Last Prophecy of Rome

Sixty-One

Paul Pasgarius the Third’s trip to Italy was the first time he’d ever left the United States. It had been a struggle to get from the airport to the place he had been told to meet Constantine. Just as he had been warned, security cordons were everywhere.

He glanced anxiously at his watch. Constantine was late. Had he been scared off — or stopped at one of the checkpoints? Paul wondered how Constantine would carry the large bag of cash he had promised.

Then he felt a hand on his shoulder. He turned around, and saw an unexpected face.

‘Constantine?’ he asked.

The man nodded. ‘Thanks for coming, Paul.’

Paul recognised Constantine immediately, from all the news about the terror threat to America. He tried to pretend he hadn’t, swallowing hard to hide his nerves. ‘Can we make it quick, please?’ He looked Constantine up and down, disconcerted that the man didn’t seem to be carrying a bag of currency. ‘Do you have the money?’ he asked.

Constantine nodded. ‘I do,’ he said, reaching into his pocket. But instead of cash, he pulled out a packet of gum and presented it to Paul as if they were two friends passing the time.

Paul instinctively took the stick he was offered, unwrapped it and folded it into his mouth. ‘Thank you,’ he said.

He was surprised to see Constantine put the packet back in his jacket pocket, and equally surprised by the gum’s strange taste. ‘Er, you’re not having gum yourself?’ queried Paul.

The man shook his head. Within moments Paul understood why, as he felt his throat tighten.

‘No gum for me,’ said Constantine matter-of-factly. ‘Some people would say gum-chewing is disrespectful, and disrespect for authority can bring down empires,’ he mused. ‘But for me, I just try to avoid gum which has been dipped in strychnine.’ He sauntered away.

Paul Pasgarius the Third’s dead body slumped behind him.

Sixty-Two

Darkness closed in. Myles felt his body drift, as if it had lost its weight. He imagined himself rise out of the chamber which had threatened to become his tomb. He was floating.

Visions invaded his mind. Dreams from ancient Rome: he pictured the Hun, the barbarian warriors from the east who had outmatched the Romans in battle. He remembered the descriptions of them — narrow-eyed, with squat heads and flat faces. The Romans had always described the Asiatic horsemen as ugly, using words of intolerance. He remembered how the leader of the barbarians, Attila-the-Hun, had held civilisation to ransom. When Rome couldn’t pay, the ‘eternal city’ was ransacked and it never recovered from the rampage of 455 AD. It meant that Rome’s last military expedition — to Libya, in 468 AD — was a fiasco, and soon the Roman Empire was formally declared dead. An imperial order was the death certificate, signed in 476 AD.

Myles imagined the Hun presenting the official paper to him now. He was being asked to sign the end of the Roman Empire. To sign away civilisation, to sign away his life… Myles refused to take the pen, but someone grasped his wrist. He was being forced to sign.

Myles mustered his strength. He tried to move his arm, to keep it away from the paper, but he was too weak. Finally, he just managed to throw his arm sideways. Whoever was grasping it was knocked to the ground. The paper was taken away. Myles knew the Empire’s death certificate would be brought back to him soon.

He became aware of the person who had grabbed his wrists. The person, who Myles had thrown to the floor, was in pain. Myles looked over and recognised the narrow Asiatic eyes described in the ancient texts.

Myles had been captured by the Hun.

He became aware of his surroundings: the flat walls of a nomadic tent, the sort used by the barbarian horseback riders, who had been ancient Rome’s final adversary. The tent had been painted green, like the steppes of Asia from where the horsemen had come. Then he saw another Hun approach him with a spear. Myles could not resist. He felt pain as the weapon was plunged into his arm. Then he felt weak. His entire being was slipping away. Like the Roman Empire, he was passing into history.

The thoughts dribbled away until he could think no more.

It took many more hours for the drowsiness to pass, although Myles had lost his ability to feel time passing. Only gradually did Myles realise he had conjured pictures of ancient Rome and imagined himself there. History had mingled with the present.

Slowly, Myles recognised he was in a sick bay. The tent was not the home of barbarian horsemen, but a green surgical curtain. It surrounded the stretcher-bed, to which he had been strapped.

‘Hello?’ he asked, although he wasn’t sure who he was asking.

An Asiatic health orderly came to Myles’ bedside. She was soon joined by a more senior-looking doctor with a peculiar logo on his breast pocket. The doctor’s face also marked him as from the Far East. Myles saw a few Chinese characters on some well-kept medical equipment.

‘So you’re awake, then?’ said the doctor in an oriental accent.

‘Yes, thank you,’ Myles replied — awake but groggy. He wasn’t sure what to ask first: where was he? How had he got there? Who was looking after him?

The doctor saw his confusion and smiled. ‘It’s all right,’ he said. ‘You’ve been with us for a while now, and there’s no sign of any problems at all with your head.’

The doctor reached over for an MRI scan and passed it to Myles. Myles tried to understand the image, which was on a large sheet of photographic film. It just looked like a picture of a brain in shades of grey. He looked back up at the doctor. ‘Er, thank you,’ he said, turning it sideways to see if it made more sense. It didn’t.

‘We did other tests on you as well,’ explained the doctor. ‘You’ve got elevated levels of calcium in your blood, and it looks like you’ve been exposed to some sort of disease recently, but it’s nothing too serious,’ he said, smiling. ‘Basically you’re fine.’

Myles barely absorbed the doctor’s words. He was still staring at his brain scan, and pointed at the edge of the scan, where his skull looked like it was nicked.

‘Yes, it’s a small fracture,’ said the doctor, nodding. ‘Probably caused by the explosion — or the fall. But you were lucky. You were the only survivor we found.’

Myles was obviously still very confused. He was sure Juma was still alive. ‘You only found one vehicle?’ he asked.

‘There may have been others, but they would have driven off before we arrived.’ The doctor explained how workers had seen two fireballs in the desert, just over the horizon. They’d gone to investigate — taking heavy security with them, of course. There they had found the dead bodies and the single overturned vehicle, which they pulled away to discover Myles. He had been lifted out on a stretcher, semi-conscious the whole time. ‘It’s not our business to ask whether it was an accident or what you Americans call a “shoot-out”,’ said the doctor.

‘I’m not American,’ said Myles. He wondered about his words as he said them. He wasn’t American, it was true. But in his culture, his attitudes and his outlook on life, he realised he had much in common with many from the United States. He was even in love with a woman from New York. He was certainly more American than the medical team who had just saved his life.

‘You said “workers”,’ he added. ‘How many workers do you have here?’

‘We have about fifty managers from China, then about two-hundred-and-fifty locals working on the rigs,’ said the doctor.

Suddenly the commercial logo on the doctor’s clothes made sense: oil. ‘So you’re the guys that bought up Iraq’s oil after the American troops left?’ asked Myles.

‘That’s right,’ nodded the doctor. ‘You guys did the fighting, we’re making the profit.’ The doctor smiled apologetically. Myles thought about arguing the point, but realised there was no need. The doctor already understood many Americans resented China buying up Iraq’s mineral resources.

‘Doctor, you know the Romans towards the end of their Empire relied on grain being shipped in from abroad, from North Africa,’ Myles explained. ‘When those lands fell to the barbarians they lost their last chance.’

‘You need rest.’

Myles accepted the doctor was right. Only now did he realise how tired he was. Not since he had been in custody in London had he had a proper night’s sleep. The medical team had wired him up to a drip, providing him with fluids which his body craved. His muscles were sore. Myles knew he was a wreck.

‘You said I had high levels of calcium in my blood,’ he asked.

‘Yes,’ said the doctor. ‘Looks like you’ve been eating chalk!’

Myles paused to absorb the information. ‘Not lead?’

The doctor smiled. ‘No, lead and other heavy metals were fine. The elevated calcium won’t do much — it might even strengthen your bones. It is abnormal, but not dangerous. It needs to come down, and it will in a few days.’

‘Calcium, not lead?’

The doctor looked slightly offended. He was wondering why the tall Westerner was querying his medical advice. ‘Yes, calcium,’ he confirmed again. ‘Your lead levels were absolutely normal. Should they not be?’

Myles’ mind was still ticking over. ‘And you tested my blood for infections, too?’

‘Yes. You’d recently been exposed to smallpox, we think, but because you were vaccinated against it, the disease didn’t take hold.’ The doctor leant back and became authoritative. ‘You definitely need rest,’ he said. ‘Now, is there anything I can bring you? A book? TV?’

Myles was still digesting the information: it meant that in Germany he hadn’t been exposed to lead after all, just harmless calcium. He turned back to the doctor. ‘Do you follow the news? Has there been anything about Helen Bridle?’ he asked.

The doctor shook his head in ignorance. ‘I don’t know,’ he admitted.

Myles wondered what else to try. He pondered for a moment, then queried, ‘Can you download books here?’

He saw the doctor nod.

‘Then, doctor, can you get me a book, please. It was first published in 1776, and written by a man named Edward Gibbon.’

‘I’m not sure books that old are available online,’ said the doctor. ‘I’ll try. What’s the title?’

Myles’ face opened into a smile. ‘You should be able to get this one. It’s called The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.’

Ten minutes later the female orderly returned and presented Myles with an electronic book reader. Myles took the device eagerly and thanked her. Immediately Myles started to scroll down.

The Asiatic woman plumped up Myles’ pillow, so he could sit up and read. Seeing Myles already thoroughly absorbed in the book, she leant over to a television suspended from the ceiling. Quietly she swung it into place and put the remote control near her patient. But Myles was too busy with the electronic reading device to notice.

Myles kept pushing his thumb down until he reached the text itself.

The words were formed in the same language as the American Declaration of Independence. Perhaps not surprising: the book hailed from the same year. Substitute the word ‘president’ for ‘emperor’, and the book could apply to the States. Gibbon had even spoken of a ‘revolution’ when he explained the purpose of his masterpiece:

Gibbon seemed to fear democracy. He had opposed the ‘colonies’, as they then were, breaking away from the British Empire.

But it was not democracy which caused the decline; Gibbon seemed to blame corruption.

Myles jumped down to the events which actually brought down the Empire, when the city itself was sacked.

Then he found a vital sentence.

He paused, then lowered the book. The words rang through his brain. Why had Placidia told him to look at it again?

Myles wondered: Was ancient history like this really so important to the present day?

He remembered the lectures he’d given at university. History needed to be humble. ‘Some people say they study the past so they can learn from it,’ he often told his first year students. ‘They’re wrong. We study history to learn whose mistakes we’re copying.’ It made his undergraduates laugh.

History mattered, but Myles knew it was the present which mattered most. Juma was heading for Rome. He might already be there. And he was going to destroy the currency conference, now just days away.

Myles picked up the remote control and pointed it at the TV as he pressed. The screen came on. The picture showed a man and woman sitting behind a desk with a map of the world’s new superpower behind them — the news in Chinese.

He scrolled through the channels until he found an English language TV station. Instantly he recognised the voice of the presenter. It was Helen. She was back at work.

Myles stared at the image of her. He longed to be with her. As he studied her face, he saw there were no scars from the smallpox, and she didn’t even seem pale: the doctors in Turkey had cured her of septicaemia completely. Knowing she was safe made Myles’ whole body relax in relief.

He tuned his ears to hear her report, which he guessed had been recorded in the last few hours. From the way she moved as she read the news, Myles could tell she was even well-rested.

‘Confirmation that his father was killed in Iraq came with only a modest consolation for his son, Richard, who has been named as his successor by the State Governor,’ reported Helen. ‘The new Senator, still shocked by his father’s death, has pledged a return to Christian values, and to continue his father’s work protecting America from terrorists…’

There was footage of Dick Roosevelt being jostled by cameras and reporters.

‘…and since the recent Congressional scandal, in which indecent images were found on roughly half of the computers in the Senate, Dick Roosevelt — whose IT equipment was given the “all-clear” — is even being talked of as a future contender for President,’ continued Helen’s voiceover. ‘Although the US Constitution requires candidates to be thirty-five years old before they can run for that office…’

Myles was interrupted by the doctor rushing in, worried. ‘We logged your name earlier as Myles Munro — is that right?’ he asked. The man raised his voice at the end of his question, as if there was genuine doubt in his voice.

But Myles knew — there was no use pretending anymore. He had been on the run long enough. ‘Yes, I am.’ Myles guessed the doctor had just made the connection, and was about to have Myles arrested. But instead, the Chinese man just said, ‘Mr Munro, we have a call for you.’ He pressed a button on the TV remote, and glanced up at the screen, which went black for a few moments, while the doctor departed.

Then a new picture appeared. Sitting in a video-conferencing studio very far away was a familiar face.

Sixty-Three

Myles adjusted the volume and sat up in bed. The picture on the video conference was slightly hazy, and the image seemed to follow half a second behind the sound. But Myles didn’t mind. To see Helen again made him feel alive. From being in the middle of a strange hospital room, it seemed as though Myles had suddenly returned home. ‘Helen,’ he smiled to the image on the screen.

‘Myles — you’re alive!’

‘And so are you! Sorry about leaving you at the hospital.’

‘It’s OK,’ she accepted. ‘You did the right thing. You saved my life.’

The words made Myles feel much better. ‘Thank you — I hope we’re together again soon.’

‘Your head?’ she asked, squinting at the camera.

Myles was aware that Helen was looking above his face. He put his hand on his head and felt bandages. ‘It’s from yesterday,’ he explained. ‘The doctor here reckons no lasting damage.’

‘You sure, Myles?’

‘I think so. Look — they gave me the scan to prove it.’ Myles held up the picture from his brain scan.

Helen twisted her head to see it more clearly, but, like Myles, she soon concluded it only showed a brain. Without expert knowledge it could mean anything. Myles waved it away, agreeing the scan picture didn’t help.

He became aware someone was sitting next to Helen. Dick Roosevelt leant into view, and towards the video-conferencing camera. It made him slightly out of focus.

‘Dick Roosevelt here,’ he said. ‘You OK?’

‘Sure, Dick. And you?’

‘Thank you, yes, I’m OK,’ he said. ‘Bearing up.’ Dick was still shocked from the death of his father.

‘I’m sorry about your father, Dick. If it’s any consolation, he died as bravely as he lived,’ reported Myles, remembering Sam’s last moments. ‘He gave his life to save others.’

Dick Roosevelt nodded thoughtfully. ‘Juma killed him?’

Myles felt uneasy about giving too many details to a son still so obviously in shock. ‘I’ll give you the full story later,’ he said. ‘But yes, Juma was to blame.’

Helen started speaking again. ‘Myles, in case you’re still wondering, you’ve been cleared. Homeland Security have accepted those terrorist plans were planted on your computer. They know you’re innocent.’

‘How did they know?’

‘Internet tracks. Computer forensics told them you were set up. They knew the classified information was planted via the IP address in Iraq, although they still haven’t traced how the people in Iraq got the files.’

To Myles, it all seemed so long ago. It took him a while to understand the implications of it all. ‘So I’m welcome back in civilisation again?’

‘Yes, Myles. And we need to take a really big holiday together.’

No longer being on the run was a huge relief, but Myles knew it was too early for a break. ‘We can’t take a holiday yet, even though I’d love to. Juma’s still dangerous and he’s still out there.’

Dick shook his head slowly. ‘Don’t worry about him, Myles. We’re wise to the threat he poses, and we reckon we’re safe.’

‘He’s a psychopath,’ warned Myles. ‘Don’t underestimate him. He’s committed to bringing America down like Rome, and he’s the sort of person that does what he says he’s going to do — no matter how crazy.’

Helen sensed Myles and Dick Roosevelt were sparring a little. She tried to calm them down. ‘Myles, don’t forget Juma bluffs, too. It wasn’t bubonic plague in Constantinople, only smallpox. And in Germany, it wasn’t lead.’

‘I know — calcium, right?’

Helen and Dick both nodded.

‘But that doesn’t mean the threat’s over,’ said Myles. ‘The plague and the lead — that was Placidia, not Juma.’

Helen noticeably tensed up. She still reacted negatively to any mention of Placidia.

Dick tried to unpick Myles’ thinking. ‘You’re saying Placidia and Juma, even though they’re husband and wife, are working to different agendas? Why?’

Myles wasn’t quite sure. ‘Placidia’s very, very intelligent,’ he explained. ‘She’s the expert on ancient Rome, and she’s the one who always wants to minimise death.’

Helen reacted with sarcasm. ‘By threatening to kill people, right?’

‘Threatening to kill, but not actually killing them,’ said Myles. ‘Hence the calcium and smallpox, rather than lead and plague.’

Dick was nodding now. ‘And Juma?’

‘Juma actually enjoys causing suffering,’ explained Myles. ‘And I’m sure he’s going to blow up the currency conference in Rome.’

‘Why do you think that?’

Myles shrugged. ‘Because he told me he would.’

Dick still looked sceptical. ‘You know, it would be very difficult for Mr Juma to bring any harm at all to the conference in Rome,’ he said. ‘You’ve seen some of the security plan for the event. It’s even stronger now.’

The new Senator waited for Myles to reply, but the Englishman remained silent.

Helen moved towards the microphone. ‘Myles, I want to be with you. I want to be with you right now.’

‘I want to be with you, too, Helen.’

Dick Roosevelt looked slightly embarrassed at the couple’s show of affection. ‘You two, if you want to meet up, I can arrange for you to get together in Rome. Myles, if you’re still worried about security at the conference, you’re welcome see more of it. I’ll show you around myself, and I won’t let the Italian police interrupt you this time.’

Both Helen and Myles soon found themselves nodding.

‘OK, then. That’s agreed,’ concluded Dick. ‘I’ll get you flown out of there and we can all meet in Rome in a day or two.’

Helen blew Myles a kiss. ‘I love you, Myles,’ she said.

‘Love you too.’

Then Dick leant forward to press a button on the screen. For a moment his jacket shrouded the camera, dark and out of focus, before the picture went black.

Myles felt alive again: he’d been cleared by the authorities and he had spoken with Helen. Soon he’d have his vitality and he would be returning to civilisation… If he could stop Juma destroying it.