"JACK!" she cried.

"AH AH AH! Careful!" Jack cried, pulling away from her. "Glad to see you too, lass, but watch the skin!"

Rose then took a closer look at her brother and recoiled. "Good lord!" she exclaimed. "What on earth happened?"

Jack's face and neck were beet red, and Gibbs fared not too much better. "Sunburn," Gibbs reported. "We've been on that blasted raft for days now." He turned to Will, shaking his hand merrily. "Thank goodness ye've come along, Cap'n Turner! We'd've been lost without ye!"

Will gave a smug nod. "Aye, a few more hours, and you both would have succumbed to the heat, I'm afraid."

"I don't doubt it, sir," Gibbs agreed.

Will and Jack then made eye contact. The last time they had seen each other, Jack had helped Will's dying body stab Jones's heart to save his life. They hadn't spoken since.

Jack's eyes smiled, though his burnt face remained stoic. "What, no tentacles yet, Turner?"

Will chuckled. "No, not yet, Jack."

"Disappointing," he replied.

"And what about you?" Will asked sardonically. "What happened to the sea turtles, mate?"

Jack shrugged. "Ran out of back hair."

The outsider who had been ever watching from afar and had been told by Will and Bootstrap to keep away from Rose appeared on deck at that moment. His blood ran cold when he saw Jack. With Rose standing by him…it was so obvious that they were related. Staying here and being noticed would only cause more trouble, he feared, so he fled back below deck to wait until he and Gibbs had gone.

"There is a debt to be settled, Jack," Will said ominously.

Jack looked alarmed. The last time the Captain of the Flying Dutchman said that to him, he died soon after. "Remind me?" he asked.

"My debt," Will replied, causing Jack to breathe a sigh of relief. "I owe you my immortality. As you…appear to be without a ship," he commented, which made Jack give a pained wince, "I can offer you a lift. Will Tortuga do?"

Jack gratefully put his hands together in front of his chest and gave a slight bow in gratitude. Will turned away to give to orders to make sail, so Jack then hoisted the bag of bottles over his shoulder and turned to Rose, saying "I need to talk to you."

Rose obliged, leading him to her room, but was confused. Jack seemed not to question why on earth Rose was here in the first place. Did he already know?

Once they were inside and the door was closed, Jack placed the bag down and said, "Glad you're here! I've got a little matter I'm hoping you can help with."

"Jack-" Rose began, trying to tell him what had surpassed.

"After Turner drops us at Tortuga, I'm think you and meself head back to Shipwreck. Dad told me about your shop thing, by the by. Sounds grand."

"Jack-"

"I just had a nasty run in with Blackbeard, you see-"

"Jack, I-"

"Oh, and you're good friend Angelica too, believe it or not."

"Jack, I'm trying to-"

Suddenly, Jack looked around her room. "Where are we?" he asked.

"JACK!" she exclaimed, laying her hands on his shoulders. She now had his full attention. "We're in my quarters." He looked bewildered, so she continued, "I can't go with you to Tortuga, nor Shipwreck. Do…do you understand what I'm telling you?"

Jack's expression then fell as he realized what she was saying. "Wait are you…you're not?"

"I died, yes," she said. "Apparently, however, I also control the seas? Calypso separated her form and endowed some of her powers to me so that she could never be bound to human form again. I…don't quite know how yet, but apparently I've had the power for years." She smiled weakly. "I'm meant to be here, it would appear."

Jack sank so that he was sitting on her bed. She sat down by him. "Unbelievable," he muttered. "Even my little sister gets immortality before I do."

She chuckled. "I take it that the Fountain of Youth didn't go as planned, did it?"

Jack grimaced. "No," he said begrudgingly. "I…may or may not have given the chalice to Angelica."

"WHAT?" Rose cried, causing him to jump. "Jack!"

"WHAT?" Jack cried, equally surprised. "She was…well. Blackbeard was there, and she was over there, and only one of them could be saved, so I picked, and…here we are!" He looked up at her, and then all of a sudden noticed the cross scar on her right cheek that was identical to his own, the incision that connected them through the voodoo doll. "Wait, what's that?" he asked, pointing to the mark.

"Exactly!" Rose cried. "Jack, it's because of them that I died! Angelica had no idea what she was doing and the black magic from the doll killed me. They used my blood to get to you! And now you're telling me that you had both of them dying, and chose to save Angelica? Who KILLED me!"

"I didn't know that!" Jack protested. "…I'm not sure she did either!"

She glared at him. "Oh, so that makes it alright?" Then, she realized exactly what was going on. She punched him in the arm, to which he exclaimed, "OW! What did I just say about 'easy on the skin?!'"

"You fancy her, don't you?" she cried. "That's why you saved her?"

Jack hesitated, then sighed. "Yes, fine, alright."

"So where is she now?" Rose asked incredulously.

"Marooned on an island far away," Jack replied.

Rose furrowed her brow. "How…romantic?"

Jack shrugged. "Eh. It would have never worked out between us. She wanted to kill me too much."

Rose crossed her arms, skeptical. "I thought you were all about, 'take what you can, give nothing back!'"

Jack narrowed his eyes. "I am!" he protested.

"So why the soft-heartedness, hmm?" she teased. "Will, Angelica… Admit it, Jack. You're a good person."

He sneered. "No. I'm a wretch. A knave."

She nudged his arm. "Nooo, you're a good person!"

He finally shrugged, conceding. "Fine, I'm…halfway decent."

"I must admit," she sighed, "I think Angelica actually is too, deep down. She seemed reluctant to threaten me. I think Blackbeard really got into her head."

"Aye, most assuredly," Jack replied. "Which reminds me…" he kneeled down next to the huge bag he had loaded into her room, procuring one of the bottles in particular and hoisting it triumphantly into the air.

Rose raised an eyebrow. "It's a…ship. In a bottle."

Jack looked offended. "Not just a ship! THE ship!" he brought it close to Rose so that she could clearly see that indeed, the ship inside was none other than a miniature Black Pearl.

"My word," Rose exclaimed. "So that's who took the Pearl; Blackbeard!"

"I've got a whole fleet of them in that bag," Jack replied. "That's why I am in need of your help."

Rose shook her head. "I am away from all of my belongings now," she said sadly. "And also my herbs, or else I would have given you aloe for your burns by now." She gave him a small smile and handed the bottle back to him. "I will continue my search, though. I promise you that."

Jack nodded, then gave her a sidelong glance. "So, you're here now for what, the next hundred years?"

She shrugged. "I think so."

He considered this, then nodded his head. "I think I can make that work," he replied. He stood, and she followed him. Then, from around his belt, he unfastened one of their two matching pendants which had kept them connected for years.

"No," Rose protested. "I thought I told you to keep them both for luck!"

"I did, and they were!" he insisted, handing her one. "You need your own luck now. …especially sailing under the command of the eunuch."

Rose rolled her eyes and laughed, tying the pendent to her own belt, then embracing her brother gently, as to "go easy on the skin."

Within an hour, they had arrived in Tortuga, and Rose bid Jack and Gibbs farewell, then the ship returned to the Locker. It was all too brief a time to spend with her brother, but she was grateful for even a moment. Even a moment meant less homesickness.

Once they had returned, Rose pushed back her sopping wet hair and caught Will's eye from across the deck.

He grinned at her with a knowing look, as if to say, Reason to smile again?

She nodded in response. A reason to smile again.