Edward Crichton - To Crown a Caesar

I opened my mouth to speak, but my response was suddenly drowned out by an insistent beep beep beep noise, emanating from somewhere in the room. I glanced around. My ropes were almost cut but I had yet to determine what was making that noise. It seemed to be coming from Bordeaux. Agrippina looked at my friend’s body as well, hoping to discover the source of the annoyance. I realized what it was a half second later.

Agrippina turned to look at me, anger in her eyes. I met her stare, and offered her a cold smile. A smile completely devoid of happiness, joy, or relief. The only emotion it conveyed was vengeance.

Through clenched teeth, I whispered, “boom.”

And then room was engulfed in flame.

The explosion originated from some place above us and seemingly on the other end of the building, but that didn’t save us from the deafening explosion or the concussive blast that sent those on their feet flying across the room and those of us kneeling against the wall behind us. I watched as Agrippina bounced off one of her Praetorians and careened across my line of sight, landing somewhere near Helena.

Luckily, the bomb hadn’t been close enough to inflict traumatic nerve damage on any of us, so we’d survive. Had we been too close, we could have died from any number of factors. The fire from the explosion, the blast wave shattering our bodies, or the pressure build up liquefying our bones could have left us as little more than a puddle of goo on the floor.

Even so, my ears were ringing and I knew I wouldn’t be hearing anything for minutes if I was lucky. But I was conscious and I finally had the opportunity to use my knife and finish cutting through my ropes. Santino was also up, patiently waiting for me to palm the knife off to him, which I did immediately.

I didn’t wait. I got to my feet and searched for Penelope .

Helena was slow to rise, sluggish at first, but she’d also been furthest from the explosion. I watched as the limber woman managed to squeeze her feet through her bound hands so that they were now in front of her. She stumbled away from me and I had to assume she was searching for Agrippina.

I couldn’t worry about her now. Praetorians were getting to their feet all around me. I needed my weapon. It was time to end this. Vespasian could live with it if we killed Agrippina. We weren’t leaving without her, but what state she came with us in was up to her.

I thought about Bordeaux. He wouldn’t have a choice on how he was coming home. Gaius and Marcus were also loose ends. I had no idea where they were. They were probably already dead.

My mind focused when I found Penelope , still in the hands of the bastard Praetorian that had been fondling her earlier. He was only a few feet away, but it felt like I was wadding through jell-o after the explosion. I pushed through it.

He saw me coming and attempted to draw his gladius , but I was on him before he could draw it from its scabbard. With a quick punch to his wrist, his grip loosened and the sword dropped back in its sheath. The move came at the same instant as I stomped on his foot, following that up by kneeing him in the balls. He doubled over in pain, still gripping my rifle, so I snatched his head with my hands and smashed my knee into his nose this time. My kneecap hurt like hell, but he was probably dead. I pushed him over and he released Penelope into the air as he fell.

I snatched her out of the air, turned, and fed a round into the chamber.

It was dark after most of the torches had been snuffed out by the explosion, but the room was now dimly illuminated by the night sky, visible through the collapsing roof. Rubble was strewn everywhere in big slabs, chunks and toppled pillars. The level above us was visible in some places, and I notice at least one enemy Praetorian buried alive, only his head exposed.

I activated the night vision on my rifle’s ACOG scope.

Peering through it, I noted two Praetorians making their way towards Helena. Once again, even through the dim green glow of my night vision, I saw evil intent on their faces, just like the Praetorian four years ago that had almost killed her.

The rest of the boys were up now as well, searching for weapons of their own. Wang was already getting in touch with his inner martial artist, having taken out two Praetorians with quick karate kicks to the head. He’d been close with Bordeaux as well, former swim buddies, and his anger was obvious. Vincent was up as well, but he wasn’t fighting.

He was grieving.

A large chunk of the ceiling had fallen during the explosion right on Titus. I could only see the upper half of the young Roman’s body, everything from his belly button down having been crushed by the concrete. Vincent held Titus’ visible upper body in his arm, and cried for his adopted son. Watching the old man cry caused me to hesitate.

But Santino didn’t see Vincent in his time of grief, or if he did, he focused on the Praetorians going after Helena instead. He bravely body checked one of them into the other and started beating him to death with his fists. His action snapped me from my own sadness at the loss of Titus and the pain Vincent was feeling. I hit the second Praetorians in the back as he got to his feet with a three round burst, just before he could enact some measure of revenge on Santino.

Helena had noticed her savior as well and helped Santino to his feet after he was finished with his prey. She reached up and touched his cheek in thanks for the save, an intimate gesture only friends as good as they could share without it seeming awkward. He threw her a goofy smile, gripped her hand momentarily, and rushed off to find someone else to kill. Helena, meanwhile, spotted Agrippina and went directly for her.

A slight motion to my left pulled my attention away from her and I spotted one of the ninjas trying to flank me. He rushed at me with his small scimitar blade, but instead of waiting for him to skewer me, I ran out to meet him. Spinning at the last second, I managed to guess which way he was going to lunge and avoided his blade. He stumbled past me and I put another three round burst into his back.

Six down, another thirty or so to go.

I unloaded the remaining rounds in my magazine on whatever targets I could find.

Nearing empty, I watched Wang take a sword to his thigh, forcing him to fight on basically one leg. A group of five Praetorians tried to overwhelm him, but I evened up the sides considerably by putting four of them down before they even reached him. The last was no match for even a handicapped Wang.

The only thing keeping the enemy at bay was my gun fire, and as I fired off another round into the last of the ninjas, there could still be as many as ten Praetorians still lurking about.

I looked around frantically for Helena and found her wrestling with Agrippina a few dozen yards away. Both women had more bruises than they’d had just after the explosion, but Helena clearly had the upper hand. Her hands may have been bound, but she was a fighter, and a well-trained one at that. Agrippina may have known how to fight, but she wasn’t a match for my woman.

I fired my last round at a Praetorian approaching the two of them, shattering the left side of his skull.

Helena’s luck was about to change when Agrippina found the orb lying on the ground beside them. Helena was on top of Agrippina, pounding into her chest with bound hands when Agrippina managed to swing the hard ball up, smacking it into the side of Helena’s head. The impact sent Helena rolling off her foe, but it had only been a glancing blow. Agrippina jumped on top of her, hoping to get the upper hand, but a very nimble Helena placed a foot against Agrippina’s midsection and threw her away. Helena quickly took advantage and repositioned herself back on top of Agrippina.