I hope that you like it! I have a new beta, Avelera, who gave me helpful hints. Please, tell me what you think about the chapter! this is edited, just up, so please tell me what you think!

The sea was just as she remembered it, salty spray dancing in the air and clinging to her skin, the dour scent of many, many men who had not bathed in ages. She could feel the ghost of Will's hand resting on her own, massaging her knuckles gently. She did not dare to look down; knowing that logic would win out and that warm feeling would disappear into the vast emptiness. She stared straight ahead, allowing herself to play the thought as long as she was able. Naturally, only one person could interrupt her reverie with such abruptness that the gentle moment was all but forgotten.

"What're you doing?" Captain Jack Sparrow sputtered, poking his head in directly next to hers and smiling as she jumped in surprise. "Boo."

She clutched her chest in a distinctly feminine way, glaring at him and sighing deeply. "What are you doing?" She questioned in return, glancing down at the half empty rum bottle clutched in his hand with evident disgust.

Hastily he pushed it behind his back, thinking that he had cleverly stashed the substance. "Nothing of importance, what a Captain does is not up to...or for? scrutiny of his crew members. Hop to, you're not a part of me crew if all you do is standing around looking pretty...by the by, you are doing a quite amateur job at that, indeed. I have said it before, these clothes hardly flatter." She sighed and whirled around, eyeing the equally inactive crew mates with a scrutinizing eye.

"Oh, yes, I can clearly see that I am the only one standing about." She near shouted over the sound of Ragetti's snores. Jack narrowed his eyes to the point of beady, his mouth open and ready to retort when she interrupted his train of thought. "You would think that with the East India Trading Company on our tails you would be more...worried." She sneered as he pressed the mouth of the bottle to his lips, swigging down three gulps before belching quite loudly.

"Ah, well worrying is for worriers, Elizabeth. I am on constant alert, my attention never..." He took a brief interlude, downing some more rum and leaning up against Elizabeth as some sort of support rail. She shrugged him off, watching in amusement as he floundered to the ground, frowning.

"You do understand that if you are found, it is straight to the gallows for you and the rest of your crew apart from-" He decided to cut in, as though whatever he had to say was of the utmost importance.

"Me...well, you would've said 'me', and by meself saying 'me' I mean you, you, governor's ickle daughter, are to receive full pardon...in exchange for a sort of agreement betwixt you and the Commodore, along with that Beckett." She froze, not visible to the naked eye, but she felt her blood go cold.

"What sort of agreement?" She asked, her eyes wide as saucers. He grinned, self-satisfied that he was able to bait her into a question.

"The sort of agreement that you won't like much, Lizzie." She hated the nickname, but decided to let it go just that once, biting her tongue and controlling her facial expressions tensely. "You, being prac-tic-ally royalty in these parts, are valued above us, how'd you put it, 'rum-soaked pirates'? I have heard that, upon capture, you will be forced to remain in Port Royal for the duration of your life, which you, in your state of being, most likely was already aware of, aye?"

She nodded numbly, certain that there was worse to come. "But you, you are a pirate, a scalawag and the rest of those rather derogatory terms that you yerself used before, and I doubt that you will see domestication as freedom. A pirate is a dangerous thing to be, which is why I think you love it." He slurred, dropping the now empty bottle with disappointment.

Her shoulders tensed, Elizabeth's eyebrows knit together. "I don't want to go back, not anymore. What's there for me, apart from my father and an eternity of meaningless soirees? I so wanted to be married, but not to whoever my father definitely has in mind." She stated and Jack twiddled his fingers, not quite enraptured in her tale.

"Oh, yes, yes, definitely. Mmm hmm, no doubt." He muttered to himself, flipping the compass open lazily and glancing down at it before closing it once again. "Sad, sad, sad." She turned to him, lips drawn in a grimace. He glanced up, evidently surprised to see that she was still standing there. "What, er, I mean is...you are as doomed as we all are if Beckett were to find the Pearl. I'll be taking a short drop and a sudden stop, but you...you will be forced into some more of those accident-inducing corsets and such," she bit her lip and he hastily revised that, "Yay for me, nay for you, I get it. And it seems as though you have acquired a taste for gent's clothing, especially that of the late Mr. Turner." He stated, frowning deeply as he poked at her sleeve.

Tired of listening to his drunken rambling, she snapped, "Is there a point to all of this raucous babbling or do you just enjoy the sound of your own talking?"

He puckered his lips in distaste, "I resent that, lassie, everything I have ever said in the history of...ever, has been of significant importance, no matter how indifferent you may seem to my roaring wit." He argued petulantly.

"You can be such a child, Jack." She stated, exasperatedly. He seemed to not take this innocent little critique well, though he shrugged it off as he did all attempts at criticism.

"Yes, well, and you don't smell half as well as you used to. Like man and...salt, hmm." He informed her, crossing his arms calmly as though he had just done her a great service in insulting her personal hygiene.

She leaned into him and took a whiff before wincing. "Ha, you are certainly none to talk, captain." Even he could identify the sarcasm that resonated in her tone, the bitterness that he had never heard before.

"Old Bootstrap junior's death got you screwy, didn't it?" She didn't bother feigning confusion or denying the truth.

"Yes," she said simply, closing her eyes and allowing the ocean spray to fly to her face, clutching the railing with a death-grip. His hand lay near hers, and they met briefly, whether by accident or not certain to either of them.

"If I'm to have my way the Caribbean will be free again to pillage and such, blah blah, la-dee-da and all that. It's not exactly a vision, love, it's more of an...aspiration. Savvy?" Her eyes remained closed, nearly squeezed shut.

A smile came across her face, an expression she had not experienced in an incredibly long while. She wanted the same thing, to be able to do what she wanted, she was no longer a little delicate lady who feigned fainting spells in a hope of distracting. If she wanted something, she used the tip of her sword to get it, and did not employ her womanly wiles. She was a different woman than the first time she was captured by Barbossa and his crew, a different person since she chained Jack to his doom, sentencing him to death. And even an entirely separate entity since Will's death. She hated that Jack Sparrow was right, that they were undeniably similar.

"Savvy," She agreed with a Jack-esque grin, knowing that he was smiling in return.

Any and all comments are accepted, as long as they are constructive. I hope that everyone's having a good summer, and once again a big thank you to Avelera!