A/N: Italics are Jack's thoughts and dreams....

It was the savage kiss of wind that made his heart swell, but her searing kiss that set fire to his flesh. It was his last night ashore,

his last time on land, his last time here. Her hair was pearled by the moonlight, her eyes deep with understanding and fond

acceptance as she glided across the floor, waltzed through his fevered dreams, and serenely stepped into Jack's waiting embrace.

Lingering, she raised one hand to the comb of her hair, as Jack only smiled softly, and gently cupped her palm in his own.

"Let me." She nodded, tilted her head, and Jack sighed as his fingers laced through the mass of snarled blond, and tenderly

released the cascade of hair, watching it tumble down her shoulders. He entwined one strand between his fingers, let them glide

from her forehead to her cheek, and then lay his hand on her shoulder. She gave him a coy smirk, bucked against the

bed with a wink.

"You've spent a pretty bit o' shine just to play with me hair, sir. Is that *all* ye wish to do?"

She never saw that lingering sadness in Jack's dark eyes as he forced the tired grin, and shook his head with a biting chuckle.

"I believe it's my coin, love, to spend as I wish. What's it to ye if I just want company and no more?"

She eyed him for a moment, then with a resigned hitch of her shoulders, mechanically slid back into his arms. "Aye, tis true, tis very true.

I just expected a bit more from ye, that's all."

Jack's fingers tightened against her shoulder, involuntarily, and she felt him shudder. "Aye, love....you and the rest of this world."

______________________________________________________________

Of all the ways to die, Jack sincerely wished it hadn't been like this. Of all the ways his last minutes on earth should have been spent,

it wasn't supposed to be like this, either. His hands were bound, his back straight as he watched the crowd, unflinching. Somewhere

in the paraphets, he knew that Elizabeth and Norrington were watching the proceedings with all the pomp the upperclass could afford.

It was a sad, sad thing, to hang a man, but it was a savage thing to be entertained by it. There was a perversely festive air to the

crowd, as they all watched him, as he slowly made his way up the wooden steps, and was halted by the guard's hands. The noose

dangled in front of him like a pendleum, and Jack watched it sway in the slight wind, his lip curling in rancor.

Would they give him a last glance at the ocean? He raised eyes to the brick walls of the fortress, and smelt the brine of the sea on

the wind. It felt like a parting kiss, as Jack wearily bowed his head in acceptance of the noose. The guard indifferently draped it

around his throat like a perverse necklace, sliding the knot down to the back of Jack's neck. Jack watched those black boots

march back to his flank, saw that gloved hand latch onto the platform's lever with a punishing grip. The magistrate had just finished

reading the long, drab list of Jack's crimes against the Crown as Jack studied the sky, and gave them all a faltering, cheeky grin.

"May God have mercy on your soul." The words were droned out, as the magistrate rolled up his scroll, gave them all a curt nod of

permission, and then went on his way. Jack heard the sudden, loud roll of the drums, felt the hands of the guard check the knot one

more time. And then, the guard triggered the trap door.

Severed. The world gave way, the platform beneath him fell down, and he plummetted into the empty air for a moment, before he was

savagely jerked upwards by the reverberation of the was the animalistic snarl, the instinctive, empty gasp as his lungs

ceased and the coil tightened until Jack was flopping like a speared fish in agony. The last sound he made was the strangled grunt

as his final breath was heaved out. His lungs contorted in his chest, he could not breathe, and the blinding pain and darkness was

rolling over him in an all consuming wave of confusion and agony.

Jack bolted awake.

The cloying weakness felt like a noose, constricting every movement to only what was necessary. The fever had laced every thought in

his throbbing skull with confusion, and the aching dark of his cabin clung to him like an unwanted cacoon. And, now,

as Jack swaddled in the sweated sheets of his bed, he blinked at the swaying lantern, paying no heed to the bright circle

haloing his wan, brittle face. It had been a week of searing, feverish hell, and he remembered little of that agonized blur

except being helpless, and held during the worst of it. He remembered a kind hand dabbling away his sweat, the twisted grimaces

of concern as the crew gawked at their stricken captain, Gibb's paternal grunts of concern, Cotton's silent compassion when

he held Jack upright during the vomiting. Jack swallowed hard, and winced at the raw, scraped sensation. He had lingered in that

netherworld of sickness and dreams, and his slow liberation from the fever breaking was disorienting.

Night had fallen, the scent of the brine on the water was as welcome as a beloved caress. He stared out at the celestial blanket

of moonlight against the endless black, savoring the stillness.

It was peaceful now, the soft roar of the ocean, and the creak of the Pearl's hull sounded like a lullaby, as Jack shoved the sheets away,

and slowly slid upright. His breath hitched at the warning flare of pain at his shoulder, and he winced as he paused, before he carefully

braced the arm on his knee. The dull ache throbbed down to a more bearable level. He lurched carefully over the edge of the bed,

grunting with the pain and gently unrolled his hunched back until he was sitting up straight. Blinking and panting with the effort, he

set his quivering legs down, and gripping the wall for leverage, hoisted himself until he stood. The world didn't tilt, and the churning

in his gut had ceased. The dull torpor made his normally quick, lilting stride impossible, and the shaking in his limbs hinted at

a pending collapse. Jack tottered forward, feeling awkward as a newborn foal. He took a lurching experimental step forward, and then

another.

"Jack!!"

Jack flinched in suprise at the loud shouting of his name, and he tilted his head over his shoulder, squinting in the wan light. Gibbs was

already at his side, his teeth winked out from the mutton chops, as he crossed his arms with a hearty laugh.

"Yore awake! Glad that ye be back, lad."

Jack raised a prim eyebrow. "Mr. Gibbs, since I've been decidedly ill, and therefore, incapable of complex navigation of any travel outside

my own fever-induced deliriums, I think it nearly impossible that I could have actually gone anywhere....unless I truly did swim to Tortuga

on the back of a mermaid and somehow wound up drinking with the sea turtles this time......" Jack trailed off with a considering squint and

a dismissing shrug as Gibbs only gaped with a tilt of his head, and a confused wrinkle in his forehead.