Bookshelf Battle

All by his lonesome, Doc rocked back and forth in the rickety chair he was tied to.  Back and forth.  Back and forth.

“Scoundrels,” Doc said to himself.  “If they think they can imprison the likes of Doctor Elias T. Faraday then they have another thing com…”

Smash.  The last rock went all the way backwards and the chair collapsed underneath Doc’s weight.  The ropes gave way and he was free.

When he stood up, Doc found himself face to face with the Reverend, who had grown weary of the bonfire outside.

The two men stared each other down.

“Are you going to bite me?” the Reverend asked.

“I should think not,” Doc replied.

The Reverend headed for his pulpit.  In the stand he used to deliver his sermons, there was a drawer.  He opened it and produced a bottle of whiskey.  “Then have a drink with me.”

“I suppose it would be impolite of me to turn you down,” Doc said.  “I say, Reverend.  Have you any writing paper?”

Curious, the preacher looked at the doctor.  “I do.”

“Might I importune you for two sheets please?” Doc asked.

The Reverend chuckled at Doc’s big words.  “You may so importune me.”

“And some ink if you can spare it,”  Doc said as he took a seat at the table.

Moments later, the Reverend returned with some paper, a quill pen, a jar of ink and a drink for the good doctor.

“Tell me,” the Reverend said. “Do you think you will remain as you are now or will you become one of the damned?”

Doc dipped the pen into the ink then proceeded to scrawl words in calligraphy across a page.

“I suspect I’ve been damned for quite some time due to the life I have lived, my good man,” Doc said as he dotted his I’s and crossed his T’s.  “But if you are asking if I will become a mindless flesh consuming zombie then I haven’t the foggiest.  I could live comfortably for many years in this harmless state or I could drop dead instantly and proceed to cannibalize the person next to me.

The Reverend gulped and slid his chair a few inches away from Doc.

“Not that I feel as though I’ll drop dead presently, mind you,” Doc said.

The two men sat and drank.  Doc finished writing on one paper, then took a second sheet and wrote on it.

“I suppose that is that is the nature of life,” the Reverend said.  “Whether or not you are about to become a brain sucking son of a bitch, none of us know how much time we have left.  We think we know and we plan accordingly but…”

The Reverend snapped his fingers.  “…at anytime we could go just like that.  Tragic, when you think about it.”

“I try my very best not to,” Doc said as he slid the second page across the table to the Reverend.  “Sir, you’d be doing me a kindness if you were to sign this document for me.”

The Reverend pulled a pair of reading glasses out of his pocket and studied the paper.

“This is a lie,”  the Reverend protested.

“Does that matter in times such as these?” Doc asked.

“My integrity may be misplaced at the moment,” the Reverend said. “But I assure you it’s still around.  If you’re asking me to be a part of something sinister…”

Doc slid the first paper across the table.  The Reverend studied it.  “Oh.”

Without thinking a second longer, the Reverend dipped the quill into the ink jar and scratched his name across the bottom of the document.

The doctor and the preacher clinked their glasses together.

“To science and religion,” Doc said. “Working together for the common good.”