Disclaimer, because I haven't done it in a while: I own many things, including the piece of junk laptop I'm writing this on (stupid spell check has decided to stop working), but unfortonately I do not own Pirates of the Caribbean.

"What are you doing?"

Emily freezes upon hearing her brother's voice. She turns to face the seven year old, who is standing in the door way to the kitchen, watching her intently.

"I'm…getting ready…to…go away for a while." She responds, choosing her words with care.

His eyebrows furrow in a way that she would find adorable under any other circumstances.

"What? No!"

She walks over to kneel down in front of him on both knees, locking eyes with him.

"There is nothing to keep me here. Papa's…" She sighed. "Papa's not coming back."

He looks hurt and she can see the tears building in his dark eyes, and she knows they are for her and not her papa, whom Joshua only barely remembers.

"That's not true, you have me! You can't leave Emmy!"

She feels her heart might break upon hearing his name for her. Tears begin to slide down his chubby cheeks. She tries to steel herself.

"I'm sorry, Joshy. Nothing's changing my mind this time."

He throws his arms around her neck and she wraps her arms around his little body, gladly excepting the hug.

"Take me with you!"

"Don't be silly! It'll be bad enough just trying to keep myself from sticking out." She chuckles softly. "It won't be forever. I promise I'll be back."

Time seems to slow for a very strange moment as an intense feeling of déjà vu washes over her. She remembers having a similar discussion with their papa, except theirs hadn't been half as nice.

But she is not their papa. She isn't leaving her little brother with nothing; he has his mother to look after him, he will be fine.

At least, that's what she tries to tell herself.

"Mummy and I will miss you, though!"

Emily tries to hold back a snort.

"I know you will." She pushes him away from her gently, looking into his eyes again. "Just like I'll miss you. Now please go back to bed. If your mum wakes and finds you gone she'll come looking for you and I don't want her to know I'm leaving."

He wipes at his eyes and nods. She stands and turns around without another word, walking back across the room.

She pauses a moment, glances back to make sure he's gone. He is. She turns back to the table she's in front of and begins what she had been about to when her baby brother had caught her.

First is the tedious process of taking off the dress she is wearing, which still has quite a few layers to spite how simple it is. She is more than a little relieved to be rid of the corset. She thinks about binding her breasts, as Alex had suggested, but decides not to, as it would seem little better than the corset, and anyways she is not nearly as gifted as some women.

She grimaces as she goes about sliding on her breaches and red blouse, thinking about the things she'd heard the women in town, and even Jade on occasion, mumbling about 'the poor Turner girl'. They think it a curse, her being taller than most girls with a figure they describe as a bit 'boyish'. They say she takes after her papa a bit too much, at least in that respect.

She knows it can't be as bad as they make it out to be; after all, Alex has at least insisted that she is beautiful enough.

She banishes such thoughts from her mind as she buttons up her black vest, then slips on the coat she'd bought in town just a few days earlier. It fits better than she thought it would, to her pleasant surprise.

She then draws her knife and gathers her hair, which flows all the way down her back, in one hand. She carefully brings the knife up, hesitates a moment, then finally makes her move, and the blade slices through her wavy dark brown locks like butter.

Her hair is just past her shoulders now, and she hates to have had to cut it, but managing it will be so much easier now. She proceeds to put her knife away and then braid what's left of her hair.

She then straps on her sword and slips the knife into her boots. She packs her dress and corset into her bag, along with her papa's flask. The string with her mother's ring on it goes around her neck now, and she slips the ring itself beneath her shirt.

She finally walks out into the cool pre-dawn air and begins heading for the docks.

"Emily? Is that you?" Alex's eyes widen as he stares at his friend, who is striding down the wooden dock towards him, wearing mens clothing and carrying a small leather bag.

"Of course it's me, who else would it be?" She asks, rolling her eyes as she comes to stand in front of him.

He can't see her all that well, for the sun has only just begun to rise, but looks her over anyways.

"What?" She asks, sounding annoyed.

"Nothin'. S'just I think I'm goin to miss seein ye in a dress. Did ye cut yer hair?"

"Yes. So…your captain. You said it was a woman?"

"Aye, her name's Anamaria. She was a friend of me mums, and I think me dad's at some point, considerin the way she looked at me when I first told 'er I was a Sparrow. I get the feelin me dad has a lot of those sorts of friends."

Emily has turned her gaze away from him by now and seems to be scanning the docks.

"Which one is it?" She asks after a moment.

"That one." He says, pointing to the one nearest them.

"Bigger than I was expecting." Emily sounds surprised.

"She's called the Sea's Queen."

"She's beautiful."

"Aye, that she is. Ye know…" He pauses, unsure of whether he should bother going on. "Ye could still go back, forget about comin along, I mean Jack had said yer Papa didn't want ye to -"

"I don't care what Papa said. There's nothing for me here, and I want to have a chance at finding out what happened to him. Now, did you talk to your captain about me coming aboard her ship?"

He sighs and nods, looking a bit defeated.

"Cap'n seemed pretty anxious to meet ye actually, soon as I told 'er yer name. Come on." He begins leading her towards the Sea's Queen. "One more warnin', ye'll be the only girl with us, 'sides the Cap'n of course."

"I already figured that, Alex. Must you insist on treating me like I'm stupid?"

He ignores the question as they begin to climb on board the ship. There aren't many others around yet, but the few that are on deck give them curious glances.

He watches closely to see if any of the looks she receives even hint at the crew realizing she is a girl; none of them do. Although it would be impossible to hide it from these men, he tucks the thought away that she could hide this detail if the need ever arose around others. He could think of several ways that it could come in handy.

"This way." He says, guiding her towards the Captain's cabin at the front of the ship. He leads her through a door beneath the raised deck where the helm is and points towards a door at the end of a short hallway. "That last door there."

Emily looks a bit nervous.

"Will your captain be awake at this hour?"

"Cap'n told me to take ye to 'er the moment ye got on board." He shrugs. "I'd just go ahead if I were ye. She also wanted to set sail at first light, so I'd best get back out there." He takes her bag from her. "I'll stash this in the crew quarters for ye."

She nods and begins heading down the hallway.

"Oh, and Emily." He calls after her softly, and she turns around. "Don't forget she's yer captain now too."

Emily watches as Alex disappears back outside. She pauses a moment, taking a deep breath to steady herself. She almost can't believe it. She is really on a pirate ship. She is really on a pirate ship as crew.

Yet another Turner ready to turn pirate. The thought crosses her mind that maybe, just maybe, all this really is foolish. Alex had tried to tell her that her papa hadn't wanted this for her…

She banishes such silly thoughts from her mind. This is the chance she'd been waiting for, for as long as she can remember. Besides, pirates didn't play by anyones rules, and her papa had given up the right to tell her what to do when he'd decided to just leave her behind.

She walks the rest of the way down the hallway and knocks firmly on the door.

There is a breif pause before the door flies open.

"Oh, what now ye… oh. You're not Jimmy."

Emily is frozen for a moment, staring blankly at the woman in front of her. She isn't much bigger than Emily, with dark skin and black hair streaked just a bit with gray, and right now she is scowling.

"You aren't one of my crew, what are you doing on my ship?"

Emily straightens up and clears her throat.

"E-Emily Turner, miss…" She trails off, unsure of what to say next. The scowl on the Captain's face disappears.

"Aye, the Turner girl, I remember. Come on inside," she turns and heads back into her cabin, and Emily follows warily, "I want to get a look at you."

Emily is still at a loss for what to do, so she settles for taking her hat off and standing in the dim light of a flickering candle. The Captain looks her over and actually appears shocked for a breif moment.

"There' s no doubt you're his daughter. By god, you look like him. Got his eyes."

"Y-you mean my papa? Did you know him?" Emily asks, her curiousity getting the best of her now.

The Captain nods.

"I sailed with him on your uncle's ship up until he was taken."

Realization dawns on Emily's face.

"Alex said..you wanted to see me when you heard my name. That's why, isn't it? Why you even took me on here?" She tries not to sound angry, remembering that this woman is her Captain now. She can hardly help it with the picture that's beginning to paint itself in her mind.

The Captain says nothing for a long moment.

"You might look like your papa, but you sound like your mum. I ain't gonna lie to you. When I left the Pearl he asked me to look after you, assuming I ever even crossed paths with you; I suppose he figured you wouldn't stay home like he wanted you too."

The angry feeling in Emily's gut grows ten fold. She can't believe what she is hearing. Her papa didn't want to bother with her anymore, so he asked some other woman to look after her? As if she is still eight years old?

"Forgive me for being forward seeing as you are meant to be my Captain," she says, and she no longer cares if she sounds angry, "but just who are you to my papa that he would have asked something like this of you?"

"Easy, girl, it wasn't like that." The older woman looks amused at best. "Yer papa saved my life at one point on the Pearl and taking care of you would be the least I could do in return. Unless I can convince you to stay here where he thought you belonged."

Emily doesn't respond, but the look on her face is answer enough on its own.

"Didn't think so, but I thought I'd try. I'd probably leave too, if that counts for anything." She looks Emily over again and her tone changes a bit, becoming what Emily supposes is more Captain like. "Now let's see if you really know what you're doing here. How much do you know about sailing?"

Emily had already comtemplated lying about this if she was asked, but now figures she shouldn't bother, seeing as this woman apparently plans to keep her around anyway.

"Uncle Jack taught me some when I was eight. I know little."

"Something's better than nothing. Alex can show you the ropes, then. How about that sword, do you know how to use it?"

"Aye, Captain." Emily replies without hesitation this time, but the Captain eyes her skeptically.

"Best not be lying. You'll be the only other girl on this ship. I trust my men, but they're still men. There's a small extra cabin just down the hall; you can sleep there instead of with the crew if you'd like."

Emily tries not to scowl.

"I can take care of myself, Captain, with all due respect."

"Wasn't intending to imply otherwise. Suit yourself. Go on, then."

Emily leaves the Captain's cabin feeling as bewildered as she is angry. This Anamaria wasn't like any captain she'd ever heard of.

And why was it that everyone wants to believe she needs 'looking after' anyways?

Wasn't actually planning to bring Anamaria into this, but then I watched Curse of the Black Pearl the other day and just had to do it.

I know these last few chapters haven't maybe been the most interesting. I promise it won't stay that way for long.

(I just read over what I wrote one last time and realized that I spelled unfortunately wrong in the disclaimer. Proof that my computer hates me now. :D)

Ok, I'll stop talking now.

Review please. :)