Alexander Page #8

In the spring, Alexander marched

an army of 150,000...

...across the passes of the Hindu Kush...

...into the unknown.

in his dream, it was the promised route

to the end of the world.

We were now a mobile empire...

...stretching back thousands of miles

to Greece.

Cooks and architects,

doctors, surveyors...

...moneylenders and wives...

...children, lovers, whores.

And slaves...

...that anonymous, bent, working spine

of this new beast.

Ravaged or expanded, for better or worse...

...no occupied territory

remained the same again.

Although devoted to Roxane...

...Alexander's visits

to her tent diminished...

...as a year, then two, went by

without a successor...

...wounding Alexander's great pride.

The surveyors are saying that Zeus

chained Prometheus up there.

In one of those caves.

They say there's a giant eagle's nest

just above it.

I suppose he drops down each night

to peck out poor Prometheus' liver.

You remember what Aristotle told us

of these mountains?

Yes, I do.

That when we reach these heights...

...we'd look back and see Macedonia

to the west...

...and the outer ocean to the east.

But I fear this world is far larger

than anyone dreamed.

A world of Titans.

The scouts have been up

every known trail, Alexander.

There is no way across.

Except to the south, into India.

Were we gods, we'd breach

these walls to the eastern ocean.

We will, Alexander.

In a few years' time, we will return.

But first, the men must see their homes.

Have you found your home...

...Ptolemy?

More and more, I think

it will be Alexandria.

Well, at least it's hot.

And Thais...

...she loved it there.

Women bring men home.

-I have no such feeling.

-You have Babylon, Alexander.

Where your mother awaits your invitation.

Yes, I have Babylon.

But each land, each boundary I cross...

...I strip away another illusion.

I sense death will be the last.

Yet still I push harder and harder...

...to reach this home.

Where has our eagle gone?

We must go on, Ptolemy.

Until we find an end.

India, the land where the sun was born...

...fabled to be even richer than Persia...

...had never been explored or conquered.

From the beginning, we struggled

to unify a land without a center.

Kings who conspired against one another.

A labyrinth of tribes urged on

by zealots and philosophers...

...to die by the thousands

for their strange gods.

We saw things we'd never dreamed

and could hardly describe.

We saw birds that could talk

and men that couldn't.

Craterus, in the advance party,

fought against men with hairy skins...

...who were tiny and

lived in the tops of trees.

-Over there!

-They're animals.

Until Hephaistion convinced us

these were animals who imitated men...

...but wore their own skin.

They called this tribe "monkey. "

Monkey. Monkey.

But we saw little difference with

the tribes who lived among them.

-Look at his hand.

-It's so much like ours.

Hello, little man.

-Do they speak?

-No, but they do sing and make noises...

...from the roofs of the forest.

We saw men

who walked naked in public...

...and spent hours at a time

staring and doing nothing.

Some who lived 200 years.

And then, there was the rain.

Never before had we seen water

that fell from the gods...

...for 60 days and nights.

Well done today.

Make sure the women and children

are fed.

You know better, Machatas.

What's your son going to say?

Come on, man.

The older you get, the stronger.

Right, my king.

You're my horse, Alexander.

I'll be with you at your side.

Everything rotted in this rain...

...and scores of men died miserably

from the tiny serpents...

...that were everywhere in this evil land.

-What happened?

-It's to the neck.

Oh, no. Zeus, no.

Hold on. Hold on.

Be brave.

Oh, Zeus.

Our quest for gold and glory evaporated

as we realized...

...there was none to be had.

Tempers worsened.

We massacred all Indians who resisted.

And with the local water putrid...

...we drank the strong wine.

And as we moved south and east...

...Alexander often returned the lands

we'd conquered to their defeated kings...

...so as to make them allies.

But this did not sit well with the army...

...who began to wonder:

Were we here for riches?

Or had Alexander...

...in some remorseless and crazed quest

to imitate the glory of Herakles...

...forgotten them?

One thing an army

knows quickly in their bones...

...is which way the gods are blowing.

Kiss him!

-To Bagoas.

-To Bagoas!

-And to my mother's god, Dionysus...

-Dionysus!

...who, we're told by our Indian allies,

traveled here before Herakles...

...some 6000 years ago.

To a hero.

To a hero!

Roxane.

You lose face.

These Indians...

...they are a low, evil people.

You don't try to understand them.

I try.

But this I know, Alexander.

In Persia, you are a great king.

Here...

...they hate you.

Let us go back to Babylon.

There, you are strong.

We'll talk about this later.

Yes.

Later.

Talk.

I shall come.

Tonight.

And I shall wait.

Good night, my king.

Your Majesty.

Come, Alexander, drink with us.

-Alexander.

-Alexander!

I remember a time

you hated how your father drank.

Now I know why.

Dionysus is hero.

But he is also mind breaker.

He destroys our self-control.

Self-control is a lover

I've known too long, Ptolemy.

The struggle worries me to the bone.

And success I find to be

as corrupt as failure.

But Dionysus,

bless his ancient soul...

...frees me from myself.

And then, I move up.

I'm simply, Alexander.

A toast to Bagoas.

And the 30,000 beautiful Persian boys...

...we're training to fight

in this great army.

And to the memory of Philip.

Had he lived to see his Macedonians...

...transformed into such...

...a pretty army.

To Philip.

To a real hero.

Philip!

To Cleitus and his new appointment

as satrap of Bactria.

Cleitus.

That's a fancy way of putting it, Ptolemy.

But we all know what a pension

and an exile is...

...after 30 years' service.

Exile?

From where, Cleitus?

From my home, Alexander, Macedonia.

You could've asked me where I

wanted to spend the rest of my life.

You call governing

this major province exile?

Has Your Majesty given any

of his closest companions...

...a province so far from home?

Then you won't make a very

good satrap, will you, Cleitus?

So be it.

Let me rot in Macedonian rags...

...rather than shine...

...in Eastern pomp.

I won't quake and bow down

like the sycophants you have around you.

Hephaistion, Nearchus, Perdiccas.

As governor of one

of our most Asian of satrapies...

...Cleitus, does it not occur to you

that if my Persian subjects...

...bow down before me,

it's important for them to do so?

Do I insist on Greeks doing the same?

You accept Greek offerings

as a son of Zeus, do you not?

Only when offered.

Why don't you refuse

these vain flatteries?

What freedom is this, to bow before you?

You bow before Herakles,

and he was mortal...

...but a son of Zeus.

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