Titus Flavius could feel his heart beating like a pair of war drums in his ears as he marched deeper and deeper into the tunnel, his eyes straining to see past the darkness in the dimly lit corridor. He mentally prepared himself for the worst, his gladius a deadly reassuring weight in his hands as he stared intently at the suffocating blackness. He idly wondered if this was how the Greek heroes of old felt when they journeyed down into Hades.

His men were shuffling not too far back, torches and swords in hand and looking as though they might run at the first sign of supernatural trouble.

The tunnel was eerily silent as they journeyed deeper into the tunnel, the only audible sound was the sound of boots scraping across the floor.

No-one dared to say a single word.

The inspiring speech of fame and glory seemed so far behind him now in that he was away from the light of Sol. His unease increased the further along he went. The masonry was on par with anything the Romans have built, yet he doubted this was the work of Roman architects, and if it turned out the Celts were behind this engineering feet, he would eat his boots.

None of it made any sense.

If the Romans didn't build this, and the Celts were certainly not the culprits, who did?

For what purpose?

How does this all link back to the Event?

How did no one notice anyone building such structures below the Celt's most sacred grounds?

More and more unwelcome questions sprung up like weeds the deeper into the tunnel they went, with no answers to any of them in sight. His vivid imagination provided possible answers, each providing less peace of mind than the last.

Rory could barely contain his excitement at the prospect of finally having human contact again as the sounds of boots scuffling along the ground came closer and closer to the main chamber of UnderHenge.

He fixed his cloak, made sure that there wasn't any smudges or dirt on his armour and fussed over the feathers in his helmet as though he was preparing for parade inspection. First impressions were important after all, and he's pretty sure that this one would set the tone of his unlife guarding the Pandorica for the next however many years.

He stood in front of the Pandorica in a parade rest position, with his hand resting on the hilt of his sword. 'Are you trying out a cool pose now, Rory?' He could almost hear Amy tease him.

"Oh my God, Amy, this is it" He whispered giddily, "We're finally going to meet proper Romans."

The sounds of boots have slowed down now as they arrived at the door. Even though Rory has no heart, his excitement turned into nervous anticipation which turned into outright fear. His nerves became frayed as he could almost see them through the door.

He suddenly became self-conscious as his mind became a whirlwind of self-doubting and anxious thoughts. Was his armour shined and cleaned enough? Should he really stand in front of the Pandorica or should he just hide behind it and come out later? What should he say to them? What will they say to him?

Oh no. What will they do to him?

For some reason, the people were just standing still outside the door and Rory could just about hear some chatter. Rory strained his artificial ears to pick up what they are saying.

Titus Flavius looked at the dimly lit set of oak doors that took up the width and height of the tunnel. He could practically feel the gazes of his men burning into his back, waiting in anticipation for orders.

He knew in his gut that the answers that he was seeking lay behind the mysterious door. He turned back to face his men and explained the plan.

"Adalric." A soft affirmative grunt responded as the tall German stepped forward, his features dimly lit by his side. "You will open the doors. Rest of us will charge through and form a shield wall." He paused here. "If you see something in there...do not break away. Remember your training." He looked at the illuminated faces of his men and saw varying degrees of fear and anticipation in each face.

"Remember that we are the elite! We are the brave!" Patently false to anyone who actually met them, but a little lie never harmed anyone, as he saw a couple of faces bobble up and down in agreement.

"Remember that there is no one in the world who can face the might of Rome. Remember that even monsters are nothing to the might of the Legion." There are still some who looked sceptical at the claim, but at least for the moment he convinced most people, including himself.

With that final talk out of the way, there was no more time to delay. He took a deep breathe in as he turned to face the door, and got into position.

He looked at the German auxiliary standing by the door in the eye, "Breach the doors, Adalric" he commanded calmly.

The blonde giant just stood there with a conflicted look on his face, and for a moment, Titus Flavius thought he was about to get told where to shove it in his signature broken Latin. As he was about to verbally give the order again, Adalric suddenly roared with a mixture of reluctant acceptance and fear before he suddenly ran at the doors and bashed them down with his mighty shoulders.

He roared with his men as they pushed forward through the breached door with their large shields in front of them without him needing to tell them to charge. "Shield wall! Shield wall!" He cried out as they poured through the door, trying to maintain discipline.

Remembering their training, they immediately formed a circular shield wall on the other side of the door, with keen eyes looking at for possible threats and swords ready to strike at anything that moved towards them.

It was a large room, large enough to fit in a couple of legions without any discomfort. As his eyes tried to pierce the oppressive darkness, he felt his heart drop as he saw the torch show flickering inhuman shadows on either sides of the room and one large and looming shape at the end of the room. When he heard faint mutterings of whimpers and prayers, he knew the others have seen what he has seen.

Rory felt vindicated in his actions as he hid behind the Pandorica just as someone yelled before breaking the door down. Goodness knows what they would have done had he been the first thing they saw when they breached the door.

There were some soldiers out there who liked to stab first, stab later and ask questions maybe never, and right now Rory didn't feel like taking a chance in finding out which type of soldiers these legionnaires were.

He very carefully leaned to have a look at the people who just entered the room. There were about fifty in total, all hunched together in some manner of a shield wall with swords and torches at the ready.

They, he decided after a cursory glance, did not look friendly at all.

Meeting with the Romans was going to be a lot trickier than he thought.

The shadows cast by the torches looked monstrous on the walls, not helped by the fact that the flames were flickering, giving a living and moving effect.

His ear was suddenly full of Paulus's sudden shrieking. "Gorgon, Gorgon, Gorgon!" The short man trembled behind his shield as he pointed with his sword, causing a great panic amongst the men. Titus Flavius turned his head to look where the Illyrian was pointing at before cursing himself as he remembered a second too late the stories of looking at Gorgons. He felt his heart stop as he saw an inhuman object, with a stalk like an elephant, short stubby protrusions and as one of the recruit's torches lifted higher...stone.

He raised his own torch up higher and flatly looked at one of the ugliest looking statue he has ever seen in his entire life. Clearly some form of primitive, barbarian attempt at masonry. "SILENCE YOU FOOLS! LOOK! It is just an ugly statue!" Everyone relaxed and breathed out a sigh of relief as they all calmed down from a collective panic attack. Paulus glowed red in embarrassment.

"Yeah, shut up Paulus, it is statue." Adalric jeered in his great booming voice, as though he didn't just shriek like a maiden not even 5 seconds ago, "Your shout nearly made my heart stop, you woman." The rest of the men laughed loudly with him, throwing their own jeers and insults at the unfortunate Illyrian. Paulus, to his credit, merely took it in good humour and thrown back his own insults at his German comrade.

There were times, Titus thought, where he would rather command proper Romans instead of the auxiliaries, but as he stood here in good humour in dark unknown territory with these foreigners, perhaps these barbarians weren't so bad after all, lack of discipline notwithstanding.

"Alright, enough of that!" Titus's voice cut through the banter; they still had a job to do and discipline to maintain after all. "Adalric, you take half the men and search the left side of the room and work towards the large box at the end of the room."

"Left is the hand you wipe your shit on, Adalric!"

"You eat my shit, you ugly!"

"ENOUGH!" His charitable thoughts on barbarians disappearing as soon as it came as he felt a familiar angry twitch coming back to his eye. He had clearly spared the rod and spoiled the lot here. He made a mental note to offer better sacrifices to Mars when he returned to camp for better quality future recruits than these sorry lot.

"I will take the other half and-" CRASH. Titus nearly jumped out of his skin at the sudden noise. Everyone became wary and on guard again.

"Oh God! Sorry!" A voice came from the side. Titus turned to look at the source of the noise and groaned. It looked as though Timon the Judean broke formation early and accidentally knocked over another statue by accident.

He raised his torch to see what the clumsy idiot had ran into to assess the damage. Loot and treasure were the salt and spices of the army salary, noble mission of investigation notwithstanding, and if the Judean had damaged something valuable, he was going to dock it out of his share.

When the light of the torch illuminated the fallen statue, he could only stare at it.

"What in the name of Dis Pater is that supposed to be?"

Rory had heard enough. He either revealed himself now, or let himself be found later, and considering that these lot did not seem to share two braincells to rub against each other for an intelligent thought, he might as well come out now and control the conversation.

His time to reveal himself had arrived.

Steeling his resolve, he stepped out from behind the Pandorica with his hands raised up, and suddenly his mind blanked.

Now what?

What should he say next?

They still have not seen him on the account that they were all crouching over some knocked over stone figure. Ah, judging by the position of that particular pillar, they probably found the Rhino Man. The trickiness of the encounter had just up by a magnitude.

Looking at them, they all looked really skittish, which was not a helpful sight as they all looked as though they were very handy with a blade.

He quashed the urge to hop back behind the Pandorica before anyone saw or noticed him.

The dreaded time to socialise with real people instead of stone figures and dead girlfriends has arrived. He really thought he was ready for this, but when it actually came to it, clearly, he was not.

He stepped in front of the Pandorica before he could think any more about it and cleared his throat with what he called great guff and purpose.

No-one noticed as everyone was still crouching over the Rhino Man.

"That is one ugly bastard." He heard one of them say. There was a pause. "Reckon he's Egyptian?"

"AHEM."

All heads turned in sync to look at him. All forty heavily armed and skittish legionnaires, his plastic brain helpfully reminded him.

"Who the fuck are you?" A centurion whose stress lines on his face were visible even with the helmet on and looked just about very ready to take an early retirement commanded. He clearly made an effort to sound arrogant and confident in front of his men but a shaky sword pointing at Rory betrayed his fear.

Say something, you idiot, his brain helpfully commanded his mouth.

Say what?

Anything!

Anything?

YES! ANYTHING!

Realising that the dumbstruck looking soldiers were still looking at him, he forced his grin into a smile and opened his mouth, hoping that something useful and not at all damning will come out of it.

"Be not afraid."

As soon as the words left his mouth, he cringed and immediately regretted his choice of words.

"Be not afraid."

What.

What in the name of the Emperor was that supposed to mean? He was just one man, and they were many! Ha! He should be afraid! He most certainly was not afraid of this man, he thought to himself as he fought to steady the shaking in his sweaty blade hand.

He heard a gasp from Timon the Judean when he heard the mysterious phrase though, perhaps some Jewish thing that he was too Roman to understand.

The figure, adorned in immaculate Roman centurion armour, with high quality clothes and tunics, still stood in front of the large cube with his hands still up in the air in a placating manner.

Whatever the case may be, he had to admit though that the man looked and spoke like a proper Roman citizen, though his Latin did have a bit of an accent that he could not place.

His men started to approach and surround the mysterious man, ready to either let loose or to capture him. Good, they still had their wits about them in the face of a potential enemy.

"I won't repeat myself again. Who are you? What are you doing here? What is this place? What is that...box?" He only meant to repeat the first question, but weeks of frustration, fear and a thirst for answers meant his normally infinite reserves of patience had long since dried out. He came here looking for answers, and dammit, he will get them!

"..." Silence met his questions as the man just looked intensively at him in the eyes.

"ANSWER ME!" His men jumped at the sudden shout, and they nervously prepared to run the man through at his command.

After a short while, just as he was about to snap and give the order to capture him, the man finally spoke.

"I...am the Guardian of the Pandorica."