Chapter 77: Outlanders

The citizens of Constantinople, for their first time, spent a day underground.

Antonius remembered that he had some guns allocated on the various towers, and hurriedly scrambled to one of the towers to see if he can make use of it to fire back at the Ottoman guns.

But what he saw made him furious, these artilleries, ever since they are placed there, has never been maintained. There are spider webs attached to the canons, there are even some rust taking shape on one of the canon, apparently the tower guards used the canons sticking out of the windows as a tool to… hang cloth! Causing the metal tubes to be wet all time, and despite repeated instructions to them to clean the canon body with rug and move it back when it is raining, judging by the current situation of the canons they never do it after the canon is placed there.

Thus, this means that the Romans cannot do anything about the Ottomans canons at all.

Later that day in the Roman senate another state conference is going on which in the end became same as usual, spurred into another round of argument.

"I remember Lord De'Ricci have told you ignorant people about the importance! Why have you not done anything about it!" Andronikos Laskaris bellowed pointing his finger towards another rival senator.

"Yes!... Yes!... Why…!" His political allies at the back bench shouted in support of Andronikos.

A senator in the opposition called Innocentius Zonaras bowed towards Constantine and replied in a serious face. "Your majesty, look at these people with such arrogance, such ill-mannered way of talking in the most sacred Senate hall, do you think that we can have such discourteous senators in the country? It will become another laughing stock of the Romans for those Catholics!"

In a series of booing sounds, another senator jumped up from his site in anger after hearing he and his allies getting mocked in such an dishonourable way, and started accusing the opposition. "Are you cursed people traitors? Trying to cause a split in our country? Make it a easy target for the Ottomans?"

Seeing that the argument is leading to a nonstop personal insult, Constantine stopped both sides from arguing and enquired the opposition in a commited tone. "Innocentius, why cant we just listen to Lord De'Ricci? After all he is doing the empire good…"

Innocentius stopped his emperor from going on further and yelled in an ear piercing voice. "Because they are outsiders! We cannot trust them!"

The moment he said that, Antonius who is seated at the back left his seat, stormed out of the hall and left a deafening banging sound echoing in the senate, a moment later Giovanni followed the former and left this place.

On his way back to the port, Antonius started complaining to Giovanni. "This senate, and their arguments, are absolutely boring, tedious, irksome, I bet that no proper writer would take up this disgusted job of documenting the minute of this crooked senate."

Giovanni sensed the resentment of hate in Antonius' speech, gave his buddy a pat on the back and also joined the army of complains. "Well last week they are still trying to get me and my brothers out of those walls to snatch back their farm steads and manors, saying that protecting their properties is what they employed us for…"

"Then why don't they themselves go out with blades in hands to protect their filthy properties themselves, are those things hanging by their chubby waist twigs?"

"Perhaps it is twigs…"

Antonius stopped by the balcony, watched the walls still enduring the incoming Ottoman cannon balls, sighed and resumed disappointedly. "My friend, do you really think that we can give our backs to these folks in such times? I bet the first thing they do when the Ottoman army come climbing the walls is to open the gates and welcome Mehmed as their new owner…"

"Who knows…"

"You can give your backs to me!" Suddenly a voice came from the other end of the corridor. The two men turned around and saw the emperor Constantine running towards them on the red carpet with a royal purple mantle which almost caused him to trip and holding his signature sceptre.

"You can count on me, Lord De'Ricci, Lord Giustiniani." Constantine stopped before the two men and said panting.

"Emperor…" Antonius and Giovanni looked at each other with eyes of disbelief. "Are you not supposed to be inside the senate holding conference with those senators?"

"I made an excuse saying that I need to go to the washroom and got out of there, then made a run straight for you two people."

"Oh…"

"What I want to say is.." The emperor finally stopped panting, looked rigidly into the eyes of the two men and reiterated himself. "You can trust me at times like this, I shall deal with all the matters inside the city, providing a safe back for you two dealing with those things outside the city, you two can trust me, because…"

"I, Constantine XI Palaiologos, never lies, never betrays, never let my ally down, never break a promise. I vow to the God hereby now that if I am to stab you two in the back or let you down, I shall be pierced to death by a thousand arrows, mark my works."

Antonius is a bit touched. "Emperor you do not need to do this…"

"Say no more Lord De'Ricci." Constantine stepped forward, held his hands and looked straight into his pair of blue eyes. "I am not like those ignorant back benchers, I know who and what I am, I know where did my power come from, I know I am worth nothing if Mehmed takes my city and my throne, not like those people who can just surrender to Mehmed and go away unharmed, thus I need the help of you two to defend me, and yourself under current circumstance…"

"Now, gentlemen, can you trust me?"