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Author: Guede Mazaka
Rating: PG-13. Violence, themes, and strong language. Some main characters dead previous to beginning of story.
Pairing: Will Turner/James Norrington, Jacques/Jack/José Gaspar.
Feedback: Favorite lines, constructive suggestions, etc. are all welcome.
Disclaimer: None of this is mine except these versions of Jacques and José. And that's only sort of.
Notes: Jacques uses the occasional French phrase (still shouldn't interfere with reading); translations upon request. //words// in Spanish. Modern-day parallel universe. Jacques looks like Brad Pitt, and José like Antonio Banderas. Some supernatural stuff.
Summary: Mindgames while driving can be dangerous for your health. For that matter, they can be dangerous anywhere.
***
"Hell itself can be no worse than the road that leads to it."-Yiddish proverb
***
A generally reliable measure by which to judge the importance of a matter is how early a man is willing to get up and discuss it. For instance, Anamaria knew it was a matter of life or death if Will managed to pitch Jack out of bed and to the negotiating table before ten in the morning.
Currently, it was five A. M. And Will was nowhere in sight, while Jack looked eerily bright-eyed. No bushy tail, but the hair probably filled in for that. Still, the way he smiled and…acted as if he were aware was downright frightening. She folded a hand over the small of her back, over the gun nestled in her waistband, and stayed by her truck. "Well, I'm here. Now, what's the deal?"
"Bit standoffish, aren't you?" He rolled down the front steps, then perched on the second one from the bottom. In the false lightening of almost dawn, Jack was a living skeleton with pearl-inlaid skin and hellfire eyes. "Wise."
"Sparrow, you and I always knew where we stood, and I never pretended different. So don't go blaming-hell, you mangy rum-soaked bastard, I should be the one booting your ass." Anamaria jabbed an accusing finger at him, but didn't take her eyes from his. "You wrecked my-"
Something brassy and round arched from one of Jack's hands to another, like he was juggling. He grabbed his knees and rocked back, mockery of oldtime gangsters who did their ordering from the porch. "Enough, Anamaria. We could go on like that all day."
"And you'd damn well deserve it." Just as a reminder, she slapped hand against arm.
"I might." Jack made a grand show of wincing and rubbing at the cheek that had borne her fury the last time. Then his eyes narrowed, and she could've sworn that the dark stuff outlining them curled into flames for a moment. "You'd also deserve it. So what say we call that even. Squared. And proceed to the present?"
Sensible enough offer, and just about what Anamaria had been planning to say. Which worried her; Jack couldn't usually be bothered to pay attention to details unless he was truly serious. And precious little put him in that state, thank God, or else there'd be considerably bigger cracks in the ground than those faultlines the newspapers were always going on about.
On the other hand, if that was true, the best thing to do was to stay on Jack's good side, take the loot and get back to neutrality, quick. "And what's that?"
"You see that?" He waved an arm toward the open garage, where reposed a truly formidable pile of boxes. When she squinted, she could just make out someone's neat handwriting-someone new, which made her even more anxious to leave-lettering every one. "Your standard household goods, portable appliances. Some valuables I'm not too fond of looking at anymore. A few of the older weapons, but they still work. And they've been vetted."
"Better be. You know how much trouble it was explaining how a little rich girl's peashooter could turn into a flamethrower?" Very carefully, moving so they both knew she wasn't being a fool, Anamaria reached into the truck and pulled out her meter. She pointed it at the heap, banged the damn thing a few times as gentle encouragement, then clucked her tongue while the readings came up. "All right, they're clean. And in respect to our previous history doing business, I'll refrain from checking the contents."
Jack held up a grubby list, covered with Jacques' looping, bizarrely slanting script. "Inventory."
"Try anything fresh, and I'll take your head off. Just bought these pants, and I'm not in the mood to ruin them." Anamaria started to come over, but whirled around when a shadow that shouldn't have been there appeared at the corner of the house.
"Very lovely, madam. I'd hate for those to be dirtied, too." Pretty blond lankiness sauntered around the corner and dropped himself besides Jack on the step, radiating possessiveness even as Jack's hand snaked about his throat, scratching very lightly under the chin.
Shaking her head, she relaxed and squatted in front of the two desert crazies. "All right, then. Let's see, and then we can open bidding."
Anamaria and Jack dickered for a good, lively quarter-hour before coming to an amount with which both of them could live. They shook on it and she flipped out her cell to call the other trucks waiting just beyond the bend of the road.
After everything had been loaded and taken away, and it was only them and her again, she went back to the truck to get the appropriately-sized wad of bills. Then she had the fun of watching Jack jab that packet of greenbacks at Jacques' lounging form.
"You selling the house, too?" She folded her arms over her breasts and grinned all she pleased as the Frenchman batted and wriggled, and Jack cursed.
"Keeping the land. Getting rid of the house; we've put too much into it. By the way, I wouldn't go near the ruins afterward." The dollars finally vanished somewhere in Jacques' clothes, and Jack resumed his usual half-dazed calm as he looked at her.
She nodded and kept her mouth shut, though his warning was commonsense that anyone with half a hand in the cauldron should know, and insulting since she damn well bathed in the cauldron. "What's the occasion, anyway? You got a date to get slapped by some woman halfway across the country?"
"I and Barbossa are about due." Jack's face didn't change. It should have. No man should be able to seem that casual and that decisive about…
…fuck, it wasn't her business, was it? "I see. Well, best of luck, Sparrow. And…" she tapped a long nail against her lip, resisting the urge to chew on it "…be a damn shame if you never stopped round again."
"Anamaria," Jack said, drawing out the vowels in a tease, "Are you admitting that you'd miss me?"
"I'm admitting that it'd be a pain in my fine ass if I had a permanently cursed patch of real estate in my territory, without an owner," she snapped. Her smile was too soft for her sarcasm, but she didn't care. Whatever else he was, Jack was a man she respected.
Which reminded her of a nasty bit of unfinished business. Anamaria took a deep breath. "Listen, Jack. I never meant to say it that way to Will-"
His eyes hardened.
"-I do like him," she ended, voice faltering at the end.
"Well, you did, and there's no changing that. I was planning to tell him about his mother, sooner of later. But not like…" Jack shook himself, and when he glanced up again, he was all clownish cheer. "See you."
If nothing else, Anamaria knew a hint when she saw one. "Later."
As she got into her truck, José showed up, drinking a bottle of what she figured to be rum. Which immediately got Jack annoyed-and damn, she wished she could stick around to watch. But prudence won out over lechery, and she reluctantly drove away.
Anamaria didn't hold with anyone's revenge except her own, and none of her present grudges were serious enough to deserve that status. Nor did she intend to acquire any new ones. So she turned her truck toward the tailgates of the rest of her gang, and didn't look back.
***
Strange thumpings from the trunk never meant anything good. Especially when they were mixed with muffled Spanish-French cursing.
When questioned, however, Jack looked defensive and clutched his compass. He stroked a possessive hand down the side of the gigantic black tank of a car. "Engine's running fine. I checked every inch myself."
"That's not the engine making those noises." Will folded his arms over his chest and strolled up to the back end, then popped the lid. He dropped his face into his hand. "Jack. No. You remember what happened last time you kept them in there."
"And you told me not to get distracted this time. Well, that's damn near impossible with them out."
Something creaked behind them, and the smile cracked right off Jack's face. He made some looping salute to what Will presumed was James coming up behind, then waved at the car. "Our conveyance, m'lord."
"It looks like it actually runs." The other man sounded edgy, as if he thought that any moment the ground was going to open up under him and chomp him into dog kibble.
Will wouldn't mind that, actually, but there were whining men in the trunk and he needed to untie them. Maybe not take out the gags, because José knew a hell of a lot of curses and Jacques' face was that shade of lobster unique to pissed-off shamans. And Will didn't feel like getting in the middle of another spell-fight. "All right, out."
Gaspar took care of the gag himself as he clawed his way free. "Thank you, Will. Jack, you're a fucking ungrateful son of a bitch, and I should-"
--melt the moment Jack laid a finger on him. Well, actually it was grab the back of his neck like he was a recalcitrant kitten. José shut up and purred, rubbing against Jack's side, while Jacques made a disgusted snort and hopped out the other side. "Who's driving?"
Really only one choice, but Will kept quiet and just loaded the last bags into the newly freed-up space in the trunk. Appearances aside, Jack was in an odd mood this morning, and with all the other strange vibrations in the air, it was best to keep out of it.
Minor crackle in space-time as the other man held his compass up to the sun, softly whistling. He stroked José's hair, slow and digging, then chucked Gaspar under the chin. "Left, and on the coast. Tortuga first."
"Tortuga? Why do we-" When they all turned to look at him, James broke off his protest, but it didn't mean he killed it. Will could see the thought squirming in the backs of James' eyes, wriggling beneath the other man's skin.
And he should stop looking at that. No, he should look, because Norrington was worth a glance and Will was male, but he shouldn't, well, attach a whole load of useless value to it. Ignoring the situation, Will reminded himself. Bad plan, but it would keep him from tripping up a lot longer than weeping like a housewife on Oprah would.
"Tortuga." Jack pronounced the name of the infamous Mexican coast town with great precision. Gambler-like, he flipped the compass and slapped it down on his other wrist. "Will. You're taking the first leg, and we're taking the back."
"Right." Which would keep the groping relatively out of sight, but also created an arrangement that practically defined awkward. Nothing to do about it, though, so Will got himself into the front seat and wrestled the keys from Jack before Jacques managed to squeeze into the backseat. Thank God the car had a CD player, and working radio. If Will managed things right, he might be able to do without having to speak to Norrington.
Not looking anywhere except the floor and the road outside, James climbed into the seat beside Will and automatically reached for the seatbelt. He frowned, scrabbled a little longer, and finally turned around to see what was going on. Promptly twisted back.
"Quoi? Something wrong?" Jacques' head briefly emerged, then dropped back with a moan.
"I took out the seatbelts because they were…getting too creative." Will said, putting his eyeroll in his voice. He put the car into gear and slowly pulled onto the dirt track that passed for a road, then slammed down on the accelerator. Impressively, James only whipped a foot forward before he had himself braced into place like Will. "Hold on."
"What the-" Oh, Norrington was angry again, was he?
"Goddamn, Will. Some warning would be-" José hauled himself up to face the back window and muttered "-nice."
Red and orange suddenly flooded the rearview mirror, making Will flinch away from that side. Thank God the car had such good soundproofing. "Sorry."
//Not really, but that's okay. We still love your sword.// The other man's face suddenly dropped out of sight, and Will had an unobstructed view of the burning house.
"Do you." If it wasn't for that laughing flicker in Jack's eye, he might look almost menacing. His dreads clinked up and down as he proceeded to demonstrate to José why tact was a sensible idea.
"Are they always…" James' cheeks were red from jaw to eye.
Will rubbed his temple and dug out his cigarettes. He cranked down a window and turned up the A/C, which was a little redundant, but fuck it. If he didn't feel like it, they couldn't make him watch, smell or hear. "Yes. There's some CDs in the glove compartment. You mind?"
"Ah…" The other man rummaged, and things clicked and snapped. Will winced. "Sorry; I didn't break any of them. Which one did you want?"
No lighter fluid. Fucker. Will knew he'd forgotten to do something. He wriggled around until he could swing his arm over the seat back and dangle the cigarette somewhere near Jacques' whimpering. Fingers clicked, flame hissed, and he untwisted to bring the lit cancerstick to his lips. "Surprise me."
***
Turner's attitude alternated between wounded wariness and uncaring oblivion, but James thought the former predominated a touch more than the latter. He would have liked to work out some kind of truce, but he hadn't managed to find a moment of privacy with the other man. Somehow Jacques or José was always around, politely asking him about this or pointing out that to him. They were…preoccupied with other matters now, but he still had the prickling in his thumbs and back of his neck that told him he was being watched. Somehow.
Very polite, they were, and Jack as well. In the same manner that James had observed groups of women acting toward a lone, bedraggled target whom they intended to force out. It made sudden mass-slaughter seem unexpectedly attractive to him, except for the fact that he needed allies until he had gotten within striking distance of Barbossa. So he would grit his teeth, and let it roll off his back.
And…he was putting on old-school punk-rock. Because while he might intend to avoid aggressiveness, that was still no reason to become a doormat.
"You…" Will arched an eyebrow, and offered James cigarettes again, which he turned down. "Never figured you for that type."
"One of my lieutenants enjoyed this kind of music, and he kept it on all the time. I became accustomed to it." To James' great relief, the slurping and bumping noises from the back had died down to the occasional drowsy mew. He leaned against the window and watched a huge bird soar overhead, so high it was nothing more than a bent black stripe.
"He have a name?"
James didn't immediately answer, choosing instead to covertly study the other man. Slightly wrinkled brow, but the skin around the mouth and jawline was free of angry tightness. Will didn't seem to be trying to pick a fight more than just holding up bland chit chat as a wall between them. Which was fine with James. "Groves-Theodore Groves. A good man."
"Take it he's dead, then." A veiled look of sympathy, shot across the dashboard. Gray smoke whipped by Will's cheek, sucked out the window.
"Yes. He was still in Port Royal with me." And that was all James cared to say on the subject; Turner could and probably had gotten the rest from the broadcasters. The music crazed the space between them, fracturing the air with half-hissed fits of garbled swearing so James could pretend the silence wasn't uncomfortable.
Once in a while, he thought he could just catch Will glancing at him. Then again, that could be a trick of the light, brought on by the fact that he was sneaking peeks at the other man. Simply checking for any negative reactions, and that was all. He very much couldn't afford to lose this chance at revenge, and he was afraid that that was just what was going to happen.
Somewhere deep in him, he knew that he'd become obsessed with the idea of vengeance, that he'd strayed from the lawful path. But loving justice meant objectivity. Meant a cold, distant relationship. And when it came down to the wire, James had never favored that kind. Elizabeth had been pure fire, beneath that proper upbringing and those tasteful clothes. God, if her father had ever seen her dressed to the nines in miniskirt and fishnets, dragging James along to some raucous nightclub-
--except Weatherby wouldn't, would he? Not when he was a heap of ashes in some urn somewhere. James hoped whoever'd informed the poor man's surviving relatives hadn't been callous enough to mention that that was all that could be recovered of him.
Fire. Fire and gunshots, and Elizabeth falling in a bloodstreaked flurry because she'd insisted on staying and guarding James' back. If she'd jumped into the water and swam, she might have survived.
If he'd been a little more watchful, and a little less trusting of the Admiralty's assurances that Barbossa had come to heel, then perhaps she never would have had to take up a sword in the first place.
James strangled his growl, and then snapped off the neck of his bitter recollections. He knew damned well what he had lost, and wallowing in it wouldn't bring his wife back. Killing Barbossa wouldn't, either, but at least James would know then that the man would never commit another such atrocity. It wasn't justice now-it was finality James was after.
Forces shifted as the car swung into a turn, and something banged into his knee. His new sword, present from Will for no apparent reason besides James seeming worthy of it to the other man, whatever that actually meant. Turner hadn't asked for it back, though, so James assumed it was a permanent gift.
The sword he'd lost had been a gift, too. Elizabeth had spent a small fortune on it, and now it was residing in the bloodstained claws of Barbossa, its beautiful steel polluted beyond recovery. When-not if-James retrieved it, he planned to break it in two and throw the pieces into the ocean, the only place with enough water to wash it clean.
"I'll take the wheel in another two hours," Jack suddenly said. Leather squealed alarmingly as James jolted to attention, but no one decided to comment on it.
"Right. Pissing break then." Will tilted his head back, blew a steady stream of dragon-breath at the ceiling, and then glanced at the road. Casually corrected the trajectory of the car.
James could see echoes of Jack all over the other man, in the ways Will spoke and walked and fought. But they were echoes, and not an imitation. He could see British and American in Turner as well, switching back-and-forth like a ball bouncing between two rackets. The man's accent varied from middle-class to trucker, and the content of his speech moved over class lines just as easily. All in all, it made for a confusing, interesting mixture that somehow rose above its diverse foundational parts to become a unique whole.
Damned good swordsman. If Sparrow had been the one to teach him that-and Sparrow had probably taught Will quite a bit, despite Jacques' spirited defense of the man. In fact, it virtually invited speculation as to-
--James was insane. He was actually becoming angry at the thought of…as if he had a right to be envious over that. He didn't have a right to any part of normal life, except for one perfect slice at Barbossa's neck.
***
Height was usually an advantage, but not inside a car. Jacques never could lie in one position for more than thirty minutes without cramping, and he always ended up at the bottom. Which meant whenever he tried to alleviate the pain of whining muscles, everyone snarled at him, and not always pleasantly.
So right now, while they were parked at a gas station, he was shamelessly exploiting the empty backseat. Stretching, toeing the door open and stretching some more, then simply draping himself on the cushions.
"Doesn't that hurt?" Will was slurping on a cherry ice as he came up and leaned on the side of the car, opposite the open door. "Sun is killing me. That leather's got to be sticking to you."
"And that is why he isn't getting up." José's face appeared in the doorway, and then his arm jabbed Jacques' leg as the other man flopped into the footspace.
"Connard." Jacques riffled José's hair as he levered himself up. "Will, would you like to share that?"
Turner snickered, and held out the frozen treat. When Jacques tried to take it, however, the other man quickly jerked away the cup. "Not really."
"Fils de putain." Will's eyes went suddenly black and metallic, and Jacques silently slapped himself. "Damn. I apologize. I didn't…"
The other man shook himself, then quietly handed over the ice. His lips were stained reddish, and growing more scarlet by the second because he was gnawing on them. "It's all right. I didn't mind before I found out what my mother had been, and don't see why I should mind now."
"I'm not taking back my apology." To punctuate his point, Jacques sucked loudly on the straw until a rude noise rang out across the station. Will grinned, albeit a little reluctantly, but that was good enough. Jacques passed the rest to José and spread his arms. "Come here."
"I think I would melt," Will replied, wry as a professional drunkard. No surprise, considering Jack's influence.
Jacques prayed aloud to heaven for patience, then beckoned the other man. "Not that. Come on. Besides, it's the only way you'll fit."
"My grandfather's funeral was less awkward," José chimed in. "And he had five wives and two mistresses. We aren't going to make you do the stiff-back thing for another three hours."
Will hung back another moment, then shrugged and climbed into Jacques' lap, half-curling so he fit under Jacques' chin. It took a bit of maneuvering to lie back without accidentally whacking something, but Jacques managed it. José was helpful enough to get out and throw away the cup, then wait until Will was settled to crawl back in.
"Still going to melt, damn it. Don't suppose you can make the A/C any better?" Will mumbled, already falling asleep. He was far more tired than he looked, which had always been the case as far back as Jacques could remember. Still waters run deep, or so the saying ran. Not that Will had ever been particularly still, despite that devastatingly innocent look he could produce on occasion. The genuine one, and not the one that popped up on command, though that was almost as winsome.
He'd learned to be a good liar when he had to be, but generally Will preferred to tell half-truths. And after five years, Jacques could still whip the other man's ass at poker.
"This is the best it can be, without explosions," José replied, sitting up and stroking Will's hair. Turner turned his head, reflexively checking the other man's face, and then relaxed into a tiny sigh.
Still a little sensitive about touching, too. Jacques didn't have a clear idea of what had happened to Will before Jack had found him, but the circumstantial evidence was overwhelming. Pointed toward a long trail of blood and hidden tears, beginning at the sickbed of Will's mother and ending with Jack's laconic, only statement on the subject: "Found him outside a brothel, shoving a crowbar through some bastard's stomach."
Unfortunate, because Jacques suspected he and Will had quite a few experiences in common, and he'd developed some choice curse-spells for the men responsible for his scars. Preacher's bullshit aside, blood really was the best thing for soothing injuries of the spirit.
//Is he asleep?// José whispered.
//Why? You want to sit?// Will muttered, eyes still closed.
Gaspar laughed quietly, shaking his head. //Still with the catnaps. You need to learn how to sleep, Turner.// He carefully lifted Jacques' head so he could squeeze his legs beneath it, then sprawled over the seat, head staring at the ceiling. //In your blood, you know. Siestas.//
//Actually, my mother never liked that idea. Said maybe it made her a bad Latina, but she preferred not to waste time.// Will flicked a finger as José's resulting grunt of mock-disgust, then turned over and snuggled back into Jacques. Which wasn't nearly as hot and sweaty as Will had made out. They'd done this too many times for it to be uncomfortable.
And that, in truth, was why Jacques was so fond of the other man. The comfort. Will might not have any supernatural powers aside from a few that strictly focused on swordsmithing, but he did have a very thorough knowledge of humanity, the bad and the good. Somehow, he'd remembered both sides of the story, in spite of everything that had happened to him, and he acted like it.
Jacques couldn't say that he had accomplished that. When Will had first dragged him out of that guttershit bar, and brought him into a decent apartment, he'd waited only until the other man had turned to lock the door before he'd tried to knife Will. Except Turner had been damnably quick, and strong for a teenager. And of course, there had suddenly been Jack, but he had mostly watched while Will had wiped the floor with Jacques. Then he'd suggested they give Jacques a bath, feed him up, and see whether Will had caught a person or an oversized stray tom.
So that was what had happened, and Will had never held that attempted murder against Jacques. The other man been damned wary for the first few weeks, but that hadn't been…it was plain caution, without the pathetic fear. That was it: simply a respect for possible danger, and a generous capacity for ignoring, if not forgetting and forgiving.
Well, that and Jacques' perennial weakness for men who truly knew how to handle a sword. Witness Jack, after all.
***
James had intended to keep silent, believing that to be the best way of handling matters until he could clear things up in private, but Jack's driving style left much to be desired. A sense of preservation of life, for example.
"Damn, it's reversing itself again." The other man scrunched up in the seat and hooked his feet through the wheel, steering with them while he batted at his compass. He veered the car into a screaming blare of horns, then overcorrected and nearly sent them into a truck of fruit.
As they whizzed by, James could just glimpse the green-shocked face of the other driver, identical to the expressions of the last fifty they had passed. The area's bars were going to have a brisk business when evening came. "Sparrow, there's a semi."
"Oh, there's always a semi. Lifeblood of the land, you know." Jack squinted at the pointer and rattled the compass, then checked it again. "Shit."
Two arms suddenly hooked over the back of the seat, startling James, and then José's tousled head pulled itself up. "Jack-"
"Jack!" James shouted. Bright, blinding headlights were bearing down with all the menace of sheer overwhelming tonnage.
"All right, all right." Calm as only the truly drunk or idiotic could be, Jack somehow staggered in place: his top half went one way, and his bottom went the other. Thus whipping the car around the semi barely in time to avoid a horrific accident. As James and José, both panting heavily, exchanged relieved glances, the completely insane man behind the wheel began to sing. Off-key, loud and humming irritatingly whenever he couldn't remember the words.
"Jack." José tapped the other man on the shoulder, and when that didn't get him any attention, he pulled out one of the biggest handguns James had ever seen. "I would hate for this to accidentally go off."
One bronzed hand went up and ran a finger along the muzzle, then flicked at the end, more scolding than mocking. "You wouldn't, mate."
"Really?" Gaspar seemed to have had about enough, so James squeezed himself against the door and edged a hand onto the door lock.
Jack's eyes flicked up, smoldering their way along the line of José's arm and neck. "Really."
They held that pose for another moment, and then José grinned and put away the gun. He flopped his arms across the seat back and leaned forward to nibble at Jack's ear. "Okay, true. But we're dead just the same if you run us off the road. Plus, that would wake up Will."
"I am awake, goddamn motherfuck wankers," came a pained groan from the back. "Jacques, move your elbow."
Rustling noises. James resisted the call of curiosity and didn't glance back. His shoulders and thighs were cramping again, so he was forced to unlock his spine and marginally relax. "Jack, is there a particular reason you need to check the compass now? As opposed to when you're not in a moving vehicle? And when we're already headed for Tortuga for whatever reason?"
"Well, as much as I'm owing visitations, it wouldn't be very wise to accidentally meet up with Barbossa right now." Sparrow took one more bearing-check, then slipped the compass back into his pocket and sat like a-in a vaguely upright manner. He straightened out the car and tugged José down for a quick kiss before letting the other man disappear into the back. "And he's not one to stay in one place, you know."
Yes, James did knew. He had several months of fruitless effort stamped into his body that told him how difficult Barbossa was to find, and a single night of drinking disgusting moonshine that told him Jack Sparrow was the only lead he had to the other man. It'd been a cheerless surprise to wake up the next morning, with vision and mind painfully intact.
"Nor is he one to grow weaker with age. We're going to Tortuga to see if I've any credit left to my name," Jack added. For once, the man's tone matched the import of his words.
"Even if you're lacking, he most likely isn't. I'd imagine the amount of ill-will he's caused totals up to a small fortune." James pushed back on his heels, trying to stretch his legs as best he could. Then he slumped down, knocking away the small inner voice that reprimanded him for not keeping up his image as a role-model. No eager new recruits were bouncing around, after all, and the other men needed little help from him.
Traveling with Jack Sparrow and the rest was like being immersed in a microcosm of rum-and-grit slurry, with the occasional flash of death. But wherever James went with them, he was fully aware of some invisible bubble that closed him off from the deepest, truest parts of the other men. The only time it had ever vanished was during that brief, rough roll in the grass with Will.
Afterwards, it'd immediately sprung up again, twice as thick and three times as opaque. James could see much, and deduce more, but he was too intelligent to fool himself into thinking he could predict a great deal about the others.
He needed to be able to do that, if he was going to have any kind of chance at surviving. And he needed to find some kind of hold over Jack's head to replace the compass, in order to ensure that he wasn't dropped once his usefulness had drained away, and he needed to practice his swordplay. Of the three new items on James' list, he knew how to go about only one.
A start was a start, though. He tilted his head back, out of the sun, and closed his eyes. Against the red veil of his eyelids, shadow figures with long thin blades began to move, attacking and retreating.
***
Tortuga. Half a mile outside of town, and Jack could already smell sweet rot and bitter life. God, and weren't the memories flooding back.
He stood there for another moment, watching the changing colors of the glitter and the lights, before he spun on one heel and tripped up the sagging front steps. It was a sad little shack, even compared to the hovels of his various personal experiences, and it didn't even have a door. Just a wired-up plywood gate, probably stolen off some ranch.
And it reeked of pigshit.
"Jesus. Good thing I found some buckets." Will raised said objects to display brown water, then gingerly nudged the gate open with his toe. Then José swung around in front of him, guns out, to step inside and check the house.
A moment later, Gaspar was coming out, sleeve over nose, and shaking his head. "Not here."
"Damn it, Joshamee." Jack settled his weight back on his heels and thought, trying to rank the likeliest waterholes.
Before he'd gotten through half the possibilities, Jacques strolled around from the back and jerked his head. "Cochons. He's in the back, with them."
"With them? Fuck, I knew getting him that piglet for Christmas was a bad idea." As he trudged down the steps, Will shot an accusing glare back at Jack.
Who was deeply, mortally offended. "What? You said you thought he'd do well with company that didn't talk back, and I merely pointed out that all the puppies and kittens in town were probably diseased."
Absolutely no appreciation he got from the boy. Jack sadly shook his head at the unfairness of it all, ignored José's snickering, and rounded the corner.
There were indeed pigs, and they were huge, grayish-brown, bristly things whose malicious beady eyes made sure Jack kept his distance. There was also Gibbs, sputtering from a slosh of water. "Don't you know it's bad luck to be waking a man up like that?"
"Yes, and I know how to ward off such bad luck. The man who did the waking buys-" Will twitched, and Jack rolled his eyes "-all right, the generous friend of the cheapskate who threw the water buys the man who woke a stiff drink."
Gibbs froze, then rubbed crusts of some substance off his eyes. A wide grin bloomed on his grizzled face, and he surged to his feet. "That's it exactly. Good God, Jack, when'd you-"
--Slosh.
"Damn it, Turner, I'm awake," Gibbs roared.
Undaunted, Will tossed the buckets aside and handed the other man a bandanna. "That was for the smell, and you can keep this, by the way."
"In that case, you should've put some soap in it," Jacques muttered. He slung an arm over Will and playfully nuzzled the other man's scowl. "Mignon."
"Knock it off." Will gave Jacques the obligatory scratch between the shoulderblades, then surprise-tickled the other man's stomach until the Frenchman yelped and jumped away. "Jack, you want a ride?"
"No, we'll make our own way into town after we settle things. But Will, would like to see you for a minute." Jack waved off Jacques and José, then nodded to Gibbs and took Will into a relatively isolated corner of the junkyard lumping up to the back of the house.
As soon as the others were out of earshot, Will dropped the joking façade: his eyes darkened, his mouth smoothed into a thin line, and his shoulders hunched as if bracing for a blow. "If this is about-"
"I've been strongly advised to let you handle that, and I think you can, so we're not even going to mention it. Saves on the arguing time. Savvy?" When he finally received a nod, Jack blew out his breath and dug up some rum. He tipped the rim toward Will, but was refused and so had to drink by himself.
Will lit up a cigarette while Jack was doing that, making short, angry puffs. "They all cut and ran the last time. I can't believe you're coming back here to get the same people."
And here it came. Jack regretfully put away the rum and leaned against a pile of rubbish. Something squeaked and skittered past his foot so he scrambled away. "Lord God on High. I see I'll need to have a few words with Gibbs on housekeeping."
"Jack."
"I didn't tell you then, because you were too young to understand, but I said they should run if we didn't get back in time. It's the Code, Will. You know that now." He'd better, Jack darkly thought. There wasn't time to teach him again.
"Yeah, I do. And it's stupid. Most people don't know about it, and if they did, they wouldn't give a fuck." Will pulled at the strands that had worked loose of his ponytail, then whirled around and paced a small, tight circle. He glanced at Jack, worried and irate all at once. "Be nice if they did, though," he admitted in a very quiet voice. "It's just…I don't want that to happen again. Jacques almost di-you almost…there was so much fucking blood."
That put a warm glow in Jack's black, foolish heart, and he had to fight to not see the scrawny fifteen-year-old in the grown man throwing a rare but impressive fit. From the car came the sound of raised voices-James and Jacques snapping at each other. No surprise, really; as easy-going as Jacques was, his Gallic temper got the better of him sometimes. Especially when there was someone as uppercrust Brit as Norrington involved.
Will looked towards the car, then snorted. "Idiot."
Which could really refer to either man, as James asked smart questions at stupid times, and Jacques had an odd broody-hen complex when it came to Will. Then Jack remembered what he'd actually meant to discuss with Will. Touchy relations or not, James did seem to open up the most around Will. And Jack badly needed information on the man, of the kind he couldn't get from calling up old friends. "One thing about Norrington."
"Yes?" The other man's gaze sharpened, fighter just stepping into the ring.
"Don't think he's nearly as straight as he likes to think he is. It'd be helpful to know what he's planning on, besides taking a swing at Barbossa." Jack stared back at Will, not letting the other man turn or drop his eyes. He clapped a hand to Will's shoulder, then tugged till they were inches apart. "I don't care who does it, but take him around Tortuga, and get a look into his head. Savvy?"
"I can do that." Will hugged Jack, then stepped back, walls blinking out of his eyes. "Watch your back, then. If you're going it alone."
"I'll be fine, you insolent puppy. Try to listen to my pair of pretties, when they're making sense; this is José's hometown, for all that Madrid's his birthplace." Jack grinned, and got one in return, easy and honed as well as the blade Will always had somewhere about himself. "Have fun, and don't do anything I…er…how does that go?"
The corners of Will's mouth flipped up in good-humored sarcasm as he walked off. "Whatever, Daddy."
"Don't call me that," Jack retorted, careful to hide his wince.
Damnation. He and Will really needed to have a talk about old Bootstrap. The last thing Jack wanted was to have that truth out itself the way it had about Will's mother: Anamaria in full hellcat-form, screeching and waving guns and words about without a care for anyone. That damned woman-
So Mrs. Turner had been from the streets, and gone back to walking them after Bootstrap had stopped coming round. Not much else the woman could do when her belly had been filled, and landing herself a good berth was one manner of seeing her child got a decent life. Even if said bed had resided in the house of the local cartel overlord. Jack hadn't held it against Maria, and he hadn't joined in the chorus when everyone else had been cursing La Espada for sheathing herself in shit.
She hadn't deserved what she'd gotten, once her lover had found out who had really fathered her eight-year-old son. And Jack hadn't gotten her call in time to do much more than carve her last words into his bones and see to her burial. He would've seen to the man, too, if she hadn't already taken care of that. That had proved to everyone that The Sword of Mexico hadn't ever lost her edge.
Damn Bill for being too scared to cherish family, and damn Maria for being too prideful to ask for aid till too late. And damn Jack himself for never noticing how much he loved his friends till he started losing them.
Let it never be said that Jack couldn't learn from a mistake, and learn well.
"Joshamee?" As soon as the other man came around the house, Jack put on his best glinting smile and adjusted his cuffs with a grand flourish. "To the rum!"
***
"If every place was like Tortuga, no man would ever feel lonely."
To emphasize Will's statement, two women wrestled themselves past, while a full barrel of sewage poured down from a nearby roof and just missed splashing Norrington. Some half-grown kids, or else very short adults, ran after a flock of panicked chickens, and on the corner, people were dicing for suspicious little brownpaper-wrapped packets.
"The first time Jack said that, I told him he was a romantic idiot. My opinion hasn't changed." José carefully stepped over two pairs of legs, which were rubbing around each other, and led the little group to the bar he remembered being most reasonable. That meaning that there was only a fifty-fifty chance of being poisoned by the shitty alcohol, and the bartender would give a count-off before he unloaded the shotgun at a nasty drunk.
//José! You been gone for forever!// came arrowing at him as soon as he stepped in. Same greasy fat rat manning the taps, beaming at him. //What can I get for you and-oh. Him.//
In response, Will muttered something resembling an irked prayer, Jacques merely gave a sweet schoolboy-smile, and Norrington just looked confused.
"Sir." Jacques produced a deck of cards from one sleeve and riffled them, each card bending and unbending with the snap of a gunshot. "And how are we doing tonight?"
//Tequila, and don't skimp on the limes. You take care of me, and I'll make sure Blondie doesn't fuck up your crew again.// Offer on the table, José shook out a cigarillo and flicked a flame to the end, then leaned on the table. He blew a perfect ring and stabbed it with the ashy tip.
The bartender drew back, as did the rest of the bar's occupants. He visibly pondered the pros and cons of kicking them out, then drew the obvious conclusion. Broad smarmy smile. "Gentlemen. There's a nice table in the corner with your name on it, and the drinks will be around in a second."
"Thank you." Will nodded politely at the bartender and shoved Jacques and José along, clearly unhappy about something.
"Hey-hey!" José pulled away just in time to miss falling over a chair, which he then appropriated for the night. A pair of passing whores made eyes at him, and he smiled but didn't otherwise do anything inviting. Embarrassing, but he was actually quite exhausted. "We tried to keep Jack in the back, but when he wants to drive…well, he drives. So don't take it out on us."
As he flopped into a chair and kicked up his feet onto another one, Will made a dismissive waggle of his fingers. Then he carefully took his sword off his back and propped it up against the wall. "I'm not mad about that. I'm worried that this'll end up like that other time. When we almost got thrown out of the city."
"Should I ask what happened then?" Norrington warily settled himself a good four feet from Will, then started to get up again as Jacques came up with the drinks. Like a true gentleman, he helped the other man set things down.
And like a true snob, he sniffed at the tequila as if it would blow up in his face. Mother of God. If Jacques hadn't sworn up and down on Our Lady's veil that he'd seen Norrington fight, and that the man was good, José would've dug in his heels and refused to go any further. He'd seen too many battles turn on a dime just because someone was too prissy to do what needed to be done.
"We acquired Gaspar here." Jacques smirked and clapped José on the shoulder, then slid his hand down in a caress. He flipped a chair around backwards and sat down, draping his arms over José's shoulders.
"What he means is-we were at a bare-knuckle match, and Jack made this stupid bet on Jacques," Will explained. He tried to squirt a lime wedge at the Frenchman, but the spray took a funny angle and ended up splattering Norrington's shoes. "Crap. Sorry."
"It's all right." Sounding like cardboard, and neither Will nor Norrington were directly looking at each other. For a moment, José wondered if he'd accidentally stepped into a TV soap opera, and if so, whether he would have to put up with a gaggle of screechy, overexcitable women. Then James shifted forward about six inches, actually betraying a hint of interest. "Jack met him at a boxing match?"
"No, no, no. I wish it were that simple." Will sent another glare Jacques' way, and an irritated huff ghosted over José's neck. "Jacques won, but the prize was an invite to the biggest poker table in town. Huge stakes, closed doors. So then Jack goes off, leaves me and Jacques outside in the fucking drizzle. About two hours later, it's still raining, and he comes out to borrow my umbrella."
Norrington scooted up another half-foot so he could reach the limes and salt. "Because…"
"Ivory and gold handle, with jewels set in it," Jacques filled in. "Very valuable antique."
"He bet my goddamn umbrella, the prat. I don't know why I put up with him." On the last word, Will tossed off a shot and dropped the glass on the table, then picked up his next one. "Anyway, it was a damn good thing it was a warm night. So a half-hour after that, he comes out again-"
"Ducked when Will tried to punch him," Jacques fondly recalled. He licked a streak up José's neck, dabbed salt onto it, then licked that off as well. Bit daintily into his lime wedge and slammed down a shot.
Will glared. "My storytelling. You were too pissed to remember all that much." He held his glass up to the light, then glanced over the table. Picked out six shots and lined them up in front of Norrington. "Hey, drink your share. Only polite, since we're paying."
"Very sensible," José absently agreed, tugging Jacques around until he had his own lovely stretch of nape with which to play. Only he squeezed the lime onto the salt, then carefully poured the tequila over it and quickly bent down to catch all the droplets before they ran beneath Jacques' collar. The other man shivered, groaned, and tried to twine sideways around José.
Norrington was blushing, as usual. As if to compensate for that, he put down two shots in quick succession, then leaned back to look at Will. "Jack ducked," he prompted.
"Badly." Will snickered at the memory. "I hit his ear, rattled some of those piercings. But he said we could come in and watch, so I figured what the hell. Might as well see what was going on. Which was José here, hogtied in the center of the table."
"I might have woken up in the wrong bed," José allowed. That part of his life was well past over and done with, so there was no point in resurrecting the dead. Especially when he'd taken so much trouble to kill them in the first place.
Norrington's hand was trembling ever so slightly as it took up the next glass, and he tore open his collar before he drank it. Wasn't used to drinking tequila, but wasn't doing too badly, either. It'd be interesting to see whether Will decided to fake drunkenness, or be honest-which never failed to amaze José. Maybe it was a result of Jack's idea of a good upbringing, but Turner's tolerance for alcohol was eerie.
So far, it appeared Will was taking the honest path. He had met Norrington in a bar, so it might be that the other man had already seen his act. Or it might be something else. Will was far more dangerous when truthful than when lying. //What's going on?// José whispered to Jacques.
//I'm not sure yet//, was the laconic answer. Then Jacques faked a look of indignation and poked José in the ribs. "You called me 'Blondie'?"
"Fuck off. You're interrupting the story." Satisfied that he had taken the high ground, José turned back to the table and expectantly waited.
***
If he were walking down a street alone, at night, and with no one else around, James would have been keeping to the lighted areas and picking up his feet right now. Except he wasn't. He was in a smoky, tar-stained bar with three…call them acquaintances, since things were a little too personal to think of them as business associates. And something was subtly wrong.
More to keep up appearances than to steady-or dull-his nerves, James took another shot of tequila. "They were using men as stakes?"
"Not really, not that night. Though it's not exactly unusual around here." Will tipped up the last shot of his share and put it down, seeming none the worse. His eyes were as clear as when he'd walked into the bar, and they didn't waver from James' face, scrutinizing it. As if searching for something.
It could have been the gaze of a stern Inquisitor, or that of a man memorizing the face of those who had wronged him. And damn it, both were valid possibilities. In fact, both were probably motivating reasons, but one was of more…immediate importance to…no, of more immediate danger to James' current pursuit. He needed to know which was foremost in Will's mind.
And he was inebriated. Hell. Perhaps Jack's driving had knocked the sense out of him. Oh-fuck excuses. They weren't going to help him now, under the focused light of Will's eyes. James thought he could smell his flesh beginning to burn, like ants beneath a magnifying glass.
"Anyway, the game was down to Jack and this woman," Will continued.
"A bitch, but luscious. Hair like midnight." José reached past for his last shot, and in passing handed James his second-to-last tequila.
Turner flicked his eyes over to his two friends, then gracefully rearranged himself so his elbows were on the table. He leaned forward, voice deepening in the age-old trick of storytellers everywhere. "She wasn't the one who'd put up José. That guy was long-gone, sobbing in a corner. No, this woman was in the game because she wanted to…" pause for recollection, and to heighten the suspense "…to 'cut off Gaspar's balls and feed them to rats for his damned father's fuck-up.' So final hand. Ace-high, by the way. She flips over a full house: three tens, pair of kings."
"Someone leaned over and threw up in the corner then," Jacques interjected.
"Jack's shoulders slump, and you can see José about ready to-" Will grinned at the other man's glare. "All right, all right. But yeah. Jack sort of tosses his cards on the table, like they're trash. Except it's thrice jacks, and two aces."
"I imagine all hell broke loose then." James desultorily finished off his shot and reached for his last one. Perhaps he was simply having an alcohol-induced hallucination. Perhaps Will was trying to make some kind of peacemaking gesture by sharing a story, to reach out.
And perhaps Turner's attitude was taking a random hairpin turn. No, James didn't think so. He simply wasn't sure what to think in place of that theory…his thoughts weren't quite connecting now.
"That would be putting it lightly." Will's eyebrows rose. "The woman jumps up, starts swearing that Jack's a fucking cheat. He proves he isn't, and we all start to walk out in disgust. Then she grabs his leg and pours out this incredible story about José's dad knocking up her mother-kid being her-then taking off with the mom's car and life-savings. Because of that, she and her mother both ended up in brothels."
"That's a horrible story," James said, his tongue feeling as if it were turning to lead. There was a point somewhere, and if he could just find it, then he could change himself back to gold.
"It's a true one." José crossed himself, an angry set to his jaw. "God forgive me, but my father was a fucking bastard and didn't die a moment too soon."
Wait. That wasn't a punchline. That was a headline. "What…" the words crumpled in James' throat.
Will had stood up and was leaning across the table, so close to James that their breaths mingled. On the side, Jacques made a startled noise, and José made an aborted move forward.
"Then Jack asked if José was actually involved, in any way, and she said no, she'd never even known there was a son until a few days before. So he told her he was sorry, but he wasn't going to let her touch José." The other man's face completely filled James' field of vision, and James briefly wondered if Will had actually crawled onto the table. Then he wondered why the air in his mouth thickened when he thought about that. "She pulled a gun on Jack, and-well, we never did figure out who'd shot her first."
"You…killed her. For seeking her revenge, which didn't happen to match your plans." And then James was simultaneously relieved and upset. He felt the first emotion because now he understood what Will had been trying to get at, and the second because the situations didn't parallel-they shouldn't parallel. But the logic was twisting in James' mind, slipping from him like handfuls of fine sand. "What the hell-you know what? My accord with Jack doesn't include putting up with this-this nonsense. I've told you over and over and over that I don't intend to interfere with your business."
Will leaned back, expressionless. "Up until we find Barbossa. Then what?"
"Then it's a fair fight, and if I'm forced to, I will go through them-" James jerked his hand at the other two, who were deathly silent "-and Jack, and you to get to him. But you're already trying to do the same to me, and we're not anywhere near him, goddamn it!"
The tequila seared off the tops of already-frayed nerves as it went down James' throat. Stupid thing to do, because it didn't calm him at all, but rather poured gasoline on the flames. He set the shotglass on the table to his right with deliberate calm, and then began to stand.
"Well, at least we know where we stand with each other," Will said. And that was the last straw.
James whipped around and grabbed the little smart-mouthed twat by the hair, yanking him across the table into a furious kiss. He tasted blood, felt curses press against his lips, but that only made him smash his mouth down even harder, trying to-to-
A safety clicked, and cold metal dug into his temple. "You're drunk," Jacques told him, in a quiet, gentle, understanding tone that froze his blood. In José's hands, more steel glinted. "You don't know what you're doing. Let go of him."
Which James did. He took a step back, nearly fell over another table before catching himself. His eyes and mouth burned, and there was a storm turning his guts inside-out. "Gladly."
Will's eyes were wide, and his bruised, red-dappled lips were parted in a surprised 'oh.' Well, damn him. Damn him, and damn Jack for-for acting intelligently. For actually doing what James had been intending, despite his disclaimer that he'd so gallantly thrown down on the table. So damn everything.
"That's where we stand," he hissed, voice carrying a conviction he didn't feel at all. Drunk, unenlightened, and alone, he stumbled out of the bar and let his feet go where they willed. "God, Elizabeth. Thank God you can't see me now."
***