Title: Weeds
Rated: PG
Pairings: Jack/Elizabeth
Disclaimer: I do not own Pirates of the Caribbean. Disney does, no money being made off this.
Warning: setting is well… later than AWE. Way later, like decades later?
Summary: Jack looks back on his thoughts about Elizabeth while coming to terms with his guilt.
Weeds. Weeds are tangled things that come up and threaten to choke the real things that are supposed to live. They are the ones that attempt to choke you, to stop you from living; or else they rape your life and live off you like a parasite or they twist themselves into your habitat and slowly strangle you to death.
Innocuous. Innocuous - now there was a word. Seemingly nice, innocent…no trouble. That is the impression you get from that word. Or is it simple? Just it's so little… it's a nice word…seemingly… but innocuous is that word that also implies that you might have a nice thing but really it's not, fuck! It's truly a fucked up word and it's bitter and twisted. Or is just me that sees it? It's just innocuous is such a crap word. Plain, simple, stark, boring. Nothing is supposed to happen with it. It's not harmful, nor likely to cause injurious harm, supposed to be inoffensive, not likely to irritate. They obviously have never been to Singapore and realised that Asians are notorious for being "innocuous". Laughing in your face I am.
Innocuous weeds. An oxymoron. Weeds are something that grows just to tangle you in its life grip, slowly peetering out your life, but combined with the word innocuous where it's supposed to be nice, simple, non irritating, non-injurious? Oxymoron.
Like her. Elizabeth Swann.
Elizabeth Swann. The parasite, the fungus, the mould. She was the seemingly innocuous weed that pervaded your senses, your life, your heart, your very soul and then proceeded to choke you to death. A true blackguard, a conniving wench, a scoundrel. The woman who had the heart of a pirate.
And the worst part about it? It was because of him.
He turned her into that. He turned her into the true meaning of pirate. She wasn't like young William who had the moral code, the principles, the essence of a good man. No, she had a soul that was as murky as the water in the dank pool of sloth; a cold and heartless as an empty beach in a storm. She was no lady; she was a dirty, stinking pirate.
He met her, changed her from what she was. She'd been the spoilt governor's daughter full of ideals. She had been everything bright on a typical Caribbean day. She had been the joy, the passion, the effervescence; everything you would have needed to become whole. She had believed in the legend that was Captain Jack Sparrow. She had believed that he had ransacked Nassau without firing a single shot and she believed he was a good man.
But that island… things changed on that island. That island had the power to change a life. It changed his – several times in fact. And it definitely changed hers.
He dashed her dreams. He wasn't the legend she had read about. He wasn't even a nice man. He was just a pirate, a dirty smelly pirate with loose morals and even looser sense of ethics.
From that island she grew, like a weed, ravenous, rapacious, and hungry for more. She wanted, needed a pirate in her life. When young William wasn't enough she became her own pirate.
All because he has told her she would… she would want to taste it. It left a bitter taste in his mouth and a rip in his heart. He'd had to spoil it all, had to have fun and play with the dolly-belle.Be the bigger man and all that . He had to muddy the waters and insert his poisonous life into hers.
"One word love; curiosity. You long for freedom. You long to do what you want to do because you want it. To act on selfish impulse. You want to see what it's like. One day you won't be able to resist."
'Meet my terms,' he'd challenged her silently. He should have known better. He shouldn't have done that. Played with her innocence like that. All she'd done was become like him, like ol' Jack.
"You came back. I always knew you were a good man."
And meet his terms she did. He never understood why she did it. He never understood why it bothered him that he never understood it. Why she kissed him with a passion then left him to basically rot and die. And why the thought of her turning into a pirate was like a knife twisting in his gut.
She turned into that damned selfish, conniving wench and he'd stood there and didn't change her path. He watched as she became as cutthroat as Barbossa himself; doing everything for her own selfish agenda. Doing things because of selfish impulse. Yeah, the thought of Lizzie turning into a pirate came with a dull ache, followed by a heart wrenching twist.
The thing is she already knew what it was about. She'd done it before. She'd used people, over and over again. He'd seen it, the former Commodore and young William had seen it and out of all of them, stupidly all he'd done was encourage it. Pirate.
Jack stood overlooking the ocean. The light reflected brilliantly off the calm sea, shining its brilliance back at him. He stood impassively, his sash riding with the wind, while the rest of him stood stoically. His mouth twisted horribly as the word echoed in his head. Pirate.
He stood there, thoughts running through his head, his greying beard flowing out in the wind. The tendrils of hair on his head, floating like wisps with the wind, the light glinting off the weathered cheeks.
Pirate. Dead – now she was dead, her body behind him. In his soul she died long ago. He could recall her final words after he found her, broken and dying, "All that I am, all that I ever was is here in your perfect eyes; they are all I can see."
As he gazed out to sea, his only thought was now he was alone.