Alex Scarrow - Gates of Rome

The man struggled to move his mouth, savouring the freedom for his tongue to actually wander around, his claw-fingers probing his crusted lips pitifully.

‘It is the month of Sextilis once again. So… it’s not so very long now, is it?’

The man was still flexing his mouth, relishing this fleeting moment of freedom from the mask.

Caligula suspected the crazed old fool was getting ready to cry out in that strange garbled language of his. He tried the same thing every time the muzzle came off. The same strangled word.

‘Save your breath. Your Stone Men won’t be able to hear you. The doors are closed and they are all on the other side of the palace. It’s just you and I in here.’

The pitiful wreck of a man tried anyway, sucking in a lungful of fetid air then screaming. ‘System… o-over-ride… en-enable… S-sponge — ’ His voice was a frail and feeble gasp like a faltering breeze across marshland reeds.

‘Trust me,’ smiled Caligula. ‘They really can’t hear you.’

Nonetheless, he tried again. This time his croaking voice had a shrill and desperate power behind it: the asylum scream of some unhinged wretch. And it was the same meaningless word over and over again. Gibberish to Caligula.

‘SpongeBubba! SpongeBubba!! SPONGE… BUBBA!!! ’

AD 54, Rome

‘So… Maddy, that thing about Caligula joining the gods? You remember? The information you got off your computer?’

Maddy nodded. She’d not forgotten. She looked ahead of them, at Sal and Bob. They were walking along a narrow avenue outside Crassus’s walled garden. Traders set up temporary stalls along the base of the pink-painted wall early every morning. Stalls that could trade for a few hours before the mid-morning call to prayer sounded across the rooftops of Rome and Caligula’s acolytes started patrolling the streets to be sure every citizen was obediently on their knees in homage to their emperor and god. The unlicensed traders and their illegal stalls were packed up and long gone before then.

Charcoal graffiti covered the flaking pink paint. Latin tags of one collegium or another, slogans, crude jokes and vulgar stick-man drawings. One clearly depicted the emperor: a stick man with an oak-leaf halo above his head and exaggerated booted feet. Maddy squinted at what it seemed to be waving around in its hand — without her glasses on, the entire street was in soft focus. It seemed to be a

…

‘Oh, per-lease…’ She tutted in disgust.

‘Joining with the gods?’ prompted Liam. ‘That’s supposed to be soon, isn’t it?’

‘Yes.’ There wasn’t a date. But the data they’d pulled up did say something about it being in the summer.

‘Should we not tell the others about that, though? I mean… it’s important.’

‘I… I’m not sure we should.’

‘Why not?’

‘Well, look… think about it. If they learn from us that actually Caligula might not be around for much longer, they’ll abandon their plans. Right? I mean… why risk your life if you just need to be patient and wait a few more weeks, months?’

They watched Sal cajoling Bob into bartering with a trader. Maddy very much doubted any haggling was going to last particularly long with something as big and as intimidating as Bob on one side of the transaction.

‘Liam, this “ascending to the gods” thing. It could mean anything. It’s far too ambiguous for us to assume it means anything. It could mean he just got sick of a disease and died, and his priests decided to make up something that sounded suitably exciting and godlike.’

‘Aye. True.’

‘On the other hand,’ she added, ‘it could be a portal.’

He looked at her and grinned. ‘Well, I was thinking the very same thing, so I — ’

‘It might be that there’s some time-travel tech somewhere in his palace that’s been in a dormant state and it starts to activate. Maybe something on a timer… a bit like one of our six-month windows, but much longer?’

She looked at him. ‘See… that’s why we’ve got to get in there. Before whatever happens to Caligula… happens. And Cato, and the others, they’re our only way in.’

‘We’re using them,’ said Liam. He didn’t look entirely happy about that. She knew he’d warmed to those two, Cato and Macro.

‘Yes.’ She sighed. ‘Yes, technically, we are sort of using them.’

‘Doesn’t seem right.’

‘Oh sheesh,’ she cursed under her breath. ‘Why do I always have to be the freakin’ bad guy? Huh?’ Truth was, Maddy had learned to think of an alternate timeline as something not entirely real, almost cartoon-like. A virtual world even. These were lives that were not meant to have been lived. In some cases, perhaps they were better lives than they should have been; more often — at least so far — they’d been horrible lives lived through horrible timelines. Yes… perhaps she should have told Cato that something in this timeline was due to happen to Caligula very soon. But if whatever happened, happened in the palace on the Palatine with them sitting around out here and, God help them, they missed it… then that really might be their one and only chance to get back home wasted.

‘We have to get in there, Liam… and we have to get in there before anything activates? Do you get it? This might just be our only way back home!’

He stroked the tuft of bristles perched on his chin thoughtfully. ‘Aye… well, I suppose.’

‘So, we don’t tell them. We need them to act on their plans. The sooner the better.’

‘So, then… our friend here is quite correct.’ Crassus acknowledged Maddy with a nod. ‘There is no need to delay a moment longer. With our conceit to lure away some of these Stone Men and with the help of yours, we have a chance for you to get to Caligula, Cato.

‘The longer we delay, the more chance there is that one of Caligula’s spies will notice our gatherings.’ Crassus looked round at the others; the two senators, Cicero and Paulus, had attended. Atellus had made a trip over from the Tenth Legion’s permanent camp; Fronto the senior centurion of the Palace Guard cohort was there and, of course, Cato and Macro. ‘I know Caligula already suspects me of whispers behind his back.’

Cato nodded. ‘Agreed. We have a workable plan now. I say we proceed immediately.’

Although the gathered men stirred uneasily, there were no objections to that.

‘Right.’ Crassus reached into the folds of his toga and produced some scrolls. ‘This is the evidence you can present to Caligula, Cato.’ He handed Cato the scrolls. Cato unravelled them and scanned them quickly.

‘This is correspondence between Lepidus… and you!’

The old man nodded.

‘If I hand this over to Caligula, he’ll have men outside your front door within the hour!’

‘It has to be convincing.’ Crassus smiled. ‘My name on these letters will be enough to ensure Caligula sends for Lepidus as well. The moment he hears both he and I have been summoned, he’ll know his involvement with us, albeit a fleeting one, has been exposed.’

‘Crassus, if I do this, you should leave Rome. If — ’

‘No! If I run before they come for me, it will suggest I have foreknowledge. I must be caught red-handed by Caligula for this to fool him. More importantly… for him to fully trust you, Cato. He may already know you have visited me, met with me. You have to betray me, Cato… you have to hand me to Caligula as a traitor.’

He hunched his shoulders. ‘I will comply… I will play the innocent old man and then, when he threatens me with torture, I will implicate Lepidus.’

Cato shook his head. ‘We need you alive and well, Crassus! When Caligula is dead, we will need all of you!’ He looked at Cicero and Paulus. ‘We’ll need every last one of you to rebuild the Senate — ’