-18. Be A Good Man

"Wake up, swine." A splash of cold water startled both Jack and Elizabeth awake. Much to his annoyance, most of the bucket had landed on Jack. They'd been sleeping with their heads resting against each other through the bars, and the sight of it seemed to infuriate Will even more. He stood before their cells with two other burly sailors.

Elizabeth met his unforgiving gaze, and felt a chill of foreboding run down her spine. What was about to happen?

"Bring him," Will ordered, and stomped back up the hold stairs.

"Come on, you," grumbled the sailors, roughly seizing Jack and dragging him from the cell.

"Jack!" called Elizabeth, jumping up to rush to the bars.

"No worries, love. Merely protocol, I'm sure." They exchanged a glance, and it lay obvious that neither of them believed it.

In the dead middle of the night, lanterns and the moon lit the deck of the Avenger. Will stood waiting at a clear space, gleaming saber in hand. He'd forged the blade himself some time ago, and never imagined he would be using it to kill Jack Sparrow.

"So what 'av we here, Will? A moonlit fight to the death? I do get a sword, don't I?"

Jack made a show of straightening his shirt cuffs, once the sailors released him and stepped away. One cautiously handed the pirate back his sword, thinking this a foolish breach of Navy protocol, but still under obligation to obey the new captain. He sympathized; if the rumors of what happened with Will's fiancee were at all true, Sparrow deserved a few good whacks of the sword. Some of the crew, but not many, stood about to watch the fight. There weren't many men to spare on the ship, after the fight, and the crew being split in half to also sail the Pearl.

"So it seems, Jack," answered Will. "Although it's not exactly within keeping of British law, I thought you might prefer to die fighting over hanging at the gallows. And, there is the fact that I would like nothing better than to cut you to pieces."

Jack swung his sword about, testing the weight, checking that it hadn't been meddled with to disadvantage him in the fight. "I was expectin' such a thing. But hassn't the idea occurred to ye that maybe the decision wasn't mine, but that of your bonnie lass, to take up sailin' on a pirate ship?"

"And choose you, over me?" Will pointed his cutlass at Jack, temper rising once again. "A life of dirt and uncertainty and running from the law, over life with the man who loves her and cherishes her more than anything?"

Jack smiled, baring his gold-capped teeth. All the signs were there, clear as day. The whelp was experiencin' a bit of denial. "That's where you've got it all wrong, mate. I don't think she chose me over you so much as she chose freedom…over you."

Without warning or en garde, Will lunged forward at Jack. The pirate easily parried the blow, his body settling into a dance he'd practiced hundreds of times over. It was a different type of awareness, not just watching the opponent's sword, but his body movements, his expression. Every little bit indicated what to expect next. It took a true master to not foreshadow in some way what his next move would be.

"What do you mean, freedom," spat Will as they fought. "Would I have locked her in a room all day, forced her to sew until her fingers bled?"

"Perhaps not in a literal sense," hissed Jack, parrying another attack. "But a happy home can serve a shackles the same as any prison cell."

"And how is a ship any different? Stuck in the same place for months on end, sailing under orders of a Captain who only knows how to serve himself, and no other?"

Jack rolled his eyes. "Face it Whelp, she left you for a life of adventure you can never give her."

"And I suppose you can? A filthy rotten pirate?"

Jack beat Will back a few paces. The whelp was fightin' out of anger, and not guarding himself as vigilantly as he should have against an opponent like the pirate Captain. "She was on my ship, wasn't she?"

"Elizabeth is not a pirate!"

"Ms. Lizzie is a better pirate than you could ever fathom of being, mate. Best accept it and get over it."

"Never!" Will slashed viciously at Jack, surprising him with his sudden burst of ferocity. Swords crossed, he pushed the pirate against the main mast, and hissed, "You have no idea how much I hate you! I never seem to be able to escape you, somehow you always weasel your way back into my life, with your silly schemes, and now Elizabeth. She would talk of you, constantly. It was your name on her lips in her sleep, not mine. I would have nightmares of our wedding night, of her crying your name. It seems the only way to really be rid of you is to kill you, for good."

Narrowing his dark eyes at the whelp, Jack caught him off guard in his rant, kicking him away.

"It's not my fault if I'm the irresistible Captain Jack Sparrow. You're taking this out on entirely the wrong pirate, mate." Now both combatants fighting with hot blood, the sound of swords clanging at breakneck speed filled the air. It came to Jack's attention a piece of rigging on a mast holding some barrels aloft, full of wood and nails for repairs after the gun battle, and without missing a beat he cut the line. The barrels came crashing down next to Will, giving the pirate the opening he needed to take advantage, knocking the cutlass from Will's hand and placing his own steadily at the whelp's throat.

"You cheated," spat Will.

"Pirate," Jack grumbled. Now holding the Captain of the Avenger hostage, Jack knew he owned the entire ship. With Will as leverage, Jack began to bark orders, menacingly threatening to slice Will's throat at the slightest provocation. He orchestrated the enemy crew to push aside a cannon, and pile all their gunpowder at and around the opening in the side of the ship. After freeing Elizabeth from her cell, they walked back up to the deck, ordering the crew to flag down their friends on the Pearl.

"Have I mentioned how beautiful you look in that dress, Elizabeth?" Will twitched at the compliment Jack paid his love, but managed to hold his self control, only unable to contain the hatred in his eyes. Jack had given it only partly to vex Will; mostly, it was just one of those rare occasions where he decided to tell the truth.

In silence, they waited for the Pearl to catch up, and come along side them. Jack now held Will with a pistol to his back, not wanting the situation to be evident to the crew aboard the Pearl. The cover of darkness helped as well.

"We want to board," shouted Will, across to the Pearl, at Jack's urging. Confused and concerned, the sailors on nightshift watched gravely, wondering what the outcome would be.

A long plank was thrown across between the two ships, of which Will, Jack, and Elizabeth traversed. Once aboard, Jack wasted no time. "Thank you much," he drawled, immediately firing at the cannon window in the side of the Avenger where the barrels of powder rested. A huge explosion shook the ship, and fire lit up the night. His next action was to womp will over the head with the butt of his pistol, rendering him unconscious on the Pearl's deck.

The explosion was powerful enough to nearly completely gut the Avenger; with such a hole in her hull and nearly split in half, she took on water fast. Panicked shouts filled the air on all sides, along with the crackling of burning wood and sail.

"Go free the crew," Jack urged Elizabeth, pushing her in the direction of the hold.

He didn't need to tell her twice; hiking up the motion-inhibiting skirts, she raced for the hold. Meanwhile, Jack took on the rest of the crew remaining on the Pearl by his onesies, hoping Elizabeth would be fast enough to bring him aid in time.

Having no idea where to find the key, she wasted no time with that route, instead finding a primed pistol with which to shoot off the lock of the holding cell. "What happened?" the newly freed pirates asked, woken by the explosion of the Avenger. "Jack destroyed the Avenger!" she answered quickly. "Grab what you can for a weapon, this is our chance to take the Pearl back!"

She herself didn't hesitate to pick up a discarded cutlass from a pile on the floor, presumably the surrendered pirate's weapons collected by the Navy crewmen, and rush back upstairs. The rest of the crew followed suit, screeching a fearsome war cry as they did. They found Jack fending off the enemy sailors, and dove in, executing their vengeance with little mercy.

It wasn't long before the pirates claimed back the Pearl, holding some Navy sailors prisoner, but many lay unmoving on the deck. "Throw him in the brig," Jack ordered of Will, who still lay unconscious on the deck. He'd missed the demise of his Avenger, and would have quite an unpleasant surprise to wake up to.

Jack and Elizabeth watched the last of said ship sink beneath the waves in silence, both lost in their own personal thoughts. It was Elizabeth who finally broke the silence between them. "Well done, Jack."

"Not a bad night's work, eh?" He smiled down at her, gold teeth glinting in the firelight.

"Promise me you won't kill Will." Jack raised an eyebrow at this. Not killing the whelp meant releasing an new enemy he was sure would hate him for life. Seeing his hesitation, Elizabeth pleaded, "Please, Jack. Be a good man."

Jack saw the opportunity for mischief, and nearly whispered in her ear, persuade me. But from the pained look in her lovely brown eyes, he suddenly hadn't the conviction. "As you wish, love." Truth be told, he didn't really want to kill Will anyway.

A/N: Thank you everyone for the reviews, your input is mucho appreciated! Every little bit helps me finish the story. Lol. Peace.