Author's note: Ahoy, everyone! Jordan here. Here's the first chapter of something I've been working on for a while -- A Bootstrap/Barbossa fic! I was inspired to write one by my dear friend Pan, who showed me who Barbossa really is, and gave me Bootstrap. So this is dedicated to her I know the fic is rather... convoluted and confusing, but it's supposed to be. I hope it's understandable, anyway.
Disclaimer: I own nothing. Don't sue me.
To the Ends of the Earth: Underwater, Bootstrap Dreams
Bootstrap knows that the water is cold, but he cannot feel it. He doesn't need to breathe but he does anyway, the familiar motions of acquisition and expulsion comforting. The water billows out from between his lips, and on the good days his lungs burn. There is nothing to see, but he does not close his eyes, and in the good moments he doesn't even notice the darkness.
There's this time when we were young. When you looked at me like I was strange and gave me a name, and I loved you for it.
Here's a story:
As the son of a Commodore, young William Turner has standards to uphold. He is to attend official functions, such as the one occurring today, in official dress, and act, well… official. His father, although obviously a military man, feels much more affinity to the noble part of his job, and thus has trained his son thoroughly as a gentleman. He always knows which fork to use, he can be courteous in four different languages, and he knows how to dress.
(He's forgotten now. A fork is just a fork to Bootstrap Bill, and the only languages he speaks are English and pirate, and he's losing even those now because fantasies do not speak in words.)
Of course, as happy as his father might be with him, William Turner himself is not. The high collared navy jacket, complete with gold embroidery and copper buttons, feels like it is choking him, and the tight beige britches ride up something horrible. It is all he can do to convince his father not to make him wear his wig – a ridiculous, flea infested white thing, which covers his short, curly brown hair and makes him feel like it is five hundred degrees out even in the dead of winter. That he couldn't have dealt with, but the rest… well, it is what his father wants, and William Turner wants nothing more than to please his father.
(He left without saying goodbye. Hector tells him much later when they are marooned together on an island, his eyes on the horizon and Bootstrap's eyes on him, as water laps around their ankles, that he would rather be stuck there forever than be back home for a moment, and Bootstrap knows it isn't because he is there and that makes him want to hold his hand.)
Well, he thinks reflectively, as he follows his father through the crowded streets of Port Royale to the center stage, that isn't quite true. He holds one secret desire which he has never shared with anyone, which eats at his insides late at night when he lies in bed, listening to the waves lap against the shore – he wants to be a pirate.
("You? You want to be a pirate?" Hector asks incredulously when they meet on a cliff, and doesn't believe him until their fancy jackets are falling down together, sleeves just touching. William watches them and feels like he is flying himself.)
Of course, the raping and pillaging don't really appeal to him. In fact, he thinks it all sounds rather mean. But being on the open water, free, the biggest care in the world being how much rum you have left – William has never tasted rum, but he is sure it must be wonderful – with no one to tell you what to do, surrounded by close friends… that is what William wants more than anything in the world.
(He's telling himself the story as he hangs, pulling endlessly upward. When he landed he rotated slowly for what felt like years but was probably only a week. Now he is motionless and he misses it. He's telling himself the story and he can almost feel it, that longing, that quaver in his heart.)
But he supposes it can never happen. After all, he doesn't even have friends, not any who might consider anything like that. Sure, he plays with the local boys, but they don't like him much – he isn't one to nick trinkets from shops, or sneak up on girls to pinch their bottoms, or roll around wrestling in the mud of an alley… it's all too unpleasant. William wants real friends, true friends, who will stick by his side through thick and thin. With friends like that, he figures, he can do anything -- even something as impossible seeming as stealing a ship, and making his way out into the world as a pirate.
(Friends like that. Friends like that. He remembers watching Hector's eyes as he sinks, remembers the strange mixture of guilt and triumph in them and wonders which he cares most about.)
Sighing, William stops beside his father, leaning against a marble pillar. This is sure to be boring. Then… a boy is leaving the crowd, a boy who looks about William's age. William has never seen him before, but... there is something about him.
(He watches through his own eyes as Hector is young and runs across the courtyard and away. He watches through his own eyes as Hector is young and then is everything.)
"Da, I've got to go to the bathroom," he tells his father, his first lie, slipping away before the man can answer. He runs after the boy, the top few buttons of his blue jacket coming undone as he does, revealing the pink skin underneath. He follows him up to a cliff, used to defend the town, judging by the two cannons which stand near-by. When he is close, he calls out to the other boy somewhat shyly. "Hey." He waves a bit, before remembering his manners and sticking his hand out straight, to shake. "I'm William Turner. Very pleased to make your acquaintance."
(We met by cannons. Separated by cannons. We'd die by cannons if we'd ever die. I love you.)
Bootstrap knows he is cursed, but moonlight cannot penetrate the depths of the ocean anymore than sunlight can. It is dark, and Bootstrap is human. If he could raise a hand he'd touch his face to verify this over and over, to feel the smooth skin under his hands, bloated by water but skin none-the-less, feel the arch of his nose and the ridge of his cheek bones.
William at sixteen lies in the small cabin touching himself, and he lets out a small sob as he comes. The bed across from him is empty, the sheets mussed by one who cannot sleep, and although Bill knows that Hector is up on the deck staring into the wind, he lies on his side and watches Hector as if he was there, tracing his friend's face with the eyes of memory, his expression lax and uncontrolled in sleep, his chest moving up and down slowly.
He has never wanted to be a monster.
Would you like another story?
Bootstrap sends a coin away. Bootstrap sends a coin away. Bootstrap sends a coin.
There's a carefully addressed envelope, smudged and well handled, and he carries it under his coat when they make port. The rest will desperately try to break the curse themselves in this Tortuga, this one last chance. But Bootstrap already knows, so he sends his life away by a shilling postage and a small tip for the mailboy. He believes Jack is dead or will be soon, and almost envies him for it. For being human. Each piece of gold is perfectly identical. No one will notice this one he sends away; for Jack but for himself as well. Hector drinks too much when he never drinks too much and Bootstrap hates himself because he does not understand why.
An interlude -- the memories flow freely and this one catches then, bright, orange color. A woman. Her hair.
Bootstrap has never really been one for women. A prostitute forced on him by Jack when he was young, her rouged cheeks and high hair pulling at his eyes, so they shut as he enters her and thinks of nothing. There's pleasure, white and hot, and then there is nothing again, and she's gone too, and Bootstrap wishes he'd had someone to betray so he couldn't. Wouldn't.
But there's this woman, and there's something about her.
He does not believe in fate, but at times he thinks it believes in him.
Jack leans back in his chair for a moment, his boots in the foreground, propping them up onto the table and laughing around his mug that Bootstrap's in love. Hector is there too, somewhere, but Bootstrap does not remember his face. Will not remember what was not there, a sadness in those glassy eyes. There wasn't one.
So it's anger, then, as much as fate, and they work together. He lies in bed as they sail away, picturing with open eyes the tiny person growing inside of her. He knows nothing of eggs and sperm, nothing of cells, and to him Will is always human, growing from the size of a marble to a proper baby, fully formed.
They meet once. He is still tiny and red, and his name is William. Bootstrap is Bill, so he is Will, and Will is perfect.
Perfect.
There are these glowing fish which swim past him, sometimes, their lures leaving bright white trails of light across his eyes, and for days he can't even see the darkness. It's much worse. Bootstrap has learned to hate the light.
There's this time when we're not so young.
"Do you even see me, Hector?" He asks desperately, reaching out a hand to brush the cloth above the other man's heart, his fingers curling away before they reach skin. Sometimes Bootstrap wants to bite him and sometimes he wants to kill him, because then he'd be marked and Hector would always be there. But mostly he wants to be allowed to love him, allowed simple touches which do not matter which matter which do not matter and which probably don't even exist anyway.
There are times I think I can almost feel you. That those are your fingers on my arm. There's this time when we were young when you did touch me, brushing ash or gun power from my cheek, and I loved you for it.
I loved you for a lot of things.
There's this story I have that you kill me. That the pistol you give him has two shots instead of one, and you use the first on me, pressing the barrel against my head while he watches and says nothing. My hand is on your sleeve, and you growl at me even then for touching you. You squeeze the trigger, and I die. There is no pain.
But I am not gone. I do not see my own body on the ground until I float up above it and stick myself behind your eyes. And then I understand. As I watch blood seep from my own head, I can feel your horror and your sadness and your necessity. I know why you did it, killed Jack and killed me, and I forgive you.
But then the water moves imperceptibly and I don't remember anymore. But I forgive you anyway.
There are times when Bootstrap sees with perfect clarity. When the images clear from his mind, leaving true eyes alone to peer sightlessly into the darkness, and those are the only times he is scared.
I loved you for a lot of things.
And there's another time you dreamt of something dark and I understood why you never seem to sleep. There are these eyes, wide open in the dark, and Hector leans back against Bootstrap and asks him softly if he thinks he has a soul.
You think I don't remember. But I do. It's hard to forget here, Hector, and you're all I ever see. It's hard to forget here.
You have a soul. Love me.
Liar.
If you were never as young as I, then why do I remember our laughter at night; the stories you told to scare me, as we lay in that small cabin we shared on our first ship? (There may have been that look in your eye and I might have wanted to kiss you, but it doesn't matter -- we were there.)
