A/N: I said I wouldn't write a sequel to 'The Bird Cage' but that was before I saw Dead Man's Chest. I should have known I'd be powerless to resist! So here we are on a new adventure. Before we begin I'll just say that this fic takes place after The Bird Cage not after DMC, thus some events from DMC will play out here in a different way. I think things should be pretty self-explanatory for people who haven't read The Bird Cage but if you want to know who the hell Sylvia is, then you'll find all the details there.

Please do not read this if you haven't seen DMC! I don't want to spoil anything for you.

Disclaimer: Disney owns everything, except Sylvia. Long live Pirates!

No time to catch your breath, we're diving straight in...

Chapter One: Thirteen Years Later

The candle light flickered as the door opened. Presuming it was Tia, Jack stayed lying down, his head aching worse than the rest of his body. She would disturb him soon enough with her questions and her bizarre remedies, there was no need to speed the process along. The air had grown very cold all of a sudden, hadn't she shut the door after her? Grumbling under his breath, Jack reluctantly opened his eyes and immediately wished he hadn't. Instead of Tia Dalma, the ethereal Jamaican seer, Jack found himself looking at something much more alarming. A person, it looked like, there were certainly human elements to it but instead of a hand, there was a lobster-like claw, and on the other hand one of the fingers was not a finger at all but a long, trailing tentacle. He only had one leg, the left leg replaced instead by what looked like the leg of a crab. All of that would have been extraordinary enough, but it was nothing to the man's face. His skin was like that of a squid, greyish-green and slimy, and hanging down, in an endless motion, was a writhing mass of tentacles, that formed a sort of living beard. Jack, unsurprisingly, forgot about the pain he was in, and decided that if this half man, half crustacean took another step he would hightail it out of there faster than lightening. A wave of nausea passed over him as the eyes buried within the squid-like face passed their icy stare over him.

"Jack Sparrow." Eurgh, the thing spoke! Jack's thoughts manifested themselves on his face as poorly disguised revulsion.

"Captain," Jack said instinctively, his voice a lot smaller than he would have liked. He convinced himself it was the pain talking.

"Ah, that's right, I did wonder when we would meet face t' face." Jack stared at the man, the thing, was he supposed to know who he was talking to? He was pretty sure that he had never been drunk enough to forget a face like that.

"Don' tell me ye don't know who I am," said the man. Jack stared hard at his tentacular face, for reasons which hardly need to be explained, but he felt no flicker of recognition.

"Nope, sorry," he said, "I ain't got a clue." The man took a limping step forward, the wood knocking hard on the floor. Jack's eyes widened. Where the hell was Tia! One of the man's tentacles reached out to touch a bottle full of shells that was hanging from the ceiling. Jack suppressed a shudder.

"A man of the sea such as yerself should really pay closer attention to the stories of yer crew." The man was getting closer, far too close for comfort. There were barnacles on his jacket. That just wasn't normal. Where the hell had Tia put his damn gun?

"Stories?" he said.

"Aye," said the man with an eerily malevolent smile, "Ever heard of Davy Jones?"

♠♥♣♦

Jack leapt out of bed with a yelp, rocking the other occupant into waking with a start herself.

"Jack?" Sylvia sat up to see Jack looking half nauseated, half startled, a somewhat amusing combination. He did not seem to think so, however, and glared at her when she began to snigger.

"It's not funny," he said testily, wiping his hands repeatedly on his shirt as if they were covered in something.

"What's not funny, Jack? You had a bad dream, that's all." Sylvia pulled her nightdress back onto her shoulder and brushed her hair out of her eyes. She had been having a very pleasant dream herself, the last golden rays of it were still warming her insides. Jack was still wiping his hands distractedly, and he had begun muttering to himself. It must have been a really bad dream. She threw back the sheet covering her and walked over to him. He didn't notice her until she was almost on top of him.

"Argh! Don't do that!" he cried jumping back about three feet.

"I'm sorry, Jack!" said Sylvia bemused, "I didn't mean to…" Jack's expression suddenly changed, a smile snapping into place.

"Bad dream, that's all," he said airily. He kissed her on the cheek and then left the cabin still muttering 'bad dream' as he went. Sylvia watched him leave, shrugged and leapt back into bed. Perhaps if she was lucky she could catch the end of her dream…

♠♥♣♦

"Fine mornin', Captain!" said Gibbs heartily, "A beautiful day fer…"

"Yes, yes," said Jack waving his hands to dismiss Gibbs' musing, "I need t' talk t' you." Gibbs blinked in surprise.

"About what?" he asked, "Will I be needin' my rum?" He reached for his hip flask instinctively. Jack ignored him. He still felt horribly unclean. The intensity of the dream had not faded one bit, in itself a worrying sign.

"Mr Gibbs," he said seriously, "How much do you know about Davy Jones?" Gibbs, who had been halfway through taking a gulp of rum, choked.

"D-Davy Jones, Cap'n?" Tears made his eyes shine as he swallowed the burning rum. He screwed the lid onto his flask unnecessarily tight, his fingers clumsy. "I've 'eard a few stories," he said evasively, "Is this enquiry part of some idle curiosity of yers?"

"Eh?" Jack looked up. "I asked you how much you knew, damn it. Ye can't answer a question with a question." He surveyed Gibbs' flask then snatched it expertly, unscrewed it, with difficulty, and took a long swig. Gibbs licked his lips apprehensively.

"What is it ye wanted t' know about Davy Jones?" he asked, bracing himself. Jack threw the flask back to him.

"I never said I wanted t' know anythin'," he said infuriatingly, "Yer putting words in my mouth." He scanned the water suddenly, then flipped open his compass. Gibbs tried to see the direction in which it was pointing but Jack was holding it at such an angle that it was hidden from him. He snapped it shut with a little 'huh'.

"Something wrong, Cap'n?"

"Wrong? No, no, nothing. Nothing at all. Nothing. No, nothing. Plot a course for land, any land. I think I need some rum."

Rum would make everything better, Jack thought, as he descended down into the bowels of the Black Pearl in search of every pirate's favourite tipple. Sylvia was right, it was just a dream, a damn realistic one that happened to show him a night thirteen years ago that he would rather have forgotten, but a dream nonetheless and dreams never hurt anyone, right? He made a rather hasty grab at the nearest bottle at found it was empty. He struck gold with the next one, but saw that the stock was running alarmingly low. No need to inform the crew, he didn't want to start a panic. He drank half the bottle, cradling the remainder to his chest like it was his first born child. There, much better.

"Thirteen years, Jack Sparrow." The rum bottle slipped from his hands and shattered on the floor, rum bleeding out onto the wooden boards. Jack whirled round, his hand on his pistol but there was no one there, he was alone.

♠♥♣♦

"Jack, my God luv, you look so pale!" Sylvia sprang to his side the moment he entered the cabin. Her nose twitched as she wrapped her arms around him. "You been drinking?"

"Trust me, darlin'. You'd 'ave been drinkin' too." Sylvia frowned, her sun tanned face looking up at him, long hair still wild from sleep. She had met Jack four years ago but sometimes it felt like she had known him all her life.

"It wasn't just an nightmare, was it?" Her arms loosened their grip. For the most part she enjoyed her life as a pirate onboard the Black Pearl but there were a few times when Jack's propensity for dangerous and unpredictable situations had her wishing that there was someway to get him to settle somewhere where the sea was a legend parents told their children as they tucked them up in bed at night. Sylvia smiled at the absurdity of the thought before turning her attention back to the present problem.

"I…it were…" Jack stopped squirming. "Listen luv, you ever heard of Davy Jones?" Believing Jack to be changing the subject, Sylvia decided to go along with it.

"Sure I have," she said, "But I don't know anything about him. Was he a pirate or something?" Jack pulled a face.

"Not so much of the was, luv," he said. Sylvia raised her eyebrows.

"Do you mean to imply that Davy Jones exists today?" she asked sceptically. Jack nodded, clearly pleased that she had caught on so quickly. Sylvia tried to hold it in but in the end her giggles were unstoppable.

"Oh Jack," she laughed, "I think you might have overdone it on the rum this morning."

"Ye won't be laughin' when he comes for ye," muttered Jack sulkily.

"What?" asked Sylvia as she wiped a tear from her eye.

"Nothin'," said Jack quickly, "Now, where's me…?"

"Hang on a minute," said Sylvia, "You can't bring up Davy Jones and then tell me nothing about him. Who was he? Ok, ok, who is he?" Jack thought of the "dream" and decided describing the man would be the best start. At least it would capture Sylvia's interest, she'd always been overly interested in squid in Jack's opinion. Of course, he had not expected that such a description would fuel the flames of Sylvia's hilarity. Her laughter rang out in peals, tears rolling down her cheeks.

"And this man-thing was in your dream?" Sylvia gasped, "Oh dear, Jack, now I know why you jumped out of bed!" Jack could feel his patience rapidly disappearing. If she did not want to believe him then she would just have to wait until…an idea struck him. There was nothing guaranteed to sober Sylvia up faster than a tragic love story, and what was this if not tragic?

"You know, they say Davy Jones became the way he is because he fell in love."

"With a crab?"

"No," Jack retorted, "With a woman." Sylvia was interested now, he could feel it. She moved closer to him, taking his hand in hers like she did whenever she wanted him to finish telling a story without getting distracted by something. This was better, a captive audience. Time for the killer punch.

"Story goes that ol' Davy Jones never stopped loving this woman, that it made him crazy. His heartache grew so bad that could not live with the pain, yet it weren't enough to kill him. So, do you know what 'e did?" Sylvia was wide eyed now. She shook her head, squeezing his hand in a silent plea. Jack had to resist beaming, it would rather have ruined the moment.

"He cut out his heart. He cut it out and locked it away then hid it from the world so he never had to feel again." Sylvia's reaction was so perfect, Jack clean forgot the purpose of telling her about Davy Jones in the first place.

"Oh Jack, that's so sad but so romantic! Oh, don't pull that face, Jack, it is! Imagine being so in love with someone that you could not bear it. It's the most romantic thing I have ever heard." She sighed and laid her head on his shoulder. Jack was sure she was about to ask whether he would cut his heart out for her and was all ready with his answer when she caught him by surprise.

"So, who was she?"

"Who was who?"

"The woman, Jack! The woman Davy Jones fell so in love with."

"Oh. I dunno, I never did ask." Sylvia hit him playfully on the arm.

"What do you mean you never asked? You didn't want to know the best part?"

"I didn' really see it as important, luv. I had more pressing matters on my mind at the time and I 'aven't heard it said since."

"Well, I think you should find out," she said, "Because I want to know." She stood up and began to remove her nightdress immodestly. Jack watched her. He never tired of seeing fabric slide off her shoulders and hips. She was so good at shedding clothes, it was almost as if she preferred to be…

"Jack, for the last time I am not walking around naked anywhere but this room. If you ask me again, I won't even do that!"

"Fine," said Jack with a slight pout, "But…"

"Warning you, Jack."

Sylvia pulled out a shirt, it was ripped under one arm but that didn't matter, who was looking anyway? It hardly seemed possible that once her every outfit had been carefully chosen and arranged so that she would be presented in the best possible way. Oh, what a tiresome life that had been. There were things she missed though, a room that did not pitch and roll for a start, the means to do buy whatever she wished (within reason, of course, she was a lady after all!), and her father. She really did miss her father.

"How 'bout you wear yer dress today?" For one wild moment, Sylvia thought her thoughts had somehow transferred themselves into Jack.

"My dress? But Jack…I haven't worn that since…" She could not finish the sentence because she could not remember the last time she had worn a dress of any kind, let alone the one lone garment that was scrunched at the back of the wardrobe. Jack was smiling at her in a very forced way. Something was up.

"What's going on, Jack?" she asked suspiciously, "Why do you suddenly want me to wear a dress?"

"Because…" Jack desperately sought an answer that would sound feasible. "Because…" Suddenly, Sylvia clapped her hands to her mouth and Jack was sure he had been found out.

"Oh Jack!" she cried hoarsely, "I can't believe you remembered…I don't know what to say. You must think I'm terrible!"

"Er…" Jack was very lost all of a sudden, and he didn't much like it. Sylvia was getting more emotional by the second, her eyes had gone all shiny, her chin wobbling.

"Fancy me forgetting our anniversary and you remembering!"

"Oh!" Jack lit up. Perfect! "Yes, our anniversary, exactly. I cleaned me hat and everything." He hastily gave it quick dusting with this hand but Sylvia was tearing up so badly that she did not notice. She flung her arms around him and smothered him in kisses.

"I love you, Jack Sparrow," she whispered huskily in his ear, "There's just one thing I want to do before I go put on that dress." Her tongue flicked out and caressed his ear lobe.

"Oh," said Jack, "Well, if ye insist."

♠♥♣♦

Wolf whistles rang out from every corner of the ship. Usually Sylvia attracted barely more attention than anyone else but usually she wasn't wearing a dress designed to expose her cleavage. She had to admit that she was strangely flattered by it all, being a pirate often meant that being attractive was given a very low priority but there were times when Sylvia just wanted to be told she was beautiful. Gibbs grinned from ear to ear when he saw her.

"Ye look like a true Princess, Sylvia," he said kissing her hand grandly. His bristly beard tickled her skin. "Jack's a lucky man."

"Too right he is," she said with a wink, "Come to think of it, where is Jack?"

"He said somethin' about needin' t' check the horizon," replied Gibbs. He hesitated then added, "'Ave you noticed anythin' strange 'bout Jack this morning?" Sylvia considered this.

"Stranger than usual, you mean? Well, he woke from a nightmare this morning, I think it shook him up a bit. Maybe it was another 'Elizabeth burned the rum' dream." Gibbs murmured his sympathetic agreement and crossed himself. Sylvia resisted the temptation to roll her eyes. What was it with these boys and rum? You'd think they had been weaned on the stuff. Come to think of it, they probably had.

"So that's it then," said Gibbs apparently satisfied, "Another Jack Sparrow mystery solved."

"Maybe," said Sylvia unconvinced, "There was something else."

"Go on," said Gibbs as he prepared to take a swig from his hip flask.

"He mentioned Davy Jones." Gibbs choked, spraying rum all over the place.

"My apologies, Sylvia," he coughed as she wiped her face with her sleeve.

"Quite alright," said Sylvia who knew it had been an accident. Gibbs wiped his mouth with the back of his hand lowering it slowly.

"Davy Jones, you say?"

"Yes, I'm sure it's nothing, but he's never mentioned him before and I wondered what had brought him to mind."

"Yes, that is interesting," said Gibbs in his customary dramatic tone, "He brought him up with me only this morning. Gets me to thinkin', why would Jack 'ave a man like Davy Jones on the mind?"

"What do you mean?" Sylvia asked but Gibbs was called away at that very moment. Feeling like she had missed out on something insightful, Sylvia went to find Jack to see if he felt like talking. She found him poring over an old map, his fingers doing more looking than his eyes. Deciding to leave him to it, she climbed back up on deck to take in some of the fresh, clear air.

♠♥♣♦

"Davy Jones…the Davy Jones." Jack wondered how hard he had actually hit his head during his fall, hard enough to create a phantom being that claimed to be a long dead sailor? Possibly. Said sailor removed a pipe from his seaweed encrusted jacket, slipped it between his teeth and lit it. The ensuing smoke made Jack's eyes water. Where the hell was Tia?

"Aye," the sailor said, "The Davy Jones." He seemed to be gaining some kind of savage enjoyment from Jack's discomfort, well, he wasn't the first person to do so.

"The Davy Jones who cut out his heart and…" Jones raised a hand, or rather, a claw to cut him off.

"Oh," said Jack, "Well, pleasure to meet ye, I'm sure we'll be seeing each other again sometime." He stood, trying to ignore the way the room swam, and the way his body screamed at him to lie back down. Unfortunately he could not ignore the tentacle that wrapped its way around his wrist, tightening around it with a cold, clammy grip.

"Yer Captain o' the Black Pearl, am I right?" Jones said. Jack, who could not tear his eyes away from the horrible slimy thing that was wrapping itself tighter around him, spoke to his hand.

"I was," he said, "Before…"

"She sank," finished Jones, "Unfortunate." There was something in the way he spoke that made Jack look up. In that split second's eye contact, Jack felt a connection to this monster that he had never thought possible. Jones' knew what it was to suffer a broken heart, their situations were not so different. So the object of his affection was a ship rather than a woman, it was but a trifling detail. All the legends he had heard regarding Davy Jones came back to him, the terrible and the terrifying, but Jack focused not on the tales of the leviathan that did his bidding or the rumours that he press ganged dying men into joining his crew of sea-phantoms. Oh no, these did not interest Jack Sparrow. He was only interested in one thing. He wanted his Pearl back.

♠♥♣♦

Jack's hand slipped and he knocked a whole stack of Sylvia's books onto the floor. Was it possible to dream when you weren't asleep? Of course it was, that was the whole point of drinking rum…only, this dream had not been rum induced, Jack was fairly sure of that. He picked up the books feeling shaky and more than a little queasy. He kept checking and rechecking his wrist as if expecting to see a tentacle winding its way round it but there was nothing there.

"A dream," he said to himself, "Just a dream."

"Thirteen years, Jack." Jack dropped the books in his hands and dashed from the room as if the devil himself were after him. He slammed the door behind him and headed swiftly into the sunshine. Nothing bad happened when the sun was shining, he tried to tell himself, nothing bad was going to happen. They would get to land within the next day or two and then he would have time to think of a way to get out of this mess. That would have been a good plan, had a ship had not appeared from the depths of the ocean beside them at that very moment.

♠♥♣♦

Sylvia was too shocked to do anything but stare as an enormous black shape rose and then suddenly erupted through the surface of the water. It was recognisable as a ship almost immediately, water streaming from its every surface. A ship it may have been but Sylvia had never seen a vessel like it. First of, it was enormous, big enough to rival the Black Pearl, for sure, and she was by no means insignificant. Then there were the carvings all over it, immaculately detailed friezes of death in every form you could imagine. As morbid as it was, there was a striking elegance to it and Sylvia found herself drawn to its dark beauty. The whole crew had frozen, stunned into silence. Sylvia looked over at Jack who was looking just as dumbstruck as the rest of them. She noticed that he had not even made a grab for his pistol or his sword.

♠♥♣♦

Oh bugger. Jack knew there was no point in reaching for weapons, he wasn't sure there was much point in doing anything about now but just because the Flying Dutchman had appeared from nowhere right beside them did not mean he was going to give in. They'd made one deal, there was no reason they couldn't make another one. Right? Jack looked nervously over at Sylvia and saw she was looking at him, her face pale. Suddenly her eyes widened and she took a step backwards, her eyes fixed on a point ever so slightly passed him. Jack was fairly certain that whatever it was behind him was not something he wanted to face just now. Maybe if he just…

"And where exactly do you think yer going?" Jack winced. There was only one person that voice could belong to.

"Davy Jones," he said turning back with a flamboyant grin. Jones looked no different from the last time Jack had seen him, just as disturbing. "Is there somethin' I can do fer you?" Jones made a show of pretending to think which personally Jack could have done without.

"You do remember the deal we made, don't you Sparrow? I raised the Pearl for you, brought her back to life, and you…ye've been Captain fer thirteen years."

"Actually…" Jack began but Jones stopped him.

"Captain Jack Sparrow? Isn't that what ye've been calling yerself, Pearl or no? Thirteen years, Jack. Time fer you to pay up." Not good.

"Jack!" All eyes turned to the source of the call. Sylvia stopped just short of the pair of them, her expression torn between disbelieving bewilderment and fierce loyalty. "Is this Davy Jones!"

"Now might not be the best time, luv," Jack hissed trying to indicate that she should make herself scarce but it was far too late for her to escape Jones' notice. His light blue eyes were fixed upon her so intently that Jack saw Sylvia squirm.

"And who be this?" Jones asked suddenly making them all jump. Jack opened his mouth, closed it, opened it again and then groaned as Sylvia leapt right into his silence.

"Sylvia," she said forcefully, "Sylvia Sparrow." Jones looked at Jack then began to laugh, a truly horrible sight as well as sound as it made all the tentacles on Jones' face jiggle and jump.

"Sylvia Sparrow," he repeated, "How…interesting."

"Aye, but now introductions are made I think it's time we talked business, 'ey?" said Jack hurriedly with a pointed look at Gibbs who, thankfully, got the message at once.

"Come along," he said to Sylvia trying to take her by the arm and lead her away, "Cap'n wants some privacy."

"No," said Jones his voice deadly smooth, "Let her stay." Sylvia pulled away from Gibbs and briefly she and Jones were in agreement, a turn of events Jack found most discomforting. Though it was nothing to how he felt after Jones next spoke.

"She deserves t' know what's t' become of her man, don't ye think, Jack?" There was an uncomfortable silence.

"What does he mean, Jack?" Sylvia asked in a small voice, "What have you done?"

"I…" But there was no use denying it. He grinned again, gold teeth catching the sunlight. "We're all friends here, aren't we?" he said hopefully, "No reason we can't talk 'bout this in a reasonably civilised fashion." Jones, unnervingly, was still looking at Sylvia who, in turn, was still glaring at Jack and appeared not to have noticed his interest.

"The terms we agreed to be the ones we will be stickin' too," said Jones. Definitely not good.

"Jack, what are the terms? What are you talking about?" Once more, Jack ignored Sylvia knowing that he would certainly pay for it later.

"Surely there must be somethin' you want more than m--…our agreed price," said Jack optimistically. For the first time since Sylvia had arrived on the scene, Jones' eyes slid away from her and fixed themselves on Jack.

"You know what, Jack?" he said with a dangerous smile, "There is somethin' I want more than you. I want her."

A/N: Wow, it feels good to be writing PotC fiction again! I hope to see some familiar names telling me what they think, as well as some new ones.