duplicity inbox / cw for nsfw shenanigans.

[unlawful]

TEXT / VOICE / VIDEO / ACTION NOTE: felix generally responds to everything in text, even voice or video calls. expect 90% of his replies to be text-based regardless of urgency.

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[unlawful]

( that's maybe the first time felix has heard him say his name out loud. almost a novelty, the way the syllables roll off his tongue. he slants his brow, glancing back at ephemera's raised arm. fighting stance. still ready, as if felix is an active threat to be fielded instead of a fleshy fucking human with no useful weapons on him.

felix has gone against worse odds, he supposes. smart to be prepared, like it was smart knocking the shit out of his head or ripping his throat open with his teeth. healed up now, but he'll have the mark as a reminder for a while. first fucking thing he sees when he rolls out of bed every morning and looks in the mirror. the mark. the memory. his blood in ephemera's teeth, and –

everything else that came after. )

Of course you didn't. ( a simple acquiesce. ) Why would you?

( the distance is a tentative courtesy more than anything born out of a wise sense of self-preservation. the rig is different ⁠— a customized perfect fit, someone clearly built it for him, and he thinks of crais, effortlessly patching felix's armor as he sat and watched him do it — but he moves faster than felix would be able to dodge or outrun.

he stays where he is and scuffs the dirt with his heel.

what does he want. he makes a soft, indignant sound low in his throat, dropping his hand from his hair to circle his throat and absently thumb the mark ephemera left on him. what does he want. what doesn't he want. )

Like, in general, or right now? Dude, I don't fucking know. I was just out for a run. You set up shop right in my last stretch.

[requiemshark]

[ Maybe someone finding him was inevitable. He’s been making noise, testing his flamethrowers, and that has a cost. Anyone might’ve come nosing around after they heard the noise, after they smelled the napalm. Whole goddamn city makes a point of getting into everyone’s business. This shouldn’t be a surprise. He and Felix have this way of colliding with each other, don’t they?

Ephemera hisses out a curse. He drops his arm, disengages the flamethrower. He’s not going to set Felix on fire. Not right now, anyway. Not when he’s unarmored and touching the healing mark where Ephemera tried to kill him last.

Fuck. ]

You gonna tell Carolina?

[ Like before, his tone is very even. ]

[unlawful]

You'd be fucked if I did, huh?

( stupid answer for a stupid question, as if he talks to carolina, as if he has any personal investment in ephemera's vendetta against her. not his business. he left the freelancers and their hot fucking mess behind him on chorus, and the only man he gives a shit about violently hurting – aside from ortez, aside from tucker – isn't here. by all logic, ephemera should've been grouped with the freelancers. he shouldn't care.

he squeezes his throat lightly and feels his pulse with his thumb, even. calm. his arm falls to his side, loosely sliding his hand into his pocket. )

Can't exactly kill me to shut me up if I just keep coming back louder than ever, and we both know how violence between us usually ends, anyway. ( different every time, but there's one commonly reoccurring theme: neither of them die. it's a bit of a prodding barb. instinctive. casually defensive. maybe it's the lack of liquor in his system. he doesn't know what to feel aside from strange, something prickling sharp under a muddied surface.

easy to fall back on default when everything's been blown open between them. he looks away from ephemera, rolling his shoulders back in a shrug. )

What a dilemma.

[requiemshark]

[ Not for the first time, he thinks about closing the distance between them and making good on the underlying threat. He thinks he would have done it back on Chorus. No question, no second thoughts. He’d just do it. And now —

Fuck.

Ephemera goes still, watching Felix intently. Clocking his every move. ]

What do you want.

[ It comes out in a hiss. Barely a question. Half of a threat. He’s in armor now. He ought to feel solid. ]

[unlawful]

( unfortunate that he keeps running into ephemera when he's too sober to cope with it. he notices things when he's sober. the tension rippling through ephemera's motionless frame, visible with a shrewd eye even under all that heavy metal plating. on edge. it's the kind of shit that he'd take deep, flourishing satisfaction in. making someone uncomfortable. making someone flinch first.

don't ask me stupid questions, he almost says. don't ask me questions you don't want the answer to. )

Just passing through, T.

( the truth. only one way to his apartment if he's not turning around and doubling back, adding an additional twenty to thirty minutes to his jog. he's passing through, and he happened to run into ephemera in the process. that's all it is.

he pulls his earbuds off his shoulders and neatly wraps the cord around his fist, pocketing it. for the moment, he doesn't move any closer. )

Who built it for you? ( with a nod in his direction. he bets he knows. ) Crais?

[requiemshark]

[ They ought to fight. They always do in the end and Ephemera doesn't know what to do with a genuine conversation, the kind that starts and ends without spilling blood. It feels wrong here. It doesn't slot into the expected places. And that uncertainty is where he gets tripped up. He has armor now.

It ought to matter. But his gaze keeps returning to the healing mark on Felix's neck and that -

Don't. Don't go there.

He holds his ground. He doesn't move at all. ]

Think he liked the challenge.

[ A lie. Crais might have liked the challenge, but Ephemera knows damn well that's not why he made the armor. ]

Not here to kill you. This shit isn't about you.

[unlawful]

( felix laughs, knifelike. )

I don't think you fucking know what it's about anymore, Ephemera.

( what to do with carolina. what to do with felix. the ephemera he knew on chorus would've already finished the job, wrapped it up and wiped his hands clean of it, and maybe this time he would've done it successfully. a man with nothing left to lose, who doesn't drop. carolina's soft, like wash. too human. she'd have slipped at some point, opened herself up to a mauling. always things you can relentlessly exploit with people who have shit to lose.

ephemera's got shit to lose now, doesn't he? a contract. friends. a man who loves him enough to hit up felix's phone in the middle of the night and ask him why he didn't leave him to die. that changes a person. that makes a person a person. he's found the fucking cure, good for him.

not like felix.

felix exhales through his nose, watching ephemera from across a dark and empty lot. )

Show me.

( the rig. he wants to see it. )

[requiemshark]

[ Ephemera's thankful for his goddamn helmet because at least it hides his expression. No poker face and he knows, he fucking knows he telegraphs too much. That's always been his problem. He had an instructor punch him straight in the face for it when he started ODST training, before he met Hunter and the others. Thought it'd make the lesson stick. Shock and awe, that sort of thing.

Didn't take. Never would. That's a problem. ]

What.

[ Utterly flat. ]

Why the fuck would I do that?

[unlawful]

( typical response, spurring the most exagerrated eyeroll from felix. )

Don't get shy with me like I didn't have my hand all up on your dick two weeks ago. ( no problem going there, sharply acerbic. ) Because I want to see it, asshole. Why the fuck else?

( curiosity, mostly. a little bit for future reference, in case shit between him and ephemera gets ugly again, and he decides to break out the rig specifically for felix. a little because he wants to know how it'd stack up against someone like carolina. a lot because he wants to know the extent of crais' capabilities.

he pulls his hand from his pocket and steps closer. )

So either show me, or stand the fuck aside and I'll be on my way.

[requiemshark]

[ Of course he goes there. Ephemera hisses out a wordless curse, hating this, but at least he doesn't flinch. Small fucking favors. And then Felix steps closer. Almost into range.

So that's how it's going. Ephemera twitches. He's not going to give ground, however this end.

Then he exhales through his teeth and lifts his arm up. He doesn't aim at Felix - or at least not directly at him - but he activates his flamethrower all the same.

Short burst. He needs to work with the HUD to get it synched up properly, otherwise he's going to keep misjudging the range. There are times when his lack of two good eyes catches him.

Like now, as it turns out. The blast falls a few inches short of where he'd aimed. Ephemera lowers his arm, frowning. ]

Motherfucker.

[ Strangely, the curse isn't directed at Felix this time. ]

[unlawful]

( interesting. the gas hits the barrel of the flamethrower and bursts out the cylinder in a sputtering flare. it doesn't go far. not the intended distance, judging by ephemera's reaction. ephemera and his toys. the fire is a good tactic because no one expects it or knows how to field it without flying into a reflexive panic, but it has its pitfalls.

like not operating correctly when he needs it to, for example. a built-in flamethrower synched to his hud has to be a little more finicky to operate than a standalone device. sometimes ortez would have similar issues with his camo unit.

this is why felix just used a fucking shield and his knives. uncomplicated.

anyone else would maintain their distance. ephemera is in a full rig, and felix is dressed down in his civvies and a pair of sneakers. felix, however, doesn't give a fuck, moving across the lot into range, then even closer, stopping a few inches short of ephemera. his fingers wind loosely around ephemera's arm, coaxing it around to peer down at the plating, the barrel of the flamethrower. )

Not syncing properly, or something else?

[requiemshark]

[ And then Felix just walks straight up into firing range like it's the normal thing to do. Like Ephemera couldn't light him up and let him burn. Like he hasn't done that to a thousand sorry fuckers before. Most of them were in armor but not all of them. Not all of them, no.

He twitches. But he doesn't jerk away. Later, he'll wonder about that. Obsess over why the fuck he let Felix step into range. ]

I installed it. Crais didn't. Isn't synched up right.

[ There's a delay. Too much of a gap between when he fires and when he needs the readings to adjust. Ephemera's not an engineer and it shows, but he knows his shit. He modified his own gear back on Chorus and for years before. Nobody else on the squad used a flamethrower and it wasn't standard equipment, so he had to do the repairs himself. Had to do everything himself. ]

[unlawful]

( felix tuts his tongue once, thoughtful. )

Locus had a similar problem sometimes. He was unfairly good with that shit, but the unit was volatile and had vulnerabilities. Can't even count the number of hours he spent working on his rig. I think he said fixed it once by stripping the HUD down to its barebones functions and syncing up the unit first.

( to be honest, felix wasn't really listening at the time. he'd asked, and ortez had answered promptly, but he'd been disastrously preoccupied with how fucking good he looked in his rig and a myriad of other indecent thoughts.

his fingers track around the flamethrower, examining the seams of the plating, how everything fits together. surprisingly clean. he shouldn't have expected anything else, really. crais fixed his armor in under an hour, like it was a fucking joke. simple. thoughtless. )

How's it powered? Same way? Reactor?

[requiemshark]

[ Stripping it down and then building it back up. That'll take time and potentially more coding skills than Ephemera's got, but he could give it a shot. He needs to know his gear inside and out. Maybe Crais would even help him with it.

Maybe. Fuck.

He holds very still as Felix inspects his gear. The whole moment feels -

Strange. Surprisingly nonviolent. Ephemera isn't certain he likes it, or knows how to field it. ]

Yeah. Power drain's minimal. Manual trigger works just fine. Secondary's got a delay.

[ The HUD giving him problems. Again. He twitches, fighting the urge to put distance between them. ]

[unlawful]

( ortez fixed felix's rig as well as his own, regularly tuning up areas that needed patching or problems in the hud that he couldn't dissect himself. not exactly felix's area of expertise. felix was good with their ship, knew how to make that fucker purr in the frozen vastness of deep space, and that's how they lived their lives for years. trading off. complementing each other's strengths and weaknesses.

their relationship was straightforward. uncomplicated, like felix's knives and shields, until gates rose from a shallow grave and made it fucking complicated. he never told him. ortez said it once and never again, licked into the damp flame of his mouth like a secret or bullet, but felix never said it back.

he wonders if he knew.

why the fuck is he here, staring down at ephemera's arm? getting so goddamn close to him? asking him shit like he cares? the thought spikes through him like ice, blocking up his throat. he wets his bottom lip with his tongue and drops ephemera's arm, too sudden. he smells like steel and napalm up close. more appealing than the oil and gritty dirt. more familiar, too. )

Might wanna give it a try if your problem's localized in the HUD, then.

[requiemshark]

[ And just like that, something shifts. Another line drawn. Ephemera goes still in a way that’s probably telling. As good as flinching, really. But even so, Felix doesn’t go for him. Doesn’t pull Ephemera’s own trick and try to stab a knife into his throat. Pop it in and twist. Never easy going against somebody in a full rig but you can do it. Ephemera has before.

Breathe. You’re fine. ]

Cool.

[ For lack of a better idea. Ephemera exhales through his teeth. He’s getting twitchy. Not good. ]

Crais fix your rig?

[ It’s asked abruptly. Someone did, presumably. Felix isn’t the type to go around when faulty gear. ]

[unlawful]

( that was obvious, wasn't it? )

Yep. ( zero hesitation in his response, at least. he has no loyalty to crais, though he knows crais has loyalty to ephemera and vice-versa. that was fucking obvious, too. what's not so obvious is why he fixed his rig beyond his bullshit response of wanting to keep him docile. ) First guy who responded, actually. How often does your petty mean girl ass fucking gossip about me with other people?

( drake, crais. he wonders if there's more, how many friends ephemera has made since his arrival. two more than felix has made. harding counts a little bit, maybe, but he's not a friend as much as he's a source of entertainment. that's all anyone is to him, in the end. )

[requiemshark]

[ Crais didn’t mention that. No reason to. Not like it’s any of Ephemera’s fucking business what Crais does. Ephemera twitches. Doesn’t bother denying it. He’s come home fucked up to Drake more than once. That needed to be explained. And then after, with Crais -

Hah. An attempt to make sense of it, he supposes. Or some small price of it. ]

My petty mean girl ass has better things to do.

[ Ephemera cocks his head. ]

You were a threat in proximity.

[ Were. A misstep, perhaps. ]

[unlawful]

( hard to miss that.

felix looks at him, silent. then, after a moment: ) Still am, Terrence.

( his delivery is nearly careful, like a warning. he still is. he always will be, as long as they share the same city and space. to ephemera, to crais, to drake, to anyone who crosses him wrong and wants a piece. always expanding, he thinks again. he'll never run out of pieces to give.

he lowers his eyes, stepping around ephemera to circle from behind and examine his rig in full detail. it bothers him. not the sex. he'd have jerked ephemera off in that elevator on the first goddamn day if it meant they got out of there faster. just another role to be played, another job to complete. but ephemera didn't kill him in that fucking hallway, and he stopped felix from tapping out in that fucking arena when it'd have been easier to just let it go.

it was a mistake. everything about every single one of their interactions is a mistake, including this moment, and more than anything felix doesn't understand why. he fucking hates it. he thinks about it until it makes him nauseous, and then he drinks to quiet the chaos. why. )

That day, in the arena, you stopped me. ( his voice is soft, spoken at ephemera's back. ) Why?

[requiemshark]

[ Letting anyone at his back is a mistake. A threat far more immediate and real than anything they’re dancing around now. Felix could fuck him up like this. Go for his spine, the reactor, any number of available weak points. Ephemera tips his head back and doesn’t move. Toggles his HUD to keep track of things, but he doesn’t move even when Felix is directly behind him.

It’s not about trust. But it’s happening, nonetheless.

Fuck.

Ephemera stills at the question. For a moment, he barely breathes. ]

Because I don’t torture people.

[ It comes out soft. Too honest. He knows what it means to be forced onto the ground, to feel yourself lose the thread. And he doesn’t have many lines left, but that’s one. Hunter would’ve wanted it that way, he thinks.

Hunter lost his mind at the end. Ephemera couldn’t do a damn thing about that. But in the arena, he could be calm. So, he was. ]

[unlawful]

( one of ephemera's lines, the limits felix doesn't have. he doesn't torture people. felix thinks of every man and woman he tortured in the years after the war, when all that shit should have stopped because there was no reason for it anymore. nothing to fucking win. no lives at stake. just money on the line.

ortez never had the patience for it. either people told him what he wanted to know, or he killed them, point-blank. felix could ease it out of them, sometimes tender. gentle, like a lover. sometimes cold, hollowing himself so fucking empty he couldn't feel anything no matter how hysterically they screamed and begged for death. he still doesn't know which was crueler of him: making people believe he cared, or never even allowing them the goddamn hope.

he traces his index finger down a seam on ephemera's back, near his spine. idly, he wonders if the reactor is in the same place or if crais switched it up. )

Wouldn't have been on your hands. ( that's why he was going to do the dirty work himself. he's used to it. ) That all it was? Mercy?

[requiemshark]

[ Every instinct Ephemera has is screaming at him to twist around and kill Felix before this turns. You let anyone at your back, you fucking deserve what happens to you. The sergeant screamed that at him once, after he made a mistake in the field and nearly got a plasma blade through his spine. It cut through his armor and it's only a goddamn miracle he didn't end up dead on some nowhere planet. Only reason he didn't was because Rodriguez was there, watching from on high, and covered his stupid ass. Fifty cal to the brainstem and the enemy dropped. Cue the sergeant's furious, screaming lecture.

Even in a full rig, he's vulnerable with anyone at his back. Ephemera slows his breathing down. He ought to swing around and hit Felix in the face. Force distance.

Funny. He doesn't. ]

A line in the sand.

[ It's said softly. ]

That what it was for you? Mercy?

[unlawful]

( wouldn't it have been easy if it was.

his fingers skip between his shoulder blades, hesitating near the base of his skull. his implant, hidden by the armor. good, that he has a way to protect it now, though it won't help his seizures. felix still doesn't know why he's here, or why that's a thought at all. ephemera could just as easily turn around and knock him senseless. kill him, even. freak out with felix at his back, throttle him until his windpipe collapses from the pressure.

it's stupid to let him at his back. they both know it, and yet. )

Me trying to tap out? That was mercy, I guess. A form of it. ( only mercy he knew how to give him in the moment: removing himself from the equation and releasing ephemera from a duty to be fulfilled. stand down, soldier. move on. but then –

but then. shit got all twisted.

felix drops his forehead against ephemera's back, between his shoulders. his armor has absorbed most of the early morning chill, and felix feels the cold across the nape of his neck too, like feathery wisps of ice. grounding. it keeps him in the moment. this is maybe crazier than anything that happened in that goddamn arena. felix thinks he's already lost his mind — before duplicity, before ortez left him. there was never any stopping it.

no salvation for the truly wicked, his mother used to say. on her worst days, she used to think he was possessed. her sweet boy, her only son Исаак, spitting image of her with his father's temperament, taken by the devil in the middle of the night. all that time in church, confessing his fucking sins away to any god that would listen on the small chance that it would cleanse him and she'd be satisfied.

she was right, all this time. just not in the way her drunken delusions told her she was right. no source for his wickedness. no devil or careless god to blame. he just is. )

But when I told you I'd let you? ( he's quiet, at a pitch that ephemera will have to strain to hear over the breeze and organic chirps of the city gradually waking. he rolls his forehead over ephemera's armored plating, exhaling slow. ) That wasn't mercy at all.

( he doesn't know what that was. )

[requiemshark]

[ It comes out quiet. The words could get lost so easily if he weren't paying attention, if he weren't so focused on this moment and the weight of having Felix at his fucking back. Ephemera barely breathes, holding perfectly still. Part of him expects a blade to the back of the skull, or drawn right across his throat. Protect yourself, he can hear the sergeant hissing, you stupid motherfucker, protect yourself.

She was brutal, the sergeant. Once, when they were both drunk, she told him she liked killing things with her knives. That whenever she had the chance, she'd do it with a blade and not a gun. Things slot into place, she said - bleary-eyed and solemn - and you know. You know.

Know what? he'd asked, but she'd waved him off. Ruffled his hair and told him to get some rest. And then she sobered up and roared at them all through the next morning's drills, and it became this thing they didn't talk about. Confessions were like that. Half-secrets. Things got lost in the war. But there were supposed to be lines.

Even at the end, there were supposed to be lines. But she told him the answer once, stone cold sober in yet another aftermath. Then you know, little brother.

In the middle, in the scrum, that's when you know what you are.

This would be easier if they fought, Ephemera thinks bleakly. He twitches, uncertain of what he's meant to do now. What he's supposed to be. Felix rests his head against Ephemera's back and Ephemera lets it happen and it just -

Hah.

Ephemera tips his head back. He breathes out. ]

What was it?

[ His voice is soft. ]

[unlawful]

( he doesn't know. he knows a little, portions of it that make sense in the chaos. the solid comfort of ephemera's body on top of him, and his calluses rough on his bare skin, tracking sensitive scars. his tongue in his mouth. his teeth down his throat. in the moment, he wanted it.

and he wanted it later when it was all over, standing in a steaming hot shower after putting his fucking fist into a ceramic tile wall, blood circling the drain.

he turns his head, lightly pressing his cheek to his back. )

Couldn't tell you. Kind of want you a little bit. Kind of hate you a little bit, too.

( half the problem. felix doesn't hate anyone. that requires energy and the ability to give an ounce of a fuck, and he hates ephemera a little bit but only a little bit. not as much as he should or shouldn't. he hates the quiet that comes rushing in alongside him, the swelling tide that sweeps him off his feet. he hates that he didn't goddamn kill him in that hallway or in the arena. he hates that he didn't stop this while there was a chance for the both of them to walk away unscathed.

he hates that he doesn't realize how badly he's fucked himself even now. felix leans away and pats his shoulder amiably, stepping back out of reach. )

One day you're probably gonna put me down. Like, 98% chance. Sort of a looming inevitability at this point. I just want you to know it's all good. I won't hold it against you, or come after Drake in the aftermath. We'll be square. You gotta do what you gotta do, you know? ( as matter-of-fact and monotonous as someone making dinner plans with an old friend, turning on his heel and digging in his pocket for his cigarettes. then, without missing a beat, he continues: ) Strip down your HUD when you get a chance. Might as well see where it gets you.