Fic: Sail to the Stars (original) (raw)

Title: Sail to the stars

Fandoms: Pirates of the Caribbean, Horatio Hornblower, Star Wars, Firefly, Star Trek 2009

Characters: Jack Sparrow, Horatio Hornblower, Han Solo, Mal Reynolds, Jim Kirk

Rating: PG13 to R. Ish. IDK, Jim likes to drop F bombs.

Summary: Character sketches and studies really. Five guys, five ships. You do the math.

The Black Pearl

Jack lost her once, he won't lose her again. The Pearl's his ship, she's Jack himself and standing out here at the helm, under a starlit sky, he decides he didn't sell his soul to Jones, he's only sharing it with her instead. He likes it better than the whole truth he didn't tell his crew, he definitely likes it better than facing the truth himself, but even more that that, he likes, he loves her song.

The Captain shuts his eyes tight, listening, learning the Pearl's song again, the way her boards creek as she courses through the water, blowing wind through his hair, bathing him in the ocean's mist, telling him just how she's been, how glad she is to have him back.

She talks to Jack, says things he's sure she never told Barbossa, that Barbossa never listened to and wouldn't again if he'd ever had the chance. He's known her since the day Jones raised her, longed to know her longer still, but their stories are just beginning, their adventure is out there, lurking just behind another day and waiting for the seizing, with the glory, and the wenches and fine dark rum rolling down his throat along with it.

Jack wants to share them all with her, the way he never got much chance before. Aside some contracts being contracts, he can find a way around them if he puts his mind to it and outsmarts Jones or find another way to stick with her no matter. He's Captain Jack Sparrow, and now he has his ship again, he's going to be invincible, inconquerable, indomitable and lots of other ins as well, when he remembers what they are.

The Pearl made him what he is and now's his turn to have a go with repaying the favor, starting with what's just behind the moon and heading into morning. Together, finally, at last, it's going to be the most amazing ride, the most perfect life every fiber of his being needs, screams out for. His pirate's heart and pirate's eyes fly open as he and the Pearl go on to chase their new horizons.

A pirate's life for him, he thinks, laughing as the spray hits his face again reminding Jack that he's exactly where he needs to be.

Hotspur

Choosing favourite ships, quite simply, is not done. Hornblower will hold his newest post for only so long as the orders tell him, then he will move on again to take another, enlist all of her crew, and carry out his posting, then move on again. In the King's Navy, all such sentiments are foolish at the least, and at their worst, interfere with the captain's duty, so he will not indulge in idle fancies of the sort, or he will not admit it at the least, even when his officers press him and they wonder.

Hornblower will never say it, not even to Bush himself, though they are...friends he supposes, for all that Bush is his lieutenant first and he must stay that way, and not to Brown, though his steward anticipates and reads him in a way too close for his own comfort, certainly, he will never tell Maria, though in those rare moments when he feels his weakest, in those nights when dreamless sleeping will not come, he looks upon his ships in his mind's eye and settles on the Hotspur as the ship that he would choose if he were pressed.

It is for when she came to him, he tells himself, and nothing more. How Hotspur saved him from floundering in the Long Rooms forever, and how her commission came to return him to sea, established him officially as commander and made him quite the man he is. He can be grateful to her most of all, he decides, though of course, the ship herself had no bearing on the change and Napoleon himself, with his grand schemes, as well as his skills own skill at whist had caused the change and it is all conjecture at his best and a conjecture Hornblower can ill afford at this, or any point in time. Still, Hotspur saved him, he decides, and though he cannot, will not let himself feel emotion in a place where it stands unneeded, he is grateful, he well knows and finds he'll say those words in place of love.

A good ship needs at least so much.

The Millennium Falcon

She's not a fancy girl and Han isn't a really fancy guy. There's more than fancy that he needs to think about, like living past another checkpoint, getting rid of the current goods and escaping the bounty stuck on both their heads. They understand each other, so they get along. Han and his ship just fit each other like a pair of well worn gloves, the same way he and Chewie go together even. Destiny or something, Luke would call it, and though Han's not one to go off trusting fate, or anything that he can't see, he thinks maybe the kid might have a point, but he won't say it to his face.

Han likes it better when he thinks of things he knows, hard and true facts he can't deny, that he can look at and feel safe. When it comes down to proven facts, he thinks about the Falcon sometimes, how he cheated at that hand of cards to woo her away from his pal. He's good at stealing Lando's girls, she's got to be at least the third he's tried and well, third times a chance.

"She'll make an honest man of you." Lando told him that first time, right before they sped away and Han just laughed. He's still laughing at that. If he'd wanted to be an honest man, he'd be all dressed in grey right now, hobnobbing with Lord Vader and his high and mighties, not trapped here on some iceberg hoping to steal kisses from the princess of nothing anymore. The Falcon doesn't mind it if he's not, she knows the way he got her, had to have her and finally came up with a way.

She just takes him for how he is, exactly what he's worth, and she still thinks he's special, likes him, understands him since they're just the same. She's maybe not so much to look at, but she's fast enough, hard edged enough, everything else he could think of enough to make her Han's best girl.

No matter what she might be thinking, no matter what way she looks at him, and then denies it, fire sparking in her eyes as she silently dares him to kiss her, to just forget the woman his heart's taken by, Han knows the princess doesn't stand a chance. He gets the idea that Falcon approves.

Serenity

Ship means a whole lot'a things to different people an' it means a whole lot more when you ain't got that much means a lot to start out with. Ain't nothin' been Mal's home a real long time now, nothin' he can count on lastin' past much Alliance gǒushí, or barrin' that, against nature an all her laws. No use denyin' death, destruction, all the rest. No use outrunnin' either, when she comes for you, that's it and all the fight a man puts in don't mean a thing. You get your number called up and that's it.

He learned it young, Mal knows, and damn if he didn't have to come accept it, but knowin' and acceptin' somethin's not the same as likin' it and there's one thing Mal doesn't like, it's standin' down in any fight, no matter what odds stand against you. He didn't do it then in that valley, and he and the crew ain't gonna be doin' it now with everythin' against them but their ship.

He named his girl for that valley that both seems long ago an like it just were yesterday. Thought he was bein' cute an' clever, while stickin' it to them all. Named his girl for those browncoats, all his men, those others died that day, got a real thrill outta her name, but he didn't know yet what she meant.

These days, Serenity's a stronger thing, Mal knows, links it to times between their jobs, Jayne polishin' his Vera at the table over protein blocks, though he's damn told the man a million times he ain't ta do it there, all River's creepifyin' thoughts turnin' ta somethin' normal like when she looks up from her controls, an' the doc's face ain't quite so pinched, his arm round Little Kaylee and not carin' one bit the looks he's gettin' for it. Learned what she meant through Hell, through worse an' comin' back again lickin' her wounds but stronger for em all, cause she survived.

Ship ain't just freedom, an' she ain't just peace, she ain't just somethin' that a man goes runnin' off with cause he hasn't got much else ta do. Serenity, she's all a' that, she's all a' them and all a' somethin' more. Mal figures out exactly what, he'll let ya know, but he's not big on metaphors or all a' that. It's better just ta let her be an' love her hard, lettin' the rest fall inta place. Mal's pretty sure with her they will.

Enterprise

Jim knows his shit, he really does. He even knows enough to know he doesn't know it all, and roughly half of what he does, he's figured out by fucking up. It's maybe not the best way he can manage it, but there's not a whole lot of options left but plunging in, full speed ahead and hoping, praying even, that he'll manage not to fuck this up.

Only he's not that hopeful sometimes, most times if he's being honest, when he sees the stack of work he can't let himself foist on Spock, because the guy's already doing his own job and adding part of Jim's there too. It gets hard when he's on the bridge pretending he's got some idea what the hell all the buttons do. He's had the classes yeah, most of them, probably he could explain the way they work on paper, but actually staring at the controls? Okay, she freaks him out, his Enterprise, and she sure freaks him out a lot.

It's not the way she's so much bigger than any other ride he's ever had. He'd be tied in some straightjacket and drooling somewhere, Jim's pretty damn sure, if he ever compared the two out loud, hell even in his head, so don't get him all wrong, he doesn't mean it like that even. It's not the way she's powerful, amazing, hell she's damned near majestic, that one gets him all freaked out somehow, he'd call that one respect. Enterprise is a classy chick, better than all the girls he's fucked and maybe she's too good for him, for anybody, but she's let him in, seemed to like him even when, technically, he shouldn't even have been there. She's put out for him once, she'll put out even more, and damn, he hopes she loves him half as much as he loves her.

What's scary is she trusts him, even though she's only got one reason to. Jim got her out of trouble once, he'll keep on doing it again, but how much of that trouble will be something that he got her in? What's scary is he can't betray her, won't betray her, ever, and he's terrified he fucking will, somehow, no matter what and late at night, in his office, the weight of it is crushing, just as much as it's plain wonderful.

Jim tells a lot of girls he loves them, goes away, then never calls. He never got what the word meant till he met his.