Disclaimer: I don't own the characters; they belong to Naughty Dog LLC. I also don't own anything else that you might recognize from history (if I did, you can bet I wouldn't be writing fanfic). This one's gonna be a little bit of actual history, a little bit of creative license, a bit of Alex Rider and "The Librarian," and a whole lot of Uncharted :)


-1-
THE CHALICE

Jerusalem, 33 A.D.

Darkness.

It covered the land, turning the middle of the afternoon until the middle of the night. At the exact moment The Savior committed his spirit to God, the ground began to rumble. Slow, at first, then more violent. Great cracks split the streets, zigzagging through the streets of Jerusalem, directly through the center of the temple. The shaking wrenched the beams above the altar, and the great purple curtain in front of the Holy of Holies was ripped down the middle, swaying, then falling to the ground.

Screams rent the air as the quakes continued, the sounds mixing with the cracking of the ground and echoing off the buildings still fortunate enough to be standing.

On the hill, above the city in chaos, it was almost silent, save for a low rumbling sound. A stream of red trickled down through the clay, bouncing and swirling through the grass.

A body swayed from the branch of an Aleppo pine, gently rocking with the rumbling earth.


It was some time later, when the earth had settled, and the sun began to set, when two men picked their way through the grass and boulders of Akeldama. They came upon the body, gazing upon it as it hung now, perfectly still.

"This is he?" the younger of the two questioned. "The man who betrayed The Savior?"

The elder of them nodded. "Thirty pieces of silver, or so the priest tells it." He rummaged through the dead man's robes, his hand retrieving a small purse. He tugged the string, and dumped the contents into his palm. "The cost to stamp out this blasphemous rabble," he added, showing the other man thirty shekels glinting in the fading sunlight, rubbing them with his fingers.

"And the price of our cause," the younger man said determinedly. "The traitor was a martyr for the greater good," he reminded the elder man, as his partner returned the silver coins to their purse. "And so we shall continue to temper the masses when their fervor becomes too great. For with chaos, there comes a time of peace."

He looked at the elder man, seemingly embarrassed by his zealousness. The other man merely smiled at him, amused. "Your commitment to the cause is noted, Brother Ira," he assured him. As voices filtered up through the grasses on the sides of the hill, he murmured, "We must go." As they began picking their way down the other side of the hill, he whispered, "Better to remain hidden until the time is right."