I swore to myself that I wasn't going to write another Bill/Will drabble, at least for awhile. I figure the other characters need some attention. However, this ficlet found its way into my imagination and wouldn't leave, so I figured I'd might as well write it.

Just a quick thank you to everyone that commented on my last story. It meant a lot to me.

Disclaimer: All characters, plots, and quotes are the property of Disney, Ted Elliot, and Terry Rossio. I don't own POTC (unfortunately), so I'm, therefore, not making any money on this. The last quote was cut from the movie, but I took it from the junior novelization by Irene Trimble.

The Walls of the Heart

Claws, acid hot, burned like ice and flame together on what had once been his back. The same claws that had effortlessly attached themselves to his insides. He didn't know which was worse, the physical pain or the ravaging sting attacking the shattered pieces of his heart. He tried to convince himself that it didn't hurt, that he was strong enough to withstand the pain, but, as it was, Will found himself attempting desperately, without success, to get his breathe back.

"William."

The single word, it lingered like a haunted dream from his childhood. His own name, said in the one voice that the small child that still dwelled deep inside the most impenetrable boundaries of his heart still hoped to hear. Corrupted, not quite unwanted, it became a jagged sword, blade raw with agonizing fire, ripping open wounds thought long since healed. The gaping wounds covering Will's back were incomparable to the pain that single word caused his soul.

"I don't need any of your help!"

He tore himself away, savagely, severing a bond that had never truly been given the chance to form. Thousands of scenarios, dreams, illusions, fantasies, whatever they were or had been, screamed to the surface of his mind. Reunions created in the imagination of his youth, almost forgotten, they now flooded his mind's eye. They would never be, now, not even in the safe recesses of his soul. Never again. In every musing of his childhood, in every quiet moment of his adulthood during which he'd slipped into longing, he'd never pictured his first words with his father, his first moments, to be like this.

"The Bo'sun prides himself on cleaving flesh from bone with every swing."

Excuses. There had always been excuses. Never anything more than empty words. There was always another ship, another voyage, with pay larger than the one before. Then he'd come home, he'd finally have the money they needed. They could finally live happily ever after. Together. But the voyages, the opportunities, had kept coming. After a few years, the letters hadn't. He'd been ten years old when he'd gotten his last words from his father. Words, cramped and messy, on a dried, yellowed, sea-salted piece of paper. And the medallion. That curséd piece of gold that had gotten him into all of this. He supposed there was an excuse for that, too.

In any case, what did it truly matter what the Bo'sun did or would have done? William Turner, senior, had been cleaving Will's heart from his chest since the day of his birth.

"Then am I to understand that what you did was an act of compassion?"

He made himself look into those eyes. His savage, bitter brown gaze didn't match the haunted blue of his father's. He had expected that it would.

"I swear you look just like him."

"It's the spitting image of old Bootstrap Bill, come back to haunt us."

The words echoed in his mind, following the footsteps of the dreams, the illusions, that had quickly faded into simple memories of a past that had never been his. They hadn't been right, after all. He'd clung to them, he realized now. A small connection to the man he'd always hoped, but had always failed, to meet. The man who stood before him now.

"Yes."

It was a single word. Again one single, lonely word. But, somehow, Will felt something shift in his heart. It wasn't forgiveness. Far from. It wasn't even understanding. He felt his anger, his pain, his fear still simmering under the surface. But, what floated to the top was something that felt a bit like relief. He wasn't alone. Not anymore. He'd been terrified when he'd realized what Jack had done. He knew what he had to do, to escape this essential hell, but he hadn't known how. He'd been forsaken amongst more demons than had ever fallen from the gates of heaven, than had ever felt it better to reign in hell. But not anymore. He didn't feel quite so abandoned now. His wounds could be put aside, hidden away, as they had always been, to be dealt with later, if it meant not feeling so alone anymore.

Another thought, one he hadn't expected, followed the first. With it, came a feeling of amazement. Perhaps there was a connection there after all. One far deeper than flesh and blood, than twenty years spent hiding behind a mask of acceptance and tears held back away from dry eyes. Whatever he had done in the past, be it twenty years ago or twenty minutes, the word his father had just uttered had lighted on the shadows of Will's own demons. He'd spent a year of his life, until this moment, believing that he had killed his father. He had tried to convince himself that it had been for the best, that he had freed him from the horrible curse bestowed upon him by glittering, enticing Aztec gold. Gold, greed, and Hector Barbossa. He'd lifted that curse, lifted it knowing that it would mean William Turner's death, but his freedom, as well. Will had held tight to that, clinging to it as he had clung to the blackened, distressed piece of ship on the day he'd first met his fiancé. He had told himself that he had done the right thing, no matter how not- right it felt.

The look in his father's eyes melted seamlessly into the heartsickness he'd felt when he'd sliced his palm and let his blood fall into the Aztec's yawning chest. He felt his own eyes soften.

"Then I guess I'm my father's son, after all."