Chapter Text
This fic is a collaborative Choose Your Own Adventure story, brought to you by the 🧶 collective (most of whom are credited as authors). You can find everyone’s preferred socials in the end notes for the final scene of each path, if you want to take a look at the men (gender neutral) behind the curtain!
Why 🧶? Because yarns are stories, woven together from many threads, and besides, our planning document looked like a conspiracy board.
The phrase “spinning a yarn” is also said to come from the stories that sailors would tell each other to pass the time while they were repairing rigging, so consider us here to help you fix your ships.
CYOA: Reunion! is best read in the Chapter By Chapter view, since it isn’t a linear story. Follow the links at the bottom of each chapter to make your way through your narrative paths of choice, rather than the chapter buttons. Each scene will have tags and warnings in the end notes, so take a peek at those if you’re curious or need a heads up.
Let’s dive in!
It’s been four days since the former crew of the Revenge reappeared, and Ed’s hiding in his cabin.
Stede’s cabin. His cabin. The captain’s cabin. Whatever.
Jim and Frenchie joined them immediately when they showed up, grabbing Izzy and throwing him in the brig, and Ivan and Fang shrugged and went along with it, leaving Ed shit out of fucking luck. And then Lucius popped over the rail, completely fucking fine, and Ed... Ed panicked, made a strategic retreat, and locked himself in his cabin with his ghosts and what’s left of his rum. And now—
Knock knock.
“Ed?”
Knock knock knock.
“Ed, Roach has made some lovely scones, and I thought you might want one? I could come in and we could have a chat?”
Ed ignores the voice at the door.
There’s a long pause.
“Edward, really, you haven’t come out in days. I just want to explain why—”
Ed doesn’t want him to finish that sentence. He stalks over to the door and throws it open. “No.”
“Ed!” Stede’s face breaks open in a wide, delighted smile, and Ed refuses to let his heart melt at all. He doesn’t let it warm his chest or curl his toes; he focuses on the basket in Stede’s arms instead.
“Fuck’s all that?” he asks flatly.
“Scones! Peach basil, a new recipe. They’re delicious.” He holds out the basket hopefully. Somehow he’s pressed his way into the cabin without Ed even noticing, which is pretty fucking typical. “For you?”
“Scones can stay. You can get the fuck out.”
Stede doesn’t set the basket down, even when Ed uses the scary Blackbeard voice. “We need to talk,” he says again, and he won’t fucking drop it.
Ed stalks closer, circling him. Stede lets himself be herded towards the door, but when he gets there, he closes it. Setting the basket on the table, he squares his shoulders, meets Ed’s eyes.
“I made a mistake, Ed,” he says, “If you’ll just listen—”
He’s standing there, all broad and blond and gorgeous, and Ed can barely bear to look at him, because he’s everything Ed thought he wanted, everything he thought that maybe, maybe he could have, and instead—
“I don’t want to hear your excuses,” he bites out, and leans closer, making himself bigger, letting his hair fall around his face in a cloud and his voice drop low. “I don’t fucking need that.”
He doesn’t want to know why. Why Stede didn’t come, why Ed wasn’t enough, why Stede didn’t want him the way he wanted Stede.
“Ed, I need to tell you, I need to—”
And his eyes are so bright, and so focused on Ed, his lips so plush-looking, his skin so soft—
Ed kisses him.
If Ed cups his hands gently around Stede’s cheeks, click here .
If Ed shoves him against the wall, click here .