you!”
My hair practically stood on end. “How can anyone be that brave?” I whispered to Reuben.
“It’s the training,” he explained. “Even in his death throes, a gladiator will try not to make a sound.”
“Are you absolutely sure you can cope with this?” I asked anxiously.
“I told you, I’ll be OK,” he said calmly. “Anyway we’re not alone.”
For a minute, I thought he was quoting his own lyrics, then I realised Reuben meant it literally. Every row of seats had at least one Earth angel in Roman costume. If I hadn’t been so preoccupied, I’d have noticed the tingly cosmic vibes.
“I can’t believe there’s so many!” I whispered.
“Yeah, and I have a feeling we’re going to need every one of them,” he said grimly.
To my relief, the first part of the programme was quite tame: there was an elephant who wrote numbers in the sand with his trunk, with a bit of prompting from his minder, followed by a team of dwarves, who did incredible acrobatics.
Suddenly Flammia rode into the ring standing in a tiny chariot pulled by a Shetland pony, and brandishing a burning torch. The crowd adored this pocket-sized fire-eating barbarian. At the end of his act he rode out in a blazing chariot, like a miniature fire god, yelling with triumph.
Next they had warm-up fights between pairs of trainee gladiators. As each pair ran on, bravely waving their wooden swords, I felt a rush of hope. Surely this one had to be Orlando. But it never was.
The crowd was getting restless. “It’s time they cut some throats around here!” yelled someone.
“Keep the action going!” someone else bellowed. ‘We want real swords and real blood, not this kids’ stuff!”
People started to boo and hiss. It was the first time I really understood why our teachers constantly go on about evolution. In my century, you’d never get fifty-thousand humans howling with excitement, purely because they wanted to see blood spouting from other people’s internal organs.
A rotten apple whizzed past my ear, followed by a flying egg. Frustrated Romans were pelting the recruits with any missile that came to hand. The trainee gladiators quickly ran off. Shortly afterwards another gate burst open. Twenty or thirty terrified men were forcibly dragged and prodded into the arena by burly amphitheatre officials.
I remembered that the Roman authorities regularly used the Games to dispose of unwanted troublemakers. These guys were probably all convicted criminals. They could handle themselves in a street brawl, but had absolutely no experience of this kind of fighting. They’d been given weapons but no armour or protective padding. But this was never intended to be a fair fight. The audience wanted to see blood flow and now they were going to get it.
I won’t go into details. No human should have to see the suffering we saw that day. Anyway, Reuben says it’s always better to light one candle than to curse the dark, so I’m going to tell you about the angels instead.
When the killings began, the Earth angels totally disappeared from the stands. It felt like lights were literally going out all around the amphitheatre. For a few chilling seconds, I saw this terrible place in all its gory blood-soaked darkness.
Then all the lights came back on, only now they were inside the arena.
To some humans, love is just a word. You love your cat. You love chocolate. But to angels love means something different, something deeper. To us, love is a power: a totally impersonal force that recreates the cosmos every single day. Think about it. Every moment love is creating brand new birds, and stars and blades of grass and amazed new humans to enjoy them. You don’t have to ‘deserve’ this love. It’s just there for free. And no-one is allowed to die alone.
What we witnessed that day in the arena was desperate, but it was also incredibly inspiring. During their last agonised moments on Earth, dying humans were shown pure love by unknown angels.
My hair practically stood on end. “How can anyone be that brave?” I whispered to Reuben.
“It’s the training,” he explained. “Even in his death throes, a gladiator will try not to make a sound.”
“Are you absolutely sure you can cope with this?” I asked anxiously.
“I told you, I’ll be OK,” he said calmly. “Anyway we’re not alone.”
For a minute, I thought he was quoting his own lyrics, then I realised Reuben meant it literally. Every row of seats had at least one Earth angel in Roman costume. If I hadn’t been so preoccupied, I’d have noticed the tingly cosmic vibes.
“I can’t believe there’s so many!” I whispered.
“Yeah, and I have a feeling we’re going to need every one of them,” he said grimly.
To my relief, the first part of the programme was quite tame: there was an elephant who wrote numbers in the sand with his trunk, with a bit of prompting from his minder, followed by a team of dwarves, who did incredible acrobatics.
Suddenly Flammia rode into the ring standing in a tiny chariot pulled by a Shetland pony, and brandishing a burning torch. The crowd adored this pocket-sized fire-eating barbarian. At the end of his act he rode out in a blazing chariot, like a miniature fire god, yelling with triumph.
Next they had warm-up fights between pairs of trainee gladiators. As each pair ran on, bravely waving their wooden swords, I felt a rush of hope. Surely this one had to be Orlando. But it never was.
The crowd was getting restless. “It’s time they cut some throats around here!” yelled someone.
“Keep the action going!” someone else bellowed. ‘We want real swords and real blood, not this kids’ stuff!”
People started to boo and hiss. It was the first time I really understood why our teachers constantly go on about evolution. In my century, you’d never get fifty-thousand humans howling with excitement, purely because they wanted to see blood spouting from other people’s internal organs.
A rotten apple whizzed past my ear, followed by a flying egg. Frustrated Romans were pelting the recruits with any missile that came to hand. The trainee gladiators quickly ran off. Shortly afterwards another gate burst open. Twenty or thirty terrified men were forcibly dragged and prodded into the arena by burly amphitheatre officials.
I remembered that the Roman authorities regularly used the Games to dispose of unwanted troublemakers. These guys were probably all convicted criminals. They could handle themselves in a street brawl, but had absolutely no experience of this kind of fighting. They’d been given weapons but no armour or protective padding. But this was never intended to be a fair fight. The audience wanted to see blood flow and now they were going to get it.
I won’t go into details. No human should have to see the suffering we saw that day. Anyway, Reuben says it’s always better to light one candle than to curse the dark, so I’m going to tell you about the angels instead.
When the killings began, the Earth angels totally disappeared from the stands. It felt like lights were literally going out all around the amphitheatre. For a few chilling seconds, I saw this terrible place in all its gory blood-soaked darkness.
Then all the lights came back on, only now they were inside the arena.
To some humans, love is just a word. You love your cat. You love chocolate. But to angels love means something different, something deeper. To us, love is a power: a totally impersonal force that recreates the cosmos every single day. Think about it. Every moment love is creating brand new birds, and stars and blades of grass and amazed new humans to enjoy them. You don’t have to ‘deserve’ this love. It’s just there for free. And no-one is allowed to die alone.
What we witnessed that day in the arena was desperate, but it was also incredibly inspiring. During their last agonised moments on Earth, dying humans were shown pure love by unknown angels.
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