“Up you go!” Jack announced.

Elizabeth shot him a disparaging look.  “Up?”  She looked up at the rigging high above her.  She had climbed up there several times, clinging to the ropes like a seasoned sailor in order to aid a crewmember in tying a knot or getting the sails readied.  Each time she had done it without thinking, without worrying about the likelihood of her falling to a premature death on the deck of the Bonny Lass.

“Yes.  Up.  Today we’re going to spend some time up in the crow’s nest.”  Elizabeth’s gaze continued up even higher.

“Can two people fit in there?” 

Jack laughed.  “It’s a lot bigger than it looks from down here.  Now…up you go!”  Elizabeth hesitated.  “I’ll be right behind you…or…under you, as the case may be.”  His voice started off soft, but then he offered an eyebrow wiggle on the last bit.

It had the effect he likely wanted it to.  Elizabeth made a sound of frustration and started the climb.  Jack stood below her, waiting for her to get high enough up for him to follow.  She had just cleared that point when Jack took the first few steps upward.  “You know, Lizzie, this is when I really wish you still wore dresses.” 

Elizabeth rolled her eyes and without thinking, lashed out with one foot.  She connected solidly with Jack’s forehead and was somewhat dismayed when she heard him let out a loud “oof” and was even more dismayed when she heard him land hard on the deck.  She stopped climbing to look down at him.

“Miss Swann!” he shouted up at her as he rose.  “That is not a nice thing to do to your captain!”  She couldn’t quite tell if his voice was truly angry, embarrassed, or just merely amused.  “You better move, missy.”  And with those words, he raced back to the rigging and started to climb after her.

Letting out a squeal, Elizabeth started to climb rapidly, not really entirely paying attention to where her feet were stepping.  More than once, she slipped a little and was forced to hold on tightly lest she lose her balance and fall.  It was a race all the way up to the crow’s nest.  For each bit she advanced, Jack was close by.  He never overtook her, however, and she knew with almost certainty that he was purposely holding back.

When she finally got to the top, she had to hang onto the top of the wooden structure and heave herself up and over.  Not an easy feat and had she been a shorter or weaker woman, she likely wouldn’t have been able to do it on her own.  As is, she just barely had the strength to pull herself over it.  She collapsed inside, sitting down to catch her breath.

Jack, following right behind her, was relieved to see her disappear inside the Crow’s nest.  It made things easier for him.  He paused for a moment and caught the eye of Gibbs, who was standing at the helm.  He nodded at the man and waved him off.  Gibbs clearly knew exactly what the captain wanted and handed off the helm to the only other person Jack would trust with the wheel, a young man far too bright for the likes of this crew.  Jack followed his progress and when the older man entered Elizabeth’s cabin, shutting the door quietly behind him, finally turned away.  Smiling, Jack followed Elizabeth into the crow’s nest, disappearing from the view of the rest of the crew.

Gibbs breathed a sigh of relief as he shut the door to Elizabeth’s cabin, reaching up to light the one small lamp in the room.  He didn’t like doing this, not a bit.  But Jack had asked and he had to agree.  Well, no, he knew he could have refused Jack’s request.  Jack would never hold it against him.  But what he also knew was that Jack would have found someone to do this duty, someone with far less respect and scruples than he.  Or Jack would have done it himself.

For some reason, he liked the thought of the latter less than anything else.  It was not entirely that he was protecting Jack, though in some ways he knew he was, but more like he wanted to keep things on the ship on an even keel.  If Jack and Elizabeth had a row, who knows what life would be like on the ship?  The two were both incredibly dominant personalities, both stubborn beyond belief.  And stupid to boot.  Yes.  Stupid.  Gibbs hated to admit it to himself, but Jack and Elizabeth had been dancing around each other, completely obtuse to what seemed to be going on in the head of the other.

And so now he had to go find evidence that something was haunting Elizabeth.  Sometimes he could kick himself for bringing anything up to that man.  “Find proof, Mr. Gibbs…figure her out, Mr. Gibbs…go dig through the lady’s under things, Mr. Gibbs.”  Alright.  The last ultimately wasn’t too bad, even if it were a bit embarrassing.

 A quick glance around her abode showed that it was a very spartan arrangement.  The narrow bed was pushed into one corner, with a small desk and chair pushed into the other.  A threadbare rug was thrown on the floor next to the bed, no doubt where her dog slept each night.  There wasn’t much there to inspect. 

He moved first to the desk, quickly opening drawers and rifling through the contents.  Most were empty, but in the ones that had something in them, he found the various tools of map reading.  He knew they weren’t Jack’s, for they were much smaller and simpler than the elaborately carved tools he owned, and Gibbs wondered briefly where they had come from.  Maps were stuffed into the top drawer, piled upon each other, each with various notes in the margins in neat script.  What he did not find was any sort of evidence to back up his claim that Elizabeth was haunted by something she wasn’t sharing with them. 

He moved on to the things she had pushed under the bed, kneeling down to pull out whatever he could find, first drawing out with a few extra shirts and a pair of pants.  Apparently the crew had been giving her various items and he was grateful for their forethought.  He hadn’t really thought of the fact that Elizabeth had little in the way of clothes and what she had come on board the ship with had been torn and bloodstained from the shark incident.  He had only been worried that she would not be allowed on and all his energies had been focused on getting Jack to allow her to continue on with them.

Once that had occurred, well, he had been fully involved in getting the betting going.  It had occupied far too much of his off-duty time.

He found nothing within the clothes under her bed.  Yet another disappointment.  He pulled himself up off the floor, joints creaking as he did so.  Yer getting’ too old for this stuff, Joshamee, ol’ boy. 

He sat down on her bed and sighed.  Nothing.  Not a damned thing.  He had looked everywhere.

A whisper of thought passed through his mind and he looked down.  The only place he hadn’t looked was the bed.  He stood and tore the pillow and covers off the bed, finally following with the bed as well. 

He almost missed it.  It seemed to be just a scrap of cloth left behind, shoved under the palette. He almost tossed the bed back down in frustration.  He almost walked out of the cabin with nothing, no proof, nothing to show Jack.  But then he picked up that scrap of cloth and discovered it was not just some random scrap of clothing, but rather a small shirt, shoddily sewn for the most part, and certainly too small for Elizabeth or anyone else on the ship.  It was small…like a child’s.  He let that though roll around in his mind for a moment, horrified at th extent of his discovery.  This was not what he was expecting.

Finally realizing his search was done, Gibbs carefully replaced everything, put it all back where he had found it, straightening things up and trying to make it as neat as Elizabeth had left it.

He carefully opened the door of Elizabeth’s cabin, looking immediately up to the crow’s nest.  The two were still up there, standing now, facing out with a spyglass pointed toward the horizon.  They were paying no heed to him, though he was surprised to note Jack’s dark eyes flitted down to him for just a moment.

Breathing a sigh of relief at getting in and out of Elizabeth’s cabin unseen, Gibbs headed straight for the helm, taking it from the man who he had left in charge.  It was a much more comfortable place for him.

“Do you know why I brought you up here today?”  They had been sitting in the crow’s nest for some time, just enjoying the sway of the ship underneath them.  It was much more prominent when high above the deck.  The first time many young sailors had gone up into the crow’s nest, they ended up having to crawl down and clean up after themselves.  Seasickness and the position went hand in hand.  Jack was glad, for more than one reason, to note that Elizabeth’s constitution was stronger than most.  This was a girl who was a natural sailor, despite the station she was born to in life.

Elizabeth just looked blankly at him, causing him to stand and hold out a hand.  She didn’t take the proffered hand, instead opting to prove she could stand on her own despite the swaying of the ship.

Jack shrugged at her reaction, opting not to say anything about the refusal.  He pointed in a direction that was slightly northeast.  “Do you see it?” 

She shook her head.  She saw birds, more sea.  The colour from so far up was fascinating, the striations of turquoise and a darker blue was breathtaking.  But somehow she didn’t think that was quite what he had meant.  He was pointing further off into the distance, toward the horizon.

“No?”  He smiled and held up a device to her.  “Now look.”  He brought it up to one of her eyes and she did as he instructed, gasping as suddenly she was staring at what appeared to be an island.  She had seen Jack and other sailors use them, but she hadn’t had a chance to look through one herself.  She hadn’t had any idea that they brought distant objects this close.

“It’s amazing,” she murmured.  “What is the island, Jack?”

“It’s a chance to stock up before we go after Barbossa”

“You know where he is?”  It was the first time he had truly spoken of Barbossa since he started training her to captain the Bonny Lass. She hadn’t been sure he even had any idea where he was.  “How?”

Jack reached into one of the many pockets on his outfit and pulled something out.  He held it out in front of her and said words she hadn’t heard in a long time.  “Tell me, Elizabeth, what is it you want most in this world?”

She smiled.  The words brought back a world of memories and for just a moment her heart felt light.  It took her back to a time before she had betrayed Jack, before Will had become the captain of the Flying Dutchman, before her hasty marriage to him.  Hasty?  Was that what she really thought of her marriage?  Something hastily decided upon in the heat of battle, when she didn’t have the time to sit down and really think, really decide if it were truly what she wanted?

Perhaps she really did feel that way.  She didn’t want to examine those thoughts.

“I want the Pearl as much as you do, Jack.”

“Really?”  He handed her the compass.

“I don’t want to look at it Jack.”  She remembered the last time she had, the confusion it had created inside her heart.

“Just look.”  She couldn’t resist the seductive tone of her voice and lifted the cover slightly.  She glanced down for a moment before slamming it shut, thrusting it back into Jack’s hands.

Her eyes rose to his, meeting his, the kohl bringing out the smile within them.  “Like what you see?” he asked and she wasn’t sure if he meant the compass or something…or rather, someone else.