(no subject)
Aug. 5th, 2006 10:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bringmethatnpcYou don't venture into the captain's cabin, on board the Dutchman. Especially not when there's any sort of music coming out. When it's the music-box it's especially deadly to interrupt him ... but it's almost as bad when it's the organ.
Tentacles clutch and hammer at the stepped keyboards like the hands of a madman, and the organ groans and bellows and thunders like the storm outside.
-----
Lightning flashes, wind tears at the sails; rain slams down, making the deck slippery and treacherous. The crew of the Dutchman works through the storm, hauling a cannon into its new place.
Over the noise of the thunder, the bo'sun bawls "Secure the mast tackle, Mr. Turner! Step to it!"
On the rain-lashed deck below, two Mr. Turners look up and move to obey.
Tentacles clutch and hammer at the stepped keyboards like the hands of a madman, and the organ groans and bellows and thunders like the storm outside.
Lightning flashes, wind tears at the sails; rain slams down, making the deck slippery and treacherous. The crew of the Dutchman works through the storm, hauling a cannon into its new place.
Over the noise of the thunder, the bo'sun bawls "Secure the mast tackle, Mr. Turner! Step to it!"
On the rain-lashed deck below, two Mr. Turners look up and move to obey.
no subject
Date: 2006-08-06 04:47 pm (UTC)But his attempts at staying unmarked arent' being helped when this other crewman - just as hideous to look at and touch as any of the crew - tries to prevent him from doing his job.
"Step aside!"
no subject
Date: 2006-08-06 04:55 pm (UTC)He's often thought he should have been quicker to learn that kindness is not repaid in kind, among the damned. It's not as though he hadn't been shown that before.
And now here's one of them getting in his way, and he tries not to look too closely at the sight of a living human face, even as their hands struggle for the rope.
"Make way, you filth --"
no subject
Date: 2006-08-06 05:02 pm (UTC)"Hey!"
no subject
Date: 2006-08-06 05:10 pm (UTC)He tugs back as a flash of lightning overhead illuminates the deck, the sails, the ropes --
-- the face staring back at him through the rain.
"No."
The wet rope slides from his suddenly nerveless fingers.
no subject
Date: 2006-08-06 05:41 pm (UTC)The bosun storms over, glaring to see who's responsible.
"Haul that weevil to his feet!"
no subject
Date: 2006-08-06 05:46 pm (UTC)He's failing.
He's failing Elizabeth.
Take it, Will. Keep strong and take whatever it is they do to you. She has faith in you.
no subject
Date: 2006-08-06 05:48 pm (UTC)"Five lashes'll remind you to stay on it!"
He raises his whip to strike.
no subject
Date: 2006-08-06 05:52 pm (UTC)Bootstrap's face is livid white in the lightning flashes.
"No!"
no subject
Date: 2006-08-06 05:53 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-08-06 05:55 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-08-07 03:09 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-08-07 03:34 am (UTC)At the sound of their captain's voice, the crew instinctively parts to either side, admitting Davy Jones to the center of the circle. Rain runs in thick rivulets between the barnacles on his hat as he approaches Bootstrap.
"And what would prompt such an act of charity?"
no subject
Date: 2006-08-07 03:40 am (UTC)"...my son."
He turns slowly to look at Will, comprehension and pain and terrible fear all mingled in his eyes.
"He's my son."
no subject
Date: 2006-08-07 08:52 am (UTC)All Will can do is stare, ignoring his predicament and the pirates. This man? His father? "Bootstrap" Bill Turner?
He's found him.
no subject
Date: 2006-08-08 01:37 am (UTC)"What fortuitous circumstances be this!" he crows, snatching the bo'sun's weapon away from him; the pirate steps back with haste to leave a clear path. "Five lashes be owed, I believe it is."
Yet when Jones raises the whip, it isn't to use it.
It's to thrust the handle at Bootstrap's face, his tentacled finger wrapped around it and squirming for purchase in the rain.
no subject
Date: 2006-08-08 03:22 am (UTC)"No," he husks. "No, I won't!"
no subject
Date: 2006-08-08 03:39 am (UTC)The siphons flex, drawing in breath, and the next flash of lightning sets off an openly pleased spark in Davy Jones' eyes.
"Your issue will feel its sting -- " and still the tentacle grasps and re-grasps the handle -- "be it by the bo'sun's hand or your own."
no subject
Date: 2006-08-08 03:46 am (UTC)"No."
no subject
Date: 2006-08-08 03:52 am (UTC)"Bo'sun!"
no subject
Date: 2006-08-08 04:03 am (UTC)He clutches at the whip, beating the bo'sun's grab for it, and turns to face Will with his jaw clenched against any further cry.
no subject
Date: 2006-08-08 07:50 am (UTC)Each lash cuts into Will's skin, sending shooting pains across his spine. Each snap makes him grunt with pain. Even after the first he can feel blood seeping over his back, to which the salt spray adds extra sting.
But it doesn't take long, at least.
no subject
Date: 2006-08-08 02:14 pm (UTC)One.
Rain and sea spray sting his eyes, blur his vision -- but not enough to block out the sight of the blood.
Two.
Or of Davy Jones's satisfied, lipless smile.
Three.
And the roar of the sea and the storm isn't anything like loud enough to drown out the crack of the whip against bare flesh, or the stifled cry of pain at each blow.
Four.
The water trickling down his face isn't from the rain.
Five.
no subject
Date: 2006-08-07 04:17 pm (UTC)But the fun's over now, and the crowd slowly breaks up as the crewmen return to their duties.
no subject
Date: 2006-08-07 04:48 pm (UTC)Doesn't mean that this doesn't hurt now, though.
no subject
Date: 2006-08-07 04:54 pm (UTC)"Will--"
no subject
Date: 2006-08-07 05:05 pm (UTC)He's too proud to accept it from anyone, least of all this pirate... his father. Will staggers away, keeping his hand against the hull.
no subject
Date: 2006-08-07 05:23 pm (UTC)He tosses a fresh shirt to Will.
no subject
Date: 2006-08-07 05:40 pm (UTC)"So I‘m to understand what you did was an act of compassion?" He asks with a faint hint of bitterness.
no subject
Date: 2006-08-07 05:45 pm (UTC)"Yes."
no subject
Date: 2006-08-07 05:57 pm (UTC)He can't actually argue that it couldn't have been worse.
no subject
Date: 2006-08-07 06:17 pm (UTC)"...one hundred years before the mast," Bootstrap is saying, low and contemplative. "You lose who you were, bit by bit. You end up -- end up like poor Wyvern."
He gestures at the wall, where there appears to be a carving of a --
No. It's not a carving; it's a man sprouting growths of coral, melded into the ship. And, apparently, mercifully unconscious.
"Once you've sworn an oath to the Dutchman there’s no leaving it," Bootstrap continues. "Not 'til your debt is paid."
no subject
Date: 2006-08-07 06:36 pm (UTC)"I’ve sworn no oath." he says.
no subject
Date: 2006-08-07 06:48 pm (UTC)But not for his son.
"Then you must get away," he says, almost sharply.
no subject
Date: 2006-08-07 07:00 pm (UTC)"Not until I find this," he says firmly. "The key."
no subject
Date: 2006-08-07 07:05 pm (UTC)Slowly, parts of him shifting in ways unpleasant to look at too closely, Wyvern pulls himself from the wall and stares at both Turners.
A creaking whisper: "Th' dead man's chest."
no subject
Date: 2006-08-07 07:07 pm (UTC)"What do you know of this?"
no subject
Date: 2006-08-07 07:10 pm (UTC)"Open the chest with the key, and stab the heart..." His voice quavers, with uncertainty or with the unfamiliarity of long disuse. "The Dutchman needs a living heart, or there'll be no captain. And ... if there's no captain, there's ... no one to have the key."
no subject
Date: 2006-08-07 07:16 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-08-07 07:20 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-08-07 07:22 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-08-07 07:29 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-08-07 07:37 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-08-07 07:40 pm (UTC)A moment later it's as though he never moved in the first place.