PROLOGUE: Born again from the ice
My life began when Rose let me slip from the door, watching me sink in the crystal clear waters just degrees away from freezing. If it wasn't freezing already. Frozen hair remained so in the smooth water. How was Rose to know that however sluggish my heartbeat was it was still there. But still to this day I thank her eternally. Her perfect timing was all I needed. But her job done I then needed HER.
As my body sank to the unforgiving depths of the ocean out of sight it was grasped by a small dainty hand from underneath. Then pain. My body had been numb for so long the sensation felt so new. But it was there, the fire now raging in my arms and legs as well as my heart. I was so taken by this new feeling that I didn't realize that the hand was not pulling me to the surface but down. Dragging me farther and farther under water until I came to among the bodies still on the deck of the ship.
The pain grew, engulfing my whole body in its red hot anger. But as the time passed I realized that the presence underneath the surface was still there. If I could have moved I would have been able to reach out and touch it. Down here in the silence I could hear only myself. My thoughts knocking around my head like dice in a cup, my heartbeat. So fast. As if it was trying to finish itself off years too early, the blood in my veins rushing by and somehow disappearing. As if there was some sort of hole that let a little bit out every so often. It all got louder. The sound deafening in the now lukewarm water that was my home.
Silence. Back above the water the silence was my enemy. But now, even the silence held mystery of the voices threaded through it. I opened my eyes- expecting darkness to greet me. Like the backs of my eyelids held. But instead I saw gray. It was filtered down in streams and I realized that this must be the light able to reach all the way down here.
Sitting up was not hard. The water guided me up. Surprising that the weight of it all was not so crushing. I could not see the surface from here but I was hungry. I wanted something, not meat, not a drink. The feeling burned in my stomach like an insistent child wanting to play. From my viewpoint I saw a body not five feet away.
I waited for the repulsion to come. It never did. Instead I felt drawn to it like a moth to a light bulb. With more aggression than I had ever had in my life I swam towards the body. Something sharp pierced my lip. I gave it no thought and merely opened my mouth. All of my mind focused on the faceless stranger claimed by the ocean. I tore in. Cold entered my belly. But it was better than the empty nothingness. Sloshy coldness filled the gap that had begged me for so long to be filled. I looked again… the body looked the same save for two small punctures in its neck.
Eyes bore into me and I turned. For the first time I saw her. She was sitting on a fallen board her ridiculously long hair floating around her like a demented halo. Her face was twisted into sadistic smile her eyes although I could barely see them twinkled in the scarce light. Her mouth opened to speak but no bubbles emitted.
"It's much easier when the hearts are beating to help you."
Alright folks... there it is. The birth of our new Jack! Now lets see where my sadistic mind takes us next!