I am unbelievably excited about On Stranger Tides! Unforuntately because of exams I can't see it untill Friday, so if any of you have seen it don't ruin it for me. I'm one of those people who hates spoliers.

Please review, thanks :)
LV
xx

There was a silence. Nobody quite knew how to respond to this. Jack just stared at me with an open mouth. Neither of us knew what to say. Nobody on board did. My heart was thumping. It looked like I was going to have a baby here. Right in the middle of the Bermuda Triangle. Unless we could get out of it in six days. Jack was pale, very pale, which didn't make me feel any more comfortable.

"What are we going to do?" I heard Gibbs ask. He sounded distant and far away. It was sweet of him to care about the wellbeing of Jack's and my baby. Jack just shook his head, words were failing him for the first time. Everyone was looking to him for guidance.

"Leave," said Jack finally. There was a collective sigh. It sounded more like relief than disappointment. I was also relieved for a second but then my heart sank.

"I don't think we can," I muttered dismally.

"What?" Jack frowned.

"Don't forget who's potentially waiting for us out there," I pushed my hair out of my eyes. "Blackbeard. George. They're both out there. We can't go back."

"But we can't go forward," Gibbs's face flushed with stress.

"Well we can't stay in the same place!" Ragetti muttered, glancing at the roof of water.

"It'll have to be forward," said Jack. "As quickly as possible. If we can reach the Fountain within six days we'll be alright." Gibbs started to protest, but Jack cut him off. "If we go back out and run into those ships waiting for us we don't stand much of a chance. Our only option is to continue with all haste. Come on!" He looked round at his crew; they started moving slowly, like a convict awaiting his death sentence. "SNAP TO AND MAKE SAIL!" Jack bellowed and they sprang into action. He turned to me, "I'm so sorry Belle, and I should have listened to you. I should have waited until after the baby came."

I shrugged, "Not much we can do about it now." I didn't bother pointing out that in his crazed state for immortality he wouldn't have paid much attention if I had mentioned this beforehand. He looked sorry enough. He opened his mouth in what looked like was going to be another apology, seems like he didn't believe my forgiveness, but I cut him off and moved off the topic. "If we're going to get there quickly we're going to have to know what we're up against. I don't much like the sound of the Abyss."

I flicked through the book. I knew I had already read the chapter on the Abyss, but I couldn't remember exactly what it said. A quick scan of the pages refreshed me enough to put the fear of God back into me. Jack saw me pale, "What? What is it?"

"What was that thing that Indigo said about shadows?" I asked, trying to stop my voice from quaking as much as my hands. Jack shrugged.

"Nothing, she just gave us something for them."

"Go and get it," I said quietly. He nodded and disappeared into his cabin. I could see the crew glancing over at me, trying to figure out what was going wrong. I went into the Cabin and shut the door behind me. He looked up from the drawers.

"I've got it," he said quietly as I sat down. I relaxed a little bit when I saw that small white bag Indigo had given us. "What do we do with it?"

"Burn it," I replied. "The second it starts to get dark, we have to line the ship with it and stay in the light at all times."

"Why?"

I took a deep breath, "Because here, the shadows are living."

"Living?" he repeated. I could tell he wasn't sure whether or not to believe me. "How can they be living?"

I looked down at the book. It was a long passage, one he probably couldn't be bothered to sit through if I just read it to him, so I decided just to lift the important parts and sum it up. "You know how, at one point in your life at least, you're afraid of the dark?"

It was a rhetorical question but one he took it upon himself to answer anyway. "I am not afraid of anything, love. Especially not something as harmless as the dark."

"It's not completely harmless, Jack," I said and looked back down at the book. "Everyone is scared of the dark at some point in their lives. Usually it's something you outgrow from childhood. But have you never wondered why we all have this common fear?" He didn't answer, but I hadn't expected him to. I had his attention now and that was all I needed. "It's borne out of an instinct we all have. All of us, every last one, are born with this primal instinct that the dark is dangerous. And that's because at one point it was. Before they managed to trap it here in the Triangle, the darkness was feared by all because of the number of lives it took. There's something that lives in the shadows, Jack. The fear we have of the dark usually leaves us because outside the Triangle the thing in the shadows is dormant, it's asleep. But not here. Here it's still living. And potentially killing."

Jack frowned. I could see that he was trying to wrap his head around it. "Right…" he said slowly. "So, what do we do when it gets dark?"

"I think the bag that Indigo gave us should have a black powder in it that will make the candles burn twice as bright as normal."

He was suddenly bright and business-like. He peered into the bag. "In that case we'll set them up on deck and we'll all just have to stay there because there's not very much powder in here and I don't know how long it's going to have to last us."

I nodded, feeling nervous and slightly sick. I was also unsure of what to expect when night came. If we were wrong about this, we ran the risk of completely wasting what Indigo had given us. If we were right... one step into the dark could kill us all.

Jack lit the candles as the sun was setting and everyone huddled up on deck. Not everyone believed us when we told them that the dark was dangerous, but they followed orders nonetheless. Every lantern and candle was brought onto the deck. Some were fixed to the railings, others just placed on the floor nearby to give as even a spread of light as possible.

When darkness did, eventually begin to creep in, I thought that it was a different kind of darkness than I was used to. It seemed much more solid. Despite the brightness of our candles the light did not really penetrate the darkness outside of our safe area. Once or twice I thought I saw something move. After an hour or so of tense sitting around people began to relax and fall asleep. I rested my head on Jack and went to close my eyes. Then I realised something. "I can't see the stars," I said quietly. People looked up but made no comment. Gibbs crossed himself.

"This is rubbish," a voice grumbled from somewhere to my right. "I don't believe a word of this. It's uncomfortable and boring and I'm going for a proper night's kip in my bunk. You're superstitious, gullible idiots, the lot of you!"

There were general grumbles of agreement from some. Many died down after and icy stare from Jack. The man who had spoken, a pirate who had signed up in Tortuga called Geoff, stood up and looked around at us all. "Will you be taking a light with you?" Jack asked, calmly.

"No," he shook his head. "I can find my way in the dark by myself thank you."

I watched him walk away, tried to warn him to reconsider but he just sneered at me. I did notice him hesitate briefly before he stepped opened the door and went below deck. The light nearest the door flickered. A bloodcurdling scream rang out.