2018-09-12 at 10:43 AM UTC
Conquering Europe was easy, too easy. Fire was all around us while I was distracted with victory. Nothing is ever as easy it seems, but Dido isn't disturbed. We are in this together. The further we expand the more trouble we create. This isn't what we wanted. Our only advantage is that we move faster than people expect. Except they never thought of this, of history reaching up out from the ground and pulling down the ankle of every traitor. Doubts plagued me. What did this have to do with the sunlight? Why did we ever leave the shore?
Every time I looked for her, she was gone, but I had no time to wonder why we were here. Overestimating the abilities of my undead army, I forgot where I was, but remember that this was not the age of iron or bronze but of materials far deadlier. Feeling into the near future, the heat of our deaths warms me, we have made a deadly mistake. Dido refuses to listen to me. We must retreat back to Carthage. This isn't admitting defeat. We will collect our thoughts, no one can even comprehend the terror we have brought.
Let us become weak again so that we do not die.
Dido refuses.
2018-09-12 at 10:56 AM UTC
Dido was right. Retreating was a terrible mistake, our entire advantage was advancing and using the wake of dead to our advantage. As we retreat our legions are decimated by missile and rocket and shell alike, except they are not replaced. We continue to lose and lose ground. It has only been two weeks since Dido and I were looking into the sea, wondering what could be. What should have been. What was in that sea? Something older than death, the stench of it follows me still.
All of this is an ever increasing weight on me, I seem so much smaller now. Dido is convinced we need to retake Greece. War is exhausting. Every word she speaks echos in my head. She tells me to go to sleep but I'm afraid of what I will wake up to.
Our ventures in Africa pay off.
2018-09-12 at 11:09 AM UTC
We found it before the Chinese, or the Americans, and we kept the both of them from our prize using every last resource we had. It was only after we were about to admit defeat that they let us walk with our triumph, a relic older than old. Hours, hours I spent with faceless bureaucrats in fluorescent rooms until we achieved a sort of understanding. In the short term we could supply the major world powers with what they needed. We could patrol our ancient seas, but we had to remove our forces from Europe, except for a few fortresses in Spain. After days of nonstop bargaining in the dim light of government, I return to the shore.
There is no one there. I remember Alexander the Great. I feel nothing. Hours go by as I soak in the ocean and Dido places her hand on me, it is time to go home. Back to Carthage.
2018-09-12 at 11:31 AM UTC
It wasn't what I expected, but it was what we deserved. As the last of our laughs left us and the sun drew to a close, as we moved ourselves back to our new Carthage, our lovely City, we saw the explosion. Immediately we knew it was Israel that launched this nuke. The destruction that was becoming evident was in the back of our minds. Our armies had already reduced Carthage to nothing but an undead enclave of our servants. Beautiful, grand, but entirely empty of life. Dido did not feel loss, nor did I. We were worried. Would this trigger more nukes?
This was too bittersweet. It's not that the nuke mattered, really. But what was the point of any of this if destruction just followed? Dido, she was full of life. She wasn't worried, I was worried. I start to wonder if we're on the same side, but I banish thought because I can feel her inside my veins and she is definitely paying attention to every twitch. A thousand years passed before the physical force of the bombs hit our blind eyes. Focusing on the light all I could see was her green eyes, a green planet.
We regain our senses. A barren wasteland awaits us and so we smile, because we were sent to rebuild.
2018-09-12 at 12:07 PM UTC
Closing my eyes was no different than having them open. Certainly this was our doom, but I felt the touch of a ghost on my eyes and Dido spoke nonsense to me. Nothing changed, but I could see. What manner of sorcery were we involved in? She held my face in her hands and every question came out, and I felt so silly that I remembered everything. It might not have been everything but she let go of my drooling face as my mind wandered to where we were before. The gravity of the situation hit me, in the middle of nowhere, lost prophets of a God designed to abandon.
It made sense, we fell to hubris. How does one even measure the success of a necromantic uprising? Truth be told we did well enough, but two people against Time isn't enough to defeat Rome. Dido is never impressed with my excuses. A trip to Atlantis should get things off our minds - but how did we get to Atlantis? That's the least of things you should forget. Dido is all over my senses, as if I should try to forget.
She winks, and I ignore it.
2018-09-13 at 1:22 AM UTC
Not even twice especially.
