Basilica

[AspisPhalanx90]

While not an "office" per se, the area you enter is the meeting place of formal business involving Roman legal complaints and actions. It is here where formal complaints are filed, and counsel is given by the Praetor

[Tazgrent]

Vibius Aemelius Strabo enters with his small entourage.

I am here to officially charge Aulus Licinius Caldius with arson.

[Maiar93]

Manius Julius Scaevola steps in, surprised that Strabo is there too.

"I will back him up. I myself saw his burned house and burned bodies inside it."

[Kubrick]

Quintus Antonius looks at the two senators from behind his desk. Being Dives' assistant while he was quaestor was quite fun but on his first day with the praetor business he already had to handle loads of complaints and now this senator walked in wanting to charge another senator. What the other man was doing here remained a mystery to him. Anyways, this was too much for Quintus to handle. 'Gentlemen, please, the preator can be here any minute now.' Maybe he can make some sense out of this.

Quintus continued to write on his parchment while the two men stood there waiting, and indeed it didn't took long for Dives to arrive, escorted by two lictors. He walked towards Quintus his desk and noticed the two men. 'Ah Strabo, my friend. I already wondered where you went this morning. And hello to you too, senator Scaevola.' Caius looked at his assistant who knew what he wanted to hear. 'Sir, senator Strabo here wishes to charge another senator. And senator Scaevola talked about backing him up.' Caius nodded. 'Vibius, please follow me to my office so we can speak in private. And senator Scaevola, if you have any other business than backing up senator Strabo, please say so. If not I will come back for you later.' He looked at Scaevola, awaiting an answer.

[Tazgrent]

As much as I appreciate your support, Manius, I think it would be better if I went in alone. There's a chance you could be on the jury and someone might decide to accuse use of conspiring.

[Maiar93]

Manius smiles and says:

"I am here, because I myself saw the destruction. I will wait my turn here."

[Kubrick]

Caius looked at Scaevola. 'I will hear the whole story from Strabo, after that I will most definitely start an investigation. Then I will speak to you. If you have any other business than the destruction of Strabo's house, please say so to my secretary.' He waved his hand in the direction of Atonius. He then walked to his office and closed the door when Strabo entered.

He smiled at him. 'Sit down, Vibius. Tell me everything that happened, even the things you already told me. We'll get to the bottom of this.'

[Tazgrent]

Strabo took his seat and began to recount.

Well, it's not much. I was at your house, as before, and I came home. It was already completely destroyed, with burning embers. I found that spilled bag of gold, it looked like someone had dropped it. That's all. Oh, and it must have been a fast fire, because all of my slaves were dead.

[Kubrick]

Caius nodded and wrote a few things done. 'If all your slaves are dead I think we can safely rule out that it was an accident. Fire's don't spread that fast.' He looked up. 'I presume the remains of the house are untouched? Except for the bodies of course. And can you think off any persons who would harm you? Try to think out off the box, I know senator Caldius is the obvious choice here but why would he harm you? Why would others try to harm your property?'

[Tazgrent]

I do not know. The coins implicate Caldius and we know he has treasonous intentions; he wanted to run to Athens. And where is Athens? Greece. He probably has allies there, and they don't like me because I hate the Greeks. He or them wanted to have me killed.

[Kubrick]

Caius shook his head. 'Caldius is a fool, yes. But is he this stupid? Who looses a bag of gold, printed with his own face, at a crime scene? Come on Vibius, even you should see that this smells. He is our prime suspect but I wont leave it at that. Apart from Caldius and the Greeks, who else would profit from harming you? Think, Vibius!' While awaiting the answer he scribbled a few more things on the parchment.

- visit Caldius
- acquire the gold
- contact Kleitos

This is when he realized that fire and Caldius seemed to have met eachother before. The fire in Caldius' house, a crime never resolved. Would there be a link?

[Tazgrent]

Of course I'm not saying Caldius himself burned my home. That would be absurd. He probably hired someone. And I'd imagine the kind of people who hire themselves out for this kind of thing probably aren't the most professional. It's entirely possible they could have dropped something,

[War lord]

Caldius enters the Basilica. Seeking the Praetor.

[Kubrick]

Quintus looks up from his desk. 'Senator Caldius, the praetor is awaiting you in his office.' He gestures at the nearby door and quickly gets back to work.

[War lord]

Thank you,

Caldius enters the Praetors office. Before Caius can even look up from his work Caldius speaks.

Was it necessary to send one of your Goons to my house to summon me like a common criminal? I am Tribune of the Plebs and I deserve respect.

[Kubrick]

The feather in Caius' hand snapped in two pieces and his piercing eyes looked up at Caldius. 'And I am the Praetor of Rome, Tribune and I'll summon you the way I like it, as long as I work to uphold the law in this city.' A lictor peeked around the corner to see what the fuzz was about but a simple nod of Caius' head made him leave, knowing it was alright. 'I presume you are up to date regarding the blazing inferno that destroyed Strabo's house? Well, this is what they found close to it.' Caius tossed out a coin in the direction of Caldius that featured the man's face. 'Not a very lifelike portrait but no one can deny that it isn't you, Caldius. So either you are incredibly stupid by creating this and paying criminals with it or either someone is setting you up. I want you to tell me everything. And we will go a few years back, to when someone set your house on fire. Think of all details that could matter, rivals, enemies, no matter what they ever did or what happened. After that we will discuss the whole tribune matter.'

Caius grabbed another sheet of parchment and a new feather and prepared for Caldius' answer.

[War lord]

Caldius looks closely at the coin, slightly bemused. He laughs suddenly and then frowns.

I've never seen these before, and aside from the image on them I'd mistake them with a real coin. But with my picture on them they're worthless, a vanity project, not something you'd burn a Patrician Domus down for. As a clue though they're still handy, (He quickly examines a another coin)

See, a job like this requires professional pride, and a proud professional leaves his mark. Now on real coinage tiny symbols on the face tell you who the money-men were the year the coin was minted, our forger has left his own unique marks. Find out what they mean, you find him. Find him, you find out who ordered the coins. Find out who ordered the coins, you've found your man. (He drops the coins back onto the desk.)

People who'd want me out of the way? That's easy, Scaevola in revenge for having Corvenus sent off the rock, Merula due to political differences, your father for obvise reasons and Imperious for opposing him in general. Now in that list, Merula is too honurable to frame me, Scaevola is too blunt in his methods and your father has bigger problems. You see where I'm going with this?

[Kubrick]

Caius leans forward. 'The whole thing smells, Caldius. I quickly had the suspicions of it being carried out by someone who wanted to see you convicted. I need proof. Anyways, do you think this might have any relation to the assault you previously had in your house? Also, what was your location on the night of the fire and do you have someone to confirm that?' Caius then shouted out and his assistant showed his face, he tossed a coin at the man. 'Find out who made it, you'll know what to ask him.' Quintus nodded and left.

[War lord]

I doubt it had anything to do with the fire at my house, the crazy who set my office on fire didn't go there with that in mind. On the night of the fire I was still in hiding, as far as most of the Senate knows I wasn't even in Italy and the other lot is willing to testify that I was on a boat to Athens with them. Either way I certainly wasn't in a position to mint coinage and burn someones house down that month.

[Kubrick]

Caius nodded, satisfied with the results he had gotten so far even if he was far from solving this mess. Hopefully Quintus had found something. 'Good, you can leave now and you are scrapped from the suspects list but try to keep it low, some people are screaming for your head and I want to do this investigation in quietness.'