Yeah! Another island fic. I suppose everyone has one of these. I started writing this because I wanted to see how the deleted scenes would work if they were blended back into the movie--a project that got way out of hand. I tend to write movie novelizations if no one hits me over the head with an oar. As you can see, no one has. There will be more, much more--this is a threat. Most parts of this series can stand alone, but this one is mostly prologue.

Rating: Will eventually have some T but this is pretty K
Pairing: None
Cast: Jack and Elizabeth
Disclaimer: The movie belongs to the mouse, the performance to the lovely Johnny and Kiera, the script to Ted and Terry.

An Ocean of Tears

By Honorat Selonnet

The sense of irony as he arched out over the azure water was almost despair. Ten years and to have come so close! To have had the decks of the Black Pearl under his very feet. To have heard, however muted, the song of the wind in her rigging again. To have felt her grace as she danced through the waves, even wounded as she was. And to have been forced at sword's point a second time to abandon his lady to the wretch who had stolen and abused her so. The sea parted around Jack with barely a splash. Like the Pearl, he was a creature of the sea. As he dove through swirls of tropical fish, jewel-toned, living treasure, the caress of water soothed his heated face. The sting of salt in his eyes was like tears—as if the Pearl sailed away from her true captain on an ocean of his tears. Even as his effects settled gently on the reef, the pirate scooped them up in his bound hands and headed for the shimmering light of the surface.

Treading water, he turned to face the horizon. To face the departure of his dreams, his life, his beloved Pearl. She had come about and was slipping slowly out to sea in the foggy miasma of the curse that hung over her—an immortal ship with an immortal crew, but no longer a winged victory. Instead, her tattered sails hung over her like funeral shrouds, a wraith ship, forever in mourning, forever mourned. For some reason, his eyes still stung and the image of the Black Pearl blurred. But even for a swimmer such as Jack, staying afloat without the use of his hands was work. Reluctantly, he let the buoying salt water carry him away from the Pearl and the horizon, towards that horridly familiar spit of land that he had escaped ten years ago.

He met up with Elizabeth, standing in the breakers, the water foaming white around her knees, as she also watched the Pearl growing smaller. Her face was a study in all too familiar emotions—rage and loss. He knew that she was seeing Will departing in the same way he saw his ship. They stood in silence, braced against the breathing of the waves, unconsciously drawing close to each other, two forlorn specks of humanity alone on the vast sea, as life and love slipped towards the horizon on the wings of tattered black sails.

As they trudged toward shore, Jack turned one last time. When he spoke, his voice was both wistful and angry, "That is the second time I've stood here and watched that man sail away with my ship." Elizabeth did not respond. For her, the ship was a nightmare, a floating charnel house of horror. And now Will was trapped in that nightmare, while she stood helpless on this sandy beach. They watched as the dark ship shrank to a cloudy smudge of black, then faded from sight. The Black Pearl was gone.

Jack, who felt as though his soul had flown like a grey gull out over the sea after his ship, pulled himself together with effort. Shrugging his shoulders and shaking water from his matted hair, he carefully arranged the muscles of his face into his characteristic mad grin and swung around to face Elizabeth, bound hands outthrust. "What do you say, love? Would you be so kind?" He nearly flinched at the look in her eyes as she rounded on him. If the lass met Barbossa again in his mortal flesh, he thought, the odds might be about even. Nevertheless, although her hands trembled a little, she fought silently with the water-logged knots until the rope loosened and the blood rushed back into his chilled hands in prickling pains. Elizabeth spun around and as much as possible stomped through the water to the shore. Jack followed her, winding up the rope and shaking his head. What a pirate the lass would have made if she hadn't been born such a lady.

Staggering up the slope from the water's edge, as usual never quite acquiring his land legs, Jack was conscious of two things—a creeping sense of desolation at finding himself on this hopeless island again and a heartfelt relief that he was not alone. Wait a minute, of course he was sorry Elizabeth had been caught in the net he'd been casting for Barbossa. She did not deserve to die on this barren little piece of earth with his mangy carcass. Oh, who was he trying to fool? He was desperately glad she was here. And while Gibbs or even the whelp, Will, would have been good company, there was something to be said for dying pickled in rum in the arms of a beautiful woman. He leered admiringly at the girl's shapely figure outlined by her clinging wet shift. Elizabeth turned and caught the tail end of that look. She started towards him with that highly businesslike manner at the end of which Jack, with the ease of vast experience, read an ear-ringing slap. Scratch the arms of a beautiful woman. Now how about that rum? Jack set off on a new tack at a faster pace than perhaps was dignified.

Elizabeth heaved a sigh, gave up on vengeance for the moment, and set out in the opposite direction. Explore the island. That sounded like a good idea. She needed to escape that bloody pirate. How could he find that dismal collection of hull and masts and wretched sails more important than Will's life? She had thought Jack Sparrow was a heroic figure, had read the stories about him with delight. But he was a monster, not a man. As bad as Barbossa. Human life meant nothing to either of them. If she spent one more moment near him she was afraid she might attack him. Not a good idea, since he was the one who would know how to get off this island and she would need his help. Not to mention the fact that he had a pistol.

She needed to think. Her heart was still numb, stunned by too many emotions too quickly experienced. Will. Her mind insisted on providing a picture of him, left behind on that accursed ship with those murderous pirates, bound and gagged, snarling and fighting his captors. Will, who was going with those cursed pirates to die in her stead. She could almost taste the bitterness of anguish on her tongue. She needed to plan, but her mind refused to cooperate. Her bare feet left the only tracks on that white empty beach as she tried to escape from the tears that stung her eyes like salt water.