Will woke with a start, wondering not for the first time if the man in his dreams had really been anything like the man his father had been. Over the years he'd had many dreams in which the man had played a part. But dreams, he always ended up reasoning with himself, were only the musings of one's own inner self. He was reminding himself of that fact once more when he sat up and found his son, golden eyes smiling, sitting on the bunk across from the one they had slept on. For the first time, the boy was waiting patiently.

"Good morning, Jack."

"Morning Da."

Will nodded and ducked his head, suddenly ashamed of the tears he'd cried on his boy's shoulder. He was ashamed of many things all at once, and the guilt weighed on him so heavily that he gasped.

Jack was quiet, watching him.

"I am sorry, Jack." He shook his head, unable to meet the boy's gaze. "For many things. I've been so busy-but it's no excuse nor am I one for excuses. There has been much on my mind and I am afraid it has cost me Jack's friendship, your mother's love, and the respect of you and Lucy-my children." He forced himself to look up into his son's face. "Can you ever forgive me?"

"Course I can!" Jack turned serious. "So'll Lucy. But I think Ma's going to need some convincing. And I know Uncle Jack's going to need a very big on-your-knees sort of apology."

Will sighed. "Yes, I was also afraid of that."

He had followed his son to their cabin, where he had thought it best to stay put in the corridor, and when Jack had emerged he had followed him cautiously up the stairs, quietly and thinking all the while about how to apologize to an older, not completely wiser, and certainly more troublesome Jack. When they reached the top of the steps where the sun poured down, Will paused.

With the sun high above, Will guessed that it was noon or after. He could not remember a recent time in which the Black Pearl had been so still and silent so late into the day. Normally the ship was cutting through the blue waters of the Caribbean, all of her crew barreling exuberantly about as their captain took her wherever it was whatever it was they were after was waiting. Captain Jack Sparrow had never been one to waste time in the morning, despite however many late hours he put in, without good reason. His stomach tying in knots, Will decided that he didn't like being that reason.

Will took a deep breath. The breeze was not as brisk as it had been the previous day, but it was just enough to soothe him. Feeling strangely calm, he raised his gaze to the helm where he had expected to find the captain of the ship.

Cotton nodded down at him, the yellow parrot on his shoulder squawking his hello. The small woman beside him scowled and rushed down the steps toward Will, her dark, untied hair streaming behind her. Anamaria stalked, dark eyes dangerous, across the deck. She pulled young Jack out of her way and stopped short of stepping on Will's toes. He froze, staring into her eyes as he remembered that that sort of greeting was usually one she reserved for Jack Sparrow, and usually one that ended with a fierce, head-spinning slap to the jaw. When she raised her hand, he flinched, readying himself for it.

Anamaria paused, shooting a glance at the young boy who'd gone stock still beneath the clutch of her other hand. Instead of the slap she'd intended, she wagged a finger in front of Will's face and gave a slight shake of her head. "I won't have nonsense on this ship. So ya best watch yourself, Turner—and don't worry, cause if ya can't handle it, I'll be watchin ya too."

"I—"

"Save it!" She let go of the boy and turned on her heel. "I ain't got the time for it!"

Will sighed and strode after her. "Please, hear me out! I know I've made a mistake!" He stopped when she did, glancing at the line she tied to another. "I know I've not behaved as a man should! I know I've been wretched! I know I've been—a," he paused, grabbing her arm and hauling her around, "right pain in the arse, lately. But—"

"But nothin!" The woman scowled at the hand gripping her elbow, but she softened as she looked up at him. A hint of a smile lit her face for a split-second, but then it was gone. "You're right, Turner, ya have been a right pain in the arse! If you're askin what ya can do to ease the suffering you've caused in our backsides I'd wager apologies be the way to go."

"I do not know where to begin with my apologies," he confessed, looking in shame at his feet.

"Few ever do."

Will looked up at her and caught her gaze for a moment. When it went past him, he turned, following it over his shoulder to the men below. He had not noticed them for his eyes had been searching for only Jack Sparrow before. Now he saw them, nearly all of them and his son who wriggled betweenst them until he was between Gibbs and Cook, gathered around someone he expected to be his friend entertaining his crew. Just for an instant, he thought it was Jack he was looking at. But unless the pirate had doffed his beads and baubles and grown years younger overnight, it wasn't. When the young man looked up, his blue eyes sparkled at Will, and recognition dawned on him as he realized he was looking at Isaac Faust.

"Does everyone look like Jack?"

Anamaria smiled, shaking her head.

--- --- --- ------- () ------- --- --- ---

"She has your eyes."

Jack rolled his. "And that's the trouble aye?" He picked Little Lucy up, surprised he hadn't found her to be so heavy the day before. "But there are occasions, Miss Witter, when things are not what they seem. Looks can be deceiving." He glanced at the woman's skirt, not surprised to catch a glimmer of gold at her hip. "A fact which has its—advantages... as you well know."

Her hand went to the spot, concealing the shine beneath it. "Indeed."

"Outside?" Little Lucy pouted and pointed at the door ahead.

"Yes, we're going. We're going." Jack tried his best to look his stern self, despite the little girl on his hip and the woman whose lead he followed out the door, to whatever men lurked about. Much to his surprise, it seemed the entire crew was on deck—and crowding it at that. He was also surprised that such an occurrence had not wrought its usual pandemonium. They weren't even boisterous. In fact, there was but a buzz amongst them. Such a situation put a quiver in his belly. When the crew of the Black Pearl were quiet, they were up to something, and when they were up to something, they were really up to something, and when they were really up to something it was usually not anything that could be classified as "good".

Ignoring the tiny hands exploring his hair, Jack stepped forward. When his heel hit the plank, several heads turned. The pirates that saw him nudged other men around them and the buzz hushed. A new din rose almost immediately, whispers and hushed voices humming together. "Captain's out," he heard one of the men whisper. "Hush up," warned another. Frowning, he tried to see over a few of the crew to the center of the circle. Finding it nearly impossible, he pushed past a few of them toward the steps to the helm, uttering his apologies all the way.

Quickly tapping heels behind him caught up and Jack sighed, allowing whomever it was to fall into step beside him. Spying Will at the top of the steps with Anamaria and suspecting that whatever it was the crew were up to was something that would require his full attention, he resisted the urge to knock him on his arse and presented Little Lucy to him. "Believe I've got something of yours, Mr. Turner."

Will opened his mouth to speak but seemed to think better of it, accepting the girl silently. When the blacksmith turned his head to kiss the girl's hair, Jack had to force himself not to wince at the bruise purpling his cheek. Remembering Barbossa's cringe-inducing cackle, he closed his eyes to will it away. Opening them, he found Will's beseeching gaze. "Jack." For some reason he wanted nothing more than to bruise the other cheek. Folding his arms across his chest, he lifted his chin and stared back at him.

Will's jaw tensed when he realized he would not be answered. "I must speak with you."

"Is that not what you're doing?"

"Not in the way I would prefer." Hot determination shone in Will's eyes. "There are things to be said that do not require an audience. When you have a moment, I would be grateful if you would share it with me."

Jack sighed. There was no way around it, he knew. When Will had that look in his eye he did not intend to back down, and as stubborn as the man was, he probably wouldn't. "Fine." Before the man could utter a single word further, he turned to look out over his ship at the men below. Several of them were nodding toward him and snickering. Gibbs was chuckling with the two redheaded Irish men. And Cook was grinning up at him. The rest were whispering, nudging each other, and looking generally sneaky—not that that was unusual. In fact, Jack wasn't even sure why their suspicious behavior seemed suspicious. Suspicious it was, however, and he didn't like it.

"You'll find me when you've a moment?"

Jack rolled his eyes and whirled to face him, brows together. "Yes, Mr. Turner, I will find you!"

Will didn't flinch. He merely nodded, his gaze sliding from the pirate to the man at his side.

Remembering that there was a man at his side, Jack glanced at him before heading back down the steps. "Yes?" A stranger, he noted. "Who are you?" Startled, he fell back a step, clutching the railing for support. To his dismay, the crew seemed to find the misstep quite a hoot and hollers rang out behind him. Recovering as quickly as possible, he reached for the sword at his hip—the sword that was supposed to be at his hip, he determined with a frown.

The strange man's steps echoed as he took them, and he came to a stop before Jack and held out his hand. "Captain."

Jack stared down at the hand that was stuck at him. The faint scar along the length of the man's index finger, stretched thin by time, he knew. Grabbing Isaac's hand and yanking him close, the breath he'd not realized he'd been holding whooshed out his lungs. A joyous cheer went up amongst the men, but he scarcely heard it for the pump of his heart pulsing in his ears. Caring not that all eyes were on them, he sought Isaac's strong shoulders with his hands, and, squeezing them, drew him closer—unsatisfied with anything less than his chin over the boy's shoulder.

"Easy there," Isaac laughed, clapping him on the back. "I told them they were all mad, but I take it back! You are bloody emotional!"

Jack tsked, frowning at the long glossy hair at his cheek. "They are all mad, and I am bloody emotional and you're not in London and I am entitled to sniffle a bit, I think, and what in the name of the bloody King is this?" He pulled back from the lad and drew a glossy strand out, scowling. "When was your last haircut?"

Isaac snorted. "You're a fine one to talk about haircuts!"

Jack slapped his hand away. "No one is permitted to touch me hair for the rest of the week. Except the wee Turners as they are the only ones who do not pull on it. Tug on it. Or laugh at it." He frowned. "How did you get away with that mop in London?"

"In London I was supposed to wear white wigs that made my scalp itch something terrible."

"And how did you manage to get all that… hair… under a white wig?"

Isaac grinned. "Who said I did?"

Jack grinned back. "I bet the King's advisor had a tizzy."

"Oh," Isaac's face soured, "bloody Fainworth. You'd think he thought he was king." He grinned again. "Hannover and I had him in so many tizzies I don't know how he managed to keep his head."

"He's not French," Jack reminded him.

"There is that."

Watching the reunion between Jack and Isaac was as refreshing as it was disheartening. Will was certainly glad to see Jack smirking and talking with his hands—but he found it difficult to keep his jealousy at bay. Isaac had been an orphan as he'd been an orphan. But Isaac, at nine, had had the great luck to find himself on the Pearl and under the wing of Captain Jack Sparrow—who shortly became the father the boy had grown up without despite their reluctance to admit it. Seeing the two reunite and knowing that he would never have such a chance with his own father…

But that was not the only issue, Will knew.

For as much as he denied it, he had hoped, all those years ago, that the slightly mad and brilliant pirate would take him under his wing. As much as he denied it he had thought that the man who was the closest link he'd ever found to his father had assumed the role somewhat—despite their differences—until Isaac had come along. It had been evident then, when Will had witnessed the pirate's way with the young boy, that Jack Sparrow was, to Will, more friend than father. And as much as he did not want to admit it, it had been yet another disappointment.

Still, he felt ill of himself for the thoughts. Isaac had been but a boy in need and to resent that seemed the mark of an awful individual, an individual who Will could not suffer to live with. He pushed such thoughts and feelings as far from himself as was possible. But there were times when it was difficult. There were times when the inner struggle was too much to bear. Losing one father had hurt. Losing two had been more than troubling.

For what was it that he had done wrong?

"Da?"

Will looked down at Little Lucy, not surprised to see the puzzled look on her face. "What is it, Lucy?"

"Sad?"

"No."

She screwed up her face and gave a vehement shake of her head. "Liar."

He sighed and allowed her to scowl at him.

"Two Untle Jat's?"

Will turned back to the two men below. He'd nearly mistaken Isaac for Jack before but he now marked the many differences between the two. Isaac Faust, for his long years in brisk London, had a fine pallor to his skin much as Jack Sparrow was tan from his basking under the Caribbean sun. He was also taller than the pirate, and thinner, and without the telltale lines of age around his eyes. Of course, Will reasoned, Jack made it difficult to see those lines what with the smudging of kohl around his. There was that Isaac's blue eyes were rounder than Jack's black. And the hair… Will smiled in spite of himself. Jack's hair set him leagues apart from any other man, including Isaac whose hair rivaled his in length only. The brown of Isaac's mane was closer in color to Will's own than Jack's and redder than both. Then there were Isaac's understated clothes and Jack's many rippling layers. Will noted that Isaac had not a single weapon on his person—while Jack had…

Will frowned.

Jack Sparrow was not armed. Neither blade nor pistol had he on his person.

"Da…"

"No, Lucy. Only one Uncle Jack. That man," he said, pointing at Isaac, though he still sought Jack's frame for an indication of some sort that the pirate captain was not as daft as to walk about his pirate ship without at least one weapon, "is Isaac. He's Jack's… well." Will furrowed his brow, finding nothing on Jack's frame. "He's… your cousin."

Little Lucy fell silent, her dark gaze steady on the younger man.

Jack chose that moment to glance their way and, throwing his arm around Isaac with a wide grin, winked up at the little girl.

Little Lucy waved happily back. "Untle Jat. And…" She pursed her tiny lips. "Tussin I-sit?"

"Something like that."

"This lad 'ere—" he gave Isaac a good shaking, nodding from him to the open-mouthed crew—for it wasn't long ago that he'd done the same to a very rich and very captive man while they'd decided his fate was to be one involving quite a few really bad eggs— "left our Pearl behind to go traipsing about London. With the King no less!"

Isaac flushed under the scrutiny of the men before them.

"How many years was it?" Jack feigned ignorance, knowing bloody well how many years Isaac had been gone. He'd loathed the emptiness in his belly at night—and not only when it was a night that found one of the three women in charge of the evening meal. "Ten? Fifteen? Seventy nine and three months?"

Isaac sighed. "Six."

"Oh that's right, that's correct." Jack flicked a hand at him. "Six years he stayed away—traipsing about with the King in London in a white wig and silk stockings!" Jack paused for the nervous chuckle that trickled through the ranks of the men aboard and shook his head, sighing sadly. "Veritable pantyhose."

"I didn't—"

"Yes you did!"

"But I didn't!"

"But you did!" Jack poked an accusing finger at him. "And—ye liked it."

"Well," Isaac conceded, nodding sadly, "they were very silky—"

"That does it!" Jack grabbed him and mussed his hair, grinning at the brightening crew. "I say Isaac 'ere needs a proper welcome 'ome, what say you?"

"Aye!"

"We'll guzzle the 'ose right out of 'im, aye?"

"Aye!"

"We'll gamble the wig right off of 'im, aye?"

"Aye!"

"We'll loot the London right out the lad—what say you?"

"Aye!"

Jack grinned. "Aye, s'what I thought."

While Jack busied himself yapping at Cook, Alice grabbed Isaac and pulled him aside, ignoring the look of pure hellfire in the party planning pirate's eyes and the guilty look on the lad's face. "Oh stop it, I missed you as much as he and therefore am entitled as much as he to your attention!"

Isaac nodded. "You're right."

"Why the long face?"

"I was gone too long."

Alice sighed. "No you weren't, and it's our fault you were gone in the first place." She heard the snort and looked up in time to catch the brunt of Jack's glare. Smiling sweetly, she glanced pointedly down at the hand where the ring glittered on her finger, and winked at the horrified pirate whose frown instantly—albeit rather stiffly—turned upside down. "So," she said, accepting with her other hand the arm Isaac offered and strolling with him past Jack, "tell me, what's this about stockings?"

Isaac flushed. "They were very silky."

The clack and clunk of Jack's hair as he whipped around—to gape at them, she figured. She waved her ringed hand over her shoulder at him in a most fulfilling au revoir. When she was sure that she and Isaac were out of the unhinged captain's line of sight, she smiled smugly, her fingers slipping to smooth over the handle of the sword that Jack had yet to notice at her side.

Above them, Will and Cotton's parrot indulged Little Lucy in a guessing game, pretending not to know what it was she spied. It was a difficult ruse, for her hints made obvious her eye's catch, but Will and Cotton somehow managed to pull it off. The giggling girl had just told them that the "beads, bandana, and gold teeths" she'd spied had been "Untle Jat" when she gasped and clapped her hands excitedly.

Will exchanged a dubious look with Cotton before turning his attention down to his daughter. "What do you see this time?"

"Gold." She shook her head as an afterthought. "Not Untle Jat's teeths!"

"Teeth, Lucy."

"No, Da. Not his teeths."

"Teeth."

She screwed up her face. "Yes okay."

"Say 'Untle Ja—Uncle Jack's teeth'."

"Untle Ja—Untle Jat's teeth…s."

Will sighed. "You see more gold?"

She brightened, nodding. "Yes, more."

"Gold, gold, gold—all you care about is me gold!"

Will looked up at Cotton and his parrot in surprise. The man flushed, squawking companion dancing on his shoulder as he glanced down at his startled Captain. Will watched as Jack shot both an anxious look in Alice Witter's direction and a glare up at Cotton before easing back into his discussion—which Will was sure was party planning—with Cook. Catching Cotton's sparkling eye, Will smiled.

"Gold—etting."

"Etting?"

Little Lucy bit her lip. "Et… handle," she finished proudly.

Will frowned, puzzling over the clues. He glanced up at Cotton, wondering if the man had figured it out, but his shrug told him that he hadn't either. Etting… Then, his gaze narrowed on Jack, searching for the sword he'd obviously missed. "Gold etching—on a handle?"

"Yes aye."

"Uncle Jack's sword," he guessed, turning back to his little girl, who sighed and pointed her finger. Following the direction and still unable to spot it, he frowned. "But I don't see what you are pointing at."

"Pretty Liar," she said, pointing at Alice Witter.

"It isn't nice to call someone a liar," Will pointed out.

"Truth hurt."

Will glared down at the woman, studying her small frame for what it had been that had caught his daughter's eye. "Where?"

"In her stirt," Little Lucy whispered.

"Skirt," he corrected, finding the glint of gold under the woman's hand as soon as the girl clarified. A growl rose in his throat as he recognized it. "It is Jack's sword," he growled. The sight brought his blood to a boil. His anger sunk fast in his stomach, though, and he found himself suddenly weary. If the pirate had passed off his gift, did it mean that he had tossed his friendship to the wind as well? "It is simply not Jack who has it."

"Trouble in the water," Cotton's parrot squawked.

Below, Will's son did not heed that warning. Jack Turner trailed after the woman he knew and the young man he didn't know. He'd found out that the man's name was Isaac and that he had been in London for six years with the King. There had been something about wigs and stockings, but he had decided that those were things he had no desire to know about. The fondness his Uncle and the Ice Queen—a name by which he must remember not to call Miss Witter as he'd been instructed on more than one occasion of its impropriety—seemed to have for the man with the sharp accent, however, had him curious.

Snippets of conversation were all he was able to hear as he darted in the afternoon shadows behind the two. Frustrating though it was, Jack bit his tongue. He was near bursting when Isaac spun around, drawing a rather dangerous looking dagger from the sleeve of his shirt. Poised to strike, the man frowned at the empty air.

Jack, not happy about the reminder that he was yet to grow tall, scowled and crossed his arms. "Down here."

Isaac looked down at him and lowered the weapon, lifting a brow. "So you are."

"How'd you do that? With the dagger."

"Pirate trick."

"You don't look like a pirate," Jack pointed out.

"You don't look like a pirate either."

"I'm not the one claiming to pull pirate's tricks."

"No but you did sneak up on us," Isaac pointed out. "That's a trick of the pirate trade as well."

Jack shrugged.

"Tell you what." Isaac's blue eyes smiled at him as he knelt. "I've a proposition for you, young Jack. I'll tell you about my pirate trick, if you first tell me about yours. Have we an accord?"

"Aye, we do," Jack agreed, shaking on it. "Nothin to it! The trick's in the shadows. Brighter it is, better shadows there are! Specially on a ship. Nighttime's easy, o'course, because it's dark to begin with."

"That's all?"

"Well I'm real fast and quiet but I thought that would be a given."

"Are you insinuating that I'm slightly slow on the uptake?"

"I don't insinuate." Jack wrinkled his nose. "You were in London too long."

Isaac laughed. "Perhaps so. Now, my pirate trick's right easy. See, all there is to it is a leather cuff under my sleeve. It buckles around my arm." He rolled his sleeve back to reveal the buckled cuff and pointed at the leather sheath. "Dagger goes in there, and all I've to do if I need it is resort to the trick up my sleeve."

Jack raised his brows, impressed. "That's ace."

"No, but that's another good thing to have up your sleeve."

Jack had tagged along on their walk about the ship, despite the anxiety he felt whenever the Ice Queen—Miss Witter—looked his way. Being turned into an icicle by the woman's grey gaze, as he'd heard happened to many less fortunate men, was not something that he wanted to accomplish at his young age. But he did want to find out more about Isaac and so he had braved the consequences.

"What's the King like?"

"Hannover? He's a rip, that one."

Isaac had been easy enough to talk to, and had even indulged Jack in his wish to stand on the railing and look out over the water at the brightly colored fish swimming far below. It was a kindness Jack would not forget—save for when dealing with his parents of course. They, he had decided, need not know about the details of his day. Though the fish were so pretty it seemed a shame to keep it to himself, he thought, staring down at a school of red, white spotted beauties.

"How do you know him?"

"It's a secret."

"Nothing's a secret on the Black Pearl," Jack argued with a smirk. "When I'm on it!"

"What does that mean?"

"Nothing!" Jack glanced at the woman to ensure his safety from a freezing fate. Finding her eyes narrowing on him, his own widened and he turned quickly to Isaac. "Do you know how to climb the rigging?"