Thank you Something Not So Normal, Jennifer Lynn Weston, Eldonyx (merci!) and Starling Rising for your reviews. On the wild roller coaster that is writing this story, your support truly came just at the right moment.

Disclaimer: I was watching Snow White pull Aladdin's hair when Captain Li Shang started making his way toward the bookshelf that covers the door to my hiding place. I certainly like Li Shang but he has this huge stick thing and he looks really angry. Not owning POTC is more dangerous than I thought...

Chapter 9

"Mus' get back, mus' get back, mus' get back…"

Who was that? Beckett opened his eyes. Good gracious, he had been dozing, head tilted back against the wall, mouth gaping wide.

It's good thing he doesn't know that we in the peanut gallery were snickering at him.

Eyes shut, Jack was still whispering to himself. His face was shiny with sweat and his brow was wrinkled in distress. Beckett gave him a murderous glare. Then he glanced at the candle nearest just in time to see it gutter out in a pool of wax. Actually, all the candles had died except for the one near Jack's head. Beckett was too lightheaded to light more candles (no pun intended!). Instead, he pulled out his pocket watch and flipped it open, dreading to look at its white face.

Three thirty-seven. Could be worse. Could be hell of a lot better. He cursed and shoved the watch back in its pocket.

Like an old man, he scooted off the barrel and landed on his feet with a grunt. He bent in half, massaging his legs. They felt bloody awful, as did his back, his shoulders, his neck…and the need to use the "necessary" as some called it was growing stronger. Indignant rage swelled, but he could do nothing about it.

Jack fidgeted against the door, and then tried to suck his thumb. The thumb missed his mouth and poked his right eyelid. He suddenly sat up. "Give me back my fruit!" he yelled, eyes wide. "Rum," he said to air before his nose. "More rum. Issa rummy world!"

Beckett stared. Jack slowly turned and saw him. "What're you doin' here?"

"Well, Jack," Beckett bit out the words, "I'm fasting and meditating because I want to be a monk. I am also daydreaming of your hanging. I could do so for hours."

"Don't hang yer onions unnerneath tables," Jack reprimanded, "yer guests'll get smelly knees. Hang 'em from the ceiling, mate."

"The onion I'm thinking about is going to hang from a gallows."

"Waste of a gallows if y'ask me," Jack said. Then he gave a chortle. "It'll look funny too, an onion hangin' from a gallows."

"You aren't thinking straight," Beckett said dismissively. "If you want to keep talking to something, talk to the door. It'll listen better."

Jack frowned at the wooden door. "'ello, door."

Beckett stared.

Jack turned. "It doesn't talk back. That's highly distressing fer a conversationalist such's meself."

Beckett slowly let out a deep breath, crossing his arms.

Jack's overly bright eyes flicked to his wrist where the makeshift bandage glared against his tanned skin. Then he looked up with an odd expression, remembering. He tilted his head back calculatingly. "Nurse Beckie's handiwork, aye?"

"You'll probably lose the hand anyway," was Beckett's acid reply.

Jack didn't answer, but his eyes began to narrow.

At this moment we take an intermission to present Jack's revised Mother of All Lists to our most gracious audience members. He has worked very hard on it – blood, sweat, and tears, people.

Note: Since Jack simply added onto his first list, we shall start with item #19.

Why Captain Jack Sparrow is Allowed to Hold a Grudge Against the World

NEW AND IMPROVED!

19. Beckett blames Jack and throws vegetables

20. Jack may never get out of pantry

21. Jack may never drink another drop of rum

22. Jack's body purchases a Level Five Fever (the worst) from Health Complications Inc., completely disregarding the fact that Jack needs his faculties to combat the insidious Beckett. Jack never should've given his body that monthly allowance. Give your body freedom with the finances and a fever is the thanks you get!

23. Jack may never drink another drop of rum (shockingly, he would settle for water at the moment. This is most grievous!)

24. Fate sniggers and tortures Jack by revealing a hole in the wall, which only allows more insanity to enter the pantry via Insane Rob. By the Dolphin's Chortle, if Fate were a girl, he'd pull her curls. He'd also give her nice knuckle to the eye, cut her ears off, push her off a cliff, pour acid on her...wait. This would be easier if Fate were a male. Drat. Oh well, gender is an insignificant detail. He'd tar and feather her anyway and then set spiders free in her hair and then drop her onto a fire ant hill...(we're afraid this entry goes for a few paragraphs. To spare those with weaker stomachs, we shan't include the whole thing)

25. Jack may never drink another drop of rum or water, even scummy water with lint in it.

26. Jack's fever drives him to drive Beckett to the point of explosion. Beckett goes all creepy and decides to bandage Jack's wrist. There is only one thing to say about this, which Jack has neatly outlined for us in #27...

27. #&!

28. Next, Jack's brain buys the weirdest dream it can find from Brain Whisks Co. Giany snowflakes. Dreadful rhymes. Weepy Violet. HORROR

29. Jack may never drink another drop of rum. Or grape juice. Coconut juice...Jack is not going to cry. He is a big boy.

30. Jack awakes to a splitting headache, vicious thirst, complaining bladder, and throbbing wrist. And there's Beckett, stockings around his ankles, wig sproinging in random directions, mouth still spitting thorns

31. Jack may never consume a drop of earthly matter in its liquid form

32. That Jack should be lowered to such a state is horrendously horrible and conducive to homicidal behavior

33. Not that this is bad. There's just the teensy detail of his Level Five Fever, which is the highest on the Gerilda Fever Scale. Thanks to his fever, Jack will be lucky to stand up. (This scale was invented by one Lady Gerilda and is highly acclaimed in doctor's circles.) (Warning: These are 'special' doctors. Don't let any of them treat you.)

34. Jack is forced to resort to lumicide in place of homicide. For the moment, at least...

You may be wondering, What is lumicide?

Just watch.

Supporting himself with one arm, Jack leaned back. He brought his lips six inches away from the final quivering candle and drew a deep breath.

Beckett tried to stop him, but both his feet were asleep. Jack's breath slammed into the flame and killed it. Jack had just committed lumicide, that hardened criminal!

On the floor, Beckett leaned back against the barrels in a haze of rage and tearful frustration. "You did not just do that."

Utter darkness reigned once more. Jack grinned, but winced because of his cracked lips. "I do, does, an' did." He lay down and stared at the wild colors twisting above his head.

Beckett tried to think of torturing Jack, but daydreaming wasn't enough for the rage roaring up from his gut. His hands curled into fists. "Sparrow you stupid lout, you-"

"Bugger that!" Jack's voice snapped out of the darkness.

"Do you even know what that word means, cretin?"

"Aye."

"Your tongue should be cut out!"

"Rose petals 'n diamonds don't 'xactly pour from yer own mouth," Jack drawled. "Y',know, you never told me what yer favorite flower was..."

"I'll remember to have Mercer cut your tongue out," Beckett continued.

"Fine by me..." Jack's voice was now infinitely weary. "It suits you, y'stringy little doll-haired lacy-livered button-nosed, bug-eating, doorknob-licking..." His voice trailed off.

Beckett ground his teeth.

"Oh, look, parrots wif gold toenails..." Jack murmured faintly, and Beckett knew the fever had overtaken him again.

Then, the worst thing happened.

An itch began behind Beckett's left ear. He scratched it, but another itch spoke up from his back. Suddenly, another on his neck, one more on the top of his head, and yet another on his chest. In one terrible flash, he realized what was to blame.

Lice. Fleas.

Cutler Beckett, neatest agent of the East India Trading Company and proud of it, was infested with bugs, the companions of lesser beings. His skin crawled as he thought of his wig, his shirt, his pants, swarming with little-

He tore his coat off. He tore his wig off. He began to pull at his waistcoat, and then realized that he could do nothing. He was completely helpless.

This was beyond the pale. He had sworn he would never be helpless again that gray day when his mother, that horrible woman, had-

His coat was in his hands. He ripped it in half with a strangled shout and then tore into his wig, fingers brutally wrenching the fine hairs off like he was skinning an animal. He couldn't stop himself. He pounded the floor with his fists until they screamed at him to stop. He lay on the floor, legs propped up on a crate of vegetables, gasping floury breaths. He tried to forget the image of his mother, a low-born woman with the filth of the streets on her showing him her scummy home, showing him that he was no better than his father said-

Hatred swarmed inside his skin like an ever-multiplying host of bugs. He tingled with it, pulsed with it. Two and a half hours. Only two and a half hours before I usher Jack Sparrow into true hell.

He took off his coat used it as a pillow, getting as comfortable as he could on the floor. He would sleep. The next thing he would hear would be rescuers.

Yes, he could wait.

Majorly crazy action looms in the near future...hooray for reviewers!