simplestgift | Twenty-one Bells: [ACTION/VOICE]

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Twenty-one Bells: [ACTION/VOICE]

[Archie has barely been around town lately, but he does appear in town this afternoon, dashing about to various shops and stores and picking up various one-use items and lots and lots of groceries. He seems to have one thing on his mind.

Later, he'll sit at the fountain and send out the voice message:]

This is Mr. Kennedy. If anyone is in need of me, I shall be at the beach house for most of the week. You can reach me there or on the journals.

Moreover, Mr. Hornblower and I are wondering if anyone would be interested in helping to build a ship. A sloop-of-war, to be specific, with room and ports enough for eighteen or twenty-two guns. I cannot claim we have a practical use for itm besides exploration, but it would be something to do. We have the plans drawn up, and all we need is enough hands to make it possible. We would be grateful for any help at all.

[After this, he'll be walking back to the beach house, where he's been babysitting Jack Sparrow since yesterday.]

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"None whatsoever." Fake smile carefully in place. "What would you have done in my place, Kennedy, hmm? Curious about that."

"In your place, I would not have over-reacted."

"Mmhmm. To my mind, it was an opportune moment, not an overreaction. What do you think of Angel, eh? Curious, me."

"He helped me get home after the draft and has at least a decent sense of humor. Other than that, I do not know him."

"....Sense of humor? Are we speaking of the same fellow? Because thus far, the only thing I have heard out of him are threats and long, boring speeches about himself."

"And that merits a murder, does it?"

"First off, it's not a murder. Vampires. Already dead. You cannot murder them. Secondses, that's not at all why I want him to be deader. I already explained it to you, Kennedy. He did somethin' to her that night--what, I do not know. Made her all different and spun. She wouldn't come near me afterward. He's a threat.

And here's a question, eh? Here's a question for you, Kennedy. What does Buffy think of Angel? What does he think of himself? I'll tell you what they both of them told me: that he's good. Good and a Champion and better than the rest. So what if this tiny shaver of a slayer followed him about? She tries to stake him, keeps him on his toes. Why on earth would her blood be on the hands of this good and holy and sainted champion, eh?"

"Something he said brought back a bad memory, Jack. It can happen whether he means it or no. I had bad dreams after something you did without even knowing you did it, and I'm not sending assassins after you. You can't tell me this has never happened to you."

"He did. Something. To her. Just because she don't own up to it does not mean it's not true. Don't you think I know her, Kennedy?!

...You had bad dreams about something I did, eh?"

He should have known not to mention that. "I know the difference between a fresh wound and an old one reopened, Jack. She wasn't lying when she said he didn't do anything. I know what those lies look like."

"And I taught her how to lie better. And I know when she's lying to me."

"She didn't tell everything, but he did not do anything. If he did, she would be more upset about it than she is. Good God, Jack, you won't believe anything but what you'd like to believe, will you? All it takes is a word for her to act the way she did that night."

The pirate stares at Kennedy for a long, considering moment. He knows what he saw, heard, and felt the night of the spar. He knows how she reacted afterward---very much like after the fight with Derek.

"You remember when she fought Derek? Did you see her after that fight, Kennedy?"

He shook his head. "No."

"I saw her three days after that fight with Derek. It nearly ruined her--was like tending a wounded wild animal to be with her. I took her home after her spar--" he spat the word--"with Angel. It was the same broken woman. The very same. Said he'd shoved her against the wall and pulled his 'Angelus' whatever-it-is on her. Said he'd tried to teach her a lesson. Said she didn't know there were lines to be drawn." Jack shrugged. "That's not very nice, is it? What if Dawn had been treated such? Would you be so sanguine about her, hmm?"

Now he was almost inviting a punch in the face.

No. He wasn't. Archie watched him through narrow eyes, trying to figure him out. Between this and the Grell situation, the inconsistency was glaring. He spoke softly.

"This isn't about you trying to be a good man, Captain Jack. You're protecting what's yours. Claiming what's yours. You wouldn't give a damn if it were Dawn or anyone else but Buffy. Grell came after me with a knife and nearly cut you in half and you were the first to tell us all to forget it happened. Angel gave Buffy a nightmare and you're crying for his blood, wrong or right, against her wishes. You cannot pretend this is out of some sense of justice."

"Listen to yourself! 'Crying for his blood'? Bloody hell, Kennedy! I've never pretended to be a just man. I'm dishonest through and through. Pirate. I told a slayer-girl he was a vampire. Hardly the same level of blood-crying, that. She'd find out soon enough anyway. And my question, you recall, was whether you'd give a damn if it were Dawn. And I suppose I have my answer, eh?"

He had paled at the mention of Grell, though.

"And if you think I've forgotten what happened with Grell...if you think I liked that plan...you have a great deal to learn, whelp."

"This isn't about me and Dawn, Jack, and I still would not innocently send an assassin after him.

If you didn't like the plan, then why did you support it? Fear?"

"Supported it because there was no better plan, and none promising for the future.

Going home, now, Kennedy."

And with that, he began to limp south. The mention of Grell was harsh enough, but Jack was not in the mood for another lecture and was not keen on possibly being caught out here in this condition by the death goddess.

Archie broke away and went back to buying groceries for the bloody grateful pirate, too angry to really continue anyway. It was the first time he'd confronted the pirate with his misdirected anger over the Grell situation. As he shopped and calmed down, he started to finally realize the anger was misdirected.

...Do I do that, often?

Like how he'd gotten mad at Horatio, but not Simpson. And that had been far, far worse.

By the time he returned to the Cullen House, he was calm, loaded with groceries, and holding a paper bag with some form of booze in it.

As for Jack, he'd gotten back with barely enough energy to draw a bath. Water had to be lugged from the cistern. He set out Buffy's favorite shampoo...she'd forgotten that, somehow. When he finally climbed into the bath, a bottle of rum dangling from his fingertips, he began, for the millionth time, to wonder where he'd gone so horribly wrong with his Annie.

While Jack was vanished, Archie went about making a decent meal. Sayo had taught him quite a bit, and after getting a fire started in the stove, he cooked two whole trout, just as she taught him. To go with it were potatoes and rutabagas, boiled and mashed together, broken lettuce with beef and cheese (salmagundy to the 18th-century people, or a salad to someone more modern), and the finest brandy he'd been able to find. He might even make chocolate, if Jack even liked anything to drink besides rum.

Eventually, Jack made his way out of the bathroom. Clean, now, with fresh bandages. Plain black sweatpants. Plain black tee shirt--the General's gold locket stood out rather brilliantly against the material. Bare feet. His wet hair, the pirate decided, smelled like Buffy. Every so often he would lift a lock to his nose and breathe deeply of her.

"You cooked," he remarked when he made it into the kitchen.

"I did." Archie was placing everything on platters. "I said I'd look after you, and I shall."

But he didn't need to be this extravagant with it. No, that was special.

"Looks...salmagundi, Kennedy?" Is that some eagerness in his eyes? Jack can't quite believe this spread. He manages to pull up a crate at the home-made dining table---there are still no proper chairs---and collapse onto it in wonder.

And then he thought of how Buffy had made him curry.

"Archie? If she takes me back? I'll be lucky. So very lucky."

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