Chapter Seventeen: A Much Needed Plan

"I don't care what the Commodore ordered!—"

"And I don't care what Jack Sparrow ordered—"

"The pirates… THEY CANNOT BE KILLED!" yelled all three girls together.

"Don't worry, he's already been informed of that, a little mermaid flopped up on deck and told him the whole story," laughed Gilette.

"This is Jack Sparrow's doing!" they yelled together again as they pushed against the locked, guarded door.

* * *

"No reason to fret. Just a prick of the finger, a few drops of blood—"

"No mistakes this time. He's only half Turner. We spill it all!" said Twiggs.

"Guess there is reason to fret," said Pintel, laughing.

Suddenly, Jack appeared. "Beg your pardon," he said, pushing through the crowd of pirates.

"Begun by blood…"

"Excuse me."

"By blood und—"

"Jack!" said Will as Barbossa looked up.

"'S not possible."

"Not probable."

"Where's Elizabeth and Lissie?"

"They're safe, just like I promised. Elizabeth's all set to marry Norrington—just like Lissie promised, and you get to die for her just like you promised, so we're all men of our word really…except for Elizabeth and Lissie who are in fact…women."

"Shut up!" said Barbossa. "You're next!" He held the knife up to Will's throat.

"You don't want to be doing that," said Jack slowly.

"No, I really think I do."

"You're funeral."

Barbossa rolled his eyes. "And why don't I want to be doing it?"

"Because," began Jack, then he knocked Bósun's hand off his shoulder. "Because the HMS Dauntless, pride of the Royal Navy, is floating just off shore, waiting for you."

"Just hear me out, mate. You order your men to row out to the Dauntless; they do what they do best. Robert 's your Uncle Fannie 's your Aunt, there you are with two ships. The makings of your very own fleet. 'Course you'll take the grandest as your flagship and who's to argue? But what of the Pearl? Name me Captain, I'll sail under your colors, I'll give you ten percent of me plunder and you get to introduce yourself as…Commodore Barbossa. Savvy?"

"I s'pose in exchange you want me not to kill the whelp."

Will frowned at Barbossa.

"No, no, no, by all means, kill the whelp. Just not yet. Wait to lift the curse until the opportune moment. For instance," he pulled out a handful of the medallions. "After you've killed Norrington's men. Every." He threw in a coin. "Last," he threw in another. "One."

Instead of throwing in the last one, he pocketed it.

Will thanked his lucky stars that Jack had a plan. "You've been planning this from the beginning. Ever since you learned my name!" he played along.

"Yeah."

"I want fifty percent of yer plunder," said Barbossa.

"Fifteen."

"Forty."

"Twenty-five. And I'll buy ye a hat. A really big one. Commodore?"

"We have an accord." They shook hands.

"All hands to the boats!" said Jack, throwing his arms out. No one moved. "Apologies, you give the orders," said Jack to Barbossa.

Barbossa stepped up. "Gents, take a walk."

"Not to the boats?"

* * *

"Music… the pirates are coming!"

"We've got to do something!" said Lissie. She ran around the room, trying to find anything that was made of cloth. "Start tying these together! NOW!" she yelled at Beth and Elizabeth.

"Why?" asked Elizabeth.

Lissie rolled her eyes. "Do you want to get out of here or not? Because if you don't would you prefer to get killed?"

"Yeah… I mean no! I want to get out of here!"

"Then tie these together!" Lissie yelled, chucking them at Elizabeth.

"All right!"

After a few minutes, the governor came to the door. "A moment please?" he asked the guard. He knocked on the glass. "Elizabeth? I just want you to know I…I believe you made a very good decision today. Couldn't be more proud of you. But you know, even a good decision if made for the wrong reasons can be a wrong decision."

But Elizabeth wasn't listening. She was already out of the window, and even though Lissie was sorely tempted to untie the makeshift rope Elizabeth was climbing down on, she followed Beth out the window, and into the rowboat.

"Elizabeth? Are you there? Elizabeth are you even listening to me?" he opened the door and saw the makeshift rope, but not his daughter. "Oh, what have you done?"

A big mistake, by the looks of it.

Once they were halfway between the ships, Lissie had purposefully knocked a screaming Elizabeth out of the rowboat.

"I hope you like to swim, Mrs. Commodore!" Lissie yelled back as she and Beth both rowed as fast as they could to the Black Pearl.

"Stroke! Stroke! Stroke!" said Beth to Lissie, who was rowing.

"Why… don't you do this yourself then?" asked Lissie.

"I like ordering people around, that's why."

* * *

"I must admit, Jack. I thought I had you figured. But it turns out you're a hard man to protect."

"Me? I'm dishonest. And a dishonest man you can trust to be dishonest, honestly. It's the honest ones you want to watch out for. Because you can never predict when they're gonna do something incredibly… stupid."

And with that, he kicked the pirate in the butt in front of him, took his sword, threw it to Will, and pulled out his own. The fighting began!

* * *

Lissie turned around, and at the same time, Beth did.

"The fighting just started!" they said together as they climbed out of the boat.

They peered through the cannon and saw the two pirates thinking about what they were going to eat once the curse was lifted. Beth almost gave away their hiding place when she almost kicked the cake over.

The girls climbed back up on deck and they already knew that no one was around—except for the monkey. It came screeching down out of the sails, but the girls just looked at each other and smiled.

"Hello, chum!" said Lissie.

Beth kicked the monkey on the head and it fell onto the cannon.

"What was that?" asked the pirates together.

They looked out and saw the monkey fall, the looked up and heard Beth trip.

"Hurry up, you clutz!" said Lissie. They quickly hid behind the pole, and the pirates ran up the stairs. Once they were out of sight, Gibbs and the rest of the crew looked to see who was coming.

"It's Beth and Lissie!"

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