Some time had passed and Gaias, Livia, and I had worked out the details of our arrangement. Gaias had a trapdoor in his office under a rug that led to an alleyway outside. He had acquired for me both normal clothes of my size that fit instead of me continuing to run around half-naked in a towel secured by a belt as well as a sort of ski mask and full body covering designed to obscure my Path. He also gave me all brown contact lenses to disguise my violet Imperator’s eyes.

I walked into the alleyway outside the Brazen Chains ludus and stripped my new clothes off shamelessly and then pulled on the all black clothes and ski mask and put in the contact lenses to cover up my eyes. I found the brick he had shown me and pried open the hidden metal panel painted and textured and coated with sand grit to look and feel like grit. I put in the key code.

1-7-3-9-2-8-# I pressed.

A section of the brick wall swiveled on a central access to let me into the passageway. I tossed my bag of clothes through. I slipped in and descended under the ludus of the Brazen Chains. Under the practice yard, actually. It was a bit damp, and the sides of the passageway had algae or mold growing on it. Droplets of water dripped on my head and shoulders from the roof of the passage. I kept going and reached a shaft with a ladder. I pressed a button on a communicator Gaias had given me and then I climbed up the ladder.

Gaias was alerted by the communicator, and presumably with the coast being clear, rolled up the rug in his office and opened the trapdoor for me. My eyes adjusted to the sudden light as easily as they had to the darkness of the tunnel. I pulled myself up and over into the room.

“Gaias.” I said, in acknowledgement.

“My Unknown Warrior.” Gaias said, smiling up at me. “You know what we’re doing this evening?”

“Training. And an exhibition. Showing me off to the others, who are questioning you bringing someone new in and giving them a place, pushing out others into substitutes when they were primary competitors.” I said.

“Indeed. I need you to prove me right. Show them what you are without them realizing what your Path is. You’ll be fighting one of the seniors of the Brazen Chains ludus, Velias. He’s a good fighter.”

“He’s no Imperator.” I said.

“No, but he has fought many battles, which I have picked up from you that you haven’t.” Gaias said.

I bristled. “I’ve gotten in enough street fights. I’ve killed several men.” The feeling of the power pick in my hand returned as I remembered putting it through skulls. Cantion skulls.

“I’m sure. Street fights aren’t gladiator fights though nor are they outright war.” Gaias said. “You don’t have to be ashamed most Imperators have never killed before.”

That caught my attention. “What?” I said, incredulous.

“What?” Gaias repeated, caught off guard and confused.

“You said most Imperators have never killed before.” I said.

“Yes, yes, I did.” Gaias said.

“How can that be true?” I asked. “The Imperators are the masters of the military, the strongest and most powerful Path.”

“And yet it is true, most Imperators have not and will never directly kill a man with their own physical or mental or spiritual power.” Gaias said.

“How can they advance then? The Imperator’s Path is a path of dominion and conquest and violence and struggle.” I said.

“They don’t.” Gaias said, shrugging.

“They… don’t. What do you mean they don’t?” I said.

“Most Imperators are and will be until their deaths Coppers.” Gaias said.

“How could they possibly be comfortable with that?” I said.

He considered me carefully. “You came from a very interesting background if you don’t know all this. The average Imperator lives long lives in absolute luxury and unimaginable wealth and political power. Many are willing to be merely mediocre if it means they can go to more dinner parties and orgies and operas. Why struggle in vain in the hope of advancement when they can just enjoy every second of their privileged lives?”

This disturbed me. I said as much.

Gaias chuckled. “Augustas shares your opinions, or so I hear.”

Fear flickered through me as that name echoed in my ears. In Illivea, you could be beaten if you were heard saying it. My vision wavered.

“You shouldn’t say that name.” I said, unsteadily.

“Augustas.” He repeated with a smile.

“What if he hears you?” I hissed.

“Oh, I’m not worried about that.” Gaias said.

This calmed me down. I had always wondered this. “So, he can’t really hear you if you speak his name?”

“No, he can.” Gaias said.

“So why are you saying it!” I said.

“Because there are nine whole solar systems of people with a certain percentage of them likely saying his name at any one time. If he paid attention to that sense at all, he’d be drowning in noise, noise within which we would be undetectable at our current cultivations and our Paths.” Gaias said.

“Ok. Ok.” I said. “I got it. Not a big deal.”

“Augustas!” Gaias said one more time with a smile on his face, just to see me flinch.

“Asshole.” I said.

“I came up with a name for you.” Gaias said.

“I thought you wanted to call me the Black Bandit.” I said.

“Need a real name for the arenas.” He said. “What about Commodas?”

“That works.” I said.

I left and walked outside in the interior of the building to step onto the sand of the Brazen Chains’ practice yard. The artificial sun of Sunburst Station beat down on us.

I picked up a sword and a shield and faced my opponent.

Velias had close cropped blond hair, a sandy beard and Golden sclera. He was six foot five and jacked with muscle. Most Servi men were under five foot eight inches, but the gladiators were evidently a different breed of men. Their Foundation may have stated they were destined to be as tall as an Imperator and they were handpicked for their height and bulk. On the Path of the Slave, they may be, but they certainly didn’t look it. They looked like proud warriors. Even among them though, I appeared freakish, being seven to three inches taller than all of them and maintaining a muscular, athletic form through all of it without be a skeletal giant.

“You’re big.” Velias said. He spat to the side. “I fought big before but more importantly I’ve fought great before. You’re only one of those two things.”

“We’ll see.” I said, calmly. He seemed agitated. Perhaps he had not expected me to be actually seven feet tall and had believed that fact to be hyperbole.

Gold Servi and Copper Imperators moved like lightning, blurring as we bashed our blunted blades into each other and our shields.

I slashed and hacked at his shield, sending up sparks as my blade scraped across his shield.

He rained down blows in return and I danced around them.

I used my reach to send my sword tip like an arrow into his torso and projected my shield into his face.

Bit by bit, over the course of twenty minutes, I wore him down and tripped him onto the sands and then held my blunted blade to his neck. I offered him a hand to pull him up but Velias ignored it.

“Whatever.” I said to myself and walked off. There was my exhibition for those who came to watch.

I went back to Gaias’s office, pulled the rug up, opened the trap door and slipped down the ladder. I collected my clothes and switched them in the darkness of the tunnel that I could somehow see in and left the tunnel for the alley. I pulled out the contacts. I walked back to the apartment Livia had found. The miniature sun at the center of Sunburst Station was dimming for the night cycle and the movement of the night life had picked up. I got lots of stares, some people touching me, some people spitting at the ground in front of me, others just getting stunned by my presence.

I walked up to our room and then knocked. She let me in. I surveyed it.

“There’s only one bed.” I commented.

Livia looked at me with her brown Servus eyes set in silver, “I can sleep on the floor.”

“It doesn’t matter.” I muttered. “Just get on the bed and try not to steal the covers.”

It took a long time for me to go to sleep. Livia pretended to be asleep, but I could tell she was still awake too. Eventually darkness took me, though I could not say exactly when it came. There was a certain amnesia in the moments between conscious and unconscious states.

When I woke in the morning, Livia was cuddled up against me.