Chapter Text
(Shark Week Maccus by t-annuki)
"Guess what day it isss! " Maccus's voice called through the heavy oaken door of the captain's cabin.
Davy Jones—four hundred and thirty-four years old, wearied by time, be-tentacled, and forever burdened by the malaise of his lost love—sat slumped in his chair behind his desk, a bottle clutched in his great crab claw. The ship was anchored, its sails long since wrapped up, swaying gently from an unseen tide.
Another fucking day.
His eyes did not rise from the scattered papers before him: expenses, employee logs, and tax forms. Modern ones. All for the strange new business enterprise of the Flying Dutchman in this strange new world. Coffee: the brewing and sale of it, to the people of the North American continent, in this, the twenty-first century.
Jones let out a low, snorting laugh. What petty trifles he had been reduced to.
The once-proud devil of the nine seas heaved himself upright, and the half-empty bottle clattered out of his claw to roll across the damp wood floors, spilling wine as it tumbled. He didn't move to clean it. It was another colorful addition to the many dark stains and sea life that graced his cabin.
He stepped slowly to the door, on the other side of which waited his trusted first mate and brother-in-arms for all of the last four centuries.
" 'T'isn't my birthday, again?" Jones grunted through the door. "As I said, I've no interest in dredging up however many years I've lingered on in this miserable, wretchedly-cursed state of—"
The door was kicked open from the other side, and Jones stumbled back, his beard flailing. Maccus and the other trusted mates, along with the sharp-toothed Morey, were standing out on the deck with unbridled excitement on their monstrous faces.
The green-tinged, triple-masted Dutch galleon with seaweed sails swayed in a modern harbor as the sounds of a great city rose in the distance with the early morning light. She had been there, for nearly two centuries since the winter of 1816, gathering barnacles (if not dust). There she had remained, through world wars, civil war, and skirmishes, after Jones decided with a great finality and resignation that her time sailing the seas had come to an end.
The Dutchman alone had persisted. As piracy fell, its brave proponents wiped clean from the map in the absence of any great rallying cry or leadership to its cause, the cursed ferryman and his cursed crew continued to wander the world. Decades passed. The goddess of the sea was still human, somewhere, and her lover a miserable monster.
The ship pulled up beside a quiet shore, dropped anchor, and waited. The Dutchman and her crew remained eternal, creatures trapped in a fishbowl, as the world changed around her. The coast was transformed from a sparsely populated, tree-lined waterfront to a concrete-paved city barreling on into a greater and even more incomprehensible future: Seattle, USA.
The now cannon-less ship, home to the curious monster crew whom all the city knew, swayed between a fishing boat and a midsize luxury yacht.
Jones squinted out against the glaring summer light, as the sounds of the city and its endless machinations blared out across the water. A few moments passed, with Jones staring at the crew in his wine-numbed state, until he realized that they were dressed in their rarely-donned, ill-fitting (but much beloved) modern street clothes.
Jones' blood ran cold.
"No," he uttered.
"It's your special dayyy! " Morey sing-songed. The yellow pools of her eyes flashed beneath the sheer fabric of a fashionable head scarf. Angler itched the front of an extra large t-shirt that read, Women Want Me, and Fish Also Want Me.
Jones turned hurriedly to retreat back into the dark safety of his cabin, but Maccus reached out and caught him by the back of his overcoat. Jones shot him a look of sheer violence over his shoulder, his beard writhing.
Such an act of insubordination during the height of Jones' reign would have been worth nine, maybe ten lashes at the bosun's hand. But the era of corporal punishment had long since passed. It wasn't proper workplace discipline, he'd been told by a stern labor inspector last June. How the world had changed for the worse.
"You've all become needless dissidents ever since you started your union," Jones spat.
Maccus crooked a palm around his ear—or where an ear would have been, if not for his hammerhead—and leaned in toward Jones. "What's that? Is that workplace intimidation I hear?"
Jones' face twisted into a scowl, but he said nothing as he allowed himself to be pulled out into the blinding light like a fish dragged up from the water. He swayed from the all-too-rich wine of this new era and suppressed a gargle in his throat, but the crew was too overwhelmed by the thrill of their day out to take notice.
"Can you believe it?" Hadras asked, the conch shell of his head swiveling in a high black turtleneck. "It'll be your fortieth day on land. That's like, more than a month."
"I spent many a day on land before all this," Jones spat. "Hardly worth the four hundred years bound to this creaking, old vessel."
"Don't be so hard on yourself," Maccus said, and he patted Jones' back. "Lot of people into older men these days."
The crew escorted Jones down the gangplank and onto the city docks. A couple local boatmen passed by, barely registering the crew's presence, having been accustomed to their strange neighbors for quite some time. Jones' crab leg thunked against the wood as they approached the threshold where the steps turned to concrete, and Jones felt a prickle on his skin. They had long since learned of the limitations of the captain's banishment from land: wood over water, walk 'n wobble. Sand or stone, stop cold.
Jones staggered along within the throng of his eager employees, having fully accepted his fate. This was happening, whether he willed it or not. They stopped just shy of the gum-speckled solid steps, and Maccus checked a plastic waterproof watch upon his wrist.
"Ten seconds to six."
For whatever reason, with the time change from the Caribbean and the ever so slight wobble of the planet over the centuries, the start of Jones' much-awaited day began precisely at six o'clock a.m.—and it would last until the following day at exactly that same time. Twenty-four hours to do anything—to go anywhere he pleased.
But lately, nothing pleased him.
Still, the crew tittered with anticipation.
"Five…"
Jones closed his eyes hard, slowing his breaths.
"Four…"
Morey's feet began an impromptu tap dance against the docks.
"Three…"
He became aware of a murmur coming from up on dry land, of people stopping on the street in curiosity.
"Two…"
Angler crouched down low like a footballer at the starting line.
"One!"
The crew surged forward, taking Jones with them, and with a shudder that felt like a glass sheet shattering before him, the captain stepped onto solid land.
His eyes were still closed as his crab leg scratched against the hard concrete. He opened one eye, his breath stopped. Slowly, he opened the other.
He was on land.
The crew went wild.
"Hell yeah! " Maccus cried. He gave Jones a colossal pound on the back, which sent the captain reeling up another two steps. He threw out his crab claw and caught onto the metal railing, and he heard it crunch beneath his grip. The sounds of camera phones clicked from up on the street, and Jones turned to look back at his crew.
"We'll not be staying out on the streets, will we?" he asked.
"Nah," Maccus said. "We've got a fun day planned for you."
The crew strode through the streets of Seattle, posing, hamming, and waving, an entourage of minor celebrities for a veritable celebrity himself, who was now withering from the unwanted attention. His octopus skin waxed between quickly-changing background colors as they passed storefronts and slowing cars, desperate to vanish. A red pickup truck sped past, and for a split second he turned the color of a fresh, bright beet.
When his speed began to flag, Morey looped her arm through his, the solid scythes of her claws locking onto his time-worn sleeve. She pulled him along with a pep in her step, like a child dragging a tired parent through a carnival. "Keep up, old man," she said. "We have the whole place reserved."
Jones glared at Morey, though he had grown ever permissive of the indignities she and Maccus inflicted on him. Them and the whole crew, truthfully. There was little dignity to be held onto. "And what is the place?" he asked.
Morey twisted her face, scrunching her eel yellow-green skin. "Do you remember when you let me join on?"
"I do."
"And how you helped me kill my wretched father?"
"I did."
"And you said, and I quote," Morey paused, and she affected the captain's irreplaceable dialect. "Ah'll endeavor to be the father you rightly deserved-ah."
Jones squinted. It was a decent imitation, but that was beside the point; he was ignorant of the full depth of what he had committed to. It had been said in a moment of embarrassing sentimentality, when the girl's hands were still red with her father's blood. Morey often described that day as "easily the best day" of her life.
Morey patted his arm. "A shit father leaves behind progeny in every colony. A good father takes his kids to the aquarium."
Jones didn't have the words to describe the whiplash of emotion that evoked. He reeled to a stop on the sidewalk.
"The aquarium? " he wheezed, and he bent double, coughing. Morey was still holding his arm, and she leaned over to peer at his face.
"You all right?"
The group halted and watched in growing concern as Jones lifted his claw to pound violently against his own chest—against the heart that wasn't there.
It was close enough, regardless. Back on the ship in its chest, tucked safely under his bed. It hadn't been there for centuries, and it was only newly arrived, after he'd sent Maccus on a cross-continent flight to go fetch it. He had plans for it—final plans—none of which he'd disclosed to his crew.
But it was close enough now to evoke all the terrible, fleeting joys and unending miseries that life brought.
"You okay?" Angler asked. His bright lure bobbled as he gently shook the captain's shoulder.
Jones righted himself, his breathing ragged. "What kind of ill-conceived effort is this, bringing us—all of us—to a place as dismal and tiresome as a prison for fish."
The crew wavered before him. Jones glared between each of them, and their eyes began to quiver. Like children watching their favorite balloon being popped, all the happiness and excitement for the day drowning beneath the tide of Jones' melancholy. Morey's hand trembled on his arm.
And, thanks to his nearby heart, he felt a pang of regret. Oh, the terrible consequences.
"Fine," he sighed. He removed his hat to readjust the now moist bandana on his head. "But I cannot keep walking in this state."
"Right, let's call the captain a car," Maccus said. He whipped out his phone, and Jones eyed him in silent suspicion.
——
The car was a strange electric model that Jones hadn't seen ten years prior during his last day on land nor from the limited vantage point of the Dutchman. When it arrived, he grappled uselessly at the door handle, which somehow seemed to be flattened and flush with the rest of the metal. After a moment, it popped out.
"Devilry," he muttered, and he clambered inside.
The driver was a young man no older than 30 wearing a white polo shirt and a too-large silver wristwatch. The smell of cologne was heavy in the air, and the breathing holes at the sides of Jones' face puckered in distaste. The man spotted Jones in the rear view mirror and did a disbelieving double take.
"Oh shit! " He swiveled around in his seat with a huge grin. "Welcome to dry land, captain! God, what are the chances—hang on, do you want, uh, water or snacks—?"
"Drive," Jones commanded. The man's mouth clamped shut.
The vehicle was eerily quiet as it moved through the early morning traffic—like a sea-borne predator tasting the water for its next prey.
"You know," the driver began, and Jones had to keep his eyes from rolling back up into his skull. Here we go.
"My buddies and I were talking about your ship the other day."
"Hm," Jones said.
The driver shifted in his seat, a scant two fingers toying with the wheel. Jones watched the incomprehensible electronics flash and change on the dashboard before the man. Little outlines of pedestrians appeared on the screen.
"We're actually part of this startup that's trying to crack immortality."
Ah. There it was.
The man chuckled. "It's crazy ambitious, sure, but we're looking at extending the human lifespan as our first big step." His eyes met Jones' through the mirror again. "Total coincidence, but, we've been poking around for investors and thinking of people who might vouch for that sort of thing."
"Why on earth would you have any desire to live as long as I have?"
The car fell silent, save for unending chimes and beeps coming from the dashboard. The man looked away, the enthusiasm of his proposal momentarily lost, and Jones directed his attention out the window. He made unwitting eye contact with an elderly woman on the street who gasped and clutched her purse to her chest.
The driver finally cleared his throat to speak again—these types were never discouraged for long.
"I mean, isn't it freeing to have so much time to yourself, to do whatever you want?" the man asked.
Freeing. Jones' skin turned hot—he could feel his heart pounding all those blocks away.
"You could go anywhere, pick up whatever skills you want, and become the most educated man in the world," the man said. "You'd literally know so much that you could be the authority on anything. You could have fifteen PhDs, write novels, and discover the next life-saving medicine of tomorrow." The man suddenly laughed. "You'd be the most interesting guy on the planet. Beloved by all."
Jones began to shake. Interesting. Loved. His claw rattled against the seat like a barnacle-covered maraca.
"And you'd be rich."
The man spoke with the air of someone who had just been begged to give his own inspirational speech; so enraptured he was by his own ideas, that he did not register the utter revulsion in Jones' tone.
"It means nothing."
"Buddy, it's everything."
Buddy. Oh, that was too far. The man couldn't see Jones' claw inching its way toward the back of his neck.
"You could invent things to make everyone's lives easier," the man went on, chuckling at his own genius—which caused his pink, fleshy neck to quiver. Jones' eyes locked onto it, his whole beard wiggling. "You'd be the next Da Vinci. Ben Franklin. Elon Musk."
So fragile. So…chokeable.
"You could be canonized a saint before you even die. You'd solve all the world's problems, and that world would be yours."
Jones' claw clicked open. Do it, the voice in his head hissed—an achingly familiar voice. Or are you not the man you once were?
"I am," he whispered aloud. The driver flinched, turning his head ever so slightly in his seat.
But a second later, Jones was saved from the moral and legal nightmare of killing a man in the 21st century.
The man let out a cry and slammed on the brakes moments before the car itself reacted. A flash of a pedestrian outline was visible for a split second on the dashboard before vanishing—and the car hit something solid.
"Oh shit, oh shit, oh SHIT."
The driver barreled out of the car in a panic. Jones threw the side door open, denting the interior with his claw, and he stood and surveyed the scene around them, shading his eyes against the sun. A crowd of onlookers was already beginning to gather in the busy intersection at the sight of the sudden accident. The driver was on his phone pacing and hissing furiously into the line.
Jones did a double take at the group directly in front of the car and rounded the vehicle, his eyes wide.
"Maccus! "
The first mate looked up from chewing his nails—Jones noticed for the first time that the text on his hoodie read Every Week is Shark Week—and he gave a nod to the captain. "Oh, hey captain. You got here fast. Penrod's hit."
Jones hurried up to his shockingly nonchalant crew members and examined the trusted mate who was groaning on the ground. The four-foot tall hunched lobster of a man, with his antenna sticking out at odd angles, looked back up at the captain and coughed.
"I'm fine," he said. "Happens all the time."
"This happens all the time?" Jones asked, and he swept his arm out to encompass the whole scene. Penrod rose shakily to his little feet, and Morey brushed off his shoulders with the end of her scarf. He seemed, excepting his antenna, unhurt.
"I mean, yeah," Maccus said. "Never can be sure if they're aiming for us, but it does happen quite a lot. We've all been shot once or twice—and hey, that's pretty cut and dry." He chuckled and gave a shrug. "When they start shouting out demons and sodomites, you're fairly certain of the cause."
"Adds a bit of dramatic tension to late night beer runs," Angler added.
The crew let out low chuckles. None of this Jones had known. He looked between the faces of his trusted mates, who seemed absolutely unbothered by the modern violence aimed their way.
Had they all been faced with this every time they went ashore? Why had they kept this to themselves—was it pride? Humiliation? Or was it now truly that mundane of an occurrence?
How had he missed the ship's doctor picking bullets from his crew?
And—his wine-filled stomach churned at this last thought—had he been spared, in some bitter way, the hardships of their particular, liminal lives?
He placed a hand on Penrod's back and directed him away from the car, shooting a glance back at the driver. The man was still whispering into his phone in a fit of righteous denial.
Jones circled back toward the man and stopped in front of him to stare down with a cold, frost bitten gaze. The man slowly lowered his phone and returned the look with a defiant ultimatum.
"Legal says I'm not at fault," the man said. "So, if you have your people call my people, then we can all just move on and—"
"You fear death," Jones said flatly.
His crew behind him let out long, savoring Ooohs—the captain was coming back in form. "Get wrecked," Angler muttered.
The man's confidence faltered, as he suddenly seemed to remember whom, of all people, he was speaking to.
"You are a weak, pathetic man who cannot cope with the prospect of his own irrelevance," Jones went on. He brought up his claw to jab—measuredly—into the center of the man's chest, and the man stumbled back with wide eyes. "You lack the will to achieve anything in your own time, and so you have dreamt up an unachievable goal to so free yourself from the obligation of doing."
Penrod and Angler were transfixed like children watching a parent dish discipline to the neighbor's kid—Morey and Maccus had dropped into low squats, waiting like dogs for the butcher to drop the juiciest cut of meat. The man's lip trembled. The onlookers stared.
"You do not truly want this life," Jone said, his voice becoming gravelly. "You would wither under the weight of it. The unending days stretched out like fraying fibers until everything begins to tear. You would feel it breaking you, in every moment, in every breath."
The contempt and fervor had left his voice, replaced by something distinctly less daunting: quiet vulnerability. The crew cast sideways glances at each other.
Jones stared beyond the man at the now distant sea. "Permanence. Irrelevance. It is all the same." His last sentence came as a whisper. "You would wish only for an escape."
He turned and left the man, walking silently past his crew toward the towering aquarium doors. The crew exchanged concerned glances before turning to trot after him: Maccus gave the car a good farewell kick.
The crew followed behind him without a word as Jones pushed open the heavy doors to enter the cool, blue-tinged interior of the aquarium. He hadn't been keen on the idea for the outing to begin with, but as the calm ambient music and dim sea-speckled lighting washed over him, he took a long, deep breath.
Just one more day.
His shoulders slumped down beneath his coat, and he felt a warm wine-glow tingling through his chest.
Oh. A very warm glow. Perhaps he'd had too much.
He shrugged off his coat and deposited it by the door in a heap, both too overheated and too rattled by the already precarious events of the morning to care. The crew were giving him a wide berth after his strange outburst, and they began poring excitedly over the facility map. Jones neared Maccus with a sniff.
"Do you have any...ah..." the captain began quietly.
Maccus reached into his little rucksack and drew out a bottle of water and a little tin of mints. He pressed both into Jones' hand and gave him a long knowing look. "Take it easy, captain," he murmured.
The crew broke off into pairs—Maccus with Morey, Angler with Penrod, Hadras with Koleniko—all scattering toward their top priority destinations. Jones suddenly found himself left with the silent and near-always overlooked Ratlin.
The wooden man, warped into a 6-foot assemblage of mast, splinters, and iron holds, adjusted the long line of rope that wound around his midsection like a belt. He had lost the ability to speak at least two centuries prior—or maybe he could still speak but decided he was over it—and if the latter case, Jones oddly respected him a whole lot more.
He met Jones' gaze with a singular woodpecker-sized hole in the center of what was once his face, and he nodded ahead of them to say, Shall we?
The two men walked slowly through the cool blue halls. Jones was grateful for Ratlin's careful, creaking pace—and he began to slow before the exhibits here and there, allowing himself to pause. He hadn't intended to do so, but it seemed a waste not to.
"It's quite different seeing them all in here," Jones remarked with a wave at the glass. "In this, ah, fish prison."
He was also grateful for Raltin's silence.
"I think," Jones suppressed a bubble in his throat, " 'tis the light and proximity. They take on new colors, it seems."
Ratlin nodded slowly, his head crackling.
"They must be glad not to be eaten."
"Cap'n cap'n cap'n! "
Morey had rounded a corner to find them, her boots skidding through the near-empty hall. She was pointing behind her toward a dark exhibit in uncontainable glee.
"Look! "
Jones strode off toward the source of Morey's joy to find the crew gathered around purple-lit glass, chuckling in excitement.
"Oh, he's gonna kill that other one," Angler said giddily.
Two octopi were in the midst of a violent, tentacle-shredding duel to the death. All the fish in the tank had retreated to one corner, hovering and staring out the glass like traumatized children as the octopi rolled and writhed through the sand, attempting to set their razor sharp beaks on the other. Bits of flesh peppered the water, and the tumult of sand was turning the tank murky as their many-suckered tentacles beat against each other like hydras.
"God, it's just like how old Shirley used to do it," Morey said.
Jones frowned. "Shirley?"
"Oh, um," Morey cleared her throat. "The Kraken."
Jones' mouth twitched. The crew's eyes were still fixed on the glass, but a palpable discomfort rippled through them.
Where had the old girl gone? It had been, what, three hundred years since they last called upon her? What had she done since then? Was she hiding in a trench somewhere, a slumbering beast waiting for the dawn of a once more hospitable world?
Had she eaten anything?
"Are they meant to be in there together?" Penrod asked an aquarium worker who happened to be strolling by. The employees had given the crew and its captain a great deal of personal space, considering the substantial sum they'd been paid to open this early for a private visit, but now the woman stopped to draw near the tank. She stared for a moment before her eyes snapped wide.
"Oh my God. No, they're not."
She fumbled with a radio clipped onto her belt and let out a haggard groan of frustration. "They're both males, so they were in separate tanks—he must have climbed out and crawled across the room— Christ, of all the days to pull a stunt like this…"
She turned and began calling out for help into her radio. The crew turned their attention back to the tank, their giddy bloodlust fading. The spectacle was no longer quite as exciting knowing the stress now unraveling for the kind members on staff. Maccus frowned at the still-tumbling combatants.
Jones, however, drew his head close to the glass to squint in at the octopi. With a surge of careless disregard and wine-bestowed confidence, the captain—against aquarium policy—brought a knuckle up to rap on the glass.
The woman looked up. "Oh, please don't do that—"
One octopus spotted Jones before the other one did, and it froze. Its beak was inches from the other's head, and a single eye swiveled around in what could have only been cephalopodian horror to fix upon the man outside the glass.
"What the..." Maccus breathed.
In a flash, the second octopus withdrew itself from the tangle and turned to face Jones with its tentacles a-quiver. Its skin flashed in rapid sequence through every known color of the visible light spectrum: in fear? Or apology?
The woman lowered the radio from her lips.
Jones held the two octopi's gazes with a stern, disciplining look. With a tight-lipped frown, he shook his head in disapproval.
"Bad," he said.
The intruder octopus fluttered back against the wall of the tank, shrinking itself as small as possible. With all the expressiveness of an errant child, it began a sheepish retreat up out of the tank. The resident octopus fled into its little stone cave and curled its arms around its head in shame.
Jones straightened back up and cleared his throat. Every jaw in the room hung open in shock.
"Didn't think that would work," he muttered.
He turned and wandered out of the hall to leave the bewildered crew and employee behind, stumbling slightly on his bad leg.
——
Maccus found Jones seated on the floor before the open ocean exhibit. The massive two story, full-wall tank bathed the whole dark room in an ethereal blue glow, the light filtering in through the surface upon slow-moving schools of fish. Several peaceful sharks circled at the bottom by the sand as manta rays danced in somersaults through the water. Jones' still face was dappled with the color of the sea.
Maccus neared the captain and sat down heavily beside him with a loud sigh, announcing his presence. It was moments after the 9am opening chime for the general public—Jones had been sitting there for over an hour, transfixed by the artificial ocean.
"Do you remember the first time we dove?" Jones suddenly asked.
Maccus startled at the captain's question, but soon his face stretched into a smile. "Yup. Had no idea it was going to happen either, but the Dutchman—whoo, she had plans." He let out a low laugh. "I remember being afraid of dying. That was probably the last time I ever truly feared it. Then pop," he flicked his fingers at his own neck, "gills galore. Oh, and that first breath of water, too. It was like…like being born again."
Jones let out an amused huff at the memory. "It was. Truth be told, the current was so strong, I was afraid of losing my hold and being carried away, lost to the deep forever."
"Hah! We would've found you and picked you up again like old Bootstrap," Maccus said with a grin. "You wouldn't have gotten out that easy."
No. It wouldn't be that easy.
Maccus stared back up at the little pocket of ocean behind the glass. "God, the feel of it…" He shook his head. "Going under. Fathoms below. Into the dark where no one can find you. Nothing compares."
"The feel of the weight of the sea crushing down upon you—" Jones stopped. He looked down at his misshapen hand lying in his lap. "It was something."
Maccus leaned back on his hands and gazed up at a sea turtle swimming lazily by the glass. "I miss it too," Maccus said quietly. "You wouldn't think it'd be something to miss, but…it was like a hug, you know? From all sides."
A second passed, and then Jones let out a snorting laugh. He bent over, shaking his head, and a tentacle snaked up to dab the corners of his eyes. Maccus shot him a sideways smile.
"You know," Jones began, his tone changed, "I'd meant to say something to the sentiment of, better to have a temporary, physical crushing sensation to grapple with than this…unending one. But a hug? Utterly enlightening."
Maccus stared at the captain, his brows suddenly furrowed in concern. "Jones…?" he began. The sounds of the oncoming early morning crowds drifted in from the side halls as he met the captain's even gaze. "Why did you…why'd you send me to fetch your heart?"
"Look, it's a walking SHARK!"
Maccus looked up and saw a swarm of schoolkids descending upon the exhibit—and unfortunately, the exhibit was him. He stood and was immediately drowned under a wave of grubby-handed kindergartners: poking and pulling, squealing in unrestrained delight. Jones stood and nodded to Maccus who fixed him with pleading, desperate eyes.
"Captain…"
"We'll meet you at the next event. Be well."
Jones strode off to find the others as Maccus sank to his knees. The children scrambled up his back like cackling hyenas taking down a buffalo as his face vanished from view.
——
Jones returned to his cabin mere minutes before 6am, like a sleepwalking corpse ready to fall. The day's events were a frightening blur—he barely had the strength to remove his hat, the thing tumbling off onto his desk as he walked past, just a few steps more, a few steps—
He pitched face first onto his bed. Well, he was glad that at least his upper half had made it.
He slithered up the rest of the way, grunting, and attempted to shake his one boot off, but he failed and accepted that he would be sleeping in most of his clothes that day. His body ached from the once-in-a-decade exertion, every muscle in his old legs on fire.
His mind swam with vivid scenes before he even closed his eyes. Morey at the arcade machines. Angler riding a mechanical bull. Maccus arm wrestling every cocky trucker at the rest stop fifty miles outside of the city that they had somehow, inexplicably ended up at.
It had been wild. And he knew how much care they put into this day every time it came around.
And yet every ten years, the world became more and more unrecognizable to him. The change was accelerating, with stranger sentiments, sights, and people emerging each time he stepped on shore. Hostile people. Curious people. Somehow, he found himself unsure of which he rightly preferred. For he remained, fixed in time, a relic to be gawked at over a cup of coffee on his own once-terrifying ship, now reduced to a seaweed-stinking tourist trap.
He closed his eyes. The Dutchman rocked gently like a mother coaxing him to sleep. He murmured an apology to her, half-delirious, and patted his hand against the headboard before it slid down, limp with sleep. The last thing he felt before his dreams took him was the steady beat of his own heart, locked in the chest under his bed.
——
——