WAKI 11

WARNING!!! BEFORE YOU READ THIS CHAPTER! DO NOT SEND ME EVIL REVIEWS OF DEATH! The situation is under control. There is no need to panic. No need to threaten my life. Ok? Understood? Great. Now, read.

He was so close. They'd been apart for forever, and now they were just a gangplank away.

The Pearl sat idly in the water, still moored to the dock. Supplies were being loaded on, even at this ungodly hour of the night. Apparently, they were about to go on a long, long voyage. Gibbs had been right. If he had come just a day later, he never would have found them.

Elizabeth walked up next to him, taking hold of his arm again. Not in a loving gesture, at least not the way he knew it. It was friendly, but not romantic. She was lending him her courage.

"Go get him, Will. And don't take no for an answer."

And then he was walking, without even realising it. One foot in front of the other, and he was there, on the deck again, standing on the floorboards that had become so familiar, despite the short space of time he had spent aboard.

And yet, it wasn't familiar at all. When Barbossa had been in possession of the ship, it had radiated evil. Now, it seemed a wonderful, benevolent thing. A thing worth fighting for.

What members of the crew who weren't busy drinking themselves to death bustled about, directing the flow of traffic. He spotted Anamaria, standing up at the helm with her usual confidence. He made his way through the web of people.

"Hello, Anamaria. How are you?" He struggled to keep his mirth under control. He was home.

Anamaria didn't even turn. Just froze, for a mere second in time. Yet it was more than he expected, in all truth.

"What took you so long, boy?"

"I don't actually know." He laughed, rubbing the back of his head. "Just needed to get some things worked out, I guess."

"You should have worked them out on the way here." Something was in her voice, something bitter, angry.

It made no sense.

"Anamaria… Are you… angry with me?" He frowned, eyebrows soaring up his face in a perfect pleading expression.

"Yes, I am." She finally whirled around, her dark eyes glittering with, to his surprise, tears. "You come to late, Will, you come to late…"

She put her head in her hands and began to cry. Will was mystified. It seemed to be a very un-Anamaria-like thing to do. Anamaria was strong and confident and always in control. She didn't cry. It simply did not happen. Whatever had happened had been something big, something huge. Something he was fairly certain few members of the crew knew about. Something only Anamaria would know.

And then…

"Hey, you! What have you done to my mate, eh?"

Will's heart stopped. He had heard that voice in his dreams so many times. He knew it like he knew his own, and yet to hear it, actually hear it… It seemed to much sharper, the words were so much more distinct, without an awful lot of the slur he had apparently added to it afterwards.

"Jack…" He gasped, turning around to meet the pirate once more.

The man before him frowned, un-lined eyes narrowing into pale slits, somehow glittering gold without the benefit of the darkening kohl. His hair, once tangled and matted into thick dreadlocks, had been carefully and meticulously combed. Not all of it had survived the ordeal. It now hung only to his chin. And as for his signature braided beard… It was gone. It was a clean-shaven pirate who stood before him now. And the clothes… He was dressed as a common man, not the brat prince of the ocean Will had known. Just a man. Just a pirate. Just… Jack.

"Do I know you, boy?"

And then Will feinted.

Ok, breathe! It's all right. Don't freak out on me, ok? And don't hit me! Everyone I got to proof this hit me. It makes me sad and angry and not want to write. If you want me to write, the review me in a calm, orderly and flattering fashion. Thank you. ALSO! I have 2 options. Either I explain Jack's past in here, or in a side story. Please vote! I am as of yet undecided.