Gaius Fabius Maximus

And so they were pulled and thrust, out of the barred wagon, blinking and staggering, hands tied, dirty, exhausted, expecting to die. First was the disgraced scion, scuffed but intact, blond hair naturally curled at the ends of a center part, framing a face built to support armored cheek-flaps.His name was Gaius Fabius Maximus, and chains ran from his wrists to those of a small dark man, falling to his knees off the wagon behind him. Others followed behind, in the same chain or in others thrown from nearby wagons pulled up in parallel to the first. They were in a grassy sloping field. A road across them, a forest behind, and beyond the fields in front, a massive army. Organized, armored, fit to raze a country. And beyond that, a blue sky and wine-grey sea.

“Up and move!” yelled a legionary waiting for him. Maximus was hooked around the wrists by something like a shepherds hook with a weight on the bottom end, and yanked forward towards another roman who repeated the motion down a chain of soldiers. this was repeated across the field. Ten chains of eight men each, pulled out of prison wagons like intestines from a sheep, while all around them ten thousand men prepared to invade.

 Maximus was pulled up straight at the end of a stagger by the final military police in the line. Sore, hungry, thirsty, and out of breath, he finally saw in front of him another worthy of his rank, another tribune. He had endured a horrible journey under mistaken circumstances, and now here was a patrician of commensurate rank and understanding, obviously arrived with the horribly overdue missive from Gauis Fabius’ father to correct the situation. He pulled himself up to be face to face with Flavius Strabo, a piggy-eyed prune of a man he had known his whole life and tortured most of his childhood. The officious little shit shoved a centurions helmet into Gaius’s bound hands and snarled “welcome to the ranks, asshole. I hope you fucking die!” before storming off.

 Maximus spat on the ground and looked around at the dirty, chained men of his new command. Criminals, every last one of them; And here he was, consigned to lead them for no other reason than doing his duty. He had led his men on a glorious charge into the breached wall of a gallic fort and shortened the siege by several days. The high casualties amongst his men were irrelevant. It all came down to the bloody stupidity of his junior tribune, a chinless wonder from the patrician Valerius family, who went and got himself killed trying to keep up with the charge, and paused at the top of the breach, silhouetted for all the Gaul archers to see.

 So now Maximus had to wait and hope his family could get him out of this mess. It was so unfair! It wasn’t him who had turned the General’s nephew into a feathered pin-cushion. None of his successes, his blood, or even his callous charm was enough to stop the General’s wrath from stripping him of his rank and throwing him in with the common criminals.

***Centurion - Roman - Gaius Fabius Maximus - disgraced for leading his century into a suicidal Forlorn Hope in a Gallic fortress - usually a commendation, but got a Patrician's son killed - caught by politics. Selfish, callous, charming sociopath***

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