Ides of March (Time Patrol) by Bob Mayer Page B

secret of fire from Mount Olympus. Angered, Zeus ordered his son Hephaestus to create a woman. Thus, Pandora was formed by the Gods out of clay.
    Pandora was blessed, or cursed, depending on your perspective, with both beauty and cunning. She was given to Prometheus’ younger brother as a bride. Once she was inside his house, Pandora showed him the pithos (a jar not a box; someone in records had been anal on facts, Scout thought, then remembered Edith and that answered that), which Zeus had bequeathed her to give as a wedding present.
    Prometheus had warned his brother against accepting any gifts from Zeus, but one given under the allure of Pandora could not be resisted. He opened it, releasing the evil spirits trapped within and thus unleashed them on mankind ever since: ‘ burdensome toil and sickness that brings death to men, diseases and a myriad of other pains ’.
    In other words, Scout thought: bad stuff . Sort of what she felt right now.
    It was legend, myth, probably embellished and twisted over the course of time, but Scout knew at the core of every legend there was truth. Because reality was much stranger than the average person knew. The members of her team had run into many myths, legends, and unbelievably twisted science, that they’d learn to expect anything. Yet, they were still surprised at times.
    Of course, as in many legends and stories, men liked to lay the cause of all ills at a woman’s feet. From Eve to Pandora. And men wrote the history.
    As if a man would listen to a woman.
    Scout was startled as an affiliated piece of data flashed through her consciousness: the only thing left behind in Pandora’s box was Elpis . Hope.
    Hope. Sometimes it was all humans had in the face of overwhelming odds.
    But Pandora had shut the lid, locking hope inside. Only evil had come forth from her jar, pithos , box, whatever.
    Scout felt the echoes of the past, along with pulses reverberating back from the future. Even when there was no hope, mankind still persevered. She observed as Leonidas went from campfire to campfire, talking in a low voice, putting a comforting hand on a Spartan’s shoulder, giving them hope in a hopeless situation.
    Something came out of all of this, Scout realized. Some power. A power that pushed back the Shadow. She didn’t know how, but it was affirmed by the faint presence of the real Cyra, outside the bubble of this day. It was as if she were out there, hovering, waiting to resume her role in her time and place and Scout was just a visitor that Cyra had allowed in for this brief, but critical time.
    Lightning flashed to the east, over the water, followed by the rumble of thunder. A storm was approaching. Scout slowly walked to the barricade of dead flesh and rock. There were sentries, of course. Scout remembered the encounter with police officer near Cleopatra’s needle. She’d just acted, knowing they needed the cop gone without incident and that Moms and Neeley pulling badges were just making him more interested in trying to figure out what was going on.
    Instinct. Drawing on something, she’d always had but not been aware of. It was a strength, a power, which Nada had sensed during the Fun in North Carolina , which seemed a lifetime ago.
    She’d done it again, just now, with Leonidas. And for that, she felt guilty. Trust was something to be earned, not conjured. But there was no time.
    Scout halted just behind the wall. There was a sentry to her left and one to her right, both peering down the pass toward the distant plain where the Persian army was massed. The fires ahead were so many they lit the northern sky like a false dawn. It was only the narrowness of the pass that had allowed the Spartans to hold the line this long as Xerxes was only able to send a limited number of soldiers against them at one time.
    Scout closed her eyes. Concentrated. Opened them and climbed up.
    Her foot slipped on viscera, falling forward, her forehead striking a stone. A trickle of blood flowed.