Aha ha ha ha ha we're almost THERE!! This is officially the last chapter of the normal story I've written, and I'm thinking I'll finish off the history before getting back to this. So you're in for like, three chapters in a row of history. Just so you know.
"Oi, Will." Captain Jack called down from atop the crossbeam, sitting on the stout wooden pole as comfortably as any chair. "Cum up here for a second, eh?" (No, that is not meant to an insinuation. He's getting his accent back, geez, what's wrong with you people?)
Will sighed and handed the box he was carrying to a passing member of the crew. They'd finally reached port, after almost a month of travel. A month of careful questions and careful answers, slowly letting Jack come back to himself, filling in the holes whenever he could. Will found that he could almost train the older man, 'teaching' him how he was supposed to behave by changing his reactions. If it appeared that Will approved of something, Jack did it more often. If Will made his disapproval known, it would almost never happen again. Although he had to be careful. There were times when Jack would do something just to piss him off. Hence the sitting at the very top of the rigging.
He was almost back to himself, actually.
On the outside, at least.
"Yes, Jack?" Will pulled himself up onto the spar with a sigh, not nearly as comfortable with the height or the rocking of the ship as his counterpart. "You called?"
"Tell me something." Jack barely sparred him a glance, looking out over the cramped cluster of houses that was the port of Santa Domingo. "Have I ever been here before?"
"Not that I know of. But probably." Will followed the Captain's eyes, past the tiny, dirty houses and out into the vast fields of sugarcane, bordered by jungle. "You've been to a lot of places."
"Yeah, I know. But this one seems familiar, somehow." Seeing the man reflexively fiddling with a moustache that was no longer there was almost enough to break his heart.
"Maybe you should ask Gibbs about it." Will sighed again, trying to ignore the sudden jolt of sadness, the likes of which were slowly getting more and more familiar as Jack's mannerisms returned. "He's known you longer than I have, after all."
"No, this was before Gibbs." Jack waved a dismissive hand in his general direction, the simple rings he had once again begun to wear glittering in the sun. "You were here with me, a long time ago. I'm certain of it."
Will did not point out how impossible that was.
"Hm. What do you say we go down and check it out?" Will turned to him and smiled, glad to have found an excuse to spend the day together. "Perhaps we'll find something to jog our memories."
"Agreed." Jack pulled himself easily to his feet, strong and confident.
