Title: A Pirate's Tears
Author: Kat Lee
Fandom: Pirates of the Caribbean
Character/Pairing: Jack/Will
Rating: PG-13/T
Challenge/Prompt: fan_flashworks #140: Gift
Warning(s): None
Word Count: 1,386
Date Written: 12 December, 2015
Summary:
Disclaimer: All characters within belong to Disney, not the author, and are used without permission.



He's strolling down the pier on another unmerry Christmas Eve, the only tune in his head the sloshing of the rum in his bottle as he swings it by the two fingers holding its neck. This one will be empty really soon and will add to his ever growing pile, but it won't solve any problems. Nothing solves Jack's problems any more, and he's unusually quiet and solemn in his thoughts, not that there's any one with whom to discuss anything this evening.

Not even the weather can merit a discussion when no one else is around with whom to talk. Everybody who was anybody had left Tortuga days ago. Only the few, steadfast Pirates and wenches like himself who have no one else other than their crew mates, if them, remain, and they're in no better a mood to talk than Jack himself. When he was younger, he would've gladly joined in the mayhem of fighting and whoring, but neither really appeals to him any longer. Very little does.

He sighs, looking out at the water through heavy, kohl-rimmed eyes. She sloshes against the pier as though she's calling to him, but she doesn't call any longer. She hasn't for years now, not since the Pearl was drowned. He'd have gone with her, but Gibbs had knocked him out and drug him onto the lifeboat. He'd knocked the crap out of him when he'd returned to consciousness, but it had too late to save his Pearl or die with her. That was the second time he should've died with some one he loved, and the second time he didn't.

Gibbs and he have not spoken a word since. A small part of him had hoped the old man might show in port this season, but he's been here for months without sign or sound of Gibbs or any of his old crew. They've all moved on without him, and Jack can't blame them. After all, without crew or ship, he's not even a Captain any more.

His boots slip on the pier, and he lets himself fall. In these quiet, sullen hours before Christmas morn, there's no one to watch him pretending to be agile, gallant, or otherwise graceful with his movements. There's no one to watch him, no one to judge him, no one with whom to spend yet another lonely holiday. There's no one, Jack thinks, sniffling, who still cares about him, and he doesn't blame a damned one of him.

He's a sorrowful sight, and he knows it. The only times he ever sleeps any more is when the rum gets the better of him, and he's still far more often its master than it being his. He wishes he can drink himself to the grave, but that hasn't happened yet. He'd always thought he'd die at sea, in battle or drowning with his ship, but he doesn't even feel like sailing any more.

The sea no longer calls to him. The Pearl is only a memory, and she's not among the ones who play most often in his mind. Those parts of him died long ago, died with his lad, the man to whom he should've given his heart. Not that Will'd wanted him. He'd always had far better taste than a drunken Pirate.

Jack stumbles around on the dock until he's sitting at the very edge of the pier, his legs dangling over the dark water. It's too bad, he thinks, there aren't any sharks or piranhas there to nibble on him. His booted heels skim the waves. There's no magic left any more, no adventure strong enough to call to him. There's nothing out there he wants. It's all far below the sea.

He closes his eyes to block out the sight of the sea and sips his bottle again. The sips quickly become gulps, and soon, he's tossing the emptied bottle away, not caring when it splashes in the water. Instead, he reaches for the second one he's got tied to his belt, uncaps its lid, and begins to down it, too. He wonders if he falls into the water, if any one will notice. Perhaps he can drown tonight; after all, better late than never.

The moon shifts as the dark clouds that have hidden her silver light glide on through the night sky. A bird calls somewhere in the darkness. The wind rises, and the waves are growing larger. Jack thinks perhaps a storm is brewing. Maybe he can lose himself in it and in the depths tonight and finally shush his brain. All it ever wants to think about is Will and the things he should've done, the words he should've said. He's tired of listening to its moaning. It's not like it's got any answers, after all.

It's not like anything can bring his Will back. God knows he's tried time and again, so many times until the Pearl drowned. That was the only thing that stopped his quest, and for a while, it still continued. But there's no answers out to be found, none of the good, dark, strong, powerful magic he needs to resurrect his Will and not have him be a damned, mindless Zombie. He wonders yet again how it is that Barbossa returned to haunt him with his skillfully scheming brain still in tact, and yet no matter how hard he's tried, he can't restore Will.

The wind's become a blasting gale. She rips at Jack's clothes, but he doesn't mind. At one time, he would've compared her to an overly eager lover, but there's love left in this world for him. There's nothing left in this world he wants.

And then the explosion happens. The emptied bottle of rum slips from Jack's fingers as he stares, open-mouthed and wide-eyed. A gangplank crashes into the dock beside him. At first, he can not move. He can only stare in disbelief. Then gibberish starts to pour from his mouth and he scrambles to his feet.

He runs up the plank to his beloved Pearl. He runs, heart shouting louder than any cannons he's ever heard. He runs onto her deck. He runs to his cabin, then down below. He checks room after room before flipping through the rigging and swiftly hitting the crow's nest, but he finds it, too, empty except for, somehow, a bottle of rum.

He leaves the rum sitting where he finds it and bolts upright again in the crow's nest. He jumps onto its rim and peers out into the dark night. "WILL! WILL!" He shouts the name a hundred times. He shouts it in the wind that's now beginning to die back down. He shouts it until he's so hoarse he can only whisper, and then he whispers it a hundred times more.

First one tear falls, then the second, then the third. Defeated, Jack steps down into the crow's nest and slinks down to its bottom. Blindly, he reaches out and grabs the rum. He takes a few gulps, holding the bottle in shaking hands, but even its sweet taste is no longer helping. "DAMN IT!" he roars and throws it into the sea whose lapping waves hungrily eat it up.

His face falls into his hands, and he weeps and he weeps for he knows his ship could only come from one. It's a fabulous gift Will's given him, to have her back, but it's useless. It's pointless. She no longer means to him what once she did, and she never will again. Nothing can fill the void in his heart, nothing but Will whose name he still whimpers on the night breeze in between sobs.

Again, he thinks of taking his life, but Will doesn't want that. It's made that much plain by throwing the Pearl back out of Davy Jones' locker to Jack. No, the sorrowful Pirate comes to decide, there's only one thing he can do now. He has to get his crew back together. He has to resume the quest to free his beloved Will, and maybe, maybe, by some miracle, next Christmas, he won't be alone. Next Christmas, maybe he'll finally have his true Christmas miracle and have his love drinking rum and toasting marshmallows next to him. But that's next Christmas. For this Christmas, Jack can only cry.

The End