007

Jack Sparrow

I looked at the case of the golden skull with amusement. It looked very familiar, well-crafted, and would probably fetch a good price in Tortuga when we got there. Of course, that was when we got there. We still had several miles to go.

And we'd have to make a stop at Port Royal first. The mission to grab this golden skull for our economic benefit had been successful. The thing had been kept in an old Aztec Temple that had been used as artillery practice by the Spaniards. Apparently, the only reason the Spaniards had never taken it from the temple was that the skull supposedly granted immortal life. It sounded very familiar to the one we nearly got in Panama. As I looked at it, I noted that it had a lot of similarities to the one in Panama. I wondered if it was from the same creator.

Well, whatever its function or our ability, it would serve us well to sell it in Tortuga and make some money for the trip across the Atlantic.

Throwing the skull in the air and catching it, I reviewed what else we had managed to accomplish. I had made contact with an info broker of sorts who informed me that my lost comrade, Scervey Joe, was being held prisoner in Port Royal.

Apparently, he had gotten drunk or stolen something, you know, did the pirate thing. So, I had called for Tanya to come to the cabin so we could discuss how we were going to rescue my former crewman and retrieve the gold stored in a safe location.

I urged her to come down right away, but it could take a while for me to give us to find her. She tended to wander off when she wasn't training the crew.

Shaking my head, I started to get up from my seat when the doors finally opened, and Tanya entered with a nod, taking a seat across from me and saying, "Well, Jack, what's this meeting about?"

I smiled, saying, "It's about the rescue of our newly found comrade in Port Royal. I was wondering if you have any ideas on how we can do this without, you know, getting arrested."

She shook her head before saying, "The simplest thing is not to do what Barbossa did. Don't bombard the city and then invade with pirates. I know he'll be in a prison cell, so we should probably just climb the side of the fortress at night. Actually, we don't even need to climb. I have the ability to fly, so I'll do the job. I'll get up there, find his cell, unlock it, and get out with him. It's not a difficult mission."

I nodded in agreement before asking, "True, but can you lift me and this other individual into and out of the fortress?"

Tanya let out a sigh for a moment before saying, "Good point. It would have to be one at a time, one leaving. And it's not like I could leave you behind. I don't know what this guy looks like."

Tanya shook her head before saying, "But that being said, this operation should be rather successful, as long as they haven't already hanged him."

"Hmm, yes, that is the main concern. He's a pirate in Port Royal, and it seems they're hanging more pirates than they used to. A real shame that," I replied.

I remembered the stories of when Port Royal was a pirate haven. We kept that city safe and protected it from the Spaniards, the Dutch, the French, and how do we get treated? Like it's our fault that there was a dang earthquake that brought half the city into the sea.

Tanya was looking at me, her eyes narrowed, and I said, "What?"

"How do we know it's not your fault? At least pirates' fault in general. I mean, we've run into cursed gold that turns people into the undead, and we've run into a skull not too dissimilar to the one you're holding that turns people into the desiccated undead after death. So, who's to say that wasn't an object that could cause an earthquake?"

I shook my head for a moment, then thought about it, and as I realized, actually, yeah, that seems rather likely. Then I thought more on it. It seems possible that it could be something Davy Jones did. After all, if you wanted to bring a pirate who made a deal with you and he starts hanging out in a known pirate haven, how are you going to get him since he can't go on land? Well, bring half the island underwater. That's concerning, but I kept that to myself, simply nodding in agreement finally.

"Good point. Well, let's hopefully not trigger any earthquakes while we're at Port Royal then, or Tortuga for that matter."

Tanya continued to look at the skull, and I held it up, saying, "Interested in holding it?"

"No," she said, shaking her head, before saying, "Just concerned about what that thing is. After all, we've seen one like it before. We know what that one does. And besides, the color of the crystals being different, I can't see many differences."

"Are the crystals different?" I said, looking at it. I hadn't noticed that before.

"Yeah, those crystals are green. The one Stubbs was using was red," Tanya said with a nod.

"They probably mean something for the Aztecs, though I doubt we'll ever know since the Spaniards killed most of their culture by this point."

Something seemed off about the way she said that, and I looked at her before saying, "You know, why do you always say things like it's already been a historical fact a lot longer than it has?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," Tanya said with a shake of her head as she got up from her chair. "I'm simply being a realist here and pointing out that whatever person made that long ago is dead, and their culture has been dead for a good 200 years, give or take."

Something was definitely up. She was hiding something, but I wouldn't push too much today. It's better to prod every now and again and not get her too defensive on the matter. Sooner or later, she'll spill the beans.

For now, I simply looked at the golden skull and said, "Hmm, perhaps they mean something. But I'm sure some governor will pay quite handsomely to have it. That's all that matters."

Tossing the skull up in the air once more and catching it, I said, "By the way, have you been doing any research on which island you're going to buy to get yourself that nice little outpost for yourself?"

Tanya nodded and said, "Actually, I'm eyeing one on the coast of North America. I've been looking into a little defensible place that could do me good.

"Hmm, North America, rather a bit of a backwater, don't you think? I mean, most trade goes directly from the Caribbean to Spain or France," I pondered.

Tanya nodded her head before saying, "It's kind of a backwater, yes. I have a feeling, though, that it will not be like that forever. Already, several ships are being built in North America instead of England, and it'll probably continue to grow as a shipbuilding industry because the trees are untapped. If one gets enough territory bought up there, you can set yourself up for quite a bit of a pretty penny. Not to mention, I see quite a lot of our cultural products going to be in demand in the coming years. You can't get as much sugar as you can in the Caribbean, but coffee is a slowly growing commodity in the North."

"Hmm, quite interesting. Do you think I should invest in North America with some of my ill-gotten gains?" I asked.

Tanya simply nodded and said, "Not now, of course. The wealth that's going to be coming out of there in the years to come will be worth it. Let's not dive into it right now simply because everyone is still focused on the Caribbean. But the Caribbean will not always be as secure as it is right now. Spain is slowly losing its hold on the region. The French and the English are building fleets that are competitive enough to cause problems. Who knows what's going to happen with the Dutch? They seem to be more and more interested in the Far East trade and less interested in the potentials here."

I have to admit, my eyes were going a little bit cross-eyed listening to her, but I followed along as she continued to talk about economic futures and potential profits. After a few moments, I said, "You know what? Maybe next time we have the opportunity, I'll give you a little bit of money to invest for me. You sound like you know what you're doing."

"Well, thank you, Jack," Tanya replied.

"No problem. Well, I'll put the skull down. It's time to get ready for telling the crew where we're going."

Tanya

"Well, that doesn't speak well about the chances of your friend," I said, looking up at the rocks where a good portion of Captain Jack's last crew now hung. "There must be 40 or 60 bodies, some of them looking rather familiar."

"We have not decided to take the Black Pearl into Port Royal directly. It was parked around a rock not too far away. Instead, we were using a rowboat we had commandeered from the shore to get closer. So we had been working together to get into the port, but he had stood up to take off his hat and give us a salute, which made me give him a side-eye."

"Really? Saluting the guys who tried to kill you?" I remarked.

"The pirates, just like me. I could be up there next, so I might as well show them a little bit of respect," Jack explained.

I let out a sigh, thinking to myself that I really needed to get as much money as possible and get out of this occupation as quickly as possible, as I pushed the boat onwards. Jack continued to salute before sitting down and taking up an oar again to help us make our way to the cliffside below the fortress where Scurvy Joe was most likely being held.

"So, about your ideas of going to North America, I thought of something I should probably warn you about," Jack said, gesturing for me to look over at him as I continued to row.

"What do you want to warn me about? What's wrong with North America?" I asked, curious.

"Well, nothing's wrong with North America, per se. It's just that you'll be a little bit closer to someone you probably don't want to be near, considering the lengths he goes to," Jack warned.

"What?" I said, surprised. "North America is part of Blackbeard's domain?"

Seeing Jack nod, I continued, "Right, Edward Teach. I haven't really looked into him, but there's something I should be concerned about. He's not a pirate lord, is he?"

Jack chuckled before replying, "Well, no, I think he does intend to take that title if he can ever get one of the Pieces of Eight. But the point is, you should be careful working in North America. It's his domain. If you tick him off, well, rumor has it that he has strange powers that many pirates would kill for."

"What kind of powers?" I asked, intrigued by the mention of these abilities.

"Those stories are quite numerous, from dark magic to possibly having deals with Davy Jones. Even witchcraft, although that last one seems a little bit far-fetched," Jack explained.

"Well, I have magic, so I should be fine," I said matter-of-factly, which earned a nod from Jack.

"Hopefully, but just be careful when you do finally go north. I don't want to hear any horror stories about you. Not to mention, the people up there are... well, they're a skittish lot about magic. Puritans and all that," Jack cautioned.

I nodded before saying, "I'm not planning to go that far north. Owning land that far up, sure, I might do that. But I'm probably going to stay further south in the Virginia colonies. Farming is going to be more profitable in the short term. In the long term, the north might have something, but by then, I'm sure the Puritans will be less of an issue."

"How do you figure that?" Jack poked, hinting that he was figuring out that I was not exactly as I seemed.

I simply shrugged and said, "Woman's intuition."

I let out a laugh as we arrived at the bottom of the cliff, throwing over a makeshift anchor to keep the boat in place. I stood up and reached out a hand to him. "Alright, Jack, let's go save your friend, Scurvy Joe."

"Yes, let's take my hand," I powered up my levitation magic and flew up as high as I could, holding onto him before arriving just in front of a cannon and a half-asleep guard. I threw Jack at the guard, and he managed to knock him out rather quickly.

Setting down on the wall, I looked out over the area, making sure there were no other guards. Thankfully, there were none before stepping down onto the ground.

"Alright, Jack, I've never been inside this fortress. Any idea where the prison cells are?" I asked.

Jack looked at me and smiled. "Of course, I have an idea. I've been here before," he said, leading the way further into the fortress. I followed behind, drawing my sword just to be safe as we made our way into a courtyard and through the shadows that were available to us thanks to the night sky. We reached a side door that Jack opened.

We moved down the doorway into the dungeon and quickly found several familiar faces. It seems not all the pirates from the transformed crew were dead. Some of them were hanging out in the various cells, most of them asleep. Thankfully, as we made our way past them, one blinked, looking confused and starting to get up.

We got out of his line of sight and continued until we found an old man with a very heavy beard, wearing just pants and no shirt.

"I can see why he was called Scurvy Joe," I remarked. "Right away, he was definitely suffering from the symptoms of scurvy. Very twitchy too, though I don't know if that was from scurvy. He did look almost like the undead with how little food he'd been eating, that's for sure."

Jack knocked on the cell door and said, "Hello, Scurvy Joe, long time no see."

The man shot up from where he was lying, looking at Jack in shock before saying, "You can't be here. This place is one of the most locked-down fortresses on the island. This must be a dream."

He gave a little fake snore and turned away from us.

Jack looked at me, and I looked at him before he said, "Unlock the door, please, madam."

I raised my wand and cast a spell on the lock, causing it to unbolt. Jack opened it, walked into the cell, and grabbed Scurvy Joe by his shoulder, pulling him up. "Can dreams do this?" Jack asked.

Scurvy Joe looked at Jack and said, "Yes, quite often, actually."

"Well, if this is all a dream, there's nothing wrong with coming with us, is there?" Jack said.

Scurvy Joe thought for a moment before saying, "You know what? There's a point there. I wake up here in the morning anyways. Come on!" He pushed out of Jack's hands and walked right towards me, saying, "Good morning, madam," before walking right by me as if he knew the escape route.

I looked at Jack, who shrugged, and said, "He's gone a little bit loopy in the head, I think."

Shaking my head, I said, "Wonderful," before following the seemingly insane man, making sure he didn't get too far away.

One of the pirates called out after Jack, "Don't leave us here, man! You put us in here with your traitors. You should let us out!"

Another one said, "They're going to execute us tomorrow."

Jack had been right behind me, but when they mentioned the execution, he stopped and looked at them, deep in thought.

I looked at Jack before saying, "Bringing back your old crew is not something we can do. We do not have the boat space."

"True, true," Jack replied, "but it could be interesting to release them. I mean, there are plenty of places to hide on Port Royal. It is an island, after all, and it's quite large."

I sighed before saying, "The only reason I would want to release them is if we needed something to distract the Royal Navy and the Redcoats, and as far as I know, we don't need..."

I stopped as I heard a cannon blast followed by the impact of cannon artillery hitting the fortress we were standing in.

This was followed by the screams of commanders, ordering their men to get up and get ready to fight, and the movement of men waking up throughout the fortress.

Looking at the pirates in the cages, I said, "You assholes just got very lucky," and I flicked my fingers, casting a spell to unlock the doors.

Without their bolts holding them in place, the doors swung open under their own power, leaving the pirates looking at their escape with confusion and joy.

Turning, I said, "Let's go, Jack," as we moved up the passageway into the active fortress that was becoming less stable with every passing moment. More and more soldiers were running about, and quite a few were manning the walls overlooking our boat.

"Great plan you guys have," Scurvy Joe said. "So, how are we going to escape with all these guards around?"

"Firetruck!" A cannonball smashed into the wall above our boat, sending several Redcoats flying in a chaotic fashion.

"Who the hell is firing at us?" Jack said, walking over to the wall, leaving me and Scurvy Joe stunned at the brazenness of his actions before we ran after him. The wall was still mostly intact, so we were able to look over the side and get an idea of what we were dealing with. It was a small ship, but it had its guns pointing directly up at the wall. It was rather unassuming except for one detail.

There was a man standing at the bridge of the ship, holding up something that was glowing red. I narrowed my eyes, looking down at the figure before I realized I was looking at a skeleton—a standing skeleton holding a golden skull with red diamonds or something that were glowing.

"Well, that was unexpected," Jack said, as I nodded, saying, "That can't be who I think it is, can it?"

"I mean, the skull looks exactly like the one aboard the Pearl, and it looks like the one we left them with," Jack mused.

There was a pulse of energy from the ship—a red wave that splashed out across the water, hitting the stones that were keeping the strung-up pirates aloft. The moment ago dead and decaying corpses decayed quite quickly, becoming undead skeletons that quickly freed themselves from the ropes around their necks and started climbing up towards the fortress.

"Oh, hey, your former crew of skeletons again. This time permanently, I'm guessing," I said as several Royal Marines came around the corner with rifles ready to attack anything, and I meant anything, as they saw us and brought them to bear.

"Hands up, pirate scum!" someone called. I turned to Jack, he turned to me before he said, "Well, you heard the man. Hands up."

I raised my hands and scurvy Joe did the same, following Jack's lead. Jack then said, "Gentlemen, gentlemen, there's no need to be pointing your guns at us. We're all friends here. We are not involved in the attack."

"Are you not involved?" came a familiar voice as a familiar admiral emerged from the darkness, his sword drawn but held downward as he approached.

"Jack Sparrow, I thought you would have kept far away from Port Royal after your successful scheming on the island of the Dead," Norrington said.

"Was planning to," Jack pointed to Joe, "here. We just need to bust an old friend out for information. How was the rest of that fight, anyways? We kind of split before you showed up inside the cave system."

I noticed a low rumble on the wall, causing some Royal Marines to look over the side at the ship. The majority kept their guns fixed on us.

"I know one of them was looking over the side, probably trying to figure out what he was looking at. Hopefully, he called his friends to deal with the oncoming undead horde before too long," I thought.

Norrington looked at Jack before saying, "Oh, it went wonderfully. We captured the pirate scum, and then we raided your little gold deposit there on the island of the Dead."

"What?" Jack said, sounding shocked. "But the cursed gold, why would you touch it?"

"We didn't, thank you very much. The pirates explained the curse, so we didn't remove any gold pieces from the chest. We took the rest of the wealth, and it has been sent on its way to England. As for the chest, it was sent back to Mexico in a way."

I raised an eyebrow before saying, "Trying to fund some sort of revolution in the colonies against Spain?"

Norrington looked at me before saying, "Oh, yes, Tanya, I remember you as well. You're a quick one. Yes, it was figured that since anyone not of Mexican descent took the gold, maybe cursing it and sending it back to Mexico would be a way to uncurs it. And it benefited us if we were to give it to people who are not interested in continuing Spanish rule of the colonies."

Jack looked completely mortified, and I simply nodded my head. It made sense, probably wouldn't work, but it wasn't our problem.

"Well, Jack, you've made your final mistake. There's no escaping, and whatever attack you're launching on our good castle here will not last very long. Any final words before you're escorted down to the prisons?"

"Yes, I have a good word. Look over the side of the wall," Jack said.

"What?" Norrington asked, though his question was answered by the screaming skeletal pirate as it crawled over the wall and jumped on a Royal Marine.

He was the first of many, as more started coming up, but the Marines quickly rallied, forming a defensive line and using their guns and bayonets to force the things back over the side, some of them falling to their death. I hoped, but with them being undead, it was hard to say.

"Call in the Black Pearl! We need help, Jack," I said, raising a finger and firing off a flare into the sky, which immediately caught Norrington's attention and several Marines as they looked at me, asking, "What was that?"

I shrugged and said, "Has another wave of undead pirates came over the wall, slashing and killing a few Marines before being forced back over." I drew my blade and slashed one of the undead pirates as it attempted to run me through, cutting its head from its shoulders and causing it to stumble around rather comically.

As the third wave started to crest the wall, screams came from behind us. I looked and saw that the pirates who had been freed from the cells below had gathered weapons and were coming to join the fight. This was good, as we needed as much help as possible. I thought, "Currently, we're winning, at least. We've only taken a few losses."

Then, a wave of red energy hit the side of the fortress, and several dying and dead Royal Marines got up. They quickly desiccated and started to attack their fellow Marines.

The situation deteriorated from there as we were forced away from the wall and into the passageway from the outer wall to the inner courtyard. More and more undead were coming over the side as we defended that passageway as best we could, a mix of pirates and Royal Marines.

It wasn't exactly great, especially considering that whoever was controlling that skull apparently was enough of a necromancer at this point that they could just force undead minions on any of us who fell and make us switch sides. There were a few more Marines who died in the fighting as we continued to hold the passageway, breaking up skulls as best we could because that seemed to be the only way to put them down or at least prevent them from being functional enough to be a problem.

"We should probably escape," Jack mused as another wave of the undead pressed against the wall.

"Probably," I said, wondering aloud, "Why are these things attacking the port? It seems rather dumb, considering there are probably more than enough Royal Marines here to defeat them. They're not fully immortal like the ones made by cursed gold."

"They're also not as intelligent," Jack mused, smashing his fist into an incoming skeleton's spinal cord and breaking it. "More fragile, less intelligent, under the control of whoever has the skull. It's a rather knock-off compared to the gold."

I laughed at that and said, "Well, maybe the answer lies with the guy holding the skull. Too bad he's not coming up here to talk."

As I said that, the red wave came up from the side of the wall. Standing on top of the wave of energy and stepping off onto the wall, as if they were in control of everything, was a skeleton holding a golden skull. They looked around before pointing at me and Jack, saying, "You. I'm here to kill you."

"Stubs, is that you?" Jack called, only to have the skeleton draw a pistol and fire a shot at him before throwing it when he missed, hitting another one of its underlings and shattering its skull to pieces.

"Of course it's me, you failed pirate! I'm going to kill you right here, right now, for what you've done to me and my crew," the skeleton growled.

"Pretty sure you did it to yourself," I pointed out, drawing my pistol with my hand and putting it behind my back as I continued to use my sword to fight off a few of the pirates.

"We would have been immortal conquerors, sending the undead to fight our battles. But you had to destroy the temple with us still trapped inside, killing us. But you forgot one thing: the wielder of this skull has many powers, and the power to bring the undead does not need to be activated while alive," the skeleton sneered.

"I don't think it's forgotten when we didn't know," I pointed out, which got the creature to look at me more annoyed.

"I'm trying to have a moment here."

"I do tend to agree with our little skeleton friend. Let him talk," Jack said, smashing the skull of another skeleton that tried to make its way through the passageway.

"How about you two just do something about him? He's attacking Port Royal because you two are here. It's kind of clear," Norrington pointed out, sounding annoyed that we were even talking to the skeleton.

"Diplomacy, Norrington. We are engaging in diplomacy," Jack said. "Maybe you should try it."

"Alright, Mr. Stubs. If we hand over Jack and Tanya, will you end your attack on my fortress?" Norrington asked.

"Not like that," Jack said, sounding annoyed, but it was a reasonable statement in my opinion. Norrington had no loyalty to us; he had no reason to protect us. Turning us over to a skeleton pirate was well within his abilities.

"No, I'm here to conquer Port Royal. I'm going to kill everyone here and turn them into an undead army the likes of which the world has never seen. Then I will conquer the Caribbean, and once the Caribbean is under my power, I will go forth onto Europe itself," Stubs declared.

"Was he always this big of a megalomaniac?" I asked Jack, who shook his head and said, "I think this is a new development."

"Right, well then," I said, drawing my pistol from behind my back and aiming at his feet because I didn't want to miss. I fired off an explosive round. There was an explosion, part of the wall went flying, and the skeletal leader of the undead horde went flying over the wall, hopefully in pieces and unable to put himself back together, falling 80 feet to his doom.

At that exact moment, I also heard the guns of the Black Pearl opening up on what I assumed was his ship, hopefully destroying it or at least damaging it enough that the Royal Marines could deal with it.

There seemed to be some sort of slowdown in the waves of the undead, as if the loss of their commander and their ship was actually affecting them. Some of them started to run and leap back over the side, jumping into the sea.

As the battle was turning, I said to Jack, "I think it's time to be on our way," grabbing him by the shoulder and scurvy Joe, rushing the two of them towards the hole in the wall.

"Hey, stop!" Norigton called as I shoved both of them over the side with me, using my magic to hold them up as best I could so that we didn't go crashing down into the rocks below. Instead, we descended slowly and landed just barely inside the boat.

From our lower position, we could see that the Black Pearl was engaging in artillery fire on the ship. It seemed most of the crew had gone up the wall to attack the fortress, which meant we had an opportunity to quickly get back aboard, and we did not waste it.

Using the oars to move ourselves back to the Black Pearl, we came aboard, ditching the boat as Mr. Gibbs helped us up.

"Hell of a thing," Gibbs said as Jack came aboard. "More undead? What is that, the third time?"

"Technically, it's a continuation of the second time," Jack said, which got a look of interest from Gibbs. But he said, "We'll answer that later. Get the Pearl underway. We need to be far away from here before Admiral Norrington decides to come looking for us."

"Aye aye, Captain," Gibbs said, giving a salute as I took a moment to catch my breath on the railing, watching it all unfold.

Jack turned to me, saying, "Scurvy, just saying, you still have the map on your back, right?"

"Of course, I have the map on my back. But it won't matter in the morning. I'll be back in my cell, and I'll regret ever working for you," I replied.

"Yes, yes, in the morning. But if this is a dream, though, you've escaped. Now you're about to go get your percentage of the treasure. So why don't you live it up and be a little bit more happy about it?" Jack suggested.

"Good point. Can't wait to see what we left behind in that box. It's been years," I said with a smile.

Jack shook his head before saying, "Good work, Tanya,

blasting that guy off the wall. Hopefully, he's down for good this time."

"Hopefully," I said, looking over the railing at the burning ship. It seemed that the crew had not secured something important before it had been blasted by the Black Pearl.

"Hopefully, he's dead."