Disclaimer: I hereby disclaim from this chapter on, until the end of this particular story, that I do not own any character, prop, theme song, etc. from Pirates of the Carribean, Curse of the Black Pearl or otherwise.
Calypso's Children
Chapter One: Commodore
Lord Cutler Beckett lifted the lip of the leather bag that sat before him on the grand desk, and the reek of decomposition magnified through the small opening, through which he could make out the heart that was still pulsing steadily. Flies swooped happily around it, alighting every now again on the grimy bag. Beckett recoiled quickly when the aroma crept up his nostrils, his face scrunched up in distaste. He looked up at James Norrington, bedraggled and gamey, who stared at him with something mixed between desperation and determination. He looked nothing like the man he once was, his brunette hair straddling his shoulders in greasy locks, and his facial hair grown into a beard as unkempt as the rest of him. He looked like a man that had tangoed with squalor. Beckett had heard the rumors of the hurricane and the report of few to no survivors. Norrington had challenged the tempest with nothing behind him but his pride and ship, and lost.
"And I'm supposed to believe this belongs to Davey Jones?" Beckett asked, indicating the bag. "Where is the chest he had it locked up in? You could have easily cut out some poor vagabond's heart and brought it to me, hoping I was either too eager or too stupid to know the difference." Beckett drawled.
"That heart is still beating, isn't it? I don't suppose you've encountered many that do that." Norrington argued, anger thick in his voice.
"Very well," Beckett said lazily, almost draped gracefully over his chair with a nonchalant attitude (though really he was just trying to get as far away from the throbbing organ that still lay on his magnificent oak desk), "I will sign your pardon." he snatched up the pardons that lay next to Davy Jones's heart, and scrawled his signature on the given line. "Congratulations James Norrington, you're a free man."
"I want my position back as commodore." Norrington said quickly.
Lord Beckett looked at him, lips turned down and eyebrows creased like a father who was disappointed in his son. "You have just wheedled your way out of death. Do not take advantage of my charity."
"Wheedled?" Norrington looked aghast and insulted. He was at a loss for words, yet at the back of his mind was kicking himself for actually hoping he would be welcomed back with open arms. This was a government that jumped at the chance to condemn him to death for a crime that was more than far-fetched, to say the least. He was accused of conspiring to liberate the same man that he was, at the time, in pursuit of. He had hoped the misunderstanding could be easily cleared (after all, the person they should REALLY be after was that bastard William Turner), but his hope was quickly deteriorating.
Lord Beckett saw the dread filling Norrington's eyes and smiled inwardly, though he wouldn't have been able to place the reason if he had been asked. He pushed himself out of his chair and walked out from behind his desk, hands clasped behind his back, to stand in front of the hand painted map that spanned most of the wall in his office. He stared at the mass of blank space still left on the canvas, and an idea crept like a smile to his lips.
"However," He began, his back still facing the former commodore, "I've no doubt you would be able to earn your position back." He turned and smiled without a hint of kindness at Norrington. "Nothing should be too hard for the man who... found Davy Jones's heart." Beckett turned back to stare at the map. Norrington felt himself grimacing. He didn't care too much for Lord Cutler Beckett's tone of phrase. It sounded too much like an accusation.
After what seemed like an eternity, James Norrington was afraid that Lord Beckett wasn't going to continue and had simply lost interest, but he finally spoke up. "I lost a map-maker to the southeast islands. I received a letter from a porter of a passing ship that they had spotted the wreckage of one of my ships about a month ago, but no bodies. Normally, I wouldn't bother wasting my time and men searching for the crew of a map-maker," He spit out the word like the thought disgusted him, "but he was, unfortunately, the best of his kind, and the only one who knew the exact location of Calypso in Salo."
"Calypso in Salo?" Norrington inquired.
"It is an island off the edge of the map, for now,and, like Isla de Muerta, can only be found by a certain means."
"What is so important about this island?"
"You don't need to worry about that." Beckett stated, turning back to face Norrington. "I will give you your title back, my finest crew and ship, and all you have to do is bring back either my map-maker, Dante, or his means of discovering Calypso in Salo."
"How am I to know what it is?" Norrington asked, but Beckett simply turned away again.
"I have faith in you... commodore." He walked back to his desk and picked up a quill, inking it and dragging it across a nearby leaf of parchment in almost illegible writing. He returned the quill when finished and handed it to Norrington. "Deliver this to Mercer on your way out. He should be waiting just outside the door. It will enlighten him of my decision."
James Norrington had no choice but to leave, knowing any further questions on his behalf would only be flippantly unheeded. Before he was completely out the door, however, Lord Beckett stopped him. "Just a moment. You might need this." Norrington turned around. Beckett carried in his hands a familiar sword, held out like an offering. "The sword given to you on your coronation as commodore. I see it only fitting that it should be returned on your– ah– re-coronation." Norrington reached out for the hilt of the sword, and it suddenly felt as if time had slowed so every second became an entire minute. It was the sword made by Will Turner's hand, under the guise of his master, Mr. Brown. The sword that had almost moved him to forgive Turner's betrayal. Almost. Everything on the boy's part had been a deception, it seemed, and nothing would please Norrington more than to hold Turner's and his best man Sparrow's life on the edge of the very sword that Turner had made. Irony at its finest moment, indeed. He held it up to the light, admiring the way revenge shined off of the well- balanced steel.
It reflected a hopeful future.