POTC: Win-Win (for Nox)
Title: “Win-Win”
Author: Shaitanah
Rating: PG
Summary: Every man has a price. In light of losing what he treasures most, Jack Sparrow wonders what his is. [Jack-centric; pre-CotBP]
Disclaimer: Pirates of the Caribbean belong to Disney.
A/N: This was supposed to be about Beckett, but then Jack came along and totally highjacked this plane.
Dedication: You said: “I play for him - and I know squat.” So, know more! XDDD
WIN-WIN
Every man has a price, Beckett likes to say, and Jack cannot help but wonder what his is.
He is no stranger to this kind of business. The things he has done for the East India Trading Company have not always been lawful; but then, legal issues have never been too much on his mind. Neither has morality.
He watches the people being herded into the hold of his ship, bone-dry limbs and withered faces, black like the dirt beneath their bare feet, chains clattering. He could be remembering the faces from his past - still alive perhaps, just across the continent - but he is not the kind of a person to dwell on the past.
The notion of slavery sets Jack’s teeth on edge. Freedom, his father would say, is a relative privilege. Jack could not explain it if ever asked, but somehow this sight does not sit well with him. It makes him question things he does not want to start questioning.
He twirls an old Spanish dollar between his fingers. Cannot remember where he acquired the coin. It looks almost black. He tosses it up, watches it overturn, glimmering dimly in the moonlight, and puts it back in his pocket.
A man who has naught has no right to complain. That much Beckett tries to make inescapably clear at every conversation. But then, such a man has nothing to lose either. Jack mentally reviews the chapters of his life: a pirate brat turned adventurer turned sea merchant in the employ of the British Empire - and still mere illusions of freedom in sight. Jack listens to the ominous clanking of shackles and casts a quick glance at his wrists as if to make sure he is still unbound.
And what is the point really? All the prestige, all the fair pay that comes with this position has too steep a price, almost like having to pledge his soul over and over again. And worst of all, the devil is not Cutler Beckett; the devil is Jack, not knowing what it is that he really wants for himself.
He regards his pistol, its weight heavy and secure in his hand. Shoot them or shoot yourself, it makes no difference. But they shoot dogs and horses, don’t they?
There is a way to stamp this dull fury out. Find a tavern and get dry. Till there is no memory of what he is doing and why he is doing it. Because it is only this way, tipsy as Davy’s sow, that he can live with himself through what’s to come. He wonders whose freedom is really about to end up on the sacrificial altar: theirs or his.
He should not feel guilty. This is, after all, just business, as Beckett would put it. Their life was over long before they crossed paths with Jack; his is in bloom.
If it could be called a life, a nasty voice at the back of his mind murmurs. Waiting for every miserable pittance of theirs like a starved dog at its masters’ table - life could, should be so much more than that!
Jack looks back at the slanted signboard indicating a tavern. Not today, love. Throwing your life away works better with a fresh head.
He strolls up the ladder, feeling like a man mounting the scaffold. New experience. Jack has always been all for new experience. There are two bloody cells in the brig, not nearly enough to cram all these people inside, and the storage unit is packed for a long voyage already. Some of them appear to be sick. The stench of sweat and vomit is nigh unbearable.
Jack shoves the key into the lock, ignoring pairs of lacklustre, bloodshot eyes watching him from the dark. The bolt clicks, a barely audible sound in the stillness of the hold. Jack pulls the barred door open. Then proceeds to open the second cell.
“Off you go,” he whispers, but the slaves just watch him with dull incomprehension. “Out, you wretches!” he barks irritably. He must get them out before the Wicked Wench is ready to sail; otherwise the cause is lost.
Meek dimwittedness is splattered all over their faces. Like cattle. He resists the temptation to leave them to their doom. If they were all to be slaughtered this very minute, they could not care less; then why should he?
Jack takes a few steps towards the ladder and waves at them to follow. After a moment of doubt, a sturdy fellow, white by the looks of it, but too dirty to tell, sets foot out of the door. Jack gulps down a sigh of relief and makes his way up without looking back. He can hear them follow in cautious catlike footsteps.
They glide down the gangway and into the night. Jack leaves his hapless flock in a small cove just outside the harbour. As soon as the Wench sets out, they are safe.
He returns to the ship afterwards and pours himself some grog. His gaze drifts lazily over the maps spread out on the table. Somehow he cannot help but notice that Africa looks a bit like a skull.
* * *
“I am disappointed,” Beckett says in that annoyingly patronizing drawl of his.
It didn’t take them long to track Jack down, considering he was not exactly hiding. His ship was confiscated and he was arrested; his employer even deigned him a visit in his gaol, so he is probably expected to feel flattered, eh?
“When you appeared virtually out of nowhere, I thought I was lucky to have you,” Beckett continues evenly. “You were a valuable asset. And then you did this. Why, Jack? Have you taken leave of your senses?”
Jack scowls at that. It’s not like Beckett is terribly curious about the reasons anyway.
“I understand the power of conviction,” Beckett remarks. “As well as the appeal of doing something grand. And since that was possibly the most significant achievement of yours, I regret to say your efforts have been wasted. They are not people, Jack. They are goods. Why would you risk everything for cargo?”
“To make you wonder,” Jack scoffs.
Beckett’s disposition remains flawless.
“You do realize that you have committed a crime against the crown, which can only be classified as robbery on the seas. Exactly the sort of activity that you once told me you despised.” He brings his face closer to Jack’s and whispers, half a tone lower, “Piracy.”
Jack smiles. Fate is a bitch, but he has always known that.
“Yet simply branding you a pirate is not enough,” Beckett adds. “You have taken something from the crown; now the crown will take something from you, and I daresay a patch of skin will not cover the expenses.”
Jack eyes him boldly. He can see a fragment of sea through the bars, and while he is separated from it, the feeling of freedom floods him from head to toe, more intoxicating than any liquor. He will not answer to anyone.
“Ah,” Beckett nods, “you think now that you have restored your dignity, you have nothing to lose. You are mistaken, Jack. A lot more can be taken from you than you can imagine.”
He snaps his fingers. The guards push Jack to the window. The sea grows larger before his eyes, infinity of pearly blue strewn with sunlight. And at the clear blue backdrop of the sky there sits the Wench, a golden flower with lily-white sails. A smile tugs at the corners of Jack’s mouth.
He narrows his eyes. Puffs of black smoke swirl over the masts. Jack’s heart sinks. Burning. He presses his face to the bars. She is burning. His sea lady is in flames! A quiet growl of desperation tears itself out of his throat.
Why would they torch their own ship? Jack suddenly sees through Beckett’s game. He knows, feels how much the Wench means to Jack. Even if he escaped from prison, she would forever be lost to him.
He watches in helpless fury as the flames devour her. When she is no more than a flickering dot on the horizon, he is brutally shoved around to face his tormentor. Beckett regards him silently, then signals the guards to let go of him. When all of them are gone, Jack sinks on the floor, defeated, the image of his ship in flames emblazoned in his memory.
Beckett remembers about him two days later and summons him to his quarters. He greets him by lifting a pike with a glowing red “P” brand. Jack stiffens.
“What would you say to a proposition of receiving another ship and a pardon just this once? On certain conditions, of course. I shall not condone a repetition of such a pitiful breach of duty.”
The image of the burning Wench explodes before Jack’s eyes.
“I would say, go to hell.”
The pike digs into his flesh. He clenches his teeth, nostrils flaring, the stench of scorched skin overwhelming. It doesn’t hurt half as much as the destruction of the ship did. Jack laughs through the pain, eyes dry and mad with anger, laughs like the devil in hell will be laughing when he lays his claim on Cutler Beckett’s soul.
* * *
Now is the time to drink. He has just escaped from prison - and damn if it wasn’t too easy, almost like Beckett wanted to see where desperation would lead him. A true captain always goes down with the ship. Should have burnt me there, Jack thinks, guzzling down more and more cheap slop.
“I’ll get you up,” he murmurs. “Even if I bloody well have to do it all by me lonesome.”
He steals a dinghy. By nightfall he is already so drunk that he can barely hold on his feet, and the rocking boat seems steadier than the plane of the shore. Get ya up, he mumbles as he draws closer to the Wench’s place of final rest. Get ya going.
He stands up, shaking, and takes a dive. The sea is cool and black. His head is spinning. He goes up for air and dives again. He drifts in the water, not knowing what he will do even if he finds her, but she must sail again, feel the wind in her sails, glide over the smooth silk of the ocean like a ray of sunlight.
He refuses to go up. His lungs are bursting with the need for oxygen and all the alcohol seems to want to flush out. He grinds his jaws and kicks off harder into the cold underbelly of the sea. She is there, he knows it. Waiting for him. If they should die, they would die free and not on Cutler Beckett’s terms.
He thinks he can see her for a moment, a ghostly carcass in the dark; and there is no more air; and suddenly a force pulls him up, throws him out on the hard deck, he coughs and splutters, and the world is all air again. He struggles to breathe, chest tight, skull splitting in half.
He opens his eyes, catches a movement overhead, like a swarm of squirming eels.
“We meet again, Jack Sparrow,” a nasal voice greets him, and he responds to his oldtime alias with a lunatic half-smile.
“Jonesy! Has anyone ever told you your face is dreadfully unappealing in the aesthetical sense?”
The sea devil leans into him, eyes narrow with concentration. “Do you fear death?”
“That depends. Are you in it?”
Jones gasps out a short laugh. “Still a jester, Sparrow? Shall we see who has the last word?”
Jack manages to get up. A strong smell of seaweed assaults him.
“What makes me so special, mate? If I’m dying, pass me on; if not-.”
“What are you up to, Sparrow?” Jones cuts him off.
“Me? Just out and about, you know.”
Jones takes a step towards him, water trickling down his heavy coat. His tentacles shift chaotically. He looks past Jack, down at the black waters.
“There is a ship down below.” He squints in Jack’s direction. “How much does that ship mean to you?”
Jack eyes him warily. “‘Fraid I don’t follow.”
“What would you be willing to give up for that ship?”
Why does everyone expect him to give something up? His mind flashes back to the Wench.
“Davy Jones,” he slurs amiably, “still trying to get me into one of your devilish bargains?”
“Thirteen years,” Jones says listlessly. “As captain of that ship. Free to roam the seas.”
And a hundred years of servitude to follow? A steep price. But then, Jack is to die this very instant, and despite his bravado it’s not what he would willingly settle for. Life has a lot more to offer than what he has been able to taste so far; as far as he is concerned, it was a mere appetizer.
He shakes Jones’s slippery hand briskly. “Deal.”
* * *
He stops just short of the shipwrecked vessel, the floating debris rocking gently against the sides of his dinghy. His heart is thumping in his throat and the livid brand on his forearm is throbbing with pain. He rises, his fists balled and his jaw set, and cries out:
“Jones! I’m here for my ship, you blasted sea wretch!”
As the charred, ghostly body of what used to be the Wicked Wench rises out of the depths, showering him with salty sprays, Jack tells himself his soul will never rot behind bars again.
December 20-21, 2009
Author: Shaitanah
Rating: PG
Summary: Every man has a price. In light of losing what he treasures most, Jack Sparrow wonders what his is. [Jack-centric; pre-CotBP]
Disclaimer: Pirates of the Caribbean belong to Disney.
A/N: This was supposed to be about Beckett, but then Jack came along and totally highjacked this plane.
Dedication: You said: “I play for him - and I know squat.” So, know more! XDDD
WIN-WIN
Every man has a price, Beckett likes to say, and Jack cannot help but wonder what his is.
He is no stranger to this kind of business. The things he has done for the East India Trading Company have not always been lawful; but then, legal issues have never been too much on his mind. Neither has morality.
He watches the people being herded into the hold of his ship, bone-dry limbs and withered faces, black like the dirt beneath their bare feet, chains clattering. He could be remembering the faces from his past - still alive perhaps, just across the continent - but he is not the kind of a person to dwell on the past.
The notion of slavery sets Jack’s teeth on edge. Freedom, his father would say, is a relative privilege. Jack could not explain it if ever asked, but somehow this sight does not sit well with him. It makes him question things he does not want to start questioning.
He twirls an old Spanish dollar between his fingers. Cannot remember where he acquired the coin. It looks almost black. He tosses it up, watches it overturn, glimmering dimly in the moonlight, and puts it back in his pocket.
A man who has naught has no right to complain. That much Beckett tries to make inescapably clear at every conversation. But then, such a man has nothing to lose either. Jack mentally reviews the chapters of his life: a pirate brat turned adventurer turned sea merchant in the employ of the British Empire - and still mere illusions of freedom in sight. Jack listens to the ominous clanking of shackles and casts a quick glance at his wrists as if to make sure he is still unbound.
And what is the point really? All the prestige, all the fair pay that comes with this position has too steep a price, almost like having to pledge his soul over and over again. And worst of all, the devil is not Cutler Beckett; the devil is Jack, not knowing what it is that he really wants for himself.
He regards his pistol, its weight heavy and secure in his hand. Shoot them or shoot yourself, it makes no difference. But they shoot dogs and horses, don’t they?
There is a way to stamp this dull fury out. Find a tavern and get dry. Till there is no memory of what he is doing and why he is doing it. Because it is only this way, tipsy as Davy’s sow, that he can live with himself through what’s to come. He wonders whose freedom is really about to end up on the sacrificial altar: theirs or his.
He should not feel guilty. This is, after all, just business, as Beckett would put it. Their life was over long before they crossed paths with Jack; his is in bloom.
If it could be called a life, a nasty voice at the back of his mind murmurs. Waiting for every miserable pittance of theirs like a starved dog at its masters’ table - life could, should be so much more than that!
Jack looks back at the slanted signboard indicating a tavern. Not today, love. Throwing your life away works better with a fresh head.
He strolls up the ladder, feeling like a man mounting the scaffold. New experience. Jack has always been all for new experience. There are two bloody cells in the brig, not nearly enough to cram all these people inside, and the storage unit is packed for a long voyage already. Some of them appear to be sick. The stench of sweat and vomit is nigh unbearable.
Jack shoves the key into the lock, ignoring pairs of lacklustre, bloodshot eyes watching him from the dark. The bolt clicks, a barely audible sound in the stillness of the hold. Jack pulls the barred door open. Then proceeds to open the second cell.
“Off you go,” he whispers, but the slaves just watch him with dull incomprehension. “Out, you wretches!” he barks irritably. He must get them out before the Wicked Wench is ready to sail; otherwise the cause is lost.
Meek dimwittedness is splattered all over their faces. Like cattle. He resists the temptation to leave them to their doom. If they were all to be slaughtered this very minute, they could not care less; then why should he?
Jack takes a few steps towards the ladder and waves at them to follow. After a moment of doubt, a sturdy fellow, white by the looks of it, but too dirty to tell, sets foot out of the door. Jack gulps down a sigh of relief and makes his way up without looking back. He can hear them follow in cautious catlike footsteps.
They glide down the gangway and into the night. Jack leaves his hapless flock in a small cove just outside the harbour. As soon as the Wench sets out, they are safe.
He returns to the ship afterwards and pours himself some grog. His gaze drifts lazily over the maps spread out on the table. Somehow he cannot help but notice that Africa looks a bit like a skull.
* * *
“I am disappointed,” Beckett says in that annoyingly patronizing drawl of his.
It didn’t take them long to track Jack down, considering he was not exactly hiding. His ship was confiscated and he was arrested; his employer even deigned him a visit in his gaol, so he is probably expected to feel flattered, eh?
“When you appeared virtually out of nowhere, I thought I was lucky to have you,” Beckett continues evenly. “You were a valuable asset. And then you did this. Why, Jack? Have you taken leave of your senses?”
Jack scowls at that. It’s not like Beckett is terribly curious about the reasons anyway.
“I understand the power of conviction,” Beckett remarks. “As well as the appeal of doing something grand. And since that was possibly the most significant achievement of yours, I regret to say your efforts have been wasted. They are not people, Jack. They are goods. Why would you risk everything for cargo?”
“To make you wonder,” Jack scoffs.
Beckett’s disposition remains flawless.
“You do realize that you have committed a crime against the crown, which can only be classified as robbery on the seas. Exactly the sort of activity that you once told me you despised.” He brings his face closer to Jack’s and whispers, half a tone lower, “Piracy.”
Jack smiles. Fate is a bitch, but he has always known that.
“Yet simply branding you a pirate is not enough,” Beckett adds. “You have taken something from the crown; now the crown will take something from you, and I daresay a patch of skin will not cover the expenses.”
Jack eyes him boldly. He can see a fragment of sea through the bars, and while he is separated from it, the feeling of freedom floods him from head to toe, more intoxicating than any liquor. He will not answer to anyone.
“Ah,” Beckett nods, “you think now that you have restored your dignity, you have nothing to lose. You are mistaken, Jack. A lot more can be taken from you than you can imagine.”
He snaps his fingers. The guards push Jack to the window. The sea grows larger before his eyes, infinity of pearly blue strewn with sunlight. And at the clear blue backdrop of the sky there sits the Wench, a golden flower with lily-white sails. A smile tugs at the corners of Jack’s mouth.
He narrows his eyes. Puffs of black smoke swirl over the masts. Jack’s heart sinks. Burning. He presses his face to the bars. She is burning. His sea lady is in flames! A quiet growl of desperation tears itself out of his throat.
Why would they torch their own ship? Jack suddenly sees through Beckett’s game. He knows, feels how much the Wench means to Jack. Even if he escaped from prison, she would forever be lost to him.
He watches in helpless fury as the flames devour her. When she is no more than a flickering dot on the horizon, he is brutally shoved around to face his tormentor. Beckett regards him silently, then signals the guards to let go of him. When all of them are gone, Jack sinks on the floor, defeated, the image of his ship in flames emblazoned in his memory.
Beckett remembers about him two days later and summons him to his quarters. He greets him by lifting a pike with a glowing red “P” brand. Jack stiffens.
“What would you say to a proposition of receiving another ship and a pardon just this once? On certain conditions, of course. I shall not condone a repetition of such a pitiful breach of duty.”
The image of the burning Wench explodes before Jack’s eyes.
“I would say, go to hell.”
The pike digs into his flesh. He clenches his teeth, nostrils flaring, the stench of scorched skin overwhelming. It doesn’t hurt half as much as the destruction of the ship did. Jack laughs through the pain, eyes dry and mad with anger, laughs like the devil in hell will be laughing when he lays his claim on Cutler Beckett’s soul.
* * *
Now is the time to drink. He has just escaped from prison - and damn if it wasn’t too easy, almost like Beckett wanted to see where desperation would lead him. A true captain always goes down with the ship. Should have burnt me there, Jack thinks, guzzling down more and more cheap slop.
“I’ll get you up,” he murmurs. “Even if I bloody well have to do it all by me lonesome.”
He steals a dinghy. By nightfall he is already so drunk that he can barely hold on his feet, and the rocking boat seems steadier than the plane of the shore. Get ya up, he mumbles as he draws closer to the Wench’s place of final rest. Get ya going.
He stands up, shaking, and takes a dive. The sea is cool and black. His head is spinning. He goes up for air and dives again. He drifts in the water, not knowing what he will do even if he finds her, but she must sail again, feel the wind in her sails, glide over the smooth silk of the ocean like a ray of sunlight.
He refuses to go up. His lungs are bursting with the need for oxygen and all the alcohol seems to want to flush out. He grinds his jaws and kicks off harder into the cold underbelly of the sea. She is there, he knows it. Waiting for him. If they should die, they would die free and not on Cutler Beckett’s terms.
He thinks he can see her for a moment, a ghostly carcass in the dark; and there is no more air; and suddenly a force pulls him up, throws him out on the hard deck, he coughs and splutters, and the world is all air again. He struggles to breathe, chest tight, skull splitting in half.
He opens his eyes, catches a movement overhead, like a swarm of squirming eels.
“We meet again, Jack Sparrow,” a nasal voice greets him, and he responds to his oldtime alias with a lunatic half-smile.
“Jonesy! Has anyone ever told you your face is dreadfully unappealing in the aesthetical sense?”
The sea devil leans into him, eyes narrow with concentration. “Do you fear death?”
“That depends. Are you in it?”
Jones gasps out a short laugh. “Still a jester, Sparrow? Shall we see who has the last word?”
Jack manages to get up. A strong smell of seaweed assaults him.
“What makes me so special, mate? If I’m dying, pass me on; if not-.”
“What are you up to, Sparrow?” Jones cuts him off.
“Me? Just out and about, you know.”
Jones takes a step towards him, water trickling down his heavy coat. His tentacles shift chaotically. He looks past Jack, down at the black waters.
“There is a ship down below.” He squints in Jack’s direction. “How much does that ship mean to you?”
Jack eyes him warily. “‘Fraid I don’t follow.”
“What would you be willing to give up for that ship?”
Why does everyone expect him to give something up? His mind flashes back to the Wench.
“Davy Jones,” he slurs amiably, “still trying to get me into one of your devilish bargains?”
“Thirteen years,” Jones says listlessly. “As captain of that ship. Free to roam the seas.”
And a hundred years of servitude to follow? A steep price. But then, Jack is to die this very instant, and despite his bravado it’s not what he would willingly settle for. Life has a lot more to offer than what he has been able to taste so far; as far as he is concerned, it was a mere appetizer.
He shakes Jones’s slippery hand briskly. “Deal.”
* * *
He stops just short of the shipwrecked vessel, the floating debris rocking gently against the sides of his dinghy. His heart is thumping in his throat and the livid brand on his forearm is throbbing with pain. He rises, his fists balled and his jaw set, and cries out:
“Jones! I’m here for my ship, you blasted sea wretch!”
As the charred, ghostly body of what used to be the Wicked Wench rises out of the depths, showering him with salty sprays, Jack tells himself his soul will never rot behind bars again.
December 20-21, 2009