The Spirit of Blood

*Chapter probably rated M or R?... Don't wanna change the whole story's rating though.*

3 Days Later

When the men's unconscious bodies were untied from the whipping post, they were taken back to their old quarters and tent groups for recovery. Upon awakening, the men were still living with the pain of punishment, but each agonizing moment only reminded them of a feeling they felt saved from. Neither man truly thought of one another upon waking, not in the seconds, minutes or even days that passed. The men would occasionally find themselves thinking of the other punished, only to remember the blurry sight of the other as blood was sprayed at each blow, immediately making them remember their own pain. The memories of rage towards the other were dull and numb as those thoughts of what it was like to fight each other were replaced by the stinging recollection of the whip.

Over the following days, the legionaries left under the Interfector's command were still waiting for fresh soldiers and a relief force to come and take over the assimilation of the Ajoans. Still stuck in their place, the amount of losses the Legion sustained against the Ajoans made it impossible to escort the fallen tribals into Legion affiliation or begin marching to bolster the Arizona Campaign's other forces in the southeast. At this time, the Interfector's soldiers had nothing to do but watch over the prisoners and wait with an incredibly understrength force. All the while, the dualists were only able to focus on recovery, and the waiting facilitated that and the other exhausted legionaries under the Bull Banner fine… At least for the moment.

The display at the whipping post was in front of everyone prisoner and Legion alike. The Interfector personally saw that moment as a chance to finally show the soldiers under his command that he was in fact Legion. As mentioned earlier, the current Primus of the 6th, 5th, and 9th was something of an unknown even up to this point in the Ajoan campaign. His reputation preceded him before taking his new charge in Gold Canyon, and his initial sparing of the Dualists months earlier brought up many questions from the centurions under his authority. The questions came from the legend of a monster who destroyed a metropolis coupled with the actions of a rather timid man who spared two disobedient officers from a Legion justified punishment. None of the commanders who saw his mercy back in Gold Canyon knew what to make of that action, but were never able to question him based on his mysterious yet terrifying reputation. After the losses in battle showed what could be considered a miscalculation in the man's tactical abilities, The Murderer was clearly not very used to leading parts of Legion campaigns, something the man himself was well aware of. However, that was also an idea he intended to counter, and his way of showing who he was arrived in what he did to Aleron and Montano.

Almost begging his men to save themselves from the punishment, The Murderer knew he couldn't change what was ingrained in them or alter their nature. He learned this upon hearing the words of Aleron. In the face of defiance that will not die, the only thing one can do is join it or perish. The Interfector tried to kill the dualists' feud with mercy, but finally learned how his new world demanded blood in all forms, no exceptions; a caveat to a system he himself needed to understand and formally carry out. Still, as he'd heard so many times over the past months, he was the word of Caesar to his forces, and though he succumbed to the Legion standard of authority, he knew Caesar personally, and knew that his enemies, sometimes even temporary enemies, could be the perfect allies given the proper circumstance. Since the dualists were properly punished and put back into the Legion ranks, The Killer was not above recognizing their value and even granting new authorities to them, given the depleted and battered state of his centuries.

One day while the Interfector's soldiers were still waiting, word came down to both Aleron and Montano regarding their reassignments. Though the Killer was confident he had destroyed both men's feud at the whipping post, he felt it also necessary to separate the two. Not only was this a preventative measure for possible future conflicts between the two, but this reassignment also served the purpose of consolidating his forces. Of the 300+ legionaries and tribal auxiliaries to have followed in the Interfector's campaign, only a little more than 100 were ready or still recovering, the rest were killed. Because of this, the commanders of the 6th, 5th, and 9th issued out their promotions to the soldiers they sought fit to fill the roles of the killed. With that, the Interfector made it a special point to directly oversee the futures of Montano and Aleron. Upon discussion with Centurion Theracos of the 6th, The Murderer accepted the recommendation to take Aleron away.

Veteran Decanus Aleron was taken into the personal guard of the Centurion Elite himself to fill a battle sustained gap. With the other Centurions losing members of their staffs as well, Centurion Theracos had one of the spots in his staff filled by Montano. It should also be mentioned that Montano took the spot of a different member of the staff, not the one made by Aleron's transfer. This was done so to prevent any potential feelings of superiority or resentment. Either way, Theracos was saddened to lose one of his best staff officers, and one of his best Veteran infantry commanders. The transfer was strange for Montano specifically who knew how to read, write, and do basic math, but was not familiar with the administrative duties of a staff member. Still, neither man could do much other than wait and heal in the days after their beating.

By the third day after the dualists' punishment, a full week had passed since the Ajoans were defeated. Now, the Ajoans had heard stories from scouts and other tribal allies about what happens when the Legion conquers an enemy, and many still in the pens began wondering why they hadn't left the pens in a week. Disease was spreading, food was scarce, many had died since being set aside for a life of slavery, and many were wondering what exactly their conquerors were doing. It was around the time the dualists were punished when word was covertly spread throughout the pens how the Legion force was awaiting backup. The captives didn't know that their subjugators were barely able to keep hold of what they had until connecting two and two. Although many of the Ajoans' sick, elderly, weak, and infirm were killed after the first night and days of assessment, the slaves of the tribe still numbered close to a thousand. Even as many behind the wire were dropping from disease and lack of sustenance, the word of impending reinforcements made those hastily constructed pens look more and more escapable.

Several Ajoans had tried to run in the time since the whipping, but the Interfector's special display didn't impact the Ajoans the way he thought it would. Many captives were still beaten for the smallest disobediences, but what the Ajoans saw the Legion do to their own two men seemed small when their tribesmen and women were found dead several times a day. Lying dead in their own excrement, dehydrated, but still free from a life of slavery, it was only the living Ajoan captives who saw their futures in the image of Aleron and Montano. With that image in mind and word of more Legion forces approaching, many began believing it was now or never.

The trouble in the pens was small at first. Many defiant acts only started out as simply obstructing the legionaries who entered to cart away the dead, or hostile shouting in the Ajoan's language. Over the hours and days of idleness and miserable endurance, many Ajoans thought that any day could be the day Legion backup would arrive. With the tension rising, the Ajoans would begin assaulting the occasional pair of legionaries, and that always escalated to a brutal squashing of the resistance. Offending mothers were forced to watch their children killed before getting the blade themselves, and defiant men had their spouses taken away for ravaging, all to quell a fiery spirit that only grew when the light of hope fell dimmer.

By the third day after the whipping, Aleron and Montano were able to walk and assist in their duties, many of which were just checking up with the soldiers under their charge and transitioning to their new assignments. Both men still couldn't walk around in full armor and even the fibers on their red tunics stung against their bandaged backs, but the two were born again after the whipping post and Legion through and through, so the pain was only a motivator. Since heading into battle was impossible for the entire unit, the only true work the two needed to do in the waiting was just standard manual responsibilities that came with any Legion unit, something still relatively easy to do without padded steel and hardened plastic armor.

With Aleron still adapting to his position on the Interfector's guard, that third day was when he learned what it meant to be constantly around the man. It meant that Aleron would know what was happening. Aleron was used to knowing things the average legionary didn't through time on Theracos' staff, but in this particular situation, Aleron learned on that third day that the reinforcements were only another day out.

Now, it is unknown how or if the Ajoan captives learned this news through overheard talk, or if what happened was mere coincidence. However, it was in the afternoon of that third day when the tension of the situation snapped. The low cauldrons of slop for the slaves were brought out and the crews of legionaries entered each pen one by one to little protest. That was hardly a moment that trouble normally came, and it all happened peacefully for each of the pens until the final one. The last and 4th largest slave pen, the one full of adult males to be sent to Legion soldier camp, was the one that took the "Chow" as a time to move.

Upholding the order of distance till the final second, the two legionaries to drop off the sustenance bucket had their exit from the pens cut short as dozens of military-age former Ajoans rushed the two. Before the event could even be processed, several shots were fired from the two outnumbered legionaries, and their blades had been ripped from them before they could even reach for them. The guards observing outside the wire panicked at the abduction's suddenness and fired a few shots into the warrior pen before halting. When the dust settled, two legionaries in nothing but their tattered uniforms were stripped of their armor, rendered weaponless, and being constrained by several Ajoans. It was unknown if the Ajoans had intentionally created a hostage situation, or even if they knew how the Legion handled hostages. Nevertheless, the gunshots and shouting brought many more legionaries to the scene, who all surrounded that pen with guns and throwing spears at the ready. Unsurprisingly, this gathered the attention of the officers who had no intention of entertaining even the meagerest of demands.

Montano was at the scene from the start, helping organize the slave rations as a new part of Theracos' staff which had been assigned supervision over the task. The shots and sounds of chaos gathered Montano and his new senior Gula, who directed all the legionaries and guns who approached the scene.

On the other hand, Aleron approached the troubling sounds behind The Interfector and his new comrade in the personal guard, "Dalton." Behind them was Theracos, seemingly mortified that any incident could happen under the supervision of his staff.

At the scene, the Interfector saw the situation in the warrior pen, looked to the row of guns around it, saw Gula and Montano directing the soldiers, and knew what to do. All was silent in the encampment when the Interfector shouted, "What's going on!?" at the warrior pen in an almost sarcastic manner.

A tribal holding a machete from one of the restrained legionaries shouted, "We have you men! We kill them!"

The Interfector took particular notice of the abducted legionaries still struggling in their bondage and nodded before shouting, "Gonna kill them if you don't get freedom or what!?... Proud of you boys, keep struggling!" at the tribals and then at the detained legionaries.

The tribal shouted, "Yes! Let us go!"

The Interfector chuckled to himself, seemingly amazed at the simple and illogically proportioned demands, yet stern seriousness in delivery.

He shouted back, "You understand I won't let a thousand of you Ajoans go for two of my guys, right!? Like, I'd still hate to kill all of you in there, but you know I'm not above that, right!?"

"Yes" was the response from the warrior prisoners. It wasn't known whether or not the response from the Ajoans was just a language barrier or if this was just a sad attempt at control over an inevitable end.

Still, the answer was "Yes" and so the Interfector did the only thing he could. He turned to the man at his side and said, "Centurion Theracos, your staff are overseeing afternoon slave chow, take care of this would you?"

"Yes Primus."

The Interfector asked Aleron to see him in an hour as the Elite stepped away with Prime Dalton, Theracos told Gula to carry it out, and Decanus Gula shouted at the encircling legionaries. Theracos walked off to strategize for future battles, and Aleron approached the pen as the guns fired at everyone inside the wire. One of the hostage legionaries was killed somewhere between the hail of bullets or by one of the Ajoans, but the other one was just cut up a little bit and slept in his contubernium's tent that night. As the guns stopped and the dust settled, the warrior pen went from around 180 captives to around a little less than 150, most of whom weren't even seriously wounded, so it wasn't quite the grand massacre. Many of the Ajoans fled to where they could in the pens as the shots came. And there were still plenty of new bodies in the sand to end whatever that situation was.

With the sun lowered a little more, the many legionaries who arrived at the trouble had left. However, there were still over 30 legionaries from the unit's different centuries who were commandeered for the aftermath. Gula and Montano ordered their troops into the pens to pile the dead and slay any of the mortally wounded; the corpse pile was to be burned within the pen as a reminder of where defiance will get you.

As the bodies were piled and the prisoners kept at bay, the Ajoans captives were rapidly forgetting what happened to their friends minutes earlier, and remembering that ferocity towards the Legion. The Ajoans were packed into one side of the pens, kept at distance by legionaries with guns, but their shouting and swearing in tribal tongue and mixed English grew louder and louder as each body was added to the pile.

When it came down to it, many of the Ajoans' fragmented insults were calling the legionaries cowards for killing them with guns while they were defenseless. Something many of the masked legionaries in those pens nodded to in acknowledgment and legitimate agreement. Aleron felt his hands reaching for his blade as he watched from outside the wire. His eyes looked around where he saw Montano speaking with Gula beside the corpse pile, Montano still just wearing a wrapping around his torso when Gula overheard something amidst the cowering angry faces. What exactly Gula heard got carried into the sea of slurs and insults being shouted in broken English, but it still caught Gula's attention enough for him to storm towards the prisoners. Many heard him when the crowd died and Veteran Decanus Gula of the 6th, shouted in cackling and nearly indecipherable anger;

"… Whatever's practical! I'll give an Ajoan my place! All you gotta do is bow so I could kill!..."

That is believed to be what he said.

Gula was known to be quite an eloquent yet loud and commanding man, but whatever was said earlier caused him to shout something nearly incoherent at the Ajoan warriors according to all Legion accounts there. That didn't matter though, since the Ajoans were still silent and seemingly very well aware of what message was delivered All this came to make sense when a giant Ajoan, a former warrior who was forced to surrender, and probably the ringleader behind the afternoon's event stood up.

Stepping over the sitting warrior captives and towards Gula, the man was naturally large, about the size of Gula who was maybe an inch or two shorter than the tribal without armor. As the warrior stepped up, he said in accented English for all to hear, "Agreed. Can't wait to wear that helmet."

Just like that, Aleron entered the pens and took a spot on the opposite side of a forming ring, pistol in hand, and across from Montano as Gula and the tribal walked up. Not one legionary to see it that day knew why Gula ordered the legionaries to form a circle, at least not until Gula began removing his armor and heard the tribal ask sarcastically, "Not even gonna give me a weapon?"

Some don't even believe Decanus Gula knew or realized that Aleron and Montano were both there at the scene when he unhooked his blade and tossed it to the tribal giant. Gula had finished removing his armor, even taking off his red tunic, exposing a muscular back covered in scars and marked in dust like he'd recently crawled from a grave. The line of guns watching the other warrior captives almost wasn't needed since all were focused and silenced by what was happening 30 yards away.

Gula had finished stripping himself of all protection and picked up the large fire axe he'd been known to use as his signature weapon in battle. Standing back up, he turned and faced the giant who was studying the fine but rusty blade he'd been given. When the tribal looked to Gula, the Veteran Decanus said "No mercy, savage." in his flat but clear toned command voice, having all but recovered completely from the sputtering rage a minute earlier. The Ajoan warrior captive nodded with a grunt and one of the legionaries in the ring shouted "Begin!"

The Ajoan dashed towards Gula terrifyingly fast for a guy his size, and darted to the side in an attempt to dodge the calculated first swing, clearly skilled in one on one combat. Still, before the giant could blink or knew what happened, his life had ended.

Gula stepped on the skull of the man and cranked the heavy axe blade out of the smashed cranium. Dislodging the blade, the sound of crumbling bone was heard in the silence as Gula lifted his axe to study the steel. Gula apparently didn't find what he was looking for in the bits of brain and blood on the axe, so he brought the axe down again. Then again. Then again. Gula smashed and hacked away at the already destroyed skull of the opponent until there was nothing but a pile of matter where the man's head used to be. All the while, the warrior slaves, encircling legionaries, and slaves in the other pens watched in silence.

Silence even as the victor dropped to his knees, began picking through the mess, and tasting parts he found "Edible." Spattered in the remains of the giant Ajoan, Gula finally begun splashing the blood from the giant's leaking neck stump onto his face and arms like he was bathing in it. Breathing heavily, and lightly chuckling all the while, he even ensured he covered the vital areas as he scooped more handfuls of blood to pour hover himself. When Gula was finally covered in enough blood, he'd begun licking the blood off his hands until he again had his fill. Drenched in the blood of the pulverized and consumed, when Gula was done, he was on his knees looking into the sunset and not even the wind made a sound.

Though he couldn't remember in the moments before, during, or immediately after, Gula wasn't always Legion. Gula was 27 years old at the time and couldn't honestly tell anyone what his life was like before the age of 15. The first 15 years of his life had never even happened in his eyes. He could tell you about the first man he killed for Caesar at the age of 16, but that would be a lie if he stated that to be the first life he took. Decanus Gula was, is, and always will be Legion. Since marching into his first battle for Caesar at age 16, he lived, breathed, ate, and slept Caesar. The lives he himself personally ended since that age were too many to count, but all of them were in the name of the Legion. Although I mentioned that Gula had lived a life before Caesar, a life that was again almost unknown to him.

Gula was born and raised in the Blood Sands tribe, an Arizona tribe that inhabited the unclaimed part of the Sonoran Wastes between the Sedonas and Atomic Stalkers north of the Phoenix valley (Back when those tribes weren't yet consumed by the Bull). Living in the mountains and deserts in the place where the sands turned steadily to blasted woodlands, the Blood Sands were the kind of people to believe if they could spill enough blood across the lands of their enemies, the blood would be evaporated into the clouds and rain down on far away lands that marked their next target. Chasing the storm clouds across northern Arizona, his tribe was a terror to so many in the northern wastes. That was until they entered Legion territory and were promptly annihilated, but not before savaging the cohort they'd come across. Merciless, and psychotic, Gula learned to love and revel in the sight of blood at a young age. Having been taught by his father at the age of 7 on how to skin a Blood Sands captive, his entire life was erased not long after the Legion detained his teenage self following the destruction of his tribe's suicidal assault.

The man had spent the rest of his life living for Caesar and Caesar alone. What he did to that Ajoan giant after the action was a reversion to his tribal self. Almost like an instinct that took him over. He'd always loved spilling the blood of those who opposed Caesar, but the mess he made in the fight with the Ajoan, and how he played in it like a child, was something foreign to him. Feeling himself acting autonomously, he knew not to stop until he covered himself in all the blood and noticed how good it felt despite not even knowing what was happening. As he stared out into that sun, covered in remains, his forgotten life had not consumed him. The spirit that manifested in him took on a new shape just as the sun was almost gone. The words, "Glory to Caesar" escaped his lips only loud enough for few in the circle to hear.

Immediately after the sun was just a glow in the west, Gula hopped back up. Walking to his end of the circle, he began casually picking up his discarded pieces of armor and reequipping himself as if nothing happened. The circle of legionaries was still around him, and the Ajoans throughout the camp were still silent when Gula looked up from fastening a shin plate and said, "Add him to the pile" to one of the masked legionaries. Gula gave the order to clear out as another team of legionaries poured alcohol on the pile of bodies. The line of guns filed out of the pens, and Montano and Aleron joined the gaggle of exiting legionaries. Although, it was just before the circle formally disbanded that Decanus Gula caught the eyes of Aleron and Montano. Upon catching both of them in his shifting gaze, he said to both of the lingering men;

"Mars gives me the blessing too. Try killing them instead of each other."

Both men heard that, and neither were sure of what that meant exactly. Aleron and Montano caught each other's eye again for the first time since the whipping post and immediately turned at the stinging memory of their injuries. Gula, Montano, Aleron, and the rest of the afternoon incident's cleanup crew left the pens. The sky was dark until the final departing legionary tossed a match on the corpse pile, giving the men in the warrior pen a source of heat and poisonous odor that would make sleep that night impossible.

The staff of the 6th departed, and many of the legionaries drafted onto the incident's cleanup crew had left the area to sleep or go about other camp duties. Aleron was the last soldier near the pens who wasn't on patrol or watch. He had some time to kill before meeting with the Interfector like he was told. So, he spent the moments watching the pile of burning bodies and male Ajoan warriors packed against the wire, trying to keep as far from their burning friends as possible. As the fire crackled, and sobs came from the onlooking women's pens, Aleron gave one last look into the dim west before turning towards the commander's tent. As he walked along the wire of one prisoner pen, he saw the many dissolutes out of the corner of his eye and paid no mind to any of them until his peripherals happened to catch a lone woman standing and facing him right against the wire. Just as he passed by, he took particular notice of this, and turned to look at her face. A young woman with tears streaming down her face and teeth clenched, gave him the look of the devil. Stopping to study the woman and possibly put her in her place, she angrily sobbed the words, "You did this."

Aleron nodded and thought, "It'd be against my position to accept glory, credit, and recognition for the work of Mars alone" and walked along.