VARIOUS DISCLAIMERS: Credit for the original fanfiction university that inspired this spinoff goes to Camilla Sandman (also known as Miss Cam, creator of the legendary OFUM) and all her loyal followers. Disney owns PotC and all the characters therein. All future students of the University belong to themselves or to their creators and will be used only by specific request.

ALSO: I've gone fishing only once in my life, 4 or 5 years ago. I caught two fish, one little one that I apologized to profusely and released, then another that was over a foot long and whom I was afraid of. The only thing in this chapter derived from personal experience is a general feeling of bewilderment and panic. Feel free to correct any errors in the actual procedures or terms, because though I did research trawling and Caribbean fish in general, I'm not sure that I learned enough to conceal my complete ignorance of the subject.

Scarlett and Giselle's life stories are entirely made-up, but they are two fairly common examples of the situations of 18th century prostitutes. The info about rum and other alcoholic beverages is historically accurate, though the exact process of its manufacture varies depending on the region. I know this chapter took forever for me to write, much longer than it should have, but it's long and unusually educational, which I hope will do a little to make up for a month of no updates.

The events of the third movie won't take effect in the story-verse until after the school year ends, because it would require some pretty weird rearrangements of everything. If I do a second year as planned, Sao Feng and the pirate brethren will join the staff then to add any relevant lessons to the curriculum.


The next morning they were dragged out of bed before sunrise by Anamaria, who herded the bleary fangirls across the docks and onto a small, sturdy fishing boat anchored at the other end of the docks.. The piers were decorated with the sprawled figures of unconscious pirates, and the fishermen were readying their boats and nets and calling out brief commands, their weathered faces softened by the dim predawn light. Anamaria turned and looked them over briefly before drawing up the gangplank.

"Do we have everyone? Good. Today you gonna get some personal experience working on a fishing boat so that if you write characters who are fishermen or fishermen's daughters, you'll at least have some idea of what their lives were like. We're going out, you learn to fish using a net and learn about the fish you catch, and this afternoon when we come back, we sell the fish, split the profits, and you are all free to go shopping." Everyone perked up a bit at that. Money! Shopping!

"Now, raise the sails and cast off. Don't give me those expectant looks, you're doing this yourselves. You can't expect to take over an enemy ship if you're not able to learn out how an unfamiliar ship works." After a bit of disorganized fumbling, they got the sails and the lines sorted out and were moving cleanly out of the harbor. It was quite a bit easier to sail than the Pearl, fewer masts, a simpler rigging, and much less ship to worry about in general. Anamaria stood by the helm and gave Tierza, who was at the tiller (steering), directions, and they sailed around the coastline for ten minutes, then headed into the open sea.

"What we are doing today," Anamaria explained as they dropped a weighted line to check the depth of the water, "Is called trawling, dragging a weighted net behind the boat. Deep-water fishing makes a profitable living for many in the Caribbean because there's deep water not far from the shore on many of the islands."

"Why did we have to go around the island like that?" Kelsey wanted to know.

"Tortuga is right off the coast of Hispaniola. If we'd gone straight, we wouldn't have been sailing into open ocean, we'd be sailing straight towards Port-de-Paix," Angel explained in an undertone. Kelsey nodded.

"What kind of fish are we gonna get?" Kat asked, looking at the net curiously. "Some of the little fish are going to get through this thing."

"Ah, but the point of deep-water fishing is to catch big fish," Anamaria said with a grin. "My father's caught fish bigger than he is in these waters. We have larger nets, for when you want to bring back a load of only the biggest fish, but this time you girls gonna get more out of seeing the variety of things you catch with a smaller meshed net. Now, you have to learn to cast it. All right, you stand here, you here… Holly, I want you to lift that weighted corner there, and Grace, you take that one… Who can tie knots? Becca? Fasten the line here as securely as you can. Sarah, you just stepped into part of the net. You go overboard with it when we cast it, and you gonna feel very foolish …" she strode around them, rapping out instructions and sorting out the nets and lines with practiced speed and efficiency. At that moment, it was very easy to believe that she had once captained her own fishing boat, entirely in her element, even commanding a crew of amateurs. "Now on my signal, hurl the net overboard. Don't drop it over the side, give it a good pitch out away from the boat. Ready… and… cast!" The students threw the big mesh contraption out into the water with a splash.

"And now we move! All standing, make full sail and keep 'er running with the wind! Tighten the line on the leading edge…. Perfect!" The students found themselves following her orders with more coordination and speed on the small fishing boat than they had managed so far on the Pearl. Between adjusting sails and checking lines, they listened to Anamaria's descriptions of other types of fishing used in the Carribean, such as coracle fishing, trammeling, angling, and the use of baited longlines and traps. Several of the students took a genuine interest and soon there was an animated discussion going on, but Abby, who had always thought of fishing as something that other people did and wasn't sure she'd even be able to bring herself to kill a fish, leaned against the mast and tried not to fall back asleep in the soft morning breeze.

They sailed in a wide arc and by midafternoon, they were heading back towards the coast. Just outside the bay, before they entered the shallower water of the port, Anamaria let them haul the net up on deck to see what they'd caught. It rose out of the water slowly, the netting straining to hold its burden of thrashing, dripping bodies.

"It… won't… come… up!"

"Are you sure they can't get out of the net?"

"Of course they can't, the question is can we get it onto the ship?"

"We need more people for this!"

"SHUT UP and PULL HARDER!" Anamaria shouted as the net wobbled violently and started to slide slowly back down towards the sea. "NOW!" Abby gritted her teeth and hauled on the line she held until her arm muscles felt like overstretched rubber bands and the blisters on her palms had opened up and stained the coarse rope with blood and pus.

"Fish," Koneka panted as they began to pull the net over the railing of the side, "Are not supposed to be this heavy. What the crap."

"Oh my god, there's sharks in there! And… oh no, there's a dolphin!"

"The dolphin! Anamaria, there's a dolphin, what do we do?" Linsey asked, running up to it and staring, aghast, as it thrashed against the net, its tail briefly stunning a small shark and a tuna. The dark-skinned woman came over, saw it, and cursed under her breath with concise and heartfelt profanity.

"What any sailor with his wits about him would- we put her back in the water. No, don't pet her. If I were her, I'd be trying to bite us myself. All right, we have to lower the net back into the water partway, and I need one strong swimmer down there with me to lower a corner of the net so the dolphin can get out. Nina, you can do it?" Anamaria glanced over at the thin, dark haired young girl who nodded.

"I was on a swim team not long ago."

"Perfect, dive now and I'll follow when I've helped them get the net back over the side. All right, keep holding it steady. Summer, Grace, Cate, I want you to push on the part of the net that's made it over the side." There was a splash in the background as Nina jumped overboard.

"And you do realize that that this, here in front of me, that you want me to start pushing with my bare hands, is a shark," Grace pointed out, hesitating and pointing at a pair of snapping jaws menacing her through the netting as the others started shoving at the other ends of the bulge of live fish hanging over the deck.

"Hurry, this thing is too heavy," Kat got out between clenched teeth as the others leaned back, straining to keep supporting the weight of the net.

"Cate, you're less easily damaged than the rest of us thanks to spelling mistakes, you handle the shark, let Grace take the other corner," Anamaria snapped out as she wrestled an indignant marlin the size of a german shepard over the side. The pail-skinned student complied, and a suddenly confused shark was pushed tailfirst off the ship by iron hands as Grace did battle with an armful of panicked tuna. There were several groans and grunts as the additional weight pulled on the lines, and Summer and Cate barely managed to catch the one that slid out of Abby and Kelsey's hands before it slipped down with the net. Anamaria dropped her hat on the damp wood panels of the deck and dove into the waves to join Nina.

"A bit lower," she yelled up to the crew. Abby would have liked to see what was going on in the water, but it was all she could do to keep the line from tearing itself out of her grip again and taking half her palms with it in the process. Later, Anamaria described it as four or five minutes, but it felt like several hours before the dolphin was finally safely back in the water and they could haul the net the rest of the way up. As soon as it touched the deck, they collapsed into limp piles of sweaty teenager and watched the fish shimmer in the sunlight. At some point Anamaria and Nina climbed back on board, and Abby listened to their conversation distantly with the small bit of her brain that wasn't busy telling the rest of her body how much it hurt.

"I didn't know fishermen in this century protected dolphins. I mean, I know it's illegal to kill them in 2007, but those laws were only made in the last few decades. Not that I'm not glad we let the poor thing go, but… would most fishing boats do that?"

"Catch and eat the spirits of their fellow sailors lost at sea? Not many, in these parts at least. I had an uncle who refused to bring in a single one, even if he had to cut his nets open and lose half his catch to let them go. When he was a boy, his ship was lost in a storm and the rest of the crew was lost. The mast had fallen on him when it snapped and his leg was broken, but he was rescued by the dolphins. They swam under him and supported him, kept him at the surface so he could breathe, and took him back to the port. The bone healed badly and he walked with a limp for the rest of his days, but he never forgot he owed the spirits his life."

"Do you really believe that they're the spirits of sailors lost at sea, though?" Nina asked curiously. Anamaria gave her a blank look.

"That is like asking, do I really believe in the tides, or do I really believe in God. They are what they are, whether I believe or not. What's wrong with your friends?" she asked, motioning towards the deck strewn with human bodies.

"We're dead," Becca explained in a weak groan.

There were murmurs of agreement from everyone but Sarah, who was grimacing and examining the red marks on her hands, and Angel, who was sitting by the net and taunting a small shark by waving her fingers in front of its face, just out of it's reach.

"Have people really gotten so weak in only a few hundred years?" Angel wanted to know.

"We're just not as used to hard physical labor as you guys are," Linsey explained from where she lay, her damp hair sticking to her face and to the deck and moving as she spoke.

"And that net weighed at least twice the weight of all of us combined," Tierza pointed out from a few feet away, her mind wandering vaguely towards rum and frozen desserts before giving up in exhaustion. "Anyone would have trouble lifting that."

"You've obviously never had to wash, wring out, and carry a pile of soaking wet quilts up two flights of stairs," Sarah said with a wry face. "I never realized how much piracy and housework have in common. Scrubbing floors and decks, lifting heavy stuff, cooking, being shouted at…"

"You scrub floors, you swab decks," Holly corrected idly, using the mast to pull herself upright.

"You sit up and stop whining," Anamaria added helpfully.

"Is that part mandatory?" Koneka asked plaintively.

"You can always choose to swim home," the pirate replied cheerfully. The students dragged themselves up to sitting positions and fixed bloodshot stares at her. "That's better. Now," she turned and reached into the net, pulling out a thrashing fish who was blue on top shading to white underneath and about a yard from its long, pointy nose to its tail.

"This is a marlin. They live in the deeper offshore waters and they are fast swimmers and fierce fighters. They get much bigger than this. Two, three times as big." She put it back in the net and pulled out a slightly smaller fish.

"This is a bonito, also called a frigate mackerel sometimes."

"I thought it was called a tuna," Summer said. It did indeed look similar to The Incredible Mr. Limpet, the infamous tuna entrée from their first supper at Port Royal.

"More compressed body, different coloring, and look in its mouth," Anamaria said, pausing to pry the fish's mouth open. "See how it has no teeth on the top, here? Tuna have teeth top and bottom. Bonito have teeth only on the bottom. And they don't taste as good as tuna."

"This is a tuna. We caught quite a few blackfins like this fellow." A foot-long, light-colored fish with black fins was held up beside the bonito for comparison.

"And here is a barracuda, which will not leap out of my hands and savage you, so you don't have to back away like that, Abby." The long, silvery fish had small fins and an underbite that showed off a nice set of sharp teeth, giving it an awkward yet evil aspect, and it was snapping at the air menacingly.

"But it's scary and it wants to eat me."

"Many things in the ocean want to eat you. You better get used to it. You're made out of meat," she was told calmly. "Now, if you want to see something more dangerous, we also caught a few sharks." Anamaria threw the barracuda back in and walked around the net to point to the shark that Angel had been harrassing.

"This is a spiny dogfish. Don't touch the two spikes on its back, they have a kind of poison in them. And the big one with the long thin tail is a thrasher shark. They get very big and very dangerous; this one looks about half grown." The monster she was referring to was at least twelve feet long and tangled in the net so badly that it was practically immobile, despite the rippling muscles under its smooth gray flesh as it desperately tried to earn its name. There was a yellow-gray squid humorously draped upon its head, tentacles hanging down like a living wig. Several students giggled.

"We're drifting off course a little, I think," Becca noticed.

"Then lesson time is over. Koneka, Sarah, Linsey, get over here and help sort these fish into crates, but if you see a sting ray, an anemone, or a jellyfish, don't touch it. The rest of you are in charge of getting us back to port."

Abby immediately declared herself navigator to give her torn-up hands a rest, and spent the journey back conversing with Tierza, who had been studying the pirate slang dictionary and was eager to share her newfound knowledge.

"… and the word savvy comes from West Indies pidgin, a shortening of savez-vous, which is French for 'do you know.'"

"Really? I thought it was just a Jack Sparrow thing."

"I think he made it a Jack Sparrow thing," Tierza decided, pulling the tiller slighty to the right to avoid hitting a rock that was nearing the starboard side of the prow. Abby had been confused by the way the thing seemed to work until she realized that the boat went the opposite way from the way you moved the tiller.

"So what'll you buy with your share of the fish money?" Abby wanted to know.

"Soap," Tierza replied vehemently. "Soap and a hairbrush." She tugged her fingers through her long, dirty-blonde ponytail and made a face when they snagged on the knots. "You?"

"Some sort of handguards or fingerless gloves to protect my hands, and some peppermint candy to get the icky taste out of my mouth in the mornings. And soap is a really good idea, now that you mention it." Though she realized as she said it that she was a lot less bothered by the way she smelled than she had been at the beginning of the term. It was funny what you could get used to, especially when everyone else smelled pretty much the same way.

"What's the weirdest thing you've ever pulled up in a fishing net?" Linsey could be heard asking Anamaria as they tried to wrestle all the squid's arms into the crate.

"Once I pulled up a fish with no eyes and a huge, gaping mouth that took up its whole entire body, filled with long, sharp teeth like knives. Inside of its mouth, it had a dangling bit of glowing light."

"Awesome."

"I was about eleven then, so I hid it among the cargo, then put it on my brother's pillow the next morning with its mouth gaping an inch from his face, then screamed in his ear to wake him up." She flashed a dazzling white grin. "He screamed louder."

That evening, after a long morning of fishing and a long afternoon of fencing lessons, they had eaten dinner at an inn by the docks and were lounging on the beach watching the sun set when Siren found them.

"Hey, all of you get up, I've been looking everywhere for you. We need to be at the Dragon's Head in ten minutes." The students exchanged tired glances and, as one, quietly pretended that she wasn't there. "Have you all gone deaf?" No response. "Hello?"

"No. We haven't had a free moment all day and we're exhausted to the point of mental breakdown." Kelsey explained in a small voice.

"We'll mutiny," Summer added petulantly.

"You can't mutiny while lying down. It doesn't work that way," Siren told them unsympathetically.

"Watch us," Becca replied.

"I am watching you, and I seem to be seeing a group of fangirls who are mutinying in order to avoid attending lessons that deal with sex and rum. This is very strange. Hell must have frozen over when I wasn't looking."

"Sex and rum?" Holly inquired. They all stirred, sitting up.

"It better be good sex," Kat grumbled as they got to their feet reluctantly.

"I thought we weren't allowed to have sex with any of the characters," Cate said, indignant.

"We are allowed to have rum with the characters," Angel pointed out.

"Correct on both counts," Siren acknowledged. "Though you won't be having sex with anyone, it's just part of the subject matter. We're learning about 18th century prostitution, and we're meeting Scarlett and Giselle at the inn for the lesson. There will be no more mysteriously lovely virgin prostitutes needing to be rescued by Jack- not on my watch. Come on, or we'll be late."

The Dragon's Head was a nice inn- somewhat more upscale than most of the places they'd seen on the island, filled with pirate captains and lavishly dressed women vying for the men's attention on the theory that a man who could afford to stay at a finer inn would be willing to pay more for a companion to warm his bed. They found Scarlett and Giselle both sitting on the lap of an aging seaman who seemed to have more gold teeth than real ones. They were laughing, and Giselle was fluttering her fan at him while Scarlett stroked his hair.

Siren waved to get their attention and they made their excuses to their former prey before going over to join the group of students.

"Standard pay for our time teachin' 'em, as we agreed earlier?" Giselle asked, raising an eyebrow at Siren.

"As we agreed," Siren reassured her. A man who had been standing nearby spilled his mug of ale and nearly fell off his stool, his eyes taking in the group of young females and the overheard comment.

"Can I watch?" he asked, eagerly stumbling over his words. Siren and several of the students started to try to explain, but Scarlett cut them off with a louder,

"It'll cost you a shilling."

"Done," the man said, reaching into his money pouch and pulling out a coin. Scarlett tossed it to Giselle. "Take my 'alf an' I don't owe ye sixpence no more."

The students exchanged uncertain glances but didn't dare say anything as they left the inn, followed by the overeager customer.

"Where d'ye want us to start?" Scarlett asked Siren.

"Takin' off the clothes," the customer suggested helpfully.

"How about explaining how you got into prostitution in the first place?" she answered, ignoring him as they walked down the streets past inns and rundown storefronts.

"Me mother was a laundress," Giselle volunteered, "I 'elped 'er when I was a girl, but me father drank 'imself to death an' there wasn't enough money to support the both of us. So a friend of 'ers found me a position as a live-in servant in a gentleman's 'ouse when I was seven. 'E lost 'is status in the navy after a bit, an' the cook there, she got me a place in a merchant's 'ouse where 'er own daughter worked. I was fifteen or so when I started workin' there, an' not one bit of sense in me 'ead. Caught the merchant's fancy, became 'is mistress, then almost two years later, 'is wife found out and before I know it I'm accused of stealin' a silver candlestick that she pawned 'erself. So I was fired an' thrown out into the street with me things in a bag. Didn't get me wages, because that had to go to pay back for what I 'stole.' For a while the kind ol' bugger supported me, got me lodgings in a boarding house an' a bit of pocket money whenever 'e came for a visit, but 'e started showin' up less an' less often, and I started 'avin' to find other gentlemen who would give me the odd shilling or two that I could use to pay the rent. It jes' sort of 'appened, really. No place else fer me to go, an' in these parts, whoring's a profitable trade."

"You mean, you couldn't get work anywhere else after you were kicked out of the merchant's house?" Kelsey wanted to know.

"Not as a servant, no. People are real picky 'bout hirin' a lass who's been accused o' stealin', and did that spiteful woman ever put the word out about me! I could've worked scrubbin' spew off the floors at a pub, maybe, or washin' clothes, or somethin' o' that sort, 'ard, long work that pays almost enough to keep ye fed an' under some sort o' roof, almost but not quite. I knew what that life was like. Lived it the first seven years of me life, didn't I. The dead tired achin' in yer bones eats away at ye, turns the world gray an' empty an' cold. 'Sides, I thought meself real fine back then, seventeen an' pretty an' the mistress of a well-to-do merchant. I wasn't gonna go muckin' about in places like that." Her smile was almost nostalgic, as if looking back on an age of innocence, which was a bit incongruous, Abby thought, while discussing a cold-blooded decision by an abandoned teenage mistress to become a prostitute.

"That's really young to be so totally on your own," she said, trying to imagine what she would have done a year ago in the same situation and failing utterly.

"She'd been on her own since she was seven, really," Siren pointed out. "Besides, in this century, you have to grow up somewhat faster than we did."

"This ain't interestin'," complained the man who had paid a shilling to watch. "Ain't ye gonna start teachin' them the real stuff 'stead o' tellin' yer life story?"

"You're not interested in hearing all about me now, love?" Scarlett asked, pouting at him and stroking his lapels lightly. He blushed a little.

"Yes, sure, I'm interested. Just, ye know... could ye tell us about it naked or somethin'? With demonstrations? Fer the lasses' benefit, o' course." He really was quite drunk, and was slurring his words considerably.

"Of course, darling, of course," Scarlett said comfortingly, then took over the narration, fully clothed and without any sort of demonstration whatsoever, and left him to work it out for himself. "My decision was a bit less a of choice. I was married an' workin' part time as a seamstress, an' me 'usband died. Left me on me own with three 'ungry children. My needlework didn't even pay 'nough to feed us, let alone keep us sleepin' indoors. We were out on the streets. Beggin' don't pay much, an' pickpocketin' just ain't possible when ye've got a two-year-old under one arm and two more kiddies clingin' to yer skirts. I 'ad to leave the kids with me sister, nights, when I went out to work, though now it's 'er daughter who looks after Danny for me. The other two are dead now, Tom a year ago when 'e was runnin' cross the street an' got knocked under a carriage, an' Jenny with a bad cough. She'd always been real sickly. Never 'ad enough to feed 'er when she was little."

The students tried to conceal their horrified reactions to the tragedy of her story and gave the red-haired woman sympathetic looks. Summer touched Scarlett's shoulder briefly, and the drunken spectator sniffled and wiped his nose and eyes on his sleeve.

"Tha's terr'ble."

"That's a woman's life," Scarlett said, the bleak, pinched expression on her face making her look years older than she was as she turned her head towards the lamplight of a nearby shop. "Least I've got me Danny left. 'E's almost nine now. A good boy, too." The lines of her mouth softened a bit. "Wants to be the captain of a ship someday, but all boys that age do, don't they? 'E'll do well enough fer 'imself."

"Hey, Jack Sparrow became a famous pirate captain young. Maybe your son will do the same thing," Cate said encouragingly. The prostitute scowled.

"Jack Sparrow owes me five shillings and a new dress for the one 'e spilled rum on."

"Owes me three shillings, a ruby the size of me thumb, and an apology," added Giselle, looking just as irate.

"A ruby the size of—" Kat started.

"— 'e 'ad a map to an island that supposedly held an ancient king's hoard, including a famous giant ruby. Said when 'e found it, 'e'd bring it back for me. Then 'e leapt out the window, not 'avin' paid fer my services mind you, shouting that he'd see me when he returned. Pirates…" Her blonde curls bounced as she shook her head reprovingly.

"Then again, they tip nicely when they do pay," Scarlett reflected philosophically. "I got a lovely string o' pearls from a captain named Edwards once."

"Was that from 'is pockets while 'e slept?" Giselle's voice was sarcastic, but in an amused, teasing way.

"No, I got six crowns from 'is pockets while 'e slept. The necklace 'e gave before 'e passed out." Scarlett grinned, flashing a mouthful of strong but slightly crooked teeth.

"Ye need to think more o' yer reputation, love," Giselle told her friend.

"Reputation?" Holly asked. "I'd think that would no longer be an issue, considering."

"A lass in our line o' work ain't supposed to steal nothin'," Scarlett explained. "If ye want regular customers, ye got to be honest. If they get robbed, they don't come back to ye next time they're in port, an' neither do their mates."

"So how old are most women when they start in your profession?" Siren asked.

"Any age, really," Giselle answered. "I know a lass whose uncle would rent 'er out to the landlord when she was twelve, when 'e wasn't puttin' it to 'er 'imself, an' then again there's old folks who fall into the trade when their children can't afford to support them no more. 'Taint just women either. Lot o' boys work down by the docks, or in the molly houses. Buggery sells as well as any other type o' sin."

"Molly houses are… brothels?" Nina asked.

"Not quite. Mollies are chaps who consider themselves part of the sisterhood- dress, talk, an' act like women, all powdered and rouged and so on. Lot o' gentlemen visit the molly houses same as the ordinary brothels. 'Taint much of a difference, to many."

"You mean, straight men will go have gay sex just as readily as straight sex?" Tierza said uncertainly. Scarlett and Giselle looked mystified at the terminology.

"She means sodomy, not cheerfulness," Siren clarified. "And until the 19th century or so, sex with another man wasn't considered emasculating unless you were the one being sodomized. Gentlemen who had dalliances with both male and female prostitutes weren't considered homosexuals."

"That's weird," Kat remarked.

"What kind of prostitutes a man frequents isn't something one asks him," Sarah said, her face slightly red. "That type of thing is talked about to other men, at clubs or while gambling. It's not a polite subject."

"Don't blush, lass, I'd bet you know an 'andful o' servants who're open to earning the odd coin on their backs. It ain't so uncommon as that," Scarlett told the younger woman, who nodded reluctantly.

"I've worked with several. But you don't just openly talk about it, it's just kind of… everybody knows but doesn't comment." There was a loud thud and they turned to find that the man who'd paid to watch the class had passed out in the street behind them. Several ragged, dirty-looking children ran over and were rifling through his pockets. The students watched in interest as his pockets were emptied, his rings and earring yanked off, and even his clothes and boots removed by greedy little hands, which then dragged the nearly naked body into an alley and scattered.

"What are they going to do with his clothes?" Koneka asked.

"Sell 'em to a rag dealer or pawnshop, who will pay less than a tenth of its worth if they're lucky. Then they'll either spend the money on something to eat or have it taken off 'em by bigger kids," Giselle answered, idly twisting a blonde curl around her finger. "Speakin' of which, should we show 'em where we get our own clothes?"

Siren shrugged. "Sure, lead the way."

Several streets later, the two women of ill repute herded them into a secondhand shop, the walls lined with racks and barrels of faded and torn finery. There was a collective sigh from the students, who started going through the clothing themselves, fingering thick brocade coat sleeves and full, flouncy skirts. Kelsey pulled a deep blue dress off the rack that looked a little like the one she'd had her character find and realized that unlike the more generalized, one-size-fits-many proportions of modern clothing, it and most of the other gowns in the shop were tailored to the specific figure of their previous owner. Angel was trying on a hat, Kat was twirling around in a long velvet cape, Linsey was examining a pair of satin gloves, and even Siren was wistfully eyeing the merchandise but trying to pretend she wasn't.

"As ye can see, these are castoffs from rich types. Sometimes ye get lucky and find something in perfect condition, thrown away just cause it's no longer the fashion that month. Anyway, it's important to look as high-class as ye can. The more expensive ye're clothes are, the more money they'll be willin' to pay for yer services. Look like a fine lady or royal courtesan, an' ye can name yer price an' set down some guidelines, but go hangin' 'round the alleys an' pubs in a plain, ragged work dress and ye'll be lucky to get a few pennies an' not too much physical damage done to ye," Scarlett explained to the students, who were not really listening.

"Look, I'm a pilgrim!" exclaimed Becca, strutting across the room in a long black coat, a pair of buckled shoes, and a tall black hat. "All I need now is a rifle and a turkey."

"This can be the turkey," Abby said, having discovered a lady's hat that was heaped nearly two feet high with fake flowers, fruits, and garishly dyed plumage. "And the feast. And the scenery as well, I think."

"Do you think they just piled everything within reach on it?" Cate wondered.

"Back to the actual subject-" Siren tried to steer them back on topic, but it was no use.

"Come, good turkey, it is time for you to die."

"But thou cannot harm me! I am a deformed turkey, see the fruit that grows from my head? It is the will of God that I not be slaughtered for thy feast, but made to live amongst thee and thy pilgrim brothers as a reminder of what awaits the ungodly in hell!"

"No! Avast, foul creature! I will smite you with this lacy pink parasol!"

"Did pilgrims say 'avast'?" Nina wondered.

"Does anyone say 'avast' in normal conversation?" countered Summer. Behind her, Holly had pulled a black stocking over one hand and arm and a white one over the other and was making them talk to each other.

"I personally am rooting for the turkey," the black stocking hand confided, looking around at the action and then at its partner like a news commentator.

"But without a turkey, there will be no feast," the white stocking argued, its mouth flapping angrily. "It is a hard cold winter in our Plymouth settlement! We are starving! The turkey must be roasted, or we will surely perish!" the white stocking raved. "But since you are preventing us from eating the turkey, we will have to eat you instead!" The white stocking clamped its mouth over the black stocking's face and started eating it, making ferocious noises as it did so.

Giselle and Scarlett exchanged embarrassed looks and then walked silently out of the shop, pretending they didn't know any of them.

"Hey, you're a turkey, you're not allowed to use a weapon!"

"Not even in self-defense?"

"I'm afraid I must ask you all to leave the shop," said a disapproving voice from behind the counter. A wrinkled, gray-mustached man was glaring at them. Siren slipped out the door, shooting him an apologetic glance.

"Sorry, we were only—"

"NOW." Trying to keep their giggles silent, they put back their costumes and exited the shop, shooting reluctant glances at the racks of gowns as they left.

"And do not return!" the shopkeeper snapped at their retreating backs.

"That's it, I'm going back to the ship," Siren told them as they joined her outside the shop. "You're the captain's problem now. He's been preparing all afternoon to teach tonight's class on rum, so maybe he's drunk enough to deal with you. Walk down to the Drunken Badger by the docks, and try not to get yourself banned from any other establishments on the way, would you?"

Jack was sitting at a table in the shadowy bar, surrounded by a large assortment of different bottles of rum, arranging them meticulously on the table and talking to them with extravagant gestures as he did so. The students exchanged grins and Holly walked up to him and tapped him on the shoulder. He spun around, hands held up as if to ward her away, eyes wide, and a half-full bottle hanging from his mouth.

"We're here for our rum lesson," the student managed to say with a straight face. He snatched the bottle from his mouth and straightened, giving them a slightly unsteady bow.

"I am honored to be yer instructor for this subject. First, ye must sit down and stop snickerin'." They obeyed more or less, piling onto the bench facing his rum display and the table behind it and trying to bite back their smiles at his serious demeanor.

"This is rum. It is a fine drink that makes the world a wonderful place. Rum is made from sugar cane. After they'd crystallize sugar out of it, see, they still got a heap o' gooey stuff they called melazas, or molasses as we say it. An' they noticed that when they mixed the molassas with water and left it out in the sun, it fermented, savvy? If ye distilled the stuff afterwards, ye got a raw white spirit. An' that was how they invented rum. Now, sugar cane came from someplace in Asia, originally, but everyone liked it, so they were tryin' to grow it everywhere. Then they sailed right into the West Indies, conquered a bunch o' people, an' found out sugar cane grows better 'ere than nearly anywhere else. In fact, sugar an' rum are two o' the reasons we're all 'ere in the Carribean. Because pirates go where the riches go, savvy? An' where d'ye think everyone chose to start up sugar cane plantations when they learned 'ow well it grows an' 'ow easy it is to get land in these parts?"

For a while, it had been sinking into Abby that despite her formal education, she wasn't that much more knowledgeable than most of the people she'd encountered in the eighteenth century. But here, sitting in a rundown pub and listening to a drunken pirate explain the history of a process she barely understood, was when it really hit her: I'm not really any smarter than these people.

Her own knowledge of geography, economics, and politics- like that of most lifelong natives of any powerful nation- was very good within the borders of her own country and rather vague everywhere else, while Barbossa could not only draw an accurate map of any region he had visited, but expound on their wealth, imports, exports, and alliances at some length. She could solve quadratic equations if she had a pencil and paper, but Jack could calculate vastly more complicated navigational equations in his head with no training but experience. Will could pry open a locked metal-and-wood jail cell using the principles of leverage. She was incapable of passing an introductory level physics class. She had always subconsciously assumed that people in the past had been simpler and more ignorant, and this prejudice had been endlessly reinforced by books, movies, and history classes. But now that she was actually here, she found herself wondering if maybe their lack of technology had meant that they had to think more rather than less.

She suddenly noticed that everyone had gone silent and was looking at her expectantly.

"Sorry, what?" she asked, blushing.

"Name any kind of drink you can think of, and he'll explain why rum is better, healthier, and more practical," Koneka repeated quietly.

"She needs rum," Jack decided and thrust a bottle at her.

"Thank you. Healthier? What about, I don't know, clear mountain spring water?" Abby asked, taking a sip and feeling it warm her throat.

"Anythin' without alcohol goes stale an' starts growin' mold within days. An' even fresh, there's no such thing as perfectly clean water. Ye can't trust the stuff. Did ye think all the fish that live in those clear mountain springs o' yers politely get out of the water when they need to use the privy?"

"Eeew!" the young women shrieked.

"A valid point, ain't it? Anyone else got one?" Jack looked very pleased with himself.

"Wine," Grace suggested.

"Turns to vinegar, sometimes in less'n a year, depending on the location ye're in an' how the cask or bottle is sealed. Here in the Carribean, wine turns faster than it does most other places, savvy? Somethin' about the air, or the weather. Whereas rum stays rum fer years anywhere, even if ye don't store it so carefully."

"But people age bottles of wine for decades and decades in wine cellars," Nina said.

"Only since they had the technology to vacuum-seal it," Tierza pointed out.

"Oh."

"Beer? Ale?" Sarah asked.

"No thank ye, I've got plenty o' rum here as it- ohhh, ye were askin' me to compare it to rum. Right. Goes bad after a few months, which means sometimes it's become undrinkable before ye've even got where ye're going, and forget havin' anythin' to drink on the trip back. An' even when it's fresh, it doesn't taste half as good as rum." He took another few mouthfuls of the rum and smacked his lips to prove his point.

"Whiskey?" Summer proposed.

"It'd work, but it's a bloody nuisance to get hold of enough of it. Sure, ye can get a few pints o' moonshine from any farmer's wife, but a dozen or more barrels of it? Only place it's produced in those kind o' quantities is in monasteries, an' they know when they 'ave a good thing goin'. That much whiskey is only available if ye make a real generous donation to the church on top o' the price o' it, savvy?"

"Gin?" Kelsey contributed. Jack shuddered and made an impressive face that involved screwing up his mouth, sticking out his tongue and wiggling one ear.

"Gin? Mostly only available on the black market these days, an' 'alf the time it's dilluted with turpentine or sulfuric acids. 'Orrible swill. Never touch it unless ye're already drunk. Never."

"Vodka," Kat suggested.

"D'ye 'ave any idea 'ow much that stuff costs?" Jack looked scandalized. "Ye 'ave to get it shipped all the way from Poland. Put together the money ye'd spend on a few voyages worth o' vodka and ye could buy yerself another ship!"

"I thought it came from Russia," Becca commented, to a chorus of agreement from the other students.

"The Russians 'ave somethin' called bread wine, but it's the Polish export vodka. Any more?" Jack looked around at them, smiling fiendishly.

"Mead!" Linsey called out at the same time as Koneka said, "Sake!"

"Both turn faster than grape wine an' cost more'n whiskey," he shot back immediately. "Anyone else got somethin'? No? Then we move on to the agin' of rum. Rum can range in color from white to gold to brown. Fresh out o' the still, rum is clear as water. When ye age it a couple years, it mellows an' starts takin' on color from the wood of the cask, turnin' darker and darker gold until it finally turns brown several more years down the line. Here, everyone try a swig from this bottle-" he pushed forward a large bottle of clear rum- "And this one." The second was a rich golden-brown. "Taste the difference?"

It was hard not to. Drinking the "white" rum was like swallowing fire. The darker rum went down much easier, and you could taste the sweetness of it more.

"What about the darker brown rum?" Cate asked curiously, pointing to a couple bottles that he had skipped over.

"Ah, now there's where ye need to keep an eye out for dishonest rum runners," Jack said, jabbing a ringed finger in the air and then looking at it his hand as if he'd forgotten what he had been doing with it. "Right. Really dark rum. Either it's been aged good an' long, which is ideal, or ye're bein' ripped off an' ye're buyin' pale golden rum that's been doctored up with caramelized sugar or some other type o' colorin'. Ye can tell from the taste- go on, do a shot of it one and ye'll see- but if the seller won't let ye taste it without buyin', 'ere's what ye do. Get a drop or two an' rub it between yer fingers. Go on, do it." He offered them one of the bottles of dark rum, and they passed it around, each taking a quick gulp of the strong stuff, then wetting their forefinger in the bottle and then rubbing the tip against the pad of their thumb. "Now smell yer fingers. What do they smell like?"

"Mine still smell like fish from this morning," Angel said.

"Mine too, even though I know I washed them," Grace groaned, making a face

"Mine too. But that can't be right," Tierza said slowly. "I was pulling lines, and I was steering. I barely touched any fish. But it smells like I did."

"An' that smell is 'ow ye know that it don't come by its coloring honestly," Jack announced smugly. "Picked up the trick from a fellow in a pub in Tobago. Startles the 'eck out o' the fools that try to pass it off as nat'ral. Now this 'ere is genuine aged rum, and it's mine. No touchy, mate." He cradled a dusty bottle of dark rum to his chest like a beloved child, batting Angel's hand away from it.

"Now one more thing it was suggested I talk about. Getting Captain Jack Sparrow drunk and seducing him." In a split second, he suddenly had the most attentive audience the world had ever known. He quickly shuffled a couple steps backwards at the looks in their eyes. "And why it does not work!" he added quickly. Faces fell. "I shall explain. First of all, how can you tell when Captain Jack Sparrow is drunk?" he asked.

"He has a pulse and he's breathing?" Linsey asked innocently.

"Not precisely," the captain corrected her, illustrating his point with obscure but strangely graceful hand motions. "I am not always drunk. I am not even always in the process of becomin' drunk. I am merely in the process of wishin' to be in the process of becomin' drunk, which is an entirely different process altogether, and unfortunately does not involve rum because if it did, I wouldn't be wishin', now would I? So I repeat the original question." They puzzled that out after a moment and then Sarah raised her hand.

"You can tell because you're holding a mostly empty bottle of rum in your hand and swaying when you walk?"

"That's just me sea legs. Ye'll notice I'm quite a bit steadier on me feet on the deck of a ship. What about the way I act? Any way to tell the difference?" They all thought hard for several minutes. The rum was passed around again for inspiration.

"You're more likely to sing when you're drunk?" Cate finally guessed.

"Not really, no. After a battle, after a meal, in the evenings in front of a fire… the best times to get drunk and the best times to sing happen at the same time a lot of the time, savvy?"

"Is it me or is it the rum or is he trying on purpose to be confusing?" Kelsey asked a little fuzzily.

"Not sure," Summer replied, taking another sip of the smooth, golden-brown rum and shaking her head.

"Any way to tell? Any of ye come up with one?"

"Mostly empty bottle in hand," Sarah repeated her previous claim stubbornly, enunciating her words with deliberate clarity as she took another taste of rum.

"Then 'ave we drawn any conclusion from this?" Jack demanded.

"You act the same way drunk as you do sober?" theorized Becca, who had left the rum alone after the first few sips and so was one of the more clearheaded members of the audience at the moment.

"An' if I act the same way when I'm sober, that means that there is no difference in my behavior when I am drunk, which completely invalidates the premise that I would be more vulnerable to seduction in a drunken state, because it means I'm really sober when I'm drunk, thus provin' that yer 'eads are full of fish and bilgewater if ye think seduction under the aforementioned conditions would be easier, savvy?" There was another long pause as they went over what he'd said slowly in their heads.

"Savvy," they admitted one by one, conceding his point.

The rest of the evening was somewhat fragmented and blurry in Abby's memory, but she had the clouded impression of a fascinating conversation they had all had about hands and how conveniently shaped they were for holding bottles of rum. And there had been something about fires, and then they had all sang a song. And another song.

The next morning, she was woken up by the painful thundering of waves against the hull and a whispered request from the hammock next to her to have their head cut off so it would stop hurting.

She actually considered granting it.