the Dalaverse

I was watching The Trailer again and felt compelled to write out the "Will you marry me?" scene. No spoilers otherwise, very short. Just what Dala wants for her graduation present. Title from the Weepies. I should've been finishing my remix story, but this bit me.



World Spins Madly On



The world is spinning madly on a thread and Will is asking her a question.

“What?” she splutters, rain and seawater splashing into her face, her eyes, down her throat. She thinks she’ll never be dry again.

He asks again, his face hard and alight like she’s never seen it before – certainly not like the first time he said it, when he was shy and shuffling his feet. Now he’s clinging to a line that may snap at any moment, sword in hand, trying to keep his footing on the surf-washed deck.

“Will you marry me?”

For a moment she thinks to call him an idiot and remind him that she’s already said yes, but she knows as well as he that that answer has lost its value, and part of her appreciates his asking again. Just – not now, for God’s sake, with the sail and cannon of a hundred enemies bearing down upon them and the sea doing its very best to reclaim the Black Pearl and her captain

“I don’t think now’s the best time,” she says, loud enough to be heard over the roar of the battle and the storm, Jack’s hoarse voice shouting orders, Barbossa’s maniacal laughter, Tia Dalma’s chanting, her own heart beating too fast with exhilaration and fear. Will is near enough to catch it and then nearer still, as he reaches with his right arm to pull her away from the path of a whistling cannon shot. His sword presses flat against her back and she has to be still or risk slicing the backs of her arms. She can remember a time when he touched her delicately, with decorum, and before that when he could scarcely look upon her without fearing doing harm. Now the heat in his eyes, radiating off his soaked body to burn away the chill of the rain, makes her catch her breath.

“We may not have any more time,” he gasps, the moment of panic leaving him short of breath. He shakes his head, sending water droplets flying. “Elizabeth, I mean – I don’t care about a wedding, if you don’t want to take my name – I know we cannot go back now. I know everything’s changed.” His thumb moves at the small of her back, and she can feel it through her leather coat. “But I must know where your heart lies.”

He doesn’t seem to realize that he is repeating Norrington’s words from a lifetime ago. There is no accusation in his eyes, no resentment; only a quiet, fierce need – not just for Elizabeth, but for her honesty.

He is not the boy she agreed to bind herself to, and she is not the girl who would have married him. Right now, she doesn’t feel anything but a roiling mess bent on staying alive. But if they do get out of this, she wants to know the man before her, and all she can offer him is the woman she has become. They'll take the rest of it as it comes.

“With the Pearl,” she whispers, brushing her fingertips along his clenched jaw. “And with you, Will.”

He smiles, a bright spot in the deepening gloom. Not with the easy pride of having bested a rival, or the astonished relief of being given something he doesn’t deserve. He merely smiles to hear his name on her lips.

Gibbs shouts his name from the gundeck and they begin to separate. But nearly as soon as he breaks contact, Will hisses, “Wait.” He reaches for her again and she meets him.

Balanced at the end of the world, they kiss as if it is the beginning.