Song of the Sea

Chapter Seven: The Attack

"You heard the lass. Get out of here!" hollered Jack to his crew. He hauled Diane away from the Pensieve and to her feet, keeping his arm around her for support. "Out! Out, dammit, am I your captain or not?!" Several members of the still-dumbfounded crew jumped to their feet and immediately began hauling the heavy trunks to the boats. One of them accidentally knocked the Pensieve over--the contents hissed and dissolved into silver mist, leaving a bone-crushing chill in the air.

"Jack," Diane hissed through still-clenched teeth, "forget the trunks. He'll be here--we walked into a trap."

"How the hell do you know that?" he demanded incredulously, and tipped some more ale down her throat. "Nothing's happened besides that bowl thing..." Just then, a chorus of the most inhuman shrieking--a raw, gurgling, somehow rotten series of howls came echoing down from the tunnels, followed by the curses and frightened yells of the pirates who'd already left. Both of them could distinctly hear the scrape of steel as several pirates drew their swords.

"Need more proof?" she said acidly, drawing her wand and struggling to her feet. Jack drew a sword, just as they heard another blood-curdling shriek and a sickening plop. They hurried into the tunnel, all nausea and weakness forgotten for Diane. She pushed Jack's arm off of her waist and followed him down the first tunnel, the two of them heading toward the yells and occasional squelches.

"Damning bloody hell!" yelled Jack as they stumbled upon the fight. He dashed toward his crew--she was closer to throwing up. The pirates were fighting...what looked like the Black Pearl's old cursed crew--but these weren't skeletons.

Corpses. Hideously rotten, decreped corpses, many without heads, most without some limbs. Even the headless ones, flailing their rotting arms, were still moving and still on their feet. An incrediblely putrescent stink wafted through the cave, making her stomach churn. She slipped back into the shadows, watching them with an equally inhuman fear. Their eyes were completely devoid of any concious thought and their wasted flesh glowed with a sickly white photophlorescence.

But Jack and his crew were out there, her friends were fighting for their lives. She bit her lip hard and grasped her wand, stepping out of the shadows. A thing, with a looling, hald-severed head and a rotting tongue lumbered straight for her.

"Reducto!" she yelled and the corpse let out a hideously gurgling shriek as the spell tore a gaping hole in its torse--but it didn't stop moving toward her. That was when it hit her--these things could be killed any further, and unless they were ripped to pieces, they would continue fighting. "Stupefy!" Like in the storm, her spell was muffed but the thing fell on its back. Quick as a flash, Diane Summoned a pile of rocks, dropping it on top of the corpse.

"Nice one!" called Jack, who was running past toward another corpse.

"Don't try killing them! Just knock them over, then we can get out!" she hollered back, her voice echoing with the pirates' yells and the corpses' howling, adding to the painful cacophony. "They're not living; they're just reanimated corpses!"

"And I didn't notice," said Jack dryly, driving a knife through the neck of one corpse and pinning it to another. "Interesting effect...now they're Siamese twins, savvy?" She didn't even have the energy to roll her eyes, just shot Stunning Spells all ove rthe tunnel. In the moment when all the corpses were either pinned or down, Jack yelled, "RUN!"

They all bolted for the exit, abandoning the trunks and many of them slipping in their haste. Even so, most of the pirates paused to stuff coins into their pockets and bags, and despite the situation, Diane couldn't help but marvel at them. Then again, she thought morbidly, they probably don't know the danger we're all in...

Suddenly, the tunnel, which had been filled with light, went dark and a wave of piercingly cold, dark mist seemed to shoot through the tunnel from somewhere near where the boats were. Fog started obscuring her eyes...oh no. Not here, not now!

"What the hell is going on?" said Jack's voice from about ten feet away, sans the usual comforting aloofness. With an immense effort, she stook her head to clear it and raised her wand.

"Lumos!" The wand tip flickered weakly, then lit with a flickering, sickly yellow glow. It was just barely enough to see by, and she could see the silouhettes of the pirates, heading back toward the light, Jack among them. He gave himself a little shake, as though pulling himself back together, and did a quick head count. His face dropped--they were two crew short. He'd just opened his mouth to say something when another wave of cold, far worse than the first, swept over them. As if the faint scene had been pasted over her eyes, she could see Solomon Annon's cold eyes upon his father...hear the old man's screams in the distance...suddenly, Jack compulsively gripped her arm. Her head cleared slightly, and with a titanic force of will, she erased the scene and focused on the smooth, rapid motion of the Pearl...

"Expecto Patronum!" she shouted at the top of her lungs. A blast issued from the end of her wand, and a chattering, blinding silver animal shot out of the end like a bullet. She expected it to be her usual cat--but it was a dolphin, diving in and out of shallow pools of water as it hurtles for the dark mist blocking the exit path. It dove headlong into a shadow, throwing it off its back and whipped several others with its powerful tail. As the dementors hurriedly glided away, the dolphin chattered and trilled at her, playfully splashing her with its fins before dissolving into silver mist.

A collective sigh rose from the group, and Jack goggled at her in high amazement, breathing harshly and holding a hand to his forehead. "What in Merlin's name are you staring at?" she yelled at him, panicking at the appearance of the dementors. "We have to go back for the others, then get out!" She started heading back toward the chamber, but he wouldn't let go of her arm.

"No! We don't have time for that!" he said firmly, regaining his wits. "Keep to the code!" A shudder ran through the pirates, but they dashed as one for the exit, Jack dragging Diane along, she still struggling to get free.

"What's the code?" she said furiously. He didn't even bother to look at her as they ran.

"Pirate's code. Whoever falls behind, is left behind." The soft note of regretful finality in his voice told her everything she needed to know.

"That's inhumane! We have to go back for them!" she yelled desperately, but he whipped around and clutched both of her arms.

"Don't do anything incredibly stupid, Diane. Now isn't the time to be noble--are you interested in martyrdom or in living?" Ignoring her protests, he dragged her toward the boat, but she didn't have the energy to resist after a few more seconds and just ran along with him, a crushing weight settling into her stomach as they finally stumbled into the boats. She mechanically tapped the backs of each of the boats and sat in the back, not even ready to summon up the energy to put her wand away. Two people already...dead. And all because of me...

Just when the Pearl started coming into view, the boat lurched and something heavy struck the back of her head. The world flashed once in a swirl of stormy color before darkness was slammed over her eyes.

She felt very warm when she woke up and dimly registered that she was lying on her side under several layers of blanket...back in the captain's cabin. Something was on the back of her head as well, and she had a killer headache. She moaned softly and tried to push herself up, but her head throbbed and the dim room spun dangerously, so she stopped.

"Smart of you, lassie," said Jack's voice good-naturedly from somewhere behind her. "Lying back down, I meant. Not getting knocked out." She automatically tried to jerk her head toward his voice, but the injury throbbed violently. He chuckled quietly.

"You're an awful patient, little Diane. Don't move your head like that. I'm gonna turn your head a bit and change the dressing." His hands reached around her and he gently placed a hand on her chin, slowly tilting her head so her neck was straight and her face away from him. Diane could feel the calluses and sword scars as they lightly scraped over her skin. She couldn't see him undoing the dressing, but the bandages were slowly loosening.

"What happened?" she asked urgently.

"Don't trouble your pretty little head too much," he replied vaguely.

"My pretty little head already is troubled, in case one pirate captain didn't notice," she retorted, regaining some of her usual sarcasm. "What in Merlin's name happened?"

"One of those boats you charmed was going too fast. You, if I remember correctly, were sitting in the back and the prow of the thing hit your pretty little head." He pulled off the last of the bandages and slowly began undoing the dressing.

"How bad is it?"

"Not too bad...bloodied up and you're going to have a lovely headache, but nothing worth crying over."

"Just like the lives of your crew?" The moment the words were out of her mouth, she seriously regretted them. Jack's fingers stiffened and he sighed heavily. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean it..." she whispered softly.

"I had to do that. You know I did. If we'd gone back, many more of us would be dead." He sighed again and rubbed her shoulders before returning to the dressing. Neither of them spoke for a while as he applied a new layer, a dark aura of tension hanging in the usually cheerful room. Wordlessly, he finished tying the last of the bandages and helped her to sit up, holding one arm around her to support her.

"Where did you learn to treat wounds?" she asked quietly, trying to break the tension. To her immense relief, he winked and poked her in the side.

"When you're a pirate captain, people tend to be bumped around a bit," he said dryly. Perhaps it was her imagination, but she could hear a slight accusatory tone in his voice. "What, don't trust me or something?"

"No...I trust your judgement," she said quietly, an implied apology for her words earlier. He grinned slightly and gently squeezed her waist. "I was just wondering where you picked it up."

"Speaking of wondering...what did you see in that bowl thing?" An involuntary shudder ran through her body as she recalled the disturbing images of the Pensieve. He loosened his hold for an instant. "If you don't feel like talking..." he began awkwardly.

"No, it's alright. I just was a little alarmed by the stuff that was in there." She then recounted the four separate visions, ending with the pale young man looking through the surface of the Pensieve. He listened with an oddly arrested look on his face as she told the story and remained silent for some time.

"What do you think that was about?" he asked finally, asking the question that had been spinning around in her mind.

"Well...most Pensieve visions have a kind of faded quality, almost as though you're looking at a highly colored dream or something. But when Solomon looked through the surface, that quality disappeared."

"You're sure it was the nutter?"

"How many nutters can there be in this world?" She rolled her eyes at him. "Anyway, you learn to look into the eyes of a wizard. He's got really weird eyes--silver."

Jack's eyebrows shot up slightly. "You mean grey? Grey like yours?"

"No, I mean silver. Silver with kind of a maniacal green glitter. It's hard to describe, but once you see it, you never forget it." She shivered mentally at the memory of those eyes, burning with hatred and bloodlust and again heard his shrieking voice, promising her death--

"You alright, lassie?" Jack asked with mild concern in his voice. She realized that the shiver had spread to her hands, which were shaking and making the top blanket shudder. With an effort of will, she forced the movement to shop, but not before Jack noticed it. He tightened his hold on her waist and grasped her hands. She didn't bother pushing him away and just leaned against his warm, solid shoulder.

"I'm fine. Just remembering."

"Mmm...savvy," he murmured vaguely, lasping back into deep thought as he slowly stroked her back. Several minutes later, he asked, "What book was Nutter Jr. reading? You didn't mention it, or did you not see it?"

Diane screwed up her memory--the book was very old. It had been bound with dark green leather and stamped with gold print...she could distinctly remember the word "demon" as well as a rather long word starting with "n"...

"Something on demons. Why'd you ask?"

"Remember that story you read to me? About how Merlin was the son of a demon and managed all the magical stuff?"

"Merlin was a normal human, not the son of a--"

"I know, but shut up for a moment and hear me out," he interrupted impatiently. His eyes were crackling with an electricity that she'd never seen there before. "Merlin wouldn't be able to do the stuff that the nutter has, savvy?"

"Right..." she said, totally nonplussed.

"And Merlin was a normal human?" She nodded again--if anything, she was growing more confused by the second. Where on earth was all this about Merlin going?

"Oh, for heaven's sake, Diane, that fall didn't knock your brains out, did it?" he said with a tinge of exasperation. "In that first memory, that lassie was pregnant and said something that scared the living daylights out of the old wart. In the second, the lassie was dead, probably from giving birth because she didn't look much older."

He paused for breath, then continued, "In the third memory, the old man brushed that pale little kid off and seemed to both hate and fear him..."

A light suddenly went off in Diane's head, immediately replaced by a wave of apprehension. "And in the fourth..." she said slowly.

"Nutter kid was reading a book on demons," finished Jack, struck by the same thought as her. Neither of them spoke for awhile, just staring at each other.

"I really, really hope you're just speculating," she whispered at last. He shrugged and tightened his grip on her.

"Don't think I am. It's the only reasonable conclusion, and Captain Jack Sparrow is never wrong," he said with a mirthless grin. "In this case, I wish he was."

Diane took a deep breath, fear flooding the pit of her stomach. "If neither of us are wrong and we're thinking along the same lines..."

"Powerful stuff...really un-savvy dead things..."

"...then he's a demon child." She shuddered as the words came out of her mouth and Jack sighed, gently soothing her with his hands...but in truth, he was just as frightened as she was.

A/N: I DID IT!!! I MANAGED TO WRITE THIS STILL!!! Aren't you people proud of me? Ok, sorry about that, but I am very happy that I can still keep up with this. Review please, and constructive crit is rewarded by bottles of rum!

In Captain Jack Sparrow we trust,

-starshimmer

Thanks for reviewers:

Slytherin queen: Eh, first day was alright, and I can still write! YAYNESS!

Celticstarwolf: Yes, he is rather taken with her, but she doesn't know, poor girl.

pottersister666: Yeah, eyes are creepy...*shudders*, but I did manage to write!

meJDgurl4ever: No, it's not Diane...*looks around shiftily*

Maryn: Romance is good...right now, it's more like a comfortable friendship because Diane's so set against romance; she doesn't know how lucky she is.

Vanity Kidman: Jack seemed too sweet? OK, is this chappie better or did I just sappy him up more?

seraph: Characters from the film? Maybe a few cameos...not much more than that. As for wizards...eh, I'm not too good with introducing canon characters, but I can try.

Iluckygirl14: Ah, well, it takes them a while because they're both so thick-headed, hehe.

musicmage: Next chapter, I take care of everyone important's backstory, or at least some of it...I promise!!

DarkWitch13: I am writing more, not gonna be easy, but I tries.

Crystale_Black: I did the thoughts right? Yay! Thank you!

Pirate Perian: Thanks, and its good to hear that she isn't a Mary-Sue.

Mistress A.S.: I think that I remedied the MS thing in later chapters, but I've only seen the movie twice, so forgive me on Jack.