Ok, here it is chapter 5 R&R please? I love your reviews so much! They make me do strange dances around my room! lol. Oh by the way there are two short scenes to read before you get to the fluff. Enjoy literacy community.

Chapter 5

Will had to find him; he didn't have a hope of achieving that on the Pearl. He'd readied the longboat and collected supplies. He looked at them: food, water - something was missing… rum! Cursing at the time loss he sprinted down to the galley.

Lydia froze, gripping with fierce intensity onto the mouth of the bottle, hoping and praying that she had just misheard a groan from the ship. But no; the voice spoke again; "There's no use denying it!" She turned slowly and, with a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach, staggered behind a wine rack to where the voice had come from. And there he was; Bootstrap Bill Turner. Lydia shuddered, repulsed by the fungi and coral growing over his face. She reached out a quivering finger and prodded him. He was solid, he was real. "Davy Jones is looking for you!" he croaked.

"I haven't had thirteen years yet!"

"Your agreement was for freedom, you didn't specify for how long! You owe him a lifetime of service Lydia!" She flinched at the use of her name and her upper lip twitched in trepidation, she remembered the conditions of the contract all too well.

"You know the deal, Miss Winter, wherever you run he will chase you, wherever you hide he will find you. He will follow you to the ends of the earth! That's the price you agreed to pay!" he wheezed, clutching onto a beam for support.

"But…"

"Save it for him, lass!" She bit her lip, then, unable to meet his gaze, fled back up the steps.

From behind a stack of barrels Will watched her go then returned to his cabin, there was no need to leave after all!

Elizabeth lay on her bed and stared at the ceiling. Every so often she made a futile attempt to count the planks of wood that made it up. Wearily she began again for the fifth time; she always lost count at thirty. Her mind was on other things. Lydia's story was one of them; Jack seemed to have a habit of saving people! He really was, she thought, much more noble than everyone gave him credit for. In fact he was O.K. all round. Again her thoughts strayed, this time to Will. He was becoming increasingly snappy and aggressive, perhaps even more so now his illness had passed. Elizabeth pictured herself married to him; where would they live? He had told her on the day that they made port in Port Royal that their life as respectable citizens certainly wasn't over. According to him they still had plenty of opportunities to come. Elizabeth supposed that that meant that they would get Jack to drop them off in England, or any other peaceable country. There Will would become a blacksmith or perhaps try to get a place in the government, and she would become a housewife. Elizabeth contemplated the unattractive occupation with distaste. When she had been a young girl, no more than four or five years of age she had dreamt of running away with a handsome explorer. Or joining the Gypsies and living free and wild. There had been another reverie, of becoming a pirate. She had that option now, of fulfilling a childhood dream. She imagined herself there, sailing the seven seas, the wind buffeting her mane of hair, every moment filled with danger, excitement, beauty and joy! She laughed out loud with happiness. She would listen to the orders of no one, with the crew behind her… and the Captain beside her. The smile vanished from her lips. Oh Jack, dear Jack, what could she do? Angrily she turned her attention back to the ceiling, and mouthing each number as she counted she attempted to push all other thoughts from her brain.

Lydia sat cross legged on the floor of her cabin. She rocked back and forth, her hands clasping her feet. What could she do? He was coming! He was coming and he was going to find her. She whimpered and began to nibble on one of her fingernails. Running was pointless, as it so often was. She was going to have to do it; serve the hundred years on his accursed ship. She shuddered, a year, a month, a day, an hour was too long! She gritted her teeth; there had to be a way out of it. Suddenly her thoughts were interrupted by someone knocking on the door; "Who is it?" she asked fearfully.

"Elizabeth."

"Oh, come in."

She did so, shutting the door carefully behind her. "I wanted to ask you something."

"What about?"

"About Will and I… and Jack!"

"Ah."

"Oh help me please! What do I do?"

Lydia felt like screaming at her, shrieking that she had it easy. But slowly her fury ebbed away as she remembered her own infatuation…

Lydia's flashback

Jack stood, legs apart braced to take the force of the waves that were flung against him. He was dripping wet all over, his hat sagging inward from the weight of the water. He had the beginnings of a moustache and beard, and his hair, already dreadlocked, was shoulder length. Lydia stood beside him, letting the spray caress her face and grinning as several fish were thrown aboard. This was her life, here was her home, here with Jack, she would never leave it, not if she could help it!

An exhausted Gibbs struggled up beside them. "Cap'n, we need to make port or at least drop anchor, this storm's been raging for days now."

Jack narrowed his eyes; "What's the nearest port?"

"Tortuga, but even that's a mile or so away. Should we try and hold out here or make for the docks?"

Suddenly the Captain raised his telescope to his eye, then with a short laugh spoke the words that would tear Lydia away from him; "Neither! Look, there's a ship coming, pirate ship, we can sail to them, it'll be good to meet some new faces!"

"Are you sure it's safe?"

"We outlaws need to stick together. It'll be fine!"

It hadn't been though. Lydia remembered perfectly Jack's startled face as a cutlass was held to his throat. She remembered screaming at him as she was dragged away by the laughing pirates, "Jack, help me! For the love of GOD save me!" Perhaps he valued his life too much to risk it for her, perhaps he just hadn't heard her. She would have liked to think it was the latter, but she could have sworn she'd seen him staring at her before she was pushed out of sight. Either way they had been pulled apart, she had loved him, but fate had separated them!

"It seems," Lydia said turning to Elizabeth, her voice catching, "You have fallen the same way many other women have fallen before you. It just remains to be seen whether you have brought him down with you!" With that the two women fell upon each other's shoulders weeping, crying for a man they had both once hated!

Suddenly the meagre light from the porthole was extinguished; something had risen up beside them. Something big!

OOOHHHH I'm evil aren't I? Muhahahahah. Next and last instalment same time tomorrow!