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It isn't a question for Ezra, when the idea occurs to him. As soon as he has it, he decides to do it.
A lot of this past however-long-this-whirlwind-adventure-has-been has been like that, honestly. Before this shit, Ezra always overthought everything, always considered every avenue to the point of exhaustion. It was just the way he was. But when it comes to the con, when it comes to stealing...He's always just been all in. Once he had an idea, he committed. Often to the chagrin of those around him, but hey, it always worked out in the end, didn't it?
And then, with the Doctor taken down, one more idea popped into Ezra's head. And it solidified just as fast as he held that bag of phones and knew he could do it, knew how easy it would be. No one knew what the Doctor looked like, no one but the people involved in his take down. And there were so many teams still active, still working their jobs, still looking to their boss for direction.
It would be so fucking easy to slip into the role.
So, he did it.
He watched Richie and Jules walk away, and he kept the phones, and when one of them rang with a man calling to update the Doctor on a job in Cincinnati...he listened.
It was almost too easy, from there. Almost too fucking easy to go through the Doctor's files Ezra obviously copied just in case, and call all the teams for an update, and familiarize himself with the workings of the organization. He'd spent enough time with Max and Sally and Maddie, especially, to get the basics down, to be able to slip into the surface level of the role, and then everything else helped him sink even deeper.
It felt right. God, he never could've imagined, but it did, it does. So long ago Max told them that they had the look, and at the time it was manipulation, but he and Maddie were right about Ezra. They were right that he needed this life as soon as he tasted it. Richie and Jules were in it out of necessity, and maybe a little bit of fun, but Ezra...there was no chance of Ezra ever leaving it behind.
And now there's no one to stop him from doing it. No Richie and Jules were their disappointed eyes, or Maddie with her doubt, or anyone who knew him in his past life. There was only this, only the future. There was only the Doctor.
Sofia (or Rosa, or whatever else she wants to call herself) joins him, because of course she does. She always had a spine of steel, always wanted so much more than the small life she was living. She had a hunger inside of her for the con, and getting to be the right hand of the new Doctor suits her just fine. She likes the power and—more importantly, in Ezra's book—she likes that Ezra has power. Thinks it's hot.
Ezra thinks it's hot, too, so it's a pretty good arrangement they've got going on.
He's a little full of himself these days, he can acknowledge that. But it's hard not to be when in a position such as his; he gets it now, why Jeffery Hull went a little mad with power. He has no interest in being like that—he saw too much pain caused by the Doctor to ever be so cruel with the people now under his employ—but that doesn't mean he doesn't get it. It's a heady thing, to command a criminal organization. To be a ghost, a master. Hard to not be smug about it all.
Despite his new role, despite his job as the man in charge, he can't stop himself from going in the field. Hull never did, thinking himself above it all, but Ezra loved running cons, being on the ground. He loved pulling things as complicated as the shit he did in Mexico to things as simple as pickpocketing, and he has no interest in giving it all up just because he runs so many crews. He can do both. He delights in doing both.
Sofia likes being in the thick of the crews. Whenever there's an issue, she becomes the one Ezra sends to go check in with the people fucking up, put a little bit of the fear of God—or, more accurately, the fear of him—into them.
(Just because he'd never hurt any of them doesn't mean he's above utilizing the fear they all already have for the Doctor. They have respect, too, and trust, and that's what matters. It all works to get the job done.)
They're all rolling in fucking money. Like fuck, if he thought their score taking down Hull was big, it is nothing compared to the money that's flowing now. Countless times, Ezra wants to pick up the phone and call Richie, call Jules, because they're his family and he wants to share this with them desperately, but—but...
But they'd tell him he's out of his mind. They'd hate him for this. It wouldn't be a good thing, to them. It would actually be a Very Very Bad Thing. And they wouldn't let it go, that's for damn sure. They wouldn't leave him alone for a goddamn minute, working their hardest to change his mind. And then in the end, once they realized there would be no making him budge, they'd fuck off angry and bitter and he wouldn't see them again.
He can't have that. He might love his new life, but he loves them. He's already lost so much in such a short period of time—he can't stand the idea of them hating him.
So it's an acceptable balance, that he's found himself in. He can make it work, can have the best of both worlds. He can be the Doctor, have all these people jump at his word, have Sofia at his side as the clever, beautiful, ruthless partner she is, and have the simplicity and calmness of his bond with his fellow 'Bumblers'.
The three of them meet up just when they said they would, exactly six months after Hull's take down. Jules tells them all about her art studio, and Richie describes his run for public office in his hometown, and they ask Ezra what he's been up to, too. They look at him with happy eyes and genuinely want to know.
So he lies. The words come easily, smoothly, as easy as breathing. He's old hand at lying by now, and doesn't feel as bad as he probably should about conning his friends. It's better this way. He tells them that he and Sofia reconnected, because that's innocent enough, and describes their world travels. Says they used their cut of the money to visit places he always wanted to go but never actually got to.
They're happy for him in this fantasy life. He decides to accept their approval despite the falsehood; what's a little bit of self-deception amongst friends anyway?
They part on good terms, with a promise for another meeting, and the exchange of phone numbers so they stay in touch. Ezra hugs them goodbye and leaves with a smile on his face, and then hops on a private plane to California to meet up with Sofia; he has a troublesome team he needs to get an update on.