[center][h2][color=bc8dbf]J[/color]unia [color=bc8dbf]P[/color]hillipa [color=bc8dbf]M[/color]axima[/h2][/center][hr] Junia was lucky enough to hit one of the Mortui squarely in the head with a stone. It had been a patrician in life, but now it lay there and twitched: nothing more than a corpse twice over. She'd always had a good arm at least, but the momentary exultation faded as two more shambled in to take its place. There had been a handful in the countryside outside of Rome and a good many in the city itself, but there were throngs here: [i]hordes![/i] [color=bc8dbf][i]What have you gotten yourself into, Juni!?[/i][/color] she screamed inwardly, hefting another stone. She was not about to waste her spear though, truth be told, there had been a worrying excess of those of late. Good, in theory, but actually a sign that the number of able defenders was dwindling. [color=bc8dbf][i]One last push,[/i][/color] she counseled herself.[color=bc8dbf][i] Once more to try to find them.[/i][/color] Then, she would focus on herself. Then, she would... [color=bc8dbf][i]give up on my child? Not in his sixth year?[/i][/color] The thought nearly crushed her. A howling barbarian of a mortui had climbed to the top of the barricade and bellowed in her face, swiping. Junia leapt back and thrust forward with her spear, taking him through the eye. He flailed and twitched and collapsed, but then there was another and it just didn't seem to end. [color=bc8dbf]"Die!"[/color] she howled back, her voice small despite its loudness, small compared to that of soldiers and men and un-dead monsters. Junia cast about, taking int he centurion with the bad hand, the red-haired house slave - at least she supposed that he was, for he had the look of one - and, somewhat further back, the dark man of Africa, who was presently going for his horse. Did he mean to fight or to run? This was insanity. There had to be a better way! A fat man in a fine toga overbalanced himself swinging a gladius and knocked her sprawling. Junia scrambled to her feet, but the ranks in front had already closed - barely. They were getting thin. She cast about for her spear, but it had fallen - tip first, into the glowing embers of a cooking fire. She shook her head, jogged over, and plucked it free. Its tip glowed and... she got an idea. Wouldn't fire kill these things? Wouldn't it spread faster and be far more effective than this piecemeal hack and slash? In those next few seconds, an idea took root in her mind and blossomed into a full-blown scenario. They needed to make a break for it, barricade the city with the mortui inside, and then burn it to the ground! Rome had been rebuilt before and would be again! There were few enough in the countryside that the legions could yet hunt them down and dispose of them, but... if their final remaining living targets were gone, the un-dead would spread out in search of new food. They would spread across Italy, and into Helvetica, Gaul, and Illyria. They would... [color=bc8dbf][i]No point dwelling on such,[/i][/color] she decided, halting her thought process. There had to be someone she could bring her idea to. Perhaps the African? More likely the centurion? The slave was a good cook, but she had no idea how clever he might be or how seriously his words would be taken. More than hers, certainly, for war was men's work and she was not a man. First, she had to put the idea to them, however. Seeing a gap close to the latter two, Junia leapt up to fill it, driving her spear into the neck of an un-dead. The thrust was not clean, and its head lolled to the side for a moment, skin and blood hissing and steaming from the metal's heat. [color=bc8dbf]"Sirs,"[/color] she addressed the two men, [color=bc8dbf]"should the gods smile upon us and we succeed in driving off this wave, I would speak to you of an idea I've had, if you'd hear it."[/color] She stabbed again, and put the dead man down for good.