Disclaimer:  My aunt bought me a copy of 'Two Towers' so I'll stop renting it and will have money left to buy the extended version when it comes out (it has entdraft and wild ents and Faramir seeing Boromir dead in the Anduin and if not for Osgiliath and elves at Helm's Deep and Aragorn taking a fall off a cliff that should have killed him but didn't it would be approaching very close to the books!) so I own that but not anything from 'Pirates'.

AN:  Oh boy, I dropped off the face of the Earth there for a bit.  I was a bloody brilliant nutter last year when I scheduled classes.  I spend half the day at a home school and half the day at an accelerated school for math and science.  Kids at my home school take five classes a day.  Most kids at the math and science center take three at their home school and three at the Center.  I'm taking  three at my home school, four at the Center, and one through another school district, as well as watching my brothers while my mom takes care of my grandma, who is only expected to live for another three months, only another six if the surgery they want to do is successful.  I'm also part of the Center Student Senate, tutoring a girl two nights a week, babysitting at the elementary PTA meetings once a month, and volunteering at the Nature Center on weekends.  I'm also supposed to be applying to colleges and for scholarships.  This means I'm getting about four, five, at the most six hours sleep a night.  Can anyone else see a nervous breakdown coming here?  My God, my God, I know you don't hate me, please don't forsake me now, I really, really need you, and thank you for not letting me find a job, it would just about kill me at the moment.  I'll write as often as I can, and I'll try to keep up the same quality of work that I've had before.  That's all I can promise.

To Love and Protect

Part 2

Jack stood quickly, the ringing in his ears fading to be replaced by a crackling sound that he knew all too well.

His ship was burning.

His home was burning.

He staggered below decks, Ana-Maria on his heels, a sick feeling settling in the pit of his stomach as he shifted to fit with the new rocking motion of his ship, a sickening, lurching motion that tore at his self-control.  He kept his face carefully impassive, restraining himself even from cursing, concentrating on salvaging lives to keep in control.  Better to be numb and functioning than screaming bloody denials to a god that had long ago turned its back on him.  That could wait until later.

Now it was even better to focus on what this chain of events meant.  He had been betrayed.  Again.  From within his own crew.  Again.

He had only taken on four new crewmen for the Pearl in the last year.  Jacob was dead.  That left Ron, Terrence, and Michael.

It was dark below decks, dark, hot, and rapidly filling with an acrid smoke that made it difficult to breath.  Breaths that were drawn were filled with the stench of sweat, and a copper-tinted reek of blood so strong that the pirate captain could almost taste it on his tongue.

Men stirred slowly, gagging in the fetid atmosphere.  Jack reached down and hauled one of them up to his feet, shoving him towards Ana-Maria and a tentative escape before reaching down to grab the next one, not even bothering to put names to faces.  It didn't matter right now.  He only wanted to see three men, and he knew that he would recognize them.

A small grimace broke through Jack's mask of calm as he reached down to pull another crewman up and pulled his hand back coated with blood.

He turned towards Ana-Maria, barely visible through the smoke in the dim lighting.

"Get everyone off the ship.  Get yourself on one of the boats."

She shook her head emphatically, stepping towards him, one arm over her mouth to act as a filter.  "Not without you."

"I'll come.  I swear.  I need to see if anyone else is alive.  I can't protect myself if I'm worried about protecting you."

"I don't need your protection."

"That doesn't mean I don't have to give it.  Please.  Go.  I give you my word that I'll come.  They need someone who's completely functional at the moment to lead them.  That would be you.  I've already lost enough here today.  I don't want to lose any more."

He turned around, hoping that he had left no room for argument, and bent down at the side of the next man, grateful for the lessening of the smoke at the lower altitude.  When he turned around again, the female pirate had disappeared.

Jack worked his swift and silent way through the perhaps dozen corpses that lay in varying poses on the planking, recognizing Terrence among them.

He wasn't sure if it was a sound or a glimpse of movement that alerted him, but he moved nonetheless, earning only a gash from his right shoulder in a diagonal line across his back from what was most likely meant to be a killing blow.

Jack drew his sword, circling the other man as he tried to ignore the steady drip of blood down his back.  "Michael."

The man smiled, though his brown eyes remained hard.  "Captain Jack Sparrow."

"Traitor."  Jack shook his head from side to side slowly and blinked, hoping to clear his vision, which seemed to be growing steadily cloudier.

"A pirate that calls someone else a traitor.  How entertaining."

"You're a pirate as well."  The pirate captain staggered and nearly fell as the ship lurched again, keening mournfully to itself as it prepared to self-destruct.

"Not quite, Sparrow.  It's funny, you know, but the same drugs that can be put into drinks, that make people so much easier to kill, ships so much easier to sink, can also most often be used to coat a sword."  The man side-stepped as Jack lunged forward, slamming the hilt of his blade into the side of the pirate's head.  The pirate captain fell forward, breathing heavily.  "I think I'll be going now.  After all, it's only the captain that supposed to go down with the ship."

Jack lay on the rough wood, struggling to stay conscious as the ship lurched around him.  It would be simple, so very, very simple, to just lay there until the fire reached the magazine and what was left of his ship, his world, tore itself apart in a cataclysm of sparks and fire.  It was a good end for a good ship, not as honorable perhaps as dying while raiding, but still a good end.  They would make tales of it, he knew, and sailors would remember the day the Pearl went for years to come, maybe even longer than they remember her exploits in life.  He could be part of that.  All he had to do was stay where he was . . .

With far more effort than he thought the movement should need Jack lurched to his feet, reeling as the world tilted randomly and violently around him, choking and gasping as smoke filled his lungs.  He had given his word to a friend . . .to a lover.  He would keep it if he could.

He was dimly aware of his hands blistering as he crawled on hands and knees up the wooden steps towards the inferno that had at one time been the main deck of his ship.  No one was on deck, and from what his distorted vision could tell him all the boats were gone.  Ana-Maria had listened to him.

The pirate captain staggered upright, cutting a meandering path towards the railing, where he attempted to grasp it with both hands, surprised to find that he still clutched his sword tightly in his right hand.  He clumsily sheathed it before climbing under the railing, not trusting himself to climb over without falling over the side or to balance on top to dive without falling off.  He had a vague awareness of someone calling his name, but he ignored it, focusing on what would come next.

They were in deep water.  He had to get a long jump, as far away from the Pearl as he could, and he had to keep his bearings, remember which way was up.  The salt water would burn all along his back, and he hoped that would help clear his head.

Taking a deep breath he dived, aware even through the haze that his form was utterly terrible and not caring much, so long as it got him away from what had been his ship.  He prepared himself for the shock of water, the flash of pain as salt water filled the slash down his back . . .

What he felt was pressure at his back and an explosion of pain and heat along the left side of his head as consciousness fled completely.