Location: house of Isambard Kingdom Brunel, Westminster, London, 5th September 1859. When the first dropsy struck, it was when I was smoking an outstanding Cuban cigar after a fine lunch of roast beef soused in gravy with a selection of vegetables.
If I correctly recall the event, my mind felt like it was being squeezed by some unfathomably powerful vice, and as if in slow motion I collapsed from my chair into an untidy heap on the floor in one boneless motion. I lay there for some minutes before my man came upon me, crumpled and in disarray. I had been banished to the smoking room as usual for the smell of my superior tobacco is offensive to my wife. Thereafter I was taken from there straight to bed.
When I woke my bedroom was stuffy with the fires banked up high. I took great comfort in the heat for I was suffering from the chills. My family came into my bed chamber with grief plastering all their faces with somber expressions. Marc my son comforted everyone else present. My gaze was drawn to my dear wife Mary seemingly stoic in the face of this serious illness hovered on the edge of things. I had been about to try and cheer everyone up from their evident gloom when it came upon me, the end or something else….
My mouth tried to form words but the pressure building up behind my eyes prevented me from speaking and like the worst headache you can imagine forcing me away from consciousness and into somewhere else with each pulse of pain that came over me like a waterfall of sensation.
Then there was a short burst of blackness followed by a feeling of traveling, while my brain pondered whether I would end up in Heaven or Hell in circular patterns of thought not being able to arrive at a conclusion. Next without warning only a feeling of tension and then release came upon me and I was then thrust into a place that I have and had no way of describing at the time even in this secret journal what I felt during those first moments other than strangeness without measure is hard to quantify. The next thing that entered my perception was another voice inside my head, speaking in Latin of all things! It was hard to comprehend what the voice was trying to tell me for a few more seconds until I grasped that it was Archaic Latin rather than the Vulgar Church Latin that had been taught to me in my school days. The almost distant voice came through to me finally ‘who is there? What are you?’ ‘Have I gone mad? I tried to say it out loud interrupting the questions of the other presence but only managing to create an echo of the words inside my own head instead, the same and yet separate from the being trying to talk with me.
The answer was not comforting in the least. ‘My name is Marcus pray tell me what voice is this that imposes upon my mind with such unusual vigour and circumstance? They are a dark presence inside my consciousness. I bid you announce yourself spirit, monster or myth!’ said with a politicians polished oratory flourish. It took a few more frantic seconds before I said back to my interrogator ‘I know not what is happening, my name is Isambard Kingdom Brunel, master engineer and I am an Englishman’ The last word was Britannia as otherwise, this male voice inside my mind would most likely not understand my meaning.
When they answered finally it said ‘Is this existence fading, mayhaps falling to death or eternal slumber, though I was in the land of Morpheus, now I fear I might travel to the land of Hades’ then I felt something fuse with my mind was the only way to describe it then I/We said ‘No, where once there was Two there is now One and our/my mission is change’
Wrenching my eyes open, from the fugue state bursting again into reality I moved my fingers and toes as my newly forged mind took in the fresco depicting a hunting scene from Greek mythology surrounded by a purple background that now made up the ceiling of what I correctly assumed then was my bedroom. Sitting up slightly I saw a man silently standing in the corner of the room, clutching what appeared to be a bronze jug holding some liquid or other and I almost recognised him but not quite.
Without any gesture, he came up to me and after placing the jug on a small table that lay adjusted to my bed spoke to me in the same Latin as before but now I could speak and understand it perfectly. ‘Good morning young Master Marcus, do you wish refreshment before your body servants enter to clothe you for the day?’ This announcement was enough with the ceiling and other similar decorations that I could now perceive as my eyes swept the grand room, much larger and better lit than my own former bedchamber let me tell you, I was not in London anymore, I was not myself anymore and this was no opium dream…..
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The Name does not make the Man
Location: Rome, Palace of Domitian 138CE
I was thrown of course, then the sudden flood of servants made any reaction moot on my part as they removed the strange bed clothes and draped what must be a toga from the look of the thing around my body as I stood there passively waiting for everything to make sense. It was then that a voice inside my head said ‘Peace, let the world flow over you and challenge not the unchangeable’ While this happening it enabled me to reflect on what was occurring for a moment or two. My conclusion was that I didn’t know what was going but then whoever really does. Coughing lightly turning to the first servant who had spoken to me, though I suppose it was more likely they were all slaves I supposed, and later confirmed, saying tentatively 'What is the date again and what is today's schedule once more if you please.' At first, I hesitated but the words sprang easily into my mind as English or French and from that point, I just spoke normally assuming that it would came out as understandable to those listening for my words from that point on. He looked somewhat surprised but recovered swiftly as all majordomos or butlers as such he must be from his sour expression tended to do in my experience. Replying 'the 8th of cotober, 891Auc young Master Marcus and you are to meet your new Father, your Uncle formerly, for a sacrifice in the new temple under construction dedicated to your adoptive Grandfather once you have broken your fast' I heard a chuckle in my mind as if it wouldn’t be an enjoyable experience.
The others had since retreated having finished their work for the day leaving no doubt to primp over some other official. I nodded in reply to the servant as this gave me some idea of what this new life or dream might entail. I looked down at my young and lithe-looking body, very unlike my own at the time this had all started and indeed when I was that age in my waking life back in my own time if I was judging things right. ‘This to shall pass’ said the voice in my head lightly like a whispering breeze.
Location: Temple dedicated to the Divine Hadrian, under construction.
My morning went by as all things do, with the surprise at the mornings food more like a decadent French aristocrats feast than anything I could have imagined providing some amusement, leading to the moment that I had dreaded throughout this time. Again the voice chimed up like having a angel on your shoulder ‘it has always been thus’
In the end, it was so formal with members of the cult of the Divine Hadrian talking among themselves more or less ignoring my presence, dismissing me as just a callow youth of sixteen summers only just about to start his way on the path of honor's that led eventually to the pinnacle of Roman Government below the Imperator that being the Dual Consulship of Rome.
They buzzed around my uncle during the ceremony and were only silent when a fine white bull was brought in and sacrificed to the so-called Divine Emperor. Shortly afterward this bloody ritual they continued talking casually, several fragments of this conversation caught my interest, one Senator was talking to a very well-heeled-looking Equestrian from the fineness of the toga lacking the purple stripe waving his arms around as he did so.
'The silting problem in the Fossa Trajana can only be eased by damming the entrance to the Tiber and then removing the cursed mud by hand' Then turning to try and hear more of their conversation, I overheard another two rich-looking fellows nattering, one softly saying to another.'My families Iron mines north along the coast on that dusty isle are soon going to have to close for lack of charcoal to process the ore, if only there was another way than shipping wood from far and wide to feed the bloomeries?' the other fellow nodded and was about to say something when proceedings were interrupted by slaves entering now that the formalities had finished to hand out wine goblets and bearing trays of snacks and nibbles.
I lost earshot of them as the crowd circulated, managing to snag a bejeweled monstrosity of a cup for myself as the slave wandered past my position against the wall almost of the chamber. The watered wine went down a treat and it was only the arrival of my Father that interrupted my enjoyment of it! He didn't waste time in meaningless greetings rather he said 'My son I am glad you came today and don't worry you soon will be a formal member of this fellowship of men destined to help me rule the Empire and preserve the Pax Romana.'
He looked down at me with what could be called love in some lights then carried on with his speech by saying 'Soon your first step will come, but first you must learn of the world and what it contains with a good Roman known to me, Marcus Cornelius Fronto. He is an expert orator and will teach you this skill as well as many other things that you must know if you truly are to be my co-successor in the fullness of time.He left at this point to carry on politicking with the powerful men that filled this half-finished temple and its precincts allowing me my thoughts as I gratefully called for my escort when I could catch the glance of the nearest unburdened slave not being belaboured by a glutton of some form for more dainties and wine to escort me back to the palace.
