come_sailaway | I'll tell you a tale of the bottomless blue

Who: Stede Bonnet and you!
What: New Shipmate Shenaniganry
When: End of April, beginning of May
Where: Everywhere
Warnings: None yet

I. Welcome to the World of Tomorrow
There is very little about this new world that Stede understands. It's all baffling to him, some of it downright incomprehensible. So if you see a flickering of lights coming from a nearby room, you might find the gentleman pirate turning the lightswitch on and off again.

"Would you look at that? Amazing! And so bright! You could read all night with something like that. But how does the fire extinguish and go back on so easily? Or burn without heat?" He glances at whomever found him. "Listen... you don't think we're dead, do you?"

II. Sign-ups Here
Stede is a professional at these things by now. He feels disjointed in this strange world and the best thing to do when you're disjointed is to seek the familiar. So he has a deckchair and a little table-managed to procure a pen and paper from somewhere and accosts anyone who passes by.

"Hello! Would you like to sign up to be a pirate? No pay just yet but adventure and glory and a cut of any treasure we come across. You wouldn't say no to some nice booty, would you?"

III. Room-Mate [locked to Gogol]

Somehow or another Stede has found his room, but when he pushes open the door his expectant face falls.

"Please tell me this is a closet."

Then he notices the room is occupied.

"Oh, sorry, is this yours? It's a very nice closet. You could do a lot with it."

IV. Hit him up with anything. He is down for adventure.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"You think breaking down a door is too hostile and yet you want to be a pirate? Assuming you do get a crew and the means to go pirating what are you going to do if you encounter another ship politely ask them to pull over?"

HA! That was cute! He could see that if say... a certain Angel decided to go rogue. That was definitely an Angel move. He couldn't see how effective that would be in an actual combat situation however.

"That's me. Tons of ideas."

"Tons of ideas and not a lot of action hm?" Doesn't he have somewhere else to be.

"Look we'll board a ship and clean it of its loot when we're good and ready. When we've had a few team building exercises. You have to know who you're working with and how to coordinate strengths and weaknesses. There's no point in just jumping feet first into the fire if you don't have to."

Anyway, he might have at the beginning but now they just sort of, pull up and plunder. The old PU&P which is sort of a new PU&P to him.

"I don't have a crew of big surly pirates..."

Nope! Its a very small ship and there isn't much place to go at all, at least no where he hasn't already been before.

"Pirates do team building exercises?"

Maybe these were less surly pirates than he had been thinking.

Neither does he at the moment. But big surly pirates do not quite match what he had in mind which were people a bit softer, a bit less inclined to stab him while he slept.

"The best pirates do. It takes a little bit of experimentation. For example, one is a trust fall. That's where you close your eyes and lean back and trust in your mates to catch you. The trick of that is to tell them about it first so you don't wake up to a nasty concussion."

And Buttons leaning over you looking contemplative. He still had dreams about that one.

Not being stabbed while one slept was an advantage though how useful were trust falls during a broadside? He didn't know. Maybe it was a quick way to duck.

"Have you ever done any pirating? Like... at all?"

"I've done plenty of pirating I'll have you know. I've raided ships and taken booty and gotten stabbed. I've even gotten hung by the Spanish. I'm practically notorious, mate, in certain circles." Very small ones.

"And what is it you do?"

"Aren't you supposed to avoid getting stabbed and hanged?"

Just pointing that out. Those sorts of things tended to lead to very short pirate careers.

"Me? I'm sort of... between careers. Former demon, looking for new opportunities."

"Stabbed is part of the trade. You don't get cool scars from just bumming around, mate. Hanging...well I can see your point." He's not sure what the ginger means by demon. Gang member perhaps? Some sort of made-up nickname?

"Are you finding any?"

"I was working on something but..."

It would likely take another couple of centuries and a few more sneak dates before that Angel would give another inch on that.

"Opportunities are limited on a ship like this."

"Oh come on. Opportunities are made not born. Come here." He pulls up a chair and pats it. "Sit. Spill what's on your mind. It always helps to have a sounding board."

"You're a pirate..."

A glance at the man as his inner voice chimed in a 'sort of'.

"What would you know about Angels?"

"You'd be surprised." He can't tell if the man is being philosophical, theological, metaphorical, or as mad as a sun touched tulip, but Stede doesn't mind. "Why don't you tell me what demons know about angels?"

Definitely the last one as he was a touch Angel crazy.

"They're annoying! Uppity..."

He grabbed the chair and slowly sank into it as each of these insults gained a softer tone every time he spoke one.

"Always end up with their nose in a book."

Then suddenly he was no longer speaking of vague others but one Angel in particular.

"I only managed to get him out of that library once for a concert. I think he enjoyed it..."

Oh that kind of angel. Stede tried to hide his smile. It was a kind of love story, wasn't it? And between two men no less. The thought made his heart do a strange flip-flop that he tried to ignore. It didn't help that one of the men was slender and leather clad and the other was bookish and tended to the library. But then he was hardly an angel to Ed's demon, and a love story didn't happen that way for men like them.

Better to focus on the matter at hand.

"And that's got you feeling a little down, it seems like."

"Being trapped on a soul sucking Eldritch ship kind of puts a damper on things."

Aziraphale hadn't gotten him down, not really. Though his concerns did involve the Angel too, they always had.

"He wants to be back at home with his own quaint little library and I can't give that to him."

"Yes that doesn't help. It's sweet of you to be so considerate... Does he like anything other than books? Is there something else you can do for him? And-- you know-- sometimes just being with someone during hard times is enough." Or so he had gleaned from his own reading and well-- his easy comfort with Ed. Granted they hadn't suffered many trials and tribulations, but so long as he could wake up and see him...life didn't seem so bad.

"Music."

Which was why he had arranged that concert, an evening of Sondheim to get his Angelic mind off everything.

"It doesn't feel like enough. I've always tried to step in whenever he was in trouble and this time I don't have a blessed clue how in Heaven to do that."

Stede considers. It's a hard thing, really. Being helpless in the face of people you care about. Stede had never quite managed impressing... well almost anyone. But this is different. They are a couple and Stede knows a lot about disappointing the other half.

How could he have done differently? He's not sure in his case but maybe he can help this fellow out.

"Have you tried talking to him about this? Sometimes we think we know what's going through a person's mind when we don't. And maybe you can help each other."

I'll tell you a tale of the bottomless blue

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