Throughout the last few missions (and even in parts of the first part of the Operation), you will recall seeing verbs that looked like the following:

Tiberius ā tīrōnibus vīsus est .
Tiberius was seen by the henchmen.

Recentiī ā Sinistrō monitī sunt .
The Recentii were warned by Sinistrus.

You may even recall seeing verbs that looked slightly different.

Tiberius ā tīrōnibus vīsus erat .
Tiberius had been seen by the henchmen.

Recentiī ā Sinistrō monitī erant .
The Recentiī had been warned by Sinistrus.

What do these verbs all have in common? For starters, they are passive verbs. That means, unlike most of the verbs that you have seen (and use every day), the subject of these verbs has the action done to it, rather than doing the action. Keep in mind your English teachers don't like you to use passive verbs, but Latin has quite a few of them!

Second, you should notice that all of the verbs above are made up of two parts: the perfect passive participle and either the present of sum (to make the perfect passive) or the imperfect of sum (to make the pluperfect passive). We'll go into these forms in greater detail down the road, but for the time being, just get used to seeing them in action.

Operative, Mission Control thinks that your research time during this episode is probably best spent drawing connections between the story unfolding inside the TSTT and the real situations of Roman history. It's clear that the Recentii are asking you to help them analyze the struggle of the orders; it's also very possible that the Brigantes in 19.3.b will respond well to some sort of magical explanation about how the mini-sig, the SIGNIFER, and the LAPIS (as you currently understand them) reveal the destiny of Rome.