"Jack, I do not want to be here!" Stephen's voice was nearly hysterical as he clung, white-knuckled, to the lowest part of the rigging.

"Where is your trust in me, my dear?" Jack called up to him, smiling.

"Right now?" Stephen hissed, panicked. "Smashed to pieces as I am certain the rest of me will be presently."

"Stephen, you are barely ten feet above the deck."

"I do not see what good you could do me standing down there anyway, Ja... aaaaaaaaaaaah!" The doctor's terrified shriek stopped as though hitting the same solid obstacle the rest of his body encountered on its way down.

"Why, I am here to catch you, plum," Jack told him calmly, smiling into wide blue eyes as he gently, and quite reluctantly, set Stephen on his own feet once more.

"Oh," Stephen muttered eloquently, certain he would feel the heat of Jack's solid form all around his own shaky self for some time to come.