#Sam Bellamy would never

[thecreaturecalledriza]

I just think it would be very nice if someone (coughSamBellamycough) took Izzy’s tummy troubles into account and doesn’t treat it like a joke or a burden. Whether it’s a sensitive stomach from anxiety or ARFID or food intolerances/allergies or IBS. Sam would definitely have the money and—in my head and general fanon it seems—the care and devotion to give Izzy gentle food that still tastes nice. Or just, you know, making sure Izzy has a healthy relationship with what food he can eat.

Here I go again with my food as a metaphor for love kick…

[arsenicflame]

when will someone pick izzy up bridal style and spin him around? hm?

[javiddenkins]

Javid Denkins is not interested in answering questions. 

It's 9:30 in the morning and I'm sitting across from Denkins in a conference room at the AMC Studios offices. Denkins declined to meet anywhere more personal than this beige and glass room, impersonal Muzak buzzing through the speakers, windows overlooking an empty studio lot. There are posters on the wall but none, strangely, for Blow the Man Down, the runaway hit Denkins conceived, writes, and now showruns. 

Blow the Man Down, or BTMD as it's frequently referred to by fans and journalists alike, is a workplace comedy set in the Golden Age of Piracy. This unusual premise would be interesting enough even without the top-tier leads brought on by AMC to play opposing pirate captains Sam Bellamy and Olivier Levasseur—Oscar Issac and John Boyega light up the screen and bring surprising comedy chops to the pirate-filled stage they share with such talents as Michelle Yeoh ("Zheng Yi Sao") and Sam Neill ("Captain Benjamin Hornigold"). 

But beyond that, BTMD seems to be that rare thing in mainstream media: a slow romance between two middle-aged men finding love for the first time. The first—and so far, only—season ends on a cliffhanger, our heroes separated by an ocean but determined to reach one another, and their love story—if it is one—stays unresolved. 

Usually an interview like this—between seasons, after renewal and filming but before advertising—would be the perfect opportunity to delve into the mind behind the magic and attempt to tease out hints about what's to come. 

But Denkins seems determined to ignore Hollywood's traditional playbook. 

Whether this is the standard conference room used for interviewing reluctant showrunners, or if Denkins picked it especially for the purpose, I'll never find out. I've already been waiting half an hour, uncertain if Denkins intends to join me at all. When he does finally arrive, he makes his position clear. 

"I'm only doing this because you agreed to my terms," he says. 

I'd describe what he looked like, if he had a coffee or a snack or a smoker's twitching nerves, if he sounded tired or amused or angry—but I can't. If you see a description here, it's because Denkins decided, for whatever reason, to approve it. Otherwise, sharing my impression of Denkins is off the table, one of many terms and conditions my editorial team and I had to agree to before Denkins would accept this meeting. 

Denkins doesn't want to make my job easy. Photos of him do exist from the few red carpets he's attended; enthusiastic interviews with the cast, writers, and production team of BTMD definitely paint a picture that belies Denkins's apparent efforts to avoid perception. But here and now, in the oppressive air conditioning of the AMC offices, I am contractually obligated to interview a cipher.

If he can be all business, though, then so can I. I hit a button on my phone's recording app, set it down between us, and ask what made him decide to tell the story of an obscure pair of pirates like Sam Bellamy and Olivier Levasseur.

He shrugs. "Why does anyone write anything? This is my job." 

It's not the kind of answer I was expecting. Something must show on my face, because he follows with, "That's unsatisfying, isn't it. No definitive answer."

"It's not what I expected," I hedge.

"What did you want to hear?"

I try to gather my thoughts, but I'm definitely stalling, uncertain that this is what Denkins intends. "I did a little research," I say. "Not as much as I imagine you did, but I found some of Bellamy and Levasseur's history together and, later, apart. Bellamy's ship is the only fully authenticated Golden Age shipwreck in the world, so it makes sense that the wrecking of the Whydah is an important turning point in season one. Levasseur, on the other hand, is best known for the mystery of his encoded treasure map, flung into the crowd at his hanging and only ever partially solved, which you seem to have used as a foundation for the coding and decoding motifs throughout. But for a show that seems determined to discuss the consequences of fame and reputation, it's fascinating that you've chosen two men most casual viewers have never heard of."

"Outside the narrative they built for themselves," Denkins corrects. "Is there a question in there?"

I remember again that Denkins isn't here to make this easy for me. "Why not choose one of the more well-known pirates of the era? Henry Morgan, Captain Kidd, and Blackbeard are all arguably more famous both now and when they were alive. What made you choose Bellamy and Levasseur for this story?"

"I think," Denkins says, "I just answered that. There's a difference between how you perceive yourself, and how the world perceives you. Those famous pirates retained their notoriety even after death. Sam and Ollie did have reputations when they were alive, but if people today know them at all, it's typically for reasons completely unrelated to whatever little fame they achieved in life."

"And that fascinates you?"

Denkins looks irritated. "It doesn't matter what fascinates me. That's the story, that's—look, I don't know how to write a puff piece like this," Denkins says. "I don't know if it would really sound like this, if anyone would bother caring enough about what I want to get this far."

"Excuse me?" I say.

"Do you honestly think," Denkins says, "there's a single journalist out there that would actually agree to these interview conditions? This is a fantasy, a what-if, and it still doesn't work."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean," says Denkins, "I didn't even give you a name."

And that's true, I realize. I don't have a name. 

"Right," says Denkins, as if hearing my thoughts—and I suppose, in a way, he does. "And you don't know how you got here, and you don't know where you'll go after. I made you up. I made all this up."

I look at my recorder, which isn't a recorder. I look at the room, which isn't a room. 

"Okay," I say. "So what did you want to happen?"

Denkins taps my phone's screen to stop the recording. Denkins imagines me noticing that he taps the screen, and so this must have meaning. There is no room for junk words and actions in prose, and even less in television. Whatever's on the page has to have meaning, or it's wasted space, wasted time, a moment that could have been useful now gone and never coming back.

Denkins shoves my phone back to the center of the table and says, "I wanted to see if I could just talk about the story without making it about me."

"But you're part of it," I point out. "You have to be. It came from you. It was something you thought was important, and then you put the effort in to create it. The story exists because of you, in relation to you. That's why people, why fans, want to know more about you. They love the story, and you made it, so they want to love you, too."

"I don't like that," says Denkins. "Rephrase it."

"They love the story," I say, parroting back at my creator, "and you made it. They want to know about you so they can know more about what the story means."

Denkins's chair creaks as he pushes it back, puts his head in his hands. I wonder if he's doing that in the real world, too, in the place where he's imagining this interview that will never exist. 

(Except I'm not the one wondering. He is. He's wondering what an interviewer would think of him if he allowed himself to show this weakness. Rephrase. Show this ache. Rephrase. Show this.)

"I'm not a story," Denkins says, face still hidden. The Muzak piped into the room seems too loud, too discordant now. Maybe that's what the world sounds like to him. "I'm not imaginary. I'm not a specimen to study under a microscope until every part of me is uncovered and connected one by one to every part of the show." He drags his hands back down and I think I can say that he looks very, very tired. 

"Yes, maybe I put some of myself in Blow the Man Down," he continues. "Maybe I did in season two as well. Maybe I put something in The Gang, and maybe I'll put something into whatever else I make for the next fifty years. And what I put there is—will be—has to be—my choice. All things I chose to share. But this?" He waves a hand at the nonexistent conference room, at nonexistent me. "This isn't a choice. It's a demand. I'm being held hostage for answers, as if me keeping my boundaries somehow ruins the show, ruins the story."

"Because you're not a story," I repeat back, watching for confirmation. "Because what you choose to reveal is the only story the audience should need."

"Yes," says Denkins. "That's it."

That's not it, though. I know this, because I'm him, talking to himself. Thinking all this through. 

"So you cut yourself off," I say. "No one can know anything about you, because they're already clawing for what you're not willing to share—so how much worse would it get if you gave them a chance to come closer, right?" 

"To take, and get it wrong anyway," he says. "Or get it right, but not like it. Not like me. How I'm perceived might change how the story is perceived. And even skipping over the whole art of it all—this is a business. How the story is perceived affects dozens, if not hundreds of people and careers. And all of it can get destroyed in an instant if there's some aspect of me that the audience decides is wrong."

Denkins pushes back from the table, stands up as if to leave. I'm not done yet, though. He's not done yet.

"Sounds lonely," I say.

"Sounds like something a fan would say," he shoots back, and I shrug.

"Blame yourself for thinking it and making me say it, then. It sounds lonely. It is lonely. It's lonely to think there's no way that you could open yourself up, talk about who you are and what your art means to you, without feeling like someone, everyone, will take advantage of that vulnerability."

I pause, and in that pause I find something to latch onto. "You've imagined me," I say. "You've imagined this scenario, where you stay cut off and oblique and hidden." I pick up my phone from where it's placed between us, and I shut it down completely—not because it exists, but because it's a symbol he understands. "What would happen if you imagined being part of the story?" I ask. Rephrase. "What would happen if you imagined being free?"

We look at each other. The tinny music of this artificial space comes to a sudden halt.

Denkins leaves the room. 

I am—

Denkins comes back. He sits down. He looks at me.

Time doesn't exist in the beige and glass room. But behind him, now, there is a poster of Sam Bellamy and Olivier Levasseur, a drilled coin on a cord stretched taut between them. And the Muzak hasn't restarted.

Denkins looks different. Or maybe he just feels different. Those things are functionally the same, here.

"You know the old movie trailers?" Denkins starts, not really a question. "The ones that start with 'in a world…'"

I nod. 

He smiles a little. "Okay. In a world where Blow the Man Down doesn't exist. Let's say there's something else instead. Let's say it's called Our Flag Means Death. It's a workplace comedy, it's the Golden Age of Piracy, the works. They even manage to kiss in the first season, though the cliffhanger is worse. And in that world, there's a different guy who runs it, a guy named David Jenkins, who seems nicer and more outgoing and shares a lot more of himself than I do. And I think it goes mostly okay for him, except he has to scrub his social media, delete most of his Instagram, and never gets to name his wife anywhere in case a fan might notice and start following her around."

"Sounds grim," I say.

He shrugs. "It's another way of handling it. David, in that world, has made a choice to draw the enemy fire toward himself, instead of hiding away and letting it scatter at random. It seems to work okay for him, and maybe it would for me too, but, you know. Maybe that's a little of myself I gave Ollie. Because I also like the idea of testing something first, all the way to destruction."

A little of myself. This—this is personal information. Something that, in the negotiations that never happened, he said he'd never give me.

My phone, with its blackened screen, is right there. I keep my hands still, folded together, decidedly not reaching for the phone. Denkins watches, sees. His shoulders loosen; neither of us, I think, realized how tense he'd been.

"In that world," he says, "there's a second season coming that no one knows anything about and there's a fandom going feral. Echo chambers that feed off their own theories because there's nothing new to add to the pot. Just like our world, right? In the absence of good data, overwrought ideology works just as well.

"And in the middle of this, to provide a distraction, maybe, or to draw that enemy fire like he so often does, David Jenkins says he'll get a Tumblr—you know, one of those not-really-social-media internet places. And maybe he does. He doesn't tell anyone his username, so it's a mystery whether he really did it or not. But someone opens an account. And someone says they're definitely not David Jenkins."

Javid Denkins is holding a cup of coffee. So am I, now. We take sips, mirrors of each other. The coffee tastes like it has seven sugars in it.

Denkins swirls his cup gently, not looking up at me. "When you're trying to figure out something that's terrifying," he says, slow and careful, "and enraging, and so big and so much that it feels like you'll collapse under the weight of it…sometimes you need to find a way to conceptualize it more abstractly. Make it manageable. Put it in bite-sized chunks. 

"So instead of me, dealing with all this fame, and these expectations, and these pulls to turn me from a person into a plot point…maybe there's this other guy. In this other universe, with this other pirate show. Another writer, who says he's definitely not David Jenkins. But—he could be. He could be. And either way, there's enough uncertainty that the fandom can't tell right away."

"Schrödinger's showrunner," I say. 

Denkins tips his mug at me. "Yeah, that gets pointed out, too. Because either it's really him and the fandom will eat at him—death by a thousand needy bites of demand, and something that feels like connection but by its nature can't be—or it's not him, just a fan pretending to be him, attention-seeking, scamming, stealing unearned laurels to crown a meaningless triumph: successfully mimicking the concept of David Jenkins."

"Pretty binary."

Denkins shrugs. "You saw the first season. I'm a sucker for duality." 

He hums and looks out the conference room's window. The AMC lot is gone. More accurately, it was never there. Outside the window is an ocean. The water is green-screen perfect, and there are two tall-masted ships in the distance: Bellamy's Whydah Gally and Levasseur's La Louise. They float angled toward one another, counterpart to their captains on the poster behind Jenkins, missing only the drilled coin between them.

"Except," says Denkins, slow and musing as he watches the distant ships, "in the vast multiverse of imaginable possible outcomes, it turns out that there is the very slimmest possible chance of a third thing happening."

There is another ship floating now between the Whydah and La Louise. It's freshly painted, poorly rigged, and its figurehead is a unicorn. Instead of one flag, it has half a dozen. And I know, because Denkins knows, that instead of gunpowder in its hold, it carries jars and jars of harmless marmalade.

"So," I say, "David Jenkins—"

"Oh, definitely not David Jenkins," says Javid Denkins, amusement lighting up his face. He keeps his eyes on that third ship.

"So the person who is definitely not David Jenkins," I say. "He comes and starts a social media account. He answers questions."

"Sort of. Nothing specific, really. Just…narrative likelihoods. Enough to dangle hope. But the fandom wants more. There's a Richard Siken line he sees, that if he'd chosen to stay anonymous maybe he could've actually posted: 'but monsters are always hungry, darling.' It's like that. So he backs up a little, and considers how to hold off the inevitable. The season two hints are vague? Make them vaguer. Add some smoke and mirrors to hide how little substance they have. There are only so many general pirate tropes around? Stretch out how long it takes to get the ones he has. Add steps. Add puzzles. Make the fandom work for it, and maybe they won't notice how little there is to find. Give them an interesting enough box to open, and they'll ignore the fact that there isn't an answer on the inside, just another, smaller box." He tilts his head and looks at me. The light outside is now luminous pink and yellow, flashing off the water and highlighting his face like a duotone painting. "Then he…" Denkins sighs. Puts down his mug. "Then I sit back and see what happens. I see if it's as bad as I think it would be if I did it here, in the real world."

"And is it?"

Denkins reaches out with one hand, tugging my phone over to his side of the table. He starts fiddling with the buttons, attention on it instead of me. "To start with? Yes. And no. It didn't matter that the one thing I promised was that I wasn't David Jenkins. They—the fandom—found me anyway. They assumed I was him. And I was right, of course I was right, they asked me questions. Hundreds of them. Like that was the only reason I existed, like I couldn't just be a regular person like the rest of them, just on Tumblr to read about the Carpathia and get taken out by the color of the sky."

"For better or for worse, you're a public person," I say. "They think they know what it means when a public person breaks down the barrier between themselves and the fans. Even well-meaning people make assumptions."

The recorder is no longer a phone and app; it's an old cassette player with thick plastic buttons like I, or more accurately Denkins, had as a child. It matches the ones his elementary school classrooms had, which in turn looked like the device Mr. Spock carried at his hip to record and interpret data from strange new worlds. 

Denkins, in the here and now, half-presses the play and record buttons, which would trigger the record function if pushed down completely. He holds back. Riding the edge of commitment. Over and over. 

"Yeah," he says. "Yes. That's true. And I could've been completely anonymous if I wanted to be left alone entirely. I suppose I wanted to prove that everything I believe—everything I'm afraid of—is true, and that I'm justified in hiding away, refusing to be 'known' by anyone I haven't specifically agreed to. Hence the thought exercise. And when I was done, and I had my proof," he says, leaving off the recorder buttons to raise a pointed finger at me, "I wouldn't have to see you again either."

We look at each other. "But here you are," I say.

He laughs. It's rusty, but sure. "Here I am," he agrees.

"So what happened?"

"Turns out," he says, "that in that infinite universe of possibilities a writer can dream up, there's a world where, yes, all my worst fears are confirmed…but that's not all that happens."

He stops, and we are both silent for a long, long moment. His fingertips brush over the recorder buttons, repetitive and soothing, like he's calming something feral and unused to human touch.

"Would you believe," he says at last, hushed and small in this glass and beige room floating on a digital sea, "that there is a world where fans—people—don't ask for more than I want to give? Who see the box I'm in, and instead of ripping it open to grasp for whatever good thing they think they can find inside…they give something back. 

"I played it all out, you see." He waves his hand over the recorder. Now there are two of them, sitting side by side, each with a row of thick black plastic buttons along the edge: one to play, one to rewind, one to record, and one to pop open its lid so that the cassette can be changed. One of the recorders is a little bigger than the other. "If I can imagine it," he says, "it has to be possible."

He looks at the two recorders; he's quiet now, talking to himself rather than me. I don't think I'm as necessary as I was before. I think maybe this is just him. Just Denkins in this lonely little room. He moves the smaller recorder so that it's lined up with the larger one, like he's lining up Matryoshka dolls as he reveals them.

"It started small," he says. "There were people who saw my puzzles, and made puzzles back for me, just to play along. People who saw my puzzles, and shared what they knew about them, just to help others play too. Small things. Little things. Possible things. I liked it. I didn't expect it. I…wanted to give back, too. Not just in the story, I mean. It was me who wanted it. Wanted to add to a world, to a community, where that sort of giving could happen. So I went further. I didn't just try to hint at common story beats this other show might hit—I started listening, following, asking what would be most welcome, and then gave that instead. And it grew. It grew until it wasn't really just an experiment anymore. It stopped being an adversarial proof. It started being…something else."

Denkins reaches out, and now there are three recorders on the table. The newest one is the smallest. He lines it up with the others.

"I'd already made David Jenkins," he says, "and in turn he'd made his own Javid Denkins. So why not do it again? This other Javid Denkins, this me who's me but not me, goes deeper. He uses the tools at his disposal. Our Flag Means Death has pirates named Edward Teach and Stede Bonnet. OFMD has a fandom like BTMD does, where people write stories about the characters, for themselves and—for others. Fan fiction. A thing that can be a gift, if you want it to be. So I started to write one."

One by one, Denkins hits the 'play' button on each of the recorders. The cassettes whir, a steady background hum. Each starts playing a part of some orchestral piece. Not the individual instruments, but something stranger. It's as if each cassette contains the whole work, but with fragments missing that the others complete. There are still some gaps in the playback.

Denkins waves his hand over the collection again, and a fourth recorder, smallest of all, appears. He presses play on it too, and the music fills in. It's a pretty little melody. Simple, if you know how to hear it.

Denkins hums a little of it before looking up, seeing me again. "That was it, really. That's what finally made all this small enough for me to understand. Made it small enough, far enough away from my actual world that I could finally let myself feel it. In this story that I'm telling, here is Edward Teach." Denkins touches the smallest recorder very, very gently. "Teach lives in a world where he's not the main character; he's just a fan of a gay pirate romcom called Blow the Man Down. He's tired, and he's angry, and he doesn't know how to deal with the world the way it is, with the fandom as he perceives it. He makes a Twitter account, anonymously, to prove that what he fears is real."

Denkins covers the recorder with both hands, only muffling the music a little. "Here's Edward Teach, made up of all my fears and saying them out loud."

He raises his hands, and now there are two little recorders, the same size, both playing the same parts together. He touches the new recorder with his fingertip, as if it's a bubble that could too easily break. "Here's Stede Bonnet," he says, "made up of all my fears coming true. And then having to live through it anyway." He stares down at this new recorder; the same as the Edward Teach one, but evidently special in some way to Denkins. He says, to me, to it, to the room: "It's a hell of a thing, to need to go so far away just to see what you've been carrying on your back the whole time."

After a moment, he looks back up at me. "In my story," he says, "Stede survives the disaster. My disaster. He survives it, because he has Ed—a love interest, yes, but not just that. He's someone he opened up to. And more than that, I saw—because I could imagine it, and so it must be possible, it has to actually be possible—I saw the fandom become…people."

With both hands, Denkins presses a button on each of these two small recorders.

Their lids pop open.

And from the walls, from the ceiling, from the glass windows and the limitless sea, there comes a multiverse of music.

"These people," says Denkins, tilting his head to listen as the swells of unseen instruments add to the gentle overture of his pocket worlds and turn the piece into something greater than the sum of its parts. "They're not some nameless collective made up of their worst impulses. They're just people. People are complicated. You can never know them completely; they can never know you. All you really get is what they—we—choose to do. 

"And I saw people try to help Stede. People, strangers, who didn't know who he was, not really. And they felt compassion anyway."

After a long moment, just taking in the music, Denkins sighs and carefully closes the lids on the two small recorders. The singing universe becomes just a recorded orchestral piece once again—though no less beautiful for it. He gently pushes the two recorders together until they're touching, side by side, and covers them with his hand. He says, "Ed got to see this. He got to know that even if his worst fear happens, he'll be okay on the other side of it. And he won't be alone." 

He lifts his hand; the two are now one, still playing its little melody.

Denkins picks up this amalgamated recorder and sets it on top of the next largest. He puts his hand over the stack he's just made. "Move it up a level," Denkins says. "David Jenkins, or someone who is definitely not David Jenkins, runs a Tumblr with games and puzzles and digital tools that stretch the boundaries of the narrative. He sees the reactions to his story. Sees fans who know it isn't real, who know that Stede and Ed are characters in a narrative—and nevertheless, these fans, these people, see that these characters are hurting. They try to help. They don't know who's behind the masks labeled 'Stede' and 'Ed,' not really. But they feel compassion anyway."

He lifts his hand. The little recorder atop the larger is gone. The music is different. Not lessened, but changed. It's come closer. 

Once more, Denkins moves the smaller combined recorder onto the last one—or, I suppose, the first of all of them. "So move it up one more time," he says. The music isn't audible in the room now; but I hear it anyway. It's in me. Us. The last little notes coming from the final recorders just a reminder of what the world could sound like.

He covers the top recorder with both hands. His touch is aching and very, very soft. "Here's me. Javid Denkins. I don't know if there's a world where I could open myself up and not have everything burn down in flames. I don't know if it could ever be possible for me to leave this room, open my laptop, and start something, somewhere, called 'definitely not Javid Denkins,' and have it be as beautiful and awe-inspiring as it was in my thought experiment.

"But God," he says, "I want it."

He lifts his hands, and all that's left is the final recorder, the one that was my phone to begin with. The music dissipates completely. But the feeling of it remains. Denkins rests his hands on either side of this solitary recorder. He says, "I don't know if all of that—all of them, my fans, my friends, all of what we made together…I don't know if it already exists for me in the real world. Just waiting for me to be brave enough to look. I don't know. But I think I have to believe that it does. That they do. I have to believe that it's possible not just to imagine that kind of grace, but to live it." 

Denkins brushes his thumb over the last recorder's play button. "I think that's what it means to be human," he says. "To try anyway. To unlock yourself despite your fears, and find hope there waiting for you."

He closes his eyes. I close my eyes. We take a deep breath together.

We open our eyes.

After a moment, I smile at Denkins, a little crooked. I've got one last question to ask, and it's one he might even answer. 

"Who are you, really?" I ask. 

It's something we all have to answer about ourselves eventually, and it seems particularly relevant now.

Denkins shrugs, and his smile mirrors mine. "Does it matter?"

"It feels like it does."

"How about this," he says. "Who are you, really?"

And knowing what I know now…if I'm anyone at all, then I suppose I'm Javid Denkins. An aspect. A reflection. A dream.

And so, in these universes he's imagined, is everyone.

"So," Denkins says. "You think I can start over?"

I smile wider. It feels good. "I'd love that."

He pushes the recorder back to me, and in my heart I hear his laughing request for one last rephrase—

Javid Denkins has been waiting for me.

It's 9:30 in the morning and I'm sitting across the table from a cheerful enigma. Denkins was already in the room when I arrived, a hot coffee by my seat and a box filled with fresh breakfast pastries and marmalade open and ready to be enjoyed. An advertising standup emblazoned with the unreleased (at time of writing) air date for season two of Denkins's Blow the Man Down takes pride of place at the head of the table. Through the windows opposite, bright sunlight bounces off the buzzing AMC studio lot, and I think I hear a certain pirate romcom's theme music playing quietly over the room's speakers.

Denkins grins at me, and it's easy to see why his actors and writers speak so highly of the experience of working with him. Because I can tell already: this is going to be fun. 

It starts when he leans forward, eyes bright, and presses the record button on my phone for me.

"Let's play," he says, and—we do.

[lavenderprose]

Listen. Do I ship EdIzzy/Stizzy/Steddyhands? Yes. Am I delusional enough to think they're drift compatible? Absolutely not. The only two people in this disaster throuple that are drift compatible are Ed and Stede and they are excruciatingly, annoyingly drift compatible. Finishing each other's sentences before they even get in a Jaeger together drift compatible. The Kaijus see Kraken Kismet coming and they run the other way not because they know they're about to be righteously pummeled right back into the breach (Tho they are) but because Ed and Stede are going to be so ANNOYING while they do it. Izzy hasn't been in a Jaeger since Sam Bellamy died and probably never will again, and as much as part of him wants to crawl inside Ed's head and live there, and despite all of their shared experiences and memories, he KNOWS that the Neural Handshake would tear both of their pysches apart. He knows Ed's mind like the back of his own hand but he doesn't UNDERSTAND a single thing about how it works. He recognizes Ed's mind in Stede, though, when they start to adopt each other's mannerisms and ways of speaking almost absurdly quickly. Might be part of the reason why he falls in love with Stede, too. Just a little.

[random-of-random]

The Pirate Queen

Chapter 6 - A Prisoner

Author’s Note: Thank you so much to every single person who reads this, who likes this, who comments on this story. You are wonderful! I hope it makes you smile!

It was as if something came over James Norrington. He grabbed one arm and then the other desperately looking for any brand she might have.

“What, exactly, are you hoping to find?” She asked and he didn’t looked up. His eyes just went over the same skin, trying to ignore how soft her arms felt. “The elusive ‘P’ that should be burned about here?” She pointed to her wrist. Finally he looked up at her. “No such luck, I’ve never been caught.”

“Well, you have now.” James said as he took a few steps back.

Alice clenched her jaw before speaking. “James we don’t have time for this, you need-“

“You will call me Commodore Norrington, ma’am.”

“James, Elizabeth has been taken.”

“What?” His jaw went slack as it seemed as if the air had been sucked out of the room.

“That’s why I ran down to the fort. I saw two of the men carry her away from her house.” James immediately started writing. “I didn’t see them take her in the ship but it’s the only explanation.”

“Wait here.” He said coldly as he walked out of his office. She distinctly heard the key click in the lock.

It was only about five minutes later when James walked back in. He closed the door behind him. The anger was coming off him in waves.

“Did you have anything to do with this?” He looked away from her and toward his desk, his voice calculated.

“Are you kidding me?” At that he turned quickly around. “James.. Commodore Norrington, I would never hurt Elizabeth.”

“I’m not in the habit of believing pirates.” He practically spit the word at her like venom.

“Well, I’m still the same woman who saved your life out there! The same one who told you about Elizabeth. The same woman you kissed.” It wasn’t the right thing to say, the hatred she saw in his eyes practically broke her heart on the spot. Well, what she thought was hatred. James didn’t have words for how he was feeling.

“I can not believe it’s a coincidence that you are here and another pirate ship shows up and attacks.”

“I was only here to find out what you know about me, my ships, and the people I care most about.”

It was if a spark ignited in his brain. “The red bow, the red dress…” it had look so familiar to him at the party, sticking out in such a particular way. The color was rarely, if ever, worn unless the party specifically called for it. “Sam Bellamy was known for wearing a red bandana and coat.”

Alice nodded. “He was my Captain.” She confirmed and James swore he felt his heart break further. “The first person I sailed under. That bow was made from that bandana. You can arrest me if you want, Commodore. String me up with the other bodies of pirates you have swinging.” As if thrown in the ocean, his fire cooled immediately. The thought of her hanging. His mind couldn’t even fathom it. “But if you want to catch up with the Pearl? You’ll need the entire Navy. Because it will take that many just to find them.”

A multitude of thoughts ran through his mind in an instant, but only one made sense. “Leave.”

“What?”

“Consider this me repaying you for saving me. Now go.” There was a million things she wanted to say, but nothing would come out. As she turned to go she heard him ask a question. “Was any of it real?”

“Most of it was real.” She answered truthfully. When she looked at him, he was staring down at his desk. “Every glance, every smile, every touch… Just the accent and the name were fake.” She didn’t wait for a response, she just left. She would never forget his look of betrayal or how cold he sounded when he spoke to her.

———————————-

Alice walked slowly back to the place she and her crew had been calling home. It was hours before dawn, but all of Port Royal was awake. They were checking on their neighbors and businesses, moving their dead, picking up the pieces of their homes. No one even seemed to glance twice at her as she walked though. Just as well, she thought.

She was almost to the door when it opened and Charlie walked out. He pulled Alice into his arms.

“We were worried about you, Captain.”

Alice pulled back. “I’m alright. How’s Edward?”

“He needs to rest, but the wound wasn’t deep. We should get him to the ship sooner rather than later, get him to the doc.” They walked into the house and Charlie let her to a sitting room where Edward was laid out on a couch. Giles was in a seat next to him.

“Good to see you, Captain.” He said with a tired grin.

“Rest, Edward.” She put her hand on his forehead and was relieved to see no fever had yet set in. “We will be leaving as early as we can.”

“What’s wrong?” Giles asked.

“Norrington knows who I am.” Edward tried to sit, but Alice kept her hand on his shoulder. “It’s alright. He let me leave. Payback for saving his life. Charlie, Giles tell the men to sleep and eat. We will leave shortly after dawn for the docks.”

“Aye, Captain.” Giles affirmed before he and Charlie headed back toward the study and the dining room.

“You get as much sleep as you can.” Alice said as she pulled a blanket halfway up Edward’s chest. “We’ll be back on the ship in no time.”

“Did you tell Norrington?” Edward asked.

“Tell him what?”

“That you’re in love with him.”

Alice let out a small laugh. “The second James Norrington found out I was a pirate was the same second he felt nothing but hatred for me.”

“I don’t believe that.” Edward refuted. “I saw the way he looked at you.”

“Maybe…” Alice sighed. “He used up the goodwill anything before tonight brought me by letting me go. He will try to chase is down soon enough.” She stood. “Now, get some sleep. We will wake you last thing before we go. You’ll need your strength for the journey.”

“Good night, Alice.”

“Good night, Edward.”

—————————

The docks were busy, to say the least, and the sun was high in the sky by the time they were ready to go. Though everything had gone without a hitch, getting all of their stuff down to the ship that would sail them to Tortuga. Everything was loaded, the men were on the ship. It was just Alice and Charlie still waiting to board. No one seemed to recognize Alice, not that she was expecting them to. In men’s clothes, that included Edward’s dark brown coat, and her hair down - no one would have guessed all of Port Royal was fawning over her as a noble less than two days before.

“Captain!” Edward called and he pointed up the docks. James Norrington along with his Lieutenant Groves and two soldiers Alice had not seen were walking toward them with a purpose.

“Stay on the ship, Edward.” Alice called immediately.

“Captain…” Charlie’s voice was low. “There aren’t any other soldiers around, we can fight our way out of this.”

“No.” Alice said quickly. “Keep yours hands visible and just stay calm.” As the men moved closer the two soldiers she didn’t know stayed behind as Norrington and Groves came within five feet of her.

“Lady Somers?” Groves asked after a moment.

“That’s not her name.” Norrington answered him before she could. His voice was almost emotionless. “She has been masquerading as a noble. She is actually… a pirate. An infamous one at that.” Groves looked from his Commodore back to Alice before his hand moved carefully to the hilt of his sword. “Alice the Enchantress is what they call her.”

“I always preferred Mad Alice.”

“My God, it can’t be true.” Groves said quietly, his eyes wide.

“Afraid it is.” Alice responded. “What can I do for you gentlemen?”

“You’re coming with us.” Norrington commanded and there was a shift in the tension around them.

“Is that so?” She asked as she raised her eyebrows.

“To help find Elizabeth.” Norrington added. “It’s either you come with us, or we will take you all to jail.” Charlie took a half a step forward. Norrington and Groves pulled their swords a small way out of their sheaths, and Alice put her hand on Charlie’s shoulder.

“Commodore, I don’t know what help you think I can be to you.”

“You’re a pirate.”

“Not all pirates think the same.” She explained, and James rolled his eyes. “Not only have I never met Captain Barbosa, but last night was the first time I ever saw the Black Pearl. If you want a pirate who can help you ask Jack Sparrow.”

“Jack Sparrow escaped.” Groves said quickly. “With Turner.”

“Who is ‘Turner’?” Alice asked.

“William Turner. He is the blacksmith’s apprentice.” Groves answered. Something in her brain pinged on the name, but she didn’t have time to analyze it. At that very moment all she knew was the safety of her crew was at stake. With that there was only one conclusion.

“Fine, I’ll go with you - on one condition.”

“You’re not in a place to be making demands of us.” Norrington reminded her.

“Captain, don’t do this.” Edward pleaded. “You can’t trust them.”

“Then trust me.” Alice said loudly to her men before turning to Norrington. “Just let my crew go. They are going to sail out on this ship, they are never coming back. Please.” Norrington took a moment to think it over before giving her a nod and she quickly turned to Charlie. “Get Edward to a doctor, take care of the man.” She ignored the protests from her crew already on the ship, “And tell Callahan to be careful with my ships.” They shared a nod before he joined the crew. They all took their hats off, bowing to their Captain. Alice bowed back before taking her place in between Norrington and Groves as they walked her toward the Fort.

“It’s funny…” Norrington said as they walked. “Pirates, for a moment, almost seemed civil.”

“They are.” Alice replied, looking straight ahead. “Much more so than the Royal Navy.”

—————————-

When they got to the Fort she was surprised when they locked her, once again, in Norrington’s office.

This time she didn’t bother to remain standing, she didn’t bother to pace, she sat down in the extra chair and just waited. Her thoughts drifted to her men. If they had gotten out of Port Royal safely. If Callahan was already waiting for her in Tortuga. She hoped Edward made it to a doctor in short time.

She couldn’t have known that Norrington had spent the night pacing in his office. His worry for Elizabeth Swann only surpassed by his anger and hurt at what Frances - no, Alice - had done. In his mind, she had used him, used all of them, to get her hands on the Navy’s own documents.

Another part of him was angry at himself for just how much he wanted to go after her, and not to arrest her. She had told him it was real, but could he even trust a pirate. He paced until Governor Swann barged into his office demanding answers.

When the door opened, Alice felt a jump of anxiety as Norrington walked in followed by Governor Swann.

“Governor Swann.” She acknowledged, but he acted as if she hadn’t said anything. The Governor seemed to be refusing to even look at her.

“You will be locked in quarters on the ship as we sail.” Norrington said, catching her attention. He was looking down at his desk, also refusing to make eye contact. “The men know you will be aboard, but they do not know why. They have been ordered not to speak to you. In fact the only ones you will speak to are Lieutenant Groves and myself.”

“So, I am your prisoner.” She remarked.

“As it should be!” Governor Swann finally spoke. His face was red and his eyes angry. “You are a pirate! You should not be given any leeway. Were it completely up to me you would be locked below deck!”

After his outburst the room seemed almost painfully quiet. Alice recognized his frustration and fear for his daughter, but his hatred for her seemed to almost outweigh it.

“Well, Governor, then I believe when they drop me from the gallows you should be the one to do it.” Her voice was calm and controlled and, by contrast, the Governor looked absolutely scandalized. “Might I remind the both of you that I have been nothing but kind. I held parties for you, fed you. Both of you, more so you - Governor - were fawning all over me.”

His voice raised. “That was before we knew you were a criminal!”

“I am less a criminal than those who trade in human beings - and they’re being paid by the Crown.”

Swann scoffed and immediately left the room without another word, slamming the door as he went.

Once again the silence hung thick, only stopped by the occasional scratching of the quill Norrington was using. Alice was normally good with silence. Now? She felt as if she would absolutely go mad if one of them didn’t speak shortly.

“Maybe you should wear a dress. Keep - keep up appearances.”

Alice stood. “Commodore, I’m going to be sequestered a room the entire time. Well, until the Navy and the Governor see fit to hang me. I think you could do the courtesy of not torturing me more?”

James’ eyes focused on her for a moment and she almost wanted to smirk, but she pushed it as far down as he could.

“Do you know anything about where the Pearl most often makes land.”

“Only a legend.”

“A legend?” Norrington asked annoyed.

“Listen, I warned you I had never seen that ship before. Most haven’t. The few who have are usually survivors. The legend is about an island. Isla De Muerta. No one knows where it is, and supposedly you can only get there if you have already been there. I haven’t.”

Norrington let out a breath he had been holding. “Someone will be along shortly to escort you to the ship.” Without another word he left and she heard another click of the lock. Sitting back down she put her head in her hands. Alice had no idea how she would even begin to get herself out of this situation.

[crustose]

Izzy Hands little-known fic rec list

I've never made a fic rec list but as a connoisseur of the genre, I'd like to offer some fics that deserve far more recognition.

I've added tumblr urls when I can find them--if you know any i've missed, let me know!

bet you say that to all the boys - Blank_Letter_Distribution - 6.2k

Izzy's a werewolf who believes he's a ferocious creature who needs to be locked away every full moon. Roach discovers that this is not the case.

Rizzy. This fic was my introduction to werewolf izzy, and is the most tender rendition of it that i've read.

The EMP goes off with an understated pop followed by a brief and nearly-imperceptible whine, but the effect is instantaneous. The two security drones hit the ground, and so does Izzy.

Titanium Ribs and a Carbon Heart - Light_In_Shadows - 16.8k

Ed's boots ring out against the floor panels as he throws himself down the corridor at a dead sprint. Get up, he silently demands, as the poorly-recycled air burns in his lungs. Fucking get up! But Izzy remains an unmoving black shape crumpled on the grating.

Steddyhands. Amazingly well-researched fic about space pirates, featuring AI Izzy. I think about the last paragraph SO often.

Roach wakes up in Izzy's body, with all his chronic pain and the past injuries he usually hides. Izzy wakes up in Roach's body, and discovers memories written into his bones that even having his consciousness swapped out will not erase.

The Body Remembers - Bongbingbong - 3.5k

Rizzy. Bongbingbong has written a lot of my favorite Izzy fics, but this one is especially great. It's a short read, and I've come back to it many times.

Israel Hands Must Die - @doctors-star - 26.1k

Izzy Hands is not having a very good day. This is an understatement, and also a shame, as it will be the last one he ever has.

No ship. This has to be my favorite timeloop fic-- watching Izzy become progressively more hopeless, and yet, against all odds, trying again. Healthy dose of Izzy whump and sweet and genuine stizzy friendship.

After Ed, grieving and angry, banishes Izzy from the Revenge, there's only one thing Izzy can think of doing to earn his forgiveness. Unfortunately, it's going to involve spending a lot of time with Stede fuckin' Bonnet.

the humble as the proudest sail - @glitterarygetsit - 52.5k (in progress)

Steddyhands. A Hanahaki rendition that's so fun (hanahaki: fun? I know, just trust me). It's how I imagine the s2 stizzy training era will go (steddyhands & hanahaki are real To ME)

It’s Enough to Make a Grown Man Cry - CananPoilot - 2.8k

Stede and the crew learn more about Izzy’s late husband, Sam Bellamy.

(former) Bellhands. When I was deep in the bellhands trenches I would regularly read this and SOB. I'm a little bit scared to reread it for fear of sobbing, even now.

[devilat-thedoor]

friends, lovers, babes🩵

refresh or catch up on What Is and What Should Never Be here!

sneak peek of Chapter 7 below the cut. i need to update my taglist! so if you would like to stay on it or be added to it, please do that here!

thank you, i love you, i hope you enjoy🫶🏽

 “C’mere.” He took your hand and helped you up from the floor before leading you to the office. You let your hand remain clasped with his until he released it to pull something from the shelf behind the desk. “This is from our first year.”  It was a small photo album. Josh laid it on the desk and ushered you into the chair.

Taking a seat, you looked down at the leather cover and ran your fingers down the edge before flipping it open. “Oh my god… Is this you and Jake?” The very first picture in the album was the twins, standing outside of the store. They both looked so young and a lot different than how you knew them. “Your hair, Josh… You look-.” You paused, clamping your mouth shut.

“Sexy? I know… All the ladies and the gents wanted me.” He was half joking but still gave you a smug smirk.

“I was gonna say you looked like a douchebag but I suppose if you felt sexy…” You chuckled at the scoff he let out and glanced up at him, “Oh, you know I’m joking. You were very sexy, boss. The faded sides suit you, but I like your fluffy curls now better… for the record.” Dropping your eyes back to the album, you flipped the page to find more photos from that same day. Sam was in a few of them along with another boy that you’d never seen before. “Bell would get a kick out of these. Sam was just a baby, oh god. You were all so young.” You studied Jake in all of the pictures. There was something different about him that you couldn’t quite place your finger on so you moved your attention to the mystery boy. A handsome, tall, dark haired boy. “Who’s this? You guys never mentioned a fourth brother.”

Josh sat on the edge of the desk and crossed his arms over his chest, “That’s Daniel- Danny.” He was smiling down at the photos as he continued, “He’s Sammy’s best friend. We all grew up together. So yeah, I guess he is our brother. I’m surprised you haven’t met him yet, he’s been back from college all summer.” As though he was growing impatient, he reached down to turn the next page himself, “These were from the day our parents signed the store over to Jake and I. Mom got excited with the camera and spent the whole day taking pictures.” 

Silence fell upon the two of you as you flipped further in the album. You stopped at a picture of Jake, holding his middle finger up to flip the camera off, or maybe whoever was behind it. “Did Sam take these? They’re so good.” You’d gotten better at noticing his work with a camera. Between the way Bellamy gushed over his talent and the few times he’d been in the store or at Jake’s, showing off his photos, you’d grown to appreciate how talented he truly was.

“Yeah, actually. He kept insisting that we’d want to look back at the year our lives changed.” He put air quotes around the last part, “But we knew that he was only documenting to keep an eye on us for mom and dad… I guess I’m glad he did.” Josh slid off of the desk and crouched down beside you with excitement, placing a hand on your knee to keep himself balanced, “He made a photo album for Jake and I and a matching one for our parents- OH! Okay, these are from our first charity event!”

“Oh wow… This is so cool.” You’d never seen the store so full. There were dozens of people in the pictures, laughing, shopping, mingling. As you continued to flip, there were photos of a makeshift stage in the back parking lot, a band playing while people watched and cheered. Jake stood at a small, portable grill, flipping burgers with a genuine smile on his face. There was a girl standing close to him, watching him, her smile not quite as big as his but still present. As you continued turning the pages, her face was becoming more frequent in the photos, always close to Jake. You started to feel a sick, sinking feeling in your stomach as you scanned over her light brown hair and blue eyes. “Josh…” He looked up at you as you turned the page, his smile fading at your expression. “Who is this girl in all the p-...” Your voice faded off as your question was answered by the next page of pictures; Jake holding her hand, embracing her, kissing her.

“Shit… Umm, I should-.” Josh attempted to close the book but you flattened your palm against it to keep it open. “Y/N, I-... it’s nobody, just-.”

“It’s her. It’s Ivy, isn’t it?”

[mystra-midnight]

Kinktober 2023

welcome to my official kinktober 2023 masterlist! below is a list of the upcoming events for the next 30 days. i'm not great at sticking to time frames, i'm very easily distracted, so instead of posting something every day, there will be a theme a week throughout october.

each week i'll post works with different boys about that theme. with that said, if there is particular character you want to see, send through an ask and i'll do my best to put something together for you.

ignore that i'm posting this again, i was silly and deleted it by accident.

Too Drunk To Fuck jax teller - sons of anarchy

he'd never been the type of man to wait. if he had an itch, it needed to be scratched. jax doubted anyone would even notice if he pounded your cunt until you were screaming and creaming on his cock.

╰┈➤ October 1st

Midnight Rider geralt of rivia - the witcher

he was not a kind of gentle man; he was not soft. he liked to use you like a toy; it didn't matter that you weren't small or light; he was strong and able to throw you around with ease.

╰┈➤ October 4th

Dirty Little Secret john winchester - supernatural

he swore that when you bent over to scoop the car keys from the coffee table, he'd been able to see up your skirt and straight to your damn cervix.

╰┈➤ October 7th

Girls On Film sam winchester - supernatural

sam winchester was a fiend, a downright dirty demon. and that was why, since that day, he'd fucked you every way he could—in every room of the bunker, in the back-seat of the Impala, in some dark, dirty ally, in a church confessional for crying out loud.

╰┈➤ October 9th

Lost Boys & Golden Girls jax teller & opie winston - sons of anarchy

It was a known fact that if any of the sons wanted his dick sucked, he could go to cara cara, and one of the girls would be on their knees in a heartbeat. such was the joy of working with pornstars.

╰┈➤ October 12th

Counting Stars bellamy blake - the 100

he was staring at you with those warm brown eyes that made your heart do somersaults in your chest—the same expression that made butterflies wing through your veins and heat pool in the pit of your stomach.

╰┈➤ October 16th

Viva La Vida steve harrington - stranger things

he loved that you weren't above begging him with tears in your eyes. he loved that you were shameless and that you'd wait for him at the door with your ass in the air and your pussy drooling.

╰┈➤ October 19th

Two Tickets to Paradise john murphy - the 100

you'd fought and given up, then started fighting again. the lighthouse, which had started as a paradise, was turning into hell, and it was breaking you—slowly tearing away your sanity.

╰┈➤ October 21st

Untitled geralt of rivia - the witcher

preview coming soon

╰┈➤ October ??

Unholy dean winchester - supernatural

preview coming soon

╰┈➤ October ??

[doks-aux]

I want the classic set-up where it’s post-reunion and Izzy has been banished from-- I’m sorry, it’s come to a “mutual agreement” that Izzy leave the Revenge as a convenient scapegoat for everyone’s problems, and only a few weeks or months later it can no longer be denied that this was a Bad Idea. So they return to whatever port they left him at or that he most likely would have rowed to and set out to find him and bring him back.

They find him with his new crew or new family--be it Calico Jack, Anne Bonny, Mary Read, Sam Bellamy, Spanish Jackie, the OC of your choice, whoever--looking relaxed and content in a way he never has before aside from really not being happy to see Stede and Co. again. And Stede invites him back on board in a way that makes it clear he does not want him back but is also actually ordering him to come back because apparently he was doing a WHOLE LOT of the actual work on the ship and they haven’t figured out how to pick up the slack yet and also Ed’s not doing great without someone to ground him or let him be the good cop and also he just kinda got really used to being the center of Izzy’s world and attention and misses it and really cannot be expected to not get everything he wants without consequence or compromise, so won’t Izzy just suck it up and quietly and graciously accept a life of thankless devotion? Maybe if he’s less annoying about it this time, Ed will give him another thump on the back. Maybe even multiple thumps!

And Izzy, who’s been mostly quiet through the whole spiel, says, “No.”

“What do you mean, ‘no’?”

“I mean, absolutely fucking not, Bonnet. Now get out of my sight.”

“But what am I supposed to tell Ed?”

And Izzy smiles. “Tell him he’s got terrible taste in boyfriends and he can go suck eggs in Hell.”

And then he stayed with the people that actually liked and appreciated him and never regretted it and lived happily ever after, the end.

[patchworkpiratebear]

My first ever try at writing fanfic! A micro script for a silly scene (set in season 1 or 2? I'm not even sure!)

-

-

-

(The crew are on shore leave, hanging around in a comfy pub. Stede & his new pal Sam Bellamy are sitting close together on a small sofa, chatting animatedly and laughing. Ed enters the room.)

Ed: "Eh? What the fuck, Stede?! You could have let me down gently, if you're not interested!"

Stede: "If I'm not interested in what?"

Ed: "Interested in me, you dick! Could have fucking said something."

Stede: "Of course I'm interested in you, Edward! You're the MOST interesting person I've ever met!"

Ed: "Well, uh... yeah, thanks, mate. But that's not what I meant! I thought you were INTERESTED, like... in us maybe being... sort of... together...?"

Stede: "Whatever do you mean, Edward? We ARE together!"

Ed: "What, you're with this guy? That was bloody fast, you only met him today!"

Stede: "What? No, dear, I'm with you!"

Sam: "Uh... Stede? If you two are an exclusive couple, why have you been flirting with me all evening?"

Ed: "We're a couple?!"

Stede: "I was flirting?!"

Sam: "Ok, sounds like you guys need to have a bit of a chat... I'll leave you to it..."

Ed: "Stede? ARE we a couple?"

Stede: "Yes? I mean, I hope so! I mean, I thought so? Do you... would you like to be?"

Ed: "YES! Fucking hell man, this is brilliant! So... when do you think we got together? You never mentioned it, you absolute nut."

Stede: "Why would I mention it? I thought you knew, I thought it was your idea! Two weeks ago, Edward, don't you remember? You gave me those lovely flowers! And you said such sweet things..."

Ed (fondly): "Yeah, I was totally flirting with you, ya lunatic... didn't realise you thought we'd got beyond that point. No objections though!"

Stede: "Sam, I really am terribly sorry! I didn't realise my conversation had implied romantic overtones. So impolite of me to proposition you like that, you must think me a dreadful cad."

Sam: "It's fine, man, I really didn't mind. Like, at all. Ok... night night chaps. Good luck..."

Stede: "Oh, um... in that case, thank you? So, I should apologise that I was not in fact 'making a pass' at you?"

Sam: "All good. I'll just... Yeah, bye."

Lucius & Pete, from across the room: "Hi, handsome, care to join us?"

Stede: "Well, Edward, sounds like we have plenty to talk about! Come up to my room to discuss this in private?"

(They go up to Stede's room.)

Stede: "Bit cosier in here, yes?"

Ed smouldering-bedroom-eyes Teach, looking Stede up & down: "Yeah, this is great."

Stede completely-oblivious Bonnet: "Wonderful! Now, we really must decide what date to count as the anniversary of us getting together. What with me thinking it was a couple of weeks ago, and you thinking it's today. We could maybe just compromise and celebrate both?"

Ed: "Sure thing, mate. Both sounds good. Wait... you actually literally meant you wanted to talk in private, didn't you?"

Stede: "Well, yes, I thought it would be easier? We can go back downstairs if you prefer though?"

Ed: "Nah, this is fine. So... you want to discuss our anniversaries...?"

Stede: "Indeed! Do you think three per year is too many?"

Ed: "What? Why three?"

Stede: "For when we make it official, I mean. Won't be any room for uncertainty on the exact date of that, I wouldn't think! So, we'll have three anniversaries each year. Is that too greedy?"

Ed: "Stede, my love. My total fucking lunatic. We can have an anniversary every bloody week if you want! Every day even!"

Stede: "Oooh, every week sounds good! Daily might be a bit excessive I suppose..."

Ed: "So... if I wait a week before snogging your face off, does that work well as another anniversary...?"

Stede: "Oh. Oh dear. No, that won't do at all."

Ed: "It won't?"

Stede: "I really don't think we need to wait that long, do we? Maybe today could be a sort of..."

(Both): "...multi-purpose anniversary?"

[thetimetravellercat]

Sometimes you start reading a fic that's 336k long and then you end up having many feelings about a rarepair you hadn't even truly considered before that and then you start writing an OS telling yourself it's gonna be short but you're lying to yourself and anyway, here have some Blackhands (Sam Bellamy/Israel Hands) with a sprinkle of polyamory (by way of OFC, aka Elspeth) and a dash of Crew & Israel Hands topped with some Israel Hands & Happiness:

Summary:

He missed Sam. More than ever he missed him and he wanted to be by his side. His love for him had never died. He didn’t care if Sam’s had. He needed to find out. He needed to see it for himself. He turned to Jim.

“I want to do right by the crew, as much as I can.” He said. “And then… then, maybe I want to see if I could get a second chance, a chance to do right by someone I cared very deeply about.”

“Who’s that?” They couldn’t help themself. Izzy would tell them to fuck off anyway if he didn’t feel like answering.

“The only person who ever loved me without owning me.”

Aka Izzy and the crew get their happily ever after.

Tags: Elspeth is the name of the OFC, Lucius lives in the walls of the Revenge, Suicidal Ideation, (briefly), Kraken Era, toes mentioned, Israel Hands Needs a Hug, protective Israel Hands, Injury, Nerve Damage, Mutiny, Ed dies?, maybe?, it’s unclear and open ended, Retirement, Fang gets a dog, Comfort, I would die for Elspeth just so you know, Happy Izzy, love is stored inside the cake, Happy Ending, Give this man a happy ending, Israel Hands-centric

[ladyluscinia]

I really cannot make it clear enough that the only people who think Izzy Hands has a massively outsized following in the OFMD fandom are people who aren't paying attention and probably get annoyed by every positive mention of Izzy Hands.

Those of us who do post about him / read fics about him / enthusiastically ship him / whatever are far more likely to quip about how there are whole dozens of us in our corner because that's a hell of lot closer to the reality. But if plain statistics on fics or repeatedly pointing out that tumblr notes are the same people hitting that same reasonable average of double digit reblogs... Idk. Maybe a more descriptive exercise would make this clear?

I'm sorting AO3 by most kudos, looking at OFMD fics with Izzy's character tag (aka the one place he really outstrips the other side characters in numbers). A few observations:

Izzy's name appears in a fic summary for the first time on Fic 6, with "...and Izzy getting disrespected several times." Not much of a mention.

First Izzy/OC ship is Fic 7 (Hell or High Water - a title I recognize but have never read)

First Izzy/Other Character is Fic 17, with Izzy/Lucius, which also appears to be the first Izzy focused fic

Fic 22 is the first appearance of BlackHands as part of a SteddyHands fic

46 Fics in we get the first one Not Technically Ship Tagged with BlackBonnet (a Lucius/Izzy with a "background blackbonnet" tag), and at Fic 63 we get the first Actually Not Ship Tagged with BlackBonnet (a Stizzy fic about bonding over hating Calico Jack).

I think Fic 215 is the first mention of Sam Bellamy? I'm trying to find something specific and it's taking a while...

Oh wait there it is! 216 Fics by Kudos into the "Israel Hands" character tag (out of 7785 total) we have the first BlackHands fic that doesn't have Stede involved. Prior to this there were a lot of BlackBonnet fics, and notable numbers of SteddyHands and Izzy/Lucius. Hell we even hit Izzy/Frenchie and Izzy/Captain Flint before getting to this point.

I'm just really trying to illustrate here that for all the snide accusations and defensive worrying I see about all the sinister Izzy fans trying to make the whole show and fandom about him, "Izzy" content (which this ought to demonstrate is hardly all about Izzy) is just not that overwhelming. Izzy content that excludes or ignores the Revenge crew even less so. Like, run this exercise with any side character and you'll get pretty similar results - seeing as the dominance of BlackBonnet above all else is still ridiculous by fandom standards - but that's kinda the point.

Izzy is a popular side character, which is a thing that tends to happen when side characters get speaking time, characterization, camera focus, exploration of their current and potential relationships (conflict counts), etc. You know, things that Izzy gets a bunch of as an antagonist? Izzy having more content than Oluwande is not really more weird than Oluwande having more content than Buttons or Wee John? I'm not going to pretend that fandom spaces don't drop the ball on content for characters of color pretty often, but the tagged content breakdown in this fandom is not far off from what you would expect by character descriptions alone.

Like the list goes Cool Protagonist / Love Interest -> POV Protagonist -> Live-In Primary Antagonist -> Side Fun Guy with a Death Cliffhanger / Fanfic Gap Ending -> Side Pirate Assassin with a Subplot -> Assassin's Side Love Interest... I mean, maybe Lucius is a bit higher than Jim even for what "Lucius in the walls" fics can account for, or Lucius / Izzy have a bit bigger of a lead than they would without white identifying bias, but that's like? Unprovable speculation at best???

Not remotely comparable to, like, "Star Wars Sequel Trilogy" where Kylo Ren is 46.3% of fics while the two non-white protagonists are only in 35.7% (Poe) or 29% (Finn). Like Poe is technically behind Hux's 35.9%, which is absurd for a secondary antagonist no matter how fun I found his blatant evil. It's like if Chauncey Badminton was neck and neck with Jim or even Edward. That is a content percentage you should question, and the numbers might be worse in "Star Wars - All Media Types" (though Kylo does at least lose to Obi Wan).

[arsenicflame]

hey does anyone wanna bounce bellhands/they all went to pirate school together ideas with me? im trying to figure out the missing pieces of my personal set up and it might be easier with someone else!

[ragingstillness]

MAJOR SPOILERS

Ok just finished the season here are my thoughts:

@/djenks fuck you man

No seriously, I love like 99% of what you do but killing Izzy? Fuck you man

I know it’s entirely possible he won’t turn out to actually be dead and season two will start with Izzy being like “you fuckers buried me alive without even checking?! I hate you all!”

I’m always afraid of stuff like this happening when characters are given so much development and love but really it feels so unnecessary I can’t accept it as a plot point like I don’t even feel sad now because I’m so numb

Certainly seems like we’re getting a third season or at least the set up is there

Ricky can fuck right off. I do kind of wish he had remained and become a sort of protégée for Stede from the beginning and someone else became the villain because the whole thing with him was clearly that he was meant to be a metaphor for queer people feeling safe to live their truth when they see other queer people do so and playing out that metaphor against the plotline of the season gets pretty negative

Not a fan of us not seeing if the rest of Zheng’s crew were ok

Not a fan of them just fleeing without acknowledging that the port is probably overrun by soldiers who are holding pirate captives still. In general I wanted a better idea of how many British soldiers were really there so I’d get a better understanding of how the plan worked

This is turning into a rant about the things I didn’t like but I’m gonna keep going, I’ll put the neutral and good thoughts at the end

Yeah Zheng’s ships got blown up but they seemed to still be on the water. Did they even try to fix them up and make them seaworthy again? Healing people?

During the fight where Stede and Ed reunite and Zheng is there I got a bad feeling that she was starting to replace Izzy as the “swordsman” character and I thought of how Auntie is acting an awful lot like how Izzy was developing when she was trying to be more encouraging to Zheng to be herself

If they were gonna have Izzy get gut shot I wanted more significance to it, maybe it’s over the only wound he has from being stabbed “in the right bits” and it was from Ed? Or smtg like that

Izzy’s death scene was way too short and no one was sad enough for me

Genuinely ridiculous for Ricky’s character to be faster on the draw than Izzy with a literal knife against his back

We never found out what happened to Ed’s red silk scrap and that was a bummer

Did the only person to acknowledge Izzy’s infamy really have to be Ricky? Give Izzy more respect from more people

Idk if this was on purpose, probably was, but the way Ricky was treating Jackie felt racially motivated to me. It’s rare the show gets explicit about that, mostly just in season one when that one officer called Roach a slave and got killed for it. It felt, like Izzy’s death, unnecessary, considering how much of this show is about joy and seems to dance nimbly around the discrimination that would have existed in that time period. Pick a lane. Is the world gonna have racism and discrimination or not? Because having just tiny moments feels out of place.

When something like “we get poison training in this family” exists why kill Izzy

Really I’m just pissed about that, he means a ton to me and to a lot of other people too. Con was the first celebrity I got to meet in person and hug and talk to. Ok the numbness is wearing off now I’m sad

Still waiting on Sam Bellamy to show up in this show

Not sure I love Izzy calling Ricky a cunt. I mean, I know I’m somewhat prescribing American sensibilities onto British language and that it seems like splitting hairs when Izzy has been calling everyone twat from the beginning but while I know this show is mostly about men being queer I wouldn’t mind less gendered insults against women

Izzy still never got a proper apology from Ed and that’s bugging me

Did Zheng not say she’d need Ed and Stede? How did they go from that to the two of them being inn keepers? Just odd and jolting

When did Ed and Stede take possession of that house where they buried Izzy?

Did the bird landing on Izzy’s grave symbolize Olivia or Buttons and are they implying that sea witch magic is gonna bring him back? Confusion symbols

The Happy/Neutral stuff:

“Finding family to kill for” - fuck me up Izzy that’s so sweet

“Being a part of something bigger than yourself” “the crew” “you have family all around you and they love you” dammit Izzy this is supposed to be the happy section

Auntie is my love she’s so good

This episode had all the slow motion badassery of my dreams

I totally knew Ed was gonna dive for his leathers, idk how I knew but I totally did

Ed reverting to a violent version of himself on the rejection of “pop-pop” is totally analogous to Ed turning to a life of piracy after killing his father and the fact that Stede’s letter/Stede’s love has always brought him out of that killing phase is beautiful to me

I had forgotten about the messages in bottles and that genuinely cracked me up

Finally we get to see the characters be really really cool. Like we’ve seen them be silly and incompetent but it’s refreshing and exciting to see them be genuinely awesome, makes me feel an odd sort of pride

Love that Zheng remained relevant for the whole season and wasn’t a one-off

I could literally feel the passion in Con’s voice talking about how the pirate spirit will survive I guarantee he was picturing himself giving a speech about queerness because the wording and delivery was very reminiscent of his commentary during conventions and especially the “vote the fuckers out” speech

Archie/Jim kiss wahoo we love to see it

Jim should wear a tricorn hat forever they looked so good

I am genuinely having difficulty remembering so many of the good parts because I’m so sad

I’m glad Ed said I love you first, it was beautifully delivered, that frigging Star Wars reference Stede you fucker

Lucius/Pete marriage fuck yeah

Wedding questions asked by the crew? Beautiful

Mateys - yeah Matelotage is a little clunky of a word to say without a french accent this is a good medium

Ok I legit can’t think of anything else I’m gonna see if I can get in a good cry before work in the morning sorry guys

[notthewriteryourelookingfor]

Thought I had last night about Izzys ring.

A lot of people headcanon that the ring is from Sam Bellamy who historically died years before Stede set foot on a ship.

So, what if Ed, Izzy, Jack, and Sam were all on Hornigolds crew, they mutiny, and take two of the ships Hornigold had and split.

Ed and Jack go one way, Izzy and Sam go the other.

Izzy and Sam end up married.

They keep in touch with Ed (less so with Jack) and one day Izzys over at the Queen Anne helping Ed out with something while they wait for Sam's ship to meet up with them.

Then they hear that Sam's ship has gone down, all hands lost.

All Izzy has is the clothes on his back and his wedding ring cuz they were only going to be apart a few days, why take anything else?

And you know that Izzy blames himself. Thinks "if only I had been there maybe I could've saved him" and "I shouldve been with him at the end how could I leave him to face that alone?" And Eds trying to convince him that Sam would want him to live and move on but Izzys just spiralling into being a complete dick and not having friends and using it as a defence mechanism cuz he never wants to feel like this again.

Ed makes him first mate cuz they've known each other for years and it's the least Ed can do and Izzy throws himself into work and into looking after Ed until that's all that exists for him.

Enter Stede Bonnet.

And maybe that's why Izzy can't deal with Ed and Stede and the crew being so happy and in love cuz all he sees when they're like that is the mental image of Sam going down alone.

And maybe Izzys a selfish bastard who's like "if I can't be happy then no one can"

Or maybe that's what grief does to you, idk.

[dancingsunflowers-ocs]

If they had a kid for Francesca and Sam

Name: Romeo Elijah Bellamy-Evans

Gender: Genderfluid (he/they pronouns)

General appearance: Dark wavy hair, dark eyes, a goofy smile that matches Sam’s perfectly.

Personality: A total sweetheart; has the biggest heart, though, and wants nothing more than to help people and make a difference in the world. As long as you don’t get on the wrong side of him.

Special talents: Street dancing, playing the ukulele and mathematical thinking.

Who they like better: Romeo likes both of their parents equally, and he doesn’t just say that the way a lot of other kids do. Their mother and father both have their different parenting strengths, but they both genuinely love and want the best for him which makes it hard to choose a favourite.

Who they take after more: Definitely Francesca; they’ve got her sarcasm and her quick temper. Although they definitely has Sam’s goofy personality too.

Personal headcanon: Francesca had heard so many horror stories about pregnancy, and never had the best relationship with her parents, so when Sam wanted to start a family with her - she hesitated on the thought of having children, but then insisted that it would have to be adoption, so when both she and Sam visited the local children’s care home, Francesca looked bored stiff, until an adorable little boy with a goofy smile looked up at her and started sticking his tongue at her, in which it was the first time that Francesca smiled in a while - so basically they both decided that certain little boy was definitely the one.

Face Claim: Avan Jogia

Tagging: @luucypevensie, @daughter-of-melpomene and @carmens-garden because they love my Glee OCs!!! 💕