Disclaimer: Tous les caracteres n'appartiennent pas a moi, et ne seront jamais les miens, jusqu'en cas ou je controle Disney. Et un dernier mot, cela indique tous les caracteres qui sont dans le film, pirates des caraibes: maladiction de la perle noire. Tout le reste sont mes propres creations. (TRANSLATION: All of the characters don't belong to me, and never will be mine, exceptin the case where I control Disney. One last word, this indicates the characters that are in the film, pirates of the caribbean: curse of the black pearl. All the rest are my own creations.) Sorry it's so long-winded.

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Jack squinted against the noonday glare reflecting off the ice. The sun, barely peeking through gathering storm clouds, was just strong enough to be caught by the thousands of ice crystals. It created a beautiful and dazzling effect to the casual observer, but for Jack and his followers it was pretty - pretty damn annoying!

Jack could barely see anything that was more than a few shiplengths in front of him. After trudging all day yesterday and last night, he and his men were footsore, weary, exhausted, cold and snowblind. Most of them, Jack included, couldn't wait to reach Port Royal, where there would be a hot fire and rum waiting in the pub. The rest really couldn't care less: they figured that by now, with nothing but more frozen ocean on the horizon, they would die out there. The least they could do was stick with the others, on the off chance Jack actually managed to get them to their destination.

Jack screwed his eyes up against the harsh light reflecting off the ice in an attempt to see if they were near any sort of land. But all he could see was more ice, and the sun's glare wasn't helping any.

Jack heard running footsteps behind him and turned his head to acknowledge Anamaria's presence.

"Hey, there - whaddaya want, Anamaria?" mumbled Jack, moving his head to look at his steadily plodding feet again.

Through chattering teeth, Anamaria wrapped her thin coat around her even more tightly and said, "How m-much f-further C-Cap'n? The men're on th-the p-point of g-giving up this c-crazy mission."

Jack shook his head wearily. "There's no point, Anamaria; we're more th'n halfway. In fact, if me calculations are right, we should be seein' the firs' sight o' land somewhere 'round four. Which, judgin' by the position of th'sun, will be in 'bout an hour or so. 's a li'l past noon."

With that, Jack lowered his head agains the wind and, settling his tricorn hat more firmly on his brow, quickened his pace.

Anamaria didn't press it. She watched his retreating back with curiousity. Why was Jack so hell-bent on reaching Port Royal? He was preoccupied, sure - but then again he generally was most of the time. It was just this time seemed somewhat different; more personal.

Anamaria smiled wryly. This was typical Jack - leading his crew off on a potentially suicidal mission without even telling them what it was about. And they followed him anyway. But even if they didn't, even if they deserted, Anamaria knew Jack would always have at least one person dogging his footsteps. Herself.

He still owed her a ship, but that was only really a pretext. Anamaria wasn't following Jack just because of that - not at all because of that, actually. She wasn't really sure if what she felt was real or not, but she'd follow him until she was sure. Did she love Jack? Anamaria smiled - only time would tell.

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A/N: Hey look! Anamaria has feelings for Jack! Where could I take THIS one, hmmm! And I'm sure y'all are drooling to know what happens to Elizabeth, but I guess ye'll hafta wait a little longer...