#AND THEN STEDE ISN'T THERE AND ALL THAT GIDDY REPLAYING IN HIS HEAD | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

ourflagmeansgayrights · 2 years

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ok but speaking from experience as someone who's had first kisses w a crush. y'all KNOW ed was getting his plan in place thinking abt that kiss the whole time, playing over every tiny detail while he robbed a guy for a dinghy. motherfucker probably got all fluttery and giggly thinking abt the little noise stede made. probably couldn't stop smiling when he thought abt the way stede's jaw fit perfectly in his hand. probably sat down to take a minute when he remembered how stede's eyes took a moment to flutter back open. probably got DIZZY thinking abt stede's crooked smile and the way he'd whispered, "you make stede happy"

rolling up to the dock with his bag of stuff already planning how he's gonna kiss stede again, kiss him properly, as soon as they're safely away. maybe thinking he won't be able to wait, that he'll kiss him again as soon as he sees him because his heart literally feels like it's going to burst out of his chest he's so, so happy

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stufftippywrote · 2 years

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not so much a fic as a collection of thoughts

on ed's state of mind post-canon. SPOILERS for the ending of our flag means death.

These days, it’s so much easier to be Blackbeard than to be Ed.

To tell the truth, it’s always been easy. It was easy from the very first act of violence. He had been beaten down and kicked about by rage and hate, and his father was dumb and easily fooled, and to watch the light go out of his eyes had been the greatest thrill of young Edward Teach’s life. The Kraken had been born then, and ever since it has been so easy to close his eyes and give in to the creature inside.

He’d convinced himself for so long that the creature was all there was to him.

But the days and months piled up. Boredom crept in, the desire for something different. The Ed inside him, long dormant, was waking up.

No - Ed had always been there. Ed was the one stopping his blade every time he made ready to gut a man. Ed was the one that whispered inside him of a loneliness that couldn’t be cured by dalliances with Calico Jack or raucous celebrations with his crew. Those things helped on the surface. Most of the time, Blackbeard convinced himself that Ed was asleep, or maybe even finally dead. But Ed always came back, wanting something else. Wanting nourishment that Blackbeard couldn’t figure out how to feed him.

And then he happened, and Ed finally was able to crawl out of his dormancy and see the sun for the first time. There had been so much hope then, a sense of overwhelmed giddiness - things were finally changing. He was changing, and it felt so much like a change for the better.

And then …

Anyway. It’s all in the past. He’s Blackbeard now, and for the foreseeable future. Whenever there are people around him, he’s on, so he tries to eschew time alone and stay on deck with his crew as much as possible. He’s picked up a half a dozen decent seamen to replace the motley group of fools that had been jettisoned when his transformation began, and though they’re not as much fun, that was okay, because Blackbeard’s not fun any longer.

He’s a killer again. A killer, even, like he never was before. Every man he runs through, he imagines he is killing Ed, little by little. He must kill and kill until that presence inside him is gone, gone, gone.

But Ed is still there.

On bright days with no wind, when the seas are too calm, he thinks he'll itch right out of his skin The sun burns right through him.

Nights, when the cool wind touches his cheek, he's reminded that he lost his beard, once, when he was soft enough to shave it off. It's been growing since, but slowly, and the protection to his face isn't as absolute as it once was.

The empty library shelves torture him. He puts driftwood on them, raided treasures, severed hands until they start to smell. He never has enough to fill all of the shelves. They demand books. They demand paper, and leather covers, and him. Ed thinks of that underwater library sometimes and gets queasy. He clutches his head and tries not to think of all the vanished words, never to return.

He replays that night in his head far too often. Tries to figure out what became of Stede. Maybe there's some other explanation. Maybe something happened to him. But what could have kept him away not just that night but for the full week Ed waited, sitting on the ship's railing and scanning the horizon for a rowboat?

The optimism that had buoyed his head for those days soon hardened over and fell, leaden, to the bottom of his stomach. Ed would have known if something had happened. He was sure of that. Stede was out there, somewhere in the world, okay. He just ... wasn't coming.

There's the hope that sits in his heart. Someday they would be hailed by a fearless ship with none of the proper dread at seeing Blackbeard's flag. When they get close enough, Ed will know it's him. That hope persists, but with each day that goes by, it keeps not happening. It would be so much easier if he didn't have any hope left. But he does, and that's what keeps him hurting.

#our flag means death #needed to get this out of my system #stuff tippy wrote #ofmd #ofmd fic #edward teach #blackbeard

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