Born Unto Trouble

[Sylvia Phoenix]

The sound of explosions, shouting, crashing waves, and thunder filling her ears. All sounds deadened moments later, forced underneath the cold water. Sputtering for air, raindrops stinging her face. Muscles exhausted, struggling to stay afloat. Grasping at wreckage with numb fingers. Finding James's hand and clinging to it for dear life. Lightning, a massive wave, still holding on, then blackness...

Minta woke. Feeling a rush of relief when she felt the sun's warmth caressing her face instead of icy water. She sat up, brushing sand from her hair, and appreciatively took stock of her surroundings. She'd drifted off while reading under a palm tree, reclining on the white sand of a beautiful beach. Today the water was a perfect shade of crystal blue, gently lapping the shore. The locals called this place Thousand Steps Cove, because that's exactly how many steps it took to walk the full length of the beach's crescent moon shape. Cozy little spot. Minta counted herself lucky that she and her comrades had wound up on this lovely island. Though haunted by frequent nightmares of the ordeal she had gone through a month earlier, Araminta felt safe.

Standing up and stretching, Minta checked to make sure she hadn't rumpled any pages of the Robinson Crusoe book she'd been reading. It was intact, thank goodness. She didn't want to embarrass herself to her hostess, who had kindly lent it to her. Striding barefoot along the sandy trail back to town, Minta was greeted by everyone she passed. The citizens of Greenford were friendly and hospitable. Simple folk with simple lives, who held traditional beliefs and made their living by fishing. After being rescued by a fishing boat, Araminta and her comrades had been taken in by the fisherman's family, and welcomed by the townspeople. Minta was beginning to feel she could belong here.

Minta and her companions were being put up at the local boarding house, owned by the fisherman's family and operated by his bright, sociable wife Renee. Entering through the kitchen door, Minta found her friend bustling about, gathering dishes, surrounded by several of her noisy young children.

"Minta, my love! Just in time. A mite of help getting lunch on the table would be dearly appreciated. Oh, finished already!" she exclaimed as Minta handed her the novel.
"It was even more exciting than you led me to believe," Minta replied smiling. "I could scarcely put it down. Echoed a few of my own misadventures, truth be told."
"Lord, but don't I know it," Renee answered sympathetically. By now the whole town was familiar with the castaways' tale of capture by Blackbeard and subsequent escape. "Speaking of which, you may want to peek in on Mr. Gillette before lunch. He's a bit more despondent than usual today."
Minta's expression saddened slightly, remembering the hard time Desmond had been having. "You've been taking care of him, Renee. Why doesn't he seem to be getting better?"
"Oh, his wound's healing up just famously. Soon he'll have naught but a scar to show for it. It's his heart that isn't getting well. I reckon you should have a chat, knowing him better than me."
"I barely know him at all," Minta replied ruefully.
"But you were there when it happened, not me," Renee reasoned. "And Lord knows you're better at talking to him than those other fellows. Mr. Norrington, silent as a stone. And ol' whats-his-name. Crazy as a coot. Hardly ever see him. I wonder where he gets off to all day."
"You and me both." Minta smirked slightly. She still wasn't used to Jack's flamboyance and bizarre personal habits. "You're right, I'll talk to Mr. Gillette. No time like the present."

Making her way through the mob of unruly kids, Minta ascended the creaky stairs to Desmond's room on the second floor landing. If he had left his room anytime in the past month, Minta wasn't aware of it. She knocked lightly. "It's Araminta. May I come in?"

[Captain Jack]

One the west facing wall Desmond sat on the cushioned window bench and stared outside, his face blank in expression but yet, still in a trance like state. The wound on his shoulder was healing very well indeed, but even though the skin had reconnected the pain would always linger. With every stretch in the morning it would ache, reaching something on a tall shelf would send tension throughout his entire shoulder blade, down his back, deep into his body and he would have to recoil with a grimace on his face. Still, the physical pain was nothing compared to what he felt in his heart. The deadness, the sorrow, the extreme pain of loss, even the anger constantly rushed through his veins and confused his emotions. Even though on the rare occasion a certain was better than the last Desmond felt like he had nothing to live for. He should have been able to break open that door, he felt at fault for Sylvia's death and now she was no longer here. Often, he would relive those moments underneath the water and tried to think of what he could have done differently but it always turned out the same and ended up weeping like a small child.

He, too, was plagued by nightmares every night and would wake up in a cold sweat combined with the pulsing pain in his heart connected to his shoulder. Even the dreams that started out good, the ones with tall oak trees rustling in the wind, children running up to him and that last scene where a woman walked out of the small cottage that he could never see the face of but so desperately wanted to be Sylvia always ended in terror. The blank woman now would turn into a rotted, waterlogged corpse of what Sylvia surely is now.

Desmond's weight had plummeted in the last month as he refused to eat anything substantial, dark circles had formed underneath his eyes from lack of sleep, his skin also became paler as he remained inside most of the last month. His thick hair had grown out quite a bit with good coverage of a beard on his face. He did not care enough to shave. Blankets on his bed where in a twirl from struggling in his sleep and the desk had thick wax candles halfway melted down.

Desmond heard a knock on the door followed by Araminta's voice. He looked toward the door with a hopeless expression. "If you'd like," he replied to her in a quiet tone

[Sylvia Phoenix]

After a moment's pause, Minta pushed the door open and stepped inside, closing it behind her. As expected, Desmond had installed himself in the window seat. She sometimes spotted him in the window when she walked in the street below. Always seeming to be watching the world pass by outside without really seeing.

Minta walked over to an armchair near the window, her bare feet not making a sound on the wood floor. The quiet room was lit only by the dying afternoon light coming through the window, giving the room a warm glow. It should have been a beautiful and serene place for the person residing there, but Minta saw nothing but despair on Desmond's face. The starkness of the shadows under his eyes gave Minta a start. She hadn't seen him in days, and he seemed worse than before.

Perching herself on the arm of the chair facing toward Des, Minta awkwardly fiddled with her skirt.
"Sometimes I dream about it," she began haltingly, not meeting Desmond's gaze. "My father died, you know. But life is for the alive. We have to move on."

[Captain Jack]

Desmond turned his gaze back out the window as Araminta silently walked through the room. Not sensing her awkwardness, he reached his hand back to his shoulder and rubbed it gently. A warm breeze pushed against the latched windows, wanting to surge into the cold room but Desmond ignored its urges and slumped further into his seat. "I should have saved her, I don't deserve to be among the living, it hurts too much," he replied, eyes still locked in their trance outside the window.

He let out a sigh, let his head rest on the cream colored wall right beneath a hanging picture and looked at Minta "It's as if my whole being was ripped out of this... this... this body I'm in and remained in that watery grave. I certainly don't feel alive,"

[Sylvia Phoenix]

Minta met Desmond's gaze as he spoke. She sighed deeply and looked at the floor, remaining in silence for several moments. His words echoed the depth of her own sadness after the loss of her father. The difference between them was that Desmond's love was unrequited and unfulfilled, and now he would never get closure. At least Minta and her father had known they loved each other. That made it easier to bear. Des didn't have that comfort.

"No one deserves such a fate," she continued quietly. "I feel guilty as well. I keep asking myself if... I had stayed home or... I don't know, said something different, begged him not to..." She gestured helplessly with her hands. "But I didn't. I couldn't have known."

Getting up from the chair, she walked over to the window. Reaching past Desmond, she unlatched the window and let it swing open. A soft warm breeze rushed into the room, ruffling her hair. She then sat down on the opposite end of the bench, facing Des.

"But I'm living with it," she continued as the little noises of everyday life floated up from the street. "I just keep telling myself, if it was meant to happen differently, it would have." She gestured out the window. "The world is still out there. We're still in it. I don't know if that makes us lucky or unlucky, but I hate to see a man wasting away in here like the walking dead."

For a moment she mentally weighed whether or not to make her next remark, and decided it needed to be said.
"To be honest... Sylvia made her own choices. She was a pirate. She stole and murdered. Are you sure she's worth making yourself miserable over? You seem nice. Not like her. You can do much better."

[Captain Jack]

As the breeze flew in between the window Desmond recoiled as if it were tiny icicles stabbing him in the face. He turned away so his face was cast in a shadow again, purposefully trying to ignore Minta's words that came at him like daggers. Running his hand through his longish hair he blurted "The world wouldn't miss me if I weren't here, there is nothing that I want to see or do, I just want the pain to end!" his voiced raised. Desmond didn't want to hear any of this "the world is still out there," talk.

He thought he would just Minta finish her speech and then she would go away like everyone else had. Then he could be at peace here in his room where he intended to stay. But he didn't expect to hear the sentence that came out of her mouth. Desmond brought up his eyes to meet her, sadness had left in an instant and was replaced by anger. "Deep down she was a good person! I know it! You knew her, what? Three days? And you branded her a thieving murdering pirate! I used to think the same thing when I was part of the guard, all pirates are scum, they all deserved to die. What people don't know is there a certain freedom not being apart of a primped society!" he was on his feet now clearly ranting in a raised voice. He had lost control, he had some sense that he was waving his arms frantically in the air but all he knew was that he was angry and wanted to release it. Though, what he didn't know yet was that Araminta was right and he just didn't want to accept it.

[Sylvia Phoenix]

Minta recoiled at the sudden outburst of rage from Desmond. Immediately she began berating herself for opening her mouth. But she, too, was angry now. Angry at Desmond for refusing to see the truth. No matter what he said, Minta's convictions about the evils of piracy would not be so easily changed. She jumped to her feet as well, squaring off with Des.

"Three days, three years, what's the difference? I've heard the reports! I've seen her face on wanted posters everywhere! My father talked constantly about the dangers of sailing the seas! He lived in fear because of her kind, but he did it anyway, to support his family! And look what happened to him. To all of us. Blackbeard, Sylvia, they were the same! Just because Sylvia was a washed-up lowlife who couldn't even hang onto her own ship, didn't make her any different from Blackbeard. I don't know what she said to you, but you must be an awful poor judge of character. Some things are obvious, even to me. You are a good person. I don't know how on earth you fell in with her ilk, but I won't stand by and watch you let your life slip away and listen to your talk. Over a dead woman who obviously didn't care for you at all!"

By now she was gesticulating wildly with her hands, eyes blazing, cheeks red. She stopped to take a breath. She wasn't sure why she should even care. But it made her blood boil to see Desmond wallow in self-pity over the loss of a pirate, when Minta wasn't pitying herself over the loss of a father.

[Captain Jack]

"You think they are all the same, you think not one of their kind," he emphasized the last two words while pointing a finger at Minta "Aren't human too?! Because you have cast her into the damned to hell category you wouldn't take the time to learn she grew up on a ship with her merchant father! She survived the shipwreck that took place and was taken by pirates." he paused, his breathing was heavy and slightly raspy sounding.

"You tell me, miss, Araminta, if you were in such a situation, how would you have handled it? Remained primp and proper or adapt?" Desmond was still very wild eyed at this point and didn't even stop to think about people passing by outside the window might hear their loud and somewhat violent sounding conversation. "And...not once has she left me behind! She is no perfect person, I admit that, but..." he paused, jabbing his finger where Araminta's heart would be, "In there, somewhere, sat a good person. Unrefined and rugged but it was there and all it needed was something or someone to bring it out."

Desmond suddenly put his hands to head, moaning in the process. He clearly had exerted himself beyond the point a half starved man should. His feet shuffled backwards and his upper body followed unable to support him. Des scrambled on the spot by throwing his right arm outward and successfully grabbed the desk but managed to knock all the candles over onto the floor. He regained his balance but continued to hold onto the desk for support.