A/N: Having not seen either of the POTC movies in some time (my copy of 1 has gone weird and won't play, and I am yet to get a ... ahem ... completely legal copy of the sequel off my best friend), so I'm not too sure if Will has a dagger in his boot or anything like that... well, I'm 99 sure that he doesn't, but in my mind's eye the bit of this chapter looked better with a dagger than a sword, so you can all deal with it. :P

Chapter 3

Will Turner was the one who finally broke the silence. 'This is some trick,' he said, and then suddenly turned on the Doctor, sticking a dagger under the Time Lord's chin.

'Doctor!' Rose exclaimed, her eyes widening.

'You said you had a ship!' Will snarled.

'Well, I do,' replied the Doctor, warily eyeing the blade pointed at his throat, 'it's just not your conventional mast-sails-helm kind of ship.'

'How does it sail then?' asked Mr Gibbs.

'Well, it...' The Doctor hesitated. 'Do you really want me to try and explain it to you?'

Barbossa took the opportunity to speak. 'Why should we trust you, sir? Your companion calls you "Doctor" but we don't know either of your names.'

'This is Rose Tyler and I'm ... well, I could tell you my Gallifreyan name, but you'd never be able to pronounce it, so let's just stick to "Doctor", shall we?'

The Doctor twiddled some controls on the TARDIS console and soon they were off. Caught off guard by the unfamiliar motion, everyone except the Doctor and Rose lost their balance and all quickly had to find something to grab to regain it.

'So, who's Davy Jones?' asked Rose, curious to know exactly who they were going after.

'Well, do you want the legend or the truth?' the Doctor asked in reply.

Rose shrugged. 'Both.'

'The legend is that Davy Jones had his heart broken and it was too much for him to live with, but not quite enough to kill him. So, he cut out his heart and hid it in a chest and moved to the bottom of the ocean. Now he's captain of the Flying Dutchman and offers dying sailors one hundred years in their service before they have to face the black abyss.'

'And the truth?' asked Elizabeth, who had been listening in, 'who is Davy Jones really?'

'Well, the truth is much less exciting. Davy Jones was scientist on the planet Ramuda. The inhabitants there are oxygen-breathing, but due to their rapid rate of dehydration, have to live almost entirely underwater. When Davy Jones was exiled for unorthodox experiments, Earth was the closest planet he could find with enough water for him to live in and survive.'

'So what you're saying, Doctor, is that Davy Jones is not of this world?' Elizabeth was a little sceptical of the Doctor's story.

The Doctor raised his eyebrows. 'Does he look like something of this world?'

'What Elizabeth means,' said Will, 'you're saying Davy Jones is from another ... physical world, not...'

'Ah, no, he's not supernatural. He's flesh and blood, just like you and me. Well, his blood's more greenish than red, but still!'

At that point, the grinding sounds indicating the materialisation of the TARDIS alerted them all to their arrival. Well, alerted the Doctor and Rose to their arrival; it really only alerted the others to the fact that something new was happening.

The Doctor opened the doors and waved everybody outside. On seeing where they were, Rose immediately felt as though she was inside one of those underwater viewing rooms they have at aquariums. They were still dry, of course, so Rose assumed the building they were in was built out of some sort of reinforced glass or something. She could see out into the murky water surrounding them and in the incandescent light that lit up the building she could just make out the shape of seaweed wavering in the seabed and the odd fish that passed by now and then.

There was no time for admiring the scenery, however, with the Doctor ushering them all through the neighbouring doorway. The room looked like some kind of laboratory - cords were running everywhere, lights flashed and noises buzzed. Though Rose and the Doctor walked right on it as usual, Elizabeth and the others hesitated on the threshold.

The Doctor turned and grinned at their reluctance. 'What are you worried about? In three hundred years or so, your world will look exactly the same.'

'Then I'm glad I won't be there to see it,' Mr Gibbs replied.

'Doctor,' Rose's concerned voice came from further inside the room, 'what kind of unorthodox experiments was Davy Jones exiled for, exactly?'

Everyone turned and followed her gaze to where an unconscious man was strapped to what looked like an upright operating table. More cords were attached to his chest and face, and though the monitors they led to were humming busily, there was little sign of life about him. On seeing this, Elizabeth let out a gasp.

'Jack!'