Geesh, you people really wanna see Silver again, huh? LOL. I personally thought he was a rather cliché character, your standard bad-guy-with-heart-of-gold-turns-good-at-last-minute character, but he wasn't too bad. He'll probably show up in the fic eventually. (If I don't put him in here I might be faced with a mutiny of my own here! LOL!)
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Things hadn't changed much in the three years since Jim's first trip to Crescentia. He left Montressor on a space ferry bound for the curve-shaped spaceport, though this time his companion was a tiny blob of protoplasm, not a bumbling astrophysicist. Even that thought didn't hurt so much now. He allowed himself a small smile as he remembered.
Just as Jim had taken a few steps down the path that led from the Benbow Inn, Amy and her three siblings came tumbling out the front door. Amelia and Doppler followed. He set his shoulders for a fight, but the adults were smiling (albeit sadly).
"Always had to do things the hard way, didn't you, young rapscallion?" smirked the former galleon captain. "I expect you to sail back to home port at the end of all this in one piece."
Doppler shook his hand gravelly. "We will, of course, be happy to manage for you temporarily. However, your ownership will promptly resume upon your return. Is that clear?" Jim noted in amusement how hard the canine scientist fought to muster the strictest expression he could.
He surprised them both by pulling them into a fierce hug. There were times he wondered if anyone truly understood him, and these two had just proven that they did. Morph, squished in the middle, squeezed out as a trail of bubbles and chittered his indignation. Instantly the kids were demanding hugs, sensing something wrong with "Uncle Jimmy." He obliged them, content with the knowledge that it was now okay to leave. A great weight felt lifted from his shoulders. Knowing home would be safe left his mind free for one single question—
"Now arriving at spaceport Crescentia. All passengers bound for Crescentia prepare to depart."
Jim stood and grabbed his bag, train of thoughts forgotten. He whistled for the morph, who was floating behind some fish lady's shoulder and mimicking her puckered expression. (The lady's child thought it hilarious, anyway.)
Together the duo emerged from the cramped space ferry onto the brightly-lit spaceport, illuminated into daylight by Montressor's sun. The unmistakable scent of the etherium, unblocked by any planetary atmosphere, filled Jim's lungs. Now there was a smell you never got tired of.
They made their way through the crowded streets, Jim avoiding as much interaction with people as possible. At spaceports that was just a smart idea. Morph didn't share his cautions, as usual. The curious creature zipped this way and that, little tongue hanging out as he panted in excitement. At least he never wandered far or for long, Jim reflected. He was heartened by the fact that the shapeshifter's color had returned to a more normal pink. The reddish hue he'd developed the past week had been worrying him.
With ease Jim found a merchant ship registrar. If anything was always looking for crewmen on a spaceport, it was a merchant ship. He got in line behind a hulking brute of an alien and it wasn't until he'd been standing for ten minutes that he realized he didn't have any place to go. He grabbed the first thing that came to his mind as the hulk went shuffling off on three legs. "Got anything going to Gossamar?" he asked.
The registrar, a fat feathered alien, looked him up and down and sneered in contempt. "You don't look strong enough to hoist a sail, let alone haul cargo," he piped in a high voice that would have been laughable in another situation.
Jim scowled and shoved his identification onto the table between them. At the registrar's touch a small three-dimensional hologram of the youth sprang up, along with a scrolling line of information beside it. He waited as the registrar read his history with yellow eyes squinted, then gave him another going over. "Says yer out of Interstellar Academy, huh?"
Jim rolled his eyes. The Academy never was one to wait long to update their information. "Gonna answer the question?" he said, instead of responding to the comment.
"Answer the question?" Morph echoed sternly.
With a ruffle of his feathers, the registrar handed back his identification. "RLS Medley leaves in two days, at dawn. Take it or leave it."
"I'll take it."
"Huh." The alien hesitated, probably trying to think of some reason to keep Jim off the register. Finally he snorted and opened the book on the table to the correct holographic screen. Jim pressed his thumb onto the first free line under the list of other crewmembers. His full name, James Pleiades Hawkins, appeared beside his thumbprint.
"Seventh sector, third level, berth ten. Good day."
Jim had no idea what made him do it—some unconscious, implausible hope—but he found himself asking before he could walk off. "Uh, would there be any way you could check and see if a man named John Silver is signed up?"
Irritated, the registrar paged through his book. "What ship?" he demanded shortly.
"I'm . . . not sure. I, er, don't even know if he's on Crescentia."
The yellow eyes went from irritated to irate. "Get going, bilge water, and stop wasting my time." As added incentive the person in line behind Jim gave him a distinct prod. He took the not-so-subtle hints and moved on.
Morph, now sitting contently on his shoulder, turned into a miniature of Jim. "Got anything going to Gossamar?" he repeated verbatim.
"Oh, that?" He shrugged. The little Jim wiggled back into the pink blob with the movement. "Off the top of my head. Mom used to mention spending some time there when she was younger. Thought I'd check it out."
Morph squeaked something comforting and cuddled his cheek, then slid into his breast pocket for a nap.
* * *
They spent the two days in a rented room above a bar. Money wasn't a worry at the present, as long as he was careful. The inactivity was the prospect that worried Jim. With nothing to occupy it, his mind was plagued with memories he would rather not remember and nightmares he wished he could forget. On the first evening he left Morph in the room and went down to the bar to see if alcohol would fix his thinking problem.
The bartender was a whip-thin and scarred woman who would have fit right in beside Birdbrain Mary in Silver's old pirate crew. At eighteen he was underage, but she didn't ask to see his identification to check. She did keep one of her five eyes on him, until she was satisfied that he was a quiet drunk and not the troublesome sort. Jim got himself good and muddled before he paid his tab and stumbled upstairs to collapse into bed. There were no nightmares, at least.
In the morning he couldn't decide if a hangover was worth his evasion of unpleasant dreams. Morph's squeaks grated on his head until he sent the shapeshifter to fetch breakfast. Too late he realized what a foolish idea that had been. He pulled on clothes and stumbled out of the room, spending a sore fifteen minutes searching for the little blob. Finally he floated up to Jim of his own accord, looking satisfied and overly round. The morph burped appreciatively for whatever he had been into.
This was not Jim Hawkins first experience with alcohol, but it wasn't one of his better ones.
Stubborn as an old cyborg pirate, Jim refused to learn his lesson and had a repeat performance the second night. He awoke to Morph's prodding chatter in his ear. " 'Ut up, M'ph," he managed over the pounding in his temples.
The shapeshifter promptly peeled back an eyelid. Jim found his eyeball two centimeters from a blurry replica of the feathered registrar. "RLS Medley leaves in two days, at dawn. Take it or leave it," said Morph. There was a pause as it sunk into Jim's foggy brain. Then—
"Shit!" He burst out of bed. The Montressor sun was moments away from making an appearance on Crescentia. Pain forgotten, Jim raced around the room and gathered his things before he burst through the door, Morph at his heels. He winced as the brisk, predawn air hit his senses. Well, pain almost forgotten.
It was close, but they made it aboard with nothing more than an unfavorable glance from the captain. Jim was completely satisfied with being a working member of the crew. There was hardly ever a moment on the Medley for stray thoughts. You did your work, then slept like the dead to rise early and do your work again. It wasn't fun—not an adventure like the Legacy's had been—but it was honest, satisfying, and kept his mind away from unpleasant memories he didn't want to deal with at the moment. Morph amused any of the other crewmen with a sense of humor. Two of the other crewmen, a blue Harklan named Snitch and a small insectoid called Runt, spent their free time swapping stories with Jim. (He avoided mentioning his trip to Treasure Planet, having long since learned it brought all sorts of unwanted attention your way.) A week flew by and before the young man could realize it, they were preparing to enter the Gossamarian atmosphere.
Gossamar was a small planet. It didn't have any spaceports, but it did take advantage of its beautiful landscapes through tourism and had a solid import and export system set up with a few other worlds. To accommodate this there was one port, a part of Port City, located on the planet. Large sailing vessels used it to dock and exchange goods and people.
Jim joined the rest of the crew in bringing the Medley down through the cloud-strewn atmosphere and securing the great merchant ship to the towering docking stations. Once the vessel was anchored to the captain's specifications, the cargo was unloaded and packed onto carts drawn by winged animals native to the planet. The carts were driven off to make their slow, winding procession down the docking station to the ground level of the port. Then Jim, Snitch, and the other crewmen who had only signed up for a one-way trip were paid and everyone went off in separate directions.
After nodding a goodbye to the two friends he had made, Jim was happy to find a faster way down to the planet's surface. The winged beast-of-burden animals—Arvians they were called, looking something like a large version of the mantabirds that populated spaceports like Crescentia—could be ridden as well as made to pull vehicles. A native Gossamarian (who was also winged) was renting them out.
With Morph clinging to his shoulder in a quivering mass, Jim eagerly grabbed the reins and leaped onto the creature's smooth back. The feisty Arvian took off the instant he was settled. It fought Jim for the reins, but he guided it firmly as they soared over the port and its adjoining city. Past the site of bustling alien activity stretched wide plains separated by sparse forests of golden trees, gleaming in the midmorning light. His spirited Arvian dipped and swerved through the landscape of flora and cavorted through the air. Caught up in the rush of flight, Jim threw back his head and yelled. "Whoo-hoo!"
"Whoo-hoo," Morph echoed less enthusiastically.
"What are you worried about?" he chuckled. "You float anyway—whoops!" Taking advantage of his distraction, the Arvian gleefully took a nosedive straight toward the ground. He yanked the reins until they were skimming just over the rolling countryside. The tall grass parted under them with the force of the wind they created.
Jim lost track of time as they explored Gossamar. Eventually the Arvian accepted him as the navigator, though it seemed to sense he didn't know the lay of the land. The planet didn't appear very populated to the brown-haired youth. Port City was by far the most urban area. Other than a few towns and hamlets he didn't see any other colonized places. The geography was mostly grass and plains, with a lesser degree of forests. Toward early afternoon they found a small mountain range. The Arvian apparently decided it had been behaving for long enough and struggled to take them down among the crags and cliffs. Jim was all for it, so he gave the beast its head and they plunged down.
But the Arvian wasn't interested in playing this time. Jim laughed as it brought them in close, hovering above the rocky slopes to scrape the moss off the stones and slurp it up with a long tongue. "Break time, I guess," he told Morph.
The glob of pink goo zipped off his shoulder and trilled a hungry sound. Jim realized they hadn't eaten since early morning, and that had been ship rations. With the reins firmly in hand, he dismounted and slung his duffel bag off his shoulder. Morph dived in before he could, emerging with a dried purp that he immediately began gnawing.
Jim grabbed a sandwich to munch on as he tied the Arvian to a scrub bush. It didn't mind, as there was plenty of moss within tongue-reaching distance.
The view from their spot was breathtaking. Behind and to the right the craggy mountains rose one after another, the sun just touching the top of the highest peak. Ahead and on the left it seemed like the whole of Gossamar stretched out like a carpet, thousands of miles below. With nothing else living in sight, the three of them could have been the only creatures in the universe.
Jim suddenly found himself now unable to think about anything but his mother, and how much he wished she were here to see this with him (which had probably been the plan of his traitorous unconscious all along, damn it). Her death . . . it wasn't fair. He'd found Treasure Planet, had avenged anyone Captain Flint had ever stolen from with its destruction. He'd become the model citizen, the best and the brightest, always played by the rules. He'd done everything that was expected of him from everyone, even his mother. Especially his mother.
Where did it say that the hero got screwed in the end? Is this what was going to happen with everyone he knew? They say all you can do is your best, but it's a lie, Jim thought bitterly. Your best was never enough. He gave his best, and he still watched them walk out of his life. His father, and now his mother. If this was what playing by the rules got you, maybe it was time to stop playing by the rules.
Which brought him back to Gossamar. Sarah Hawkins had mentioned it often to her son, but in the fanciful way one remembers a meaningful vacation that could never be recaptured in the same way. He'd never felt the incentive to come here himself. He wasn't the sightseeing type. She never took him, either. By the time he was in the picture his mother was no longer interested in leaving Montressor, for vacationing or any other reason. But she did tell stories. At the age of twenty she had stayed in Port City with her family for a month, been charmed by the little shops and inns. She'd loved to explore the countryside (a fact which had surprised a young Jim Hawkins, who couldn't imagine his mother exploring anything). She talked about old friends in a way that he now suspected meant they'd gotten into their fair share of mischief, though she'd never told him any specifics for fear of "giving him ideas." God, would he find any of those old friends here? Would he have to be the one to tell them? He didn't know if he could. . . .
A soft bump on his elbow brought Jim to his senses. Startled, he found the Arvian hovered beside him, reins trailing on the ground. Looking around for the scrub bush he saw Morph snoozing on his bag, and found only small particles of the bush hanging from the creature's lips. "Oh, you eat more than just moss, huh?" he smirked at the beast. The young human leaned forward slowly, but the Arvian floated backward out of reach. Its tail whipped furiously like an ecstatic puppy.
Jim relaxed, shoulders slipping down a few inches. He and the beast stared each other straight in the eye, measuring. On his next intake of breath he threw himself forward in a rush and grabbed the dangling reins. "HA!"
The Arvian wheeled around, and the already off-balance Jim went sprawling near the edge of the drop-off. His boots skittered on loose debris as he scrambled for footing, but the Arvian swung out over the open air and—with his hand still tangled in the rein—Jim went with it.
"Note to self: don't spook an Arvian next to a precipice," he muttered to himself through clenched teeth, wrapping his other hand in the thin leather strip that was keeping him from plummeting to an untimely death far below. Dangling like a worm on a fishhook was not his idea of a good time.
The Arvian wasn't used to such a weight pulling on its head. It spun in a circle and bobbed around, shrieking as it tried to dislodge the uncomfortable anchor. However, the uncomfortable anchor wasn't interested in being dislodged. He clung on and prayed the halter wouldn't slip over the thing's head.
After the aerial acrobatics didn't work it slowed, and Jim thought maybe it was calming down. The next thing he knew they were heading straight for the rock wall of their high perch. The crazy beast was trying to scrape him off using the mountain! He braced himself for impact.
"Oof," he grunted, then blinked in surprise as his head hit a fluffy pillow instead of stone. The Arvian backed off for another go and he watched the pillow turn back into Morph, who squeaked in distress at his friend's predicament. "Distract him!" Jim called to the little shapeshifter.
Before the Arvian could plunge forward again, Morph zoomed up and jiggled before its eyes. It didn't seem to be doing much good until he morphed into a patch of moss. The food instinct overrode its panic and it darted forward to snap at the floating morsel. Morph led the winged creature up the mountain face and onto the ledge where they had rested. As soon as Jim's feet touched ground again he threw his weight backwards and hauled on the reins. Morph shot to safety as, hand over hand, he reeled in the Arvian. Its wings buffeted him, but he hung on and finally got an arm around its neck. After he covered its ice blue eyes with his hands it, like other domesticated animals unable to see, settled down and put its trust in Jim.
"Whew. Almost went solar surfing without the surfer," he remarked wryly, cautiously easing the reins back over the Arvian's head. It nudged his elbow, all good graces and amiability now. Its thin tail flipped back and forth.
Morph was taking shelter in his duffel bag when he went to reclaim it. "It's okay now, little guy," he assured the blob. "You did a great job. Thanks." Morph burbled happily, but didn't venture to come out when invited to. Jim shrugged and slung it back over his shoulder with the shapeshifter still inside.
The shadows on the ground were long. "Time to get going," the youth announced to his two companions. "I've only rented this crazy thing for the day, and I wouldn't mind being under a roof tonight too. What say we head back to Port City, Morph?"
"Port City, Port City," chirped his bag. With a grin Jim mounted and steered the Arvian back the way they came.
* * *
The trip back was faster than the trip out, thanks in part to the fact that the Arvian was tired from its little adventure. After returning it to its renter, Jim and Morph went strolling the streets of Port City. The evening was upon them and they were fortunate enough to quickly find what they sought: an inn to crash for the night. Above the door swung a wooden sign with the words The Gentle Inn in stylized red letters.
Morph, again settled in his usual spot on Jim's shoulder, wiggled and squeaked with excitement. The young man took this as a positive sign and pushed open the door, spilling warm yellow light into the street. A meal and a bed awaited, and that would be a good end to the day.
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I'm so evil, getting Disney characters all drunk and swearing. =) I have plans for Jim now. Ooohhh yesss. *rubs hands together evilly* Plans.
TP Trivia: Anyone wondering what this "etherium" thing that keeps popping up in Treasure Planet is? The word was confusing the heck out of me, along with the fact that all the characters seemed to be breathing fine in space. I learned from the "making of" book that the etherium is the Treasure Planet universe's version of space. But this space isn't freezing cold and empty. It's filled with atmosphere, creatures, and currents. Kinda like a combination of space and the ocean. Cool or what? ^_^