The landscape is beautiful. Mountains line their path, tall and magnificent in the bright sun… icebergs, covered in layers of snow. It's cold beyond cold here. The crew grabs every errant item of clothing they can get their hands on and tries to layer up and keep busy doing – any little task that can be found to be done, anything to keep their minds off the freezing and the snow.

Emily tries to get Alex to tell her what's wrong now, but he's being evasive and acting just strange. Well, perhaps that's not saying much, he's a Sparrow. Stranger than usual, then. She tries to get him to come to bed with her – with no real ulterior motive other than to warm up a fraction and because she misses him – but he shies away from the idea. He doesn't seem angry, leading her to believe it might not be anything she's done, but then, what is it? She can't figure it out. But she's nothing if not stubborn, so she just keeps trying.

…

The mountainous icebergs thin out slowly until there is nothing but leagues and leagues of blue in any direction. The moon shines full and bright this night, reflected perfectly against the water, a sight just as beautiful as the mountains before it – except they've stopped moving. There's no wind in the sails to speak off. Emily doesn't know what to do with this, but they are here now and panicking will do no one any good, so she decides to simply do nothing. Her goddess still won't answer any calls for help; there's nothing can be done until the wind decides to pick up again. At least the temperature has evened back out for the moment.

She worries, though, about anything and everything that is going on, enough to make her dizzy and sick with fear and apprehension. It doesn't help that it only just occurs to her that she's not sure what she'll do with her papa when she finally does have him back, and she worries to spite herself about how total his disapproval will be of who she's become and is still becoming.

Trying to distract herself, she settles her thoughts on Alex, again.

Thinking to make him jealous – after all, turnabout is only fair play, right? – she brings Andrews men up for some air. One is entirely uninterested in her, seeming to thoroughly share his captain's mentality when it comes to women and pirates, though he is at least smart enough not to say anything. His fellow midshipmen, however, is a different matter entirely. His name is Riley and he doesn't seem to know what to make of Emily, but when she tries her hand at flirting with him, she can see a mischievous glint in his eyes.

"May I ask something, Captain?"

"Of course."

He's looking out to sea. "Where are we? This place…"

"It feels different."

He looks back to her and nods and to spite the mischief she has a feeling he's capable of, she also senses a naivety that she herself had never had the privilege of having and decides not to tell him. "I seem to recall a saying about curiosity and a cat…" He opens his mouth to say something in return, but Alex has just come up on deck and spots her immediately, so she cuts the boy in front of her off. "Tell me, Riley, would you be terribly adverse to the idea of playing pirate?"

His mouth snaps shut and his brows furrow as he turns to look where Emily is, then back to look at her in confusion. "I'm – I'm sorry?"

"Just play along." She turns so her back is to the rail and then discreetly pulls him closer, and he's not that naïve it appears, because he catches on easily enough. He leans in as close as he probably dares and boldly rests a hand on her arm, perhaps as though to comfort. "Mr. Connolly." She says, just a touch louder than necessary, knowing Alex will be listening by now. "How sweet of you to offer such words of comfort to the woman who's imprisoned you."

"Well, how can one resist when so beautiful a woman stands looking so sad and lonely." He offers the smallest of smiles and brings a hand up to gently brush a strand of her hair out of her face, but goes no further than that, and his words sound sincere enough that she wonders if she really does look sad and lonely.

Emily glances in Alex's direction and is pleased to find him glaring, a hand hovering dangerously close to his pistol, his eyes hard… but his fist clenches and he only shakes his head before stalking off back in the direction he'd come from.

She thanks Riley, rewarding him with a kiss on his cheek, and contemplates trying to pull him in for more… but no. She is not a man; there are reasons a line must be drawn somewhere. Instead, she leaves him, sneaking off to steal a bottle of rum for herself before retreating to her cabin and selfishly allowing the spicy liquid to serve as a lullaby. If she dreams that night, she doesn't remember it when she wakes… and forgets to care when she finds herself curled up with Alex, his strong arms enveloping her as though he never wants to let her go again.

He doesn't comment on the bottle sitting on her desk, half empty, but does comment – in an off handed fashion that isn't at all like him when it comes to violence – that he should have said yes when she'd offered to shoot Andrews and his boys.

Peg only gives a triumphant smirk in return.

…

"How are we to know if we're even going the right way? I can scarcely tell up from down out here." Jo stares up at the sky as the sun sets and the stars begin fading into existence.

"Can't ye tell us?" Alex asks Emily softly. "Ye've got me dad's compass, what's it tellin ye?"

She's been trying to avoid this. With a sigh and some frustration, she takes the thing out from where it's strapped to her belt and opens it slowly, already expecting that'll it'll probably be spinning again, torn between the same three things. Except it isn't. It's pointing next to her – to Alex. Slamming it shut again, she stares out to sea as Jo is, a blush creeping up to color her cheeks as she can feel him eyeing her. "It doesn't seem to be working anymore. Maybe it won't considering where we're headed." She lies. "Suppose that's fine though. We're trying to find what no one's supposed to be able to, right? If we go by the usual logic, being lost should put us right where we need to be."

"Broken compass." Alex murmurs, his eyes still on her, and she knows he doesn't believe her.

"I'm not sure 'logic' is the right word to put to it, but you have a point." Jo concedes.

Emily glances at Alex. "Let's hope I do." And she retreats below decks.

…

"Honestly. Sometimes even I wonder how you can be a member of the gentle sex." Jo scolds her for flirting with the Navy boy – apparently Alex had said something. "I keep wondering if there are any rules you won't break…"

"Pirate." Emily points out crossly. "And don't act as if I'm the only one breaking rules, just look at you!" She gestures to – well, Jo. The older woman has, somewhere along the line, given up and acquired a new outfit, now wearing trousers, shirt and simple vest instead of a dress. Unlike Emily's, her outfit is more about not standing out – the shirt and vest seem to be oversized by design and the trousers have room to them too, helping to hide Jo's curvier and very feminine frame a bit.

Jo looks a touch sheepish, but scowls. "You're a terrible influence. My mother, may she rest in peace, she'd be rolling over in her grave to see me now."

"Staying on my ship was your idea, I denounce any responsibility involving you," she gestures to Jo again playfully, "being you're degenerate, trousers wearing self. Besides, you'll be glad of them at some point or other, the trousers I mean. I guarantee it."

Jo glares – and then giggles to spite herself, rolling her eyes.

"You've never mentioned your mother before." Emily points out softly after a moment.

Jo is staring out at the water surrounding them now and doesn't respond for long enough that Emily almost regrets saying anything. "She was from Spain, I think, with her accent and my complexion, but we never talked about it. But we lived in England, until she died. My father would stay with us on occasion. He used to be in the Navy; that's what she always told me, until I was old enough to notice different. She never seemed to mind him coming and going. I always thought that odd, but I suppose he took care of us somehow, because we certainly never starved. She passed on when I was fourteen."

Emily mulls this over a moment. "It's odd, isn't it? How much we seem to have in common. You, Alex, and I anyway."

"Our goddess again, fixing things in her own way." Jo turns to look at her now. "Making a family out of those who never quite knew the meaning of the word. That's what you're making us, you know, this whole ship. Some sort of strange family."

"Me?" Emily asks, bemused.

"You. You're really rather hard to figure out, so busy looking out for everyone else sometimes that you're as attractive to trouble as Alex is, but I have to admit it's serving you well enough. You're making real friends, quite a lot of them, and you don't even notice, which is the most amusing part of it."

Emily doesn't know how to respond to this, so she doesn't, and all is silent for a long moment. "You're mother. What was she like?" It's simple curiosity that prompts her to ask. She's not sure if her mother, barely there in the beginning and then crazy as she had gone, was ever really a mother. She wonders what a real, proper mother might've been like.

Jo looks away again. "Prettier than I." Jo says with a sigh that is almost wistful. "But I got my own attitude from her, and that serves me far better considering where I've ended up. My father says that was what he loved most of my mother anyway. She was endless patient, though. And gentle."

"Were they? In love? No, I'm sorry, that was an odd question. My papa wasn't wrong when he said my tongue would get me into trouble someday."

Jo smiles faintly. "Sisters, right? Sisters shouldn't have to hold their tongues with each other. Yes, my parents loved each other. It – wasn't as whole or perfect as one might dream of, but it I think it really was love. Anyway, if it wasn't, I don't see why my father would have kept coming around every so often, or why mother would have waited for him to. And it was alright the way it was, at least it seemed so to me."

The idea that love can still be love, even being a little broken and imperfect, has never occurred to Emily. Is it possible, then, that her papa hadn't been lying when he said he still loved her mother? She doesn't bother trying to sleep that night; instead she stays up, stares at the stars reflected on the water like glass, ponders what Jo had described, thinks of Alex, and starts to wonder…

…

"Cap'n!" The exclamation comes from the cabin boy. He's in the crow's nest to begin with, but before Emily can even respond he's scrambling down the rigging and nearly falling in his haste. "Cap'n, there's – we-we're going to – there'll be nothing left of us!"

"Timmy, what on earth are you…"

"Just – just look, Cap'n!" He points with a trembling hand.

Emily darts over to the railing, Jo joining her along with several others. "Oh." Is all Emily can seem to get out. She's pretty sure she'd been told about this part by someone at some point but it hadn't actually… she hadn't quite realized…

"Cap'n?" Jo asks nervously as Alex starts shouting preemptive orders for the ship to be turned around.

Her goddess whispers, soft but firm, and an unnatural calm takes over Emily. "What did I tell you? Get good and lost and here we are." She mutters to Jo before turning with a scowl. "Belay that! Sparrow, no one ever gave you permission to give orders on my ship! It won't matter anyway, the pulls too strong."

"Ye won't have a ship left to give orders on if we don't do somethin, Captain!" He retorts, sounding more his usual self, and it's comforting in a way. Somehow she can believe everything will be fine as long as some thing's stay just the same; Alex being Alex is one of those things.

"We've got this far, I trust my goddess. There's nothing to do but brace ourselves. Someone go down and let Andrews and his boys out, if we make it out of this I'll still need them alive! Let's hope they can swim."

"If!" Alex throws up his hands. "If we make it! Bloody 'ell."

But Emily's right, the pulls too strong, it's over before they really have time to do a thing about it anyway. The ship tips forward and then is swallowed up by the waters of the massive, treacherous waterfall. Emily, along with Jo and just about everyone else, jumps ship just before it does, and after that it's all very much a blur of falling, falling, falling and then water, everywhere, the weight of it pressing down on her. Emily claws desperately in the direction she hopes is up, holding her breath and hoping her lungs won't burst before she gets there…

The Queen is…gone. Just, gone. Bits and pieces of driftwood float lazily by as Alex sits on the beach and watches with a sick feeling in his stomach.

The crew drag themselves ashore, one by one. Jo doesn't take long to join him, gasping incoherently about trousers and how she's glad she'd given up on her dresses, ringing out her long black curls. Andrews and his two midshipmen make it ashore as well – Andrews without the wig he'd been clinging to, which would be amusing in any other given situation. Alex counts, knowing well the number of men who'd been aboard the Queen, as Emily had told him, talked of them all with some fondness for their loyalty. There are four that don't immediately resurface.

Emily is among them. The ships been obliterated and their smart, fiery little fearless leader is missing in action. Oh Emily, what have you done?

"Alex?" Jo asks, a hand placed hesitantly on his shoulder. "Alex. I don't see…" She trails off, and squeezes his shoulder a bit. "Do you – do you have any idea what comes next then? Only I don't think we should linger here. This place…it doesn't feel right. My goddess still won't talk to me, though."

He gives a minute shake of his head, the most he can seem to make his muscles move. "We wait."

"In any other situation…" Jo sighs. "She'd remind us we're all pirates. In any other situation she'd want us to keep to the Code."

"But this isn't… No. We wait."

There is a pause, and then she sits down next to him in the sand. "Aye then." She replies softly. "Not much else to be done, I suppose. We wait."

The sun is too bright and shines down on them harshly, but the air is dry and chilly. The sand beneath them doesn't feel right either; it's too rough against the skin. Jo hugs her knees to her chest next to him, and he's a little startled to see her looking small and vulnerable; he's used to her having this quiet strength about her, as if she's just as ready to take on the world as Emily is, but here in this strange, forsaken place she looks frightened and uncertain and… he wraps an arm around her, pulling her close in a brotherly fashion. She leans in to him and they stay that way for who knows how long, just staring at the pieces of their beloved little ship as they float by.

…

He almost misses it. It's the strangest sight, because it looks for all the world like an oddly shaped rock that's just kind of floating along, hovering perhaps an inch or so above the sand. His brows furrow as he watches it… is he going mad? Maybe. The idea of Emily being quite, well, gone would be enough to do that to him, he's sure. But no, wait, Emily, she'd said… at the Fountain, something about a crab. And his father, telling a story and trailing off to mutter, something about being in the Locker…

Calypso.

He pulls away from Jo and gets to his feet and goes after the rock (or crab or whatever) a few steps and notices it's not the only one. There are several more emerging from the sand and beginning to trek towards a hill in the distance.

"What is it?" Jo asks.

"Dunno. I think… well, I'm gonna find out. Got nothin to lose now, anyway."

Jo stands and glances at the rest of the men scattered about the beach, grimacing, before she comes up next to him, and silently they get moving.

She's so long under water that she's almost certain she should be dead already. She feels the need for air, but not as desperately as she should. She keeps clawing her way upwards, and at least she really thinks it's upwards, because she swears that's where the light is coming from, but the water is so murky that she can't really see. But she can't give up. She knows this with a certainty. She can't give up.

When she finally breaks the surface, it takes her several moments to even realize that something's still quite wrong; she's far too busy gasping for air and just being happy that she obviously hasn't drowned. Swimming at a sluggish pace towards land, she drags herself ashore and for a moment just lays in the sun – too bright, though the air here is strangely cold, but at least she can feel that – on sand that is too rough against her skin, but there's no room in her mind to be worried about any of that. For one thing, there should be her ship, or whatever's left of it, but there isn't, the water is unnaturally clear and undisturbed. And for another, where is everyone? If she made it, surely she can't be the only one? And wait a moment, the waterfall – there isn't one.

Her affects were lost somewhere along the line. Before she has time to despair the loss of the finely crafted, well balanced blade her father had made special for her before leaving, though, she turns around only to find it sitting in the sand behind her, belt, sheath and all. Oh, yes, great. Lot of good it'll do me. She thinks, feeling quite hopeless.

Staggering to her feet and running a hand through her tangled brown curls, she directs, instinctively, the question of where exactly she is to her goddess… and gets no immediate response, of course. She almost wants to cry for all that she feels so frustrated, and indeed she could, as there is no one here to see her. She's just about to give in at that thought when something else catches her attention, crawling up slowly out of the water and heading determinedly right past her; a little grey rock. No, not a rock, a crab. Turning with brows furrowed, she watches as several more of them crawl up out of the sand and begin following the first one, leading further inland.

Perhaps her goddess is listening, then. Taking a breath, Emily retrieves her sword and begins to follow her strange little guides.

…

She's just beginning to worry that she's being silly, following the little things, when she notices what's happening just a few paces away now. The sand had long since given way to a flat, gray, rocky nothingness in any direction but the one she'd just come from; she is traipsing through a desolate wasteland, but the crabs are doing something strange now. Piling atop each other, crawling one over the other and then up through the air as though there is something their crawling on, but there isn't. There's just nothing.

"Oh good." She mutters as she continues moving forward. "Am I going mad or what?"

She pauses just a few paces away from whatever's happening, feeling, for the first time in ages, her goddess' presence. Calypso is scolding her silently, and Emily huffs. "Well, what is it then?" Her goddess expresses an odd combination of annoyance and fondness at Emily's attitude, but before Emily can say or do anything else the crabs begin to fall away, bit by bit, crawling back past her, back to the water perhaps. Emily doesn't care about them any longer; she's much more preoccupied with the small cottage that's now standing before her. The small, very familiar cottage that definitely was not there before and that she has no idea how it can be here now.

It's the quaint little hut that she had called home for the first fifteen or so years of her life. And her goddess is nudging her quite firmly towards it.

The sand soon gives way to a flat, abysmal, rocky nothingness in any given direction. Alex and Jo promptly find themselves traipsing through a desolate wasteland.

"Guess this is probably nothin." He admits after some time, even as they continue to follow the odd little troop of creatures serving as their guide.

"It's better than sitting on that beach waiting for nothing."

"Ye really aren't gettin anythin from that goddess you and Emily talk so much about?"

"No. I'm sorry, there's just…" She trails off, eyes widening as she comes to a halt. "Well."

Alex stops too and looks where she is – and imagines his own eyes are going quite buggy as well. The crabs are doing something rather strange now, forming a pile, climbing up one on top of the other and then further, right up thin air as though there's something there, though there clearly isn't. As if that weren't enough, the odd little creatures seem to be multiplying rapidly; there must be thousands of them now, and whatever they're crawling over, it's quite large.

"Well, you brought us here, what is it then?" Jo's grumbling aloud, rather irritably, and Alex casts her a look, perplexed. She scowls. "My goddess does pick the most opportune moments…" She trails off, obviously being sarcastic, before throwing her hands up and stalking off towards…whatever it is the crabs are doing. "Yes, my goddess. Come on then, Alex."

Knowing far better by now than to try arguing with a woman when her mood turns sour – and especially upon the occasion that she's acting crazier than some tend to think he is –, he just follows.

Emily opens the door slow and cautious, having no clue what she'll find behind it, but there proves to be nothing out of the ordinary about the cottage itself. There's her father's work area, a fire blazing, his hammer laid out over the anvil as though he'll be back any moment to continue working on something. And there, in a farther corner, the area that serves as a kitchen with its small stove and that one little window where Emily could look out… except she can't see anything out of it now, just – gray.

"Papa?" She calls quietly, stepping further into the room. He must be in the back room that held their beds. Slow and tentative, she begins making her way towards it. "Papa?" A little louder this time.

She is just a few very short paces away from the door when he appears in it, brows furrowed over eyes so much like her own, obviously bemused. "Emily?" He comes forward a few steps, reaching out as though to touch her cheek, but drops his hand at the last minute. "Odd."

"Papa –"

"I suppose you're going to yell at me too. It would be fitting. To see this you just when I'd given up that last hope."

It clicks almost instantly. Had he been aware? Had her visit, perhaps, made him aware? Aware of time passing, all those months it had taken her to pull all this together? And now he thinks her a mirage of some sort, another creation of his own mind come to mock him further. "No. No, I'm not here to yell at you." She says quietly. Darting forward on impulse, she takes his hand in her own and brings it to her cheek for him. "I'm here. Papa, it's me and I'm here and we are leaving this cursed place." She says it with a certainty she shouldn't feel but does.

Something stirs, behind his eyes… he looks even more confused. "No. I told my daughter no, she wouldn't have…"

Dropping his hand and stepping back as a thought strikes her, she holds out her hands. "Look at me. My goddess sent me here, you remember, but that was some time ago. Look at me. How would you have known what I look like now, papa?"

Startled, he does look her over. His eyes, still quite bewildered, dart over her form before landing on her leg and getting quite stuck there, his eyes widening. "Emily?" He stutters, apparently horrified, but that something behind his eyes is more than just a stirring now. Suddenly he looks angry, and Emily can't feel anything but relief. Anger means, by some gracious miracle, he's not lost to her, not in full. "Emily Turner! I told you not to – why must you be so damned stubborn! You're here. No! What – how…"

Something pulls Emily's eyes downward, a tapping at her foot it feels like, and there's another one of those little crabs. It's quite undeniably trying to point her out of the cottage, seeming quite urgent.

"Papa, I don't think there's time. We need to leave. Now." And before he can say anything else she's grabbing his wrist and dragging him out the door with her with an ease that should be worrying she thinks, but there isn't time to dwell, she can feel it now, her goddess seems to think lingering in this place is not a good idea.

They stumble back out into the flat, rocky nothingness and her papa comes to a halt, squinting into the brightness of it, before turning back incredulously to stare at the cottage. "Oh."

"Papa, come, please, we must get moving."

He nods slowly, tearing his eyes back to her. "How did you get here? Did you have a ship? There was nothing left of ours when… how are we to get out of here?"

"I don't know!" She bursts. "I just… My goddess got me this far, I expect…" There's another line of crabs, leading her across the vast expanse of complete nothingness. "Just come on." She pulls him along as she follows them.

It's the Sea's Queen, Alex realizes. Or, at least, it sort of is. The ship that is slowly being revealed as the crabs fall away from it, bit by bit, is quite a bit larger than their beloved little sloop. So much larger and so very, very different because of it, in fact, that the only way they know it is the Queen is the letters on the side of the ship, painted boldly in gold. The ship that now sits idly before them is a galleon the size of his father's precious Pearl. Big enough to be much more formidable with the right person at the helm. She has a pretty little figurehead now, a woman wearing a crown and appearing to hold a sword. She's beautiful, Alex thinks, as Jo mutters something to the same affect next to him, and then his feet are moving seemingly of their own accord. He jogs up to the large, beached vessel with wide eyes and reaches out a hand slowly to lay it on the hull, half afraid that it's going to vanish right before his eyes as easily as it had appeared.

"My goddess." Jo says. "It's – it's real. Is this really the ship? Our ship?"

Alex nods, slowly turning to look at her. "Guess yer goddess is still on our side after all, eh? Thing is – 'ow do we get anywhere with it?"

Jo doesn't answer, wandering a few paces way before grabbing onto a rope that's hanging down from somewhere on the Queen's deck. Staring upwards for a moment, she mutters something about trousers again, and then starts to climb.

…

Jo's half hanging from the rigging, staring down at something below them, but Alex is still just trying to get over the fact that he's standing on the Queen. Everything is just as it had been before they'd gone over the edge of the waterfall; there's not a barrel or coil of rope or cannon out place. Except it's all multiplied to fit the much bigger layout. He'd even stumbled down to the captain's cabin only to find that it too was considerably larger – with a second tall cupboard identical to the one Emily already used and a cozy little seat below the much bigger window. It looks like a cabin befitting a gentlemen of fortune now. Well, gentlewoman anyway.

He runs a hand along the rail almost reverently as he strolls back up to Jo. "I 'ope we can find Emily. She'll love this."

Jo doesn't respond immediately. Confused, Alex peers over the side, looking where she is. It's the crabs again. They're everywhere, surrounding the ship, and it's almost as if…

Jo jumps down from the rigging and grabs onto the rail, clutching it with both hands. "Alex, I think you may want to hold onto something."

"It's not much further."

"How do you know that, Emily? There's nothing but – there's just nothing."

Her papa isn't scoffing at her; really, he doesn't sound anything but thoroughly bewildered. "I just know." She forces herself not to snap. "Look, there's sand, we must be getting close."

"But close to what?"

She doesn't answer, just keeps moving with determined strides even as the flat, gray nothingness starts to give way to coarse sand, and they'll soon be charging right up a hill of it.

"Emily." Her papa keeps saying her name. He won't let go of her hand, either, almost as if he's still trying to convince himself she's real. He comes to an abrupt halt just as they make it to the foot of the hill. "Do you feel that?"

The question is strange enough to have her stopping as well. She turns to him and they exchange a brief and possibly quite identical look before she catches sight of something behind him and just stares. He turns as well, and his eyes widen as Emily pulls them aside. It's a ship. A very large ship – well, large in comparison to her little Queen anyway – being propelled forward by waves of… oh, well, it would be those little gray crabs again.

"Ship?" Her papa mutters, and it sounds like a question.

"Ship." She confirms, no less bewildered then him now. The vessel sails right by them and over the hill, and Emily's eyes widen as a delirious smile tugs at her lips when she sees the gold lettering on the side. "MY ship! Ha!" She begins jogging after it, tugging her papa along again.

"Your ship? You have a ship?"

"Aye, my ship. How did you think I got here?"

"You were on Anamaria's ship, and it was not this large."

"Well, now it's my ship. And it is. Apparently." They come over the hill, and Emily pauses to just stare as the ship slides easily into the water, and there's that blasted waterfall in the distance. And her crew. And a wigless Andrews with his two boys, oh that's funny. "Brilliant! Oh, thank my goddess, we're getting out of here!"

"Goddess?" Her papa asks blankly, but she's already tugging him forward again and shouting at her crew, urging them on towards the water and the ship that's already beginning to float away.

…

It's Alex that helps her up onto the ship, and in all her excitement she easily forgets herself, throwing her arms around him and planting a kiss right on his lips. "The Queen, she's beautiful, this is brilliant! How did…"

"Ye're guess is as good as mine, dearie, it just kind of 'appened. Brilliant indeed!"

Jo comes up with Emily's coat, placing it over the younger woman's soaked and shivering shoulders. "Wonderful as it is, we still need to get out of here, Cap'n." She reminds, as usual the closest to being a voice of reason.

"Right, of course." Emily sobers, letting go of her lover and affecting a more commanding tone. "Launch the boats, get the rest of the crew aboard. We'll really need every one of them now to keep up the ship, won't we? Well, to do it smoothly anyway. I want Andrews and the other two brought on first, I know there's nowhere else for them to go, but I don't trust them for a moment all the same so…"

"…keep a sharp eye on 'em anyway, aye Cap'n." He finishes for her and goes off to enlist the help of the few other men that had swam out with Emily and her papa.

"Papa." She turns to him. Has he been staring at her this whole time? It looks like he might well have been, and for a moment they stand there like that, just staring at each other. She wants to shoot forward and throw her arms around him and cry like she is a little girl again – and before she can make up her mind to do so, he's already come forward to wrap his arms around her. She returns the hug and they stand there like that for a few long moments, until she finally pulls away. "I know there's so much to…but we have to get out of here. I have to get my crew home first."

He nods slowly, tearing his eyes away from her, inspecting the ship around him. "I haven't forgotten how this goes. I could never forget..."

"You've been here so long." She says a little more gently. "Papa, you should rest, or…or…"

He runs a hand along the rail. "Let me help. I think…it'll feel more real if I can be of use." He looks back to her again. "You really are the Captain."

"This really is my ship." She affirms with a much weaker smile. "And you'll never believe all that I went through in getting it and making it mine, just so I could make it all the way here. But I don't promise unless I intend to keep it."

He mirrors the smile, and dare she hope that's pride she sees in his eyes now? "Right then, Captain Turner. Get me out of this God-forsaken place, will you?"

"That was the idea." She clears her throat and tosses her coat aside. "Jo! Come help us start on these sails! I've a feeling this'll take just a bit longer than it used to."

Jo joins her in staring up at the three full masts the Queen is now sporting. "Aye, perhaps a bit."

I actually read up a little. I'd only given the Sea's Queen a single mast, which, as I understand it, would make it a very small ship indeed. The kind of ship I've turned her into, a galleon, has three – sometimes four – masts. So the Queen now has three, and is designed something a bit more like the Black Pearl (because, as I understand it all, the Pearl is likely a galleon), but its painted up more like a naval vessel – a bit of mischief on my part, that'll come into play later. Again, this is just as I understand it, if I get something wrong and someone just happens to be cool enough to actually know all about this stuff, please forgive me.

Next time we'll see them make it back to the land of the living, and then a whole lot of (long awaited, I'm sure) dialogue between father and daughter, and believe me, it will be interesting. Also, next chapter is number 50. And I'm not even sure how many more chapters I'll need to be done with this monster of a fic. I have a plot now though! A proper one! That's a huge improvement from the beginning anyway.

Ok, done rambling now. Thanks for reading. :)