Tears continued to flow. Annie’s surprised expression showed no trace of understanding what trauma her insensitive words had caused. Her husband Arthur simply shook his head, doubtless reflecting on his wife’s thoughtless remarks, while remembering many earlier examples of similar tactless behaviour as one of the reasons for the majority of their arguments over the years. The room hushed into an embarrassing silence until broken by a tiny voice asking a question.
‘Mummy - why you cry?’
Chapter Thirty Four
It is recorded in ancient texts that those whom the Gods wish to destroy are first made mad. Ezra epitomised this ancient philosophy to such a finite degree that even his closest, most loyal, supporters were now covertly discussing his irrational behaviour behind his back.
Quintus Claudius Avitus, Minister for Justice, was on his way to seek an audience with Ezra after a meeting at which the Council of Ministers had voted unanimously to undergo Immaculation as a means to convince Ezra that death was preferable to the suspicion of being thought traitorous. While Quintus walked towards the Office of Administrative Affairs he was severely tempted to turn around and tell his fellow ministers that the decision to suffer Immaculation was not only unjust, unpalatable, and patently ridiculous, but was also an unacceptable affront to their ministerial positions in the government of Terra Nova. The majority of the ministers had long records of dedicated public duty and were held in high esteem by those whose votes, mandatory at elections held every four years, ensured they remain in positions of power where they were able to influence Ezra, if necessary, to a particular point of view. Not any longer. Ezra had become so powerfully obdurate that his bidding was passed into law without ministerial consultation or approval. In fact, the Senate and the Council of Ministers had each become bodies defunct of anything other than meek compliance to the Great Leader’s wishes.
The OAA office was palatial, grandiose. Ezra had overseen its refurbishment over the past twelve years since his much loved predecessor, Nehemiah, had succumbed to old age and reluctantly stepped aside until dying in, some contend, suspicious circumstances two years later. Vast areas of white marble floors were surmounted by towering columns, domes and arches which supported intricately carved ceilings depicting personalities and events from ages past. The most talented of artists had laboured to reproduce frescos of the same quality and standard as those left behind in their original version of Rome. Sculptors were appointed, ordered perhaps is a more appropriate word, to produce the most incredibly beautiful free-standing statues of past and present heads of state and important dignitaries. Needless to say, Ezra’s likeness was there in abundance, his features chiselled exquisitely into the finest marble, his likeness painted upon walls in the most prominent of positions, his body carved elegantly from the most excellent of woods.
Quintus entered the OAA and walked towards a large, ornate table behind which was seated a large, self-important looking man, dressed in similar flowing clothes as those worn by Quintus, the difference being that Quintus’s white, gold-trimmed, toga was fashioned from the finest silk, while the man’s was in dark coloured, coarsely spun, cloth. The man looked up. Either he didn’t recognise the visitor or perhaps his position as Ezra’s chief representative was a contributing factor but the contemptuous look on the man’s face was anathema to Quintus who was not one to entertain such crass behaviour from those he regarded as plebeians.
“Can I help you?’ asked the man haughtily, his heavy accent betraying low origins.
‘Can I help you Sire ?’ replied Quintus, staring the man directly in the eyes.
There followed a passive standoff as the two men stared each other down. Quintus’s stare proved fiercer and more compelling.
‘... sire,’ repeated the man quietly, finally, reluctantly. ‘Can I help you... sire?’
‘Yes, you can help me. Let Ezra, our Great Leader, know that his Minister for Justice, Quintus Claudius Avitus is here and wishes to see him on a matter of utmost importance.’
The man‘s face screwed into a satisfied smirk.
‘I am afraid, sire,’ he said. ‘Ezra the Great Leader is unavailable but if you care to take a seat I will attempt to find out when he may be prepared to see you.’
Quintus took further exception to the man’s pomposity.
“You will go now, immediately, and speak to someone in Ezra’s secretariat and determine when he will be available to see me! Have I made myself clear?’
The man sat, transfixed. Quintus leaned forward.
‘Don’t sit there staring at me - go - now!’
The man shrunk into his seat.
‘I dare not, sire, for it has been made clear to me, on pain of severe punishment, that Ezra is not to be disturbed, at any time or for anyone!’
Quintus, normally calm and composed, exploded with anger.
‘GET ME EZRA BEFORE I HAVE YOU FLOGGED FOR YOUR INSOLENCE.’
His shouted remonstration reverberated throughout the hall. Doors opened, bodies appeared, quizzical looks could be seen on several of the startled faces. Quintus raised himself to his full height. He wrapped his toga’s surplus silken material over his shoulder and strode resolutely in the direction of the secretariat situated at the far end of the hall.
‘Sire, please do not enter that room, for it is forbidden and I will be severely punished...’
Quintus ignored the man’s shouted plea and pulled open one of the double doors situated beneath a sign carved into the marble architrave.
SECRETARIAT
He entered the room and stopped, mouth agape, as he saw Ezra standing in front of a marble desk fondling a beautiful, scantily dressed young woman. Ezra’s attention was drawn to Quintus’s arrival by the woman motioning towards him with her eyes. He turned around and saw Quintus, mouth wide open, standing in the doorway.
‘What are you doing here?’ he yelled, pushing the young woman roughly to one side.
Quintus stared in disbelief, turned around and departed the room, closing the door quietly behind him. He passed the man who had informed him of Ezra’s instructions
‘Now I know why he was unavailable,’ he said. ‘If I have caused you trouble, please forgive me.’
He left the OAA building, trembling, angry and wracked with sadness that the man he had most admired, his long time friend and colleague, the Great Leader Ezra, was nothing more than an ageing lecher who put his carnal desires ahead of important affairs of state. He walked back towards the Senate building, determined to reverse the decision made by the Council of Ministers to undergo Immaculation.
He is losing his mind, thought Quintus. Now is not the time to pander to his idiosyncrasies.
Chapter Thirty Five
The deep freeze, induced by Noah’s startling revelation, had begun to thaw slightly after Richard had enjoyed a restful night undisturbed by dreams. He could not, however, come to terms with what Noah had told him. How could he possibly originate from Terra Nova when he had a father and mother, a brother and sister back on Earth with whom he had shared a happy childhood, with whom he had developed into an adult and with whom he shared similar characteristics? The more he thought about it the more ridiculous Noah’s assertion had become. But then nagging, disturbing doubts began to emerge.
Right, he thought, while sitting up in bed at the safe house, let’s consider the facts. I’m dark-haired, blue-eyed, while James and Emily are fair-haired and brown-eyed, just as are both our parents... .so what does that prove? James and Emily have the same slightly crooked nose as dad, the same regular teeth (although with a small gap at the front, same as mum), while I do not. Mine are quite small with an over bite, if I’m being entirely honest. Whoa, hold on there for a moment. I’ve inherited dad’s build right? Just like him, I’m slim, angular, medium height, whereas James and Emily are tall, a bit overweight, er, just.... like.... mum in fact. Hey, what am I doing
? Stop making a case for Noah’s outrageous statement. Just a moment though. I remember my Aunt Eliza, mum’s sister, saying once that I didn’t look like any of the family and was I a product of our local milk man! Mum wasn’t very happy at the remark and rebuked her sister, who was only joking of course. But then what about mum’s unusually short pregnancy? Even the doctor was surprised. Only thirty weeks into the pregnancy and out I popped in a matter of minutes, weighing an incredible nine pounds and some ounces. Mum said it was a miracle, dad didn’t know what to say, James just pointed, Emily wasn’t born yet. And how about schooling? Yes, that’s where the similarities lie! We all went to primary schools where each year all three of us ended up top of the class. Oh, there was something extraordinary. I was only five years old when I mastered advanced mathematics! But my dad said that was probably a quirk of nature. Grammar school was different. James couldn’t cope with the teaching and left at sixteen with minor O-level results. Emily on the other hand stayed on until eighteen and, er, failed her A-Levels. Meanwhile I breezed through my A-levels, straight A’s plus in nine subjects, including maths, science and physics! University followed. A four-year long degree course in physics proved something of an achievement I suppose - since I acquired a Master of Physics degree with honours! But, whatever, James and Emily landed really good jobs - James is regional manager of a mobile phone company while Emily is assistant librarian at our local library. My job at Alcan Enterprises, while not necessarily requiring my Master of Physics degree is sufficiently demanding, from an IT perspective that is, since I carry out a range of bespoke programming projects for a number of end user clients. But do these random thoughts add up to anything significant? Noah has just told me that I’m of Terra Novan origin. He has yet to explain how I came to be born into a very ordinary family in a very ordinary part of southern England! I expect answers from Noah plus irrefutable proof. Do I think that will happen? Knowing Noah, I think not!
Chapter Thirty Six
Ezra’s rage at having been caught in an extremely compromising situation was akin to that of a spoilt, undisciplined child. When he saw Quintus enter and then turn around and leave his private secretariat, he was so angry that he lost all semblance of self control. His immediate reaction was to violently push aside the young woman he had been embracing. She slipped, toppled over and struck her head on a corner of the adjacent desk. Immediately a trickle of blood began to seep from a gash on her forehead. The blood coursed down her cheek and ran onto her neck and onto a pale, bare shoulder. She rose unsteadily, wiping blood from her cheek with the back of a hand that refused to stop shaking. She didn’t utter a sound. Instead, mouth wide open, she listened aghast as a foul mouthed tirade poured unabated from Ezra’s purple-hued lips. She had never, in her relatively short life, heard anything quite so nauseating. Anger, such as that being demonstrated by Ezra, was an emotion entirely alien to her and it terrified her in a way she had never before experienced.
‘Get out, get out,’ he yelled. ‘And stop staring at me you, you... ignoramus; and clean that ghastly mess from your face; and close your damn mouth! Go - now - get out of my sight.’
It was at that moment she realised that Ezra’s confessions of his undying love towards her were nothing more than lies, designed to coerce her into a sexual relationship where lust was paramount and his stated love for her was nothing but a charade. She picked up items of personal underclothing strewn around the desk, and walked away towards a door at the rear of the Secretariat. Ezra continued shouting abuse as she closed the door behind her. He looked down at the marbled floor where spots of blood were beginning to congeal. His face was flushed to the colour of a red pepper. He sat down in the chair behind the desk and furiously rubbed his face with both hands as if trying to cleanse himself of the unremitting anger he still harboured. He spoke in a voice that was trembling like a frail autumn leaf in a gusting wind. He pointed towards the main door of the Secretariat and yelled, his voice resonating, echoing, throughout the vastness of the empty room.
‘Quintus Claudius Avitus, you are no longer my Minister for Justice. You are sentenced to proscription the instant you turned your disloyal, disgusting back on me.’
Chapter Thirty Seven
The Council of Ministers was recalled immediately by Quintus upon his return to the Office of Administrative Affairs. He reopened the debate on the already accepted resolution to undergo Immaculation as a means of sating Ezra’s demand to find and expose a traitor among his ministers. When asked why, by a puzzled Marcus Annius Verus, he stated that he believed the decision was unsound not only because of the entire Council of Ministers were involved, but also because it transgressed an existing statute that prohibited mass Immaculation. Marcus, vocally persistent, queried Quintus’s statement that there exists a law banning mass Immaculation.
‘I am not aware of such a law,’ queried Marcus, rising to his feet. ‘Can Quintus inform the Council under whose authority was the law drafted, who approved it and when the law was passed into the statute books?’
Quintus listened intently. A hint of a smile accompanied a nod of his head.
‘I am Ezra’s Minister for Justice and I have the authority, and the power, to draft and pass laws. So the answer to your question Marcus Annius Verus is, I am the authority and I approved it. Then I passed it into the statute books, using the powers that are inherent to my position. This occurred a mere one hour and forty-five minutes ago! Now, are there any more questions?’
Shocked silence does not adequately describe the reaction to Quintus’s statement. Never in living memory, and certainly never under Ezra’s rule, could any of the ministers recall such a departure from established protocol. Hands were raised to cover open mouths; unblinking stares from minister to minister conveyed the depth of shock that was saturating, swamping, the atmosphere in the meeting room. Marcus slumped down onto his chair and shook his head repeatedly in disbelief at that which he had just heard. Close compatriots looked to him for a defiant reply, but were disappointed when not a sound left his clenched lips.
Quintus, composed and resolute, remained on his feet.
‘I stand before you today with a large measure of foreboding regarding the future of our once proud democratic system, which I fear has been misused and degraded over the past two years. We have seen odious laws introduced which we, to our utmost shame, have passed without protest; laws that our forefathers would have dismissed in disgust before reaching the drafting stage. We have acquiesced when we should have resisted, we have grovelled when we should have rebelled, we have failed our people when we should have stood up for what is right. We should have stopped this descent into bloody autocracy.’
His words were spoken with the passion and authority that accompanies a true belief in one’s duty and morality.
‘Earlier today I witnessed something that caused me to seriously question my position. Our Great Leader Ezra has, I fear, become a tyrant whose selfish use of his omnipotence knows no limits. We, all of us gathered here, have allowed this to happen. Because of what I witnessed, I decided to take a stand, a position, no matter the consequences, before the damage that has been inflicted and which continues to be inflicted on our planet and its people, becomes irretrievable.’
Every minister was dumbstruck. Agonising, long, minutes passed before Publius Gratius Balbus, who volunteered to undergo Immaculation in order to satisfy Ezra’s demand for a traitor to reveal himself, was the first to react.
“Can Quintus explain to us the reason why he has decided to blacken Ezra’s name when it is plainly evident that he has been forced to introduce laws to stop the inexorable drift into lawlessness and a further drift into insurrection? Surely now is the time to demonstrate our loyalty to Ezra, rather than the reverse?’
Before sitting down Publius looked to Quintus for a sign that his questions would be answered. Quintus satisfied him by a nod of his head.
‘That which I witnessed earl
ier today was but the straw that broke the donkey’s back. I believe it is unnecessary to describe in detail, but suffice to say it was nauseous in the extreme and epitomised the depths to which Ezra’s morality has sunk. What I am saying to you all is this. Consider the many ways in which our society has degenerated from those high ideals which were introduced and rigidly adhered to by our forefathers over five millennia. Immaculation and Proscription are two of the many odious laws that have been introduced for no reason other than to protect Ezra and his sycophants - and we, his Council of Ministers, have condoned and passed these laws without a murmur of dissent. To say I am ashamed at our, my, dereliction of duty is to put it mildly.’
He paused and looked directly at Publius.
‘Publius asked, is this not the time to show our loyalty to Ezra? I think not. Now is the time for us all to demonstrate our loyalty to those who governed Terra Nova before us; those who are descended from the brave souls who challenged and overcame the unknown when leaving Mother Earth. They are the ones to whom we should be loyal; not to a man who has destroyed all that our forebears so diligently put into place.’
Marcus Annius Verus, never one to keep his opinions to himself, was becoming increasingly restless as he listened to Quintus. As Minister for State Security he was personally responsible for the implementation of some of the most abhorrent laws proposed by Ezra, and subsequently ratified by the Council of Ministers - in particular those laws relating to Immaculation and Proscription. He was particularly reticent about criticising Ezra in public but, to his credit, he vociferously argued his case when he came face to face to Ezra in private meetings. Those raucous meetings became a thorn in the side of Ezra because, although he was not impervious to a degree of debate, he was domineeringly adamant in ensuring the outcome was always in total accord with his dictates. Marcus’s ministerial position, as a consequence, became more and more tenuous each time he raised questions about the validity of Ezra’s laws. But this situation was different. Here was Quintus Claudius Avitus, advocating against Ezra in an open forum, a situation which he found unacceptable. He rose slowly to his feet as a hush descended in anticipation of what was to come.
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