Pirates of the Caribbean One-Shot
ZOMG, I finally wrote something this summer. Jesus H. Christ on a cracker.
...No, it's not about the OT4. I am sorry.
Title: Leave of Absence
Fandom: Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest
Genre: Humor, Slash
Pairing: Captain Jack Sparrow/Ex-Commodore James Norrington
Rating: PG-13 for sexual situations and suggestions
Setting: After the third movie, which obviously doesn't exist yet, leading to some vague guessing on my part as to what may or may not have happened in the intervening time.
Summary: Norrington discovers yet another consequence of imbibing in too much rum whilst in the company of pirates.
Disclaimer: Obviously not mine; I'm just borrowing them. Though I make no promises as to returning them in the same condition.
Author's Note: I blame machi_neko for this madness. Yet again.
When James Norrington awoke that morning, the first thing that he came to be fully aware of was that his eyes were still closed. So, naturally, he opened them.
The jaggedly sharp saber that the sunlight seemed to have formed itself into as it attempted to stab out his freshly exposed eyeballs made him immediately reevaluate, reconsider, and regret that course of action.
He didn’t so much close his eyes again as he did deeply furrow them to the point of forming a nearly airtight seal. A sense of ominous and all-too-familiar foreboding sweeping through him, he took quick stock of his other available senses. His head was throbbing rhythmically, a hazy spinning sensation present when he tried too hard to recall the events of the previous evening. His whole body felt leaden and stiff. His hearing echoed faintly, as if his ears had been plugged up with a good amount of cotton wool. And finally, and perhaps most telling of all, there was a thick and bitter taste at the back of his throat that had nothing to do with garden-variety morning breath.
So he had been back at the bottle again. And hardly with any watered-down penny ale either, if what was left of the taste in his mouth was anything to go by. No, there it was, the bittersweet syrupy tang of sugarcane let too far gone to be good for anything but making the wisest of men come to forget his own name.
Not that he was prone to this sort of thing any longer: he stayed away these days, for the most part. He kept off the drink, sailing his ship with a firm and steady hand across these waters to the furthest shore. But there were always opportunities lurking it seemed, and he always found his way back again as easy as if he’d never left. There’d be another shore leave, another holiday, another break in his routine; another period of days or even weeks with nothing to fill his time with but his own company. And so would come another night that found him at the corner of some tavern, a cold flask in one hand and a heavy purse in the other, with no thought in him but a steely determination not to leave until both were empty.
Still, there were worse lots in life to have than his. And there were worse mornings to wake up to than this, at that. As far as he could tell from feeling alone, he seemed to have made it back safely to his own bed again, and none much the worse for wear. Better clean sheets and familiar bedding than a filthy back alley somewhere in port. Although there was some minor concern to be had over the state of his clothes as he appeared to be wearing none, and sleeping in such a condition was hardly his usual habit.
But there would be time enough to worry over that later, when he was better rested and in fuller recovery of his hangover. Right now, his only plan was to settle comfortably down in his pillows and drift back into blissful sleep.
All such thoughts, however, were brought to a rather abrupt and jarring halt as two things were simultaneously identified: the sound of a faint groan from somewhere behind him, and the warmth of another slumbering body in the sheets against his.
“Oh God.” Norrington’s eyes popped wide open, all thoughts and fears of the burn from the persistent morning sunshine far gone. He pushed himself into a more upright position with one arm, turning his head to peer over his shoulder and behind him at the rest of the bed. Not much was discernable at first to his still protesting eyes and groggy brain, but he got an immediate sense of broad shoulders stretching into a well-muscled arm that eventually ended in a callused hand with filthy fingernails. A shudder seemed to go through the body, and a decidedly masculine yawn split the air.
“Oh God.”
His eyes starting to go as wide as barrel-mouths, he watched unblinkingly as the bed’s other occupant awakened, slowly pulling themselves into a sitting position. The sheets rippled against a tanned chest and tattooed forearms as black dreadlocks fell away from dark eyes and half-rotten teeth, the features of the face swimming and shifting as they resolved themselves into the familiar visage of…
Jack Sparrow.
“Oh God!” Norrington gave a decidedly unmanly shriek as he jerked upright and grabbed the sheets so as to clasp them close to his bare chest, scooting back as far as he could until his back slammed into the headboard with such vigor that the whole frame shook. The unsteady vibration seemed to serve to finish the process of awakening Sparrow who turned his head in Norrington’s direction and blinked slowly several times, apparently taking the sight of the other man in.
“Hullo then.” Sparrow half-heartedly stifled a massive yawn, jaw stretching wide as his gold fillings glinted in the sunlight. “Looks like y’had yourself a touch better sleep than I did.”
Norrington opened his mouth, but found himself gaping noiselessly as any and all words refused to come out. He was forced to settle for a quick series of stuttering sounds as he floundered, desperately struggling for sense. Sparrow, for his part, seemed at least partially puzzled by this, though he mostly seemed to be still somewhat unawares. He just kept looking blearily in Norrington’s general direction, continuing to blink heavily as if trying to wring the fog of sleep and rum from his eyes.
“You’re…you’re…” Norrington started to make noises that began to form the semblance of actual words. He gawked at Sparrow, who only peered dully back at him. A finishing dose of frustration was what finally sent Norrington over the edge back into coherency.
“Dead,” he expounded in equal amounts of horror, fury, disbelief, bafflement and disgust. “You are supposed to be dead!”
“Am I not?” A few more sluggish blinks from darkly-smudged eyes. Sparrow looked around, at himself, at Norrington, and finally back at himself again. “Ah. I see,” Sparrow began, something as close to the light of comprehension as ever could exist in his eyes coming about, “you would be referring, of course, to that whole affair.”
Norrington just stared at him.
“The business with a certain accursed and otherworldly sailor by the name of Davy Jones and his pet sea beastie,” the pirate elaborated after a sufficient pause had been created.
“Yes,” Norrington’s voice was completely flat, “it would be to ‘that affair’ that I happen to refer…”
“Mmm. Well,” Sparrow clapped his hands together with a half-hearted chuckle and a slight wince, as if it were all some sort of badly-timed joke, “it seems that that particular bit of business did not turn out quite as it first appeared. You know how it is, then: reports o’ me demise were greatly exaggerated, and all that. Terribly sorry to disappoint…”
“Disappoint?” Norrington repeated disbelievingly in a voice that was both frigid and acidic. The hands that clutched at his sheets were working themselves into very tight fists.
“Well, given the usual state of affairs occurring betwixt the two of us, it would be both natural and immediate to assume that you yourself would be less than pleased to discover I was, in fact, not on my way to an early watery grave, after you came to think otherwise.” Sparrow paused, cocking his head thoughtfully. “Then again, you did seem well enough pleased to see me last night, so perhaps I did come to somewhat a hasty conclusion.”
At which point Norrington remembered fully the current set of circumstances. The color draining from his face, his eyes darted about the room as he weighed the facts: he and Sparrow, alone, in the captain’s quarters of his ship, both in his bed, both apparently naked, and himself still unable to picture anything from the night before but a rather vibrant blur.
“Oh God.”
“You keep saying that,” Sparrow observed, squinting at him with a slight frown. “Y’know, mate, if you discovered religion when you gave up the bottle, I find me’self thinking it’d be only right and proper to give up the one as you happen to rediscover the other.”
“I haven’t discovered or rediscovered anything,” Norrington snapped, glaring at him furiously. He straightened in his sitting position, letting go of the sheets with one hand as he struggled to regain his composure. “How are you still alive? What is going on here?”
“Well that would be, for all purposes, a rather majestic, lengthy, and decidedly twisty story.” Sparrow played absently with one of the beaded strands of his beard while gesturing grandly with his other hand, eyes looking off into space as he recalled past events. “It all starts really, you see, with Davy Jones himself, and his ancient long-lost tale of heartbreak and misery-”
“I don’t care!” Norrington practically exploded, losing more and more patience with both Sparrow’s narrative and the pirate himself with each passing second. Sparrow started, dropping his hand as he looked at him, taken aback.
“Well in all fairness, mate, you did ask.”
“Get out of my bed!”
“Hey!” Sparrow protested, resisting all attempts to physically propel him over the side of the bed. “Ouch!” He reached out with both hands to latch onto the head of the frame. “That’s some fine sense o’ English hospitality you’ve got there, ex-Commodore!”
“It’s Captain again, for your information,” Norrington seethed. “I don’t know what ungodly and wretched circumstances could have possibly compelled me to invite you onto my ship in the first place, but as long as you’re here you might as well show me the proper respect!”
Sparrow tilted his head at him, thoughtfully weighing his words for a moment.
“You don’t remember a thing then, do you?” he finally concluded, looking at Norrington seriously. “About what it is precisely that occurred between the two of us the previous night.”
“Perhaps not, but I can certainly figure out the general idea,” Norrington reported in a deeply sickened tone of voice. Sparrow seemed taken aback.
“Er, no offense to your imagination,” he began hesitantly,” but I think it may be lacking a bit in a certain direction. You see, we-”
“I don’t care,” Norrington cut him off, now looking thoroughly nauseated. Sparrow, however, was hardly a man that gave up easy.
“Maybe not, but-”
“Enough.”
“Well, it’s not like-”
“No.”
“But you see-”
“Stop.” Norrington was growling between clenched teeth at this point, and Sparrow finally (though not without certain reluctance in his features) managed to gather that it’d be in his best interests to stay quiet. Norrington groaned deeply, closing his eyes as he massaged his brow with one hand. “If I’m lucky, I will never come to recall fully the events of last night.”
“That hurts, mate,” Sparrow remarked in a wounded tone. “Deeply.” Norrington dropped his hand and lifted his head slightly in order to more effectively glower at him.
“And you,” he enunciated sharply, “would do best to act as if you didn’t remember a thing either. Am I perfectly understood?”
“Perhaps,” Sparrow mumbled, “but I have a most worrisome feeling that I’m not.”
“Oh, do tell,” Norrington laughed humorlessly. He looked at Sparrow disbelievingly. “Tell me, does anyone ever understand a single blasted thing that you come to say?”
“I’ll have you know,” Sparrow said authoritatively, making those sweeping hand gestures of his again, “that people in general can understand, quite easily as a matter of fact, what I have to say,” here he paused, fixing Norrington with meaningful glance, “provided of course they’re willing to listen.”
Norrington rolled his eyes and sighed in frustration, wondering which he was going to get rid of first, the hangover or the pirate, and which of the two was actually contributing to his headache the more.
“You see, the thing about listening is it takes more than just a keen ear. It takes more even than a keen mind. You could listen to the greatest speaker of our time go on and on for ages, and some would know what he was saying and some wouldn’t, but whether or not they really understood him would be another thing all together.” At some point during this speech Sparrow’s dramatic hand movements led to him pushing the sheet off of himself and exposing the entire length of his body. Norrington made a strangled sound, averting his eyes and holding a hand up in front of his face. If Sparrow noticed either his state or the other man’s reaction, he didn’t seem to care. “No, the real key, it so happens, is having a keen heart. Then no matter what the other bloke is saying: big words, small words, nonsense words, profane words, French…it doesn’t matter two bits. Because you still get the meaning behind it, y’see?”
“Oh, I certainly do.” Norrington winced, still making a point not to look in Sparrow’s direction. “I see all too much, at the moment.”
“Begging your pardon?” Sparrow squinted, not seeming to understand.
“Do you mind?" Norrington demanded, exasperated, moving his head just enough to indicate with his chin the lower part of Sparrow’s anatomy. He dared a glance around the cabin and chose to be relieved for the moment that all the various articles of his and Sparrow’s clothing seemed to be scattered nearby. “Go on then,” he gestured towards where the other man’s trousers had been slung over the back of a chair, “have some common decency, why don’t you?” His request was met with a blank stare. “Please.”
“Well now wait just a minute,” Sparrow finally caught on, looking offended, “what’s all this ‘frenetic disgust’ business about then? I rather dislike what you’re insinuating about the state of my equipment.” He crossed his arms over his chest huffily. “It’s a fair sight better than yours, I tell you.”
Norrington instantly forgot his discomfort and turned to meet Sparrow dead in the eye.
“Excuse me?”
The mirth quickly drained from Sparrow’s face.
“Ah, er, nothing,” he deadpanned quickly, giving a half-hearted shrug. “Nothing’s wrong with it.” A pause. “I mean, if you’re into that sort of thing-”
“Get out!” Norrington pointed towards the door with a shaking hand, his face beginning to turn red as his temper flared up again. “Get back into your filthy rags and out of my cabin, off my ship, and out of my life!”
“No need to have an attack there, mate,” Sparrow muttered disjointedly, rustling distractedly in the sheets as he tried to get his bearings. “Nothing wrong with having a shorter sword, some folks actually prefer ‘em, think they’re easier to handle, Oof!” A rather sharp kick from Norrington found its target on the side of Sparrow’s hip. “You’ve made your point then, I’m going-”
“Good.”
“Still, there are some less than splendid things to be said about your abilities as a host.” Sparrow was generally talking to himself now, all but ignoring Norrington completely. “The less than usual circumstances of this little get-together not withstanding,” he sighed, finally starting to rise from the bed, “you’d still think you could have done a bit better; I mean, as a bit o’ common courtesy from one pirate to another-”
“What?” Norrington stiffened, his anger rapidly vanishing. “Wait!” He reached out and latched onto Sparrow’s wrist, freezing the other man dead in his tracks. “What,” he asked slowly, carefully, voice filled with disbelief, “did you just say about me?”
“I believe I made a rather disparaging remark regarding the state o’ your, er, weapon-”
“After that,” Norrington pressed, grinding his teeth again. Sparrow blinked, apparently lost. Norrington took a deep breath and let it out slowly, forcing himself to count all the way to ten. “What you just said,” he pressed, stressing each word with a forced patience. “Something along the lines of ‘a common courtesy’…?”
“Oh. Right,” Sparrow cleared his throat, shrugging, “common courtesy. From one pirate to another.” Norrington practically dragged Sparrow back into the bed with him, so hard did he pull at the other man by the arm.
“Are you actually calling me a…?” Norrington’s disbelieving gape quickly turned into a fierce scowl, his eyes narrowing intently. He glared sternly, the business with Sparrow’s trousers or lack thereof quite forgotten. “I am not a pirate.”
The dark-eyed man chuckled good-naturedly, a smirk playing around his features.
“Sure you’re not. Ah!” Sparrow winced, drawing his breath in sharply as Norrington tightened his grip where he had Sparrow by the wrist.
“I am a privateer in the service of His Majesty,” Norrington stated, his gaze steady and very serious where he met the other man’s eyes, “not some lawless sea-going brigand. I carry Letters of Marque signed by the king himself, employing me in the name of crown and country.”
“All right,” Sparrow smiled generously, spreading his fingers wide, “so you’re a legal pirate, then.” Norrington swore an oath under his breath, snapping his hand back from its grip on Sparrow’s wrist as if he had been burned. He turned his head away sharply, scoffing.
“You have not the slightest idea what you’re talking about.”
“Tell you what, man,” Sparrow replied calmly, rubbing at his wrist without the slightest trace of concern, “if there’s one thing I know inside and out in me black and salty heart, it’s the business of pirates. What they do, how they act, every last little bit.” Sparrow sighed, making himself comfortable on the far side of the bed. “Pirates go about their merry way, sailing the seven seas in the fastest ships they can get their hands on. Pirates attack other ships an’ take what don’t properly belong to them.” His scowl still in place but starting to fade slightly, Norrington’s eyes slowly drifted back in Sparrow’s direction, watching him silently.
“Pirates burn an’ murder an’ pillage an’ steal, and the best get good and bloody rich off of it.” Sparrow lay on his back, hands tucked behind his head, a wide grin spread across his face. “Pirates like you.”
“You’re…wrong.” Norrington swallowed, his voice suddenly going hoarse. “There is a difference between what I do and piracy. I may fight, capture and even sink the merchant vessels of enemy nations, but there is a difference. You are wrong.” He turned away again, suddenly feeling a chill. “You have to be.”
“Whatever makes you feel better, mate,” Sparrow murmured half-heartedly, closing his eyes. But now Norrington wasn’t listening to him anymore.
There was a difference between the two of them, by God. There was a difference. He knew there was one; he was completely sure of it. Or at the very least, he had been sure of it all that time ago when he had first received his new employment. Oh yes, he had been ever so doggedly sure of it then. But looking at the issue again now, after so much had gone by both in time and circumstance, he just wasn’t sure anymore. Not in the least.
He had embarked upon this particular new chapter with the assured personal conviction that in doing so he was getting his old life back, or at the very least something quite close to it. Perhaps he wasn’t back in His Majesty’s navy or even among proper society again, but no one could argue against that he was certainly moving up in the world from where he’d been previously. It wasn’t the top of the world, but he was Captain James Norrington again, and that was a title that had been sorely missed. He’d cleaned himself up, bought new clothes, decided to forgo the traditional powdered wig in exchange for a neat ponytail and some much-needed trimming of his whiskers, and generally formed himself into the semblance of a respectable man again. And even if Lord Beckett had sneered a bit upon hearing that the ship he had offered him was to be renamed by its captain as the Honor Bound, Norrington hadn’t cared. Or at least, he hadn’t then.
But where exactly was he now? Over a year’s labors later, and he was one of the most successful privateers in England’s service. He had engaged close to sixty merchant ships of foreign nation and taken the cargoes of nearly all of them. He had fought and sank over a dozen enemy vessels. He had successfully captured or killed every captain that had ever ordered an attack on the Honor Bound. And what did he have to show for it all?
He ran a good ship, but he was hardly about to be commended for that. And while his crewmen didn’t hate him by any stretch of the imagination, they were far from calling him friend either. He had no friends, no companions; he wandered from port to port, from one shore leave to the next, alone save for the familiar warmth waiting for him in a bottle of rum. While his men went ashore and spent the next few days in the cheery company of each other and whatever new friends they could make with their pay, he stayed onboard checking over his ship and counting the cargo. And maybe he wasn’t bloodthirsty, or filthy, or greedy, or conniving, but would that save him if ever he was captured? To the Frenchmen and Spaniards upon whom he preyed, did it really matter that he attacked their vessels in the name of his king instead of his own? No, no honor awaited him at their hands, only the infamous short drop and sudden stop.
Not only was James Norrington a pirate to the minds of possibly every man in the Caribbean save himself, he wasn’t even happy.
“Oh God,” he said yet again, but this time for a very different reason. All this time he had spent, thinking he was finding his way again when he had only succeeded in getting himself even further off course. All this time, wasted.
Suddenly, he felt very, very tired. He lay back down on the bed and shut his eyes.
“Hey now,” Sparrow leaned over him, a note of concern in his voice as he took in Norrington’s state, “there’s no need to be that way.” His only answer was silence. Sparrow cleared his throat, looking awkward. “C’mon mate, chin up, eh? It could always be worse.” He grinned and took on a cheerful tone. “I mean, there’re certainly poorer lots in life to find than that of a pirate. Plenty of fine pirates in the world, right? Take me, for example!”
Norrington moaned and settled further in, pulling the sheet over his head. Sparrow chose not to be disheartened by his behavior.
“C’mon then, think of it. It’s a good life, a hearty one, a merry one, not particularly a long one…not that it has to be short, mind you, plenty o’ pirates have lived themselves to a ripe old age. If they cared to. And were wary not to get themselves caught.” Sparrow quickly switched his train of thought. “But that’s hardly the point! Think of it, you get to sail across the open waters for a living, taking in the view. You get to keep your own hours. You’re practically expected to drink and make merry with the local women…”
Norrington clenched his teeth and breathed through his nose, his usual state of annoyance when confronted with Jack Sparrow starting to cut through the bleak fog of his depression. Was it completely impossible for that man to be both conscious and silent for more than a few minutes at a time?
“…and just think of all the exotic places one can travel to. And all of the interesting people one can meet. And kill. Again, if one cares to. And is capable.”
“Shut. Up.” Norrington opened his eyes again, rolling them heavenward.
“You say something, mate?” Sparrow blinked. “Didn’t quite catch that.”
“Shut up.” Norrington sat up and turned around to face him, glaring. “Is that truly such a hard request for you to fulfill? Or are you simply incapable of keeping your mouth shut for any given period of time?”
“Well that’s a fine bit o’ business, this.” Sparrow frowned. “Here I am doing me best to get you feeling better, and you-”
“If that was your idea of cheering me up,” Norrington laughed in bitter disbelief, “I am sorely frightened to see what you would have had to say if your intention was bringing me down!”
“It’s the thought that counts, mate,” Sparrow insisted, looking insulted.
“Oh, please.”
“You know, Captain Norrington, you are by far and most quite possibly the most ungrateful man I’ve ever had the unfortunate displeasure of meeting.” Sparrow stared at him levelly, somehow looking quite solemn for a man with cosmetics smudged about his eyes. “In no less than one morning in your fine company, I have been kicked, shoved, verbally assaulted-”
“Be quiet,” Norrington snapped, feeling his anger start to heat up yet again.
“Not even to mention all that screaming you’ve been doing. I’m beginning to understand why you spent so much time on Tortuga as a drunkard; if ever there was a man in need of a good calming dose of rum, it was you.”
“I said, be quiet!” Norrington groaned, pressing his hands over his ears. “Just stop talking, why don’t you?”
“Why should I?” Sparrow demanded cheekily. “To make you happy? Considering how you’ve been acting towards me so far, I can’t begin to imagine why I would want to. If anything, I have every reason in the world to keep on talking, if only so as to displease you further.”
Norrington seethed. Ever since first meeting the man, it had all been more of the exact same thing. Sparrow gave him nothing but irritation, irritation which increased every time that damnable man opened his mouth. What Norrington wouldn’t give to find an effective way to get him to shut his trap once and for all! Almost as soon as he finished forming this thought, however, to his supreme horror Sparrow prepared to speak once more. No, no, not this time; this time he was going to keep him quiet, no matter what it took…
Thus, the fact that his next course of action was to kiss Jack Sparrow very firmly and deeply on his already parted lips.
It was not the most clever or thought-out of plans, perhaps, but it was admittedly a successful one: save for a sole startled “Mmmmph!” near the very beginning, not a single blessed sound escaped the pirate’s lips. For perhaps the first five seconds or so Sparrow attempted to pull away, and then there was a pause in his movements. This was followed rapidly by a reversal in the direction of his momentum. The kiss deepened. Time passed.
Norrington was…somewhat unaware of the rest of his surroundings.
The hastily formed and executed plan was not quite as scandalous when one considered that he had woken up this morning in the same bed with the other man after what could have only been a drunken one-night affair. Still, if he was thinking anything close to clearly he would have almost assuredly kept the embrace as brief as possible. The fact was, however, that while many words could be used to describe the state his mind now happened to be in, “clear” was definitely not one of them. In other words, Norrington was enjoying himself far too much to realize that he should be horrified at the fact that he was enjoying himself.
There was something unexpected about Sparrow’s mouth, and hardly the fact that he had a nimble tongue. Unsurprisingly, he tasted a bit like rum and a bit like stew and a bit like bad breath, but there was something else as well. Rich and deep, dark and sweet. Exotic. Intoxicating. Promising and tempting and invigorating all at once…
Jack Sparrow tasted like freedom.
It was several minutes later that Norrington finally pulled himself away, quite dazed and out of breath. He was panting heavily, starting to sweat, still naked, and now he had an odd aftertaste of pirate in his mouth. And he couldn’t seem to recall whenever he’d last felt nearly as self-satisfied as he did now.
With a contented sigh he dropped smoothly back onto his bed, practically melting into the pillows in sheer relaxed bliss. Sparrow, on the other hand, remained in a sitting position. He was blinking slowly and widely, an indecipherable expression on his face that seemed oddly reminiscent of a man that had been struck by lighting.
“Why, Norrington,” he finally said slowly, eyes still just a bit out of focus, “how incredibly forward of you.”
“Whatever do you mean?” Norrington questioned, chuckling faintly to himself. “Don’t tell me that the great Captain Jack Sparrow is turning bashful all of a sudden, particularly after you’ve been trying to brag to me all morning about our escapades of last night.”
“Well, actually,” Sparrow coughed, “what I’ve really been at, mate, is more along the lines of trying to warn you away from the path of a fanciful imagination.” Norrington’s faint smile quickly reversed itself into a deeper frown.
“What?” He turned his head to stare up at the other man. “What exactly are you trying to say?” he demanded, although he was already starting to get a very bad idea of where this was headed.
“See, what happened was this,” Sparrow quickly elaborated with a series of rapid hand gestures. “I myself stumbled into port shortly after the witching hour, at which point I discovered you seated at a tavern some roads back. I can’t be sure, o’ course, but I assume you’d already worked your way through quite a bit of rum yourself first.” He frowned, pointing curiously. “Unless it so happens to be in your usual fashion of behavior to greet acquaintances of yours with a large hug?” After a brief pause, he chose to interpret Norrington’s speechless stare as an answer in the negative. “Anyway, barring drinking all of our combined sums away, and some decidedly embarrassing fits of crying and off-key singing, the two of us didn’t accomplish much else other than stumbling back to your ship an’ passing out in this here lovely bed.”
“But we woke up without any clothes on,” Norrington protested dazedly.
“You passed out first, and then…” Sparrow trailed off and then continued with a sheepish grin. “Well, I always sleep in nothing but me skin; I suppose I must have assumed everyone else did the same.”
A very silent and tense pause.
“You mean to tell me…” Norrington’s voice was hoarse and cracked before he got halfway, forcing him to clear his throat hastily and try again. “In other words, you are saying that we didn’t…anything?” There were no words to adequately describe the horror now present in his expression. “We didn’t do anything.”
“In other words,” Sparrow agreed, “no, we did not.”
“But then that means,” Norrington continued slowly, dreading the final realization, “that the furthest we happened to go was-”
“Was that rather forceful though admittedly not unpleasant kiss you presented me with just now,” Sparrow finished helpfully.
“Oh God.” Norrington’s eyes glazed over. “Oh God.”
“And there we are again.” Sparrow sighed, shaking his head. “You really are going to have to find yourself another decent oath, mate.” He shifted slightly on the bed, getting himself more comfortable. “I myself used to prefer invoking the name and various articles o’ Davy Jones, but that become a bit this side of awkward what after actually meeting the bloke and all. And then after he practically begged me to be the best man at his wedding, well…”
Norrington was at this point not listening in the slightest, as he was too busy trying to decide whether he wanted to laugh or cry.
“…right, then,” Sparrow concluded awkwardly, watching Norrington with a cringing expression on his face. He looked away, lacing his fingers together. After a few more moments of heavy silence he started to whistle an unidentifiable tune. He came to a dead halt, however, as Norrington abruptly raised his head to stare at him full force.
“What I said earlier,” Norrington pressed through tightly grit teeth, “about not recalling that any of this had happened…”
“Oh, no worries there,” Sparrow was quick to assure him. He smirked thoughtfully, leaning against the headboard with his hands tucked behind him. “The last thing I want is to have to deal with the reactions of those spirited lasses back in Tortuga if they come to find out that the best kiss I ever had was from a handsome English privateer.”
“Of course.” Norrington found himself smiling in spite of himself. He wasn’t sure what was more pleasing: that he had just been properly called a privateer, or the fact that he was apparently the best kiss Sparrow had ever had.
And he wasn’t even thinking about the fact that Sparrow had said he was handsome. Really, he wasn’t.
“It’s most interesting really,” Norrington mused aloud. “Suddenly I find myself torn between finding you actually likeable, and wanting to slit your throat.”
“I tend to have that effect on people,” Sparrow informed him lightly. “Can’t for the life o’ me imagine why.”
“Indeed.” Norrington didn’t bother trying to hide the dripping sarcasm in his tone. Shaking his head, he exhaled slowly and settled back into bed. “There’s nothing more to discuss then, I suppose. The two of us shall never speak of this again. As far as the rest of the world is concerned, it never even happened,” he concluded authoritatively, satisfied. “And that, as they say, is that.”
“Well, actually,” Sparrow piped up suddenly, “there was a matter I was considering on, regarding this whole most unusual state of affairs.”
“Oh?” Norrington raised an eyebrow. “And whatever might that be?” Sparrow rolled over so that the two of them were lying face to face.
“It’s just,” Sparrow began slowly, “as far as I hear, the rest o’ your crew is on leave for another few days, eh? It’s just the two of us on this lovely boat, all to ourselves. And here I am thinking, well…”
Nimble, callused fingers began skillfully working their way across Norrington’s chest and along the side of his neck. And in spite of any of his earlier reservations, he didn’t push them away.
“One supposes, as long as we’re about this whole careful business of keeping secrets, that there might as well actually be something worth the effort of keeping a secret about.” Sparrow gave a rather mischievous grin. “Savvy?”
Completely against all of what would have been his normal logic, Norrington found himself replying to Sparrow’s grin with one of his own.
What the hell. After all, it wasn’t as if he had anything else to do.
“Savvy.”
EDIT: No longer a one-shot; the other parts can be found in my Memories here.
...No, it's not about the OT4. I am sorry.
Title: Leave of Absence
Fandom: Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest
Genre: Humor, Slash
Pairing: Captain Jack Sparrow/Ex-Commodore James Norrington
Rating: PG-13 for sexual situations and suggestions
Setting: After the third movie, which obviously doesn't exist yet, leading to some vague guessing on my part as to what may or may not have happened in the intervening time.
Summary: Norrington discovers yet another consequence of imbibing in too much rum whilst in the company of pirates.
Disclaimer: Obviously not mine; I'm just borrowing them. Though I make no promises as to returning them in the same condition.
Author's Note: I blame machi_neko for this madness. Yet again.
When James Norrington awoke that morning, the first thing that he came to be fully aware of was that his eyes were still closed. So, naturally, he opened them.
The jaggedly sharp saber that the sunlight seemed to have formed itself into as it attempted to stab out his freshly exposed eyeballs made him immediately reevaluate, reconsider, and regret that course of action.
He didn’t so much close his eyes again as he did deeply furrow them to the point of forming a nearly airtight seal. A sense of ominous and all-too-familiar foreboding sweeping through him, he took quick stock of his other available senses. His head was throbbing rhythmically, a hazy spinning sensation present when he tried too hard to recall the events of the previous evening. His whole body felt leaden and stiff. His hearing echoed faintly, as if his ears had been plugged up with a good amount of cotton wool. And finally, and perhaps most telling of all, there was a thick and bitter taste at the back of his throat that had nothing to do with garden-variety morning breath.
So he had been back at the bottle again. And hardly with any watered-down penny ale either, if what was left of the taste in his mouth was anything to go by. No, there it was, the bittersweet syrupy tang of sugarcane let too far gone to be good for anything but making the wisest of men come to forget his own name.
Not that he was prone to this sort of thing any longer: he stayed away these days, for the most part. He kept off the drink, sailing his ship with a firm and steady hand across these waters to the furthest shore. But there were always opportunities lurking it seemed, and he always found his way back again as easy as if he’d never left. There’d be another shore leave, another holiday, another break in his routine; another period of days or even weeks with nothing to fill his time with but his own company. And so would come another night that found him at the corner of some tavern, a cold flask in one hand and a heavy purse in the other, with no thought in him but a steely determination not to leave until both were empty.
Still, there were worse lots in life to have than his. And there were worse mornings to wake up to than this, at that. As far as he could tell from feeling alone, he seemed to have made it back safely to his own bed again, and none much the worse for wear. Better clean sheets and familiar bedding than a filthy back alley somewhere in port. Although there was some minor concern to be had over the state of his clothes as he appeared to be wearing none, and sleeping in such a condition was hardly his usual habit.
But there would be time enough to worry over that later, when he was better rested and in fuller recovery of his hangover. Right now, his only plan was to settle comfortably down in his pillows and drift back into blissful sleep.
All such thoughts, however, were brought to a rather abrupt and jarring halt as two things were simultaneously identified: the sound of a faint groan from somewhere behind him, and the warmth of another slumbering body in the sheets against his.
“Oh God.” Norrington’s eyes popped wide open, all thoughts and fears of the burn from the persistent morning sunshine far gone. He pushed himself into a more upright position with one arm, turning his head to peer over his shoulder and behind him at the rest of the bed. Not much was discernable at first to his still protesting eyes and groggy brain, but he got an immediate sense of broad shoulders stretching into a well-muscled arm that eventually ended in a callused hand with filthy fingernails. A shudder seemed to go through the body, and a decidedly masculine yawn split the air.
“Oh God.”
His eyes starting to go as wide as barrel-mouths, he watched unblinkingly as the bed’s other occupant awakened, slowly pulling themselves into a sitting position. The sheets rippled against a tanned chest and tattooed forearms as black dreadlocks fell away from dark eyes and half-rotten teeth, the features of the face swimming and shifting as they resolved themselves into the familiar visage of…
Jack Sparrow.
“Oh God!” Norrington gave a decidedly unmanly shriek as he jerked upright and grabbed the sheets so as to clasp them close to his bare chest, scooting back as far as he could until his back slammed into the headboard with such vigor that the whole frame shook. The unsteady vibration seemed to serve to finish the process of awakening Sparrow who turned his head in Norrington’s direction and blinked slowly several times, apparently taking the sight of the other man in.
“Hullo then.” Sparrow half-heartedly stifled a massive yawn, jaw stretching wide as his gold fillings glinted in the sunlight. “Looks like y’had yourself a touch better sleep than I did.”
Norrington opened his mouth, but found himself gaping noiselessly as any and all words refused to come out. He was forced to settle for a quick series of stuttering sounds as he floundered, desperately struggling for sense. Sparrow, for his part, seemed at least partially puzzled by this, though he mostly seemed to be still somewhat unawares. He just kept looking blearily in Norrington’s general direction, continuing to blink heavily as if trying to wring the fog of sleep and rum from his eyes.
“You’re…you’re…” Norrington started to make noises that began to form the semblance of actual words. He gawked at Sparrow, who only peered dully back at him. A finishing dose of frustration was what finally sent Norrington over the edge back into coherency.
“Dead,” he expounded in equal amounts of horror, fury, disbelief, bafflement and disgust. “You are supposed to be dead!”
“Am I not?” A few more sluggish blinks from darkly-smudged eyes. Sparrow looked around, at himself, at Norrington, and finally back at himself again. “Ah. I see,” Sparrow began, something as close to the light of comprehension as ever could exist in his eyes coming about, “you would be referring, of course, to that whole affair.”
Norrington just stared at him.
“The business with a certain accursed and otherworldly sailor by the name of Davy Jones and his pet sea beastie,” the pirate elaborated after a sufficient pause had been created.
“Yes,” Norrington’s voice was completely flat, “it would be to ‘that affair’ that I happen to refer…”
“Mmm. Well,” Sparrow clapped his hands together with a half-hearted chuckle and a slight wince, as if it were all some sort of badly-timed joke, “it seems that that particular bit of business did not turn out quite as it first appeared. You know how it is, then: reports o’ me demise were greatly exaggerated, and all that. Terribly sorry to disappoint…”
“Disappoint?” Norrington repeated disbelievingly in a voice that was both frigid and acidic. The hands that clutched at his sheets were working themselves into very tight fists.
“Well, given the usual state of affairs occurring betwixt the two of us, it would be both natural and immediate to assume that you yourself would be less than pleased to discover I was, in fact, not on my way to an early watery grave, after you came to think otherwise.” Sparrow paused, cocking his head thoughtfully. “Then again, you did seem well enough pleased to see me last night, so perhaps I did come to somewhat a hasty conclusion.”
At which point Norrington remembered fully the current set of circumstances. The color draining from his face, his eyes darted about the room as he weighed the facts: he and Sparrow, alone, in the captain’s quarters of his ship, both in his bed, both apparently naked, and himself still unable to picture anything from the night before but a rather vibrant blur.
“Oh God.”
“You keep saying that,” Sparrow observed, squinting at him with a slight frown. “Y’know, mate, if you discovered religion when you gave up the bottle, I find me’self thinking it’d be only right and proper to give up the one as you happen to rediscover the other.”
“I haven’t discovered or rediscovered anything,” Norrington snapped, glaring at him furiously. He straightened in his sitting position, letting go of the sheets with one hand as he struggled to regain his composure. “How are you still alive? What is going on here?”
“Well that would be, for all purposes, a rather majestic, lengthy, and decidedly twisty story.” Sparrow played absently with one of the beaded strands of his beard while gesturing grandly with his other hand, eyes looking off into space as he recalled past events. “It all starts really, you see, with Davy Jones himself, and his ancient long-lost tale of heartbreak and misery-”
“I don’t care!” Norrington practically exploded, losing more and more patience with both Sparrow’s narrative and the pirate himself with each passing second. Sparrow started, dropping his hand as he looked at him, taken aback.
“Well in all fairness, mate, you did ask.”
“Get out of my bed!”
“Hey!” Sparrow protested, resisting all attempts to physically propel him over the side of the bed. “Ouch!” He reached out with both hands to latch onto the head of the frame. “That’s some fine sense o’ English hospitality you’ve got there, ex-Commodore!”
“It’s Captain again, for your information,” Norrington seethed. “I don’t know what ungodly and wretched circumstances could have possibly compelled me to invite you onto my ship in the first place, but as long as you’re here you might as well show me the proper respect!”
Sparrow tilted his head at him, thoughtfully weighing his words for a moment.
“You don’t remember a thing then, do you?” he finally concluded, looking at Norrington seriously. “About what it is precisely that occurred between the two of us the previous night.”
“Perhaps not, but I can certainly figure out the general idea,” Norrington reported in a deeply sickened tone of voice. Sparrow seemed taken aback.
“Er, no offense to your imagination,” he began hesitantly,” but I think it may be lacking a bit in a certain direction. You see, we-”
“I don’t care,” Norrington cut him off, now looking thoroughly nauseated. Sparrow, however, was hardly a man that gave up easy.
“Maybe not, but-”
“Enough.”
“Well, it’s not like-”
“No.”
“But you see-”
“Stop.” Norrington was growling between clenched teeth at this point, and Sparrow finally (though not without certain reluctance in his features) managed to gather that it’d be in his best interests to stay quiet. Norrington groaned deeply, closing his eyes as he massaged his brow with one hand. “If I’m lucky, I will never come to recall fully the events of last night.”
“That hurts, mate,” Sparrow remarked in a wounded tone. “Deeply.” Norrington dropped his hand and lifted his head slightly in order to more effectively glower at him.
“And you,” he enunciated sharply, “would do best to act as if you didn’t remember a thing either. Am I perfectly understood?”
“Perhaps,” Sparrow mumbled, “but I have a most worrisome feeling that I’m not.”
“Oh, do tell,” Norrington laughed humorlessly. He looked at Sparrow disbelievingly. “Tell me, does anyone ever understand a single blasted thing that you come to say?”
“I’ll have you know,” Sparrow said authoritatively, making those sweeping hand gestures of his again, “that people in general can understand, quite easily as a matter of fact, what I have to say,” here he paused, fixing Norrington with meaningful glance, “provided of course they’re willing to listen.”
Norrington rolled his eyes and sighed in frustration, wondering which he was going to get rid of first, the hangover or the pirate, and which of the two was actually contributing to his headache the more.
“You see, the thing about listening is it takes more than just a keen ear. It takes more even than a keen mind. You could listen to the greatest speaker of our time go on and on for ages, and some would know what he was saying and some wouldn’t, but whether or not they really understood him would be another thing all together.” At some point during this speech Sparrow’s dramatic hand movements led to him pushing the sheet off of himself and exposing the entire length of his body. Norrington made a strangled sound, averting his eyes and holding a hand up in front of his face. If Sparrow noticed either his state or the other man’s reaction, he didn’t seem to care. “No, the real key, it so happens, is having a keen heart. Then no matter what the other bloke is saying: big words, small words, nonsense words, profane words, French…it doesn’t matter two bits. Because you still get the meaning behind it, y’see?”
“Oh, I certainly do.” Norrington winced, still making a point not to look in Sparrow’s direction. “I see all too much, at the moment.”
“Begging your pardon?” Sparrow squinted, not seeming to understand.
“Do you mind?" Norrington demanded, exasperated, moving his head just enough to indicate with his chin the lower part of Sparrow’s anatomy. He dared a glance around the cabin and chose to be relieved for the moment that all the various articles of his and Sparrow’s clothing seemed to be scattered nearby. “Go on then,” he gestured towards where the other man’s trousers had been slung over the back of a chair, “have some common decency, why don’t you?” His request was met with a blank stare. “Please.”
“Well now wait just a minute,” Sparrow finally caught on, looking offended, “what’s all this ‘frenetic disgust’ business about then? I rather dislike what you’re insinuating about the state of my equipment.” He crossed his arms over his chest huffily. “It’s a fair sight better than yours, I tell you.”
Norrington instantly forgot his discomfort and turned to meet Sparrow dead in the eye.
“Excuse me?”
The mirth quickly drained from Sparrow’s face.
“Ah, er, nothing,” he deadpanned quickly, giving a half-hearted shrug. “Nothing’s wrong with it.” A pause. “I mean, if you’re into that sort of thing-”
“Get out!” Norrington pointed towards the door with a shaking hand, his face beginning to turn red as his temper flared up again. “Get back into your filthy rags and out of my cabin, off my ship, and out of my life!”
“No need to have an attack there, mate,” Sparrow muttered disjointedly, rustling distractedly in the sheets as he tried to get his bearings. “Nothing wrong with having a shorter sword, some folks actually prefer ‘em, think they’re easier to handle, Oof!” A rather sharp kick from Norrington found its target on the side of Sparrow’s hip. “You’ve made your point then, I’m going-”
“Good.”
“Still, there are some less than splendid things to be said about your abilities as a host.” Sparrow was generally talking to himself now, all but ignoring Norrington completely. “The less than usual circumstances of this little get-together not withstanding,” he sighed, finally starting to rise from the bed, “you’d still think you could have done a bit better; I mean, as a bit o’ common courtesy from one pirate to another-”
“What?” Norrington stiffened, his anger rapidly vanishing. “Wait!” He reached out and latched onto Sparrow’s wrist, freezing the other man dead in his tracks. “What,” he asked slowly, carefully, voice filled with disbelief, “did you just say about me?”
“I believe I made a rather disparaging remark regarding the state o’ your, er, weapon-”
“After that,” Norrington pressed, grinding his teeth again. Sparrow blinked, apparently lost. Norrington took a deep breath and let it out slowly, forcing himself to count all the way to ten. “What you just said,” he pressed, stressing each word with a forced patience. “Something along the lines of ‘a common courtesy’…?”
“Oh. Right,” Sparrow cleared his throat, shrugging, “common courtesy. From one pirate to another.” Norrington practically dragged Sparrow back into the bed with him, so hard did he pull at the other man by the arm.
“Are you actually calling me a…?” Norrington’s disbelieving gape quickly turned into a fierce scowl, his eyes narrowing intently. He glared sternly, the business with Sparrow’s trousers or lack thereof quite forgotten. “I am not a pirate.”
The dark-eyed man chuckled good-naturedly, a smirk playing around his features.
“Sure you’re not. Ah!” Sparrow winced, drawing his breath in sharply as Norrington tightened his grip where he had Sparrow by the wrist.
“I am a privateer in the service of His Majesty,” Norrington stated, his gaze steady and very serious where he met the other man’s eyes, “not some lawless sea-going brigand. I carry Letters of Marque signed by the king himself, employing me in the name of crown and country.”
“All right,” Sparrow smiled generously, spreading his fingers wide, “so you’re a legal pirate, then.” Norrington swore an oath under his breath, snapping his hand back from its grip on Sparrow’s wrist as if he had been burned. He turned his head away sharply, scoffing.
“You have not the slightest idea what you’re talking about.”
“Tell you what, man,” Sparrow replied calmly, rubbing at his wrist without the slightest trace of concern, “if there’s one thing I know inside and out in me black and salty heart, it’s the business of pirates. What they do, how they act, every last little bit.” Sparrow sighed, making himself comfortable on the far side of the bed. “Pirates go about their merry way, sailing the seven seas in the fastest ships they can get their hands on. Pirates attack other ships an’ take what don’t properly belong to them.” His scowl still in place but starting to fade slightly, Norrington’s eyes slowly drifted back in Sparrow’s direction, watching him silently.
“Pirates burn an’ murder an’ pillage an’ steal, and the best get good and bloody rich off of it.” Sparrow lay on his back, hands tucked behind his head, a wide grin spread across his face. “Pirates like you.”
“You’re…wrong.” Norrington swallowed, his voice suddenly going hoarse. “There is a difference between what I do and piracy. I may fight, capture and even sink the merchant vessels of enemy nations, but there is a difference. You are wrong.” He turned away again, suddenly feeling a chill. “You have to be.”
“Whatever makes you feel better, mate,” Sparrow murmured half-heartedly, closing his eyes. But now Norrington wasn’t listening to him anymore.
There was a difference between the two of them, by God. There was a difference. He knew there was one; he was completely sure of it. Or at the very least, he had been sure of it all that time ago when he had first received his new employment. Oh yes, he had been ever so doggedly sure of it then. But looking at the issue again now, after so much had gone by both in time and circumstance, he just wasn’t sure anymore. Not in the least.
He had embarked upon this particular new chapter with the assured personal conviction that in doing so he was getting his old life back, or at the very least something quite close to it. Perhaps he wasn’t back in His Majesty’s navy or even among proper society again, but no one could argue against that he was certainly moving up in the world from where he’d been previously. It wasn’t the top of the world, but he was Captain James Norrington again, and that was a title that had been sorely missed. He’d cleaned himself up, bought new clothes, decided to forgo the traditional powdered wig in exchange for a neat ponytail and some much-needed trimming of his whiskers, and generally formed himself into the semblance of a respectable man again. And even if Lord Beckett had sneered a bit upon hearing that the ship he had offered him was to be renamed by its captain as the Honor Bound, Norrington hadn’t cared. Or at least, he hadn’t then.
But where exactly was he now? Over a year’s labors later, and he was one of the most successful privateers in England’s service. He had engaged close to sixty merchant ships of foreign nation and taken the cargoes of nearly all of them. He had fought and sank over a dozen enemy vessels. He had successfully captured or killed every captain that had ever ordered an attack on the Honor Bound. And what did he have to show for it all?
He ran a good ship, but he was hardly about to be commended for that. And while his crewmen didn’t hate him by any stretch of the imagination, they were far from calling him friend either. He had no friends, no companions; he wandered from port to port, from one shore leave to the next, alone save for the familiar warmth waiting for him in a bottle of rum. While his men went ashore and spent the next few days in the cheery company of each other and whatever new friends they could make with their pay, he stayed onboard checking over his ship and counting the cargo. And maybe he wasn’t bloodthirsty, or filthy, or greedy, or conniving, but would that save him if ever he was captured? To the Frenchmen and Spaniards upon whom he preyed, did it really matter that he attacked their vessels in the name of his king instead of his own? No, no honor awaited him at their hands, only the infamous short drop and sudden stop.
Not only was James Norrington a pirate to the minds of possibly every man in the Caribbean save himself, he wasn’t even happy.
“Oh God,” he said yet again, but this time for a very different reason. All this time he had spent, thinking he was finding his way again when he had only succeeded in getting himself even further off course. All this time, wasted.
Suddenly, he felt very, very tired. He lay back down on the bed and shut his eyes.
“Hey now,” Sparrow leaned over him, a note of concern in his voice as he took in Norrington’s state, “there’s no need to be that way.” His only answer was silence. Sparrow cleared his throat, looking awkward. “C’mon mate, chin up, eh? It could always be worse.” He grinned and took on a cheerful tone. “I mean, there’re certainly poorer lots in life to find than that of a pirate. Plenty of fine pirates in the world, right? Take me, for example!”
Norrington moaned and settled further in, pulling the sheet over his head. Sparrow chose not to be disheartened by his behavior.
“C’mon then, think of it. It’s a good life, a hearty one, a merry one, not particularly a long one…not that it has to be short, mind you, plenty o’ pirates have lived themselves to a ripe old age. If they cared to. And were wary not to get themselves caught.” Sparrow quickly switched his train of thought. “But that’s hardly the point! Think of it, you get to sail across the open waters for a living, taking in the view. You get to keep your own hours. You’re practically expected to drink and make merry with the local women…”
Norrington clenched his teeth and breathed through his nose, his usual state of annoyance when confronted with Jack Sparrow starting to cut through the bleak fog of his depression. Was it completely impossible for that man to be both conscious and silent for more than a few minutes at a time?
“…and just think of all the exotic places one can travel to. And all of the interesting people one can meet. And kill. Again, if one cares to. And is capable.”
“Shut. Up.” Norrington opened his eyes again, rolling them heavenward.
“You say something, mate?” Sparrow blinked. “Didn’t quite catch that.”
“Shut up.” Norrington sat up and turned around to face him, glaring. “Is that truly such a hard request for you to fulfill? Or are you simply incapable of keeping your mouth shut for any given period of time?”
“Well that’s a fine bit o’ business, this.” Sparrow frowned. “Here I am doing me best to get you feeling better, and you-”
“If that was your idea of cheering me up,” Norrington laughed in bitter disbelief, “I am sorely frightened to see what you would have had to say if your intention was bringing me down!”
“It’s the thought that counts, mate,” Sparrow insisted, looking insulted.
“Oh, please.”
“You know, Captain Norrington, you are by far and most quite possibly the most ungrateful man I’ve ever had the unfortunate displeasure of meeting.” Sparrow stared at him levelly, somehow looking quite solemn for a man with cosmetics smudged about his eyes. “In no less than one morning in your fine company, I have been kicked, shoved, verbally assaulted-”
“Be quiet,” Norrington snapped, feeling his anger start to heat up yet again.
“Not even to mention all that screaming you’ve been doing. I’m beginning to understand why you spent so much time on Tortuga as a drunkard; if ever there was a man in need of a good calming dose of rum, it was you.”
“I said, be quiet!” Norrington groaned, pressing his hands over his ears. “Just stop talking, why don’t you?”
“Why should I?” Sparrow demanded cheekily. “To make you happy? Considering how you’ve been acting towards me so far, I can’t begin to imagine why I would want to. If anything, I have every reason in the world to keep on talking, if only so as to displease you further.”
Norrington seethed. Ever since first meeting the man, it had all been more of the exact same thing. Sparrow gave him nothing but irritation, irritation which increased every time that damnable man opened his mouth. What Norrington wouldn’t give to find an effective way to get him to shut his trap once and for all! Almost as soon as he finished forming this thought, however, to his supreme horror Sparrow prepared to speak once more. No, no, not this time; this time he was going to keep him quiet, no matter what it took…
Thus, the fact that his next course of action was to kiss Jack Sparrow very firmly and deeply on his already parted lips.
It was not the most clever or thought-out of plans, perhaps, but it was admittedly a successful one: save for a sole startled “Mmmmph!” near the very beginning, not a single blessed sound escaped the pirate’s lips. For perhaps the first five seconds or so Sparrow attempted to pull away, and then there was a pause in his movements. This was followed rapidly by a reversal in the direction of his momentum. The kiss deepened. Time passed.
Norrington was…somewhat unaware of the rest of his surroundings.
The hastily formed and executed plan was not quite as scandalous when one considered that he had woken up this morning in the same bed with the other man after what could have only been a drunken one-night affair. Still, if he was thinking anything close to clearly he would have almost assuredly kept the embrace as brief as possible. The fact was, however, that while many words could be used to describe the state his mind now happened to be in, “clear” was definitely not one of them. In other words, Norrington was enjoying himself far too much to realize that he should be horrified at the fact that he was enjoying himself.
There was something unexpected about Sparrow’s mouth, and hardly the fact that he had a nimble tongue. Unsurprisingly, he tasted a bit like rum and a bit like stew and a bit like bad breath, but there was something else as well. Rich and deep, dark and sweet. Exotic. Intoxicating. Promising and tempting and invigorating all at once…
Jack Sparrow tasted like freedom.
It was several minutes later that Norrington finally pulled himself away, quite dazed and out of breath. He was panting heavily, starting to sweat, still naked, and now he had an odd aftertaste of pirate in his mouth. And he couldn’t seem to recall whenever he’d last felt nearly as self-satisfied as he did now.
With a contented sigh he dropped smoothly back onto his bed, practically melting into the pillows in sheer relaxed bliss. Sparrow, on the other hand, remained in a sitting position. He was blinking slowly and widely, an indecipherable expression on his face that seemed oddly reminiscent of a man that had been struck by lighting.
“Why, Norrington,” he finally said slowly, eyes still just a bit out of focus, “how incredibly forward of you.”
“Whatever do you mean?” Norrington questioned, chuckling faintly to himself. “Don’t tell me that the great Captain Jack Sparrow is turning bashful all of a sudden, particularly after you’ve been trying to brag to me all morning about our escapades of last night.”
“Well, actually,” Sparrow coughed, “what I’ve really been at, mate, is more along the lines of trying to warn you away from the path of a fanciful imagination.” Norrington’s faint smile quickly reversed itself into a deeper frown.
“What?” He turned his head to stare up at the other man. “What exactly are you trying to say?” he demanded, although he was already starting to get a very bad idea of where this was headed.
“See, what happened was this,” Sparrow quickly elaborated with a series of rapid hand gestures. “I myself stumbled into port shortly after the witching hour, at which point I discovered you seated at a tavern some roads back. I can’t be sure, o’ course, but I assume you’d already worked your way through quite a bit of rum yourself first.” He frowned, pointing curiously. “Unless it so happens to be in your usual fashion of behavior to greet acquaintances of yours with a large hug?” After a brief pause, he chose to interpret Norrington’s speechless stare as an answer in the negative. “Anyway, barring drinking all of our combined sums away, and some decidedly embarrassing fits of crying and off-key singing, the two of us didn’t accomplish much else other than stumbling back to your ship an’ passing out in this here lovely bed.”
“But we woke up without any clothes on,” Norrington protested dazedly.
“You passed out first, and then…” Sparrow trailed off and then continued with a sheepish grin. “Well, I always sleep in nothing but me skin; I suppose I must have assumed everyone else did the same.”
A very silent and tense pause.
“You mean to tell me…” Norrington’s voice was hoarse and cracked before he got halfway, forcing him to clear his throat hastily and try again. “In other words, you are saying that we didn’t…anything?” There were no words to adequately describe the horror now present in his expression. “We didn’t do anything.”
“In other words,” Sparrow agreed, “no, we did not.”
“But then that means,” Norrington continued slowly, dreading the final realization, “that the furthest we happened to go was-”
“Was that rather forceful though admittedly not unpleasant kiss you presented me with just now,” Sparrow finished helpfully.
“Oh God.” Norrington’s eyes glazed over. “Oh God.”
“And there we are again.” Sparrow sighed, shaking his head. “You really are going to have to find yourself another decent oath, mate.” He shifted slightly on the bed, getting himself more comfortable. “I myself used to prefer invoking the name and various articles o’ Davy Jones, but that become a bit this side of awkward what after actually meeting the bloke and all. And then after he practically begged me to be the best man at his wedding, well…”
Norrington was at this point not listening in the slightest, as he was too busy trying to decide whether he wanted to laugh or cry.
“…right, then,” Sparrow concluded awkwardly, watching Norrington with a cringing expression on his face. He looked away, lacing his fingers together. After a few more moments of heavy silence he started to whistle an unidentifiable tune. He came to a dead halt, however, as Norrington abruptly raised his head to stare at him full force.
“What I said earlier,” Norrington pressed through tightly grit teeth, “about not recalling that any of this had happened…”
“Oh, no worries there,” Sparrow was quick to assure him. He smirked thoughtfully, leaning against the headboard with his hands tucked behind him. “The last thing I want is to have to deal with the reactions of those spirited lasses back in Tortuga if they come to find out that the best kiss I ever had was from a handsome English privateer.”
“Of course.” Norrington found himself smiling in spite of himself. He wasn’t sure what was more pleasing: that he had just been properly called a privateer, or the fact that he was apparently the best kiss Sparrow had ever had.
And he wasn’t even thinking about the fact that Sparrow had said he was handsome. Really, he wasn’t.
“It’s most interesting really,” Norrington mused aloud. “Suddenly I find myself torn between finding you actually likeable, and wanting to slit your throat.”
“I tend to have that effect on people,” Sparrow informed him lightly. “Can’t for the life o’ me imagine why.”
“Indeed.” Norrington didn’t bother trying to hide the dripping sarcasm in his tone. Shaking his head, he exhaled slowly and settled back into bed. “There’s nothing more to discuss then, I suppose. The two of us shall never speak of this again. As far as the rest of the world is concerned, it never even happened,” he concluded authoritatively, satisfied. “And that, as they say, is that.”
“Well, actually,” Sparrow piped up suddenly, “there was a matter I was considering on, regarding this whole most unusual state of affairs.”
“Oh?” Norrington raised an eyebrow. “And whatever might that be?” Sparrow rolled over so that the two of them were lying face to face.
“It’s just,” Sparrow began slowly, “as far as I hear, the rest o’ your crew is on leave for another few days, eh? It’s just the two of us on this lovely boat, all to ourselves. And here I am thinking, well…”
Nimble, callused fingers began skillfully working their way across Norrington’s chest and along the side of his neck. And in spite of any of his earlier reservations, he didn’t push them away.
“One supposes, as long as we’re about this whole careful business of keeping secrets, that there might as well actually be something worth the effort of keeping a secret about.” Sparrow gave a rather mischievous grin. “Savvy?”
Completely against all of what would have been his normal logic, Norrington found himself replying to Sparrow’s grin with one of his own.
What the hell. After all, it wasn’t as if he had anything else to do.
“Savvy.”
EDIT: No longer a one-shot; the other parts can be found in my Memories here.