Lucilla's dining room was as beautiful and cold as a tomb, and he was the guest of honor.
Marble statues of their ancestors stared down from shadowed alcoves, their stone eyes seeming to judge him. A single, massive table of dark, polished wood stood between him and his sister. There were no guards. No servants. Just the two of them, alone with the ghosts of their family.
Lucilla smiled at him from across the table, a predator enjoying the silence before the strike. She looked ethereal in the flickering lamplight, a goddess of the underworld.
"I am so glad you could come, brother," she said, her voice a silken murmur. She poured him a cup of deep red wine from a silver ewer. "Falernian. Your favorite."
Marcus took the cup. The wine smelled rich and sweet, but he didn't recognize it. The real Commodus would have. He took a small, cautious sip. It was just wine. For now.
"You seem... different today," Lucilla began, her eyes watching his every move. "Softer."
"The duties of an emperor are heavy," he deflected, the lie feeling thin on his tongue. "They change a man."
Her smile widened, but it held no warmth. "Do they? Or do they simply reveal what was always there?" She leaned forward, her elbows on the table. "Remember that summer by the sea, at Father's villa? You were just a boy. You promised him you would conquer the world for the glory of Rome."
She paused, her gaze pinning him to his seat. "And then you turned to me, your hands covered in the blood of a sea bird you'd killed, and you promised you'd burn the world to ashes if I asked you to."
The story was a blade, aimed directly at a memory he didn't possess. He felt a cold sweat on his back. He had no response. JARVIS was a thousand paces away in the archives, useless against this kind of psychological warfare.
He scrambled for a reply, anything to fill the suffocating silence. "We were children then. Full of grand, foolish promises."
"Were we?" she whispered, her voice dropping to an intimate, chilling tone. "I don't think you were foolish, brother. You still have that... fire. The one that frightens people. I can still see it in your eyes. You just hide it better now."
Her gaze was so intense it felt like a physical touch, searching for the monster she knew, the violent, predictable brother she understood. He felt like an actor whose co-star was improvising with a real knife, and he had forgotten all his lines. He was an open book written in a language she could read and he couldn't.
He had to get out. He stood abruptly, his chair scraping against the marble floor. "Thank you for the wine, sister. But Rome's affairs await."
He turned and left without looking back, feeling her cold, analytical stare on him every step of the way.
He returned to his imperial chambers, the mask of Commodus finally falling away. He was emotionally and mentally drained. The sheer effort of pretending to be a man he wasn't, of navigating a minefield of memories that weren't his, was a crushing weight.
He sank into a heavy chair, burying his face in his hands. He was an imposter, a ghost in another man's life, and he was failing.
He didn't notice Marcia until she spoke. She had been there the whole time, quietly turning down the silks on his bed, a silent fixture in the room.
"My lord," she said softly.
He looked up. Her face was filled with a cautious concern. She saw the exhaustion, the deep lines of stress etched around his eyes. This wasn't the arrogant, cruel emperor she served. This was a man carrying an impossible burden.
She took a step closer, breaking a dozen rules of protocol. Her voice was barely a whisper. "Why did you do it? Pardoning the gladiator. It has brought you nothing but danger."
The question was simple, direct. It wasn't about politics or power. It was about him. It was the first time anyone in this gilded hell had shown a flicker of concern for the man, not the title.
And in that moment, the dam inside him broke. He couldn't tell her about the future, about the AI, about Marcus Holt. But he could give her a piece of the truth.
"Because I'm tired of fear," he said, his voice low and raw with a weariness that came from another lifetime. "Perhaps mercy is a sharper weapon. It just takes longer to work."
The vulnerability in his voice hung in the air between them, a fragile thread connecting two people from different worlds. It changed everything.
Marcia's eyes widened. She saw the truth in his exhaustion. This wasn't a trick. This was real. And in this palace, real was more dangerous than anything. She made a choice. She stepped over the line from servant to ally.
She moved closer, her voice dropping so low he could barely hear it. "The danger is closer than you think," she whispered, her gaze darting towards the heavy chamber doors. "I was serving wine to Senators Varrus and Quintus earlier. They are your sister's men."
Marcus sat up straight, his fatigue vanishing, replaced by a cold dread. "What did they say?"
"They spoke of your... change," she said, her hands twisting in the folds of her simple dress. "They weren't planning a coup. Not with blades."
She leaned in, her words a chilling premonition. "They were talking about bringing a Greek physician from Alexandria. A man known for treating 'afflictions of the soul.' They think you are possessed by a spirit. Or that you have gone mad."
The blood drained from his face. It was a brilliant, terrifying strategy. Lucilla wasn't just planning to kill him. She was building a medical and religious case against him. She could have him declared insane, unfit to rule, and lock him away in a dark room for the rest of his life without spilling a single drop of blood.
And Marcia, by telling him this, had just tied her fate to his. If discovered, she would die.
Before he could process the new threat, the chamber doors burst open. A centurion, his armor splattered with mud and his face pale with panic, rushed into the room, bypassing all protocol. He fell to one knee.
"Caesar! An urgent message from the port of Ostia!"
Marcus stood, his mind racing. "What is it?"
"The dockworkers, my lord," the centurion gasped, breathing heavily. "They heard of your mercy. They heard you pardoned the glator Crixus. They've taken it as a sign... a sign that the Emperor's iron will has softened."
"Get to the point, Centurion!" Marcus snapped.
"They've gone on strike, Caesar! All of them! They are demanding double pay and a shorter workday. The grain ships from Egypt are anchored in the harbor, but not a single sack is being unloaded."
His act of mercy. His one attempt to do something good, something human. It had backfired spectacularly. He had shown compassion, and they had mistaken it for weakness.
A cold fear, more primal than any fear of Lucilla, gripped him. He asked the only question that mattered. "How much grain is left in the city's granaries?"
The centurion's face was ashen. "Three days, Caesar. At best."
Marcus didn't wait. He ran. He sprinted through the gilded halls, past shocked guards and bowing senators, his purple toga flying behind him. He burst into the archives, the scent of old papyrus filling his lungs.
He threw the laptop open, its screen casting a ghostly blue light on his face. His fingers flew across the keyboard, inputting the new data: dockworker strike, grain supply critical, public mood shifting.
JARVIS processed the information in a nanosecond. The screen filled with grim predictions, the text a cold, digital prophecy of doom.
GRAIN RIOTS IMMINENT. PROBABILITY: 98%. PROJECTED CASUALTIES: 5,000-10,000 WITHIN 72 HOURS.
A new line appeared at the bottom of the screen, blinking in stark, red letters.
EMPEROR SURVIVAL PROBABILITY... RECALCULATING... 4%.