#texball

Carolina learns that Texas and Kimball are dating when she sees them together late one night. They’re not even touching, not really, but there’s something… quietly intimate about the way that their heads are leaning in towards each other.

She never saw Texas’ s face back at Freelancer. She never saw that original body, destroyed by Donut, only the replacement that Sarge had built.

But she thinks back on body language and tries to imagine if she’d ever seen Texas look so… peaceful. Like she is in this moment, holding a glass of moonshine, turning towards Kimball, all of her muscles relaxed.

Carolina turns away, feeling like she’s intruding on something, even though they’re in a public room.

In her mind, Epsilon is quiet, as unsure of how to react to this as she is.

Grif has to admit, he’d always taken Tex for a wild sex type, not a “holding hands in the cafeteria” type, but maybe Kai had given him the wrong impression.

It’s also completely possible that they’re both, but the point is, he did not expect to see their fingers intertwined in a public space first thing in the morning.

Because there they are, sitting next to each other, arms on the table, fingers tangled together, both of them smiling as they eat, not making eye contact. Sure, they’ll peak at each other out of the corner of their eyes when they think the other isn’t looking, but officially, their attention is on their food.

It’s so discrete that Grif could almost think they were being subtle, if it weren’t for the aforementioned open hand holding.

Kimball tells Caboose that she’s dating Tex, after Caboose sees Tex rubbing circles against Kimball’s back the way that Tucker does for Wash.  

Caboose nods solemnly. “That’s very nice!”

Church would not want Tex to be lonely forever, after all. Caboose knows this. Besides, it is nice to see Texas and Kimball smile.

Tex puts an arm over his shoulder after that and ruffles his hair, and Caboose smiles.

Kimball could watch Tex fight all day.

She’s supposed to just be getting Washington’s signature for a squad transfer, but Texas has been helping out with training and…

She took her armor off for it.

She wears sweat pants and a tank top, both in her signature black, and her hair is kept out of her face by a headband that Kimball knows she stole off Kimball’s dresser last week. Tex stands in the middle of the training room mats, completely at ease while the New Republic soldiers circle around her nervously.

Tex’s musculature is artificial, Kimball knows. She’s a robot; her strength comes from steel bones and a series of power cores. Her body could have been dainty and thin, with small arms and slender legs, and she’d be just as strong.

Kimball probably owes Doctor Grey and Colonel Sarge a drink, because there had been no need to give Tex a body quite like this. She’s built like a boxer, or at least the kind of boxer that sculptors like to make statues of, and Kimball’s eyes roam freely, wandering from the curves of the biceps revealed by the tank top, to the way her back muscles move as she shifts from foot to foot, to thick, muscled thighs.

It probably shouldn’t be allowed for Agent Texas to look quite this good. If she’d been the one in the ring, Tex would have no problem knocking her to the ground and—

Kimball quickly cuts off that train of thought. It’s not appropriate to fantasize about her girlfriend in public.

The soldiers leap at Tex and Tex moves in response, lashing out with her fists. Tex is enormously heavy for her size, and it shows when she moves. Each step is heavy, every punch carries an unbelievable force. She doesn’t have Carolina’s speed or agility, but she makes up for it in strength and… stamina.

Kimball’s face heats up at that thought, and the blush deepens suddenly as Tex knocks the last of her partners to the ground, and twists to face her. Tex’s expression doesn’t change from the predatory one she wears during combat as she looks at Kimball. If anything, it grows hungrier.

“Alright,” Tex calls, nudging Jensen with her foot. Jensen groans dramatically and rolls over. She’s the only one who managed to hit Tex, so Kimball thinks she should be proud. Sure, Tex had thrown her to the ground right after, but Texas is infamously unbeaten. As is Carolina. The two of them refuse to spar with each other, because of some unspoken of wounds from Freelancer. “We’re done for the day.”

Her students slowly pulled themselves to their feet, nursing their various bumps and bruises, and disperse. Kimball stays where she is at the edge of the room, feeling paralyzed in the best way by the heat in Tex’s gaze, but Tex drags it out. She stops to say something to Jensen, pats Matthews on the head, and stops for a drink of water that she doesn’t actually need.

Kimball could walk over to Tex, sure, but something keeps her in place, anchoring her there until Tex finally reaches her.

“Like what you see?” Tex says when she finally draws close enough to Kimball. There’s a challenge there, and Kimball is more than happy to meet it.

“Not here,” Kimball says calmly, as though her heart isn’t pounding in her chest, as if she hasn’t been fantasizing about Tex pining her to the sparring mat for the past half hour.

Tex’s grin is full of promise and mischief, and she inclines her head in the direction of her bedroom.

Kimball leaves the training room, into the hallways, knowing Tex would follow in a moment. It’s better, they’ve agreed, not to be too public with their relationship. They need to be professional about this. They’ve only officially told a few people, even if most of the armies have at least heard rumors by now.

Which is why she gasps in surprise when Tex nudges her only a few doors down from the training room, a silent question.

Kimball should say no, should grab Tex by the arm and drag them to Tex’s bedroom, but…

She nods.

It’s all the warning she gets before Tex spins her around and pins her against the corridor wall, her hand against the chestplate with more than enough pressure to keep Kimball there. Even with Kimball in armor and Tex out of it, Tex is far stronger than her, and the thought of that really shouldn’t make Kimball giddy.

“We’re in public!” She hisses, but there’s a giggle to it as Tex fiddles with the seals of her helmet.

It’s dropped to the floor unceremoniously when she succeeds, and Kimball should probably protest, but the thought is lost as Tex’s lips catch hers. Her mouth is searing with heat from the exercise, and Kimball lets out a thoughtless moan as she closes her eyes and tugs Tex closer to her, her hands resting on Tex’s broad shoulders.

“I saw you watching me,” Tex murmurs, her mouth moving to trace Kimball’s jaw, all the way up to her earlobe. Ceramic teeth nip down there, and Kimball gasps, her knees going weak as warmth floods her. “Can’t wait to peal you out of that armor.”

“Tex,” Kimball clutches at Tex’s arms, trying hard to stay upright.

“I’m gonna get you to spar with me one day,” Tex says between presses of teeth and lips against every exposed inch of skin that she can find. “Pin you to the mat, make you squirm…”

Kimball gasps again, going boneless between Tex and the wall, her cheeks warming up again as she realizes how transparent she must have been.

“You like that?” Tex’s voice is hot against Kimball’s ear—her entire body is scorching as she’s pressed against Kimball’s armor, all of the delicate electronics overheated without her armor’s cooling systems.

God if only they weren’t in public.

“My room,” Kimball says, struggling to make her voice sound authoritative, and ending up breathless instead.

Tex presses their mouths back together in response, and Kimball feels herself melting under the pressure of lips, teeth, and tongue, the heat pooling low in her abdomen as Tex’s fingers curl against her jaw, cradling her.

Tex suddenly pulls away, and Kimball opens her eyes just in time to see Tucker step out into the hallway, a helmet under his arm.

“Hel-lo there,” Tucker says, eyes wide. “Get it, Tex!”

Kimball hastily shoves Tex away from her. She shouldn’t be able to even budge Tex, especially not at the current angle, but Tex must be as eager as she is not to be caught in a compromising position, because she goes easily.

“Hey Kimball,” Tucker says, his eyes flicking between the two of them, his smirk all-too-knowing. “Having fun?”

“Captain Tucker,” she says, and this time she sounded in control of herself at least. “What are you doing here?”

His eyes dart to her jawline pointedly, and she hastily pulls up the neck of her under-armor to conceal the marks there. He then casually runs his hands over his hair, and Kimball immediately pats down her own bun, checking for loose hairs. She nods quickly at Tucker gratefully.

“Just was on my way to check on the training room. Caboose and Carolina are sparring soon.” He pauses, and then grins. “Also, figured I should tell you that if you need any toys I know a g—hey!”

Tex has taken advantage of Tucker’s assistance with Kimball’s appearance to grab Kimball’s helmet from where she dropped it, and throws it at Tucker, cutting off what he had to say next.

“Stay out of my sex life,” she says, but there’s amusement there, even as Tucker squawks and ducks out of the way.

“We should go,” Kimball says. “Thank you, Captain Tucker.”

He grins and waggles his eyebrows at them suggestively before making his retreat into the training room.

“What the hell are you doing?” Kimball demands, her heart hammering in her ears. She can hear Felix and Locus behind them. The sword feels hot in her hands, a reminder of how close they are to losing everything.  

“Whatever you hear, don’t move,” Tex orders her. She yanks out a small, circular unit from the center of her armor, and presses it against Kimball’s chest. The gesture should be intimate, but it’s too abrupt to be anything but desperate. There’s a flick of a switch, and then Kimball looks down to see her own body missing in a faint shimmer. Tex’s invisibility unit, she realizes. “Got it?”

“What are you planning?”

“No time! Just stay there!”

Tex turns and runs away, but she doesn’t get very far.

There’s the sound of gun going off, and then a body hits the ground. Tex lets out a guttural sounding roar, and another gun goes off.

The sound of something snapping rings through the air with a loud and horrible crack, and Tex yells.

Kimball hears herself gasping, and mutes her helmet quickly so that Felix and Locus won’t hear her, trying not to shake. She’s not human, she reminds herself. She doesn’t feel pain like we do.

“Well you’re a sight for sore eyes, Texas!” Felix’s voice fills Kimball with a curdling sense of dread. She grips the sword tightly in her hands, imagining turning it on, and running Felix right through. It’s a stupid fantasy; they would kill her before she got close, and then she’d be dead, and they’d have the sword. But it makes her feel somewhat better.

“If she’s here, the general will be close by,” Locus’ voice used to haunt Kimball’s nightmares, before the war. She’d only seen him from a distance, but she’d heard his voice on the radio, demanding surrenders and the like. He’d been a perfect, if terrifying villain back then. Now, she’s not sure she was wrong.

He’s still haunting her nightmares, but Felix has joined him, now.

“Oh Vanessa!” Felix sings out. His voice echoes through the cave, making it impossible to tell how close or far away he is. Kimball twitches, half expecting to see him peering at her over the rock she’s hiding behind, ready with a knife in his hand. But he doesn’t appear. “Vanessa! Come out, come out, wherever you are!”

The next noise that comes out of Tex is a scream.

It’s fake, Kimball tells herself, pulling her knees up to her chest. She’s faking it.

“You like this one, don’t you Kimball?” Felix asks, his voice dangerously soft. But it still carries through the cave, and Kimball bites the inside of her cheek. The tone is almost teasing, almost familiar. It sounds like something he might have said when he worked for her, teasing her about a pretty soldier or something similar. But she knows now, the underlying threat in that voice. “Tell you what. If you come out now and give us the key, we’ll let her live.”

Kimball stifles a gasp. They don’t know she’s a machine, they don’t know she’s a machine, she tells herself. She presses her forehead against her knees and tries not to listen as Tex yells again and again. Kimball knows how beatings sound like; it’s all fists and kicking right now, keeping Tex too much in pain to get up, to fight back. There’s the sound of armor hitting armor for a while, before Felix mixes it up.

“You know,” Felix says suddenly, and ice floods Kimball’s veins, half afraid he’s noticed that Tex’s skin is made of metal and carbon and fiberglass. “I wonder if a Freelancer is as much fun to cut up as Tucker—fuck—”

There’s a thud, and it’s Felix’s turn to let out a pained noise, and a gun goes off, and—

“Bitch!”

“Be more careful, Felix,” Locus reprimands.

“You scream like a five-year-old,” Tex’s laugh is strained. In Kimball’s mind, Locus’s boot is pressed against her helmet, pushing her into the snow.  

“Last chance, Kimball!” Felix yells. “I’m going to gut this bitch slowly, you hear?”

“She’s not here, dumbass.” Tex sounds breathless, but smug. Kimball can just picture her grin, the same one she’d wear when she’s just been told off for kicking Caboose through a wall for sparring practice or for when she’d dumped a bucket of spiders on Washington or— “She’s long gone by now. I knew you had to play with your food—”

One, two, three, four gunshots go off in quick succession, and Tex is cut off abruptly with a gurgle. Kimball bites her tongue so hard she tastes blood, her heart racing in her chest so hard she can feel it through her armor.

“Move,” Locus says. “We need to catch up with her.”

“I’m telling you, she’s here!”

“Your own argument was that she would be unable to listen to Agent Texas suffer,” Locus snaps. “You have wasted time. There are no heat readings. She is not here.”

There’s a long, horrible pause. Kimball barely takes the time to be grateful that the invisibility unit apparently masks her heat signature. She hadn’t even stopped to consider such a thing.

“Fine,” Felix says, in the most petulant tone. It was the one he’d used when he’d bickered with Tucker over the stupidest things. He sounds like a child, instead of the terrifying monster who might have just killed Tex while Kimball listened.

She wants nothing more than to throw the sword away from her, but she makes herself keep it close, cradling it against her chest. There’s the sound of footsteps fading away, moving into the distance.

Kimball forces herself to wait a full ten minutes before scrambling out from her hiding place. Felix and Locus don’t jump out and kill her on the spot, so she figures she waited long enough.

She looks around, trying to see what happened. The first thing she sees is how the color red stains the snowy floor of the cave.

It’s oil, not blood, she tells herself. It’s some sort of trick that Texas is using; Kimball remembers overhearing a conversation between Tex and Grey about Tex’s robot body.

Tex lies in an undignified heap on the ground, where they’d thrown her aside. As if she’s trash. There’s a discarded gun lying on the ground next to her, emptied of bullets after Locus or Felix had shot Tex. Kimball lunges forward, her heart hammering in her chest, half afraid of what she’s going to find.

There’s no signs of life in the body as Kimball rips off the helmet, exposing Tex’s android face. There’s marks on it, from when her helmet and visor had been hit, but nothing too serious marring it. It’s the rest of her body that’s riddled in bullet holes, her arm hanging at an awkward angle, as if broken. The electric blue eyes are staring open, lifelessly and Kimball can’t help herself, a sob breaking out of her throat.  

“You should have stayed hidden,” a voice says behind her, and Kimball yelps and drops Tex’s body as a floating white ghostly form appears behind her.

It’s Tex; it can’t be anyone else. Kimball would know that body language anywhere, the curve of the ancient armor. The ghost moves forward, settling down into the body. Suddenly, Tex sits up, her body still awkwardly in Kimball’s arms.

“Tex,” Kimball breathes. The knot of tension in her chest loosens somewhat; she’s never seen Tex’s A.I. form before, but she knows what one looks like because of Epsilon, and it’s not too hard to put the pieces together. That was how Tex had fooled them. She had shut down her robotic body by leaving, and that had eliminated any potential life signs that Felix and Locus would have checked for.

Tex hadn’t died because of her, hadn’t died to protect Kimball and the sword, to stop Felix and Locus from killing her entire planet. Kimball half wants to laugh, half wants to cry. They’ve won this round.

“Aw, were you worried?” Tex laughs, pulling herself up further, until she’s on her knees, facing Kimball. The mechanical rise and fall of Tex’s chest sounds labored, and Kimball tries not to think about the damage done to Tex’s body. Even if it didn’t kill her… she thinks she can hear the whir of fan blades and the scratch of gears.

“Yes!” Kimball snaps, fingers digging into Tex’s shoulders. God, there are still bullet holes in her armor, the red-tinted oil making the armor slick. It shouldn’t look so similar to blood, and yet… it was enough to fool Felix.

Tex’s face flickers with emotion. Her eyes soften slightly, and she reaches out to cup Kimball’s face in an armored hand. Kimball leans into it unthinkingly, even though the hand is streaked with the fake blood.

“I’m not human, remember?” Tex says, surprisingly soft. “I’ve survived worse than this.”

Kimball pulls back. “That doesn’t make it okay,” she says, her voice trembling. “I heard—I know you feel pain!”

“Not the same way,” Tex says, overly patient, as if she thinks that Kimball is being ridiculous, and Kimball hates that, hates the way that Tex downplays her own suffering, because she knows better. “I’ll be fine.”

“Don’t,” Kimball snaps. She thinks she can still hear the sounds, and her mind is starting to match the noises she’d heard with Tex’s marks. And as far as Felix and Locus had been concerned, they’d just done that to a human. Her stomach twists and lurches inside of her, and Kimball tastes bile. She swallows it down; she can’t puke in front of Tex. “Just… don’t.”

Tex reaches out, and grabs Kimball’s helmet, pressing the catches to get it to release. She tosses it to the side, where it lands besides Tex’s own helmet in the fake-bloodied snow.

“I’m fine. You’re fine. That’s what matters,” Tex says, her thumb brushing against Kimball’s cheek. It’s only then that Kimball realizes that there’s dampness there, and that Tex is brushing away the tears that have been gathering on her face since… Kimball isn’t even sure how long she’d been crying.

“Don’t do that again,” Kimball tries to order, but her voice is still shaking. She’s shaking as the adrenaline and fear drains away, just leaving her exhausted and scared. All she wants to do is curl up into a ball and cry, but there’s no time; she needs to get the sword to safety, she needs to—

Tex leans forward, pressing her forehead against hers, and Kimball’s breath catches in her chest. Her arms wrap around Kimball, pulling them closer into a tight embrace that’s shockingly intimate, despite the armor they’re both still wearing.

“It’s okay,” Tex whispers, almost gently, almost kindly, and before Kimball can even have time to marvel at this strangeness—at the tender way that Tex is cradling her face in her hands, at the soft pressure of Tex’s forehead against her own—Tex kisses her.

Kimball doesn’t even hesitate before kissing back ferociously, her own hands cradling Tex’s face; scarred, damaged, but alive, and just focuses on that, of the humming of Tex’s mechanical body beneath her fingertips, of the taste of metal that Tex’s kisses carry, the press of lips and teeth and tongue as they fall into each other.

Finally, the need to breathe pulls them apart, and Kimball presses her forehead back against Tex’s.

Her heart is still racing, but there’s a faint giddiness to it, pushing aside the grim horror that has been hanging over her.

“We need to get the sword back,” she whispers. “We need to—to hide it, and then we need to destroy that temple, and—”

“In a moment,” Tex says, brushing Kimball’s cheek with her thumb again. “Let’s just… take a moment to breathe, okay?”

“Right,” Kimball says.

She’d shut down the power to that arm before it had started sparking, which might have alerted Kimball that something was wrong with her mercenary. Luckily Tex was ambidextrous and happily returned fire with her other hand.

She’d already repaired her armor. In a lot of ways, she was lucky she was in the future; her armor no longer was next-generation, top of the line. If it weren’t for the active camouflage unit, it would have been no better than the armor that the rest of the New Republic war. Not that she used her camo, these days.

She kind of envied Felix his fancy armor and toys, some days. It would be nice, not having to hide. She was definitely a little jealous of Locus, whose own cloaking was just as good as hers, but took less energy to run. She promised herself that when she’d kill him, she’d scavenge it. She deserved a fun new toy, after dealing with all this bullshit.

But there was a bounty on her head, last she knew. And Felix was a self-proclaimed greedy son of a bitch. So Tex wasn’t about to show her hand. Not even for Kimball.

“Here,” Kimball handed her a bottle of something.

“What’s this for?” Tex asked, peering inside. The liquid was dark amber, and smelled awful.

“You got shot today,” Kimball said. “Figured you could use a drink.”

Tex hesitated for a moment. Alcohol didn’t have much effect on her.

Shrugging, she pulled off her helmet. Kimball visibly startled. Tex rarely removed her armor, so she guess she couldn’t blame her.

“Join me?” Tex asked. It was stupid but…

She hated the quiet.

It reminded her too much that the silence was supposed to be filled by idiots in colorful armor.

She wasn’t as good at being alone as she’d once been.

Kimball looked possibly even more surprised, but she joined Tex, sitting down next to her and taking off her own helmet.

They both shed their armor, leaving it in haphazard piles on the ground. Tex leaned against the headboard of her bunk, Kimball leaned against the foot, and they passed the bottle between them.

“Your eyes,” Kimball said, hesitantly.

Tex knew her eyes didn’t look normal. They were as fake as the rest of her body, but they were one of the parts that showed it best. “You like them? The guy who installed them told me I should have gone with brown, but I told him he was biased.”

Sarge had been completely opposed to blue eyes, when he’d helped her remodel her body. Brown, he told her, brown would be the way to go, but Tex had reminded him that she was a Blue, whether he liked it or not. Scowling, he’d acquiesced, but she’d had to promise to insult Grif three times to get it done.

The alcohol was affecting her more than she’d expected. She was getting maudlin.

Kimball smiled, and took another drink.

“Where did you even get this?” Tex asked. It tasted disgusting. Tex’s taste buds were crude—Sarge could only do so much—but she was pretty sure alcohol wasn’t supposed to taste that awful.  

“Confiscated it from someone who was drinking on watch duty,” Kimball saluted with the bottle, then passed it over. “Officer’s privilege.”

Tex snorted.

“Are you alright?” Kimball said. “Really? When Locus shot you—”

“I’ve had worse friendly fire,” Tex lied. It hadn’t been friendly fire at the time. Donut hadn’t been an ally, not then. But it had the effect she wanted—the concern in Kimball’s eyes faded just a bit. Tex didn’t need Kimball to worry. She might wonder why Tex was perfectly fine, despite the injury.

Tex didn’t think about how, if she was a human, she might be dead right now. A blow like that had killed York fast enough. Same shoulder, too.

She passed the bottle back to Kimball without drinking anything.

“He was aiming for me, wasn’t he?” Kimball asked.

Tex shrugged the shoulder that hadn’t been shot. “Maybe,” she admitted.

Kimball hit her head back against the bar she was leaning against. “I never wanted this. Any of this.”

“What did you want to do? Before?”

Kimball shrugged. “Politics, I guess. I wanted to fix things.” Her eyes lingered on Tex’s face. Tex glanced away, suddenly worried all her patches had peeled away, revealing the metal underneath Sarge’s careful work. “What about you?”

Tex laughed. “It was never about what I wanted.” Never. All she wanted was to go home. All she wanted was her friends to be alive. All she wanted was Freelancer to burn, to leave her alone, for the Director hurt the way she had. All of those were distant dreams now, faded with age and torn around the edges. Now there was nothing but the fight in front of her. She’d accepted this when she’d realized she wouldn’t be getting off Chorus anytime soon, even with all her skills, no matter how many people she killed or how many shipments of supplies she brought back.

Tes accepted the bottle from Kimball. It was almost empty. She raised it up in a toast to the dead, the missing, and those left behind. “I was always going to be a soldier,” she told Kimball, and drank the last of it.

2. After a long day

Another failed training exercise lead Kimball to the bunk she shared with Allison, nearly ripping her hair out.

She was grateful, for this, for everything. Allison didn’t judge her for yelling, for being frustrated. She saw Kimball for who she was, and didn’t judge her for fraying around the edges, for nearly falling apart. It was a friendship Kimball was grateful for—she was a mercenary like Felix, sure, but she was solid. She didn’t try to charm, didn’t even ask for money. She just wanted to be gone, and she was clear about it. Things were straightforward with Allison. Kimball knew exactly where she stood.

“And then they turn the corner, and Captain Grif shouts, ‘Every man for himself!’ And then everything falls to pieces!” Kimball couldn’t believe it, sometimes. The mighty Reds and Blues, the heroes who brought down project Freelancer, and they were… she didn’t even know. They weren’t what she expected, that was for sure.

Allison grimaced. “They’ll get better,” she said. “They’ve got a lot at stake here too.”

“I’m not sure if that’s enough, Allison,” Kimball said quietly. Missing friends and determination were nice, but this was the entire Federal Army. This was Locus, who had even Felix running scared half the time. They were running out of time, and everyone knew it.

Allison sighed, and suddenly there was a bottle of something amber in her hand. “Got any glasses? Sounds like you need this more than I do.”

“Where did you get that?” And how had she managed to procure it at just the right time.

“Found it on a supply run,” Allison said, removing her helmet. As always, Kimball felt herself relaxing slightly when Allison signaled she considered it safe enough to remove her helmet. “Figured we might need it.”

“For medical purposes,” Kimball said, but there was a smile on her face that she tried to hide. She thanked everything she could think of that Allison had crash-landed here.

“Destressing the general is a medical purpose,” Allison said, pouring two generous helpings into the cups Kimball had managed to scrounge up. She was smirking as she passed Kimball her cup. Kimball threw it back, telling herself the burning in her throat was only due to the alcohol, not due to the gratitude closing up her throat.

“I just—I thought they’d be heroes,” Kimball said, leaning forward, her hair falling in her eyes. She brushed it away, irritated. It was getting too long again. “Stupid of me. I thought they could fix things.”

“No one can fix this mess that easily,” Allison said. “I wish they could.” Her gaze was distant, lost in some memory, some private thought that Kimball was not privy too. Allison’s past was vague and mysterious. She didn’t like to talk about herself much at all. Kimball almost was irritated by that sometimes, but that was the way Allison was. She’d grown to accept it.

Kimball found herself laughing, the taste of it bitter on her tongue. “I don’t even know what would happen if we won. Then what? We’ve been at war for years. We have an army of traumatized kids and no one knows how to run anything and it’s been years and no one’s come to help us!”

It was all hopeless. Once, she’d had such a clear picture of the future, of what she wanted, of the way she would help her people. Now, she felt like she was drowning just trying to keep them all alive long enough to even think about tomorrow.

“You’ll figure that out when it happens,” Allison said. “You’re good at this, Kimball.” She sounded almost earnest.

Kimball burst out laughing again in disbelief. Kimball wished she could blame the alcohol. “Alright. Bed time for you,” Allison said. Kimball blinked, realizing just how drunk she actually was in that moment.

“We’re so screwed,” Kimball muttered, despite herself.

“No, you’re not,” Allison’s hands were warm on Kimball’s shoulders as she rolled her onto her side. “Now sleep.”

3. Just because

“I like your face,” Kimball slurred at her. The stuff they’d gotten their hands on that night was stronger than usual, enough to reduce Kimball to a five-drink state two drinks in. “It’s… pretty.”

“Used to be prettier,” Tex said dryly. It was true. At Freelancer she’d been… uncanny. Smooth features, a button nose that had never been broken, eyes so solidly blue they’d looked like marbles. Blonde hair that never seemed to get dirty or greasy, always soft to the touch. Every injury she’d ever sustained vanished before she could track it, the Director and his cronies wiping it away. No scars, no marks, proportions so balanced it was like she’d been designed, not born. Which was what she had been. A fighter in a body built for beauty.

A perfected version of a dead woman.

Truth be told, she’d been grateful when Donut had scrapped it. The body she was in now was built like a soldier, solid if short, but her shoulders were broad and every inch of her body appeared to be corded with muscle. Her nose was crooked, her teeth uneven, and the patches of her repair work on her face and hands gave her the look of scars. Sure, she had dyed her hair blonde, but she still had to keep it clean, still had to work for it, not that she always bothered.

It was a comfort that Sarge had given her. A flawed, breakable body.

Kimball laughed. “Weren’t we all?”

Tex stopped, considering this. “I guess.” She stared at her hands. Her last ones had been dainty, pale things. Her current ones were crisscrossed with scars. These hands had been to war and looked it. “I think I like me now better, though.”

This body was hers. The Director had never seen it, never touched it, had no part in shaping it. Sarge had made it for her, with her input, and she could still see him in its workmanship, even now that she had taken his creation and taken it to hell and back.

“Me too,” Kimball said, giving her a little grin. She leaned against Tex’s shoulder, and Tex let her. Human contact was a rare and precious thing. She didn’t often like it, but she could handle this. This was okay. “You’re here now.”

Tex snorted, looking away from Kimball. “Going soft on me, Kimball?” She wondered what Kimball would have made of her, back at Freelancer. Would Kimball still be here, leaning against a pretty little mannequin who followed orders without so much as a question, blowing up buildings and killing someone who called her a friend without hesitation? The absence of CT’s dog tags around her neck felt conspicuous in that moment. She’d lost them in the crash, and it still felt wrong. “Well?”

Kimball didn’t answer. She had fallen asleep on Tex’s shoulder, head lolling to one side as she began to snore.

Tex grinned to herself, and moved Kimball under the covers as gently as she was able to.

“Night,” Tex said quietly, before leaving. Tex didn’t need as much sleep as Kimball did. She’d keep an eye on things until Kimball woke up.  

4. After an argument

Kimball held up the bottle as she pushed open the door to the new room in Armonia that she shared with Tex. Tex was lying down on the bottom bunk, staring at the bottom of the mattress above her.  “I hear you were fighting with Carolina.”

“Damn it, who told?” Tex complained. She was scowling—it had actually bothered her, whatever had gone down. It was rare to see Allison—Tex, Kimball corrected herself—flustered at all. She took everything in stride. It had been a comfort, earlier, to know that no matter what had happened, Allison would be… not stoic, exactly, but un-phased. Nothing could cause her to falter. And now that Kimball knew that she had spent years with the Reds and Blues, that particular aspect of her personality made a lot of sense.  

But it seemed that Carolina was good at getting under Tex’s skin. It worked the other way around, that she already knew—she’d been regaled multiple times by Wash and Tucker both about Carolina’s own issues regarding Tex. But she hadn’t realized that Tex would have been affected. Tex was supposed to be unstoppable. Not emotionless—Kimball had never made that mistake. But she’d never seemed to be bothered by other people’s opinions of her. It was a confidence that Kimball had always envied. But it seemed like Kimball might have made a mistake, assuming that was the case.

Tex sat up, and Kimball’s brain stuttered to a complete stop as she realized Tex’s state of dress.

Dark pants were normal for Texas to wear, but for once Tex had done away with her long sleeves and high necks, instead wearing a tank top with a low back and front. Kimball couldn’t help but stare. Texas was built like a boxer, compact with muscle, and despite her short stature Kimball couldn’t help but feel dwarfed. Kimball had assumed a lot of the power Tex exuded normally was the armor, but clearly, that wasn’t the case.

Tex noticed Kimball staring and looked away. “You going to tell me to get repaired too?” She asked bitterly.

Kimball blinked, tearing her eyes away from Tex’s biceps to finally take notice of the rest of what was exposed.

Her mouth fell open as she really looked at Tex.

There was a rough looking puncture through her shoulder, the edges of her synthetic skin curled away from it, exposing the metal beneath. Right above Tex’s collarbone there was a place where a spider-web fracture could be seen. The skin on her upper left arm had been roughly torn open a long time ago, revealing a jagged slice of darkened chrome.

“Your shoulder,” Kimball said quietly. “That was from…”

“Yes,” Tex said tersely. She didn’t want to talk about it, Kimball could tell. But the memory was so clear to Kimball; the way Allison had yelled when the bullet had punched through her shoulder, but she had still knocked Kimball to the ground, her other hand swinging up to return fire without hesitation. Kimball had been terrified she’d been about to lose Allison, like she’d lost so many others over the years.

But Allison had been fine, she’d said. And Kimball could see that—there was no blood in Tex’s body, and she’d been using both arms since, so the damage clearly had not effected the complicated circuitry of Tex’s body.

But there was a hole, where Locus had tried to kill her, and Kimball didn’t know how to handle that.

“You said you were fine,” Kimball wanted to reach out and touch it, but she kept perfectly still. Tex looked like a wild animal, cornered and feral. Kimball hated that; hated the idea that she was the one making Tex like that. The last thing Kimball wanted to do was make Tex feel trapped.

“I’m fine,” Tex snapped. Her electric-blue eyes, which Kimball had once supposed to be prosthetic, but now new to just be one of the most obviously robotic touches of her body, were completely unchanged, reflecting nothing about how she was feeling, but her mouth was drawn into a thin, dangerous line. “It’s superficial.”

“There’s a hole in your shoulder,” Kimball’s eyes kept drifting to it.

“And I’ve had it for ages now, and it hasn’t affected my performance,” Tex’s chin went up, challenging Kimball, daring her to say otherwise.

Some of those injuries looked ancient. Tex had probably had them since before she’d even landed on Chorus. Bullet and knife wounds, alongside all sorts of other marks, gathered from fights long passed. From a life long before Tex had stumbled into Kimball’s own.  

Kimball swallowed dryly and nodded, meeting Tex’s gaze as evenly as she could. “Understood, Agent Texas.”

Tex relaxed slightly at that, although she still didn’t sit down. It was not quite parade rest—her arms crossed defensively, but her feet were planted solidly, ready for a fight. It was a stance Kimball knew well; she was pretty sure she saw it in the mirror every day.

“What’s the one on your chest?” Kimball winced—she should have changed the conversation, pulled them away from.

Tex reached up absently to touch it. Kimball wanted to touch it herself—it had cracked like something solid, like ceramics or even glass, but the rest of Tex’s skin looked soft, like human flesh. How had Sarge managed to make her a body so lifelike, that Kimball had never even suspected before the truth had come out? “That one? Just a scratch. You should see my back.” There was a faint smile playing at the corner of her mouth—lost in memory, maybe.

“Maybe later,” Kimball said, fairly certain that she would either have one of two reactions in she was given the opportunity to examine Tex’s back up close: drooling or gasping in horror, and Tex wouldn’t appreciate either one. Tucker had been very clear about one thing when Kimball had asked—there had been a boyfriend, back when he had known Tex, before. A boyfriend named Church, who was apparently a completely separate entity than the Epsilon A.I. that dwelled within Carolina’s armor. And, in Tex’s mind, he had died only recently. (And Washington had apparently killed him, which really only raised more questions for Kimball that she didn’t dare ask.) “Drink?” She said, holding up the bottle again.

Tex fell down back onto her bed with a sigh. “Please,” she muttered.

5. After the war

The ceremonies were all done, and the parties were dying down. And Tex was trying to figure out what happened next.

The war was over. That had always been her end point, the time she was supposed to escape, to go back to Blood Gulch, to find her boys, to find Church.

But they were all here—all except Kai, at least—and Church was dead. He’d been dead the whole time Tex was on Chorus. He’d been dead and she hadn’t known, he’d died thinking he was going to find her in the Meta’s patchwork of AI, he’d died thinking she was gone, and Tex hadn’t been anywhere, lost between point A and point B in the timeline.  

What was left at Blood Gulch for her?

Tex didn’t like those thoughts.

She stared down at her new smooth hands, and scowled. It wasn’t anyone’s fault, she knew. She’d destroyed her old body herself. But the blankness, the newness, of this body rankled. It felt artificial and cold, it felt like—felt like the first time she had taken her armor off in front of York and he’d freaked out, because she was so obviously inhuman, with no scars and a too-pretty face.

Luckily her face was mostly the same as it had been before, minus a few chipped teeth, a couple of scars, and a broken nose. There was no artificial beauty in this body. And then there were her new eyes, a bright, vivid green, an electric counterpart to Carolina’s.

“Penny for your thoughts,” Kimball said. She looked exhausted but happy, her smile crooked and her eyes bright. Kimball had scars; years of war had left their toll. Kimball wore them like badges of honor, each one a screaming statement. She had survived, she had lived, and whoever had tried to make it otherwise wouldn’t live to regret it.

“My thoughts are way more expensive than that,” Tex scoffed.

Kimball laughed, reaching out and pushing at Tex’s shoulder. Tex was wearing a tank top, since there were no scars or holes she needed to cover up, and Kimball’s hand ended up resting there, Kimball’s thumb brushing against her collarbone. It was the first time that Tex could think of that Kimball had touched her skin, and something about it made Tex pause, turning to stare at her.

Kimball looked panicked for a second, but recovered quickly enough, holding up a bottle of what had to be the awful gin Tex had caught Jensen brewing in a bathtub last week. “How’s this for a down payment, then?”

“You know how to convince a girl, General Kimball,” Tex said, grabbing the bottle and removing the crude wax seal.

“Got to keep my loyal mercenary happy,” Kimball said with a lightness they both knew she didn’t feel.

Three mercenaries had come into this war. Two had been traitors, two had survived.

“I’ll bring you Locus’s head when I find him,” Tex volunteered, rather generously in her own opinion. “You can mount it on the wall in your office.”

“I think I’ll have to pass,” Kimball said, but her mouth was twitching.

Tex took a swig and spluttered slightly at the taste. “Fuck, Jensen is awful at this.”

Kimball grabbed it back and sniffed it cautiously before trying. “Grey says it’s safe, at least,” she said, making a face of her own.

“Well in that case…” Tex took the bottle back. Kimball’s hand had left her shoulder, and Tex wondered why the loss of contact bothered her.

She passed it back to Kimball, and for a moment their fingers brushed. Tex’s eyes widened as she recognized the feeling that rose in her chest. Shit. Not good. No crushing on your boss, Texas, she scolded herself. “Any sign of Felix’s body yet?”

“Nope,” Kimball said. “But I’m not stopping until we find it.”

“Want to dance on his grave?” Tex asked. She was pretty sure that this new body didn’t have the alcohol tolerance of her old one—either that or Jensen’s booze was very strong—because her smile was a bit wider than it should be, and she nudged Kimball.

“It will be important to morale to definitively prove that he’s dead, Agent Texas,” Kimball said loftily. “And if we can prove his identity to the UNSC, it might aid with any potential investigation—”

Tex snorted. “Suuuuure.”

Kimball narrowed her eyes at her, but she was smiling too, the bottle dangling loosely from her fingers.

“How’s the new body?” Kimball asked abruptly. “I wasn’t sure if—you’d like the changes—”

Tex shrugged. “I—it’s fine.”

“We can get Grey to change them back, if you don’t like them,” Kimball said hurriedly. “It shouldn’t be a problem—”

“No,” Tex said, a little too harshly. She stared down at the ground.

“Tex?” There was a pause. “Allison?”

She didn’t understand. None of them had. Tex didn’t care about the eyes—if anything, she was touched by the gesture—but they were gone. Every bullet, every knife, every grenade, the fall from the ship that had brought her to Chorus, her last fight with York, every encounter with Locus… all of them were wiped away.

Tex closed her eyes. “It’s too—clean. Too new. And my scars are gone.”

“… oh.”

Tex swallowed and grabbed the bottle back. A few swallows later, Tex could make herself speak again. “It’s what he used to do. The Director. Bastard. I’d get injured and when I’d wake up the scars were gone because I wasn’t allowed to lose. I couldn’t… I had to stay like that. They reminded me. I liked that. I don’t like forgetting things.”

There was a long, silence, after she’d finished speaking.

“Have you considered tattoos?” Kimball said. “I’m sure there’s someone around who could help you with that.”

Tex paused, considering it for a maybe. “Maybe when I’m sober,” she decided.

Kimball laughed, and Tex savored the sound slightly.

“And Kimball? Thanks.”

Kimball’s hand landed on hers. Her hands were scarred and warm.

“You’re welcome, Tex.”

+1.  A date

The bottle of wine was a lucky find—buried in an old house, but still good. Grey had given it to her with a slight wink, obviously knowing what Kimball had wanted it for. At least no one else seemed to have cottoned on to Kimball’s blatantly unprofessional intentions towards Tex. Even if Kimball technically wasn’t Tex’s employer anymore. And even when she had been, they’d been friends as well.

Kimball was nervous about this; she and Tex drank hard liquor and talked about things as friends. They didn’t drink wine and… do anything else.

But Kimball had to know for sure.                                                                        

It was odd, no longer sharing a bunk with Tex. But there was more room in the new base and less need for someone to watch Kimball’s back at all times, and Tex had claimed her own room. Kimball would be lying if she didn’t admit that she missed the company. She missed Tex. She knocked on the door cautiously.

There was the faint sound of footsteps, and then Tex opened the door. There was a small but genuine quirk to her mouth when she saw it was Kimball. Today Tex had chosen to wear very tight black pants, and her favored black tank top, which exposed Tex’s arms, as well as the new tattoo on her arm; a simple black α. Honestly Kimball was just amazed she hadn’t tried to jump Tex ages ago.

She held up the bottle. “It’s a…good vintage?” She offered, all of the smooth, witty lines she’d worked out in her head in advance flying right out the window the second she was presented with the image of Tex’s hair pulled up into a ponytail, exposing the curve of her neck.

Tex blinked, squinting at the bottle. “Is that wine?”

“Yes?”

“Shouldn’t you save this for like… a date or something?” Tex asked, tilting her head to one side. A lifetime in armor had taught Tex to be expressive with her body language. “I’ve got some proper tequila under my bed.”

Kimball shifted, her mouth dry as a bone as she forced herself to speak. “I was, um. I thought that… that’s what this could be?”

Tex stared at her for a long, painful moment, her new green eyes unreadable as her blue ones had ever been. Kimball nearly ran to spare them both the embarrassment, but she held her ground, forcing herself to wait to hear Tex say it.

“Huh,” she finally said. Then she reached across and took the bottle from Kimball, examining the label curiously. “You’ve got glasses? Or are we drinking from the bottle again?”

“Why change habits?” Kimball managed to say. They’d only drank with glasses the first time after the Reds and Blues had arrived, when Tex had been the one to provide the alchol. The other times it had just been the two of them, passing the bottle back and forth. There was an intimacy to it that Kimball had savored.

Tex stood aside to let her in, and closed the door firmly behind them. She locked it.

Tex laughed and sat down on her bed, the invitation to join her implicit as she started to wrangle with the cork.

Kimball sat down, and took the bottle when Tex handed it to her. It felt slippery in her grip. She took a sip, and nearly dropped it in surprise. It was good. Kimball couldn’t remember the last time she’d had alcohol that hadn’t been terrible. It had been bathtub gin and rotgut whiskey for years.

Tex took it back and took a sip. “Not bad,” she said, her mouth making that small, secretive smile that Kimball always enjoyed seeing.

And then she kissed Kimball.

Tex tasted like metal and wine, her lips were dry and oddly smooth, but Kimball honestly couldn’t care less as Tex grabbed her hips and pulled her closer. Kimball cupped Tex’s jaw in her hands, her thumbs coming to rest on her cheekbones. Tex’s skin didn’t feel synthetic at all, and Kimball was in awe of what Sarge and Grey had done, creating a robot so lifelike that if it hadn’t been for the strong metal taste, Kimball might not have known Tex wasn’t human.

Tex pulled Kimball forward more until Kimball found herself on Tex’s lap, their foreheads pressed against each other as they separated, breathing heavily.

Tex had finally succeeded in getting her nose broken again so it was the way she liked it. Her face and hands were now marked with the faint, scarlike lines of patching on her skin. Tex must have done them herself; Sarge or Grey could have done them so that they left no marks, but Tex wanted those marks. Kimball indulged herself, just this once, and traced over the skin of Tex’s cheeks with her thumb, feeling the bumps of the scars.

“Like the new face?” Tex laughed, her mouth going down to Kimball’s neck.

Kimball gasped, her fingers tangling in Tex’s hair. “Yes,” she managed to say. “Yes.”

Tex laughed. “And here I thought I’d have to get you drunk to get you to admit that again.”

Kimball flushed but Tex had returned to kissing her lips. After a considering moment, she fell backwards onto the bed until she was lying down, Kimball sprawled out on top of her.

“Well,” Kimball said, propping herself up as best she could to preserve her dignity. “We do still have the rest of the bottle.”

“Maybe later,” Tex said, and she reached up and touched Kimball’s face with a gentleness that seemed almost out of place. “I can think of a few better things to do.”