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Chapter 6

Billy, the town's only and therefore most frequented surgeon had come into world as one, Fitzwilliam Everett Tavistock. When he was of age he entered the Royal Navy to attend to one of the king's most esteemed admirals and his crew. To everyone's great dismay, he cared more for his own insatiable thirst for all manner of liquor than for the brave men's physical health. One day, during a pirate raid, the crew decided to heighten their chances for survival of future injuries by trading him to their attackers. The medic soon found that pirates not only appreciated his maverick methods, but that their rum supplies outstripped that of the Royal Navy in considerable quantity. He settled into his new life without regrets or reservations.

After 35 blood and rum-soaked years at sea, he took up residence at Shipwreck City, the reputation he'd won preceding his arrival earning him the bloody moniker: Billy the Butcher. Aside from his disreputable celebrity, Kate's objections to Billy extended beyond his character; not only did she despise his crudity, she doubted his qualities as a surgeon were as developed as his marked preference for torture and infliction of pain. In this instance, however, they didn't have much choice. The man William had found on the beach had been shot in the chest two days ago, and from what she'd seen of it, they would need to extract the bullet and cut away the infected flesh. Kate prided herself that her knowledge exceeded that of an ordinary midwife. A surgery of this calibre, however, required not only experience, but equipment.

After she'd delivered William at the doorstep of Nell and her brother Sean, she headed straight for the Seasick Siren, the filthiest tavern in all of Shipwreck City. Billy could without exception be found until the sun came to a peak, playing cards, brawling and, most importantly, drinking until the barkeep had his motionless body thrown out into the gutter; Kate sincerely hoped that today was an exception.

When she entered the tavern, all eyes that were not yet closed in blissful delirium turned to her. A reputable woman in the Seasick Siren was a sight to behold, but Kate ignored the uproar she caused. A man's life hung in the balance and if it meant the sacrifice of her fragile reputation, she'd take the risk.

Her quarry was situated at a round table in the corner where he was busily trying to gain a glimpse at his neighbour's cards, in an attempt to drop the ace he'd been hiding up his sleeve.

Billy was a stout, bald-headed man who might have been termed mousey, if it were not for his habit of dressing to the nines as though he was still serving the king's admiral. His appearance might have been dubbed shabby, but the few dangling buttons left on his coat were brightly polished and the frills of his shirt were the whitest in all of Shipwreck City.

"Billy," Kate called out to him, her voice firmly demanding. "Your services are needed."

Glassy, expressionless eyes scorned the sight of her but were grateful for the interruption that might distract his companions from the escaped ace.

"Well, look who it ain't! Everyone's favourite witch!" he slurred mockingly, but Kate would have none of it. Arms akimbo, she glared at him, pointedly ignoring his verbal slander.

"They found a man, down at the beach. He's been shot in the chest."

"What's it to me?" he asked, impatient to continue the game since it seemed no one had witnessed his blatant cheating.

"It seems rum has dulled your ears and your wits; you're a surgeon, in case you've forgotten." Kate's voice, saturated with sarcasm, brought forth the confidence of having lost the battle, but not the war.

"Correct," he retorted sharply, obviously taking umbrage at her thinly veiled insult. For an unprincipled and ill-tempered man, there could be nothing worse than exposure to ridicule. Particularly at the hands of a cantankerous midwife who didn't seem to be aware of her place in the world. He loathed her; the detestation of her person visible in every fibre of his being. His thin lips shook below his enormous moustache as he continued:

"I'm a surgeon, not the community welfare association. I offer my competent services against adequate payment, and I doubt that piece of semi-human jetsam of which you speak is in possession of anything more valuable than the lead shot in his lowly flesh."

Kate's lips curled into a sly smile. She'd been expecting his abominable response and at last she played the trump card she'd secreted in her sleeve.

"This 'piece of semi-human jetsam', as you so eloquently chose to call him -," she spoke loudly so that every wandering ear in the tavern might hear, "- is Captain Teague's son."

The Seasick Siren fell silent; an empty tankard dropped to the ground as the pirates in the room gave a collective gasp. Billy stared sullenly at the table, his cards spilt in front of him; the damn, cunning witch had pulled an unbeatable ace. There was nary a man in town foolish enough to refuse Captain Teague any favour. Dejected, he collected his black medic's bag and blacker heart.

When Elizabeth returned to the kitchen, her nightgown replaced with a grey blouse and brown skirt, Jack continued to lay motionless on the table he'd been placed upon, head dropped to the side as if only loosely connected to his maltreated body. Against the white linen sheet, he looked like a heap of rags, crusted with dirt and dried blood; the aroma was nauseating.

Tai and his companions leaned against the window sill, chatting quietly. Elizabeth fought the red-hot anger welling up inside her painfully clenched stomach at the sight of their obvious indifference towards the suffering man.

Tai sensed her incense and caught her eye. When she opened her mouth to speak, a sharp rebuke leaping to her lips, he put a finger to his. He approached her, tilting his head towards hers until she could feel his warm breath against her ear.

"Sssshhh, Captain Turner," he whispered, "Captain Sparrow is very ill. Loud talking and touching?" He stepped back and shook his head. "No good. Makes him thrash and scream."

Though it was unlikely that his men had understood a word of what Tai had told her, they nodded in acquiescence when Elizabeth looked their way over his shoulder. It was obvious they had been discussing her, and more likely than not, Tai had related to them how her story intertwined with Jack Sparrow's. Briefly, she wondered how much her First Mate had been able to gather from what he'd witnessed in the past, but quickly brushed the uncomfortable thought aside.

Conscious of Tai's watchful gaze, she circled the table to gain a glimpse of Jack's face, needing to know whether it was fixed in a wild grimace, contorted from pain and lingering madness, or if his tortured body had finally taken mercy on his suffering mind and slipped into unconsciousness. Her steps were measured; calm like her breathing, displaying an inner strength and self-control she didn't feel but knew was necessary to keep the impending hysteria at bay. The events that had so mercilessly stolen her childhood away had also taught her how to detach her thoughts and actions from the battling emotions inside her soul. To observe her deeds from afar like a stranger while the hollow shell of her body did whatever was necessary.

Jack's return pulled a multitude of strings inside her heart, had touched places thought long forgotten or carefully erased from the charted map of her life. She wouldn't allow herself to process them yet.

She trusted in her mind's ability to endure the agony and madness. Her mind was her strongest ally in the constant mêlée between all things rational and emotional until she forced herself to face him. Every oppressed fear, squelched to the bottom of her heart broke through the barriers and before her mind could regain rule over its dominion; her hand flew to her mouth to muffle the impending scream of horror and panic.

Jack was still breathing, rasping, inarticulate gasps escaping his slightly parted lips, but his eyes were those of a dead man--fathomless depths as wide as the sea as if his spirit had already left him. Unable to bear the sight, Elizabeth wanted to run away, put as much distance between herself and the lifeless impersonator wearing Jack Sparrow's features, but her limbs disobeyed her commands. Her paralyzed mind was whirling with images and feelings, pulling her down into a maelstrom of memories.

A face towered above her, dripping wet with outlandish ferocity, yet displaying earnest concern for a nameless young woman …; obsidian eyes shimmered in the firelight with tiny golden sparks, speaking of dreams lost and unfulfilled while a drunken voice defined freedom, an indistinct longing for something that could not be gained …; absolution painted across softened features while a man sentenced to death celebrated victory over his murderer …

Jack Sparrow had been a man of many faces, more than anyone had ever been allowed to see, but the one her eyes sat fixed upon couldn't possibly be his. The Jack she'd known years ago might have been a liar and a cheat, a pirate through and through, but despite his lack of honour and decency, he'd never lacked life. The man before her was already dead.

Elizabeth was overcome by the sudden urge to grab his shoulders and shake him hard. She wanted to hear him scream, wail, cry … anything but his current display of inanimate indifference. Shifting towards his motionless body, she reached out to touch him, but a warm hand rested upon her shoulder, pulling her back into reality.

She spun around and faced Tai, his unvarnished pity and sadness darkened his scarred features.

"Let him die," he murmured quietly, his chin pointing towards Jack's ashen-face, which appeared as if life seeped from his veins. She had seen more than one man die, knew death's messengers when she encountered them, but in this particular instance her heart informed her that Tai was wrong. She refused to let him be right!

"No one dies on my kitchen-table." With a warrior's air, she shook off the man's hand. No longer immobilized by shock and helpless fear, her soul was renewed with courage and fighting spirit. Every bit as threatening and powerful as the incomparable Captain Teague, Tai couldn't help but see Elizabeth as he'd seen her on the day she'd led them all into battle. Undoubtedly, she was a queen from her golden locks to the hem of her skirts, prepared to fight for a life she'd already resurrected from the depths once, and Tai wondered if maybe there was more to her resistance than met the eye. He made a mental note to ask his wife about it; weren't women supposed to understand these things?

In an attempt to escape her defiant gaze, he turned back to Jack Sparrow– and started. "Look!" he whispered to Elizabeth, and when she spun around, she immediately recognized the flickering lids and quivering lips; the injured man was desperate to respond to her impassioned words, but she would have none of it.

Pressing her lips together, she hissed with some venom in her voice: "That especially goes for you!"

Tai and his men saluted her, their bodies rapt at attention; a trained response to their time when they'd served beneath her ferocious command.

"Gentleman." She fixed each man with a piercing, terrifying gaze. "At ease."

Elizabeth continued to glower at Jack, daring him to perish under her watch with a look so threatening even a stronger man would have been brought to his knees by it. The door flew open and Kate Heung strode into the room, closely followed by Billy the Butcher. He wore an apron that was not nearly as white as the frills of his shirt, but littered with dark stains that looked suspiciously like blood. At the sight of Billy, the room took an instinctive step back, and even Jack shifted uncomfortably on the table, groaning at the pain even the tiniest movement seemed to cause him.

In a protective gesture, Elizabeth stood behind his head and put her hands lightly on his shoulders, careful not to cause him any more discomfort, while she gazed questioningly at the intruders. Kate seemed irritated by Billy's tiring presence, and admittedly his filthy grin and boasting attitude didn't inspire much confidence in his abilities. Why was it, she wondered, that their last hope always made it seem as if there was no hope left to be had?

"Where's the patient?" Billy thundered; the absurdity of his question, considering that Jack was lying undeniably on the table in front of him, seemed to be part of a well-studied performance, as was the straightening of his filthy apron and the theatrical unpacking of the black bag containing his instruments.

"He's got a bullet in his chest," Kate reminded him, obviously not trusting him to find out himself, but Billy ignored her completely. Perverted pleasure glittered in his watery eyes; he leaned over Jack, only to recoil immediately with a screwed up expression of disgust. "You've fetched me to perform surgery on a corpse!" he coughed, pulling out a soiled handkerchief and pressing it to his nose in a manner that barely enabled him to breathe. "This man is already dead."

"I'm not a surgeon and even I can see he is still breathing!" Elizabeth snapped, feeling her temper rise again. Her grip on Jack's shoulders tightened involuntarily and he winced. A cruel smile crept like a spider to Billy's lips still concealed beneath the handkerchief. Perhaps there was still some sport to be had, after all!

Covering his mouth and nostrils, he leaned over his defenceless victim with renewed vigour; Elizabeth thought she saw Jack's eyes growing wide with fear. She wasn't convinced he knew Billy, but the stories alone would have sufficed to make every man still in control of his limbs to run for his life at the sight of the infamous medic. Of course, fighting to run away, one of the oldest and most honoured pirate-tradition, was out of the question for Jack. She felt something inside her break when she realized he was at least vaguely aware of what was happening to him, even though he was already too far gone to express any other sentiment than mortal agony.

Billy gestured with his free hand above the wound; signalizing to Kate to rip away more of Jack's shirt so that he wouldn't have to put down his handkerchief. Elizabeth held her breath and put a hand to Jack's heated cheek. Whatever was to come, it would hardly ease the pain that was blazing in his eyes and straight into her very soul. She had to force her mind from his gaze while her thumb stroked over his cheekbones, reassuring him she wouldn't abandon him when Billy the Butcher finally did his name justice.

Contempt for Billy written across her face, Kate stepped forward and tore Jack's shirt open until his chest was fully exposed. In the lamplight, the wound was even more repulsive than it had been in the protective darkness of the beach; even the midwife, who had seen more than most civilians, seemed momentarily shocked by the gruesome sight. Tai, who was looking over his wife's shoulder, grew remarkably pale and hurried to join his companions at the window.

Billy was not put off in the least by the festering wound surrounded by what looked like rotten flesh. Dark crimson slowly turning black, a colour already obtained by the dried blood covering the patient's skin, reached almost down to his stomach. With gleeful fascination, he observed the injury; Elizabeth half-expected him to shove his fingers in the wound as Kate had done before. Only Billy's would do so with less deliberation and with the outright intention to make Jack wail like an abandoned seal.

Fortunately, he refrained and stood to drink in the macabre picture before him, gulping it down like a cup of particularly fine grog. His eyes wandered over the bruised body, registered the faded scars criss-crossing Jack's sides and the dark shade of an oddly shaped tattoo right above his hipbone.

Billy's eyes paused and his breath stopped as his eyes focused on the two circular scars below his collarbone. Bullet scars, without a doubt.

"Extraordinary," he mumbled to himself, and though the dirty rag pressed to his face had muffled his words, his over-wrought amazement at the sight reverberated through the thick cloth. He bent forward until his nose almost touched Jack's stomach and he regarded the darkened circles from all angles, completely lost in the beauty of something only he, a master of art amongst philistines, seemed to be capable of appreciating.

"Well, what have you found?" Kate inquired impatiently, the irritable tapping of her foot on the floor unnerving his delicate ear. With a histrionic sigh, he straightened himself and took measured steps away from the repellent stench of the injured man before he pulled the handkerchief from his face.

"Ladies and Gentlemen," he announced pompously, "this is a truly remarkable case. Captain Sparrow-" He gestured to Jack's body as though he was lecturing a group of eager pupils. "-has apparently survived two shots to his chest, which, even in my own wealth of experience, is unique." He paused and surveyed his enraptured, captive audience with a triumphant smile on his lips.

The Turner-woman seemed unusually taken aback by the dying man's fate, which made the proclamation of his diagnosis even more enjoyable. He examined her taunt, pale features and bared his teeth like a wolf prepared for the slaughter of lamb before he continued. "Regrettably, he won't survive a third. He's as good as dead. My professional opinion is that you end his agony by blowing out his brains."

The barbarous cruelty displayed by the surgeon's words pulled over them like a suffocating blanket, and Billy revelled in their helpless, desperate ire. With a last, thoroughly pleased glance at Jack who now lay with his eyes closed, he picked up his unneeded tools and was about to place them back into his bag when he heard an all too familiar clicking sound alarmingly close to his ear.

"By my reckoning, you were speaking of YOUR brains," a female voice spat. "It won't end HIS agony, but it may very well end mine. In the very least, it is my professional opinion that it may rid me of your unendurable codswallop!"

Billy swallowed so hard he feared his Adam's apple might protrude from his gorge; this was not going according to his plan, and he would be damned if it wasn't that bloody woman interfering with his affairs. From the corner of his eye, he saw it was indeed Elizabeth who held the intimidating pistol to his temple.

He had savoured the desperation unfolding around him too thoroughly; she had used his moment of blissful abstraction to open a drawer on the underside of the table and pull out a firearm that seemed far too large for her dainty hands. Her visage evoked images of a lioness defending her cub and a faint suspicion crossed his mind, the connecting piece that seemed to explain everything, but before he could put his finger on it, he caught another click. He felt the cool metal of a second weapon press itself forcefully to his temple. "This man," Tai Heung said fiercely, "saved my life. And you will save his." He paused, irony touching his lips as he added an insincere attempt of civility:

"Please."

Billy's eyes travelled the room, frantically searching for the tiniest trace of compassion in the faces of those present, but he found only loathing and fierce determination. There was no one in the room that wouldn't object to either the Turner-woman or the Chinaman doing something that might cost him his life. Circumstances were grim, he realized, and if he ever wanted to see his beloved grog again, he would have to waste his precious time to tamper with a hopeless case.

Accompanied by an irritated groan, he lifted his hands in defeat and announced his capitulation. "Alright, alright. I'll try, but …," he began, intending to inform them beforehand that he'd not take the blame when the man died, but his saucy impudence rewarded him with the intensified pressure of two gun barrels against his temples.

"There's no 'but'!" Elizabeth hissed dangerously close to his ear, and there could be no doubt she meant it. "Save his life, or you lose yours."

"Alright. I'll do it," he finally gave in, seeing that further discussions would get him nowhere, least of all back to his favourite place at the Seasick Siren's gaming table.

"But I cannot do this alone. His only chance of survival stems from the extraction of the bullet." Faced with the sad reality that he would actually have to perform surgery on the poor devil, he shot another glance at Jack, in an attempt to assess the situation.

"He's quite a linnet, if you ask me, but I've seen men developing almost supernatural powers when in this kind of pain … I really can't imagine what it must be like for him. Excruciating, agonizing … pure torture." He found himself shivering with anticipation at the sound of his words. He was about to continue his elucidation on the pain Jack would most likely encounter during the surgery when the same annoying voice interrupted him again: "Yes, yes … so what do you need us to do?"

"Us? Us as in 'us', including you?" he exclaimed, momentarily oblivious of his previously precarious position. Elizabeth was quick to remind him that by no means was he permitted to mock her –the renewed clicking of her pistol was more effective than a punch to his already disfigured nose.

"I need at least three men to hold him down, a bowl with hot water, towels – oh, and two bottles of rum. One for him and one for…medicinal purposes."