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Chapter Text

Izzy Hands would rather die than listen to Stede Bonnet fuck his boss, a man he had lusted after and hero worshipped for the better part of two decades. It’s been a long time since, but having once loved and lain with his captain, the thought of Stede Bonnet anywhere near Ed–a pirate superior to the gentryman in every way–still stings. Like an un-gloved slap to the face, it stings. So, you can imagine then, that the thought of Stede Bonnet bringing the great Blackbeard pleasure, touching him and taking him to the heights of bliss, is the worst possible hell Izzy Hands can imagine. 

Bonnet, of course, makes sure it’s a hell that he experiences often.

Too often for it to be coincidence.

Too loudly for it to be anything but on purpose.

Stede makes sure Izzy knows this.

It’s like a game they play.

Izzy just doesn’t know that.

The first time he walks in on it is his own fault. Roach tries to warn him that the captain—captains, he said, though Izzy paid that mention no mind—are in their chambers, but Izzy’s too bothered by the fact that none of these sailors seem to know how to sail to catch the hint Roach tries to hand him when he babbles about how busy they are. So now he’s standing in the doorway of the biggest room below deck, watching the dread pirate Blackbeard get railed on both hands and his one good knee, his face pressed into the mattress and his bad leg gripped tight as it wraps around the set of pale hips plowing into him from behind.

It’s not that he hasn’t seen his boss in flagrante before. Hell, Izzy’s been caught in the act of coitus with the man more than once himself, stared at by a crew member or three while he was bouncing on Blackbeard’s dick. The issue is how Ed looks now, for fuck sake. How he looks as Izzy catches him doing that with Stede Bonnet. Fucking Stede Bonnet. How Izzy catches him fucking and being fucked by Stede fucking Bonnet.

Edward Teach hasn’t been submissive a day in his life, but that’s how he looks now. Like a bitch in heat, being bred by a beast. Because, from what Israel can see slamming between his boss’s thighs, Stede Bonnet is aptly named. Hung like a steed, indeed. And it’s mesmerizing, much as he might hate that it’s not him there with Ed. It’s mesmerizing seeing Blackbeard clutching at the sheets, moaning like he’s been shot at and left on the floor to bleed. Izzy can't stand it. He can't stand it, but that doesn't stop how he finds the whorish sounds that tumble from Ed's mouth, the symphony of slapping skin and the soft grunts of the son-of-a-bitch at the helm of Ed’s pleasure, all so fucking entrancing.

It's hard to tear himself away, hypnotized as he is by the sight before him, but pull his gaze away, he does.

Stede’s not looking at Ed when Izzy looks up, though.

He’s looking straight at Izzy, like he can see right through his soul.

“Fuck! There, yes! Fuck, right there! Just like that, babe!" Ed groans. “Just like that.”

Stede does it again, whatever he’d done, but his eyes are still locked on Izzy Hands.

There’s a spark there, a steel in Bonnet’s eyes that Izzy tells himself to note. He doesn’t know what it means, but he knows that it unsettles him, more than the flush he can feel rising on his cheeks, the way his pants tighten, how his face radiates heat. Bonnet’s looking at him like he’s penetrating him too, like he’s got Izzy pinned under thumb, beneath his boot. And there’s a quick flash of want there before Izzy feels sick, before he feels like he’s going to crawl right out of his skin. So, he flees without saying a word, back to his bunk to swallow a bottle of rum and do his best to forget where he just was. What he just saw. What he just heard.

What he will never admit he wants to be part of.

Alas, too busy chastizing himself, Izzy should’ve noted the dumb blonde’s dumb look better, should’ve recognized the twat had something up his sleeve, though he hadn’t been wearing any at the time. Because now his life is hell. Because now they’re here, with the once-rich fop flinging the great Edward Teach over every hard surface he can muster for an afternoon, mid-morning, or dead of the night romp, the co-captains amorous to the point of Izzy's near-insanity.

Seems to be that if Izzy’s around, Ed’s getting plowed. 

All to prove the point that Izzy’s not.

Izzy’s not. But dear god, he wants to be.

Add it to the growing list of reasons he hates himself.

Chapter Text

Israel Hands watching in awe as Stede's cock slides in and out of his boss is something of a shock to Stede Bonnet. As much as the fact that he gets to stick his dick in Ed Teach at all is, really. But, much like Stede got over his luck in love, accepting the man beneath the myth of Blackbeard was equally as enamored as he once they'd finally found time to talk, he also gets over the unexpected intrusion of Israel Hands in a shockingly short amount of time. In fact, by the time Izzy flees, Stede is already plotting. And Ed, despite being face down, screaming into the mattress when his right hand man shows up, knows it. Because not even getting his back blown out can distract Blackbeard from the sound of his first mate's footsteps. Nor, apparently, can it stop him from also knowing Stede like the back of his own damn hand.

"What are you—" 

Voice thin and threaded with lust, Ed interrupts himself with a groan almost immediately, a vigorous thrust from behind the result of Stede being so startled by the question, his grip on Ed's hip slips. 

"What are you thinking, Stede?" Ed chokes out again, chest heaving and coated in sweat. "You alright back there?"

Stede wonders a moment at Ed worrying about his emotional state. Then he wonders why he wonders, when someone giving a shit about how he feels has been a dream of his for ages and this here right now is proof his dreams have come true.

So he answers instead of spiralling out for no good reason, words carried upon a longer and more gentle grind into the borderline overstimulated love of his life, just the way he knows Ed likes.

"Izzy was just here. He may have seen us in the act. He looked..." Stede pauses to gather his thoughts, to find the right words, surprising himself at the one he's landed on. 

Ed supplying it before he gets the chance is even more surprising.

"Jealous? Mmm. Yeah," his lover agrees with a whimper, Stede choosing this moment to stop with the head of his cock on Ed's prostate. He shifts minutely, like he's adjusting the fit of a hat rather than rubbing against a bundle of nerves that has Ed writhing like he's about to combust. But somehow, he doesn't. Somehow, Ed carries on, speech having not yet been torn from his grasp.

"Heard him gasp at the door when he saw what's had me sitting funny the last few days," Ed gasps, himself, and Stede revels in the irony being caused by his dick. But Ed takes the silence as something more meaningful and continues, struggling for words in spite of himself. In spite of his brain clearly being pudding after an hour of being plowed into oblivion just like he'd begged for. 

He's so damn proud of Ed attempting to talk it through as a two-man crew, desperate as he is. 

Communication hasn't always been easy for them.

Awkward topic at hand, Stede aims to make it a bit harder.

"Iz's always been a jealous bastard, baby. Doesn't matter what he thinks, though. Just want your thoughts. Put 'em in my mouth and eat 'em for breakfast," Ed babbles. "Can I, love? Give you a penny, one for each of 'em. Fuck, give you a whole fuckin' bucket of doubloons for 'em, just wanna know what you think. How you feel. Babe, tell me how you feel."

Guttural and groin-tingling, a moan springs from Ed's chest and rings in Stede's ears, entwining with the sound of tearing sheets hitting the air. Tattered fabric twists in Ed's fingers, soft, sweat-soaked silk clutched so hard between his callused hands it has no choice but to rip when Stede rolls his hips. Just a little harder, with a touch more intent, so determined is he to stop Ed's ability to speak in full sentences that Stede happily sacrifices his second favorite set of sheets. 

"You should be too preoccupied with pleasure to worry about my current thoughts, dearest. Now please shut up and enjoy yourself. I've honestly no clue how you can focus on anything other than how you feel wrapped so exquisitely around my cock, anyhow. Must be losing my touch."

Ed laughs in response, pushing himself up so his back lies flush with Stede's front, head turning so they're almost mouth-to-mouth. "Other than the fact that Izzy just saw your fuck-stick and you're oddly calm about it?" he asks, lips grazing against Stede's with every syllable. "My booty-hole says those thoughts feel wicked mischievous, mate, and a pirate's booty never lies. Can't help but be intrigued, can I?"

Stede chortles back, arms wrapped around Ed's middle as he leans forward to snatch a quick kiss.

His pirate captain ensures it's a lengthy one.

"Astute as always, Edward," Stede smiles when he pulls away minutes later. Hands skirting low along the planes of Ed's stomach, he lingers just above the wetness that pools beneath the tip of Ed's erect but as of yet ignored cock, the warm skin pebbling at his touch. "Your ass-hole is indeed correct. Which leads me to wonder..." He stops, a slow drag of his fingertips along Ed's throbbing, sticky, overheated cock certain to overload Ed's brain, but he does it anyway. "How would you feel about a fuckery against your first mate?"

Ed shudders, like he's just been offered everything he's always wanted to ask for, and Stede almost blows his load right there, Ed's enthusiasm even sexier than the man's sea-salted leathers puddled in the corner on the floor.

"Fuck, yes," he says, gasping again. "What kind of fuckery? A fucking fuckery? I'm in. Tell me everything. Let's do it. I'm in."

And Stede does. 

He tells him everything he thinks of Izzy, and what he just saw, never stopping the motion of their lovemaking for a second as he does. 

He tweaks Ed's nipples and tells him about the tent in Izzy's pants and the fear in his eyes and how it just made Stede want to fuck Ed harder. 

How it made him want to make Izzy watch. 

He finally touches Ed's cock, slowly and reverentially, and tells him of ideas that have been in his head, far darker and for far longer than he wants to admit. But he admits them anyway and then he feeds on the sounds Ed makes when he does, his lover just as depraved as he is. 

And then, when it's all over, when his soul's been scooped out and he feels airy and hollow, he basks in the glow of them having come apart one right after the other, unexpected words of honesty tying them together as they cause them to come undone.

He might be fucked in the head, but Ed's so fucking into it, so equally fucked up. And if that's not heaven, Stede doesn't have a clue what is.

And Izzy... isn't prepared. 

Izzy isn't prepared, but when it begins, he thinks he can deal. And for the longest time, he does, more or less, fool himself into believing that's the case.

Harder and harder it gets, but he does it. 

Until the day he walks into his own quarters to see Stede Bonnet, sprawled buck naked atop Izzy's bedspread, tongue up an equally nude Edward's ass, his horse-cock hanging, hard and wet, between his overly muscular and unneccessarily propped-open thighs.

Until, riddled with shame and stripping his dick with his fist in secret for months after every encounter, the ship's first mate finds his sanctuary violated and himself with nowhere left to turn.

Until, frustrated and horny as hell at Bonnet and Blackbeard's antics and his inability to join them, Israel Hands snaps like never before.

It's a day none of them can ever come back from, a day of infamy on the Revenge.

Story goes, the screams echoed for miles.

Chapter Text

Ed hadn't intended when he'd started the day to scare off his first mate. It didn't take much to anger Israel Hands, but it took a lot to drive him away, and never in a million years would Ed have agreed to Stede's debaucherous plan that morning if he knew he'd be losing Izzy by the end of the night.

The overall fuckery has been going on for months now, and to be honest, Ed almost feels bad at how much he gets off at Izzy's obvious distress. But the mix of longing and hatred on his face every time he finds Ed and Stede pretzled together is like a lubricant for Ed's lust, sending a spike of heat through him like nothing else does. 

The way Stede grips him tighter when he notices Izzy–the way he grabs him hard enough to leave bruises, bruises that haven't left his hipbones in weeks–sets fire to Ed's blood, evidence that it hits Stede the same way. And the way he runs his mouth about it the second Izzy flees? Fuck, Ed's honestly surprised he can walk at all with how fervorous it makes them both, the ship's co-captains biting and clawing at each other like two feral cats fucking in a closed sack.

He's too old for this shit, but fuck, he loves it.

Loves how he's reminded that he's loved by his near-constant aches. Loves the thrill of knowing he makes an impact on more than just a man's flesh. Loves how possessive Stede is, how bossy and greedy and needy he is as he whispers filth about Izzy into Ed's ear.

"Do you think he wishes he were me right now or you, darling?"

and 

"What bet his cock is in his fist this very minute, my love?" 

and 

"Imagine how he'd feel pressed between us, dearest. Would you want me to fuck him into you? Or are your dreams full of you fucking him into me?" 

These are the phrases tattooed on the inside of Ed's skull. He can hardly bear the weight of them.

Fuck, clever as he is, Ed can't even figure out how his brain hasn't turned to mush already. But then again, maybe it has. Maybe planning for Izzy to catch them twice in one day was a bit too much, the handjob-turned-more he'd walked into earlier one thing, but this, entirely another. Maybe fucking in Izzy's safe space broke him to the point of no return, Ed and Izzy both. Cause Stede's tongue up his ass feels better than maybe anything ever has before, but the look on Izzy's face this time isn't bringing Ed the usual kind of joy.

No, this time, it's making him feel a little sick. And despite Stede's mouth being a miracle and the delight of the two-then-three fingers he adds to the mix, the groan Ed makes when Izzy whispers "fuck you", turns on his heel, and otherwise silently storms off has absolutely nothing to do with his lover or his lover's wonderful plundering.

"Stede," Ed moans, awash in sensation despite the situation. His cock throbs, dripping all over the sheets. And he can feel the mess between his cheeks, the dark, downy hair there soaked with spit as it parts with ease for Stede's teasing. As it parts for his conquering and inquisitive tongue. 

Ed feels the press and glide of the slick muscle probing, feels Stede's oil-sloppy fingers slipping back inside, and it's nirvana. 

Really, it is.

But it's all muffled, somehow. His whole body is screaming with pleasure, but it's all minimized by the look of sorrow and resignation on Izzy's face.

The look was as haunting as Ed is horny.

"Stede, baby. Stop," he pants, trying his damndest to bring his brain back to its home inside his head, too busy bouncing around somewhere up between the stars he started seeing when Stede found and vigorously fingered his prostate a few minutes prior. "Babe, stop. Stop."

He doesn't think Stede saw the look on Izzy's face this time, though, because he stops before Ed even finishes asking but also looks confused when Ed throws himself off the bed and attempts to stand on jelly knees, oblivious to the oil and spit spilling down his legs. 

"Stede, I–" he starts, then backtracks, unable to get his thoughts to work. His brow furrows as he tries to find the words, tries to find his feet beneath him, and he's so glad Stede gets him, verbal or not. "He–"

His co-captain's gaze softens in understanding, like he sees the stress on Ed's face and that alone is enough to tell him something's gone wrong, a possibility they'd known of when they'd first begun. Ed's pretty sure they underestimated exactly how wrong it might go, though. Grossly underestimated Ed's handle on things. 

On Iz.

He doesn't mean for it to, but his voice cracks when he asks–

"Stede. What if he leaves?"

"Go," Stede says, easy as breathing. Ed stands on shaky legs, and Stede looks at him like a proud doe watching her new-born fawn take it's very first steps. He looks at him with love and says, "Find him. And I'll come find you. I'll even bring your favorite robe. Go."

Ed just stares at him, scared and unsure. 

What the fuck has he done? And what will following his first mate do? 

Will it damage things more? 

Will it damage he and Stede, too? 

Are things already beyond repair? Is his chasing his first mate down just grinding his already fractured relationships to dust beneath his boot?

"Edward, go. For the love of god, do not let this," Stede gestures to the nudity and implications of said nudity between them, "stop you. You will be inconsolable and I will be quite cross. I love you. You love me. Now find him."

Fuck, Stede's right. 

Ed loves that man more than the moon loves the stars. 

He's so fucking right.

So he goes.

On shaky, sex-slick legs, he follows.

When he catches up with Izzy, the deck has been cleared of crew. The deck's been cleared of crew and Izzy's lowering a lifeboat, and a chill races up Ed's spine. Dread coils at the base of it, slithers up his throat like it's strangling him from within, the tableau before him confirming his worst fear. The tableau before him indicative of exactly how bad Blackbeard went and fucked things up. 

Because it is Ed's fault, he knows. 

Might've been Stede's initial idea to mess with Izzy, to see if they could antagonize him into finally admitting his feelings, if not joining them in some carnal fun without admitting them, but Ed's the one who said yes. Who set the precedent when he fed into Stede's ideas like they were starving, orphaned children and he a rich benefactor, adding the perfect twist to already indecent plans because he knew Izzy–knows Izzy–well enough to know what works.

What hurts the worst.

Means Ed should've known better.

Means he does know better.

Of course, he can't let Izzy go. 

But he also can't let Izzy know that he can't let Izzy go.

Can he?

Fuck.

If only there were an easy way to make Iz stay.

If only there was an easy way for Edward to explain.

But there isn't. Of course there isn't.

So, cleverness failing him, how the fuck is Ed supposed to make Izzy understand this game they've been playing has never really been about pain? How's he make it make any sort of sense when how he feels barely makes sense to him? Especially while he's standing there, staring across the boards, butt naked, ass-hole gaping?

Fucking hell.

Chapter Text

"Is the rasp still there when he moans, do you think?" Izzy hears sometime mid-morning as he walks past the jam room. 

It's one of a trio of unexpected questions, questions that stop him dead in his tracks. Questions he very quickly wishes hadn't been asked.

"Is he still gravelly when he groans? When he comes? Or perhaps he goes silent, screams trapped in his throat. What do you think, dear?"

Izzy's certain the day can't get any worse.

How wrong he soon finds himself to be.

Because Stede's voice is saccharine when he continues, carrying a note of mockery as he talks over Ed's moans. It's evident to Izzy that they're fucking–long and slow and hard by what sounds like the table scraping across the ground, digging shallow divots into the wood–and it's even more clear that they're discussing him for their own pleasure while doing so, the twisted fucks. 

Fuck, Izzy feels ill.

Hard as fuck, but equally as sick.

He's caught them so many times by now that he's lost count, but this...

This is new. And he's not sure what to do with it.

"Oh, that's right," he hears muffled through the wall, the words no less devestating with their edges softened. Maybe even more so, because... because he just can't know if they know. He hears them, but he's not yet sure he's meant to this time, and fuck if that doesn't make him feel worse. Like he's the one doing something wrong when really, he's been the constant victim of a reverse peeping tom for weeks, now.

"You've fucked him before," Stede continues. "You know exactly how Izzy sounds with a cock stuffed in him, don't you, darling?"

It's true. He does. But that's not what he says.

"Y-your hands," Edward mewls, whimper threaded through with need. 

He's still loud enough to be heard through the god damn door, to Izzy's dismay. 

"Baby, your hands."

It's not an answer to the question.

(It's a plea for Bonnet to continue whatever pleasure he'd just caused. 

It's a bleat from the mouth of the most feared man on the ocean, begging for more.

It's the sound of sensation erasing history and writing it anew, not in flesh and blood and ink and bone but in love and heartbreak and the way they dance, daily, together but forever apart from him, twirling for eternity inside the vicious cycle they've trapped themselves in.)

Bonnet seems to take it as an answer, anyway.

And Izzy... well, if Izzy's looking through a small knot-hole in the door to see what's happening inside, you can blame it on his possessing an unhealthy dose of masochism.

"No, love. Your Hands," Stede growls, picking up his pace. 

Through the slightly rotted wooden slot, Izzy hears his name and sees Bonnet's slick fist fly across Ed's hardened flesh. He sees Bonnet's fist strip Ed's cock at the same speed as Stede's hips slam into Ed's pert and perfect ass. Watches him fuck Ed fast enough, hard enough, perfectly fucking rough enough for Izzy to feel flayed alive from his fully clothed position outside the fucking room.

He's gutted, blood boiling, hungry for a combination of things you'd have to kill him to get him to admit.

If this is how it hits him, he can only imagine what Ed feels. And fuck. Imagine, he does, for probably too long. But then again, any time inside his head is too long these days. He's known that for ages, known he's just reopening old wounds. If only he could stop himself, he would, but he finds it one of few skills he's lacking.

There's a squeak from within that startles him, snaps him back into himself, but Izzy can't tell if it's from the table shifting or if the sound has tumbled from Edward's plush and kiss-plumped lips. 

Regardless, he knows he can't stay here much longer, though. 

Not due to any fear he has of being caught, no. 

Basilica Hands has no fear of discovery. 

His fear is for the way each second he stands here changes things in ways there's no chance he can prepare for. No chance he can recover from.

Because, fantastic first mate he may be, but he cannot for the life of him fathom what the fuck is he supposed to do with this.

How's he to make sense of something so senseless?

"Think about your Hands, love. Pretend you're thrusting into him right now, not my fist." 

With a firm yet fuck-thickened voice but no regard for who might hear them, Stede says this.

Izzy wants to kill him.

Or maybe himself, he's not entirely sure.

"Think of how he would look bucking and writhing beneath you as I thrust you into him," Stede continues, oblivious to Izzy's thoughts, if not his presence. Izzy's fairly sure now that this was planned, but it doesn't matter. Not with Stede's words and Ed's moans ringing in his ears. Not with his shame and rage and lust and grief wrapping around him like a blanket. "Think of how he'd look staring up at us from the flat of his back, speared as deep on your cock as he can go. Think of his face when he realizes we own him, that he's ours. That he belongs to us. What do you think he'd do to learn that we hold the keys to his pleasure and all he has to do for them is ask?"

Fuck.

Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.

No way in hell does he have the capacity to deal with this... this whatever the fuck this is.

They'd put each other through hell, he and Edward had. Dragged each other through to Hades and back again, too unable to communicate to do anything but hurt themselves and each other. And then Bonnet had come back, and then things had changed. Though there would always be a toe-sized chasm between he and Ed, being forced to truly talk things through (quite literally with a gun to his head), seemed to have fixed them. Brought them all to what Izzy had assumed to be a platonic and begrudging acceptance of each other. 

Of the situation.

Except his bosses fucking nasty to thoughts of him tilts his entire understanding of the whole god damn situation, doesn't it?

"Fuck, baby," Ed whines, and of course Izzy's jealous. Of course Izzy's confused and sad and horny and frustrated. Nostalgic. Despite having had a multitude of sex, only once had he ever made Ed sound like this, in a moment nothing like the one he currently finds himself in. So yes, it kills him to hear it spring from within, just tears him to god damn shreds, never mind he's technically taking part in taking Ed apart right now, unwilling participant though he is. 

And doesn't that just set fire to the arrow in his heart when he clues in?

Cause they might be talking about Izzy, but he doesn't really exist. An addictive addition to their fucking, Israel's feelings are only worthy of note to enhance his captain's too-active sex life.

"Fuck. He feels so good on my dick, Stede. Wish you could feel how good he feels."

In just eight little words, the only world he's ever known ends. A single phrase shatters his understanding of everything and Izzy stops, overwhelmed. Slowly, he takes his wandering hand off his straining cock and takes a giant step back, unable to process. 

Not quite able to understand. 

His brain is full of buzzing bees, so he shakes his head and listens, no longer in control of anything, if ever he was.

And then he hears Bonnet moan in agreement.

Izzy hears Stede moan, "yes, I want that," and he freezes. 

Blood races in his veins, rushes in his ears, and he's frozen. 

In a single second, his ended world turns upside down.

Stede agrees with Ed, and Izzy's head is full of static. Full of whiskey-soaked cotton balls the words have just set on fire. Full of feelings he just can't begin to comprehend.

Stede agrees, and Izzy's heart is tired.

He's heartsore and tired and his is throat full of bile, but he listens just long enough to hear Stede agree and then he turns on foot and flees. Silent but full of deafening fury, Izzy storms away before he even knows he's doing it. He heads to his room to hide once more, and in his escape, fails to hear Ed say–

"Fuck, miss how fucking good he feels. Miss him so fucking much, Stede."

In his escape, Izzy misses every syllable of the way Ed comes crying his name.

It's why he's shocked to the core hours later, dusk settling on the barren deck of the ship, when a very naked Ed strolls toward him, clearly having torn out of Izzy's room mid-fuck. It's why he's shocked to see the mix of fluids all over the man's bare thighs, how his skin turns to gooseflesh in the cool of the night. It's why he's shocked that, with no fucks to be given for his partner or his own pleasure or the plight of Izzy's heart, Ed's nude form storms toward him. 

Izzy snaps out of his stasis at the sight.

It has to mean something. Doesn't it?

That Ed's here, like this, looking like that, because of him...

It fucks with his head as much as the morning's eavesdropping had, as much the entanglement on his bed he's just been forced to bear witness to does.

"Whatcha doing?" Ed asks upon arrival. It's far too casual for the situation, obvious he's trying for indifference but landing far nearer to angry and scared, not that he'd admit to either.

Blackbeard doesn't feel fear, after all. That's how the story goes. That's how it's always gone.

Izzy ignores it, just like he spent years trying to ignore his lingering feelings and the guilt and shame that comes with them. He's got nothing to do with Ed experiencing whatever the fuck Edward's experiencing right now, not when it's his own damn fault this is happening anyhow. 

Izzy can barely handle his own emotions these days, dug up and thrown in his face as they've repeatedly been. It's not up to him to be responsible for Ed's any more. Never was in the first place, and thanks to Bonnet of all people, they both know it. But fuck, doesn't mean it's not a hard habit to break.

"Iz," Ed tries again, voice a little softer, more imploring this time. Only he can manage to sound both resigned and cajoling, and that's exactly what Izzy hears. But Ed's words... they don't stop him like they're meant to. They don't stop him at all. "What d'ya think you're doing, Iz?"

Izzy sighs.

The weight of nineteen and a half years is carried on that sigh.

The pressure of two decades of sacrificing himself to twisted adoration, tying his heartstrings into his means for survival, is carried on that sigh. 

He wonders if Ed notices. 

If Ed's ever really noticed.

"What the hell does it look like, Edward?" 

It's sotto voce when Izzy asks, watching as the lifeboat settles in the water instead of looking at Ed. 

There's a finality in the way it sits there, he thinks, waiting for him patiently. Waiting for him to say or not say all the things he's spent years refusing to acknowledge, all the very same things that today is forcing him to feel in spades. 

Were he another man, he'd wish he could admit it, but to Izzy, it's akin to slitting his wrists.

Only... only, it's unfortunate, because Izzy would likely survive it, which is why he'll never do it. He can't imagine living with his heart on his sleeve, bleeding out as if Edward bloody Teach would ever see, let alone do or care anything about it. 

So he steels himself. Turns to his very naked boss, his former friend and once-lover, and starts the last fight he ever intends for them to have 

"I'm knitting a fucking dress, Edward. It's pretty, don't you think?"