Norrington's Darling

Up Is Down

POV: Zuri Norrington

Time moved differently in the Locker. I tried to keep track of the time we had been in the Locker, but day and night was odd here, just as the air was dry and scentless. Before long, I had lost track. Shortly after, we ran out of water.

Jack toyed with the map, examining it and idly turning it. He seemed to be talking to himself, but Barbossa had fallen into a sullen silence, I was too busy trying to keep my stomach, and the crew was too busy—

"What's that?" Jack leapt to his feet. Barbossa's head snapped to him as Jack ran to the side. "What IS that?" Gibbs and Will joined him. "I dunno. What do you think?" The question was aimed at his shoulder. Jack had gone crazy, hadn't he?

"Where?" asked Gibbs.

"There," said Jack, eyeing the empty horizon. Vaguely I wondered if the Locker had messed up his head permanently.

Jack gave a little cry, then scurried to the other side of the ship. Several crew members followed. Jack muttered to himself and raced back to the other side of the ship, still making odd sounds and mumbling to himself.

Jack was talking to himself...and running back in forth. Had I not been so desolate and hopeless, I might have found it amusing. But the deficit of water and the unlikelihood of ever seeing my James again made the scene vaguely annoying.

"Ahhh beeehherrr!" The sound Jack made next wasn't one I had heard before. Then he ran back to the other side of the ship. Gibbs rolled his eyes but followed again. Ragetti's eye rolled across the map as the ship began to sway and rock from side to side. Barbossa clamped his hand over the eye. Now Tia, Elizabeth, Tai Huang, and some of the crew from Singapore had joined Jack. I rose unsteadily.

"What is it?" asked Elizabeth. She appeared to be as clueless as the rest of us.

"Er—eeeeuuuuhhh!" cried Jack. He launched himself to the other side of the Pearl. The ship gave a lurch and suddenly I understood. I raced to the map, looking down at what Jack had discovered. 

"He's rockin' the ship!" Pintel realized.

"We're rockin' the ship!" cried Gibbs.

On the map, Jack had put together new words: Up is down. A smile curled across my lips, the first since we'd recovered Jack from that spit of beach.

"He's brilliant," I gasped.

"Aye," agreed Barbossa. "He onto it!"

The ship groaned as the weight of the crew going from one side to the next rocked it.

"He's rockin' the ship," repeated Pintel. My estimation of his intelligence went down a hundredfold.

Ragetti ran to him with rope. "We'll tie each other to the mast, upside down, so when the boat flips, we'll be the right way up!" Pintel apparently thought this was a great idea and followed him.

"Time it to the swell!" shouted Barbossa. As the others continued running, I joined them. He disappeared downstairs to yell, "Lose the cannons, you stinking bilge rats! Unstow the cargo, let it shift!"

Below the deck came the sounds of men falling over themselves to follow his orders, barrels slamming to the ground, cannons rolling from their places. Ragetti and Pintel succeeded in tying themselves upside down, watching us as we raced across the deck.

My body protested. It had been growing heavier over the past few weeks, thanks to doing nothing on a ship for such a long period of time among other things, and now I was at the point where this exertion was not pleasant. My stomach felt tight as I ran beside my brother, who turned to grin at me. I mustered a grin in return, somehow. 

Barbossa joined us. The ship  slowly made progress as we ran.  A few unlucky sailors fell into the sea; one was smashed by a cannon. We all gave a collective groan for the poor man. Our feet lifted off the deck. We hung by our hands. I held tight to the banister of the Pearl as she tilted tilted tilted—

"Now up," Jack began as the opposite rail met water, "is down!"

The masts crashed into the water and with them the Pearl turned over completely. Loose cannons began to drift off the deck and Will sank, catching rigging to stop himself from sinking forever. I tightened my grip, praying my fingers would not suddenly lose their strength for however long we remained underwater.

The Pearl stopped groaning as it settled into its new position. The crew exchanged looks. I glanced at Jack, who gave me a reassuring nod. 

At last the sun sunk beneath the horizon. Magic rippled through the water as the sky and water around us flashed an emerald green. The ship began to creak as we raced downward...but no. We were racing up to the surface, the surface of the land of the living.

The Black Pearl broke the surface with a thunderous crash and a mighty spray of water. Coughing and grasping for breath, I sank to the deck and reached for Jack. He held me close as the water sloshed off the deck and soon he was helping me stand.

We struggled to our feet. I looked to Tia, who nodded. We were back. Gone was the thump of Jones' heart beneath our feet. The smell of the sea had returned and the air was ripe with the moisture that belonged there. I took in a lungful of air—real air. 

"Blessed sweet westerlies!" cried Gibbs. He spat water out as he struggled to his feet. "We're back!"

Jack let me go as he steadied himself. "Welcome back to life, Jackie," I said quietly. I couldn't tell if he looked relieved or terrified.

Elizabeth stumbled. "It's...a sunrise!" And indeed, the sun was glowing on the horizon, rising every second, when I turned to it. For every sunset in the Locker, a sun had risen in the land of the living. I wondered how many days had passed. I wondered what my dear James had done with them.

James. I clutched my stomach, suddenly feeling sick. He'd warned me before we'd separated that he might not survive. Had it been a warning? Had he done something incredibly stupid that would get him killed?

"You would know," Tia said softly to me. "You would know." For some reason, I found that relaxing. Tia always knew.

The sun was warm on my face. I closed my eyes and tilted up my head, soaking up its golden rays. Here, this. This was home. This was life. After my trip within the Locker, I would never again regret my days here.

Perfection never seemed to last forever when it came to me. I didn't know why I expected it to stay that way now. And, of course, it did not.

Barbossa turned and pulled a gun on my brother.