#princeps vale au

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Quiet in Rome [now complete!]

MGP rpf | Roman Empire AU | marc/vale | implied bez/cele | 3/3 | rated E | 20k

When Vale was eleven years old, he decided to kill his father. At forty-five, being still alive to the annoyance of his senators, he puts on dinner parties.

Or, for Marc to go from Hispania Tarraconensis to Rome, it is seven days by sea.

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how do things change if its vale who has the baby in roman au? he's old been emperor for most of his life thinks he's dying they've successfully managed to poison him finally but nope out pops a baby

Short answer is that in Roman AU: Mpreg Edition he doesn’t, partly because that’s actually a fairly set version of the story running along the main fic, but mostly bc if he got knocked up in Roman AU he would historically accurate mabort so fucking fast. I do see your references to cryptic pregnancy in the ask tho!!

So ok. On a practical level, Vale canonically bottoms once for Marc and it’s actually IN Roman AU, so he’d have to get knocked up in a pre-Marc tryst or he’d have to get knocked up in his post dinner party Marc hookup, which for uhhhhhhhhhh logistical sex reasons is unlikely, but those are pretty much the options.

However if he DID get knocked up via the hookup at the end of the fic, and if as you kinda imply he kinda goes the cryptic mpregnancy route, 1) Marc would probably notice, and also the fleet of doctors, but we ignore that 2) Vale would be horrified and try to give the baby up to someone like Luca, to pose as his. Marc and Vale visiting the baby in secret kind of thing.

So for the action itself, you have Vale slinking off to, he thinks, either ride whatever poison out or die with dignity, and ends up instead giving birth alone* (*marc manages to be there by the end). It’s awful, it’s terrifying. By the time Marc arrives it happens pretty fast and pretty bloody. They’re in like an abandoned barn near Tivoli that Vale used to hide in as a kid. Vale came here to die and now Marc’s clutching his hand while Vale says horrible things including but not limited to “how could you do this to me” and “it’s not yours” (lie) and Marc never ever lets go of his hand.

Vale after trying to follow the standard midwife’s advice and not breastfeed at all, knows he should hand the baby right off to a wet nurse to try to stop his own milk as fast as possible. Does have to nurse the baby right away once or twice tho bc it’s just him and Marc and the viscera and the baby. Marc bloody-handed trying to guide the baby’s head to help it latch. Vale in some kind of mental collapse tbh, in part bc the emperor never actually gets privacy, so Vale disappearing is going to start a civil war in maybe five more hours. Part of the reason he was lashing out by telling Marc the baby isn’t his is bc he can’t claim the baby isn’t VALE’s like. Marc just saw everything. Worse, Vale knows. But this man does not want a natural born heir! He was a natural-born heir and yes it’s all fine NOW but he spent his childhood dodging assassins alone.

However he’s also survived this long for a reason, so he’s still bleeding and watching Marc fumble through cutting the umbilical and is telling Marc he (Vale) will have to say his absence was an attempted coup that Vale survived. It has to stay a secret. No one can know. The baby has to go to someone, now.

(Notably, if MARC carries the baby in Roman AU then Vale would allow himself to not pretend it’s Luca’s etc. But not if he carried.)

And Vale is planning to drag himself up as soon as he can stand and stumble back into the palace at Tivoli and try to sell the idea that he just dispatched an assassin when he can provide no body no alibi and no proof. He is at least covered in blood and smelling like someone’s guts, so there’s that.

And he’s telling Marc, who is somehow here in this moments, “take it to someone. Luca or Franky. Not Uccio, people will guess” etc etc.

And Marc gets up and takes the baby. He’s not totally sure Vale is going to be ok. He takes it to idk Luca or Franky and shows up covered in blood. Then he goes and he finds and kills one of Vale’s guards. And then plants the body so Vale’s insane cover story bears some credence and there’s a dead man to blame for Vale’s “kidnapping”. Then finds Pecco, gives him Marc’s own bloody sword, and says, with crazy dead eyes, something like, “You just killed a guard who kidnapped Valentino. The guard’s body is in the west garden.” And long story short Vale gets away with his cover story, one innocent man is murdered, Luca (still not sure it’s Luca but probably??) tactfully retires to a different country villa with an infant in tow, and Pecco gets all the credit and a second consulship out of this and can never ever tell the truth about it. Vale only realizes everything Marc did after the fact. Hashtag romance. They are both a little fucked up over this for the rest of their lives I guess??

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read all of quiet in rome yesterday and it had me clapping and cheering to an audience of myself alone in my room. extremely good. loved all the clothing details. especially loved the ending, with marc hiding in vale's bed, dangerous but protected. and ESPECIALLY loved how you wrote vale, thinking about "the boy" as almost a different being who "forces" him to act in certain ways, his paranoia for himself but also for marc. and the small detail that made me giggle was marc in his pov talking about "meeting pecco" as if they bumped into each other and had a nice chat, and then finding out from vale's pov in the next chapter that marc apparently got pecco drunk. i'm sure the truth is somewhere in the middle but it was delightful. poor little pecco, caught in the middle of their games

THANK U THANK U SOOO MUCH I get so happy when I hear stuff like this 🥲 I did feel like writing that fic was a learning experience, bc my style changed under me a little this year, and a few things are awkward or overwritten as a result. So I’m extra happy that ppl are picking up on/enjoying stuff I was trying to do!! ie Vale basically putting blame on his (necessarily) violent younger self to avoid his guilt for what he has done and what he worries he might do to Marc! And also feeling like he failed that younger self in a few ways!

I think about this in a less dramatic and literal way with Vale and his relationship to his own youth and his own iconography in canon (funny word in rpf always). I think he was better at cutting people out and cutting ppl down as a kid than he is now. Like 21yo Vale would Not be fighting a proxy war via the medium of SPORTS PODCAST. And it’s a big part of aging as a vicious (necessarily!) and ruthless creature that you wrangle with some of this.

AND you caught the little joke with Pecco (a few other ppl have mentioned this, ty all). Which I now get to explain which is sloppy of me as a writer, whatever it is rpf fanfiction. Marc mentions getting his “people” in Rome to confirm something about Vale earlier on, and ok fine he did get Pecco drunk over the winter, but Vale also got a lot of info about Marc’s recent injuries out of that exact same convo with Pecco (he mentions this in the middle of “greet me correctly”) and proceeds to get Marc’s inexperienced cavalrymen drunk (they WILL accidentally talk but they don’t know anything about anything, as Marc was well aware when he chose them). They are both spying on each other lmao, roughly equally! Marc might have it easier (it’s not like Vale can get a spy in Marc’s household), tho Vale is more determined and willing to be privately undignified about it. Poor tired Pecco is being used by both of them as an informant. In other news, happy 2025 Ducati Garage Season to all who celebrate 🎊

Ok I’m done thank you for liking the fic!! Thank you for giving me an excuse to talk about it!!

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last chapter of roman au had me so wired i was standing around my room and legit pacing… SPIT IN HIS MOUTH !!!!!

SPIT! IN! HIS! MOUTH! Truly I worried that I could have gone harder on that scene so I’m glad it hit. Thank u for giving me this window into the reading experience, truly making my very stupid 3am fic posting bedtime worth it. I hope this was while your power was still out and by dramatic candlelight xoxoxo

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In the mpreg au of the roman au how would thing change if the rosquez baby was a boy

(Referring to this mpreg AU of Roman AU)

Comically large fat baby boy with a little placid gaze… Oh everything is a little Worse and more terrifying, but actually more on Valentino’s end! Marc is already pretty maxed out on “we keep the baby safe and no one can know” with his loud-crier finicky colic-y baby girl. Love that we’re now in au of au of au.

One slight difference I guess is when Marc nearly dies in/shortly after childbirth and begs for Vale, Alex does not nearly cave and write a letter. He’s (allowed in the room for mpreg reasons) holding the baby because the midwife and her assistants are desperately trying to save Marc, and Alex is looking at this tiny tiny male baby, barely cleaned off, and crying because he keeps having to tell Marc, when he tells Alex to get Vale, make Vale come, “I can’t do that. I can’t do that. No, Marc.” Because either he’s holding a natural-born heir* or he’s holding an heir who will die (baby will be ok!! But it’s extremely touch and go at this stage), and Alex is like. That man already nearly got my brother executed once. If Marc had his son and the baby died…? But frankly at that point he’s just furious and terrified for Marc.

*natural-born heirs were not nearly as big a deal in Rome, at least in terms of the emperor, as in post-Roman societies that practiced pretty strict inheritance. Which is a generalization that pained me so bad to write but basically, don’t picture Tudor-style drama here. He actually doesn’t need a son, and very personally does not want one. Vale in Roman AU talking about adopting is like, part of a long tradition of adopting a grown man as the next emperor. So this IS a big deal, but more in the sense that natural-born heirs were more often used as a tool to overthrow a later emperor. Not necessarily Vale, but would this baby be a threat to anyone Vale selects (Pecco in the background shaking like a chihuahua)? Oh yeah. Has Marc already been implicated once in a plot to overthrow/destabilize the emperor? Yyyyyep. THIS is what has Alex so horrified. Also a little bit the viscera. Alex already did not want to have a baby himself and this is getting solidified via trauma. (They both can get pregnant in this AU. The mpreg brothers! Alex successfully does not have a baby lol)

When Valentino finds out, it’s like. Wow catastrophe! He did exactly what he worked so hard never to do. Actually he definitely used some form of contraceptive (ancient Roman style, yes i did go on jstor about it) with Marc during their latest hookup and every time before. However Marc is one of those people who just gets pregnant at the drop of a hat. Alas, by thirty Marc IS tiredly aware of this. And Vale maaaybe doesn’t realize how risky fucking Marc is, because previously Marc (also militant about ancient contraception) had one youthful mabortion and one youthful miscarriage he did not tell Vale about. Or perhaps tried to tell Vale once and Vale didn’t believe him due to the divorce.

Marc didn’t notice this third pregnancy for a long time, actively participated in cavalry warfare during it, somehow didn’t miscarry, got horribly injured (spiral fracture in arm which was also getting crushed under a horse), was laid up in bed trying not to die of infection, still didn’t miscarry. He was far enough along by the time he realized, but thought he’d miscarry again. Didn’t want to. Wanted to keep the baby. Thought he was going to have to retire anyway. Body horror. Keeps it from Alex for a while, but eventually calls in a midwife and asks her if the fetus is alive. Sick with the idea that he’s messed it all up, that his broken body is going to miscarry again, late. Wow none of this has to do with fat happy baby boy AU, this is all just general mpreg AU.

MY POINT was that Valentino worked very hard never to have a natural-born heir, because he was a boy-emperor who killed his own father to keep from being killed first (I’m trying not to spoil the extras in long-version of Roman AU, but he had kind of an Alexander the Great’s youth in Macedon problem. It was complicated, but there WAS a second potential heir and Vale was too dangerous to leave alive). And the idea of introducing a child to the court is like. He actually does not and cannot think about it. Jokes that with any luck he’s infertile! A daughter would be terrifying enough, but less focus would be on her, since despite this being mpreg universe — idk, you can’t tell who has the mpreg gene cluster or whatever, no mpreg science here, but gender roles stay pretty similar and guys who find out they can get mpregnant get shuffled a little closer to eunuchs on the social scale, but that's about it. While there is a little less stigma against bottoming in a male homosexual relationship overall, Romans loved horrible gender roles too much to give them up. This actually isn’t me just handwaving, I do think this is how it would go lol. — she’d be considered useful to marry off to someone’s son, legitimizing him as a threat to power. Could be a little easier to hide her. A son is just. Worst nightmare! A situation Vale really cannot fully control, and a person he basically by definition cannot keep safe. Splash-landing into the epicenter of his own trauma! People around him HAVE been murdered before.

So Vale realizes that Marc has a baby via uhhhh why did I decide this dramatic reveal would be through Marc lactating and failing to hide it when they hook up at the end of the fic. Kink reveal and baby reveal all in one!

But yeah so he realizes Marc has a baby and is trying to work himself up into jealous rage bc the very clear alternative is: he fucked Marc 16 months ago. Which is too terrifying to contemplate. Marc MAYBE first lies and says the baby is dead. Doesn’t dare name someone else as a father (Dovi maybe would volunteer) in case that actually gets them killed. I think Marc is actually pretty aware that Vale will say insane shit about Marc and imply that Marc tried to overthrow him, but Vale has forced senators to kill themselves — standard senatorial execution — over much less. He does know that he, Marc, is likely to survive this, though he doesn’t particularly care whether he does.

Buuut once the cat is firmly out of the bag, Marc refers to his fat happy baby boy (side note: Marc is one of those tiny and underweight people who manages to have the biggest fattest baby boy in the baby boy au. The girl baby au she’s a little premature and small like Marc, in my head? But part of the lore of Boy Baby is that he is very chill and robust and not sickly at all) as neutrally as possible until Vale, horrified, being smashed in the face with the reality of being in love, being smashed in the face with the reality of having done what he swore he would never do, asks outright: son or daughter.

And Marc at this point cannot hide it! Calculating little brain, aware that too many people in Tarraco know! Has he been passing the baby off as a cousin’s or whatever like yeah but. Not well. And everyone knows the baby’s male; he’s peed on much of Marc’s household at this point. So he does tell Vale it’s a boy :) vicious of him tbh. He’s been backed into a corner and is furious about it. Aaaaand instead of the further fight Marc is bracing for, Vale crumbles. Genuinely has a breakdown. Two huge forces in him (desire to have a baby with Marc lol) vs the absolute horror that is the twelve-year-old kid inside him who occasionally takes the wheel and is fucking terrified traumatized. Like he is kneeling on the floor having a panic attack in front of Marc. Not his most suave moment.

Now this IS a moment where there could be some misunderstandings, but the thing about them is they are liars and all but actually do tend to understand each other, or rather, when there’s a lack of understanding it’s only occasionally on Marc’s side (Marc at 31 knows Vale won’t kill him. Marc at 22 did sort of think Vale would let him get away with pretty much anything. Not without reason, sure! but no, not anything). Marc is like. Standing over Vale, brittle, cold-faced, (tiny tits still leaking milk), saying, something along the lines of You will not ask me to hurt him. I will end you. basically. And Vale manages to wheeze out, “Is he safe? Is he safe?” So misunderstanding averted, tho naturally the soap opera continuuuues. also marc is going to get treated like glass a bit and hate it.

In Boy Baby version, though, Vale is way more careful about how close the baby ever gets to Rome, or at least way more stressed about it if it happens. Elaborate bullshitting, extensive Marc-style blatant lying to his near and dear ones who absolutely have guessed what's up. Etc etc!

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obviously completely ok if no but do you have any jorge/aleix thoughts! who are they in roman empire au maybe??

Oh man great timing because I didn’t have any Jorge/Aleix thoughts re: Rome UNTIL this morning, thanks to that photo of Marc, Alex, and Jorge all sitting in plastic chairs post motocross. And I was like Ah They’re Negotiating. In The Roman AU.

The thought was: Jorge has taken a big demotion in order to become governor of a very wealthy powerful province (something akin to Northern Africa, which I think was historically so powerful that the governorship came with a demotion in rank to keep the governor from threatening the power base of the other governors/the emperor). And Aleix has been more on the military route, career-wise, but he maybe pulled a few strings to stay near Jorge during Jorge’s two-year governorship and push to force Vale to give him a consulship (world championship???).

And he gets it I guess but then it’s just: all over. You serve 2 year terms as a provincial governor and then someone else is coming in. Consulship is also short. He’s being sent to like Britannia after this. He’s spiraling. Aleix is sleepless sneaking out of his barracks to the governor’s mansion. In thru the side door, the servants know him. Putting Jorge’s face on the mosaic floor. Making him lick Aleix’s boots (caligi reference) while Aleix edges him until Jorge can make it thru another miserable day. (Vale is not happy to be pressured to give Jorge the consulship).

Jorge ALSO knowing Aleix is reaching the end of his military term which he’s serving bc he wants to become a full citizen, so any children Aleix might have (Jorge torturing himself) will also be citizens…. There’s no reason to stay in the military beyond that point… Jorge desperately trying to imagine doing all this alone (and in Britannia) and works himself up so bad he has to go find Aleix who is at a dinner party and Jorge fumbled his way thru faking a political emergency to get Aleix to leave and let Jorge blow him in an alley or take him to a high class courtesan or something (the latter is mildly disastrous ). Not perfectly fleshed out but don’t worry they CAN be experiencing their own agonies in Roman au. Tho I don’t think there’s any AU scenario more insane romantic than Aleix’s final race like I’m not even trying to match that.

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I don’t think I said this in the bez chapter of Roman AU but one time Cele tripped on his own toga and chipped a tooth and broke his collarbone due to Cele’s luck being roughly the same in all universes. This stresses Bez out.

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yes google docs when i miss the ! and hit @ i DO want to try to tag a potential phd supervisor with whom i've been emailing in this 15k of rpf fanfiction about valentino rossi facefucking his longtime rival as the emperor of rome. i feel that some feedback regarding my depiction of classical antiquity will really reflect my later research interests. note that i accurately describe the toga picta when someone gets erotically choked by it.

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uhhhhhhh, is somebody going to pull a Marc Anthony and wear the shortest toga's possible to show off those thighs? Marc is there, but I'm honestly much more interested in ur thoughts on it, or if you could imagine it for someone.

thank you for the roman au, it's absolutely amazing :)

thank you for immediately asking the important question :) i was literally typing out an addition to that post when i saw this ask come in, which read, in effect: marc wears a tunic so short you could cut yourself on it, and over that a looong toga. In a Cake's "Short Skirt Long Jacket" way.

in fairness he is probably not the only one doing the marc antony short skirt thing, looking at mgp as a whole. many options to suit your fancy!!

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bez in roman au cross-dressing via long-sleeved tunic which he's also wearing kind of long around his calves like. shit that's just julius ceasar in his youth hold on.

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i would desperately like to post the first chapter of the 15k of motogp Roman AU: Extended Edition, which has been ready to go for ages, but my track record with finishing multichapter fic that are even a LITTLE tiny bit incomplete -- like this one is fully written, but I could see a coda popping up in a final edit -- is currently sitting at ummm 0 for 4. or more. So I'm afraid.

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Investigating proper toga procedure for rpf fanfiction today

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so wikipedia assures me that the Latin cognomen (third name of a freeborn Roman citizen) can occasionally operate like an Arabic nisba, solving my issue of "too many of these italians don't have three names". but it also means i just stared at a gdoc and whispered "but is the nisba in the genetive". anyway i'm suffering for art again (motorsports rpf)

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Thanks tumblr boop posting for giving me a useful (reconstructed in the 19th century, but still) visual of the toga praetexta (aka the one with the cute purple trim) that Cele wears in Roman AU…. (Bez and most other academy boys are in the plain white toga virilis) (they are NOT wearing boring tunics under their togas like you see here tho!! they are popping off)

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going places in Latin grammar wikipedia i wouldn't go with a gun, all in the name of expanding bez's roman au cele nickname repertoire. i hate latin. if I give celestino an appropriate noun-in-nominative-case latin name he becomes celestis. that's third declension so the diminutive can't be the one I was thinking of (celestulus aka Little Celestis)... 3rd declension Little Celestis is fucking Celesticula. this is an abomination. or possibly slang for balls. he is celin goodnight.