#the disciples and five points mob cross over | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

writingfortoomanyfandoms · 5 years

Text

Watch It Burn - Part Three

Pairing: Undecided x mob!Reader

Requested: No

Summary: Olympus and the Horsemen have to unite but more than one secret is uncovered

Warnings: Swearing, mentions of drinking/alcohol use etc

A/N: Sorry for the long wait but I hope you guys like this part! The pairing is still undecided so please let me know who you would like to see it written for! Please remember to like, reblog, leave comments to let me know what you think about it!

The only sound resonating through the meeting room of the Speakeasy was that of Famine’s fingers tapping lightly on the table. It was a light, spider-like sound that was disconcerting in the otherwise silent room.

Athena had had only one previous “meeting” with The Horsemen, and yet she had already picked up that Famine found it difficult to keep completely still. But other than his tap-dancing fingers, Famine’s body language remained neutral - interest was clear on his features as he observed the women, but other than that, there was no give-away to what he was thinking.

One of the things that Athena found the most interesting, yet slightly unnerving, about Famine was the near-permanent smirk that lay on his face. He always looked on the verge of making a joke- as if quick wit resided easily on the tip of his tongue.

Athena wondered what he would have been like outside of this life, outside of The Horsemen.

Death, on the other hand, simply looked bored. He was sat back in his chair slightly, his body language completely closed off towards the people sat at the table. His eyes were lowered, as though he thought that they could use them to look into his soul.

“I thought you said that you would get better at hosting,” Athena said finally, breaking the tense silence that lay between the five mobsters. Famine quirked an eyebrow at her.

“They’re late.” Hera supplied an answer to Famine’s silent question. Her tone was icy and unwelcoming, clearly aggravated by the long wait that they had been forced into.

“They are talking with Ares,” Famine informed, the statement accompanied by an eye roll. His words, however, caused scoffs to be let loose by the women. Death’s head whipped up so sharply at their noises of indignation that Athena wondered how his head didn’t snap off.

“You are in Ares territory and you’re here as guests, so show some fucking respect,” he hissed, his eyes cold and deadly as the threatening words were spat towards the ambassadors of Olympus.

“When Ares shows us and Atlas some respect, we’ll be happy to return the favour,” Eris snapped back and, for only the briefest of seconds, confusion flickered on their faces.

Athena looked at Hera, only to find the woman’s gaze already on her, a frown on her face as well. They didn’t know.

Death and Famine were saved from Eris’ harsh response as the door finally flew open.

Conquest surveyed the room with careful eyes as he led two figures in behind him. They finally landed on Athena, after it seemed he fully examined Hera and Eris, as she was the only one he recognised outside of the other two Horsemen. He raised a single eyebrow at her.

“Did Atlas never teach you how to sit properly?”

It was a fair comment, Athena never did sit on her chairs the normal way. She would sit cross-legged on them or with her knees bent upwards, often having her legs resting against the table. Sometimes she would sit sideways on a chair, using one arm rest to prop up her back and swing her legs over the other one. Even she wasn’t quite sure why she did it, but she supposed there was an aspect to it that made it easier to reach her concealed weapon.

“Did Ares never teach you what a clock is?” Conquest watched her for a moment more, almost as though he was daring her to say something more or seeing if she would change the way she was sitting.

Athena returned his stare levelly.

“We’ve wasted enough time already, we have other places to be,” Hera spoke, finally breaking the silent stand off occurring between Athena and Conquest.

“If you’re not going to take this seriously, we do have other places we can turn to,” Eris added, having never been happy with going to The Horsemen in the first place.

“You came to us,” Famine pointed out. “You need us.” The bold statement made the three women let out cold laughs.

“Is that what you think.” Eris stated, bordering another silent challenge.

“You’re saying you don’t need us?” War questioned, pulling a pack of cigarettes from a pocket and lighting one.

“Believe it or not, we do have allies.” Hera informed the Horseman. Athena shot her a warning look and moved her eyes up to meet War’s.

“You may be the most convenient choice, but don’t think for a second we can’t go elsewhere,” she hissed, assuring the men.

Conquest and War took seats at the table, with Conquest at the head and War next to Famine. The third man remained standing and Athena could feel his eyes weighing on her.

“Can I help you?” She asked, looking up at him and raising her eyebrows.

“This is Silence, our head bodyguard,” Conquest said, holding his hand across the table to War, indicating he wanted a cigarette. War rolled his eyes as he passed one across and lit it.

“Yeah, well, that’s great, but you can stop staring at me,” Athena sneered at Silence. The bodyguard scoffed.

“I’ll be outside, sir,”

“Whiskey?” Conquest offered, nodding towards the decanter on the table. Death clearly took that as a sign and poured a glass for everyone.

“Not for me.” Athena said curtly, pushing away the glass Death passed to her. The Horsemen raised their eyebrows, but Athena simply rolled her eyes.

“So, what do you intend to do with The Disciples?” Conquest asked, leaning back in his chair and looking at the three women in front of him.

“Take them down,” Hera said simply, taking a sip of whiskey.

“If it was that easy you wouldn’t be here.”

Eris looked to Famine and nodded at him. “You’re most probably suffering the most,” she mentioned and Famine raised his eyebrows in surprise.

“Me?”

“They’ve taken over the drug trade, which is your area of expertise, right?” Eris questioned, Famine chuckled a little.

“Do you know everything about us?” He asked. Hera and Eris shot not-so-discreet looks at Athena, smirks growing on their faces.

“We have good intelligence,” the Horsemen followed the Olympian’s gazes, eventually resting their eyes on Athena.

“We don’t want to go to war,” Athena said, moving on from their questioning gazes.

“Is that so?” Amusement danced in Conquest’s eyes, as though she was a small child who did not understand the ‘real world’ in the same way that they did. Athena sneered at him, shaking her head.

“Believe it or not, Atlas didn’t teach us to seek out war.”

“And Ares didn’t teach us to be stupid,” War countered.

“Ever consider that it’s more foolish to go looking for violence and war than to look for peaceful solutions?” Hera questioned.

“Well I do have a reputation to uphold,” War pretended to ponder. Athena looked away to hide her amusement.

“So you want to enter peace talks?” Conquest cut in, clearly frustrated by how off-topic the meeting had quickly become.

“That is the idea, yes.”

“And have you got intelligence on them, too?” The question was directed towards Athena, but she hesitated before responding. Atlas had warned her about being careful of what she shared with The Horsemen- even after they had agreed to help them.

“In the process of,” she settled on.

“Care to share?” Conquest asked and Athena shook her head.

“You know, I kinda don’t,”

“You want us to be allies, but you won’t tell us what you know?”

“We’ll tell you as much as you need to,” Eris said, eyes blazing in anger.

“What do you know of them?” Hera asked instead, clearly not wanting any of the mobsters to blow up.

“Silence tends to keep all of our intelligence,” War waved them off. “If there was a serious threat then he would have brought it to our attention.”

“Then he’s clearly not doing a good job,” Athena informed them. Conquest looked to Famine and the ginger man nodded slowly.

“It is true that the drug trade has been slowing down.”

“It has for all of us,” Eris inputted.

“And you know that’s The Disciples?”

“Yes, and we also know that they’re getting into the weapon industry,” Eris’ statement was directed towards War who frowned, shifting in his seat to sit up properly.

“That… would make sense,” he agreed.

“And they’re using kids to do their dirty work,” Athena added, the familiar anger bubbling in the pit of her stomach as she thought about the kids.

“You mentioned that,” Conquest agreed, moving forwards as though he could look into her soul. “But then you sent a kid our way to deliver a message,” Athena rolled her eyes at his judgemental stare.

“You wouldn’t have hurt him,”

“Is that so?”

“Believe it or not we don’t endanger children willingly,” she scoffed. The leader surveyed her for a moment before leaning back in his chair again.

“Okay. So start talking.”

32 notes · View notes

romancatholicreflections · 7 years

Text

1st June >> Daily Reflection on Today's First Reading (Acts of the Apostles 22:30; 23:6-11) for Roman Catholics on Thursday of the Seventh Week of Easter

Commentary on Acts of the Apostles 22:30; 23:6-11 We are now coming to the end of the Third Missionary Journey. Events are moving very fast as we have to finish the Acts in the next three days! And a great deal is happening, much of which will have to be passed over. It might be a very good idea to take up a New Testament and read the full text of the last eight chapters of the book. As we begin today’s reading let us be filled in a little on what has happened between yesterday’s reading and today’s. After bidding a tearful farewell to his fellow-Christians in Ephesus, Paul began his journey back to Palestine, making a number of brief stops on the way – Cos, Rhodes, Patara. They by-passed Cyprus and landed at Tyre in Phoenicia. They stayed there for a week, during which time the brethren begged Paul not to go on to Jerusalem. They knew there would be trouble. But there was no turning back for Paul and again there was an emotional parting on the beach. As Paul moved south, there were stops at Ptolemais where they greeted the community. Then it was on to Caesarea where Paul stayed in the house of Philip, the deacon, now called an ‘evangelist’. (Earlier we saw him do great evangelising work in Samaria and he was the one who converted the Ethiopian eunuch.) Here too there was an experience in which Paul was warned by a prophet in the community of coming suffering. Again they all begged him not to go on but he replied: “I am prepared not only to be bound but even to die in Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus.” They then accepted God’s will and let him go. When they arrived in Jerusalem they received a warm welcome from the community there and went to pay a formal visit to James, the leader in the Jerusalem church. They were very happy to hear of all that Paul had done but they were also concerned (and their concern would seem to indicate that there were some in the city who had not fully accepted the non-application of Jewish law for Gentiles). The local Jews (including, it seems, the Christians) would have heard how Paul, also a Jew, had been telling Jews in Gentile territory to “abandon Moses”, that is, not requiring them to circumcise their children or observe other Jewish practices. Some suggested a tactic for Paul to assuage the feelings of these people. On behalf of four members of the Jerusalem community, he was to make the customary payment for the sacrifices offered at the termination of the Nazirite vow (cf. Numbers 6:1-24) in order to impress favourably the Jewish Christians in Jerusalem with his high regard for the Mosaic Law. Since Paul himself had once made such a vow (when he was leaving Corinth, Acts 18:18), his respect for the law would be publicly known. Paul agreed with this suggestion and did as he was asked. However, as the seven days stipulated were coming to an end, Paul was spotted by some Jews who had known him in Ephesus. A mob rushed into the temple and seized him, and might have harmed him, if the Roman commander had not seen the riot. He rescued Paul, then arrested him and put him in chains and thus out of the reach of those wanting to harm him. It was only after the arrest that the commander realised the Greek-speaking Paul was not an Egyptian rebel. Paul then asked to be allowed to address the crowd and, in a longish speech, told the assembled Jews the story of his conversion on the road to Damascus (the second time the story is told in Acts; it will be told again in chap. 26). At the end of the speech, the crowd bayed for his blood and Paul was about to be flogged in order to find out why the Jews wanted him executed. At this point, Paul revealed to the centurion that he was a Roman citizen and that, unlike the garrison commander who had bought his citizenship, he had been born one. This created great alarm among his captors and he was released. The Roman commander then ordered a meeting of the Sanhedrin to be convened so that Paul could address them. While those of the high priestly line were mainly Sadducees, the Sanhedrin also now included quite a number of Pharisees. This council was the ruling body of the Jews. Its court and decisions were respected by the Roman authorities. Their approval was needed, however, in cases of capital punishment (as happened in the case of Jesus). Paul being brought before the Sanhedrin was already foretold by Jesus to his disciples, Matt 10:17-18. Paul, in time, will appear before ‘councils’, ‘governors’ and ‘kings’. He began by telling them that everything he had done was with a perfectly clear conscience. On hearing this, the high priest Ananias ordered that Paul be struck in the mouth. It was not unlike his Master being struck on the face during his trial. Paul hit back – verbally. “God will strike you, you whitewashed wall.” He said this because, although Ananias was supposedly sitting in judgement according to the Law, he was breaking the law by striking the accused. Josephus the Jewish historian tells us that Ananias was actually assassinated in AD 66 at the beginning of the First Jewish Revolt. When Paul is accused of reviling the high priest, he said he did not realise Ananias was the high priest and apologised. It is at this point in today’s reading that one of the most dramatic scenes in the Acts, begins. Paul knew his audience and he decided at the very beginning to make a pre-emptive strike. He professed loudly and with pride that he was a Pharisee, knowing that his audience consisted of both Pharisees and Sadducees. Addressing his words specially to the Pharisees, he said that he was on trial because “our hope is in the resurrection of the dead”. That was not quite the whole story, of course, as he made no mention of Christ but it immediately put him on the side of his fellow-Pharisees. As Paul had told the Corinthians in one of his letters, if Christ was not risen from the dead, neither could we rise and there would be no basis for our faith. The hope of a future life was at the very heart of his Christian preaching. That, of course, is not what the Pharisees heard. They immediately latched on to the fact that Paul, as a fellow-Pharisee held a belief that was denied by the Sadducees. The Sadducees only accepted as divine revelation the first five books of the Bible, what we call the Pentateuch. The resurrection of the body (in 2 Maccabees) and the doctrine of angels (in the book of Tobit) did not become part of Jewish teaching until a comparatively late date. On both these issues, however, Paul (a Pharisee himself) and the Pharisees were full agreement In the first five books of the Old Testament, there is no mention of a future resurrection, nor spirits, nor angels. It was on the basis of this belief that the Sadducees had challenged Jesus about the fate of a woman who had married seven brothers. If there is a resurrection, which of the seven would be her husband? For those who did not believe in life after death, the question was a nonsense. Paul’s words on resurrection immediately diverted attention from him to this contentious dividing point between the Pharisees and the Sadducees. All of a sudden the Pharisees make an about-turn: “We do not find this man guilty of any crime.” And, in a deliberate provocation to the Sadducees who did not believe in angels: “If a spirit or an angel has spoken to him…” This could be a reference to Paul’s account to them earlier of his experience on the road to Damascus. All objectivity was forgotten and the Pharisees, despite their earlier protestations, sided with Paul, “their man”, and a brawl ensued. It got so serious – and, remember, these were all “religious” men! – that the tribune, fearing Paul would be torn to pieces, came to his rescue and put him back in the fortress. That night Paul received a vision in which he was assured that he would be protected in Jerusalem because it was the Lord’s wish that he give witness to the Gospel in Rome. Perhaps Paul’s behaviour in this situation is a good example of Jesus” advice to his disciples to be simple as doves and as wise as serpents! Paul was more than ready to suffer for his Lord but he was no pushover. While we, too, are to be prepared to give witness to our faith even with the sacrifice of our lives, and never to indulge in any form of violence against those who attack us, we are not asked to go out of our way to invite persecution or physical attacks. That is not the meaning of the injunction to carry our cross. Jesus himself often took steps to avoid trouble. Joan of Arc defended herself as did Thomas More and, indeed as Jesus himself did during his trial: “If I have said something wrong, why do you strike me?” But, like them, we will try never to evade death or any other form of hostility by compromising the central teaching of our faith.

1 note · View note