Somewhere between getting everyone on board, making sure Andrews and his boys are once again good and locked up, getting the now huge(ish) Queen ready to sail again, and making sure her father is something-sort-of-vaguely-resembling alright, night falls. Emily doesn't want to admit how exhausted she is; sleep doesn't come easy to her under normal circumstances, much less in this strange place. But Jo tells her she looks like a dead woman walking, and Alex practically drags her back to their cabin, and it's funny how even being the captain she doesn't seem to have much say in things sometimes.

She wants desperately for Alex to stay with her as he normally would, but knows that would be a risk with her father on board. Alex offers to stay with her anyway, angrily stating that Will Turner had given up whatever say he'd had in who put their hands on her, but Emily allows saner heads to prevail and tells him to leave. She needs to have a proper conversation with her father before they start worrying about all that.

It takes a long while, but eventually, she falls asleep…

"…cap'n. Cap'n!"

…only to be awoken long before the sun starts to rise again. The crewmen on the other side of her cabin door sounds worried but not panicked. "Aye, aye, I'm coming!" Emily snaps as he continues trying to wake her. She'd told Jo that if she was going to be made to go down and get some rest, she better not be woken unless something was on fire, and since she doesn't smell any smoke…

She forgets to be annoyed the moment she steps up on deck an sees why someone had come for her. This part definitely hadn't been mentioned in anything her papa told her. Striding slowly across the deck to stand next to her papa, she stares out at all the small boats drifting past the Queen, most carrying but a single passenger equipped only with a lantern. Her men are coming up on deck as well, murmuring nervously amongst themselves. Emily glances at her papa. "They're no threat. Are they?"

Her papa shakes his head. "As I understand it, this was meant to be your mother's job. Providing the souls safe passage across." Whatever he's feeling, if anything, it's carefully hidden, and Emily doesn't feel like trying to figure it out. He goes on quietly. "There's nothing we can do for them even if we wanted." He walks off, slipping past the men around and back below decks.

Jo takes is place moments later, looking – panicked? No, that's not quite the right word, but she is worked up about something. Clutching the rail so hard her knuckles turn white, her eyes sweep across all the souls sailing by… before hardening as they finally settle on one soul in particular. Emily follows her gaze uncertainly; there's a man coming up just alongside the queen. Not a particularly large or intimidating man from what Emily can tell, but he had been a handsome one in the polished way of a gentleman, with white wig, plumed hat and all. "He was a Company man." She points out, recognizing the dark red-embellished uniform. "Did you know him?"

"He's…" Jo cuts herself off, clearing her throat. "He was my husband."

"Your husband?" Emily's eyes widen as she looks at Jo. Jo had spoken of her husband before, but only once or twice, and she had made it seem that the man was already dead.

"Aye." Jo replies a little more forcefully, standing a little taller. "And good riddance to him." She raises her voice as though hoping he'll hear. "I hope he rots in Hell."

"Jo!" Emily replies, startled, but before she can ask for any kind of explanation, Jo spins on her heel and disappears just as Emily's papa had moments earlier.

"Well." Alex says from the position he's taken up on the other side of her. "And I thought you were full of surprises."

…

Next comes heat – stifling and humid, boiling as it had been freezing in the beginning. Emily tries to make sense of the map and use what she's learned of the stars as a guide, but the truth is with nothing but water around for miles in any direction, she can't well be sure of anything anymore.

"Up is down." Jo murmurs, swiping back a lock of her dark curls, damp with sweat, as she looks the map over herself. "Just how specific was your father with the stories he told you?"

"Not particularly when it came to this one." Emily admits. "But then I never had reason to ask." Jo raises and eyebrow as her tone becomes almost wistful. "I was more interested in all the big battles and my parents being in love."

"Not that I'd blame you for that, but it doesn't do us much good now."

Emily only shrugs, but before she can say anything, her father's gruff baritone reaches her ears as he comes up behind her. "Up is down."

"You know what it means." Emily turns to him, stating the probably obvious.

He nods. "As new and pretty as this ship is now," he glances around at all the new cannons, "you're not going to like it."

"The only part of this venture that I have liked was finding you." Emily points out, resigned. "I wasn't expecting much different."

"Maybe your goddess had another way of helping?"

She ignores the unspoken question behind the words 'your goddess'. There'll be time for explanations when they aren't dangerous low on consumable liquids. Actually, strike that, she thinks, taking out her father's flask (which she'd had filled with water). Entirely out of consumable liquids. Oh dear. "If she'd see fit to, now would be the time I think." She says with a grimace, half hoping her goddess is listening.

"William Turnah." A familiar voice intones, almost crooning, as the wind picks up. He freezes. Emily exchanges a shocked look with Jo as their goddess's presence grows considerably stronger. Before anything else can happen, a stream of water swirls up through thin air and then out to hover over the deck of the queen, corkscrewing upwards and then evaporating to reveal Calypso herself in the familiar form of Tia Dalma. The crewmen nearest stop and stare in bewilderment. "Back from de dead." Calypso goes on, unbothered, her gaze traveling over Will's form as though inspecting him, and then she turns to Emily and Jo, smiling. "I knew yeh could do it."

"Not without your help." Jo points out respectfully.

"You have our thanks, as always." Emily adds.

"Might I ask what I'm missing?" Will interjects softly, staring at the goddess warily.

"Much." Calypso replies. The wind picks up again. Clouds begin to roll in overhead, and the waters surrounding them start to become restless. Calypso's smile fades, her expression turning grim. "And I do not have de time to explain it myself. Yeh must be returned soon. But I would speak with my blessed ones first. Come." She leads them below decks, to Emily's cabin it seems.

Emily pauses to place a kiss on her papa's cheek. "I will explain everything soon, I swear."

He nods, though not looking particularly satisfied, and she slips below decks as well.

…

The goddess is staring out the window dominating the far wall of the captain's cabin when Emily walks into the room. The clouds are growing thicker and darker and the ship is beginning to be tossed about by choppier waters. There's a storm trying to brew, but Emily gets the feeling it isn't at her goddess' behest.

"My goddess…" Jo's the one to speak up.

"You forgive him. My fat'er. The sea. He worries I spent too much time as one of you." The goddess says softly. "I have made too many exceptions to de rules. It is only natural dat I should be punished." She turns around to address them properly again, draping herself over the seat below the window. If Emily didn't know any better, she'd say the goddess looked weary. "I know yeh have been wonderin whether I am angry wit you. I am not. But I am only allowed to interfere so much." Emily glances at Jo, but the older woman appears just as confused. Neither of them says anything. The goddess goes on. "I will bring yeh back to de land of de livin, but after dat I am afraid yeh are on yeh own for to de time bein."

"You mean," Emily asks tentatively, "no more visions either?"

"It has been decided yeh visions and de way I heal yeh are part of my blessin and up to me. Help beyond dat is not and has been forbidden. I am sorry, young one."

"But you haven't been sending me visions." Jo points out quietly.

"And I can't begin to understand the one you've been sending me." Emily adds, more forcefully.

Calypso shakes her head. "I cannot give yeh de answers. Yeh must find dem for yehselves, as I know yeh can." The wind rattles the window and a wave crops up to splatter against it, and she turns to stare out to sea again. "Know dat I will still be watchin, though, my precious girls."

Emily's eyes widen in worry at the growing chaos outside. "If there's a storm brewing, I'll have to tell the men to…"

"Dere is no need, young one." And before Emily can answer her goddess dissolves into a stream of water and slithers past, caressing Jo's shoulders and then Emily's, then slipping out of the cabin and up on deck. They follow quickly, watching as the stream dives back into the sea – and, rather abruptly, all is silent. The wind stops, the waters calm, the too bright sun shines again, just beginning to set. The men around stop what they'd been doing and look around with wide eyes, even more confused than when the goddess had shown up.

And then it happens. A massive wave, as though someone had decided to pour half the sea out right on the Sea's Queen. There's no time to do anything about it. Emily just has time to shout for everyone to hold onto something, and then it comes crashing down and for a moment that's all they know. The ship just stays their like that, resting comfortably on the bottom of the ocean. Emily watches as a fish swims by, unbothered by her as it goes on its merry way. Just when she thinks her lungs might burst, they shoot back up towards the surface. Emily is reminded of the Flying Dutchman as water pours out of every crack and crevice on her ship, cannons and all. She thinks she catches a glimpse of green… but wait, the sun doesn't seem to be setting anymore. It's in the east now and getting higher in the sky.

She hopes, faintly, that they won't encounter any other ships for a while. Any powder they have for their guns will be soaked and useless at the moment.

"We're back." That's her papa, sounding in awe. She turns to him, and he's staring out to sea, appearing to take a deep breath.

"At last." Emily confirms, and she thinks she should be happy too. But with what her goddess had said… a sick feeling settles in her stomach as Calypso's presence fades again. She doesn't like this. Not at all.

"Any chance we could have that talk…" Her papa breaks off, startled apparently. "…now." He finishes of, a little tense, eyeing Alex.

Emily pushes Alex away firmly and tries not to seem as flustered as she now is. Her papa had been right there when she'd kissed Alex upon making it back on the ship. It wasn't as though she hadn't made it obvious they were more than friends; she'd just been careful with letting on how much more. "Of – of course." She offers a small smile. "Alex, why don't you take the helm? You know where we're headed."

They'd already found a small island with a fresh spring. Her father had shied away from replenishing their water supply there, but wouldn't give a reason why. Since there certainly hadn't seemed to be anything wrong with it, Emily had ordered as many barrels to be refilled as was possible. It still wasn't much but they were headed for Shipwreck now, so it would do until then.

"Aye, Cap'n." Alex replies easily before swaggering across the room, the look on his face just daring her papa to say something. He says nothing. Alex disappears and her papa closes the door.

"Is that really the boy you used to play with down by the docks?" Her papa asks as he makes his way across the room. Emily only nods. An almost scowl takes over her papa's face. "He reminds me of his father."

"He can be a lot like Uncle at times I suppose, but he's a good –"

"Good man. And you sound like your mother."

"He is, though."

"Is he…" Will trails off, the almost-scowl becoming a full one. "What is he to you?"

"He is…" Emily sighs as the only thing that comes to mind is what she'd told her brother. "Complicated. Increasingly so."

"You're not just friends, then."

"I'm not sure what to say we are. We're pirates, words like 'courting' wouldn't exactly fit, would they?" Except they'd be far beyond 'courting' even if the word could fit. How is she ever to explain that?

Her papa softens some. "No. I suppose not." He pauses, looking around her cabin a bit. "So all of this – a gift from your goddess?"

Emily lets out a breath and nods, glad of the subject change. "Ana's ship was destroyed by the waterfall. I'm not entirely sure where this one came from, but I'm beginning to see why Uncle's so attached to the Black Pearl. I could hardly imagine giving the Queen up before, but now…" She runs a hand along the wall before coming to the window seat, where she sits herself, curling up against the pillows in one corner. "I think I could live with being in love with a ship."

"Do you see him often? You're Uncle?" He comes over to sit on the other end of the seat.

"Often enough. At least every other time we make port at Tortuga."

There's the worried almost-scowl again. "You make port their often?"

"Papa." She says, tone warning. "It's the only free port in these waters and with the Admi-" She breaks off, not wanting to bring up her problems with the Company just yet. "We are pirates." She reminds him again instead. "Besides, at least there I won't be clapped in irons basically on the grounds that I'm a woman wearing trousers. Which has almost happened, by the way. Which isn't to say," she goes on more mischievously, "that I haven't spent a night in a cell. Just not for being a woman in trousers."

Now her papa's eyes widen. "You've – you've been arrested before?"

"Three times, actually."

There's the scowl again. "You sound almost proud of yourself."

"Proud I got myself clapped in irons and thrown in a cell, no. Proud I escaped all three times, perhaps just a little. Well, alright, proud of the first two times. The third was dumb luck and Joshy's help."

"Joshua?" Her father shoots back up to his feet now, running a hand through his hair and Emily feels mean for baiting him, but Peg's the one who has her smirking in rebellious satisfaction. He turns to her again as a thought seems to strike him. "Why was he with you?"

Any trace of amusement fades in an instant. "Papa, perhaps you should sit down again. You've been gone so long, a lot has happened."

He sits again. "She's gone, isn't she? Jade's gone."

It's so much worse than Jade just being 'gone' that Emily isn't sure she can bring herself to tell him the truth. "She's… she was still so sick. She was trying to take Joshy to England to see – her mother? Or her sister. I don't remember, someone she thought would look after him. But their ship… It was attacked."

He's staring down at his hands, which clench into fists. "Eliza-" He seems to joke on the name. "Your mother. She has Jade?"

"Yes." She decides not to explain about what else she knew about it thanks to her goddess' visions. She'd felt bad for her sort of step-mother; she could only imagine what her papa would feel knowing the details. "Yes, she has Jade. But Joshy's alright. Alive and well."

"But not with you anymore." Her papa points out, turning back to her.

"No. Not anymore." And there's yet another thing she doesn't know how to go about explaining. Telling him she'd left her brother behind because she wanted him to be safe would require her to explain why. Telling him she'd been worried about Joshy and what he'd try with Alex would also require further explanation – an explanation of her own selfishness, definitely not one she wants to give. "He's safe, though. At Shipwreck Cove with Alex's grandfather and the woman who works for him. A maid." She adds hastily. "Just a maid."

"But not before he apparently sprung his sister from jail." There's resignation and amusement in her papa's tone this time.

"Ah yes. Don't worry. I wasn't sure whether to be happy about that one either. You'd never believe how he pulled it off, too."

"Dare I ask?"

They spend the next few hours in Emily's cabin as she tells him that story, along with many others. He seems shocked by a few, but not angry, never angry with her. Mostly, he just seems amused. Resigned and amused. This should be a relief to her, and indeed it is on some level. But there's a part of her that wants him to worry and be angry.

She wants the assurance that he cares enough to be worried and angry. She'd gone all the way to the end of the world to get him back, is it too much to ask, for once, for him to just act like her father? She can't quite decide what to do about it when he simply doesn't.

…

"Alex!" She exclaims that night when he comes in and refuses to leave, pulling her in for a kiss. "We can't." She giggles against his lips. "My papa…"

"Will be sleepin with the rest of the crew by now, darling." He begins trailing kisses along her jaw, nips at her ear, then kisses down her neck.

"You still…" She gasps softly as he reaches to untie her corset, his lips already brushing feather-light against the tops of her breasts. "…can't sleep here, Alex, if he sees – in the morning…" But she isn't really stopping him.

He undoes the corset with the efficiency of practice and tosses it aside. "So I won't sleep 'ere. I'll leave as soon as…" His hands trail down to cup her bottom, pulling her closer still.

She sighs, caught between exasperation and mounting pleasure as he continues his ministrations. "Goddess, you're going to be the end of both of us." But she's not really complaining, because he hasn't paid her such full attention since before their last visit to Tortuga.

She remembers something about a vision she'd had. About her father and Alex and swords clashing across the deck of her ship… but her dreams had been rum-hazed and fuzzy when she'd had it and any details she had remembered have faded. Figuring Alex has a point, they can work their way around the problem that is her papa, she gives up and begins responding to him in kind.

To spite what Jack had thought at one time or other, Will Turner has never been stupid. Naïve, perhaps, but even that was long ago now. He sees the way his daughter looks at Alex Sparrow. And he sees how Alex Sparrow looks at his daughter. And he recognizes those looks, very clearly. He wonders if either of them has got the words out yet. He remembers how difficult it had seemed for him and Elizabeth, but that had been in a world far apart from this one. Out here, playing by an entirely different set of rules, there'd be nothing to hold his daughter and Alex back.

If he is right… he doesn't know what he'll do. He sees a lot of Jack in Alex. He sees a young man who is very much a pirate in Alex, and he does not, decidedly, like it, because he knows how a pirate thinks. Some rational part of him knows also that Emily is no better with all the tales she'd told him of her own mischief (and there had been an impressive amount of that considering; how much trouble could a girl of not even twenty manage, anyway?) But that's not the point. Emily is his daughter. And now that he's here he feels already a need to make up for what he hadn't given her before; to be her father in all the ways that actually count. But how can he? She'll never accept it if he does try, that becomes clear immediately. He already sees more of this stranger, this wild lady pirate captain, than he does Emily; he doesn't know his daughter anymore.

He'll give her space, he decides, plenty of it. She'd gone all the way to the end of the world just to bring him back; she doesn't hate him. He resolves to be content in that knowledge and simply leave things at that.

(But then he remembers how he'd caught Emily in Alex's arms and how the boy had given him a look that just dared him to do or say something about it and he thinks this might be much more difficult than he'd thought.)

Joshy watches. He sits at the dock for hours on end with a patience that a just-about-ten-year-old shouldn't have and he waits and he watches, his sister's letter clutched in his hands. He knows she'll come back. She has to come back. She'd promised and she wouldn't leave him and he just has to believe. She'll be back.

He hasn't quite forgiven Emily for the way she had shouted at him. He certainly hasn't forgiven her for leaving him behind and for such a terrible, selfish reason too. But he thinks that maybe, just maybe, if she really does come back, he could forgive her. Maybe everything could be good again. He really hopes it could be. He misses his sister desperately.

So he sits. And he watches. And just when he begins to worry that something has happened, that maybe she really isn't coming, he wakes one morning. And looks out the window. And sees sails on the horizon. Fresh, white sails, too many of them to belong to the Queen in actuality, but that's alright. He has a feeling. Bolting out and right past the kind elderly woman who'd been taking care of him, he runs for the docks as fast as his legs will carry him. Sure enough, mere moments pass before the ship is close enough to see what colors its flying, the pirate flag with its proud skull and bones.

Home has just come back for him.

"Emmy!"

She barely makes it onto the dock before she is nearly barreled over by a wiry, auburn haired blur. Giggling softly, she wraps her arms around the boy now clinging tightly to her middle, bending down to press a kiss in his unkempt hair. "Always good to know I'm missed. You act as if you thought me dead." She pulls back to look at him, and his green eyes are wide and fretful. "I take it you got my letter then? I knew I shouldn't've sent it."

"That's alright. You're here!" Joshy replies, as if that somehow fixes everything.

"Apparently." She replies, amused.

"Joshua." The gasp is from her papa, and she can't quite seem to get used to it again, hearing his voice.

The waterfall, wandering through the Locker with nothing but a lot of small gray crabs for guidance, her new (and undeniably improved) ship, the visit from her goddess… it's all a long and surreal blur. She's found herself, over the last days, having to pause and just close her eyes at moments in an effort to make sure she's not just dreaming.

Emily casts a glance at her papa. "Remember, in my letter, I said something about a new guest aboard the Queen?" Joshy nods, also glancing at – well, the odd stranger in his eyes, Emily can tell.

Their papa comes forward, a little wary. "You don't remember…? Well, no, perhaps not. You were but five."

Brows furrowing in somewhat adorable bewilderment, Joshy stares first at Will, then Emily, then Will again. "I was five when our papa left. Did you know him? Emily says papa had lots of friends, but mummy wouldn't talk about it."

"I said in the letter, Joshy." Emily says quietly. "I said I was taking the Queen someplace dangerous. Someplace I might not make it back from. Remember the things your mother used to tell you? About papa and our Uncle and all their adventures?" Joshy nods. Glancing at her papa again, she plows on. "And I explained that they were true. The reason I was gone so long, the reason I sent the letter… Joshy, I was stealing our papa back."

It takes a moment, but Joshua Turner, young though he is, is not stupid any more than his papa. When his eyes settle on the stranger again, it's not a stranger he's seeing anymore. Realization dawns in those big green eyes. "Oh." He says quietly, continuing to stare up at his father. "I'm – I'm almost ten, you know."

"Yes." Their papa replies. "Believe me, son. I know."

Abruptly feeling uncomfortable, Emily decides whatever is about to happen does not actually need to include her. As her papa and her brother continue talking, she slips off to join Alex just as he makes his way off the ship, promptly dragging him to – anywhere that isn't where her strange, broken little family is.

She thinks, maybe, she feels a set of familiar green eyes burning into her back as she goes. She chooses to ignore it.

Emily's on the beach this time. The scene isn't much different, she and her mother arguing over the heart.

"Mother. Mother, please. I don't want to fight you."

"I can't let you do this, Emily. I won't."

Her mother's hair is definitely moving this time, several slimy serpents writhing and hissing with the she-devil's mood.

"Please, it would be so simple."

"Simple?" Her mother circles her like a hungry shark scenting blood in the water. "…just what is your plan then? Are you to replace me and give up the freedom you've grown so accustomed to? Or would you give up your Alex…"

Emily would never. Not Alex. Not with this – this thing she feels for him, the thing that has her heart feeling like it might burst out of her chest at the very thought of him. "…stop stalling mother. I need it. I don't want to fight you, but I will if I must…"

And there they are again, swords clashing, dancing across the beach as a storm rolls in and rain pours down in sheets. They pass right by the Chest, and a cold shiver runs down Emily's spine at the sight of it, the reminder of just what she's fighting. She doesn't have the key. She can't kill her mother even if she can get to the Chest. There's only one way this can end, and goddess, she's terrified. The wind and the rain pick up further, the sand turning to mud beneath them. Emily's leg is a distinct disadvantage here; she's not moving as well, and she knows it, and her mother is good with her blade and relentless. Before Emily knows it she's bleeding from cuts on her good leg, her stomach, her cheek. Her arm.

Her arm. The one she's fighting with. Emily's stumbles back and lands in the sand as her sword goes flying. She scrambles backward as her mother continues to advance on her, pulling out her pistols, but it's no use. She'd taken an impromptu swim earlier; the powder in the pistols is as wet as she still is.

She doesn't notice the long boat that just manages to make it to shore. Neither does her mother. They're so fixated on each other, they forget the world around them exists, and when a familiar figure darts forward and throws himself in front of Emily with a growled 'no!' just as her mother brings her sword up again and thrusts it forward…

Everything changes.

"Alex." Emily stutters, staring down in horror at the boy now lying across her, another one of her father's swords sticking out of his shoulder. Wrapping her arms around him, forgetting her own injuries and ignoring her mother for the moment, she cradles him shakily. "Alex. No. No, no. Alex." She chants his name as he looks up at her, looking frightened but also, somehow, calm.

"I love you." His mouth forms the words, though she can't hear him.

Salty tears overflow freely, mixing with the rain already dripping down her cheeks. "Alex Sparrow. I love you too. Alex I should've told you before a thousand times over and I'm sorry and I'm saying it now so you can't leave me. You have to stay here and prove me wrong, prove –prove that it can end well. Alex, please. Alex. Alex!"

"Alex!" She screams aloud, shooting up in bed, and this feeling – this is worse than when she sees herself die. She gasps for breath but can't seem to get enough air, her heart pounds in her chest – goddess, the thought of Alex being the one to die leaves a feeling so empty she knows she'd never be able to fill it if it really happened. She feels something warm slip slowly down her cheek and reaches up with one shaky hand to catch the single tear drop, bringing it back to stare at her wet fingers in surprise. Peg Leg Turner doesn't cry, can't remember the last time she'd allowed herself to. She wipes the tear away, annoyed at herself.

(But Emily just can't help it, and as she lies back down she curls up beneath the covers and sobs like the world is going to end because without Alex Sparrow hers just might.)

…

She doesn't really fall asleep again and gets up early the next morning so she can sneak through the halls to his room. She knows she shouldn't. Her brother had been given a room just down the hall from Alex's. If Joshy stirs and hears anything… there's no way that situation could end well. But she needs Alex. She needs the assurance that, for now at least, he's alive and well.

She knocks just loud enough that he should hear, and several moments pass before she hears movement. He shuffles across the room and opens the door looking adorably sleepy and disheveled and confused. She can't think of anything to say, so she just stares, and he starts to look worried. "Emily? What's the matter?" Shaking her head, she only steps forward and slips her arms around him, laying her head on his chest and listening to his steady heartbeat. He obliges her, wrapping his arms around her slender frame, placing a kiss atop her head as he runs a hand through her loose curls. "Visions again?" She nods, and he goes on. "Want to come in?"

She's too tired to be worried, and it feels so right to be in his arms she wouldn't have the will to protest anyway. Emily follows him inside and curls up in his bed with him and, safe his arms, is sound asleep in minutes.

From the standpoint of any actual mythology… I'm using very little of it here, obviously. Let me know if you want me to give a further explanation of that bit about Calypso.

Also, don't hate me for the vision of Alex. I know what I'm doing, I promise. Thanks for reading. :)