#@sidewaystime

[uncommonsockeater]

so, fun fandom happenstance--i was at the maritime museum yesterday and spotted a familiar face on the postcard rack so grabbed it--

hello toby schmitz! well that explains this photo anyway--but it’s even better in the light of the lovely black sails headcanon/fic about miranda and the playwright aphra behn bc guess what it‘s advertising?

the blurb:

The classic 1677 battle of the sexes, by the first professional woman playwright (and actual spy!) Aphra Behn.

Lost in a maze of masquerade and revelry, a ratbaggy gang of exiled cavaliers plunge into the steamy depths of Naples at carnival time. They’re led by Willmore (Toby Schmitz) a seventeenth-century playboy who’s been round the block a few times and survives by his wit and exuberance. But then he meets a young woman who has the guile to expose the Rover’s true self. He’s almost prepared to fall head over heels for her. But she’s a nun. And there’s the most beautiful woman in Europe on the same street....

clearly ts is landing all the fun roles at the moment.

[uncommonsockeater]

grifter!au: james was a rising star in the military special forces but left after some ugly [classified] incidents in [classified location] which left him with a slowburning hatred of institutions and hierarchies. he became a self-employed investigator and acquisitions expert along semi-shady lines and was introduced to the alfred hamilton case by his old friend/colleague peter ashe, who had also retired from [classified military position, something that administered to james’s branch of the special forces].

unbeknownst to james, one of alfred’s companies [classified government military contracts *vague handwaving*] is responsible for the [classified fuckup] and ashe was involved in covering it up in return for various favours. fearing that the supposedly dead thomas and miranda hamilton may have stumbled on this information in the course of their own investigations, they’re hoping james will provide ‘confirmation’ of their ‘guilt’ followed by surety of their deaths; and, if not the latter, a location where they will very shortly send... possibly james, assuming he can be bribed into wetwork.

of course ashe doesn’t have as deep a knowledge of james as he thinks he does and they both severely underestimate him, to their detriment. they’ve written him off as a lower-class, uneducated (but just smart enough for their purposes), usefully patriotic tool who can be convinced to carry out illegal or unethical actions ‘for the good of the nation,’ ‘it’s a national security issue, of course you understand,’ etc etc. also they assume that, being from a poor working class background, he’ll be grateful for the money and not ask too many questions about facts or ethics or what actually happened here. in addition they have in reserve a [classifed incident] which they believe they can use to blackmail him should he get unruly, maybe frame him for treason.

however! 1) any patriotism james had didn’t survive his military career; 2) he sees and resents their (better hidden in ashes’ case, but still evident) classism; 3) he outright loathes alfred hamilton and is determined to fuck with him out of spite; 4) so far as [classified blackmail incident] goes he seriously has no fucks to give anymore. let the world know, he’s past caring and he’ll take his chances with the law/secret services/whoever comes after him (in fact, he’s in a bit of depression and has little to no interest in self-preservation. at least the adrenaline rush will be something); and 5) the more he digs the dodgier the whole case appears to be, and the more intriguing he finds thomas and miranda. (in fact getting to know this couple via their paper trail, online history, interviews with people they knew, their taste in books and art and music, is the only highlight of this shitty job.)

furthermore *someone* keeps leaving helpful self-terminating messages on his phone to point him in particular directions that seem to undermine any case alfred and ashe make. some of these messages are... quite flirtatious. (picture jack’s irritation at being used as a conduit for long-distance seduction. he believes in the purity of his work, people. where’s the respect.) thomas and miranda have much the same access to information about james that peter ashe does, but have drawn very different conclusions from it. also they both  agree that james looks really tasty in dress uniform.

eventually alfred has to take care of his wayward investigator and much to his surprise james finds himself extracted from his operation by the objects of said operation and some lanky hipster and his unfriendly girlfriend who may or may not have a face and a personality somewhere under the hat brim, james hasn’t seen either yet.

[uncommonsockeater]

grifter!au--early on, miranda and thomas like to joke about their bit of rough who likes to get rough, but they cease fire when they realise james might be a little sensitive about the class thing.

they don’t ever want him to think they see him as anything less than themselves. and, generally speaking, james doesn’t want to be objectified by a pair of toffs, buuuuut over time he learns that’s not what their relationship is, not what they are to him or he to them, and eventually he trusts them enough to admit that he... kind of... likes it... when they do that... sometimes. it’s all fine so long as it stays in the bedroom.

he’s got a bit of a service kink happening there too but that’s got a more universal application. miranda calls him their very parfit gentil knight.

(god, it is so difficult to prioritise your sex-life when the children are still at home.)

jack obnoxiously persists in calling miranda and thomas ‘our mummy and daddy.’ anne wishes he’d get some new material; preferably something that doesn’t put her off her feed. james initially protests his inclusion in the ‘our’ on the basis that he refuses to be related to jack fucking rackham (never mind the rest of the implications) but eventually figures out that he cannot beat jack, he can only try to out-weird him. increasingly grotesque and off-putting characterisations of relationships are mooted. as the noob who’s parachuted into this mess with no explanations, john silver is very. very. uncomfortable.

meanwhile jack and anne continue to stew over max. anne hates that stuck-up corporate drone (with her stupid sexy suits and stupid sexy voice) to a suspicious degree! jack is professionally and personally embarrassed! anne vs heteronormativity vs strange awakenings! jack struggling with non-anne-centric attraction! it’s like they’re going through a second puberty!

the hamiltons observe their turmoil with a loving and indulgent eye and start using lots of metaphors involving ‘flowering’ and ‘budding’ and ‘blossoming’ in their everyday speech. everyone else squirms.

miranda: *wistful noises about their babies growing up*

james, wryly: “they’re not my babies.”

(john silver enters the room.)

james: “they’re my semi-demi-hemi step-sibling half-nibling hillbilly kissing-cousin quasi-incestuous in-laws.”

(john silver rapidly exits the room.)

james; “...that’s jack’s latest reckoning, anyway.”

(john silver, softly, to himself: “what the fuckening.”)

[uncommonsockeater]

note: could not find a better depiction of young!jack and young!anne than in these great gifsets. (also reluctant to google ‘teenage redhead’ for obvious reasons.)

grifter!au thoughts re: jack and anne. childhood best friends from a low socioeconomic neighbourhood, although jack and his dad were more aspirational lower-middle class than poor, while anne was living below the poverty line in a family situation that was closely monitored by child protection services. they were separated when jack’s father was bankrupted (through no fault of his own) and in desperation he committed some sort of fraud and was imprisoned. around the same time anne’s home life became untenable, and they were both packed off into the foster system.

jack’s a self-educated i.t. guy who got into criminal hacking bc he was never going to be that poor and helpless again etc--also to track down anne, whom he never forgot. one of his first capers, which happened many years later when they were finally reunited, was helping anne steal herself from her terrible low-life criminal boyfriend and absconding together with a shitload of dirtbag boyfriend’s ill-gotten gains. unfortunately, being new at this stuff, they didn’t cover their tracks as well as they should have--but another more experienced pair of grifters picked them up, offering them protection and support and a chance to hone their skills in their service. they’ve been with the hamiltons ever since.

while jack’s use was obvious they weren’t quite sure what to do with anne, who, shall we say, does not have the people skills needed for a grifter (although she’s pretty deft with her hands and good at pick-pocketing). also at this point she had had no formal fighting training--but her temper and incredible protectiveness of jack (a hangover from childhood where she was the scrapper who fought the bullies off him) meant she continually got into fights where, even if she was vastly outmatched, she just would. not. stay. down. this determinator quality combined with a natural grace, stealth, quickness, and the less glamorous but important ability to take a beating and keep going, convinced the hamilton’s she’d make a good hitter with the right training. she takes to knives like a duck to water. when james joins them she gets better and better because of the quality of her training partner.

(also jack has been anneromantic and annesexual for his entire life and, as well as feeling jealous over anne, is highly confused when he’s attracted to max’s brains and cunning.) (i mean that’s actually my headcanon for the show, so.)

[uncommonsockeater]

grifter!au. anne: has hobbies. or at least she tries to have hobbies.

she and jack are gamers. this surprises james--jack, yes, he’s a nerd, but anne? but she’s really competitive and really good and when she and jack team up they’re nigh unstoppable. sexist gamergate types end up with their asses kicked and compromising personal information posted on public forums. james eventually joins in (ex-military, strategy games, it’s a thing), which jack asserts is more evidence that he’s actually the red-headed stepchild of the family, not ‘daddy class’. james says never sully his ears with the phrase ‘daddy class’ again.

miranda gardens. (they move around a lot but miranda always manages to at least set up some window-boxes.) anne will go out with her and pull weeds and grub about in the dirt in companionable silence. miranda never says anything when she pulls out the onion bulb and leaves the weed behind, or fetches lavender when thomas asks for rosemary.

thomas handles most of the day to day cooking by default--miranda just buys take-away, jack’s abilities stop far short of his ambition and the results are mediocre at best, and silver’s banned from the kitchen after the still-bloody roast chicken incident, the caterpillar salad incident, and the exploding squash incident (they agree that once is bad luck and twice might be a coincidence, but three times means he’s probably cursed). james is almost professionally good but only does big event cooking on special occasions, like anniversaries or big wins. anne doesn’t really cook but she does like to watch others do it, and to filch bits without getting caught. sometimes she’ll get roped into sous chef-ing --‘good practice for your knife skills!’-- protesting half-heartedly, but she secretly likes it.

she runs, while wears heavy-duty headphones (present from jack) to ignore the rest of the world. jack is finicky and more hipster-than-thou about his music but anne just likes pretty much everything, even the cheesy 80s playlists silver makes (to tease the ‘olds’ with. thomas sings along unironically).

she doesn’t really have the patience for serial tv or most movies but weirdly it turns out they all like old-fashioned comedies like ‘bringing up baby’ and ‘arsenic and old lace’. and of course there’s Heckle Night, where they eat junk food and pick heist movies to death. action films too.

basically she enjoys the sort of domestic stuff she didn’t get much of in her early life, but she’ll also try a little of whatever everyone else is doing to see if she has any taste or talent for it. there was a watercolour phase, because of miranda, which no-one mentions on pain of stabbing by fork; and an orienteering phase because of james, but it turns out anne hates the great outdoors (especially walking in it, sleeping in it, and peeing in it). she’s making up for missing that period of experimentation most people have as teenagers where they’re finding that stuff out about themselves.

[laureljupiter]

I’m imagining the faces of current and future US History/government teachers trying to explain Anthony Weiner’s role in the Hillary’s Emails witch hunt to their students and it is Sustaining me through these last days of this macroaggression of an election

[laureljupiter]

Making zucchini bread and listening to a Tupac mix:  peak Alison Hendrix