The Black Pearl would reach Tortuga tonight.

Gibbs took care of the helm and had Marty and Mr. Cotton with him, who followed his terse instructions. Ragetti and Pintel were below deck, probably sleeping to arrive at Tortuga refreshed.

Yesterday, Gibbs had fallen asleep. Yesterday he had also drunk rum, and today he forwent it. Gibbs rubbed his aching forehead.

A few lamps were burning in Jack's cabin, and he was uncorking an almost empty bottle of rum when there was a knock at his door. Without waiting for his answer, Rachel appeared. Her gaze fell surprisingly quickly on the rum in Jack's hand.

He also looked at the bottle and put it down on the table next to an empty one that he hadn't put away since the day before yesterday. Sad but true, Jack had not drunk any rum today, yet.

Normally it was him who went to see Rachel, and now she was doing it with him twice in a row. He didn't know if that suited him.

Rachel looked around the room, paced to a map hanging on the wall and looked at it.

"Is it agreeable to the lady if I drink?"

He knew she didn't agree. He just wanted to know if she had a convincing argument.

Far too sober was he and his mind sharp as only in this state. He noticed what he had missed yesterday.

There, too, she had gone to see him and there, too, she had weighed up how much he had drunk. She had had some request and had decided she didn't want to tell him like that. Jack looked up at the ceiling and hoped her request would be resolved quickly.

"Would you not rather tell of your sorrows than drown them?" she asked.

Jack answered nothing, and Rachel took the floor again.

"Show me which countries you have travelled to. I mean really travelled, not just stopped over. Tell me about the people and cultures you've met."

Again she looked at the rum – barely enough for four sips – that was on the table.

Jack eyed her and then stepped up to the map on the wall. He looked at it closely, his mouth slightly open, and stroked his chin beard.

"This can get out of hand," he warned Rachel, who now sat down on the table and watched him.

It was getting out of hand. Jack couldn't remember the last time he had talked so extensively that he finally lost interest in doing so.

Rachel was a good listener, he had to give her that. She laughed now and then, asked questions and widened her eyes at the right moments. Jack had often just looked at the map while telling her stories.

He turned to her jauntily and lingered in the position. She had finished the rum. Why had she finished the rum? She didn't even like rum.

Jack stalked up to Rachel and leaned against the edge of the table next to her. Her response was a reprimanding look. Jack smirked and crossed his arms in front of his chest.

"Stop it," she demanded.

"What exactly?"

"Grinning like that and looking at me."

"Love, may I give you some advice?"

"Depends on the advice."

"Gonna be hard to stake this out before I call it to you, aye? Stop trying to control life."

She tilted her head and looked at him in a steadfast way.

"I don't," she said.

The spark in his eyes became an infernal burning.

"That is what you do. You hide behind the etiquette and expectations that you have got from fine folks and that you wish to fulfil. As soon as you lack that, you feel more comfortable and become someone with whom one can have the … most minimalist form of fun."

Outraged, Rachel opened her mouth to object. Jack's raised forefinger, whose many different meanings she was beginning to understand, silenced her this time.

"Even now, you wanted to tell me how to behave. You seek control in your outside world. You want to determine how people think and react. You lack something important."

Jack leaned towards her, his voice had become a whisper by the end. In the dim light of the lamps, he needed to be close to Rachel if he wanted to see if the rum was clouding her senses. Her eyes were clear, however, and neither could he detect any other kind of inertia in her facial expression.

"What would that be?" she asked suspiciously.

"Security within yourselves – trust in yourselves."

Just above her collarbone, Jack's explanatorily raised fingers circled and were meant to distract her from the way he gazed at her cleavage. It worked too well.

"If you feel safe in here, it doesn't matter what's going on around you," Jack said.

He leaned his upper body forward, and Jack took the last step towards her.

Rachel had been watching his hand, which was so close to her, and now looked up warningly at him.

He simply didn't care. Jack had bought this security dearly, and no chaos in his environment could take it away from him again.

His words made her think, although her mouth was just a thin line and she drew her eyebrows together waspishly.

"Look at me. I'm about to do something stupid that is almost certain to … not culminate in success. Why can I do it? My certainty allows me to. The certainty that no matter what happens, I can handle it."

He smirked at her conspiratorially and did not take his eyes off her. Rachel leaned her head back as far as she could.

"Stop it," she said.

Jack made a reproving noise.

"You're doing it again. Demanding control," his voice darkened and softened. "Come on, we've talked so much, it would only be sensible to get our lips acquainted in some other way, huh?"

She wanted it. That's why the rum, to silence the doubts. Jack was sure.

"Put that out of your mind. You have already kissed me twice against my will."

A little bit of pretended act of coy was always part of it with women like her.

"All good things come in threes, and I am a self-confessed repeater. Besides, it would then be time for you to admit your will openly for once instead of denying it."

Iron discipline, which had been drilled into her since childhood, was the only reason Rachel didn't laugh.

Arguments upon arguments, Jack Sparrow never seemed to run out of them.

Rachel would never get used to how blatantly and undisguised he was when he wanted to seduce. For nothing else were his words and body language but an attempt to put her under his spell.

His mind was nimble enough to send his words to his own amusement over a narrow tightrope for a balancing act. The abyss consisted on one side of the hint of honesty that could stand behind everything he said.

On the other side, exaggerations and irony lurked, never allowing one to rule out the possibility that he was saying everything in jest.

Where honesty began and irony ended, only he knew. Just as, only he knew which side the words fell on. He probably didn't care where they landed sometimes.

Jack could be pushy, was fully aware of it and didn't give a damn. Self-confidence – he was right. His was enough for two and attracted her.

Rachel, unfortunately, could not deny how refreshing this was, and much less could she doubt that he often succeeded with it.

"You want the prize for worst rogue badly, don't you?"

Rachel quickly closed her mouth as she realised how she adopted his way of wanting to elicit reactions.

Jack tilted his head to the side thoughtfully and quickly made a judgement. "This prize …"

"No," Rachel said firmly.

"The problem with the two times before that is that in doing so, you merely provided me with a foreboding before the real experience."

Again, Jack leaned towards Rachel and overcame the distance she had newly made.

The lifting of her hand made Jack's eyes widen. He had simply received too many slaps in his life not to find this alarming.

She held her finger in front of his face, which he had shoved closer and closer to hers.

"You are a pirate and I will not let you steal anything from me again," Rachel said resolutely.

Jack rolled his eyes inwardly. If she only knew how much that sounded like an invitation to him, she certainly wouldn't have said that.

He had wanted to play with her recklessly, to tease her beyond her limit. The kiss had not been important to him, nothing he cared about. Sure, he would have enjoyed it.

Her stubborn need to control, however, now made Jack laugh softly and turn away from her.

"If you wish to turn your hunch into an experience, ask next time, agreed?" she asked.

Jack glared at the wall in amusement and then turned to Rachel. She wanted control? Should be able to be arranged. Humble, he inclined his head and looked at the floor.

"Deal. Is it convenient for you now?"

She groaned in annoyance.

It was tougher to convince that woman of anything than trying to separate Gibbs from his needless superstitions.

"If you insist …", Rachel said, and Jack looked at her.

Her shoulders were taut, her face a mask. But after her emotional outburst at the disagreement, Jack now knew that her reserved expression had nothing whatsoever to do with her inner life.

The fact that he had such a hard time reading her was another mystery that appealed to him.

"What? I put the helm in your hands and you hand it right back? What have I done to deserve this?"

"Absolutely nothing, but earlier you won't let it rest, am I right? These constant advances, this feigned interest in my views and the conversations we have. You won't stop playing the nice chap …"

Jack clicked his tongue to interrupt her. "I've stopped playing the bad chap for you from time to time – don't confuse this."

"Whether this is true or not remains to be seen."

"Does this mean you are extending your second tour on the Pearl?"

"Quite possibly. Jack … you wanted …"

Too bad, she almost blabbed …

"I wanted to drink this measly remnant in the bottle next to you. You wanted something from me. I know what – but not why. This is …" Jack approached her again until he could wistfully taste her breath. It had been a good vintage. "Surprisingly interesting," he finished the sentence.

She still wanted him to put in an effort and if it didn't plague him to know her reason for doing this, he would have done her that favour by now at the latest.

She was far too good at this non-verbal temptation to look him first in the eyes and then on the lips with her mouth slightly open. An unambiguous command or an invitation not to be refused – depending on who was standing in front of her.

But Jack was also too good at misunderstanding orders and turning down invitations.

"Next time you want to do something, do it right away. Even if it's just a delicate execution of sabotage to get someone else to do what you want. The talk just now is spoiling a bit my mood personally," Jack said in his lowest tone and he slowly straightened up.

If she thought that would be enough to make him act, then with a little effort he could feel sorry for her. It spoke for the fact that the previous fine gentlemen she had dealt with were all arbitrary, naff and shallow.

"Sabotage?" she inquired belatedly.

Jack winked and walked up and down in front of her, waving his index finger.

"Time for cover-up has passed and again, act more swiftly. Hesitation is a form of indulgence that one can rarely afford, love."

His gait quickened and his heartbeat followed suit, accelerating as well. Jack glared at Rachel.

If one manipulated people with some regularity, one could not save oneself from a shadowy delusion of persecution. If a manipulation was good, the manipulated person would never know about it, but one carried the knowledge of it oneself. Successful manipulation was a little self-destructive, and Jack had many delusions that haunted him and underpinned that.

"Do you know who could confirm?" he asked. "The pirate who croaked before you with my dagger in his throat and, … probably, quite a few others who have been in a similar situation and can never be again."

A moment ago, she had let her legs swing back and forth just above the floor. She stopped that immediately, but from her face Jack could read absolutely and still nothing. However, the freezing of her movement was reaction enough, and he showed her the gold tooth with a smile. She pushed herself off the table.

"Jack, why are you doing this?"

She had never looked for confrontation before, and that was suspicious.

"What?"

"A counter-question – I see. You wanted to teach me that a counter-question that serves as a distraction must be interesting or unpredictable. At the very least, it should awaken thoughts in the other person that he or she has never had before, and that's risky because it's a shot in the dark every time. Your counter-question just failed to even begin to do any of that."

Not without a small amount of pride, Jack nodded.

"Yeah. I simply did not understand the question. When are you going to start paying me for these recommendations? You know, nothing good is free, and you can do even something bad exceptionally well."

"When are you going to start doing what I want you to do?" she asked, taking a step towards him. "I mean now – not in general," she added ashamedly, as if that would improve his situation.

And then there was the lowering of her head, and Jack's unpleasant increased pulse slowed down again.

Her complicated and deeply anchored values – fundamental beliefs – made it impossible for her to act as he had just insinuated for a few minutes. She did not manipulate.

Jack knew that every anchor could be loosened or released – sooner or later – if someone really intend to do so. And he also knew now that the day would be a disaster for her if that happened to her, because she built everything on said anchor.

Stupid of her. An anchor was a support in bad times, not a resilient architecture to build on.

He did not want to be a chain link pulling on this anchor. At least not if he destroyed the construct by doing so – not with an unintentional mistake on his part.

If a manipulation went as planned and remained unnoticed, then it was a little self-destructive – failed manipulations were different. The ones that the target noticed. They sometimes left deep wounds, and not on the one who had failed in the deception. Jack knew this from both perspectives.

"At least answer me honestly why you reacted like that, and then I'll go," Rachel demanded of him.

Unlike him, she could read him far too well, at least at that moment, and that increased his pulse again. Jack reminded himself that it was a game for him with nothing at stake, and he calmed down again and abruptly tired of the whole thing.

"Reacted like what?"

"When you mentioned the dead man. You know how that burdens me and makes me angry. Angry because I don't know how to deal with it. You hurt me and I want to know why."

"You …", Jack said, stepping up to her and only realising when he looked at her that his tactic couldn't work.

He wanted to mirror her, to dazzle her with her own behaviour. Would work wonderfully to manoeuvre her into a pitfall if he could imitate her behaviour … but again – no emotion on her face. Nothing he could adopt.

She was as reserved with her inner self – as he was with his true thoughts. He could lay out his thoughts for her – perhaps forgetting a few details because he didn't have the patience for them in himself – but he couldn't tell what was going on inside him emotionally.

All she provided him was vulnerability through her honesty about her feelings. So all he could reflect was honesty about the thing he could not say anything about spontaneously.

That sounded like a doomed strategy, which was at least entertaining if he was lucky. He paced up and down again.

"Love, I would need three days in a row with no sleep, oodles of rum and occasional conversations and occupations that clear my head to explain to myself why I did that. And even then, there's a chance I could only comprehend how the chain of reactions went, not what caused it. Realistically, I'm never going to put in that effort because I already don't care about the outcome at that moment, and I'm not even sorry to confess that inadequacy."

Rachel actually had the nerve to stand right in front of him as he turned back to her. Jack raised his eyebrow in wonder.

Then he felt her hands on his face. The fingers pressed a little too hard and betrayed her nervousness. She searched and found something in his eyes before she put her lips on his mouth.

Not like the two times before was she passive, like frozen. Jack was too busy to answer the why.

He placed his hands on her back and without pressure, her lips pushed against his. He willingly opened his mouth.

For Jack, it was a game – it always was – and that's why he continued to test boundaries – to learn the rules so he could bend them. His hands slid down her back, lower, until they … Rachel gave one of his forearms a light slap, and Jack's hands darted upwards again, to the permitted area of her back.

Jack smiled. He usually got what he wanted, though not always the way he wanted it and even more rarely at his preferred speed.

Finally, Rachel detached herself from him without haste and then looked at him as if that had just been a lesson she had taught him. Jack knew he would want revenge for that.

"Nicer if both agree, isn't it, Mr. Sparrow?" she asked him, her voice conveyed an invisible smile.

"Ah … I didn't agree – not on those conditions."

She rightly didn't believe a word he said, she made that clear to him with a glance before she left the cabin.

Jack searched the room for rum. It wasn't a lie. When chaos erupted around him, raging, claws out for anything it could reach, he literally thrived.

But it was different when chaos reigned within himself … and Jack was so familiar with chaos, he already recognised it when it was still at the beginning of its development. When it gathered and lost itself in him, rapidly and sluggishly at the same time.

Outside, Rachel leaned against the door to Jack's cabin. The stars shone brightly above her. A girlish smile crept onto her face and made her look down at the floor as she ran her fingers over her lips.