Curiosity

With each stroke of the oars that took him further away from his doomed Pearl, Elizabeth's words reverberated round and round his head "Curiosity". "Because you'll want to". "The right thing". "Good man".

He had smiled then. At her continued insistence on his goodness. A genuine smile. Not his usual trademark smirk.

He couldn't smile now. There was no-one to rescue him. No-one to manipulate into unwittingly saving his skin. This time he had nothing else to trade. Nothing to barter. Except the Black Pearl. Only the small hope that the Kraken would go after the larger prey and ignore his insignificant little boat bobbing on the waves as he scurried towards land and freedom.

He looked over his shoulder towards the land getting imperceptibly closer. He was now almost equidistant from its safety and the Pearl.

But was it really freedom? Could he bear to spend the remainder of his life on dry land? Never again to feel the salt spray in his face and the roll of her deck under his feet? Never again the exhilaration of flying, her canvas snapping, before a storm? Never to be lulled to sleep by the soothing rocking of the waves beneath her keel? Only able to stand on a quay looking longingly at the horizon he could never again seek, watching others sail away out of sight. Was that how the legend of Captain Jack Sparrow would end – rotting away in dry-dock, as a rum soaked bum telling tales of former glories and always at the edge of his hearing, the whispers of how he abandoned his friends, his crew and his ship? Always being afraid of the sea, his lifelong love?

Without the Black Pearl he would no longer be "Captain Jack Sparrow". His fate was as tied up with hers as surely as if he had been shackled to her mainmast by an iron manacle. He had abandoned his friends and his remaining crew but could he abandon her? His Pearl. His freedom. Thirteen years ago he had promised his soul to save her, spent ten long years trying to win her back from Barbossa and now he was leaving her to go down to her fate - alone. He had betrayed her. He was not a good man. He was a liar, a scoundrel, a manipulator, a thief, a rogue, a murderer and a betrayer.

"A chance to be admired and gain the rewards that follow". Elizabeth's words repeated in his mind.

He didn't care a tuppenny fig for admiration and rewards. There would be neither for him now. The best he could hope for was a quick death. If he did turn around he might give his friends and his crew a slim chance to escape the Kraken's tentacled clutches.

Time was almost up. Jack's thoughts were whirling round his head like the eddies on an ebbing tide.

"Curiosity." He could almost feel Elizabeth's breath warm against his lips.

What would the compass say? Not that it had been any damn good recently. Bloody thing spinning all over the place like an empty rum bottle on a pitching deck.

Jack flipped the lid of the compass box open almost without conscious thought and lowered his kohl rimmed gaze.

And as it had done for 10 years, the compass spun on its spindle for a heartbeat and then quickly came to rest. Pointing at the Black Pearl. His Pearl. His lodestone. His freedom. His heart's desire.

Bugger, bugger, bugger, bugger. He snapped the lid closed. The bloody thing was right. Here, alone, out on the sea it knew what was in his heart. It wasn't fooled by the contradictory thoughts in his head. Jack finally knew what he had to do. He would do the right thing by his Pearl. And as a consequence the right thing by his crew, by Will and by Elizabeth. Would she finally kiss him for appearing to be a good man? Possibly. Damn, he really was curious about that. He hoped he was not too late - he could see the Kraken's tentacles already holding the Black Pearl in a destructive embrace, plucking men from the decks and the rigging. With a few skilful strokes of the oars he quickly turned the boat around. Away from land. Towards his Pearl. Towards the horizon.

The legend of Captain Jack Sparrow would have a fitting finale – not on the end of a rope nor in a drunken brawl in some seedy tavern – the Captain would go down, fighting, with his ship. His Black Pearl.

And if anyone had been observing they would have seen the glint of golden teeth in the sunlight and heard a baritone voice softly singing "yo ho, ho ho, a pirate's life for me."

After all he was "Captain Jack Sparrow"… and legends never die…