Jack crouches outside the cabin door, listening. New Jack is alone, tapping his fingers on the table-top—no, on the bamboo chart. From time to time, his hair trinkets jingle or the bunk creaks as he shifts position. Then he rolls a peanut between his palms, its shell popping and splitting. That settles it. She knocks.

"Come in if you must," calls New Jack, not sounding especially pleased to have company, "but it's only fair to warn you I was about to enjoy a quiet frig."

"Chrrrr!" scolds Jack, and bounces with annoyance. Doesn't he know she can't reach the damned latch?

"Oh," he says, now sounding especially displeased. "It's you. Well, he ain't here. Try up on deck."

She screeches and flings herself at the door, thumps into the woodwork just too low to grab the latch, scratching and scrabbling her way down a surface scored by previous failures.

"Awright! On me way! No call to resort to explosives."

Timing her leap by the sound of New Jack's footsteps, First Jack cannonballs satisfyingly into his stomach just as he gets the door open, knocking him down. She plants herself on his chest and tweaks a beard braid to keep him from standing up or rolling her onto the deck.

"I told you," he protests as vehemently as he can while keeping his chin still. "He ain't here! An' if you've come pick on me in his absence, well, think again, because I can..."

She cocks her head and waits with genuine interest. There's really not much anyone can threaten her with since she found the shiny coins, but New Jack has shown himself more inventive than most. They had some great fights the time he sailed off with Daddy's ship.

"Because I can... I shall... just, um... go up on deck. Yes, that's it. To Hell with the stink! We'll see how fierce you are with Uncle Hector there to watch, eh?" He glowers, but doesn't move.

She places the beard braid gently back on his chest and hops to the floor. Tormenting the interloper is fun, but it won't secure her place as Daddy's original and favourite Jack.

In fact, First Jack is beginning to appreciate New Jack's presence. It's all very complicated, but obviously she and he have more in common than their names and their pretty shirts. Daddy, in his wisdom, has seen that she misses climbing and whooping with a troop of creatures like herself, and he has provided New Jack to keep her company.

She is dimly aware that this constitutes a major shift from the days when she thought New Jack was stealing Daddy's ship, and wasted no opportunity to persecute him by snatching his hat or throwing crap at him.

Even once the ship business was sorted out, she resented having to share with the newcomer. But now she understands more of what Daddy is trying to do, and she feels confident of her status. Hasn't she seen Daddy reduce New Jack to a trembling, whimpering wreck just for asking to share her bananas?

She climbs New Jack's leg and gives him a conciliatory hug. She can't decide whether he's a large, tailless monkey or an exceptionally sensible human, but then she herself is not sure whether she's a small, furry human with a tail or an exceptionally sophisticated, seafaring monkey. Either way, she's willing to make friends.

"Whoa!" He flings his arms out and stumbles back, but she clings tight and balances them both with her tail, so they don't (quite) fall. He puts one hand to the bulkhead to steady them as he hitches the other awkwardly round to cradle her bottom.

She strokes his face with both her hands.

"Now wait a minute, you, er... monkey, er... thing...  Whatever. I'm truly flattered and what have you, but this is entirely unexpected and well—let's be uncharacteristically honest here—not entirely welcome. You are Hector's pet—fuck knows why—not mine. I don't even like live monkeys, which you are not. Frankly, Whatever-you-think-your-name-is (and I really, really hope it's not Jack), you're a tad creepy for my tastes."

Nervous prattle. She lost the thread somewhere around "flattered" but she understands: New Jack is jumpy. So she wraps her arms round his neck, curls her tail all the way round his waist, and hugs him as tight as possible.

"Whoa!" he says again. (She's noticed it's a favourite sound of his.) "Whoa! That's..." He clutches her tail with both hands, not quite removing it or stroking it, but almost both. "That's... ooh! Really quite nice, in fact. Like extra arms. And furry." He wraps his own arms around her, taking the weight. "Must be nice that—havin' extra furry arms—eh? Furry additional arms, that is, not arms that are extra furry. That wouldn't be so good at all. Although, now I think of it, there was that Gunner..."

Poor New Jack. The others don't seem to mind their terrible taillessness, but he's smart enough to know what he's missing. Perhaps he had a tail once and lost it. She hugs him extra tight and chirrups comfort noises.

"...had arm hair you could braid. Never could figure out a way to fasten it though." New Jack scratches the back of her neck.

It feels nice. First Jack closes her eyes and leans into it.

"Y'know, I'm beginning to see what Hector gets out of this pet monkey business," announces New Jack, sitting down heavily on the bunk with First Jack still attached. "Yer not so bad once you decide to be friendly. Nut?" He places the whole dish on the mattress beside him.

He seems more settled now, and she really wants a nut, so she pats him reassuringly and scrambles off his lap.

"Question is," he continues as she sniffs out the salty ones, "what makes you so friendly all of a sudden?"

She finds a salty almond, licks it clean, and replaces it neatly in the bowl.

"If you think I can protect you from the Beastie, you're in for a big disappointment, my lad."

The salt is all gone now. She selects a nice, plump peanut and nibbles at it delicately, waiting for him to say something that makes sense.

"You don't like the stink either, eh? I 'xpect that's why you came in here. Not that a cabin'll do us much good if it decides to attack. I hope for your sake undead things can still pass out when they get chewed into tiny pieces."

This doesn't make sense, but New Jack looks so sad that she holds out the rest of her nut—a generous offer, because it really is an especially plump and creamy one. (Though not quite as good as she remembers nuts tasting, long ago.)

He looks at her oddly, shrugs. "Don't mind if I do." He munches appreciatively while she hunts for another good one. "Makes as much sense as old Hector striding about on deck apparently under an unshakeable misapprehension that sea monsters don't move without direct orders from Captain Barbossa." He leaps to his feet and strides up and down the cabin, waving his arms and glaring. "Aaarrr, look lively therrre me heaaarrrties! Avaaast the staaarrrrboarrrd tentaaacle, ye lubberrrs! Belay thaaat slime aaand splice me them pointy faaangs!"

This is a fine game! New Jack sounds just like Daddy, and looks nearly as commanding. She scurries to perch on his shoulder, waving and screeching commands of her own.

"Haaaul caaanvaaas, ye scurrrvy dogs!" orders New Jack, laughing now. "Ten points to windwaaarrrd aaand spike me them suckerrrs, ye suckerrrs!"

First Jack cheers, clinging to his topknot for balance. But something's missing: New Jack has no hat. She jumps onto a high shelf and brings him Daddy's second-best one.

New Jack stares at her. "Hector has a spare hat?" He sets it on his head and twirls towards the mirror. "Makes a depressing kind of sense, I suppose. Two hats, two Jacks..." Wearing Daddy's hat, he leans close to the glass and examines his reflection. "Whaaat should I do with ye, Jaaack?" he asks it, eyes narrowing to charcoal slits. "Do I waaant to be a-killin ye now? Or later?"

Jack squeaks in alarm. If this is a game, it's not fun.

New Jack starts. "Not you, monkey!" he snaps in his normal voice. Then he turns back to the mirror. "But what is he up to, eh? And what kind of deal has he made with Tia?"

Jack doesn't know. But she wants to play at Daddy again, so she pulls the hat further down onto New Jack's head, picks up Daddy's other earring from the shelf and hangs it in New Jack's hair at about ear level.

"Spares of everything, eh?"

She squats in front of New Jack and chutters expectantly.

"Awright," he sighs. "One more aaarrr, aye? But then I'm takin' a rest. Bloody exhaustin' the way Hector carries on. Dunno how the old bugger keeps it up." He carries her back to the bunk and flops down, scratches her ears absently.

She waits for the promised aaarrr, but New Jack has gone quiet.

Just as she's about to poke him, he says, "You really like the old goat, don't you? Old walrus, I mean."

Jack can't think who he means.

"An' I'm not sayin' I can't see your point of view, but you want to be on your guard there, lad. Never give him a clear shot unless you've stolen his powder first, if you take my meaning. He talks nice, an' he knows a thing or two about—no, belay that, never you mind what about—but he'll mutiny on you quick as a flash if he sees profit in it. I tell you, you've got to watch that one like a bloody hawk – just you take it from ol' Jack."

A mutinous walrus? Or was it a goat? First Jack is puzzled. There is a goat on board, but she doesn't seem to be planning anything. And the parrot isn't much like a hawk either.

New Jack is talking nonsense again, but he's still wearing the hat. She looks at him and says "Rrrrr?" which is as close to aaarrr as she can get.

New Jack rolls his eyes exactly like Daddy. "Aaarrr!" he says. "Aaarrr, aaarrr, aaarrr! Therrre ye go. Thaaat's yerrr lot. Me throat's gettin' sore." Still wearing the hat (now distressingly dented), he lies back on the bunk and folds his arms under his head. "Come overrrr 'errre, me deaaarrr," he continues—to Jack's surprise and delight—nodding towards a space on the mattress beside him, "aaand settle yerrrself down nice aaan' quiet like a good Jaaack."

First Jack isn't allowed to share Daddy's bunk. (Not that she would want to, because she has a cushion all of her own and it's much snugger than a nasty, big, flat bunk.) But this must be a new and even better game! Clever New Jack will be Daddy, and First Jack will be New Jack!

She quickly slips off her clothes (like New Jack did when he wanted Daddy to cuddle him) and wobbles towards the bunk on her two back legs. She's not sure what to do with her tail, but otherwise, it's a pretty good likeness.

Except that New Jack isn't watching. His eyes are closed and he's humming to himself. This isn't very like Daddy. Jack considers sneaking up and pulling his beard, but she's not sure if they're still playing the game, and surely no-one—not even strange, New Jack—would have the nerve to pull Daddy's beard.

While she's hesitating, she hears a familiar, heavy tread, and the cabin door opens.

New Jack sits up so fast he bangs his head, denting Daddy's hat some more.

"Tryin' it for size, Jack?" asks Daddy. "I'd not have thought yer head were so big."

First Jack snatches the hat and flees to the high shelf, abandoning New Jack to face Daddy alone.

"Needs some feathers," says New Jack.

"I had to take 'em for me best hat," replies Daddy. "After some show-off sliced the plumes off it."

"Ha!" New Jack laughs rudely.

Jack cowers behind the hat, waiting for wrath to descend, but all Daddy says, ever so casual, is, "I killed him."

"Not very effective, then." New Jack detaches Daddy's earring from his dreadlock. "An' you can have this back too—doggie teeth don't go with my look."

"Wolf's teeth," corrects Daddy, wearily.

New Jack snatches it back and peers closely. "You were done, mate."

Jack bounces and chirrs. When is New Jack going show some respect?

Unfortunately, this reminds Daddy of her presence. He looks at her crossly, then turns on New Jack. "Why?" he demands, "be my monkey naked?"

"Be it? I mean, is it?" asks New Jack. "Oh. So it is. Well how should I know? You're the one with an unhealthy interest in simians."

Jack wonders if simians are something you wear, and whether she has any. She likes clothes.

Daddy, looking pinker than usual, hands her the little britches he sewed out of the friendly lady's skirt. "Make haste, Jack," he hisses.

She takes the britches, but jumps down to the floor so she can put on the pretty shirt (just like New Jack wears) first. That way, she can do up the britches over it, then put on the waistcoat.

"Blimey!" says New Jack. "Not very big is he?

She has the shirt on now. It would be nice to have a sash and belts like New Jack's to wrap over it all. Maybe he'd let her have a piece of the fabric...

She tugs hopefully at the end of New Jack's sash, but he picks her up, and dangles her upside down, which is not what she had in mind, but quite fun anyway.

"Do all monkeys have tiny little todgers, then, or did you have the poor little sod snipped off in his prime? This size obsession of yours is getting' out of control, mate."

"Will ye quip gawpin' an' let 'im put his britches, on?"

"Wait a minute! It's not a... That's never a bowsprit! It's a... Bloody Hell, Hector... she's ... It's a..."

"Fire bucket?" supplies Daddy, helpfully, though First Jack has no idea what either of them is on about, since New Jack is still gawping at her bottom and Daddy is peering at a knot in the panelling."

"Aye, fire bucket," agrees New Jack. "Fire bucket with a bloody enormous, um... handle."

"Tis just how monkeys be made."

"Bollocks!" says New Jack loudly, "though in point of fact, bollocks are precisely not the issue. I lived with a family of monkeys once, in Malabar."

First Jack twists around and scrambles up his arm. This is getting interesting.

"Nasty, smelly, little things." (She grasps his hair at this point and prepares to tug.) "But most hospitable." (She abandons the hair tug, but keeps a firm grip, just in case.) "Quite exceptionally welcoming, especially in comparison to the neighbouring humans. I was almost sorry to leave."

This is good enough for New Jack. Her fingers are already deep in his hair, so she shows her appreciation by grooming.

"And unbelievable delousers," New Jack continues smoothly, "but not one of them with a clit the size of a dick. I generally remember that kind of thing fairly accurately."

"If we could save the Legend of Jack Sparrow Among the Monkey People for another day?" interrupts Daddy. (Jack hopes this other day comes soon.) "Jack here don't hail from the East Indies, but from New Spain, and her kind be all like this. The man I took her from had a whole hut full of 'em. Mostly vicious brutes what jumped our lads as soon as the cages began to break open. But Jack here climbed right inside me shirt and clung on tight through all the fightin' an' pillagin'. Ne'er gave me so much as a nip. I had to be a-keepin' her after that."

New Jack looks at the place where Daddy's shirt gapes open and you can jump through to his warm, hairy tummy. He pulls a very strange face. "I'm really, really hopin' that's not when you named it Jack," he says. Then he swallows. "Oh fuck. You bloody knew, didn't you? And you still called it—her—Jack...Tain't bloody fair, that!" He twirls to confront Daddy, hands on hips.

Daddy sighs and rolls his eyes.

"Course, you never were too sure of the difference." New Jack is sneering now, for some reason. "Easily confused, as I recall."

"Come now, Jaaack," coaxes Daddy. "Bad luck to have a woman on board an' all that. Ye know how it be."

New Jack's eyes are slits again. "How d'you keep it from the men, Hector? Don't tell me she keeps them dear little britchikins on at all times. Monkey's got to piss, eh?"

First Jack doesn't understand at all. New Jack is snarling at Daddy, but Daddy looks crestfallen, almost cringing. She grooms New Jack frantically, hoping to ease whatever is going on.

"Ye know crew, Jack—an' that crew more'n most. If it sticks out or hangs out, it be one of us."

New Jack chuckles, softening slightly. The grooming must be taking effect. "Bloody unimaginative lot."


Good: now she can eat the lice she squished earlier.

"I s'ppose she fooled me for a few months an' all," New Jack concedes. "Though, in all fairness, I was more focused on vengeful giant squid-beasties for most of that time. Matter of priorities, as it were."

"Aye," agrees Daddy, things definitely settling back towards what First Jack thinks of as normal. "'Tis news of the Kraken as brings me down here."

She feels New Jack freeze. She works her nails through the itchy patch just behind his ear until he strokes her tail and lets the air out of his lungs. That's better.

Better still, Daddy reaches up to scratch behind First Jack's ear, resting his other hand on New Jack's shoulder. "It be dead, Jack," he murmurs. "Stranded on the shore."

New Jack shakes his head just as she sights a fat louse. "Chrrr," she scolds. Then she tugs irritably at his hair and jumps over to Daddy's shoulder.

"Not possible," New Jack states. "Either it ain't dead or it ain't the Kraken."

Now it's Daddy's turn to shake his head (but she isn't trying to groom him). "Squid the size of a fleet; stinks to high heaven; gulls perched all over it stuffin' their bellies and crappin' fit to paint it white. Now I call that a dead Kraken."

"Oh."

"Aye."

"Well it would explain the smell, I suppose. But how?"

"Tia don't know—or don't care to tell—but she's been hintin' that somethin's got Davy Jones' bollocks in a slip knot."

"The heart!" New Jack squawks. "Bloody James bloody Norrington stole me bloody heart!"

"If ye've a likin' for men in uniform, ye'd only to..." Daddy plays with a lock of New Jack's hair, but New Jack—contrary and puzzling as ever—flicks it out of his grasp.

"Davy Jones' heart, walrus features, as well you bloody know!" New Jack sighs. "Was plannin' to use it as leverage—good fer at least another thirteen years—more, prob'ly. But that puking drunk of an ex-commodore figured where I'd hidden it an' left me to deal with Fishface an' his monster (to say nothing of the Governor's monster—I mean daughter) all by me onesies."

"Now what would a pukin' drunk of an ex-commodore be a-wantin' with a thing like that?"

"Same thing we'd want. Leverage. Bastard prob'ly took it straight to Admiralty House—or worse, the East India Company—dumped it on someone's desk and demanded his own bodyweight in gold braid an' a stupid hat. An' a wig. Bloody stupid powdered wig with no earthly point nor purpose—not unless you had an urgent and unforeseen need to conceal yourself among patisserie."

Daddy's hand is back on New Jack's shoulder. "Jack. Let's not be losin' the heading here: whose desk? Who'd trade for a disembodied heart?"

"Not exactly standard naval issue, you mean? Not the thing for fine, upstanding admirals and the like."

"Could be gettin' a man the wrong kind of reputation." Daddy stares into New Jack's face like he's searching for something. "But the East India Company ain't gen'rally so choosy—so long as they be turnin' a profit."

"So, he'd need someone in the Company willin' to keep an open mind about supernatural goings-on..."

"Death slowin' ye down, Jack? Or be ye thinking I've not figured it out yet?"

"Beck it!" spits New Jack.

First Jack is impressed. She's not heard that one before but, from the look of them both, it's even more nautical than "fuck it."

"Aye," says Daddy, stepping behind New Jack and holding both his shoulders now.

New Jack leans on Daddy and tilts his head back. "Hector, d'you think I kiss people because I intuitively sense they're about to burn me to the waterline, or is it something in the way I kiss as provokes 'em to do it?"

"Now, Jack," drawls Daddy, "would kissin' be a euphemism here, or be we talkin' about the captivatin' Miss Swann?"

"Both," snaps New Jack. "Neither!"

"Ah!" says Daddy. "Well, considerin' how easy ye make enemies, and how ye swive half the folk ye set eyes upon, I'd say the overlap be no more'n happenstance."

"Do not! Nowhere near half," grumbles New Jack, wriggling under Daddy's arms until they are face to face. "Not that many enemies either."

"No? Care to take a count among the present ship's company? I'll fetch paper and ink."

New Jack holds up his hands in surrender. "Awright, awright, you've made yer point. I'm only tryin' to live life to the full." His shoulders droop dejectedly. "Don't seem fair I should get killed for that. Leastways, not so bloody often."

"Ye must admit ye have a way of spreadin' alarm and confusion. But, for what it be worth, Jack, I've doubted yer courage, yer seamanship, yer sobriety—I still have me reservations about that one—but I never once doubted that ye be a man."

Not a tailless monkey after all then. First Jack feels a stab of disappointment.

New Jack looks surprised. He obviously thought he might be a monkey too, but he recovers quickly. "Well, that's a relief," he says, fingering the buttons on Daddy's beautiful coat, "I was afraid you'd be in need of complicated and embarrassing anatomical elucidation..."

But Daddy cuts New Jack off in mid-flow. "Not even when I had me hand up yer skirts."

New Jack's mouth is still open. He shuts it. Sniffs. Then he removes Daddy's hand from his buttock, strides to the door, shrugs on his nice, flouncey coat, sets his leather tricorn on his head, pulls his spyglass from a pocket, and wheels to face Daddy.

"Didn't you have a dead Kraken you wanted to show me?"

"I'm not sure how clear ye'll be seein' it with that," says Daddy, sauntering over and wrapping his fist round the tip of the spyglass. "But if ye ask nicely, I'll let you borrow me big one."

Left on her own, Jack jumps onto the bunk and starts work on the dish of nuts. All that tension has made her hungry.

From the other side of the door, she hears New Jack say, "You know, I'd have thought, meself, that the point of maximum doubt would be before you put yer hand up me skirts, rather than after. Because, after, the evidence tends to be fairly unmistakable."

"'Tis a fair point," sighs Daddy. "Once he put his finger on it, as it were, even that dunderhead Sao Feng figured it out, did he not?"

They are both still laughing as they climb up the companionway and out of earshot.

A question takes shape in First Jack's mind. Even in the warmth of the cabin, the fur on her back prickles. How long has Daddy known New Jack?

______________________________________________
Nuts Out series:
First Nut out of the Locker
Second Nut Out of the Locker: Like Nuts for Bananas
Third Nut Out of the Locker: Intense, with a hint of Kraken
Fourth Nut Out of the Locker: Two's Company
Fifth Nut Out of the Locker: Small Island Paradise
Sixth Nut Out of the Locker: Madness and Brilliance
Seventh Nut Out of the Locker: Goats and Monkeys
(Almost) Eighth Nut Out of the Locker:Sibling Rivalry
Ninth Nut out of the Locker: Last Men Standing

____________________________________________________________________
Backround Notes
Just in case anyone thinks I make this stuff up.
Warning. May contain more information than you really wanted.

1. Jack the Monkey is a white-throated capuchin, played in COTBP by Tara, a ten-year-old female capuchin, and Levi, an eight-year-old male, and in the next two films by Boo Boo, a twelve year old male and Mercedes, a ten-year-old female. Mercedes—renamed Chiquita for some reason—went to the premiere of AWE on Geoffrey Rush's shoulder. (wikipedia.) So the notion that Jack is female is at least 50% correct.

2. It's not true what they say about the Internet: I couldn't find descriptions of monkey genitalia anywhere. My old-fashioned university library was more forthcoming. (I did have to play pick'n'mix with South American monkeys species, but I feel this is a canonically appropriate accuracy level for Pirates fic.) I can't be sure about white-throated capuchins, but females of several similar species do have an enlarged clitoris. Disappointingly, it seems this is not for Fun, but for dribbling pee onto branches as they scent-mark their way through the canopy. Or so says a male primatologist...

3. Jack and Hector know a lot of songs about yardarms, bobstays, and fire-buckets. You can learn one too if you click here.

4. Furry pov was viva_gloria's idea. I don't think I'd ever have thought of it, but once she planted the suggestion, I was helpless to resist. This is All Her Fault!