Wow, you people astound me. I put up a new chapter, and within thirty seconds, I'm smacking my head against my desk, cause someone else has commented, and I didn't notice in time to include my thankfulness of them in that chapter. For that, I apologize should this ever happen to you. Yes, apologizing in advance. For the rest of you....wow. Bloody freaking the biggest thank-you ever wow! I love you all!
Okay....only a few more reviews to go! And then.....50! Whoot!
Spontaneousxhumanxcombustion: Aww...*cries* Now you've gone and done it - you make me feel loved! *huggles* Awww....I love you too! Thank you SO much!
Jenn: *dance of happy rum-ness!* Yay! Me loves you! *huggles* I know...who could hear them in theater, what with the drooling?
Jehsahka: Aww....thanks!
Alicia: Two reviews in one go! Whoot! Thanks, I hope this "more" helps!
Spontaneousxhumanxcombustion: Yay! You're back! Coffee is good...so long as it induces reviews! Whoot! Glad you like it!
Lyssa2: Aww...that's okay. It's still nice that you care enough to review! Yay! And seriously, I doubt that my adventure can be more interesting than your adventure (Go read it people, if you haven't already! Lyssa2's writing is bloody amazing!), but it's the thought that counts. Whoot!
Sirena: Yeah, I know. If Jack weren't so darn charming... sheesh. Thanks for your support!
Jygri: LOL, that makes it sound like one of those 'Got Milk' commercials! "Got Rum?" Oh dear.....thank you so much!
Tabby Kitten: Yay! Helping me reach my goal! *huggles* Thanks!
*sniff* You love me, you really love me!
Of course, none of you love me enough to pay me, so it's suffice to say that, yet again, I own nothing, and I am making no money here.
***********
Christine crossed her arms, leaning back against the rough wooden wall, trying to adjust her robe so it covered her flimsy nightgown. She was really quite surprised at how much she seemed to care about this - for pete's sake, this 'nightgown' was practically a dress in and of itself!
She suspected that, primarily, the reason she cared was that Elizabeth seemed to care so little, and she was certain that the other girl should be caring a good deal more. Instead, Elizabeth was storming around the small room like a fury scorned, fists clenched at her sides, muttering furiously. "Pirates!" she hissed, as she passed Christine on one of her sweeping passes of the room. "'Not part of the bargain', indeed!"
Christine sighed. "Elizabeth, maybe...it's alright. Really." They'd been in here all night, and all of this day, for that matter, and still Elizabeth marched around, growling.
Elizabeth stopped her pacing, glaring at the ground. "No, it isn't. We're on a pirate ship, totally against our will, and there's no way to get off. This is not alright."
Christine sighed. "Sorry."
Elizabeth groaned, and turned to face the younger girl. "I'm sorry...I just....I thought for sure that parley would work!"
Christine shrugged. "We're not dead, are we?"
Elizabeth almost smiled, when the door to the tiny cabin they were in slammed open, and Pintel and Ragetti stomped in, grinning like banshees.
"You'll be dining with the captain," he said to Elizabeth, holding a pile of fabric forward. "And he requests you wear this."
"Well, you may tell the captain that I am disinclined to acquiesce to his request." Elizabeth retorted sharply.
Pintel grinned. "He said you'd say that. He also said that if that be the case, you'll be dinin' with the crew....and you'll be naked."
Elizabeth snatched the dress, and his grin disappeared. "Fine," he snapped.
"And what about me?" Christine demanded, pushing forward to glare fiercely at the pirate.
He looked her up and down appreciatively, then sent her a lurid grin. "Perhaps ye can be dining with us tonight, poppet."
Christine sneered. "I'd rather not eat then."
He smirked. "We'll see about that," and hurried out the door, a grinning Pintel at his heels.
***
Twenty minutes later, Christine and Elizabeth sat at the captain's dining table, which looked fair to fall over with all the food on it. Elizabeth wore the pouffy burgundy dress that Pintel and Ragetti had delivered, and Christine wore a plain, pale yellow dress that a fuming Pintel had delivered a few minutes after Elizabeth's, relaying her invitation to the dinner as well.
Christine suspected that Captain Barbossa had simply forgotten about her when inviting Elizabeth, and had probably had a good laugh over it all when Pintel went to him with his suggestion that she might join the crew instead. Indeed, there were traces of laughter in his eyes still as he sat across the table from them.
At that moment, Elizabeth was daintily cutting up her food, eating like a proper lady. Christine was staring at the row of forks, trying to figure out which one she should be using for what.
"There's no need to stand on ceremony, nor call to impress anyone. You must be hungry." Barbossa smirked, and with great relief, the girls attacked the food. Elizabeth snatched a leg of some kind of bird and began hungrily mowing down, while Christine speared a potato with her fork and began eating it right off the fork. Barbossa smiled, and carefully poured two goblets of wine. "Try the wine," he offered them the glasses, and both thankfully gulped down the liquid. Christine immediately began coughing, having never drunk wine before and being quite unprepared for the sharp taste that would burn down her throat. Barbossa nearly laughed, watching both of them closely, then lifted two green apples off the fruit bowl in the middle of the table. "And the apples? One of those, next."
Christine dropped her fork, it clattering off her plate. "It's poisoned," she whispered, suddenly realizing why he was offering them so much food.
Across the table, Elizabeth dropped the bird leg she'd been eating.
"There would be no sense in killing ye, Miss Turner, Miss..." his eyes narrowed, as he examined Christine. "I don't believe I caught your name, Miss..."
Christine swallowed. She hadn't really given any thought to this. She certainly didn't want him to just...have her thrown overboard because she was useless, but from the way he was talking, she didn't think she wanted to say she was Turner, either. Something about the way he said that there'd be no sense killing 'Miss Turner' made her skin crawl. So, swallowing, Christine gave it her best shot. "Christine....Swann."
Elizabeth's eyes widened as she gaped across the table at her, and Barbossa's eyes narrowed. "Swann, ye say?"
"Yes. I am Governor Swann's niece. I'm visiting from...." She wracked her brains for a moment, trying to think of the town I'd said we came from. "St. George."
"Hmm." Barbossa eyed her carefully, then nodded. "Might make for a handsome bit of ransom, when all this is said and done." He grinned at her then, and turned back to Elizabeth. "Aye, Miss Turner, no sense in killin' ye."
Elizabeth held her chin up high. "Then release me. You have your trinket; I'm of no further value to you."
Christine winced. Elizabeth seemed to have a great knowledge about pirates, but the poor girl really had no idea what she was dealing with.
Barbossa removed the medallion from the front of his jacket, and Christine felt that familiar thrill of deja vu sweep up her spine. "You don't know what this is, do ye?"
Even as Elizabeth said, "It's a pirate medallion." Christine was leaning forward eagerly. She was convinced that I hadn't been telling the whole truth when I told her that the medallion was just a pirate's mark, and now that there was a medallion identical to the one the I still had with me at that moment, she wanted desperately to know what it was. She also had to wonder if maybe it might be able to tell her how a simple medallion had transported two teenaged girls into a movie/back in time/halfway down the world.
"This is Aztec gold. One of 882 identical pieces they delivered in a stone chest to Cortés himself. Blood money paid to stem the slaughter he wreaked upon them with his armies. But the greed of Cortés was insatiable. So the heathen gods placed upon the gold…a terrible curse. Any mortal that removes but a piece from that stone chest shall be punished for eternity." Barbossa finished his grim story as Christine gaped, and Elizabeth looked at him derisively.
"I hardly believe in ghost stories anymore, Captain Barbossa."
"Aye, that's exactly what I thought when we were first told the tale. Buried on an island that cannot be found except for those who know where it is. Find it, we did. There be the chest, inside be the gold, we took them all. Spent them and traded them. We frittered them away…on drink, and food, and pleasurable company." Barbossa sighed, playing with the medallion "The more we gave them away, the more we came to realize – the drink would not satisfy, food turned to ash in our mouths, and all the pleasurable company in the world could not slake our lust. We are cursed men, Miss Turner . Compelled by greed we were, and now we are consumed by it."
Christine could only stare at the captain in horror. She knew that Elizabeth clearly did not believe, and in fact, out of the corner of her eye, she saw the other girl slid a knife into her belt. But Christine was fairly sure that the pirate was telling the truth - and cursed coins would explain, somewhat, how they ended up here.
Swallowing, she whispered, "And how can you end the curse?"
Barbossa watched her cooly. "There is one way we can end our curse. All the scattered pieces of the Aztec gold must be restored and the blood repaid. Thanks to ye," he pointed to Elizabeth, "we have the final piece."
"And the blood to be repaid?" Elizabeth demanded.
"That's why there's no sense to be killin' ye - yet." He smirked, and offered the green apple. "Apple?"
Elizabeth sprang to her feet, knife in hand, and plunged it into the captain's chest. Christine let out a shriek, jumping to her feet. "What're you- " she gasped, but no blood seemed to be gushing from the wound. Instead, Barbossa merely gripped the handle of the knife, and with a squelching sound, pulled the blade from his chest.
"I'm curious, after killing me what was it you planning on doing next?"
Elizabeth screamed, and dashed for the doors. Christine would have followed - had Barbossa not stood directly between her and the door. A scream, followed by a succession more of them sounded from outside, and Christine whimpered, wondering what horrible things were happening to her friend.
Barbossa laughed, and reached forward to grab Christine's arm. "Might as well see what's going on too, Miss Swann?" And despite her struggles, he held her too close and tight to run, and as they stepped towards the door, Christine forgot to struggle as she swore her heart stopped.
On the deck, panting and looking more terrified than anything, stood Elizabeth. But behind her....
The pirate crew was laughing, walking on rotting feet, weapons held in skeletal hands, eyes staring out of decaying skulls. The entire crew had been transformed into living skeletons.
"Look! The moonlight shows us for what we really are. We are not among the living and so we cannot die but neither are we dead. For too long I've been parched with thirst and unable to quench it. Too long I've been starving to death and haven't died. I feel nothing, not the wind on my face nor the spray of the sea, nor the warmth of a woman's flesh." Barbossa reached towards Elizabeth, and as his hand fell under the moon's rays, it turned skeletal, rotton. Christine muffled a scream, even as Barbossa pulled her farther forward, moonlight falling over his entire body. "You'd best start believing in ghost stories, Miss Turner; you're in one!"
His teeth uncorked a wine bottle, and he tossed it back, wine splashing down his spine, spilling over the ribs, falling onto the deck. Now Christine shrieked, ripping herself out of his grasp as the wine poured over her dress, staining the pale yellow as though with blood.
Elizabeth thundered past, throwing herself into the captain's quarters, and Christine followed, just barely able to get in before Elizabeth slammed the door shut behind them.
Together, the two girls fell to the floor, leaning back against the door, dry sobs racking their bodies.
And outside the door, they heard the bone-chilling cackles of a pirate captain and his un-dead crew.