Something has gone wrong. Very wrong! Five of the Sailor Soldiers are in...Ancient Rome?!
And a sinister plot is looming closer...
Sailor Moon belongs to Naoko Takeuchi, Toei Animation, DiC, and Cloverway, in that
order. I make no money by this. More's the pity.
All other characters _not_ taken from History are mine, and you must ask permission to
use them, if you can find a way of using them outside this.
_This_ is emphasis. *This* is thought.
Kudos to the movie Gladiator, which was the inspiration for this.
And now, Scorpinac Fanfic Productions presents:
******************************************************************************
Sailor Moon
Roman Legends
by Scorpinac
Chapter 9: Plots
"Theophilus, there's someone to see you," Semon said at Theophilus's door.
"Really?" Theophilus asked as he continued to look through some scrolls, making notes
with his quill here and there. "Show him in."
The room was a general duplication of his room in Derorium, as he preferred that
arrangement, and he had even brought Lita's wand for the corner. He did so love that piece of
artwork, though he often thought of Lita's comment about it giving her power. Cephiro came in,
and moved over to the desk, looking at the ex-gladiator passively.
"Marcellus Theophilus," he said. "I am Barvus Cephiro."
"That's nice," Theophilus glanced at him, and picked up his goblet, taking a drink of the
potion held therein. "You'll excuse me if I do not stand up."
"Whatever you like," Cephiro said. "I wish to speak with one of your...warriors."
"One of mine?" Theophilus looked up, an amused smile on his lips. "To what do I owe
the honor? Wait, you wish to buy him at a low cost, and then sell him to one of my competitors
at two to three times what I sold for. Is that it?" He then put the goblet back down.
"No, I merely wish to speak to her," Cephiro smiled back.
"Her?" Theophilus blinked. "You mean my dear Lita?"
"Oh, yes," Cephiro nodded. "I assume you saw what happened in the Colosseum?"
"Of course," Theophilus replied. "My Lita beat some of the best Rome had to offer. Five
to one, and she got four of them to send each other to Pluto via the Charon Ferry! And allowed
the last one to live, though I dare say his ego didn't survive too well."
"I meant the Spaniard, Maximus," Cephiro said. "I do believe he wishes to kill
Commodus."
"Oh, that would be a tragedy," Theophilus said, his voice full of mock worry. "We better
notify the Senators. Oh, wait, most of them were there, weren't they? Well, then, I think that
takes us out of it, doesn't it?"
"I was thinking forwards, actually," Cephiro said, leaning his weight on the desk slightly.
"To _after_ Maximus kills him."
"Oh, like he'll ever get that chance," Theophilus chuckled, looking back to his scroll.
"Actually, I do believe he will get his chance," Cephiro said. "I don't know about you,
but I was in a position to see _Commodus's_ face, and he seemed almost...livid when Maximus
took off his helmet and revealed his name. I do believe Commodus wants him dead as much as
Maximus wants Commodus dead. I give him a month, tops."
"I still don't see what this has to do with Lita?" Theophilus stated, still looking at his
scroll, and making a few more marks. "I really must consider raising my charges by about two or
three percent."
"It doesn't," Cephiro said, leaning a little closer to Theophilus. "Not one bit."
"What?" Theophilus looked back up.
"I said, it has nothing to do with Lita at all," Cephiro repeated. "It has to do with the little
Prince, Lucius Verus."
"What about Lucius Verus?" Theophilus asked.
"That's between me...and Lita," Cephiro said, smiling slightly. Theophilus simply looked
confused. He knew this slave trader was up to something, but what?
* * *
Pherinias slowly crept through the royal palace of Rome, keeping himself to the shadows
as much as possible. According to the plans, he'd entered on the flip side of the building from the
Prince's quarters, and now had to work his way over to them slowly, so as not to be spotted and
caught. As he passed one chamber he heard two people, a man and a woman, talking and the
rustling of papers.
"Why is he still alive?" the male asked.
"I don't know," the female replied.
"He shouldn't be alive," the male said. "It vexes me. I am terribly vexed. They lied to
me in Germania. They said he was dead."
"Then you must let the Legions know, that their treachery will not go unpunished," the
female stated. Pherinias spared only a glance inward as he quickly swept past. Soon he would
find the chamber he wanted.
And Red and Pinky would die.
* * *
"Fear not, my maidens, for I shall fight for your glory!" Lucius waved a wooden practice
sword in the air, pretending to be powerful and strong.
"Hooray! Our champion goes to battle!" Salina and Rini squealed accordingly. The game
was Lucius's idea, but Rini and Salina didn't mind since all they had to do was sit on one of their
beds and 'cheer' for Lucius. A slave stood quietly and calmly, a barely disguised look of humor
and amusement on his face, to one side with another wooden practice sword. He was to be
Lucius's 'challenger' for the game. Lucius then turned to him and they began going through one
of Lucius's practice routines.
As a Prince and potential future ruler of the Roman Empire, it was important that Lucius
knew how to use the sword should he one day have to lead men into bloody battles and wars.
Rini and Salina watched as he went through the practice session, admiring his already very high
level of skill.
"He's pretty good, isn't he?" Salina said to Rini.
"Uh, huh," Rini agreed. "They've probably been teaching him from the moment he could
walk straight without falling down on his bottom."
"Yeah," Salina said, then blinked. "Bottom?"
"Mm, hmm," Rini said. "I'm a refined young lady, I am! I'm far too modest to say such a
word like..." she quickly glanced around, then closed her eyes into mischievous slits. "Butt." She
and Salina then giggled girlishly at Rini's humor.
* * *
Lita was laying quietly on her bed, thinking about the day's events. Her cell was sparse,
only the small, flat bed, a small altar for praying to the gods and dead loved ones against the side
of the wall, and a clay chamber pot and water filled basin on a small wood table furnishing it. The
bed had only one feather stuffed pillow and a simple handwoven wool blanket on it. Not much,
but it was better than sleeping on straw, or the floor, which was made of concrete.
While it was nice to know that Serena, Ami, and Hotaru were all okay, she still had
questions. What had happened to Serena, how had Rini been stolen away by slavers and Serena
left behind, and how had Rini wound up in the hands of the Prince of Rome?! Also, and probably
most importantly, what was Rini being made to do by the Prince? And she kept finding herself
coming back again and again to the question of whether or not Vassos, Urian, and Semon were in
love with her. It really didn't seem possible, but...
"You look as though you are carrying the weight of the entire Empire upon your
shoulders," a male voice commented, and Lita glanced over at the cell bars that separated her
from the outside world, and freedom.
Outside, looking in on her, was a man with short gold hair and a red-gold beard and
mustache, both well trimmed, and eyes that were a blazing shade of brown. He wore a simple
metal armor vest over a red tunic and well made Roman sandals. In the center of the vest, carved
in shiny, well polished copper, was the Greek letter Delta, with the letters Gamma and Epsilon
side by side below it. Around the letters, in sharp blue and green, were a lion and a large lizard,
like a dragon, each facing away from the letters toward the man's arms.
"Hello," Lita said. "If you're here to have my body, the answer is 'not in your lifetime!'"
"I have a wife for when I'm in need of sex, but I can see why one would want your...
supple frame," he replied. "I am Barvus Cephiro. I have come to talk." He waved a hand, and
one of the servants walked up and opened the door. Cephiro stepped in, and the door was again
closed. It was then Lita noticed he carried a sheathed sword at his waist.
"Feeling a little overconfident, aren't you?" Lita asked. "I might grab that sword and kill
you with it."
"I don't think you will, Lita," Cephiro said. "I could be wrong, but it almost looked like
you were _trying_ to knock out all of your opponents today, rather than kill them."
"I only kill when I'm left no other option," Lita admitted. "But you look as though you're
a rather important person around town, so you might make a good hostage, if nothing else." She
grinned at this as she sat up slowly, still having a small ache from her now considerably less
worrisome wound.
"And there's that," Cephiro waved a hand to indicate her injury. "Oh, yes, I do believe
that the late lamented Thanos got you pretty good today. Before he went and lost his sword arm,
I mean." Cephiro calmly moved over to the alter, glancing at the objects there on, which
amounted to a couple of candles and a throw cloth underneath them, as well as a pair of wood
figurines Lita'd been allowed to carve in her free time. Figurines of her parents.
"Was that his name?" Lita asked dryly. "I'm afraid it didn't come up."
"I really only picked it up myself from those grousing about losing bet money because of
it," Cephiro admitted. "Still, though, it must be pretty bad, huh?"
"It looks worse than it is," Lita said. "If you just came to check on my boo-boos, you can
go now."
"Actually, I came on something far more important," Cephiro said, turning to her. "I've
heard through the wind that you are, though exactly how is beyond my ability to explain,
acquainted with the pink haired wonder."
"Pink haired...you mean Rini?" Lita asked. "Yeah, I know her. She's my friend's girl.
Actually, I'd really like to know how she got enslaved to begin with, to tell you the truth."
"Hmm," Cephiro glanced back to the altar, drifting off into thought for a moment. "Very
peculiar. You came from Derorium, and she was in Devinsa, yet you were friends with her
mother. No sense in it..."
"Sure there is," Lita said, re-grabbing his attention. "My parents and I went for a visit to
Africa about three months ago, my parents got killed by bandits, I got lost in the desert, my camel
died on me, I got picked up by Petros while trying to help one of his 'wares' in her attempted
escape, she and I got sold to Theophilus, he decided to make me a gladiator because...for his own
reasons, etc., etc., etc." Cephiro stared at her for a few moments, then shrugged.
"It makes as much sense as anything," he said.
"Of course it does," Lita put hands behind her head and laid back down. *I just wished
I'd thought of it while I was talking with Serena, Ami, and Hotaru!*
"Anyways," Cephiro continued, "I came to talk to you of the little girl's welfare." Lita
lifted herself up on her elbows.
"What about Rini's welfare?" she asked.
* * *
Pherinias continued his slow journey across the palace. Finally, he saw a lit chamber
ahead of him, and heard the sounds of two wooden swords clacking against each other, and
children giggling and cheering emanating from within, and moved closer. As he drew near, he
heard someone from the side, and ducked behind a nearby tapestry. Glancing carefully out he saw
a pair of servants walk by, and once they were gone, he slipped out and quickly made for the
chamber.
At the door he noticed a guard standing quietly to one side, lightly dozing. He crept
closer, keeping as quiet as he could. When he reached the entryway, he quickly covered the
man's mouth to keep him from crying out, and, taking out his knife, ran him through the heart.
Pherinias then pulled the man aside and hid him carefully behind another tapestry, then returned to
the door.
Glancing inward, he saw a servant sword fighting with the Prince, the two using dull,
wooden swords, as he had surmised from the noise. And behind them, were his targets.
This was going to be easier than he thought...
* * *
Lucius and the servant continued to battle, the two holding even. Rini and Salina
continued to 'cheer' for their 'heroic champion' as he fought for their 'valor'. Compared to what
they'd seen today in the Colosseum, this was far more preferable. At least here no one died for
real! Occasionally Rini and Salina would giggle at Lucius for making a simplistic mistake in his
routine, though more often at a quietly shared joke.
Rini was also worried about Lucius's uncle. From what she'd seen and heard, that
Spanish gladiator, Maximus, was convinced that Commodus was responsible for his family's
murder. And for whatever reason, Commodus clearly wanted Maximus dead, too! It had only
been the pressure of the crowd that had stayed Commodus's hand, and he was clearly quite
incensed about it afterwards.
Just then, she thought she saw someone at the entrance to Lucius's quarters. Someone
familiar. Someone she _really_ didn't _ever_ want to see again! A moment later, the figure was
gone.
"You okay, Rini?" Salina asked.
"Yeah," Rini answered. "Just my imagination."
* * *
Cephiro smiled, seeing his latest plan coming to fruition. *Oh, yes, just a matter of time.
Always a simple matter of time.*
"Well, what about Rini's welfare?" Lita asked again, having sat back up fully.
"I hear she has an insolence about her," Cephiro said. "I've heard that she sometimes
dares to speak back to her owner, to question his commands."
"She always was outspoken," Lita said. "But never countermanding, not to her parents or
her elders."
"You think I am lying?" Cephiro asked.
"I barely know you," Lita said. "So I can't really make that judgement yet."
"Did you see her today, at the Colosseum?" Cephiro inquired, turning to look back at the
altar, and picking up the female figurine to look at it more closely, his expression turning very
solemn.
"Yeah, she looked fine," Lita said. "And put down my mom!"
"Did you see her when she went in with Lucius?" Cephiro prodded.
"From the windows in the cell area," Lita said. "She still looked fine. Now put my mom
back!"
"Are you really sure about that?" he looked at her. "Would you swear to her well being
before the gods?" Lita stared a moment before answering.
"Yes," she said. "Put it down."
"That would be a mistake," Cephiro said, finally returning the figurine to its proper place.
"I saw part of her back as she, quite wisely, followed Lucius in retreating from the arena. I saw
scars."
"Scars?" Lita asked, afraid of where he was going with this.
"Whip scars," Cephiro looked at her, his face now grave. "Lucius has had her flogged.
Probably more than once."
"Flogged?!" Lita gasped, her eyes filling with horror at the information. "Rini?! Oh,
Gods, no!"
"Oh, yes," Cephiro stated. "I hear the whip can be quite painful, especially when swung
by a professional expert." *Yes, that's the way, burn my little one, burn.*
"That little..." Lita snapped, her anger beginning to cloud her judgement. "How dare he!"
"He dared!" Cephiro said, raising his voice ever so slightly. "And I have heard rumors of
more."
"Like?" Lita asked, her teeth beginning to grit.
"I hear," Cephiro said, taking a step closer, "that he has also been using her in bed, with,
or without, her consent. At least as far as he is able." Lita felt her anger boil over.
"That little...bastard!!" she roared.
* * *
Pherinias quickly ducked back into the shadows. It seemed for a moment that Pinky had
spotted him. He remained quiet for a moment, then leaned very slowly to look into the room
again. The two girls were now focused squarely on the mock battle. The Prince, Lucius, was
doing well, considering it looked as though the slave he was fighting against wasn't really trying.
At least, Pherinias presumed he was a slave, he couldn't really tell.
He watched for a few moments longer, and then entered the room, crept up behind the
turned back of the slave/servant, and grabbing him with one arm around his neck, rammed his
blade into the man's lower back. He then tossed him aside, and stared at his prey.
* * *
"He is indeed," Cephiro said, keeping himself calm. *She's mine.*
"OOH! If I could only get my hands on him!" Lita growled. First Hotaru had nearly been
raped, and now she'd learned that Rini was being flogged, and quite possibly raped as well, by
some...snot-nosed Prince!
"Maybe you will," Cephiro commented.
"What?" Lita blinked, her anger still burning.
"You're good, very good," Cephiro said. "I give you a month before the Caesar and
Lucius Verus have you brought before them, to grant you your freedom." Lita watched him
carefully now.
"So?" she asked. "I want my freedom. It's the only thing that I fight for."
"But you could use that opportunity," Cephiro stated. "And use it well."
"How?" Lita asked. "Wait, you mean..."
"Yes," Cephiro said, conviction filling his face. "You can kill Lucius Verus!"
* * *
Rini, Salina, and Lucius looked on in shock as Pherinias grabbed the slave from behind
and stabbed him. The slave dropped his wooden sword as he felt the knife sink into him, and then
Pherinias pulled the blade back out, tossing the wounded man aside like a doll.
"You!" Rini gasped.
"What are you doing here?" Salina asked. Both of their eyes had widened in terror.
"Did you really think I was going to let you get away without evening the score?"
Pherinias grinned his sickly, twisted, mean grin, his eyes mean as ever, and now looking just a
touch insane.
"You mean..." Rini said, terror filling her voice, and nearly overwhelming her.
"It's time to die, Pinky," Pherinias sneered. "You, too, Red."
"They are my property!" Lucius said in his most commanding voice, holding his wooden
sword at the ready. "You will not touch them!"
"Out of my way, boy," Pherinias sneered, and Lucius jabbed his sword into the man's
torso. Unfortunately, the wooden blade was nothing against Pherinias's hard brown leather
armor. Pherinias glanced at it, mentally acknowledged that there would be a bruise later, and
swatted the sword aside. He grabbed Lucius by the arm and tossed to him to the floor near his
own bed.
"I told you, boy, I don't care about you!" Pherinias snapped as he tossed the child aside.
"I only want the slaves." He started to walk closer to them, and the two did the only thing they
could think of.
They screamed at the top of their voices!
* * *
"Kill..." Lita stared at him. "I couldn't..."
"You could!" Cephiro said fiercely. "It would be simple. A hidden blade, an arrow head,
or even just poisonous lipstick, if you could stomach giving the boy a full kiss on the lips."
"But...deliberate murder..." Lita said. "I can't!"
"So you would rather your friend's child, a friend, by your own behavior and reactions,
you are very close to, suffer at his hands?" Cephiro asked. Lita lowered her eyes for a moment,
considering.
"No," she said. "I can't let Rini suffer, not like that, not when she doesn't, not when she
could _never_ possibly deserve it!" *I'm supposed to protect her _and_ Serena, after all. It is my
job, after a fashion.*
"Then what is the problem?" Cephiro asked.
"Well, I..." Lita stammered, then looked up. "I'll be killed, that's what! Even if I nail
him, the little prick and his uncle have, like, a thousand bodyguards and soldiers around them all
the time. I'd be turned into chop suey before I could blink!"
"No, you wouldn't," Cephiro smiled.
"Huh?" Lita stared incredulously.
* * *
Pherinias roared, and dove at them, and Rini and Salina dodged to either side. Salina went
for a corner, trying to get out of his reach, but Pherinias saw her, and lunged for her again. To
the opposite side, Rini ducked behind a small rocking horse. She glanced out, saw Pherinias
going for Salina, and dove back out, ramming her full weight into the would-be killer. He turned
on her, and grabbed her by the arm. In desperation, she bit into his wrist, but he only flinched,
and rose his knife to strike again.
Lucius jumped on his other arm, trying to hold the blade back, and Pherinias flung him
back down in rage, glancing at him briefly.
"Fine, you want to die, I'll do you, too!" he roared, "But first, Pinky!" He turned back to
Rini, and found Salina trying to tug his hand off of the pink-haired wonder's arm. *Ah, two-for-
one sale,* he thought, leering at the two panicked girls.
Just then, a large form rammed into Pherinias, knocking him aside, and causing him to lose
his grip on Rini. It was the slave, his back bleeding profusely, his green eyes looking glazed, but
still alive.
"ROUVIN!" Lucius cried. But Rouvin, the slave, didn't listen. He wrestled with
Pherinias for the knife, and Pherinias, in much better shape, easily pushed back. After a few
seconds, Pherinias shoved Rouvin off, and Rouvin flopped down at the base of Lucius's bed.
Pherinias turned back to the three children.
"Enough games..." he growled. Suddenly there was a sickening **thunk**, and Pherinias
stumbled. Six Praetorians had appeared at the door, one carrying a standard bow and arrow set.
One of his arrows was now lodged in Pherinias's back. The guard quickly knocked another
arrow, and fired again into Pherinias's rear as the other five charged in along the sides of the room
to maintain their comrade a clear shot. Pherinias's eyes filled with shock, and he tried to move
forward to the two girls again. But then the other five guards got to him, drew their swords, and
that was the end of Pherinias.
As the five sword bearers wiped clean their blades, and the bowman shouldered his own
weapon and called for assistance and began to check the immediate area for the missing
Praetorian, Rini and Salina dashed over to Lucius, who was kneeling over Rouvin and holding up
his head.
"Rouvin, please say something, anything," Lucius pleaded.
"The man, is he..." Rouvin breathed.
"Pherinias is dead," Rini said. "He won't be hurting anyone else."
"Good..." Rouvin said, then shuddered a moment. Instinctively, Rini reached under,
found the wound, and pressed, pressed as hard as she could, to stop the bleeding.
"Are you okay, my Prince?" a guard asked.
"Yes!" Lucius snapped. "Now get some help for Rouvin!" The guard turned and gave a
silent signal, two of the other guards filing out to get some assistance as the other two were
removing Pherinias's body.
"My Prince...Lucius..." Rouvin said.
"Yes," Lucius said.
"Set me free," Rouvin said. "If I am to die this night, let me die a free man." Lucius
looked stumped, unsure what to say.
"Please, free him," Rini said, then thinking over what she could possibly give Lucius in
return, took a breath and said. "If you do...you can...have my body..." Lucius looked at her, and
Salina stared in surprise at Rini's selflessness. Lucius smiled.
"Keep your body," he said. "I will not trade anything for it." He then turned back to
Rouvin. "You are free, Rouvin. You are free." Rouvin smiled. Salina stared at Rini still, then
glanced at her hands.
"What are you doing?" she asked.
"Huh?" Rini looked at her. "I'm applying pressure to the wound to stop the bleeding.
That's standard first aid...isn't it?" Lucius and Salina just looked at her, and then the guard
leaned down, and gently lifted Rouvin to look at the wound.
"It doesn't look too serious, but it does appear deep," he said, pushing Rini's small,
blood-stained hands aside, and then placing his own in their place, putting far more pressure on it
than she could muster. "And it is standard battlefield practice for tending wounds," he added,
"though I think I shall refrain from asking where _you_ learned it. Go stand watch at the door."
Rini nodded and went over to the chambers entrance. The guard then turned to Salina. "See if
you can find some clean linen for bandages until they get back," he said, and Salina obediently
nodded, and went to seek the requested items.
"Please," Lucius said, looking at Rouvin, "don't go yet." But Rouvin had shut his eyes.
* * *
"I have connections in the palace and the Senate," Cephiro told her. "I can see to it that
you are allowed to live, and are imprisoned."
"What good does that do me?" Lita asked.
"Considering how much Commodus and the Spaniard, Maximus, seem to hate each other,
I give the Caesar a month, at best, before he fowls up and gets killed by the man. Once that
happens, and Lucius is dead, I will make a move to become Regent, whilst a new Caesar is found
and named," Cephiro laid it out for her. "I will silently give you a pardon and let you go free, and
no one be the wiser."
"It still sounds risky," Lita said.
"The risk is minimal," Cephiro said. "And the gains, astounding. You will be free, the girl
will be safe, and I, well, I will be in a position to change the face of the Empire, at least until a
new Emperor is chosen...if ever." Lita thought it over. It still seemed risky to her, but if Rini was
being harmed, assaulted, defiled...what choice did she have?!
"Well," Cephiro asked, "Your answer?"
"I'll only do it for Rini," Lita said, her eyes filled with rage and anger.
"Whatever you like," Cephiro smiled.
"Very well," Lita agreed. "Lucius Verus will die."
* * *
Darien paced restlessly, growing ever impatient as the time drew longer and longer. Mina
sat in a corner, holding Diana, who was beset with worry over the missing Rini. Michelle and
Amara held each other nearby, not sure of anything else to do, and Rei sat on the floor, trying to
find the missing senshi through meditating.
Luna and Artemis sat near the machine, watching as it was worked away on by Trista...
and the man she'd called in for help. They'd only met him once before, except for the Outers and
Diana, and he seemed trustworthy enough. But would either of them be able to decipher it?
"Oh!!" Trista grunted in frustration. "It just doesn't make any sense!"
"Sure it does," her companion commented. Everyone looked at him, and he turned to
them. "If you know what you're looking at," he added.
"And you know what it is, John?" Mina asked. Johnathan Lundar was supposedly an alien
from an advanced race that specialized in many sciences, including Time Travel. They weren't
sure if they believed him, but he knew intimate details of the last day of the Silver Millennium that
couldn't be explain any other way than he had _been_ there! He certainly didn't _look_ a
thousand years old! Thirty, if that, really.
"Of course I do," John said, taking off the spectacles he was wearing. "It's a Time
Bomb." Now they looked at him as though he were looney.
"A time bomb?" Diana asked. "You mean it was set to blow up at a certain time?"
"Ludicrous!" Luna said. "Are you saying it exploded and blew our friends into tiny
pieces?! Impossible, it's still here!"
"Of course it is, Luna," John said, turning back to the device and re-donning his glasses.
"Let me explain. It is not a time bomb in that it is a time delay explosive device. No, far from it.
It is a Time Bomb, an explosive that detonates in time, but not in space. The name here,
'Temporal Transference Research Advancement Protocol', was a dead give away. My people
studied the theory once, but abandoned it ages ago."
"So the others..." Darien began.
"Have been blow across time," John said. "Other than that, they should be peachy.
Separated, but peachy."
"Separated?" Rei asked.
"Oh, yes," John said. "It's really quite simple. When a Time Bomb goes off, there is a
small spacial displacement, as well as the main, usually massive, temporal one. The closer you are
to the bomb, the further back and away you go. For instance, I've calculated that the guy who
was building this thing was blown back approximately..." He picked up some figures he worked
out on a pad of paper by hand, "three to four thousand years ago, and by the power it was amping
when it popped, about the mid-Atlantic, maybe forty or fifty miles off the American coastline."
He glanced back at the attentive group. "I think we can write him off."
"Can't we just throw it in reverse?" Mina asked.
"Oh, heavens no," John said. "These things never do reverse. But you can follow them."
"But where are they?" Artemis asked. "And when?!" John again looked at his pad of
paper.
"Relax, I worked that out, too," he said. "Given where they were standing, they would
have been blown back to sometime in 180 Amino Domini."
"180?!" Darien snapped. "That's almost two thousand years ago!"
"True," John said, then glanced back down. "Also, given relative positions to the Bomb, I
guestimate that Ami and Hotaru would have both wound up somewhere in the southern area of
what is now Austria, though not necessarily together, and Rini and Serena will have landed in the
southern part of Italy, maybe Sicily. And that's provided they didn't land right smack dab in the
middle of the Mediterranean, but I think we can safely say that, that didn't happen."
"How do you figure that?" Amara asked.
"Well, we're still here, aren't we?" he asked her. "And they can't have altered history too
drastically, since even a minor time ripple would have been noticed by now."
"But it's only been," Mina said, checking her watch, "six hours!"
"For us," John said, and then looked abashed. "Did I forget to mention there's a slight
dis-correlation between how much time has passed here and there due to this thing's effects?"
"Yes," Trista said, standing up. "How big a dis-correlation?!"
"They would have experienced about five to seven weeks of history by now," John
admitted. "Oh, and Lita would have landed in upper Africa, relatively near the Mediterranean
coastline. And the exact date each one would have arrived in when they re-entered normal space-
time is simply incalculable. They could have landed within minutes, hours, or even days of one
another."
"Five...to seven...weeks?!" all five Scouts and Darien shrieked.
"Yes," John said. "But hardly anything could have happened to them, so long as they
kept a low profile."
"Um...isn't 180 A.D.," Diana said, "in the middle of the Roman Age?"
"Why, yes," John confirmed, "At the Empire's height...oh, dear. Ami has blue hair."
"So?" Mina asked.
"Well, in that time, she would be considered a 'collector's item' by most slavers," John
pointed out, making the room go pale. "Rini, too, for that matter. You did say her hair was pink.
You really must introduce me sometime."
"My baby...a slave?" Darien whispered, his mind thinking on how most slave owners were
reputed to have treated their 'property' in those days in the history books. An image of Rini
dressed in rags and chains, covered in filth, and forced to do menial labor at some madman's
whim floated through his mind.
"Well, we'll just have to hot foot it, won't we?" John said, returning to the device, and
quickly scritching something on a fresh piece of paper, which he ripped off and handed to Trista.
"Take this to Carol, would you. She'll get you all some appropriate wardrobe."
Snapping out of it, Trista took the page, and Michelle moved up to join her.
"You'll probably need an extra pair of hands," she said, and Trista nodded, picking up her
Garnet rod and waving it, and the two vanished. John continued his work on the machine, and a
few moments later the two scouts reappeared, carrying a load of clothes with them.
While Johnathan finished with the machine, the others stepped out to change clothes.
When they re-entered, Trista had de-transformed, and each girl wore a color coded roman dress -
Rei in red with white lacing and a single shoulder strap, Michelle in a sea green with blue lacing
and double shoulder straps, Trista in indigo with black lacing and double shoulder strap, a shawl
holding in all of her dark green hair, and Mina in a cute yellow-orange number with bright red
lacing and a single shoulder strap, the one bare shoulder almost deliberately worn low near her
breast. They also wore small gold bracelets and simple Roman sandals.
The two exceptions were Darien and Amara. Darien wore Roman battle armor, as though
he were a soldier in the Legions; a dark metal armor vest over a red tunic with a red cape, armor
skirt, and sandals, a helmet with a red tuft of feathers in the top under his arm. And Amara wore
a blue toga with a yellow sash, and the same sandals as everyone else. Artemis looked them over
approvingly, though he did give a stern glance at Mina.
"Yeah, I think that'll do," he said. "Darien, shouldn't you have a sword?"
"I have some Roman coinage, he can pick one up," John said, finishing up, and working
out some final calculations on his pad of paper. "Yeah that'll do it." He turned to look at the
others, and nodded approvingly, then glanced at Amara and Michelle. Michelle wore one
additional accessory: a metal collar around her neck, to which a six-foot chain was attached, the
other end of the chain in Amara's hand.
"What's that for?" he asked.
"Well, my hair is sea-blue," Michelle pointed out. "I wouldn't want to be kidnapped, so
for our trip to Ancient Rome, I shall be Amara's loving and loyal little pet." The others gave
them quiet, somewhat stunned, looks.
"You're into the kinky stuff, aren't you?" John accused. "And Amara, why aren't you
wearing a dress?" Amara just scowled at him.
"Can we get going?" Darien asked. "I feel ridiculous in this thing!"
"Oh, we're ready to roll," John said, and turned and punched a few buttons on the
machine. "I think we can agree that they all would have made for somewhere easy for you to find
them, so we'll send you all to just outside Rome itself, by about two to three kilometers or so, in
about mid-June. That should be enough."
He rose to his feet and indicated for them all to stand in one spot, fishing some Roman
currency from one of his pockets and handing it to Darien, and the three cats quickly hopped into
the group as well.
"Bunch in tight, that should keep you all together," John instructed. "And good luck."
"Aren't you coming?" Rei asked.
"No," John said. "These are galactically illegal for a reason, you know. If anyone asks, I
was never here, and I never saw that thing."
"But, John..." Darien started, but John hushed him.
"We must each follow our own conscience, Darien," he told him. "And mine says that I
must stay here." John then went over and pushed a few more buttons, then made for the door.
"Fortunately this thing has crappy range, anyway, and I can get out of dodge before it pops."
"Wait!" Mina cried. "How do we get back?!"
"You'll just have to use the old-fashioned way," John said. "Use the Time Gate!"
"But..." Trista said.
"It'll be eleven to one! Just knock her out!" John called, and ducked through the lab
door. Before anyone else could say anything, the Bomb flashed, and a moment later they were
gone. John stepped in, and looked at the empty room.
"Well, that's that," he said, and pulled out a small pistol like object from his vest,
adjusting a switch. "Pity to destroy it," he commented to himself, "it's a wonderfully made
machine." He aimed, and fired the Staser, vaporizing the Time Bomb forever. He then quietly
pocketed the weapon. "A pity," he repeated to the air. "Oh, well, back to the Dojo."
* * *
The flash ended, and when Darien and the others could see clearly again, they found they
were standing in a grassy countryside, mountains in the distance, and the sea just a little ways
beyond to the right. Off in the distance to the northeast was a large city, and even from there they
could tell it was made primarily of stone.
Looking around, they saw no one in immediate visual range, and began to head toward the
city. As they approached it, they saw several people working in the fields nearby it, and others
coming and going from the city. For a moment they weren't sure they were in the right place,
though they were definitely in the right time - the togas, dresses, and other robes worn by those
around the place clearly indicated that they were most definitely in Ancient Rome.
"Over there," Darien said, pointing to the city skyline. "It's Rome alright, and no
mistake! That's the Colosseum." They glanced where he pointed, and sure enough, there was
the Colosseum, complete and undamaged...from the outside...
"And it's whole!" Mina stated, her eyes wide with impression. "It's official, we're no
longer in Tokyo, Toto!"
"Woof," Artemis said.
"Cool it, Dorothy," Rei retorted. "Remember people, low profiles! We go in, find our
people, we get out. No tampering with history!"
"Don't need to tell me twice," Amara said, staring at the vast city before them.
"It's so big!" Diana exclaimed. "How will we find them?!"
"We'll look, of course," Luna replied. "We shan't give up till we've found them safe and
sound!"
"I can't believe it's so beautiful," Michelle breathed. "I always thought of the Roman Age
as decadent and corrupt."
"Oh, there's plenty of corruption and decadence," Darien said. "It's just hidden under all
the 'good manners' and 'politeness'. Harder to spot that way."
"I just hope they're all alright," Trista said, her mind centered on Rini and Hotaru. Her
thoughts also went out to Serena, Lita, and Ami, but those three had more than proven time and
time again that they could easily take care of themselves.
As they drew nearer the city, they noticed a cart stopped beside the road, carrying various
weapons. Three men were with it, and were currently working on repairing a damaged wheel.
They moved closer to it, and as the three men continued to work, Darien selected a good looking
blade from the cart, and laid down some of the money John had given him, saving the rest for
later, just in case. As they moved away, Darien glanced at the coins, and many did look of the
proper age and time...but a few looked a little bit off...
They continued toward the city, and Darien quickly strapped the sheathed blade to his
belt, allowing it to hang at his side. The city was truly immense, and there were hundreds of
people. As a safety precaution, Mina took Artemis into her arms, as did Rei with Luna and
Darien with Diana.
As they began to pass through the streets, they quietly began asking if anyone had seen
anybody matching Serena, Rini, Ami, Hotaru, or Lita's description. One man they asked nodded
no on the first four, but when they described Lita, his eyes lit up.
"That sounds like the new woman warrior in the Colosseum," he said. "The one who
took out five of Rome's finest just six days ago. What did you say her name was again?"
"Lita," Mina said. "Lita Kino."
"Yes, Lita the Magnificent!" the man replied. "It probably is her. And magnificent she is!
A real firebrand! I dare say her owner must have trouble with her!" At that they thanked the man
and continued on.
"Lita...in the Colosseum?" Diana whispered. "Why would she be there? And what did he
mean, her owner?"
"She's a gladiator," Darien whispered back. "A slave made to battle other slaves to the
death in barbaric 'games'!"
"At least we have an idea of where to look for her, if it's our Lita," Mina said. "It could
just be someone who looks like her, yeah, that's it, just a look-a-like!"
"Don't count on it, Mina," Amara said. Suddenly, Michelle yelped. They stopped and
turned to see what was up, and saw some guy pawing her chest from behind.
"Ah, yes, fine build, ample anchorage, a good specimen if ever I saw one," he said, and
spun her around. Michelle found herself facing a tall, brutish guy with slightly long brown hair
and a thick, shaggy beard and mustache with mean, deep black eyes. He wore blue dyed metal
roman armor over a blue tunic and a pair of well made sandals, a sword on his waist, and a single
key hanging from his belt. Stamped on the vest in either gold or bronze, they weren't sure which, was a side
view sigil of a powerful Griffin, its talons outstretched. In the Griffin, made apparently from
copper, were the Greek letters Delta, Gamma, and Epsilon, in a triangle arrangement. The whole
vest was clearly kept carefully polished to a shine. He looked Michelle over quickly, and nodded.
"Yes, very attractive, you'll do nicely." He then turned to Amara. "I will pay you forty gold
coins for this slave, my good man."
"She's not for sale!" Amara snapped, then leaning in to ruffle Michelle's hair. "You see
this? Natural! She's worth about a thousand _times_ what you're offering! Besides, I like her."
Amara grinned as the man listened to her voice, realizing his mistake. He then took a careful look
at her.
"You're...a woman..." he said.
"Do tell," Amara said. "Now get lost!" The man suddenly glowered.
"Do you know who I am?" he asked. Darien pulled his blade and pointed it at the slaver.
"Someone with a rapidly shrinking lifespan if you don't take off!" he said. The slaver just
looked at him crossly.
"I am Darvinian Cavinus, partner to Barvus Cephiro, one of the most powerful slavers in
all of the Empire!" he stated, and suddenly pulled his own blade and smacked Darien's aside with
it with ease. "And I am also a master swordsman! So I would not advise pulling a blade on me
again." Darien felt his eyes and face fill with loathing for this man, but checked it.
"Either way, Michelle is not for sale! So beat it!" Rei and Mina snapped together, and
Trista also made herself look as menacing as possible. Cavinus just glanced at them idly. He then
looked squarely at Darien for a moment.
"You almost look...yes, very much so...ah, no matter!" he muttered. "Keep the woman,
then. But you'd better keep both eyes open, or you might lose her." Before they had a chance to
respond to that, Cavinus walked off, dismissing them. For a while they sat and fumed to
themselves quietly, Darien sheathing his blade.
"I am officially in favor of making this as short a trip as _possible_!" Michelle declared.
"Indeed!" Luna whispered quietly. "The nerve of that monster!"
"Grabbing at Michelle like that," Diana whispered, her fur on end. "I oughta bite off his
ear!"
"Cool it, Diana," Artemis told her, also whispering. "I feel the same, but we can't draw
attention to ourselves too much."
"I know, I know," Diana relented.
"I just hope Rini or the others didn't wind up in his vile clutches," Darien said, and they
moved on.
As they continued to ask around, they picked up some hints that a girl matching Hotaru's
general description was seen in accompaniment to a wealthy Roman Lady from the more northern
provinces about a week ago, but nothing overly solid.
On Ami, they came up with almost less than nothing. They caught rumors of a girl similar
to Ami having passed through the market place multiple times, or going into the Colosseum to
watch one of the 'Games' currently in process over the last week, and some claimed longer. But
nothing concrete. All the stories they'd picked up stated that the girl in question wore a shawl
over her head constantly! This, of course, made more positive ID nearly impossible, more so
when most of the people they asked weren't really looking that hard.
For Rini, much to Darien's upset, they got only a pair of rumors. One of a pink-haired girl
sold at a slave auction weeks ago, the auctioneer claiming the color was natural for her. And the
other of a girl with hair dyed a shade of pink in the Imperial Palace, a supposed slave, whether for
labor or for pleasure was dependant on the opinion of who was asked at the time, to the Prince of
Rome, or to his mother, the Lady Lucilla, or maybe to the Emperor himself, Caesar Commodus.
The lack of solid information left Darien feeling very angry.
And finally, they could find little information regarding Serena - blonds were too prevalent
in this age and time, and apparently her hair style either didn't stand out too much, or she'd taken
it down and was wearing it loosely. A few thought they might have seen such a girl, contritely
either in prison, a brothel selling her services, a slave market, or a food market, the last either in
chains or free.
Basically, they were getting nowhere!
"Okay," Rei said, "I hate to suggest this, but right now our only solid lead is that Lita
_might_ be somewhere around the Colosseum. I say we should go over there and ask about her,
who...owns...her, and where he or she might be keeping his...property."
"And it occurs to me," Mina said, "We might want to try to keep the wands, and roses,
stowed at all times."
"Why?" Diana asked quietly.
"Does the term 'witch' mean anything to you?" Michelle said, picking up on Mina's
meaning.
"Sure, an evil sorceress, why?" Diana replied.
"In this time," Darien said, "anyone suspected of having witch, or in my case warlock, like
powers was considered evil...and typically burned at the stake while still breathing, _and_ still
conscious!" Diana's little face shrank in terror as images of all the Sailors and Darien being
torched before a mob calling them evil monsters set on 'bewitching' them all passed through her
young mind.
"Oh..." she said.
"Don't worry, it's not like they'd be able to actually catch us and tie us to the stakes
before we'd made our escape," Luna told her. "Smart thinking, though, Mina!"
"Hey, she's not totally brain dead!" Artemis smiled, and then was beaned over the head by
Mina.
"You insinuating something?" she asked.
"No, sorry, forgive..." Artemis croaked. Luna just sighed.
"Rei's right, though," Trista said glumly. "Lita is the only one we have a solid lead on.
So let's...go to the Colosseum..." No one really cared for the idea, but they turned and started to
make their way toward the largest fighting arena on Earth anyway.
As they drew nearer to the building, they realized they were starting to get a little hungry,
and seeing several different food stands, went up to one selling simple vegetable and meat dishes.
Three women and two small boys ran the stand, and Darien dumped almost all the remaining
money they had for the meal.
Afterward, they moved to a slightly less crowded place to sit down and eat, keeping the
building in sight. As they sat and ate, five men came and sat not three feet away. They got their
attention for one reason - one of the two more important looking one's, who sported yellow eyes
and brunette hair with streaks of grey and silver going through it, and wearing a rich looking red
toga and a white sash, three rings on one hand, and fancy sandals, was carried up sitting in a chair
by two of the three others with them.
The other important looking fellow wore a green toga and blue sash, which looked just as
rich, five fancy rings, and equally fancy sandals, and had faded carrot-top hair and dull green eyes.
The other three all wore simple white togas and sandals. It seemed they were only servants.
They began to eat as well, and the two important ones began talking.
"So, Agamemnon, what's next on your agenda?" the man in the chair asked.
"Well, Theophilus, now that my men have survived the 'Massacre of the Barbarians in
Francia' lunacy, I'm scheduled to have some of my best go against a menagerie of animal and
human contestants next week," the other one, Agamemnon, stated. "And you?"
"Four of my best are to battle with the four best of Nikos, of Churia!" Theophilus replied.
"Fate has smiled on us, Commodus is totally preoccupied with that Spaniard, Maximus, who lead
his group to victory in the Carthage re-enactment, and then trounced Tigris of Gaul's ass the
other day!"
"Yes, it is nice not having to worry about pointlessly wasting our gladiators for some
madman's whim!" Agamemnon agreed. "Oh, I hear you were paid a visit by Barvus Cephiro."
"If you could call it that," Theophilus frowned. "Peculiar man, devious. I don't trust him
an inch."
"He's a slaver, he could supply additional manpower," Agamemnon commented.
"Nothing wrong with that."
"With him, I'd look even closer at the available wares than I usually do with Petros!"
Theophilus retorted. "Mark my words, that man is planning something!"
"Aren't they all?" Agamemnon asked, then glanced at Darien and the others. "Now
there's something you don't see everyday. Check the toy on the chain." Theophilus glanced
over, and ran his eyes over Michelle, who quietly munched her meal.
"Dye, no doubt," he said, "Not unlike the child who dashed into the arena with
Commodus and Lucius Verus. You remember her, surely?"
"The slave girl?" Agamemnon commented. "How could I not. Only a Prince would dye a
girl's hair like that!" Throughout all, the two were eating their own meal, as were the three
servants. The girls and Darien quietly ate their own meals, slipping some to the cats. One of the
servants spotted them, and glanced at them.
"Those three cats are a bit unusual," he commented.
"So they are, Semon," Theophilus said. "Those spots are probably shaved. Some people
are odd with pets." At that point the five finished their meals, and Agamemnon and Semon took
the plates to a nearby wagon filled with...unpleasantness, and disposed of them. Meanwhile,
Theophilus pulled out some papers and glanced at them.
"Oh, yes, it's going to be an interesting week," he said, then glanced back at them. Most
specifically, at Darien. "Tell me, did you lose your legion?"
"No," Darien said, "I have taken leave of the army, and am returning home, stopping in
Rome to see some of the games, and, uh, make a few bets." Darien wasn't sure where that had
come from, but at least it sounded good.
"Well, the war in Germania is over, I suppose some troops are going back to the families
they left behind to fight it," Theophilus said, and then Agamemnon and Semon returned, and
Theophilus snapped his fingers. The other two servants lifted him up, and the small group left.
The girls and Darien sighed.
"Well, that was interesting," Rei said. "We finished?"
"Yeah, let's get going," Mina said. They quickly disposed of their plates in the same
fashion, being careful not to dwell on the other garbage in the wagon, and returned to working
their way to the Colosseum. As they continued through the crowd, they were suddenly pushed
aside by a rude, pompous man in brightly colored robes and a black cloak with deep black hair cut
close to his head, very light stubble on his chin and upper lip, and eyes that were a piercing blue
that made your blood freeze with their coldness.
With him were a six year old girl in a very fancy red dress with long auburn hair and dark
green eyes, and a young woman, not much more than mid-twenties, with light auburn hair in a
bun on her head and brown eyes wearing a beautiful green and purple gown and a small gold
bracelet shaped like a dragon eating its tail on her wrist. The man seemed seriously annoyed about
something, and the girl seemed equally displeased. The woman, however, seemed almost
downcast, submissive.
"Hey, watch it, buddy!" Mina snapped. The man turned, then stared at her for a moment,
then grabbed Mina by the chin and looked closer before letting her go with an angry wave.
"No, you're not her! Not at all!" he gruffed. "The one I want was wearing her hair in pig
tails!" He then glanced at Amara. "And she had it long, not to mention she was a _she_, and a
little younger!"
"What's your problem?!" Amara snapped, her voice filled with ire. She'd barely met the
man, and already she detested him.
"I am looking for a thief," he said. "I know she is still in Rome, her party never returned
to Tarria. She would have had to pass through my town of Ferrio to do so."
"What did she steal?" Trista asked.
"My most favoritest of favorite jewelries!" the little girl cried. "It was a pink heart with
gold wings and a crown on top and pink crystal in the middle and a diamond inside!" They all
blinked at the description. There could be no mistake. The little girl had just given a fairly
accurate description of Rini's brooch!
"That sounds like something that belongs to my daughter!" Darien said. "A little girl of
nine with pink hair and red-brown eyes named Rini. Have you seen her?"
"No, but if this is the girl I think you're talking about, then you owe me money as well!"
the man stated. "The brooch was stolen, diamond and all, by a woman with blonde hair in pig
tails and two buns to either side of her head..."
"That's Serena!!" Mina screeched. "Do you know who she was with?!"
"Of course," the man said. "Thernacius Farrium Rex, and his eldest boy, Georgio. Not
only did she steal from me, she humiliated me as well. She will be made to return the trinket, pay
for the damages against me as much as possible, and then I will throw her to the brothels!"
"Yeah!!" the little girl agreed. At that point, Darien lost all sense of himself, and decked
the man, hard! He looked up from the ground through a bloody nose and split lip at Darien, who
stared back, anger filling his eyes as they had only one other time that Mina and Rei could
remember...when he was under Beryl's control. Members of the crowd glanced at them, but
decided to move along.
"You touch her, and you won't live long enough to regret it!" Darien warned him.
"How dare you," the man said, rising back up, equally incensed. "I am Terrarium
Aurelius Querian! The wealthiest independent man in the southern provinces of Sicily! You shall
be cast in irons...and thrown to the galleys for this!!"
"Daddy?" the little girl cringed backward into the woman, who was presumably her
mother.
"NOT NOW, JULIA!!" Querian snapped, then turned back on Darien. "Oh, you shall
pay! Yes, you shall..." He never finished. Darien decked him again, and lead the girls away.
Querian rose again, now angrier than ever, and sporting an even bloodier nose and deeper split lip
than before. "That man...as bad as his wife!! I'LL GET THEM BOTH!!!!" Julia and her mother
just watched.
******************************************************************************
I bet you didn't expect to see _him_ again, did you?! And you probably don't want to see
Eleutherios again, either, but you will! Next time, in Chapter 10: Conspiracies. See ya then!
Want to shoot the breeze?! E-mail me at Scorpinac@sa-tech.com!
And a sinister plot is looming closer...
Sailor Moon belongs to Naoko Takeuchi, Toei Animation, DiC, and Cloverway, in that
order. I make no money by this. More's the pity.
All other characters _not_ taken from History are mine, and you must ask permission to
use them, if you can find a way of using them outside this.
_This_ is emphasis. *This* is thought.
Kudos to the movie Gladiator, which was the inspiration for this.
And now, Scorpinac Fanfic Productions presents:
******************************************************************************
Sailor Moon
Roman Legends
by Scorpinac
Chapter 9: Plots
"Theophilus, there's someone to see you," Semon said at Theophilus's door.
"Really?" Theophilus asked as he continued to look through some scrolls, making notes
with his quill here and there. "Show him in."
The room was a general duplication of his room in Derorium, as he preferred that
arrangement, and he had even brought Lita's wand for the corner. He did so love that piece of
artwork, though he often thought of Lita's comment about it giving her power. Cephiro came in,
and moved over to the desk, looking at the ex-gladiator passively.
"Marcellus Theophilus," he said. "I am Barvus Cephiro."
"That's nice," Theophilus glanced at him, and picked up his goblet, taking a drink of the
potion held therein. "You'll excuse me if I do not stand up."
"Whatever you like," Cephiro said. "I wish to speak with one of your...warriors."
"One of mine?" Theophilus looked up, an amused smile on his lips. "To what do I owe
the honor? Wait, you wish to buy him at a low cost, and then sell him to one of my competitors
at two to three times what I sold for. Is that it?" He then put the goblet back down.
"No, I merely wish to speak to her," Cephiro smiled back.
"Her?" Theophilus blinked. "You mean my dear Lita?"
"Oh, yes," Cephiro nodded. "I assume you saw what happened in the Colosseum?"
"Of course," Theophilus replied. "My Lita beat some of the best Rome had to offer. Five
to one, and she got four of them to send each other to Pluto via the Charon Ferry! And allowed
the last one to live, though I dare say his ego didn't survive too well."
"I meant the Spaniard, Maximus," Cephiro said. "I do believe he wishes to kill
Commodus."
"Oh, that would be a tragedy," Theophilus said, his voice full of mock worry. "We better
notify the Senators. Oh, wait, most of them were there, weren't they? Well, then, I think that
takes us out of it, doesn't it?"
"I was thinking forwards, actually," Cephiro said, leaning his weight on the desk slightly.
"To _after_ Maximus kills him."
"Oh, like he'll ever get that chance," Theophilus chuckled, looking back to his scroll.
"Actually, I do believe he will get his chance," Cephiro said. "I don't know about you,
but I was in a position to see _Commodus's_ face, and he seemed almost...livid when Maximus
took off his helmet and revealed his name. I do believe Commodus wants him dead as much as
Maximus wants Commodus dead. I give him a month, tops."
"I still don't see what this has to do with Lita?" Theophilus stated, still looking at his
scroll, and making a few more marks. "I really must consider raising my charges by about two or
three percent."
"It doesn't," Cephiro said, leaning a little closer to Theophilus. "Not one bit."
"What?" Theophilus looked back up.
"I said, it has nothing to do with Lita at all," Cephiro repeated. "It has to do with the little
Prince, Lucius Verus."
"What about Lucius Verus?" Theophilus asked.
"That's between me...and Lita," Cephiro said, smiling slightly. Theophilus simply looked
confused. He knew this slave trader was up to something, but what?
* * *
Pherinias slowly crept through the royal palace of Rome, keeping himself to the shadows
as much as possible. According to the plans, he'd entered on the flip side of the building from the
Prince's quarters, and now had to work his way over to them slowly, so as not to be spotted and
caught. As he passed one chamber he heard two people, a man and a woman, talking and the
rustling of papers.
"Why is he still alive?" the male asked.
"I don't know," the female replied.
"He shouldn't be alive," the male said. "It vexes me. I am terribly vexed. They lied to
me in Germania. They said he was dead."
"Then you must let the Legions know, that their treachery will not go unpunished," the
female stated. Pherinias spared only a glance inward as he quickly swept past. Soon he would
find the chamber he wanted.
And Red and Pinky would die.
* * *
"Fear not, my maidens, for I shall fight for your glory!" Lucius waved a wooden practice
sword in the air, pretending to be powerful and strong.
"Hooray! Our champion goes to battle!" Salina and Rini squealed accordingly. The game
was Lucius's idea, but Rini and Salina didn't mind since all they had to do was sit on one of their
beds and 'cheer' for Lucius. A slave stood quietly and calmly, a barely disguised look of humor
and amusement on his face, to one side with another wooden practice sword. He was to be
Lucius's 'challenger' for the game. Lucius then turned to him and they began going through one
of Lucius's practice routines.
As a Prince and potential future ruler of the Roman Empire, it was important that Lucius
knew how to use the sword should he one day have to lead men into bloody battles and wars.
Rini and Salina watched as he went through the practice session, admiring his already very high
level of skill.
"He's pretty good, isn't he?" Salina said to Rini.
"Uh, huh," Rini agreed. "They've probably been teaching him from the moment he could
walk straight without falling down on his bottom."
"Yeah," Salina said, then blinked. "Bottom?"
"Mm, hmm," Rini said. "I'm a refined young lady, I am! I'm far too modest to say such a
word like..." she quickly glanced around, then closed her eyes into mischievous slits. "Butt." She
and Salina then giggled girlishly at Rini's humor.
* * *
Lita was laying quietly on her bed, thinking about the day's events. Her cell was sparse,
only the small, flat bed, a small altar for praying to the gods and dead loved ones against the side
of the wall, and a clay chamber pot and water filled basin on a small wood table furnishing it. The
bed had only one feather stuffed pillow and a simple handwoven wool blanket on it. Not much,
but it was better than sleeping on straw, or the floor, which was made of concrete.
While it was nice to know that Serena, Ami, and Hotaru were all okay, she still had
questions. What had happened to Serena, how had Rini been stolen away by slavers and Serena
left behind, and how had Rini wound up in the hands of the Prince of Rome?! Also, and probably
most importantly, what was Rini being made to do by the Prince? And she kept finding herself
coming back again and again to the question of whether or not Vassos, Urian, and Semon were in
love with her. It really didn't seem possible, but...
"You look as though you are carrying the weight of the entire Empire upon your
shoulders," a male voice commented, and Lita glanced over at the cell bars that separated her
from the outside world, and freedom.
Outside, looking in on her, was a man with short gold hair and a red-gold beard and
mustache, both well trimmed, and eyes that were a blazing shade of brown. He wore a simple
metal armor vest over a red tunic and well made Roman sandals. In the center of the vest, carved
in shiny, well polished copper, was the Greek letter Delta, with the letters Gamma and Epsilon
side by side below it. Around the letters, in sharp blue and green, were a lion and a large lizard,
like a dragon, each facing away from the letters toward the man's arms.
"Hello," Lita said. "If you're here to have my body, the answer is 'not in your lifetime!'"
"I have a wife for when I'm in need of sex, but I can see why one would want your...
supple frame," he replied. "I am Barvus Cephiro. I have come to talk." He waved a hand, and
one of the servants walked up and opened the door. Cephiro stepped in, and the door was again
closed. It was then Lita noticed he carried a sheathed sword at his waist.
"Feeling a little overconfident, aren't you?" Lita asked. "I might grab that sword and kill
you with it."
"I don't think you will, Lita," Cephiro said. "I could be wrong, but it almost looked like
you were _trying_ to knock out all of your opponents today, rather than kill them."
"I only kill when I'm left no other option," Lita admitted. "But you look as though you're
a rather important person around town, so you might make a good hostage, if nothing else." She
grinned at this as she sat up slowly, still having a small ache from her now considerably less
worrisome wound.
"And there's that," Cephiro waved a hand to indicate her injury. "Oh, yes, I do believe
that the late lamented Thanos got you pretty good today. Before he went and lost his sword arm,
I mean." Cephiro calmly moved over to the alter, glancing at the objects there on, which
amounted to a couple of candles and a throw cloth underneath them, as well as a pair of wood
figurines Lita'd been allowed to carve in her free time. Figurines of her parents.
"Was that his name?" Lita asked dryly. "I'm afraid it didn't come up."
"I really only picked it up myself from those grousing about losing bet money because of
it," Cephiro admitted. "Still, though, it must be pretty bad, huh?"
"It looks worse than it is," Lita said. "If you just came to check on my boo-boos, you can
go now."
"Actually, I came on something far more important," Cephiro said, turning to her. "I've
heard through the wind that you are, though exactly how is beyond my ability to explain,
acquainted with the pink haired wonder."
"Pink haired...you mean Rini?" Lita asked. "Yeah, I know her. She's my friend's girl.
Actually, I'd really like to know how she got enslaved to begin with, to tell you the truth."
"Hmm," Cephiro glanced back to the altar, drifting off into thought for a moment. "Very
peculiar. You came from Derorium, and she was in Devinsa, yet you were friends with her
mother. No sense in it..."
"Sure there is," Lita said, re-grabbing his attention. "My parents and I went for a visit to
Africa about three months ago, my parents got killed by bandits, I got lost in the desert, my camel
died on me, I got picked up by Petros while trying to help one of his 'wares' in her attempted
escape, she and I got sold to Theophilus, he decided to make me a gladiator because...for his own
reasons, etc., etc., etc." Cephiro stared at her for a few moments, then shrugged.
"It makes as much sense as anything," he said.
"Of course it does," Lita put hands behind her head and laid back down. *I just wished
I'd thought of it while I was talking with Serena, Ami, and Hotaru!*
"Anyways," Cephiro continued, "I came to talk to you of the little girl's welfare." Lita
lifted herself up on her elbows.
"What about Rini's welfare?" she asked.
* * *
Pherinias continued his slow journey across the palace. Finally, he saw a lit chamber
ahead of him, and heard the sounds of two wooden swords clacking against each other, and
children giggling and cheering emanating from within, and moved closer. As he drew near, he
heard someone from the side, and ducked behind a nearby tapestry. Glancing carefully out he saw
a pair of servants walk by, and once they were gone, he slipped out and quickly made for the
chamber.
At the door he noticed a guard standing quietly to one side, lightly dozing. He crept
closer, keeping as quiet as he could. When he reached the entryway, he quickly covered the
man's mouth to keep him from crying out, and, taking out his knife, ran him through the heart.
Pherinias then pulled the man aside and hid him carefully behind another tapestry, then returned to
the door.
Glancing inward, he saw a servant sword fighting with the Prince, the two using dull,
wooden swords, as he had surmised from the noise. And behind them, were his targets.
This was going to be easier than he thought...
* * *
Lucius and the servant continued to battle, the two holding even. Rini and Salina
continued to 'cheer' for their 'heroic champion' as he fought for their 'valor'. Compared to what
they'd seen today in the Colosseum, this was far more preferable. At least here no one died for
real! Occasionally Rini and Salina would giggle at Lucius for making a simplistic mistake in his
routine, though more often at a quietly shared joke.
Rini was also worried about Lucius's uncle. From what she'd seen and heard, that
Spanish gladiator, Maximus, was convinced that Commodus was responsible for his family's
murder. And for whatever reason, Commodus clearly wanted Maximus dead, too! It had only
been the pressure of the crowd that had stayed Commodus's hand, and he was clearly quite
incensed about it afterwards.
Just then, she thought she saw someone at the entrance to Lucius's quarters. Someone
familiar. Someone she _really_ didn't _ever_ want to see again! A moment later, the figure was
gone.
"You okay, Rini?" Salina asked.
"Yeah," Rini answered. "Just my imagination."
* * *
Cephiro smiled, seeing his latest plan coming to fruition. *Oh, yes, just a matter of time.
Always a simple matter of time.*
"Well, what about Rini's welfare?" Lita asked again, having sat back up fully.
"I hear she has an insolence about her," Cephiro said. "I've heard that she sometimes
dares to speak back to her owner, to question his commands."
"She always was outspoken," Lita said. "But never countermanding, not to her parents or
her elders."
"You think I am lying?" Cephiro asked.
"I barely know you," Lita said. "So I can't really make that judgement yet."
"Did you see her today, at the Colosseum?" Cephiro inquired, turning to look back at the
altar, and picking up the female figurine to look at it more closely, his expression turning very
solemn.
"Yeah, she looked fine," Lita said. "And put down my mom!"
"Did you see her when she went in with Lucius?" Cephiro prodded.
"From the windows in the cell area," Lita said. "She still looked fine. Now put my mom
back!"
"Are you really sure about that?" he looked at her. "Would you swear to her well being
before the gods?" Lita stared a moment before answering.
"Yes," she said. "Put it down."
"That would be a mistake," Cephiro said, finally returning the figurine to its proper place.
"I saw part of her back as she, quite wisely, followed Lucius in retreating from the arena. I saw
scars."
"Scars?" Lita asked, afraid of where he was going with this.
"Whip scars," Cephiro looked at her, his face now grave. "Lucius has had her flogged.
Probably more than once."
"Flogged?!" Lita gasped, her eyes filling with horror at the information. "Rini?! Oh,
Gods, no!"
"Oh, yes," Cephiro stated. "I hear the whip can be quite painful, especially when swung
by a professional expert." *Yes, that's the way, burn my little one, burn.*
"That little..." Lita snapped, her anger beginning to cloud her judgement. "How dare he!"
"He dared!" Cephiro said, raising his voice ever so slightly. "And I have heard rumors of
more."
"Like?" Lita asked, her teeth beginning to grit.
"I hear," Cephiro said, taking a step closer, "that he has also been using her in bed, with,
or without, her consent. At least as far as he is able." Lita felt her anger boil over.
"That little...bastard!!" she roared.
* * *
Pherinias quickly ducked back into the shadows. It seemed for a moment that Pinky had
spotted him. He remained quiet for a moment, then leaned very slowly to look into the room
again. The two girls were now focused squarely on the mock battle. The Prince, Lucius, was
doing well, considering it looked as though the slave he was fighting against wasn't really trying.
At least, Pherinias presumed he was a slave, he couldn't really tell.
He watched for a few moments longer, and then entered the room, crept up behind the
turned back of the slave/servant, and grabbing him with one arm around his neck, rammed his
blade into the man's lower back. He then tossed him aside, and stared at his prey.
* * *
"He is indeed," Cephiro said, keeping himself calm. *She's mine.*
"OOH! If I could only get my hands on him!" Lita growled. First Hotaru had nearly been
raped, and now she'd learned that Rini was being flogged, and quite possibly raped as well, by
some...snot-nosed Prince!
"Maybe you will," Cephiro commented.
"What?" Lita blinked, her anger still burning.
"You're good, very good," Cephiro said. "I give you a month before the Caesar and
Lucius Verus have you brought before them, to grant you your freedom." Lita watched him
carefully now.
"So?" she asked. "I want my freedom. It's the only thing that I fight for."
"But you could use that opportunity," Cephiro stated. "And use it well."
"How?" Lita asked. "Wait, you mean..."
"Yes," Cephiro said, conviction filling his face. "You can kill Lucius Verus!"
* * *
Rini, Salina, and Lucius looked on in shock as Pherinias grabbed the slave from behind
and stabbed him. The slave dropped his wooden sword as he felt the knife sink into him, and then
Pherinias pulled the blade back out, tossing the wounded man aside like a doll.
"You!" Rini gasped.
"What are you doing here?" Salina asked. Both of their eyes had widened in terror.
"Did you really think I was going to let you get away without evening the score?"
Pherinias grinned his sickly, twisted, mean grin, his eyes mean as ever, and now looking just a
touch insane.
"You mean..." Rini said, terror filling her voice, and nearly overwhelming her.
"It's time to die, Pinky," Pherinias sneered. "You, too, Red."
"They are my property!" Lucius said in his most commanding voice, holding his wooden
sword at the ready. "You will not touch them!"
"Out of my way, boy," Pherinias sneered, and Lucius jabbed his sword into the man's
torso. Unfortunately, the wooden blade was nothing against Pherinias's hard brown leather
armor. Pherinias glanced at it, mentally acknowledged that there would be a bruise later, and
swatted the sword aside. He grabbed Lucius by the arm and tossed to him to the floor near his
own bed.
"I told you, boy, I don't care about you!" Pherinias snapped as he tossed the child aside.
"I only want the slaves." He started to walk closer to them, and the two did the only thing they
could think of.
They screamed at the top of their voices!
* * *
"Kill..." Lita stared at him. "I couldn't..."
"You could!" Cephiro said fiercely. "It would be simple. A hidden blade, an arrow head,
or even just poisonous lipstick, if you could stomach giving the boy a full kiss on the lips."
"But...deliberate murder..." Lita said. "I can't!"
"So you would rather your friend's child, a friend, by your own behavior and reactions,
you are very close to, suffer at his hands?" Cephiro asked. Lita lowered her eyes for a moment,
considering.
"No," she said. "I can't let Rini suffer, not like that, not when she doesn't, not when she
could _never_ possibly deserve it!" *I'm supposed to protect her _and_ Serena, after all. It is my
job, after a fashion.*
"Then what is the problem?" Cephiro asked.
"Well, I..." Lita stammered, then looked up. "I'll be killed, that's what! Even if I nail
him, the little prick and his uncle have, like, a thousand bodyguards and soldiers around them all
the time. I'd be turned into chop suey before I could blink!"
"No, you wouldn't," Cephiro smiled.
"Huh?" Lita stared incredulously.
* * *
Pherinias roared, and dove at them, and Rini and Salina dodged to either side. Salina went
for a corner, trying to get out of his reach, but Pherinias saw her, and lunged for her again. To
the opposite side, Rini ducked behind a small rocking horse. She glanced out, saw Pherinias
going for Salina, and dove back out, ramming her full weight into the would-be killer. He turned
on her, and grabbed her by the arm. In desperation, she bit into his wrist, but he only flinched,
and rose his knife to strike again.
Lucius jumped on his other arm, trying to hold the blade back, and Pherinias flung him
back down in rage, glancing at him briefly.
"Fine, you want to die, I'll do you, too!" he roared, "But first, Pinky!" He turned back to
Rini, and found Salina trying to tug his hand off of the pink-haired wonder's arm. *Ah, two-for-
one sale,* he thought, leering at the two panicked girls.
Just then, a large form rammed into Pherinias, knocking him aside, and causing him to lose
his grip on Rini. It was the slave, his back bleeding profusely, his green eyes looking glazed, but
still alive.
"ROUVIN!" Lucius cried. But Rouvin, the slave, didn't listen. He wrestled with
Pherinias for the knife, and Pherinias, in much better shape, easily pushed back. After a few
seconds, Pherinias shoved Rouvin off, and Rouvin flopped down at the base of Lucius's bed.
Pherinias turned back to the three children.
"Enough games..." he growled. Suddenly there was a sickening **thunk**, and Pherinias
stumbled. Six Praetorians had appeared at the door, one carrying a standard bow and arrow set.
One of his arrows was now lodged in Pherinias's back. The guard quickly knocked another
arrow, and fired again into Pherinias's rear as the other five charged in along the sides of the room
to maintain their comrade a clear shot. Pherinias's eyes filled with shock, and he tried to move
forward to the two girls again. But then the other five guards got to him, drew their swords, and
that was the end of Pherinias.
As the five sword bearers wiped clean their blades, and the bowman shouldered his own
weapon and called for assistance and began to check the immediate area for the missing
Praetorian, Rini and Salina dashed over to Lucius, who was kneeling over Rouvin and holding up
his head.
"Rouvin, please say something, anything," Lucius pleaded.
"The man, is he..." Rouvin breathed.
"Pherinias is dead," Rini said. "He won't be hurting anyone else."
"Good..." Rouvin said, then shuddered a moment. Instinctively, Rini reached under,
found the wound, and pressed, pressed as hard as she could, to stop the bleeding.
"Are you okay, my Prince?" a guard asked.
"Yes!" Lucius snapped. "Now get some help for Rouvin!" The guard turned and gave a
silent signal, two of the other guards filing out to get some assistance as the other two were
removing Pherinias's body.
"My Prince...Lucius..." Rouvin said.
"Yes," Lucius said.
"Set me free," Rouvin said. "If I am to die this night, let me die a free man." Lucius
looked stumped, unsure what to say.
"Please, free him," Rini said, then thinking over what she could possibly give Lucius in
return, took a breath and said. "If you do...you can...have my body..." Lucius looked at her, and
Salina stared in surprise at Rini's selflessness. Lucius smiled.
"Keep your body," he said. "I will not trade anything for it." He then turned back to
Rouvin. "You are free, Rouvin. You are free." Rouvin smiled. Salina stared at Rini still, then
glanced at her hands.
"What are you doing?" she asked.
"Huh?" Rini looked at her. "I'm applying pressure to the wound to stop the bleeding.
That's standard first aid...isn't it?" Lucius and Salina just looked at her, and then the guard
leaned down, and gently lifted Rouvin to look at the wound.
"It doesn't look too serious, but it does appear deep," he said, pushing Rini's small,
blood-stained hands aside, and then placing his own in their place, putting far more pressure on it
than she could muster. "And it is standard battlefield practice for tending wounds," he added,
"though I think I shall refrain from asking where _you_ learned it. Go stand watch at the door."
Rini nodded and went over to the chambers entrance. The guard then turned to Salina. "See if
you can find some clean linen for bandages until they get back," he said, and Salina obediently
nodded, and went to seek the requested items.
"Please," Lucius said, looking at Rouvin, "don't go yet." But Rouvin had shut his eyes.
* * *
"I have connections in the palace and the Senate," Cephiro told her. "I can see to it that
you are allowed to live, and are imprisoned."
"What good does that do me?" Lita asked.
"Considering how much Commodus and the Spaniard, Maximus, seem to hate each other,
I give the Caesar a month, at best, before he fowls up and gets killed by the man. Once that
happens, and Lucius is dead, I will make a move to become Regent, whilst a new Caesar is found
and named," Cephiro laid it out for her. "I will silently give you a pardon and let you go free, and
no one be the wiser."
"It still sounds risky," Lita said.
"The risk is minimal," Cephiro said. "And the gains, astounding. You will be free, the girl
will be safe, and I, well, I will be in a position to change the face of the Empire, at least until a
new Emperor is chosen...if ever." Lita thought it over. It still seemed risky to her, but if Rini was
being harmed, assaulted, defiled...what choice did she have?!
"Well," Cephiro asked, "Your answer?"
"I'll only do it for Rini," Lita said, her eyes filled with rage and anger.
"Whatever you like," Cephiro smiled.
"Very well," Lita agreed. "Lucius Verus will die."
* * *
Darien paced restlessly, growing ever impatient as the time drew longer and longer. Mina
sat in a corner, holding Diana, who was beset with worry over the missing Rini. Michelle and
Amara held each other nearby, not sure of anything else to do, and Rei sat on the floor, trying to
find the missing senshi through meditating.
Luna and Artemis sat near the machine, watching as it was worked away on by Trista...
and the man she'd called in for help. They'd only met him once before, except for the Outers and
Diana, and he seemed trustworthy enough. But would either of them be able to decipher it?
"Oh!!" Trista grunted in frustration. "It just doesn't make any sense!"
"Sure it does," her companion commented. Everyone looked at him, and he turned to
them. "If you know what you're looking at," he added.
"And you know what it is, John?" Mina asked. Johnathan Lundar was supposedly an alien
from an advanced race that specialized in many sciences, including Time Travel. They weren't
sure if they believed him, but he knew intimate details of the last day of the Silver Millennium that
couldn't be explain any other way than he had _been_ there! He certainly didn't _look_ a
thousand years old! Thirty, if that, really.
"Of course I do," John said, taking off the spectacles he was wearing. "It's a Time
Bomb." Now they looked at him as though he were looney.
"A time bomb?" Diana asked. "You mean it was set to blow up at a certain time?"
"Ludicrous!" Luna said. "Are you saying it exploded and blew our friends into tiny
pieces?! Impossible, it's still here!"
"Of course it is, Luna," John said, turning back to the device and re-donning his glasses.
"Let me explain. It is not a time bomb in that it is a time delay explosive device. No, far from it.
It is a Time Bomb, an explosive that detonates in time, but not in space. The name here,
'Temporal Transference Research Advancement Protocol', was a dead give away. My people
studied the theory once, but abandoned it ages ago."
"So the others..." Darien began.
"Have been blow across time," John said. "Other than that, they should be peachy.
Separated, but peachy."
"Separated?" Rei asked.
"Oh, yes," John said. "It's really quite simple. When a Time Bomb goes off, there is a
small spacial displacement, as well as the main, usually massive, temporal one. The closer you are
to the bomb, the further back and away you go. For instance, I've calculated that the guy who
was building this thing was blown back approximately..." He picked up some figures he worked
out on a pad of paper by hand, "three to four thousand years ago, and by the power it was amping
when it popped, about the mid-Atlantic, maybe forty or fifty miles off the American coastline."
He glanced back at the attentive group. "I think we can write him off."
"Can't we just throw it in reverse?" Mina asked.
"Oh, heavens no," John said. "These things never do reverse. But you can follow them."
"But where are they?" Artemis asked. "And when?!" John again looked at his pad of
paper.
"Relax, I worked that out, too," he said. "Given where they were standing, they would
have been blown back to sometime in 180 Amino Domini."
"180?!" Darien snapped. "That's almost two thousand years ago!"
"True," John said, then glanced back down. "Also, given relative positions to the Bomb, I
guestimate that Ami and Hotaru would have both wound up somewhere in the southern area of
what is now Austria, though not necessarily together, and Rini and Serena will have landed in the
southern part of Italy, maybe Sicily. And that's provided they didn't land right smack dab in the
middle of the Mediterranean, but I think we can safely say that, that didn't happen."
"How do you figure that?" Amara asked.
"Well, we're still here, aren't we?" he asked her. "And they can't have altered history too
drastically, since even a minor time ripple would have been noticed by now."
"But it's only been," Mina said, checking her watch, "six hours!"
"For us," John said, and then looked abashed. "Did I forget to mention there's a slight
dis-correlation between how much time has passed here and there due to this thing's effects?"
"Yes," Trista said, standing up. "How big a dis-correlation?!"
"They would have experienced about five to seven weeks of history by now," John
admitted. "Oh, and Lita would have landed in upper Africa, relatively near the Mediterranean
coastline. And the exact date each one would have arrived in when they re-entered normal space-
time is simply incalculable. They could have landed within minutes, hours, or even days of one
another."
"Five...to seven...weeks?!" all five Scouts and Darien shrieked.
"Yes," John said. "But hardly anything could have happened to them, so long as they
kept a low profile."
"Um...isn't 180 A.D.," Diana said, "in the middle of the Roman Age?"
"Why, yes," John confirmed, "At the Empire's height...oh, dear. Ami has blue hair."
"So?" Mina asked.
"Well, in that time, she would be considered a 'collector's item' by most slavers," John
pointed out, making the room go pale. "Rini, too, for that matter. You did say her hair was pink.
You really must introduce me sometime."
"My baby...a slave?" Darien whispered, his mind thinking on how most slave owners were
reputed to have treated their 'property' in those days in the history books. An image of Rini
dressed in rags and chains, covered in filth, and forced to do menial labor at some madman's
whim floated through his mind.
"Well, we'll just have to hot foot it, won't we?" John said, returning to the device, and
quickly scritching something on a fresh piece of paper, which he ripped off and handed to Trista.
"Take this to Carol, would you. She'll get you all some appropriate wardrobe."
Snapping out of it, Trista took the page, and Michelle moved up to join her.
"You'll probably need an extra pair of hands," she said, and Trista nodded, picking up her
Garnet rod and waving it, and the two vanished. John continued his work on the machine, and a
few moments later the two scouts reappeared, carrying a load of clothes with them.
While Johnathan finished with the machine, the others stepped out to change clothes.
When they re-entered, Trista had de-transformed, and each girl wore a color coded roman dress -
Rei in red with white lacing and a single shoulder strap, Michelle in a sea green with blue lacing
and double shoulder straps, Trista in indigo with black lacing and double shoulder strap, a shawl
holding in all of her dark green hair, and Mina in a cute yellow-orange number with bright red
lacing and a single shoulder strap, the one bare shoulder almost deliberately worn low near her
breast. They also wore small gold bracelets and simple Roman sandals.
The two exceptions were Darien and Amara. Darien wore Roman battle armor, as though
he were a soldier in the Legions; a dark metal armor vest over a red tunic with a red cape, armor
skirt, and sandals, a helmet with a red tuft of feathers in the top under his arm. And Amara wore
a blue toga with a yellow sash, and the same sandals as everyone else. Artemis looked them over
approvingly, though he did give a stern glance at Mina.
"Yeah, I think that'll do," he said. "Darien, shouldn't you have a sword?"
"I have some Roman coinage, he can pick one up," John said, finishing up, and working
out some final calculations on his pad of paper. "Yeah that'll do it." He turned to look at the
others, and nodded approvingly, then glanced at Amara and Michelle. Michelle wore one
additional accessory: a metal collar around her neck, to which a six-foot chain was attached, the
other end of the chain in Amara's hand.
"What's that for?" he asked.
"Well, my hair is sea-blue," Michelle pointed out. "I wouldn't want to be kidnapped, so
for our trip to Ancient Rome, I shall be Amara's loving and loyal little pet." The others gave
them quiet, somewhat stunned, looks.
"You're into the kinky stuff, aren't you?" John accused. "And Amara, why aren't you
wearing a dress?" Amara just scowled at him.
"Can we get going?" Darien asked. "I feel ridiculous in this thing!"
"Oh, we're ready to roll," John said, and turned and punched a few buttons on the
machine. "I think we can agree that they all would have made for somewhere easy for you to find
them, so we'll send you all to just outside Rome itself, by about two to three kilometers or so, in
about mid-June. That should be enough."
He rose to his feet and indicated for them all to stand in one spot, fishing some Roman
currency from one of his pockets and handing it to Darien, and the three cats quickly hopped into
the group as well.
"Bunch in tight, that should keep you all together," John instructed. "And good luck."
"Aren't you coming?" Rei asked.
"No," John said. "These are galactically illegal for a reason, you know. If anyone asks, I
was never here, and I never saw that thing."
"But, John..." Darien started, but John hushed him.
"We must each follow our own conscience, Darien," he told him. "And mine says that I
must stay here." John then went over and pushed a few more buttons, then made for the door.
"Fortunately this thing has crappy range, anyway, and I can get out of dodge before it pops."
"Wait!" Mina cried. "How do we get back?!"
"You'll just have to use the old-fashioned way," John said. "Use the Time Gate!"
"But..." Trista said.
"It'll be eleven to one! Just knock her out!" John called, and ducked through the lab
door. Before anyone else could say anything, the Bomb flashed, and a moment later they were
gone. John stepped in, and looked at the empty room.
"Well, that's that," he said, and pulled out a small pistol like object from his vest,
adjusting a switch. "Pity to destroy it," he commented to himself, "it's a wonderfully made
machine." He aimed, and fired the Staser, vaporizing the Time Bomb forever. He then quietly
pocketed the weapon. "A pity," he repeated to the air. "Oh, well, back to the Dojo."
* * *
The flash ended, and when Darien and the others could see clearly again, they found they
were standing in a grassy countryside, mountains in the distance, and the sea just a little ways
beyond to the right. Off in the distance to the northeast was a large city, and even from there they
could tell it was made primarily of stone.
Looking around, they saw no one in immediate visual range, and began to head toward the
city. As they approached it, they saw several people working in the fields nearby it, and others
coming and going from the city. For a moment they weren't sure they were in the right place,
though they were definitely in the right time - the togas, dresses, and other robes worn by those
around the place clearly indicated that they were most definitely in Ancient Rome.
"Over there," Darien said, pointing to the city skyline. "It's Rome alright, and no
mistake! That's the Colosseum." They glanced where he pointed, and sure enough, there was
the Colosseum, complete and undamaged...from the outside...
"And it's whole!" Mina stated, her eyes wide with impression. "It's official, we're no
longer in Tokyo, Toto!"
"Woof," Artemis said.
"Cool it, Dorothy," Rei retorted. "Remember people, low profiles! We go in, find our
people, we get out. No tampering with history!"
"Don't need to tell me twice," Amara said, staring at the vast city before them.
"It's so big!" Diana exclaimed. "How will we find them?!"
"We'll look, of course," Luna replied. "We shan't give up till we've found them safe and
sound!"
"I can't believe it's so beautiful," Michelle breathed. "I always thought of the Roman Age
as decadent and corrupt."
"Oh, there's plenty of corruption and decadence," Darien said. "It's just hidden under all
the 'good manners' and 'politeness'. Harder to spot that way."
"I just hope they're all alright," Trista said, her mind centered on Rini and Hotaru. Her
thoughts also went out to Serena, Lita, and Ami, but those three had more than proven time and
time again that they could easily take care of themselves.
As they drew nearer the city, they noticed a cart stopped beside the road, carrying various
weapons. Three men were with it, and were currently working on repairing a damaged wheel.
They moved closer to it, and as the three men continued to work, Darien selected a good looking
blade from the cart, and laid down some of the money John had given him, saving the rest for
later, just in case. As they moved away, Darien glanced at the coins, and many did look of the
proper age and time...but a few looked a little bit off...
They continued toward the city, and Darien quickly strapped the sheathed blade to his
belt, allowing it to hang at his side. The city was truly immense, and there were hundreds of
people. As a safety precaution, Mina took Artemis into her arms, as did Rei with Luna and
Darien with Diana.
As they began to pass through the streets, they quietly began asking if anyone had seen
anybody matching Serena, Rini, Ami, Hotaru, or Lita's description. One man they asked nodded
no on the first four, but when they described Lita, his eyes lit up.
"That sounds like the new woman warrior in the Colosseum," he said. "The one who
took out five of Rome's finest just six days ago. What did you say her name was again?"
"Lita," Mina said. "Lita Kino."
"Yes, Lita the Magnificent!" the man replied. "It probably is her. And magnificent she is!
A real firebrand! I dare say her owner must have trouble with her!" At that they thanked the man
and continued on.
"Lita...in the Colosseum?" Diana whispered. "Why would she be there? And what did he
mean, her owner?"
"She's a gladiator," Darien whispered back. "A slave made to battle other slaves to the
death in barbaric 'games'!"
"At least we have an idea of where to look for her, if it's our Lita," Mina said. "It could
just be someone who looks like her, yeah, that's it, just a look-a-like!"
"Don't count on it, Mina," Amara said. Suddenly, Michelle yelped. They stopped and
turned to see what was up, and saw some guy pawing her chest from behind.
"Ah, yes, fine build, ample anchorage, a good specimen if ever I saw one," he said, and
spun her around. Michelle found herself facing a tall, brutish guy with slightly long brown hair
and a thick, shaggy beard and mustache with mean, deep black eyes. He wore blue dyed metal
roman armor over a blue tunic and a pair of well made sandals, a sword on his waist, and a single
key hanging from his belt. Stamped on the vest in either gold or bronze, they weren't sure which, was a side
view sigil of a powerful Griffin, its talons outstretched. In the Griffin, made apparently from
copper, were the Greek letters Delta, Gamma, and Epsilon, in a triangle arrangement. The whole
vest was clearly kept carefully polished to a shine. He looked Michelle over quickly, and nodded.
"Yes, very attractive, you'll do nicely." He then turned to Amara. "I will pay you forty gold
coins for this slave, my good man."
"She's not for sale!" Amara snapped, then leaning in to ruffle Michelle's hair. "You see
this? Natural! She's worth about a thousand _times_ what you're offering! Besides, I like her."
Amara grinned as the man listened to her voice, realizing his mistake. He then took a careful look
at her.
"You're...a woman..." he said.
"Do tell," Amara said. "Now get lost!" The man suddenly glowered.
"Do you know who I am?" he asked. Darien pulled his blade and pointed it at the slaver.
"Someone with a rapidly shrinking lifespan if you don't take off!" he said. The slaver just
looked at him crossly.
"I am Darvinian Cavinus, partner to Barvus Cephiro, one of the most powerful slavers in
all of the Empire!" he stated, and suddenly pulled his own blade and smacked Darien's aside with
it with ease. "And I am also a master swordsman! So I would not advise pulling a blade on me
again." Darien felt his eyes and face fill with loathing for this man, but checked it.
"Either way, Michelle is not for sale! So beat it!" Rei and Mina snapped together, and
Trista also made herself look as menacing as possible. Cavinus just glanced at them idly. He then
looked squarely at Darien for a moment.
"You almost look...yes, very much so...ah, no matter!" he muttered. "Keep the woman,
then. But you'd better keep both eyes open, or you might lose her." Before they had a chance to
respond to that, Cavinus walked off, dismissing them. For a while they sat and fumed to
themselves quietly, Darien sheathing his blade.
"I am officially in favor of making this as short a trip as _possible_!" Michelle declared.
"Indeed!" Luna whispered quietly. "The nerve of that monster!"
"Grabbing at Michelle like that," Diana whispered, her fur on end. "I oughta bite off his
ear!"
"Cool it, Diana," Artemis told her, also whispering. "I feel the same, but we can't draw
attention to ourselves too much."
"I know, I know," Diana relented.
"I just hope Rini or the others didn't wind up in his vile clutches," Darien said, and they
moved on.
As they continued to ask around, they picked up some hints that a girl matching Hotaru's
general description was seen in accompaniment to a wealthy Roman Lady from the more northern
provinces about a week ago, but nothing overly solid.
On Ami, they came up with almost less than nothing. They caught rumors of a girl similar
to Ami having passed through the market place multiple times, or going into the Colosseum to
watch one of the 'Games' currently in process over the last week, and some claimed longer. But
nothing concrete. All the stories they'd picked up stated that the girl in question wore a shawl
over her head constantly! This, of course, made more positive ID nearly impossible, more so
when most of the people they asked weren't really looking that hard.
For Rini, much to Darien's upset, they got only a pair of rumors. One of a pink-haired girl
sold at a slave auction weeks ago, the auctioneer claiming the color was natural for her. And the
other of a girl with hair dyed a shade of pink in the Imperial Palace, a supposed slave, whether for
labor or for pleasure was dependant on the opinion of who was asked at the time, to the Prince of
Rome, or to his mother, the Lady Lucilla, or maybe to the Emperor himself, Caesar Commodus.
The lack of solid information left Darien feeling very angry.
And finally, they could find little information regarding Serena - blonds were too prevalent
in this age and time, and apparently her hair style either didn't stand out too much, or she'd taken
it down and was wearing it loosely. A few thought they might have seen such a girl, contritely
either in prison, a brothel selling her services, a slave market, or a food market, the last either in
chains or free.
Basically, they were getting nowhere!
"Okay," Rei said, "I hate to suggest this, but right now our only solid lead is that Lita
_might_ be somewhere around the Colosseum. I say we should go over there and ask about her,
who...owns...her, and where he or she might be keeping his...property."
"And it occurs to me," Mina said, "We might want to try to keep the wands, and roses,
stowed at all times."
"Why?" Diana asked quietly.
"Does the term 'witch' mean anything to you?" Michelle said, picking up on Mina's
meaning.
"Sure, an evil sorceress, why?" Diana replied.
"In this time," Darien said, "anyone suspected of having witch, or in my case warlock, like
powers was considered evil...and typically burned at the stake while still breathing, _and_ still
conscious!" Diana's little face shrank in terror as images of all the Sailors and Darien being
torched before a mob calling them evil monsters set on 'bewitching' them all passed through her
young mind.
"Oh..." she said.
"Don't worry, it's not like they'd be able to actually catch us and tie us to the stakes
before we'd made our escape," Luna told her. "Smart thinking, though, Mina!"
"Hey, she's not totally brain dead!" Artemis smiled, and then was beaned over the head by
Mina.
"You insinuating something?" she asked.
"No, sorry, forgive..." Artemis croaked. Luna just sighed.
"Rei's right, though," Trista said glumly. "Lita is the only one we have a solid lead on.
So let's...go to the Colosseum..." No one really cared for the idea, but they turned and started to
make their way toward the largest fighting arena on Earth anyway.
As they drew nearer to the building, they realized they were starting to get a little hungry,
and seeing several different food stands, went up to one selling simple vegetable and meat dishes.
Three women and two small boys ran the stand, and Darien dumped almost all the remaining
money they had for the meal.
Afterward, they moved to a slightly less crowded place to sit down and eat, keeping the
building in sight. As they sat and ate, five men came and sat not three feet away. They got their
attention for one reason - one of the two more important looking one's, who sported yellow eyes
and brunette hair with streaks of grey and silver going through it, and wearing a rich looking red
toga and a white sash, three rings on one hand, and fancy sandals, was carried up sitting in a chair
by two of the three others with them.
The other important looking fellow wore a green toga and blue sash, which looked just as
rich, five fancy rings, and equally fancy sandals, and had faded carrot-top hair and dull green eyes.
The other three all wore simple white togas and sandals. It seemed they were only servants.
They began to eat as well, and the two important ones began talking.
"So, Agamemnon, what's next on your agenda?" the man in the chair asked.
"Well, Theophilus, now that my men have survived the 'Massacre of the Barbarians in
Francia' lunacy, I'm scheduled to have some of my best go against a menagerie of animal and
human contestants next week," the other one, Agamemnon, stated. "And you?"
"Four of my best are to battle with the four best of Nikos, of Churia!" Theophilus replied.
"Fate has smiled on us, Commodus is totally preoccupied with that Spaniard, Maximus, who lead
his group to victory in the Carthage re-enactment, and then trounced Tigris of Gaul's ass the
other day!"
"Yes, it is nice not having to worry about pointlessly wasting our gladiators for some
madman's whim!" Agamemnon agreed. "Oh, I hear you were paid a visit by Barvus Cephiro."
"If you could call it that," Theophilus frowned. "Peculiar man, devious. I don't trust him
an inch."
"He's a slaver, he could supply additional manpower," Agamemnon commented.
"Nothing wrong with that."
"With him, I'd look even closer at the available wares than I usually do with Petros!"
Theophilus retorted. "Mark my words, that man is planning something!"
"Aren't they all?" Agamemnon asked, then glanced at Darien and the others. "Now
there's something you don't see everyday. Check the toy on the chain." Theophilus glanced
over, and ran his eyes over Michelle, who quietly munched her meal.
"Dye, no doubt," he said, "Not unlike the child who dashed into the arena with
Commodus and Lucius Verus. You remember her, surely?"
"The slave girl?" Agamemnon commented. "How could I not. Only a Prince would dye a
girl's hair like that!" Throughout all, the two were eating their own meal, as were the three
servants. The girls and Darien quietly ate their own meals, slipping some to the cats. One of the
servants spotted them, and glanced at them.
"Those three cats are a bit unusual," he commented.
"So they are, Semon," Theophilus said. "Those spots are probably shaved. Some people
are odd with pets." At that point the five finished their meals, and Agamemnon and Semon took
the plates to a nearby wagon filled with...unpleasantness, and disposed of them. Meanwhile,
Theophilus pulled out some papers and glanced at them.
"Oh, yes, it's going to be an interesting week," he said, then glanced back at them. Most
specifically, at Darien. "Tell me, did you lose your legion?"
"No," Darien said, "I have taken leave of the army, and am returning home, stopping in
Rome to see some of the games, and, uh, make a few bets." Darien wasn't sure where that had
come from, but at least it sounded good.
"Well, the war in Germania is over, I suppose some troops are going back to the families
they left behind to fight it," Theophilus said, and then Agamemnon and Semon returned, and
Theophilus snapped his fingers. The other two servants lifted him up, and the small group left.
The girls and Darien sighed.
"Well, that was interesting," Rei said. "We finished?"
"Yeah, let's get going," Mina said. They quickly disposed of their plates in the same
fashion, being careful not to dwell on the other garbage in the wagon, and returned to working
their way to the Colosseum. As they continued through the crowd, they were suddenly pushed
aside by a rude, pompous man in brightly colored robes and a black cloak with deep black hair cut
close to his head, very light stubble on his chin and upper lip, and eyes that were a piercing blue
that made your blood freeze with their coldness.
With him were a six year old girl in a very fancy red dress with long auburn hair and dark
green eyes, and a young woman, not much more than mid-twenties, with light auburn hair in a
bun on her head and brown eyes wearing a beautiful green and purple gown and a small gold
bracelet shaped like a dragon eating its tail on her wrist. The man seemed seriously annoyed about
something, and the girl seemed equally displeased. The woman, however, seemed almost
downcast, submissive.
"Hey, watch it, buddy!" Mina snapped. The man turned, then stared at her for a moment,
then grabbed Mina by the chin and looked closer before letting her go with an angry wave.
"No, you're not her! Not at all!" he gruffed. "The one I want was wearing her hair in pig
tails!" He then glanced at Amara. "And she had it long, not to mention she was a _she_, and a
little younger!"
"What's your problem?!" Amara snapped, her voice filled with ire. She'd barely met the
man, and already she detested him.
"I am looking for a thief," he said. "I know she is still in Rome, her party never returned
to Tarria. She would have had to pass through my town of Ferrio to do so."
"What did she steal?" Trista asked.
"My most favoritest of favorite jewelries!" the little girl cried. "It was a pink heart with
gold wings and a crown on top and pink crystal in the middle and a diamond inside!" They all
blinked at the description. There could be no mistake. The little girl had just given a fairly
accurate description of Rini's brooch!
"That sounds like something that belongs to my daughter!" Darien said. "A little girl of
nine with pink hair and red-brown eyes named Rini. Have you seen her?"
"No, but if this is the girl I think you're talking about, then you owe me money as well!"
the man stated. "The brooch was stolen, diamond and all, by a woman with blonde hair in pig
tails and two buns to either side of her head..."
"That's Serena!!" Mina screeched. "Do you know who she was with?!"
"Of course," the man said. "Thernacius Farrium Rex, and his eldest boy, Georgio. Not
only did she steal from me, she humiliated me as well. She will be made to return the trinket, pay
for the damages against me as much as possible, and then I will throw her to the brothels!"
"Yeah!!" the little girl agreed. At that point, Darien lost all sense of himself, and decked
the man, hard! He looked up from the ground through a bloody nose and split lip at Darien, who
stared back, anger filling his eyes as they had only one other time that Mina and Rei could
remember...when he was under Beryl's control. Members of the crowd glanced at them, but
decided to move along.
"You touch her, and you won't live long enough to regret it!" Darien warned him.
"How dare you," the man said, rising back up, equally incensed. "I am Terrarium
Aurelius Querian! The wealthiest independent man in the southern provinces of Sicily! You shall
be cast in irons...and thrown to the galleys for this!!"
"Daddy?" the little girl cringed backward into the woman, who was presumably her
mother.
"NOT NOW, JULIA!!" Querian snapped, then turned back on Darien. "Oh, you shall
pay! Yes, you shall..." He never finished. Darien decked him again, and lead the girls away.
Querian rose again, now angrier than ever, and sporting an even bloodier nose and deeper split lip
than before. "That man...as bad as his wife!! I'LL GET THEM BOTH!!!!" Julia and her mother
just watched.
******************************************************************************
I bet you didn't expect to see _him_ again, did you?! And you probably don't want to see
Eleutherios again, either, but you will! Next time, in Chapter 10: Conspiracies. See ya then!
Want to shoot the breeze?! E-mail me at Scorpinac@sa-tech.com!
