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The Evil Lady E	By : EvilE Category: Pirates of the Caribbean (All) > Het - Male/Female > Jack/Elizabeth Views: 5990 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own the Pirates of the Caribbean movie series, nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
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Chapter 13: The Sea and the Serpent

Captain Jack Sparrow stared over the edge of the deck in the dawn light, still able to see Elizabeth's body as it sank farther and farther into the sea. Tugging gently on the braids of his goatee, as he always did when truly nervous, he fought the panic rising in his chest and pushed himself away from the rail. He tried to congratulate himself, to tell himself that, all said and done, he had won. Which had always made him feel happy, before. But all he could think about, suddenly, was everything that he had lost to the cold, unyielding sea.

Lots of treasure. Friends. The Pearl. And now... her.

Regret, that two-timing, cruel, deceitful whore of an emotion, was fighting its way out from his heart, howling at the top of her lungs. He hadn't given her a fair chance, it yelled at him.

But he had.

He hadn't given her enough time to apologize, it insisted.

But he had.

Not even he really believed he would do it, really strike her lights out and watch her drown in the sea, even though she deserved it.

But he had.

He was already hastily stripping off his boots and lifting his leather holster belt over his head, dropping it to the deck, when he heard a very familiar, very spooky whisper deep inside his head.

“Jack Sparrow...”

It was the Voice.

Not now. Rather busy at the moment!

“What are you doing?” the Voice whispered, the sound echoing through his brain.

I'm not doing, I'm undoing. In a hurry.

“Don't do it, Jack.”

Not listening. Got to go now.

“Jack, you cannot save her.”

Bloody well goin' to try. He dashed toward the rail.

“Jack, I can't permit you to take it back.”

Take what back? He sat on the edge and swung his bare feet over.

“The sacrifice of the virgin.” The s in sacrifice seared through his brain, and as comprehension slowly dawned through his confusion, he began to be more afraid than before.

Words and images flooded through his mind, one after the other.

The witch: “All de blood of de virgin. Dis was de price of raisin' him from de dead.”

Barbossa: “If I don't bring the blood by sunset, the gods will undo what they did and I go back... to Hell.” Mad, rattling laughter.

Jack himself: “If it were God, he'd have given me a boat.”

The Voice, in his dream: “Tempted by carnal desires...Do not despoil her for your own perverse pleasure.”

Jack himself, again: Thought only heathen gods were this pushy about timing. Is that you, Quetzalcoatl?

The witch: De headen gods be dangerous. An' dere's someting dey always wannt for deir troubles.

Blood. Of a virgin.

Elizabeth.

Jack retraced his mental steps over and over, hitting the same bumps and tripping over the same torn-up boards, and was still afraid to conclude the truth. He saw the blood pouring from Elizabeth's hand. He heard the mad cackling of Barbossa, and the serpentine caress of the Voice.

“My God, what have I done?” he muttered aloud. Without wasting another second, he then plunged himself, headfirst, into the churning water below.

* * *

Jack swam as he'd never swum in his entire life. His arms made great, sweeping strokes beside him, and his legs pumped furiously, relentlessly, to carry him downward with a speed matched only by something that actually possessed scales, and fins.

In truth, he'd only thought as far as reaching her, not about conserving enough energy to propel them upwards, or saving enough breath to reach the surface again. He had always prided himself on his lung capacity - has to hold lots o' hot air, Gibbs once said - but confidence in his abilities was the farthest thing from his mind. Having already drowned, he felt no fear of the dark ocean's void, and instead feared that he would live, having to know that she was gone, and he had done it.

Perhaps they would both meet in Hell. He was certain to be headed there, after the dissolute life he'd led, and she... mate-murdering tendencies aside, she had gone so far as to actually chop off whole chunks of his hair. A good chance she'd be headed there too.

He thought of Davey Jones, and wondered if he'd end up serving an eternity there on that ship, after all, laboring beside Bootstrap and all the others. No small wonder the poor man had ripped out his still-beatin' heart and locked it away, and now it was god-knows-where, probably being used as leverage in a tug-of-war between Commodore, Lord, and Sea-Captain... Jack wished he could have locked his own heart away, too, somewhere nice and warm, to protect it from the damage wreaked upon it by one pretty, brilliant yet foolish, tawny-haired British lass.

As he swam deeper, the salty sea water stinging his eyes, the vast irony of his predicament struck him... of all the women he'd known in his life, all the women he'd come to like and respect, like Anamaria and Tia Dalma... and his mum, God rest her soul... and all the women he'd used to satisfy his intermittent sexual appetites... Giselle, countless other doxies in Tortuga and Singapore and all over the bloody world, truth be told... the only woman he found himself able to love, even in his own admittedly selfish, immature, obsessively sexual way... was the only woman he could absolutely, positively never have.

And the one he'd just stupidly, thoughtlessly murdered.

He almost gave up, right then, almost said To hell with it and God damn me for a fool, anyway, when he caught a flash of something brown and waving, just to his right. It brushed his outstretched fingers, and he tried to get hold of it. It was hair. Her hair.

With a final burst of speed he reached down and grabbed a handful, arresting his downward motion, and pulling her up into his arms, relief shooting through him. He looked up at the surface - the morning sun barely visible through the aqua water - and began to stroke, feverishly, toward the surface.

They'd never make it, Jack thought, even as he swam as hard as he could. It's just like the other time. Too far down, not enough time left. We're done for. Bring on the Judgment. Lizzy and I can share a cabin on the ship to pirate Hell. Maybe then I can finally get her in my bed...

But that thought brought to mind the other part, too, about the Voice. He'd been made a fool of by whatever it was. The anger seemed to channel new energy into his feet.

Nobody made a fool of Captain Jack Sparrow. Not an undead pirate, not a pasty-skinned British princess of a woman, not some slimy bastard of a heathen god. Well, all right, maybe the woman. But definitely not the god.

He kicked and swam with one arm while he clutched Elizabeth against him with the other. It never occurred to him to pray. He was finished with deities.

With a suddenness that shocked him and nearly sent him slipping back into the silent blue waves, his head broke the surface. He took huge, gasping breaths as he adjusted Elizabeth's limp body in front of him.

Her lips were blue, and her skin whiter than scrubbed canvas. He slid her over his left shoulder and paddled, his muscles straining, toward one of the ropes suspended from the ship. With great effort he hauled himself, inch by inch, up the rope, Elizabeth's limp weight making it harder than ever before... and it had been a while since he'd pulled himself onto a ship like this... had forgotten how hard it was. But he put hand over hand, bracing his feet against the slippery hull, trying to keep balanced so that Elizabeth wouldn't slip. They'd come too far for him to give up now. With a final, heaving effort, he reached the lip of the deck and slid Elizabeth onto it, then crawled up and collapsed next to her, totally exhausted.

After a minute, Jack was extremely displeased to hear an urgent whisper in his mind.

“Jack Sparrow.”

You! You've got a lot of nerve talking in my head again, after THAT.

“It's time to go, Jack.”

Go? I'm not goin' anywhere, you lyin', cheatin'... higher being!

“You've withdrawn the sacrifice. That means I can no longer restore you to life.”

Jack sat up and opened his eyes, and scanned the deck for his sword. He saw it, lying on a pile of rope near the prow, and crawled toward it.

I can't believe anything you say. Everything you told me about Lizzy was a lie.

“Not at all, Jack. On the contrary, everything I showed you was true. But you were weak, and did not complete your mission.”

Weak, eh? I'll show you who's weak, he thought at the presence, his hand finally closing around his sword. Show yourself, you bloodthirsty wretch. Show yourself, and fight me!

Jack's eyes scanned the deck forwards and backwards, the aural light turning slowly from pink to orange.

“Very well,” said the Voice.

A mist seemed to sprout from the center of the deck, shimmering in the golden light. A reflection seemed to shoot out from it, like light glinting off a steel sword. The metallic glimmer moved this way and that, in a giant curvilinear S, before seeming to part the mist with a razor-sharp, echoing, glassy note that rang out in the morning air.

The mist fell away, and in its place was a serpent. Its body was a sizable foot in diameter, and at least twenty feet long, covered in shiny, leaf-green scales. Its head bore a terrifyingly impassive gold mask and rose to a height halfway up the main mast. Behind the head, iridescent feathers sprouted, populating wings more profound than those of an albatross. Its eyes, visible through the mask, swung around to fix on Jack, and he saw they were golden, too, with swirling colors in the irises.

It was huge, and beautiful, and terrifying. The witch's words came back to him, then.

Quetzalcoatl. The feathered serpent.

Meaning, giant Aztec snake, Jack translated. Really big... snake. Not good. Not good.
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The Evil Lady E