Hero of Rome

Titus

As Titus lay in the cold embrace of death, the wisdom of Marcus Aurelius spoke to him in the darkness.

“Meditate upon what you ought to be in body and soul when death overtakes you; meditate on the brevity of life, and the measureless gulf of eternity behind it and before, and upon the frailty of everything material.”

These things Titus reflected on as his mind stirred in awakening, perhaps as a result of entering the Underworld. The wise stoic had been correct on life’s shortness, as evidenced by his own demise with the natives. Everything Maximus and he himself had struggled so hard for now crumbled apart, the fragile things they were. It was all meaningless now. Even his hopes and dreams to reunite Livia with her children, even his love for her, would become nothing in death.

As grieved as Titus was by this, in the vastness of eternity, he accepted death. He had tried his best, forged the life he wanted, broken free of trying to win his father’s approval, found love, and had saved Rome from a shameful tetrarchy. Now, in death, he would rest.

The Underworld began to glow warmly at first, which he could see through his eyelids. When his eyes could work, he glimpsed fire, but it was not the flames of Pluto that he expected. Instead, it was the small fire at the center of what looked to be a leather tent. On the floor were animal pelts and bowls mixed with what looked like herbal remedies. As his senses returned, the smell of cedar, damp animal hides, and strangely decay slammed into his nose.

The strange surroundings propelled Titus to his feet, but an elderly woman who looked a thousand years old emerged and placed her leathered hands on him, keeping him down. She had a sweet and caring demeanor, whispering something in her native tongue as Titus obeyed, laying back down on the animal skins. The sudden movement caused a flare of pain in his neck. He touched in to examine the wound and was surprised to find it sticky instead. The old woman with long, silver hair down to her waist and black eyes muttered something again in her raspy voice, reaching for a small bowl filled with a brown jelly. She hummed a song to herself as she applied the cool remedy to his neck which began to glow, easing the pain. He noticed some of the plants used for medicine on the table behind her wilted as she healed him.

“Thank you, mother,” Titus said, though he doubted she could understand him. Though, she did nod as she stood to her feet. She held up her hands, as if for him to stay, and departed the tent.

Alone again, the memories of the battle flooded into his mind. He’d been shot, hence the wound. His men, including Maximus’s Lucius and top commanders had also perished, including the Chief Shikellamy.

“What in Vulcan’s name happened?” he said, rising to his feet. It didn’t make any sense. Someone, a Roman most likely, must have shot the Chief to incite a battle. Did that lead to the natives shooting them in retaliation, hence his downfall?

No, he thought. We would have seen them first. We were all attacked from behind.

A disgusting revelation occurred to him, making him want to puke.

It must have been a Roman. Caesar’s doing.

It was the only conclusion that made sense. Caesar had deliberately not come to the meeting, trusting Titus with the mission, along with Maximus’s top men who had been near to Maximus’s assassination attempt.

He must have wanted to clean up any evidence and advance his conquest, Titus thought, slowly moving to the tent’s opening. But I saw no one in the trees. Perhaps an agent of Pluto?

Titus’s thoughts immediately turned to Cassius the Shadow as the possible culprit. He would have no hesitation taking down his allies if it meant the Shadow’s gain.

A sudden, violent rage threatened to overcome him. That man had unnecessary harm to him, Livia, and Maximus, and Cleopatra. Everything within Titus wanted to smash him to death with Paxbreaker.

Speaking of, where was his war-hammer?

The burning anger only subsided when he stepped out of the tent into the nightmare that was the native village. The scent of rot and decay became unbearably strong as he looked out onto the disordered village of longhouses. Dead and dying natives lay all about the cool autumn ground as tattered survivors attended the sick or mourned the dead. Tools, baskets, even animal carcases were scattered across the village as normal activities were halted by the disease. There must have been only a little over one hundred natives that weren’t ravaged by smallpox. No one paid Titus any mind as he walked amidst their suffering.

“Thunderman,” a strong voice boomed across the village.

Titus turned in surprise to see Logan and a few of his men striding towards Titus. The warchief’s son exuded rage and looked ready to kill him. Titus raised his hands in a show of peace.

“You can understand me?” Titus said as Logan and his men surrounded him with their spears.

“Only now I can, thanks to the great Taronhiawagon,” he said, his eyes dark and weary. He shook his head, as if remembering something unpleasant. “I went through great pain to speak to you, now you must answer my questions. Why have you turned on us? We sought a peace with you, yet you Thundermen turned on us! You killed my father!” The native guards suddenly pointed their obsidian spears on Titus who stood unarmed. They could easily slay him. “Tell me now one good reason why I shouldn’t kill you.”

“Friend,” Titus said, speaking softly yet with sternness, “for the same reason you saved me. You saw my intentions with your father and your tribe. I was betrayed by my own men who seek your destruction. My lord and friend, Maximus, co-leader of the Thundermen, was betrayed. I seek vengeance on the man who killed him. He is the one who rode in on a horse of the clouds.”

Logan scoffed, spitting on the ground. His men relaxed their spears. “Well I am sorry to disappoint you. Your man has fled from our lands. He tasks his other Thundermen with the task of destroying us. Not that he has much of a challenge.”

One look at the less than one hundred villagers still unaffected by the disease confirmed this.

“Curse his name,” Titus said, looking at the gray and cold clouds. Umbra was the only way he could get back home. He did not have the blessing of Jupiter nor the precision of Maximus to leap across the ocean. He was stuck here, and would likely die with the natives.

“I need to get back to Rome,” he continued. “I must avenge my lord. But I cannot cross the ocean.”

Logan waved him off as he turned away from him. “That is not my concern. Your fate is well deserved. Now leave me be, I must attend to my people who die because of yours.”

Titus sighed in defeat as he was left alone. The natives chose to ignore him as smallpox continued to ravage them. All was truly lost. He could try to return to the Roman fort. But he feared the Roman spies might kill him first, for he was dressed as a native in what appeared to be deerskin. Even if they did recognize him, who was to say he wouldn’t be shot again by a Pluto-blessed?

Titus did the only thing he could think to do. His hands were idle, which meant his mind would wander, and that he could not allow. So he chose to help the villagers with their dying and dead. Titus had once received smallpox as a child and developed immunity, so he had no fear in helping an older man lift up his deceased son, carrying him outside the village walls, and digging his grave. He repeated this kindness to as many of them that needed it, far into the afternoon. It was the least he could do. He crossed paths with Logan several times carrying the dead, whose anger towards him weakened with each passing.

His hands became sore from the dozens of graves he made, but it felt right to do. He pushed himself to aid these natives who reminded him in many ways of his village from his first life.

Titus’s mind was so engrossed in his work that he hardly noticed the first screams. The name Kanontsistóntie ringed throughout the surrounding woods, piercing his ears as he finished covering another grave.

Looking into the dark trees, he did not expect to see what he saw, having no concept of the native monsters. Glowering at him with hungry deranged eyes and black, ropy hair down its face was a huge, floating severed head.

Titus stood staring at the giant head for a moment too long.

It was beyond reason to see what he saw. Yes, he had faced a Minatour, fought cyclopes, giants, and so many more monsters with Maximus. But a giant head?

Titus didn’t have time to react as the evil head tore through the air, teeth bared, aiming directly at him. Titus threw himself down to the grave, missing its terrible jaws by a hair. The hungry head chomped through the wooden wall just behind him, leading to more terrified screams.

By the gods, Titus thought, rising to his feet. More screams pierced the air as the head continued its cannibalistic rampage. Titus charged through the hole it had made, horrified by what he saw. A majority of the sick natives were made quick work of as the floating head devoured the weak first.

The remaining one hundred native warriors shot their bows with enchanted arrows or called upon divine animal spirits to attack it. Some of their blessings allowed them to leap impossibly high to pierce the flying head with their obsidian spears. Yet the monstrous thing was too quick, and it snatched many of them from their flight and tore them to pieces, crushing them like grapes before they could pierce it. Not even the natives who glowed with healing on the outskirts could redeem them.

Titus had no weapon to fight with.

“Thunderman!” Logan screamed, throwing Titus’s magnetic warhammer in the air to him as he ran to engage the flying head. The necklace of the metal Iroquois god Titus had made for his father swung around his neck. “Run back to your men. Kanontsistóntie has come for us!”

Titus caught Paxbreaker mid-air. The weapon pulsed and hummed with energy. No, Titus would not run.

The Kanontsistóntie, with gore dripping from its teeth, turned to face Logan and his men. Titus was too slow, too far away to catch up as the head roared and shot towards the Chief’s son.

“No!” Titus yelled as the head clashed into them.

Dirt suddenly rose and exploded in that instant, causing the head to spiral out of control. Logan’s two men were perfectly fine, having shielded themselves with earth. Logan however dropped from the claws of a horse-sized spirit eagle and landed on top of the giant’s head, repeatedly stabbing its brain with an obsidian knife. The Kanontsistóntie thrashed and chomped, trying to shake him off. The monster was too busy trying to remove Logan that he ran straight into Titus’s warhammer. Several of the Kanontsistóntie’s teeth went flying with Titus’s direct hit.

Titus barely had time to roll out of the way as it continued its flight past him, eating more diseased natives along the way. He had no idea how much health that thing had. It seemed to recharge from its wounds the more it ate flesh. Logan noticed this, cursing as he had to stab the monster again.

An idea struck him as Logan’s necklace swung violently from his neck.

“Plant the figure in its skull!” Titus yelled, throwing a nearby spear at the head to get its attention. Logan seemed to understand, despite confusion on his face.

The angry Kanontsistóntie bellowed with fury as it charged Titus. He would have only one shot.

Steady now, he thought, the magnetic energy pulsing through his rapidly beating heart. Before the Kanontsistóntie came too close, he heaved with all of his strength and threw his warhammer straight into its forehead. Magnetic energy rippled across the giant head’s face. As soon as it did, its eyes rolled back and the head toppled to the ground, sending Logan flying into the arms of his spirit eagle which caught him in the air. Titus danced out of the way as the Kanontsistóntie rolled like a boulder past him, sending blood and guts everywhere.

Logan landed next to Titus a second later, looking at him with surprise. The rest of the native warriors and those who survived the onslaught were similarly mute as they beheld him.

Logan stretched out his hand, which Titus grabbed.

“Our village owes you, Thunderman,” he said, nodding gravely. “Whatever you need, we will fulfill it.”

The large spirit eagle landed on Logan’s shoulder. What Logan had achieved with the spirit gave him a crazy idea.

“Actually,” Titus said, “there is one thing I could use your help with.”