Jack was sitting at his desk when Will came in after he had changed his wet clothes. The captain, seemingly not caring for his own drenched slop, had his feet on the wooden desk with a bottle of rum in his hand. "Ye know, ye could 'ave seen this storm comin' if ye'd wanted." Will frowned, how should he have done that. "Ye need te lis'en te 'er." "Listen to whom?" Will asked bluntly. "Te 'er!" Jack growled and jumped up. Staggering about the room, taking a sip from the rum from time to time, he explained: "Te yer love. Yer life. The sea talks te ye, lad, if ye only would lis'en." Jack paused in front of Will and wildly waved about: "Ne'er fo'get tha' she can take away everything fro' you if she wants. She can take the Pearl, she can take yer life if she feels like it. But she won' if ye learn te lis'en. Te 'er waves an' 'er whisper in the wind, mate." Will thought for a moment. Maybe Jack was right. He nodded slowly. "Are ye willin' to lis'en?" Again, he nodded. "Good." Jack took a long drink of his rum, then handed Will the bottle. His eyes dug into him. Will swallowed the lump in his throat and raised the bottle to his lips cautiously. Quickly, he took a small sip of the alcohol and handed the bottle back. He did his best to disguise the burning sensation in his throat. "The sea is me life," Jack began. "Me life. I don' 'ave one without 'er. I've spent ages out on the water. I can't imagine bein' on land. I don' have a real life beyond this 'ere ship. Now, time fo' the story." Will was transfixed with the tale, listening ever so eagerly. "When I firs' started, I was but a wee lad. I was a lily- livered coward, aye." "How did you become a captain then?" Will asked, then felt embarassed for interrupting the story. He blushed. "Well," Jack smirked, "that's what I was jus' about to tell ye." He sat down on his desk and gulped some more rum: "So when I firs' went off te the sea I was just like ye are now.." Will frowned and Jack grinned mischievouly: "On me firs' trip the dear lady thought she'd teach lil Jack a lesson. We were in a calm an' 'ad 'oisted all sails an' were scrubin' the decks when the strom started. No' like this one. Tha' storm was jus' suddenly there, playin' with the good ol' Santa Anna. Waves like mountains, I'm tellin' ye. The boom was outta control an' some of the crew were washed overboard. An' ye know what I did?" Will shook his head, totally engulfed by the tale. "I jumped over the rail te try to save 'em." He shrugged nonchalantly. "Didn' work. Let tha' be a lesson te ye: don' try te save 'em. If they ain' tough enough, they ain' tough enough." Will looked around, a bit confused. "So, it's every man for himself?" Jack laughed, almost diabolically. "Every man fer 'imself? Yer right! We're all brothers 'ere, but we ain' heroes. Though..." He looked around, then focused back on Will. "Some mates do look out fer each other." The thought made Will smile a bit.