Jack climbed like a man who had made a terrible decision and refused to admit it.
The palace wall was hotter than it had any right to be. Sun-baked stone pressed into his palms, his boots scraped for horizontal land and every breath like he was a dragon breathing fire. That would look cool at least.
He'd already committed, though. Which meant the only sensible thing to do was continue committing.
"Up we go," he muttered to himself, scaling a decorative ledge that looked like it was built for birds. "Nothing suspicious about a pirate climbing a royal palace. Perfectly normal. Practically encouraged."
He reached a balcony—white pillars, sheer curtains fluttering, the faint scent of floral oil drifting out like an invitation. Jack's grin flashed, self-satisfied.
"Ah. A balcony. Balconies always mean—" He hauled himself up and swung a leg over. "—someone rich is nearby."
He landed lightly, dusted his hands, and straightened his coat as if he'd arrived through a front door with an appointment.
Then he froze.
Because he felt it. Multiple pairs of eyes. And the moment he looked up, he got proof—high, sharp screams.
Two maids stood at the edge of the chamber, mouths open, hands half-raised in a helpless attempt at bravery.
One screamed, "PIRATE!"
The other screamed, "IN HER MAJESTY'S CHAMBERS!"
Jack blinked once, then twice, and raised a hand in a slow wave.
"Good afternoon."
The first maid didn't stop. "THE TALL DARK AND HANDSOME PIRATE IS IN HER MAJESTY'S CHAMBERS!"
Jack's mouth twitched. He couldn't help it.
Tall, dark, and handsome.
He tilted his head, savoring it like good rum. "Well," he said to nobody in particular, "that's just flattering, even if a bit insulting."
The second maid grabbed the first by the sleeve and started dragging her away, but she still found time to throw a furious look back at Jack.
"And don't think we didn't see the way you landed like you owned the chamber!"
"I do own the chamber and if you allow me," Jack said tipping his hat and trying to look charming, "even your heart."
The maid looked like she was deciding whether to faint or throw a vase at him. She chose screaming again and retreating at speed.
Jack sighed with theatrical patience. "All right, all right. No need for panic. I'm not here to—"
He stopped short.
Because past the curtains, framed by soft light and regal décor, stood a woman who made the entire room feel like it had been built around her.
She was beautiful in a way that didn't feel fragile. Flowing blue hair, dark eyes that didn't flinch, a slender figure wrapped in formal royal attire: a purple blouse, a white robe with a pink border draped over her shoulders, gold jewelry at her neck and wrist, earrings that caught the light when she moved.
And she had a large stomach—undeniably pregnant.
Jack's eyebrows lifted.
His brain, which normally prioritized treasure and self-preservation, tried to pivot to something "pirate-y" out of habit. His instincts offered him options he'd seen uglier men take.
He immediately rejected all of them.
"No," Jack told himself firmly. "We're not doing that. It shouldn't be done by me."
He cleared his throat and, as if performing for an audience he could not see, straightened his posture into what he imagined "respectable" looked like.
"A tall, dark, and handsome man," Jack said under his breath, "is not supposed to do the creepy things. Only the creepy men do the creepy things."
His gaze drifted off, as if he were pointing his judgment at the universe.
"Ugly ones. Greasy ones. The ones who smell like boiled socks and disappointment. The ones whose personalities are made of… of—" he searched for something suitably vicious "—moldy cheese and lies."
He paused, then added, because it felt right, "Like Pintel."
The woman in the center of the room didn't blink.
She stepped forward and placed herself between Jack and the two trembling maids behind her—shielding them with her body despite her condition.
That alone told Jack she was no porcelain figurehead queen.
"State your purpose," she said, voice even, controlled, the tone of someone who'd had to sound calm while her world burned around her.
Jack lifted both hands, palms open.
"Nearest exit," he said quickly. "That's all I want. I will leave. I don't want your jewels, I don't want your… very expensive curtains, I don't want your—" he glanced at a polished table "—ceramic items, and I most certainly do not want your royal wrath and maybe warmth."
The maids behind her stared at him like he'd just said he didn't want oxygen.
The queen's eyes narrowed a fraction. "A pirate who claims he wants nothing."
Jack smiled, hoping it looked sincere and not like a thief trying to escape after failing to steal, "I have very honorable intentions."
One maid whispered loudly, because subtlety clearly wasn't a palace requirement. "He says that like it's a real sentence."
The other maid hissed back, "If he's honorable, I'm a marine."
Jack's smile tightened. "You wound me."
The queen's gaze flicked—not at Jack's face, but at the room. At the curtains. At the balcony. Like she was tracking something else, anticipating movement.
Jack noticed, and that made his own instincts flare.
His senses tingled, a sharp prickling along the back of his neck.
Someone was coming.
Not the usual heavy-footed stamp of soldiers. This felt… sudden. Like the air itself had shifted. Like there was.... sand.
Jack moved on reflex, his body sliding away as if pulled by a thread he couldn't see.
He reappeared near the balcony ledge just as something formed where he'd been standing.
Sand—coalescing into a human shape.
A woman stepped out of it with irritation rolling off her like heat from stone.
Black hair. A cigar between her fingers. A hook where a hand should've been. A presence that made even royalty feel like it should take a step back.
Jack's face lit up with furious relief.
"Ah! Croco!" he snapped. "There you are! I was wondering where you disappeared off to after—LEAVING ME WITH THE GUARDS!"
The woman's eyes went flat with murderous patience. "Don't call me that."
"Oh, I'll call you what I like," Jack said, offended. "I was captured. I was interrogated. I was threatened. I was—" he gestured vaguely "—mistreated by a man with a very square jaw and no sense of hospitality."
The queen stared at the newcomer.
Not at Jack. At her.
And the shock in her expression wasn't the shock of seeing a stranger.
It was recognition.
The maids, sensing the shift, went silent in a way that felt like fear learning how to kneel.
Jack followed the queen's gaze, then looked back at Crocodile, and then back again.
The resemblance hit him late, like a delayed punch.
The shape of their eyes. The line of the cheekbones. The same hard calm buried beneath different lives.
Jack's mouth opened slightly.
The queen spoke first, voice tighter now. "Who is this?"
Crocodile clicked her tongue, annoyance sharpening. She clearly didn't want to be here. Didn't want this room, these eyes, this moment.
Jack, unfortunately, lived for moments.
He leaned his head side to side, studying them like a man watching a theater play he had paid to see.
Then he smiled—wide, delighted, wrong.
"Oh," Jack said, as if the answer had been obvious all along. "You're family."
Crocodile's eyes narrowed. "Don't."
Jack ignored her and kept going, because Jack Sparrow had never met a boundary he didn't try to climb.
He pointed at the queen, then at Crocodile, then back at the queen.
"You look too similar," he said. "And that name… Nefer—Nefert—Nefar—whatever it is, it's not a tavern name. It's a family name. A big one."
The queen's lips parted, and Crocodile's expression sharpened into warning.
Jack raised a finger dramatically.
"I've got it," he announced. "Croco! You are the long-lost queen of Alabasta! Exiled by your brother who wanted the throne for himself! He tried to kill you, so you turned to piracy, swore vengeance, and became a… a desert legend."
For a moment, the room just stared at him.
Then Crocodile snapped.
"It wasn't like that!"
Jack's eyes widened. "So it was something!"
Crocodile took a step, sand twitching around her feet. "I wasn't exiled. I left on my own."
The queen's breath caught. Her eyes flicked between Crocodile and Jack like she couldn't decide which was the greater threat.
Jack, meanwhile, looked pleased with himself for landing anywhere near the truth.
He brushed dust off his sleeve and—because he was Jack Sparrow—sat down on the edge of a low table as if he'd been invited.
The maids stared at him like he'd just insulted the entire concept of furniture.
"What are you doing?" the queen demanded, incredulous.
Jack settled in. "Listening. I want to hear family truths and drama. It's rare I get to witness royal scandal in person."
Crocodile's hook slashed toward him.
Jack blocked with his sword, grunting as pain lit up his arm like a warning bell.
He bared his teeth. "Why are you attacking me? I'm merely—"
He stopped.
Because the queen gasped.
A sudden wet sound—water splashing on stone.
Everyone turned.
The queen clutched her stomach, face tightening. Her breath hitched. Her knees bent slightly.
The maids behind her shrieked.
"She—she—!"
Crocodile's eyes widened in genuine alarm, and she barked the first useful thing she'd said all day.
"Help her!"
Jack blinked, then—because the timing was, in fact, absurd—let out a helpless laugh that died in his throat when the queen's pain became undeniable.
Guards stormed in.
Steel glinted. Boots thundered. The room filled with bodies and urgency.
Cobra himself followed, older than he should've looked, eyes haunted by days without sleep. Igaram entered with him, tall and broad, mustache stiff, expression snapping between confusion and fury.
Cobra's gaze landed on Jack first—anger flaring.
Then it snapped to Crocodile.
Shock.
Then to the queen—
Worry, relief, desperate love all at once.
He rushed to her side, catching her hand as she groaned.
Igaram looked like he was trying to process three different disasters simultaneously.
"Why is there a pirate in—" he began.
"Why is there another woman—" he continued.
"How is the queen in—" he finished, horrified, as understanding struck. "Labor."
The maids caught the queen as she swayed.
Igaram moved fast, clearing space, lifting her carefully onto the bed with more gentleness than his body suggested he was capable of. Cobra stayed by her side, holding her hand like it was the only stable thing left in the world.
He glanced toward Crocodile, voice lowering.
"Lili…" he whispered.
Crocodile's face tightened at the name and she turned her head away, jaw clenched so hard it looked like she could bite through pride.
Jack stood awkwardly beside her, sword still in hand, suddenly aware he had wandered into something far bigger than his usual mess.
Then the palace shook.
A distant boom rolled through the stone like thunder.
Another, closer.
A guard burst into the chamber, panicked, sweat streaking his face.
"Your Majesty!" he shouted, voice breaking. "Jamie Carragher—he's here! Himself!"
Cobra's eyes widened.
Igaram's face hardened.
Crocodile's expression shifted into something colder than the desert night.
Jack's mouth opened, ready to say something completely unhelpful—
Outside the city wall, Van Augur faced the swordsman with the glasses.
Smoke curled around Gerrard's coat. The katana in his hand looked too clean for the carnage it had created.
Gerrard tilted his head slightly, studying Augur like a problem that needed solving.
"Why are you attacking fellow pirates?" Gerrard asked calmly. "Are you here for profiting off the chaos? Or merely stupid?"
Augur's eyes were flat. He raised the senriku—its barrel dented, stock scratched, the weapon's dignity bruised by too many blows and too little respect.
"I'm not with you," Augur said.
Gerrard nodded once. His glasses caught the light, flashing coldly.
"Then you die."
Augur tightened his grip and fired.
Gerrard moved.
He was somewhere else the moment the shot arrived, as if distance meant nothing and time was negotiable.
Augur's instincts screamed too late.
Steel flashed.
Pain tore across Augur's chest like a hot rope.
He slammed back into the wall with enough force to rattle stone. His breath hitched. Blood ran warm down his torso.
He looked down at the gash.
Then he looked at his rifle.
The senriku had taken damage too—hairline fractures in the structure, the kind of harm that didn't just threaten function but insulted the weapon's identity.
Augur's face didn't change.
But something did.
Something personal.
He lifted the rifle slowly, shoulders squaring despite the pain, and stared at Gerrard with a quiet certainty.
Whatever happened today—whatever kingdom burned, whatever pirates cheered—
The man who damaged his rifle was going to die.