There Is Truth In Wine

When local archeologists first found the inscription, they rightfully assumed it was a lamentation, perhaps an epitaph. Only later was it revealed to have been a warning.
Carved in the back wall of a newly-excavated catacomb, the Latin text read, “Fratres mei dormiunt in sanguine Neronis.” The formal translation proved to be no less cryptic: “My brothers sleep in Nero’s blood.”
Emperor Nero’s reign was notorious for its mass executions, tortures, and the infamous Great Fire of Rome, where, allegedly, the man strummed on a lyre while his city burned before him. But despite the well-documented horrors, no historical references could explain the meaning of men “sleeping in Nero’s blood.”
The truth would require deeper digging.
It was Evan Spalding’s idea. The lead personality in a team of videographers, he proposed sending sonic waves through the wall in an attempt to compose a picture of what, if anything, lay beyond it. 
When the vibrations came back, they didn’t map just some small, barren antechamber. It was an entire hidden wing of the catacomb. 
The discovery gave Spalding’s crew the first rights to explore the new space, and they wasted no time in gearing up to penetrate its shadowy depths. Along with infrared cameras, they donned gas masks to shield against built-up effluvium from rotting bones. 
Carefully, the section of wall was removed, revealing a rounded tunnel just large enough to crawl through. The crew, however, was no stranger to claustrophobic settings; they’d traversed tombs all over the world from Pakistan to Peru. Comparatively, this particular excursion should have been a cakewalk.
Resembling more tactical soldiers than videographers, the crew entered the tunnel one by one, eager to shed light on the treasures beyond.
The eerie green hues of their infrared cameras revealed not columns of alcoves holding crumbled remnants of skeletons, as to be expected in Roman catacombs, but rather a smooth, polished passageway that stretched far into the gloom. The only standout detail was the presence of burnt torches mounted on the walls, evidence enough that the chamber was once regularly used. 
But for what?
The answer lay within a round, massive chamber at its end. At first the crew was perplexed by what they saw. At its center was the ruins of a winepress: a large hollowed pit for crushing grapes, funneling their juices into auxiliary vats. Spalding scrutinized the site, his brow furrowing. Winepresses were typically above ground...why would there be one deep within a catacomb? And what connection did it have to Emperor Nero?
Further scanning of the chamber revealed decrepit wooden shelves flanking the side walls. Nestled upon them were dark glass bottles that glistened white in the infrared. 
Ramos, the crew’s chief translator, approached the rows of bottles, shining a flashlight across them. The liquid inside had long spoiled, displaying various shades of separated solutes, but its appearance was unmistakable. 
“Wine bottles,” Ramos confirmed. “Yes...they were indeed making wine down here.”
“In a catacomb?” Spalding asked. “On Nero’s behest?”  
“Wait...the glass is engraved,” said Ramos, narrowing his eyes. “‘Vinum...Dissensionis.’” He paused. “‘Wine of dissent.’”
“Not exactly charitable marketing,” Spalding commented, scratching his chin.
“There’s text over here,” Dylan, another videographer, announced. He hovered his camera over a shining plaque nailed to the wall. “‘Manes...eorum...bibam.’”
“‘I imbibe their spirits,’” Ramos recited.
An ominous chill hung over the crew. Pieces were starting to come together. The mournful inscription upon the wall...the winepress hidden away in a catacomb...the innumerable, foreboding glass bottles. But no one yet seemed daring enough to propose an answer.
The final link clicked when Spalding walked to the edge of the hollow pit and stared into it.
He hadn’t seen them at first, as time and decay had adhered them to the ground. But the bottom of the winepress was littered with the dusty molds of human bones. None came together in skeletal form; many had been broken...smashed or crushed, by the looks of them. Spalding staggered away from the pit, bile churning in his stomach.
“They executed men here,” he gasped. “Dissidents...and grinded their blood in with the wine.”
“Oh my God,” Dylan hushed. “And Nero drank that wine...but why?”
“To spite his enemies,” Spalding guessed, his voice trembling. “Or to...imbibe their spirits...to trap them on Earth...or extract hidden knowledge from their souls…”
“That absolute nutcase,” Dylan whispered, backing off from the plaque.
Ramos, examining a wine bottle in his hands, made to place it back on the shelf. But he froze, his arm halfway extended. Something had caught his eye. Something vague and undefined, but primally, horribly, familiar.
His heart squirming in his throat, Ramos lifted the bottle closer to the light, peering through its murky contents. 
A human face drifted in the wine.
Ramos yelped and dropped the bottle. It shattered on the stone floor. Aged, putrescent wine flooded over his boots as the rest of the crew scrambled and shouted, startled by the noise. Ramos stumbled backwards, his camera aimed at the scene.
The dark puddle before him bubbled and steamed. From the liquid rose an entity...a misty, decomposing wraith, staring daggers through its empty sockets. 
The men in the room screamed in terror, rushing past each other, viewing the chamber only through the ghostly green of infrared.
In the confusion, one of them barreled straight into a shelf.
It crumbled to pieces from the force. Wine bottles tumbled, breaking and splattering their contents like black, fermented rain. 
And from the noxious pool emerged dozens more wraiths, their voices rising in a hellish cacophony, jaws gaping, arms extended, hands grasping at thin air.
As one, they lurched for the intruders. 
Their cameras shorted out. The chamber went completely dark.
The symphony of shrieks and dismemberment exploded from the chamber, echoing up the passageway, spilling from the hole in the wall like the bellow of a dying beast.
The wall was promptly sealed. 
Many more men had come to sleep in Nero’s blood.