Silentium et Ordinem

For the glory of Rome?

Dacia 101 AD [Bulgaria]

The rain streamed down from the sky. It came and hit everything beneath it, sparing nothing that was out from cover or shelter of some sort. As it hit the ground, the blood which stained it flowed around like a river, diverting itself as it met each object. The rain, no matter where it fell made it to the ground, no matter the obstacle.

It fell upon the cool steel blade and ran down the handle, again, making the blood which covered the unsheltered surface, traveling down the perfect metal and onto the ground. This blood did not divert, it went straight and flowed like the most flawless tributary. Much blood covered this blade, much blood from many different beings. This blood had been spilled and weighed down with guilt, it wore upon the blade not like a medal or paramount achievement, but that of a truth that had been wrongly realized.

Numerius stood motionless, his body still and calm while the rain came hammering in sideways, stinging what skin he had left exposed. He held his gladius in his hand, the longer it seemed to stay there, the heavier it seemed to get. But the weight was one that he was going to bear. As he was being cleansed by nature, the physical guilt had left him, it also left behind the allegorical sense of wrong, of pain. Although he was not hurt, he definitely felt like he was. His breaths were invariable, in and out like an unchanging force, visible because of the temperature. Now, just like every other time, he didn't care, he simply stood and took whatever nature gave him, as he had done his whole life. It was what he was taught. Although his exterior was still, his mind was moving, rapidly thinking and doing, as it always was for a man of his intelligence.

Before him lay something that his eyes could not fathom, neither could any part of his being accept or deny, both were equally worse things for him now, acceptance and denial, both seeming like sins. For this horrible act, he would not allow himself to give in to either, nor anything of the sort. Numerius looked down upon the rivers of blood flowing from human bodies. The lifeless cadavers were left in the positions they had died in. Various ones on top of others. Most contorted in horrible ways. Being in the army for about 5 years now, by this time, war had given him many sights to behold of the dead after battle. Enemies on the battlefield were most often barbarians clad in bloodstained armor and brandishing weapons meant for killing Romans, for killing Numerius's brothers in arms, his extended family of sorts. It filled his mind during times of peace, about how all he wanted to do was to kill this enemy, and this enemy was unquestionably his. And because of this, when he saw them laying dead upon the ground after the battle, he felt no remorse nor any sense of compunction towards them.

Now however, fate had chosen a different situation to present the dead, but these dead were not just put before him for his mere seeing and acknowledgment, they put here by him. This fact is what put him in this state, consisting of questioning his very own purpose, his life, and more importantly, his loyalty.

Numerius looked upon the deceased. They did not look like the enemies that had been slain on the battlefield that he had seen before. These beings were people, villagers, and unquestionably not his enemy. They had been wrongly made so. Even upon riding into this small Dacian village, Numerius had begun to see it, only after killing all these innocent women, children and otherwise innocuous people did he realize his moral contravention. On the ground before him were several dead children. Their bodies were covered from head to toe in blood and mud, their faces were static in a state of shock, terror and pain. These expressions were only supposed to be held by slain enemies of Rome, not innocent children.

Finally, after what appeared to be an eternity, Numerius moved. He picked up his scutum shield, which was freestanding on the ground to his immediate left. He picked it up and held onto it. With his head still down, rain dripping from his helmet, Numerius closed his eyes and respired deeply. The thoughts that were stinging inside his head were like that of a sword or spear, slowed, darkened and shimmered away until they were nothing. Only when the serenity of a clear mind had set itself, Numerius felt something grasp his shoulder.