~ Déjà Vu (That'd be French) ~
~|:O:|~
The wind blew across the Caribbean port and it pushed against the boy's back as he moved from wharf to wharf, searching for the burned ship with black sails. He'd been told he'd find it here, after his weeks of searching. He finally halted, coming to a stop abruptly.
She groaned against her moorings, and the charred angel riding the bow seemed both hellish and heaven-sent at the same time. For a moment, he was thrown back eight years, remembering soft voices spoken outside his bedroom door, and resting his ear against the grainy wood to hear as best he could.
"He's a good boy. He has your temperament."
"But he has your eyes. I catch myself some days, when he looks at me. Will, I see you in his eyes. I know he's bound to go after you when he's old enough, as you did for your father. What do I tell him?"
"Tell him part of our truth. It will make it easier, for this world is hard, and shall get harder the more time goes on. The dead talk of war and the living do too. Keep him safe; there have been too many I've taken from the seas who speak of impressment."
"Perhaps. . . I could apprentice him; keep him from the ocean and the ships."
"No, Elizabeth, don't. I know that burden, and it becomes no easier to bear after knowing your fate was only hindered by it; unchanged. The sun's set, I must go. Tell him he's a good lad and that I love him, Elizabeth. I love you."
"And I love you."
The breeze chilled him, feeling cold and clammy against his neck when it hit him again. He straightened, absently touching the hilt of his sword Mother had given him before he'd joined the king's navy. Now was not the time to think of his father, or of his hazy memories from his youth. Strangers coming at night, guarded conversations before the hearth well after other respectable people were snug in their beds; the cargo appearing mysteriously in the cellar and vanishing by the next morning, after his mother welcomed dark-dressed men in through her door. None of that had business being on his mind now.
He swallowed, eyeing the trimmed black sails waiting to be dropped when the captain gave the orders to head out. He noticed the gangway was not down, so he stepped up to the moorings and climbed aboard. Jumping over the rail, he landed firmly upon the deck. It was empty of any guard or sailors, but pristine. Which surprised him; he'd been taught for as long as he'd been in the navy that pirates were unethical, unorganized brutes. Clearly, someone was wrong. He disliked dwelling on the thought that perhaps the navy was mistaken.
If he could not trust the law, who could he trust?
Unease filtered into his conscious as he moved toward the helm, still searching for some sign of life aboard the eerie vessel. It was a fine galleon, and he rested his hand on the wood as he stood near the helm, observing the deck below.
"What are you doing on my ship?"
The tone of the voice was slightly slurred, slightly educated, and sounded as if its owner was more than a little inebriated. Henry whirled, hand habitually going to his hilt after all his years as a midshipman for His Majesty's Navy. But he supposed that was over since, well, his imprisonment for disorderly conduct (which he was innocent of).
The figure which had emerged from the captain's quarters was rather reviling. But also rather comical, and it made Henry want to grin. The fear he'd felt when the decaying specter had told him to find Captain Jack Sparrow resurfaced, preventing him, however. With a swaggering walk that seemed to further his strange appearance and cause his grey-tinged black dreadlocks to sway, beads tinkling together, the person came toward him, before stopping beside the helm and leaning upon it.
Abruptly he leaned forward, his eyes narrowed. "Have I threatened you before?"
"What?" Henry was caught off-guard.
"You look familiar, have I fought with you before?" the man demanded again, waving his hand in annoyance.
"No, I've never met you until now!" Henry blustered, his temper rising a bit.
Ah. Hmm. . . ." the strange man rubbed his bearded chin, looked around for a moment and then asked with a drunken drawl, "Then what are you doing on my ship?"
Henry stared, taken aback and unable to come up with a reply.
"Well?" the man asked, motioning wildly to the boy.
Henry swallowed, and nodded. "I'm, er, here on important business."
"We all are on important business, lad." The man sighed a little and leaned heavily forward on the helm before pulling back, as if tired of something. "If someone wasn't on important business, then it would be unimportant; and unimportant means that the person who was important, or rather, the person who had something important worth doing, believed that this most important thing he was tasked with was unimportant and not worth his important and valuable time to do. Savvy?"
Henry blinked, unsure about what the man had just said. He nodded, feeling lost. "I'm looking for Jack Sparrow. Do you know whereabouts I might find him?" He decided it was best he change the subject.
"Well," the man moved around, straightening up some, "here he is. You've found him. But he wants to know, what the name of the person looking for him with such an urgent matter on his mind is."
The boy wasn't certain of everything in that sentence, but he knew this pirate – er, Jack Sparrow – wanted his name. And, he felt duty-bound to tell him. Mother had raised him right, so he couldn't keep the information back.
"I'm William Henry Turner, but most who know me call me Henry." He admitted, before wondering why he had felt the need to share his full name with a stranger.
The man in front of him blinked, and leaned in closer. Henry pulled back, but the pirate reached out and held him in place, all the while studying him intently.
"William, is it? Good, strong name. Named after your father, I wouldn't doubt." The pirate straightened up, his memory working on him and giving him the sense that this had all happened before. The fuddle rum always gave him was leaving his brain, and he was remembering old adventures and some things he'd rather he could forget.
"Yes. . ." the boy replied, his face uncertain.
"I swear you look just like him," the man suddenly declared, moving off down the deck. Henry watched him go, more confused and shocked than he had been. And then his senses came to him and he hurried off after the pirate. It was only as they stood beside some rigging, and Henry watched him for a moment that he realized what Jack Sparrow was doing. He was trying to get the ship underway. What sort of daft fool . . . ?
"How do you know my father?" he had wondered that, and felt he had to ask before he told the man his message and the pirate clammed up and refused to speak to him anymore.
"Ah, well, your father. . . Here, help me with this." Together they lowered the black sails and tied off some loose rigging. The dreadlocked pirate looked over at him as they hauled up the anchor. "He was a good man. . ." He stood, moving back to the helm. For a moment everything was quiet, and all that could be heard was the creaking of the rigging and the ship. "Good pirate. I was probably one of the few who knew him as William. All the rest of the lot called him Turner. Except for your mother, that is." A distant look fell over the older man's face, and he smiled slightly, then came out of his reverie and glanced over at the youth. The pirate waited. Because this boy was his father's son and he'd do it. Jack just knew it.
"My father was not a pirate." Ah, there it was! Just like old times. "He was an honest sailor. Not some filthy rat raiding good people!" Well, that was a bit different from last time.
"He was a bloody pirate, a scallywag! I know, 'cause it was me who suffered under some of his wild notions!" Jack rebuffed with mild annoyance. Will had not been like this . . . or had he and he'd just forgotten?
Henry began to pull his sword from its scabbard, but the pirate reached out quickly and laid a hand down on it. Their eyes met in that tense instant. "Put it away, son. And keep it there. Not many who are better swordsmen that I, but your father was. And he taught your mother. I have no need to get beaten in a fight I know I can't win." Roughly the youth jerked his hand away, quickly sheathing his weapon.
"I refuse to believe your words!" the boy retorted hotly. Jack chuckled, and before long it turned into an all-out laugh.
"What message had you for me? Some important business, you said?"
"Aye! A Captain Salazar is searching for you, and he said to tell you that death is coming straight for you!" Henry spat out loudly, feeling confused and uncertain. This pirate seemed to know more about his father than he did, and surprisingly, Henry was inclined to believe him. There had been nothing but honesty in his gaze as he'd spoken.
Jack stiffened. And then he smiled. "Well, lad, it looks like you'll be comin' along for the adventure! Perhaps we meet your father and he explain his curse to you, eh?" He grinned at the young man, and he looked one part mad and two parts mysterious. Henry could hardly keep his curiosity at bay.
"What do you mean, 'his curse'?"
"Ah, well, when we come across him – and I can bet you that we will, for I'll be needin' of his help – he can tell you. But for now, I'll do a bit of talkin' after we reach Tortuga, since I can't take my attentions off this ship, and I need you to man the canvas when I tell you to." He returned his attention to the horizon and the Pearl.
Henry frowned slightly. He came up beside the pirate, and looked at him. "Tortuga?" The name felt strange on his tongue, though it also felt eerily familiar.
"Tortuga." Jack replied with a flourish in his tone, looking at the boy with a crooked grin. It was silent for a moment between them, and only the wind in the canvas and the ocean could be heard. All at once:
"Can I call you Will?"
Henry thought quietly a moment, and then nodded.
"Aye, I don't mind."
"William it is then. Fortune's smiling down at me! It is good to have a Turner aboard again!"
A/N: Just a little something I wrote up awhile ago after watching the teaser trailer. I'm just wild about seeing 5 after all these years without a Pirates movie! (I hope and pray it'll be better than 4!) I own nothing, I just wrote this for my own pleasure, and the nostalgia I felt at realizing that Jack's probably going to have a young Turner to deal with again who knows nothing about his father's real life. I hope you enjoy it!
WH
