DISCLAIMER: If I owned Disney, trust me, the movies would have been MUCH more historically accurate.
AN: This term is soon coming to an end! I have posted the application for the second term of the OFUM (go to my profile and find the Official Fanfiction University of the Caribbean 2 under my stories as the application is the first chapter.) Anyone who's interested in applying to be a student this time around, get your butts over there and sign up. That's about it, I think. Sorry for the inarticulateness. It's two in the morning. And inarticulateness is not a word. What should that be, lack of articulation? Is there a less formal way to say that?
~Siren
She was dreaming of shooting cheeseburgers in the mall with a pistol. She'd fire, then run across the tiled floors to where the dead cheeseburger lay and bite into it, bullet and all, then she'd sight on another one and do the same. The first few were right out there in the open, but then it became more of a challenge, trying to see if she could spot any more among the crowds of people who, with typical dream-logic, were going normally about their business. She had gotten onto the escalator to go search the upper floors for wild ice cream sundaes, still chewing the last mouthful of her seventh burger, when the person on the escalator behind her grabbed her shoulder and started shaking it.
"Abby, you need to get up!" Her eyes flew open and she choked on a mouthful of fabric. Spitting it out, she pushed herself up onto her arms and looked down at her sleeve, which she had been trying to eat in her sleep so enthusiastically that there were a couple small tears where her teeth had broken through. Wide-eyed, she looked up at Sarah, then further up at the visibly lighter water above them.
"We're going back up?" she asked hopefully, leaning back against the soft surface behind her and staring up towards the barely-visible sunlight.
"Yes. Only an hour and a half left and then we're freed from our service. We're being dropped off in Port Royal again. We were going to wake you up, but you looked so comfortable and she didn't seem to mind, so…"
"She who?" Abby asked, then froze and slowly turned her head to look behind her.
She had been sleeping snuggled up to the tip of one of the Kraken's tentacles resting on the ship's deck. A soft whimper escaped her lips and she slowly edged away from it.
"It's… all right, she really didn't seem to mind," Sarah said lamely. "Cause, I mean, if she did, it's not like she couldn't have moved it."
"Sarah?" Abby's voice trembled. "I wanna go home."
Maybe it was the not-eating, or the hundred hours of darkness and cold and nervousness, or the beatings she'd taken during the self-defense lessons catching up to her. She didn't know. But all the sudden, the entire thing felt like a sick, drug-influenced nightmare. She wrapped her arms around herself and rocked back and forth, trembling convulsively and squeezing her eyes closed, ignoring the sounds of voices around her and trying to will herself back into the shopping mall dream, back to the world of free-range cheeseburgers and oblivious strangers. She distantly felt herself being dragged somewhere, but ignored it, ignored everything for a long time until finally everything was dark and still and silent and she opened her eyes nervously. She was still underwater, and there were wooden planks beneath her, but she couldn't see anything, and there were no tentacles anywhere.
"Am I dreaming again?" she asked the silence hopefully.
"Ah, ye're back then, lass?" Abby blinked at the creaky-sounding voice, trying to identify it.
"W-Wyvern? I'm in the hold?"
"Aye. Hope ye ain't bothered by the dark. The teachery one said ye'd be calmer without the light. It bother ye? I can holler them back down with a lantern if so."
"No. No, the dark is good. I think I'd rather no one else come down here right now," she said shakily.
"So what shook ye so badly, lass?" Wyvern asked, his voice kind in the darkness.
"This, here, everything… I don't belong here! I'm not a pirate, I was never anything like a pirate! I want to watch TV and eat cereal and wear clean underwear!"
"All right," Wyvern said, sounding a little puzzled. "That's all?"
"I just don't belong here. I'm weak and pathetic and a failure at adventuring."
"Ye never did belong here, any of ye. Ye're livin' young women who've got no real evil in yer souls. O' course this place don't suit ye. Even us crewmates ain't here by choice, ye know. We're here because it's a step up from Hell. Not much of a step neither. Plain foolish to think you'd fit in here." Abby blinked, absorbing his words.
"So I'm not a coward?"
"Psh, o' course ye are. Most people are if it comes to that. That's why heroes are heroes, because normal folk, they snivel and cower and hope if they shuts their eyes all the scary bits'll go away. What d'ye need to be a hero for? Any family vendettas need to be settled, curses after ye, destinies to forge?"
"Not that I know of," she said softly, twisting her fingers around each other.
"Then there's no need to become somethin' ye ain't," Wyvern concluded logically. "The sea and the deep are big, black, ancient things. They've broken many a stout-hearted man before ye and will break more after ye're gone. Why d'ye think the crew o' this cursed ship's full o' anger and hate? It gets to them, too, the ceaseless dark and cold. Men were never meant to live under the water, trapped between life and death and eternity."
"I guess so. It's just that everyone else seems to be doing so much better than I am."
"Up until less'n an hour ago, you were doin' just as well as the best o' them. What was it spooked ye?"
"I woke up and found out I had been cuddling with the Kraken," Abby said miserably, shuddering.
"Cuddlin' with" *snerk* "the—sorry, lass…" Wyvern's voice cracked and he let loose with a rusty laugh. "The Kraken, that… that's rare, it is. Well, ye do have a story to tell, don't ye!"
"I guess," she replied, managing a small smile. "You know, it was actually pretty comfortable?"
They were still talking and laughing an hour later when suddenly, the water level in the cabin began to drop. Abby leapt to her feet.
"We're back, we're on the surface! ThankyouthankyougoodbyeWyvernIloveyou!" she shouted over her shoulder as she found the hatch in the dark after a moment of fumbling and flung it open, throwing herself through and twirling around in the sunlight. She was not the only one shouting and cheering, but she wasn't sure she'd have been able to stop even if the entire deck had been still and silent.
"It's air, it's air, I'm breathing air!" she chanted, bouncing up and down. She touched her neck and felt for the gills and found that they were gone. "Yesss! I'm not all fishy anymore! Woohoo!" The warmth of the sun felt wonderful, so wonderful. She ran up to Siren.
"Siren, guess what?" Her instructor was standing, basking in the sun with her eyes shut and her face turned up toward the light.
"Mmm?"
"I'm not a pirate. I'm a girly, neurotic coward with a weak stomach and fangirlish tendencies! Adventure confuses me, the mysteries of the deep ocean scare me, the characters pity me, and I am so totally okay with that because I am not underwater anymore, bitches!" she was grinning maniacally. "Yes! Take that, you stupid… sea!" she shouted at the ocean around the ship. Siren started laughing and opened her eyes to shake her head at Abby in disbelief.
"Well, I'm glad to see you're feeling better. Now come on, let's go hoist some sails so we can get on land even faster." Abby bounced and nodded an affirmative.
"Aye aye, captain!"
"Pardon?" a gruff voice snarled from behind her and Abby spun around to see Davy Jones giving her… well, pretty much the look you'd expect if you called anyone else Captain on his ship.
"You know, I even like you," she told him, beaming, then ran to help Angel with the fors'l, leaving him standing there, blinking, hat dripping in the sunlight.
"… Scurvy lil' tramp!" he yelled after her. "Belay that! No dancin'!"
Kat was the first one over the side and wading to the shore when they did get close enough, and threw herself to the ground and kissed the dirt dramatically, then pushed herself up onto her elbows and spat out a mouthful of sand and a small jellyfish, which she looked at, mystified, for a moment. Abby, who had been about to do the same thing, decided to hug a palm tree instead, then couldn't find one and after a few minutes of wildly looking around, settled for hugging herself.
For what could have been anywhere from five to twenty minutes was spent on the sand, wringing out hair and clothes (as much as was possible while still remaining dressed) and basking in the sun like bedraggled, overgrown reptiles, watching the seaweed-covered sails of the Dutchman vanish in the distance. It was Cate, who was standing in the sun and inspecting the extent of the rust damage who noticed the horses.
"Horses!" she said, pointing.
"Do people made of metal get sunstroke?" Siren asked sleepily without moving an inch from where she lay sprawled in the sand.
"No, seriously! There are two horses coming. One of them has a rider. In blue and a wig. Navy?"
"Great, just what we need," Holly moaned. "I cannot, will not deal with Beckett until someone feeds me something cooked. Anything. A cracker. One of Summer's apple muffins, anything!"
"I think they're back on the Pearl," Grace said, sitting up and shading her eyes, trying to see the approaching rider. "I know Barbossa was using a few of them as paperweights. I don't think that's Beckett. I just don't see him facing us without his little retinue to keep us in check."
"Admiral Norrington? Governor Swann?" Sarah asked wistfully. "Civilized people?"
"If it is Beckett, maybe we can cook him," Tierza told Becca reassuringly. "He's not as resourceful as Jack. He might not get away."
"I'm liking the sound of civilized people myself," Koneka said as dryly as could be accomplished while soaking wet with salt water.
"It's Norrington," Kat said, sitting back down and poking at the jellyfish she'd spat out earlier with a stick. It was a grayish-purple color.
"Seriously?" Siren asked, cracking her eyes open just a bit. "I wonder why."
"I thought I saw the Dutchman a bit ago," Norrington called out a second later as he dismounted a dozen yards away, unknowingly answering her question. "And I assumed since the Kraken took you off the Dauntless, that was where I'd find you. Is anyone hurt?"
"Wet, hungry, tired, filthy," Linsey replied. "Hurt, not so much."
"Well, I did bring something to eat and the things you left behind on the ship," the commodore said mildly, then his eyes widened as Siren gasped, jumped to her feet, ran over, and threw her arms around him in a ribcage-crushingly enthusiastic hug.
"You are a wonderful, wonderful person," she said fervently.
"Ah… let go?" Norrington managed, then carefully pried himself out of her grip, looking rather alarmed and disgusted as he tried to brush away the sand and sogginess she'd left on his uniform and gestured vaguely at the saddlebags the horses were carrying, which the students were already rushing to open.
"Bread!"
"Dry clothing!"
"My shoes!"
"Look at the pretty horses!"
There was a prolonged stretch of chaos and quarreling as no one could figure out which things were whose at first, and they finally settled down on the sand with their weapons beside them and munched on whatever they'd been able to grab before the food ran out and passing around the aleskins. Nina had come up with the rather clever idea of leading the two horses a bit away from the group and changing clothes using the horses' bodies as a screen, which was working rather better for the people who ended up with the black horse than the brown, which had decided what it really wanted to do just then was wander over there. Norrington had politely averted his eyes from the general area where this was going on, and was trying to speak to Siren about some sort of plans for after the finals while staying physically as far away from her as possible.
"Oh for heavens sake," Siren finally snapped, turning to him. "I just said you were wonderful. I am not going to rape you!"
"I don't believe anyone had implied that you would," Norrington said politely, though he looked relieved at such a definite anouncement of it.
"And certainly not while you're wearing that wig," Siren continued, making him choke on a mouthful of ale.
"What the devil is it with you future females? I'll have you know that normal young women find a well-attired man in a wig very attractive," he replied indignantly.
"Yep, seemed to do wonders for Elizabeth," Kelsey said sarcastically.
"Pirates are apparently what do it for Elizabeth," Norrington replied tersely. "I rather doubt the wig had anything to do with it."
"Forget about wigs for a second! I'm sorry I mentioned it! So is there any way we can…"
"It's not possible. I refuse to allow you to smuggle pirates past the port authorities yet again. Do you have any idea what I risked to do so once? I am certainly not going through that again simply so that you can have this silly 'graduation ceremony' of yours. Hold it at sea. Hold it on Tortuga. Hold it in Australia for all I care. But you will not be letting pirates back into Port Royal."
" Fine.," Siren gave in. "Is everyone dressed in something dry? Got your shoes and weapons? Then lets go to the inn and get some rest. You've a couple more classes in the next few days, and then it's Finals time."
That night at the inn, Abby slept like a log, bedbugs and all.
"Today we are having a very important class on character pairings." The students were gathered on the chairs and settee in the large upstairs drawing room of the Swann mansion, feeling cleaner, drier, and more rested than they had in months. Even Siren had given up the added authority of standing while she lectured to curl up in a cushioned armchair. The bright Caribbean sun speared through the half-open curtains to illuminate particles of dust in the air, and after weeks of hard decks and salt water and wind, the elegance and damask drapery of the room was almost claustrophobic.
"I'll start with the cardinal rule of any pairing: don't go out-of-character. And I'm not just talking about the pair in question, I'm talking about all the characters. Don't just wave a magic wand and turn any other contender for a character's affections into a complete douchebag so that they have an excuse to turn to their 'real' soulmate. You are not the douchebag fairy. If you really believe those two characters belong together, you should not need to take anyone out of character to accomplish it."
"Likewise," Siren continued, "Falling in love should not make anyone go out-of-character. Yes, people sometimes act differently when they're in love. But they act differently in specific ways. They may be unusually happy or unusually moody. They may lie to make the person they love happy, or because they think the lie will make that person love them more. What they won't do is start thinking and talking differently. If this is a person who doesn't normally talk about their feelings, falling in love isn't going to change that. If they're normally inarticulate, they will not turn into a Hallmark card—if anything, they'll get more inarticulate. If they don't trust easily and don't have many close friends, they're going to take a very long time to fall in love, and an even longer amount of time to admit it."
"And if it's Jack, he's never going to love any woman as much as he loves the sea and the Pearl," Summer added vehemently.
"It is also true that a romance is not going to make you love the things you already love any less," Siren said with a nod to Summer. "Now let's talk about logic. If you are going to pair up two characters in any serious sense, they have to like each other and they have to respect each other. If you really want to pair up two characters who to all appearances seem to hate each other in the movies, you have to do one of two things. One, you contrive an incident in which they discover something that makes them no longer hate each other. Two, you come up with a believable explanation of circumstances that during the events of the movies forced them to act as if they did hate each other when really they didn't. I must add to this a specific warning: make sure that if you do use option one, you address the real reason that they hated each other. For instance, if Admiral Norrington finds out that Captain Jack Sparrow is really a great guy and donates to charity and saves dying kittens, that does not change the fact that Jack is a pirate and Norrington hates pirates. If you really want the two of them to be together, you're either going to have to engineer some set of circumstances that will cause Norrington to completely change his mind about the whole pirate issue or just accept that this is not a relationship that's going to work and move on to a different pairing.
"Now, notice that I am not going to tell you that you are not allowed to use that or any pairing, even in the cases of pairings that make me want to vomit blood. Because if you are able to make it work in a believable way, without going out-of-character, then you have earned the right to use that pairing."
"So you're okay with slash pairings and stuff?" Becca asked, looking surprised. "You don't think that counts as out-of-character to begin with?"
"If it's not considered out-of-character for, say, Will and Anamaria to get together even though they showed no sign of attraction to each other in the movies, then the same goes for any two characters. That's how I see it anyway. I mean, it's not like anyone's sexual orientation was mentioned one way or another in any of the movies. I think being a Disney character is kind of like being in the army: Don't ask, don't tell.
"Another thing a lot of writers screw up is the sex scene if there is one. The easiest way to handle it is the fade-out method, where just as things are about to get graphic, the scene fades to black and resumes again afterwards or the next morning. But if you're really determined to write a sex scene, please, and I can't stress this enough, please be aware of what is and isn't physically possible. There are some things you cannot do in a hammock. There are some things you cannot do for very long. There are some things you cannot do without lubrication. Make sure everything you're describing is realistic. If you're a virgin, find someone who isn't to beta read the scene for you. You also need to carefully consider what words or euphemisms you're using for certain actions and body parts, because you don't want your reader to crack up laughing in the middle of the scene."
"And then there's the obvious result of sex, which is…" Siren paused, looking at them expectantly.
"Babies," said Grace just as Kat said,
"Orgasms."
Siren laughed. "I was referring to pregnancy. Now, there were a couple semi-reliable means of birth control available in the 18th century, but they were mainly used by whores. It was pretty much assumed that good girls didn't know about such things, so generally even if they did know, they would have considered it unthinkable to actually use them. So it's pretty much inevitable that unless your character is the kind of unashamed and experienced woman of the world who actually would employ these methods, frequent sex is going to result in pregnancy. And regardless of how independent and headstrong your female character is, keep in mind that this is the 18th century we're talking about. If she's pregnant and recieves a proposal of marriage, she is not going to turn it down to raise the child as a single parent, even if the proposal comes from a man who she doesn't love. It's just not how things were done back then. There is one option for sex without pregnancy, however, and that is that one of your characters is infertile. However the tradeoff there is that if they can't have kids, they can't have kids, period. Depending on your plot, this may or may not be something you want." Siren shrugged. "Your call."
"Any other rules?" Nina wanted to know.
"Yes. If it's a long story, it needs a non-romantic subplot, or the romance itself needs to be the subplot rather than the main one," Siren answered promptly. "Pirate ships are not pieces of scenery. They don't just sail from nowhere to nowhere with the occasional stop at Tortuga and no apparent trade or battle ever taking place. If they're on a ship, other things are going to be happening that have nothing to do with the romance."
"I think we've learned that one pretty well by now," Tierza said wryly.
"I certainly hope you have," Elizabeth said, appearing in the doorway and startling everyone who'd had their back to it. "It's two hours past noon, you know. Shouldn't you be at the smithy? Will said you had a class with him."
Siren let her head fall back against the wooden back of the chair with a painful-sounding thunk. "I knew I'd forgotten something."
The class with Will was fun—Abby realized that she'd never really noticed when the swordfighting lessons had become fun, they just had at some point. She and the other students had certainly not learned as fast as she'd hoped—she was still and, she guessed, always would be, at a beginner's skill level. Still, even though she knew Will was holding back, it gave her a strange thrill not to be disarmed within the first few seconds of sparring with him when it was her turn to be tested at the end of the class. She knew how to look at the maneuvers now, and she suspected that when she got back home, reading the battle scenes in her old story would be deeply embarrassing.
Her old story. Had she really just thought of it as her old story? She'd only just finished it before she'd left! But with everything she now knew—with her experience of actually working on a ship and living in the time period—she would never have written anything like "The Sparrow and The Hawk." This made her feel oddly homesick… she longed for the feeling of the keyboard beneath her fingertips. The stories she could write now!