i was rooting for you, mate

Bad Luck

James frowned and looked over at Gibbs, wondering if he was trying to be helpful or if he just liked to hear himself talk—or both. The man had always been a talker, a compelling storyteller, and rarely missed a chance to share a tall tale. “But it was only a chapter,” Gibbs continued. “Turns out I’ve got a knack for matchmaking. If someone’s looking for a crew, or a carpenter or a fine navigator, or what have you, he comes to me first and I’ll put him in touch with the right man for the job. Found my way again. Gave myself a new purpose, you know?” James still just frowned. Gibbs sighed and leaned back against the railing, then pulled out a flask and took a small drink from it. James caught himself eyeing the flask, and his body ached for a taste of rum with renewed fervor. He looked quickly away, but not before Gibbs noticed his lingering gaze. “You sure you don’t want some?” Gibbs asked. “Seems you’ve gotten used to having your fill of the stuff, and like I said, we’ve got plenty.” James shook his head. “It wasn’t always like last night,” he said. He had quickly learned that his days were much more tolerable when he didn’t wake up with a ruthless headache after spending half the night puking in a gutter—or off the pier. “I’m not that far gone. I intend to break this horrid habit.” Gibbs shrugged and put the flask away, then looked up at the sails with a slight frown. “Wind’s picking up.”

. our Captain of Sorrows . [insp]

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details:

Some self indulgent norribeth -- finished the rendering for practice.

i admit i am not the most prolific reader of fic, particularly when it involves characters i'm writing! so i am perhaps not a great authority in this matter.

but! here are a few! in no particular order:

the vain title take Of lord of thee, and arbiter of war - by tortoiseshells (rated t, 6k words) (not really romantic in the traditional sense but god do i think about this one so much)

hold me like no other by bowditch (rated t, 4k words) (this one is cheating bc it was a birthday present but it makes me insane every time alright)

Here is a truth (here is another truth) by deweydecibelsystem (rated m, 2k words)

the things you do for love will come back to you one by one by rosehips (rated t, 44k words)

calluses by kuryakin (rated g, 1.6k words)

his proposal to elizabeth (which is awkward and misguided, but sincere!), yes, but also

his snarky arrest of jack sparrow, in which he acknowledges that jack saved elizabeth, and offers him a handshake—and uses that handshake as a feint to determine jack's identity

he's a pirate killer in a pirate movie, and he's good at killing pirates! in fact i think the script goes out of its way to show that if it were any pirate but jack sparrow, norrington would've come out the victor. jack actively uses norrington's assumptions of pirate behavior to his advantage and subverts them by being honest, knowing that norrington is savvy enough to mistrust him—or otherwise, jack is exploiting his knowledge of the supernatural, which no one else outside the black pearl thought was real either! THATS the real genre displacement, and it's far from affecting norrington exclusively. 

James dies. Elizabeth brings him home. ✦ potc, post-at world's end, norribeth. multichapter wip

“Death be a different mistress altogether, Miss Swann,” Barbossa says. He leans back into the gloom of the cabin; only the whites of his eyes reflect the bare candlelight. “I happen to know her well. You don’t want to be crossing her.”

“I don’t think he’s dead, Barbossa—I know he isn’t. He can’t be, he simply cannot.” Elizabeth wrings her hands together. She hates this, this helplessness, this begging.

Barbossa’s nails drum the table in a slow, steady taunt. “And what, pray, makes you think that?”

The memory is never far from her thoughts; it lingers there like a cobweb, translucent and unobtrusive, always quietly wavering in her periphery. The image of James standing with his sword drawn, pistol aimed—the crack of his shot cutting the rope, sending her plummeting to the sea—her fleeting glimpse of his final moments—

What Elizabeth says is: “He was…run through, not with a blade, but with a piece of the Dutchman. And he was not one of the sailors aboard when Will came back. If he is not there already, then he will be with the other souls on their way to the afterlife, waiting.”

What she does not say is: I never forgave him. He did not ask, but I denied him anyway. He cannot be at peace.

"I'm sorry for the part I played in the mutiny against you, Jack. I stood up for you. Everything went wrong after that. They strapped me to a cannon. I ended up on the bottom of the ocean, the weight of the water crushing down on me. Unable to move. Unable to die, Jack."

jack [sparrow] knows that norrington will catch elizabeth rather than chase him, so he aims tactfully when he tosses her back to the navy:

and like. i just think it's nice that neither of them acknowledge this moment at all: elizabeth isn't pulling away and norrington isn't interrupting the action to notice that it's happening, despite all the complicated feelings that would otherwise arise. there's a certain—i don't think comfort is the right word here, but trust that they know each other well enough that it's not worth reacting to? i know there's a lot going on in this scene, but it's coming on the heels of a dreadfully awkward proposal AND an exposing swim in the harbor, and it's still not uncomfortable.

they're out of society's clutches in DMC, but i do really like the physicality of how elizabeth does not help to toss norrington into the muck, but gently helps him up and turns him over rather than just offering her hand

and in AWE after a year (or more?) apart, not really knowing who is alive or dead, when elizabeth trusts him the least, her instinct when trapped in a bad situation is still to rush for him—and norrington replies in kind by pulling her immediately into a hug.