Fic: Not So Ancient History
Not So Ancient History
By
LindsayR
Summary: Cougar has a past that not even the Losers could begin to imagine.
Pairing: Slight Cougar/Jensen
Spoilers: No real Losers spoilers but pre-movie if I have to pick a timeframe.
General spoilers for Pirates of the Caribbean 4.
Author’s Note: Saw Pirates of the Caribbean 4 two days ago and had already started writing this when dustedink posted this: COUGAR IS A... COUGAR WAS A... COUGAR HAS PIRATEY ANCESTRY!!! SOMEONE NEEDS TO DO SOMETHING ABOUT THIS!!! So this is me doing something about it.
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He dreams of gilded halls, palaces and gold. He dreams of the smell of the sea and the mist of the ocean, of wood and sails and ships that don’t exist anymore. He dreams of kings and queens, ladies in waiting and life at Court. He dreams of faith, the supernatural, and the Fountain of Youth. He doesn’t remember the exact words he said that day but remembers enough to know that he said it was for God to grant eternal life, not that pagan water. It makes him laugh bitterly sometimes, the irony that God granted him eternal life. He never wanted to live forever.
His king was the only one who knew, back then, when everyone else began to age, save him. His king knew and understood that for some reason God had chosen him to live on. Still, he sent him away. He could not stay at Court where they lived under microscopes and gossip ran rampant. He would have been called evil, witch, devil. His king would have had to order him killed or thrown in prison. Instead his best friend, his king, gave him money, more than would last three lifetimes, and bade him to leave, travel, and never stay one place long enough to let anyone realize what he was.
Immortal.
So he traveled, saw the world and all it had to offer. There are very few places on the planet he has not traversed. He’s kept moving, saving his money, living frugally, and eventually investing in the stock market. He knows the rest of the Losers would have a field day if they knew the sort of money he has.
The Losers. His best friends and the only family he has known since life at Court. They are nothing like his king or the friends he had at Court, but in many ways it is better. He is no longer the well-bred, well-mannered Spaniard who put his faith and his king above all. He is no longer a leader, a captain, issuing orders and leading a crew. He is content now to be the quiet one, to study others with his eyes and mind rather than bowl them over with words. He leaves that to Jensen.
Amazingly enough, it takes almost three years for them to learn his secret. It’s his own fault, really, for paying more attention to keeping Jensen alive than to the fact that there was a knife wielding assassin sneaking up on his position. The man slits his throat and while he’s choking on blood, he rolls over, pulling the gun hidden in his waistband, and shoots the man point blank between the eyes, before giving in to the darkness that is clouding his vision. It is the soft crying he hears upon waking. He’s laid out on a bed, blanket over his entire body. The blood at his neck is gone as is the wound. Slowly, he lifts the blanket away and spies the source of tears. Jensen. Always Jensen.
He’s been trying to deny it, avoiding any talk of feelings, but this experience has opened his eyes to the fact that it is hurting them both too much to ignore the fact that they love each other any longer. He cannot offer Jensen the sort of life he deserves. Jensen will age, will grow older, and he will remain the same. It cannot last forever, but he will take as many years as he can. With a quiet voice, he whispers his love’s name, and taking in the shock, awe, love, and wonder filling the hacker’s gaze, knows that the time has come. His secret will be revealed. Somehow though, he’s finally realized that the Losers, his friends, won’t really care.