The needle of the compass really didn't know where to put itself today.

Jack swore loudly, and snapped it closed.

He had a sudden mental image of the needle swinging to an abrupt stop in a beautifully definite direction, and eagerly he pulled it open again – only to swear even more violently and hurl it to the bottom of his boat.

"Why," he asked the clouds wearily, "does the rum always insist upon being gone?"

The clouds didn't answer him. They simply glided, fat and puffy in an achingly blue sky. The glare of the water was enough to knock a man out today, and Jack had a splitting headache. The pain drove hard and deep under the top of his skull, and he bunched his eyes up tight as he uttered a wild, half sob.

"Come on," he said desperately, lunging again for the compass. His fingers hesitated on the crease where the lid would lift, and he breathed in slowly. "I know what I want," he whispered. "I know what I want - "

The needle wouldn't be pointing anywhere. He saw it in his head as clear as day – circling hopelessly round and around in a circle, as wildly clueless as he was.

"Know what I want know what I want know what I want…"

But this time it would be different. This time he would flip it open and THERE his direction would be, his path clear, all confusion wiped away as easily as breath on a cold bottle of rum. A giddy smile was already splitting his face at the prospect, he laughed eagerly and it was lifting –

Uncertainty overwhelmed him. His fingers had just pulled up the lid by a fraction, but refused to go any further. Biting his lip and closing one eye, he lowered his head so as to peer through the smallest possible gap between the lid and the needle, so he didn't have to see it in full view, so the truth wouldn't hit quite so badly…

He couldn't see a blasted thing. Growling in irritation, Jack flipped it all the way up, then screamed. His throat hurt with it and his brain near cleaved in two with it, with the one strangled note of misery and rage. The bloody thing was BROKEN. Fecking BROKEN. CURSE the wench that gave him this infernal thing along with her lies and kisses, and curse whatever shrinking pathetic piece of himself that ever wanted it in the first place. Jack gripped it in both hands, widened his eyes with the pure futility of it all, half-wanting to smash the thing into a thousand pieces, the other half wanting to gaze upon that needle forever, waiting for it to tell him what he wanted, where to go, what to do.

Angrily, he released all of his fingers from their death grip, and the compass smacked back to the floor of the boat. One hand automatically groped for his rum bottle, and brought it up on one smooth arc to his mouth. A single amber drop fell from the rim, flavouring his tongue with it's sweet, barely-there taste, then was gone.

The rum was gone.

It was always gone. Just when life was going right, just as he had his freedom and he had his definite path in mind and he had his map and something to float in, hell, he had his own flag and everything. Then bugger it all, flash bang and there you are, stranded in the middle of the ocean with no rum. Like when he hadher alone on that island…

Jack paused, and raised an eyebrow. Getting a bit confused there, mate, he told himself severely. That island scene was years ago. Distant mem'ries.

But regardless. Either way. Life could be a cynical son of a whore at times, and it bloody loved taking your rum away. Jack sucked petulantly on the neck of his rum bottle. It tasted like rough, salted glass. She had tasted much sweeter. He had called her a pirate but she didn't kiss like one.

There – he had done it again. Distant memories. Breathing in deeply and massaging the top of his head, Jack slid slowly down, the greased skin of his bare back sliding down the splintery wood of his dingy. He continued to slide, rum bottle still clutched in one hand, and the compass somehow finding its way into the other, until he lay in an uncomfortably curled position in the bottom of his boat.

The sun shone, encompassing him in its blanketing, unrelenting heat. He closed his eyes, gazing at the angry red underside of his eyelids – the very view of the deepest circle of Hell. Although Jack was better educated as to what Hell was truly like these days.

The images swirled across his mind and he let them dance there, pretty and deceiving. Shadows of drunken nights in Tortuga, the glittering lights of Shipwreck Cove in the pale evening starlight, gazing into the yawning jaws of the Kraken and beyond that the slime coated darkness, the scream in his mouth rallying to break free just as –

Her face. Her face, set half in and out of shadow, hair teasing softly across once porcelain cheekbones. He had liked her when she was so perfect, with her smooth skin and untainted eyes, liked her more when she was vandalised by the rough edges of piracy. He'd first met her as a governor's daughter, and the longing had been there from the start. The longing to take her and run with her and let her feel freedom, to kiss the creamy skin of her throat, to hold a gun to her temple and let her feel the fear of death, make her realise that life was not to be wasted, not to be controlled by people who had no right…only to realise that she learnt this herself in the end. The moment her chapped lips had pressed against his, the deception hidden in her closed eyes and urgent press of her body, the moment she had whispered that she wasn't sorry but the sorrow was crying in her eyes…she learnt it all. Her face had stayed with him as the Kraken pulled him under.

Jack's eyes opened. When had he lost his path, he asked himself. When had his compass suddenly stopped working, when had his mind become fogged by these drunk thoughts when the rum supply had been dry for days? And since when had she been constantly within a hand's reach in his head all the time? When had he stopped caring about the fountain of youth?

The compass balanced upon his stomach, rising gently up and down with every breath, and once again Jack had a sudden swift mental image of the needle break into his head, pointing firmly in one direction to his deepest, innermost heart's desire and the path was achingly clear, leading him straight to her –

With a scream, Jack snatched it up and flung it overboard. It sailed through the air, twisting and whirling against the sharp blue sky, then hit the surface with an abrupt splash. The water swallowed it up without a second thought, and, paralysed by what he had just done, Jack stared at the ripples flowing steadily from the point of impact.

With a sickening cry of alarm, he grabbed desperately at an oar, keeping his eyes fixed on the point it had disappeared, cursing and snarling under his breath and tears starting wildly in his eyes – he couldn't lose it, he couldn't lose it for bloody hell's sake…

He thrust an arm overboard, plunging it into the sea and clutching with desperately flexing fingers on the deep, warm waters.

"Come back!" he muttered hoarsely, continuing to reach as far as he could, the warm waves lapping hungrily up his arm, and with a wild, choked sob, he withdrew. "COME BACK!" he screamed at the surface, his eyes wide and almost starting from their sockets, but the feeling was already within him, that sick, gloating feeling of well done, Jacky boy, now you'll never know, you'll never find her now, Jacky…

He drew a hand up to his face, and raked his stubs of fingernails down from the damp cloth around his forehead to his chin, leaving raised red marks that hurt dully in the glare of the water.

"Broken," he whispered. "Fecking thing was broken anyway."

The sentiment did nothing to prevent the tears sliding down his cheeks and evaporating in the merciless Caribbean sun.

0o0

Another story that's been hanging idly around my computer for a while that I thought I'd share with you guys...

That's if anyone reads it.

BYL xxx