"I would walk the world
I'd cross the sea
I'd journey beyond the moon
I'd try anything, go anywhere
To find my way back to you"
- Lindy Robbins
The Pearl came crashing down with a thud, landing at a dangerous tilt before quickly righting herself. It seemed Jack had been right; she could handle anything. Realizing they hadn't met an untimely demise, the crew began to return to their stations, still stunned at the notion that they'd made it through such a fall unscathed. Elizabeth and William slowly walked out on deck. Though they had fallen over World's End in the dead of night, daylight met their eyes, the sun now high in the mid-day sky.
"Mama?" William questioned.
Clearing her own mind of its momentary fog, Elizabeth turned to her son. "Yes, darling. Everything is opposite here, remember?"
He nodded and continued to look around in amazement. Suddenly, the full gravity of what she'd done fell upon Elizabeth. They were now in the Land of the Dead. There was no turning back. Before she had time to berate herself further, Jack and Barbossa assaulted her, each trying to arrive at her side before the other.
Elizabeth looked from one to the other. Despite the fact that each man held their features carefully indifferent, she knew them well enough to recognize the delight under the surface. She'd been missing Will for so many years. She knew all too well the desperation that brought - and she could see it reflected in their eyes. It occurred to her at that moment that Jack and Barbossa had been looking for the Fountain of Youth for the same amount of time. Now they were agonizingly close to the key, close to having what they had longed for all those years - and so was Elizabeth.
"How will we find him?" she asked.
"Finding someone in the Land of the Dead is no easy feat, tis true," Barbossa said. "We found the Locker easy enough, but young Captain Turner could be anywhere upon these vast waters."
Gibbs joined the trio, the charts in hand. "Aye, and the charts be of little help in the matter. They offer no advice on the navigation of these ghostly waters."
"Don't seem so ghostly to me," Ragetti interjected.
Pintel appeared alongside him hefting a cannonball. "Now that that obé women ain't wit' us, I was finally gonna see wha' a cannonball would do - "
"But there ain't no bodies," Ragetti reminded him.
Jack, Gibbs, Barbossa, and Elizabeth briefly glanced at the water to confirm his statement for themselves. Indeed, it was clear of both bodies and longboats.
"It seems Turner has been quite fervent about his job," Barbossa offered.
"No doubt to avoid the tentacles," Gibbs replied.
Elizabeth gave an exasperated sigh. "But how will we find Will?"
Jack, who had been silent throughout their encounter, wordlessly reached into his jacket and held out the compass.
"Your compass?" she asked, her voice tinged with doubt. "Will it work?"
"It's worf a try," Jack answered, tantalizingly dangling it before her. "Give us our bearing, Captain Turner."
Elizabeth gingerly took the compass from him, setting it carefully in her palm. She glanced around at the group surrounding her. All eyes, including her son's, were now watching her in anticipation.
Take me to Will. I want to see Will, she thought. With bated breath, she lifted the compass's top. Her look of utter disappointment told Jack all he needed to know. Nevertheless, Elizabeth showed him the compass, its arrow spinning wildly.
"I had hoped it was just me," Jack told her, referring to the compass's inability to provide him with a heading out of the locker all those years before.
"Its magic won't work in these waters," Gibbs offered as an afterthought.
"What now, Jack?" Barbossa asked.
"We set sail, dead ahead – if you'll pardon the term."
Jack seemed amused with himself, even if no one else was.
"It will be like searching for a needle in a haystack," Elizabeth protested.
"We have no way of knowing the distance to cover to the Far Shore," Gibbs stated. "Lest we wish to stay indefinitely, we can't linger here for more than a day or so."
"A fool's chance," Elizabeth muttered.
"It's the chance we'll have to take," Barbossa replied.
"Aye," Gibbs nodded in agreement, walking off with the rest of the crew to comply with these new orders.
Elizabeth looked over at her son who was steadfastly watching the horizon. She gave a weary sigh. The sad truth was that the odds of finding Will in the time allotted were slim to none.
Her despondent mood was not lost on Jack. "I came here for the key, and I don't intend to leave wifout it. You can be sure of that."
Elizabeth watched him walk away with a wry smile. In his own peculiar way, she knew Jack had meant to offer her encouragement. Looking at William, who so eagerly scanned the waters, she found all the determination she needed.
Elizabeth slammed Jack's compass down on the table, its arrow still maddeningly indecisive. "A lot of help you are," she huffed.
With an irritated pout, she walked out on deck in search of William. A canopy of stars now replaced the bright sun. Eight hours of searching without a single sign of the Flying Dutchman had left the crew on edge – and Elizabeth quite beside herself with anxious frustration.
After a quick scan of the deck, which offered no sign of her son, Elizabeth's heart caught in her throat as she finally spied him.
"William!" she cried, immediately regretting the raised voice that could easily frighten the child.
William nimbly scampered down the rigging, his eyes locked on his mother's slightly pale countenance. He quickly bridged the distance between them.
"William," Elizabeth chastised, "how many times must I ask you to stay down from the crow's nest?"
"I know, Mama," he replied with the voice and mannerisms of someone who had been through this conversation many times before. "I was just looking for Papa. I've been watching for him all day."
Elizabeth regarded her son sadly. "As have I. It's very difficult….waiting, isn't it?"
William nodded.
"I don't want you to be disappointed, love, although I fear it may be too late for that," she quietly added. "William, we may not find him before we must leave.
"We'll find him," William answered surely. "We're close. I can feel it."
His mother smiled. "Can you, now?"
"Mmhmm," he answered, a yawn immediately following. "I hope we can find him before my birthday. Papa would make a wonderful present." His eyes were alight with excitement at the notion.
Elizabeth hated to dishearten him; nevertheless, he needed to know. "Your birthday's the day after tomorrow, William. If we don't find your father by then, I'm afraid we'll have to go back without seeing him."
Another yawn overtook William, whilst he shook his head 'no', still secure in his avowal that they were certain to find his father.
"All right, my darling, you've convinced me. We shall see Papa - but most assuredly, not tonight, else you would have seen his ship, even from afar off, at your," here she annunciated the words in a very motherly manner, "unnecessarily high vantage point."
William shot her an apologetic look.
"Right now," Elizabeth continued, "it's off to bed, for we've all had a very trying day."
William followed his mother back into their cabin without any struggle or argument. As exciting as it all had been, and as eager as he was to finally meet his father, he could not deny that he was utterly exhausted.
Once his mother helped him change and saw him settled in bed, William was asleep mere seconds after his head hit his pillow. Elizabeth, too, was worn out from the stress of the past twenty-four hours and, though she doubted sleep would come, decided to very shortly thereafter join her son. Nevertheless, she could not deny herself one last scan of the horizon.
After, yet again, finding three hundred and sixty degrees of emptiness, Elizabeth made her way back to her cabin. A gasp from overhead stopped her before she opened the door.
"What it is?!" she asked.
"Over there!" Ragetti pointed as he yelled down from his post in the crow's nest.
"I don't see anything!" Elizabeth shouted back.
"What's all the shoutin' for?" Pintel asked.
"Master Ragetti claims to have spotted something on the horizon," Barbossa replied, much more for the benefit of Jack, who had been drawn out on deck, than for Pintel.
Jack immediately pulled out his spyglass, followed shortly thereafter by Barbossa.
"It's a boat – ship!" Ragetti corrected himself.
"Aye," Gibbs agreed after a look through Jack's glass. "I'd know those sails anywhere."
"Adjust course accordingly, boys," Barbossa ordered the crew. "It seems we've found ourselves the Dutchman."
With a rousing cry, the crew set out to follow the command. In the whirlwind of activity that followed, only two figures remained still: Jack, who stood basking in the success of yet another of his farfetched plans, and Elizabeth who seemed frozen in place, her eyes glued to the tiny speck that now appeared on the horizon.
Despite the fact that the entire purpose of their extensive journey had been to find her husband, Elizabeth never allowed herself to fully believe they'd actually encounter him, fearing the disappointment would be too much for her to bear, and knowing she must be strong for their son. Now, realizing it was in fact happening, Elizabeth was unprepared for the torrent of emotions that flooded her heart as she gazed upon the nearly undetectable spot that was his ship.
Jack walked up alongside Elizabeth, giving her a devilish 'I told you so' grin, which was lost on the woman who was powerless to remove her eyes from her own long missing heart, slowly returning to her across the waters.
Even in a tender moment, such as this, Jack refused to be ignored, vocalizing his triumph instead. "Ye see, luv. I never leave wifout getting whot I came for."
Elizabeth spared him one quick glance before turning her sights back to the Flying Dutchman.
Seeing the elation coupled with yearning that shone brightly in her eyes, Jack quipped as he walked off, "And it seems neither will you."
Elizabeth clutched the side of the Black Pearl, nearly overcome at the notion that she would soon see Will - soon be in his arms again - for the first time in nearly six years. Her head began to reel for, now that she had him within eyesight, she found she could scarcely stand the additional wait - swearing that, if the Pearl didn't go faster, she would rise up and sprout wings to get to Will.
