#was drawing this right when the ofmd news hit

[hansoeii]

crowley!

[theclaravoyant]

AN ~ For @fictober-event’s Fictober 2023 prompt: “You lost it. Well, we lost it.” Set during s2, written pre-airing, insp. by that one shot of Stede aboard the ruined/abandoned(?) Revenge Masterpost of my Fictober OFMD fics

Fandom: Our Flag Means Death Characters & Relationships: Stede Bonnet (& his ship), background gen Revenge Crew, background Ed x Stede.

Shattered

When Stede finally climbs aboard, the sight hits him in the gut like a cannonball. The wind is, if you’ll forgive the expression, knocked suddenly and gracelessly out of his sails as he gazes numbly around at the splintered wood and fraying rope and scorch marks that litter the deck. His precious Revenge lies around him in ruins.

“What… happened here?”

The world feels unsteady around Stede in a way it hasn’t for a long time. He’s long since got his sea legs, but now he can feel the sickening lurch of the deck beneath him.

“You lost it,” Lucius says, and it almost sounds sad and sympathetic coming from his lips. “Well, we lost it. And then Blackbeard lost it - like, lost it lost it.”

Stede runs a hand along a rough and beaten piece of the balustrade. Tears well in his eyes at the thought of losing his ship. It had been his home for so long now, and more of a home than any house he’d ever lived in. More than that, it had been where he’d found his crew. Where he’d found himself. And Ed -

“Ed did this?”

“Well, not as such,” Lucius explains. “More like, let it happen. It’s kind of the lot of a pirate ship, you know?”

He presses his lips together, because he’s trying to let Stede down gently, but he doesn’t really have that setting. Especially not about ‘Ed’ right now.

Stede nods, trying to convey like he’s listening, but he’s not really sure how much information he’s taking in. Oluwande had tried to warn him that Ed would be angry - might even try to kill him. He’s not himself. He used to think this ship was the best thing since sliced bread. He used to take pleasure in its finery and even before that, take pride in any ship he sailed. Any pirate worth his salt did. With a pang of irony, Stede even finds himself missing Izzy, who - flawed and difficult and downright loathsome though he may be - would have sooner performed as a children’s birthday clown than let any ship under his purview fall into such disrepair.

He swallows the self-doubt that opens up like a chasm inside him, and asks - 

“And where’s everyone now?”

“They’re on the Queen Anne, at least, last I heard,” Lucius explains. He pulls a folded up wad of paper from his back pocket and holds it out to Stede. “Frenchie has been sending messages in bottles while I’ve been stuck on that island. I think he’s trying to tell me where they are like, in the world, but uh…“

Stede unfolds the paper and examines it. It’s a series of drawings, of course, and he can’t figure out what most of them are let alone what they could be referring to. But at least it gives him something to focus on other than the lingering scent of gunpowder and something rotting on his ship. Conjuring as much leader-y sounding pep as he can manage, he nods and tries to embrace this new obstacle - uh, challenge.

“Right. My turn to give it a go then, I suppose.”