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wisdomeagleTitle: My Cup Runneth Over (Old Song, New Translation)
Fandom: Firefly/Serenity
Featured Character: Shepherd Book
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers/Timeline: Assume through the film.
Summary: Five rungs on the scale of perfection.
Notes: This is a remix of And Yea Though I Walk... by![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
were_lemur. It was written for the ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
remixthedrabble 2008 challenge. Originally posted here.
Disclaimer: Some of it belongs to Joss, some of it belongs to werelemur, some of it belongs to me, and all of us belong to God.
Wordcount: 5 x 100 words = 500.
My Cup Runneth Over (Old Song, New Translation)
+1+
Book's first confessor wanted details about the desperate criminals he killed and the ruthlessness in his heart. Book ran, again.
The second Abbot welcomed travellers with champagne. He promised that the virtues of encloistered life would outweigh any sins Book carried. The place smelled of Alliance comfort.
At Southdown, rescued wisdom can be found in books from Earth-that-was, and the chapel is bare of any comfort but the owl seal of Sophia and the empty cross of Wisdom incarnate. No Abbot asks his past or celebrates his future; no confessor intervenes in front of any God. Here, Book will stay.
+2+
In the safety of the Abbey, they don't follow outside news. That's the hardest burden, much harder than celibacy. He could withstand the outside silence easier if his confession didn't pound in his ears, deaths on his conscience and justifications in his heart.
"It becomes easier," the abbot says, a dark word of quiet council.
"If I only knew -- if there were tangible proof that the world is better for my secluding myself from it."
"*Shepherd* Book, I understand you've decided?"
"Yes, of course. I'll profess when my time comes."
"Then you needn't look outward to see a change."
+3+
Inside these walls, the old lies fade like mist. He can see violence, corruption, his own excuses in harsh relief against the starkness of the Abbey chapel. The new lies die harder, the easy metaphors of forgiveness and grace, the vivid symbol: slain body of a shepherd, mutilated by a corrupt government, whose blood restores worlds to peace.
These images won't be eased gently out of his meditation; they must be blasted away, burnt away, turned to char as he seeks, not mercy for sins unforgivable, but the emptiness at his center and the Black that will meet him there.
+4+
Shepherds don't ever retire -- he knew that when he entered the Abbey and he knows it as he leaves. Those who enter young, (pious men, ambitious men, men who want to elude the grasp of Alliance Operatives), the middle-aged preachers who train the next generation of Shepherds, and those, like Book, who enter late in life, dying to one world to be reborn in another -- all are bound, lifelong, to their vows. When Book boards *Serenity*, a harmless old man, no threat to the passengers, he doesn't discard old vows but pledges new ones, of evangelism and protection.
+5+
Book's last confessor is a man named Mal.
"You never married?"
"I'm wed to Christ."
A snort. "Never killed a man?"
"I never claimed that."
"You've killed a man."
"I have." Decades' old remembrance.
"Then I think you've got some explaining to do, *preacher*." Mal is wary: he has to trust the safety of his crew to the surety of Book's repentence. He listens to Book with a hand on his gun, watching for deceit in his eyes. When Book's done, Mal says, voice tight, "Any reason I shouldn't shove you out the airlock?"
"No."
"Good. We'll set things right."
+fin+
Fandom: Firefly/Serenity
Featured Character: Shepherd Book
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers/Timeline: Assume through the film.
Summary: Five rungs on the scale of perfection.
Notes: This is a remix of And Yea Though I Walk... by
were_lemur. It was written for the remixthedrabble 2008 challenge. Originally posted here.Disclaimer: Some of it belongs to Joss, some of it belongs to werelemur, some of it belongs to me, and all of us belong to God.
Wordcount: 5 x 100 words = 500.
My Cup Runneth Over (Old Song, New Translation)
+1+
Book's first confessor wanted details about the desperate criminals he killed and the ruthlessness in his heart. Book ran, again.
The second Abbot welcomed travellers with champagne. He promised that the virtues of encloistered life would outweigh any sins Book carried. The place smelled of Alliance comfort.
At Southdown, rescued wisdom can be found in books from Earth-that-was, and the chapel is bare of any comfort but the owl seal of Sophia and the empty cross of Wisdom incarnate. No Abbot asks his past or celebrates his future; no confessor intervenes in front of any God. Here, Book will stay.
+2+
In the safety of the Abbey, they don't follow outside news. That's the hardest burden, much harder than celibacy. He could withstand the outside silence easier if his confession didn't pound in his ears, deaths on his conscience and justifications in his heart.
"It becomes easier," the abbot says, a dark word of quiet council.
"If I only knew -- if there were tangible proof that the world is better for my secluding myself from it."
"*Shepherd* Book, I understand you've decided?"
"Yes, of course. I'll profess when my time comes."
"Then you needn't look outward to see a change."
+3+
Inside these walls, the old lies fade like mist. He can see violence, corruption, his own excuses in harsh relief against the starkness of the Abbey chapel. The new lies die harder, the easy metaphors of forgiveness and grace, the vivid symbol: slain body of a shepherd, mutilated by a corrupt government, whose blood restores worlds to peace.
These images won't be eased gently out of his meditation; they must be blasted away, burnt away, turned to char as he seeks, not mercy for sins unforgivable, but the emptiness at his center and the Black that will meet him there.
+4+
Shepherds don't ever retire -- he knew that when he entered the Abbey and he knows it as he leaves. Those who enter young, (pious men, ambitious men, men who want to elude the grasp of Alliance Operatives), the middle-aged preachers who train the next generation of Shepherds, and those, like Book, who enter late in life, dying to one world to be reborn in another -- all are bound, lifelong, to their vows. When Book boards *Serenity*, a harmless old man, no threat to the passengers, he doesn't discard old vows but pledges new ones, of evangelism and protection.
+5+
Book's last confessor is a man named Mal.
"You never married?"
"I'm wed to Christ."
A snort. "Never killed a man?"
"I never claimed that."
"You've killed a man."
"I have." Decades' old remembrance.
"Then I think you've got some explaining to do, *preacher*." Mal is wary: he has to trust the safety of his crew to the surety of Book's repentence. He listens to Book with a hand on his gun, watching for deceit in his eyes. When Book's done, Mal says, voice tight, "Any reason I shouldn't shove you out the airlock?"
"No."
"Good. We'll set things right."
+fin+