Babylon, Persia - June 323 B.C.
Nearchus:
Alexander, the army will divide. Satrapies will revolt. Without your orders, there'll be war.
Perdicass:
We beg you. Tell us who.
Alexandria, Egypt 285 B.C. – 40 Years Later
PTOLEMY:
Our world is gone now. I'm the last left alive.
Whether that’s a curse or blessing, who by Hades would know?
But I've paid my price …in blood. And in broken dreams.
They say we were the greatest fighting force ever known to man.
Greater even than the expedition to Troy.
But how can I say it? How can I tell you what it is like to be young and to dream big dreams?
To believe when Alexander looked you in the eye, you could do anything.
Anything.
In his presence, by the light of Apollo, we were better than ourselves.
Truly, I’ve known many great men in my life… but only one colossus.
And only now when old do I understand who this force of nature really was. Or do I?
Did such a man as Alexander exist? Of course not.
We idolize him, make him better that he really was.
Men, all men, reach and fall… Reach and fall.
In the East, the vast Persian Empire ruled almost all the known world.
In the West, the once great Greek city-states, Thebes, Athens, Sparta, had fallen from pride.
For 100 years now, the Persian kings had bribed the Greeks with their gold to fight as mercenaries.
It was Philip, the one-eyed, who changed all this.
Uniting tribes of illiterate sheepherders from the high and lowlands.
With his blood and guts, he built a professional army that brought the devious Greeks to their knees.
He then turned his eyes on Persia, where it was said the Great King Darius himself on his throne in Babylon, feared Philip.
Philip was murdered much to Persia’s delight and perhaps sponsored by their gold.
And Alexander, at 20 became the new ruler of Macedonia.
Announcing revenge for the death of Philip, Alexander liberated all of the cities of western Asia, south to Egypt, where he was declared Pharaoh of Egypt and worshipped as god.
And finally, he provoked the rise to battle in the heart of the Persian Empire, near Babylon.
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