Nina surprisingly deflected away a few of his knife strikes with relative ease, but she probably couldn't keep it up forever. She wasn't a skilled enough swordsman to maintain an impenetrable defensive position. He would get through at some point, and when he did, she’d likely end up with a knife in her. Nina brushed that worry away momentarily. She just had to stay focused. That was the key. If she let her mind wander or worried about anything else, her body would follow her lead and not react in time to the problem that was right in front of her.
“Look at you!” Mr. Nero jeered. “You have no right to use that sword! A peasant like you!”
Nina ignored his taunts. The only reply she wanted to give was landing a blow with her sword, but he was managing to evade the blade so far.
“That sword belongs to Rome! It belongs to a leader! Give it over now and I might just let you live after all!”
“I'm flattered!” Nina said through gritted teeth as she avoided a strike and dashed behind one of the Hypogeum's broken pillars, just to catch her breath. “But stop holding back on my account! I can promise you that I'm not going to give it up willingly! You're going to have to earn this sword if you want it so bad!”
“Fine by me!” Mr. Nero roared, swinging his arm around the pillar and trying to slice her. “I'll take it from your corpse then! You can join Santino in the dirt. You and he will just be fertilizer for the glorious Rome that we’re going to rebuild!”
Mr. Nero really was an eloquent speaker, even when he was trying to murder someone. He made it all sound so poetic and reasonable. It was lunacy but the message he was giving her was loud and clear. It was a shame that he didn't just get into politics like a normal person, where his words could really make change. Instead, he’d become a fanatical murderer with delusions of grandeur... though that didn't sound far off from most politicians after all.
His attacks were getting even more ferocious and she stumbled back away from him, trying to regain her balance. He threw one of his knives at her, probably hoping it would find its target like a well-placed dart but she got out of the way in time. It flew past her and clattered around in the stone ruins behind her. He was desperate to kill her now but a move like that had just disarmed him of one of his only two weapons. He wasn't doing himself any favors, but she wasn't going to point that out to him. He seemed to be trying to make up for his lost weapon by sprinting at her with his remaining blade. She blocked his strike and returned one of her own. Caesar's sword cut through the air and was intercepted by his knife. However, she’d swung so hard that Mr. Nero's blade fumbled out of his hand and out of his reach.
She'd done it; she’d disarmed her opponent completely. For a second, she thought she could hear the cheers from the crowds that once sat above thousands of years ago. She really was going to get out of this, victorious and alive.
Mr. Nero was backed against one of the Hypogeum pillars, his hands raised as she held the tip of Caesar's sword in front of him. She hoped he was afraid behind that mask, she wanted to see his face now that he lost. She wanted to see how close she’d brought this sicko to tears.
“Looks like you lose,” Nina said, not being able to hold back a broad smile.
“Have I?” Mr. Nero looked up at the Colosseum stands, right to where the emperor used to sit and watch. “This was usually the part where the victorious gladiator would look up for the emperor's decision. Pollice verso. That's what they called it. They’d indicate with their thumb whether they wanted the defeated gladiator to live or die. Of course, the crowd would influence their decision sometimes. It's always been up to debate if thumbs up meant to let them live or was meaning that they had the approval to kill them...it's never been clear. But I assure you, had we brought back the real Rome...had we given the Colosseum its prestige back...I would’ve restored pollice verso. As for if I lost...well...I don't see the emperor making a decision, do you?”
“I don't need someone else deciding for me.”
Mr. Nero laughed again. “Fine then. Strike true.”
“First take off your mask,” Nina demanded firmly. She wanted to look into the eyes of the man that had caused her so much trouble. She wanted to see what kind of person would put on that mask and start causing so much chaos throughout Rome. “Take off the mask, I said!”
Mr. Nero lowered his hands and stood casually in front of the tip of her sword. With the passive expression of his mask, he looked entirely unimpressed by her victory, maybe even unconvinced. He gave a shrug of his shoulders.
“I'm not going to do that,” Mr. Nero said. “Not until this fight is over.”
“It is over!”
“No,” Mr. Nero kept laughing. “Not yet. Not until one of us is dead. So either I take this mask off while looking down at your corpse or you pull this mask off of mine. You want to be the victor? The real victor? Then finish it.”
Nina wanted to end this, but could she really kill an unarmed man? She thought she could kill him with ease but that was when he was coming at her with knives. Now he was backed into a corner, defenseless. Killing him at this point would seem like avoidable bloodshed. Maybe she could deliver him and his friends to Inspector Amaro? She didn't necessarily need to kill Mr. Nero after all.
“Do it!” The voice from behind those frozen lips screamed.
She didn't.
Nina stood still, just holding the blade toward him but she wasn't advancing or lunging forward. She wasn't skewering Mr. Nero like she thought she was going to. She was just keeping him against those ruins, doing her best to stay in control of the situation.
“See?” Mr. Nero snickered. “Then this fight isn't over. Not quite yet.”
Suddenly, both of Mr. Nero's hands grabbed onto the old blade, and he yanked the sword out of Nina's grasp. She let out a shriek of panic and tried to snatch it back from him but he swung hard, hitting her in the face with the pommel of the weapon. Nina fell to the floor of the Hypogeum, her whole head ringing with pain. When she could open her eyes through the pain, she looked up and found the masked man standing over, pointing the sword down in her face.
The Third Triumvirate had secured the sword of Caesar.
Nina wanted to kick herself for her failure. She should’ve run him through with the sword instead of how she just stood there like a fool while he waited for his opportunity. She’d stabbed an enemy once before with a much different blade. The consequences of that decision hadn't been good. She thought sparing him in this instance would be a good decision, but now, it would probably be what caused the end of her. Mr. Nero wasn't going to return the favor. He was going to finish this like a gladiator would, like Nina should have. There was no stopping it now. That silly mask on his face would be one of the last things she saw before she died.
“You were so close,” Mr. Nero said, speaking in a fake sympathetic voice. “But you didn't have the stomach to fight in this place. This Colosseum has always had one simple doctrine that it goes by. That rule is kill or be killed. It's simple, but you couldn't even manage that. You just had to take the moral high ground. Morals don't exist in this place, Dr. Gould. You really should’ve realized that. This is no place for mercy or staying your hand, not unless the emperor instructed you. And seeing as there’s no emperor here, you should’ve fought until your enemy was dead.”
“You love to hear yourself talk...” Nina muttered from the floor, staring right at the sharp tip of the blade that was in her face. It was inches away from her eyeball. “I'm sorry I didn't kill you.”
Mr. Nero laughed again but then his attention shifted to the sword that he was holding. “Caesar had good taste. This sword feels so nice to hold, perfectly balanced. Can you imagine how many people fell to this sword all those years ago? How many different bloodlines he severed with it? You should be honored. You get to join that long line of victims? The first to die by this sword in thousands of years.”
“You sound jealous,” Nina mumbled . “Give me the sword back and I can change that.”
“This really
didn't have to be this difficult, Dr. Gould,” Mr. Nero said. “If you'd just handed us the sword, everything would’ve worked out okay for you. You would be leaving Italy right now, going back to whatever hole you came from. Our terms were so reasonable, if you ask me.”
“I wasn't going to give it to a bunch of criminals and murderers,” Nina insisted. “I highly doubt Julius Caesar would’ve wanted that. I was never going to follow through on your offer. Not ever.”
“Well, it doesn't really matter, does it?” Mr. Nero said and she could practically see his smile behind those frozen lips. “I ended up with it anyway. All of your efforts were for nothing besides giving this to us...the people who will use it to carve a new future for Rome. It won't just be a simple city anymore. It’s going to be so much more again.”
Mr. Nero raised Caesar's sword over his head, ready to deal the killing strike.
Police sirens suddenly rang out and at least a dozen men came pouring into the Colosseum. Mr. Nero looked around seemingly calmly but it was just the mask that made him seem so unfazed. Behind that false face, he must’ve been trembling. How could he not be? The sick game he was playing was over and with that, all of his hopes and dreams of bringing back Ancient Rome would be washed away.
Mr. Nero still stood over Nina, Caesar's sword in hand, ready to bring it down to execute her. Just one swift movement and Nina knew she’d be gone. She’d be bleeding out before any of the police got anywhere near her to try to help. Hopefully, Mr. Nero would catch a bullet before he could stab her. She just hoped that the police could resolve this, but she’d no idea how they got there.
Police officers surrounded them. Some were in the tunnels of the Hypogeum close by while others were standing over the pit, their weapons pointed downward at Mr. Nero.
“Lower the weapon!” The police ordered Mr. Nero to drop the sword, but Mr. Nero’s head just tilted to one side curiously, like he was trying to figure out what was happening, or how he was going to get out of it. His head then swung in all different directions, maybe looking for an escape route but there wasn't one. He was completely surrounded.
“I'll be taking that sword then,” Elijah said, walking up from the within the crowd of policemen and holding out an expectant hand. He seemed to have recovered well enough after getting knocked out of the fight.
Elijah did this. He’d called the police. Nina had gone through so much effort just to get away from their entanglement with the police, to keep them from tracking them to the sword's location...and now here they were, at the sword's location. She felt a sudden urge to scream at Elijah, but it passed just as suddenly. He may have called the police without telling them, but his choice to go behind their backs might’ve ended up saving their lives.
Mr. Nero looked in Elijah's direction. For a moment, it looked like he might just cut Elijah down; one last victim to take down before the cops enveloped. Or Mr. Nero could decide to stab Nina instead; he still had the sword pointed right at her. He was probably contemplating both of those options. Or maybe he was pondering the third option—where he surrendered and simply relinquished the sword?
Mr. Nero chose the third option and lowered the weapon before handing it to Elijah. Elijah looked surprised by the lack of resistance but Mr. Nero clearly knew when the battle was over and there was no chance of victory.
“Interrupting a fight in the Colosseum...” Mr. Nero said softly. His voice sounded so distant behind the mask now. He must’ve realized that all of those deranged dreams were just that; Rome wasn't going to become some unstoppable empire again. “Receiving help from outside of the arena...an emperor would have killed someone for such a disgraceful act.”
Nina got to her feet and brushed herself off briefly. “Well, then it's a good thing that all of the emperors are dead and they're never coming back. We're not gladiators, and you're not saviors of Rome. You're just criminals and criminals don't get to create new empires. Criminals go to prison.”
The police had poured into the Colosseum, dozens of them, and were quickly rounding up the Third Triumvirate. A group of them found Monica in the audience stands, holding her bloody face. It took a few police officers to lift a beaten down Mr. Commodus off of the floor of the Colosseum where they also helped August to his feet. Nina didn't want the police to be involved in any of this, but she had to admit, she was glad they’d showed up when they did. A couple of them came up to Mr. Nero and slapped handcuffs on him, leading him away.
A familiar face appeared among all of the police officers—Inspector Donatello Amaro. He stood out among his peers thanks to his long hair, beard, and more casual attire. His badge shone brightly on his belt though and he trotted forward causally, straight to Nina. He glanced over a the restrained Mr. Nero and showed his uncomfortably thin smile before turning his attention back to Nina.
“You know, a lot of this disaster could’ve been prevented if you’d have just let me and my men keep watch over you...you didn't have to throw yourself from a moving vehicle.”
“This never would’ve happened at all...we never would have been able to find the sword or catch the Third Triumvirate if you lot were staring over our shoulders the whole time. This is how it had to happen.”
“Fair enough,” Inspector Amaro said with a shrug. “Your stunt was mildly impressive, I'll admit. It couldn't have been easy to pull off. Your gamble did pay off in the end. It seems you made all of the right shots. Well, almost of the right shots. Your friend, Mr. Dane made the call to us. Without that contact, you might have that sword in your heart right now. At least give us credit for that...or who knows? Maybe you would’ve been able to get out of it yourself?”
“You want me to thank you? You should be thanking us? We’ve practically delivered the Third Triumvirate to you.”
“I see that,” Amaro said and waved his men to bring Mr. Nero over to him. “And as promised, I will see to it that this group of petty thieves are brought to justice...without those silly masks...”
Inspector Amaro ripped the mask off Nero's face and revealed a young, hateful face beneath. Mr. Nero was a young man but his eyes were sunken into a spiteful permanent leer. His eyes seemed to hate everything that they saw—it was him against the entire world.
Inspector Amaro laced his fingers together and stood proudly in front of his quarry. “You’ve gotten awfully quiet now that you’re no longer hiding your face. Those little letters of yours suggested a much more boastful personality...someone who was so sure of himself. Or did one of your two friends write those letters? The big one perhaps? That’d be a surprise.”
The unmasked Mr. Nero spat on the ground in front of Amaro and shook his head. “You’re all just getting in the way of the inevitable. You think that we’re the only ones that want to see Rome back to how it used to be?”
“Perhaps not,” Inspector Amaro acknowledged. “There are plenty of imbeciles in the world.”
Mr. Nero launched a wad of saliva from his mouth again and this time it caught Inspector Amaro's cheek. He looked stunned for a second but then wiped it away with two fingers, looking more annoyed and perplexed than disgusted.
“You can hate me if you want. Go on. Add me to those proscriptions of yours. Let’s see how much good a hit list will do you from behind bars. Something tells me...it won't be quite as effective.”
AS MONICA WAS BEING LED AWAY in handcuffs, Nina stared at the woman. Monica seemed so utterly different from the woman that Nina had spoken with outside of the Palazza Nuovo; the woman that had been weeping and scared. It was such a convincing act. Maybe instead of robbing museums and killing former bosses, Monica would’ve had better luck on stage in some theater somewhere?
Nina was still trying to figure out what had cracked inside of Monica’s mind to make her go through with this. There was something so warped, her skull was as fractured as the mask that she used to wear.
This may be Nina’s last chance to ever speak with the mysterious Miss Caligula, and Nina wasn't going to let that opportunity go to waste.
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“Was it worth it?” Nina asked, stepping up to the enchained woman.
The police looked annoyed by the interruption, but they let Nina continue to talk to her. After all, Nina had helped catch her. Perhaps they still felt a little indebted to Nina and her team? At least, that's what Nina liked to think.
Monica looked at Nina, but there was nothing but venom in Monica’s eyes. Monica was seething with hatred. Nina expected as much. Nina had ruined Miss Caligula's plans, after all. Though, even if they’d gotten the sword, it would’ve been quite the challenge to somehow make Rome a world superpower again. It was too ambitious of a goal, one that three people definitely couldn't accomplish on their own. Maybe they could have recruited more people to their cause, but it’d take a whole populace, or at least the most powerful people of one, to actually make the changes that they wanted.A sharp smile stretched across Monica's lips. It was so hideous, an expression that didn't belong on a human face. Nina almost wished that she could put that Caligula mask back on the woman.
“Of course it was worth it.”
It didn't make sense, but Nina shouldn't have been surprised. After all, Miss Caligula was just as deranged as her namesake.
“You didn't get the sword.”
“No...” Monica snickered. “But we may have forged a sword even better than Julius Caesar's. Our sword is one that can penetrate the mind, stab people's thoughts. It's already finding new bodies to pierce.”
Operation Rubicon Page 15