The mud was slick with blood.
Marcus stood with his back to the raging Tiber. Decimus was on his right, spear leveled. Narcissus was on his left, a towering wall of black ceramic and blue light.
Ten soldiers formed a jagged semi-circle around them.
Facing them were fifty Stalkers.
The pack didn't charge immediately. They circled. They chittered. They knew the prey was trapped.
In the center, the Siege Stalker pawed the ground. It was a mountain of muscle and bone plating, breathing steam into the cold twilight.
"It was an honor, Dominus," Decimus whispered, gripping his spear until his knuckles were white.
"Save the eulogy," Marcus snapped. "Aim for the eyes."
The Siege Beast roared.
It charged.
The ground shook.
"Hold!" Marcus yelled.
The beast hit the line.
It didn't stop. It plowed through three soldiers like they were wheat. It gored a man on its bone-horn and tossed him into the river.
The formation shattered.
"Scatter!" Marcus ordered.
He didn't run away. He ran at the beast.
The Siege Stalker turned its massive head, trying to trample him.
Marcus slid. He went under the tusks.
He slashed upward with the Vibro-Gladius.
HUMMM-SHUNK.
The blade cut a deep groove in the beast's underbelly. Thick black blood sprayed.
The monster screamed—a sound like grinding metal. It bucked, kicking out with massive hind legs.
Marcus rolled clear.
But the smaller Stalkers swarmed.
They hit the remaining soldiers. It was a massacre. Teeth met throat. Claws met unarmored flesh.
"Narcissus!" Marcus shouted.
The giant was surrounded. Six Stalkers were climbing him, trying to find a gap in his armor.
Narcissus didn't care. He grabbed one by the tail and whipped it into the ground.
CRACK.
He punched another in the ribs, caving its chest in.
But he was being overwhelmed. The sheer weight of the pack was dragging him down into the mud.
"Caesar! Behind you!" Decimus yelled.
Marcus spun.
A Stalker leaped at him.
He brought the sword up. Too slow.
The beast slammed into his chest plate. The impact knocked the wind out of him. He fell backward into the shallow water.
The Stalker was on top of him. Its jaws snapped inches from his face. Saliva dripped onto his visor.
Marcus jammed his left forearm—the ceramic gauntlet—into its mouth.
The teeth crunched on the armor.
Marcus struggled. The mud sucked at his legs. He couldn't get leverage.
"Die!" he grunted.
He drove the Vibro-Gladius into the beast's side. Once. Twice.
It shuddered and went limp.
Marcus shoved the carcass off. He stood up, water dripping from his armor.
He looked around.
Decimus was down, fighting with a knife. Five soldiers were dead. Narcissus was buried under a pile of black fur.
They were losing.
On the far bank, the raft had landed. The refugees were safe. They watched the slaughter in horror.
"We need an exit!" Marcus shouted.
He looked at the Siege Stalker. It was thrashing, wounded but furious.
An idea.
Marcus sprinted.
He jumped onto the back of a dead Stalker, using it as a stepping stone.
He leaped onto the Siege Beast's flank.
He grabbed the coarse fur. He pulled himself up.
The beast bucked wildly.
Marcus held on. He climbed to the shoulders.
He raised the sword.
"Drive!" Marcus roared.
He stabbed the Vibro-Gladius deep into the beast's spine, just behind the skull.
The creature shrieked. Its legs locked. It went berserk.
Marcus twisted the blade.
The pain drove the beast forward. Blindly.
It crashed into the pack of smaller Stalkers. It trampled its own kind.
"To the water!" Marcus screamed, steering the beast by twisting the sword like a tiller.
The Siege Stalker plunged into the river.
The cold water hit it. It thrashed, losing footing in the deep mud.
Marcus jumped off.
He landed in the freezing current.
He surfaced, gasping.
"Narcissus! To the water!"
The giant heard him.
Narcissus roared. He stood up, throwing Stalkers off his back.
He saw Marcus in the river.
He didn't swim. He charged.
He ran straight into the Tiber.
The water rose to his waist. Then his chest.
The Stalkers stopped at the bank. They hissed at the water, pacing back and forth. Their heavy cybernetics and dense muscle made them poor swimmers.
Narcissus reached Marcus.
"I have you," the giant rumbled.
He grabbed Marcus by the back of his armor. He grabbed Decimus, who was floating nearby, bleeding from a scalp wound.
"Go under," Narcissus said.
"What?" Marcus spluttered.
Narcissus didn't explain. He walked deeper.
The water went over his head.
The blue light of his chest core glowed eerily beneath the surface.
He was heavy enough to walk on the bottom.
Marcus took a deep breath.
He was dragged under.
The world turned silent and brown. The current pulled at him, but Narcissus's grip was iron.
They moved along the riverbed.
Marcus watched the blue light ahead of him. It was the only star in a muddy universe.
His lungs burned. Thirty seconds. Forty-five.
The light began to rise.
They broke the surface.
Marcus gasped, coughing up water.
They were on the far bank.
Narcissus dragged them onto the rocky shore. He stomped out of the water, water cascading off his armor like a surfacing submarine.
He dropped them on the dry ground.
Marcus rolled onto his back. He stared up at the purple sky.
"We made it," Decimus wheezed, clutching his head.
Marcus sat up.
He looked across the river.
The Stalkers were still there. Fifty of them, pacing the bank. They howled—a sound of frustration and hunger.
The Siege Stalker was washing downstream, dead.
"They stopped," Lucilla said, running down from the refugee camp to meet them. "They didn't follow."
"They aren't amphibious," Marcus said, wiping slime from his face. "Cybernetics sink."
"But Vane has boats," Lucilla warned. "He won't stop."
Marcus stood up. He sheathed his sword.
He looked down the coast road.
In the distance, barely visible through the twilight gloom, lay ruins.
Tall columns. Broken arches. The skeletal remains of a harbor.
Ostia.
The ancient port of Rome.
"We need a ship," Marcus said. "Before Vane sends the sharks."
He turned to the refugees. They were huddled together, wet, cold, and traumatized. But they were alive. And they were looking at him.
Not with fear anymore. With awe.
They had watched him ride a monster into the river. They had watched Narcissus walk through the deep.
"Form the column," Marcus ordered. His voice was hoarse but steady.
"We march to the sea."