Seven Days

On the first day, Jack Sparrow puts his pistol to his head and pulls the trigger. Nothing happens. The powder in his shot is too wet from the swim for it to go off. Later that afternoon, he thanks whoever it is up there that's looking out for him, and tucks his pistol back into his sash. The shot isn't meant for him.

On the second day, he lays flat on his back, on the hot sand and stares at the sky until colours start swimming infront of his eyes. The clear, cloudless horizon reminds him too closely of Hector Barbossa's cold, smirking blue eyes. He looks away and he doesn't open his eyes again until the moon is high.

On the third day, Jack feels sick. The ground underneath his feet is too still and his gut aches for the lulling, rocking motion of the deck. He stands in the shallows, to feel the warm water lapping against his legs but it doesn't help. He sways when he walks, lilting dangerously to port. When he sleeps that night, stomach rolling, he dreams of her.

On the fourth day, he thinks. Mutiny is an ugly affair at the best of times, but this, this was so much more. This is betrayal in every sense of the word. He'd been stabbed in the back by his mate, his crew and his lover. Worst, he'd betrayed her. She'd been trying to warn him, every step of this voyage and he'd not heeded her.

On the fifth night, his lady love calls out to him. Jack can hear her cries drifting over the dark sea. His beautiful Pearl wails to him, raped and abused by cruel, unfamiliar hands. He'd never really considered the Pearl to be one of his posessions because she was an equal, so inexplicably joined together. They shared a soul. She'd always spoken to him, something that had made the crew think he was madder even than he seemed, and he'd talked back. But now her cries were so angered and incensed and he couldn't call back to her. It brings a grim smile to his face, feeling the way that she misbehaves for the scum that captains her now. That night, Jack drinks himself to sleep, fingers still curled around the bottle.

On the sixth day, all that Jack see's is revenge. They stole his dignity, his position and his freedom. They left him to die. They took his love from him, and they mistreated her. He could still hear the Pearl, in his head, and suddenly, the place for his last shot suddenly seems so obvious. It belongs in Hector Barbossa's black, mutinous heart, on the day that he reclaims his Pearl.

On the seventh day, a small rum runners ship makes berth on the island. In the brig, as the ship makes set for Singapore, Captain Jack Sparrow sleeps, and dreams of the day that he see's black sails in the sunset.