The Turning of the Tides

TITLE: The Turning of the Tides 13/?

AUTHOR: Seraphina )

PAIRING: eventual Jack/Will slash

RATING: eventual NC-17

SUMMARY: Will has to revise his moral standing when he is forced to help Spinoza tend the wounded.

DISCLAIMER: not mine, never were and unfortunately never will be.

AUTHOR´S NOTE: silentchaos89: I completley agree with the taking it slowly. I still feel that despite him having lightened up by the end of the movie enough to snog the chick, i think he´s still have a major stick up his arse when it came to anything else especially seeing as it was a hanging offense back then. Glad you´re enjoying it though and thanks for your comment!
anonymous_fan: Of course your opinion counts! all my reader´s opinions count! as for slashy goodness, i´m trying to develop a bit more of a friendship between the two first...when you think about it, they only spent a grand total of about a week with each other in the movie, if that, and half of that, Will didn´t trust jack as far as he could throw him but i swear there will be slashy goodness!
Yukio: happy to make you laugh and entertain you and i´m very glad you like it! next chapter is just being beta´d at the moment so it shouldn´t be too far away!


CHAPTER 13

Will’s senses were assaulted as soon as he entered what was normally the crew’s quarters. The air smelt foul, heavy with a sickly sweet odour that came with only one thing - rotting flesh. Rotting flesh on the living meant infection, and as he stepped clear of the stairs and strode through hammocks in which lay the victims of these infections, Will was forced to hold his forearm to his nose simply to breathe sucessfully without gagging. Several months living in one’s own filth as well as that of nearly a hundred others, under a cruel hand, had left many slaves with wounds that refused to heal. There were wails of pain and delirium coming from all directions, but above that, from the direction of the makeshift ‘infirmary’, he heard shouting in French.

Finding that the cloth of his shirt did little to block the stench, Will attempted to breathe through his mouth, but the taste of the air was little better than the smell. The smith paused momentarily to compose himself, forcing a look of resolve onto his face, and continued his path through the swinging hammocks toward the rising shouts up ahead. He knew that if he looked too closely at what was going on to his left and right, he might very well be sick. Spinoza could only deal with so many patients, the rest was left up to those amongst the crew who could stomach it, whether they had any medical expertise or not, and Will’s bet was on the latter.

As he cleared the last hammock, Will found himself face to face with one of the biggest Africans he’d ever seen. Memories of Barbossa’s bosun came quickly to mind, although this man lacked the self-induced scars that had made that cursed pirate particularly intimidating. The expression on this man’s face, however, was not exactly one of welcome and before he knew it, Will found himself pinned to the wall, bottles clinking next to his head in the shelving he’d made not days before.

The man seemed to demand something of him in French. Will, devoid of both comprehension and weapon - his sword was somewhere back on the Liberté - could only struggle in vain against the man’s hold, which was gradually starting to cut off the smith's air supply.

From somewhere behind this giant came more shouts in French. Will recognised Jack’s voice. Although he did not know what the captain was saying, he knew that he was not happy. Will, still angry with Jack, childishly wanted to tell him that he did not need his help, but was prevented from doing so by the massive forearm across his upper chest. There was more shouting, and Will knew it to be Spinoza. The man holding him growled something back without taking his menacing eyes off Will and, if anything, his grip tightened.

Panic rose in Will as the edge of his vision started to go black, and it was not until he was on the brink of losing consciousness that he was released.

Shakily he rubbed at his chest, guessing there would be a bruise there come morning, not knowing what had been said to the man to change his mind, but happy that it had been. The slave was still standing in front of him, staring down at him with mistrust. Will sidestepped gingerly, not taking his eyes off the man till he was quite sure he was out of arm’s reach, then turned to see what the hell the commotion was about.

Spinoza’s desk was cleared and had been dragged away from the wall to stand in as a surgical table. Jack stood to his right at one end, and whilst Will could tell the pirate was trying to catch his eye he refused to look in Jack’s direction. Not that he could have torn his eyes away from what was on the table even if he had wanted to. If he’d thought that the scene above deck had been bad, Will now knew he had been naïve and stupid.

A slave boy no more than eight years of age lay in the grip of fever. He was clothed only in a tattered pair of breeches but Will barely registered this for, below the non-existent hem of the pants, the boy’s left leg was raging with infection from the knee down. Will’s eyes followed the varying colours of skin from black to red to a horrid unnatural pus-green in the the region where a big toe should have been.

Will made a choked sound in the back of his throat, looking to Spinoza, who was trying to keep the healthy leg still as he examined the wound.

“W-what happened?” the smith managed to get out, eyes wide as they swept over the entire form of the boy, who writhed and moaned as Spinoza went about his examination.

“Yer ‘Capitaine’, tha’s what 'appened,” Jack growled, hands on the boy’s shoulders in an attempt to keep him supine.

Despite the situation, Will looked up sharply at the pirate, eyes narrowed. “I never said I agreed with what he did.”

“But ye’d rather martyr him an' hate me, is tha’ it?” Jack snapped back coldly.

Will ground his teeth, trying hard to remain civil. “This is hardly the time, nor the place, Captain.”

“I quite agree.” Spinoza looked up over the rim of his glasses. “Glad you’re here, Master Turner. Can’t say as young Robby was much help, although he meant well. Very nearly had me amputate a man’s entire hand when the finger was all that was needed, he was shaking so much.”

Will gulped nervously, his stomach feeling as though it had dropped about a foot. “Amputate?”

“Oh yes.” Spinoza grin was almost maniacal, and Will thought for a moment that perhaps all this was starting to unhinge the little old man whom he'd thought to be a bit mad from the outset. Spinoza continued: “That’s all I’ve been doing for the past hour. Can’t really do much else for a lot of them I’m afraid. It’s always like this when you’re forced to clean up someone else’s mess. It never fails to amaze me just how stupid some people are. You’d think that a bunch of healthy slaves would fetch a far higher price than a bunch of cripples would.” The physician shrugged and went back to the examination. “But what would I know? I’m just the doctor.”

The bitterness in Spinoza’s voice was apparent and Will felt pity for the man. No, the physician had not gone crazy; he, like Will, was merely struggling for understanding.

Will shook these thoughts from his head and began to mentally brace himself for the task at hand. When he’d lived in England, a dog had died in the lane at the back of the house he’d lived in with his mother. No one had come to take it away and the smell of it had wafted in through the windows. That’s what the wound smelt like to Will, but it looked even worse. The angry lines of infection wound their way right up the boy’s leg and the skin looked like it was ready to burst. Again Will felt as if his stomach had dropped.

“The captain did this?” Will asked quietly as Spinoza went about his work.

To his right, he heard the pirate take a breath as if he were about to launch into another tirade, but it did not come. Spinoza’s warning glance in the pirate captain’s direction was not lost on Will and he was thankful. Will had meant it when he’d said that it really was not the time or the place.

Instead a deep voice from behind him spoke up, nearly scaring him out of his skin. He’d almost forgotten the huge slave was there.

“Yes, it was the captain’s doing.” The man’s voice was quiet and even, with only a trace of an accent. The fact that this man could speak English and speak it well was a source of confusion for Will but he dared not question it, lest he find himself pinned to a wall and unable to breathe. Instead, he turned, his back to Jack, not on purpose but because it meant he could see both who was speaking to him and what Spinoza was doing. No, having his back to Jack was merely a bonus.

“The captain, with the aid of the bosun’s hammer and chisel.”

Will was sure that the colour completely drained from his face at that moment. His mouth felt dry but he still managed to speak. “Why?”

The big man looked sad and Will found it hard to believe that a moment ago he’d found him menacing.

“Punishment,” the man said quietly, and then recounted a story that Will was unlikely to forget, along with the rest of the day's events, for a very long time.

Having been captured at a very young age and forced into slavery in the West Indies, the man had been given the name 'Horatio' by his master; a learned and not unkind plantation owner by the name of Hamish Cameron. Cameron had obviously been more of a modern thinker, insisting that Horatio be educated and raised in the main house in the hope that he would faithfully serve his master in the man's older years. The slave was schooled in what he coined 'white devil tongue', and was apt at communication in both English and French by the time Cameron passed away. Upon his master's death, Horatio was granted freedom in accordance with Cameron's last will and testament and was able to join the crew of a merchant ship heading back to Africa. There he started a new life. When his son was born, he was given a 'white devil name' and was taught everything his father knew, Horatio praying that should the day arrive when Darius encountered these devils, perhaps being able to understand and communicate with them would be of some value.

Despite all precautions, however, when the slavers did come, the plan backfired. On the journey to the Caribbean, Darius was over heard by Moreau, begging for fresh water from one of the crew in French. It seemed that the Captain disliked hearing his language coming from the mouth of a slave and he had the boy beaten, demanding who had taught him. Horatio had, of course, stepped forward and begged that he should be the one punished and his son spared. He was granted half his request as Moreau did indeed agree that the father should be punished and so it was that Horatio was forced to cut off his own son's toe or the boy would be hanged from the yard arm.

The huge man had managed to keep his composure throughout the tale, although it was a rapid telling with no pause. As the last words left his mouth, however, his whole massive frame shuddered as he allowed himself one discreet sob. He rapidly collected himself and simply looked at the smith with dark eyes.

Will could not speak. He could only blink rapidly as he looked from father to son.

“Are ye still o' the mind tha' mine were th' actions of a cold-blooded killer?”

Will’s eyes flicked up to see Jack’s face, altogether sober in the candlelight.

"I never said..."

"Ye didn't have to."

Will felt a twinge of guilt as he looked at Jack, the kohl-rimmed eyes holding none of the spite they had before. But nor were they pleading. It was as if they simply appealed for reason. Either way, Will still found himself unable to respond.

The silence was broken by Spinoza as he straightened quickly from the examination which he had just completed. “Well, it would seem that Mister Horatio here quite naturally lost his nerve. The toe has been removed in two blows; the first obviously not being strong enough. Though I highly doubt that was where the problem started. More likely a few weeks in less than hygienic conditions is the culprit." He adjusted his spectacles and looked to the lad standing rigidly nearby. "Will, some laudanum, if you please. Second from the bottom, third from the right. Yes, yes, that’s it.”

Will’s hand shakily took the bottle from the shelf, still keeping a safe distance between Horatio and himself as he passed the bottle to the physician. “What will you do?” he asked after taking a deep breath and finding his voice.

“It’s as I said; amputation is essentially all I can do,” he answered, administering the drug as Jack tipped Darius’ head forward. The old man then began to rifle around in one of the desk drawers, finally pulling out a small bone saw, a length of linen and a small box made of jade.

“His whole leg?” Will cast a nervous eye from the saw to Horatio, wondering how all this would sit with the patient’s father, given the original circumstances of the injury.

Spinoza shook his head and moved back down to the other end of the table, instruments in hand. “Maybe two inches below the knee. I should prefer to save the joint if possible. It would make any future prosthesis far more effective.”

Will frowned. “Any future what?”

“Fancy way o’ saying ‘peg leg’,” Jack offered with a wry smile, and Will felt for moment, that things were as normal. "Likes his fancy words, does the good doctor.”

Will nodded and looked back at Spinoza as he opened the box to reveal what looked to the smith like a few dozen extremely thin pins.

“I once met a chinaman in my exile, who taught me the art of pressure points and how they can be used, along with these needles”, he held one up to the candlelight in demonstration, "to heal and block pain.” Spinoza moved quickly then, inserting the needles in different places around the boy’s knee. “It does not hurt him,” he said at one point, eyes flicking up to Will’s face as he cringed every time the skin was broken. Then, when the physician seemed satisfied, he tore the left leg of the boy’s breeches, and deftly tied the length of linen tightly around the small thigh.

Will cleared his throat nervously, glancing between the bone saw and the putrid limb. “And what part am I to play in this operation?”

Jack snorted. “That’s easy; I hold down this end, an' you hold down that end.” The pirate motioned with his head to both the Darius’ legs. As if on cue, the good leg flailed accompanied by a whimpering moan and some delirious words in what Will assumed to the boy’s native tongue. He had to hide his surprise as Jack unexpectedly brushed a hand lightly over the fevered brow of their patient, crooning softly in what could have been French but was most likely nonsense. Whatever it was, it seemed to have the desired effect and Darius slumped into a more or less relaxed state.

Spinoza gave a business-like cough and after rolling up his shirt sleeves as far as they would go, he doused his hands with a bottle of distilled alcohol he’d managed to make himself.

During Will’s daily consultations with the physician, Spinoza had pointed out that it had become a necessity in the end, as the rum he’d previously been using kept on mysteriously disappearing. It had taken a lot of convincing the crew that it was not a good idea to go drinking the distilled stuff and in fact, one particular pirate, whom Will had not known, had apparently learnt the hard way. And so Spinoza’s disinfecting supplies had ceased to be coveted trophies.

Will took the bottle as it was handed to him and followed suit, his own sleeves pushed up out of the way. A small hiss escaped his lips when the alcohol found a scratch on the back of his hand, presumably from the raid, he had not even realised was there. The smith shook his hand, the resulting cool breeze easing the sting a little as he replaced the cap on the bottle and put it out of the way on the shelf.

“Alright, gentleman. Let us get this over with as quickly as possible, shall we? Will, I’ll want you on the other side of the table,” directed Spinoza, positioning the smith next to Darius’ right leg. “It will be the good leg that gives us the most trouble I should imagine; he won’t be able to feel any pain in the bad one, perhaps just a little pressure. Now, Jack, you come around next to Will, that's it. Now hold the child down well, by the shoulders I think is best. You might try leaning over him a little. I don’t particularly want him seeing this no matter what state of mind he’s in.”

Will made room as Jack bustled in beside him, the pirate’s back mostly to him as he shielded the scene that was about to unfold. Will was finding it hard to swallow as Spinoza picked up the bone saw, and ran the serrated blade back and forth through the flame of a nearby candle. His heart pounded in his chest as he placed his hands gently but firmly on the clammy skin of the good leg. As soon as he did so, Darius’ body seemed to surge up with impossible force for one so small, and he started screaming.

“What in God’s name..?” Will cried, baring down on the undulating limb beneath him. Again he heard Jack’s kindly mutterings from his left, the movement receding to the fitfulness of fever.

“Same hold used on 'im as last time, I should imagine,” Jack said without turning.

Will looked up at Horatio for confirmation and the tall man nodded, hands fisting at his sides. He looked as if he were about to launch himself at the three of them and whisk his ailing son away. His jaw worked as he obviously battled internally to keep his emotions in check, perhaps realising that this was the best chance Darius had of survival. At least Will hoped that the slave had realised this. If not, they were going to need more than a bone saw and Jack's soothing gibberish to defend themselves.

The smith felt eyes on him then, and he realised that Spinoza was staring at him, waiting for an affirmation that he was ready. Will took a deep breath, and applied more pressure to the good leg. He then gave a quick nod, although he was sure he could never be ready for something like this, and moved his gaze, watching the proceedings only from the corner of his eye.

Spinoza worked efficiently but with care, muttering quitely to himself as he went. The linen used as tourniquet around the boy's thigh made for minimal blood flow yet the quicksilver scent still filled the air. It was, however, a welcome reprieve from the putrid stench of rotting flesh. The saw had to have been at least halfway through its job when Will felt the muscles beneath his hands tense. He threw all of his weight onto the bottom half of the boy in anticipation just before the attempted thrashing and screaming began. Everything erupted; Horatio started towards them yelling at Spinoza, who was yelling at Jack and Will to hold Darius down, while Jack in turn was yelling at Horatio even as he bodily threw himself across the boy’s chest. All Will could do was hold on as he could not understand a word of what was being said.

“What the hell is going on?” Will demanded angrily of Jack, who no longer had his back to him but was rather on his stomach, doing his best to keep Darius still. “What is he saying?! What is the boy screaming?!” Despite not knowing what it was he was saying, it sounded to Will that it was one thing being repeated over and over in a chilling panicked scream. The sound of it was starting to make Will panic too, not to mention the ominous sight of the father looking as if he were about to commit three different murders.

Jack looked stern but spoke calmly, staring directly into Will‘s eyes. “Nothin', it’s nothin', Will. Just 'old him down fer Christ’s sake.”

Will nodded shakily, tried to swallow, then though better of it as he feared the action might cause the opposite reaction. His heart pounded in his ears as he leant even harder across their patient.

Suddenly, Horatio switched to English, bellowing so loud that undoubtedly the whole ship could hear. “He can feel it! He says he can feel it!”

Will balked, nearly losing his hold on Darius in the sudden moment of horror. “He what?!”

Spinoza, always the voice of reason, switched to English then, as well. “And I’m telling you, sir, that he can not. Sensation perhaps, but pain, no! Now step down and let me do my job!”

Will thought that he had done rather well up until the point the boy’s screams were articulated in English. The high-pitched, frantic cries of “I can feel it!”, accompanied by the sound of the saw to his right, had Will slumping over the boy’s good leg, and giving a rather loud, choked sob. All he wanted to do was put his hands to his ears and block out the awful, gut-wrenching sound.

At first he did not hear Jack’s voice so near to him, but when he registered the warm breath on his cheek, he turned his head to the left and found himself face to face with the pirate, who still, through all this, looked as calm as he had on the day of his hanging in Port Royal.

“Will, lad. Listen to me. If tha' madman says the boy doesn’t feel any pain, then he doesn’t, savvy? I swear t' you, Will; he can’t feel it. Now jus' hold in there, mate. It’s nearly over.”

Will nodded dumbly, finally finding the ability to swallow without gagging, and Jack gave him a quick, tight-lipped smile. “Good lad.”

By the time it was done, and the stump cauterised, Will thought he might pass out again. Although Spinoza had, using his own brand of bedside manner, convinced Horatio to lend a hand rather than threaten to tear some off, Darius had not stopped screaming until the limb was almost detached.

After the wound was dressed, and Darius was moved to one of the spare palliasses, Jack announced that he needed to go topside and decide on what was to be done with the crew of the Liberté. Will made to go after him, to talk, but a small strong hand gripped his upper arm and forced him to sit on a nearby stool.

“I’m going to check that wound to your head before I do anything else,” Spinoza stated, wiping his hands on what had to have been one of the only pieces of clean linen left on board, before adjusting his glasses.

“It’s really not that bad,” the smith said, making to stand up only to be pushed down again firmly. In truth, he had forgotten he’d even been struck, the past half hour having been what it was.

Spinoza tisked and leant in for a closer look. “I’ll be the judge of that, thank you very much. Besides, your talk with Jack can wait. He has things to do too.”

Will did not bother asking how the bizarre and inquisitive fellow had worked out such a thing and instead sat back patiently, deciding that Spinoza was right, as always.