Work Text:
My father and I are different to each other. He was a marvellous pirate, he didn’t care for authority. He was respected. I am not a marvellous pirate, authority matters to me because people need to know that I’m in charge. I don’t know if the ‘respect’ held for me isn’t influenced by fear. Captain Rose was rumoured by the navy to be violent. Whereas I, Captain Price, don’t have rumours about that. I am violent.
Though my father and I aren’t similar personality wise, nor are we looks wise, we are similar in the sense of how we’re going to mark history. It’s our only thing in common. We’re not biologically related, my mother told me that much. Rose was an okay father when he was there. My mother got engaged and I had to make do with the fact that this pirate was my father now. My stepfather at that.
I couldn’t care.
He left anyways, so I never had reason to care. He got engaged to my mother and then left, and since then? Nobody’s heard of the ‘great’ Captain Rose. Rumours say that he had a partner and a son, but other rumours said he couldn’t commit to a relationship, and that he is still out there.
My mother didn’t know who to believe. She waited, and she waited. We weren’t poor, but we weren’t well off either. We struggled and that’s all I can say. I can’t describe it any other way. I never really loved my mother. Sure, I cared about her, but not enough to love her. It’s odd for somebody to feel that way. Perhaps that’s where my downfall came. My mother was lovely, and loving. That changed when that stupid captain never came back and married her.
She sat at our door, and she waited. And she waited. Forever waiting.
Her waiting got her sick, and she died. Unlike her, I didn’t take long to resent him. He was meant to be my father, and he was meant to tend to my mother’s needs. I doubt I would’ve loved him because I couldn’t love my mother, but I certainly wouldn’t love him now.
My mother’s passing resulted in me getting put in a home. I was angry. Why wouldn’t I be? The rumours didn’t stop at the home. It was all talk about the Black Rose Pirates. “They did this” and “they did that”. I wanted to throw up every time.
I hated how they were all anybody spoke about. Then you came along. Scrawny, terrified; if I were to be honest, it felt like looking into a mirror. At a replica. You came in soggy, blubbering about something I can’t even place my finger on anymore. You looked lost, so I took it upon myself to be there for you. It didn’t feel like I truly cared though, even I knew that much.
I don’t know when I started hating you.
Maybe it was the fact you were closer with the man who was supposed to at least be there for me and my mother. I know you were because you mentioned it once. You were so sad, it made me feel sick. Maybe it was when you brought up being surrounded by people on a ship, or having a sister. You were so needy for comfort, you were so sad. It made me sick to my core.
I don’t know why I still took you upon myself, under my wing. I should’ve at least expected someone who was even previously associated with Rose to be a quivering little coward like he was. Maybe it was the resemblance; a bastard with no other family.
I took you under my wing, and I still hated you.
I hate how you had what I never did. I hate how even after that fact, you still managed to bitch and cry about it.
I just assumed you would grow out of it. That I could show you that being weak and vulnerable would get you killed. They say you can’t teach an old dog new tricks though. I guess that much was true. Even alternative methods of showing you this barely worked.
You clung to my every word. It was embarrassing almost how much what I said impacted your actions! Was this what being around that sad excuse of a captain did to people? Break them down to nothing but your level of pathetic-ness? In my head, I couldn’t help but laugh. You cared too much, and I cared too little. I said whatever and you believed me.
You did whatever I said, because I told you I was the only one that could ever truly love you. You would’ve jumped into a sea of man-eating piranhas if I’d asked, so I thought that I’d done something right for once. Guess I was wrong about that.
You were fine watching it. You were fucking okay with watching them hurt others, watching me hurt others, so why the hell was it so wrong when it was your turn? Why the hell did you suddenly gain some fucking weakness? I thought it was fine though, it was supposed to be fine, because you still did it. Even if you did try pussy out of it. I thought that I had finally fixed your fucking bitching and whining, that you were finally more than some soggy kid I first knew.
Why I actually let myself believe that, I will never know.
Do you know how terrifying it is to watch everything you built from scrap burn right in front of you? Or even trying to avoid the roof crumbling in on you? The ash and smoke filling your lungs? I don’t think you ever will know that. Because you weren’t there. If I could, I’d kick myself for believing someone who was associated with the Black Rose Pirates would ever do anything good.
Maybe that’s when I truly started hating you.
Did you want me dead or was that just going to be the sick bonus of ruining my home just like the man who came before you? For someone who was so fucking cowardly, a pussy, and mortified of even the idea of laying an ill finger on anyone, you sure had no issue doing it to the one who was there when you had nobody.
I woke up. I don’t even think you intended on me doing so ever again. I couldn’t see out of one eye, and everywhere stung. I was almost killed, and you were nowhere in sight.
Out of everything I did, I thought I told you family mattered more than anything.
You weren’t a replica of me, you were a replica of him. I think that’s why I hate you, Chip. You were always a replica of him. Two assholes cut from the same cloth. Maybe that’s why I kept you around.
I had to build everything back up again, you know.
But no matter where I am, you seem to follow. Just to tear it all back down again.
I hate you, Chip. I really do. It was a mistake for me to take you under my wing, and I should’ve let you drown in that sorrow you had when you were a kid. I never ever should’ve gotten vulnerable, and I shouldn’t have let you believe that I ever cared.
But I did care. Didn’t I? Maybe that’s why I kept you around for so long.