Well, here it is :) Hope you all like the first chapter, I wanted it to be longer but there really isn't a lot I could put in it, although I tried, lol. Was going to post it yesterday, but I had so much to do and I was so tired, I'm off all this week, so hopefully the next chapter will be up really soon! So once again I hope you all enjoy the first chapter and further chapters in the future :)
Disclaimer: I do not own anything or anyone that is related to Pirates of the Caribbean, all that belongs to Disney (although I wish that I own Jack...) I'm only writing this for my sheer enjoyment. But I do happen to own my OCs like Nicolette Brown and Christopher Brown/Grayson, they are of my own creation.
Better Summary: Nicolette Brown thought that life outside of Port Royal would be worth while, and she was partly right. But when Jack gives her distance suddenly, she doesn't know if it is really worth it any more. She tries willingly to keep next to him thinking it only to be a phase, but when Nicolette finds out that he's hiding more than his past from her, she is proven wrong. Lord Beckett wants control of the seas and he needs the help of two people in order for that to happen. Two operatives are easily manipulated by him to do what he wants, and they will accomplish their separate goals no matter what. But this only leads Nicolette to come to a choice between family and love.
Review Replies (all others I replied to in message, I think, if I didn't then let me know, lol):
Jacob's only girl: Awe, thanks! Hope you didn't have to wait too long for it, I tried posting it up earlier, but school got in the way of everything -_- Hope you enjoy the first chapter :)!
DarkArtest: Thank you! I'm glad that you enjoyed it! And if you want to, you should, lol! :) I hope you enjoy the first chapter !
Chapter One: Stranger than Usual
She turned the page of her book, feeling the rough paper in between her fingers. This was the fifth time she had read it and it was only the fifth time she had read it in three weeks. Was she bored?
No, how could anyone be bored on a pirate ship. Something new happened everyday. Was she mad?
What was there to be mad about? The only thing, really, to be mad about was that the man that she had lived with for the past year had suddenly stopped being the way he was once to her all but a month ago.
She hated this book. Why was she reading it again? Nicolette Brown looked away from the wording that she thought to be nonsense and a bigger nuisance than what she felt to be. It was dark outside... bleak. Every night they sailed was now like this. She hated that, too.
Nicolette threw the book out of her hands to the damned table in order to knock off the charts that Jack had been studying with for hours, but to her disappointment in her efforts it missed. But, although, she was partly disappointed, she did happen to hit Jack Sparrow square in the head. She tried not to laugh and turned her head innocently to the window, acting like she didn't do it as Jack annoyingly turned his head to face her while nursing the back of his head with a hand. "What was that for?" He asked the first words he had spoken to her of the day.
She looked back at him confused and she stared at him blankly, pretending that the throwing of the book was a part of his and her imagination. Nicky asked, "What was what for?" Her arms crossed over her chest.
Jack rolled his eyes aggravated, he didn't need this, not now. He looked down at the book then back at her, "That." He started and Nicky looked down at the book as well then back into his deep brown eyes. "You threw that at me since you're the only person, other than me, in the cabin. Unless there is some ghost or someone of me crew that is hiding in here, which I highly doubt, love, then it wasn't you. But you are at a disadvantage."
Nicolette just shrugged and stated with a smile, "I did in fact throw it, but unfortunately I missed." It was truly the truth, but Jack didn't believe her at all. He only scoffed and turned back to his charts, studying them like the world would crash around him. They should be there already. Why they weren't, he had no idea. Hopefully an hour, maybe two. Nicky's face dropped and instead of letting her eyes gape at Jack, she only looked forward and let her head lean against the dark wood of the ship. Her leg was extended onto the little perch she had set up for herself two months ago. Nicky looked back at Jack who was studying and tapping his compass to help him.
It was hopeless.
Before Nicolette was going to stand up and walk toward Jack, both their heads looked sharply at the door hearing a heavy knock. Jack could almost smile, finally, they could get this under way. Jack rushed toward the door and opened it quickly. Nicolette raised her eyebrow seeing Jack excited about the knock and got up, walking suspiciously at the door that revealed Gibbs, Jack's appointed first mate. The two were talking in hush tones that weren't a part of her liking at all.
From their silent conversation that Nicolette couldn't hear at all, Jack's face dropped, realizing that he didn't tell her about the prison. She wasn't going to be happy or excited like he was about this. Knowing Nicky, she would be the exact opposite of that. He looked over his shoulder and saw her with her hands across her chest and her eyebrows furrowed at him. "Bugger." He muttered, this wasn't going to go on too well, he knew.
"Fifteen men on the Dead Man's Chest." Gibbs' voice surrounded the Black Pearl as it sailed in the bleak night sky. His voice was cryptic and he held a bottle of rum in his hand. "Yo ho ho, and a bottle of rum." Nicolette was leaning over the railing, worried about Jack no matter how much she despised him at the moment for not even mentioning their little side trip to a prison. Damn him. "Drink and the devil had done for the rest. Yo ho ho, and a bottle of rum." Gibbs let out a laugh and Nicolette looked at him over her shoulder annoyed as he looked down at his bottle of rum before going to take a swig.
She swiped it out of his hand as he was about to take a drink out of it. He gaped at her for a moment as she took a long swig of her own out of it. The hard liquid burned down her throat, but it no longer bothered her like it had the first time. She had grown accustomed to the taste. "Sorry, here you go." Nicky gave the bottle of rum back to Gibbs roughly and he reluctantly took it from her. Jack had been gone way too long. Stuff happened to him if he was gone way too long. "He's gone too long." She stated to Gibbs before gulping. "That usually isn't a good thing."
Gibbs went next to her with the bottle dangling in his grasp. "Aye, that it isn't." He agreed, slightly leaning over the railing with her. Him and Nicky had grown to be good friends over the past year, he was almost a father figure to her since he seemed wise and reasonable. Less and less Gibbs had complained about a woman on board, it happened sometimes, and Nicolette didn't let the habit bother her like it had with Anamaria. Wherever she was, Nicky did miss the only woman on board with her, the men were sometimes too much.
Gibbs tried to assure the worrying woman next to him, "But it's Jack we're talking 'bout here. Don't worry, miss, I'm sure the Captain is fine. He gets himself out of sticky situations easily."
Nicolette begged to differ with that, recalling times that she had gotten Jack out of plenty situations that were named sticky. Tortuga, Singapore, Nassau, she could name practically all the ports that she had gone to that year where she had to either help him talk himself out of it, help him use 'physical force', or just get him out of there when he needed to get out of there. Nicolette wanted to point them out to Mr. Gibbs, however decided that now was not the time. Before she could give him a sarcastic remark, a murder of crows hovered over them while screeching with the whistle of the hollow wind.
"That's bad luck." Nicolette stated instead and Gibbs actually turned to her, almost as a way of agreement.
The crows flew to the Turkish prison that had been rumoured to be the most tortuous prison in the seven seas. It was on a secluded island slightly off its coast. A prisoner was being dragged by his wrists roughly onto the cobblestoned walkway to the black doors that were almost as large as the building—it seemed. His clothes were tattered and his ankles were bloody and torn. He was screaming in agony from the pain and fear of what might happen to him. Along with the crows, a bell sounded throughout indicating it to be a new hour. The bloody, stone cobbled walkway had cages with prisoners already in them dangling on the sides. Some seemed starved from the lack or no food and brittle from the harsh wind that surrounded them and blew its way into their cages. You could see their rib cages go through their thin rags that clung onto the cold sweat of their bodies.
Their cages rattled. Several crows landed on top of them and some actually flew into them. There was a man who seemed already half dead and ready to decompose, seemingly delicious to the vulture like creatures in the murder. The man cowered in his cage as one flew into his own and before he knew it, its beak went to his eye taking it out roughly as the man yelled out in bloody murder.
He yelled louder when he saw the bird fly away with his eye in his beak and a dark red liquid starting to drip down from his empty socket. He would probably die within a few minutes since he was so weak and starved to the point of almost being a rotting corpse. The man who was being dragged had seen it and he struggled in the guards' grip even more, only making his ankles bloodier and weaker as they brought him to the opening to the prison. He soon figured out that it was no use to try any more. He gave up as the guards dragged him into the building, the doors closing in front of them.
Nicolette and Gibbs along with the other crewmen of the Black Pearl who were before sleeping drunkenly on the deck, could hear the painful moans and screams of agony of the prisoners. Nicolette cringed thinking horrible things that might be happening to Jack, but some might not be as worse as what she might do to him when he comes back. The couple had been acting strange to the crew lately, stranger than usual. She was hesitant on taking out her spyglass that was hidden in her waist jacket. Nicolette just couldn't, not daring.
She retreated her hand from her pocket, knowing her nerves about Jack would only increase.
The darkness around them didn't settle her mood at all, she missed the warm Caribbean sun, she wanted to go back there. She couldn't wait for this affair of Jack's to end, whatever it might be, to be done and over with. Hopefully, things would go back to... what seemed to be normal for each other rather than... distant and secretive.
On the other side of the prison, men that had died in the prison (that everyone considered as the 'lucky bastards') were in caskets containing their lifeless corpses. Two workers threw each one into the bleak water, not giving the respect of the dead, but some of those criminals did not deserve said respect. They floated to a far-off distance from the secluded island and a crow that trailed away from its murder landed on top of it smelling rotting bones.
To get into the casket, the bird pecked onto the deep brown wood. Peck, peck, peck, the man inside winced from the annoyance that was now annoying him. He hated birds since Cotton's parrot arrived. The crow was unsuccessful in entering. He tried again, peck, peck, peck. Damn bird. The man went into his holster and took out his pistol during the birds last two peck. He leaned the pistol onto the wood with his finger wrapping around the trigger. Peck, peck—boom! The annoying crow was shot through the wood and fell into the water lifelessly leaving the remainder of feathers scattered along it.
An arm extended through the small hole that the bullet had left with the pistol still in its hand. He rotated his hand around searching for the bloody thing. It wasn't there, good, he didn't have to worry about his hand being torn off by that wretch. Captain Jack Sparrow emerged from the casket going through the pieces of wood that contained him. He felt that his head was topless and he panicked, searching the wooden casket that was containing him and the dead body for his hat. Jack made a face when he had found it on top of the body's skeletal face. If it weren't his hat, he would probably burn it.
Jack placed his hat on top of his head and put his reliable pistol safely under his belt. Jack looked back down at the corpse then back up seeing the Black Pearl at a far off distance. The black sails silhouetted with the dark sky that was barely under the light of the moon. He had to make a make-shift long boat. The casket should do... but what should he use as an oar? Jack looked down at the body and bowed his head, crossing himself. Jack took the leg of the dead body and pulled and tugged at it to get it out.
"Sorry, mate." He muttered as the leg finally snapped off from the hip. Sparrow dipped it into the water and started to row toward his ship. "Mind if we make a little side trip?" He asked it as if it could talk back... you never know. Silence was the answer to the question. He tilted his head knowingly and stated, "Didn't think so."
Nicolette walked over to the railing nervously and sighed in relief seeing Jack row his way to the ship. When he got closer, she noticed that he was in a casket... using a dead man's leg as an oar... or that was what it looked like to her. She shook that thought out of her head, thinking it to be ridiculous. Gibbs rushed over to the side as Jack was making a stop at the bottom of his ship.
Gibbs offered a hand to help his Captain up, but instead received a rotting bone that Jack was using earlier. He examined the bone in his hand. Nicolette took Jack's coat and went behind him draping it along his shoulders that were partly drenched. Her eyes widened when she realized that it really was a bone. But she shouldn't be surprised, she muttered, "I should already be accustomed to this."
Jack did a quick glance at her and was about to say something when Gibbs stopped observing it. His voice was confused as he spoke, "Not quite according to plan."
He turned his head toward Gibbs to explain, "Complications arose, ensued, were overcome." Nicolette rolled her eyes and objected to commenting, knowing it to be a lost cause if she were to state that that was why she should have gone with him. But she was a little happy that she wasn't allowed to, since she might also had used a dead person's leg to escape.
Jack walked forward and Gibbs followed him, Nicky stayed behind with her arms crossed on her chest. She knew the crew was upset about something, she didn't want to get into it. Gibbs asked, "You got what you went after, then?" Jack took out a piece of cloth that was in his waist jacket as he continued. Nicolette gaped at him. That was what he risked his life for? A bloody piece of cloth? Her original plan to stay behind was vetoed.
She hurried over and inquired, "That's what you went after?" Jack pursed his lips and rolled his eyes. He loved Nicky, but sometimes she was annoying about his actions and intentions. It was her only flaw. Jack reluctantly turned around to face her and she added, "A bloody piece of cloth?"
"Ah, Nicky," Jack had started walking forward without paying attention to where he was walking to, "it's not only a piece of cloth, darling. There is far more meaning—." Jack walked into Leech who was standing with his arms crossed over the crew who were looking at Jack slightly disappointed. Nicolette backed away, feeling the intensity of their stares that were on him.
Gibbs explained to his Captain while he was just looking at them confused, "Captain, I think the crew—meaning me as well—were expecting something a bit more..." Gibbs trailed off searching for the right word and Jack looked over at him questionably. He found it, "shiny." 'Ayes,' sounded out throughout the crew in agreement. Gibbs started to explain as Jack looked pointedly at his crew that were surrounding him not in a friendly way. "What with Isla de Muerta going all pear-shaped and reclaimed by the sea, and the treasure with it—."
Leech interrupted adding, "And the Royal Navy chasing us all around the Atlantic—."
"And the hurricane!" Marty intruded after him. Another sound of agreement was heard around them and Jack looked back at Nicolette who was looking away from the crew minding her own business.
"Did you know about this?" He inquired to her and Nicky took a moment before realizing that he was talking to her.
She shrugged, "Somewhat." Jack glared at her as she looked away from them and gazed to where ever she was looking at before and act like she wasn't paying attention at all.
Gibbs' voice made Jack turn toward him again, "All in all, it's been some time since we've done a speck of honest piratin'." Jack still looked pointedly toward the crew and Gibbs, he looked between them. The thing that he had was better than a shiny penny! Though it was a cloth, with a drawing... okay they might not be excited about it, but still!
He made a face and asked, "Shiny?"
Gibbs confirmed, "Aye, shiny."
Jack looked around at his crew, "Is that how you're all feeling?" Nicolette could've sworn that she saw his eyes bulging out in paranoia from the corner of her eye, but ruled that out. "That I'm not serving your best interests as Captain?" Oh Lord, he thinks they are mutinying him, Nicky thought. An awkward silence had fallen around the crew and everyone looked at each other knowing that it was true, but were too scared to mention it. Jack had become handy with his pistol and his aim was as sharp as ever. He wouldn't mind right now if he had death on his ship because of that.
A brave soul decided to squawk, "Walk the plank!"
With no hesitation, Jack took out his pistol annoyed with that bird and pointed it straight at him. "What did the bird say?" Nicky looked at him in disbelief of how jumpy he was. She tried not to focus on it.
Leech's voice radiated into the air and it was one of the few sensible things that he was so kind to share to others, Nicolette believed, anyway. "Don't blame the bird." She didn't like Leech, he seemed too, what was the word? Well, he seemed too smart, knowing, factual, a know-it-all, almost. They never acknowledged each other ever since Jack had picked him up in India. "Tell us, what's in that piece of cloth you got there."
Nicky walked next to Jack as he took a peek, she tried to as well, but all of a sudden the damned monkey that belonged to Barbossa jumped down and snatched it out Jack's hand before he could respond. Jack, the monkey, scampered across the deck on his little paws while Jack was trying to use his own pistol to shoot the little bastard. But to his dismay, it didn't work. Wet powder. Of course. Nicky's pistol was in his view and in a flash, Jack swiped it out from under her belt and aimed it at the cursed monkey. He pulled the trigger, but since it was undead, it failed. But the sound of the bullet firing scared Jack the monkey into dropping the cloth onto the deck.
Nicky rolled her eyes and looked at Jack annoyed. She stated, "You know that won't do any good." Marty ran over to go get it.
"Does me." Jack replied to her looking her in the eye somewhat annoyed at her as well.
"Maybe if you were nicer to the cursed monkey it wouldn't be doing such mean things to you." She stated with a smirk developing, but Jack didn't have one at all.
He retorted, "Maybe if you just shut it for once in your life, I would be nicer to the damn monkey and we can call it a day!" She glared at him and knowing that she was unwanted at the moment she backed away a bit. The crew around them could feel the tension between the two that had been there for weeks at a time. They didn't know whether or not they were having a fight or that they suddenly couldn't stand each other. They never argued, argued around them, that is. But there were definitely muffled arguments they heard all the time during the night sky.
Marty cut the tension with his voice like a knife, "It's a key." He held the cloth in front of him, revealing the key. The cloth seemed rough and old between his fingers. Nicky along with the crew tilted their heads slightly trying to comprehend on why this was important. She looked up at Jack for answers and his face seemed to lighten up slightly. He sauntered over to Marty taking it out of his hands. Marty backed into his early position next to Leech, he was up to his hip, almost.
"Much more better." Jack stated as he raised the cloth to reveal to all the key. He corrected, "It is a drawing of a key." Nicolette raised her eyebrow and like the other members of his crew, she held the confused expression that was beckoning on everyone's face. Jack waited for them to be as excited as he was about this, but none of their faces changed. His smile dropped and he tried to talk to them as if they were children, "Gentlemen," he looked toward Nicky and added, "and Nicky, what do keys do?"
She rolled her eyes as Leech answered it unsure, "Keys... unlock, things?"
"Oh, really?" Nicolette looked over at Leech annoyed. She stated sarcastically to him, "I didn't know that." Leech glared at her and she looked away from him in the opposite direction. Nicolette muttered, "Idiot." Leech gritted his teeth hearing it. He didn't like that woman at all.
Gibbs' voice stopped Leech from doing something that he would regret to do, "And whatever this key unlocks, inside there is something valuable." He was starting to catch on to what Jack was trying to get out. Finally, Nicolette thought, someone with a brain. "So we're heading out for whatever this key unlocks!" Nicolette lost hope and looked over at Jack who seemed like he had hope for Gibbs as well, but they were just crushed.
He was close, though. "No." Jack stated and Gibbs looked at him confused as Jack took a step forward toward him, "If we don't have the key, we can't open whatever it is we don't have that it unlocks. So what purpose would be served in finding whatever need be unlocked, which we don't have, without first have found the key what unlocks it?" Jack spoke way too fast for anyone around them to even comprehend a word. Nicolette raised an eyebrow while trying to catch up to what he had said. Not even she, who sometime had spoken the 'Jack' lingo that she had grown to hate, didn't understand at all. So they were going after the key? That would seem logical.
Gibbs looked between Nic and the other members of the crew before answering, making sure that he wasn't the only one that was confused. He looked back at Jack, "So, we're going after this key!"
"You're not making any sense at all." Jack stated, Gibbs just looked at him like he was crazy. Nicolette raised her brow and gained the same look Gibbs had. He was acting... strange, more strange than usual. It was odd, even for him.
"You're not making sense." Nicky commented, receiving a glare from Jack before adding, "You can't deny it." She crossed her arms over her chest with her eyebrows furrowed at him. Actually, he could deny it. Jack couldn't tell. Was she mad or annoyed with him? But by the look, the tone, the hands over her chest, and her... glare, he had the feeling that it was both.
Marty looked up at Jack and asked, suddenly feeling tension, "So, do we have a heading?" Jack's focus was not on Nicky any more, but it was now on Marty.
Jack smiled brightly, unlatching his compass. "Aye! A heading!" He opened the compass onto the palm of his hand and stared at it, focusing on what he wanted. Key. Key. Key. Key. Key. Key. Instead of having a general heading, the needle spun wildly. At first it went toward the Starboard side of the ship, would've worked, probably, then toward Nicolette, who was looking at him like he had lost the least amount of sanity that he once had. Then it just turned and turned into a slow, never-ending cycle that he couldn't make out.
Jack shoots his arm out and began to point a way with his eyes never leaving the compass, just in case it would stop, "Set sail in a... general," the needle turned somewhere else and his finger followed in the opposite direction, "that way direction." Nicolette just looked at him for a moment and raised her eyebrow with her eyes narrowing at him concerned. Maybe he was sick and had a fever, he always had a heading right away.
Gibbs raised his eyebrow, too, "Captain?" He leaned forward slightly to take a peek at the compass, but Jack snapped it shut immediately, before Gibbs could influence it. Even though, he would possibly have a better heading to wherever they were going than Jack would.
With that, Jack turned on his heel and walked to his cabin slowly as he ordered, "Go on, snap to and make sail. You know how it works." Jack could feel all the confused stares that were burning his back. Gibbs looked toward Nicolette who only looked back at him equally confused then he looked at Marty who was standing next to him. Jack went into his cabin with a slam of the door.
Gibbs and Marty walked over at the railing while the other crewmen were running around the ship following their orders. Marty looked up at Gibbs with concern and he looked down at him, "Have you noticed lately, the Captain seems to be acting a bit strange..." Gibbs raised a brow and Marty only shrugged adding, "er."
Gibbs looked over at the cabin door agreeing with him, "Aye. Somethings got Jack vexed, setting sail without knowing his own heading. Mark my words, what bodes ill for Jack Sparrow, bodes ill for us all." Marty nodded, and followed his gaze toward the cabin.
"Something isn't right with him." Nicky stated as the crew finally got out of their current state and started getting to work on an order that they weren't sure of. She looked over at Gibbs and Marty who were at the railing looking at the Captain's quarters with concern. Nicky walked to their cabin and slowly opened the door a crack to see Jack pacing the cabin and taking off his coat. He was acting more strange than ever. She muttered to herself, "Something isn't right with him at all."
Jack really is acting strange...er, lol. And Nicky and him, seem to definitely not be the same at all because of it. So this was the first chapter, I tried making it longer, like I said before, but I didn't know what else to put into it. I hope you all enjoyed it and the next chapter will be up really soon, I promise.
Review?
*Revised*
