Well, devoted fans, whom I have made wait so long for this finale.
I'm sorry. I didn't want it to end and it's been a real push to finish this, when for me the story had already ended before I even wrote it. I only hope I've done justice to the characters I've come to love and respect so much.

FINAL PLAYLIST:
'Will and Elizabeth' from Curse of the Black Pearl.
'One Day' from At World's End, which will need to start from 1:32 minutes in.
'One Last Shot' and 'He's a Pirate' also from COBP.

I will miss this story and your enjoyment of it very dearly! It's the best thing I'm ever going to achieve in terms of these films, and this thread.

So farewell! May the wind forever fill your sails, may the horizon be ever open to your hungry eyes. And may you always be free.

All my love, Dorian.

36

Yo ho, all together
Hoist the colours high
Heave-ho, thieves and beggars
Never shall we die.

The sturdy body of a female citizen stopped Elizabeth's fall short; she yanked the woman's course clothing in an effort to tug herself upright. Her throat burned and tightened while the corset squeezed her lungs short of breath, though not as tightly as the last time.

"Elizabeth!" her father was shouting, amidst two sets of echoing footfalls that scrambled and clattered over one another in urgency.

But she scarcely noticed them, still clinging to the plebian woman in a state of transfixed horror and hope, her eyes riveted upon one spot, one man – the feathered hat and rippling cloak – who was still cutting through the crowds at a stunning pace towards the gallows.

The executioner had his hand on the lever, but the man was faster still. There was a metallic shimmering sound, and a sword flashed through the air like a white column of fire, leapt from his hand like an arrow.

Elizabeth shrieked incoherently, for Jack was falling, Jack was doomed –

And then, quite suddenly, he wasn't.

The Governor and James' hands fell away from her shoulders almost as soon as they had hold of her, both staggered into immobility.
She took the chance and sprang forwards, towards the somehow airborne figure, balanced halfway between life and death.

As she sliced people aside in pursuit of the cloaked man, it all became clear, and her heart burst in a sudden glory of heat and relief.

'Will and Elizabeth'.

Jack scowled at her broad smile as he swayed upon the embedded sword, his tied hands doing him no help, his feet precariously placed.

"Don't just stand there!" he managed to bark out.
Now that there was no turning back, he had apparently traded his concern about her for encouragement of her piratical spirit.
Or was it just that he wanted to survive?

She threw herself after William who was climbing the wooden steps – narrowly evading the axe of the frenzied executioner – not knowing how to defend herself or what she was about to do, acting on sheer impulse of purpose and survival.

"Get Jack down!" Will yelled, swinging another sword at their opponent.
He'd come prepared for this.
A great surge of gratitude and elation gave her the strength to dive onwards, to the square hole where the crown of Jack's head was just visible.

The momentum of her leap sent her ducking just short of the executioner's weapon – she gasped in pure defiance of shock and indignation. A cry from her father below indicated his similar feelings.

But the stroke of the axe was a lucky one – before she could reach Jack the rope was cut – he was falling safely to the ground, with a sword now in his reach.

William was fiercely battling the wretch with flashing, certain swipes of his weapon – the man was teetering on the edge of the platform – Elizabeth barreled forwards, and with a contemptuous yell aimed a kick square at his stomach. He gave a grunt, and soared through the air on his back. There was a sharp shout that she recognised as the Commodore's – the executioner must have landed on top of his gathered soldiers as they were ascending the steps.

A flash of colour caught her eye, atop one of the great flag poles – she looked up – a parrot lifted itself into the sky.
She was winded with blind joy.
There was hope. There was hope for Jack.

Now Jack himself appeared, none the worse for wear, clutching the length of rope with his hands freed.

"Where's the sword?!" she yelled, as he beckoned for her to jump down.
He caught her with strong ease, her body slamming into his for an electrifying moment. "Have you ever tried to extract a sword William has thrown?"

There was no more time for chat. Soldiers everywhere were dashing towards them from the battlements, the Commodore's men slowly recovering from being flattened.

"Will!" the Captain cried, tossing one end of the rope in a wide arc to their partner.

Waves of men came at them in red coats from one side. Elizabeth ran at Jack's side with one hand on his arm, trusting him, only knowing that safety was directly beside him. Clasping the rope firmly Jack upended the enemy whole line.

Another, behind them. They stood no chance against Will and Jack's momentum.

The three of them darted away towards – towards anywhere. Away from the soldiers, or at least the thinnest distribution of them.

Another batch of them were roped viciously around a stone pillar – Elizabeth aimed a deadly upper cut at one and a square kick at another.
Jack glanced at her with a grin. "Easy, darlin'! We don't want ter be charged with murder!"
"You're in trouble enough!" she quipped back.

The rope was out of their hands now – it was down to solid fist fighting. More and more red coats flocked around them. They swung and thrusted, but were inevitably forced to duck behind the only remaining pillar – and emerged out onto the same treacherous battlement that Elizabeth had fallen from so long and not long ago.

The game was up.
A thicket of bayonets and swords bristled around them. Will stood with his back pressed to Jack's, holding his weapon aloft threateningly; Elizabeth flung herself in front of the pirate too, protecting his torso with her own, her shoulder blades against his warm chest. The mad thrumming of his heart resounded through her body.

'One Day', 1:32.

Unconsciously, his hands half circled her waist, as though ready to maneuver her aside at the first sign of attack.
She was both thrilled and lulled to the core at that one touch.
This was it. This was the sum of life. There was nothing beyond this, this definition of life itself.

Just herself and Jack, their friends, their side against the other side.
They waited.

"Elizabeth!" her father and James puffed into view, their faces locked in expressions of wide horror. "For goodness' sake, lower your weapons!"
"She's a danger, Governor!" cried one soldier with a puffy eye, "She can't be trusted! No offence meant, Sir."

She was being scrutinised by every present male – she was surrounded by arbitrating men.
An official threat. A female terror. A disgrace.

Good.
She tore off her ridiculous hat. It had come loose in the brawl anyway. Some of her hair let itself down in longer flowing curls, grazing her neck and reminding her of a sun-stricken beach, yellow and wild, smelling of rum and the salty surf.

Jack's fingers squeezed her waist in approval, swelling her defiant pride. Only his opinion mattered now.

"Mister Turner." James addressed Will curtly, trying to put off Elizabeth's damnation a little longer. She glimpsed the pain that she caused, and remembered that she was his fiancée. The empty space beside him where she should legally be standing gaped at her.

He did not look at her. "I thought we might have to endure some manner of ill-conceived escape attempt. But not from you."
"After all I have done for you!" the Governor chimed in, "You throw in your lot with him? And allow my daughter to do the same? He's a pirate!"

"Yes, he is." Will's voice did not even tremble. "He is an unprincipled criminal, for the most part."
"Then what in God's name are you doing?"

Elizabeth had turned her head to stare at her friend, despite her protective stance before Jack. His figure was tall and rigid with determined purpose.

"I'm fighting for something that's worth fighting for."
"And what is that?"
"Your daughter's soul."

A holy kind of quiet dipped upon the whole congregation. Elizabeth felt all eyes veer upon her.

"Would you care to explain yourself?" James asked in a low, edged voice. Now his eyes rushed to her, and scored her flesh with their intensity.

"Governor Swann, I know your daughter." Will continued, as though James had never spoken. "I have played and grown with her, I have been her confidant. And even I have been shunned from the truth she didn't dare to tell me. I understand the things she fears and I know her limits, and her sense of truth, and her spirit."

Elizabeth realised that the first tear was on her cheek. She fought against the rest.

"Governor, did you ever believe that she could do anything but die here? Do you believe she will settle like an ordinary woman, with an ordinary man? Do you think she can withstand it?"

Weatherby Swann had no answer to give – his expression was only half one of shock. The rest of him was struggling for denial, but unable to express it. He found that he couldn't lie.

"This pirate loves your daughter. I witnessed him losing himself to her, I've seen him kill for her protection." Will's tones swelled over the crowd, "He loves her with a purity to match any man. He offers her an escape. From your shackles. He is the only man I would have for her. A man of freedom. A little freedom, to compensate the rest."

Music Stops.

"Remember whose side you are on, young man." the Governor warned.
"I think you make sides too quickly." came the flashing reply, "I think you know whose side she is on, and you know she does it for reasons that overcome everything you stand for."

There was no answer to that, either.
Lizzie's father shook his head soundlessly, and turned to her with a hopeless expression.
"Is this what you really want? Elizabeth?"

"It's the only thing for me. I wouldn't be anything if I weren't here, between you and him."
"And I wouldn't be anything, now, if I ceased to belong to 'er."

She looked up at Jack, startled. His eyes were fixed on James and her father, stormy with fierce sincerity.

'One Last Shot'.

"Elizabeth?" James' tone cut through her in its innocent grief. "This is where your affections lie? Truly?"
"I'm sorry."
"You choose him over me?"
"I tried to tell you." she stood irresolutely against him, with sympathetic honesty, "I'm not the fine woman you want to marry, I wasn't made for it. You wouldn't listen."

He steadied himself, and seemed to swallow his sadness. It was logic, and he accepted logic.
"I wasn't to know."
"No. You weren't. But here I am, and I'm sorry." she repeated, "I can't expect forgiveness or mercy, but there's nothing else. You understand."

He and Jack exchanged brief looks. James nodded, slowly, thoughtfully.

"I cannot implore you?" her father broke in again, "I cannot convince you to stay?"
She shook her head, and the freedom seemed to burst from her in a wide, pure, involuntary smile. She shone.
"Be happy for me," she only said, "Father. I've made my choice."
There were no more words to explain herself. She was liberated, she belonged, she was her true self.
She didn't have to say it.

"Well…" her father looked about at the soldiers, at the Commodore, at Will. "What happens now?"

Jack stiffened, and suddenly grabbed her arm.
The parrot – he had seen it, as it flashed away over the battlements. She just caught its wing.
It was time.

"I have to say," Jack grinned in his ridiculous, charming manner as he strode flamboyantly out into the crowd, giving Elizabeth the discretion to move freely. "I'm actually feeling rather good about this. I think we've all arrived at a very unusual and… special place, eh?"

They motioned as one body, towards the same spot – as though fate drew them there, to their beginning place, their starting point. As though it reached out to offer them a new beginning now.

All they had to do was let go, to give over to the urge, and jump.

"Commodore! I 'ope this hasn't left bitterness between us. Good luck finding a lawful woman!"
"Jack!" she jabbed him in the side.
"William!..." he struggled, then settled for "Nice hat."
Will looked vaguely pleased.

"Governor! I will love this spirited lady until the day I perish. That I promise ye. She'll be as safe as if she were kept in your cosy manor for the rest of her days."
"What are you doing?" her father interjected, stepping forward. The crowd were beginning to wise up.

"Jack." she urged, shrugging her light overcoat off.
The company gasped as one, as she swiftly tore the laces from her corset, and sent it fluttering to the ground.
She had waited to do that for a long time.

"Friends!" he clasped his hands together gleefully, now speeding backwards, "This is the day that you will always remember as the day that you –"
And tripped.

She peered down over the precipice where he now plummeted.

The soldiers were closing in on her.
She jumped up onto the ledge, making them freeze in their tracks, and laughed aloud for sheer hearty rebellious liberated joy.

"This is the day that you will always remember!" she cried, with a voice that rose above everything, that laughed at each of them individually, and caressed them fondly as things below her. "As the day that you almost caught Captain Jack Sparrow – and Elizabeth Swann!"

Then she was sailing, sailing through air, flying through her vivacity, and she was screaming and laughing, and this was life. This was life. Finally, she knew it as everybody hoped to know it.
She belonged to the world again.

She slid into the water feet first, just a gasp of breath held in her, enough to help her kick to the surface.
He was waiting.

"You bumbling fool!" she yelled with glee, splashing him and laughing aloud, "I had to finish your famous last words for you!"
"You finished them for me?" he roared in return, delighted.
"Yes. I tacked a few of my own words onto the end. I hope you don't mind."

He splashed her back, and helped her out of the abominable dress until she was once again in her petticoat, much less encumbered.

"Well, then." he set off at an impressive pace, shouting back over his shoulder, "If ye don't drown before we reach the ship, I can thank ye once we're on board!"
"You'll be thanking me 'til the day you die, you ungrateful pirate!"
"Come along! Wouldn't want to get caught now!"

The Black Pearl emerged, dark and wonderful and incandescent, from behind the cliffs. Its black sails picked up the wind with expert practice. Ready to carry them fast and far across the ocean.
Home.

Her legs were stronger than she'd thought. The water divided for her like a curtain. Like a generous friend.
She swam after Jack, unable to prevent the grin on her face.
They had made it.
They were free.

A rope in the water. Jack's arm around her. More flying, more weightless, thrilling airborne joy. The deck, the ocean dripping from their clothes. It was a swirling excitement of faces and colour. Cheers and hats went up into the air like birds, she was wrapped in a long coat. Gibbs' coat. She was being shaken by the hand, Gibbs' hand.

Then, then. Another hand intercepting. A hand leading her to the helm, to the great wheel, where she stood looking up into his fine face, drinking him in like sunlight. He had his hat back – he was complete again.

He inclined his head to plant a sweet kiss on her lips, tasting of the sea they had just burst from, and everyone and everything else fell away for a moment. It was just the three of them. Jack, Lizzie. And the wide, wide ocean.

"I meant what I promised yer father." his eyes glinted, "Every word, luv."
She kissed him again, fiercely. He knew she agreed.

"Captain Sparrow." Ana Maria, stalking towards them, another great coat in her hands.
She smirked with real comradeship at Elizabeth, and then passed the garment over.

Lizzie threw the coat over Jack's shoulders. Her hands lingered on him.
"The Black Pearl. She's yours." she murmured.
"She's not the only one."

He drew her close, put her between himself and the wheel, and then rested his hands on the spokes with his arms either side of her. She could feel the new raw power surging through him. His fingers caressed the wood with a love beyond human relations – as one would caress one's redemption.

"Let's have our heading." he plucked the compass from his side and held it aloft. "On deck, you scabrous dogs! Man the braces! Let down and haul to run free!"

"Should I be preparing myself?" Lizzie asked playfully, in the warm cage of his arms, "For more of this commanding attitude – towards me? Captain?"
"Oh, only when you wants it, luv." his low laughter brushed her ear as one arm wound tightly, suggestively around her waist.

She smiled to herself, biting her lip in anticipation.
"For now…"

"Yes, for now… Just look at it. It's all waiting for us, impatiently." he stared over her shoulder at the glorious scene, the sails furling and catching the wind, the crew dashing about the deck. The beautiful distant line where the sky befriended the ocean. "Do you have all the things you wanted, 'Lizabeth?"
"More. Much more."

"Well, then... Bring me that horizon."

"Isle de Muerta?"
"You read my mind, darling. I have an awful lot of gloating and reveling to do."
"I want my fair share."
"Pirate."

They both beamed. Another quick, burning kiss. The Pearl cut through the waters like a hot black knife.
The fastest ship in the Caribbean.

His humming tickled her ear, and she recognised the tune with a high, untamed, joyous spirit.
"Mm-hmhmhm, hmhmhm…"

She flashed him a sly grin.
"And really bad eggs…"
The bonfire danced in their eyes. Their voices joined and were one.

"Drink up me hearties, yo-ho!"

'He's A Pirate'.

La Fin