When in Rome...

***When in Rome...*** is the twenty-sixth *Ultimate Alien* chapter of *Clock 10: Choose Your Own Adventure*.

## Plot

The team battles Forever Knights in the Catacombs beneath Rome, Italy. Clock attempts to transform, but Jimmy keeps trying to call him, which prevents the transformations. No one notices in time to stop a Knight with an energy sword from slashing Clock. The Ultimatrix is hit and he's knocked back, only for a wall to separate him from the group. The Ultimatrix finally allows for transformations, but restricts him to Terraspin, Humungousaur, Echo-Echo, and Rath.

Continuing on his own in the new section of the catacombs (having opted out of using Rath or Humungousaur to knock down the wall in fear of creating more damage), Clock is ambushed by some of Vulkanus' pickaxe aliens, who he easily defeats with the use of Terraspin. Flying through the underground tunnels, Terraspin breaks down a wall to find Vulkanus himself with more pickaxe aliens. Annoyed, Vulkanus leaves the pickaxe aliens to take care of Terraspin. This proves ineffective, as Terraspin uses both magic and wind powers to take care of them. Rather than simply fly after Vulkanus, Terraspin plays along with the video game styled puzzle in the room. He becomes Echo-Echo and solves the two-button pillar puzzle with ease before heading on his way, and failing to solve a puzzle with a pressure plate. Echo-Echo becomes Humungousaur, and places a nearby metal box onto the pedestal, opening the passage to the next area.

Upon reaching the next area, Humungousaur becomes human again and peeks into a small vent before going Echo-Echo and venting *Among Us* style, reaching the other side of the iron bars in the room. Echo-Echo pulls the lever on this side which lowers the bars, then becomes Rath to put the large pedestal from the other side into the similarly shaped hole on this side, which allows access to the next place, right after Rath punches his way through an unstable brick wall.

Here, he meets Vulkanus again, and the two begin combat. Rath unleashes Ultimate Rath, devouring a few pickaxe aliens and smashing the heads of others. He rips Vulkanus out of his combat armor and yeets him into the wall, knocking him unconscious. The door out of the area opens right after. Ultimate Rath becomes human before continuing into the next area: a chamber of floating floors above a lava pit. Clock becomes Rath again, parkouring his way up the floors and platforms, almost falling to the lava at one point. When he reaches the top, he manages to make it outside, finding himself in the Roman Colosseum.

Outside, Rath fights his way through several Roman-styled Forever Knights, and notices the center pedestal in the Colosseum is surrounded by three rocks that oddly have lasers coming out of them into the pedestal. The lasers power a force field surrounding an unknown person or thing. Rath becomes Humungousaur and tries to dig through to get to it, but the force field is spherical. He then becomes Terraspin to try to blast the shield with magic, but this proves ineffective. He then destroys the rocks with the lasers instead, allowing the force field to lower.

The force field lowered, the thing inside is revealed to be Enoch, one of the many leaders of the Forever Knights. Terraspin, after realizing that a peaceful way out of this would be futile, attempts to fight him, but Enoch's sword proves quite combative and defensive. When a portal spell also fails, Terraspin becomes human, and asks Enoch to grant him a "dying wish" due to his knight's honor. Enoch begrudgingly plays along and Clock turns into Rath again, only to play *Apache* by The Sugarhill Gang, challenging Enoch to a dance battle. Enoch refuses and insists on killing him instead, his sword powered by the artifact in his helmet. Rath shatters the helmet, causing Enoch to be depowered and turn to stone.

Rath continues dancing and singing along to *Apache* after Enoch's defeat as he becomes human, only to be called by Jimmy yet again. Jimmy warns him about an oncoming cosmic storm, and Clock dispatches some Plumbers to scope it out.

## Major Events

* Although not realizing it, Clock interacts with a piece of the Potis Altiare for the first time.
* Clock fights Enoch for the first time.

## Characters

* Clockwork Firefly
* Taryn Firefly
* Kevin Levin
* Charmcaster
* Jimmy Jones *(voice)*

### Villains

* Forever Knights
* Vulkanus
* Pickaxe Aliens
* Enoch

## Aliens Used

* Terraspin *(2x)*
* Echo-Echo *(2x)*
* Humungousaur *(2x)*
* Rath *(3x)*
	+ Ultimate Rath

## Trivia

* This chapter begins the Potis Altiare arc from *Ben 10: Ultimate Alien: Cosmic Destruction*, taking the place of the Dagon arc originally at the end of *Ultimate Alien*.
* The attack by the Forever Knight and interference by the initial interaction with a Potis Altiare piece causes the Ultimatrix to malfunction and restrict Clock's alien usage. This is a nod to the game mechanic within *Cosmic Destruction* that only let players use four aliens per level, with three being needed for the level's puzzles, and the fourth being the player's choice. All Potis Altiare arcs revolve around this game mechanic by having the pieces interfere with the Ultimatrix before it can get properly calibrated with them.
	+ In this chapter, Clock chose Rath to go along with the other three aliens. In the other chapters, Blake chose the fourth alien, along with adding additional variety to choices as time went on based on needed powers.