Disclaimer: I do not own Treasure Planet
A/N: Hi guys! THIS IS IMPORTANT SO PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE ENJOYING SOME JIM-CASSANDRA ACTION! I just wanted to mention that I have set up a poll which regards this story and the characters within it. Basically its asking if there was a film made of this story and of course it would be a cartoon like 'Treasure Planet' who would be the best actress to voice the character of Cassandra. I'm going to be doing other polls for Selina, Diana and Sophia (if you haven't forgotten about her and she might have a larger role in the sequel to this story so you will be seeing more of her in the future). So I hope you'll visit me on my profile page and cast your vote it would be much appreciated and I hope you enjoy this new chapter!
Jovial Nights
For Kurama'slilAngel
Cassandra sat on the window seat thinking about the moment where she could've almost kissed Captain Hawkins. She recalled the gentle but urgent breath she could see on her lips. The proximity between them allowed her to see how blue his eyes were. How handsome his features were. Even though she was of reasonable height James Hawkins seemed rather tall in that moment. She felt like a small child that needed to be hugged because she realised just how lonely she was. She was going to have a lonely life ahead of her and she knew it. She knew it before and she actually looked forward to the independence she would have. However when she realised what it was she wasn't going to have or be able to have in a very long time she suddenly began to feel an overwhelming sense of regret. She was never one to regret. She wanted to take the only chance she would have at intimacy only if it lasted a few seconds. She thought about how badly she actually wanted that to happen as well as the fact that it conflicted with her principles.
She was going to be returning home under the pretence that she was going to train to become a Space Captain herself. If she followed this path she could be effectively throwing that dream away. She had wanted this since she was a little girl, she more or less really began to fall in love with Captain Hawkins when she was sixteen years old. Its pretty obvious that the more than ten year old dream was going to win over an attraction to someone which had only developed over the course of two years. In her mind, she would be using the old tricks of the trade lesser women used in order to climb up the ladder and achieve their goals if she was going to pursue a relationship with Captain Hawkins.
She knew that wasn't the reason why she wanted to kiss him but she could see how other people could see it that way. There was always a different way of looking at a situation such as this. Even though society on a whole had been through a feminist revolution there were still some women upholding the 'great' traditions of being a social-climbing, nosey, gossiping, dried up hags. Even though she cared nothing for what people thought of her she knew she was in the position now where she had to think about her actions and what those who would determine her future would think of her actions. She at least cared about their opinions and she actually had to in some instances as well. Therefore she had to be careful, even if that involved abstaining herself from falling in love with Captain James Hawkins any further.
Although she did begin to wonder why she was initially attracted to him in the first place. She had to look for the answers now if she was going to solve this problem. There was a part of her however which didn't want to. Perhaps if she saw the causes she might be able to relieve them in some way. She grimaced as it occurred to her she was treating love like it was a disease. She should be struck down for her cruelty. She was more or less planning to demise of her friendship with Captain Hawkins or whatever it was that they had between them. When she first saw him as a little girl he reminded her of her father. She didn't know that the root of her attraction to him was due to an Electra complex but she was compiling a list of reasons.
He had the same look in his eyes she had when she went on her first voyage. His eyes, as she recalled, were like the deep blue sky. She never romanticised about anyone except for James Hawkins which could only mean that there was something about him which would make her behave in such a different way as she would behave to others. Ever since she met him as that little nine-year-old-girl something inside her began to change. She could see he was like the wind without a care in the world. She was more like a playful breeze which hadn't passed her test yet and still had to wait until she could leave the ground. Once it was because he was a rebel without a cause and now it was because he found his purpose which was to be a nowhere man. He was excited by the prospect of entering into the sky and into the unknown. He wasn't afraid to jump into a worm hole because he wanted to know what was at the other end. Neither was she.
She sat there and a smile crept onto her face. So that was the reason. It was the familiarity one felt when they found the person they knew could only understand them on a deeper level than most people. He was the person who she identified from across the way who could be the one person to hold her hand through everything and all those things she wanted to do because things are always better shared than to be experienced alone aren't they? Even after years of not seeing him again she was still able to recognise him and that just showed how much he meant to her. It was because even at the young age that she was, she could see that they were twin souls both turning their eyes up to the skies rather than looking forward.
His eyes always seemed to pull her in. It was like she was being cast over by something or had come down was something and was completely weak to feeling the things that she felt. When you were will you were more or less a rag doll which could be thrown about from side to side and had no control over yourself. That was what she felt like. They always sucked her in whenever she looked into them. That was why she got so vulnerable whenever they spoke to one another. It was why she got so emotional whenever they spoke. It didn't matter where they were or what it was she was talking about she had no fear of dodging the subject or speaking her mind.
All except for that one thing. That one thing which would change everything. Her emotions went into hyper mode whenever they spoke because he always made her feel passionate about something. He always made her feel angrier, more loyal, sadder, happier and made her realise that she could feel things more than she thought and some things she never though existed. She felt all the things she felt normally but just in more depth. She couldn't think of a simpler way of putting it because this reaction, this feeling she had towards him really couldn't be explained. People tried to think of causes for it, she was trying to right now, when at the end of the nothing could explain why she was feeling this. She could analyse it and think of reasons why she was attracted to him. She just couldn't explain why she was in love with him.
He could also be reasonably polite as well. He wasn't afraid to be honest with her or to tease her either. Something else which was quite refreshing coming from a man. From her first voyage he kept on insisting on wanting to pick her up. At the time she found it very flattering. Now she would just find it insulting however it showed that he had a considerate personality nonetheless. Not many men had that trait any more. It was obvious he was doing it out of goodwill and not to use it as a means to an end. Well...there may be a reason for him being particularly attentive to her but what she meant was that other men would have more devious thoughts running through their heads while behaving that way. She could really imagine James Hawkins wanting to do anything dishonourable to her considering his past actions towards her. He always wanted to help her. To believe in her. Something which not many people other than her friends and very few family members she had left gave her.
After thinking this over she realised that when she found the reasons why she liked James Hawkins there was nothing really to complain about. She ran her hand through her hair and frowned. She couldn't believe it. The thought of being in love not being such a bad thing actually crossed her mind into the section of reasonable thoughts. After all the lectures she had received from Selina and Diana it was finally beginning to sink in. She never thought it would be a conclusion she could reach reasonably. She always thought it was something which she thought was so delusional and a waste of time but now there was nothing really stopping her from accepting it being anything short of being a simple truth. Also another thing was that the man she was in love with was a lot better than most men in this universe.
Diana was about to (possibly) marry a man she didn't love or know. Selina was tabbed for having scandalous affairs with rich men for the rest of her life and Sophia was now in a marriage which she jumped into with the first person who said 'boo'. Captain Hawkins had, in a way, ticked all the boxes. There was nothing wrong with him. There was nothing wrong with the feelings she had for him. The only problem was her. She just couldn't allow herself to be happy because she had convinced herself that over the years that it wasn't possible to be happy in this world only lucky and successful and that you could only hope with plenty of hard-work under your belt that you could at least be remembered for something being worth remembered for. That was how sad her life truly was. She was a lone star but she didn't want to be alone. Deep down. She should really sort out her own feelings before she would allow him to love her.
She felt a hand on her shoulder and looked up to see it was Selina. "Come on. We're going out."
Cassandra blinked at her. "Going out where?"
"The crew are having some celebration. Playing music and things. We should go."
Cassandra sighed. Selina knew full well that she didn't like dancing. She was just trying to find an opportunity to torture her or worse. Selina rolled her eyes and took her by the wrist.
"You're going whether you like it or not." She said decisively.
She dragged her up the stairs and down the corridor all the way to the deck where she was thrown into an explosion of music. Cassandra stepped back for a moment and blinked because it was so loud and chaotic. The lights had been lit and the crew members were playing any musical instruments they had brought with them and were playing more merrily than she had seen any orchestra at a ball or dance she had to attend. She could now see it as the cheery, wonderful celebration that it was. It was beautiful. Some were already dancing with some female crew members in some form of folk dancing she wasn't familiar with.
She had been taught the conventional ballroom waltz which she absolutely hated with a passion. In those agonising hours she had to force herself through that ridiculous subject and was always listing the things in her head which she thought which would be better to do. She always had to be the one to play the male role since she was one of the taller girls in the class. She hated the stiffness of it as well. People said dancing could be an expression on ones emotions but they were wrong. It was too confining, too polite for lack of a better word for someone to really be able to express their emotions in it. In this dance however people were free. They were free to throw their hair in the wind. To throw their arms about. To spin. To throw their head back. If she was ever to learn a dance willingly it would be this one because this was the only one where she would be able to express her passionate, unpredictable and uncontrollable emotions. As she had recently found.
Selina smiled and leaned over Cassandra's shoulder. "What do you think?"
Cassandra gave her a smile which told her that she very much approved and slowly nodded her head. "Very good."
Selina laughed and patted her shoulder. "I thought you would like it."
She then skipped into the crowd and took the hand of a handsome sailor who was already offering his hand for her dance which she took instantly and drew him to the section of the deck where people were dancing. He looked at little surprised by her brazen behaviour and expected her to be either flirtatiously coy or shy. Cassandra laughed at the scene and clapped to the music. He obviously got a little bit of a shock as would many other men who would follow after him. While she was standing by the scene some people tried to make eye contact with her so they could offer her to dance. She kept her eyes on those who were dancing to avoid such a thing. She wanted to dance but she only wanted to dance with a man she at least knew and that was only her brother and the Captain and none of them were anywhere to be seen despite the noise everyone was making. Then she spotted her brother who was practically throwing Diana around the deck but was laughing and throwing her head back. She smiled at the scene and her heart warmed at the image of her friend being so happy. She hadn't seen her this happy in years.
"Miss Richardson." Someone whispered in her ear. She jumped and found the Captain grinning at her. He looked her up and down and offered her his hand. "Looks like we've found another again. Do you want to dance?"
She giggled nervously and shook her head. "No. Dancing isn't exactly my forte."
However Jim was already pushing her towards the crowd. "It's nothing like the dancing you've learned its one anyone can dance to. You just have to go with it."
She nodded and gripped onto his shoulder tightly and took his hand. "Is this right?"
He smiled nodded. He wrapped his arm around her waist bringing her so close that their bodies were pressed against each other and was sure to feel her heartbeat against his chest. Jim couldn't believe what he was doing. He was overstepping the boundary of what a Captain was allowed to do and he knew if anyone heard about this he would certainly get in trouble. Then he heard Ben's voice screaming in his head and knew it wouldn't stop unless he listened to it and did as he was told. He instantly began spinning her round and stepped back and forth. Her hair was escaping her already loose bun and at some point released her and spun her round her she lost the pins and other things holding it in place with her dark hair falling down on her shoulders like the night sky fell down against the twilight sky when its time had come to dominate over the world in its designated hours.
"You should wear your hair down." He said quietly. He hesitantly ran his fingers through her hair which made her shiver. "I should've told you that from the night before. It looks beautiful down."
"Alright."
He smirked and brought her close again leaning his face closer to hers. Everything, despite it was rushing past her, seemed to slow down for a moment. All the world seemed to go grey except for them and nothing else existed except those two. Nothing else mattered and they felt like they were in their own little bubble. They couldn't hear the music or anything except for their heartbeats. They couldn't feel the cold night breeze or anything except for the electricity soaring through their bodies. Jim leaned forward and was about to bring her lips to hers. She raised her lips to tell him she invite it but within a few seconds of them meeting in the middle something inside the bubble smashed the moment into a thousand pieces.