Chapter 2- Ambition
Thank you for the reviews! The last chapter was mainly an intro to the setting, like I said… this one gets us into the main plot. Finally, you shall find out about the curse! Mwah-ha! Yeah, ok, that was weird, wasn't it? Ok, here's the story…
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Jack was now sixteen years old. It had been three months since he had run away from home, and he had not been back since. He was not at all homesick.
Life on the account suited Jack exceedingly well. He felt like he was born to sail the sea, and to be a pirate.
Charlie had always been his friend, and that friendship had only grown during their time at sea. Jack had also grown fond of Jacob, even though he could be a bit stiff at times.
At the moment, Jack was helping to move the plunder they had just got off of the latest ship they had captured below decks. It wasn't a real treasure, mind- just some fabrics, weapons, food, supplies, and money, but it could be sold for a fair profit.
He set down the barrel he'd been carrying with a grunt. Wiping his brow, (which was now adorned with the red bandana we are all so familiar with) he headed back up on deck to bring down the rest.
The addition of the bandana was not the only change. Jack's skin was tanner now, and he had a few beads in his hair.
When he got up there, Charlie approached him. "Jack." He said grabbing a barrel. "I found out where we're headin'."
Taking a large crate, Jack wondered momentarily why Charlie seemed to think he would care overly much. "Where's that?" he asked.
"Tortuga."
Jack nearly dropped the barrel he was carrying. "Oh." He said, trying to recover. "Well then, I'm sure it'll be, uh, interestin'."
"Ye plan on goin' ashore when we get there?" Charlie asked as they went below.
"If the captain gives me leave." He replied.
"D'ye want to go ashore?"
Jack set down his barrel next to the others in the storage room with a bit more force than was necessary. "I could do with a few nights on dry land, yeah."
"You'll be okay?"
Jack sighed. "Look, mate, there is one condition."
Charlie arched his eyebrows in a silent question.
"If we're gonna go out drinkin', we gotta stop somewhere besides The Brigand's 'Aven." He said it with a completely serious face, and Charlie wasn't sure how to react for a minute. Then Jack burst into laughter.
"You're bloody insane, mate." Charlie said.
"It's a gift." Jack retorted.
-
When night fell, however, Jack was not so cocky.
There is something about nighttime that magnifies our fears and erodes our self-confidence. Anyone may fall into this deadly trap, and Jack was no exception. Perhaps the Jack Sparrow of later years will learn to avoid it, but at age sixteen, he was helpless in the face of the power of the night.
This is the reason why Jack, instead of mending one of the sails that had torn earlier in the day, (which was what he was supposed to be doing) was leaning against the rail on the starboard side of the ship, close to the bow, looking out into the darkness.
Jacob, who was also on watch, became slightly worried when he saw Jack maintain that position for close to ten minutes. So he left the crow's nest, where he and an elderly pirate they called Old Tom had been acting as lookouts, and went over to him.
"Ye alright, Jack?" he asked, trying not to sound concerned, He had learned that if you were nonchalant with Jack, he would tell you what was on your mind, whereas if you acted worried, he wouldn't open his mouth.
"See that?" Jack asked, pointing at a faraway cluster of lights.
"Aye." Said Jacob.
"Tha's Tortuga."
Jacob didn't respond, mostly because he was at a loss for what to say.
"It's funny." Jack continued after a moment, still looking out over the water. "I spent fifteen years of my life there, an' fer that entire time, I were wishin' I were somewhere else. An' now that I've left, I'd rather not go back at all. But when I do go back, I'm afraid that I won't want to leave again." He turned to look at Jacob. "Crazy, ain't it?"
"Not necessarily." Jacob said slowly. "It's yer home, Jack."
"Aye, but where's home? Is it where yer family is? Cuz if so I don't got much've one, an' the bit I do 'ave ain't worth speakin' of. Is it where yeh spent yer childhood? Cuz if that's so, it don't really count, seein' as me childhood's a thing I'm rather keen on forgettin'. Is home where ye feel ye belong? Cuz if so, mate, my home's the sea."
"That's… really poetic, Jack."
Jack grunted noncommittally.
"I think it's the first time ye've said somethin' that deep when ye weren't dead drunk."
Jack snorted. The snort turned into a chuckle, and the chuckle into a laugh. Soon Jacob joined in, and as they laughed, Jack managed, for a moment, to forget Tortuga, and the memories that awaited him there.
-
The next day, they docked in Tortuga. As the crew went off in their separate directions, Jack looked around.
He saw the town of his childhood- and the town he wished he could never see again. It was, in a word decrepit, which also described his life there, which had seemed to mirror the buildings that rotted along with their occupants.
He was interrupted from his depressed recollections by Jacob, who rested his hand on Jack's shoulder. "Ye alrigh', Jack?"
"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine." He replied, fooling no one.
Charlie approached them. He was in an optimistic mood, mainly at the prospect of the night that awaited them. "Shall we be off then?" he asked.
"You two go ahead." Jack said slowly. "I'm gonna go check up on… a friend of mine."
"Ya want me ta come with?" Jacob asked.
"No!' Jack said, a bit too quickly. "No- I'll just be a minute."
"Alright then." Charlie said. "We'll meet you at The Faithful Bride."
"See ya in a bit then." Jack replied, hurrying off before anyone could ask more questions.
He made his way to the outskirts of the sprawling town. The streets were unnamed, but this was the territory he had grown up in, so he did not stop and did not falter- if he did, he was afraid he might loose his nerve.
He turned around a corner- and received quite a shock.
The building had obviously been abandoned to fire. The roof was caving in, and the walls were crumbling. A charred, faded sign above the door announced the name of the pub it had once been.
The sign was unreadable now, but Jack had seen it so many times that he knew what it said.
"The Brigand's Haven." He muttered. He gave a long sigh. What now?
He looked across the street, experiencing a sense of déjà vu.
As a child, he had frequently looked out one of the windows, to see this same view. The intersecting street was referred to as "Lover's Lane", because it was haunted by a great deal of the town's prostitutes. Jack had always wondered if his mother worked on that corner. He sometimes wished that he knew where she was… but not lately. The truth was that she had abandoned him. It would be best, he reasoned, not to seek her out.
He shook his head. There was no use dwelling on the past. He set off down the street.
In a few minutes, he'd arrived at a shabby and thoroughly unpleasant little shack. He knocked on the door.
"Who is it!" it was not phrased as a question.
"Jack Sparrow."
The door swung open, revealing a fat old man with an eye patch and pipe stuck in his mouth. He both looked and smelled as if he had never bathed in his life, which was probably close to the truth.
Despite his appearance, however, the man, who was known only as One-Eyed Joe, was not what he seemed. Rumored to be a former spy, One-Eye (as most called him) was debatably the best source of information in all of Tortuga.
"You Tom Sparrow's boy?" One-Eye asked.
Jack nodded.
"What ye be wanting?"
"Information."
"It'll cost ye."
"I'm prepared to pay."
"Whaddaya need ta know?"
"The Brigand's Haven's burnt down. Where is my father now?"
"Ye got two shillings?"
Jack handed over the money.
"Go down the street to the first intersection and take a right. You'll find 'im on the corner of the third intersectin' street."
"Thank ye kindly." Jack said, and set off.
-
When Jack reached the corner, his first thought was that One-Eye had been mistaken. All that was there was an empty lot, with a few homeless men camped out in the middle.
Jack was about to try retracing his steps, when he saw one bum sitting away from the rest. He looked familiar.
Warily, Jack made his way over.
"Never though I'd find ye here." He said.
His father squinted up at him. "Don't speak o' what ya don't know of."
"The Brigand's Haven burnt down. I'm guessing all your money burnt with it?"
Tom grunted. "In a sense. But it ain't my fault."
"Oh, it isn't?"
"Nope."
"How d'ye figure that?"
"Sit down, Jack. This'll take a while."
Jack wanted to defy his father as much as possible. But, from force of habit, he found himself sitting.
Tom cleared his throat. "So tell me. What've you been up to these few months?"
"You've never cared about me before, why the sudden interest now?"
"You're bold all've a sudden." His father commented.
I'm sure that the reader has noticed the exact same thing. This was because Jack had quickly learned that not all men were as controlling or quick to anger as his father. Once free of Tom's strict command, he learned that there was more than one way to live, and, as soon as he had realized that, he had immediately chosen to break free of the servile manner that had been instilled in him by his father.
He was still Jack Sparrow, but he was becoming more and more like the Jack Sparrow who would become wildly famous in a few year's time. He was breaking free of his father, and this was, of course, a good thing. Tom, however, was understandably upset. He became even more so when he heard Jack's reply.
"You can't hurt me, Dad. Not anymore. I'm rich; you're poor. I'm a successful pirate; you're a penniless bum. I've won; you've lost. It's over. I'm not afraid of you anymore. Next time you hit me, I'll hit back. But there won't be a next time, will there?" Jack quirked his eyebrows and smiled.
"There'll be a next time if I say so!" Tom insisted.
"No. It's my turn to be the boss now. You won round one; I can't deny that. But round two's just beginning, and this time the stakes are higher. And guess what? I've got the ace." Jack answered.
Tom could see that the current conversation was getting them nowhere, so he changed tact. "So, you're a pirate, eh?"
"Aye." Jack said, suspiciously. "An' if ye want some o' me money on account o' what I said about being successful just now, ye can forget it. I've not got that much, it's a fair amount an' it was hard earned, so ye can just-"
"Jack, relax. I'm not after your money."
"Excuse me if I don't trust you." he replied instantly.
There was a silence between them, during the duration of which they stared at one another intensely.
"This isn't my fault, you know." Tom said. "Me bein' broke."
Jack looked incredulous. "Oh, surely it isn't!" he said with a great amount of sarcasm. To tell the truth, Jack probably would have blamed his father even if he had been robbed of all his money after being knocked unconscious. It would have been his own fault fir being knocked out.
"It's not." Tom insisted. "Look here, Jack. In this family, things happen. My father, his father, his father's father's father's father- they all died penniless. This family is cursed, Jack."
Jack sniggered. "Sure. That's convenient. You're right! It wasn't you fault! It was the curse!"
"Go ahead, laugh." Tom said sulkily. "But one day you'll lose everything, you won't be laughing then!"
"I don't believe in curses; there's no such thing." Jack replied. "And I'll prove it to you."
"Why are you so eager to prove yourself to a father you detest?" Tom asked, sure that Jack did not possess the answer.
But Jack replied with, "Because I want to prove that it's your fault that you've become…" he looked him over, and did not see his father. He saw only a beggar. "This."
"You're a pirate, Jack. Success implies that what you're successful at is legal."
"Whoever said that was daft. I can, and will, be a successful pirate. I will be the best, most feared, and most infamous pirate on the ocean." As Jack said it, he knew that this oath would shape his life. He would spend the rest of his days trying to fulfill it, and only death would stop him.
"I'll hold you to that." Jack's father replied seriously.
"I'll break this curse, if there is one." It was a question- Will fulfilling my oath set myself and all my descendants free from the curse?
Tom nodded, providing a dual answer.
"I should go." Jack said. "My friends," he let the word roll slowly from his mouth, enjoying his father's reaction to it's use, "Will be missing me."
Jack walked away, leaving his father alone once more.
"Go." Tom whispered, too soft for any to hear. "It's too late for me, but it's not too late for you. Break this curse… son."
So perhaps there is still hope for Tom Sparrow's soul.
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