Chapter Text
Ed liked to dissociate before raids. He once loved being a pirate - the open seas, the thrill of the chase, the satisfaction of a hold full of plunder. But even when he was still young, reveling in a good fuckery and building his reputation, actually taking a ship had never been his favorite thing. It was the journey, not the destination and all that.
Alcohol made the grisly bits easier. Blurring the line between dreams and reality, the screaming and the scent of blood felt far away. Ed couldn’t remember the last time he was sober during a fight.
When the fighting was done, he blinked back to himself again. The deck of the ship was dark with blood, slippery beneath his feet. Somewhere to the stern a lantern had smashed, sending burning oil across the quarter deck. The remaining passengers and crew were lined up midship, forced to their knees at swordpoint. Some were bloodied, some were shivering, almost all of them were weeping. It made Ed’s vision blur even looking at the miserable lot.
The Captain gulped down the nausea lingering in the back of his throat, and walked over to his first mate. It was the hangover, he told himself. Blackbeard doesn’t get sick by the sight of violence.
“Merchant sloop,” Izzy said, casting his eyes around the ship appraisingly. “Not expecting trouble. Most of the crew weren’t even armed.”
The two men looked back at the passengers of the ship. They were a mixed bunch. Some wore old, filthy rags, like his own crew. Others were well kept and clean, dressed in fine fabrics. Aristocrats. Just like…
“Cowards.” Izzy spat. “What do you wanna do with them? Deal with them quickly, or are the crew allowed to have a bit of fun?”
Ed barely heard him, walking over to the hostages. There was a man, his age. His hair fell in blonde curls, obscuring his face. Ed stopped in front of him, and nudged at the man’s chin with the toe of his bloodstained boot.
The man looked up. His eyes were an unfamiliar piercing blue.
“Please,” The man spluttered. “Please don’t kill me. I’ll do whatever you want. I’ll give you anything you want.”
Ed sneered at him.
“There’s nothing I want that you can give me.”
The man cringed, tears crawling down his cheeks.
“Please. Please, I have a daughter. She’s so young, she’s on this ship. Please!” Ed’s eyes drifted down the row of people until they landed on a young woman with blonde hair. She faced away from them, sobbing into the shoulder of another man. “Let me live. I’ll give you anything. I swear on my life. Anything. I’ll give her to you.”
Blackbeard’s eyes snapped back to the man.
“What’s that, mate?”
The blonde man’s eyes lit up.
“You don’t want what I can give you, but she’s a beauty. Even a monster like you has enough humanity in him to want her. She’ll do anything you want. She’s yours, if I get off this ship alive. ”
The girl was far enough away she couldn’t hear her father over the sea and her own tears. She had a streak of blood across her hair, her dress torn across the shoulder. Her breaths came in great shuddering heaves.
“You fucking rat.” Ed spat. “I should’ve shot you the second you opened your mouth. You rich bastards are all the same, you’d do anything to save your own skin. Never care who you hurt, or that you loved them! As long as you get away you don’t care.”
The man paled as Ed stooped to his level. If it weren’t for his eyes, he could have been Stede. And he was the same; under the posh clothes he was a selfish, arrogant, stuck-up prick. Ed’s rage boiled, and built, and burst.
The first punch made the man’s nose look a lot less like Stede’s. Blood gushed down his lips and chin, hiding the familiar looking features. The second punch crushed something around his eye and the blue disappeared. Ed kept hitting the man until he didn’t look like Stede at all. The man slumped to the ground once Ed finished with his face. He stamped on the man’s hands, grinding his fingers into the deck. The man sobbed louder than his daughter.
“Tie him to the mast.” Ed commanded. The rich man was in too much pain to try and escape, and it took no time to have him bound fast. Izzy looked on proudly.
“Your orders Blackbeard?” He said.
“Show the gentleman what he gets for trying to bargain with me.” Ed said. “Let him die slowly. And let him die last.”
“And the rest?”
“Take what you want, then throw them overboard. But not the girl.”
Izzy grinned nastily, turning to the crew to relay Blackbeard’s orders. The crewmen grabbed captives from the line, eager to do their duty as his crew. The screams started as suddenly as they were silenced. Ed got to the blonde woman before anyone else could, and he tugged her up, out of her husband’s arms. One of the crew pulled the man to his feet, away from her.
“Richard!” She screamed, throwing out her arms to her husband. “Don’t leave me Richa-”
The crewman thrust a sword into her husband’s belly, jerking it out with a slice that tore open his gut. He fell to the deck with a choked cry and was still.
“No, no. Richard.” The woman fainted in Ed’s grasp. Ed hauled her towards the mast, where her father groaned through the pain, and dumped her at his feet.
“See mate, this is where your bargains got you. All your money, all your deals, they can’t save you from me. I am Blackbeard. I am your doom. I’m the monster monsters are afraid of!” Ed stalked closer to the man, close enough to feel the whistle of breath through broken teeth. “And I’m going to tell you a secret. Shhh shh shh, it’s okay.” Ed said, as the man whimpered. “I know you’ll keep it. No one would believe you anyway, but I want you to know.”
Ed backed away, looking the man in the eye, so much like Stede. Stede who abandoned his family, Stede who abandoned him. Stede who took him for a fool, who made him a fool, left him and was never, ever coming back.
“I don’t kill. And that won’t save you from me.”
The man whined something pitiful, but Ed didn’t care. He strode to the stern where the lantern fire was fizzling out against the wash of blood. He grabbed a second light, smashing it against the bulwark and kicked a few ropes into it until it caught. It spread this time, racing across the polished rails.
“Blackbeard!”
Ed turned to see Izzy striding towards him, furious.
“Izzy.” Ed said, looking around for the ladder off the burning ship.
“Have you lost your mind?! We needed to strip this ship for supplies.”
“There’ll be another.” Ed said with a shrug. “This was good. I needed this.”
“This is not good. When the crew decides to mutiny because they haven’t eaten in three days, you’ll have no one to blame but yourself. You’re not Edward, but you’re not being Blackbeard. I don’t know who this is, but they are a shit captain. And you know how I feel when you start making bad decisions.” Izzy said.
Ed fought the urge to vomit on Izzy’s shoes.
“Don’t you know who I am?” He said instead. “I’m the Kraken mate. Now get off this ship unless you want to stay on it for good.”
Izzy glared at Ed, something on the edge of his tongue, but he turned and stormed away instead. Ed watched him go, the rage turning back into dull apathy. The charred wood smoked as he made his way back towards the longboats and his crew.
“Curse you.”
Ed stopped. The voice was a woman’s but not the rich man’s daughter’s. He turned around, and in the midst of the inky flames stood a woman, who looked to be in her mid thirties. She wasn’t in rags, but she wasn’t richly dressed. He didn’t recognise her from the line of captives. She must’ve hidden herself before, but it didn’t matter. She’d never leave the ship alive. She was as doomed as the ones already dead.
“Heard that one before.” He grunted, going to leave.
“Curse you, Edward Teach.” Edward stopped.
No one knew Blackbeard’s real name.
“I’m Blackbeard. Whatever you think you know about me, you’re wrong.” He said. The woman looked down her nose at him, green eyes glittering in the dark.
“What I believe matters not. You have shown yourself to be a monster, in thought and in deed. My curse is that what you make of yourself becomes flesh. May the world see you as you truly are.”
Ed wanted to look away from her, but her eyes held him in place with an iron grip. The world shrunk around them, darkening faster than smoke, more choking than ash. A cold chill slipped down his spine and his muscles froze in place. There was green, like the flash of light before sunrise hit the horizon, green like the trees and fields he’d left behind in a city he’d never thought of as home, green like waistcoat Stede was wearing when Ed gave up everything he was for him -
“Boss?” He snapped out of his trance. The remaining members of his crew were staring at him, and the fire snapped and crackled as it closed in, catching more and more of the ship in its grasp. The woman had vanished, like she had never been.
The boat ride back to the Revenge took an age. Ed wanted to be done with the day, back in his cabin with a bottle for company, but the sea was against him. He needed the hair of the dog that bit him, that would settle the burning ache spreading in his chest. He felt hot even though the doomed ship had drifted away.
He reached over the side of the longboat, splashing freezing sea water on his neck. It was a relief, but not enough. He stripped off his leather jacket, not caring if anyone else in the boat saw the lavender shirt underneath. Sweat stained the material like he’d been working hard on a long summer day, instead of being sat in a boat in winter.
“Aren’t you hot too, lads?” he panted.
Frenchie and Fang sat facing him, clinging to whatever they’d been able to salvage from the sloop. Neither one would look him in the eye.
Of course he had to sit in a boat with the two men who were most afraid of him. He’d marooned their friends, the closest thing they’d made to a family, and both of them knew if they complained, they’d never see another sunrise.
His chest burned, and his head pounded like someone was hammering a nail inside it. His gut ached, his whole body hurt.
“Boss,” Fang said. “It’s freezing cold. Are you doing okay?”
Something about Fang’s soft brown eyes eased the pain in his chest. For all his willingness to filet a man on Blackbeard’s orders, he could be gentle when he needed to. If there was a way to capture a person’s voice and keep it, he’d keep Fangs’ for its healing abilities.
If he ever found himself in a room with Fang alone - no crew, no Izzy - then he’d have to thank him for his patience, and loyalty. Ed hadn’t been doing much to earn it these days.
Frenchie glanced up at him, but quickly looked away when Blackbeard looked back.
“Might it be the flu?” Frenchie added, quietly. The flu. Yes, that made sense. It was the flu.
Ed climbed up to the Revenge with little effort, now the pain was less. Once he was on deck, he reached back to help Frenchie up, but the man flinched away, almost losing his footing. Fang shoved him back onto the steps before Frenchie lost his grip, and Ed drew back.
Frenchie jumped like he was about to be hit. Just like Ed did, when he was a young lad and his father was home. Just like his father.
Getting stabbed in the gut would have hurt less than the pain that ripped through him at the thought. Ed’s legs buckled beneath him and he stumbled, grunting as he hit the deck.
Everyone on deck heard the thump, and there were buzzing whispers like a wasps nest. No one moved, or tried to help him. No one wanted to touch him. Why would they? The last person who’d been kind to him had been thrown overboard for it. Who needed a curse? He was already a monster in everyone’s eyes.
The pain increased by the second, like his insides were trying to force their way out of his chest, heart thumping against his ribs and his guts churning. The bitter tang of blood stained his tongue, and sweat crept down his neck.
He didn’t know how long he sat there, breathing jerkily and trying to get himself under control. He had to be Blackbeard, and Blackbeard wasn’t weak, or vulnerable, or cowardly. With effort, he hauled himself upright. Like a coward, he escaped from the deck, the stares, the murmurs.
Stumbling towards the Captain’s cabin, he grit his teeth to keep from crying out. His feet felt like they were on fire, burning in too small shoes. His sweaty hand slipped on the door knob as he twisted it open. The voices were louder as he fumbled, then quiet again as he slammed the door behind him and locked it. If they wanted to mutiny right now, let them. He just wanted everything to stop.
It was so much, the pain all consuming. It ate him from the inside until he barely felt human. His skin felt constricting, too small for everything he had inside, it pushed to get out, break free. He kicked off the boot but it didn’t help, every bone in his foot felt broken. He threw off his shirt and pants, hissing as he tripped on some discarded thing in the low light.
He broke down in front of the empty library, grunting and reaching for the bottle of rum he left on the shelves. The rum burned on its way down, and Ed retched.
He needed something. He didn’t know what, but he was so alone, he hurt so much. Dizzily, he called out.
“Help! I need - ”
He coughed again, holding his chest. It throbbed under his hands. As he looked over the room for anything that might make him feel better, his eyes danced over the windows. Nothing but freezing water out there. But the fresh air might help him. And while he was at it, he could just jump. Make all of the pain go away at once. Who was there to stop him?
He heaved himself across the room, his body feeling twice as heavy as normal. He almost cried as he tried to flip the catch and open the window, his fingers refusing to move. He let out a long breath when it swung open, fresh, cold air hitting him. He needed more. Using the windowsill for support he heaved himself up and leaned out. The open air, the open ocean was in front of him. The sound of waves was like a chorus in his ears.
The night was dark and the water cold. No one would stop him if he jumped now.
Ed woke up on the floor of the captain’s quarters. His skin felt awfully cold. No wonder, since he was completely naked and sleeping in front of an open window. His damp hair fell over his face as he pushed himself off the ground.
“The hell?” he grunted, getting to his feet. Like usual, his knee protested about the movement. He walked the few steps to the window and looked outside. The sea frothed and churned angrily under the dim, cloudy morning sky. Edward closed the window, scratching his graying stubble, deep in thought. Waking up naked on the cold floor wasn’t new. He’d found himself in weirder places after getting drunk.
He collected yesterday’s clothes from where he’d thrown them. Picking up his sweat-soiled lavender shirt, he wrinkled his nose. What had he been doing last night?
Shit. He’d acted like a delirious drunk in front of the entire crew, all whining in pain and stumbling around. Izzy wouldn’t let that go easily; that wasn’t what he wanted Blackbeard to be. But what was the point? Blackbeard could be the devil himself and Izzy still wouldn’t be satisfied.
If Izzy wasn’t the only person he had left, Ed might -
The thought was interrupted by shuffling in the walls. Maybe Izzy wasn’t the only one he had.
“Hey kid. Are you there?” He asked.
“Oooooo. You’ve summoned me from the afterlife.” A muffled voice said from the auxiliary wardrobe. Ed hadn’t known the lad was such a good climber, or how he’d gotten back into the ship without anyone noticing. But late one night, deep in the throes of drink and regret, he’d heard a muffled thump, and a very familiar sounding voice swearing in pain. He’d had a good night's sleep for once, after that.
“Oh right. Yeah. Ghost and all that.” Ed said. He hadn’t figured out why the lad decided it was a good idea to be a talkative, sarcastic ghost either, but he didn’t question it. Lucius would worry less if he thought he was pulling off his little fuckery.
“So did you actually want to talk to me, or are you checking if you’re still haunted?”
“‘Course I’m haunted.” Ed snorted, trying to find his clothes. “Bloody Bonnet won’t let me have a single night without him.” Ah, there were his pants, in a tangle on the floor by the broken bottle.
“You dream about the Captain?”
“Yeah. Well. Nightmares.” Ed said, heaving himself into his pants and buttoning them up. Damn it, two of the buttons were gone, popped right out of the stitching. “Leaving a guy to the British in the middle of the night makes an impression.”
“Is that what all the banging was about last night? Did you have the terrors?”
Ed’s hands faltered on the clasps of his knee brace.
“I’m Blackbeard mate. Nothing scares me.” He said, shaking the feeling off.
“So last night you were very bravely calling for help? I think I heard a sob. And a whimper.”
“Oh”, Ed simply said. “That. It was probably nothing. I’m fine now.”
“ It was nothing.” The lad mocked his voice, “It didn’t sound like nothing. After all that drama, I heard the window opening and a splash. I thought you jumped! You scared the crap out o-” The lad stopped, mid sentence. After a second of silence, Ed grinned, as he heard Lucius cover himself.
“I was worried I wouldn’t be the only one haunting this bloody ship. It’s not ‘nothing’. Are you hurt? Did something happen?”
Ed frowned at the questions. He looked from the dark rum stain on the floor near the bookcase, to the spot where his jacket still hung half on, half off the bed. He pressed a hand to his chest, where his organs had obviously not succeeded in shoving their way through his ribs. They’d burned, and ached, as if his heart was pumping melted metal through his veins. His legs and arms had hurt with every movement. His skin had been tight, like a rope ready to snap, a wineskin full to bursting.
“Maybe it’s the flu?” Ed muttered, eyes not focusing on anything.
Lucius huffed, “The flu? Tell me you haven’t convinced yourself of that, Edward.”
Ed nodded. “Fuck, I don’t know, man! If I’m not sick I don’t know what’s going on. I didn’t get so much as a fucking splinter on that raid. I bruised my knuckles on some rich assholes’ face, could’ve breathed in a bit too much smoke when that weird woman distracted…” Ed stopped, eyes growing wide.
“That weird woman what?”
Oh. Oh no. It couldn’t be, could it? If it was true, he was fucked.