Title : "Legendary - Cassander, part 1"
Rated : T
Type : sample writing
Warnings : mentions of blood, violence, suffering
A/N : I know I'm late to the "Alexander" fandom, having only discovered the movie recently. I was too young to see it when it was in theaters, but I've always loved history, especially Greek/Roman. Anyway, this was one of a collection of small parts of a larger story that I wrote while in class. The story as a whole is only partly about Alexander and co. and the role they play when the pantheons of different mythologies clash, but then this is just a sample from the beginning that I thought I'd share as my first addition to the site. It's not really going anywhere, but I hope someone might enjoy it regardless. This is my take on what could have become of Alexander and his army after their deaths. Please realize that I am writing about these figures as characters, for the sake of an interesting tale. I'm not writing a biography.
/
The sun was beginning to set over the desert, bringing yet another day to its end. Many of the men had come to envy it for that, the ability to find an end while they were forced to continue on and on, and start again, again, and again. Most of them had long since lost track of how long it had been, Cassander Antipatros among them.
The early days of confusion and lonesome wandering through endless sands and storms had long since passed, and now the bulk of Alexander the Great's late army once more followed its king across the world. The Underworld, more specifically, if the delirious rambling of despairing soldiers were to be believed. It could very well be Tartarus, for all Cassander knew, though there was a distinct lack of fiery pits and molten lakes to be seen. But perhaps those had just been the images of men who feared the gods.
Cassander did not fear the gods. He had been raised to believe in them, yes, and from an early age he had learned to despise them, just as he despised the man he now trailed after in this perpetual march of agony.
He raised his head when he felt his horse slow. The rest of the army was coming to a halt as well, and above the forsaken ranks he could see the king dismount his own bony steed and make his way to the jagged canyon wall that blocked their path forward. A few officers skulked after him like hungry dogs, following only because they knew not what else to do.
Alexander ignored them until he reached the wall, running a hand along the sandy stone as he inspected an open gap in the rock face. From where he was, Cassander estimated that maybe four or five men on horseback could ride flank to flank, but he could only make out the opening. Who knew if the path narrowed further in, or completely ended altogether? It would take days, or more, for the entire contingent to find a way through. An even if they did, there was always the grim possibility that the earth would suddenly crush them from within.
But then it really didn't matter either way, did it? The result would be the same as it always was, and Cassander's lips curled bitterly when he realized he couldn't be angry at Alexander for any decision he made now. Time had no real meaning here, and neither did death. If a man's throat was slit he would suffer for the amount of time it took him to bleed out, and then a minute later his body would stir to life once more, his wounds healed and his flesh restored. Cassander had seen it happen, and had had it happen to him, hundreds of times. But it made no difference how many times death claimed you. Their punishment was inescapable, and so they were condemned to forever relive the path that Alexander's conquest in life had taken them.
What had started as a dream had twisted into a nightmare, as their king descended into the madness and corruption that his ambition had sired. Determined to reach the end of the world, he had pushed his army mercilessly until they could take no more. The man they had once followed willingly now wielded his power against them, but fear of reprisal had only kept them obedient for so long.
Cassander remembered that morning as though it were yesterday. Alexander was prepared to march them to their deaths, and they couldn't bear the prospect of another day wading through waterlogged jungles, each step bringing them that much farther from the homes they had left behind for the sake of glory. As dawn broke over the Hyphasis, the men were too exhausted to care if they were all executed for treason, and they were well aware that continuing forward would mean death regardless; Their enemies stood ready on the opposite shore, thousands of men, horses, and massive war elephants fresh and waiting for the invaders to cross the river, where they would be met with blades and spears, and the swinging tusks of the elephants eager to stain their ivory crimson with foreign blood. They'd seen the damage the beasts could do up close, crushing men into the earth, entrails draped across their colossal teeth as they trampled all that lay in their path. No one who crossed the river had a chance of survival. The river itself reached more than a hundred fathoms in some places, with crashing rapids and deadly rocks… the horses were already in poor condition, their hooves rotting and infected from the perpetually damp soil. Most would be lost before they even made it halfway across.
Only one among them had supported Alexander unconditionally, and not one man doubted that he would have followed the king straight into Hades itself. Such loyalty was bred from love, a love born in childhood and continued into adulthood.
Cassander had never understood the bond between Alexander and Hephaestion, but the depth of it was clear to all who witnessed it. It is said that such bonds occurred only a handful of times before, the last being that of the legendary hero Achilles and his brother-in-arms, Patroclus.
Cassander didn't know what oaths Alexander and Hephaestion may have sworn to each other, save for the ceremony they had performed at the ruins of Troy, at the start of Alexander's great undertaking, when they had paid homage to their ancient counterparts.
It was believed by some, and perpetuated by Alexander himself, that the young Macedonian conqueror was the son of a god, rather than of King Philip before him. Alexander fancied himself Zeus's child, choosing his father for himself and encouraging the excited buzz of rumors that solidified the idea among his followers.
Alexander was a brilliant strategist, unparalleled in his time, so it could be surmised that he as the son of the Almighty ruler of Olympus was a clever means of instilling awe and fear in the minds of the foreign barbarians he set out to rule. Cassander knew this was merely a happy byproduct, however. The truth was that Alexander wanted a reason to distance himself from Philip's legacy, and he satisfied his vast ego in the process.
Cassander did not believe for a second that Alexander was the son of a god, Zeus or otherwise. He never had, though he was more inclined to accept that the young king was a descendant of Achilles; the similarities were impossible to ignore. Both were great men, whose towering strengths and tremendous flaws practically mirrored each other. Swollen pride and arrogance had blinded both of them, and ultimately led to the loss of the one thing they valued most in life, but had forsaken in their selfishness.
He didn't know about Achilles, but now Alexander was suffering for the mistakes he'd made in life. This was Cassander's one solace in this damned eternal campaign – that Alexander, the once great ruler of all the known world, suffered more than all of the men who followed him combined.