Disclaimer: I don't own anything from Pirates of the Caribbean, and I don't claim to.

Note: After the release of At World's End, it's necessary for me to say that this is completely AU.

Chapter Three
East India Trading Company's Headquarters in the Caribbean, Port Royal

Edmund stood in front of the wide table, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. His hands clasped behind his back were sweaty, despite the fact that his pulse was calm and even. He brushed a dark curl away from his face and tried to stuff it back into the drooping ribbon tied at the base of his skull, without success.

The man sitting at the table was silent, reading from an untidy bundle of papers held loosely in his soft hand. Edmund had been standing there silently for nearly five minutes, and the white-wigged man's frown had deepened slowly until it was a deep scowl.

Edmund took that as a bad sign.

Finally, with a sigh, he set the papers down and tiredly rubbed at his eyes. "Mr. Seward, is it?" he asked, shifting to sit up straighter in his chair.

"Yes, Lord Beckett, sir."

He regarded Edmund with obvious disinterest. "And you're a midshipman?"

"I was: I passed the Lieutenant's exam last week, sir."

"I see." Beckett pushed some of the top papers aside; Edmund recognized his captain's handwriting on one of the sheets, the bosun's on another. "What is it that you are requesting of me exactly?"

"I would like to sail with your ships on your special mission."

Beckett stared at him, showing no emotion on his face. "You have been at sea a total of six months, is that correct?" He didn't wait for an answer. "And yet you expect me to impose you, a greenhorn, hardly even a lieutenant, on one of my captains? They have their jobs to think of, boy, and you would only be a distraction and liability to them."

Edmund's face set, a remnant of his not-long-past childhood.

Beckett let out a bark of laughter. "I see now. You expected me to agree to send you – a boy I met today for the first time, with only two letters of confidence – you expected me to send you on this mission that, if it fails, could very well be the end of the East India Trading Company?"

"I'm more qualified than–"

"You're a child."

Edmund's mouth snapped shut. He glared at Beckett and held his gaze for all of a minute, before that six months' training forced his eyes to the floor.

Beckett was laughing again, a low, malicious chuckle, his eyes squinted into arrogant slivers. "You seem to be very set in your decision, boy. Why might that be? In search of the wealth to be had?" He smiled at this, but it wasn't a friendly smile.

"No, sir," Edmund said quickly, "not at all." He hesitated, raising his eyes just enough to look at Beckett's chin, but no farther.

"Oh?" His silence was inviting.

"I–" He chanced a quick glance to gauge Beckett's mood. "I would like to see the pirates receive their due punishments, too, sir."

Beckett stared at him, silent. There was an amused quirk to his face, but it was cunningly masked by his cool gaze.

Edmund kept his head low and shifted back on the heels of his feet. He had never been one to deal with the stress of rejection and humiliation very well. A tall glass of ale was sounding very appetizing.

The corners of Beckett's mouth twitched and drew out into a thin, hard smile. "You are rather serious about this, aren't you?"

"My mother," he said, stopping his slow retreat to the door, "was raped by pirates. She died when I was young – before I can remember, actually – which is why I joined the Royal Navy."

Beckett tilted his head back in a slow nod of recognition. "Ah." Deliberately, he stood and walked around his desk, leaned against it directly in front of Edmund. "Revenge. Of course. I understand revenge very well." He glanced over to the balcony that opened upon the harbor; Mercer stood just outside the doorway, unseen but always listening. "Ah, yes. I think I might have a job for you."

Edmund's face lit up with a child's joy. He struggled to rein it in, force it into a more dignified expression of polite interest. He failed miserably.

Beckett watched this telling play of emotion across the boy's face with interest. "Yes, I believe I do," he said, smiling. Abruptly, he pushed off his desk and crossed the room to a smaller table, line on one side with bottles of wine and on the other fine-looking alcohols. He picked up a bottle of red wine and poured himself a celebratory glass. "A drink?"

Edmund shook his head politely. His hand unconsciously felt his pocket where a few coins from his most recent pay rested with delightfully comforting weight; he would treat himself to a few drinks that night, but later.

The wine was gone in one quick gulp. With his free hand, he opened the small drawer. "Have you ever seen this man?"

Edmund took the stiff parchment. A pirate stared back at him, a mane of unkempt hair in a halo around his head and a mocking grin on his face. Jack Sparrow, he read, Wanted Dead or Alive for Committing Crimes against the Crown, Theft, and Murder. He shook his head. "No."

Beckett tapped on the poster with a pale finger. "This is your job." At Edmund's look of confusion, he continued, "You are to find this man for me. He has been captured several times in the past, but each time, without fail, he escaped. You are to find this man and bring him to me; if the situation calls for it, bring him to me dead." He paused to let his words sink in. "Are you still so sure that you wish to sail with my men?"

"Yes." His voice was hard and determined.

Beckett held out his hand. They shook, each looking the other straight in the eye. "Then we have reached an accord?"

"I will do my best, sir. I will find him."

"Good." He walked with Edmund to the door. "I will send you your official orders in a few days' time. But it is extremely important that you remember–" With a hand on his shoulder, he stopped Edmund and turned him about, leaning in close to him. In a conspiratorial voice, he said, "You must remember that no one can know. Can you do that?"

Edmund nodded. "Yes, sir." He opened the door. "I– I look forward to working with you, sir."

Lord Beckett stood in the now-quiet room, contemplating the closed door. Behind him, Mercer stepped inside from where he had been standing on the balcony. "Sir." His frown was deep, and he looked rather unhappy with the proceedings. "If you will permit me to say–"

Beckett turned around and went to pour himself another drink. He remained silent and attentive, waiting for Mercer to continue, but not looking at him.

"If you will permit me to speak, sir."

"Go ahead."

Mercer paused in a rare display of attempting to choose his words carefully. "I'm not certain that was the wisest decision."

"You aren't?" Beckett smiled to himself, still facing away from Mercer, and stepped farther into the room, toward the windows opposite the balcony. "Do go on."

Mercer followed him, stopping a few feet away. "Are you certain that the boy will be able to carry out your orders? That maybe it would be wiser to entrust such an important job to someone more experienced in matters such as this?"

Beckett turned. "Such as yourself?"

Mercer looked down, jaw clenched. "Not necessarily myself, sir, but someone who has some sense of secrecy and duty."

Beckett grinned. He offered his clerk a glass of wine; Mercer made no sign of noticing the offer. "Yes, you see, that's the beauty of it." He walked lightly over to his desk and sat down, looking again at Edmund's papers. "If I had entrusted someone of more experience to carry out my orders, I know for certain that it would have ended badly. The experienced ones are shrewd. They know all the tricks – and I know that I would end up on the losing side. They would instantly seize upon the opportunity of blackmail. But this boy has no experience of the sort." He finished the last of his wine, swishing it for a moment in his mouth before swallowing. "I can trust him. He has no ulterior motives. Not while he's still so young."

Mercer turned to face Beckett, resigned. He knew what to expect.

"Mr. Mercer." Beckett handed him the papers. "His mother was a whore, wasn't she? I want you to find out as much as you can about him and his family. See if you can't find the identity of his father. After all," he said, turning back to the numerous accounts he had to attend to, "it never hurts to have something with which to bargain."

Mercer slipped quietly out the door. When Beckett glanced out the window, he saw the retreating form of the jaunty-stepping boy Seward, trailed by the smooth shadow of Mercer's coat.

Author's Note: (Oh, how I do love writing villains.) This, I believe, introduces the only (main) original character in this series. As far as I can tell, at this point. I have up to chapter fourteen outlined, and enough material for a good deal more than that, but any writers out there know how much the original intentions tend to change as the story progresses. There's really no telling what will happen! And, sorry that this chapter was quite a bit shorter than usual (more than a thousand words, oh dear), but I didn't want to force it.
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