Muses of Roma (Codex Antonius Book 1)

by Rob Steiner

  “I know where it is, Guardsman. I've been here before. Just open the doors so I’m not delayed any longer than I already am.”

  The Guardsman nodded, then tapped a few keys on his terminal. The thick glass doors behind him clicked, then slid open to the right. Appius strode through the doors, while Lucia made a show of prodding Blaesus and Daryush to follow. They entered a small, doorless corridor that led to an elevator at the end.

  Lucia leaned close to Blaesus and asked, “How are you doing?”

  “Sweating like a gladiator,” he replied in a harsh whisper. “These thermal masks are lovely outside, but hotter than—”

  Appius turned with glare. “Quiet.”

  They entered the elevator without another word. Appius pressed the button for the first level rather than the third.

  “Your friends should be in the 988 section on level one,” Appius explained.

  “Will the guards be any trouble?” she asked.

  “No,” he said. He pulled his own hidden pistol from his black vest, checked the rounds, and then returned it to his vest. “Getting in will be easy. Getting out will be the challenge, as we discussed.”

  When Appius had told Lucia the plan, she thought its chances for success were slim. Now that she was here, she wondered if the plan wasn’t suicidal. Yes, the compound was lightly guarded due to its remote location. But these were still Praetorian Guardsman, the elite Roman security force. They would be hard to kill; even the green men downstairs were trained to deal with attempted breakouts.

  Blaesus tested his wristbands. “Are you sure these will come off when I pull? Because they seem tight to me.”

  “I cut them myself,” Lucia snapped. “A good tug will do, but wait until we get past the guards.”

  Daryush regarded his wristbands and gave them a gentle pull. They snapped and fell to the floor.

  Lucia cursed and picked them up just as the elevator door slid open.

  One guard sat at a terminal in front of glass doors that led to the prison cells. The Guardsman looked up as they exited the elevator. He also seemed like a fresh recruit, and he had the bored gaze of a man lulled to complacency by a dull post.

  “Prisoner transfer,” Appius said, stepping forward to hand the young Guard his com pad.

  The Guard eyed his terminal. “Yes, sir. I’ll just need to see—”

  Appius brought his pistol up with his other hand and shot the young Guard in the head. The Guard fell backward in his chair and hit the floor, his skull and brains dripping down the glass doors behind him.

  Appius rushed around to the Guard's body, pulled a large knife from his coat, and hacked off the Guard's right hand. He stood up, placed the bloody hand on the desk, and then punched a few keys on the Guard's terminal. The glass doors behind him clicked open. “Let's go,” he said, grabbing the bloody hand and bolting into the cell corridor.

  Lucia swallowed. Blaesus pulled apart his wrist bands and retrieved a pistol from his coat. Daryush stared wide-eyed at the dead Guard, now handless and, for the most part, headless.

  “Come on, big man,” Lucia said from behind him. He tore his gaze from the Guard and moved to follow Blaesus and Appius into the corridor.

  All four checked the narrow rectangular windows on each door. Lucia counted twenty cells, ten on each side of the corridor. She peeked through the windows on the left side while Appius and Blaesus took the right.

  The first three cells were empty. In the fourth one she saw Kaeso.

  “In here,” Lucia cried out. When she said that, Kaeso leaped up from his cot and stared astonished at Lucia through the window. He shook his head and grinned.

  Appius rushed over, placed the Guard's bloody hand on the door pad, and the door clicked open. Kaeso, dressed in yellow prison garb with no shoes, pushed the door open and charged out.

  Before she could open her mouth, he said, “Nestor, Ocella, and Gaia Julius should be next to my cell.”

  “Nestor and who?”

  “Later,” Kaeso said, then rushed passed her and hurried to the cell next door.

  “Glad to see you, too,” Lucia muttered.

  She stood beside Kaeso and looked into the fifth cell’s window. A middle-aged woman stared back at her, trying to get a glimpse of the commotion outside. Appius opened the door with the Guard’s hand, leaving a bloody smear on the pad. Though she was also dressed in yellow prison coveralls, the woman stepped out as if she had entered the Senate. She held her chin high, regarding Lucia, Appius, Blaesus, and Daryush with cool eyes and a frown. Her lip curled when she saw how Appius was opening the doors. They were obviously not the rescue she expected.

  You must be Gaia Julius, Lucia thought.

  “Don't forget the boy,” Gaia said.

  “Where is he?” Appius asked, looking through the next cell’s window.

  “Is he not here?” Gaia asked.

  “Haven't seen him yet.”

  Appius placed the hand on the door pad, leaving another bloody smear. Nestor stepped out and took Lucia in a large hug.

  “I knew you were crazy,” he laughed, “but I had no idea you'd attack a Praetorian compound. I cannot wait to hear your story.”

  Blaesus and Daryush came over to Nestor, both smiling. Blaesus slapped Nestor on the shoulder. “It is a long story fraught with peril and perdition, my good medicus.”

  “Later,” Kaeso growled. He nodded toward Appius who was still checking cell windows. “Who's he?”

  “Another long story,” Lucia said.

  “I found Marcia Licinius,” Appius announced. He opened the door with his gruesome key. “Time to leave,” he said to the occupant. He did a double take, and frowned. “Do you want to leave or not?”

  “Of course,” a woman's voice said from inside the cell. “Lead the way, Praetorian.”

  An Indian woman with short brown hair, who appeared to be Lucia's age, stepped out of the cell. She carried herself with the same haughtiness as Gaia Julius, which made Lucia wonder if she was also a patrician.

  “Ocella?” Kaeso said with concern.

  “Where’s Cordus?” Ocella asked calmly. “We cannot leave without him or this was all for nothing.”

  “He's not here,” Appius said, reaching the end of the corridor.

  “Where else would they keep him?” Kaeso asked.

  An alarm blared in the hallway. They all winced at the piercing wail. Appius ran past Lucia. “Let's go!”

  Lucia glanced at Kaeso, then followed the Praetorian, with the rest in pursuit.

  In the Guard station, Appius hurried over to the storage locker and yanked it open. Over a dozen stun batons hung from hooks inside.

  “How are we getting off the compound?” Kaeso asked. “And could I have a weapon?”

  “First question, the roof,” Appius said. “Second question, knife or baton?”

  “Knife,” Kaeso said. Appius handed Kaeso the bloody knife he’d used to cut off the Guard’s hand. Kaeso wiped it on the Guard's pants, and tucked it through his coat belt.

  Ocella grabbed Appius's arm. “We cannot leave without Cordus,” she said firmly.

  “If we don't leave now, none of us will.”

  “The Liberti is right,” Gaia said. “We can’t leave the boy. Better to die rescuing him than leave him with the Praetorians. They will use him to find us anyway.”

  Lucia couldn't believe what she heard. “Are you two insane? Praetorian commandos are going to charge through that door any second and you want to take them on?”

  “Wait,” Blaesus said from the Guard station. He stared at the terminal, reading the text that scrolled down the screen. “It’s not us. It says 'all available units assemble in exit 3 to repel imminent assault.'”

  “They’re under attack?” Kaeso asked, rushing to where Blaesus stood.

  Appius leaned forward. “Impossible. Nobody can get within a hundred miles without being detected.”

  Lucia was about to ask if it was Umbra Ancilia when her collar com vibrated against her neck. She'
d switched the com to vibrate out of habit when off the ship, even though nobody was on Caduceus to call her.

  She tapped the collar com. “Who is this?” she asked.

  “Uh, is this the trierarch of the Liberti ship?” a young voice asked.

  The eyes of everyone in the room swung to Lucia.

  “Who is this?” Lucia repeated.

  “Cordus,” Ocella said, and moved to Lucia. “Where are you, Cordus? Are you all right?”

  “Ocella! I am fine, for now, but I am on the Liberti ship. I assume this is the one rescuing us?”

  Ocella laughed. “A lucky assumption, but yes. Stay there, we're on our way.”

  “I will not leave without you.”

  Lucia stared at Ocella. “How did he...?”

  “We’ll ask him later,” Kaeso said. “Let's get to the ship.”

  Once they all crowded into the elevator, Appius slammed the button for the first level. When the elevator reached the ground floor, the escapees pushed themselves against the sides of the elevator, and Appius held up his pistol. The doors slid open. Appius scanned the area, then lowered his weapon.

  “Clear,” he said, hurrying out. He rushed to a locker behind the deserted guard station, whipped the door open, and threw jackets, thermal hoods, and boots onto the floor at the feet of the former prisoners. “They keep these for transfers outside the compound. Lucky for us they don't use off-compound clothing.”

  They dressed within seconds. Appius pushed through the glass doors and into the vestibule in front of the metal door. He pulled his thermal mask over his head and neck, then slammed his hand on the door pad. The door slid open with a metallic grind. Lucia had just pulled her thermal mask over her head when a blast of frigid air hit her. Appius raced out the door and toward Caduceus.

  A shot cracked from behind them. Blood sprayed from Appius's neck and he went down. He did not move. Lucia blinked and then knelt down next to Appius while the others raced toward the ship. Kaeso stopped with Lucia.

  “He's gone,” Kaeso yelled as more shots kicked up snow around them.

  “I know.” She pried Appius's gun from his hand. “We might need this.”

  Kaeso pulled Lucia up and they both raced toward the ship, pulse bullets cutting the air around them.

  Lucia was startled to see Appius go down, but she never trusted him anyway. That was cold considering how he helped them, but it kept any regrets at bay while she tried saving her centuriae and crew.

  The escapees had all entered the cargo bay, and Blaesus shut the Cargo One ramp door as Lucia and Kaeso leaped into the bay. Lucia kept running past the others and up the ladder to the command deck. Kaeso followed, as Daryush hurried to the engine room.

  On the command deck, a boy jumped up from her pilot's couch. A part of her wanted to bow to the boy. He was the Consular Heir to the Roman Republic!

  And the host of a psychotic alien virus. That thought made it easier to push past him and jump into her pilot’s couch.

  “Are they shooting at us?” he asked.

  “Yes,” she said.

  Kaeso strapped himself into his command couch and tapped the ship's intercom on his display. “All crew find a delta couch and strap yourselves in. We're going to delta sleep as soon as we clear the atmosphere.”

  Lucia ran the engine startup, her eyes flitting to the window, watching for commandos. The ship’s ion engines roared to life, and she saw that Daryush had started spooling the way line engines.

  “Um, where should I sit?”

  Without glancing back, Lucia said, “Go to a cabin on the second level. Use a delta couch there.”

  “Can I use this—?”

  “That's Nestor’s. Get off the command deck.”

  The boy sighed, but then hurried away just as Nestor entered the command deck and strapped himself into his delta couch.

  “This is all moot,” Nestor said, working his delta controls. “We won't get a two miles before the orbiting Eagles shoot us down.”

  “How did you get down here?” Kaeso asked Lucia.

  “Appius did something to the beacon.” She quickly explained what the former Praetorian did. “Welcome to the Vacuna, Centuriae.”

  Kaeso raised an eyebrow. “Can you do it again?”

  She shook her head. “Almost destroyed the com system. Ship can’t take that kind of overload again. Ion engines are online.

  “Wayline engines?” Kaeso asked.

  “Daryush is spooling them. They’ll be up before we leave atmosphere.”

  “How long?”

  A series of pings came from the outer hull, and she looked out her window. Six black-clad commandos rushed toward them, all firing at the ship with pulse rifles.

  Lucia didn't wait for Kaeso's command to lift off. She tapped the sliders on her pilot's control board, the ship lurched, then the inertia cancellers kicked in and the ride turned smoother. Pings still resounded off the hull until they were two hundred feet in the air.

  “Course?” she asked Kaeso.

  He pulled a collar com from a basket next to his couch, clipped it to his yellow prison tunic, then said, “Gaia, Ocella, Cordus, if you're in a delta couch, pick up the receivers.”

  A few moments later, Gaia's voice came over the com. “I'm here, Centuriae.”

  “Ocella here.”

  Then, “Cordus here, too.”

  “Where are we going?” he asked. “And we need to know now.”

  Gaia said, “There's a Saturnist planet.”

  “No,” Ocella said, “we can't waste any more time. Cordus? We need to go to the planet we talked about. We need the proof before the Romans find us again.”

  “What planet?” Gaia asked.

  “Cordus?” Ocella asked again.

  There was a pause, then Cordus said, “Centuriae?”

  “Yes.”

  “When I was on the command deck, I noticed your engines are a bit...untraditional. Can you get us to a specific planet without using the main way lines? If you can, I can give you the exact numbers.”

  Lucia gaped at Kaeso. How did that kid know our engines can do that?

  Kaeso said, “Yes. Give me the way line numbers.”

  Cordus relayed a set of numbers and Lucia entered them into the reconfigured way line navigation system. She frowned at the numbers as she entered them. When Cordus read the last number, Lucia shot a look at Kaeso.

  “Centuriae, that’s—”

  Proximity alarms blared. Lucia’s radar showed two Roman air fighters, a hundred miles away, screamed toward them at three times the speed of sound.

  “Two Falcons approaching from the north— Missile launch!” Four, then six, then twelve missiles popped up on Lucia's display.

  Kaeso tapped his com. “All crew prepare for delta sleep.”

  “Centuriae,” Nestor said, “engaging way line engines in the atmosphere will tear us apart.”

  “Those were the old engines,” Kaeso said.

  Nestor just exhaled.

  The alpha way lines every school child knew always began at a point two thousand miles from a planet's atmosphere. No one ever determined why two thousand miles, so the priests attributed it to divine calculation, and said any way line jump attempts outside that jump point would meet disaster. Subsequent experimentation confirmed it.

  But quantum way lines intersected with a planet’s core. Could the new engines find them while still in atmosphere?

  They were about to find out. “Course set, Centuriae. Piloting controls transferred to your terminal.”

  She leaned her head back, waiting for delta sleep. She turned to Kaeso and watched his grim determination until her eyes closed.

  Lepidus exited the compound's main entrance near the landing yards when a deep boom rumbled across the landscape. The shockwave hit him a moment later, a blast of hot wind out of place in this frigid land.

  Did the Falcons kill them? If they did, the Consul would have the pilots crucified before the day was out.

  He walked to where A
ppius lay in the hard packed snow, blood turning the white ground a dark crimson around his head.

  “They’re gone,” he said.

  Appius blinked behind his thermal mask. Lepidus held out a hand, and Appius took it to rise to his feet. “The bitch took my gun.”

  “We’ll get you a new one,” Lepidus said. “Let's get inside before that pig's blood freezes solid on your neck.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  As they strode back to the compound, Lepidus noticed Appius’s frown.

  “What is it?”

  “We lost good men today.”

  “You doubt the wisdom of the Consul?”

  “No, Evocatus. I understand why the escape had to appear real. I just...hope they will receive proper funerals.”

  Once they entered the metal doors to the compound, Lepidus turned to Appius. “They are Roman heroes. The gods will welcome them all to Elysium with triumphs. Besides, they were young and inexperienced, so their loss will not terribly damage the state. They were sacrificed for that reason.”

  Appius nodded. “I don't understand how letting the Liberti go will aid us. Once they take a way line, we'll lose them.”

  Lepidus sighed. “It sounds to me you are doubting the Consul again.”

  When Appius was about to protest, Lepidus raised a hand. “I know how confusing this must seem. There are parts of the plan to which you are not privy. All you need is faith in the Consul and the gods that the part you play will keep Roma safe from her enemies.”

  Appius nodded, but his eyes told Lepidus the boy did not have the faith Lepidus required in his apprentices. He was certainly good at what he did, but without faith, he would never serve the gods and the Roman state with the unquestioning devotion they deserved. Lepidus feared that when this mission was over, he would need to search for another apprentice, and Appius would be relegated back to the Praetorian commandos from which Lepidus plucked him. It saddened Lepidus and frustrated him, but he would not give the gods and the state a successor that did not share his loyalty.

  Now he had to hurry to the shuttle that would take him to the orbiting Eagle fleet assigned to follow the Liberti ship. He didn’t know where the ship was going, or even how the Eagles would follow it.