His Story -- A short story by Jukyu

Disclaimer: This is an alternate history and is in no way meant to demean or degrade any religion or group. I mearly present this narrative for your enjoyment as a "what could have been."


"Come now Mr. Walker, I may have ordered the death of thousands but I can hardly be caused an inhospitable host. Now have a seat and we can begin the conversation. I'm sure you have many questions and I many answers. I will warn however, that while I am granting you this audience out of respect for your father, there are only two outcomes when it ends. Either you agree with me that I am my organization are in fact necessary and just, or I turn you back out into the cold night from whence you came with nothing but your agony and a way of ending the suffering when you've had enough.

Good, I see you've decided to take me up on my offer of comfort. One of my aids will bring in some tea momentarily, but for now lets begin with who I am and why we are here. I, Mr. Walker, am one of the ruling members of the grand council of Solaris. Our founding was ancient, but the scribes of the order show that our founder was Octavious of Rome, Ceaser Agustus. After defeating Mark Antony at Alexandria he claimed the tiltle Imperator, Emperor of Rome. He was a strong man, and a forward thinking man. In his forsight he created an order of 9,000 called the praetors, and that sir was our beginning. At first we were simply body guards, not very different from the secret service. However, on his death bed the Ceaser summoned the head of our order and gave him one final order. Rome was to remain under an emperor, but he forsaw danger in such ultimate power. As long as an emperor fulfilled the needs of the people we were to remain loyal. However, if one should fall under the excesses and granduer of the office we were to arrange an end to their power. We 9000 were to retain order in Rome and for many years we did.

Through several Emperors things were well. We performed our duty admirably and protected each, none having an idea that their life and power were at our whim. We were the people, we were the Republic. Our first opportunity to act occured of course with Nero as the history books have recorded. As the crazed Emperor played his violin and watched Rome burn, we plotted his demise. It was not hard to despise of such an unpopular Emperor and I am amazed that the populace believed the suicide story. What person ever ended their own life with a sword to the throat? However such coverups kept secret our true nature. Even the legions once loyal to him called for his head. There were some in our order that felt that this was our opportunity to seize Rome itself. However, wisdom prevailed and we remained in our place, patricians in the shadows.

For a period things went well but eventually the Emperors, half paranoid from frequent attempts on their lives, became suspicious of their own "loyal bodyguards and began to disband the order. Accustomed to our power, even if it be covert, this did not go over well. It is not recorded who came up with the idea to create a religion but that is what we did and that is where we draw our name. We created the cult of Solaris, and through the worship of the sun we were able to maintain power, this time without fear. Our leaders became priests, others mere members but through our religion we spread throughout rome until even the Emperors themselves were members and again under our influence. We held marvelous festivals, incredible games where life and death were parried around as dice, the known world was ours. Was ours until the Christians spread out of Judea.

At first there was no problem, they were easily supressed through laws and the colleseum. However, as time went by their influence grew and it became apparent that our two organizations could not co-exist. The death blow came with Constantine. It is not known to us whether his conversion was of a religious nature or of a desire to end our subtle controls. but suddenly the empire was Christian and we were the outcasts, pagans. For a time we fought back, yet methodically we were swept into oblivion. Our members were hunted, our festivals replaced by Church holidays such as Christmas, we were on the verge of being forgotten. In a last ditch effort an attempt was made to mold the new religion to do our bidding though gnosticism, but that too was put to rest by the Council of Nicene. The Roman Church was now the dominant power of the world, and we were forced to slink back into the shadows.

For many years our numbers were small and those that knew the truth of our order were few indeed. We fled into the Eastern Empire where we could opperate, possibly find a small seat of power without raising the suspicions of Rome. This was fortunate for us indeed, however, for Rome was sacked by the germanic tribes and the Eastern Empire remained for a thousand years.

For a few hundred years the most the order could control was a small province on the very eastern edge of the Empire and it was there that the next great rise of the order occured. We found a resource in the indiginous tribes in the area. For they were strong yet not united by a religion as the Empire was. If we had in centuries before united Rome under worship of the sun, could we not do it again with the Arabs? This was the hypothesis and in Muhummed our prayers were answered. A tent maker but a visionary and a genious tactician, we gave him the tools to create a religion and therefore an Empire by which to rival the Byzantines. Where we once were priests of the sun we would now be the ministers of Allah, the moon god.

Things went better then we could have expected. Islam blossomed and spread throughout the non-christian world again giving us an Empire to control. Our power increased until we dared to challenge the Byzantine Empire and Europe itself, but were unable to conquer the Christian world. It was then that we decided that if we could not defeat them, perhaps we could infiltrate them and gain some influence. We did afterall already control their holy lands. All it took was a bit of sabre rattling to get Constantinople nervous enough to ask the Pope for help. Thus the crusades began and in it one of our most successful business ventures. We recruited from the crusaders entering the land, and thus created the Knights Templar. We played the war from both sides, and in doing so created a financial Empire in Italy. Once again the order had a foothold in our dear Rome, but this time our power came as bankers. The Knights Templar took control of the Holy land. Those in Italy would gladly take the posessions of the crusaders in return for a receipt. This receipt was then redeemed in the Holy Land for gold. However, having control of both sides allowed up to periodically cause wars and a great many of these men never had the chance to redeem their posessions.

Eventually we feared the Church would become suspicious so in a great battle we thrust our knights of the templar out of the holy land and back into Europe where they became our inroad. The valiant knights that had defended the holy land, now back within the Holy Roman Empire and noone to question us. Thus we operated from two bases of operation, the Middle East and Europe and in doing so enjoyed great power.

At the height of the order, our fortunes were greatly enhanced once more. Sensing weakness in Spain, we attacked with our Muslim forces, taking control of much of the Kingdom. Our brave Knights Templar, doing everything in their power to prevent this attrocity, were for their efforts entrusted with the treasury of Spain. From this we completed our financial institutions in Italy, all while pretending to be faithful to the Church and working in the shadows to weaken it. We financed the Protestant movement that greatly weakened the Church, and we created the free-masons, a non religious organization by which we could control Europe itself.

Part 2 will follow in this thread. I need a break.

[edit on 30-11-2004 by jukyu]

Part 2:

Well Mr. Walker, now that we have breaked for tea let us continue with this chronicle. At this point in time we enjoyed great power, but it was unwieldy. We controlled vast Islamic states, but the more fervent of those that we converted took it to a level never imagined and even back then we began to know the radicals as a thorn in our side. Then there was the problem of European polotics. Through our little secret society we had done well, but we had no direct control over the monarchs of Europe and their petty squabling. Our Catholic influence had completely disappeared with the excomunication of the Knights Templar, a loss we took sorely. Our fanancial holdings in Italy were going well, but money holds little power if you can not use it to influence the comings and goings of men. We had even lost our Moore foothold in Europe to a couple of young catholic monarchs, Ferdinand and Issabella. So radically Cathoic were they that we completely withdrew our presence there, and hoped to influence Spain and indeed the rest of Europe with a singular event.

Being Roman in origin and not having been affecting by the loss of knowledge in the Dark Ages propogated by the Roman Catholic Church, we knew certain things. We knew of Vergil and his measurments of the Earth. Having been so far east for so long we knew of the Chinese legends of a land East across the great ocean we now know as the Pacific. So, we set our sights on creating a new unspoiled Empire, across the sea.

For this purpose one of our operatives, a very bright Genoan named Christopher Columbus was employeed. Having entered the order through our influence in Italy, he was set with the task of finding a monarch to finance a voyage to this new world. While we could have easily financed it ourselves, to do so would have been to reveal our riches, our existance, and face the wrath of the world. Instead we would use Europe to accomplish our goals. Columbus traveled through Europe looking for financiers, and ironically the nation that had driven us out of Europe, Spain, was the only one to bite. This became a two edged sword for they gained great wealth from the expeditions that followed which greatly enriched the Chruch, but our promise land was discovered and other nations were quick to give us chances to
overtake it.

I see you your mind is wondering so so I will jump ahead a bit to things that pertain to your land, America. Using our financial power we dabbled where we could and created some sucessful businesses in Boston and the other British cities in North America. It was later however that true opportunity presented itself. Our secret puppet society, the masons, had travelled across the ocean and many prominent colonists were members. It was from this we gained the knowledge that the seeds of rebellion were present. Using the masons it was not hard to turn those seeds into full scale revolution. The United States were created and at last we had our new Empire. You ask how a democracy could be controlled by we, such a few people behind the scenes? Well our power came from the illlusion of election. Americans didn't elect anyone, they only picked the person that got to place a vote, the basis of the electorial college. As you may guess, the members of that college were always members of the society. Things progressed from there.

Ok I'm done for a while again. Comments are very much welcome.

I love the plot! It's very interesting. I must admit, at first I didn't know whether to hate it or love it. Most of the time I hate reading anything about America being a puppet government. I'm kinda closed minded about those sort of things. But then I felt really stupid. After all, it's just a story!

Anyway, great story! I really liked it.