30,000 B.C. CHRONICLES
ROME
BY
MATTHEW THAYER
Rome is the fifth book in the 30,000 B.C. Chronicles series.
Copyright © 2017 by Matthew Thayer
30000bc.com
[email protected]
Cover art and drawings by Darko Tomic
ISBN # - 978-0-9883879-4-2
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
Table of Contents
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
CHAPTER THIRTY
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
EPILOGUE
***
THANK YOU READERS
DEDICATION
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
FAREWELL – AU REVOIR
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
ADDITIONAL BOOKS IN THE SERIES
CHAPTER ONE
Rome is a compilation of journal entries and voice transmissions created by time travelers shipwrecked in the Paleolithic. The members of the scientific expedition tell the tale in their own voice and style. Their quotes are unaltered and true.
TRANSMISSION:
Bolzano: “Maria Duarte, say you have not forgotten my oysters.”
Duarte: “Paul has your pouch. We filled it this morning.”
Bolzano: “Bravo! I just assured Captain Jones you would not let us down.”
Duarte: “What’re you making?”
Jones: “He won’t tell ya.”
Bolzano: “It is a surprise.”
Jones: “See.”
Duarte: “Smells good.”
Bolzano: “Where is Leonglauix?”
Duarte: “Gray Beard begged off at the last minute.”
Bolzano: “Pardon me?”
Duarte: “He didn’t want to come so we left him.”
Bolzano: “On the island? Is he ill?”
Duarte: “Nah, working on a new rope.”
Bolzano: “But . . . I have an important question.”
Duarte: “What do you want me to do about it, Sal? If it’s pressing, paddle over.”
Bolzano: “It is not that important.”
Duarte: “So, what are we drinking tonight?”
Bolzano: “I thought you would never ask!”
From the log of Paul Kaikane
Recreation Specialist
Sal laughed so hard he almost fell into the fire.
He was telling us about his older stepbrother in Milan who designed sex machines. We stood around the fire keeping warm as Sal filled us in on their rivalry and how he baited the guy into shaming himself at a family dinner party. He said he waited until the men were drinking brandy in his father’s study to tease his brother with, “Fabio, your wife claims you have been spending an inordinate amount of time with your latest sex device.”
“That struck a nerve!” Sal roared, laughing and throwing his head back so hard he teetered. If Jones hadn’t been there to steady him he would’ve gone in for sure. Sal didn’t miss a beat.
“How was I to know his predilections? Rather than take it as a joke, the imbecile leaped from his chair and shouted, ‘My wife does not understand me!’”
The Italian started giggling so hard he had to fight to tell the rest. He said they watched on his father’s wall of TV monitors as the knucklehead marched into the dining room to confront his wife in front of the family’s women. The wife had no idea what he was talking about, but she and the hens figured out pretty quick. He was having an affair with a brain simulation. Sal thought it was the most hilarious thing he’d ever heard. I guess you had to be there.
Or really hate your stepbrother.
My wife was only a couple horns of wine behind Sal and had no interest in sibling rivalries. She wanted to know about the sex machines. How they worked, all that. Typical Maria, always curious, even when she’s half in the bag. Salvatore said the machines got you off without touching anything but your mind. Neuron stimulation or something.
“Was it marketable?”
“Oh, yes. Father made oodles of money.”
“Your tried it?”
“Of course.”
“Tell me.”
“I would rather we sing.”
And that’s what they did, starting out with a duet from a German opera about angels, and then taking turns at solos. Some songs were modern and some in native dialects. We all warbled a few, even Jones. There’s not much else to do on a dark spring night in the hills and swamps of Rome.
The day started with Sal roping us into helping him with a new recipe for steak and oyster pie. We spent all morning gathering mushrooms, truffles and onions, and the afternoon messing with his stone oven, getting the limestone slabs and fire just right so the crusts would brown on top. Sal mostly pointed and drank while we did all the work.
He’s calling his latest vintage a “port.” It’s sweet for my taste, and more powerful than his usual juice. One thing I’ll say for Sal, apart from almost roasting his ass in the fire, he can hold his booze. Sometimes he gets wobbly, but he’s usually a happy drunk. It’d be hard to ask for a more entertaining host.
Maria never drinks on the island. It’s fun to see her loosen up like last night when she sang her solos and did her little dance. She closes her eyes and really gets into it, which makes me fall in love all over again.
Jones and I don’t usually hit the sauce very hard and we didn’t last night. Sal’s finally learned not to force it on us. We just pour it out when he’s not looking. Alcohol doesn’t make me happy the way it does him and Maria. I wouldn’t say I’m a mean drunk like my old man, but it’s hard not to start thinking about problems, stuff that needs to be done.
I’ve seen Jones get a good buzz on, let go and have fun, but his sense of duty makes it tough. Ten minutes did not go by last night without him flipping down his visor to scan the perimeter for hostiles. He and I ended up back at the table, stuffing our faces with oyster pie and sipping horns of spring water while Sal and Maria got louder and sillier.
Thought I might get lucky, but she was asleep the second her head hit the furs. Maria loves this bed in Sal’s guest room.
I’ve been up for about an hour, working on a To Do list for the sailing canoe. It’s a long list. Time to sign off and wake my sweetheart. If we’re going to leave, we’d better get moving.
TRANSMISSION:
Kaikane: “Time to go, babe. Dawn Patrol.”
From the log of Maria Duarte
Chief Botanist
I had been dreaming of my parents and an incongruous childhood visit to Nob Island in Old Town San Francisco, herds of mammoth swimming the channels beside our ferry and roars of lions echoing through the canyons of polymer buildings, when Paul gently traced a fingertip across my brow.
Surfacing slowly, struggling to hold on to Mother and Father as they faded
into the future, I awoke in such a haze it took a moment to register where I was. Lupercal Cave. Tossing aside fur covers and forcing myself to sit up lest I sink back to sleep, I listened to Paul pull on his leathers and lace his moccasins in the chill darkness. If our system for leaving Rome didn’t require such an early departure, I would have gladly dragged him back into bed.
I wonder why we sleep so soundly in Cpl. Bolzano’s cave. The circle of furs he has stacked in his guest chamber is no more comfortable than our pallet on the island. Could it be the wine? I did drink four horns, maybe five, but certainly far less than our host. Salvatore was in dandy form, singing opera and telling raunchy stories of home as he staggered around the fire. I bet he woke with a doozy of a hangover.
The tall Italian was snoring in his private chamber as we cleared the cave’s heavy hide doorway and emerged into the light of a quarter-moon. Following the dewy path through ferns and sedge to Salvatore’s hilltop “patio,” we paused for about 32 minutes to hydrate, eat muesli and half-ass it through our morning stretching exercises.
Each time we visit, it seems they’ve burned down another patch of the Palatine’s forest. Sal always has a fire or two smoldering at the base of trees he deems to be in the way. His clearings have opened up great views of Rome’s swamps and neighboring hillocks.
Crisscrossed by the V-shaped wakes of swimming moose and hippo, the wetland’s surface shimmered silver in the light of the narrow moon. I couldn’t see the Tiber, but knew the wide river was out there ready to deliver us to the sea.
Compared to the screeches and roars of the bottomlands, the summit of Palatine Hill was quiet. Rome’s nocturnal chorus features soloists of every size and shape imaginable, from crickets and peepers to grunting boars and bellowing musk oxen. All we had were owls and bats fluttering through the air as we found flat spots on the flagstone patio to perform a few simple Tai Chi forms to warm our muscles for the journey ahead.
Capt. Jones observed from Salvatore’s personal chaise lounge. We found him sprawled on the padded deerskin, his atlatl and two bolts close at hand. To Paul’s low whistle, the burly Captain answered with a sigh. “I heard ya.”
We let him rest as we wordlessly went through our morning routine, took turns straddling the section of stream that serves as the summit’s toilet.
“See y’all next month,” he yawned as we shrugged on packs and hoisted our weapons to leave. In Green Turtle fashion, we each carried three spears over our shoulders and a club tucked beneath our belts. I have a new head cracker that’s all wood and lighter than my last stone-headed model, which broke while I was pounding a tent stake. Paul still wields the legendary Meteorite Club, though he has nearly lost it or had it stolen a dozen times.
“And Kaikane . . .” Jones called.
“Yep?”
“Ya see that damn red wolf, leave ‘im be. He’s mine.”
“Roger that, Jones. Catch you later.”
The West Point captain laid his large head on Sal’s feather pillow, pulled a fox-fur quilt over his shoulders and closed his eyes.
“Good night, Juniper,” I said on my way past.
“Night, Doc.”
Until necessary, Paul prefers not to use the sensors in his helmet. Maybe his night vision is better than mine, or he’s just a stubborn male. I turned my visor on at the top of the ancient trail and scanned for danger all the way to the thicket of willows where our kayaks were stashed next to the boys’ two boats. Not that I saw any bears or leopards, but if there is going to be trouble, I prefer to have as much warning as possible.
The Palatine was void of threats. Seven years of man exerting his dominance with fire and force has taught most local predators to hunt other hills. Wandering bears and lion packs sometimes scale to the top in search of the great cave and nearby sweet-water spring, as does the occasional resident animal that should know better.
A wolf that has been raiding Jones’ trap line is growing increasingly bold. Last week while the Captain was asleep inside his lean-to on the Palatine’s southern flank, the wolf laid tracks through his camp, including right past his makeshift door. Jones is keen to teach that wolf a lesson.
Thought commands sent through my helmet switched the kayaks from stealth mode to glowing red in my visor as we neared. Once our packs were stowed and weapons tethered, we dragged the long, sleek boats to a mossy cedar log that juts into the water like a dock.
Towing his kayak by its bowline, Paul confidently strode to the end of the log and gave the rope a tug. Stepping off the log as the kayak shot past, he lowered his agile body onto the seat in one fluid motion. Looking back to confirm I was ready, he unfastened his paddle and began quietly stroking across the inky water.
My launch may not have been as practiced or graceful, but I did manage to tightrope the log and get into the kayak without flipping the boat or soaking my leggings. Believe me, full immersion is far colder and stays with you much longer than getting wet from the dew. I joined Paul about 50 yards offshore and together we headed west amid the surfacing fish and sleeping ducks.
“We’d be killing it with floater hooks,” Paul said wistfully as a pike splashed nearby.
“Go ahead, we’ve got a little time to spare.”
“Not really. I’ll catch some cod out by the island. How does that sound?”
“Good plan.”
In our early years exploring Rome’s great swamp, we often got turned around in the series of spillways and ponds that lead to the Tiber. Now we are rarely forced to backtrack or, heaven forbid, once again portage our boats through forest and marsh to reach the main river.
Paul’s helmet bloomed in my visor, powering on as we neared the first rapids. Rounding the initial bend, the current swept us within three yards of a pride of lions swarming a juvenile water buffalo on the stony shore. In a flash, the roars and carnage were behind us.
The opening cataract has only one tricky spot, a pair of narrow bends we call “S Turns.” In spring and most early summers, the outflow runs so swiftly we don’t dare challenge the turns and their looming boulders. A dry winter and even drier spring have made it passable. We splashed through without worry.
Every trip back to the island unfolds in segments, each portion unique from the bits that precede or follow. After the calm, mellow waters of the central swamp, there is a claustrophobic gamut of tree-lined streams and pools so overgrown and tight we barely have time to see what we are missing. Then, with one final log run through the forest, we’re spit onto the deepest, widest river in the land. The muddy Tiber presents its own perils and challenges, but it also offers broad views and open spaces landlubbers rarely experience inside the never-ending primeval forest.
Countless life-and-death scenes play out on the Tiber’s shorelines at all hours of the day, especially in the hour before dawn. We passed mother hippos tending their young, bison herds milling, waiting for first light to cross the river, and doe giving birth to fawns. Carnivores ranging from mink to tiger feasted on their night’s kill, bingeing before retreating to the shadows to rest.
Nearing the coast, signs of mankind begin to appear–smells of smoke, barks of domesticated dogs and glimpses of humans themselves. This morning we paddled within feet of a one-armed man using a pronged spear to harvest frogs. He was looking down and never saw us as we passed his spot amid the cattails.
The local population of Cro-Magnon varies with the seasons, but at any given time there may be as many as five or six clans, a total of about 180 people, camped along the seashore on each side of the river. Most are nomads following the herds and berry crops up and down the coast, but there are also three local tribes. Two clans live in leaky huts near the sea, laying claim to opposite sides of the river mouth, while a third incestuous tribe has been relegated to the inland dunes south of the Tiber, out where the rolling sand hills seem to go on forever. This shy clan rarely travels more than a mile in any direction from its dugout cave, exhausting resources so severely its people barely get by.
�
�There he is!” Paul said on the com line, a trill of excitement in his voice. “You see him?”
I didn’t know what he was talking about. “Who? What? Which side of the river?”
“Red wolf that’s been bugging Jones. To starboard, hassling those cats. Cocky bastard. See him?”
“Now I do. He is big.”
“Not too big for Jones.”
“I hope not.”
In the few seconds he was in view, the large canid circled a pair of lynx, interrupting a riverside breakfast of black pig. It would have been interesting to see how the interaction played out, but the current was running too swiftly. Pulled by an outgoing tide, it grew faster and choppier as we closed on the coast.
Campfires on both sides of the river sent up flares in my visor amid the heat signatures of men and women moving about, beginning their day. We always try to pass through this area in full dark to avoid giving the natives a look at our boats and paddles. Mankind forever seeks easier and faster ways to do things. The Cro-Magnons already hike upstream to float logs across the river. It won’t be long before somebody decides to make a boat or canoe. I’d prefer the inspiration come naturally–not before its time because we’ve been sloppy.
I suppose, if we were serious about following The Team’s rulebook, we’d be invisible and armored in our stealth jumpsuits. As convenient as it would be to slip past unnoticed at any time, we haven’t geared up completely in years. Those jumpsuits are evil.
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