know that you had a choice ( vane headcanons )

I have been yelling at Malakh about Vane and his perceptions of intelligence so let me do a brief run down for you folks.

Vane does not view himself as smart – he views himself as adaptable and capable of surviving anything just short of a motherfucking apocalypse, provided he has the right resources.
Smart People Are A Resource.
How??
Smart people can tell you if that pardon in your hand is In Fact a pardon and not a letter which reads This Is Charles Vane, Arrest Immediately, Don’t Worry, He Thinks This Is A Pardon complete with overdramatic flourish that was the 16th century standard for the cry-laugh emoji and whose meaning has been lost over time to translate simply as those bitches were extra.

In all seriousness though Vane was kidnapped at the age of seven and forced into hard labor for 13 – 14 something years I am too tired to check my own chronology on this so whatever, sleepdrunk headcaons ahoy.

In any case – after busting out of Hell he meets Edward Teach who is ruthless and big on the whole animal food chain philosophy of Only The Strong Survive – but also, deeply valued the power of intellectual warfare and emphasised the importance of being smarter than the enemy.

He taught Vane a lot of things – including his letters, which nobody in that era understood as Fucking Impressive because you learn your letters as a child or you’re Just A Dumb Peasant for struggling with it as an adult – but above all he emphasised that fear inside of Vane, that internal terror of being dragged back to Hell – by making it clear that if you Were Not Strong & Smart Enough, You’d Be Fucked.

So Vane – a very big, very powerful lad – learned quick to be The Strongest Fuck On The Docks and to establish his dominance as fast as humanly possible. Because with dominance and strength comes reputation and with reputation comes the power to encourage smart people to ally up because often times smart people tended to have a need for strong people, and thus transaction is crafted between the two.

However Vane also knew he could not survive as a dumb people. Not if he wanted to ensure he never, ever found himself on the stocks again. He needed to be more than strong he needed to be smarter than the strong, he needed to be strong and smart. Which leads in to his observational method of learning – he learns by osmosis, to be perfectly frank – and that is why the more exposure he has to the people he registers and views as smart and in charge, the more likely he is to sound vaguely like them when he enters into his own verbal disputes.

Vane is in fact a very quiet fucking person. He is more often than not reluctant to engage in lengthy conversations – for fourteen years of his life talking was often punishable by the lash and learning to overcome that training is difficult. It often takes a mask or an armor to manage, and at the same time he cannot sound like a parrot or people will see right through him.

So he listens and he watches and when he speaks he measures and paces himself, but his focus is generally on how to maneuver this situation like [ insert person best suited to maneuvering this situation ] and builds from there. The only times Vane really sounds like himself is when there is no fight or threat at hand, and generally tends to involve minor domestic moments with Rackham or Bonny – the only people aside from his ‘family’ and Teach who really know he’s a very simple man with very simple needs and goals.

What even they don’t know though, is that while he boxes it up in powerful ways so people will listen, at the end of the day the only thing Vane truly wants is the guarantee that he and those he cares about will be able to live free, and feel safe. And as someone who has never felt safe a day in his life – its the moments when he doesn’t feel like he has anything to prove that he is at his most honest, though more often than not – he is in a safe situation, and just doesn’t realize That Is What This is.

And that’s a rambly headcanon that covers a whole lot of shit to ultimately say if you’re wondering why I often portray Vane in nonthreatening positions its because I want to learn who he is in those situations because I know exactly who he is when he’s threatened and the point of development is putting characters in situations that are abnormal to learn about them :V

And also I just really wanted an excuse for that calligraphy joke. And also to tie in the whole Everything Is A Transaction To Vane thing I nattered about when I was 150% more coherent than I am right now ❤ WOO!

Mun Note: This is a long overdue commentary so – my bad. A lot of this has already been shared with my primary writing partners in regard to Vane, but it should probably be said and linked because it was supposed to be on his profile like, six months ago.

Firstly, although I do write Vane as bisexual I flatly refuse to at any point act as though his relationships with individuals in his canon storyline have any subtexts. As I stated very loudly in my approach to John Silver’s sexuality, I consider it a disservice to the very open discussions Black Sails has on shame and sexuality by openly exploring women who love women and men who love men by inserting commentary and analysing things to have a completely different narrative for the sake of a ship.

In short: While Vane may develop relationships with men in alternative storylines and through threading, I do not consider the canon narrative to provide any evidence toward my decision and interpretation of his sexuality – nor will I, at any point, attempt to push the idea onto anyone that anything said or done in the canon narrative has anything to do with romantic feelings.

Secondly, it should be noted that though Vane has a high sex drive and greatly enjoys fucking in general, he is generally a little wary of being treated like a human sized dildo. More often than not people will get away with it just because he really has a very low standard when it comes to how he expects to be treated in this case, but the more obvious it is to him that your interest in him only stems as far as he can physically satisfy you, the less likely it will be that he’s going to give a shit about anything you need outside of that particular relationship.

In short: Vane is not a dumb animal and it is abundantly clear to him when he is being used as a sex object. Simply because he doesn’t object doesn’t mean he isn’t aware and has not classified the relationship as purely sexual as a result. Purely sexual relationships with Vane mean he is not obligated to give a flying fuck about your opinion, politics, or feelings. While he will ensure that both parties leave satisfied physically, expecting more from him after engaging him like this is sheer folly.

Thirdly, everything with Vane is about exchanges – absolutely everything comes down in some way to a value transaction. Not all values are measured in coin – some are measured in aims and benefits of a more mercurial nature. As long as he believes that those aims remain in alignment and that the partnership is balanced, he will do all in his power to maintain that partnership and ensure that the other party benefits from his protection.

However when it is made clear to him that the balance has shifted, and that his needs and aims are no longer being accounted for, he will address it – and no amount of manipulative bullshit will change the truth. Crossing Vane by going back on a deal never ends well, especially if that deal involves sexual intimacy. He takes it very goddamn personally, and will respond in a manner that is quite personal as a result – he can be very petty when he is enraged, and it never does well to forget that he is an extremely dangerous man.

In short: Vane is a hedonistic creature. When he wants sex, he has no issue procuring it from somewhere. So if he is maintaining a committed sexual relationship with someone, guaranteed it has absolutely nothing to do with the sex part and everything to do with some other transaction in play. As the only time it has happened is on Discord, I cannot say if it is guaranteed, but that transaction can be as simple as a sense of emotional safety – the sex is simply part of that exchange, though Vane would have a harder time quantifying that in words. And I do have a canon example that goes with all this transaction shit but its going under a cut because it involves Cursed Things That I Hate A Lot.

So with Eleanor, the transaction was that in exchange for his protection, the removal of Blackbeard and the power of his name, she would in turn establish for Nassau the legitimacies required to make her sustainable long term. When it became clear that she had no intentions of maintaining her end of the bargain and was instead fully determined to treat him as an obstacle toward her goals as opposed to a partner in achieving them, he was viciously clear in his opinion of this betrayal. Had there been no sexual component, his displeasure would have meted itself out a little less drastically – but no less effectively.

As I will probably never remember to write up the whole spiel on it and I have yelled about it enough with my partners, the TL;DR for Vane and Eleanor was they made a deal and Vane made a choice. He believed in her ability to obtain what he wanted and so he turned on a man he otherwise had no reason to challenge, and saw the success of Nassau as the price for his own betrayal. He refused to give up on Eleanor for so long because without her he did not believe his intentions would be manageable, and without her his sacrifice of Teach would amount to nothing, which was something he could not abide.

Sex between them was always manipulative on her part, and he was not blind to that fact, but so long as it seemed their goals were aligned there was little he would not offer her. When it became clear their paths had diverged, and her betrayals became insurmountable, Vane had little issue burning the bridge because it was never about love between them – it was a transaction, and his sacrifices on the table were massive. He needed her, and he put his chips down – that’s on him. She failed him – that’s on her.

Fun Facts:

Benedict Charles Vane is 56 years old.
Katherine Marie Vane is 53 years old.

They are both still alive, and searching for Charles whom they believe is still in the West Indies, taken by one of their enemies. While they are correct in the assumption that Charles was kidnapped on account of their business for the EITC, they have spent the past three decades searching in the wrong corner of the world.

While verses may be created where word of Charles Vane the pirate of the New World reaches the West Indies, for the most part this simply remains as a fun aside. What is more, he has no siblings – the loss of him devastated Katherine and Benedict too completely, and the mere thought of another child often upsets them greatly.

Some small insights into Charles before he was kidnapped at the tender age of seven.

Born to Benedict Charles Vane and his wife, Katherine Marie Vane (

née

Barrett ) an EITC overseer and the wits behind his operation respectively, Charles was a shockingly healthy child. While many mothers in their vicinity fretted over fevers and coughs, baby Charles weathered through his early winters with his only cries being for food, changes and the insistence on being held.

By the time he was five, he had moved from England to Singapore and discovered a love of climbing and of bugs. One of Benedict’s friends was a naturalist by name of Alexander Warren, who informed the young boy that a great deal about our world and how to live in it could be learned through the study of nature and most particularly, the hardy insects. This lead to the early formation of a fascination that never leaves Charles, though unfortunately for dear Katherine her son’s understanding of “bug” was rather — broad.

To Charles a bug was just about anything he didn’t know the name of, or happened to think looked interesting. This would then be brought to Mister Warren for information, though when the man was not around it would result in all manner of creepies and crawlies being discovered by Mrs. Vane or her staff on hand, set in a teacup or even the teapot itself. This ranged from, but was not limited to, salamanders, toads, tadpoles and on one remarkable occasion, a very small and likely newly hatched crocodile.

Then, of course, there was the climbing. Charles

loved to climb literally everything and his poor father was perpetually having to get him down, cause like a big dumb cat Charles could Get Up There but was utterly incapable of getting back down.
Katherine would try and insist he get himself out of his own trouble, but then he’d start to cry so she’d huff and send Benedict up to retrieve him.

Aside from this particular display, Charles was not in fact very prone to tantrums as a child. He actually tended to just watch a lot and he didn’t like confrontation, so when the other kids got real loud and rowdy he would scuttle away rather than join suit. When he was really upset or angry about something he would end up crying and holding his fists at his sides as he hyperventilated because he literally couldn’t connect to his words when he had Big Feelings.

This eventually transformed into staring as intimidatingly as possible. As an adult, Charles’ eyes widen whenever he is feeling Big Emotions because he learned that was a way to keep tears at bay. It ensures that he controls himself, regardless of what might be coursing through him at any given moment.

When particularly emotional as an adult, Charles stammers and it becomes a real struggle because not only does he not verbally connect well once his emotions start churning, he is also dealing with the fact that when Emotional he starts thinking more in Papiamento than in English so there’s also language barrier struggles that cause him to kind of….stall. We see this a few times in the show, particularly with Eleanor, and his eyes widening in emotional moments is something I expanded on based on the actual canon so, watching closely for that is a wild ride let me tell you.

Charles tends to display his friendship in ways one might liken to a domesticated house cat. Many of his more affectionate gestures tend to fall into tactile fields – be it brushing up against a person’s side or even taking a seat and pressing his side against them, chances are casual and calm physical interaction is a sign that Charles likes you.

Resting his head against shoulders and even laps is a sign not only of his affection, but of his trust and admittedly, possession. This is his quiet, but poignant means of showing the world that you are his person, and that undoubtedly means people would answer to him if anything were to happen to you.

Perhaps the most notable tactile offering Charles has though, is in regard to his hair. He does not take well to it being touched or grabbed by anyone without some form of permission granted from him – each and every time. Simply because you could touch his hair before doesn’t mean you can now, and that is important to understand.

That said, anyone he allows to not only touch his hair, but to modify it – either by means of styling ( be it braids, buns and ponytails – or flowers and beads to decorate it ) or in the much rarer instance of cutting it is someone Charles not only trusts, but is someone he openly adores in as affectionate a manner as he understands how to convey. To put it in meme terms, being allowed to play with or modify Charles Vane’s hair in any way makes you a God Tier friend.

It should be noted that in cases of a sexual nature, this does not always hold true. Just about anyone can touch Charles’ hair if he happens to be fucking them – but as soon as the sex is over the permission is immediately and thoroughly revoked, unless of course the person he is having sex with happens to be someone he trusts – which frankly has only ever happened in an AU environment anyway.

( Fun Fact Time: Outside of the circle of ocs I have yet to write about, there are very few people with the right to touch Charles Vane’s hair. Anne Bonny is the reason behind the braids we see more often than not. Jack Rackham and Blackbeard are both permitted to touch his hair depending on his mood and theirs. Outside of this, and only in the applicable AU’s, the only other people with this permission are Edward Pellew, Joji and Abigail Ashe. )

Another means in which Charles displays his friendship in a feline like fashion comes from his manner of bringing his people food or fighting off their enemies. The more he looks after someone’s welfare and even reputation, the more likely it is that they matter to him.

( Fun Fact Time: Charles had other means of getting information on Low that did not involve turning to Max. If he had not wanted an excuse to restore Jack’s reputation, he would not have been pressured into accepting terms that would require him to restore it. )

Another thing is lending – Charles is not the most materialistic person ironically enough. Despite being a pirate, greed is not his vice and in fact there is very little in life that he covets that can be measured in a physical sense. That said, he doesn’t particularly like being stolen from, and if he doesn’t like someone he is not above going after them for doing so – even if all they stole was something small and innocuous, like a shirt.

In the event that he likes a person though, what is his – well, it is as good as theirs anyway. A good portion of his formative upbringing was spent as a slave in a labor camp – when one has absolutely nothing to call their own, what little things they have are either guarded jealously or shared communally, and Charles was very much among the latter in his camp. So to him, sharing his clothes and even his food with his crew and chosen family comes completely naturally – what belongs to him, belongs to all who depend on him, and all whom he counts as his own.

( Fun Fact Time: He is aware that some people – namely, Jack and Anne – seem to consider taking his clothes to be something of a sport, so he plays along even though he believes them completely entitled to his shirts and other miscellany, as he sees it as a form of play between the three of them and literally does not realize they actually think they’re just getting away with stealing his stuff. )

Small gestures like getting something broken repaired or anticipating a need and tending to it is also a big way Charles shows he cares. He watches all the fucking time, he is always absorbing knowledge and observing, so he tends to note small details and kind of plays his hand sometimes. This is perhaps the most notable in Living Does Not Mean A Happy Ending, where he is partly looking after Flint. Here, he brings the man books and teacups, and generally finds means of repairing household damages during downward spirals, as well as ensuring Flint has means of self care when things get really bad. None of which he would do, if Flint had not become one of “his” in that verse.

Lastly ( and perhaps, by Charles’ view, most importantly ) if he hands a person an iguana or any other type of lizard, this displays the same measure of trust and adoration as someone handing you a kitten from the litter of their most treasured childhood cat. Rejecting that lizard is a terrible offense, and will make it difficult for Charles to wholly trust you going forward.

Oh – actually, one final thing. If you’re afraid of a type of bug or like, scared of lizards, he will shoo bugs for you and also do silly shit to make lizards less scary — like put them on his head.

And that is the sum total of How To Tell If Charles Vane Is Your Friend!

An important thing to note is that Charles doesn’t abide by nicknames and monickers very well. His name is one of the few things Albinus and other handlers could not take from him – it is a core part of his identity in the sense that it serves as a reminder to him both of where he came from and the man he could have been, as surely as it serves as something to develop, so that it can define the man he has become.

He is Charles Vane and that is something nobody can take away, nor change – so to have that name manipulated or altered by others ( generally harmless things, such as Charlie ) is, by his estimation, a sign of disrespect and an effort to minimize him and the meaning of his name.

His responses to this are generally sharp and unwise to contradict or ignore – and common enough that the few who do address him by a nickname ought to recognize they are an exception to a ferociously drawn and maintained line. There are three individuals with this power at present.

The foremost among them is Yawi, a former slave woman with a long history with Charles, and the only person who can call him boy and not only get away with it, but immediately have his attention.

Some may think her nickname for him is Abo as, more often than not when she says it, his head lifts and he immediately responds to her, but that’s literally the equivalent of saying someone’s nickname is You! because they know they’re the shithead being addressed in that particular tone. Her actual nicknames for him are various terms of endearment not uncommonly utilized by mothers overseeing reckless sons.

Secondarily is Blackbeard, who is the only person Charles respects enough to accept criticism from and any morphology on his name is – generally acceptable. It very much depends on tone – if he feels he is being mocked or derided with the shift, even Blackbeard will be fought on it. And not even Blackbeard can get away with Charlie. He is, however, the only man who can use son and not get himself punched in the face for it.

That is not to say Charles necessarily sees Blackbeard as a father figure – rather, it is a display of his understanding Blackbeard sees him as a son-figure, and he accepts that the term is not an insult but an endearment, even when it is used in a tone that might incite outrage on account of being scornful or exasperated. Like Yawi, Blackbeard can get away with a fair amount of shit, because Charles understands it isn’t disrespect he is facing, but the frustration of someone who gives a fuck.

The third, and final party on this list is quite possibly the strangest, and that is Jack Rackham – the only man alive who can call Charles Vane Chaz and not even get huffed at over it. The relationship between both of them is a complicated one to be sure, though I imagine if Jack ever realized how much Charles both trusts and respects him, he’d be downright thrown.

Regardless of that, it is due to Charles’ unique understanding of Jack that this nickname is permissible – though if it is ever used in a demeaning way, retaliation is generally swift and unquestionably clear that the privilege is temporarily stripped.

As I am presently in the process of adding birthdays to all my dossiers because it’s time to upgrade continuity around here, it should be noted that Charles has no idea when his birthday is, having been taken from his home and set into labour well before the concept could really settle on him.

The day that is acknowledged as his birthday was chosen by Rackham in a fit of pique, though how ‘celebratory’ it is tends to be about as predictable as Vane’s moods. Small traditions have sprouted through trial and error on Rackham’s end though, and they’ve all been noted – even if not all have been particularly appreciated.

Some small and irrelevant headcanons about the jungle cat tribe ( 4 / ?? )

Jack has 0 time for spiders and will nip out of an area so fast if he happens to see one moving. He has been known to shriek if caught by one unexpectedly and rapidly pat himself down as if convinced they’re crawling all over him. He also does a ( to Charles, anyway ) arcane sort of hop and jiggle followed by rapid hand flapping afterward. This escalates exponentially in the event there was actually a spider on him.

This terrible habit has lead to both Anne and Charles making a natural habit of checking an area over automatically and sweeping away any spiders they happen to notice – and to develop a manner of dealing with them once in a room without Jack noticing. Sometimes they have had to just smack a hand over his mouth while another party deals with it. His reaction is completely involuntary but it is dramatic and drastic enough that they’ve learned to compensate for it.

While not nearly as alarmed as Jack, Anne hates the sound of cicadas and will often get drunk to numb herself to the noise. More often than not she falls asleep with her head on Jack or Charles’ chest, using their heartbeat to help drown out the awful droning chorus of demons.

Charles has absolutely no issues with bugs, at least that he knows of. He’s generally the one taking care of bug problems for people who do have these issues, and has a habit of cornering creepy crawlies that are just plain funky looking to examine out of sheer curiosity, at times leading to Anne plucking it up and tossing it into the bushes because he doesn’t need to torture the damn thing.

( Note; he is never actually hurting the bug but it’s not like bugs are really meant to be picked up and turned over and squinted at for extended periods of time either. )

One time Charles offhandedly tried to pass Eleanor an iguana.

It went about as well as to be expected.

Some small and irrelevant headcanons about the jungle cat tribe ( 3 / ?? )

Charles really loves iguanas. There have been times when he’s been sunbathing and ended up with one treating him as a sun rock so he’s refused to move.

Jack has learned not to shoo the iguanas, and accept when Charles has been ‘chosen’ because more often than not, shooing the iguana results in unwelcome scratches on an already easy to anger triangle, and a disrupted nap.

One time an iguana walked over Anne’s hat and she seemed unable to deal with it so Charles picked up the lizard and put it on his head. He then handed her the hat, and the look was so bizarre and silly whatever slipped inside her resettled itself and she busted a gut laughing.

Since then, she has had little issues with lizards and has been known to plop them on Charles’ shoulders, lap, and indeed – head – should she happen to come across one when he seems to need cheering up, or she just notices it seems placid.

Whenever the little buddies are passed over to him, Charles inevitably ends up scooping it in his arms at some point and cradling the lazy lizard while he goes about his business.