Disclaimer: If I owned Pirates of the Caribbean, there'd be more Norrington.
Your Dreams, Rising and Falling with the Sea
--
James is a small child, perpetually trailing after his father in whatever he does. It does not matter how strict he is or how little he cares for failure. After all, he is an admiral, a title highly respected and rightfully glorious.
Besides, James already knows that he will not fail. There would be too many people he would be disappointing, and, if he were unlucky, he'd take lives with him as he went down. James simply could not live with that, thus, he will not let anyone down if he can help it.
His biggest dream is to be a hero. There is nothing more that he wants other than to save innocent people by defeating the horrid pirates and robbers across the Atlantic- and he will defeat them; the pirates in his father's stories always lose. Perhaps he'd even become an Admiral, like his father, and marry the beautiful girl waiting for him on shore.
What other option exists?
--
Lieutenant Norrington sails aboard the Dauntless to the Caribbean. He travels with Governor Swann and his irrepressible daughter Elizabeth, who already shows an unnatural interest in pirates. It's quite odd for a girl her age, who wanders about the ship singing pirate songs that he suspects are rather unpopular with actual pirates. Gibbs claims that she's bringing bad luck to the ship, but Norrington is more concerned about her obvious fascination, wondering why the villains seem to be glamorized.
(Later, Elizabeth mentions that her song caused them to find young Will in time to rescue him. Gibbs grudgingly concedes. Norrington thinks, what a pity the pirates left before we could defeat them.)
Only a fool would dare risk the Governor's wrath by slighting his beloved daughter. This means that Norrington is often stuck with the unenviable duty of making sure the girl does not get herself into trouble. He placates her with tales of piratical crimes, tales of the Navy's most famous pirate defeats, and pointedly does not mentions anything related to that bloody Jack Sparrow. Well, why not try to put her off pirates, he figures, not realizing the inappropriateness of some of the stories until years later.
While he's at it, he mentions little things like starting signal flares and tying rope knots, thinking them safer as the chances she will use this knowledge are slim.
When the long voyage is over, he realizes that nothing could decrease her strong interest except time. He doesn't have too long to dwell on this fact, though. Pirates are still sailing across the seas, and he needs to catch them. It is what he does.
This is not the time to neglect his duties.
--
Commodore Norrington is one of the youngest to ascend the ranks in years. There's a reason he's known as the Scourge of the Caribbean. Otherwise, fearless rogues tremble at the thought of coming across him. His career is at a rather high point as he accepts the beautiful sword with the elegant golden handle.
The only thing that lacks in his life now is marriage, but hopefully that should be completed soon enough. He plans to propose to Miss Elizabeth Swann, who has grown up to be quite a fine woman. She is radiant and fiery and reminds him of the sea.
Everything goes according to his plan until she faints, falling a rather long distance to the sea. He prepares to jump in after her in a rush of blood to the head because it's Elizabeth, the girl he wants to marry, but Gillette holds him back, fearing that he will die upon the rocks below. Norrington worries more about Elizabeth dying, either upon the hard rocks or by drowning, but then of course Sparrow swoops in to save the day. The cursed pirate does a decent deed. It surprises everyone there except Elizabeth, who seems for a few minutes not to have lost her childhood piratical fancy.
Norrington arrests what has to be the worst pirate he's ever seen. Who would carry items like a compass that doesn't point north and a pistol with one shot? Ridiculous. He attempts to escape, but Mr. Brown knocks him out with an empty bottle. It is a brave act for one obviously reeking of stale drunkenness, though he wonders if Will Turner had anything to do with this capture.
But then pirates invade and kidnap Elizabeth, and again his worry sends him out of mind. Elizabeth is his first priority. Then he shall worry at the alarming number of pirates escaped from the prison. Rash Mr. Turner teams up with Sparrow- he'll be damned if he ever calls him Captain- and they commandeer the fastest ship in the Caribbean to chase after her.
This is especially absurd. Norrington thought Turner would have more sense to team up with a reckless, slithering pirate. Turner's not the only one who cares for Elizabeth. It would do him well to realize that.
--
They find Elizabeth and Sparrow later after spotting a signal flare that appeared to burn down the island. Elizabeth accepts his offer in marriage. She reassures him that she would not give her word in vain, making James the happiest man alive. He even partakes in a glass of wine in celebration, and James Norrington never drinks when he is aboard a ship. His father said it would addle his senses.
After fighting the cursed skeletons and taking a large number of pirates into his custody, it is the day of Jack Sparrow's hanging. Turner surprises all there except apparently Elizabeth by causing a great hullabaloo in trying to prevent Sparrow from dying, though in retrospect Norrington cannot say he's surprised.
Turner also picks this moment to confess his love for his fiancée, and Norrington sees shock and a joy she tries to hide. Elizabeth winds up in Will's arms as Norrington gradually feels ice flooding his body.
He lets her go, even though it shatters his heart. Norrington could not bear to see Elizabeth unhappy by trapping her into an unwanted marriage. There is no sense in containing the sea, and Norrington likes to think that he is a sensible person. Perhaps focusing on recapturing Sparrow, who has escaped yet again after throwing himself off the wall, will help distract him.
Norrington, in a rare act of piratical charity that may or may not have had to do with Elizabeth, gives Sparrow a day's head start. It is especially unlikely that Sparrow should evade capture again, and James Norrington does not fail.
--
Except he does, immersed in crashing waves, dying sailors and he has to be close, if we sail on we'll catch him soon.
--
Whoever knew that the once highly respected, former Commodore Norrington would be fool enough to sail through a hurricane?
He sits on a rotting barstool, drinking rum in that pirate's nest of a tavern he's always hated (but he's too drunk to care), still wearing his now shabby navy uniform in a mockery of who he once was. James' wig, brown-gray and sticking up with mud and ocean salt, still stands upon his head. Oh, if Elizabeth could see him now, he often bitterly thinks. What a fine catch she missed.
If people cared enough to truly think here, the general assumption would be that James stole the uniform. As it is, the drunks and rogues and pirates think he's a fool for not selling that coat. He could get a pretty penny for it if he wants.
There's nowhere else for a disgraced, shamed ex-Commodore to go without questions and sad stares following him. No one asks questions in Tortuga.
James Norrington remains in the same stool in the same bar day after day, or occasionally in the pigsty of the said bar, replaying the night of the hurricane in his mind. He feels the ship crack beneath him and go down, down, down into the depths of the Caribbean with his crew. This is a fiasco so catastrophic that it could never be forgotten. James is rather surprised his father hasn't disowned him.
Sometimes, he hears tales of Jack Sparrow, who happens to have a fair amount of enemies in Tortuga, evading capture like the slippery goddamn pirate he always is. While he isn't drunkenly ranting to the understanding prostitutes about that "damn Sparrow, he ruined my life, I'll kill him if I get the chance," James marvels at how nothing ever changes for Sparrow.
Pirates aren't supposed to be the stable, unchanging ones. He guesses that, hell, when you fall this far, nothing startles you anymore.
--
James would do anything to get his commission back; he sinks so low as to be a deckhand for Captain Jack Sparrow, the same one who destroyed his life. Elizabeth flirts with Sparrow often, especially if one is considering the girl has a fiancé. Then again, Elizabeth never put much stock in mere engagements. James allows himself to be bitter about such things.
He suffers through the flirting, thinking Once, I would have been happy if that were me and realizing that would nevertheless be true.
But his main goal still is redemption, so he steals the heart of Davy Jones and Elizabeth's Letters of Marque while feigning heroism. Who knew that Sparrow was in a great deal of trouble? James chuckles at the irony. He does regret leaving Elizabeth, wondering if he will redeem himself to her someday.
The look on Lord Beckett's face when he hears the "thump-thump" in the sack is surprising. James doesn't think the heart is that important, yet Beckett astonishes him by not only grants his former commission but promoting him to Admiral, like he's wanted for as long as he could remember.
However, he cannot forget for a moment that piracy regained his life.
--
Admiral Norrington, too late, discovers that he made a huge mistake.
Cutler Beckett elevated him merely to use him as a pawn. Even the high and mighty Davy Jones, king of the sea, does whatever Beckett says in fear that he'll stab the heart. It isn't enough for Beckett, though, who will not settle until he controls all that he can in the world. He wears gaudy East India Trading Company blue and mustard yellow, a symbol of Beckett's domination, and misses his heavier brocade.
James didn't really regain his life. Instead, it is a harsh caricature, with his Navy being used for unscrupulous ends. Beckett's already got the seas, the beautiful, storm-tossed seas, and all James truly wants is what he cannot seem to gain.
He finds himself almost hoping for Sparrow's miraculous return from the dead.
--
Governor Swann is also dragged throughout the ocean on Beckett's ship. James nearly feels the we're-in-this-together empathy of a fellow captive, except Governor Swann never had a choice. He just desires the safety of his beloved daughter. Weatherby Swann should be at his house in Port Royal, not the beaten man Beckett uses to sign all of his documents. It is unjust.
When Beckett unforgivably murders Swann for asking too many questions, James officially chooses a side. He is horrified, especially because Elizabeth, who is now Captain Swann apparently, was the one to tell him.
James deserves Elizabeth's disgust, he knows; he'd be equally disdainful towards one who deserted his crew. It is the least he can do when he unlocks the prison cell's doors and lets Elizabeth escape with her pirate crew, completely comprehending that he is as good as signing his death warrant. He loves Elizabeth more than anything else and doesn't really see it as dying, rather, saving Elizabeth from Beckett.
Yet James doesn't expect the deranged Bootstrap Bill to come out of the ship's barnacles, though he understood that someone might sound the alarm. There is no escape for him, even when Elizabeth offers it. Only a coward would save his own skin. With the taste of salvation on his lips, he shoots the rope and is impaled by Bootstrap for his efforts. Jones offers him a place in his crew, but James has seen too much to accept.
He hopes that, in death, his life wasn't a complete failure.
--