Menas and Menecrates Are Not Dead
Title: Menas and Menecrates Are Not Dead
Author: lareinenoire
Play/Poem: Antony and Cleopatra
Recipient: gileonnen
Rating: PG
Summary: Two underutilised pirates ponder free will, politics, geography, meteorology, love, and the relative vintages of wines grown in volcanic soil.
Warnings: Silliness, gossiping pirates, unexpected revelations about human nature, canonical character death (offstage)
Author's Notes: This is unashamedly silly. I apologise in advance.
"We should have poisoned them." Menas prodded a half-empty goblet with his thumb, sending it crashing to the deck. "You know we should have poisoned them."
"I know, I know."
"Remind me again why we didn't?"
Menecrates sighed. "Orders."
"We're pirates. When did we follow orders?"
"Since we got involved in politics." Menecrates spat through the porthole into the water. "We should have known better."
Menas grinned. "But we do now, don't we?"
"Oh, that we do, sir. I believe the Dominus Sextus Pompeius has a fine villa on the southern coast, near Messina. Perhaps we'll pay him a visit."
"Well, the great Caesar did charge him with ridding the seas of such pestilence as ourselves--"
"--and the gods forbid he should need to seek us out far and wide when we could so easily come to his very threshold." He groped beneath the pile of ropes and his bedroll to reveal one last bottle of Pompey's finest Sicilian vintage, loaded just a few days before from that very estate. It was something in the soil, Pompey claimed, and Menas was reminded of a lovely bottle he'd found on a ship belonging to a merchant from Herculaneum. "To law-abiding citizens."
Menecrates raised his goblet. "To weak stomachs and full purses."
They drank in companionable silence for a few moments before Menas wondered aloud, "Do you think it will last?"
"What will last?"
"The Triumvirate."
"Not a chance," snorted Menecrates. "They don't need Sextus Pompey or Fulvia or any other malcontent. All they need is time."
"And the beauteous Cleopatra," Menas added. "She treats her lovers well; did you not mark the Egyptian Consul's colouring? And not from drink, you take my meaning."
"I do. And she a Queen with fewer scruples than our former master. Perhaps after our visit to Pompey, we hie to Alexandria and offer ourselves to Antony's fair mistress."
They were men of the sea and it did not surprise them in the end that they reached Egypt by a more circuitous path. What did surprise them was the fleet of Roman galleys spread across the harbour of Alexandria.
Cleopatra, it would appear, was dead. As was the other moiety of the triumvirate--nobody who knew him would think to flatter Lepidus with the title he claimed--which left only Caesar.
"Another Caesar," Menas said with a shake of his head. "Will they never learn?"
"They never do."
The pause lengthened into thoughtful silence as they gazed upon the once-great Egypt, now hemmed in and shackled to Caesar's star. "What do you know about Britannia?"
"The weather's vile."
"But will they pay for a decent vintage?" The visit to Pompey's estate had been nothing if not productive. "Or do they know nothing about it?"
"Never assume that anybody knows about anything, Menas."
"Are you turning philosopher?"
"And give up piracy? Not on your life."
Hoisting the sails aloft, they turned away from the harbour and from Rome to seek more promising shores.
Author: lareinenoire
Play/Poem: Antony and Cleopatra
Recipient: gileonnen
Rating: PG
Summary: Two underutilised pirates ponder free will, politics, geography, meteorology, love, and the relative vintages of wines grown in volcanic soil.
Warnings: Silliness, gossiping pirates, unexpected revelations about human nature, canonical character death (offstage)
Author's Notes: This is unashamedly silly. I apologise in advance.
"We should have poisoned them." Menas prodded a half-empty goblet with his thumb, sending it crashing to the deck. "You know we should have poisoned them."
"I know, I know."
"Remind me again why we didn't?"
Menecrates sighed. "Orders."
"We're pirates. When did we follow orders?"
"Since we got involved in politics." Menecrates spat through the porthole into the water. "We should have known better."
Menas grinned. "But we do now, don't we?"
"Oh, that we do, sir. I believe the Dominus Sextus Pompeius has a fine villa on the southern coast, near Messina. Perhaps we'll pay him a visit."
"Well, the great Caesar did charge him with ridding the seas of such pestilence as ourselves--"
"--and the gods forbid he should need to seek us out far and wide when we could so easily come to his very threshold." He groped beneath the pile of ropes and his bedroll to reveal one last bottle of Pompey's finest Sicilian vintage, loaded just a few days before from that very estate. It was something in the soil, Pompey claimed, and Menas was reminded of a lovely bottle he'd found on a ship belonging to a merchant from Herculaneum. "To law-abiding citizens."
Menecrates raised his goblet. "To weak stomachs and full purses."
They drank in companionable silence for a few moments before Menas wondered aloud, "Do you think it will last?"
"What will last?"
"The Triumvirate."
"Not a chance," snorted Menecrates. "They don't need Sextus Pompey or Fulvia or any other malcontent. All they need is time."
"And the beauteous Cleopatra," Menas added. "She treats her lovers well; did you not mark the Egyptian Consul's colouring? And not from drink, you take my meaning."
"I do. And she a Queen with fewer scruples than our former master. Perhaps after our visit to Pompey, we hie to Alexandria and offer ourselves to Antony's fair mistress."
They were men of the sea and it did not surprise them in the end that they reached Egypt by a more circuitous path. What did surprise them was the fleet of Roman galleys spread across the harbour of Alexandria.
Cleopatra, it would appear, was dead. As was the other moiety of the triumvirate--nobody who knew him would think to flatter Lepidus with the title he claimed--which left only Caesar.
"Another Caesar," Menas said with a shake of his head. "Will they never learn?"
"They never do."
The pause lengthened into thoughtful silence as they gazed upon the once-great Egypt, now hemmed in and shackled to Caesar's star. "What do you know about Britannia?"
"The weather's vile."
"But will they pay for a decent vintage?" The visit to Pompey's estate had been nothing if not productive. "Or do they know nothing about it?"
"Never assume that anybody knows about anything, Menas."
"Are you turning philosopher?"
"And give up piracy? Not on your life."
Hoisting the sails aloft, they turned away from the harbour and from Rome to seek more promising shores.