Edward Crichton - To Crown a Caesar

I bounced on the bed before picking up the sheets that hung over the side and smiled. She rolled her eyes, but moved to sit next to me all the same, removing her vest and duty gear.

“Do you have a place where we can store our gear?” She asked.

In response, Galba opened a simple cabinet full of his legionary armor and gear. He removed his equipment and we replaced it with our own, removing our combat jackets and boots as well, placing everything neatly inside. Helena moved beneath the bed first, but I paused for a last few words with Galba.

“Um. I wouldn’t mention we’re here if I were you.”

He looked at me slyly, at least as his slyly as his ugly face could allow. “After everything you have just told me, do you really think I would give you to her now?”

I shrugged. “Never can be too trusting.”

Galba laughed. “That is a grand understatement. Will you need any food or water before I go?”

“No,” I replied. “We’ll be fine. Just remember to keep in mind what we spoke about today.”

“How could I not?” He asked bluntly as he left the tent.

Hoping he was as good a man as I thought he was, I handed the MRE and CamelBak blindly to Helena beneath the bed and slid in alongside her. The sheets concealed us entirely, and thankfully, the bed was high enough above the ground that the space didn’t seem too cramped.

“Well, this is comfortable,” Helena commented, clearly anything but on the hard grass. “We have to spend a whole day down here?”

“Hold on,” I said, reaching out from beneath the bed. Grasping something soft, I pulled it below to discover a feather pillow and a woolen sheet. I handed them to Helena and reached up again to find another pillow.

“Such a gentleman,” she quipped as she maneuvered the blanket beneath the both of us.

“I do try,” I said to a response of silence.

I turned to look into her eyes, green as ever, and like always, appearing to look right through me. She was waiting for something, and I knew from her gaze that she could wait all day.

I decided I wasn’t going to spend it in awkward silence.

“So?” I started. “Anything on your mind?”

She narrowed her eyes, directing a hint of anger at me. “And what could possibly make you think that?”

“Oh, I don’t know. You’re normally so talkative that it’s sometimes hard to know when you’re ignoring me.”

“Very cute, professor.”

I frowned. She may have meant her words to sound flippant or comical, but her tone didn’t deliver the sentiment. She shifted so that she lay on her back and stared at the bottom of the bed, her attention distant and directed away from me once again. A minute passed before she finally opened up.

“You’re not the same man I fell in love with.”

Well that was unexpected.

“I’m not?”

“No, you’re not,” she said, shifting only her head, her gaze once again making me more uncomfortable than most of what she said. “Most of the Jacob Hunter I fell in love with is still there — the one who is caring, strong, intelligent, and the man who I still love. But you’re also different now. It began a few months ago when you first outlined your plan to ‘fix the timeline’. Now you’re obsessed, indignant, and self-righteous.”

“Self-righteous?” I blurted.

Just then a voice crackled in my ear.

“Uh, guys?” Santino’s voice transmitted again through my ear piece. “You’re on VOX.”

I felt my face get warm. I must have accidentally left my radio set so that it transmitted everything I said, not just what was said when the “push to talk” button was held. I reached into my cargo pocket and switched the radio back to PTT mode.

I clicked the transmitter. “3–3, this is 3–1, over,” I sent using our official call designations. While no one could pick up our com chatter here, old habits die hard.

“3–1, 3–3, go ahead,” Santino replied automatically.

“Go to ground, 3–3. Hold your position. 3–2 and I are hunkered down in camp for the duration of the day, howcopy?”

“Solid copy,” he said before holding his tongue for a few seconds. “Come on, guys. I’m already bored out of my mind. You expect me to just lay out here and wai…”

I switched off my radio, silencing him.

“That wasn’t very nice,” Helena chided.

“He’ll live. I’ll switch it back on in a few hours.” I paused while I checked the radio again before turning back to Helena. “So… ‘self-righteous’?”

“Exactly. The problem is your idea that we’ve somehow broken something and that it’s our, and only our, responsibility to fix it. We have no idea how these so-called laws of time work. The future could be exactly as we left it, but that isn’t even the most important part.” She paused and took a deep breath, “The important part is that I don’t even know why you think this is so important because you won’t talk to me about it.”

My brain immediately wanted to say one thing, but a distant voice in the back of my head made me stop. I turned inward and tried to find an honest answer for Helena. I knew she deserved the truth, but in this moment, I was finding it difficult to give her an answer. I couldn’t just tell her all my theories were based off of science fiction television and documentaries on the Science Channel. She wouldn’t accept that, and I suppose I didn’t either.

What I did trust, however, was myself. I’ve always trusted the men I had under my command as a SEAL, but the only person I could ever absolutely rely on was me. Every single job throughout my life that had to be done, I did myself. Every one of those experiences helped build my confidence in my own instincts and abilities. It hadn’t been easy as a kid, as it rarely is, but over time and through the vagaries of life, I grew into a rock steady adult who trusted himself implicitly. Experience is the forbearer of all knowledge and I had been through a lot in my time, and everything within me had been telling me that something needs to be done.

“I feel it in my gut, Helena,” I said wholeheartedly. “I really do. I know this is the right thing to do.”

“In your gut?” Helena asked knowingly, her look suggesting she had known the answer all along.

I eyed her suspiciously. “Yes. It’s never led me in the wrong direction before.”

“Well, Jacob,” she said coyly, “I’ve always trusted your gut too. I always have but only because my own gut lets me. After everything Agrippina’s done to manipulate us, I promised myself years ago that I wasn’t going to blindly follow anyone ever again, that I’d never be that little girl again who had no choice in who she was going to marry.” She took a second before jabbing a finger against my chest, biting her lower lip as she did so. It hurt a little and I flinched away as she continued. “You’re just lucky that you’ve always been good at making decisions because I’ve never had any reason to doubt you before.”

“Except now,” I said, understanding.

She nodded. “I want to trust you, Jacob, like I always have, but I just can’t if you don’t trust me in return.”

Just like last time, I opened my mouth to answer immediately, only to close it just as quickly. Seconds later, I figured out what she was trying to get at. In all the time I’d known her, she had always been the person I could rely on more than anyone, even myself, but all I’d done over the last few months was push her away and internalize everything without ever seeking her input. Bordeaux was right. Trust and communication were two sides of the same coin. From her perspective, I no longer trusted her because I no longer sought to confide in her.

To her, it must have felt like a complete betrayal.