269 - Rome

The flicker of the candle was the only light the man had in his small cell. His tattered toga was supplying him with no warmth from the cold February air breezing through the open window, so his hands were shaking from both the cold and the fear of his impending doom. Using the last few drops of ink in the small inkwell on the table and his hand made wooden stylus, he wrote his final letter to the women he loved.
Two Roman guards entered the cell, grabbed the prisoner by his arms, yanked him from his stool and dragged him out of the cell to his execution. The letter lay on the wooden table, a cold wind blow through the window and blow out the small candle ... The room went dark.

2010 - South Dakota

Dean Martin's 'That's Amore' was echoing it's way around the warehouse to Claudia Donovan's dismay, "ARTIE that is it! ENOUGH of this old guy music!", Artie moved his small glasses down his nose and turned from the computer to face the stropping 19 year old girl.
"It's Valentines Day Claud, this isn't old guy music. It's romantic music!"
"Romantic? If I have to listen to Deano sing 'When the moon hits your eye like a bigga pizza pie' I will be forced to throw a bigga pizza pie at the stereo and then you!"
"It's for one day! It makes the warehouse happy! Live with it!"
Claudia grabbed her clipboard with a huff and stormed out of the door of the office, to only return within a couple of seconds. Without looking in the direction of Artie she walked across the office shyly to pick up her headphones off the coffee table, without looking at Artie again she made her way out of the office to go do an inventory check items from a former warehouse.

Normally Claudia thought that inventory checking was a mind numbing giant waste of her talents, she would rather be getting her hands on some artifacts or inventions that could be in her mind 'improved'. Her main interests are the moment were the Farnsworth's or even the Tesler gun, the improvements she could make. However every time she goes near anything with a screwdriver, Artie would move quickly to stop her "Don't even think about it missy". But Inventory checking from former warehouses was interesting, this was inventory and artifacts that hadn't been checked or seen in decades and on today's agenda stock from Warehouse 3.

Warehouse 3

Warehouse 3 had been located in Italy during the midst of the Roman Empire and when Roman emperors came across these items that displayed great powers or in their eyes 'god like' powers they chose to lock them up in the Warehouse and use them to help keep control of their mighty empire. It was a commonly known fact to many warehouse agents that Nero's lyre that he played whilst Rome burnt down was housed in the warehouses unchecked artifacts somewhere, the last time it was seen an Agent Morris from the former Warehouse 2 was playing it in 1666 in London.

Claudia walked down the 'Roman Aisle'. Dean Martin had been downed out by David Bowies 'Space Oddity' coming out of her purple Skull Candy headphones "Who needs Deano when you have the great Bowie?". She started walking down the aisle like in zero gravity "Planet Earth is blue and there's nothing I can dooooooo", she drummed her black nail polished fingers on the clipboard in time with the beat. She turned her head left and was nose to nose with a bust of Julius Ceaser that had a blood red cape draped around it's neck. Claudia picked up the small brown index card in front of the bust and read:

'Artifact: Julius Ceaser's Cape. Power: Gives the wearer great strategical powers in the art of war. Control an army to great success'

Claudia made some notes on the paper clad clipboard, then looked up at the cape again "So that's how them Roman's managed to do it!". Moving down the aisle she came across a sword owned by the legendary Spartacus, a potion formula used by villagers in Gaul to fight the Roman's with super human strength. But there at the end of the shelf was a small brown piece of folded paper, Claudia was intrigued and removed her headphones let them hang around her neck. She gave a scowling look at the nearest speaker that was still playing 'That's Amore', "ARTIE GIVE IT A REST!". She know that Artie could hear her scream and was probably still sitting next to his computer with a huge smile on his face.
Attention was quickly taken back to the small folded brown paper on the shelf, she took out a pair of purple latex like gloves from her back pocket, put them on and picked up the piece of paper. "WOW this is old!", a quick look at the brown index card on the shelf simply read:

'Artifact: Saint Valentine's Last Letter. Power: . . . . . '

Through the years the index card had worn away, the power that this artifact had was no longer legible. "So what makes you so special? Your just a really old romantics last letter" Claudia began to unfold the paper and to her surprise the writing on the paper was as clear as if it was written that very morning, nothing had worn or aged apart from the paper it was on. She couldn't help but read the short letter.

'To my Lucilia,
The last few months I have felt like I've been surrounded by demons sent straight from the depths of Tertius, but you my dear Lucilia, you my love have been my shining light, my saviour, my Venus. Cupid has shot his bow in my favour and has brought you to me. No matter what will happen to me, my love for you will be endless.
From Your Valentine'

"Oh my God that was the most puke-a-delic piece of crap I have ever read", she folded up the paper, placed it back on the shelf and wrote on the brown index card in front of it 'May cause reader to puke!'. Her purple headphones went back on and once again Bowie was drowning out Dean Martin, raising her pen as a make believe microphone "There's a star man waiting in the sky, he's like to come and meet us, but he thinks he'll blow our minds". She finished her inventory checks and walked through the maze that is Warehouse 13 and back into the office to hand in the checklist.

The Pink Spirals

The office was empty so she just lay the clipboard next to Artie's computer, looking around the room again there was no one around, then the warehouse sound system came into sight. Another quick look around, she held her hands behind her back and slowly walked nonchalantly across the room, whistling now and again to add to her nonchalant manor. One more look to see if anyone was around ... no ... a black nail polished finger pressed the 'OFF' button and Dean Martin was no more. There was enough time for a silent "Yeah!" and little dance before a voice was heard from around the corner.
"What happened to the tune? After the twentieth time on that loop it was starting to get catchy, also for some reason I think someone should order pizza for dinner tonight ... I'm hungry" It was agent Pete Lattimer who had found the Warehouse manual in a cupboard and was thinking about going to read it but go distracted by a comic strip in the paper, "When the moon hits your eye like a ..."
"Pete one more word and I'm sorry I will have to kill you!"
"Oh so it was Miss Donovan that turned off the tune ... Naughty, Naughty ... Artie is not going to like that!" Pete walked from around the corner wagging a rolled up newspaper in Claudia's direction. Claudia looked at him with a smile,
"I warned Artie, I can't work with old guy music playing. Just count your lucky stars that I didn't snap the CD in two!"
"WOW Claud, CD? It's on MP3"
"Well I will ... I will ... I"
"Ha, I have out smarted you! Ha"
"I ... I ... I see Pink spirals everywhere" Claudia's eyes went a light pink and then closed "I ... I ..." she collapsed on the floor, eyelids flickering fast, heart pounding visibly fast under her denim jacket. Pete raced across the office and dropped to her side, held her up in his arms and looked at her flickering eyelids "that's not good!". He looked around the empty office and started shouting for help "ARTIE! MYKA! HELL MISS FREDRICK! ANYBODY! HELP!""

A small smile formed in the corner of Claudia's mouth and quietly whispered "Pete", her heart start pounding quicker and then stopped! Her body went limp in Pete's arms.