#kind of stizzy idk

[captainsamuelmorrigan]

After the toe incident, Izzy starts getting night terrors, sometimes sleep paralysis. It starts small, Izzy's limbs feeling like dead weight as he watches Ed, eyes burning, staring at him from the corner of his room, his hands holding those goddamn scissors like a butcher's blade.

His nightmares are the worst. In his nightmares he loses his other toes, his feet, his legs, but worst of all, his dueling hand. He's tossed off the ship in pieces and parts, without any way to defend himself. He wakes up in cold sweats, and even Lucius from his vantage point in the walls can hear him whimper in the dead of night.

In true Izzy fashion though he tells no one, depends on no one. He gets more and more irritable, snapping at smaller and smaller things, and even Fang and Ivan have to start to avoid him because if they even look at him the wrong way he'll end up giving them a thorough tongue-lashing. He barely talks to anyone besides Edward anymore, and everyone notices the hushed tones he uses with him. Something has happened and everyone knows. Somehow, this makes Izzy even worse. A wounded animal is a dangerous one.

When Stede comes back, the whole ship dynamic changes again. Stede has become a real pirate in his time away, and Izzy is more relieved than mad at his return. He assumes that Ed will stop visiting his room in the dead of night. The monster has his princess, so the knight will be spared. Only, he still has those fucking nightmares. His aged mind plays tricks on him, there are now 2 figures. Along with Ed's burning look, there is Stede, his usual annoyingly bright smile becoming deranged, too wide for his face. The nightmares become Stede laughing his chirpy laugh as Ed rips him apart.

Izzy stops sleeping entirely.

After Izzy nearly passes out on deck, stumbling and muttering about, Stede's overprotectiveness of his crew wins out over his hatred of Izzy. He starts asking around, if anyone's heard anything or seen anything that might be keeping Izzy up. He even secretly tests the floorboards outside of Izzy's room to make sure they aren't squeaking. Eventually talking to Lucius, who talks about hearing Izzy crying and yelping in the night, and talking to Ed who admits to hurting him worse than he has before helps him piece together what's happened.

Immediately Stede sets a course for port. Izzy's room becomes the first and only room on The Revenge to have a lock on it.

Stede also drops a little Dad knowledge while Izzy happens to be in the room, in what Izzy can only describe as a stage whisper. "When my daughter started having nightmares, I got her a doll that my ex-wife and I told her would protect her from any harm." Isreal very much doubts a stupid doll could protect anyone from anything.

Nevertheless, Izzy starts sleeping through the night. He starts locking his door less and less, trying to subtly invite Stede or Ed into his space in small, blink-and-you'll-miss-it sort of ways like he always has. His room isn't really one that anyone comes to, though Stede makes an effort, trying to follow the breadcrumbs that Izzy puts down to lead to a positive relationship with him.

The small, button-eyed plush cat staring at Stede from next to Izzy's pillow practically sends Stede into full blown mama-bear hysterics. Izzy threatens Stede that he will throw the stupid toy overboard if he ever mentions it again, so neither Stede, nor Ed talk about it in front of Izzy.

What matters is that "Smudge" makes Izzy feel safe enough to sleep through the night.

[laceratedlamiaceae]

"It wasn't actually you who stabbed the painting, was it?" Stede asks suddenly in the middle of their training.

"No," Izzy answers after a moment of careful consideration.

"Then why'd you tell me you did?"

"I thought Edward was dead. And I want"--Izzy heaves a shaky sigh--"I wanted someone to remember him fondly."

"You mean me?" Stede asks, pointing at himself dumbfounded.

"Fuck if anyone else is going to, after all the shit he did."

Stede takes a moment to consider this. Even after everything his crew has told him about Ed, he finds it hard to believe that it isn't all just one big misunderstanding. But if Izzy, Blackbeard's most loyal servant, was saying it as well…

"Not even you?"

Izzy shakes his head, holding back the tears threatening to well up. "Not anymore."

[paleode-ology]

as always I’m thinking about the Stede/Izzy/Ed dynamic and trying to figure out how they can still win. I started going through this in the notes of a post and realized I just wanted to talk about it lmao so here we are

I’m Okay. So here’s the thing. I am so pro steddyhands. Like frankly it’s a dynamic that I love and want to see more of and like. As more mentally healthy individuals I think they would be soooo unstoppable like actually peak romance and chaos. BUT they are. Not. Mentally healthy individuals like they are all so incredibly fucked up. And that is maybe a post for another time. Anyway so I have two ideas about the ideal plotlines for these three, which I call the realistic plotline, and the one that won’t happen but would be sooooooo gay plotline.

This post ended up being kind of long bc I talk a lot lmao so here’s a cut.

Even though I want in my heart a steddyhands endgame, Jenkins has said that the third season would (if greenlit) be the last, and that’s just not enough time to work out a well-written and satisfying romantic end for the three of them. Also, I just honestly don’t think steddyhands was ever in the cards for this show; it would just be way too messy idk. Realistically, I think we can definitely get an Izzy and Ed reconciliation, and we’re DEFINITELY getting stizzy bonding this season, so at the very least they’ll all be friendly going into the third. But this season is obviously about Stede and Ed learning to trust each other again and get to know each other better before they go back into romance. They have shit to work out and they’re clearly gonna be starting to do that in the next few eps.

I thinkkk the plan is for them to heal this season and actually figure out their feelings for each other bc let’s be so real, they were so fucking repressed in season one and had just BARELY realized they were in love before things went to shit. The third season will probably just be them becoming proper husbands and co-captaining and like fighting the British yippee. Cannot wait.

As for Izzy. Oh my god Izzy. Okay. So he’s sticking around for now. He’s been the only one looking out for his crew this whole time (and honestly I think he and Stede might bond over that. Stede kind of gives very few fucks about his crew but he values their lives and doesn’t WANT to leave them behind. Tbh breaking them out while also dealing with Ed’s death was just so insane of him and like. He’s gonna be such a good captain.) and anyway, we know he’s going to be teaching Stede pirate things. Not to mention that everyone loves Con so Izzy’s undoubtedly going to be hanging with the crew and keeping them organized while Stede and Ed fuck off on their bonding excursions.

My running theory for Izzy in season three is that he’s going to be captaining the Adventure. (For those who don’t know, the real life Blackbeard had the real Israel Hands captain that ship for a hot minute.) Izzy’s wanted to captain a ship for a long time, and I mean, he’s the Revenge’s captain in all but name at this point. So once he’s sure Ed and Stede and the crew aren’t going to set the Revenge on fire and accidentally kill themselves, he’ll go off to captain the Adventure and have his own healing journey during the third season. Hell get to figure out what it’s like to be out from under the shadow of Blackbeard, and like honestly it’ll be way less stressful and he’ll have a good time. Season three can cut between his adventures and the Revenges adventures, and the overarching plot will have all of them reunite in the latter third of the season (deus ex machina Izzy PLEASE). They’ll work together, have a final reconciliation where they all end on good terms, and either Izzy will go his own way as his own pirate captain, or he’ll decide that he’s grown and healed but he still likes working with New Ed and he stays on with the Revenge or they form a fleet with the Revenge and the Adventure and maybe another ship that shows up at some point in the third (I just feel like a fleet of two ships sounds stupid sorry). Maybe they’ll give Izzy a boyfriend in season three also. Like maybe it’s just me but I feel like getting laid would fix him.

I’m really, really excited for Stede and Izzy to get closer this season. Their little enemies to romantic rivals to still romantic rivals but they have bigger things to worry about to besties is just so real. And I think that them being closer is going to just bring this new balance and dynamic that we haven’t seen before.

So that’s the realistic plotline. Everyone ends up happy, we have pirate husbands, and no one dies except for the British. Onto my insane pipedream plotline also known as the outline for the fic I will probably never write.

Basically, it starts off quite similar to the above prediction for the rest of the show. The only caveat is, the show extends past three seasons. I don’t know that Jenkins will keep writing after the third, even if the response is huge, just because he seems really dedicated to telling the story properly, and unless he decides now that he wants to keep it going, a fourth or more season would mess up the pacing of the show, especially since the season three finale is supposed to the The Show Finale. But for the sake of this fic outline, let’s pretend we get as many seasons as we want.

I still think Izzy should captain the Adventure. Like I really firmly believe that his and Ed’s relationship cannot fully heal unless they part ways for a bit, and as an Izzy diehard I just want him to have fun without worrying about Ed 24/7. I want it to be light, though. Like mostly just him working out his shit with Ed and what he wants from his life going forward.

Meanwhile, Ed and Stede get to have their honeymoon phase on the Revenge. They’ll have a mostly functioning crew for once, and I also like the idea of them escaping the law or fucking up nobles. Like just really have a fuck the rich moment. Once again, it’s light. BUT I also want them to acknowledge that they miss Izzy. Like Ed will tell stories about the years he worked with Hornigold and how he fell in love with pirating and probably compare this new beginning with him and Stede to when he set out on his own captaining journey and as he reminisces and starts to get over the trauma he never really dealt with, he’ll realize just how much Izzy was always there for him, and he’ll regret how he treated him when Izzy was the person closest to him for so long. Also, generally seems to be leaning away from being a full pirate rn. Like he’s definitely starting to realize that there’s more that he wants out of life, which he’s going to have to balance with pirating being the more that STEDE wanted out of his life.

Meanwhile, Stede will have his pirating tricks that Izzy taught him, and while Ed has his own style and certainly lots of pirating experience, he’s already taught Stede a lot, and, quite frankly, he’s a terrible teacher. Like. We saw how the sword fighting lessons went. Izzy is going to be more effective, and I think he and Stede are going to have a lot of fun once Izzy realizes that Stede actually respects his advice and genuinely wants to improve. Like that’s going to be really good for them. But then Izzy leaves, and Stede’s left with not very many people to go to with advice or ideas. People that will critique him (mostly) fairly. Once again, Ed loves Stede, but he mostly just wants Stede to be happy, and he’s good just being on the sidelines watching his husband slay the pirate life. So Stede misses Izzy too.

So does the crew. Ed tends to view himself as quite separate from the crew, and while that’s subject to change, I don’t think he actually knows how to be a good captain? Like. Izzy has been doing his job for him for forever. Meanwhile, Stede cares about the crew’s well-being, but he really isn’t that close with any of them. He very much sees himself as their leader, and lets them do whatever the fuck they want as long as the ship isn’t sinking and they all get to do some good old fashioned raiding.

Izzy, on the other hand, spent a long time in the space between captain and crew. While he sees himself as part of the crew, he has a huge responsibility that inherently comes with being first mate and is further burdened by the weight of dealing with post-breakup Ed. He earns the respect of the crew when they see how much he takes on for them. “He’s our dick.” While Ed’s prestige intimidates crews into following him, and Stede initially bought a crew, Izzy earned the respect of his crew, and he proved to them that he cared about their lives and their well-being. So yeah, going back to the Ed/Stede co-captaining chaos means that the crew is going to miss Izzy.

Note here that I think the Adventure would already have a crew. I don’t know under what circumstance they’d need a new captain, but let’s imagine that that’s what’s happening here. I want Izzy to be fully out on his own, without any of the crew he’d had before. Our season one crew stays with the husbands. In my mind, Izzy meets a guy from the Adventure, they become besties, and then that guy invites Izzy to come be their captain bc the old one like died or whatever. New guy is Izzy’s first mate, and helps him work through some of the Issues.

And Izzy LOVES being captain. He likes the responsibility, he likes looking out for his crew, and he enjoys looting and fucking over other pirates and colonizers and it’s just a whole vibe for him. He’ll earn the respect of this crew as well. He prioritizes their lives over his own, and they genuinely enjoy working for him.

Here’s the thing, though. Being captain is lonely. He has his own quarters, which are pretty fucking sparse. He has a new crew, and while making his own name is good for his ego, no one on his new ship knows him the way his old crewmates did. And let’s be honest, while his crew enjoys working for him, he runs a tight ship. He’s abrasive. He’s brutally honest. He can be cruel. He’s fucking insane with a sword. Let’s not forget that this is a man who, unlike Ed and Stede (for now) very willingly murders. Izzy can be SCARY when he’s not running himself ragged trying to please and take care of and save the man he loved without getting the rest of his crew killed.

So. He’s not really bonding with the crew. They aren’t friends. They’re just a team of pirates who trust their very scary leader. He’s close with his first mate, at least, since that’s the buddy who brought him onto the Adventure. For the most part, the isolation isn’t bad. He’s allowed to reflect and grow and become more confident in himself. He realizes he’s his own person and not just Blackbeard’s guard dog.

Still, he finds that there are things he misses about the Revenge, so when Ed and Stede find themselves in a tight spot (with the British? I do think it would be so fucking funny if we had ANOTHER Badminton), Izzy doesn’t hesitate to come to their rescue. He saves the day, gets to talk a bit with the husbands, and they decide that while being separate was good, maybe traveling together is something they can do again. The Adventure joins the Revenge, and we end season three.

THEN in season four we get to see the three of them together again. Their time apart has helped ease tensions, but there’s still work to be done before we enter poly territory. So Ed and Stede are fully in a relationship, with Izzy on the outskirts. Izzy’s gotten over his blind devotion to Ed and has grown closer to Stede, and it’s comfortable, but sometimes still a bit weird.

Izzy’s (and by extension, Ed’s) past is coming back to haunt him in this season. People he thought he’d left behind show up, enemies he’s made are coming back for revenge, and he can’t deal with it all on his own. Ed and Stede have to help him through it, and they have his back the way he had theirs at the end of season three. Ed begins to realize that he didn’t know Izzy as well as he thought he had back when they were shipmates, and so they get to talk and properly discuss what went wrong between them (namely Ed’s dismissive attitude towards Izzy and Izzy’s inability to accept Ed as anything other than the Dread Pirate Blackbeard).

Stede and Izzy get to be Violent together while Ed stays behind and organizes the auxiliary wardrobe, and now that Stede has improved on his swordsmanship even more, they get to have a lot of fun. Bonding via murder, my beloved. They learn how to work as a team, which would just be SUCH a dynamic like gentlemen pirate plus rabid chihuahua? Nothing better.

Eventually, I think the Adventure would make its departure. Izzy’s first mate would become captain, and they’d part amicably. Izzy stays with the Revenge. With Ed and Stede. The three of them take meals together. Izzy is a co-captain in all but name, preferring to remain first mate as long as he gets a say in what they do and where they go. He loves working more with the crew again, and they’re more responsive to him than they’ve ever been.

And slowly but surely, they all realize their complicated feelings for one another. Secretly and without telling each other, obviously. Ed and Stede are both confused with themselves because they’re HAPPY they have and love each other, but they also both value their time with Izzy so, so much, and of course they can’t say anything to the other because then Ed will think Stede doesn’t want him anymore, or vice versa, and that’s not what’s happening.

Izzy is just so fucking confused bc he can tell that how he felt about Blackbeard hasn’t gone away, exactly, but something’s different. And when he and Stede are fighting together or preparing the next ambush or discussing plans for their next stop, it’s so fun. Fighting with Stede is like breathing in a way that fighting with Ed never was. So. What the fuck? But it doesn’t matter how he feels anyway because Ed and Stede are together and why would either of them ever want to replace the other with Israel (Basilica) Hands?

So while they’re each having an existential fucking crisis, the entire crew knows what’s going on, or they at least have realized that there’s something weird happening with Izzy and the captains, but it’s not bad the way it had been before. So there’s betting pools going on who’s fucking who and whether or not Ed and Stede will leave the other for Izzy or if they’ll all just end up being together.

And just as things are reaching a breaking point between the three of them (Izzy retreats from them both, snapping at them and refusing to open up the way he had been previously and yelling at the crew more than usual, Ed stops talking to anyone at all, preferring instead to do target practice with Jim, and Stede is throwing himself into one raid or project after another, staying up through the night until he can’t stay awake any longer), our main conflict comes into play. We’ve been dealing with someone from Izzy’s past all season, and things finally come to a head. Tables are turned, and now Ed and Stede have to work together to save Izzy from whatever the fuck is happening. During this time, they realize that Izzy is equally important to the both of them and vital for the co-captain dynamic and they’re like. Fuck. Now we REALLY have to save Izzy.

And god, Izzy’s been saving their asses this entire time, hasn’t he? He’s always been there, and now they need to be there for him.

So uhhhh they rescue him and everyone kisses yippee that’s the ens of season four. Season five gets to be the True Poly Season, where they get to fuck around and be the baddest bitches of all time and it’s beautiful.

And that’s my rough outline for. What the show could be? A fic I want to write but probably won’t? Uhhhh yeah 👍

[izzysillyhandsy]

"You must have a lot of time on your hands"

A list of my (very much Izzy-related) meta from the most recent to the oldest:

After the Finale:

Prince Ricky and Izzy Hands (WHY did noone notice the gun?)

Izzy is punished for every transgression (and dies of a combination of the worst traits of the people he loves/aligns himself with)

Izzy isn't the main character (but he makes the main couple more interesting)

Why do some people hate Izzy so much? (or: it's so much easier to hate Izzy than Ed)

The cruelty of the murder/suicide scene (finally closeness - but at what cost?)

Izzy didn't die of the gunshot alone (Ed's and Stede's suicide missions combined cost Izzy his life)

Poor Izzy aged 10 years in 6 months (he finally looked like a father figure, at least)

Izzy's "death threat" towards Edward (as if Ed would ever believe Izzy could kill him)

The difference between Izzy's and Ed's anger (Inwards vs. outwards)

Ed is an "us" person (Ed and his attachments to "the one" person)

Re: the deathbed conversation (a very confused post where I fail to make sense of it all)

A cool death - Ed's theatrical, performative suicide (Ed and Iz and their rituals, and when Ed went too far)

Death and change in OFMD (maybe it doesn't have to be a death?)

Izzy as Calypso, Ed as Odysseus :) (OFMD and Greek mythology - there are parallels, I swear)

How I learned to stop being angry and love the Death Scene (for now) (the death scene is either well-written or tragic, but never kind)

Thoughts about the finale, and my utter confusion about Izzy Hands (posted 2 days after the finale, expect sadness and confusion about Izzy's purpose in the narrative)

It's only suicide if we die... and Izzy's second suicide was planned to set Ed free (a very weird theory, posted 1 day after the finale - proceed with caution)

What I wanted most from Ep 6-8 - and a very hurt reblog after the finale :( (Ed and Izzy were done dirty)

Between Ep 7 and the Finale:

The meaning of the skeleton mermaid flag and Stizzy's Revenge theory Part 1 as well as Stizzy's Revenge theory Part 2 (my favourite theory ever!!! Should be canon imo)

Ed and Izzy: Cleaning up the mess (too much trauma, too little time - or: Ed needs Izzy to be whole)

Izzy is NOT ok (the "I'm feeling GReAT!!" phase of breakups) (a reaction to people posting "happy Izzy gifs" where he actually looks like he's barely holding it together)

Izzy's Gravy Basket (Ed and Stede had their visions/dreams - Izzy needs that too!)

Ed-and-Izzy-related stuff that stood out for me in episodes 6 and 7 (lovely little moments between those 2)

May I present Izzy's Fuck-I'm-going-to-die-for-this-twat sequence (not meta but kinda prescient)

Between Ep 6 and Ep 7

The Man with a Hook for his Head (it's Izzy - he gets his own symbolic bedtime story)

My predictions for the S2 finale (also, 100% wish fulfillment) (some of that didn't age well)

Too many thoughts about episodes 4 and 5 and "Moving On" (a very emotional post about Izzy and Ed and my fears for their trajectory)

Between Ep 3 and Ep 4

My immediate thoughts about the murder/suicide scene (there's soooo much going on!)

Izzy has love for Ed. Ed has love for Izzy. (it's an unhealthy love but it IS love)

"Can't believe I was living like this" - "I feel like a million bucks actually" (Ed wasn't feeling better at the end of Ep10)

Before S2:

What do you want most for Izzy Hands in S2? (we got so much!!)

What I like about Izzy is that he is so sincere. (my most controversial post for some reason - it's so tame idk? But that was the atmosphere before S2 I guess)

Reasons why Iz is so relatable (to me at least) (my first attempt at explaining why I love Izzy when so many people still hated him)

[jellybeanium124]

so first off SALS includes the right both to like and hate a ship. it just means be chill. but basically as someone who (sorry) enjoys steddyhands/stizzy (sorry)... man I wish more of people who were into it were normal (sorry again). like dude it sucks having to basically go into fics with a checklist of things that it needs to do or avoid, or suddenly hitting one sentence and going "fuck this shit, I'm out."

I've always been a crack-ish multishipper. putting characters into relationships who are not canonically in one and maybe shouldn't be and thinking about what might happen has always been fun for me. relationships are emotionally intense and great for character drama/interactions in general. and these ships only work if you soften izzy. like obviously. I think there are ways to do it that keep him more recognizable, but sometimes people just don't care.

to me, stizzy without steddyhands only works in some kind of au where neither of them know ed, and even then I think you should ask yourself why you are pairing them together and not gentlebeard. I think there are legitimately premises that you could explore with stizzy and not with gentlebeard. on the most basic levels there's the enemies-to-lovers thing, but there's also izzy's toxic masculinity/internalized homophobia issues. how would he deal with being in a relationship with his complete antithesis? how would this force him to confront his inner demons? how would stede react to these struggles? how would he try to help, and when would he get mad at izzy for being an asshole? you can write a story where getting together with stede forces ed to confront his inner demons, but the stizzy version of that and the gentlebeard version of that are not going to be the same story.

in the end, I think this comes down to a very basic disconnect (besides the racism and shitty tropes, and all that). in my mind there are two kinds of fanfiction: fanfiction that exists primarily to be in communication with its source text, and fanfiction that exists primarily to get an emotional response out of the audience (porn, hurt/comfort, angst, fluff, any emotion, basically). this isn't a one-or-the-other situation, but every fic and every writer thinks one of these is more important than the other. every fic favors one of those goals. and having the latter goal isn't a bad thing! most bad fics have the latter goal, but not every fic with the latter goal is a bad fic.

stizzy and steddyhands, as ships, do not exist primarily to be in communication with the source text. and if they are, that communication is usually opinions I don't like (izzy deserves to be a protagonist or some shit, yknow). these ships exist for porn, for hurt/comfort, for angst, for fluff, for creating a highly specific emotional experience for the author and readers. "well why are they even writing fanfiction then?"/"why don't they go find other characters who are closer to the dynamic they're writing" because they are attached to these characters and want them involved in these emotions, and because they are okay with their work being very different from the source material.

idk if this makes any sense lol. it's not exactly a defense or anything. it's definitely not a defense of people who think ed needs to be babysat, fuck those guys. I guess I just kinda wanted to give my perspective on why these ship interest me? I think a lot of y'all's posts on the subject come down to: "why would anyone like this? it wouldn't work in canon" and the canyon response to that is "well it does actually *some fucking bullshit, etc etc*" and my response to that is "I know, I'm fine with that, I just like the situations it opens up and I like the emotional catharsis I can experience from some of these fics, even tho they are 'bad fics' in that they are not in any sort of real communication with the source text." and you can think that's bad lol, like it does sound kinda bad when I write it out like that. but you can't get the specific flavors of emotional catharsis from fics from any other medium of art, generally speaking. not in the same way, not easily, and not in 2k words.

[batsarebetterthanpeople]

BTS!! Don't Hurt Yourself

BTS: Write a dvd commentary about a passage from the fic (I cannot pic a fav so I'm just gonna give any old passage, I chose this one because I have a fun backstory about when I wrote it)(Full disclosure I own dvds but its been so long since I watched dvd commentary that I don't really remember what it's like so I'll just talk about the passage and how I made the decisions I did and how it came about, you know, the making of the passage.)

Spicy. alright I can do spicy.

Stede had always thought that a desire to hurt another individual out of malice or hatred was something that was intended to be done without their consent, that it would be dampened by the thought that the other person was into it. He was somewhat surprised to find that Izzy’s openly asking for it did not cheapen his own sadistic pleasure in giving the bastard what he deserved.

And he did deserve it, Stede decided as he pressed the head of his cock into Izzy’s tight, wet cunt. Izzy deserved to get smacked around and spat upon. Not just for the stunt with the blow job and the secret phone call, but also for calling Edward a whore, and a twat, and every other unkind derogatory thing he’d said in that courtroom and out, and for being generally an unpleasant, nasty little man that no one wanted to be around, and for causing Ed so much grief.

First of all, Bonnet, you are also causing Ed grief by fucking his husband but I digress

anyway. Backstory: This is from Chapter 7 of Don't Hurt Yourself. A chapter which I slaved away on for I think about two months, because I had written up to the point where Stede and Izzy Yaoi prat fall onto each other and Stede ends up with Izzy's tit in his hand or whatever, and I had no idea where to go from there ie how to get Stede's cock in Izzy's cunt in a way that was at least realistic enough for me to be satisfied with it.(emotional realities not physical realities, as is my right as an ofmd fic author, David Jenkins school of writing ect.) It's a problem I have with writing both Jack/Stede and Izzy/Stede, I have to seamlessly bring them from bitching at each other like they do in the show to fucking each other. Its not as easy as it sounds.

The breakthrough of the writers block came for me the same night I did magic mushrooms for the first time. My dealer told me that they would take about 3 hours to kick in (they took half that amount of time) and I was like, well I have three hours to spare so I might as well try to bang out a couple paragraphs. (it was the day I posted "why is it so much easier to write when the edible is about to kick in" It was not an edible I was waiting on. Idk why I said edible I regularly admit to drugs on here lmao.) So I managed to write a lot of the dialogue and then these two paragraphs. But the shrooms kicked in as I was finishing up the last paragraph, which meant that I ended it with some absolutely inebriated drivel about the word fuck and how it's used to convey both hate (e,g. shut the fuck up, fuck you) and sex that I had to delete when I was sober and I very rapidly lost the ability to write after that.

Anyway now that the fun back story is out of the way let's actually talk about what's happening in these two paragraphs. Stizzy hate sex! Stede and Izzy are sometimes hard to make fuck because Stede simply does not think about him, but they're also incredibly fun to make fuck. Muppet vibes off the charts especially when they're doing bdsm (which is the only kind of sex Izzy knows how to have). Miss Piggy slapping Kermit energy but they're not married.

I also tend to think Stede has a dark side. He's as mean as he is nice and he's real fucking nice. I love it when he's evil, because I'm horny about evil men. I think if Stede would think about Izzy long enough he could get dark with it (a vibe which is not incompatible with muppetry broaden your horizons for the possible.) and I think the only way to make him think about Izzy long enough is to have Izzy wrong Ed and make it clear to Stede that Ed was wronged and put Izzy in Stede's direct line of sight.

Basically, I want Stede to have hate sex and I want him to realize he's a sadist. I tried to convey that here. I think that Stede as a character has the capacity for so much love and so much hate. It's an important balance to strike when writing him, if you go too far in one direction you turn him into an unrecognizable monster (which I've seen certain people do) but if you go too far in the other he becomes an unrecognizable woobie baby which is so fucking boring dude. I hope I got across his sadist awakening well. he still needs a second one where you learn you can do it to people you like tho...

The ask meme

[izzy-b-hands]

Stizzy!!!!

Alexz!! I'm betting this is for the ship it or no meme, I just got notifs abt messages today and saw this one; I am so so sorry I missed this initially!! 🫂💙 (I have another one to get to as well bc I saved it to my drafts while working on it got distracted and here we are 😭. that one will also be published today i promise y'all janskfnf)

Absolutely for Stizzy: ship it!

1. What made you ship it?

There isn't one thing in particular exactly, or one moment. Over time I just sort of went like. These two both feel out of place, but for different reasons (Stede bc he's new to piracy, Izzy bc all he's used to is sailing with Ed) as things change thru s1, and while it's a wonderful place to write butting heads and bitchy lil snaps at each other lol, it's also a place they might meet in the middle, each holding their relative uncertainty and nervousness over their situations, and hesitantly allow one another to help shoulder the burden. Eventually that turns into damn it I actually like him and then Oh No He's Fuckable Too akbskfngjg

2. Fave Things?

That Izzy's love language of acts of service is gonna have such an easy time here ajdbfknfjg. Stede is used to having ppl bring him stuff for the most part it seems (not a dig exactly, just like. what he seems to have grown up with/is used to lol) and Izzy seems to show caring easiest thru the phrase 'let me do it for you' and cups of tea and making sure everything else is looked after (that used to mean Bonnet would fuck off, now it means he's extra time for Bonnet to fuck him)

That Izzy doesn't seem used to showing himself (and at times, others) kindness that's blunt, but Stede absolutely would do those things abt him and slowly he'd be like 'well...maybe not terrible' while Stede kisses him over and over for a particularly daring kill during the just finished raid, despite the entire crew looking on and giggling (Ed is Radiant bc the ppl he loves are getting along!! and it's hot to watch them fuck! two birds one stone fuck yeah!)

I could go on but there's another question so I'll stop this one here amsdjfng

3. Unpopular Opinion?

Nothing comes to mind immediately on this, but I also just sort of assume constantly that however I'm thinking abt a ship is potentially a way others won't like so idk if it counts if social fear keeps me from writing up any potential unpopular opinions to keep them in my memory lol

[arsenicflame]

Fake dating/married for spy reasons, idk if that's a Trope but. I like it so

oh this is a fun one! im gonna treat is as fake dating for any kind of undercover reason, which i think is pretty much what you mean! (ie, im thinking fake dating to steal something, to get information, to hold a jailbreak)

B: Like it. Not one of my bigger cravings, but it can scratch a certain itch if I’m in the right mood.

i def find this fun!! im not always a fan of fake dating without motivation (but like, i say that, and i know damn well theres some killer izzyfic on that front) but i love scenarios where they conclude... 'ah yes, pretending we're a couple is the perfect way to get ourselves into this place' despite then fact, it almost certainly isnt. i think its double fun when you have someone else along who Knows theyre fake dating & keeps making jokes about it.

basically, what im saying is enemies into fake dating stizzy (because theyre the only two who could possibly do this task) with ed also along for the ride (perhaps its ed's job to cause the distraction?) and ed just keeps poking at them about them being a couple while theyre both just trying not to tear each others throats out (because theyre supposed to be dating!) its perfect, its wonderful. 10/10

Give me a fanfiction trope and I’ll grade it

[marsvioletsixtyfour]

I'm really enjoying edizzy and stedeedizzy smut in fanfics and fanart and whatnot but I just cannot get into any type of romance between these two. Like I'm honestly more likely to read some kind of romantic stizzy (it still has to be fucked up though) than e+i

Because naturally people write maybe not sweet but soft and passionate stuff for them and I always feel that it's ooc. These two don't have canon soft or passionate moments that would sway me into believing in it idk maybe it's because I don't know enough about marriage. The yearning is always one sided only and not very self aware and if I'm meant to imagine that they were a couple before it went sour (or almost grew up together - my least fave fanon out there) then I get a sprain in my imagination

The way ed is with stede there's no fucking way he had a functional romance before... And I really don't see him in edstede reversed dynamic where someone has romantic feelings for him and he's totally clueless we're just just good friends guy, the one post that imagines ed saying the fine things line (slightly changed) to izzy at some point before. I'll never buy it 🫠 the kind of deranged fanon I blacklist

The ones where ed wants him carnally but casually and objectifies uses etc him tho 🥵 (with consent and devotion from the interested party to make it tasteful)

[izzyspussy]

Izzy and Calico Jack fucking while each openly pretending the other is Ed. Thoughts pls.

(and then Izzy attempting the same thing with Stede but they just end up accidentally in love and they are both mortified)

tbh i think jack is really manipulative and borderline abusive, but he does it in such a sinister way i think he wouldn't think of doing that because it's so directly mean. or rather. he would think of it, maybe, but he'd try to make a production of how it was an accident and he didn't mean it and he's so sorry. at least at first, until called out. and then since izzy would be more pissed off than hurt - because it's jack and fuck him anyway - he'd be more upfront about it after that. and then he'd be able to taunt izzy in ways that actually did hurt him. but he would never actually be pretending izzy was ed, just making use of the ruse.

izzy on the other hand might do this one of two ways.

one: he'd openly do it much more directly than jack would think of (and therefore would beat him to it). he'd also be faking at it and doing it just to be cruel. it would also not exactly hurt jack's feelings, but still definitely hurt his pride, make him jealous, etc. izzy would not be able to leverage it to be quite as hurtful as jack could, as seen above. mainly because jack simply has more ammo against izzy in this area than izzy has against jack, and also because jack doesn't have the depth of feeling for ed that izzy does.

two: izzy would actually pretend jack was ed. like, genuinely. like, obviously jack doesn't make a very convincing ed and izzy is perfectly well aware of that, BUT. he could be at a juncture where he thinks that jack is the closest to ed he's ever gonna get. so he'd be doing that. and either jack would give so few shits about izzy as he's fucking him that he wouldn't notice OR he would be feeling nasty enough that day that when he did pick up on it he would then drag it out into the open himself and taunt izzy that he's right and jack is the best he can do.

i think izzy and stede actually would not be quite that nasty to each other! they are mean and bitchy and have a genuine dislike between each other, and they do purposefully hurt each other sometimes - feelings and otherwise - BUT! i don't think they get that cruel to each other.

however, i think they might end up in bed together and both be privately pretending the other is ed. during the kraken era probably idk. the only problem with that being of course that neither of them is very discreet. so they both know they're both doing it and it fucking sucks real bad, but they both think it's kind of them to let the other keep on. so it's this soul-crushing open secret between them that they're both wishing they were with him. :)

ETA: obviously stizzy accidentally Make Love because that's what they'd do with ed lmfao. but it still sucks!! it's really painful and sad and pathetic, but also deeply intimate so like. definitely one of the experiences of all time, for both of them. and then they have this like really unhappy but really intimate painful-pleasurable Thing that they've gone through together, that they've done to each other. after this they Know each other in a way no one else does or ever will, and in a way that reflects themselves. so like. they're fucking bonded for life. unfortunately.

[sunnibits]

idk if this constitutes a dm bc usually im rotating izzy on a pike over flame & he occasionally catches fire so i have to let the smoke out of my mouth so. i did it yesterday & now i can offer only a seasoning: stizzy... izzy being dickish sure but also bested into silence... stede saying “good. because i quite liked it”(?) ... the next time they meet stede just. fully going mean girl ? 😭 maybe i need a rewatch but like i get izzy being particularly mean (esp bc of ed) but STEDE ? literally said ud see him again & that u enjoyed the fight. like imagine having a quarrel & like, for no reason in particular u cut open this mans shirt & in return he holds a dagger to ur face... and like that totes doesnt mean anything. the doki doki anime blushes r unimportant but then ur boss is so interested in him for some reason & then when u find him again to invite him for a meeting or whatever he called you the WRONG name & is like “this guy 🙄” when ur like . no you guy !!!!! being unprofessional & not getting my name right. FUCK YOU. like it literally is so.. what is wrong w them. like theyre both roleplaying tough like witty pirates while also being so cartoonishly silly themselves. & thats why i think stizzy can still win /j (also stedes “seems theres trouble in paradise 😏” as he walks away from ed & izzy ? petty bitch i love u)

sorry for the rlly late response but LMAO YES. STIZZY RIGHTS.

honestly tho I love the pre-ep 4 stizzy dynamic SO much because it’s like. before izzy really starts having a Miserable Time so he’s just confident and it’s the funniest little bitch vs bitch battle between them I enjoy it so much. like the way he keeps SMIRKING at stede through both this episodes?????? stede’s whole ‘I kind of enjoyed it’ thing?????? absolutely scrumptious. delicious. they’re so funny. idk if I had a real point to this but anyways they should make out and insult each other while they do it.

[izzyspussy]

Stizzy ask (pre steddyhands I guess?)

Idk if this is for you my guy but I've had this rattling around my brain for the last few days and uhhhhh

A sex pollen/fuck or die scenario where Izzy is the only one affected.

The crew know how it has to be handled. Only one way. The captains decide the responsibility falls to them, they won't let any of the crew handle it.

Ed, with his history with Izzy, says he'll do it

Izzy, still coherent enough to have a say, refuses to let Ed "sacrifice himself" and would rather die than let Ed near him, no matter how much he'd want that in any other circumstance

... so Stede steps up

... Izzy doesn't say no

oh dw anon sex pollen is very much For Me

anyway, yeah. i imagine it's probably just a really strong or a botched movie-magic kind of aphro and not actually a fuck-or-die situation, HOWEVER, it is genre shenanigans innit (the genre in this case being porn lmfaooo) so izzy has no frame of reference for it whatsoever and reluctantly believes the supposedly more genre savvy (superstitious) characters when they say he'll literally keel over if he doesn't Get It.

i think it's a combo of ed and izzy who decide none of the crew can do it. izzy doesn't trust any of them enough to let them at him in the first place, and additionally he's absolutely certain they'll hold it over his head forever. ed is just possessive and trying to pretend he's not by using the "captains' responsibility" excuse (though izzy does feel protected by the fact that ed apparently won't stand for dubcon with a crew member, the sexual politics between them are hwjhwlkjas how you say...? wack lmao).

but! izzy doesn't want ed either. the "sacrifice" idea you put forward doesn't really make sense to me except maybe as an excuse. izzy doesn't want ed because he's in love with him and fucking him for exclusively practical life-saving reasons will break his heart. but of course he would never in a million years admit that out loud, and he has to give some reason, so not wanting ed to be dubconned by the situation is what gets said.

so then stede is the only option. and izzy also doesn't want stede just because he doesn't want to owe him, and he figures stede really is taking one for the team (read: for ed) here. but he trusts stede to be kind without belittlement during the act itself, to not meet however izzy reacts to things in his altered state with judgement, to not insult his body, to not tease him later unless duly provoked.

and... he's. attracted. to stede. maybe. maybe. has started to respect him, even. he doesn't have a crush, certainly not, obviously no one on earth can compete with ed that's utterly preposterous izzy will never have feelings for anyone else ever ever ever. obviously. but, y'know. stede is pretty, and he can be properly ruthless when he wants to be, and there's just something about having his attention...

so. yeah. this is. actually quite a few steps above tolerable. not that izzy would ever in a million years admit that out loud. he just. doesn't say no.