"I know it's not an ideal situation, but Daddy will be home soon, okay?" the man asked his son, who sat upon a rust stained bed frame. It squeaked when he reached in to wrap his arms around the thin boy. "A day. Two at tops."
No matter what he said, the boy continued to cry silently, careful to hide the sobs from his father. The man stood to leave, and with one final look at his son, closed the door to the bedroom and ascended the stairs to the deck.
The boy refuse to look up. No matter how many times his father went away and came back, he knew, even at his young age, that one day he wouldn't return. Because when he went away to do his job, everyone always came back intoxicated by alcohol or some other foreign luxury they pillaged. He knew this because he ha grown up with the life of living at sea, below the lives of killers and manics and addicts who called themselves pirates.
He knew his father was one of them. He knew he did the same things they all did, and he knew that there was a way to change it- he had seen it the days when they would dock and go into cities. Big luminous buildings with not so much as a lake in sight. With people and women who carried on as if these men were not among them.
All of a sudden, he wanted his father. More than he ever had wanted him in all his nine years. The boy climbed the small set of steps to the door.
"...another job!" a voice bellowed.
"But it's her city! She might still be there! An theres... I mean... There's four small ports a mile up!"
"No. It's about time you start picking sides, Adan." the man was speaking to his father, standing face to face with the man and a scowls sat on his face.
"Picking sides?" his father bellowed. He scratched the scruff on his chin and began pacing. A small crowd of peers began to crowd around the pair. "I've picked your side for eight years! You think I want to be here? With Peter? Away from his mother?"
With one swipe of his hand, the other man brought his hand to his father's throat, and pinned him to the nearest pole. The scruffed man made choking noises and gasped for a breath, which was denied.
"Listen, Adan." the captor drawled. "It's a kindness I let you on this ship. You and that bitch and bastard would have never made it on your own if you didn't bring your years-worth earning of booze." An unspoken breath lingered on his lips. He finally released his father's neck, dropping him to the wood with a crash.
"I-" he gasped. His chest heaved with breaths that never came. "Hook-...please...don't,"
With another grand motion, Hook's hand,wielding a knife, descended on Adan's face. His head flew to the side. A growing red mark was left in the track of the blade.
"This is my ship." Hook spat at the man now coughing at his feet. "And I will do whatever I please. You've been a traitor for too long, Pan." To punctuate his point, Hook sent a boot into Adan's stomach. At a last feeble attempt to speak, he uttered a word to the brute looming over him.
"Peter?" The man named Hook laughed, and soon everyone in the vicinity joined in. "Peter will be in good hands."
His son's care was the final promise Adan Pan heard, before a wound to the stomach caused him to gasp in shock, a final breath he would ever take.
Storm clouds rolled into focus as the full mast ship rolled into shore of its next destination.