A/N: I'm purging my files, so expect several updates in a row. I apologize for any errors or lacking quality - some of this is old and hardly edited.
Pirate-Taught and Pirate-Made
She forgot sometimes that he was a pirate. Well, not what he was, so much as what that meant. With his playfulness and his jokes and his half-thought-out schemes, it was difficult to recall that he made his living off of killing, looting, pillaging. Then there were moments when that was all she could remember and she had to force herself to believe that he was her friend – or as close as Jack Sparrow could be.
This was one of the latter moments – Jack holding his sword to Will's neck and speaking in a tone she hadn't ever heard directed at one of them, as though he could and would kill them if pushed one step further, "Can't let you do that, William. 'Cause if Jones is dead, who's to call his terrible beastie off the hunt, eh?"
She had never before considered what may happen, what Jack may do, should it come down to their deaths or his. And she didn't really want to know. It was one of the hardest lessons she'd had to learn, being so long in the company of pirates: sometimes it was better not to know. Sometimes – often – she truly didn't want the answers to her questions, and there were many of them. Who was Jack Sparrow? How had he become the man he was? Even though it was hard to believe Captain Jack Sparrow had not always existed exactly as he did, a pirate captain on the Black Pearl, turning tricks with his words and wiles…
Where did he come from? What was he like as a child? Who raised him, cared for him? Did anyone?
But beyond even her lessons in the vagaries of pirates, the perils of knowledge, there was the lesson she discovered she was still learning: never trust a pirate. For as much as she may care for him and he for her, and as much as she may want to put her faith in him, to be able to follow him without reserve, she could never, ever, forget that he was a pirate. A murderer, a thief, a liar, and a solid friend until the times got tough. No matter how much she may wish it were not so, Jack Sparrow was a pirate and pirates could not be trusted.
.:.:.
Later, what felt like years later, Elizabeth pressed a kiss to his salty, rum-stained lips and clicked the handcuffs into place.
"It's after you, not the ship. It's not us. This is the only way, don't you see? …I'm not sorry." Her voice shook. He looked at her, so understanding, so ridiculously accepting of his fate at her hands, and all he said, vicious and oddly triumphant, was, "Pirate."
She left him there to die. To save herself, and the man she loved. And that night in her dreams, all she heard, echoing over and over was his voice, "Pirate. Pirate. Pirate." She woke in the morning, shaken and shivering and couldn't quiet her own voice in her head, whispering, "Never trust a pirate."