering just beyond the scope of its process. If it weren’t for the smell of the cooking fires, the sounds of the animals and people, the agonizing bite of cold, she would have felt as disconnected as the sun.

“Such quiet. Quiet before the storm,” she heard Cort mumble. She looked up to see that his eyes were half-closed, focused on some distant point. They were a curious bundle hedged against the ridge: Cort hunched in a nook between one tree trunk and the wall of dirt behind him, Rachel wedged against him, arms wrapped around each other, two blankets surrounding them both, two blankets covering their legs. She lay her head back upon his chest. Cold had a way of making her go inward and she rather liked the dream-like state enfolding them. His voice seemed to become a part of the surroundings, though…rather like it had become part of their pine glade.

Her fingers found the curve of his shoulder, tunic open just enough to touch skin, and she began brushing lightly with her fingertips, wholly melded now as she listened, opening her heart as wide as she could.

PART 9

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