DISCLAIMER: Yeah, I own it! Y'know what I own the world too, what ya gonna do about that huh! Bub? Just kidding, I'm just a poor uni student, living on the edge.

Alex found that if you hid behind the three gunpowder barrels that sit at the bottom of the first set of stairs; you can get a good view of the deck above. At this point in time she couldn't exactly see much of the action, just people running about, but she knew the ship was getting closer and instead of continuing to try and run Jack would let them board, and hopefully flog the living daylights out of them.

"Alex?"

She spun around quickly ready to say that she was down below and not on deck and why does Jack have the right to order around anyway, only to find that it was Tom, holding a wooden spoon, looking very concerned.

"Oh, hello Tom. How's the galley? Everything still alright?"

She attempted to sound nonchalant, it didn't work, in fact she failed miserably.

"S'alright Alex," Tom started patting her shoulder, "Captains been through a lot of these battles we'll be fine."

Alex started to glare once she heard his name, they better be alright, and he better be alright, because if he died she'd kill him.

Jack stood proudly on deck his cutlass belted to his waist as he saw the ship get closer. If it was a fight they wanted, that's what he'd give them, besides with Alex on board he wasn't sure if he wanted to put the Pearl through yet another broadside attack.

"Get ready lads, they're only the Spanish, yev fought worse."

The crew let out a nervous round of chuckles as they waited for the ropes to carry the first sailors over.

Ten minutes later and Alex had still resisted the urge to go upstairs, had listened to the fighting, impersonated a boxing commentator as she watched one tussle and sharpened her dagger and still she didn't go up. Personally she thought she was doing well, she was staying down below, the Spanish was staying above deck and her kitchen was safe, keep it that way and she would be able to follow Jack's instructions. That however didn't happen. They had to come down, and quite simply Alex had to stop them, she also had to protect her galley.

"That's far enough."

She said determinedly as she stood in front of two of the Spanish intruders.

"Mujer."

One said mockingly and lifted his sword in what Alex was sure was meant to be a sexy and dangerous way, she sliced his arm.

"Aiya! Puta!"

He cried out grabbing his arm and gesturing for his comrade to continue the fight.

"No me jodas, hijo de la puta!"

Alex spat at them and dived into the fight.

It wasn't exactly like you saw in the movies, there weren't any really flashy moves and for the most part Alex was attempting to dodge the rather long blade and lunge at their arms, legs or not-quite-eunuch parts with a much shorter blade.

Alex had gotten reasonably pissed off when one of them had snagged a lucky shot and got her leg, after she'd tripped him.

"Holy crap!"
She cried out as she stepped back her leg burning with the sword wound.

"That was a shitty shot, hombre."

Alex growled at them and was certain that her anger would incarnate into a fantastic fighting style, that insane idea was doused with reality when her knife got knocked out of her hand due to the fact that her two attackers were knocked out.

Pulling herself out from under the now dead to the world assailants she saw Tom looking quite smug with a very heavy skillet brandished in one hand.

"You'll make a great chef."

Alex conceded smiling and taking back her knife and liberating one of the swords went up the stairs to join in the fight.

The scene that met her as she got onto the main deck was something she'd expect to see in one of the old American pirate movies, not in everyday life. Telling who was who was the easy part, the Spanish wore uniforms, but as far as winning? That was anyone's guess.

Anna-marie seemed to be holing her own near one of the rear cannons and with Gibbs nearby they were putting up a good fight, but Jack… surrounded, swaggering and taunting, typical.

Alex fought or rather avoided her way towards him, dodging swords, sailors and fisticuffs with anyone till she got close enough to Jack to lend a hand.

"Jack!"

She cried out as she lunged with the sword ridding him of the assailant behind him.

"What the bloody hell are you doing here?"

Alex expected that reaction.

"Saving you arse I expect."

Alex ducked as a sword swiped close to her head, when she'd stood back up and fended off another attack Jack grabbed the back of her shirt.

"I told you to stay down below!"

He yelled, and looked surprised for a second when Alex took aim and threw her knife…into a soldier swinging on a rope towards them, they moved slightly out of the way as he let out a cry and landed back on the galleon.

"I was going to, until they decided to pay me a visit. Then I decided, if you were incompetent enough to let them get that far into the ship you wanted me to help fight because you said you wanted to keep me safe, but clearly not that much."

He looked shocked as she finished her spiel and fought off a soldier as he continued to stare gob smacked. Alex looked at him and tapped his cheek, tugged in a chin braid, nothing.

"Jack?"

Before she could tug his chin again he'd pulled her close wrapping his free arm around her waist and fiercely mashing his lips to her, Alex stood there surprised and merely enjoyed the experience.

Breaking the contact Jack kept hold of her waist.

"Be safe, we'll have a chat when this is over."

With that he launched himself back into the fight, and left Alex wanting, wanting his lips, wanting his body, wanting… oh she hated that man sometimes!

Alex could almost hear herself cheering, they were winning, the Spanish were retreating! It was largely a fight she'd attempted to control. The whole piratical murder on the high seas thing wasn't really her thing, but she'd done what she could to keep herself and the crew safe. It was enough to appease her sensibilities.

"Puta!"

A sailor yelled at her running at her, she rolled her eyes, the insult was getting rather old and personally she was getting tired of it.

"Walk away, hombre."

She yelled out as she brandished the cutlass and waved it about threateningly, he kept running, shit. She hated it when they did that. She stepped aside as he ran towards her aiming to give him a reasonable cut on his chest, and she did that but then he stumbled against the railing and fell overboard, still clutching Alex's arm. Plummeting towards the warm Caribbean water Alex just knew Jack wouldn't be happy.

"Throw the Spanish overboard, any of the crew dead, Gibbs?"

Gibbs, tired and slightly bloody shook his head,

"We've got two badly injured, Captain."

Jack nodded and as he looked along around the deck he saw his crew, alive, victorious and missing one wife.

"Where is she?"
He ground out his teeth gritted and hand clenching the hilt of his cutlass.

"Who?"

Gibbs asked and was jabbed in the ribs by Anna.

"My bloody wife!"

He began to storm around on deck looking for the annoying present of Alex.

"Tom!"

His former cabin boy ran forward,

"She ain't in the galley, Captain. Haven't seen her since she got on deck."

The captain let out a sigh; he'd lost sight of her after the kiss. He didn't know what had possessed him but once she'd mouthed off at him he could resist shutting her up in the most delicious way. Her lips were sweet, sharp, perfect and full of promise, and then he'd lost sight of her.

"Anna,"

"We'll find her Captain, no need to get your heart in a twist."

Minutes later and Jack knew for sure she wasn't on the ship, he was almost certain the Spanish hadn't taken any prisoners. The deck sounded dangerously silent as the crew were beginning to figure out that she'd gone.

"Captain, I'm afraid she must have fallen overboard during the fighting."

There was a sudden large, ungraceful sodden thump on the deck. Turning Jack spied the drenched, dishevelled figure as Alex.

"Of course I bloody well fell overboard! Some Spanish bastard dragged me along with him, European bastard. Nobody thought to check any of the grapples and ropes that are still hanging around did they, Christ!"

She stood up slowly the water dripping steadily from her. Her hair and clothes were plastered to her and Jack, just quietly, couldn't resist drinking in her form, gods she was delicious when she was angry.

Anna stepped forward quickly recognising the looks from both parties.

"Let's go to your cabin, Alex. So you can clean yourself up."

She didn't put up much of a fight as she followed the female pirate down below.

It wasn't until after dark that Alex had completely calmed down from the raging event of the day. It also wasn't until then that Jack had come to see her. She'd been resting on the bed rubbing some cream into her rope burned hands.

He walked in quite suddenly not knocking; old dogs can't learn new tricks she thought quickly and slammed it behind him, she sat up, this wasn't good. She'd seen aroused Jack, amused Jack, behaved Jack, crafty Jack, cunning Jack, even cranky Jack and many more of his facial and personality types but seething with anger Jack was something she'd yet to experience and it looked like she was about to bear the full brunt of it.

Spanish:

Mujer: woman

Puta: whore or bitch

Hijo de la puta: some of a bitch

No me jodas: don't fck around with me.

I know this was a long wait for the next chapter but Uni is Uni. Here's one with a small cliffie, got you guys waiting to hear what will happen when a worried and tired Alex meets a very angry Jack. Remember my fan writing side survives only on reviews and PM's so without them I may starve and die. So don't kill a poor writer and keep reviewing, for Alex if nothing else. Cheers, CC

soaringphoenix86: My faithful fan stalker. You gotta know I luv yah on. Three PM's later and I am updating, and worked very hard with it. Had to get six seminar reports, two essays and a scene breakdown into Uni before I could even think about updating but here it is.

Second Star to the Left: Glad you like it, I was just overwhelmed by uni that I had to take a break from fan writing. Please continue to read and review.

Robin Goodlass: Glad you enjoyed the argument. It was so fun to write, but coming up… an argument, with yelling! JOY! I'm going to enjoy writing the next chapter.

Dugadugabowbow: thanks a bunch. Please keep reading and reviewing.

Jolly Rouge: Wow, you mean I'm one of the first to introduce you to the fandom? I feel very lucky. Thanks and keep reviewing.

Mooncheese: Thanks! I'm trying very hard to do good characterisation. I don't just want to do Amusing!Jack or Serious!Jack, I want to blend the a-typical fandom character types. I'm working on some more serious stuff at the moment but more amusement to come in the near future of the story.