FANFIC: Sea Turtles (4/6) For potcfest challenge
Title: Sea Turtles
Author: mamazano
Characters: Gibbs, Scarlett, Giselle, AnaMaria, Jack
Rating: PG-13 (mild suggestive talk)
Disclaimer: Disney owns them, I just play with them
Summary: Gibbs agrees to escort Scarlett & Giselle on a simple "shopping" excursion. Little did he know, they'd be getting more than they bargained for.
Author's notes: Written for potcfest
Prompt # 102. A non-sexual adventure that happens to Gibbs, Scarlett, and Giselle after they wander away from the docks at the end of AWE - anytime after.
Special thanks goes to compassrose7577 for her diligent beta-reading and overall advice.
Previous Chapters: One Two Three
Sea Turtles - Chapter 4
****
AnaMaria led the way down the road, her destination the healer’s house in the hills. Her cousins followed, carting the unconscious Jack Sparrow. Giselle, tenacious as ever, brought up the rear. Realizing they could not carry Jack the entire way, and unable to locate a wagon, Ana’s cousins had scrounged the next best thing: a wheelbarrow. The wheel squeaked mournfully as they pushed Jack along.
Giselle was torn between waiting for Gibbs and Scarlett or going with the others. Figuring that Gibbs would take care of her friend, Giselle opted to go with Ana and her cousins, hoping they could find help for Jack. Burning with a fever, he had not regained consciousness, and lay sprawled in the makeshift cart, one beringed hand hanging over the side. Despite her worries, Giselle, had to smile as she noted that Jack had acquired yet another new ring, this one a gold signet.
The wide road narrowed to a rutted path as they reached the outskirts of the town. They trudged down the muddy road without conversation, only the squeaking of the barrow wheel breaking the silence. The sun was riding low in the sky, by the time they reached the small, hill settlement, a collection of wattle and mud-smeared houses, with deep porches and palm-thatched roofs.
After a hurried consultation between brothers, they turned down a small path that wound its way past an assortment of cottages, with chickens busily pecking in the yards, and small vegetable gardens planted behind. Mongrel dogs wandered lazily along the road and goats grazed the green hillside.
Surrounded by a crude split-log fence, the last house in the lane was set back from the road, amid trees festooned with an odd assortment of trinkets and shiny objects. On closer examination, they turned out to be bits of broken bottles, feathers, crude pottery and shells, bleached bones and a shriveled chicken foot or two.
The house itself was larger than any of the others they had passed. It was a wooden structure built on either side of a wide breezeway, with tall windows that offered additional ventilation.. Set on posts and raised several feet off the ground, the house had a high-pitched thatched roof and a deep veranda encircling it, providing welcome shade.
As they entered the gate, a woman came out to stand on the front steps. Her teeth flashed white against her ebony face, her hair done up in a red scarf, her dress a swirl of color.
“What can I do you for?”
“Tante Mamie!” André stepped forward in the fading light.
“André!” The woman came down the steps and threw her arms around him. “How be you?”
“I am fine, Tante. But my friend here, is not so fine.” He gestured to Jack, where he lay in the wheelbarrow.
“He is sick?” She went over and gave Jack a closer look. She gasped. “Jack Sparrow!”
“You know him?” Ana stepped closer.
Mamie nodded. “Me know him.” She frowned as she felt Jack’s head. “Him no good. Plez, kom ina mai haus. Kom, bring him.”
A younger woman appeared on the steps, a young child clinging to her side, eyes wide with wonder. “Mama, who is it?”
“André et Marcel, Thérèse garsons. You know dem?”
“Of course.” She came down into the yard and gave them each a hug. Turning to Ana she said, “I am Jolee. You are Ana. I believe we met, once?”
Ana nodded. “When we were young, oui.” She turned a concerned face toward her cousins carrying Jack up the steps. “Do you think your mother can help him?”
Jolee nodded. “For Jack Sparrow? For him, she would do most anything, if at all possible. Come, we will see what we can do.”
They turned and went into the house, leaving Giselle standing in the yard, forgotten, unwanted, and alone.
****
“Mister Gibbs! Are you sure this is the right way?” Scarlett paused to mop her face with her handkerchief. They had been walking for what seemed like forever, following a rutted path in the fading light of day.
Gibbs was peering down at the path, squinting into the gloom. “Aye, they came this way. See the tracks here,” he said pointing. “And here. Looks to me, they’ve got them a cart of some sort.” He wiped his face and neck with his neck scarf. “Most likely to carry Jack.”
Scarlett snorted. “Most likely, we’ve been following some local going home from market.” She was tired: tired of walking, tired of being hot, then wet, then hungry, and now thirsty… tired of this whole adventure.
“No! No! No! This is the right path.” Gibbs straightened and glanced at the sky. “We best be going, if we’re t’ find ‘em before dark.”
They turned off the main road, onto an even narrower path, past a row of cottages, their candlelit windows providing a feeble light to illuminate their way. By the time they arrived at the house at the end of the lane, the stars had begun to appear. The track they were following ended there, as well, an empty wheelbarrow setting in the dooryard.
Scarlett shivered as a wind suddenly blew cool across her face, the oddments hanging from the trees clinking softly, as the last vestiges of daylight faded behind the hills. The house sat crouched in the darkness, the windows glowing like eyes in the night.
“Now what?” Scarlett asked, peevish and disappointed.
Gibbs rested his hand on the butt of his gun, nervous and alert. “Figure, this must be the place. We’ll just go in and ask…”
“Ask what?” Scarlett demanded, exasperated. “’Excuse me, but did you happen to see my friends? You can’t miss them; they have a notorious, and unconscious, pirate with them.’”
Gibbs nodded sheepishly. “That’d about do it.” He opened the gate and peered into the dim. “’Pears t’ be someone sittin’ there.”
Scarlett, following on his heels, squinted as well, just able to make out a figure sitting on the stoop, elbows on knees, chin in hand. It was Giselle, looking rather dejected.
“Giselle!” Scarlett rushed across the yard. “Where’s Jack?”
Her friend looked up, her face troubled. “They took him inside.”
“Why are you sitting out here?” Gibbs glanced up at the house.
“Wasn’t invited.” Giselle sighed. “They just went inside, never said a word to me, like I didn’t exist.”
Frowning, Gibbs stepped to the door and knocked. A few moments later, a young woman opened the door. “I’m here about Jack Sparrow,” Gibbs said without preamble.
“He is a friend of yours?” The woman glanced past him, toward Scarlett and Giselle.
Gibbs nodded. “Aye, and the ladies, as well.”
“Wait a moment.” The woman closed the door.
A small wind stirred the odd ornaments hanging in the trees; they tinkled and jangled, lending an eerie sound to the stillness. Scarlett shivered, a prickly sensation on the back of her neck. A black and white cat wandered around the corner of the porch, paused and stretched lazily, then went over and butted against Giselle’s hand with his head. Allowing a scratch or two behind his ear, he casually strolled into the yard, and sat, tail twitching intently as he stared at a patch of grass. In a blur of motion, the cat pounced, and then pranced off into the bushes with his prize, hanging from his mouth. Scarlett shuddered, her mood troubled by the implied premonition.
The wind picked up, swirling leaves through the yard, the items in the trees clanging louder. A low, throaty yowl sounded from the bushes, then another. The black and white cat raced back towards the house, his fur standing on edge. A clap of thunder sounded directly overhead, causing both women to jump in alarm. The rain came without another warning, a sudden downpour that drowned out any other sound.
The three of them retreated further onto the porch to escape the deluge. Then, almost as abruptly as it had begun, the rain ceased. The frogs began to call, in a harmonious calliope of sound, accompanied by the buzzing of the cicadas in the trees above. Fireflies dotted the yard with their intermittent flashes of light.
Scarlett glanced at Giselle, where she sat in a rattan chair, half illuminated by the light spilling from the window. She appeared to be toying with something in her lap.
“What’s that?” Scarlett asked, curiously creeping toward her.
Giselle quickly stuffed the object into her purse. “Nothing! Just a trinket I picked up at the market.”
“Let me see,” Scarlett demanded, holding out her hand.
Giselle paused for a moment, then reached in her purse with an embarrassed smile as she did as she was bade. “It’s nothing, Letty. Just a bit of fun.”
Scarlett examined the little doll, a remarkable image of Jack Sparrow. Gibbs, who had been staring out into the yard, turned and gasped, his face blanched.
“Where’d you get that? Them dolls are bad luck,” he said in a low ominous voice, pointing at the bois bois doll. “I tell you, known to bring harm, to the one they look like.”
Giselle’s eyes widened with realization. “Do you think…?”
At that moment, the front door opened again and Ana came outside. “You best come see Jack, before it’s too late,” she said, her voice twisted with emotion.
The three of them followed her into the house, through a large open room with high ceiling and mud-plastered walls, sparsely furnished with a mixture of rattan and wood, the floors covered with woven palm mats. Ana led them down a central breezeway, towards the back of the house, where there were two smaller rooms that served as bedrooms. The moonlight streamed through the lattice-covered window, casting a crisscross pattern of shadows across the room. Jack was there in bed, sweating in pools of water, delirious with a high fever, and writhing in agony.
“What’s the matter with him?” Giselle asked, hushed.
A voice from the shadows answered. “Someone done put a gris-gris on him.”
Gibbs eyes widened and he hastily crossed himself, turned around counterclockwise twice and spit.
Scarlett, being the most pragmatic of the group, raised an eyebrow and asked coolly, “What exactly is that supposed to mean?”
“Someone has cast a spell against him,” Jolee explained. “They’ve bewitched him, somehow. Mama is doing all she can, but her medicines are not powerful enough to counter this.”
Giselle cast a worried look at Jack. “Will he die?”
Mamie came over with a towel and wiped Jack’s brow, while muttering to herself. She shook her head and turned to them.
“De Obeah must be called. Dis bad, bad for Jack.” She narrowed her eyes and asked, “None of you know who done this? Who done cast de spell?”
Giselle, a stricken look on her face, pulled the little doll from her pocket, and held it up for all to see, swallowing hard. “I think I did,” she said, tremulously
****
Go to Chapter Five
Author: mamazano
Characters: Gibbs, Scarlett, Giselle, AnaMaria, Jack
Rating: PG-13 (mild suggestive talk)
Disclaimer: Disney owns them, I just play with them
Summary: Gibbs agrees to escort Scarlett & Giselle on a simple "shopping" excursion. Little did he know, they'd be getting more than they bargained for.
Author's notes: Written for potcfest
Prompt # 102. A non-sexual adventure that happens to Gibbs, Scarlett, and Giselle after they wander away from the docks at the end of AWE - anytime after.
Special thanks goes to compassrose7577 for her diligent beta-reading and overall advice.
Previous Chapters: One Two Three
Sea Turtles - Chapter 4
****
AnaMaria led the way down the road, her destination the healer’s house in the hills. Her cousins followed, carting the unconscious Jack Sparrow. Giselle, tenacious as ever, brought up the rear. Realizing they could not carry Jack the entire way, and unable to locate a wagon, Ana’s cousins had scrounged the next best thing: a wheelbarrow. The wheel squeaked mournfully as they pushed Jack along.
Giselle was torn between waiting for Gibbs and Scarlett or going with the others. Figuring that Gibbs would take care of her friend, Giselle opted to go with Ana and her cousins, hoping they could find help for Jack. Burning with a fever, he had not regained consciousness, and lay sprawled in the makeshift cart, one beringed hand hanging over the side. Despite her worries, Giselle, had to smile as she noted that Jack had acquired yet another new ring, this one a gold signet.
The wide road narrowed to a rutted path as they reached the outskirts of the town. They trudged down the muddy road without conversation, only the squeaking of the barrow wheel breaking the silence. The sun was riding low in the sky, by the time they reached the small, hill settlement, a collection of wattle and mud-smeared houses, with deep porches and palm-thatched roofs.
After a hurried consultation between brothers, they turned down a small path that wound its way past an assortment of cottages, with chickens busily pecking in the yards, and small vegetable gardens planted behind. Mongrel dogs wandered lazily along the road and goats grazed the green hillside.
Surrounded by a crude split-log fence, the last house in the lane was set back from the road, amid trees festooned with an odd assortment of trinkets and shiny objects. On closer examination, they turned out to be bits of broken bottles, feathers, crude pottery and shells, bleached bones and a shriveled chicken foot or two.
The house itself was larger than any of the others they had passed. It was a wooden structure built on either side of a wide breezeway, with tall windows that offered additional ventilation.. Set on posts and raised several feet off the ground, the house had a high-pitched thatched roof and a deep veranda encircling it, providing welcome shade.
As they entered the gate, a woman came out to stand on the front steps. Her teeth flashed white against her ebony face, her hair done up in a red scarf, her dress a swirl of color.
“What can I do you for?”
“Tante Mamie!” André stepped forward in the fading light.
“André!” The woman came down the steps and threw her arms around him. “How be you?”
“I am fine, Tante. But my friend here, is not so fine.” He gestured to Jack, where he lay in the wheelbarrow.
“He is sick?” She went over and gave Jack a closer look. She gasped. “Jack Sparrow!”
“You know him?” Ana stepped closer.
Mamie nodded. “Me know him.” She frowned as she felt Jack’s head. “Him no good. Plez, kom ina mai haus. Kom, bring him.”
A younger woman appeared on the steps, a young child clinging to her side, eyes wide with wonder. “Mama, who is it?”
“André et Marcel, Thérèse garsons. You know dem?”
“Of course.” She came down into the yard and gave them each a hug. Turning to Ana she said, “I am Jolee. You are Ana. I believe we met, once?”
Ana nodded. “When we were young, oui.” She turned a concerned face toward her cousins carrying Jack up the steps. “Do you think your mother can help him?”
Jolee nodded. “For Jack Sparrow? For him, she would do most anything, if at all possible. Come, we will see what we can do.”
They turned and went into the house, leaving Giselle standing in the yard, forgotten, unwanted, and alone.
****
“Mister Gibbs! Are you sure this is the right way?” Scarlett paused to mop her face with her handkerchief. They had been walking for what seemed like forever, following a rutted path in the fading light of day.
Gibbs was peering down at the path, squinting into the gloom. “Aye, they came this way. See the tracks here,” he said pointing. “And here. Looks to me, they’ve got them a cart of some sort.” He wiped his face and neck with his neck scarf. “Most likely to carry Jack.”
Scarlett snorted. “Most likely, we’ve been following some local going home from market.” She was tired: tired of walking, tired of being hot, then wet, then hungry, and now thirsty… tired of this whole adventure.
“No! No! No! This is the right path.” Gibbs straightened and glanced at the sky. “We best be going, if we’re t’ find ‘em before dark.”
They turned off the main road, onto an even narrower path, past a row of cottages, their candlelit windows providing a feeble light to illuminate their way. By the time they arrived at the house at the end of the lane, the stars had begun to appear. The track they were following ended there, as well, an empty wheelbarrow setting in the dooryard.
Scarlett shivered as a wind suddenly blew cool across her face, the oddments hanging from the trees clinking softly, as the last vestiges of daylight faded behind the hills. The house sat crouched in the darkness, the windows glowing like eyes in the night.
“Now what?” Scarlett asked, peevish and disappointed.
Gibbs rested his hand on the butt of his gun, nervous and alert. “Figure, this must be the place. We’ll just go in and ask…”
“Ask what?” Scarlett demanded, exasperated. “’Excuse me, but did you happen to see my friends? You can’t miss them; they have a notorious, and unconscious, pirate with them.’”
Gibbs nodded sheepishly. “That’d about do it.” He opened the gate and peered into the dim. “’Pears t’ be someone sittin’ there.”
Scarlett, following on his heels, squinted as well, just able to make out a figure sitting on the stoop, elbows on knees, chin in hand. It was Giselle, looking rather dejected.
“Giselle!” Scarlett rushed across the yard. “Where’s Jack?”
Her friend looked up, her face troubled. “They took him inside.”
“Why are you sitting out here?” Gibbs glanced up at the house.
“Wasn’t invited.” Giselle sighed. “They just went inside, never said a word to me, like I didn’t exist.”
Frowning, Gibbs stepped to the door and knocked. A few moments later, a young woman opened the door. “I’m here about Jack Sparrow,” Gibbs said without preamble.
“He is a friend of yours?” The woman glanced past him, toward Scarlett and Giselle.
Gibbs nodded. “Aye, and the ladies, as well.”
“Wait a moment.” The woman closed the door.
A small wind stirred the odd ornaments hanging in the trees; they tinkled and jangled, lending an eerie sound to the stillness. Scarlett shivered, a prickly sensation on the back of her neck. A black and white cat wandered around the corner of the porch, paused and stretched lazily, then went over and butted against Giselle’s hand with his head. Allowing a scratch or two behind his ear, he casually strolled into the yard, and sat, tail twitching intently as he stared at a patch of grass. In a blur of motion, the cat pounced, and then pranced off into the bushes with his prize, hanging from his mouth. Scarlett shuddered, her mood troubled by the implied premonition.
The wind picked up, swirling leaves through the yard, the items in the trees clanging louder. A low, throaty yowl sounded from the bushes, then another. The black and white cat raced back towards the house, his fur standing on edge. A clap of thunder sounded directly overhead, causing both women to jump in alarm. The rain came without another warning, a sudden downpour that drowned out any other sound.
The three of them retreated further onto the porch to escape the deluge. Then, almost as abruptly as it had begun, the rain ceased. The frogs began to call, in a harmonious calliope of sound, accompanied by the buzzing of the cicadas in the trees above. Fireflies dotted the yard with their intermittent flashes of light.
Scarlett glanced at Giselle, where she sat in a rattan chair, half illuminated by the light spilling from the window. She appeared to be toying with something in her lap.
“What’s that?” Scarlett asked, curiously creeping toward her.
Giselle quickly stuffed the object into her purse. “Nothing! Just a trinket I picked up at the market.”
“Let me see,” Scarlett demanded, holding out her hand.
Giselle paused for a moment, then reached in her purse with an embarrassed smile as she did as she was bade. “It’s nothing, Letty. Just a bit of fun.”
Scarlett examined the little doll, a remarkable image of Jack Sparrow. Gibbs, who had been staring out into the yard, turned and gasped, his face blanched.
“Where’d you get that? Them dolls are bad luck,” he said in a low ominous voice, pointing at the bois bois doll. “I tell you, known to bring harm, to the one they look like.”
Giselle’s eyes widened with realization. “Do you think…?”
At that moment, the front door opened again and Ana came outside. “You best come see Jack, before it’s too late,” she said, her voice twisted with emotion.
The three of them followed her into the house, through a large open room with high ceiling and mud-plastered walls, sparsely furnished with a mixture of rattan and wood, the floors covered with woven palm mats. Ana led them down a central breezeway, towards the back of the house, where there were two smaller rooms that served as bedrooms. The moonlight streamed through the lattice-covered window, casting a crisscross pattern of shadows across the room. Jack was there in bed, sweating in pools of water, delirious with a high fever, and writhing in agony.
“What’s the matter with him?” Giselle asked, hushed.
A voice from the shadows answered. “Someone done put a gris-gris on him.”
Gibbs eyes widened and he hastily crossed himself, turned around counterclockwise twice and spit.
Scarlett, being the most pragmatic of the group, raised an eyebrow and asked coolly, “What exactly is that supposed to mean?”
“Someone has cast a spell against him,” Jolee explained. “They’ve bewitched him, somehow. Mama is doing all she can, but her medicines are not powerful enough to counter this.”
Giselle cast a worried look at Jack. “Will he die?”
Mamie came over with a towel and wiped Jack’s brow, while muttering to herself. She shook her head and turned to them.
“De Obeah must be called. Dis bad, bad for Jack.” She narrowed her eyes and asked, “None of you know who done this? Who done cast de spell?”
Giselle, a stricken look on her face, pulled the little doll from her pocket, and held it up for all to see, swallowing hard. “I think I did,” she said, tremulously
****
Go to Chapter Five