The Thousand Perils of Mars

by Zophiel Lagace

Amidst the war at Gaul, storming politics and adventures, Julius Caesar is haunted by reminisces of a past he mistakes as dreams. Defying the rule of Gods and men, two souls crossed ways over and again through the mist of Time, two souls that would have never met without the supernatural intervention of an ancient being.

1. Introduction

Introduction:

"Comrades in arms, a thousand perils of Mars

have proven you and I, in ten years of victory now—

is this what your bloodshed in northern fields deserves,

your wounds, your deaths, for winters passed in the Alps?

Rome is sounding her loud alarms for conflict

as if Punic Hannibal himself had crossed the Alps!

Cohorts are filling up, full-strength with raw recruits,

Whole forests fall for fleets. What are their orders?

Pursue Caesar on land and sea!" (1)

—o0o—

Author Note: Thank you so much for clicking on this story; pretty please, just take a minute and read the following, it'll save you lots of awkward moments and several "WTF?!" faces, I promise.

Disclaimer: This is NOT a historical essay, this is NOT based on the Rome HBO series or any other book, novel, movie, videogame or TV Special; it is not my intention here to discover the black thread or the wheel. My only goal is to tell a story based on historical events and characters and try to make it (hopefully) interesting. I do not own the characters involved in this crazy thing I call a story, I just own the interpretations of historical events and characters along with the many mistakes and far-fetched ideas.

Warnings: This believe-it-or-not freak-show of a story is YAOI, slash, m/m or whatever you want to call it (oh, yes. I'm dead serious about it) and full with videogame/anime/supernatural-like ideas.

Beware Fellow Muggle, this is NOT a common story, it's more like Japanese manga meets Ancient Rome, so proceed with caution.

Short Historical Context: I truly don't want to be pretentious or a History Police Agent, I just want this story to be entertaining, but I think it will be helpful to give you a historical context.

Once upon a time in 753 B.C. Rome was born. Rome was a kingdom until the year 509 B.C. when its last King was expelled from the city, then it became a Republic.

The Republic was ruled by 2 Consuls elected annually from the ranks of the Senate, which was the all-powerful oligarchy of Rome. The Senate didn't have direct power over the government of the Republic, it acted through the magistrates, but no magister in his right mind would ever oppose the Senate knowing how powerful it was and how great its prestige and authority.

Julius Caesar was born on July 12th, 100 B.C., when Rome was still a Republic, although facing hard times and problems that will eventually destroy it, giving birth to the Empire, ruled no more by Consuls and the Senate, but by a Princeps (or Emperor).

The first Roman Emperor was Caesar Augustus (Julius Caesar's grandnephew). I agree with some authors that state the Roman Empire began when Octavius was named Caesar Augustus, in the year 27 B.C.

Marcus Trajan was born on September 18th, 53 A.D. (during the reign of Emperor Claudius) and became Princeps (or Emperor) in 98 A.D.

Thank you so much,

Zophiel

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(1) Marcus Annaeus Lucanus (Lucan). Pharsalia. Penguin Classics Edition, p 13

Lucan wrote this poem portraying Julius Caesar as a blood thirsty tyrant for taking part in the Civil War and not because he wanted to sing about Caesar's greatness; but, despite being a Caesar's fan myself, I like this part and, in my very personal opinion, I think is really cool, reason why I took a part of it for the title of this story.