Critical Path

The young servant girl didn’t move. She looked at Aimee, who returned a nod.

The girl scurried over, took the platter, and reached for Augustus’ goblet. He held his hand flat over the top of it. “Bring me some root wine.”

Augustus yawned. He needed a fix—another reason why he had to take control of Unity. With the destruction and revolt of the farms and the harvesters, the town provided the only protected source of root he knew of.

Aimee stood. “Join me by the fire. We still have things to discuss.”

She sauntered over to a pair of wooden chairs positioned in front of a stone hearth that was already crackling with flames. Augustus followed and sat down. The croatoan picked up a section of sawn log and clumsily tossed it onto the fire. Red embers shot across the floor around Augustus’ sandals.

“Careful, you stupid…” he trailed off.

The alien let out four raspy clicks. Aimee rubbed its arm again. “You can leave us to it. I’ll join you shortly.”

The thought of her having sex with the creature turned Augustus’ stomach—if that’s what was happening, the rumors were that she had yet to have intercourse with anyone or anything, but she seemed overly fond of this one. Integration had its limits, and fornication crossed his personal line. Besides that, the croatoans were relegated to a minority in his mind, susceptible to a coordinated human attack if the remaining population managed to organize themselves. She was nailing her colors to the wrong mast. Augustus shook his head.

“Is there something wrong?” Aimee said.

“No. I was just thinking about how I could be of best use to your town. I have impeccable administrational and leadership skills. The ludus is… fun, as you would say, but I can offer so much more.”

It felt so low having to sell himself to her, but the hand that wields the knife never wears the crown. Others could do the dirty work; he had to remain clean in the eyes of her supporters.

“You’re planning on staying around after all?” Aimee said.

“This seems to be the best place to start rebuilding our world now the alien council is no more. Together we can regain the glory of our former empires.”

The servant brought two goblets of root wine. Augustus felt a noticeable lift almost immediately after two large gulps. Aimee drank greedily; wine dribbled from the side of her vessel, down her chin, and onto the front of her dress.

Although centuries younger than he, he reckoned she also feared a rapid ageing process without a regular supply of the croatoan root.

“Because of your previous rank, I’m prepared to give you a senior position on the local council—this is something I’ve been considering since you came back to Earth in such a spectacular way last month. You can keep your ludus if you can ensure a regular supply for the arena. We’ll review your status after a couple of months.”

She gave him a condescending smile.

Augustus resisted throwing the contents of his goblet in her face. He couldn’t take much more of her arrogance. He smiled. “Very well. Entertainment is a key part of keeping up morale. Tomorrow, Jackson will be a retiarius. A step up in sophistication from the usual sword-swinging butchery you’ve served up here.”

Aimee shrugged. “What’s a retiarius?”

“It’s normal when facing a heavy opponent like your champion.” Augustus swung his arm around his head. “Jackson will have a weighted net and a three-pointed trident. It’s designed to make him more agile to make up for the lack of armor. We want to at least make it appear like a fair fight.”

Augustus viewed it as a no-lose situation. He knew Jackson bettered the hunter Baliska and heard all of the whining stories from that useless lump of excrement Gregor. If Jackson proved triumphant, he’d get rid of one problem—Aimee’s lethal bodyguard. If he lost, it would still be pleasurable, especially if Jackson remained alive and Augustus could don the robe and mask of Charon and inflict the deathblow with a large sledgehammer to the temple.

Having missed his opportunity on the mother ship, Augustus was eager for another.

“You’re daydreaming, Augustus,” Aimee said. “What do you see in your dreams?”

“A crushed insect,” Augustus said. He clapped his hands together and smiled at the thought of Charlie Jackson being squashed under the foot of his superiors.

“Just remember,” Aimee said. “If you help me, I can make your life in this town comfortable. Our strength is teamwork, living together and sharing resources.”

Augustus slowly nodded and held his goblet toward Aimee. She clinked her vessel against his and smiled. Most of what she said was meaningless to him. Soon, she would find out exactly how efficient he could be.

The last true Roman yielded to no man, or woman.

CHAPTER FIVE

Layla smiled at Venrick as they looked at each other through the window.

Although the croatoans didn’t really have the musculature to smile, there was a kind of eye movement that indicated a show of friendship. Layla picked this up from a number of the smaller engineer-types in the farms.