Oooh . . . When the crypt goes creak and the tombstones quake, spooks come out for a swinging wake. Happy haunts materialize and they begin to vocalize, grim grinning ghosts come out to socialize!

Yeah, I just saw The Haunted Mansion and I am sorry. I don't think they did the greatest job with that. It was short and had a predictable plot. Maybe it's just me but I figured out that Sara Evers was . . . Never mind. I don't want to spoil it for you. I wonder if they'll have any other movies of DL rides?

Let's see.

If, you're mind's been wishin' 'bout goin' fishin' but you're still down on the shore. Grab your campin' gear and meet us right here. Got a whole bunch of fun in store. It's time for a vacation for some rest and relaxation. So forget your cares and join us bears in the great outdoors. Country Bear Jamboree of course. What was that movie called?

What about?

-How do you do? Mighty pleasant greetin'. How do you do? Say it when you're meetin'. How do you do? With everyone repeatin'. Pretty good, sure as you're born.

-Everybody's got a laughin' place, a laughin' place, to go ho ho.

-Zip a dee doo da. Zip a dee-eh. My oh my what a wonderful day. Plenty of sunshine headin' our way. Zip a dee doo da. Zip a dee-eh! That would be Splash Mountain. I know there were cartoons on that.

It's a Small World is Chucky, International

I must be nuts. I know all the words to the Disney Land rides! Everyone reading this should know the pirate song by now but if you insist . . .

Mungojerry; Growltiger was a bravo cat who hung out on a barge. In fact he was the roughest cat that ever roamed that barge!

Jack; Wrong pirate song, Mungojerry. Go back to the CATS fic. *sigh* The pirate song will appear in one of these chapters. It's in Chapter One (not to be confused with the prologue).

Anyways, here's a disclaimer for all the crap I wrote above. I don't own anything above except for my critique on the Haunted Mansion and my ideas for Chucky International. And I certainly don't own anything below except for my original characters, not to be confused with participants in the story. In short, I own all the characters who lack names.

Generally, I come up with a character, and then I assign people to it, sort of like casting a person in whatever role, the exceptions being people I wrote for someone.

A disclaimer to Margaret Mitchell. Guess why, I dare you.

A disclaimer to GP high school and Warren high school, not necessarily in that order, not that I'd want to own either.

(God this is taking forever. I should have paid as I went.)

Elise Sparrow I modeled after Aunt Elise in Les Parapluies de Cherbourg, however, I met a woman that would be perfect for her. Eric, David, and the future kids are all people I know, though David and Eric's names have been modified. Mei Lin is Zhang Ziyi. Captain McLean and his friend Parker are also people I know, again, names modified. Captain Arod and Schoolteacher Williams are both baritone players. I can't tell you where I got Angelique from because a certain Asian food will sue me just for mentioning their work. Tavington I got from the Patriot. I just changed his first name because we had too many Williams in this fic.

That all for now. On with the chapter.

Chapter VIII –Islands, Sadists, and the Usual Pirates

— [21st century]—

Anita Arenas kicked the ground in confusion. Everybody was gone. Lizzy had vanished from the face of the earth, Claudia, who had quit band anyways, wasn't dropping by like she'd promised. Robin wasn't calling and Ryoko had deserted her section.

Ryoko not showing up hadn't really surprised Anita. It could have been her parents weren't letting her or she could have just been tired of the tuba section. Whatever the case, those four were gone. Anita had also heard rumors about a girl named Diana who'd gone missing. All of this was strange and Anita didn't like it one little bit.

Of course, Anita had no idea that the news flash that night would have anything to do with her friends' disappearances.

She was sitting at her house, glad she didn't have to work that night, ignoring her brothers, one, who was trying to get her to change the channel on the TV, the other who was on the computer, listening to loud drum corps music and answering all questions in monosyllabic grunts, when something caught her eye.

There had been a major robbery at the local gunsmith. Most of the weapons in stock had been taken. There were no clues and no suspects that made any sense. The store windows were unbroken and the only thing found was a gold coin, covered in blood. The blood had been tested and compared with the shop owners but the blood had proven inhuman. The authorities were not able to give any further information.

Anita shrugged and allowed her little brother to have the remote. He changed it to the Simpsons and the news report vanished from her mind.

That night, she dreamt of the movie she'd seen recently, Pirates of the Caribbean. She worked at her local theater and had managed to get free tickets to the show her friends had been talking so much about. The dream was not so strange in itself … no, it was fairly normal … but the cast of her dream was very odd indeed. She could not believe her eyes … or, mind rather.

She started out at Will's house, which had to be new because it didn't look like Gov. Swann's house. She saw Robin, Lizzy and Claudia as well as Ryoko's little brother. A guy that looked like DJ was talking to Lizzy and Norrington of course kept showing up. Anita knew it had to be a dream but she didn't wake up. She found that strange seeing as she usually woke once she discovered this.

Her vision moved to the Pearl and she searched for Jack but he wasn't there. Diana was however. Anita didn't know how she knew this, having never met the girl, but she did.

And then, she ended up on the island. The first thing she saw was a little boy throwing rocks at gulls. This didn't interest her and the dream moved on to find Ryoko and Jack Sparrow sitting as plain as can be in the sand. She was looking at something on his arm and his face grimaced as if he were in pain. All of a sudden, they looked up and gazed right at her. Ryoko mouthed Anita's name and the dream ended with Anita yelling for Ryoko.

She sat up and almost hit her head on the ceiling. She was on the top bunk of a bed in her own home in the year 2003. It was almost September. And she had four missing friends that she suspected might have gone back in time. But that was crazy right?

"Are you all right?" a voice asked. Anita looked down to find one of her brothers. She must have woken him up with her screaming.

"Yeah, I think," she answered shakily. "I had a weird dream. About ..."

"About your missing friends?" he asked.

"Yeah."

He yawned. "I might expect Ryoko to go missing but I don't know about the others. I don't want to scare you but it's been over a month now. They probably aren't coming back."

She glared at him. "Why are you so negative? You aren't supposed to give up on people like that. Weren't you friends with some of them too?"

He shrugged and disappeared beneath the bunk. Anita expected him to just go back to sleep but he surprised her and actually answered the question. "Elizabeth made fun of me and asked personal questions every time I saw her. Claudia did much of the same, except she hit me or stretched my face. Ryoko … we did nothing but fight, pretty much. She was just so much fun to tease. I had the most interaction with her mainly because we were in the same section." Anita heard him scoff. "The others I didn't know. I met the boy once. If it were just Ryoko … I'd say she ran away and is probably better off. None of my business though, so oh, well."

"Well, I'm still worried," Anita answered, crossing her arms. He didn't reply and Anita couldn't get back to sleep.

—[18th century]—

Lizzy woke up with a headache. She'd been dreaming about her old life and unfortunately, she'd dreamed that she was at band practice. Running laps, doing pushups, playing flute for long hours, and being yelled at for no good reason. That was practice. Robin woke groaning too.

"That was a crazy ass dream," she said, looking at Lizzy. "I was dreaming of Anita but she wasn't doing anything. It was normal. It was weird. She was just ... arguing and watching TV."

"Are you aware that you said it was both normal and weird?" Lizzy asked laughing. Robin shrugged.

"I'm starving," Robin changed the subject. "I want food."

"No, really?" Lizzy asked sarcastically. "I thought you'd like paper for breakfast."

Robin threw a pillow at Lizzy and the fight began. They pummeled each other with the pillows until the room swam with feathers. The little white fuzzies stuck to everything including Lizzy's glasses. When Angelique opened the door, she actually shrieked.

« Oh! Mais non! Qu'est-ce que vous faites mademoiselles! » She shooed them out of the room. «Zut alors ! Pas de bêtises. Regardez la salle ! Ce n'a pas possible ! »

"I'm not sure," Claudia said from the doorway. "But I think she said, 'Oh, no! What have you guys done! Rats! No silly things. This isn't possible!"

"That's exactly what she said," Lizzy answered flatly.

"Who's Anita?" Jack asked her. Ryoko shook her head and blinked.

"A friend from my home," she answered, still checking his arm. "It's only by luck that she wasn't transported here with us. She might have been there with us if it hadn't been for her other plans."

It was midday on the island and the sun cleaved down to beat upon the white sand and palm trees. Ryoko held up the stone Jack had crushed with an annoyed look and tossed it aside. She then dabbed at his wound.

Jack nodded, wincing again. "If it hurts, say something," she scolded.

"It's fine. It'll hurt for a while. I believe you've sobered me up just with your poking."

"You wanna do it yourself?"

"Sorry," he answered. "I'll stop complaining."

"Should I tie something over it?"

"Nah," he answered. "It'll heal faster if I leave it out." He stood suddenly. She stood and gave him a quizzical look.

"Won't it get infected that way?"

"Follow me, grab the kid," he told her, all a flurry unexpectedly. She called Eric over and they both followed Jack who led them right into the trees.

"Barbossa and his mates are out for now," he explained. "But we can't be on the beach at night. They'll spot us right away and we can't let them find us. They know we're still alive and you can be damn sure they're going to sweep the area. Luckily, I know this island. It's one of a chain that I've used to stash some things. Barbossa doesn't know about it being my stash but that doesn't mean he won't look here. There's a fresh water ... thing back in the trees. I couldn't tell you what it is. It's too small to be a lake, to big to be a pond and I'm not sure how it occurs here but it's there. There are fruit trees and other such things and of course, my stash, which includes rum, gin, wine, you get the idea. There's also water but I wouldn't drink it. Kid, this is your lucky day."

"Jack, I don't think that's a good idea," Ryoko told him, putting Eric behind her. "He's only eleven."

"Old enough for me," Jack retorted smiling. "I started when I was ten. There isn't anything else anyways. I won't let him have the hard stuff."

"You said there was a freshwater ... thing back there," she added.

"I also said I wouldn't drink it," he countered. "I know too many men that have used that water to bathe and I don't care how long ago it was. I'm not drinking their old bathwater."

Ryoko's eyebrows went up. "Point taken."

"We can't have a fire come nighttime," Jack added. "They'd see the light too easily. It'd be a beacon. There's nothing to worry about here anyway. Only gulls come here."

"Obviously you haven't seen "The Birds"," Ryoko joked. "Or we might end up like Prometheus, only our innards won't grow back." She and Eric went and brought the trunk back with them into the trees. Jack opened a felled tree that had been ingeniously hollowed out to contain shelves.

"A mythology reference," he smiled. "I didn't expect it of you."

"Well, I was sort of an expert in my class," she blushed.

"See these?" he motioned to Eric, pointing at bottles with a dark liquid in them. "Those are the only ones you can have because you will get very sick otherwise. Understand?"

The kid nodded eagerly.

"If you take any of the others, I will personally give you back to whoever you ran away from and my threat is good, kid." Eric's eyes grew very wide and he nodded again, though not as eagerly as before.

Jack turned to Ryoko. "You can have whatever you want but I'll warn you. These bottles are the strongest," he pointed to the far left, top self. "I won't even touch those for awhile. I recommend the stuff just up from his bottles. There isn't much of it left but it'll do."

And so, their stay on the island began.

Tavington decided to get some fresh air and stretch his legs. Without telling Governor Swann, he started into town to catch up on what he had missed. He passed the jailhouse and spared a sneer for the poor souls within. He read the bulletins and made his judgments on people in the street. He did not however, enter the ladies' house down the street from the jail. He had been forbidden to go there years before and he did not want a repeat performance. He was a changed man, or so he wanted everyone to believe.

He stopped in the street long enough to see two women walking up, a basket held between them. One had long brown hair, tinted gold in the afternoon light. The other had thick dark hair, almost black, and olive skin. They chatted aimlessly as they walked, the basket holding nothing as of yet.

Robin and Claudia had been sent out to get some things for Elizabeth who wasn't allowed to leave the house simply for the man who was watching them. They filled the basket and paid the merchants as was correct and Tavington observed. He rather liked the brown haired one. She looked strong.

On one such occasion, that he was looking at her, Robin turned and met his eyes as if she knew he was behind her. He smiled at her to show he meant no harm and she nodded. She turned her back and continued to walk.

"That guy has been following us for a long time," she whispered to Claudia. "Don't look back or he'll know we suspect him."

"What do you think he wants?" Claudia asked as if she were telling the weather. "Apples or bananas?"

"I'm not giving him apples or bananas," Robin answered. "Let's just go home now and if he doesn't like what we brought, we can make him a sandwich." This was code for, 'let's get outta here and if he tries anything funny, we'll beat the crap out of him or scream rape.'

Robin took the lead and didn't look at the man as she passed, her head held high. Claudia did the same but made the mistake of looking back. He was watching them suspiciously. He held a gleam in his blue eyes that Claudia didn't like. He was dangerous. You just didn't see it until he looked at you.

When they were safely behind Will Turner's gates and walking up the step, Claudia asked the question. "Who was that?"

"I have no idea," Robin told her. "I don't want to know. He is one creepy guy. Looked like he was about to take a bite out of me. Or at least like he was dreaming about doing it."

"Do you think he could be that guy who's after Elizabeth?" Claudia suggested. "Or maybe one of the bounty hunters?" Robin shrugged. Little did either of them know, he was both.

For that was his ticket to Elizabeth's heart as he saw it. Bag the biggest bounty thrown his way in a long time. Grab the Sparrows and deliver them already cooked. Dark or light meat? Don't answer that question.

Norrington perked his head up when the knock came. "Come in," he said shortly. Governor Swann entered and shut the door.

"Thank you for getting Elizabeth to understand," he told the man, taking a seat in a leather chair. "She is most difficult at times."

Norrington smiled. "It was my pleasure, Governor. Nothing I wouldn't have done on my own if I had known in time."

The Governor nodded but his face fell a tad grim. "Unfortunately, I did not come here to your office to merely thank you. I must speak to you about a most distressing matter. Why did you remove the warrant for the Sparrows?"

Norrington's smile faded and he began to dig through his desk. "There was more than one reason, but here is a legitimate one once I explain." He unearthed a sheet of parchment and handed it to the Governor.

"That is a list of names of bounty hunters looking after the Sparrows this moment." There were only about five names but one stood out. "Belle Watling, Dante Smith, Vincent Plum, C. Falcon, and Darren C. Tavington."

"You told me that he wanted to redeem himself enough to be worthy of Elizabeth's hand," Norrington added. "I believe that by going after Jack and Scarlette, he is trying to gain her favor. His father was after all a—"

"I know, Commodore, I know," Gov. Swann lamented. "But what have you done about it?"

"I have granted the Sparrows safety while in Port Royal. This means, if he wants to catch the bounty, he must leave Port Royal to do so and if they are here, one of them is more than likely to commit some act that would condemn them again. I am not trying to save their lives per say, but merely using them as an opportunity to rid ourselves of another nuisance."

The Governor nodded, smiling finally. "I like a man who thinks, Commodore. I admit when I saw the notice of their safety here I thought you'd made a mistake but I was the mistaken one. Good day, Commodore." The Governor turned to leave but stopped in the doorway. "Er, Commodore?"

The man looked up from his papers. "Yes, Governor?"

"Have you found someone to escort to the ball yet?"

Norrington smiled. "I have, sir."

Governor Swann smiled. "I should have known you would find one easily. Good day."

"Good day, Governor."

Anamaria sighed. "He's got less than a week before we go back to the code."

"You'd leave him?" Diana asked. "Just like that?'

"No, not just like that," Anamaria answered. "I'd feel bad about it but we've got to stick to the code or we're not pirates. Plus, his direct order was to leave if he didn't show in a month."

"A month moored at Isla de Muerta," Diana corrected.

"Well, that gives him two weeks tops. We've been here fifteen days already."

"Has it really been that long?" Diana asked.

"Aye, that it has."

Gibbs moped about the bowsprit, looking longingly out to sea. "I hate bein' stuck here but I'll do anything for Jack. I wonder if he even made it out of the noose."

"Of course he did," Diana told him. "Don't give up hope and if you do, don't do it aloud. You'll crush other peoples' hope."

Gibbs looked at her. "You talk mighty smart fer a woman. Hope you weren't bad luck after all."

"That's the spirit," Anamaria scoffed under her breath.

Barbossa and Mei Lin had to do something and fast. The Dragon had taken a shot the night of Jack's escape and the two ships had moored in New Orleans, which hadn't been far from the attack.

Blowing the passenger ship sky high hadn't helped matters, for neither the Dragon nor the privateer deck had been far enough away to avoid the shock totally. So Barbossa and his men settled in New Orleans while the ships were being looked at. The repairmen had been paid a hefty sum to keep their mouths shut on anything they might have discovered and they were keeping quiet.

Coincidentally, Ragetti and Pintel, everyone's favorite one eyed man and ex-dwarf stumbled in to Rosette's parlor. Seeing their condition, she told them the ladies were off resting but the bar was open. They sat at the stools and drank while chatting about their new favorite subject. Belle Watling.

"She's a real beaut, ain't she," Ragetti slopped, dripping his drink over himself. "I loves tall women."

"You got'a stop wantin' t'ings ya cain't 'ave," Pintel told him.

"I wanted my glass eye an' I got it."

"Yea, but dat was diffrunt. You know it. Belle b'longs ta dat shaggy bloke. Barton, I reckon he's called. I wouldna tangle wit'im. They say he eats rats."

"Oi, Pintel … you reckon rats be one o' dem forbidden meats they was talkin' 'bout? Maybe dis Barton bloke is—"

"Would you stuff it wif de Bible talk already! You can't even read an' all ye've been talkin' bout be that bloody book!"

"Yeah, but I tol' ya b'fore, ya get credit fer tryin' … and we ain't immortal no more … I done some bad things, but dat don't mean I'm all bad … Oi, look, Pintel!" Ragetti pointed. "She's got a picture of ol' Jack Sparrow!" Sure enough, the portrait Jack had spoken of, the one the poster had been modeled from, was stuck to the wall by dagger behind the counter.

Pintel fixed a nasty yellow eye on Rosette. "What's your name, girl?"

"I'm Rosette," she told him "What's it to you?"

"You know anyone named Scarlette?"

"Scarlette Sparrow you mean?"

"Yeah, 'at's the one. You know her and dat rat in da picture?"

"They were just here two nights ago," she answered. "Moved out by now, I reckon. That'll cost you seven bits each."

"Can we pay you in reales?" Pintel asked.

"Sure." He put out fourteen reales, paying for Ragetti who couldn't count to ten if his life depended on it. They left Rosette's place none the wiser except that they thought they were smarter. Better questions would have been "What was he doing here?" "Where was he headed?" and "Do you know anyone else who could give me some information?" but those were other questions for smarter pirates to conquer.

It was their third day on the island and Jack's wound was healing at the edges. Ryoko told him that he'd have a scar but he didn't seem to care. It didn't hurt as much anymore, or he'd just gotten used to it.

Eric had pulled the boat up and began sleeping in it, using Jack's torn shirt as his pillow. They had clothing, food, drink and somewhat of a shelter over their heads. No one could ask for more, given the situation. Jack had told Eric to catch a gull and the boy had tried and tried, not having much luck.

"He's never going to catch one of those," Ryoko told him.

"I didn't intend for him to," Jack agreed. "We couldn't eat one anyway. Cooking it would release an odor of roasting meat that would alert Barbossa should he come near."

"So you sent him out there to occupy himself?"

"Precisely."

She shrugged and leaned against a tree to watch. The gulls were toying with the boy, dive bombing him from behind and raking his untidy hair. He would fall over and yell at the birds, only to go chasing after them again.

"How's your arm?" she asked.

"Fine," he grunted. "It's getting darker. We should move back into the trees." He called the boy in and they retreated into the shade of the greenery.

For about a quarter mile, the trees were luscious and thick but the trio had set up a makeshift camp near the fallen tree/cabinet, surrounded by the thick ring of trees. It was a clearing not far from the miniature lake. Neither the clearing nor the little lake could be seen from the shores.

Darkness came quickly that night, the moon barely a crescent, coming back from its black stage. Eric, obviously following the male role model, drank himself to sleep in the little boat.

"See what you've done, Jack?" Ryoko pointed out. "You know you could drink him under the table and beyond. You shouldn't make it a competition. The poor kid is going to be in a world of hurt come morning."

"I noticed you didn't stop him," Jack countered, taking a swig of his own bottle.

"What ever," Ryoko gave up. She couldn't win against Jack, try as she might.

"Do you think anyone's worried about you?" he asked, suddenly serious.

"You mean in the future? Maybe. Anita is I guess. I know a few people who would be. The rest just use me. I have a feeling that if I had been expendable last year, they all would have shown their true colors against me instead of humoring me."

"What about your parents?" he asked. She was quiet for a moment.

"I think my dad hates me," she told him frankly. "Maybe he doesn't hate me, but he doesn't act like he likes me. Everything I do seems to be wrong. I'm the black sheep in his perfect family, I guess. I wear black, he picks on that. I play a bass instrument, he picks on that. I do well in language arts and creative classes, he throws math at me." she tossed a rock into the bushes. "God, I hate math. He wants to move away from home. It'll be far enough away that seeing my friends very often will be a major pain."

"What about your mother?"

"I knew you were going to ask that," she sighed. "My step mother goes along with what he says mostly. It's an argument that I'll never win. I've just got to bide my time until I move out. She's all right sometimes but she just contradicts herself like crazy to the point where I don't know what to say or do to please her. As you may have noticed, I'm not the image of femininity."

He was quiet all through this, taking a drink intermittently. She turned to him and pointed. "It's your turn now. I've met your mom. What about your dad?" She reached into the tree and grabbed a bottle, not really paying attention to which except by staying away from the far left where the "big stuff" was.

"He was a Spaniard born in India with a French-Irish name," Jack said simply. "Quite a swordsman, from what I learned, but a bigger drunk. He had a taste for adventure but was adamantly against piracy, or at least he told my mother so. Didn't seem to stop him from becoming one himself," He took another swig and she opened her bottle, sniffing the liquid.

"I was born in India as well during some venture or other. When I was still young and unspoiled, we moved to New Orleans. He sent me to school in England, the best he could manage. My mother didn't want me going off to Spain so he sent me to London."

"That makes sense," she agreed. "I can see why you've got a better vocabulary than most pirates."

He nodded and she sipped the liquid. It tasted bitterly sweet with an underlying tang somewhere in the mix. She tried it again; noticing that the slight spice it struck wore out the more she drank of it. Soon she was sipping just as if it were a soft drink.

"I guess you could say I didn't like my father either," he added. "He wasn't very faithful to my mother. No one's quite sure how he was killed," Jack paused thoughtfully. "He was found in the river but he'd been stabbed and shot and was covered in burn scars. They only knew him from his jewelry."

"I'm sorry," Ryoko said softly. Jack shrugged.

"Don't be," he told her. "He was a bastard anyway. Did my mother good to be rid of him. He used to joke that she was number fourteen of fourteen wives. I didn't see her much after that. Believe it or not, my turn to piracy was not of my choosing. I was once a cartographer's apprentice with the East India Trading Company. I was swept up in the idea of sailing and through one mistake or adventure after another, I have risen to what you see before you, a notorious Captain. You did say your stepmother, right? What about your mother?"

Ryoko sighed. "I suppose it won't hurt to tell you some of it. I've learned to distance myself from the tale so my emotions don't get in the way of the telling." She took a long drought from the bottle and Jack noticed it. When she put it down, he was laughing.

"You grabbed at the wrong side of the shelf, luv," he pointed to the bottle in her hand. "That's a hefty mix, one of my favorites. It doesn't taste like much but there's more in it than in most. You'll be worse off than the boy come morning if you keep at it."

She smiled at him, her eyes still clear. "I'm not feeling much effect from your bottles, Jack. May I continue?"

"Oh, certainly. By all means, talk," he motioned with his hand and she noticed that he was clearly getting drunker than she was. She didn't even feel the slightest bit woozy.

"She and my dad had gotten divorced a couple years before and my brother and I were living with her. She'd had boyfriends here and there, no one too mean or too nice. She had pretty good judgment concerning us anyway. She was beautiful to me. Of course, every little girl thinks her mother beautiful but she really was. She had long dark hair and dark skin. She was Indian, not from India, but the new colonies. I got most of my looks from her but my golden hair and green eyes came from somewhere else. My dad, of course, though his hair is as black as hers was. Anyways, she had this one boyfriend that seemed all right. I was a kid then and intuition meant nothing to me. If I felt anything weird about him, I dismissed it as my imagination. I don't really remember what I though about him before." She took a drink and breathed deeply.

"He and my mom had been fighting on and off while he was staying with us. It was normal. On night in March, they just started going at it. I closed my door and put a pillow over my head, trying to stifle their voices. I was useless around violence back then. I'd never been around it. I hardened up quick.

"The shouting stopped of course. I can't remember if I went in and saw what had happened or if I imagined the details but my mind had shut down to protect itself. I woke up that morning to find a police officer in my room. He dressed me, tied my shoes the special way. I guess you wouldn't know. Anyways, he wrapped my brother and me up in our blankets and took us out of the house. We were set in my dad's truck and he started the engine and drove off. You look confused."

"I got you until the truck part," he admitted.

"Remember when you first saw us?" she asked. "When there were all those loud things going by really fast in the road? The smaller ones are cars, the bigger ones are trucks. It gets much more complicated but I'm not the one to ask. You want the details on cars and trucks; wait 'till we get back to Port Royal. Nick knows all about them."

They both paused and drank. Ryoko continued.

"Well, I had heard stories about parents kidnapping their kids from each other and I was smart for a kid. I asked him if she knew he was taking us. He just sort of thought about it and told me that our mother had gone away. Now that wasn't too specific for a seven and three year old so we took it to mean she was on a trip and hadn't taken us with her. I didn't really understand until later that day when my aunt came to talk. My mother was dead and I didn't know it." Her face was very serious, the only hint that she might have given to sorrow were her slightly red cheeks, and that might have been attributed to liquor.

"That bastard of a boyfriend had killed her in a rage," Ryoko hissed. "And my father hadn't the courage to tell us outright. That's when I started not trusting my father. That and the fact that he thought I was some fragile little girl. Up until then, he may have been right, but I had strength enough to get through my mother's death and I had my own shell now. No one needed to protect me. I was my own protector even though I was smaller than everyone else was. I'm still small but no one that knows what they're doing seriously messes with me. I've got clowns like you who push my buttons and get my temper but bastards like Barbossa are the ones I'm talking of."

She stopped and drained the last of the bottle. Tossing it away, she concluded. "Emotion is a curse. Don't let on that you care about something and no one will use it against you. They are going to try to use me against you, Jack just because they think they know what's going on. Don't let them use me. I don't mean anything to you. I'm just bait, as Barbossa put it. You may need me to find whatever it is you're looking for but don't let on or we're all done for."

Jack had sat in silence through the last and contemplated what she had said, carefully choosing his words. "You speak from experience. The curse of emotion has run athwart of you before."

"And it has you as well," she pointed out. "You're just as guarded as I am, if not more. I know why you shut your doors. You keep thinking back to the day you first lost the Pearl to Barbossa. You never fully trusted anyone again."

"Barbossa wasn't the first one to take that ship from me," he said quietly. "Barbossa pales in the list of men I'd like to end permanently, but there's no reason for you to ever meet half of them. I would kill a man for knowing half of what you know about me, luv. I can't, or rather, won't kill you. But I can get you to tell me your big secret."

"I have no secrets," she whispered. "I have only my anger. My whole life I've been promised things, promised happiness or something better to come and every damn time, I get let down, disappointed. Whether it be by my friends, teachers, parents, anybody. Everybody. They swear God loves everyone but why is it every time something good finally happens, it all gets torn away like that scab on your arm. Every time I start to heal, they tear the wound up again. It'll only be so long until my patience is bled out."

She hit the ground with her fist, disturbing a bit of dust that settled powdery fine along the bottle. She leaned her head back and squeezed her fingernails into her palms. She would not cry in front of this man, not if she could help it. Once she calmed herself enough, she glanced back at him.

"You want to know my secret? I'll tell you. Someone I trusted got through all my defenses and I thought I was safe. Finally, someone understood because they had the same philosophy. I willingly let them in and didn't guard myself. I did what everyone was urging me to do. Open up, let someone in. You know what happened? The one person I thought could never hurt me because we were too alike, did worse than anyone else did. They knew exactly how it was and they still devastated me. I would never knowingly do that to someone and anyone who would, shouldn't be around to hurt people."

The tears finally fell, warm and sultry, falling down her tanned face without a sound to mingle with the sand below. She knew that if he touched her now, the salt filled droplets might never stop but she didn't care.

He moved over and pulled her into his arms, moving the left one a bit slower. She turned away at first but he was persistent. She finally gave in and curled against him, hiding her face from the world as he protected the rest of her.

After awhile, the tears did stop and she halfway pulled away from him. She felt vulnerable afterwards and ended up against him again, his arms securely around her waist. She closed her eyes and just basked in his warmth.

One of his hands began to trace a circle on her hip, the thin cloth of the breeches she was wearing not much for blocking the sensation. She was content enough that this did not disturb her nor did the warmth of his lips against the back of her neck. She turned in his arms, perhaps to ask what he was doing, but she was not given the chance. He met her mouth and sealed it with his own. Her surprise almost broke through but he was not satisfied to let it stop there. His lips met hers with varying pressure, backing off to short, soft teasing bits of contact and deepening to long, openmouthed kisses that left them breathless.

Her arms went up around his neck and he smiled against her mouth. "This is definitely a change." She looked at him from inches away, this time her green eyes bearing no anger. He took her at her glance and pressed his lips to hers in a most demanding way. He leaned until she was against the sand, and he above her, locked at the mouth and then she opened her lips, letting him through.

His hands were working all the while, unbuttoning the loose shirt she wore, each button slipping away signifying the last strands of his control. The shirt came away and he ran his hands down her pale chest, his darker skin stark against hers. He hesitated over the bra and stopped to look at it, sliding a finger below the under wire and running over the scars patterned there. He touched the larger scar below her left collarbone.

Looking at her face, he knew he mustn't stop for any length of time or they might leave that clearing hating each other. He merely ran his rough hands down her stomach, stopping at her waistband. He pressed his warm lips to her throat and she gasped as he slid his fingers past the line of the breeches. He met the resistance of another type of futuristic garment, elastic. This was easily conquered and he massaged her lower abdomen, enjoying her gasps before going any farther. He dragged his hand away from her stomach and met her lips with a new fervor, mainly to distract from what was about to happen.

He pulled the strings on her breeches and easily coaxed them down without any resistance. She was well distracted, running her hands down his firm tanned chest. He placed a knee between her legs and forced them apart, lying between them, allowing her to grasp the full situation. She gasped and tried to draw a breath but he stole it and explored her mouth some more. Her warm little hands were traveling down his back like butterflies, softly caressing. He wanted her attention elsewhere now and he gave a gentle shove against her lower body to draw it there.

Her hands became quiet, resting lightly at his waist. He moved to go further and she stopped his hand, her fingers barely going around his wrist.

"I can't go any further than this," she whispered quietly. He grinned and kissed her again, forcing his tongue into her mouth. She turned her head away from him and said in a clearer voice. "Either you're drunker that I think you are or you're under the impression that I am. Enough, Jack. This is a bad idea."

He lowered his lips to her throat and she gave a shiver. If he kept this up for long, she wouldn't be able to stop him. She placed her hands firmly on his shoulders and attempted to push him off. He grinned, his drunken smile holding more than one might expect, and rolled, moving off her like a large playful cat. She stood, staggering a bit and slid her breeches up, tying them securely. She sat down again and closed her eyes. She fell asleep and slid down the tree, falling in a line. Jack stretched out beside her and they both slept.

Mei Lin was not about to stay in New Orleans if she could help it. She knew Jack was hiding somewhere out at sea but as for where she couldn't guess. She stole a small sloop and set off, ignoring the shouts from the dock.

"Relax, gents," Barbossa growled from his place by a post. "She'll bring it back once she finds what she wants."

Mei Lin didn't know much about ships but she knew enough to maneuver her way out to sea. It had been dark for hours and Mei Lin crossed her arms in despair. She was lost and her childish impulse to go and find Jack had failed.

The sloop drifted without guidance, rising gently with the swells. Mei Lin drifted off with it, the waves lulling her to sleep. She curled in a little ball, her knees drawn up to her chin and she slept, her straight black hair covering her shoulders in a shiny film.

She woke with the dawn and started her futile chore again, not knowing if she was heading in the right direction or not. Her upturned eyes searched the horizon inexorably but she found nothing. Mei Lin spent another hard-floored night in the bottom of the sloop and well past midnight, the moon almost half-full now, she woke to the sensation of the hull scraping sand. She popped her head above the gunwale and her sight fell on an island.

She smiled for the first time in days and jumped from the sloop, her little feet not making a sound as she pattered over the sand.

She perched silently in a tree and listened, fear gripping her like a hand at the things she heard. The song she was hearing made her want to run and hide.

Ryoko woke gradually, aware that the sun had been up for a while. She was fully clothed and she was warm. She drew in a deep breath and felt arms tighten around her waist, pulling her close against a firm body. That woke her up far enough to realize her head was going to split. She turned to find Jack, propped up on his elbow, his shirt carelessly untucked and unbuttoned, showing his flat chest off. He kept a hand on her waist and looked at her strangely.

She raised an eyebrow, pulled herself to her feet, and stumbled off to the shore, her stomach heaving and her head splitting.

She dropped to her knees and cast onto the sand, only bringing up liquid. There was something exploding behind her eyes that made her vision blurry and indistinct, as if there were a creature in her skull trying to get out. She finally sat on her legs, bent over her knees, her head resting in the sand.

Jack watched her from the edge of the tree line, leaning calmly against a palm tree. The liquor sat well with him from the night before, his head barely throbbing. She stood and walked past him not even glancing at him. He followed her back into the tree line where she sat down by the felled tree.

"Remind me not to drink so much," she whispered, leaning her head against the tree. "My brain is trying to escape through my eye sockets and I've never thrown up that violently before in my life. How's Eric doing?"

"He's fine," Jack answered. "He got up and went about his business like usual. His drink didn't seem to stick to him much. He has a faster metabolism than we do. I told you you'd have a rough time of it last night."

"You did?" she muttered absently. She yawned and made herself more comfortable against the tree. "I don't really remember much of last night. How much did I drink?"

Jack help up a bottle and sat on the tree above where she was leaning. "One of these and you'd had something earlier. This is a mix of stuff, the flavors canceling each other out, giving it a sweet enough taste that the liquor is masked. You don't even realize how much is gone until the bottle is empty. Very good for rookies like you, though I wouldn't recommend drinking the whole bottle."

"You're going to make an alcoholic out of me," she yawned. Eric ran up, his little voice highly excited. "Stop chittering at me! I have a headache and you're a soprano!"

"Scarlette, Scarlette! Look what I found! Come see!" She knotted her brows and looked up at Jack.

"Didn't we tell him my real name?"

"A name's a name, Ryoko or Scarlette, you're branded either way."

"But I'm not your wife," she pointed out, allowing the child to pull her from the ground.

He gave her a strange little smirk. "Was last night your first blackout?"

She shrugged. Eric was tugging on her hand and she was slowly being pulled away by the insistent child. "I remember talking to you and drinking but after that, my mind's blank. I don't even remember what we were talking about." She turned and followed the child.

Jack laughed and shook his head. She didn't remember. Nothing had changed between them in her eyes and he found that hilarious and just slightly wearisome. He shook his head again. It would probably be the last time that anything like that occurred. She wouldn't get that drunk again and if she did, she wasn't likely to black out. He almost wished he'd ignored her protests for he was sure he could have won her over with a few more minutes of coaxing.

He slid down to lean against the tree. "Oh, well. Maybe it's a good thing she doesn't remember. She'd probably slap me for it if she didn't shoot me first."

Eric led Ryoko off into the clearing and past the lake. He made sure she was following and disappeared into the foliage.

"Hey, wait for me," she cried, looking though the small opening in the trees. She squeezed through and her eyes widened. There was another small clearing almost completely encompassed by the trees forming a sort of cage made out of rough bark. There was a trap door in the center of the clearing and Eric was pulling on the handle he'd uncovered. The thing was obviously locked and she didn't see any means of opening it. Eric went to fetch Jack while she wandered around the confined space.

She pressed a hand to the roughened bark of one of the trees and blinked away the dizziness still encompassing her brain. She shook her head and frowned. It seemed she'd been waking up beside Jack now for days, weeks … and it still surprised her every time. However, she no longer felt like panicking when he got too close. What was happening to her?

Eric returned then, followed by Jack. Upon seeing the pirate, she frowned again and turned away.

"Well, you've discovered it," he said through the trees. "I wasn't going to tell you about it yet. That will be our hideout when Barbossa shows up. You and the kid are going to get down inside there while I cover the top enough to disguise it."

"And what are you going to do?" she asked. "Stand upon it and fight to the death?"

"No," he answered. "I'm going to run off into the water and swim. There's a cave underneath this island that comes up right there. I'll show you." He squeezed through the opening in the trees and pulled the door open easily. It hadn't been locked but that had been the appearance. The door stopped halfway open and hung there with a certain stiffness. He bade them to follow and Ryoko glanced down into the pit, not trusting the musty scent rising from its depths. Eric had already scampered down and was yapping excitedly.

Ryoko didn't really want to go down into the pit but Jack held his hand out for her, waiting patiently as if he could wait there forever. She took his hand, and allowed him to pull her down into the pit after him.

The cave below included a bed, a hammock, and several boxes of miscellaneous stuff. Plenty of gold and other treasure littered the place and Eric was going wild. There was a drop off, the granite floor giving way to a gradual slope that disappeared beneath the water. Light from the sun bounced off the sandy bottom and lit up the cave, giving the illusion that the water was one wavering light. There were wall sconces with old oil lamps and plenty of other necessary objects.

"But doesn't your old crew know about this island?" she asked him, the light glinting off her face.

"Not about this cave," he answered. "They know about the tree and the lake but this cave was my own little discovery. I furnished it and put everything down here. We should move the contents of the tree down here as well in case we've got to make a run for it." And that was their project for the next hour. They ferried the bottles down to the cave as well as the boxes that had been in the back of the shelves hidden by the bottles. By the time they finished, the sun was setting.

"I must have really overslept this time," Ryoko noticed. "The sun is already going down."

She stretched her arms above her head and something occurred to her. She looked at her arms and legs, or what she could see of them and decided she really needed a bath.

She waited until Eric was out dead, sleeping in the hammock below. She told Jack where she was going and he told her he'd sit with his back to her, making sure their buddies in the ships didn't arrive just in time for the show.

She wasn't sure why but she trusted him not to look. Digging through the boxes, she'd found some lye soap, which usually didn't smell the greatest but must have been made with rose petals for the perfume and the color. She knew that the petals could be crushed and added to the lye before baking the soap and she was grateful for something other than water.

She smiled as she put a foot gingerly into the water. It was lukewarm with the Caribbean heat and would suit her just fine. She washed her hair, doing as best she could with the lye, trying not to get the corrosive soap in her eyes. Her skin could take it but her eyes could not. She hummed absently to herself, a song she knew from her time.

"Does that song have any words?" Jack asked from the darkness, startling her into remembering that he was there. She looked at him to make sure he was facing the other direction.

"It does, but I can't understand them," she admitted. "They're in Chinese."

He smiled in the dark. "Sing the words and I'll tell you what they mean." He did not hear Mei Lin who had just beached the sloop at the shore.

Ryoko hesitated but shrugged and began to sing. She liked the song because it sounded mournful, though she couldn't understand the lyrics. As she sang, Mei Lin launched herself into the tree and was just in time to hear it. She froze at its haunting melody and trembled. It was a ghost song, she felt. A song not to be sung, for the lyrics, nothing unusual in Ryoko's time, caused fear in this time. A song of omen and Mei Lin, not seeing Jack yet, took Ryoko to be a ghost, her pale flesh illuminated by the moonlight, giving her a frightening luster in the other woman's eyes.

Mei Lin tried to slide down the tree in silence but her fear made her clumsy. Her foot snapped a branch and the ghost's eyes searched her out in the darkness.

Jack was up and running, searching out the girl in the dark. He loomed dark and ominous against the moon and all Mei Lin could think of was fear. She couldn't see Jack's face or anything else, his dark silhouette against the moon freezing her on the spot. He looked rather like a wild barbarian monster to her frightened eyes.

He pinned her to the ground easily, twisting her arms around and bringing her towards the water. Ryoko had sunk herself into the water until everything she didn't care to show was covered. Her hair spread out in the water spookily.

Jack pulled Mei Lin in her green silk into the clearing, the moon showing against her clothing and skin in an almost ethereal light.

"What's she doing here?" Ryoko asked. "Are the others here?"

"I'm going to check. You'll have to hold her," he dragged a bit of rope that dangled from a tree and fastened Mei Lin's wrists together. He did the same to her ankles and motioned.

"Jack," Ryoko began.

"Now don't let her move or she could get away. We don't want her warning her friends."

"Jack!"

"Better yet, sit on her. I'm sure you weigh enough to keep her down."

"JACK!"

"What?"

"I'm naked! I'm not holding anyone down!"

He grinned and shook his head. "Whoever said modesty was what made a woman. Here." He slipped the shirt off and tossed it to her. She caught it before it hit the water, stood in the shallow part and slipped it on in one fluid motion so that nothing was really seen, save for short glimpses. The shirt, like always, went well past her thighs and covered everything a 21st century girl would care about.

She stepped onto the sand and Mei Lin watched her come with large frightened eyes. Jack watched her too, but it wasn't fear on his face. Ryoko knew from watching too many martial arts movies that Mei Lin was dangerous even pinned. Ryoko rolled her onto her back and sat on her thighs while keeping her hands on the girl's shoulders. The result was Mei Lin and she having very close eye contact, the Indian's hair dripping water into the Chinese's clothing and hair.

Mei Lin still thought she was staring into a ghost's face when Ryoko began to speak. "What are you doing here?" She spoke slowly

Mei Lin tried not to speak but the ghost had asked her a question. She must answer the ghost or feel her wrath. She spoke in Chinese rapidly but Ryoko shook her. Mei Lin let forth a squeak. The ghost was angry.

"Speak English," Ryoko told her clearly.

"Mei Lin … no … I sorry. Don't hurt ... I don't hurt ... you."

"You won't hurt me?" Ryoko asked. "Why?"

"I ... can't, don't understand all. Need more words." Obviously, her English left her with her fear.

"Mei Lin," Ryoko whispered, bringing shivers from the other girl.

"You know name? How?"

"Jack told me."

"Sparrow? You are ... Sparrow's ... helper?"

"… Yes."

"Well, its all clear," Jack assessed, re-entering the clearing. "Only the sloop is on the beach and I looked around. No one else is out there."

Ryoko looked up from her spot. "Can I let her up now? She's terrified."

Jack frowned. "What of?"

"I can't figure that out. She isn't talking much sense, not in English anyways." Ryoko stood carefully and Jack hoisted Mei Lin to her feet, balancing her between the two of them. He spoke to her rapidly in Chinese, which sounded strange coming from him.

He laughed shortly. "She thinks you're a ghost. She said you were singing a bad song. Ryoko the ghost, better yet, Scarlette, the ghost that aids Jack Sparrow. That's good. It might scare some of the more persistent idiots away."

"That sounds retarded."

"Maybe to you, but these men are a rather superstitious lot."

Mei Lin spoke again, her eyes widening. Jack looked at the other girl. "I didn't know your name meant Demon Caller. It makes sense."

"Yeah, I call demons named Jack Sparrow," she said. "It also means two headed dragon but she shouldn't know that. Ryoko is Japanese."

Jack shrugged. "I guess she speaks a little. I certainly don't. She is absolutely terrified of you and I think we can use that to our advantage." He spoke to Mei Lin and she talked back, biting at him acridly with her quick tongue. Ryoko didn't understand but she caught that she wasn't cooperating. Jack gave Ryoko a look and smirked. He spoke again and the girl cringed, speaking softly. Jack, under that wonderful tan, paled.

"What's wrong," Ryoko asked warily.

"He's in New Orleans," Jack answered in a strained monotone. Ryoko understood immediately.

"We have to draw him away from there!" she exclaimed. "We don't know what he might do if he finds out you have a mother there!"

"Are we to draw him here?" Jack pressed her. "Would you really risk your life for someone you just met?"

"You don't understand," Ryoko told him. "No one deserves to lose a mother, not even you, Jack. I know how it is and I can't let that happen to anyone."

Jack regarded her with a strange interest, his dark eyes realizing who she really was. This girl, or woman depending on what time you put her in, was both part of Jack's threat and his weakness. He hadn't realized it but it had been true ever since she'd been dragged onto Barbossa's privateer ship.

She'd killed six men to get away from being raped but no woman's actions were acknowledged unless through men. What Barbossa's men saw was a woman who belonged to Jack Sparrow killing their compatriots. This made Jack look even bigger, for surely no woman that belonged to a man was better than he was.

Jack ran this through in his head and came up with a plan that just might work, if done right. He whipped out a dagger and sliced quickly through Mei Lin's ropes.

"What are you doing?" Ryoko asked him. He ignored her and freed Mei Lin's ankles as well, moving back immediately to get out of range of her kicks.

"I'm letting her go because she's bound to tell Barbossa where we are." He spoke quickly to Mei Lin and pointed. She glanced at Ryoko and ran off, flying quickly through the night, silently passing through the thick air.

"Why did you let her go? Do you want to be discovered?"

He looked at her tiredly. "I have but a week and a half to get us back to the Pearl. By letting Barbossa come under my terms, I can guarantee that the deadline is met. I told her that you would set upon her your wrath if we died any place other than Isla de Muerta, where the Pearl is moored. My ship can annihilate both those ships. Barbossa is taking us to the cave of course so that he can kill us. He's wanted to do it for so long that he'll prolong it."

"So he's coming here to capture us?"

"Yes but we've a change in plans. We still can't use fire because he's too smart for that. If he sees it, he'll know we're up to something and he may kill us on sight, or kill me at least. There are still uses for conquered women." He grinned, motioning for her to follow. He led her back down into the cave and shut the trap door, spilling them into darkness.

"I can't see anything!" Ryoko muttered, putting her hands out in front of her. Everything was silent and she was slightly frightened, though not enough to bother calling out or something silly like that. Jack was deliberately trying to frighten her, the way she saw it. He found it to be a test.

He knew exactly where everything was in the cave and knew that Eric was passed out again. The kid slept so soundly it was nearly impossible to wake him up. He woke up when his body had had enough rest.

Anyways, Ryoko was wandering around the room with her hands out, refusing to let her fear persuade her to call for Jack. He could hear her, moving her feet, barely leaving the floor so not to step into anything. He heard a splash and a groan and knew she'd stepped into the water.

Another sound echoed across the cave and it confused him. He realized she was moving clothes around and he heard her sigh in relief. He grinned in the dark and moved toward her as silently as he could manage. She was facing away from him and when he put his arms around her, she couldn't retaliate. She gave a little yip that is exclusively a girl noise and scoffed when she realized she'd done it.

He knew the reason for the sound. She'd found a pair of breeches, obviously tired of wearing just the shirt. Rather than telling him to let go, she began to untangle herself from his arms. He smirked and refused to release her.

"Jack," she started. "Are you going to let me go?"

"Maybe," he answered condescendingly. "If I feel the time's right for it."

"And when will that be?" she groaned.

He only laughed, his breath raising the hairs along her body in a wave.

"Either you're drunk or you think I am." It seemed to be a phrase she used a lot, with minor changes depending on the situation.

"Neither, luv," he whispered. He began to move, forcing her to walk with him. The world was turned upside down to where she didn't know up from down. He'd sat down and taken her with him and now she was thoroughly confused.

She knew she must be on the bed for nowhere else in the cave could have the texture and volume of what was beneath her. A rough hand closed around one of her wrists, pulling her forward, another hand going to the back of her neck.

She felt him looming in the dark and knew he was moving closer. "What do you think you're doing?"

He laughed and pulled her up to him, sitting her on his knees, her feet dangling above the floor. "You've got to live a little, luv," he told her easily. "We may die after the two days it takes them to sail this far and you're still being stubborn."

"Stubborn?" she asked, slightly peeved. "Stubborn you say. What do you want me to do? Lie down and let you have whatever you want? Do you think just because you're Jack Sparrow I'm going to fall for your charms like every other woman but Elizabeth? Oh, boy. Let me tell the world. Get in line to have a night with the infamous Jack Sparrow." She moved her arms with the words in a grand gesture.

"Captain Jack Sparrow," Jack commented in the darkness. Ryoko seethed and tried to get away again. He stopped her with ease of course.

"Sometimes I wonder if you even consider me as a friend," Jack told her, his words seeming more intimate than normal in the close darkness. "You are so cruel but I put up with it because I need you."

"I'm cruel?" Ryoko scoffed. "You turn everything into a suggestive meaning and it drives me insane!"

"Would it really pain you so much to be with me for a night?" Jack asked in an amused sort of way.

"Yes, it would," she told him in fact. Her face was a brilliant shade of red and luckily, it was too dark to see.

"Why?"

It was sort of an odd question but she answered it. "I don't love you, Jack," she told him. "And I know you don't love me, not that anyone would."

"Why must it be about love?" he asked. "Why must women complicate things?"

"Jack, some things need complication! I will not be your wench! I don't even know if I'm stuck in this time or not. If I become more than ... what I already am to you then what happens if I go back to the future?"

"You can't go back until the prophecy is fulfilled," Jack told her. "We know nothing about where this heir is. I say it again. What if the heir isn't born yet?"

"That is not my problem," Ryoko told him, truly believing her words. "And I do know what you're getting at. I am not having kids. Not yours, not anyone's, and especially not in the 18th century. Do you see how small I am? Petite women did not birth very well in this time! I can't believe we're even talking about this! Ask Anamaria to give you an heir. She might agree and she's better built for it."

She could feel him laughing in the dark. "Are all future women like this?"

"No, you just got lucky," Ryoko enlightened him. She was protecting her own emotions by fighting. She had sworn long ago that she would not be bested ever again in a war of hearts.

"How can you kill a man, even six men, and seven if you count Abuta, but get prudish when it comes to things like this?"

"That was self defense. They would have raped me or what all if I hadn't stopped them first. I realize you might do the same if I keep refusing, though I don't think that's in your nature."

"Only when all participants are drunk," he muttered. She ignored the comment, not knowing how close she'd come to making that statement true the night before.

"Jack," she told him, her voice tired. "I will play your wife, wench, woman, whatever you call it because that's pretty much who everyone assumes I am by now and in certain scenarios, it is safer than being something else, but until further notice, nothing in the way of ... your heir by means of me will be attempted. I certainly don't hate you. In fact you're probably one of my closest friends right now but I just can't sign myself over to you and this century just yet or even ever if it comes to that. I'm sorry."

"If you are going to play my wife, you need to make it believable," he whispered in the dark, taking what he could. "You blush too easily and are reluctant to the touch, though you're reluctant with anyone's touch, not only mine. I've noticed Lizzy hugging you or Will touching your shoulder. You've been hit one too many times, haven't you?"

He couldn't see it but he knew her jaw had dropped. "How did you know? I didn't tell you, did I?"

"No," he answered. "I know because I used to be that way. There was more than one reason why I didn't mourn my father's death as much as some would have wished."

"I'm sorry," she answered in a small voice.

"You don't need to fear me, luv," he told her. "I won't hurt you physically, however, we do need to work on your acting skills and my critique is brutal. You don't walk like a pirate's wench, let alone one that belongs to me. You need to have a swagger and an air. Show off your body even through the yards of cloth you wear."

"I don't need to act all the time," she mentioned. "Only when disguise is needed, right?"

"Wrong," he contradicted. "Any pirate or man that knows you are mine will not touch you. My threat is strong in the Caribbean and to be protected by it means utter shielding."

She nodded, her hair brushing his face. The darkness prevailed and even after the hour they'd been below, their eyes hadn't adjusted. There wasn't any light to adjust to. The lamps couldn't be lit with the hatch shut for there was no vent for the smoke to escape by.

"So what do I need to work on?" she asked, defeated, knowing she had somewhat dug her own grave in this endeavor.

"Well, I've noticed that you've gotten used to sitting on my knees by now," she was blushing, though he couldn't see it. "Stop blushing."

"How do you know I'm blushing?"

"I know you."

"Lucky me," sarcasm, of course. "I'll have you know that my school mates thought I was a spectacular actress."

"I'll bet. Now, you need to be calm through things like this or it will never work. Barbossa's pirates are gullible but other's aren't so stupid. You'll have to convince my crew as well and they aren't so dim in the head as Barbossa's idiots. Ready?"

"As ready as I'll ever be considering I don't know what you're going to do," she said honestly. He grinned in the dark and she knew it. She knew him as well.

"Don't blush and don't let on. Pretend it's nothing." The first thing she felt were his hands at her waist. He pulled her up to his chest putting her eyes even with his. Their height differences made eye contact easy and she could actually see his face a little. Then, quite suddenly, he tipped her into the crook of his arm and had her down on the bed, her head pooled in her own hair. On of his hands was around her thigh and she could feel his breath against her ear.

"You're blushing," he whispered, his voice making her shiver. "And you are trying not to frown. What happened to your spectacular acting skills?"

"Jack Sparrow," she told him. "You are a rogue."

"At least you didn't slap me," he answered. "In fact, I would never do this in front of anyone, but I might do this." And before she could ask him what, he followed her breathing and found her mouth. In his opinion, their drunk kisses had been much better than this because she completely froze with his contact and he pulled away.

"That really needs help," he told her.

"Sorry," she answered in a sulkish tone, trying to keep her temper at bay. "I haven't had much practice. As much as I'd hate to admit it, I've only really been kissed once. No one knows about it because I never told anyone who it was. The other three times were all stupid accidents. Once, a boy fell on me, another time, a guy was drunk, and then there was you on the ship. I'm not what you'd call the ideal woman in the 21st century, or even less so here. It's pathetic! I'm seventeen!"

"It could be worse," he told her. "You could be horribly ugly and overweight with pimples all over the place and hair in unlikely places like on your tongue or in between your toes."

"Please tell me you're not describing someone you know," she said. He laughed and kissed her cheek unexpectedly. It was on with the lesson.

By the end of another hour, Ryoko had had enough of it. She suspected he was putting her through this, tricking her, simply because he could. She caught herself thinking about an English author who'd written a scale for kissing out of ten. She berated her self for thinking such things and shut her eyes, though the room was dark.

Her mind would not sit still. She imagined answering questions her friends asked her. "So when, where, and who was your first French?"

"In the 1800's, in a dark cave, and a pirate captain who is the identical copy of Johnny Depp." She almost started laughing at the absurdity of it. Of course, she also laughed at the irony that she was in a place that many girls would kill to be in and she didn't exactly want to be there.

That always seemed to happen. When she'd found out that her pants size was a three, she got mad because she had to buy all new pants when most of the girls in her group were fives or sevens or up. Her bra size had gone up and she wasn't exactly happy about that either but everyone else was envious (well, not everyone else. She thought Robin was bigger than she was, possibly) A C wasn't that big. She swore she was ugly when she really had a refreshingly interesting face. Her voice could go from the tip of the tenor range to the middle of the soprano range. If she had any other person inside her, say maybe a girly cheerleader, she could have been the star of her school. Instead, inside that petite, beautiful, gifted little body, was an outgoing, highly eccentric tomboy that didn't give a shit what anyone thought of her.

Or maybe she cared too much.

She stretched out on the bed and got into a comfortable position. She knew Jack was lying on his back, staring at the ceiling he couldn't see and she didn't bother to tell him to behave himself. It didn't matter how they fell asleep, she would wake pressed against him with his arms firmly clamped about her waist. It was how she had awaken the four days they'd been on the island and she knew that if she continued to share a bed with the mischievous captain that it was probably how she'd wake up from that point on. She realized with an odd peace that it didn't bother her much.

Barbossa was sitting in a pub, dubbed the Purple Parrot. He couldn't drink anything or order anything but the smell of the rum in front of him calmed his nerves. Mei Lin had been gone for four days (two to get there, two to come back, which means Jack and Ryoko actually had four days to prepare). When she came striding into the pub, Barbossa was actually happy to see her.

"Hi, Big Beard," she addressed him.

"What did you find?" he asked her.

"I find Jack and woman," she answered. "She is China ghost. Very bad to cross."

"She's a demon caller?" Barbossa asked. "Ryoko, I think her name was."

"Yes. Bad to cross. Said that only if die in Island of Death, she not come hurt. Jack too."

"So we kill them at Isla de Muerta," Barbossa answered to the point. "I was planning on it anyway, a bit of irony in my revenge. Where are they?"

"Island, small, two days."

"He must be in the Sallow series of islands. Do you remember which one?"

"One with little lake. Many trees, big one on ground."

"Ah, his favorite. I should have known. Are you coming with us for the voyage?"

"I no go," Mei Lin told him adamantly. "I not cross Ghost Ryoko. She is Jack's protector."

"And vice versa, I daresay," Barton commented, moving up behind her. "Ryoko is no ghost. Do you want to know what I found out? Ryoko, alias Scarlette, is Jack's wife according to the local whorehouses. You'll also be pleased to know that a certain Captain has a mother in town."

"Are you certain?" Barbossa asked, leaping to his feet. "That thar be blackmail by the bundle! A mother, here! Well, it'll have to wait as a backup plan. If we can't kill him this time, we'll use it, but I really hope it don't come that far. You see, I had a mother once and not even I would stoop that low fer anyone but Sparrow. What about Ryoko?"

"His wife," Barton answered. "There were witnesses aboard the ship they came in on that they weren't acting like brother and sister, as they were presumed to be. Later on, I learned that Jack and Scarlette made a little visit to a cottage bungalow down at the south side of town. This would be his mother's house."

"And how did you obtain this information?" Barbossa asked.

"I tapped into a woman's mind," he explained. "You can do it too. Ragetti told me of a woman that had seen the two and I merely went to extract more information. Apparently, after rescuing the girl from us, he married her."

Barbossa laughed a tinny growl that struck a nasty chord throughout the pub. Men turned their heads to find the voice and quickly turned back once meeting his cold brackish eyes as briny as the sea.

He strode out of the pub, leaving his drink where it sat. He'd done nothing more than take a gulp, swish it around in his mouth and oust it in the spittoon a few feet away.

They returned to the privateer, which now had a name. Barbossa had decided ironically to call it the Black Opal for obvious reasons. The new lettering on the side struck a certain pride within his ebon heart and he grinned, showing off grimy teeth, the two pointed canines lighter than the rest. He boarded the ship and set out the call for all hands to return to deck. A few men were sent out to retrieve their comrades and at about 11:30, all hands were on deck.

"Gents," he growled. "And dame for Miss Belle. We be headin' out to the Sallow islands. The Sparrows, yes, that is plural, are on one of them and we be finally givin' that scallop what he deserves."

"What do you mean plural?" Twigg asked derisively.

"Gents, Jack Sparrow has become a tamed man," Barbossa grinned. "It appears the woman that killed six of our number has done it. Next time you see her, she'll be Mrs. Sparrow to you, and soon after, the widow Sparrow. I'll not be killin' her just yet and I don't expect you to touch her. She's too dangerous."

"A woman, dangerous?" Grapple scoffed, not dead after all.

"You'd better believe it, Grap, or else you might be one who gets killed by her. She's part of Jack's battery, no doubt. Only a man as mad as he could have landed one like her. In fact, I believe they be two of a kind. She's just as crazy as he is! But we know how to deal with them, do we not, gents?"

There were jeers and laughter. The pirates nodded as if he'd said something profound. He clapped his hands, commanding their attention again.

"Weigh the anchors, hoist the sails, man the decks, rigs, and the helm for we're off to the Sallow Islands."

And The Black Opal set sail, leaving The Poison Dragon in the harbor of New Orleans.

Little Previews of sorts?

Robin, Lizzy, and Claudia are getting ready for the ball. Will is trying to keep Elizabeth patient, David is becoming more and more prominent in Lizzy's mind, Tavington is springing out of the woodwork, Norrington and Gov. Swann are waiting, Nick is becoming more and more bored by the second, and Gillette is looking for a date.

Anamaria and Gibbs are anxiously counting the days while Diana mopes about, her mood and motive unknown. Jack the monkey has taken to hanging around her and she welcomes him. The monkey does not like the midget.

Anita Arenas is not doing well in school. She keeps falling asleep in class and dreaming of the past, where her friends seem to be dominant.

The Maxwell family of the 21st century has moved away from California to another state where two other girls have started having strange dreams about the movie, which uncannily includes five future girls and one boy. These girls are named Heather Cook, and Kristin Thornburg.

Mei Lin and her Asian crew bunk down in the Dragon as the reparations take place. The boat is being careened and caulked for voyage. Barbossa, Barton, and Belle are sailing hard towards the Sallows.

There's a storm in my pants.

And our friends Jack, Ryoko, and Eric are still on the largest Sallow, where Ryoko is just now beginning her lessons in sword fighting and romantic acting.

Stay tuned. A disclaimer to Sean Wilson-Luckinbill for reasons not yet stated. A disclaimer to the Purple Parrot, which is actually a cigarette and gambling store in Oregon. I just liked the name and thought it fit well with the fic. A page count leaves us at … 148!

Au revoir, until next time.

"Do you have the courage and fortitude to follow orders and stay true in the face of danger and almost certain death?" That is the most HORRIBLE line in the WORLD! We took that scene to Regional acting competition and I gargled it on our last performance and got counted down for articulation. Any way, the best two group acting ... movie scenes, Labyrinth and Pirates of the Caribbean were shot down brutally by the witches in Macbeth. Oh well. There's always next year ... hee hee.

Oh … well, I suppose I might as well tell you. This chapter was actually about a page longer because the scene with the ... drinking where Ryoko opens up her mind was ... longer before. The events conducted in the first cut of the chapter were ... very R rated. I didn't like them. They weren't … bad. They just didn't need to be there. If you want this special ... scene, I'll send it to you, but I warn ye, it might give you a stomach ache ... or worse. 0_0 _

Revisited Gossip?

Well, not gossip really. Just updates. I just finished acting in Peter Pan … I was a pirate, of course. I played Cookson, the pirate who, if anyone's seen or read the originals, after Starkey, Jukes, and Cecco die, accuses Hook of being the Jonah. I also got to guard Wendy and almost throw her overboard! I wrote the music for the pirates entrance and helped big time with costuming and make up, doing the war paint for most of the Indians (full body paint for the men) and Hook's make up. It was fun. Now I'm doing The Hobbit and I'm playing Essie the Troll … they're putting me up on stilts and stuff … it's going to be fun. Not only that, but I'll be doubling as a drummer once again (I was the drummer for the Indian dance scene in Peter Pan and now I get to be a Goblin drummer.)

Revisited on 10-27-03 … page count is … 216.