#bs bs

!!!!!!!! HI AND WELCOME!!!!

I hope you enjoy the uh. Extreme black sails brainrot.

with all the Black Sails pride stuff going around I keep getting that horrible goose instinct to Cause Problems On Purpose by suggesting that Thomas is actually bi

“Keys.” Hand flat, palm up, expectant. No room to bargain.

Jack squints behind his sunglasses. His hand worms its way into the pocket of his trousers, fingers curling around the keys. He takes a deep breath. He's never been good at denying Charles anything, but failure is just the groundwork for success. "Sorry, did I hear that correctly? Did you think you were going to drive my car?"

Charles' gaze is flat, unimpressed. "Did you think I wasn't?"

Jack's upper lip curls into a sneer. "You forget I've been on that deathtrap you call a motorcycle -"

"We hardly skidded, fuck, live a little -"

"Yes, I'm trying to, which is why you're not driving -"

"So you're going to drive for sixteen hours and do the whole haul on your own?"

"What do you think we did before you came along? We had to get here somehow."

Charles' face doesn't change, but the tiniest furrow of his brows has Jack biting his tongue. He doesn't often think about it, talks about it even less: the first days after he'd met Anne, both of them broke and homeless, sleeping in the back of the dingy white Toyota Camry that had carried them cross-country running more on grit and desperation than fuel (the car and them both). If he closes his eyes, he can feel the wind whipping through his hair again, the way it had in the cold morning hours speeding down the interstate, stinging his face until his eyes watered, blurring the white lines ahead and the matching pallor of his knuckles on the wheel. If he closes his eyes, he can feel it again, the reckless, dizzying exhaustion that weighed him down, making each blink feel like it might be his last. In retrospect, it had been rash and stupid to hitch a ride with the first person they saw coming down the road after them, as the sun rose on the smoking wreck that was their engine 20 miles outside the city. It had been foolish to bank on the kindness of strangers, especially out here, especially given what - who - was chasing them. But Jack hadn't slept in two days, hadn't eaten anything that wasn't leaden fear, and Anne had been so, so still in the passenger seat; and he could smell the dried blood on her and -

Thank God it had been Charles, really.

Jack shakes himself back to the present. Sentiment aside, he’s still loathe to concede. He raises a fist above a flat hand, palm up. "Best of three?"

Charles gets that look in his eye, the one that Jack knows means he's only indulging him because he feels like it, and mirrors him. "Fine. One, two -"

Anne wins the game of rock-paper-scissors by shoving her way into the car and slamming the driver's side door behind herself. "I'm driving."

Jack has never been able to say no to her, and he isn't about to start now. He tosses the keys to her through the open window.

+

Max has pride of place (and of air conditioning) in the passenger seat, so Charles and Jack are relegated to the back of the car, crammed in among the sleeping bags and food boxes like so much junk. The beat-up sedan was never meant for a four-person interstate camping trip; it’s a tight fit and Jack’s trousers are already creased horribly. Sweat beads down the back of his neck - the A/C doesn’t reach past the front seats, and with Charles a veritable human furnace beside him, it’s already sweltering.

"Christ, it's intolerable back here."

Charles’ voice is a rumble he feels more than hears. "Your shit car, Jack."

+

Jack falls asleep two hours into the ride, his head banging none too gently off the window every time Anne hits a pothole - if he were a different man, Charles might suspect her of doing it on purpose.

It's not an attractive face: his expression is slack and his mouth has fallen open and he's started to drool onto Charles shoulder. Still, he hesitates to wake him.

+

They make fine time along the highway, the roads thankfully mostly devoid of traffic despite the brilliant sun pounding down on them. It's a long haul but they manage easily enough between the four of them, switching off driving (and DJ rights) every few hours. They rotate from Anne's aggressive takes on traffic laws to Max's much more controlled pace, sticking carefully to the speed limit and signalling religiously. The scenery crawls by at a painfully law-abiding pace until Charles takes the wheel, and then all bets are off. "I am never getting in a car with you again," Max hisses as they round the hairpin turns up the mountain pass 30 miles above the speed limit. Jack, slammed back into his seat by G-force and holding onto the passenger door for dear life, agrees. They careen round a corner at a speed that bounces Jack's head off the window and suddenly they're headed straight for the low guardrail, half a foot of gravel between the front wheels and a deadly drop.

"Charles!" Jack says and if his voice is three octaves higher in warning it doesn't matter because they're about to die. Max gives a sharp intake of breath behind him, and even Anne grunts in alarm as - they slam forward in their seats as the breaks engage, momentum flinging Jack forward. Only luck and reflex spare him from concussing himself on the dashboard. As it is, he slams his forehead painfully into the backs of his hands.

"What the hell? You tryin’ to kill us? " Anne's voice is low and rough and Jack would feel almost bad for Charles if he hadn't just tried to kill them.

Charles just jerks his chin at the rearview mirror, and the thrum behind them coalesces into a roar, and they all watch as a U-Haul flies round the bend, completely eclipsing both lanes as its back wheels fishtail behind it.

Jack sinks back into his seat, sweat sticking his shirt to his clammy skin. “Fuck,” he says with feeling.

There's no question of who gets shotgun while Jack is driving so he and Anne are treated to the rare sight of Charles and Max crammed together in the back seat, trying to keep as much physical distance between their bodies as possible and regarding each other warily like strange cats.

+

It's almost a relief to pull up to the campground to find Flint sitting on a log by the ancient firepit. He looks up from the piece of wood he's whittling as they clamber out of the car, each vying to be the first to stretch cramped legs and hunched backs.

"I know." Jack rolls the bottle around in his hands, rolls the rum around in his mouth. Swallows through the caustic burn. "I know that. Despite what many people think, darling, I am not stupid -"

Anne snorts. "Looks like it from here."

Jack sneers and lifts the bottle to his lips again, another harsh swallow. The alcohol sears his throat, lets him take another breath, just enough to get the words out. "I know it's a lost cause."

Anne doesn't respond, just looks at him, steady blue eyes saying more than she'd ever put into words. Jack is hit with a rush of gratitude nearly as strong as the rum: if anyone has to see him like this, at least it's her. At least Anne is with him.

Vane, clearly, is not.

"Fuck," Jack snarls. He runs a hand through his hair, fights the urge to scream and smash the bottle against the wall.

Anne nudges his leg with her boot. A weaker man might have called it a kick. "'s not your fault."

That chokes a dark laugh from Jack, the sound mangled in his throat. "Oh, I'd say it is."

Anne makes a rough noise in her throat, acute denial. Jack is touched, in the part of him that isn't focused on getting blindingly drunk.

"I'll be fine," he says, waving an arm magnanimously. Rum sloshes onto his wrist. "I'll drink this and I'll - be fine."

"You're an idiot," Anne says bluntly. "He should fuck you instead, you're worse than any woman."

Jack would almost take offence, but Anne’s lips are pressed into that thin line, the one he sees when she looks for him after a raid. "I'll take that as a compliment."

As she pushes herself up and stalks away, he can just hear, spat like an invective, "Men."

Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Black Sails Rating: Explicit Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Captain Flint | James McGraw/Thomas Hamilton/John Silver Characters: Captain Flint | James McGraw, John Silver, Thomas Hamilton Additional Tags: Unresolved Sexual Tension, Getting Together, Fluff and Smut, Anal Sex, Anal Fingering, Blow Jobs, Resolved Sexual Tension, love and cherish James Flint 2k5ever, idiots to lovers, Thomas Hamilton has Had Enough, Light Angst, Post-Canon Summary:

It's been nearly two months since John Silver showed up to the home of Mr. and Mr. Barlow. Thomas is done waiting for he and James to sort out everything that is still unsaid between them - he's taking things into his own hands.