guanin

Fandom: POTC
Disclaimer: To my great regret, I don't own them.
Characters: Jack, James
Summary: Takes place during DMC after the Pearl picks up James in Tortuga. He and Jack have a little talk that turns out not so well for Jack. Inspired by that picture where James is scrubbing the deck of the Pearl in front of Jack, which I can't post because I have no idea how to do so and am too busy right now to learn.

Title: Small Talk

Jack stood in front of Norrington, his figure casting a shadow across Norrington’s kneeling form. His hand, which had until now been so diligently scrubbing the planking, stilled, and a frowning face peered up at him, managing to look menacingly commodorial despite the filth matting his hair and every inch of his ragged clothing.

“Is there something you want, Sparrow?” Norrington asked, his voice cutting just on the edge of annoyance.

Deciding to overlook the obvious hostility in his voice, Jack dangled a rum bottle in front of his face, its stopper already removed.

“I thought you might fancy a drink,” Jack said, regaling him with his most charming grin.

James stared at him as if he had expressed the sudden desire to become a monk and renounce all worldly pleasures until the end of time.

“I don’t drink with pirates,” he said flatly.

“Really? Could have fooled me, mate. You were doing an admirable job of pretending to do so last night in Tortuga.”

“There’s a difference between drinking around pirates and with them, Sparrow.”

“Is there? Well, you are on a pirate ship.” Jack spread his arms wide, encompassing the thoroughly piratical Pearl. “So you‘re stuck with us whether you like it or not.”

Norrington lowered his eyes to the deck for a long moment, then he let out a sharp sigh brimming with far more exasperation than was warranted, in Jack’s opinion.

“All right,” he said, standing up. “I suppose I can endure your company for a while.”

Jack frowned at the suddenly much taller figure, wishing that the man wouldn’t insist on taking advantage of his height to loom over him like some rapacious bird eagerly waiting for the right moment to devour him. It was creepy.

“No need to make it sound so horrible,” he said, holding out the bottle he’d offered earlier. “Especially after a man’s trying to be friendly and all.”

Norrington took it, in exchange pressing the wet rag he’d been using to clean the deck into Jack’s hand. Jack frowned at the sodden thing, and threw it atop a coil of rope two yards away, making a mental note to pick it up later.

“And while we’re at it,” he said, “since you are now a member of my crew, as strange and bizarre as that sounds, it would not just be a matter of courtesy but also of duty to call me captain.”

“My most sincere apologies, Captain Sparrow,” Norrington drawled, not bothering to grace him with a glance as he threw his head back to take a long swig from the bottle. “I pray that I haven‘t offended your delicate sensibilities.”

“Really convincing, mate. I’m touched by your heartfelt remorse.”

Jack popped the cork from his own bottle and tipped it back, delighting in the long burn that warmed his throat. With a wary eye, he observed the former commodore, trying to reconcile this new Norrington with the man he had so near tragically run into in Port Royal. While that man had practically shone with the pristine, self-righteous whiteness of his newly pressed uniform, this one looked filthier than the monkey fresh from a raid of the food rations. Whatever the lovely Miss Swan had to say about Jack’s personal hygiene, even his particular sense of cleanliness balked at the layers of grime clinging to Norrington’s person. It looked as if he’d been smacked with every sort of dirt imaginable, then dipped for an hour in a pool filled with muck. Jack preferred not to think about what exactly the dirt consisted of, as he thought he recognized a distinct odor that emanated from Gibbs whenever he ran into him in Tortuga. At the very least, Jack thought, looking at the bright side of the situation, this version of Norrington had absolutely no grounds to complain about any aspect of Jack’s appearance or odor, as he had been so prone to do in the past.

“I don’t believe,” Norrington said, leaning back against the rail, “you were expecting me to be less than candid about my displeasure about being onboard this vessel.”

“It weren’t me who forced you up the gangplank. You had your choice of ships back there, plenty of crews you could have joined.”

“And would any have taken me, I wonder?”

“Of course they would have,” Jack professed, making Norrington narrow his eyes at him. “A strong, able man like you. Such a prime hand at scrubbing decks. You would have had then all in a tangle, fighting each other over who would be the lucky one worthy enough to carry you aboard his ship.”

Norrington cracked one of those tight smiles that lurked on his face whenever he found something particularly amusing about Jack.

“And after they discovered my former profession, they would have fought each other again over who got the honor of finishing me off.”

“That is a terribly bleak mood you are in. Though I had been wondering how you managed to survive for so long at a port so hostile to your kind.”

Norrington shrugged. “Hiding in plain sight.”

“Aye, that does work, doesn’t it?”

James looked him over, one eyebrow cocked.

“Somehow,” he said, “I doubt that you’d be able to pull it off.”

“What?” Jack cried out, affronted at this latest attack upon his honor. “I’ll have you know that I’m a master of disguise. There’s none who can recognize me if I’m of a mind of not being recognized.”

An awfully cheeky smile peeked at James’s lips. Insubordinate-like even.

“Am I to deduce that the proud Captain Jack Sparrow would willingly trim that stringy beard and cut his outrageous hair to pass of as a regular citizen? I’m astounded.”

Jack nervously twirled one of his prized, decorated strands, grimacing inwardly at the thought of clipping it after growing it with such devoted care, but he quickly covered it up with a devilish grin.

“I’m Captain Jack Sparrow. You’d be surprised at what I can do.”

Norrington stared at him for a moment, then his lips curved into the most blade like smile Jack had ever seen.

“Captain Jack Sparrow.”

Norrington said every word slowly, precisely, stretching out the syllables in a long sneer that rumbled across Jack’s survival instincts like a sudden squall gusting over the horizon. He cursed inwardly, wondering at what mad impulse had compelled him to allow Norrington anywhere near his person.

“The man escaped from justice, how many times now?” Norrington said in an uncomfortably sardonic tone. “I can’t recall, the number boggles the mind. Who outran a ship of His Majesty’s Navy clear across the Atlantic, even as far as the Mediterranean itself, mocking the elements as he sailed his infamous ship into the thundering gusts of a hurricane to evade capture, leaving said navy ship to battle it out with no hope of survival. The free ports are probably overrun by old sailors telling how the legendary Captain Sparrow made a pact with the sea spirits so that he would survive while his would be captors would not.”

“Now, Norrington, you can’t honestly be setting any stock by those tales, a reasonable man like you. The Pearl was damaged, too. Took a nasty blow. It took us weeks to fix her proper. You can ask the crew."

“And yet, she remains to sail the seas in all her glory.”

“Luck?” Jack piped up, a sheepish grin on his face. “Excellent sailing abilities? Luck and excellent sailing abilities?”

Norrington’s stern glare intensified as he looked at Jack. He resisted the sudden urge to flee for his life. Surely the good ex-commodore wouldn’t actually try to murder him on his own deck in full view of his crew where he was certain to receive a rapid and violent comeuppance. Would he?

"I saw you," James said, regarding the quarterdeck, "standing there, looking through your glass at me. At my ship. The ship that was meant to capture you and take you back to Port Royal even if I had to drag you all the way back in a canvas bag. We were never close enough to have you within range of our guns, yet sometimes I could swear I heard the manic tinkle of those damned silver trinkets of yours mocking me. How fanciful of me."

An ugly sneer tightened around his lips and Jack took a careful step back, glancing quickly around the deck. Gibbs was nowhere to be found and only a few of the new hands were around, nowhere near enough to defend him should Norrington get mutinous. Damn.

Norrington suddenly snorted, a sound that baffled Jack completely.

“Don’t worry, Sparrow. I won’t murder you in cold blood in front of your crew when I have no possible means of escape.”

“That’s a relief, mate,” Jack said, not relieved in the tiniest bit. “Though I don’t like that last bit you added on there. You really should let bygones be bygones. I mean, a man can’t be faulted for trying to prolong his own existence, can he?”

Norrington turned away from him with a disgusted air and took another swig from the bottle.

”I don’t suppose,” Jack said, “there’s any way of banishing those murderous thoughts from your head altogether, is there?”

“Is that what this little conversation of ours is about?”

“Well, I figured, since I have you aboard my ship, and you did get on it voluntarily, mind you, I might as well try to dissuade you from that deadly course you seem to enjoy so much. Really, you can’t go through life constantly thinking about killing people who’ve never done you any wrong. It’s not healthy for either of us.”

That mockingly amused look crept back on Norrington’s face.

“I find it interesting,” he said, “how you always mange to manipulate words to your own benefit. And people actually believe you.”

Jack frowned.

“Nothing untrue about what I just said.”

“Never done me any wrong?”

“Well, I haven’t. You’re the one who keeps going on about hanging me. If anyone should be complaining here, it’s me.”

“I seem to recall that one time when you stole the Interceptor from me.”

Oh. That. Well, that was actually a very reasonable complaint to make. He considered saying “Pirate,” but that probably wouldn’t be the best thing to say with this particular audience.

“I needed a ship,” he said. “Me and Will couldn’t really escape in a dinghy, could we?”

“Now, see, you of all people should realize, Sparrow, that such an argument is never going to work with the commander of said vessel, particularly when, while it was under your care, it somehow happened to get blown up.”

“Now, see here, I was already a prisoner aboard the Pearl when that whole thing happened. I tried to get Barbossa to negotiate instead of outright attacking, but he was having none of it. It was impossible to argue with that man. Now, I would never have treated such a lovely craft so shabbily, I assure you.”

“Is that so? Well, I wouldn’t wish to accuse you of things that weren’t in your control. There are already so many that were, totally and completely. But, since I am no longer a commodore or a captain, or any sort of king‘s officer and therefore it‘s no longer my duty to deal with your past exploits, I suppose you have nothing to worry about.”

He thrust the bottle at Jack, who hesitated before taking it, holding it carefully by the neck, entertaining a mad fear that Norrington had, through some extraordinary sleight of hand, managed to poison the liqueur inside while distracting Jack with his blood hungry accusations.

“If I may be excused, captain,” Norrington said grimly, leaving Jack feeling slightly ill and in dire need of copious amounts of rum.