Beginning's End

Disclaimer: Not mine. Never will be.

Note: I may continue this if I think of somewhere else to go. It has only been reviewed by me, so it isn't really beta-ed. Comments welcome and encouraged!!!

By the First Noelle

Hector Barbossa raised the gun and aimed it, not at the Turner boy as must would expect, but at the boy's love, Elizabeth. He needed Turner's blood after all, and the girl was no longer necessary. She stopped dead in her tracks, fear evident in her eyes. He cocked the gun, smirking menacingly at her.

Suddenly, a shot rang out through the cavern, and not from his own gun. His body jerked slightly as the bullet tore through him. It was moments like this, and there had been a few of them in the last ten years, that made him briefly glad to be undead.

He turned to the man with the smoking gun: Jack Sparrow.

"Ten years you carry that pistol and now you waste your shot," he said with a slight laugh, lowering his gun from Elizabeth. It was, perhaps, this move that sealed his fate.

"He didn't waste it!" shouted Turner from somewhere behind him. He turned swiftly, in time to see the last medallion drop into the cursed chest.

Then…he could feel. He noticed absolutely everything: the slight breeze across his face, the way the ground beneath him was uneven and had coins scattered under his boots, and the odd, warm liquid running down his chest. Then pain. An unimaginable, roaring pain. He reached for his coat and tore it open to watch in horror as blood seeped from the bullet hole.

"I feel…" he paused for a second, thinking for the word though the lethal wound and wonder at being able to feel again, though the edge of his consciousness was beginning to fade. "cold."

He looked up at Jack, memories of their past friendship, at his mutiny, and of this newest betrayal coursed through his mind. His eyes met Jack's, begging silently to be saved, though he knew that nothing could or would be done.

Despite this, Hector Barbossa was greedy to the end. With the last of his strength, he reached for the deliciously green apple in his picket. Even as he fell to the coin-laden ground, his strength failing him, he tried in vain to taste that which he'd missed most in the last ten years.

He watched his battle with Jack from behind his own eyes, but unable to control his actions. In this version of the battle, however, it was not both himself and Jack who were immortal. He was no longer under the curse of the Aztec gold, which was, in itself, a curse.

Constantly, he would move too slowly, or Jack to quick, and his opponent would slice at him, causing pain to flood his senses. Yet, despite how many times Jack's sword pierced his skin, he could not die, or even give up. He was forced to keep fighting, pain from old wounds and new blending together until all he could feel was the agony of it.

He once again raised his sword to perry one of Jack's attacks, wishing that his body would give in to the wounds that had to be killing him.

"Stop!" said a voice that certainly did not belong on Isla de Meurta. Tia Dalma's face was a mix of anger and authority. Suddenly, Jack Sparrow vanished, and Barbossa gained control of his body. He collapsed to the ground, his sword falling noisily against a pile of gold coins.

His loud breaths were the only noise filling the cavern, even as Tia stepped over mounds of treasure towards him.

"What would ya do ta be free from dis hell, Hecta Barbossa?" she stood over him, looking down at his broken and bleeding form.

"Name your terms," his voice had lost any of the vanity it had held when he could not be killed.

Tia smiled down at him before the cavern slowly faded from his vision and he vanished into a sea of calming, pain free darkness.

He blinked his eyes open slowly, unaccustomed the bright sun outside the window. It felt like he had just fallen asleep, and that business about being uncursed and fighting Jack had been a dream, but…no, he knew that that was the least of what he had experienced when he was there. Wherever there was.

He propped himself up on his elbows to get a better look around. The room was dimly lit by the window, which had a somewhat moth-eaten curtain over it. There were shelves opposite him and a very thin wall with no door separating this room from the next. And sitting at his feet was his faithful monkey.

"Jack," he said, his voice much more hoarse than he remember it being. The monkey chirped in delight to see his master awake and, when Barbossa sat up completely, scampered up to his usually perch on his shoulder.

Slowly, he stood not knowing how long he'd been immobile. He had some sense that time had passed, but no idea exactly how long. He had on an identical white shirt to the one he'd been wearing when he'd been shot, minus the blood. His pants and his boots were on, but his outer coats were missing, along with, most importantly, his hat.

He heard movement in the other room and headed there in his usually swaying gait.

Tia Dalma sat facing away from him, peering down intently at something on the table in front of her. She turned around quickly, though, when a floorboard creaked under his foot and smiled.

"Ah, Barbossa, 'ow nice ta see you in da land o' the living," she stood and disappeared upstairs, rummaging around for something. He took this opportunity to look around the room and smiled at what he saw.

Sitting on top of a very cluttered shelf sat his hat, quite a bit less tarnished than the last tine he saw it, with no holes and no chopped off feather. He'd just walked over to it and picked it up when Tia returned from upstairs.

"I see you've found ya hat," she said, still smiling. She was carrying the rest of his clothes, still none of them bloodstained. She dropped them on the table and looked at him expectantly. He took the few steps needed and took them, Jack leaping from his shoulder. He put them on, noting the texture of each individual piece.

After he put on his hat with a slight flourish, he looked back to Tia Dalma with a genuine smile on his face. She mirrored his expression and stepped forward seductively towards him. After ten years of forced celibacy, her hand on his chest felt much more erotic than it should have. She leaned up, her face so close to his that he could feel the warmpth of her breath on his lips.

Then, just as suddenly as this mood of hers had come, it vanished and she pushed away from him. As she moved to the other side of the room, he growled in frustration. At least, until he saw something round and green flying through the air towards him. He caught it, a predatory smile on his lips. An apple. Tia watched him eat it, then, when he was about halfway done, gestured for him to sit across from her at her table.

"So Barbossa, I take it ya be ready to talk about the terms o' your life," she said in a no-nonsense tone. Barbossa nodded, somewhat cautiously, taking another bite from the apple. "Ya must know of the goddess Calypso, and da roll da Pirate Lord's Nine Pieces of Eight 'ad on bindin' her to 'er human form?"

"Aye," he said, still cautious.

"Free Calypso," she said, her voice demanding no argument.

"Now see here, Tia. Ye can't expect me to be agreeing to something that's nigh impossible, now can ye?" he said standing, asking, in his own way, for a more easily completed task.

She also rose, walking around the table to stand before him. "I brought ya back from the land o' the dead, Barbossa, and I can send ya back just as easily."

She put her hand on his chest again, but there was nothing sexual about it this time. Instead, he felt himself weaken and, looking down, he saw his skin begin to disintegrate before his very eyes.

He stepped back in alarm, leaning against the chair he had been previously seated in. As he left her grasp, his strength returned and he became human again. He looked at the hand holding the apple, immensely glad to still feel its juices sticking to his skin. He had thought for a moment that he had been just as cursed as before but…

He looked back up to Tia Dalma, a new respect in his eyes, "I will do all in my power to do so. Though," he began, stepping back towards her, "it is no ordinary voodoo witch that can raise a man from the dead."

She smiled sinisterly at him, "You 'ave all the information dat ya be needin', Hecta. Don't look for more."

She turned and walked away, leaving him to examine his hand for any missing flesh.