Command me fic #10 - POTC - A Matter of Speaking
Title: A Matter of Speaking
Author: ErinRua
Rating: PG
Length: @ 1300 words
Characters: Jack Sparrow, Will Turner
Notes/Disclaimers/Summary: Will, Jack, and few choice words.
A ficlet written for honorat whose prompt read:" *Drool* Something in your African Star Universe for PotC?" Which, post- AWE, I can only interpret to mean any universe in which Jack and Will are actually friendly. ;-) I hope you enjoy, O Clever Rat!
Boom - the smithy's door slammed, a shard of daylight but a flash of light and gone. Will paused at the forge, hammer and tongs in his hands, as the newcomer plastered himself with his back against the wall.
"Help."
And not one word more did he speak. Will squinted through the forge's dusty shadows towards the gleam of rolling eyeballs and the pale swatch of a dingy, once-white shirt.
"Jack."
"SHHH!!" A be-ringed hand waved frantically. "Not so loud."
"You're in trouble."
Not a question. The eyeballs rolled more dramatically.
"Of course I am, whelp!" came the hissed reply. "That should seem to be the bloody point!"
"Aye." Carefully, for a smith never gives in to the urge to hurl or otherwise mishandle his tools, Will set the hammer and tongs aside. "Which brings me to the question, why are you here?"
Jack - for it was indeed Captain Jack Sparrow - jerked a dirty finger to his lips and knelt to peer out the keyhole.
"Jack."
"Confound it, boy!" Sparrow pivoted about, tilting like a mast to a sudden untoward gust, and steadied with outrage write large across his face. "Have you no care at all for an old shipmate?"
"An old shipmate who carries mischief and mayhem the way most men carry a handkerchief?" Will leveled a dark look that belonged on a much older and sterner face. "Tell me why I should."
"Because - hsst!"
In a frantic flurry of hands, sleeves and dreadlocks, Jack scurried across the shop, where he dove behind the bellows and peeped out, owlish beneath his red headscarf. Outside, a clatter and rumble marked the passage of a cart. Will sighed deeply and cocked an eyebrow at his uninvited guest.
"What did you do, Jack?"
"Nothing! I swear!"
Spoken without once looking at Will, for Jack instead peered frantically towards the door, as if he could pierce the sturdy oak by will alone.
"Ja-ack?" Will crossed his arms on chest. "The truth, if you can bring yourself to face it."
"What?" Jack pivoted around, canted to starboard then righted himself, his dark eyes wide with affront as he splayed a grimy hand against his chest. "William, I am disappointed in you. Given the long and salubrious nature of our association, I would think you -."
"Know you well enough to tell when you're lying."
Under Will's unwinking scrutiny, Jack seemed to deflate when he sighed.
"Ah, young Turner, and here I thought you were your father's son."
"My father -" The word came delicately edged in acid. "- is not harboring a fugitive in his place of business."
"Fugitive? Now, who said a word about - meep!"
A sharp rattle at the door sent Jack dashing once more for the shadows, frantic as the flight of a demented pigeon. Will's gaze followed like the points of twin rapiers.
Then daylight burst across the sill and two Royal Marines stepped through the door.
"Good day, sah!" barked the sergeant crisply. "Have you seen anything untoward or unusual in the last while?"
The Marines waited with bright-eyed, officious expectancy, while Will schooled both eyebrows to rise in what he hoped formed a mild demeanor.
"What sort of things should I have noticed?"
The sergeant's spine straightened almost to the point of straining several vertebrae. "Specifically, any shady, suspicious fellows skulking and lurking about."
"Ah. They sound ... unsavory."
"Oh, quite, sah. He is unsavory and despicable."
"Is he a felon of some sort?"
"A felon, a scoundrel, a blackguard of the first order." Both Marines' faces screwed tightly into expressions of distaste.
"A pirate," offered the second Marine, and Will tried not to notice how a workbench laden with steel billets suddenly shuddered.
"Whom you are seeking in broad daylight," he noted.
"I'm afraid so, sah."
"He sounds quite mad."
"Brash as a peacock," the sergeant blithely stated. "But more than a little jingle-brained."
The workbench jolted, jangled, and Will scooped up his hammer and tongs, steel clanking ere he set them down again.
"Really."
"Positively. They say he was marooned, once. Too long in the sun, you know."
The second marine leaned forward and tapped his temple. "Mad as a hatter," he said in a stage whisper.
"For what do you seek this fellow, then?" asked Will.
"Most lately?" The sergeant sniffed. "Public indecency."
"Running in the raw," the other Marine added.
Will's eyebrows leapt. "As in ...?"
"Galloping down the street as starkers as the day he was born."
The workbench lurched, but a dirty hand flashed up to clamp the billets down tight.
"Remarkable. And what, pray tell, precipitated this ... exhibition?"
"A harlot, I believe, sah." Seeing the question on Will's face, the sergeant clarified, "As in he failed to pay for services rendered."
"Ah. I see."
"But the warrant of course enumerates countless positively livid crimes, so you understand the necessity of apprehending this villain as quickly as possible."
"Of course."
"Well, then." The sergeant looked to his companion, who squared his uniformed shoulders and stepped back. "You'll let us know if you see anything, won't you?"
The workbench trembled. Will pasted a smile on his face.
"Of course, Sergeant. Thank you for your concern."
"Good day, sah!"
With that, the Marines faced about and tramped noisily out the door. The thump of its closing puffed dust into the air, which drifted in a gentle haze amongst the beams of light. This rendered the golden, haloed affect that gathered about Jack's rising head more than a little ludicrous. A fact Will noted by a stern look and his arms crossed on his chest.
"I can explain!" blurted Jack, tatty sleeves billowing about his hands. "It was a misunderstanding, a simple miscalculation, a mere -."
"Jack, nothing with you is 'mere' or 'simple'."
"Yes, but there were mitigating circumstances! Will, I swear upon my -."
"I'd rather you didn't." Will sighed and took off his apron. "Whatever it is, you can't stay here."
"Well, I can hardly nip outside and go strolling off like the bloody parson's wife, now can I? Unless you genuinely wish to see me rotting corpse dangling from the gibbet."
Eyes beseeching, Jack drew himself up, hands clutched before his breast, for all the world as if he were going vaporish.
Will positively, absolutely would not fall for such blatant chicanery.
"Very well," he sighed. "Then you shall hide, and hide quietly, until it is dark and I close up the shop. Am I understood?"
"Perfectly," Jack purred, a broad display of ivory and gold beaming in the dim light, and he minced about to face the other way. "Now. I think I shall pass some time admiring these beauties over here."
"Jack."
"Hm?"
A distracted reply, for Jack's attention already focused with avaricious delight on a gleaming display of finished and nearly finished swords.
"'Quietly' does not include playing with the merchandise."
"Mm, yes, of course."
A lost cause, of course, for polished steel passed lightly across tar-grimed fingers and Jack's smile deepened to border on the sublime. Will could only sigh, and turned to resume his work.
With the thump of the bellows and the clang of his hammer, he almost missed Jack's later remark.
"It was wholly warranted, you know."
Pausing, Will looked up. "What's that?"
"My escape from that ... female creature. Her reaction was completely overdone, I assure you."
Will frowned. "How so?"
Jack leaned from the hips, eyes wide beneath the bangles in his hair.
"The bloody trollop fell asleep. Before our business was concluded!"
~ * ~
Author: ErinRua
Rating: PG
Length: @ 1300 words
Characters: Jack Sparrow, Will Turner
Notes/Disclaimers/Summary: Will, Jack, and few choice words.
A ficlet written for honorat whose prompt read:" *Drool* Something in your African Star Universe for PotC?" Which, post- AWE, I can only interpret to mean any universe in which Jack and Will are actually friendly. ;-) I hope you enjoy, O Clever Rat!
Boom - the smithy's door slammed, a shard of daylight but a flash of light and gone. Will paused at the forge, hammer and tongs in his hands, as the newcomer plastered himself with his back against the wall.
"Help."
And not one word more did he speak. Will squinted through the forge's dusty shadows towards the gleam of rolling eyeballs and the pale swatch of a dingy, once-white shirt.
"Jack."
"SHHH!!" A be-ringed hand waved frantically. "Not so loud."
"You're in trouble."
Not a question. The eyeballs rolled more dramatically.
"Of course I am, whelp!" came the hissed reply. "That should seem to be the bloody point!"
"Aye." Carefully, for a smith never gives in to the urge to hurl or otherwise mishandle his tools, Will set the hammer and tongs aside. "Which brings me to the question, why are you here?"
Jack - for it was indeed Captain Jack Sparrow - jerked a dirty finger to his lips and knelt to peer out the keyhole.
"Jack."
"Confound it, boy!" Sparrow pivoted about, tilting like a mast to a sudden untoward gust, and steadied with outrage write large across his face. "Have you no care at all for an old shipmate?"
"An old shipmate who carries mischief and mayhem the way most men carry a handkerchief?" Will leveled a dark look that belonged on a much older and sterner face. "Tell me why I should."
"Because - hsst!"
In a frantic flurry of hands, sleeves and dreadlocks, Jack scurried across the shop, where he dove behind the bellows and peeped out, owlish beneath his red headscarf. Outside, a clatter and rumble marked the passage of a cart. Will sighed deeply and cocked an eyebrow at his uninvited guest.
"What did you do, Jack?"
"Nothing! I swear!"
Spoken without once looking at Will, for Jack instead peered frantically towards the door, as if he could pierce the sturdy oak by will alone.
"Ja-ack?" Will crossed his arms on chest. "The truth, if you can bring yourself to face it."
"What?" Jack pivoted around, canted to starboard then righted himself, his dark eyes wide with affront as he splayed a grimy hand against his chest. "William, I am disappointed in you. Given the long and salubrious nature of our association, I would think you -."
"Know you well enough to tell when you're lying."
Under Will's unwinking scrutiny, Jack seemed to deflate when he sighed.
"Ah, young Turner, and here I thought you were your father's son."
"My father -" The word came delicately edged in acid. "- is not harboring a fugitive in his place of business."
"Fugitive? Now, who said a word about - meep!"
A sharp rattle at the door sent Jack dashing once more for the shadows, frantic as the flight of a demented pigeon. Will's gaze followed like the points of twin rapiers.
Then daylight burst across the sill and two Royal Marines stepped through the door.
"Good day, sah!" barked the sergeant crisply. "Have you seen anything untoward or unusual in the last while?"
The Marines waited with bright-eyed, officious expectancy, while Will schooled both eyebrows to rise in what he hoped formed a mild demeanor.
"What sort of things should I have noticed?"
The sergeant's spine straightened almost to the point of straining several vertebrae. "Specifically, any shady, suspicious fellows skulking and lurking about."
"Ah. They sound ... unsavory."
"Oh, quite, sah. He is unsavory and despicable."
"Is he a felon of some sort?"
"A felon, a scoundrel, a blackguard of the first order." Both Marines' faces screwed tightly into expressions of distaste.
"A pirate," offered the second Marine, and Will tried not to notice how a workbench laden with steel billets suddenly shuddered.
"Whom you are seeking in broad daylight," he noted.
"I'm afraid so, sah."
"He sounds quite mad."
"Brash as a peacock," the sergeant blithely stated. "But more than a little jingle-brained."
The workbench jolted, jangled, and Will scooped up his hammer and tongs, steel clanking ere he set them down again.
"Really."
"Positively. They say he was marooned, once. Too long in the sun, you know."
The second marine leaned forward and tapped his temple. "Mad as a hatter," he said in a stage whisper.
"For what do you seek this fellow, then?" asked Will.
"Most lately?" The sergeant sniffed. "Public indecency."
"Running in the raw," the other Marine added.
Will's eyebrows leapt. "As in ...?"
"Galloping down the street as starkers as the day he was born."
The workbench lurched, but a dirty hand flashed up to clamp the billets down tight.
"Remarkable. And what, pray tell, precipitated this ... exhibition?"
"A harlot, I believe, sah." Seeing the question on Will's face, the sergeant clarified, "As in he failed to pay for services rendered."
"Ah. I see."
"But the warrant of course enumerates countless positively livid crimes, so you understand the necessity of apprehending this villain as quickly as possible."
"Of course."
"Well, then." The sergeant looked to his companion, who squared his uniformed shoulders and stepped back. "You'll let us know if you see anything, won't you?"
The workbench trembled. Will pasted a smile on his face.
"Of course, Sergeant. Thank you for your concern."
"Good day, sah!"
With that, the Marines faced about and tramped noisily out the door. The thump of its closing puffed dust into the air, which drifted in a gentle haze amongst the beams of light. This rendered the golden, haloed affect that gathered about Jack's rising head more than a little ludicrous. A fact Will noted by a stern look and his arms crossed on his chest.
"I can explain!" blurted Jack, tatty sleeves billowing about his hands. "It was a misunderstanding, a simple miscalculation, a mere -."
"Jack, nothing with you is 'mere' or 'simple'."
"Yes, but there were mitigating circumstances! Will, I swear upon my -."
"I'd rather you didn't." Will sighed and took off his apron. "Whatever it is, you can't stay here."
"Well, I can hardly nip outside and go strolling off like the bloody parson's wife, now can I? Unless you genuinely wish to see me rotting corpse dangling from the gibbet."
Eyes beseeching, Jack drew himself up, hands clutched before his breast, for all the world as if he were going vaporish.
Will positively, absolutely would not fall for such blatant chicanery.
"Very well," he sighed. "Then you shall hide, and hide quietly, until it is dark and I close up the shop. Am I understood?"
"Perfectly," Jack purred, a broad display of ivory and gold beaming in the dim light, and he minced about to face the other way. "Now. I think I shall pass some time admiring these beauties over here."
"Jack."
"Hm?"
A distracted reply, for Jack's attention already focused with avaricious delight on a gleaming display of finished and nearly finished swords.
"'Quietly' does not include playing with the merchandise."
"Mm, yes, of course."
A lost cause, of course, for polished steel passed lightly across tar-grimed fingers and Jack's smile deepened to border on the sublime. Will could only sigh, and turned to resume his work.
With the thump of the bellows and the clang of his hammer, he almost missed Jack's later remark.
"It was wholly warranted, you know."
Pausing, Will looked up. "What's that?"
"My escape from that ... female creature. Her reaction was completely overdone, I assure you."
Will frowned. "How so?"
Jack leaned from the hips, eyes wide beneath the bangles in his hair.
"The bloody trollop fell asleep. Before our business was concluded!"
~ * ~