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thinking about how both Ed and Stede are very prone to nightmares, thinking about how they've self taught to deal with those themselves without creating a fuss, thinking about how now when one of them has one, they wake the other one up and then they discuss and deconstruct Ed's nightmare of his spider tattoos coming alive and crawling up his nose (and Stede getting gum in his hair) 🥲

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Fall has arrived in Blorbo Simulator Land. Ed and Stede are raking the leaves in their big garden. Well, Ed is raking.

Stede is rather enjoying himself playing in the piles of leaves! Look at him go!

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Floor time*: perhaps you require it.*

*Edward Teach lying on his tummy on the floor with multiple nautical charts, a pencil, a tide table, a compass, and chart plotting tools. He's shed his jacket and has pulled his hair into a bun so it's out of the way. His t-shirt is riding up a bit. He's in his socks (no boots) and he's kicking his feet and stretching his toes absentmindedly. He is using things for paperweights that were never intended to be paperweights.

*He does require this.

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Edward "Blackbeard" Teach + smiling (Season 2)

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things for ed to say right before passing out

“hang on i gotta sit down”

“babe, are you ok? you’re ok, right?”

“why’s it dark. did it just get dark all of a sudden? are you seeing—oh k, maybe it’s me then”

“actually, with enough discipline, you can do fine on just one hour of sleep per night”

“right. so. think i’ll pass out now. you got this 👍”

“i’m gonna take a lil nap, hold on”

“hey that’s blood. is that mine? it doesn’t look like mine”

“i’m actually so completely fine right now,”

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You show up for your first day at Copyright-Free Magic School. As you're going through orientation, you're informed that all new students get a school-assigned familiar that they are responsible for housing and maintaining. The staff member assures you that your assigned familiar is appropriately chosen and reflects you in some way.

Spin this to find out yours. (Remember, you are responsible for maintaining this familiar in your dorm room.)

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*puts on Weird Random Interests hat* So, etymologically the "ruth" in "ruthless" comes from the same root as modern "rue" (of "you'll rue this day" fame). "Rue" by itself means and meant everything from remorse/regret over sympathy/compassion to grief, so someone who is ruthless has no regrets, feels no remorse, lacks sympathy and compassion and doesn't grieve his past actions. For the course of most of the show, the character this is most true for is Izzy.

Izzy is the character who shows zero remorse and compassion faced with things like killing Stede, selling everyone out to the British, having Stede shot in front of Ed for Ed's own good, etc. Even later, after he turns nicer, we never really see Izzy grapple with any remorse over his actions. The closest we get is the deathbed admission that he Blackbeard was bad for Ed but that he kept pushing Ed into this role because Izzy needed Blackbeard.

Ed's feelings of guilt over various past actions are intensely addressed, Ed is full of remorse and guilt, and also Stede definitely regrets his "ruthless" actions.

Ruthless is just a bad word to describe either of them IMO. I stand by Izzy being ruthless, especially in season one. One could argue Zheng to be ruthless, what with the "join me or die" situations (although we don't learn enough about her motivations and feelings to be really sure). Ed isn't ruthless, but rather he is calculated in his usage of violence. He doesn't lack understanding or empathy for what happens to other people. Stede just has, like, a short fuse (and a completely out of whack moral compass). Some of Stede's violence is vengeance, after a lifetime of being bullied and being the victim he's not going to take this anymore and if you hurt him or his people he will make you regret it. (He named his ship The Revenge!) Stede is done rolling over and turning the other cheek. Stede is, after a lifetime of being stepped on, finally letting himself be angry and act in this anger. (Which is not necessarily a fault, anger exists to protect us, it's, evolutionarily, the fight back and survive emotion.)

Ed on the other hand doesn't even act in anger. Ed is super hard to even make angry, and even then he usually takes a moment or two of deciding his actions before he reacts. Ed takes a step back, evaluates the situation after the initial anger has already passed and then decides what he has to do, considering exactly what he needs the other person's reaction to be. And when his calculated decision is something that hurts the other person, he regrets it and feels bad about it even if the other person had it coming. (His dad for example really had it coming, but the guilt over little Ed's calculated decision of "it's either you or me/us" sticks with Ed all his life.)

See, y'know, I don't think "ruthless" is really an appropriate word to describe Ed. I mean, yeah, there's the pirate of it all, but OFMD doesn't operate with irl standards towards this stuff. If anything, Ed's got the opposite of ruthlessness going on (he is full of ruths?). There are certainly times when you could make the argument he's behaving cruelly, but that's not his base state and it's always informed by extreme emotional turmoil where he's feeling forced to behave that way. If anything, Ed is extremely prone to just rolling over, not getting his way, and letting people treat him like shit.

Stede, though. STEDE. I adore my guy Stede, but he's where I think we run into some real potential for unchecked anger issues and ruthlessness. Stede is the kind of guy who feels like he has a lot to prove, and even when he's perfectly capable of resolving things with his own style, we see him resort to violence purely out of seeking social approval or just because he wants to. We're talking about a guy who easily manipulated a boat full of assholes into setting themselves on fire (not just because Ed was hurt, either, but clearly also because he's getting personal satisfaction out of it). I think killing Ned Low is the perfect example - Stede has already won, and in the real world I'm sure it would be dangerous to let Ned live, but if that was a genuine concern in this world, someone would've mentioned it (not least of all Ed, who is the one to directly say to Stede that he doesn't have to kill Ned). Stede kills Ned not because he has to but because he wants to, because Ned hurt Ed and the crew and (not least of all) because Ned insulted Stede by calling him a pet, someone who can't take care of himself or hold his own as a man.

Basically. We need more fics where Stede is allowed to be angry and violent in response to shit, where Ed gets captured and Stede burns cities to the ground to save him, where they get through the bad shit and Stede's still struggling with feeling like he has to bite people in the throat for being rude to Ed.

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For the top 5 asks. Top 5 Ed Teach curls, please

And number one.

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i'm sure we all know there's a divide in fandom over how long ed and izzy have worked together. the common canyon assumption is that ed and izzy have known each other since the hornigold days but gb types are more likely to think it's strongly implied they've only been working together for a few years. i would like to propose an alternative that i think might be broadly acceptable to both sides: for narrative parallel reasons, ed met and hired izzy hands on the exact same day stede met and married mary allamby

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I see a lot of posts that are like "the OFMD fandom is dead" or "wow it's so weird how no one talks about OFMD anymore," and I'm gonna have to disagree.

We're still out here writing fic and meta and making art and raising thousands of dollars for charity, yeah? Most of the people I'd like to think are my friends are still posting. It's still the second most active fandom I've ever been in (the first being Star Wars, where huge swaths of the fandom were not places I wanted to be). Maybe I'm just lucky enough to find myself in the parts of the fandom that are still here.

And I truly do consider myself lucky! Prior to OFMD, all of my favorite characters were minor and finding anything related to them was a struggle. Now? I'm spoiled for choice when it comes to fic and art! I have so many fics on my to-read list and I'm adding more all the time. I get to see brand new art and edits and gifs on my timeline every day.

I genuinely love it here, and I'm so glad that the fandom (the part that I'm in, at least) isn't dead. I certainly don't plan on going anywhere; if anything, I'd like to be more involved. I want to share fics and art and hang out with you all.

So thank you if you're still here and still creating! This fandom provides a lovely little escape from The Horrors and I never want to leave.

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babe...

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hey... do you want to do something weird?

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Some of my art for this years OFMD Big Bang!

Illustration 2 of 2 for a story that'll get it's official post on Tuesday - keep an eye out!!

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It’s baby gay Stede’s first Pride, and Ed’s a sucker for sweet things 🍒 🏳️‍🌈🥰

An @ofmdaction prompt for my dearest, most excellent Jess, aka @stedesparasol , based on this fun post (which was based on a prompt I suggested, so it’s all come full-circle here 😆 )