The ruler of the greatest empire the world had ever known, the Emperor of the Roman Republic, was having cause to regret that it was a republic. The senate was sitting, as senates tend to do, and instead of sitting down and shutting up, as Julius Caesar explained his plans for expansion of military conquests, they were objecting, complaining and bellyaching. The emperor had just about had a bellyful…

"Caesar's conquests have gone belly-up! He can't even control a handful of barbarians! And he expects us to fill his soldiers' bellies with the taxes taken from our provinces!" bellowed Senator Contentius.

"Now, don't be bellicose…" muttered a senator.

"Quiet!" called Senator Audacius, presiding over the session from his position on the podium. His words fell on deaf ears as the shouting in the Senate grew louder, many yelling against Contentius but quite a few for him.

"You ought to silence him, O Caesar," an Imperial aide muttered privately to Caesar, as quietly as he could over the din.

"There's no silencing him," Caesar grumbled. "He's like a dog with a bone, is Contentius."

The aide nodded sagely. "That Gaulish village is always a bone of contention."

"Silence!" Caesar's voice had an edge that cut across the babbling senators. "Senators, Caesar has heard you!"

"You may hear," Contentius flung his toga over his shoulder, smacking the senator behind him with it, "but the question is, what are you going to do about it?"

Julius Caesar raised his chin. There was an imposing air to his posture that gave even the most belligerent senators pause. "I recognize the truth of what you say. This has gone on for too long. I shall crush that Gaulish village, and you shall all bear witness to Rome's rule over the ancient world!"

Fine words, but achieving them? Not so fine. Caesar was in a fine fix, pacing back and forth in his quarters. Cleopatra, who was visiting, watched him sidelong as he strutted and fretted, amusement in her fine eyes. "Another fine mess you've gotten yourself into, O Divine Caesar," she smiled.

Caesar paused in his furious pacing. Truth be told, he felt like pulling a Cleopatra himself, and smashing a vase or two to calm his nerves. He merely took a deep breath through his nostrils, "Nothing is any use. Brute force is useless. What kind of an idiot would I be to mobilize the entire army of Rome to crush a handful of madmen? I would be a laughing-stock…"

"And more so if they failed," Cleopatra said, caressing her pet tiger.

Caesar still couldn't quite bring himself to smash a vase, but he did clench his fists, screw his eyes shut tight and make a sound very like, "Gnnnn!" He took a deep breath and resumed his pacing. "I've tried everything. My crack troops have been defeated, they don't care about gold, the sower of discord turned out to be a huge failure, the spy—"

"Julius!" Cleopatra's bright brown eyes lit up as she turned towards him. For a moment, he was so distracted by her loveliness that he forgot everything. Then, he concentrated on what she was saying. "…they call the Dream Whisperer?"

He frowned for a moment. When he had to remember a name or a face, he flew through the faces in his memory, sharp and clear, until one stood out clearly. This name had trouble attaching itself to a face. Ridiculous! Caesar did not forget faces! Cleopatra's lilting voice continued. "When there was the trouble with that praetor they said was in Pompey's pay, and you sent that secret agent of yours to spy on him in his sleep—"

"Caius Insidius!" The light broke in upon Caesar's brain, although more like the croak of a raven than the carol of a bird. "The Dream Whisperer!"

"That's the one."

Caesar dropped into a chair, thinking furiously. Unmasking the traitorous Perfidius, once Praetor of Corsica, had been a bad business, and he wasn't sure he liked or even trusted Caius Insidius, even though the man was a member of Caesar's own Secret Service. He was one of the best strategists and thinkers in the service, and was loyal to Caesar like no other. He had, however, the rather unsettling talent of interrogating people in their dreams. Or speaking to them, anyway; Caesar had been too squeamish to ask what exactly it entailed to infiltrate a man's slumber. Having gained admittance into the suspect senator's bedchamber, Caius Insidius had whispered into Perfidius' dreams, and the man had answered back with confirmation that he was indeed in the pay of Pompey. That had been the end of that: Perfidius had been thrown to the lions, and Insidius had gone back to the Secret Service, doing only the gods knew what.

"The Dream Whisperer," Caesar muttered slowly, running a hand over his chin. Someone had called Insidius that back then, and the name had stuck.

Cleopatra knew better than to say more. She sat back and watched the wheels turn in Caesar's mind.

Since that meeting, a week had passed – a week of the most strenuous and frenetic activity the Secret Service of Ancient Rome had seen in most agents' living memory. Caesar had given orders that Caius Insidius was to study the records on the Gaulish village, but he had not been prepared for the massive amount of requests for information that had followed upon his command. Caesar had to admit he was impressed, even though the fellow made him uneasy. Insidius had requested records that Caesar himself hadn't known existed; he had sent messengers to the centurions who had commanded the fortified camps of Totorum, Laudanum, Aquarium and Compendium, with lists of questions to be answered, about their previous campaigns against the village; he had dispatched messengers to ask about the village warriors' and druid's travels to Corsica, Belgium and beyond; he had sent further messengers to detachments who had faced the Gauls on land and sea. Respecting the agent's thoroughness, Caesar had commanded that the best resources of the Roman army be placed at his disposal, and the Secret Service told him that it had taken quite a few of these resources before Insidius was satisfied.

Caesar drew himself up in his seat as Caius Insidius finally arrived for his audience at the appointed time. The man, although a Roman citizen through and through, was clearly Numidian by birth from the blue-black shade of his skin. Caesar would not be Emperor if he didn't know that his crack spy was the offspring of a love affair between a Roman Senator and a freed Numidian slave woman, both of whom had died and left their son to his illustrious career in the Secret Service. Heredity had served Caius Insidius well: his unprepossessing appearance made it easy for his enemies to underestimate him. The Dream Whisperer was slight and short of stature, with cropped-close dark hair and a small round nose. The one distinctive feature about him was his large, flint-black eyes. Although they appeared sleepy and nonchalant, they could turn piercing in a moment, giving the unsettling impression that he could see into your soul.

Right now, the agent was looking into Caesar as though he could see inside Caesar, see the emperor's distrust of him. His well-formed lips curved into a tight smile. A shiver ran down Caesar's spine. "Ave Caesar."

"Ave." Caesar forced himself to set his unease aside. He had not become what he was by listening to foolish whims. "Caius Insidius, it has been suggested to me that you might know of some strategy to conquer the village of madmen in Armorica known as the Indomitable Gauls. Caesar has been informed of your diligence in studying their actions, and Caesar is pleased. Now Caesar asks you: Do you think your talents can be used to bring them to their knees?"

Insidius raised his head and nodded confidently. "I am assured of success, O Divine Caesar."

Caesar's eyebrows went up. "It would be better to speak truth now, Insidius, if you are making empty promises. To lie to Caesar is to lie to the gods."

"Who would dare to attempt to deceive our divine emperor? Why, he would see right through me," Insidius murmured, eyes still boring into Caesar's own. Caesar felt exposed, as though the spy's gaze could penetrate his toga. He cleared his throat and straightened up.

"You have spent a long time in study. Now tell me your plan."

Insidius nodded, his eyes taking on a less piercing aspect, becoming merely bright and professional. Caesar motioned him to a couch, taking one himself; he sat upright on it, and his agent followed suit. "O Emperor of Emperors, Divine Caesar," said Insidius, "the best way to approach a chain is from its weakest link."

Caesar frowned. "I thought you had studied their names and descriptions!"

"Indeed I have. I know them now better than my own family."

"Then you know that we've tried it. The bard is just as dangerous as the rest of them. He may seem harmless, but they'll move heaven and earth to save him. And that's not counting his voice, which should be classed as a weapon all to itself."

"But it is not the bard I mean."

"Who, then?"

Insidius' voice was quietly confident. "The large brute."

"Obelix?!" Caesar rose, incredulous. "He is the most powerful of all the Gauls! He is permanently strengthened by the magic potion! Why, on one occasion, completely alone and unarmed, he managed to defeat and demoralize my crack troops, sent specially to bring the rebel Gauls to heel! All by himself!" He sat, panting, chagrined at having let his agitation show so plainly. "You must have the names mixed up, Insidius."

"Begging your pardon, O Wonder of Wonders, Divine Caesar, I have made no mistake. True, the Gaul called Obelix is physically strong. But he is emotionally the weakest and most suggestible of them all. He is extremely susceptible to feminine charms…"

"We've tried that before," sighed Caesar. "He's too simple for that to work for long. He seems to have an odd stupidity that defies seduction."

"Indeed, O Caesar," Insidius nodded. "It is that which I intend to use: psychological warfare. His simplicity makes him vulnerable to attack."

Caesar shook his head rapidly. "Tried that as well. Drained Rome's treasury dry to get him, and the other idiots, selling menhirs. Reports arrived that he abandoned menhir-dealing before any of the other villagers did, preferring to wallow in the mud like the boars he's always hunting with his friend Asterix. And why that strategist wastes his time with the big brute is another of the Gauls' mysteries," he added, half to himself.

Insidius had been nodding throughout the previous monologue as if listening to things with which he was already well familiar. "You have inadvertently touched upon the very point that I wish to utilize, O Caesar."

"But I've just told you! We have tried to split them up, to sow discord, and they ended up banding together more strongly than before!"

"It is not hate that I plan to use, O Divine Caesar, but love."

"Oh, no." Caesar buried his head in his hands. "More talk of women?"

"No. I speak not of eros, but āgāpe: brotherly love."

"Āgāpe?" Caesar raised his head, brow furrowed. "Explain this scheme to me."

Insidius leaned forward and lowered his voice. "It has often been said, O Caesar, that but for the druid, the dwarf and the monster, the village would fall. It would be simple to capture the druid, but for the fact that the midget and the brute always rescue him, and the brute defends the village until they get the druid back. Would you say, O General – for I speak to you now, Divine Emperor, in your capacity as a warrior and strategist – that if the great fat brute left the village, it would be possible to capture their druid and subdue the rest?"

Throughout Insidius' monologue, the emperor had gradually raised his head from his hands, and was now listening intently. "Yes… Yes, it could be possible, if the druid were captured quietly and siege were laid to the village. Yes…" His gaze grew distant as various plans of battle unfolded before his mind's eye. "But," he blinked, suddenly seeming to awaken from his reverie, "how would you get Obelix to leave? He would never abandon his friends, and I can tell you with certainty that he would die rather than let Asterix in particular come to harm."

Insidius' smile only broadened. "Exactly."

Caesar scratched his imperial head.

"He will always want to be close to him, so long as feels he is protecting him. But if he felt his presence would harm that precious blood brother of his, he would go to the ends of the earth to keep him from being harmed."

"But how in the name of Jupiter would that happen?"

"That, O Divine Caesar, is where I come in. Will you give me the support I need for this mission?"

Caesar straightened. "You are an agent of the Roman Empire. The resources of the Empire itself shall be at your disposal."

Insidius nodded approvingly, turning the nod into a bow just in time to halt Caesar's uneasy feeling that it was he who worked for the spy, not the other way around. "Thank you, O Divine Caesar. Allow me to share with you the outline of my plan…"