[that surprises him; he genuinely expected that some of his belongings just evaporated into the ether when he did. it was a good collection, definitely shouldn't have gone to waste, and refilling it one way or the other won't be a hardship. makes him smile a little, mostly to himself.
he takes the first puff of the cigarette after lighting it, but then passes it to jack, draping an arm across one long leg. yes, he could probably light a cigarette for each of them, but it's an old habit not to burn too quickly through a stash of something good - besides, there's intimacy in this sort of ritual that is only easy, and they have so few of those associated with this new thing, still. for a minute he doesn't even say anything, just looking at jack, satisfied by the sight of him, all marked up and messy and relaxed.]
[ He doesn't mind passing it. A long time ago, Jack only really smoked with Charles anyway, much preferring the drowsy calm of liquor. In his time here, he's needed to pick up another coping mechanism, so it isn't always such a social affair, but that's what it started as. It's like returning to his roots, sharing a cigarette with Charles after a year in Duplicity, even with so much of this, from the lightbulb overhead to the sticky feeling rolling down his thighs, being far too new to let him get lost in nostalgia. ]
Oh, God, fuck off. [ He chuckles with the cigarette still between his lips, coughing out the smoke as he nudges Charles off to look in the mirror on the opposite wall. ] Or I've been mauled by some beast. Hell's wrong with you?
[ He tries to put on an air of annoyance, but what should be topped off with a growl, he can only muster a smile for. There's something distinctly careless about standing around naked, freshly fucked and gone soft with a smoke in his mouth, that makes it hard to truly feel defensive about it. ]
Know a witch who can make me presentable again. No matter.
[vane just lounges right where he is as jack departs the couch, unrepentantly admiring his bare ass and the streaks of come on his thighs, to say nothing of the evidence of said mauling. but when jack returns, he stands up to meet him, taking the cigarette and inhaling with a pointedly raised eyebrow.]
I didn't start it.
[thus simultaneously acknowledging two unspoken things: one, that it was irving; and two, that it was a competition. but hell, if jack 'knows a witch'...]
Which means you made a choice to come see me looking like that.
[his knuckles bump jack's chest as he hands the cigarette back. important to note: he doesn't look pissed. but he is using his 'fuck around and find out' voice. make of that what you will.]
Could feel you getting impatient, even over the phone.
[ Okay, caught red-handed. But consider, Nate might have better shit to do than get himself involved in Jack's stupid romantic dramas yet again. That's not the reason, though, and they both know it, so Jack won't insult him by pretending. He could have done a better job of hiding it, but he chose to flaunt it, just as much for the joy in being marked by Irving as it was to provoke Charles into doing the same. And Jesus, did he. ]
My neck won't play host to any more proxy battles between you if I'm going to look like I've been attacked, after. Enough of that.
[look: if it was a real battle he wanted, that wouldn't even be a question. he certainly wouldn't warn jack about it, or ask his permission. so jack could always consider snippy sarcasm about it to be another step on the road to acceptance.
it's a far cry away from making nice with jack's other lover, but it's also a far cry from actually trying to murder him.]
If he tries to call me out, I'll come.
[let that be known, as well, as he flattens his hand against jack's chest and gives him a deliberate push in the direction of the bedroom: he has every intention of respecting jack's desire not to take sides, but a challenge requires an answer. whether it's obvious, or hidden like morse code in the marks on jack's body, left for the next pair of hands to find.]
Unless you think you can give me a good enough reason not to.
[ In the same warning tone as âare you going to make me?â, that implies Charles wonât be happy with the result without saying so outright. Even as a joke, the idea of them at each otherâs throats stresses him out enough that his next drag is a long one, eyes not leaving the other man even as he exhales. He got lucky, he realizes, that between John and Anne, the former would rather avoid conflict and the latter can tolerate just about anything, if it makes Jack happy. Charles isnât so simple as that.
He steps back, with the push, and swats his hand away, blowing smoke into the face of his former captain. He might be easily provoked by a handful of love bits, but whatever it is heâs trying to pull out of Jack wonât come so easily. ]
He doesnât want to fight you, Charles. If he could pretend you donât exist, he probably would, but he knows too much to do that. Told him about you, when I thought you werenât coming back.
[so much for teasing. jack has never really been a pushover in their relationship, even when he had to resort to ingratiation to keep vane from losing his temper. but this swift, sharp defensiveness is new.
if anyone else had tried to slap his hand and blow cigarette smoke in his face, he'd already be putting the embers out in their eye. but it's jack doing it. new, and deeply unpleasant.
if he was grinning before, he's not now, but instead of getting angry he just looks at jack for a moment, taking his measure with seven months and a new partner added to the scales. then he takes the cigarette, and puts it in his mouth before turning away to head into the kitchen instead.]
[ Well, mission accomplished there. Jack's sure Irving hasn't spent a single second since he found out thinking about anything else, because Jack hasn't, and he knew immediately what it meant when he told him that Charles had returned. He knows. Maybe he's been dreading it, even.
Still, that answer makes him smile, despite himself. Of course he does. Captain egos... ]
If Hickey's left any food in there, it'll be off by now, he's been gone a couple weeks.
[ Maybe today's the day Charles Vane learns about doordash. Until then, Jack presses his fingertips into the bruises he left, before fishing around on the floor for his pants. ]
[in fact he'd just opened up a cabinet to look for bottles, prompting him to smack it shut again, annoyed.]
Fuck kind of man doesn't drink?
[just grow up and develop functional alcoholism like an adult. but fine! he'll just hydrate, then - presumably hickey, whatever kind of man he happened to be, did in fact own cups. he steals one and just fills it up from the sink. he is hungry, but only realized it once jack mentioned it, not yet feeling any sort of urgent need to resolve it. or put on his own pants, for that matter. in fact, after the first glass goes down, he's going to take the next one with him into the bedroom, along with the dwindling half of the cigarette.]
Lightweight who doesn't want to be caught in a lie.
[ Handily, it's what Jack suspects the real answer is, as well as a succinct explanation of his side of why it didn't work. He's got nothing more to say about it, more occupied with eyeballing Charles, who has made no effort whatsoever to make himself decent. Now he's regretting not marking him up the same way, because he looks too damned perfect, like a statue, even with all the scars.
He follows a step behind so he can ogle his ass, and if he's caught, he'll just smile, pants slung over his shoulder like a towel instead of actually pulled on. Once they're in, he kicks the door shut behind them, and settles onto the bed, taking up enough room lounging that Charles will have no choice but to invade his space if he wants on the bed at all. ]
Edited (just making it make sense snsjs sry) 2022-11-17 15:26 (UTC)
[jack is welcome to eat his heart out; vane himself certainly doesn't stop his eyes from lingering whenever there's an appetizing view of jack's naked body in front of him. he's comfortable in his own skin, and he's comfortable with jack; in fact, the only thing(s) he didn't bother to remove were the bracers - one of which still has the scarf braided through it.
he's a little more guarded now, but that doesn't stop him from draping himself across jack with no more hesitation than it takes to set the glass down on the side table. he lounges sideways over jack's stomach, elbow propped up on the other side of him, as though he's been doing it for years; when he decides to do something, like kill a man or steal a ship or be a better partner, he doesn't spend a whole lot of time second-guessing himself about it. even if he's still figuring out what the fuck that last option looks like.
another slow pull of the cigarette, which he deliberately breathes out in a rolling plume across jack's chest.]
[ It gets too damn cold here, is what Jackâs thinking when he lays down, the warm rush of their little tryst finally fading, when Charles drapes himself over him like a chiseled, glistening blanket. It helps, but he pulls an actual blanket over them both anyway, not worried about the implications of getting so cozy so much as his feet getting cold. ]
Never had one.
[ Itâs spoken softly, like a confession, instead of a rejection. Someday, heâll insist to a woman he doesnât know and wonât believe him, with the utmost sincerity, that Charles Vane was a good man. Jack will believe it to the end, beyond the end, for Charles. His metric for good and bad might be skewed by his career choices, but the man cuddled up against him is an honest one, an honorable one, a loyal one. A better man than Hickey. A better man than Jack.
He wrings his hand at his side for a moment, and then reaches to Charles, just short, soft strokes over his forearm. ]
No taste for men I canât trust, is more like it. Shacked up half a year, Iâm not sure I ever even knew the man.
[it's a nice feeling, having jack deliberately reach out and touch him. not even with specific intent; just, it seems, for the sake of doing it, that contact. not much at all, and yet far too much to be ignored. vane could never say later that he didn't notice it happening, just as jack could hardly argue he hadn't meant to do it.
he takes one more pull, and then offers jack the cigarette.]
Can't seem to recall it well enough - [jack's retelling, that is] - was he on the ship with you?
[ He does it without thinking. It feels a hell of a lot better than not touching him does. They've been separated for so long that Jack doesn't consider whether it might come across as too needy or soft, in fact, it's not a concern he's had for months, now. ]
He wasn't. By the time we set sail, it was good and over between us.
[ He doesn't remember because Jack hadn't mentioned anyone, but Anne, John, and Carver. It sounds suspiciously like he's fishing for something, but he doesn't call it out. He's happy to tell him whatever he wants to know about the time he lost.
Jack takes the last drag, and stubs it out in an ashtray on the bedside table that's seen some use. Hickey was a smoker, at least. ]
Offered him a spot. Any experience at all was welcome, half the crew had never been at sea before at all. But, he was never an enthusiastic sailor to begin with.
[ And even in a professional capacity, he doubts Hickey had any interest in seeing he and John together. ]
[he's not fishing for anything more than what he got, which is the answer to the question he asked and also to hear jack's voice besides. he likes listening to jack when he's talking quietly, enjoying the breathy, soft quality of his voice at lower tones for longer than he admitted it to himself. now he's admitting it to himself.
plus, his hands are free. now he can run his fingers slowly across the shape of different marks, here and there, some already going purple. admiring his work, as it were.]
Who else was with you?
[slightly more of a practical question this time; if he happens to encounter them about the city, he'd like to be aware of it.]
Anne, John, Billy, obviously. Told you about Carver. The Rhatigans. Ducky...she's gone now.
[ She was the first person here who he deemed worth straying from Anne for, and the last time he saw her, they were washed up on the beach. He tries to answer the question instead of thinking too hard. ]
That he-witch, his name's Nate Hawthorne. Think you'd like him. He brought some of his colleagues along. Chris Sonom, a magic healer. A kid named Parker we almost lost, washed up on the beach a week after the rest of us.
[ He sits up, suddenly, on his elbows, grinning like he's holding back laughter. ]
Oh, you'll love this. There was some absolute jester walking around declaring himself Edward Teach. He fucking wasn't, most elaborate baffoonery I've ever seen, though.
[ It had prompted a brief existential crisis, at the time, but now, he can laugh at it. ]
He was insistent, too. And said he and I had at one point been lovers. Man was disturbed.
[the names are committed dutifully to memory, in succession; it's not necessarily a free pass into his good graces, but if they've offered jack respect then it's enough of a reason to be slightly less of an asshole upon first meeting. in theory. either way, sometimes it's just good to be aware.
then jack mentions teach. vane receives the information at first with a look torn between amusement and scorn - but the idea of a world in which jack rackham and edward teach were lovers makes him laugh outright, enough to leave his shoulders shaking when he tries to rein it in. holy shit.]
The fucking balls on that idea - [incredible. he shifts a little, pushing himself up over jack's stomach just so he can roll sideways and settle his head back on the other pirate like a pillow.] He still here?
[ There were others. A handful of which are gone now, and others simply deckhands he never got the chance to really know, but the memory of "Edward Teach" has his face to split with a sniggering grin to pay them any mind. ]
Not just that, but didn't know who Anne was. Barely knew you. Making shit up as he went along, I think, but he had people going.
[ Of course, it was all deeply disturbing to hear, but now that he's fucked off, Jack can postpone that crisis for another time. ]
Nah, he's gone. You'd have killed him on sight, probably. Worst imposter I've ever seen.
[jack's certainly not wrong; he's a little disappointed that he missed the opportunity, if only to see it for himself and then be able to say he did something about it. he's still chuckling, thinking about it, even as his thoughts tilt more toward the teach they knew than any potential impostors.]
He'd have been... disgusted. Killed the bastard himself.
[their teach, that is. the one who never understood what charles vane saw in jack rackham; the man who called him a lion long before daphne chose it as a pet name. but thinking about him now is an inevitable reminder of regret. his amusement fades, until he's quiet again.
that might have been it. he could have stayed silent, gone moody, or put it out of his mind altogether. or... he could tell jack about it. seems equally inevitable that he would, sooner or later, if a reason to do so happened to come up between them. but he's here, and jack's here, and he's thinking about it. so... why overthink it?]
[ Unlike Charles and Anne, it's been many years since Jack's seen any version of Teach but the strange imposter, and last time he did, they weren't exactly friendly. He knows from Anne that somehow, the two of them ended up sailing together, but he never pried into the details, decided he didn't need them after the bomb of Charles' death had been dropped. Being in Duplicity, he's learned enough about his life after he'll remember it without the gory details.
Just like him, of course, to have exactly what he wants, a reputation that will last centuries, and find a way to be dissatisfied. ]
[it wouldn't stop him, either way. though he took teach's advice more seriously than anyone else's before jack came along, in the end he always made his own choices. for better or worse. he shakes his head a little against jack's hip.]
I betrayed him again. [just a murmur. matter-of-fact, if not for the softness of it, betraying regret.] In front of his men, and Flint's. If he'd have shot me dead on the spot, I wouldn't have blamed him - but I knew he wouldn't.
[ His men and Flint's? As much as Jack would love to get the juicy details about that, he bites his tongue, brushing his fingers against the side of the other man's neck. ]
He'll forgive you. After you're gone, he'll come back to fight them with Anne and I.
[ Jack can't give him any more detail than that, besides the gruesome way that Teach met his end because of it. He bites his tongue on that, too. ]
[his brow furrows slightly, but for a minute that's all, just the trace of a frown as he stares at nothing and his thoughts waver between the look of shock and betrayal on teach's face at ocracoke beach, and the tingles left behind by jack's fingers on his neck.
forgiveness means nothing, realistically, to a dead man. but he's not a dead man here - not in any way that matters, even though there's no going back, he and teach will never see each other again. he's alive enough to be experiencing this moment, and in this moment, it's nice to hear it. soothes something to a dull ache instead of a sharp one.]
He wanted me to leave with him. [it feels weird to tell jack as much, stepping across the uneven ground between their timelines. he's not even really sure why he's saying it now, other than simple pleasure of telling jack things and being known by him a little better because of it.] Drive off the governor's fleet, then put Nassau behind us for good. All that shit I put him through, all the years in between, but he just... dismissed it. Like it didn't fucking matter.
[ Or he wouldn't have been hanged in Nassau. It's starting to take shape, the time in between what he remembers and what Anne does, the exact things Jack has worked hard to convince himself he doesn't need to worry about, that he can't worry about, lest he drown himself in what-ifs that he can't even remember.
But coming from Charles, freely given instead of wrenched from his brain, he doesn't mind. He's not like Jack, he doesn't waste time talking about things that don't matter. It's important to him, then, and since it is, Jack wants to know. ]
He was like a father to you, wasn't he? [ Not a real question. He knows. ] Get close enough to someone, you'll forgive them anything. No matter how much time's separated you, I'd hope.
[ Not that he would know. Longest he's ever been separated from Anne is the month she fell into that coma here. Longest he's been separated from Charles is the months he was just gone, and here he is, pressed naked against his side. ]
[not until it happened to him, with teach, and in him, with jack. twice that one of them should, by all rights and every example, have killed the other and written off his very existence. instead they deliberately chose otherwise, and after enough time had passed it was like it never happened at all.
at least, that's how he remembers it. jack was winked to duplicity at a time when that bridge was still mending.
but, in any case. he doesn't need to tell jack that he's right. they both know it. instead he turns over again, this time onto his front so he can crawl up the other man's body and kiss him, deepening it, sliding a hand firmly around the back of his neck. when he speaks again it's just a murmur against his mouth, thumb running gently down the center of jack's throat.]
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he takes the first puff of the cigarette after lighting it, but then passes it to jack, draping an arm across one long leg. yes, he could probably light a cigarette for each of them, but it's an old habit not to burn too quickly through a stash of something good - besides, there's intimacy in this sort of ritual that is only easy, and they have so few of those associated with this new thing, still. for a minute he doesn't even say anything, just looking at jack, satisfied by the sight of him, all marked up and messy and relaxed.]
You look like you fucked an octopus.
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Oh, God, fuck off. [ He chuckles with the cigarette still between his lips, coughing out the smoke as he nudges Charles off to look in the mirror on the opposite wall. ] Or I've been mauled by some beast. Hell's wrong with you?
[ He tries to put on an air of annoyance, but what should be topped off with a growl, he can only muster a smile for. There's something distinctly careless about standing around naked, freshly fucked and gone soft with a smoke in his mouth, that makes it hard to truly feel defensive about it. ]
Know a witch who can make me presentable again. No matter.
[ He returns, and holds the cigarette out. ]
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I didn't start it.
[thus simultaneously acknowledging two unspoken things: one, that it was irving; and two, that it was a competition. but hell, if jack 'knows a witch'...]
Which means you made a choice to come see me looking like that.
[his knuckles bump jack's chest as he hands the cigarette back. important to note: he doesn't look pissed. but he is using his 'fuck around and find out' voice. make of that what you will.]
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[ Okay, caught red-handed. But consider, Nate might have better shit to do than get himself involved in Jack's stupid romantic dramas yet again. That's not the reason, though, and they both know it, so Jack won't insult him by pretending. He could have done a better job of hiding it, but he chose to flaunt it, just as much for the joy in being marked by Irving as it was to provoke Charles into doing the same. And Jesus, did he. ]
My neck won't play host to any more proxy battles between you if I'm going to look like I've been attacked, after. Enough of that.
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[look: if it was a real battle he wanted, that wouldn't even be a question. he certainly wouldn't warn jack about it, or ask his permission. so jack could always consider snippy sarcasm about it to be another step on the road to acceptance.
it's a far cry away from making nice with jack's other lover, but it's also a far cry from actually trying to murder him.]
If he tries to call me out, I'll come.
[let that be known, as well, as he flattens his hand against jack's chest and gives him a deliberate push in the direction of the bedroom: he has every intention of respecting jack's desire not to take sides, but a challenge requires an answer. whether it's obvious, or hidden like morse code in the marks on jack's body, left for the next pair of hands to find.]
Unless you think you can give me a good enough reason not to.
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[ In the same warning tone as âare you going to make me?â, that implies Charles wonât be happy with the result without saying so outright. Even as a joke, the idea of them at each otherâs throats stresses him out enough that his next drag is a long one, eyes not leaving the other man even as he exhales. He got lucky, he realizes, that between John and Anne, the former would rather avoid conflict and the latter can tolerate just about anything, if it makes Jack happy. Charles isnât so simple as that.
He steps back, with the push, and swats his hand away, blowing smoke into the face of his former captain. He might be easily provoked by a handful of love bits, but whatever it is heâs trying to pull out of Jack wonât come so easily. ]
He doesnât want to fight you, Charles. If he could pretend you donât exist, he probably would, but he knows too much to do that. Told him about you, when I thought you werenât coming back.
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if anyone else had tried to slap his hand and blow cigarette smoke in his face, he'd already be putting the embers out in their eye. but it's jack doing it. new, and deeply unpleasant.
if he was grinning before, he's not now, but instead of getting angry he just looks at jack for a moment, taking his measure with seven months and a new partner added to the scales. then he takes the cigarette, and puts it in his mouth before turning away to head into the kitchen instead.]
Good. I want him to know I exist.
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Still, that answer makes him smile, despite himself. Of course he does. Captain egos... ]
If Hickey's left any food in there, it'll be off by now, he's been gone a couple weeks.
[ Maybe today's the day Charles Vane learns about doordash. Until then, Jack presses his fingertips into the bruises he left, before fishing around on the floor for his pants. ]
He doesn't drink, either.
[ Wasn't meant to be, between them. ]
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Fuck kind of man doesn't drink?
[just grow up and develop functional alcoholism like an adult. but fine! he'll just hydrate, then - presumably hickey, whatever kind of man he happened to be, did in fact own cups. he steals one and just fills it up from the sink. he is hungry, but only realized it once jack mentioned it, not yet feeling any sort of urgent need to resolve it. or put on his own pants, for that matter. in fact, after the first glass goes down, he's going to take the next one with him into the bedroom, along with the dwindling half of the cigarette.]
Come on.
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[ Handily, it's what Jack suspects the real answer is, as well as a succinct explanation of his side of why it didn't work. He's got nothing more to say about it, more occupied with eyeballing Charles, who has made no effort whatsoever to make himself decent. Now he's regretting not marking him up the same way, because he looks too damned perfect, like a statue, even with all the scars.
He follows a step behind so he can ogle his ass, and if he's caught, he'll just smile, pants slung over his shoulder like a towel instead of actually pulled on. Once they're in, he kicks the door shut behind them, and settles onto the bed, taking up enough room lounging that Charles will have no choice but to invade his space if he wants on the bed at all. ]
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he's a little more guarded now, but that doesn't stop him from draping himself across jack with no more hesitation than it takes to set the glass down on the side table. he lounges sideways over jack's stomach, elbow propped up on the other side of him, as though he's been doing it for years; when he decides to do something, like kill a man or steal a ship or be a better partner, he doesn't spend a whole lot of time second-guessing himself about it. even if he's still figuring out what the fuck that last option looks like.
another slow pull of the cigarette, which he deliberately breathes out in a rolling plume across jack's chest.]
Losing your taste for bad men?
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Never had one.
[ Itâs spoken softly, like a confession, instead of a rejection. Someday, heâll insist to a woman he doesnât know and wonât believe him, with the utmost sincerity, that Charles Vane was a good man. Jack will believe it to the end, beyond the end, for Charles. His metric for good and bad might be skewed by his career choices, but the man cuddled up against him is an honest one, an honorable one, a loyal one. A better man than Hickey. A better man than Jack.
He wrings his hand at his side for a moment, and then reaches to Charles, just short, soft strokes over his forearm. ]
No taste for men I canât trust, is more like it. Shacked up half a year, Iâm not sure I ever even knew the man.
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he takes one more pull, and then offers jack the cigarette.]
Can't seem to recall it well enough - [jack's retelling, that is] - was he on the ship with you?
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He wasn't. By the time we set sail, it was good and over between us.
[ He doesn't remember because Jack hadn't mentioned anyone, but Anne, John, and Carver. It sounds suspiciously like he's fishing for something, but he doesn't call it out. He's happy to tell him whatever he wants to know about the time he lost.
Jack takes the last drag, and stubs it out in an ashtray on the bedside table that's seen some use. Hickey was a smoker, at least. ]
Offered him a spot. Any experience at all was welcome, half the crew had never been at sea before at all. But, he was never an enthusiastic sailor to begin with.
[ And even in a professional capacity, he doubts Hickey had any interest in seeing he and John together. ]
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plus, his hands are free. now he can run his fingers slowly across the shape of different marks, here and there, some already going purple. admiring his work, as it were.]
Who else was with you?
[slightly more of a practical question this time; if he happens to encounter them about the city, he'd like to be aware of it.]
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[ She was the first person here who he deemed worth straying from Anne for, and the last time he saw her, they were washed up on the beach. He tries to answer the question instead of thinking too hard. ]
That he-witch, his name's Nate Hawthorne. Think you'd like him. He brought some of his colleagues along. Chris Sonom, a magic healer. A kid named Parker we almost lost, washed up on the beach a week after the rest of us.
[ He sits up, suddenly, on his elbows, grinning like he's holding back laughter. ]
Oh, you'll love this. There was some absolute jester walking around declaring himself Edward Teach. He fucking wasn't, most elaborate baffoonery I've ever seen, though.
[ It had prompted a brief existential crisis, at the time, but now, he can laugh at it. ]
He was insistent, too. And said he and I had at one point been lovers. Man was disturbed.
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then jack mentions teach. vane receives the information at first with a look torn between amusement and scorn - but the idea of a world in which jack rackham and edward teach were lovers makes him laugh outright, enough to leave his shoulders shaking when he tries to rein it in. holy shit.]
The fucking balls on that idea - [incredible. he shifts a little, pushing himself up over jack's stomach just so he can roll sideways and settle his head back on the other pirate like a pillow.] He still here?
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Not just that, but didn't know who Anne was. Barely knew you. Making shit up as he went along, I think, but he had people going.
[ Of course, it was all deeply disturbing to hear, but now that he's fucked off, Jack can postpone that crisis for another time. ]
Nah, he's gone. You'd have killed him on sight, probably. Worst imposter I've ever seen.
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He'd have been... disgusted. Killed the bastard himself.
[their teach, that is. the one who never understood what charles vane saw in jack rackham; the man who called him a lion long before daphne chose it as a pet name. but thinking about him now is an inevitable reminder of regret. his amusement fades, until he's quiet again.
that might have been it. he could have stayed silent, gone moody, or put it out of his mind altogether. or... he could tell jack about it. seems equally inevitable that he would, sooner or later, if a reason to do so happened to come up between them. but he's here, and jack's here, and he's thinking about it. so... why overthink it?]
Not sure he'd be partial to me either, anymore.
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Just like him, of course, to have exactly what he wants, a reputation that will last centuries, and find a way to be dissatisfied. ]
What makes you say that? Lying in bed with me?
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Hadn't even considered that part, to be honest.
[it wouldn't stop him, either way. though he took teach's advice more seriously than anyone else's before jack came along, in the end he always made his own choices. for better or worse. he shakes his head a little against jack's hip.]
I betrayed him again. [just a murmur. matter-of-fact, if not for the softness of it, betraying regret.] In front of his men, and Flint's. If he'd have shot me dead on the spot, I wouldn't have blamed him - but I knew he wouldn't.
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He'll forgive you. After you're gone, he'll come back to fight them with Anne and I.
[ Jack can't give him any more detail than that, besides the gruesome way that Teach met his end because of it. He bites his tongue on that, too. ]
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forgiveness means nothing, realistically, to a dead man. but he's not a dead man here - not in any way that matters, even though there's no going back, he and teach will never see each other again. he's alive enough to be experiencing this moment, and in this moment, it's nice to hear it. soothes something to a dull ache instead of a sharp one.]
He wanted me to leave with him. [it feels weird to tell jack as much, stepping across the uneven ground between their timelines. he's not even really sure why he's saying it now, other than simple pleasure of telling jack things and being known by him a little better because of it.] Drive off the governor's fleet, then put Nassau behind us for good. All that shit I put him through, all the years in between, but he just... dismissed it. Like it didn't fucking matter.
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[ Or he wouldn't have been hanged in Nassau. It's starting to take shape, the time in between what he remembers and what Anne does, the exact things Jack has worked hard to convince himself he doesn't need to worry about, that he can't worry about, lest he drown himself in what-ifs that he can't even remember.
But coming from Charles, freely given instead of wrenched from his brain, he doesn't mind. He's not like Jack, he doesn't waste time talking about things that don't matter. It's important to him, then, and since it is, Jack wants to know. ]
He was like a father to you, wasn't he? [ Not a real question. He knows. ] Get close enough to someone, you'll forgive them anything. No matter how much time's separated you, I'd hope.
[ Not that he would know. Longest he's ever been separated from Anne is the month she fell into that coma here. Longest he's been separated from Charles is the months he was just gone, and here he is, pressed naked against his side. ]
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[not until it happened to him, with teach, and in him, with jack. twice that one of them should, by all rights and every example, have killed the other and written off his very existence. instead they deliberately chose otherwise, and after enough time had passed it was like it never happened at all.
at least, that's how he remembers it. jack was winked to duplicity at a time when that bridge was still mending.
but, in any case. he doesn't need to tell jack that he's right. they both know it. instead he turns over again, this time onto his front so he can crawl up the other man's body and kiss him, deepening it, sliding a hand firmly around the back of his neck. when he speaks again it's just a murmur against his mouth, thumb running gently down the center of jack's throat.]
Funny how things work out.
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