Dude! I've done it again. So let's just pretend that three months is a week. I've been super busy - got into college (yay!) and I'm going to Australia and Hong Kong in a couple weeks. So here is a chapter, more to come, and I hope you all enjoy it :)

R & R! x

It was ten years ago that it happened. Eight years ago, Jack met Cecilia. She was dangerous, beautiful, and quick. Everything about her seemed to lure Jack in. He knew she would never forgive him for what he did.

Jack was barely twenty and already he was branded with 'P' of piracy from his brush with the East India Trading Company.

To escape hanging, Jack had joined the crew of the most prestigious ship afloat: The Pearl. It did not take him long to fall into Captain Barbossa's good graces – that was the easy part. Staying there was the difficult part. It had only been a couple weeks since he was made first mate and Barbossa had already begun to watch him. There was a thin line between where he was with Barbossa and the captain complete distrusting him. He needed to regain the man's trust.

After he had heard the man in the tavern, he headed back to the ship. It was the perfect opportunity. He worked it all out before he even reached the gang plank of the Pearl. He would suggest they set course to see the sorceress Tia Dalma. Of course, Barbossa would disagree and fob off the idea because it was a poor decision. He would empower Barbossa and give the captain no reason to believe that he would ever turn to treachery, or even be capable of being an efficient captain.

Once he got to the Pearl, he played the part flawlessly. Barbossa did not give him a second glance for the first time in days. The men set course for Whitecap Bay.

The Pearl made it to Whitecap Bay with relative ease. Barbossa had the men steer the ship into small cove that almost ran the ship aground. Some of the men were ill at ease, while others seemed to vehemently disagree with the captain – saying that running the ship so close to the shore would strand them. Whenever complaints arose, the captain would not address them, he would merely chuckle to himself and order that the man be made to scrub the ship clean. The complaints died out over the first couple hours.

Jack was put in charge of the venture onto the island. He was to chose three men to go with him. In order to go along with his earlier plan, Jack declined and said he would only take two. Barbossa laughed, saying Jack had no idea what he was getting himself into. Jack was not entirely sure what he was getting himself into, but he wanted Barbossa to believe that, whether or not it was true.

Jack had to choose two men.

The first was a deserter. Charles Gibson had been a part of the English Royal Navy, until he his was captured and tortured by an enemy ship. They had managed to get him back but not before the pirates had disfigured him. Gibson refused to speak of what happened to him but he had long, ugly white scars running down his thick tan arms.

Jack was sure that the scars were not the only things that his torturers had left him with but he decided that it was none of his business either way.

The second man aboard was Nathaniel Butler. He was a young boy who had always wished to go out to sea but his mother had never let him. Jack found him in a tavern after he had run away from home. He was young — younger than Jack and even though he talked incessantly, he seemed like he would be a good shipman and wily kid – good to have in a rough situation – so Jack allowed him aboard his rowboat.

Before they left, Jack asked Barbossa what he needed.

"Find me a mermaid," was all he said. No one had heard their captain give the first mate his orders.

Was that the reason they were there?

Jack, being younger than Gibson, but older than Butler, decided to remain in charge considering it was his voyage as first mate. He had no heading, as he had refused to ask Barbossa what they were being sent out for, which forced him he followed Gibson's instruction.

"We'll go east," was all Gibson said when asked for a heading.

"East we shall," Jack nodded.

Night fell and the men remained in the dinghy. Unsure if they should go to the shore or wait. Eventually, Jack noticed the old mossy lighthouse but thought nothing of it and said nothing about it. He decided, either way, they should get to the shore.

The three men moved slowly through the water, watching the shore carefully to make sure they were not in for any surprises.

"Did you see that?" Nathaniel whispered.

Jack turned to look at where Nathaniel was pointing. "What was it?"

"It looked like a woman," he said.

"Mermaids," said Gibson.

Jack looked at Gibson, glad he had brought him along. Especially if he knew anything that could help them catch one.

"You're pulling my leg," Nathaniel said, making light of what the serious man had said. "Mermaids don't ex — "

The boat jolted violently.

"Jack, what was that?"

Jack looked at the boy and back at the man who was not stoically silent. He knew Gibson was right but he was not going to tell Nathaniel that. He said nothing. While they made it to the sand without any trouble but both Jack and Gibson were sure that they were in for a lot more than trouble if they stayed on the island.

"What are we supposed to do here?" Nathaniel asked.

Before anyone had a chance to answer they heard singing.

My heart is pierced by Cupid

I disdain all glittering gold.

There is nothing can console me

But my jolly sailor bold.

Come all you pretty fair maids

Whoever you may be

Who love a jolly sailor bold

That plows the raging sea.

My heart is pierced by Cupid

I disdain all glittering gold.

There is nothing can console me

But my jolly sailor bold.

"What's that?" asked Nathaniel.

"Shut up, boy, they'll hear you," Gibson said.

Soon one voice was joined by another, and then another. Nathaniel followed the voices before Jack or Gibson could do anything. The water was lapping around his knees when the mermaids' webs grabbed him and ripped him apart before he hit the water. It was a morbid sight and all Jack or Gibson could do was stand there and watch.

"Stupid boy," Gibson said, turning his back on the water and heading toward the jungle.

Jack followed him, telling him that Barbossa had sent them to capture a mermaid.

"Capture a mermaid?" he laughed. "He sent us on a wild goose chase. Two men could never capture a mermaid." He sat in the sand. "We would need at least three or four men."

Jack looked sheepishly at the ocean and then back to Gibson. "There has to be a way."

"I'm sure there are," he said, "but not where both of us would get back to the ship alive. There's no way that I'm risking my life to get some uppity captain a mermaid."

"What does he need it for?" Jack said.

"A lot of things in this world require something from a mermaid," he said. "Their tears, their scales, their blood. They are the children of the sea and we are men of the sea. We need them as much as they need us."

"What do they need us for?" he said.

Gibson laughed. "Haven't you heard the tales before, lad?"

Jack ignored his condescending tone considering everything the man must have seen. A man with scars like his could look down on any man. "What tales?"

"Mermaids devour us. Look at what they did to the boy."

"I just thought they were territorial," Jack said. "Do they really…" He clawed at the air and made chewing noises.

"Yes," he said. "They're all beautiful – this is an island full of the most beautiful women you will ever see in this short time you have in this life, but they're deadly. Grow teeth sharper than the finest blade at the smell of human blood. Claws too in some stories. God knows what they really are, hardly any live to speak of them."

"So how are we going to do it, more importantly?"

"We'll have to see in the morning. Mermaids are nasty business, but they are simpler to deal with in daylight. It is easier to see what's lurking under the surface."

"In the morning then?" Jack said.

"The morning," Gibson confirmed.

"Why didn't we bring any rum?"

Part II is on the way. See you then! x