Title: Relating to a Psychopath
Author: Neldluva
Fandom: Pirates of the Caribbean (At World's End-specific)
Character: Jack
Rating: PG13, to be on the safe side
Warnings: brief language, craziness, mentions of sexual activity
Summary: A look at the time between when Jack arrived in Davy Jones' locker and when he first appears in At World's End.
Author's note: What can I say? I like the crazy. And Jack is so fun to write crazy. Is it sadistic of me to say I like watching his brain break? Oh well. Take a look and see! Title taken from a Macy Gray song of the same name.
"Well, look where we are now, Jack old boy," Jack whispered to himself. He squinted into the distance, trying to see something, anything, that might be ocean. "Davy Jones' locker."
He sauntered down from the forecastle. The deck was empty save for the Pearl's usual trappings. There was no sign of life apart from Jack himself. No birds in the sky, or clouds to blot the sun, or even that infernal little monkey. He already knew that his ship was grounded miles from any ocean, not that the Pearl would go anywhere in the calm, still air.
Jack made his way beneath deck, looking around behind rope and cannon. He inspected every inch of the Pearl's shadowy interior. There was no one beneath deck either, not even in the bilges.
"More rum for me, then," Jack said as he blew off a dusty bottle. "Who needs water when you have rum, says I? I need no water, I'm Captain Jack Sparrow!"
He wandered away, trying not to think of how few bottles of rum there were on board. Eternity was looking a mite bleak, with no one around and rum getting scarce.
A shadowy figure flickered at the corner of Jack's vision, and he spun around, trinkets jingling around him. He cautiously edged closer, one hand on his pistol. He could have sworn he checked the whole ship…
"Hello?" he called. "Anyone there? Gibbs?" He silently hoped no one was there. If anyone saw Captain Jack jumping at shadows, he'd never live it down.
No answer. Must have been a trick of the sun and the rum. Jack shot the area one last warning glance before defiantly gulping again at his rum. He could make it through this. He wasn't going crazy. He was Captain Jack Sparrow, he could do anything. He sat so the bright sun wasn't in his eyes and settled down to get nice and drunk.
He found, over the course of a few days, that the sun didn't change. Day or night, early or late, it beat down with the same pale intensity that strained his eyes and made little wavy mirages appear on the horizon. He had also found that Captain Jack Sparrow did indeed need water, and occasionally food. The barrel beneath deck was fortunately half-full with mostly clean, albeit slightly state, water. And the food hadn't all gone bad yet. Still, eternity was looking to be a very, very long time during which to be hungry.
There was also someone else on the ship. Jack had never seen the man directly, but he knew he had to be somewhere. Who else would make the tiny half-seen movements in the corners of Jack's eyes, or noise on an otherwise still boat? Try through he might, Jack had never found the scoundrel. The man left no sign – no bed, no noticeable missing food or water, not even a smell. But Jack knew he was there, and searched constantly for the intruder.
What time he wasn't searching for his unwelcome guest he spent pacing the deck, trying to formulate an escape plan. He was obviously in a place, and a man can get out of a place if it exists. But the plan just wouldn't come, like his brain had ceased to function, and his thoughts kept going back to Will and Elizabeth.
"Let's not think of that one," he muttered, trying to direct his thoughts to a more productive path. "She's not going to want to save you, she put you here … and the boy won't disagree. There's gratitude, eh? Give 'em an inch and they…"
"Talking to yerself now, Jack?"
Jack looked up, his gaze narrowing. The figure before him looked like a villain, all dirty and stained and his hair matted from years of neglect. Was this the yellow-livered bilge rat that'd been haunting his ship? Why did he look so familiar?
The man smiled, showing gold-capped teeth. "Cat got your tongue?"
"Do I know you, sailor?" Jack asked in his most authoritative voice. "Speak quickly!"
"You know me, Jack." The stranger's eyes went sly and glinty.
Jack didn't like this, not one bit. "I do not!" he protested firmly. "And you would do well to show respect to your captain, Mr. … whatever your name is."
The man gave a small nod and salute, both of the gestures sarcastic and defiant. "As ye wish, Cap'n Sparrow."
"That's more like it." Not that it made Jack feel any better. He walked a few steps away. "Well, back to work! Go do – something. Something else. Right." He ran back up to the helm, trying to look as though he was doing something very important and hoping the man went away. When he looked back at the deck, the rascal was gone, having left no sign that he had ever been there. Jack stifled a shiver and looked back to the endless horizon.
"What a fix, then," he whispered. "Grounded in Davy Jones' locker with a crazy man. Let's hope he has no taste for rum."
Jack generally tried to avoid the other man, with his wild twisted hair and shiny jewelry. There was something very odd and not quite right about him. He would pop up, unexpectedly and without a sound, right behind Jack at random times. Jack always hurried away; at first he tried to do it subtly, but eventually he felt no qualms about letting the man know he was unwanted. And of course, there was that odd sense of familiarity, though Jack could never place how he knew the man.
Jack started calling him Smith, at a lack of any other option. Smith never really did anything, just followed Jack around and remarked about how Jack tended to talk to himself or put slack in the sails as though there were a wind to catch. Jack ignored him, sometimes sticking his fingers in his ears, though that never worked at stopping Smith's voice. And then Smith would disappear, probably skulking below deck or climbing high on the rigging because Jack could never find him again.
Edible food started running low, as did drinkable water. Jack was down to his last two bottles of rum. He still had no escape plan, and Smith had been showing up more often lately. Somehow, Jack wasn't so surprised when he felt Smith's arm over his shoulders and his hot, scentless breath one particularly bright day.
"Quite a pickle we're in, Jack," Smith said, mumbling practically in Jack's ear.
"Aye," Jack agreed tiredly, taking another pull from his bottle of rum. He had long since stopped demanding his title from Smith, seeing as how it never stuck.
"No great plan to escape? No feats of derring-do to get out of this hellhole of doldrums?"
"Still working on that part," Jack replied, fighting irritation – with Smith, with himself, with everything that had happened to land him in the locker. "If ye get any bright ideas, you let me know, though. Looks like we might need more rum soon."
"Aye." Smith's fingers drummed lightly on Jack's upper arm. "Mite lonely too, just the two of us."
Jack rolled his eyes and stepped slightly away. "Don't mind lonely," he said, half to himself. "I'd take all the lonely in the world for an ocean and a breeze."
"Really, Jack?" Smithy had moved to lean against the mainmast, dark eyes sparking mischievously. "Ye'd give up the wenches, a crew, fer the sea? Ye'd give up everyone, even Will and his dear Lizzie?"
Jack's eyes narrowed suspiciously. "How did you –"
"Her kiss felt good, aye? Better than the wenches. Rich girl, pretty girl. Ye liked it, Jack."
"Liked it right into the locker," Jack pointed out bitterly. "Nay, the thought doesn't tempt me. I've washed my hands of that one. Figuratively speaking."
" 'Course, Jack." Smith's smile just grew, and his gaze shifted to somewhere over Jack's shoulder. Jack followed it, the bottle of rum dropping from his suddenly loose fingers.
Elizabeth stepped out of the shadows, looking just as she had after they had been thrown off of the Pearl by Barbossa and his ghostly crew, with her pale brown hair mussed and wearing only her thin white petticoat. That night on the island, he had been so gloriously drunk and she had looked beautiful to him. She wouldn't normally have attracted him … her bodice was depressingly modest, and her spitfire attitude was annoying at best, intimidating at worst. But when he was drunk and lonely and looked at her in the firelight, that had all faded away. She had given him those eyes, the eyes a woman can give a man to make him do anything she wants, and he had held her close enough to smell her hair.
Of course, nothing had happened. The conniving wench had stolen all of his rum to use in her bonfire and had rushed back into dear Will Turner's arms, and Jack had bid her good riddance. At least, until they had found him again. She might have even become his friend, briefly, right up to the part where she left him to the Kraken.
Jack's eyes went wide, and he danced back away from her. "No! No no! I'm done with you!"
"Jack…" she said, her eyes shining with tears.
"No! Lalala, can't hear you! Ye're not even really here!" He glared accusingly at her. There was no way she could have followed him … was there?
"I am here, Jack. Please, don't leave me alone." She took a few steps toward him, tears still in her eyes and chewing on her lip the way she did when she was nervous. She was giving him that look, the same one she had given him that night on the island. "Look at me, Jack."
"Nope!" he shouted, backing against the rail and holding his hands out. He didn't look at her, stared only where her bare feet book out from the hem of that blasted petticoat. "Elizabeth Swann, it's been fun, though actually not really, and I must insist you leave my ship post haste and go back to wherever ye came from. Now, shoo."
"You can't mean that, Jack." Her lips trembled, and Jack remembered how they tasted. She looked hurt and a little angry and so achingly real that Jack wanted to shoot her. Maybe he would, just to make himself feel better.
He pulled out his pistol, pointed at her gut, and shot her. She gasped and stumbled back, her eyes wide with surprise before she crumpled.
"That's for puttin' me here, love," Jack told her as she died, blowing the smoke from his pistol before replacing it. "And don't come back."
"That wasn't very nice, Jack," Smith said as he appeared at Jack's side once more.
"She deserved it, don't tell me she didn't." Jack walked away, intending to find that last bottle of rum and forget what just happened.
"I s'pose the lady wasn't the best of company," Smith continued, swaying after Jack. "What about the boy, then?"
"You're barking up the wrong mainmast, mate," Jack said as he dusted off the bottle. "It's ladies, through and through. Will's a nice lad, but…"
"But he has lovely legs, aye?" Smith breathed hotly in Jack's ear. "We've always liked lovely legs…"
"Aye," Jack agreed, pausing in his steps. He licked his lips, mouth suddenly dry.
"Not too hard on the eyes, is he?" Smith's fingers skittered intimately over the back of Jack's neck.
"Nay," Jack said hoarsely, willing Smith to leave.
"Find out if he really is a eunuch … if he is, then it's just like fucking a girl."
"Only without all the fun parts," Jack said nervously.
Smith's lips parted in a leer that glinted even in the dim light below deck. "How many fun parts d'ye need, Jack?"
"I like to keep my options open." Jack swallowed and pushed away from Smith, making his way up to deck once more.
"Jack!"
Jack winced and shut his eyes, willing it not to be true. But he felt a hand on his shoulder and turned to face Will. The lad looked just as he should, face distressed and determined, clothing askew, eyes wide and dark and pleading.
"Jack, you must help me find Elizabeth!" Will stepped closer, too close, and leaned in so Jack could see that freckle on his neck.
"Sorry mate, but I'm through with do-goodery," Jack said, stepping away from the thing that looked real but couldn't be. "You'll have to find some other pirate to help you find your lass. And might I suggest a leash in the future."
Jack turned his back on Will, only to be faced with Smith again. He smiled like he didn't care and took a big gulp of rum.
"I know what this is," he said, louder than necessary. "This is me going crazy, am I right, Smithy? You're all just dreams out o'me head, aye? Well, enough! Captain Jack Sparrow does not go crazy!"
"Oh really now?"
Jack dreaded turning around again. All of this was making his head hurt, and if that voice was who he thought it was, he really was in hell. Sure enough, there stood Barbossa at the helm, huge plumed hat and monkey and all. Beside him stood a figure that looked uncomfortably close to Jack's father. Jack felt a tremor run over his shoulders.
"And here I just thought it was part o'yer charm, Jack." Barbossa smiled a rotten smile, and the monkey squawked.
Jack grimaced with displeasure. "You're all figments of my perverse and admittedly questionable imagination," he said, though his voice wavered.
"You calling me a figment, boy?" Jack's father growled, a fierce look on his weathered face.
Jack flinched and turned away. "Ye're none of you real … get gone, stop haunting me!"
"You can't escape us, Jack," Will whispered, ghost-breath hot and scentless in Jack's ear.
"Not even if you try," Elizabeth added from his other side. "We're part of you, locked in your head."
"No, get away!"
"Where would ye go, Jack?" It was his father's voice this time, too close for comfort. Jack shivered again. "Stuck on land, no ocean in sight, nothing for miles and miles but hard packed desert. Where would ye run?"
Jack wasn't much of a man for pleading … not even when in the most dire circumstances would he think to beg for his life. He came close, then, wanting to implore them to retreat and leave him be. He could practically feel the shreds of his sanity unraveling, plunging him down a dark hole from which there was no return. He clutched at his head and rocked slightly, his breath quick and panicked. A plan, he needed a plan…
More insect-light ghost fingers danced over his shoulders, and he leapt away, for all the good it would do.
"Get away!" he screamed, squeezing his eyes shut and leaning over the rail of the Pearl. "Leave me in peace!"
There was no reply. Hesitantly, Jack cracked one eye open. No sign of the monkey. No Barbossa. No long-legged Will or his half-dressed girl. Jack opened the other eye and removed his hands from his head. Had they finally decided to leave him alone? Had he rid himself of the ghosts at last? They were silent now, and invisible, and it looked as though they were gone.
The tension flowed out from Jack's shoulders, and he sighed with relief. Hopefully that had just been a brief moment of insanity, quick to be forgotten and no longer to be troublesome. He bent to retrieve his rum – fortunately, little of it had spilled, and there was a good two inches left in the bottle. He hummed quietly under his breath as he swaggered his way back to the helm, that one he had sung with Elizabeth around the bonfire – hell if he knew what it meant, but the tune was catching. He gulped at the rum, silently congratulating himself on conquering insanity.
That is, until he sputtered and nearly choked on the mouthful of rum. Smith was back on deck, but there wasn't just one of him … there were at least fifteen, all in varying degrees of undress but all with the same faded scarf around the head, the same jingly jewelry that Jack recognized crashing into his eyes as he spun around. A goat wandered around deck, nibbling at random scarves and braying quietly. He gaped for a moment before throwing his shoulders back, refusing to be outdone.
"You. Sailor," he said, pointing to one in front. "Your name, sir."
"Sparrow," the man replied, gold-capped teeth flashing.
"And you?" Jack pointed to another who was scratching his head with boredom.
"Sparrow, Cap'n," the man said.
"And what about you?" Jack gestured at another, one near the middle.
The men arrayed on deck stared at each other, several of them shrugging and some raising their eyebrows questioningly at Jack. The appointed man said nothing, though he appeared to be … preening.
"That's a chicken, sir," one of the men pointed out.
"Right," Jack muttered to himself, making his way down to deck. "Even my figments think I'm crazy." He glanced around, searching for a breeze or any sign that his situation had changed. "Right, lads. Back to work. Make 'er ready to sail! Sparrow, get the chicken put away! You, Sparrow, swab this deck! And you!"
"Me, sir?" one of the men asked as he approached Jack's side.
"Yes, you. You look a trustworthy gent. You'll be my first mate. All hands to stations! I'll tolerate no laziness aboard my ship!"
Jack wandered around, inspecting their work. The figments were slower than he would have liked, and took breaks too often, but beggars can't be choosers. Satisfied that all was in order, he returned to the helm, surveying his new crew. Lousy and pox-ridden and lazy they might be, but they were his, and he had his Pearl, and all was fine.