Rome AARisen - a Byzantine AAR

Update is almost done! (as in tonight it'll probably get posted) It would've gone up a few hours ago, if Windows hadn't insisted I needed to update, then taken 2 hours to do the update.

Thank you Microsoft.

The delay is mostly from me adding onto it. Originally this was to be a one scene add on to what happened before. Then I thought of a second scene, and then a third to make the second and first fit. And so now things have ballooned. XD But its almost done, as I said.

Fall of Stars - I tease? Nah! Never! At least I'm not as evil anymore about leaving everyone on cliffhangers like I did for a while (and dragging them out, like when Hajnal tried to off Demetrios).

And yes, the song is One Winged Angel by Nobue Uematsu from Final Fantasy VII. Ironically, I'd never heard of this until my boyfriend dragged me to a concert in Chicago. I fell in love with the song at that point XD. So congratulations, you get five brownie points! They can be converted into... something. Honest. Perhaps. Maybe. I lie. I think.

The current brownie point total stands at:
Fall of Stars - 5
VILenin - 2

For those still trying to guess the event, since you know the name of the song, there are several good orchestral versions on Youtube. Run over there, take a listen, and come back with your guesses! When the update is posted tonight, I'll also reveal who is right. Keep in mind, "some future event" might not even take place under Basil - I have some important events lined up as late as 1400. A right answer on this doesn't have to be as specific as "Ms. Peacock, in the kitchen with the gun," it only needs to be general, as in "there was a gun."

RGB - Oh, believe me, its getting pared down from now on. Especially considering Manuel pulled a Demetrios and had an army of children as well, keeping it fully up to date would be simply impossible.

Hayes - Welcome to the thread, I'm glad I provide some entertainment during some otherwise boring times for you! Who was your favorite character? (I'm always curious about that... its fun to see how that changes as the story goes )

Estonianzulu - Hmm. I have no idea how he'd react - though I'd guess Sulieman, while devastated, is too skilled and cool of a customer to do something exceedingly rash. He might be a humanist, highly intelligent and even chivalrous to his opponents, but he's also the time that would deep freeze his revenge before serving it to his enemies...

Enewald - LOL. After Basilieos' generation (4th generation in game) I quit counting Komnenids, there were too many. We've got another 10 generations to go before the tale of the Komnenids is done... I don't want to venture how many are running around by the end of things...

As for the song - yes, definitely composed in the last century! And yes, it comes from a battle!

English Patriot - 'Prolific' is the polite way of saying he couldn't keep his pants on. XD

Fulcrumvale - I went into the family tree idea thinking "Ooo, this'd be fun, and it won't take too long to do!" Boy was I wrong. Compiling the list of family members took probably a half hour. Building the thing was the hardest part, simply because with Georgios' horde, there wasn't enough room (hence the craziness of the lines there). There are alot of interesting things I noted that I couldn't draw in and forgot. For example, Alexandros Thrakesios (Basil's friend) is the son of Romanos Thrakesios. Yet, after Alexandros' mother dies, Romanos marries Basil's half-sister, so you have father and son married to half-sisters.

Sometimes Konstantinopolis looks alot like an Arkansas holler.

kalendaree - The guess of battle is good. The event I'm talking about takes place in the battle, and is so major it overshadows the battle. I haven't said whether the event was good or not - these Komnenids are schemers, so you never know...

AlexanderPrimus - He's not married, yes. Regardless of what happens with Sophie, he's young, and heir to the most powerful empire in Christendom. His lack of marriage will likely be temporary.

canonized - I actually never thought about that until you brought it up. The guy who's playing it picked it up by ear, and I had it for the teaser instead of the official piano music because I thought his sounded better and closer to the actual song. The distortion is still bad... fortunately I have some time to play around with fixing that before things need to get recorded.

August 20th, 1162



Sophie Komnenos, daughter of Theodoros, closed her eyes and felt the evening breeze blow across her face. The air was wet and salty, blowing straight from the Marmara into the gardens of the Boukelon Palace, home of the Imperial family since the fire that ruined the Great Palace itself.

When her blue eyes opened, she watched the slowly setting sun, and the shadows her slight frame cast on the palace behind her. She thought she heard a voice, and turned around.

And smiled. She'd never let her mother, or even Basil know it, but every time she saw him her heart skipped a beat - that feeling where she had to catch her breath at his dark eyes.

She admitted, when she first saw him years ago the Prince wasn't much to look at. When he was 11, he merely looked tall, gangly, as if someone had given him extra bone in his arms and legs. His face had been a splotchy mess, and when he wasn't standing around in awkward silence, he burbled out a tidal wave of words that made little sense with each other. At first, he was a minor annoyance.

As time went on, though, she began to like his company - then cherish it, to the point that when he'd ridden off to go hunting with his father that fateful day, she'd almost told her father of how they felt for each other. His splotchy face was now clean, if slightly rugged, his hair dark, his eyes large, brown, and full of emotion. He was still gangly, but from the few times she'd watched him sparring, she knew there was muscle under his loose clothes. He would never be brutishly large like his grandfather or someone like Vataczes, but like his father, his mold was almost statuesque.


"Good evening, my lady," he said in his deep tenor voice with a slight bow. He always had spoken Greek with a slight accent, the kind that a mere passerby might describe as stodgy or aristocratic. For her, it was all part of the charm. Adding to that, only did he look perfect and sound perfect in her eyes, he was a gentleman, something that made him all the more attractive.

Sophie blinked, trying to calm herself down. Mother always said that women had to remain calm - their calmness was supposed to soothe the passions that often overtook the man.

"Good evening, my wolfie," she smiled. Ever since Basil had told her the story about how he and his friends had been labelled "wolves" by the irate kitchen staff in Taranto, she'd taken to calling him her "wolf." Partly it was cutesy - something about "wolfie" made her giggle - and partly it was her way at being clever. Basil was not a ravenous, mangy beast - if anything, he was more akin to a deer, shy and majestic at the same time.

She leaned over and gave him a peck on the cheek - once again restraining herself. Sophie Komnenos might have been a high-born lady, but she was not naive. She'd heard her mother and sisters talking, she knew things, and she knew she wanted those things. She also knew if she was overt, and pushed someone as pious and shy as Basil towards them, he'd probably become as skittish as a deer at a watering hole. So she held herself back from anything more. As it was, his face went beet red. She grinned - she might not want to scare him off, but she did love gently teasing him. She patted a spot on the blanket next to her.

"No lessons, I take it?" he asked, sitting down. "What, with it being near dusk - no time to get through St. Augustine, right?" he laughed nervously.

"No," Sophie said quietly, "I want to talk about your plan."

"Ah..." Basil nodded. Sophie, of all people, had been the first he'd run his idea past. She was the one that pointed out Latins could augment his numbers, and that they'd be easy to come by from his relationship with Rimini. She'd also been the one to point out that Vataczes would have to be removed if Zeno was to be embarassed. "What about it?"

He had that partly proud, happy look on his face that reminded Sophie of a puppy. Yet the topic of tonight's conversation was going to be anything but cheerful.

"Well, I for one am worried," Sophie said softly. "It's a war, Basil..."

She'd know about the plan for some time, and so long as it was a mere plan, it was something distant - something immaterial, a mere idea. But now that slowly it was turning into action, all of her anxieties and fears came rushing to the fore.

"I know its a war," the Prince replied in a distant, almost academic tone. "I understand war - I've understood war since I was a child."

"Have you killed a man before?" Sophie pressed on. "Not just a man that was threatening you, but killed a man, in cold blood?" She had never seen a battleline, never seen or heard the slaughter that was a "glorious field," but she'd heard all about it. Not just the rollicking tales of her uncle Kosmas, but the stories of the armless, legless men that were dragged home behind his armies.

He looked down, staring into the grass. Sophie thought she saw his jaw moving, as if he was biting down hard on his own tongue.

"Yes," he said slowly. He started to work his mouth to say more, but her finger touched his lips as she shushed him quietly.

"You needn't say anymore about that," she said quietly. It was plain it still hurt him, all these years later. She didn't know the particulars, but she guessed it probably happened during the sack of Taranto. She had heard all about his actions during the attack on Emperor Manuel - killing in those situations was far easier. A man could run on instinct in a battle. After the battle, when men who shouldn't be left alive were cowering in fear, would be the real test of mettle.

For few moments, an awkward, dead silence hung between the two, before finally he looked up. He blinked twice, then his whole countenance seemed to change. "Yes, enough about that," he said calmly.

"When are you leaving for Apulia?" she asked.

"Not for a while, I imagine - a month or two," Basil said quietly. While that was more time than she had originally feared, Sophie's heart still fell. Despite her efforts, it was apparent her downcast emotions had found expression in her face.


"You needn't worry, Vataczes will be coming with," Basil said, his words confident but his voice uncertain.

Sophie wasn't so sure. Vataczes might have had a fine reputation as a soldier, but she had seen him in galas and official events - he behaved like an oafish pig. She wouldn't willingly trust the safety of her love to any such brute.

"You have to trust me!" Basil smiled, and she could immediately tell the false bravado coming out. The same grin he gave when she was reading to him, and he pretended to understand what she said.

"I..." she started to say, before she stopped, to gather her thoughts.

"You have to trust me," Basil repeated himself, "I won't intentionally put myself in harms way. Well, war is harms way, but I wouldn't intentionally risk myself more than you could bear..." The qualifications continued for another few moments before Sophie had enough, right after he asked yet again, "Why do you worry so?"

"Because I love you, you idiot!" Sophie snapped.

Basil tried to open his mouth, but nothing came out save a series of confused noises. Sophie's hands went to her hips, and she rolled her eyes.

"You're going off to war, Basil. That scares me - it scares me to no end. I may never see you again!" Sophie said, trying to fight back the tears she felt building behind her eyes. There was so much she wanted to say, so much she wanted to do - finally, she just blurted what was on her mind.

"This is the part where you ask for my hand," she sighed, looking down at her bespotten and speechless love. A slight smile spread to one corner of her lips, as she offered her hand.

"I what?"

"You ask for my hand," Sophie repeated gently, and slowly. "You're going off to war, to an uncertain future. I can't bear to lose you. I want you to ask for my hand. As in the following - 'Sophie, I would like to ask for your hand in marriage.'"

More stuttering and uncertain words. "But we'd need your father's - "

"He doesn't need to know right now," Sophie said demurely. "He is off in the Levant. Besides," she smiled, "mama and my brothers would be spoilt keen to hear I have the hand of the son of the Emperor. Father can rot in Jerusalem! If he's not here, he can't stop anything!"

"But we'd need dispensation from the Church!" Basil stammered. "And with Zeno running the Patriarch like a puppet-"

"You're off to speak to Zeno anyway, you said," she said slowly, "with a deal he couldn't refuse, you said? Couldn't something be added?" Sophie put her hands behind her back and smiled.

"Yes, but Zeno is allied with your father, and I don't know what he'd say, and -" Basil blabbered until suddenly stopping in midsentence.

"It finally dawns on you," Sophie openly laughed. She would permit herself a little bit of fun. "My poor wolf pup! I certainly hope on our wedding night you won't need such guidance?"

She chuckled evilly at the stutterings that spilled from Basil's mouth.

"No matter, I'll teach you everything," she twisted the tease a little more and laughed. That thought was far better than the fears that gripped her.



September 1st, 1162


Basil nervously looked around, as the noise of dancing and celebration filled the room around him. Jugglers tossed baubles with ease, dancers pirouetted and twirled before his eyes, as musicians played happy, joyous tunes that contrasted harshly with the dread that filled the young man's heart.

The Prince looked up at the raised dais at the front of the great banqueting hall of the Boukoleon Palace, and saw Zeno smiling broadly as he regally presided over the entire affair, talking with guests, chatting with friends and cronies. Basil knew he should have been happy right now - Zeno had agreed to his proposals, even agreed to celebrate Basil's wedding feast at the same time as his consecration as co-Emperor. He had given no indications he knew of the Latin troops in Apulia, or, indeed, that he was any the wiser to Basil's plans.

Yet the Prince was filled with a sense of unease. Zeno was sly - it was not like him to not know what was going on around him. The prince guessed that co-Emperor Zeno had some plots of his own, but that wasn't what set Basil so at unease.

The cause of his currently flimsy stomach sat across the hall from him, daintily eating grapes from her plate.


"It would seem congratulations are in order." Basil turned, and found a smiling Rodrigo sliding into the chair next to him. "A trip to Apulia, on the state's pay? Excellent!"

"You act as if you're coming along," Basil flashed a wry grin. "Who would have known?"

"Someone has to keep an eye out for all the enemies you can't see," Rodrigo patted Basil on the shoulder and laughed. "Now, where's that stunning new wife of yours?"

"There," Basil pointed to across the hall.

"It was a wonderful ceremony, Patriarch Gennadius had some of the kindest words I've ever heard him use to a member of the Imperial family," another voice added, as Alexandros plopped into the seat opposite Rodrigo. "Zeno must've greased his palms extra slick to get those words said."

"And your wife looked stunning," Rodrigo added, "Perhaps I should go check up on her, prepare her for you?" he smirked.

Basil frowned, then rolled his eyes at the Spaniard. Rodrigo ignored him - already his eyes were scanning the crowd, looking for potential young ladies.

"Is sourpuss still unnerved about tonight?" a third voice cracked, as Bernard, troublesome as ever, joined the three.

"He is," Rodrigo replied, "didn't even make a wisecrack when I commented about 'prepping' Sophie."

Basil frowned. For part of the Prince, the party couldn't end soon enough. For the rest of him, it could go on forever, as he had little, if any idea what was to come. When Rodrigo and Alexandros began boasting of their conquests, Basil usually shut them out.

Now, he wished he'd listened some - at least for mechanics.

"I...um..." Basil stammered. To the Prince's chagrin, both Rodrigo and Alexandros both smirked at his discomfiture.

"Is he going to ask it?" Bernard piped up gleefully, and Basil's face turned two shades redder.

"Yes, Basil?" Rodrigo smiled in mock comforting, "What is it?"


"Well... it's my wedding night, and I..." Stammer. Red faced embarassment. "I...need some..."

"There's a reason you should've practiced in that high class place your father's stewards wanted to take you to," Alexandros said with military simplicity, "but no. Someone felt 'uncomfortable' and 'ill' so he didn't go!" Rodrigo and Bernard both cackled, and Basil's face turned a shade of red normally reserved for the cloaks of strategoi.

"Rodrigo still practices, and yet the tourney never arrives," Bernard smiled slyly.

It was the Spaniard's turn to flush red and glare.

"Basil, listen," Rodrigo said simply, "I'll be frank and honest with you. It's not that hard." When the other two broke into snickers, Rodrigo gave an icy glare. "You'll do just fine. Believe me! Here," Rodrigo grabbed a passing servant and snagged the largest goblet on the man's platter, "drink this!"

Basil blinked, looking at the enormous goblet. No, not a goblet, he corrected himself - a jug. Even holding it at arms length, the smell of the wine enveloped him.

"This is called grappa, its a new type of drink from Italy," Rodrigo said expertly. "Instead of fermenting the wine, they boil it and collect the vapor." He pushed the drink closer to Basil. "Drink! It will calm your nerves!"

Basil closed his eyes, and lifted the goblet to take a sip. Fire filled his mouth, and ran down to his belly, where it landed with a visceral thud.

The prince blinked, water coming to his eyes.

"Great stuff isn't it?" Rodrigo smiled as the others chuckled. Basil merely glared at them.

"It's rancid," he muttered. Basil looked up, and across the room, Sophie waved at him. Her smile, encouraging, inviting, loving, made him forget his friends, and his anxiety. If all else failed, Basil thought, at least one Roman Prince could say he was genuinely happy for a moment.


Zeno Komnenos, from his place on a raised dais near the front of the hall, quietly observed the Prince and his compatriots, only a few feet away, and wanted to laugh at the pale look on the Prince's face. Zeno remembered that terror well - save his was partially sated because it was in a brothel in Siracusa, with a whore paid for by his father's coin. Christophoros' wanted his son to learn early, before he started breeding heirs - something Manuel clearly had not done with Basil.

Part of Emperor Zeno was amused to no end - that a boy so young, so obviously inexperienced, had come up with the proposal that had greeted his eyes only a month prior. Zeno would get a co-Emperorship, his lackey would be restored to army command, if Basil was released from the city to raise a force in Apulia and the Prince had the hand of Theodoros' daughter Sophie. As her father was off in the Levant, Zeno signed off on her father's behalf, as well as persuaded Gennadius to issue the proper dispensation. After all, the diadem was worth a wedding, and watching the son and heir of his arch-rival leave the city was just extra frosting on the cake.

Basil called himself clever. Going to Apulia to raise his thematakoi? Obviously, that had nothing to do with the thousands of armed Latin 'pilgrims' sitting in Taranto. Nothing whatsoever.

Zeno permitted himself a small chuckle. For days, he'd puzzled over this - that Basil was rushing to get an army was something that made sense. Using that army to gain popularity made even more sense - It was an age old Roman tradition, it seemed. But so few? For the longest time Zeno pondered what the boy intended to do with a mere 14,000 troops - in an Empire that if all levies were raised, all soldiers called to service, could in sum muster nearly 500,000, as many as in the days of Justinian?

He obviously couldn't have been marching to Anatolia - in the face of Sulieman such small numbers would have been useless. Armenia was too remote for Basil to gain the popularity he craved.

Yet there was Syria. Flushed with 40,000 Turks, under the leadership of the Sultan's son. A huge force, threatening to take Antioch and Damascus. If Basil could defeat the Turks there, he'd slice open the underbelly of the Muslim beast - he coudl either march into Anatolia to cut Sulieman off from his lands, or march into Mesopotamia to destroy Sulieman's capital. Zeno had to give the boy credit for his boldness, that was for sure.

But what if the boy was successful? By the numbers, to Zeno's mind it made no sense - 14,000 could not hope to defeat 40,000, even if the Megos had lead them - and this little host would be lead by a 16 year old boy. What if this brash young Prince managed to break Syria, even if the Sultan sent reinforcements? Zeno did not at all buy Basil's clarifications that Vataczes would command, not at all. The whole situation smelled foul. Normally, Zeno would have ascribed it all to youthful arrogance and inexperience, save for the attitude of his neighbor to the right on the dais.

Normally the vast meal would have been served on couches, so all could relax and louge as they ate, but the condition of Emperor Manuel had prevented that. The senior Basilieus was strapped into his chair underneath their joint table, and gingerly picking at peas between wet and heavy coughs. He said nary a word to Basil's plan, which in Zeno's mind, meant his rival had approved it. And if Manuel Komnenos had approved of a plot, that meant he felt its chances of success were more then negligible.

Yet, Zeno reasoned, at the end of the day he would have a diadem and Basil would not. With the Prince out of the city, the co-Emperor reasoned he could begin courting the palace regiments, perhaps even some of the damned Nubiatakoi. The situation was a win - win. If Basil returned triumphant, he would come back to a city filled with Zeno loyalists. If he failed, he would come back disgraced, with a powerful opposition ready to sweep him aside - if he came back at all.

But one could never be too cautious. The co-Emperor looked down the long tables laid before them, and caught the look of Venizelos. The strategos' eyes were casting long and dark daggers in Zeno's direction. Zeno hardly blamed him - after all, it was by Imperial decree that nearly all of Venizelos' guard troops were sent to Cherson, to deploy as a "deterrent" against a "possible Cuman threat." That left Venizelos with 35,000 thematakoi against a general who had seen success from the Euphrates to Ikonion.

As much as Zeno understood his crony's frustration, he needed Venizelos to lose. Konstantinopolis itself was safe - the Turks had no navy, and if they even sniffed of trying to build one Imperial fireships would decimate it quickly. The most Sulieman could do, Zeno knew, was sit at Chrysopolis across the Bosphorus and glare at the prize he couldn't take. He was playing a psychological game with the Romans - a game Zeno had caught on to. If Venizelos tried to stop him - as he would have to, Zeno would see to it - he would be crushed easily.

Maybe, just maybe, Sulieman would try to slip some troops back to Syria. There wouldn't be a large, unified Roman force in Anatolia left, after all. One could maintain a menacing presence with 40,000 as easily as 60,000. Perhaps Sulieman might even go himself to Syria - that would certainly spoil whatever the young Prince had planned.

Zeno had grown up watching Nikolaios Komnenos masterfully playing the game of intrigue, and sat on the sidelines as Manuel brutishly attempted the same. All along the way, he had learned one important lesson - one could never be too cautious. If that didn't work, Zeno had several additional backup plans as well.

"He's outsmarted you," a weak, phlegm filled voice said, just above the din of song and conversation. Zeno turned, and his looks went sour as he saw Manuel leering at him with a positive sneer.

"What?"

"Whatever you're thinking," Zeno's co-Emperor said slowly, as if to anunciate the words for a stupid child, "he has outsmarted you."

"We'll see, cousin," Zeno smiled back politely. Zeno Komnenos was no fool. As he leaned back in his chair and relaxed, the co-Emperor smiled. He still had a few tricks up his sleeves.



So Basil's plan is in action, and he's wed the girl of his dreams. Yet Zeno has figured things out, and remains confident that things will fall his way. How will it all turn out, and how will Basil get along with the Latins he's about to meet in Taranto? The Turkish War continues next Rome AARisen!