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Lucius had rushed to the first mate’s room in a panic and as he pushed open the door a tiny voice in his head had urgently tried to remind him that he should always knock before doing such thing if he didn’t want to be stabbed, but it was already too late to do something about it because the door was wide open now and oh, god, there was so much skin in sight.
“Oh, my god, not again!” he shrieked.
“For fuck’s sake, Spriggs!” Izzy yelled back. “Don’t you know how to knock?!”
“I’m sorry! I’m so sorry!”
“You’ll be if you don’t get out immediately, Spriggs!”
Lucius’ only relief was to see that the very naked first mate didn’t have any knife or gun nearby. He was sure the angry man would have already used it if he had.
“I’m sorry! I was worried about the Captain! The last time I saw him was at Jackie’s, when I saw he hadn’t slept in his cabin I thought he could have been kidnapped or something!” Lucius tried to explain.
And that was the truth! He had panicked, thinking that Stede might be in trouble or already dead on a dirty alley of the Republic while the crew was sleeping it off on deck after a night of too much drinking.
“Well, that was very thoughtful of you, Lucius, but, ahem, you can see I’m fine,” Stede said, his face turning an incredibly intense shade of red.
“Oh, I can see A LOT, don’t you have blankets here at all?” Lucius replied without thinking.
“Out, Spriggs! Now!” Izzy bellowed.
Lucius’ self-preservation instinct took finally over and made him bolt from the room, only to turn back again to close the door behind him as he kept uttering apologies.
“That was… well, that was… unexpected,” Stede finally said as the sound of Lucius’ footsteps faded away.
“That’s a way of saying it,” Izzy grumbled.
“But Lucius might be right about something,” Stede added, surprising the first mate. “You don’t have many blankets here, maybe you could join me in my cabin next time...”
“Next time?” Izzy replied, hesitantly.
“Well, I thought, that maybe- that is, if you would want to- maybe, we could… do this again?” Stede stuttered, looking way more unsure than he had lately. “Unless you think-“
“Yes,” Izzy stopped him with just one word.
“Yes?” Stede replied, smiling brightly at him.
“I wasn’t complaining, I just- I mean, I-“ Izzy said quickly. “It was… unexpected, that’s all.”
“That’s a way of saying it,” Stede said with a twinkle in his eyes.
Then he leaned down to kiss Izzy and the first mate certainly didn’t complain at all.