Fic: PotC AWE (Jack/Will, NC-17)
Title: Something Rich and Strange
Rating: NC-17
Pairings/Characters: Jack/Will
Notes/Warnings: Deviates from AWE after the credits (before the “ten years later” scene)
Disclaimer: Still not mine. Title from Shakespeare’s The Tempest
Beta: hatofhornigold
Summary/request: For the merrypirates holiday fic exchange. For Placeofinsanity who asked for, "At the end of the World, Elizabeth doesn't wait - but Jack? He does."
*~*~*~*
Jack stands with his feet in the water and feels the sand slip away from under his boots. He sinks a little and takes his hands out of his coat pockets to help keep his balance. It’s dangerous out, and the desert behind him and the ocean in front of him are lit up with cracks of lightning tearing through the sickly green of the storm clouds. There isn’t any moon here at World’s End and the wind lashes the slack tide, washes sand over Jack’s boots, water seeping in where the leather is coming away from the sole.
This is neither his nightmare, nor his purgatory. Certainly not his hell.
His place in the locker was deathless and unending, trapped with himself in a dry wasteland. Not that Jack isn’t a charming fellow, but he doesn’t - wouldn’t trust himself if he came upon himself in a darkened alley. This place bears a certain resemblance to that place, enough that Jack is sure he’s not just standing on some other terrifyingly supernatural beach, but Jack is not afraid of storms, or of drowning, or of dying. Not these days anyway. It’s been eleven years. Things change, and Jack’s always thought of himself as an adaptable sort of creature.
It is bloody cold though and it wasn’t easy getting here. He glances up at the sky through force of habit, but he’s been standing here for days and nothing ever changes. He shouldn’t expect to be able to tell the hour just because his fingers are getting numb.
Jack picks at a ragged cuticle, watching the horizon. Those eleven years were kind to him. If he’s honest with himself, he can admit that the ten years between Barbossa stealing his boat the first time and his getting her back weren’t all bad either. Christ, the adventures he had then. The eleven years after the Black Pearl got nicked the second time were no less eventful and he felt as though he had learned a valuable lesson. Yes, he loved that wretched ship and she might be an unfaithful bitch but he could survive just fine without her and sooner or later she’d come back to him for a spell. He’d had her for a few years - around year six or seven - and he’d had a good run of things.
But it wasn’t with her that he’d finally succeeded in what he’d never thought possible. They’d been looking for immortality when Barbossa got the crew cursed the first time, with the coins and all. And as much as Jack had appreciated not being killed by things like stabbing, he didn’t fancy not being able to enjoy that immortality. The fountain of youth was more what he had in mind. He’d found it in the back of beyond in a stinking swamp, already delirious with fever, either from the insects, the foul air, or the syphilis finally getting nasty again.
It was a tangle of jungle, overgrown and green and the devil himself sat perched atop the mossy stone leering at Jack. The last might have been a product of the fever, but Jack wasn’t about to argue the point.
Jack had rather thought that it would just be a fountain, he’d drink, and that would be that. It was proving to be a little more difficult than he had prepared for. But in for a penny, in for a pound. “Pardon me,” Jack said. “As the French say. But in return for immortality, without all the messy business of illness, aging, or injury, what would you want?”
The devil cocked its head to one side and licked its black lips with a forked tongue. It stood, moss shearing away from its goat legs, and climbed down, stalking over so Jack could see the black of its eyes. Its breath reeked of sulfur and its horns were twisted, gnarled things. “We must wager. If I win, I get your soul. If you win, you get what you want.”
“I’m not one to cry off a good game,” Jack said, trying not to give in to his body’s demands that he topple over and die of fever. “But I’m not feeling at my best. No, sir, I think it’s quite probable that you’re merely a figment of my imagination and it would be best if I drank before I lose the chance altogether.”
The devil put its hand on his arm, steadying him. “I do have a fondness for you, Jack,” it said, and Jack muttered, “Ta,” as it helped him stagger towards the fountain.
“Perhaps we’ll play over something else, some other time then.” The devil put a hand on Jack’s chest, halting any further forward motion. “But do consider; is this what you really want? Beckett was not the last of his kind, merely the beginning of a changing world. Are you as you were twenty years ago? Is the world as it was at the time of Christ? All things pass, Jack. Are you prepared to endure alone?”
Jack managed a cheeky grin. “I’ll have you, won’t I?” he asked.
“If you think you are afraid now, what will you do when mankind learns to fly, when cities tower like Babel did, when the world is small and there is nothing left for men like you?”
Jack stared thoughtfully at the fountain. “P’raps I’ll learn to fly,” he said. “I think I’d quite like that.”
The devil sighed and helped him the last few steps. “I didn’t expect I’d change your mind,” it said. “I hope you don’t regret this.”
When Jack drank from the fountain, his fever abated and the devil was gone, leaving only an overgrown fountain with the carving of an angel atop it, incongruous in a fetid swamp. “Me too, mate,” Jack said, in case the devil was still listening in.
And so he had slogged his way back to the shore, and carried on with his life from there. Eight years later, eleven years after he’d set out off the dock leaving Gibbs in Tortuga, he stood on the shore at the end of the world, not a day older, rid of the Pox though a little concerned that he wasn’t going to recover the wits he’d lost to it, and healthy as a horse. The immortal Captain Jack Sparrow at last.
“You know,” he said to himself, “we really ought to have warned young Captain Turner about this. We certainly got the short end of the stick when it came to Miss Elizabeth, not as short as James, to be fair, but only the good die young, hey? You’d think with the lady’s history he might have had the foresight to consider that she would hold fast to form and change her mind.”
“Fickle as the Pearl,” Jack agreed. “But as much as you favour the lad, recall that he rarely has either foresight or does much considering.”
“True,” Jack said. “There is that.”
Ten years after William Turner the younger became Captain William Turner of the Flying Dutchman he returned to shore only to find that Elizabeth had found ten years too long to wait. ‘Course Jack had known that little fact for going on three years before Will did. Got the news from an old friend’s second cousin on his father’s side while he was collecting on an old favour for one of those other adventures he’d found himself on. Couldn’t blame her, Jack supposed. Will would have come back, full of tales of daring do and excitement, young and handsome and she’d be ten years older, bearing the weight of gossip. Who’s that woman with the imaginary husband? No, Jack can’t picture her pining away as a true exile for that long. She’d move on to save herself.
Jack wandered down the beach. He’d done a walkabout when he’d arrived and there was absolutely buggerall but storm and sand. An endless stretch of pathetic fallacy. After Will found out that his tenure as Captain was going to last a while longer than he had expected (and honestly, that minx Calypso was having a laugh if she thought Jack hadn’t caught on to the pattern. A man who’ll go to the ends of the earth for a woman who balks at that sort of devotion and who is, as she’d said, as changeable as the sea. Jack would wager the next captain will have much the same story) Will had pitched what Jack could only call a bit of a tantrum.
For a year now, no one had been ferried and no one had seen hide nor hair of the Dutchman. There’d been something of a half-arsed effort at the start, but if Jack knew anything about anything, he’d wager Will was sulking. And when you can’t go ashore and you’re stuck on a ship with your whole crew giving you the eyeball, so all you can do is feel sorry for yourself and resent their pity, well, you’ve got to get away elsewhere.
Where better to go than over the edge of the world, to Davey Jones’ locker (which had something of a ring to it, rather than “Will Turner Junior’s locker”) where the Captain of the Flying Dutchman could in fact go ashore, as it wasn’t really shore at all, but somewhere between. So Jack, being a charitable sort of fellow, had come after the boy, to offer him a shoulder to cry on etc. and to talk him into getting back to work.
As it turned out, Jack owed Calypso a favour and when Will stopped doing his job, she called it in.
Still, he’d been so good as to bring a few bottles of the good stuff, and if that isn’t charity, Jack doesn’t know what is. The problem is that Jack has been standing around on the beach, with Will’s ill humour making him very soggy indeed, and Will hasn’t even deigned to show up.
“You can’t hide here forever!” Jack shouts over the howl of the wind. “Coward!”
He’s tried shouting himself hoarse before, but he figures it’s the ‘coward’ that draws Will out this time. In the next flash of sheet lightning Jack sees Will facing him in the shallows, without coat, or hat. His hair is longer than it used to be and the wind has ratted the curls into an unsightly, salt-crusted mess. His eyes are milky blue and glow faintly in the dark and if he’s blinking at all, Jack can’t see it.
Jack offers a little bow but can’t bring himself to smile. No wonder Tia Dalma sent him here if he’s already starting to turn. Bloody Will Turner. Can’t do anything halfway. “No, Lizzie and I never did, though I can’t say I didn’t try,” Jack says. “Yes, I knew before you did anyway. I’m here because Tia Dalma, rather, Calypso wanted me to remind you that if you don’t do your job you’ll become rather less handsome than you are even now. I listened because I thought she was worryingly powerful when she was a swamp-dwelling priestess so I’m not bloody well going to argue with the lady now she’s a goddess. And she probably asked me to keep an eye on you because she thinks you’re special, and have a nice arse, and wants to bed you.” Jack spits rainwater out. “Does that about cover it?”
Will clenches his fists and his lips press down into a displeased scowl but he doesn’t try to take a swing at Jack. “Leave me in peace,” he says, wading out deeper into the water.
“”Fraid I’m stuck here,” Jack says, raising his voice a little so Will can still hear him, rocking back on his heels in a casual sort of way. “Wrecked a ship to get here, not a lot of ways back again, ‘less you’re agreeable to taking on a passenger.”
Will stops, water battering at his knees. Jack can see him weighing his options, clear as day in the lines of his forehead and the brackets around his mouth. He can see the moment that Will decides not to leave him stranded. “If I take you back, will you promise to leave me alone?” Will asks, and he sounds defeated, which wasn’t really Jack’s intention.
Jack grins at Will, certain the Captain of the Dutchman can see him just fine in the sudden deadly, black calm of the night. The waters still around his boots and there is no distinction between sea and sky. He adds a wink. “Why William, you just don’t know me at all, do you?” Jack says.
Will does blink then, that eerie blue shuttered away for just a moment and Jack counts it as a win.
*~*~*~*
Jack has seen all sorts of crews, but the crew of the Dutchman is already starting to look a little coral crusted and showing the odd hint of shark tooth and crab claw. They don’t look angry, they seem worried.
“No Turner the elder,” Jack notes as Will hustles him straight through to the great-cabin. The ship is in good repair if nothing else. A little green of wood and wet of sail, but Jack imagines there’s not a whole lot that anyone could do about that.
“No,” Will says. “He moved on.” He shuts the door behind them and doesn’t offer Jack anything to dry himself with, nor any other kind of hospitality. Will leans against the edge of the table that takes up most of the space and crosses his arms over his chest. “It won’t take us long to get you back to the world. I’d ask you not to touch anything but honestly I doubt you’d be able to restrain yourself.”
Jack looks around. At some point the room might have looked lived in, but it’s been organized and depersonalized until there’s nearly no evidence of habitation at all. There aren’t any charts or waggoners, no navigational equipment. It’s a boring looking existence and if there’s one thing that Jack is good at, it’s causing excitement in Will Turner’s life. “Mate, there’s nothing here to get into. Your smithy looked more cozy than this cabin.” Jack pulls out one of his bottles and a knife and pries the cork out. “You go ahead,” he says. “I’ll amuse myself.”
He waits until Will gets to the door, waits until Will’s hand is out to push it open and then says, “Not to overstep-”
Will looks back, tangle of curls sliding over his shoulders. “What?”
Jack shakes his head. “Never mind,” he says and takes a casual drink.
“Spit it out,” Will snaps. “If you have something to say.”
“It’s nothing,” Jack says. “Forget it.” The door slams behind Will and Jack immediately puts the bottle down and starts opening drawers. Christ, Will leads a boring life. Jack finds evidence of an anemone collection and can barely contain a yawn.
The Dutchman moves swiftly but they have to travel overwater, not under, with Jack aboard, and they’re coming back from over the edge of the world, it’s not a jolly old rowboat outing. Jack can hear Will barking out orders as the ship gets underway and feels the shift underfoot as she catches the wind and for a moment he feels a pang of nostalgia for the young man who hadn’t known a bunt from the bosun. The cabin is bare and Jack was right, there is virtually nothing in it with which to amuse himself.
Jack picks up the bottle again and takes another drink. He’s never been one to hold on so tightly to people and he would have thought an orphan would have known better, but there’s no accounting for people. If the stories are true, that boy had been waiting nigh on fifteen years for his girl. Jack would be in ill humour too, if he were inclined to care about other people in that sort of a way. He’s selfish, he knows that, but it’s served him well. Can’t say he isn’t glad to see that the lad’s at least in one piece though. Call him soft but he has something of a fondness for young Mister Turner.
An hour or two later, Will slams back into the cabin. “You found it, didn’t you?” he demands and Jack doubts Will is talking about the anemone collection. “That’s what’s different about you. Nothing is different. You’re exactly the same as you were before.”
Jack had been anticipating something of the sort, and he’s well prepared; bare feet up on the table, slouched back in a chair, down to his shirtsleeves so he can dry out. “Depends on who you ask,” he says, not bothering to try and feign ignorance. “You sit and I’ll tell you what. You ask me a question. If I don’t answer it, I have to drink. Then I’ll ask you a question and if you don’t answer etc.” The bottles are already lined up on the table, glinting dully in the lamplight.
“When?” Will doesn’t sit down, just stands there, arms crossed over his chest, glaring at Jack.
“Eight years ago, in a swamp.” Jack takes a drink and at Will’s expression adds, “Never said you couldn’t do both.”
Jack doesn’t have time to open his mouth again before Will is pulling his shirt off, necklaces slapping gently against his chest, revealing the scar where they cut out his heart. Jack wonders without real interest who has it now. William turns around and Jack can see there are circles of light down his back, either side of his spine, glowing blue as his eyes through his skin. Jack’s heard stories of such things, but he’d thought them tall tales. Viperfish, someone had called them once, luminous and deadly. He’s pale and there’s a greenish hue to his hair, which Jack had thought was a trick of the light at World’s End, but apparently not.
Will picks up the bottle and takes a drink. “That’s what you wanted to know, isn’t it?” he demands.
It is, but Jack’s never been one to play fair. “Was going to ask if you ever got that wedding night,” he says, “or if your tragic lack of the appropriate equipment hindered the event.” He waves a hand at the other chair. “Sit, Will, you’re giving me neckache.”
“No you weren’t,” Will says, but he sits. “Did you have her before I did?”
Jack shrugs a shoulder. “Would’ve, but I’d had a bit too much to drink and might’ve passed out.” He gives Will an appraising look. “To be fair, would’ve had you too, if there’d been opportunity. I’ve had more successful adventures, I’ll admit.” He gives Will the time to fortify himself with the rather fantastic sake he’d brought. The shock and outrage doesn’t come though and Will meets his eyes when he drinks. Will used to go pink when Jack got too close. How things have changed.
It’s not that Will’s transformation is anywhere near tentacles or barnacles, but even without the eerie blue glow coming from his eyes and back, he’s not the boy that Jack remembered. It would almost be a shame, but though Jack does miss the coltish, confused, brave creature Will was, he’s not sorry to be sitting across from the man he sees; broad shoulders, callused hands, and broken heart, still a little confused and likely still as brave. Sitting there, turning himself into a monster. The scar on his chest is a bloody red against the grey hue of Will’s skin. It’s raised still and Jack wonders if it ever aches, as his own scars did, or if Will doesn’t feel that sort of thing anymore. It looks like it was only done recently.
“It’s your turn, Jack,” Will says, and Jack realizes he’s been staring.
“You haven’t seen her in eleven years, mate,” Jack says, though it’s not late enough in the evening for that sort of comment. “I know you had your heart set and all, but is something you never had really worth all this grief?” He swings his feet down off the table and leans over the table to take the sake from Will.
Will laughs and Jack is relieved to see that he hasn’t got the needle sharp teeth yet. “I’m allowed to be upset about having my life taken away from me,” he says. “I waited ten years only to find out that I’m trapped here until someone kills me. And all that time I thought I’d get to have a life I chose. Touch of fucking destiny,” he says bitterly. “So don’t worry. I’ll go back to it. The souls will get where they’re going.” He takes the sake when Jack pushes it towards him. “I just wanted a little time to mourn.”
“Ten years?” Jack asks. “You know that you didn’t have to wait that long, right?”
Will tips his head back and swallows sake until he’s gasping. “It’s not your turn,” he says, which means the answer is yes. No wonder he’s in a foul mood. “You said if there’d been opportunity…no this isn’t my question, I know what you said. I want to know if it’s still…if you still would. With me.”
Jack hesitates. Eleven years ago, Jack would have had Will over the nearest convenient surface and once more for good measure.
Will puts the bottle down, out of the way. “Because I wouldn’t’ve then, but…” His smile isn’t as bitter as his laugh was, but it’s wry and world-weary. “I’m no coward, I’m not afraid of it,” he says. “And shouldn’t I get something I want?”
Jack looks at Will’s strange blue eyes and leans over to thumb a snarl of Will’s hair behind his ear. “I can’t believe I’m saying this,” Jack says. “But in the spirit of share and share alike, and in the interest of you not dumping me in the middle of the ocean when you’re feeling more yourself, trust me, William, you don’t want me to fuck you.”
Will catches hold of his wrist and his hands are cold, and strong, and rough. “No,” he agrees.
*~*~*~*
“You’ve done this before,” Jack accuses, one hand braced against the bulkhead, on his knees in Will’s bunk.
Will pushes Jack’s thighs further apart and eases a second finger into him, mouthing at the base of Jack’s spine. “Is that a question?” Will asks, thumb pressing in a distracting sort of fashion between Jack’s balls and hole.
Jack lets his forehead thud against the flat, lumpy pillow and breathes in the smell of fish and saltwater. “Fuck,” he says. His thighs and hips ache already, stretched the way they are, and he’s still damp from the rain, cold, and his arms shake under him. “Christ, Will.”
Will drapes himself over Jack’s back, biting at his neck and shoulder. “Keep talking,” he says. “Tell me you like it.”
It’s a rare occasion that Jack finds himself without something to say, but when Will takes hold of his hips and pushes into him, the head of his cock easing into Jack as Jack pants for air and tries to remember how to relax like this, he can’t think of anything.
“Christ, you’re tight,” Will says, breathless, hands tightening against the slip of Jack’s sweat, pushing further into him.
Jack gets his other hand under himself and shoves back, groaning out blasphemies. “Don’t let just anyone do this,” Jack manages. Will’s necklaces drag over the skin on his back, catching in his hair, and his teeth and his hands leave bruises. He sits back on his heels, pulling Jack with him, stretching him, and Jack grabs onto the arm around his waist and holds on, cock wet against his stomach.
Will fucks like he has something to prove, hard and possessive until Jack curses and comes. Then he hesitates and Jack is prepared to be annoyed, he’s not one to be held onto, but Will lets go. Jack pulls away and grapples Will onto his back, settling back down onto him, bracing himself against Will’s chest and working his hips until Will shoves up one last time and slumps into the sheets.
“Bloody hell, Jack,” Will says.
Jack sprawls out on the bunk, sucking in air. “Aye,” he agrees.
*~*~*~*
Will is lying on his stomach, face pillowed on his crossed arms. Jack sits beside him, running a bone comb through Will’s hair to sort out the tangles before they snarl beyond saving. He remembers a lover doing this for him back in his distant past when his own hair was still brushable, and he recalls it being rather nice.
“I put it back,” Will says, in a sleepy mumble. “Cut myself open and put it back in. Jones took his out, I put mine back in.”
“Your heart?” Jack asks. He presses his palm against Will’s back and feels it beating under Will’s ribs.
Will turns his head so he can raise an eyebrow at Jack. “No, my gizzard,” he says. “Yes, my heart. You think maybe, if that wasn’t a rule, that the others might not be and I could retire my post rather than be murdered for it?”
Jack puts the comb down on the floor and lies down so he’s mostly on top of Will, legs tangled together. Will still smells strongly of saltwater and vaguely of fish but he also smells a lot like Jack and something in Jack rather likes that. “I told you, Tia Dalma has a soft spot for you. Bat your eyelashes at her, let her cop a feel of this fantastic arse, and let her pick the replacement.” He presses his face against Will’s hair and slides his hands up Will’s arms, rubbing against him, his hardening cock slipping between Will’s thighs. “I bet with a little effort we could find that fountain again.”
Will pushes himself up on one elbow and reaches back with the other hand to get hold of Jack’s thigh and dig his fingers into the muscle there. “You don’t want to spend eternity with me,” Will grunts, shifting his hips in an unsubtle hint for Jack to get his hand underneath them and around Will’s cock. It sounds more like a question though. Jack would feel bad that the poor thing’s been so unwanted all his life, but it ain’t his fault, and besides, finding someone’s company agreeable is no reason to tell them lies like forever. Problem with most love-match marriages, in Jack’s opinion.
“Who said I did?” Jack returns, pushing Will back down. “I said I’d help you find the fountain if you like.”
Will rolls over abruptly, pinning Jack underneath him. “I don’t know that I want to spend eternity with you,” he says. “You’re aggravating, and always in trouble, and I still suspect that all this is somehow your fault.”
Jack grins at him and digs his heels into the bunk, grinding up against Will. “No need to flatter me,” he says and Will snorts to hide a smile and bites his shoulder. “Besides, someone told me that in the future we learn how to fly. Who wouldn’t want to see that?”
“I’ll think about it,” Will says, pressing Jack’s leg back towards his chest. Jack figures he’ll give Will the dignity of a little time. He might even pretend to be surprised when Will asks him for help with Tia Dalma. He’s fantastic in bed, he can have a little theatre from Jack out of it, if he wants it. Seems fair.
He pushes into Jack, looking down at him with his bright, unblinking blue eyes, and Jack closes his own eyes, thinking of where the sky meets the sea. Will’s back is strong under his hands, shoulder blades curved under his palms. He thinks he could stand to run into Will every so often.
End.
Rating: NC-17
Pairings/Characters: Jack/Will
Notes/Warnings: Deviates from AWE after the credits (before the “ten years later” scene)
Disclaimer: Still not mine. Title from Shakespeare’s The Tempest
Beta: hatofhornigold
Summary/request: For the merrypirates holiday fic exchange. For Placeofinsanity who asked for, "At the end of the World, Elizabeth doesn't wait - but Jack? He does."
*~*~*~*
Jack stands with his feet in the water and feels the sand slip away from under his boots. He sinks a little and takes his hands out of his coat pockets to help keep his balance. It’s dangerous out, and the desert behind him and the ocean in front of him are lit up with cracks of lightning tearing through the sickly green of the storm clouds. There isn’t any moon here at World’s End and the wind lashes the slack tide, washes sand over Jack’s boots, water seeping in where the leather is coming away from the sole.
This is neither his nightmare, nor his purgatory. Certainly not his hell.
His place in the locker was deathless and unending, trapped with himself in a dry wasteland. Not that Jack isn’t a charming fellow, but he doesn’t - wouldn’t trust himself if he came upon himself in a darkened alley. This place bears a certain resemblance to that place, enough that Jack is sure he’s not just standing on some other terrifyingly supernatural beach, but Jack is not afraid of storms, or of drowning, or of dying. Not these days anyway. It’s been eleven years. Things change, and Jack’s always thought of himself as an adaptable sort of creature.
It is bloody cold though and it wasn’t easy getting here. He glances up at the sky through force of habit, but he’s been standing here for days and nothing ever changes. He shouldn’t expect to be able to tell the hour just because his fingers are getting numb.
Jack picks at a ragged cuticle, watching the horizon. Those eleven years were kind to him. If he’s honest with himself, he can admit that the ten years between Barbossa stealing his boat the first time and his getting her back weren’t all bad either. Christ, the adventures he had then. The eleven years after the Black Pearl got nicked the second time were no less eventful and he felt as though he had learned a valuable lesson. Yes, he loved that wretched ship and she might be an unfaithful bitch but he could survive just fine without her and sooner or later she’d come back to him for a spell. He’d had her for a few years - around year six or seven - and he’d had a good run of things.
But it wasn’t with her that he’d finally succeeded in what he’d never thought possible. They’d been looking for immortality when Barbossa got the crew cursed the first time, with the coins and all. And as much as Jack had appreciated not being killed by things like stabbing, he didn’t fancy not being able to enjoy that immortality. The fountain of youth was more what he had in mind. He’d found it in the back of beyond in a stinking swamp, already delirious with fever, either from the insects, the foul air, or the syphilis finally getting nasty again.
It was a tangle of jungle, overgrown and green and the devil himself sat perched atop the mossy stone leering at Jack. The last might have been a product of the fever, but Jack wasn’t about to argue the point.
Jack had rather thought that it would just be a fountain, he’d drink, and that would be that. It was proving to be a little more difficult than he had prepared for. But in for a penny, in for a pound. “Pardon me,” Jack said. “As the French say. But in return for immortality, without all the messy business of illness, aging, or injury, what would you want?”
The devil cocked its head to one side and licked its black lips with a forked tongue. It stood, moss shearing away from its goat legs, and climbed down, stalking over so Jack could see the black of its eyes. Its breath reeked of sulfur and its horns were twisted, gnarled things. “We must wager. If I win, I get your soul. If you win, you get what you want.”
“I’m not one to cry off a good game,” Jack said, trying not to give in to his body’s demands that he topple over and die of fever. “But I’m not feeling at my best. No, sir, I think it’s quite probable that you’re merely a figment of my imagination and it would be best if I drank before I lose the chance altogether.”
The devil put its hand on his arm, steadying him. “I do have a fondness for you, Jack,” it said, and Jack muttered, “Ta,” as it helped him stagger towards the fountain.
“Perhaps we’ll play over something else, some other time then.” The devil put a hand on Jack’s chest, halting any further forward motion. “But do consider; is this what you really want? Beckett was not the last of his kind, merely the beginning of a changing world. Are you as you were twenty years ago? Is the world as it was at the time of Christ? All things pass, Jack. Are you prepared to endure alone?”
Jack managed a cheeky grin. “I’ll have you, won’t I?” he asked.
“If you think you are afraid now, what will you do when mankind learns to fly, when cities tower like Babel did, when the world is small and there is nothing left for men like you?”
Jack stared thoughtfully at the fountain. “P’raps I’ll learn to fly,” he said. “I think I’d quite like that.”
The devil sighed and helped him the last few steps. “I didn’t expect I’d change your mind,” it said. “I hope you don’t regret this.”
When Jack drank from the fountain, his fever abated and the devil was gone, leaving only an overgrown fountain with the carving of an angel atop it, incongruous in a fetid swamp. “Me too, mate,” Jack said, in case the devil was still listening in.
And so he had slogged his way back to the shore, and carried on with his life from there. Eight years later, eleven years after he’d set out off the dock leaving Gibbs in Tortuga, he stood on the shore at the end of the world, not a day older, rid of the Pox though a little concerned that he wasn’t going to recover the wits he’d lost to it, and healthy as a horse. The immortal Captain Jack Sparrow at last.
“You know,” he said to himself, “we really ought to have warned young Captain Turner about this. We certainly got the short end of the stick when it came to Miss Elizabeth, not as short as James, to be fair, but only the good die young, hey? You’d think with the lady’s history he might have had the foresight to consider that she would hold fast to form and change her mind.”
“Fickle as the Pearl,” Jack agreed. “But as much as you favour the lad, recall that he rarely has either foresight or does much considering.”
“True,” Jack said. “There is that.”
Ten years after William Turner the younger became Captain William Turner of the Flying Dutchman he returned to shore only to find that Elizabeth had found ten years too long to wait. ‘Course Jack had known that little fact for going on three years before Will did. Got the news from an old friend’s second cousin on his father’s side while he was collecting on an old favour for one of those other adventures he’d found himself on. Couldn’t blame her, Jack supposed. Will would have come back, full of tales of daring do and excitement, young and handsome and she’d be ten years older, bearing the weight of gossip. Who’s that woman with the imaginary husband? No, Jack can’t picture her pining away as a true exile for that long. She’d move on to save herself.
Jack wandered down the beach. He’d done a walkabout when he’d arrived and there was absolutely buggerall but storm and sand. An endless stretch of pathetic fallacy. After Will found out that his tenure as Captain was going to last a while longer than he had expected (and honestly, that minx Calypso was having a laugh if she thought Jack hadn’t caught on to the pattern. A man who’ll go to the ends of the earth for a woman who balks at that sort of devotion and who is, as she’d said, as changeable as the sea. Jack would wager the next captain will have much the same story) Will had pitched what Jack could only call a bit of a tantrum.
For a year now, no one had been ferried and no one had seen hide nor hair of the Dutchman. There’d been something of a half-arsed effort at the start, but if Jack knew anything about anything, he’d wager Will was sulking. And when you can’t go ashore and you’re stuck on a ship with your whole crew giving you the eyeball, so all you can do is feel sorry for yourself and resent their pity, well, you’ve got to get away elsewhere.
Where better to go than over the edge of the world, to Davey Jones’ locker (which had something of a ring to it, rather than “Will Turner Junior’s locker”) where the Captain of the Flying Dutchman could in fact go ashore, as it wasn’t really shore at all, but somewhere between. So Jack, being a charitable sort of fellow, had come after the boy, to offer him a shoulder to cry on etc. and to talk him into getting back to work.
As it turned out, Jack owed Calypso a favour and when Will stopped doing his job, she called it in.
Still, he’d been so good as to bring a few bottles of the good stuff, and if that isn’t charity, Jack doesn’t know what is. The problem is that Jack has been standing around on the beach, with Will’s ill humour making him very soggy indeed, and Will hasn’t even deigned to show up.
“You can’t hide here forever!” Jack shouts over the howl of the wind. “Coward!”
He’s tried shouting himself hoarse before, but he figures it’s the ‘coward’ that draws Will out this time. In the next flash of sheet lightning Jack sees Will facing him in the shallows, without coat, or hat. His hair is longer than it used to be and the wind has ratted the curls into an unsightly, salt-crusted mess. His eyes are milky blue and glow faintly in the dark and if he’s blinking at all, Jack can’t see it.
Jack offers a little bow but can’t bring himself to smile. No wonder Tia Dalma sent him here if he’s already starting to turn. Bloody Will Turner. Can’t do anything halfway. “No, Lizzie and I never did, though I can’t say I didn’t try,” Jack says. “Yes, I knew before you did anyway. I’m here because Tia Dalma, rather, Calypso wanted me to remind you that if you don’t do your job you’ll become rather less handsome than you are even now. I listened because I thought she was worryingly powerful when she was a swamp-dwelling priestess so I’m not bloody well going to argue with the lady now she’s a goddess. And she probably asked me to keep an eye on you because she thinks you’re special, and have a nice arse, and wants to bed you.” Jack spits rainwater out. “Does that about cover it?”
Will clenches his fists and his lips press down into a displeased scowl but he doesn’t try to take a swing at Jack. “Leave me in peace,” he says, wading out deeper into the water.
“”Fraid I’m stuck here,” Jack says, raising his voice a little so Will can still hear him, rocking back on his heels in a casual sort of way. “Wrecked a ship to get here, not a lot of ways back again, ‘less you’re agreeable to taking on a passenger.”
Will stops, water battering at his knees. Jack can see him weighing his options, clear as day in the lines of his forehead and the brackets around his mouth. He can see the moment that Will decides not to leave him stranded. “If I take you back, will you promise to leave me alone?” Will asks, and he sounds defeated, which wasn’t really Jack’s intention.
Jack grins at Will, certain the Captain of the Dutchman can see him just fine in the sudden deadly, black calm of the night. The waters still around his boots and there is no distinction between sea and sky. He adds a wink. “Why William, you just don’t know me at all, do you?” Jack says.
Will does blink then, that eerie blue shuttered away for just a moment and Jack counts it as a win.
*~*~*~*
Jack has seen all sorts of crews, but the crew of the Dutchman is already starting to look a little coral crusted and showing the odd hint of shark tooth and crab claw. They don’t look angry, they seem worried.
“No Turner the elder,” Jack notes as Will hustles him straight through to the great-cabin. The ship is in good repair if nothing else. A little green of wood and wet of sail, but Jack imagines there’s not a whole lot that anyone could do about that.
“No,” Will says. “He moved on.” He shuts the door behind them and doesn’t offer Jack anything to dry himself with, nor any other kind of hospitality. Will leans against the edge of the table that takes up most of the space and crosses his arms over his chest. “It won’t take us long to get you back to the world. I’d ask you not to touch anything but honestly I doubt you’d be able to restrain yourself.”
Jack looks around. At some point the room might have looked lived in, but it’s been organized and depersonalized until there’s nearly no evidence of habitation at all. There aren’t any charts or waggoners, no navigational equipment. It’s a boring looking existence and if there’s one thing that Jack is good at, it’s causing excitement in Will Turner’s life. “Mate, there’s nothing here to get into. Your smithy looked more cozy than this cabin.” Jack pulls out one of his bottles and a knife and pries the cork out. “You go ahead,” he says. “I’ll amuse myself.”
He waits until Will gets to the door, waits until Will’s hand is out to push it open and then says, “Not to overstep-”
Will looks back, tangle of curls sliding over his shoulders. “What?”
Jack shakes his head. “Never mind,” he says and takes a casual drink.
“Spit it out,” Will snaps. “If you have something to say.”
“It’s nothing,” Jack says. “Forget it.” The door slams behind Will and Jack immediately puts the bottle down and starts opening drawers. Christ, Will leads a boring life. Jack finds evidence of an anemone collection and can barely contain a yawn.
The Dutchman moves swiftly but they have to travel overwater, not under, with Jack aboard, and they’re coming back from over the edge of the world, it’s not a jolly old rowboat outing. Jack can hear Will barking out orders as the ship gets underway and feels the shift underfoot as she catches the wind and for a moment he feels a pang of nostalgia for the young man who hadn’t known a bunt from the bosun. The cabin is bare and Jack was right, there is virtually nothing in it with which to amuse himself.
Jack picks up the bottle again and takes another drink. He’s never been one to hold on so tightly to people and he would have thought an orphan would have known better, but there’s no accounting for people. If the stories are true, that boy had been waiting nigh on fifteen years for his girl. Jack would be in ill humour too, if he were inclined to care about other people in that sort of a way. He’s selfish, he knows that, but it’s served him well. Can’t say he isn’t glad to see that the lad’s at least in one piece though. Call him soft but he has something of a fondness for young Mister Turner.
An hour or two later, Will slams back into the cabin. “You found it, didn’t you?” he demands and Jack doubts Will is talking about the anemone collection. “That’s what’s different about you. Nothing is different. You’re exactly the same as you were before.”
Jack had been anticipating something of the sort, and he’s well prepared; bare feet up on the table, slouched back in a chair, down to his shirtsleeves so he can dry out. “Depends on who you ask,” he says, not bothering to try and feign ignorance. “You sit and I’ll tell you what. You ask me a question. If I don’t answer it, I have to drink. Then I’ll ask you a question and if you don’t answer etc.” The bottles are already lined up on the table, glinting dully in the lamplight.
“When?” Will doesn’t sit down, just stands there, arms crossed over his chest, glaring at Jack.
“Eight years ago, in a swamp.” Jack takes a drink and at Will’s expression adds, “Never said you couldn’t do both.”
Jack doesn’t have time to open his mouth again before Will is pulling his shirt off, necklaces slapping gently against his chest, revealing the scar where they cut out his heart. Jack wonders without real interest who has it now. William turns around and Jack can see there are circles of light down his back, either side of his spine, glowing blue as his eyes through his skin. Jack’s heard stories of such things, but he’d thought them tall tales. Viperfish, someone had called them once, luminous and deadly. He’s pale and there’s a greenish hue to his hair, which Jack had thought was a trick of the light at World’s End, but apparently not.
Will picks up the bottle and takes a drink. “That’s what you wanted to know, isn’t it?” he demands.
It is, but Jack’s never been one to play fair. “Was going to ask if you ever got that wedding night,” he says, “or if your tragic lack of the appropriate equipment hindered the event.” He waves a hand at the other chair. “Sit, Will, you’re giving me neckache.”
“No you weren’t,” Will says, but he sits. “Did you have her before I did?”
Jack shrugs a shoulder. “Would’ve, but I’d had a bit too much to drink and might’ve passed out.” He gives Will an appraising look. “To be fair, would’ve had you too, if there’d been opportunity. I’ve had more successful adventures, I’ll admit.” He gives Will the time to fortify himself with the rather fantastic sake he’d brought. The shock and outrage doesn’t come though and Will meets his eyes when he drinks. Will used to go pink when Jack got too close. How things have changed.
It’s not that Will’s transformation is anywhere near tentacles or barnacles, but even without the eerie blue glow coming from his eyes and back, he’s not the boy that Jack remembered. It would almost be a shame, but though Jack does miss the coltish, confused, brave creature Will was, he’s not sorry to be sitting across from the man he sees; broad shoulders, callused hands, and broken heart, still a little confused and likely still as brave. Sitting there, turning himself into a monster. The scar on his chest is a bloody red against the grey hue of Will’s skin. It’s raised still and Jack wonders if it ever aches, as his own scars did, or if Will doesn’t feel that sort of thing anymore. It looks like it was only done recently.
“It’s your turn, Jack,” Will says, and Jack realizes he’s been staring.
“You haven’t seen her in eleven years, mate,” Jack says, though it’s not late enough in the evening for that sort of comment. “I know you had your heart set and all, but is something you never had really worth all this grief?” He swings his feet down off the table and leans over the table to take the sake from Will.
Will laughs and Jack is relieved to see that he hasn’t got the needle sharp teeth yet. “I’m allowed to be upset about having my life taken away from me,” he says. “I waited ten years only to find out that I’m trapped here until someone kills me. And all that time I thought I’d get to have a life I chose. Touch of fucking destiny,” he says bitterly. “So don’t worry. I’ll go back to it. The souls will get where they’re going.” He takes the sake when Jack pushes it towards him. “I just wanted a little time to mourn.”
“Ten years?” Jack asks. “You know that you didn’t have to wait that long, right?”
Will tips his head back and swallows sake until he’s gasping. “It’s not your turn,” he says, which means the answer is yes. No wonder he’s in a foul mood. “You said if there’d been opportunity…no this isn’t my question, I know what you said. I want to know if it’s still…if you still would. With me.”
Jack hesitates. Eleven years ago, Jack would have had Will over the nearest convenient surface and once more for good measure.
Will puts the bottle down, out of the way. “Because I wouldn’t’ve then, but…” His smile isn’t as bitter as his laugh was, but it’s wry and world-weary. “I’m no coward, I’m not afraid of it,” he says. “And shouldn’t I get something I want?”
Jack looks at Will’s strange blue eyes and leans over to thumb a snarl of Will’s hair behind his ear. “I can’t believe I’m saying this,” Jack says. “But in the spirit of share and share alike, and in the interest of you not dumping me in the middle of the ocean when you’re feeling more yourself, trust me, William, you don’t want me to fuck you.”
Will catches hold of his wrist and his hands are cold, and strong, and rough. “No,” he agrees.
*~*~*~*
“You’ve done this before,” Jack accuses, one hand braced against the bulkhead, on his knees in Will’s bunk.
Will pushes Jack’s thighs further apart and eases a second finger into him, mouthing at the base of Jack’s spine. “Is that a question?” Will asks, thumb pressing in a distracting sort of fashion between Jack’s balls and hole.
Jack lets his forehead thud against the flat, lumpy pillow and breathes in the smell of fish and saltwater. “Fuck,” he says. His thighs and hips ache already, stretched the way they are, and he’s still damp from the rain, cold, and his arms shake under him. “Christ, Will.”
Will drapes himself over Jack’s back, biting at his neck and shoulder. “Keep talking,” he says. “Tell me you like it.”
It’s a rare occasion that Jack finds himself without something to say, but when Will takes hold of his hips and pushes into him, the head of his cock easing into Jack as Jack pants for air and tries to remember how to relax like this, he can’t think of anything.
“Christ, you’re tight,” Will says, breathless, hands tightening against the slip of Jack’s sweat, pushing further into him.
Jack gets his other hand under himself and shoves back, groaning out blasphemies. “Don’t let just anyone do this,” Jack manages. Will’s necklaces drag over the skin on his back, catching in his hair, and his teeth and his hands leave bruises. He sits back on his heels, pulling Jack with him, stretching him, and Jack grabs onto the arm around his waist and holds on, cock wet against his stomach.
Will fucks like he has something to prove, hard and possessive until Jack curses and comes. Then he hesitates and Jack is prepared to be annoyed, he’s not one to be held onto, but Will lets go. Jack pulls away and grapples Will onto his back, settling back down onto him, bracing himself against Will’s chest and working his hips until Will shoves up one last time and slumps into the sheets.
“Bloody hell, Jack,” Will says.
Jack sprawls out on the bunk, sucking in air. “Aye,” he agrees.
*~*~*~*
Will is lying on his stomach, face pillowed on his crossed arms. Jack sits beside him, running a bone comb through Will’s hair to sort out the tangles before they snarl beyond saving. He remembers a lover doing this for him back in his distant past when his own hair was still brushable, and he recalls it being rather nice.
“I put it back,” Will says, in a sleepy mumble. “Cut myself open and put it back in. Jones took his out, I put mine back in.”
“Your heart?” Jack asks. He presses his palm against Will’s back and feels it beating under Will’s ribs.
Will turns his head so he can raise an eyebrow at Jack. “No, my gizzard,” he says. “Yes, my heart. You think maybe, if that wasn’t a rule, that the others might not be and I could retire my post rather than be murdered for it?”
Jack puts the comb down on the floor and lies down so he’s mostly on top of Will, legs tangled together. Will still smells strongly of saltwater and vaguely of fish but he also smells a lot like Jack and something in Jack rather likes that. “I told you, Tia Dalma has a soft spot for you. Bat your eyelashes at her, let her cop a feel of this fantastic arse, and let her pick the replacement.” He presses his face against Will’s hair and slides his hands up Will’s arms, rubbing against him, his hardening cock slipping between Will’s thighs. “I bet with a little effort we could find that fountain again.”
Will pushes himself up on one elbow and reaches back with the other hand to get hold of Jack’s thigh and dig his fingers into the muscle there. “You don’t want to spend eternity with me,” Will grunts, shifting his hips in an unsubtle hint for Jack to get his hand underneath them and around Will’s cock. It sounds more like a question though. Jack would feel bad that the poor thing’s been so unwanted all his life, but it ain’t his fault, and besides, finding someone’s company agreeable is no reason to tell them lies like forever. Problem with most love-match marriages, in Jack’s opinion.
“Who said I did?” Jack returns, pushing Will back down. “I said I’d help you find the fountain if you like.”
Will rolls over abruptly, pinning Jack underneath him. “I don’t know that I want to spend eternity with you,” he says. “You’re aggravating, and always in trouble, and I still suspect that all this is somehow your fault.”
Jack grins at him and digs his heels into the bunk, grinding up against Will. “No need to flatter me,” he says and Will snorts to hide a smile and bites his shoulder. “Besides, someone told me that in the future we learn how to fly. Who wouldn’t want to see that?”
“I’ll think about it,” Will says, pressing Jack’s leg back towards his chest. Jack figures he’ll give Will the dignity of a little time. He might even pretend to be surprised when Will asks him for help with Tia Dalma. He’s fantastic in bed, he can have a little theatre from Jack out of it, if he wants it. Seems fair.
He pushes into Jack, looking down at him with his bright, unblinking blue eyes, and Jack closes his own eyes, thinking of where the sky meets the sea. Will’s back is strong under his hands, shoulder blades curved under his palms. He thinks he could stand to run into Will every so often.
End.