"Where's the Commodore?" Gibbs asks.
When nobody replies, I answer. "He fell behind."
"My prayers be with him. Best not wallow in our grief. The bright side is: You're back. And made it off free and clear." He says to Jack. Suddenly the Flying Dutchman surfaces alongside us.
"I'll handle this, mate." Jack says, stepping forward.
"Hey! Fishface! Lose something? Hey! Oup!" Jack falls down the stairs of the Pearl.
Smooth, Jack.
Smooth.
"Got it!" Jack stands up, struts across the deck, holding his jar of dirt proudly. "Come to negotiate, eh, have you, you slimy git? Look what I got. I got a jar of dirt! I got a jar of dirt! And guess what's inside it?"
"Enough!" Jones spits out. The Flying Dutchman's cannon covers slide down, cannons emerge from the holes. Great.
"Hard to starboard." Jack says quietly.
"Hard to starboard!" Elizabeth screams.
"Brace up the foreyard!" Will continues.
"Hard to starboard!" And Gibbs finishes.
A heavy cannonade fires from the Flying Dutchman, blowing large holes in the Pearl.
"She's on us! She's on us!" Pintel yells.
More cannons fire behind us. I stand by Gibbs, watching the Dutchman slowly falling behind.
"She's falling behind!" Elizabeth exclaims
"Aye, and we've got her!" Gibbs says.
"We're the faster?" Will asks.
"Against the wind the Dutchman beats us. That's how she takes her prey. But with the wind . . ." Gibbs explains.
"We rob her advantage." Will finishes.
"Ah!" Gibbs says walking away.
"They're giving up! Yay!" Marty exclaims, looking away from the ship fading in the distance.
The crew cheers. I make my way to Jack, feeling safer with him by my side. Will walks up to us.
"My father is on that ship. If we can outrun her, we can take her. We should turn and fight." Will says.
"Why fight when you can negotiate? All one needs . . . is the proper leverage." Jack sets his jar down. Suddenly the Black Pearl shakes. Jack's jar of dirt falls to the deck, breaks open and spills all the dirt. Jack runs down to the spilled dirt, searching frantically for the something.
"Where is it? Where is the thump-thump?" Jack asks, continuing to search the dirt.
I was just about to ask Jack what he was talking about when a crew member yells out "We must've hit the reef!"
Everyone, including me but not Jack, goes over to the railing to examine it.
"No. It's not a reef! Get away from the rail!" Will grabs Elizabeth and me, pulling us away from the railing.
"Then what is it?" I ask, looking confused at Elizabeth, who has the same face on.
"The Kraken. To arms!" Will commands.
"All guns, defend the masts!" Gibbs yells out.
"It'll attack the starboard. I've seen it before. Break out the cannons and hold for my signal." Every crew member aboard the Pearl does as he says, they grab spears, swords and also prepare the cannons. A deep rumbling sound catches the attention of every breathing being on the ship. The Kraken's tentacles slowly crawl up the hull.
"Easy, boys!" Will says, going below decks.
"Will?" Elizabeth asks.
The tentacles rise higher.
"Steady! Steady." The crew members seem really jumpy.
"Will?" Elizabeth repeats.
The tentacles start feeling around the ship.
"Hold. Hold . . ."
"I think we've held fire long enough." Pintel complains.
"Will!" I yell.
"Fire! The crew fire the cannons, hitting the tentacles and nearly severing some. The Kraken sinks into the sea, some tentacles glowing from the blast. Everybody aboard the ship cheers in triumph.
"It'll be back. We have to get off the ship" Will says, backing away from the railing.
"There's no boats though, genius." I say, placing my hands on my hips.
Will notices the wrecked boats, then sets his eyes on the barrels of gunpowder.
"Pull the grates! Get all the gunpowder onto the net in the cargo hold." Will hands Elizabeth a long gun.
"Whatever you do, don't miss." He tells her.
"As soon as you're clear." Elizabeth replies. The crew is busy loading barrels of gunpowder from the hold.
"We are short stocked on gunpowder. Six barrel." A crew member says to Gibbs.
"There's only half a dozen kegs of powder!" He passes the message to Will, who just came down to his level of deck.
"Then load the rum!" Will leaves the crew quickly after that.
Gibbs seems shocked, then turns to see the entire crew halted, staring at him in shocked silence.
"Aye! The rum, too" Gibbs says. The crew continues loading, adding run to the mix of gunpowder.
"Step to!" Elizabeth runs to the railing, sees Jack rowing away. "Oh, you coward!" A heavy thud hits the Pearl.
"Pull away!" Will commands the crew.
"Heave! Heave like you're being paid for it!" Gibbs yells to the members of the crew who are raising the net up.
Will hangs onto the side of the net of gunpowder barrels, attempting to attract the Kraken's attention, failing miserably.
"Euh! Come on! I'm over here! Come on!" Will slashes at tentacles with his sword. A tentacle hits the net too hard and so the net wraps around the tentacle. Will holds on to the net and miraculously stays on it.
Only his foot is caught in the net.
"Shoot! Elizabeth, shoot!" Elizabeth hesitates, waiting for Will to fall free.
She's not going to shoot you idiot! She loves you too much to shoot now!
Suddenly, one of the Kraken's tentacles wraps around Elizabeth's leg and drag her backwards. She drops the gun in the process. I know that should help her, but Will just lost the only person he could trust to shoot.
Or did he?
I run over to the gun and aim it at the net, waiting for Will to fall. I'm like Elizabeth, in not going to shoot while he's still caught. A tentacle grabs me and lifts me up. Screaming, I am thrown close to the wheel, but not close enough to hit it. Better then being dead, right?
I look up over at Elizabeth, who is trying to pull the rifle under someone's boot. Jack picks up the rifle and takes aim at the gunpowder. Will falls to the deck as the bullet makes contact with the barrels. The Kraken releases its hold, burned tentacles withdraw into the ocean.
The remaining members of the crew come out of there hiding places.
"Did we kill it?" Marty asks.
"No. We just made it angry. We're not out of this yet. Captain! Orders!" Gibbs runs up to Jack.
"Abandon ship. Into the longboat."
"Jack! The Pearl!"
Jack stops in quick thought. "She's only a ship, mate."
Jack . . . !
"He's right, we have to head for land."
Nobody cares, Elizabeth.
"'S a lot o' open wa'er." Pintel adds.
"That's a lot o' wa'er." Ragetti agrees.
"We have to try. We can get away as it takes down the Pearl." Will agrees also.
"Abandon ship. Abandon ship or abandon hope."
The crew get ready to leave the Pearl, loading supplies and guns.
"Jack," I walk up to him. "You can't seriously be thinking about this. It's the Pearl. You've wanted her forever and you're just going to let her go like this. By some ugly sea monster who takes orders from someone who has tentacles on his face?!"
"Crimson-" Jack starts before I interrupt.
"You're planning something, I know you are. You always are."
"Zariya, sacrifices have to be made someti-"
"Jack! Are you even listening to yourself?! You are letting the Pearl go! You will never get her back again!"
"Shut up, Riya! I made my decision. Now go!" Jack points to the longboat.
I hesitate only for a second before marching off to the longboat. Jack has never yelled at me before. He did some weird Jack screams, sure, but he never yelled.
I guess that people change.
And sometimes not for the better.
"Prepare to cast off! There's no time to lose! Come on, Will, step to!" Gibbs announces.
"Where's Jack?" Will asks after Elizabeth took a seat in the longboat.
"He elected to stay behind to give us a chance." The crew look at her uncertain. "Go!" She commands.
The longboat takes off.
I know that I should feel bad about leaving Jack here . . .
But I don't.
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I thought a little suspense at the end of the chapter would be a change.
Tell me what you thought of the chapter. Sorry it took so long to update. This chapter was so long that it took some time to edit.