4 – Fighting for freedom
Jack looked back for a second, the sound of the explosion distracting him from his fight with Barbossa.
He hoped that the boy had understood his plan and won't do anything stupid to endanger it.
"I'm gonna teach you the meaning of pain." One of Barbossa's men was telling Will when Elizabeth appeared from nowhere.
"Do you like pain?" She asked knocking the pirate with a heavy staff "Try wearing a corset."
Here she was, the stunning miss Swann, ready to battle and screw everything up for him. Jack never stopped fighting Barbossa hoping that at least with Lizzie help, the Whelp would be able to fucking break the damn curse, possibly without killing him in the process.
"Whose side is Jack on?" Elizabeth asked Will while helping him up. Jack wanted to roll his eyes at the stupid question, but he could not.
"At the moment?" Will answered her unsatisfactorily for Jack before they started to fight the three pirates together. In little time, they were able to string the pirates together. It was a funny thing to see.
Jack and Barbossa moved the fight outside the line of vision and Jack couldn't see what was happening, but when he heard a big boom he hoped that they both were okay.
Seconds after he saw Will running toward the chest, finally he could put the final touches on his brilliant plan.
Jack cut his hand and smeared the medallion with his blood before tossing it to the whelp.
He smirked, knowing that they had won, almost, but before he could tell anything Barbossa had took out his pistol and aimed it at Lizzie.
Jack heart would have stopped if he wasn't already dead. He couldn't let it happen. He took out his own pistol with that single shot that he had hoped to use to kill Barbossa, aimed and fired.
"Ten years you carry that pistol, and now you waste your shot." Barbossa mocked him, and for a second Jack believe him and did not care. He looked at his right, Elizabeth was safe, that was the most important thing, he still could kill Barbossa with his own sword.
"He didn't waste it." Will voice made him look away from Lizzie, he was beside the chest with the bloody medallions in his hand. He dropped them, breaking the curse.
Barbossa seeing that dropped the sword and opened his jacket, a big pool of blood started to spread on his white shirt. He looked up in his eyes, some tears running down his cheeks.
"I feel…cold." He whispered in awe before falling dead, an apple rolling away from his hand.
Jack looked at Elizabeth again, she was looking at Barbossa dead body, maybe a little relieved of the death of her kidnapper, then she closed her eyes for a second, took a big breath and started to walk away from the corpse. She started to look around her at the treasure, her eyes sparkling a little.
Looking at her like that Jack could see her pirate heart. He was sure that with the right teacher and a little time at sea, Lizzie could become a fearsome pirate, maybe even a Captain. He wanted to go to her, talking her into sailing on the black pearl, but then he saw the Whelp beat him on it.
Elizabeth turned and saw William. Their eyes met and Jack saw the love they felt for one another, he felt a little constriction in the place where his heart was, he blamed the fact that his heart just started to beat again. He turned around and started to inspect the treasure.
After taking some pieces he swaggered toward the Whelp, Elizabeth wasn't beside him anymore.
"If you were waiting for the opportune moment…that was it." He mocked him, not feeling guilt at all when the boy looked sadly at him. "Now, if you'll be so kind, I'd be much obliged if you'd drop me off my ship."
Elizabeth turned around and looked at him strangely, he wanted to ask her why the sad look but she started to walk toward the longboat.
He shook his shoulder and followed her, William behind him.
When he got to the mouth of the cave he understood Elizabeth expression. His ship, the Black Pearl, wasn't there anymore. He sighed and still get inside the longboat. He had no choice, if he wanted to go back on true land he would have to go with the Commodore, hoping to be able to avoid his hanging in some way
"I'm sorry, Jack." Elizabeth said to him when William started to row toward the Dauntless.
"They done what's right by them. Can't expect more than that." He felt her hand on his arm, but he didn't turn around.
When they got to the ship, Norrington smirked down at him.
"Put him on the brig, together with the other scoundrels." the commodore said to two of his men.
The travel back to Port Royal was boring and uneventful. Jack had almost expected the Pearl to come back to save him, but the three days needed to reach the port passed and that did not happen.
He had been put in a single cell, the commodore was probably afraid that if put with the other he could find a way to escape. He was always alone but for that short hours during the night when Lizzie came down, keeping him company.
"If I could I would let you go Jack." She said to him the last night. "But I couldn't find the keys for the cell or the manacles, I'm so sorry."
He smiled kindly at her and took one of her hands in his through the cell's bars.
"You did me a favor enough by searching for them, luv. Don't worry about me, I'm Captain Jack Sparrow, I will find a way to save meself." He smirked trying to reassure her, even if he didn't have lot of faith in his own abilities.
They reached Port Royal midafternoon on the third day of navigation, the commodore did not waste time to arrange his execution the next day.
Lizzie came again that last night, she cried a little for him and herself too. The commodore told her that he had hired a woman to help her with the details for their wedding.
"I can't marry him, Jack." She whispered to him. "I love Will." Hearing that made Jack feel that strange painful contraction again, but he ignored it, trying to soothe Elizabeth.
They talked for a while, until it was time for Elizabeth to sneak back inside her house, or else she would be found out.
"Don't come tomorrow." Jack said to her, not wanting to see her crying at his execution. He didn't want to die with her sad face as his last image of her.
"I won't stay away, Jack." She told him. "My father and the commodore too had already asked me, saying that it wasn't something I should watch. They know that your death will hurt me, but if they want to go through it I want them to see me suffer."
He could understand her, so he said nothing more about it and with a last kiss on the back of her hand he let her go.
In the morning, before the commodore's men came from him, William came see him.
"I wanted to thank you, Jack." The boy said. "I would love to free you, but the commodore made so that my trick won't work anymore on this new door."
The chatted for some minutes, William asking him the questions about his father that no one else could answer.
"Thank you, Jack, for coming back. You are a good man." William said before going away, hearing the guards coming down.
Jack thought back at both Elizabeth and William words. He had gone soft lately.
With a sigh and a smirk, he let the guard bring him away, toward Fort Charles and the gallows. At least he won't have to think about his pact with Davy Jones. He will be free, dead, but free.
"Jack Sparrow, be it known that you have…" one official started to read all the accuses.
"Captain, Captain Jack Sparrow." He hissed at him when he forgot about his title again. Why could no one remember about it?
"…for your willful commission of crimes against the crown. Said crimes being numerous in quantity and sinister in nature, the most egregious of these to be cited herewith – piracy, smuggling, impersonating an officer of the Spanish Royal Navy, impersonating a cleric of the Church of England…" He smiled at the last one. That had been a funny one.
"Ah, yes." He looked at the executioner that glared at him through his cape.
"…sailing under false colors, arson, kidnapping, looting, poaching, brigandage, pilfering, depravity, depredation, and general lawlessness. And for these crimes you have been sentenced to be, on this day, hung by the neck until dead. May God have mercy on your soul."
They didn't know half of it, but those crimes were still enough to be hanged.
He didn't want to die, not now nor ever, so he was happy when he saw William coming at him.
"Move!" The boy screamed throwing his sword in the same moment the executioner pulled the lever, letting the trapdoor open. The sword luckily got stuck in the wood of the trapdoor and he fell precariously on it.
Will start to fight with the hangman and during the fight they cut his rope, freeing him. Will push the executioner out of the platform, just when the commodore and his men reached it, stalling them for the time he needed to free his hands. They fought bravely all the way up to the tower from where Elizabeth had fallen just a week ago. Unluckily the men of the commodore cornered them in the end.
"I thought we might have to endure some manner of ill-conceived escape attempt but not from you." The commodore said to the whelp.
"On our return to Port Royal, I granted you clemency. And this is how you thank me? By throwing in your lot with him? He's a pirate!" The governor seemed angry so he hid behind William, knowing that the two men will be less likely to want to kill the boy to get him.
"And a good man." That made him smile. Jack pointed at himself and proudly mouth to the commodore's men "That's me." "If all I have achieved here is that the hangman will earn two pairs of boots instead of one, so be it. At least my conscience will be clear." The whelp was a little naive, but Jack had to admit that he was brave and loyal, just like his father had been.
"You forget your place, Turner."
"It's right here…between you and Jack." William said while the commodore had his sword at his neck.
"As is mine." Elizabeth put herself in front of him.
Jack heart skipped a beat, pride and a little fear making him smile at Lizzie brave gesture.
"Elizabeth! Lower your weapons." The men looked at the commodore for orders. "For goodness' sake put them down!" Relived Jack saw them lower the muskets.
"So, this is where your heart truly lies, then?" Norrington asked her sadly.
"It is."
Jack looked up and noticed a parrot, Cotton's parrot on a cannon.
"Well! I'm actually feeling rather good about this." He got around William and Elizabeth. "I think we've all arrived at a very special place, eh? Spiritually…Ecumenically…Grammatically?" He said to the governor, taking pleasure into breathing on his face. "I want you to know that I was rooting for you, mate. Know that." Never he had been less serious. He went back next to Elizabeth, sad to have to leave her behind. "Elizabeth." He said going back to his mocking tone, trying to hide any feeling at all. "It would never have worked between us, darling. I'm sorry." He walked away, hoping that she hadn't see what he had tried to hide. "Will." He turned around, wanting to ask him to look after Lizzie, but he decided to not to in the last moment. "Nice hat." He walked toward the battlement. "Friends! This is the day that you will always remember as the day that –" He pushed himself over, faking a fall to add a little drama to his exit.
He fell in the sea, he came up for air and looked one last time up, they were all looking down at him, bewildered that he had survived the fall. He smirked, turned around and saw his beloved ship.
When he reached it his men heaved him on board.
"I thought you were supposed to keep to the Code." He smirked at them, happy to see them all.
"We figured they were more actual…guidelines." Gibbs said with a smirk of his own, helping him up.
"Thank you." He said to cotton when he gave him back his precious hat.
"Captain Sparrow." Anamaria said, putting his coat on him. "The Black Pearl is yours."
Jack walked to the helm and look around himself fondly. He was home. He was free.
"On deck, you scabrous dogs! Man the braces! Let down and haul to run free." He screamed to them, he had a reputation to maintain. "Now...bring me that horizon." He started to hum a familiar song, a memory of fire and rum and sweet lips on his. He took out his compass and looked at it. "And really bad eggs, drink up, me 'earties, yo ho." He singed seeing the needle point toward fort Charles.