I would have done it anyway
Summery – The things Archie would have told Horatio if he could have, that day in Jamaica when he died…
Rating – Mentions suicide and J/A implications. PG13, I thinks.
AN – My first (and probably only) Hornblower fic. The result of Archie psychobabble needed to be wrote down…behold the results. I actually wrote this montsh ago, just never had the guts to post it.
…
I wondered when I was alive how much you truly knew about me. What had you learned for yourself and what had you heard from the other men? I took many secrets to my grave.
I had been subject to fits for most of my life. I don't even know when they started; I just know that they did. Just as I know my father changed, and so did mother and her friends. They all changed. I was allowed to have free reign outside. My family gave me money every night almost to go to Drury Lane. It wasn't until I was thrown aboard Justinian that I realized why.
My family were ashamed of me.
I had often wondered who was right. My family, those who birthed me, raised me, fed, clothed and taught me, and whom believed that the affliction of my body was an infliction upon them also.
Or my friends. My comrades. The men I face death beside and for every day. Those who have done nothing but their duty, but have cared little or not at all of the fits I suffer.
I believed you to be right, but then, I believe you to be a little of both. The love between us is that of brothers, or at least what I dreamt it to be when I was a child.
But we are not family.
Not truly
But it doesn't matter...I would have wanted the life I got if it meant meeting you.
My second secret was Simpson.
Did you know aboard Justinian why I had a fit when he returned to the Midshipman's Mess? Or six weeks later, aboard the rowing boat when we moved in to cut out the Papillon?
Did you know in El Ferrol why I chose suicide over return to my old life?
Did you know why I woke that night you stayed beside me with a long dead name on my lips?
I was twelve years old when I first started aboard the Justinian. I had been beaten down by my parents because of my fits. I knew I mustn't let the other men find out...especially not the Captain.
But someone did find out.
I had been given the only spare bed, the one beside Mr. Midshipman Jack Simpson. I understand now why it was empty.
That first night, I dreamt of the life I had laid before me dashed by the discovery of my 'curse', as my family had called it. I dreamt such a nightmare, in fact, that I woke on the floor with a set of eyes upon me.
"I won't tell anyone." Jack had promised. "I'll even tell you my secret..."
But he hadn't told me.
He'd shown me.
That was the night I discovered he was a Sodomite.
That night, and for several nights a week thereafter.
It wasn't until many months later someone else discovered my fits. I worried that they would report them to the Captain, but I feared more as to the price they would charge me for their silence.
But Midshipman Clayton was different to Mr. Simpson.
But by then I was sunk. I was so deeply involved with Simpson and his desires that there was no way I could speak for myself against him.
But he didn't believe that.
He started getting worse, beating me into submissiveness. He taught me that I was his, his servant, his possession. He even went as far as to brand me once on shore leave.
I was twelve years old the first time I contemplated suicide.
I never told anyone about that.
I cried a confession against Claytons shoulder several times as the atrocities suffered at Simpson's hands, but I was always careful to hide the worst of it. I knew, I just knew, that if I were to tell him, he would turn on me.
That's why I never told you.
My savoir came when I was fifteen. Believe it or not, it was Styles.
He has, as you may have discovered, a soft spot for children. Not even just those aboard his own ship. I have never known him to harm a child, even enemy children encountered during battle.
He found me once huddled in one of the holds after Simpson had returned to his bed. I still don't know what had bought him down to that area, only that he said he'd heard something. I know I had a fit that night...he must have heard that.
He asked me what had happened, and I made an excuse about a nightmare driving me to seek solitude, but the heavy dark rings under my eyes convinced him that it was not my first sleepless night. Eventually, I told him that Mr. Simpson had grown angry and taken the reduced cat to me, and I admitted that it was not the first time. It hadn't been a complete lie...Jack had beaten me that night, and many other nights previous.
Styles had asked to see how bad the damage was to my back, and I allowed it, afraid of discovery if I refused.
His hands as he lifted my shirt hem from my breeches were enough to send me into another fit.
Eventually, he discovered the truth.
The injuries I had sustained had grazed the skin the way a cat will, but it had not broken deeply enough to reach blood.
Yet there had been blood on the bottom of my white shirt.
He went after Jack the next day, and, from the best of my reckoning, he had pushed him over the side of the ship and held him with only a grip on his shirt, threatening to let him drop. He had warned Simpson away from me, and for a time, I thought myself safe.
That time was over far too quickly.
I would have given anything then to alleviate the suffering forced upon me.
Then I met you.
I was eighteen, you a year younger. Your life had been books and good upbringing.
You were an innocent.
To him, you were an easy target.
And by God, Horatio, you angered Jack something awful in your actions. He beat you almost to death after your stunt with the inquest. What did you think would be the logical next step?
Did you notice in your self-pity that I was not amongst the other officers for nearly a week afterwards?
Did you wonder why?
For you.
I knew what Simpson would do to you, given the chance, given another sliver of a reason.
I just had to outweigh his reason to go after you with his reason to go after me.
It wasn't hard. The receiving end of Simpson's sadism had taught me at least his likes and dislikes. The thought of doing such things disgusted me, and no doubt had you know, they would have disgusted you too.
But I did it even so.
I did it for you.
Did you know that your silence in El Ferrol was what had nearly cost me my life?
You never told me that returning to the Indy didn't mean returning to that life.
You never told me that Jack Simpson was dead.
But I would have done it anyway.
Returned to that life with you.
For you.
It was what you wanted.
I hadn't known that he was dead when you attempted to save me. I hadn't known until I began leaving my cell and speaking with the other men that Simpson was dead, and had been so for three years.
Did you know, Horatio, that even if you had not left Marietta's side on the bridge that I would have sat beside you where you knelt and I would have waited for my death?
I would have died with you rather than live alone.
Do you know now, my dearest friend, that even if I had not been shot aboard the Renown, that I would have died in Jamaica?
The miss of the bullet would have bought me time, but not life.
I would have swung for you, Horatio.
Because I simply can't have it any other way.
Even if I wasn't already dying, I would have taken the blame from you, Horatio.
I would have given my life for you.
No matter what was different and no matter what else happened…
I would have done it anyway.