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Everything in Panama City had gone mostly according to plan, a rare happenstance for the pirates in this motley crew, and the more superstitious among them spent the first few days on board their new vessel debating whether this meant good luck or bad, fair wind or foul.

The Spanish ship they'd stolen isn't large or particularly pleasing to the eye, being in need of some new paint and wood maintenance, but it's seaworthy and swift before the wind, and most importantly, well-stocked for a long voyage.

And a long journey to Singapore it will be.

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There's a captain at the helm.

For all intents, and despite the meager extent of the other's acquaintance with him and the way his face remains impassive, looking over at the horizon, Barbossa seems to be content. Almost, if it weren't kinda blasphemous to think so, happy.

Which is quite logical, because he is. After so long, to be at the wheel once again. To feel the wind on his face, the spray of the sea... To be alive and captain of a ship. Not -his- ship of course, not the Pearl, but that can and will be solved in time.

He even seems to be singing something under his breath.

Anyone dares to try and sneak upon him to hear just what tune it is?

Not far off is a first mate and boatswain. He's surely not happy, but transferring his discontent into the actions of a sailor calm him some. As has seeing Barbossa's skills as a captain. The man is not and never will be Jack, but he's a far sight more able that Gibbs' last commander in the navy.

"Ship seems to be ship shape."

"It'll do"

He doesn't take his eyes from the sea ahead. The Pacific is honoring its name so far, but it's not the kind of sea you can trust. It's not a noble ocean like the Atlantic. This one is treacherous and bloody-minded, and will sneak upon you if you but give it a little break.

"What is there on your mind, mister Gibbs...? A blind man with his back to you could see the troubled look."

And a good captain listens to his bosun, lest he ends up marooned on a tiny spit of sand with naught but a pistol and one shot.

Gibbs is quiet for a moment. As if gathering thoughts. Or maybe courage.

"I've been meaning to ask you...why did you betray Jack?"

Barbossa pauses for a moment, then signs for Mister Cotton to take the wheel and keep the ship on the same course. He turns to Gibbs, walking to a coiled roll of rope and sitting back on it heavily. This had to come, hadn't it...?

"Why does one mutiny, or desert, or any of the many names treason has depending on the circumstances, mister Gibbs? There are a thousand reasons, and seldom is it just one that's involved. Now, I want you to consider this, mister Gibbs. A one-man mutiny never works. Jack's crew mutinied because, quite simply, we didn't think he was a good captain."

He tilts his head back to regard his First Mate. There is his perennial arrogance there, in the stare of his yellow-rimmed dark eyes, but there's a lot more to be seen if one looks closely. Weariness at the whole matter, maybe, and a fierce determination that has nothing to do with the undead's obsession with breaking the curse.

Gibbs notes the arrogance. You have to be arrogant to lead a mutiny, even if you think there is just cause. And he sees the weariness. Does Barbossa perhaps regret his choices in retrospect.

He could argue that Jack is the finest captain he's ever known. He is smart enough not to enter pointless debate.

"There are other methods for replacing a captain. And the timing, if my understanding of the tale, is rather curious. Seein' as how Jack trusted you and the crew with the one secret he rarely trusted anyone with, all these years.

"Not that you didn't do him a favor by sending him away from the curse."

Barbossa, in turn, knows exactly how loyal Gibbs is to Jack. He doesn't expect that to change, not now, not ever, until probably Jack gets him killed. But he is not above being honest when it will actually bring a result.

"Now, I won't be saying greed didn't have some part, but you cannot expect a pirate crew not to be greedy. And a captain has to know his crew, and be able to measure them."

He actually chuckles, but his eyes narrow slightly. A sore spot? You can bet it. It's reasonable to assume no one likes to be reminded of having been a cursed undead for a decade or so.

"Yes, yes I did. And despite that he repaid it only with death, here I am, going to his rescue. Isn't life ironic, Mister Gibbs...?"

"Aye, it is," Gibbs says thoughtfully. Irony would include the sad fact that Jack's most recent voyages have left his new crew as hard up for coin as his old may have been. "It seems to go with bein' a pirate, if nothing else. We might not be as rich as we like, but we never lack for the bruises of fate." He pauses - it's hard to let the words flow as they might when talking to Barbossa.

"Did Tia Dalma tell you of the fate of Bootstrap Bill?"

(( OOC: Good question. I'll go with "no", since I don't think anyone would provide a man like Barbossa with more information than needed, right? ))

He looks up with mild curiosity at the mention of Bootstrap. Odd, how the presence of his mutt has brought the old pirate to Barbossa's mind more than a couple times lately.

"Is there anything to know, since last I saw him?"

"Aye, there's much. Especially since I'm supposing you thought that when you cast him overboard, weighted down by the cannon, that he was never to return. But did you ever ask yourself what happens to a man when he's stuck at the bottom of the ocean, cursed never to die, and there are forces in that selfsame ocean greater than even the Aztec mages?" No, Gibbs really doesn't think that he can either scare Barbossa or make him feel guilty. But just the telling of the tale to the traitor will make Gibbs feel better.

Actually... Barbossa chuckles. Undead or no undead, he is one mean bastard and has always been.

"I never thought about that when I shouted 'To the Locker with ye!' as we threw him overboard." A thoughtful pause, then "So old Bootstrap is one of our enemies now?"

Well, of course, being a part of Jones's crew -makes- Bootstrap one of the bad guys in Barbossa's book. And it explains a lot. Oh, yes, it does. So young Mister Turner isn't just tagging along his lass. There's more to the mutt than seems at first.

"He's one of the damned, no thanks to you and your crew." Gibbs has never actually met Bootstrap, so far as he knows, but he feels a kinship with the man, as a loyalist to Jack. So his sneer is not a shock. "A good man, doomed to serve that monster.

"Just thought you ought to know of that."

"You don't know much about Davy Jones, do you, mister Gibbs? I understand you feel the need to blame me for every evil since the Great Flood, but you don't get press-ganged into the Dutchman's Crew. It doesn't work like that. If he's serving aboard Jones's ship, then that's because he accepted the captain's offer."

Barbossa still looks up from his seat on the rolled-up coil of rope, arms crossed on his chest, his lips set on a very much not amused frown.

"And besides, many a good man ends up where no good man should, and more than one bad man escapes his well-deserved fate through luck... And sometimes misplaced loyalty."

"I don't feel the need to blame you for every misdeed. Only the ones you had a hand in. And even if he accepted Jones' offer, it's not as though I can see him lettin' Jones thorugh him back over like a fish." No one has told Gibbs the tale of Davey Jones in one sitting, but the facts have woven themselves together enough. "The point remains, his only crime was the one that you will never be guilty of...loyalty to anyone besides yourself.

"Though in the grand scheme of things, there are worse crimes, and I won't deny that - as Jack might put it - you can always trust a untrustworthy man to be untrustworthy." He smiles just a bit.

"Which only goes to assert that ultimately, he had a choice"

Barbossa shrugs, waving the point away.

"Don't blame me for something that a man who died at Isla de Muerta did, Mister Gibbs. Death puts a big damper on vengeance, usually."

He smiles, an amused, very much sinister slice of a grin.

"And, to continue quoting Jack himself, it's the trustworthy ones you have to watch out for. Never know when one of them will go and do something stupid."

Which is a not-so-nice way of saying 'I'll be keeping an eye on you, mister Gibbs'.

Gibbs wouldn't have it any other way. He might not respect Barbossa much, but that respect comes from a sense that Barbossa is, above all else, true his own code, twisted it might be.

"No, you never do. Which begs the question of how we make sure young Mister Turner doesn't make a mess of things." Whatever confrontation was in Gibbs' bones has passed for now.

"First thing, by having him know what he needs to, strictly. Knowledge in the wrong hands can be more dangerous than steel or gunpowder."

He stands, limping back towards the wheel.

"And keeping an eye on him at all times. Which reminds me, where is our young blacksmith-turned-pirate wannabe...?"

Gibbs nods in total agreement. Will might be more dangerous than Barbossa and not realize it.

"I think he's been keeping to himself. Sometimes below deck, sometimes above. There's much for a smith to do, and I think he's been keeping to it when he can."

"Yes, but blacksmithing of the kind a ship needs won't be keeping his mind busy, only his hands. We need to find something for him to do. Something that'll keep him occupied."

He takes the wheel once again, consults the compass at the helm and adjusts the course.

"Let me ponder it. I've worked with men his age enough to perhaps have a few ideas." Not that any come to him immediately.

"You do that, Bosun Gibbs. And, just so you are ready, we will be needing four or five men for a... Delicate work at Singapore. I may have my reasons to be sure Sao Feng will help us, but I'll be damned if I trust a pirate."

He says that last part with a half-grin.

"I would like you to be the leader of a small... Emergency support party. I'm telling you in advance so you can start picking your men."

With this, Barbossa turns his gaze towards the prow once more, partly expecting the conversation to be over.

And as Gibbs now has two things to think on, he first goes silent and then goes away.

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