Fic: Cephalalgia [Inception]
Title: Cephalalgia
Character/Pairings: Arthur/Eames, mentions of Cobb, Phillipa, Ariadne, Mal, OFC
Rating: PG - 13
Word Count: 4,050
Disclaimer: Mr. Nolan owns it all
Warnings: Language, violence
Summary: Five times Eames wakes up with or to a headache, and one time he doesn't.
Author's Notes: Written for the square "headache" on my hc_bingo card and for ilovetakahana per her request. Happy Birthday, bb! ♥
headache (n): a continuous pain in the head
informal: a thing or person that causes worry or trouble; a problem
I.
He wakes to the sound of screaming.
Immediately, he bolts upright from the mattress, fighting the sheets that have somehow managed to wind their way around his torso, tripping over his backpack and scattered school materials on his way to the door. "Mum?" he calls frantically, jerking the door open and stepping out into the hallway, looking up and down the darkened corridor. "Mum?"
The screaming dies down to low moans and the occasional sob, and he moves quickly towards the source, the small bathroom at the other end of the hallway, right next to his mother's bedroom. The floorboards are cold against his feet; padding barefoot in the middle of January in a frigid English winter isn't ideal, but they haven't the money to buy groceries most of the time, much less socks. His empty stomach gurgles then, almost as loud as the creak of the old door as he opens it. "Mum?" he asks softly, sticking his head into the crack and blinking in the dim light. "Are you okay?"
Charlotte Eames sits curled up on the cold tile, knees pulled in toward her chest, willowy arms wrapped around her legs. Her bathrobe hangs haphazardly on her woefully thin frame, sliding off one shoulder and she looks up at the voice of her youngest son, eyes red-rimmed and swollen. Mascara runs in thick streaks down her cheeks and her strawberry blonde hair looks like hay, tangled and unwashed, framing her head like a dull halo. "Richard?" she whispers, swiping at her eyes with the crumpled tissue clutched tightly in one fist. "Is that you?"
His heart breaks, ever so slightly, and he steps into the bathroom. "No, mum. It's me." One beat passes, then another, and he waits with baited breath, waits until the frown creasing his mother's features - she looks much older than her thirty-three years like that - smoothes out and recognition lights up her eyes.
"William," she says, and a smile pulls at her lips as she raises her arms. "Come here, darling."
He goes without complaint, sinking to his knees and allowing her to embrace him, gently plucking the tissue from her fist. She gazes down at him, eyes gentle and for once, lucid, adoring and grateful and filled with regret. "I'm sorry," she whispers, and her voice breaks; she raises a hand and takes his, stilling his efforts to wipe the streaks of makeup from her face. "I'm sorry, darling."
"It's not your fault, Mum."
"You're so thin." She pats his cheek. "Fancy a bite to eat?"
Charlotte doesn't know that there's not a crumb to be found in the entire house, that her son's feet are too big for his one pair of shoes, that his clothes are starting to hang off his lanky frame like a scarecrow. He doesn't blame her though, because he knows she loses track of time easily; the hours, days, and years all blend together within her mind, reality and fantasy melding together as she lies in a near catatonic state in bed, crying over things that never happened and never will. So even though he hasn't eaten in days, even though his stomach feels like it's gnawing at his spine and even though his head aches from low blood sugar, even though he knows he should hate her for her negligence, he doesn't.
"No, I'm not hungry." Climbing to his feet, he pulls gently at her hand. "Come on, Mum. You should go back to bed."
She's not looking at him anymore though, she's gazing out the window and into the darkness. There's an old tree out there, blackened and twisted from a lightening bolt. It used to be beautiful and flowered every spring, until the year his father ran away with a whore and his eldest brother was found face down in a ditch, the year his second eldest brother disappeared and his mother went crazy. Charlotte's eyes are faraway; a half-smile touching her lips as if she can see the delicate buds on the dead branches, as if she's still twenty-two and without a care in the world and beaming at the prospect of moving into a flat with her new husband, crazy, but because of love and not because of the cruelty of life.
"The flowers are late this year," she murmurs dreamily, and turns to look at her son, smile growing wider, manic. "Why is that, Richard?"
He tenses, and tries to let go of her hand to back away, but her fingers are quick and agile, her grip tight. "Mum, it's me. It's William."
"Why?" she repeats, and raises herself up off the ground, her expression growing tight and angry, lovely features hardening in sudden hate. "Am I that much less beautiful?" Her fingers tighten. They'll leave bruises tomorrow. "Answer me, you bastard!"
He remains silent, holding his breath, hardly daring to blink.
"Leave, then," Charlotte hisses, abruptly letting go and turning away, leaning over the sink and staring at her reflection in the mirror. "Go on, get out. I don't need you." LIke a drowned person, she fumbles for the folds of her bathrobe and draws it tighter around herself. "I have my boys, and they'll love me even if you won't." Her face brightens then, and she lifts a hand, touches a finger to the reflective surface, and traces the outline of her face. "Especially William. He's always so patient." She laughs, a broken sob of a laugh. "I don't deserve him. But I love him, still."
"Mum-"
"Get OUT!!" she shrieks suddenly, rounding on him with all the fury of a woman scorned, of a madwoman who'd lost too much in too short of a time, who has not a penny to her name and nothing else in the world but her youngest son.
He does as she says, retreating from the bathroom and walking back to his room, where he crawls under the threadbare coverlet and lays there, listening to his mother's sobs. There's nothing he can do when she gets in one of these states.
His stomach grumbles, and his head aches.
II.
He opens his eyes and stares up at the ceiling of the office space, blinking away the fogginess of the sedative-induced sleep. There's a dull ache in the side of his head and he winces as he sits up, raising a hand to his face, trying to will it away. A bullet to the head is the easiest way out of a dream, but getting an entire magazine emptied into his face isn't exactly his first choice nor his favorite way of waking up.
Fast approaching angry footsteps are his only warning before Eames finds himself dragged out of the desk leather desk chair and slammed against the nearest wall. Dark eyes bore into his, narrowed into slits and spitting sparks, and despite the action augmenting the feeling of someone hammering at his skull, the forger forces himself to grin, nonchalantly. "Something wrong?"
Arthur's lips are pressed into a thin, hard line; his fingers twist the fabric of Eames' shirt an a surprisingly strong grip, but his voice is flat and calm and oh so very cold when he speaks. "Just what do you think you're playing at?"
Eames lifts his hands in a show of innocence. "Haven't a clue what you're talking about, darling."
Arthur moves like a snake - swift, without warning, and deadly. Before Eames can blink, there's a muzzle pressing against the underside of his jaw although the point man's eyes haven't strayed from trying to bore a hole in his skull. "I take my job very seriously, Mr. Eames," he says, quietly. "I suggest you start doing the same."
"This is because I killed her, isn't it," Eames replies, equally soft, and almost feels bad at the flash of raw, naked pain in Arthur's eyes that disappears within a fraction of a second. "Bloody hell, Arthur. What I did was for the job." And for you, he wants to add, but doesn't. Instead, he just stares back at the other man, at the haggardness of the finely sculpted features, at the dark circles under the eyes, at pallor of his cheeks and the sure signs of exhaustion and stress. The air hangs heavy and thick between the two of them, cloying and almost as tangible as the words neither of them say, words like I'm sorry and Everything will be alright and Let me help you, darling, what they'll never say although both of them know how to read each other with the greatest of ease and like no one else can.
Behind them, Cobb and the mark sleep on, blissfully unaware of the confrontation, and the office building is silent, deserted in the darkness of the hours after all the breadwinners pack up their briefcases and drive back to their wife, two point five kids and picket white fence. Eames keeps his hands raised placatingly, although in the position they stand, he knows of five different ways to use his weight to his advantage and against the slighter point man.
"She's already gone, Arthur," he says, and the gun under his chin falters; Arthur steps back as if the words are a physical blow. "There's no harm in killing a Shade." He raises an eyebrow. "Or would you rather forfeit the job because of a projection of a dead woman?"
Arthur punches him in the face.
Eames tastes copper as he slowly turns his head back forwards, spitting blood out onto the floor. "You're getting as bad as Cobb," he remarks blithely, although the force of his temple smashing into the wall has doubled the pounding in his head.
"Her name is Mal," Arthur hisses. He's shaking. "And I swear, if you kill her again-"
"So I was supposed to let her eviscerate you?" Eames retorts hotly, feeling ill at the mental image. "Is that what you would do? Fucking hell, Arthur - you already helped Cobb bury his wife, and now you're letting her haunt him?"
It was Arthur who made Mal's funeral arrangements when Cobb had to flee the country, Arthur who goes back to the United States to check up on the children, Arthur who dragged Cobb (literally) out of his depression and back into the field to distract him from Mal's horrific suicide. Eames knows that Mal is - was - a lovely woman, knows that she was just about the closest thing Arthur had to a sister or a mother, knows that beneath the veneer of quiet strength and support Arthur presents for Cobb's sake, he's hurting too.
And it worries Eames, more than it should. Knowing that Arthur would rather allow himself to be tortured by Mal's projection than kill her is more than the forger can handle.
Arthur clenches his jaw at the truth of the other's words. "I can handle myself." He turns stiffly and walks away, leaving Eames slumped against the wall, blood in his mouth and with the hurt of a blow that didn't come from Arthur's fist.
The dull ache behind his eyes spreads.
III.
The room reeks of sex and sweat and immediately, even without opening his eyes, Eames knows exactly where he is. With a mental groan, he turns over on his side and the bedsprings - it still has springs creak at the redistribution of weight. He can't hear the shower running and there's definitely another individual present in the room, so he steels himself for the terrible awkwardness of the morning after, and cracks his eyes open.
She's awake as well, propped up on one elbow and smiling at him. "Good morning, handsome."
Eames stares at her. Fiery red hair, hourglass figure, freckles and legs for miles - she's what most men would kill to share a night with, but all he can remember from last night is a whole lot of nothing. Saying he had a bit too much to drink would definitely be an understatement, which is made all too obvious by the terrible pain spiking through his brain. Experimentally, he tries to open his mouth for a quick and witty retort and groans instead, pathetically burying his face in the pillow. It feels like someone twisted all his limbs into impossible contortions, stuffed something dead and rotting into his mouth, and clubbed him over the head with a metal crowbar. Repeatedly.
Yep. Definitely too much to drink.
There's a soft laugh from beside him, and the redhead - what's her name again? Never mind, it hurts too much to even think - stirs, climbing out of bed. He hears her picking up her clothes from the floor and wonders if he's missing something; he'd been expecting a shout of indignation or disgusted scoff before a slamming of the door that would've been murder on his head. Presently, the mattress dips again and he feels a gentle hand on the crown of his head. "So, what, is he married or something?"
Eames raises his head and squints at her. "Pardon?"
"The man you were thinking of all last night."
His tongue feels three times its size as he chokes on nothing but nausea and guilt. "Who?"
She laughs, but it's neither one of ridicule nor disdain. Her eyes are green, Eames thinks stupidly, and then remembers with a start just why he was drawn to her at the bar - green eyes instead of dark brown, and with hair of red and a figure like that, she's the furthest thing from-
"My name's Stella, not Arthur," she says kindly, and something in Eames' chest clenches painfully.
-Arthur. Arthur.
Just the very mention of the name sends an ice pick through his temples and Eames lurches for the small adjoining bathroom, nearly tripping over his own two feet en route to the toilet where he sinks to his knees and presses his forehead to the cool porcelain, trying not to think of poncy point men with dark eyes and marvelous arses, dry senses of humor and suits that fit so perfectly that it has to be a sin.
Or of one point man in particular becoming an item with a nice girl who can give him a family and a chance to settle down, the comforts of having a wife and a marriage and a secure relationship - everything that a forger who's on the Most Wanted List in over fifteen countries, who wears a thousand faces but his own, who lives out of hotel rooms and has no roots to speak of, can't.
Eames closes his eyes and imagines said point man (his Arthur, his darling, his loss) kissing Ariadne (sweet, young, talented Ariadne, for whom he can't possibly dredge up even the slightest shred of hatred because she's simply lovely) in the hotel lobby of the second level of the dream - and he dry heaves, grabs the sides of his head, and tries to forget.
An impossible task. It's been two months since the inception, and it's been seven years since he first laid eyes on the other man. He'll never be able to forget Arthur.
- - - - -
The ringing of his cell phone stabs through his eyes like hot pokers and Eames groans, fumbling at the bedside table and squinting at the tiny display screen.
Arthur, it reads and he blinks, wondering if this hangover is one unlike any other, so much so that he's hallucinating.
"Hello?"
"Eames."
He fumbles for his totem, flipping the chip over his knuckles once, twice. "Arthur."
"Ariadne and I are taking a job and we need a forger. How do you feel about the Himalayas?"
IV.
"...can't do that, Cobb. You know that next month is..."
He's dying. Eames is sure of it. He's barely awake when the pain makes itself known by means of invisible anvils dropping on his head, one after another, ceaselessly.
"Eames is still asleep. I'll have to run it by him..."
Oh, Christ. Of course Arthur would be up at stupid arse o'clock in the morning, talking to Cobb, of course. The throbbing in his head augments.
He's had headaches before, stress-induced and otherwise, but they've never, ever been this bad. His brain feels like it's trying to leak out of his ears and spontaneously combust at the same time; the whisper of his skin against the sheets feels someone's shoving a spike through his temporal lobe, and besides, moving any part of his body sends twinges of pain up screaming nerve endings and to his head. It's stupid as hell, and thank God his bladder is empty, because even twitching his foot in a lame attempt to get out of bed felt like a grand piano falling from the sky and crushing his head like an overripe melon.
Something that sounds like a gunshot pierces through him and then, as light floods the room, he recoils and jerks the sheet over his head with a barely audible whimper, because holy fucking Mary, Mother of God-
"Eames?"
He flinches at the sound of his name - more like the volume, actually - and the room is plunged into blessed darkness once again before the sheet is pulled away from his face and then a wonderfully cool hand descends upon his brow, familiar fingers skimming over his tightly shut eyes. "Eames, what's wrong?"
"Lower," he barely manages to groan, and judging by the pause, guesses that Arthur's quirking one eyebrow.
"Lower?"
"Voice. Head. Hurts. Darling..." The last monosyllabic word comes out as a pitiful whine, as if Arthur, point man extraordinaire, can somehow reach inside his head and still all the elephants stomping around and having a parade inside his skull.
From somewhere above him, Arthur chuckles lightly and Eames almost feels offended for a moment before the other drops a gentle kiss onto his forehead. "I'll be right back," he murmurs, lips soft against skin and Eames can only bury his face back into the pillow miserably, not really caring where Arthur goes so long as the pain goes away.
The door opens and closes, shutting out any possible light from the sitting area and Eames silently counts the number of steps it would take for Arthur to go anywhere, since he can't actually hear - Arthur's footsteps are always silent - six paces from the bed to the door, seven paces from the bedroom door to the couch, four paces from couch to television, and...and...and trying to remember the layout of their flat takes too much effort.
A hand falls on the back of his neck, gently kneading the tense muscles there; the bed dips just a bit and then fingers are carding through his hair, gentle and so unmistakably Arthur's that Eames leans into the touch. "Come here," comes the order, quiet and tinged with the slightest hint of concern evident under the fond exasperation. Blindly, Eames allows himself to be maneuvered until his head rests in Arthur's lap - a much more favorable substitute than the pillow - thinking ow, ow, bloody fucking ow the entire time.
When a cool cloth lands on his forehead, he twitches. But when the pads of Arthur's fingers press firmly against the base of his skull though, Eames stops thinking entirely.
"Mmmm..." is all he can manage, and Eames is pretty sure he's purring by the time Arthur starts scratching his scalp gently. He sighs, turning to press his face against Arthur's stomach, and presses a kiss to the warm skin there. "More?"
Arthur snorts in what must be the most dignified way possible. "You're impossible," he murmurs, but doesn't stop, and Eames smiles.
V.
"Leave the girl alone!!"
His right arm is broken, he's definitely sure he's got a broken rib (or five) because it hurts like blazes to take a breath; blood runs from a long, ugly laceration across his chest and he must have a concussion given how much his vision is blurring. But Eames can still see well enough alright and he sees darling little Phillipa lying on the dirty floor, blood caking one side of her face; he hears her terrified scream as she wakes to see the monsters standing over her, and for the first time in a long time, William Thomas Eames finds that he is afraid.
"It's me you want," he hollers, fighting against the goons holding him back, heart beating a rapid staccato against his ribs because he knows, he knows that if anything happens to Phillipa, he'll never be able to look at himself in a mirror ever again. "It's me you want, so don't you wankers touch her!"
As if all a part of one body, they turn and mercifully, do as he demands, leaving Phillipa a shivering heap against the far wall.
And they go for him instead.
- - - - -
His head seems to be their favorite target, something about "getting it through his thick skull". Eames really isn't sure he has any skull left.
- - - - -
"Uncle Eames," Phillipa gasps, and then she bursts into tears. "Oh, Uncle Eames!"
Oh, bloody hell.
Pulling himself up with difficulty, Eames more or less drags himself over to the young girl, reaching out unsteadily and tracing his thumbs under her eyes, just like he'd seen Arthur do so many years ago, except that time, the tears had been over a bottle of spilled nail polish, and not over being kidnapped and traumatized. "Hush, dove, hush," he whispers. His hands are shaking, and one leaves a streak of blood on Phillipa's pale face. "It's alright. Everything is going to be okay."
He's lying, and Eames thinks she knows, but he repeats it anyway. "Everything is going to be alright, Phillipa. Okay?" His head feels heavy, and then before he knows it, he's flat on his back, head pillowed on the girl's jean-clad thigh. She's crying, and he's sorry, but his arms are too heavy to lift up to wipe the tears away again.
"Uncle Eames," Phillipa whispers, "wake up. Wake up, please."
He doesn't.
I.
"Cerebral aneurysm."
Arthur's voice is steel, his words clipped, each and every syllable enunciated clearly. His eyes are cold, so cold and his jaw clenched tight as he glares at the doctor as if he wishes to reduce the portly, balding, bespectacled man to dust by the sheer intensity of his look.
Said unfortunate man squirms and clutches his clipboard nervously. "Yes, Mr. Davidson. The inflammation of the blood vessel was probably a result of direct head trauma, and-"
"I don't care," Arthur breaks in, and ignores Cobb's worried glance. "Is he going to wake up." It's more of a flat statement or a directive than a question, and the doctor shrinks about two inches.
"The chances are slim, sir."
"Slim." Another flat statement punctuated by a narrowing of the eyes. "How slim."
The silence is more of an answer than anything else the man could have said, and Arthur's shoulders stiffen; he takes a half-step forward and Cobb raises a hand as if to stop the point man from snapping the doctor's neck right then and there. "I don't accept that prognosis," the point man snaps, all molten fury and defiance. "I won't accept that."
"Arthur-" Cobb tries, but falters when Arthur turns a dark glare upon him before pivoting on his heel and stalking away, sweeping past a forlorn-looking Phillipa sitting in the lobby, brushing past Ariadne and her fiancee.
In the hospital bed, Eames' chest rises and falls, eyes closed to the world, trapped in a sleep from which absolutely nothing can rouse him.
- - - - -
It's six months before he wakes.
- - - - -
When he finally claws his way out of the shroud surrounding his mind, the name Arthur, Arthur, Arthur on his lips as the only word he knows, the only salvation from insanity and an eternity trapped in his own mind.
His eyes blink open slowly, gritty from months of sleep, the first sight he sees is a man he'd thought he'd forgotten - an ever-loyal, intelligent, faithful, beautiful man, his darling.
Eames wakes not to a headache, but to Arthur.
Character/Pairings: Arthur/Eames, mentions of Cobb, Phillipa, Ariadne, Mal, OFC
Rating: PG - 13
Word Count: 4,050
Disclaimer: Mr. Nolan owns it all
Warnings: Language, violence
Summary: Five times Eames wakes up with or to a headache, and one time he doesn't.
Author's Notes: Written for the square "headache" on my hc_bingo card and for ilovetakahana per her request. Happy Birthday, bb! ♥
headache (n): a continuous pain in the head
informal: a thing or person that causes worry or trouble; a problem
I.
He wakes to the sound of screaming.
Immediately, he bolts upright from the mattress, fighting the sheets that have somehow managed to wind their way around his torso, tripping over his backpack and scattered school materials on his way to the door. "Mum?" he calls frantically, jerking the door open and stepping out into the hallway, looking up and down the darkened corridor. "Mum?"
The screaming dies down to low moans and the occasional sob, and he moves quickly towards the source, the small bathroom at the other end of the hallway, right next to his mother's bedroom. The floorboards are cold against his feet; padding barefoot in the middle of January in a frigid English winter isn't ideal, but they haven't the money to buy groceries most of the time, much less socks. His empty stomach gurgles then, almost as loud as the creak of the old door as he opens it. "Mum?" he asks softly, sticking his head into the crack and blinking in the dim light. "Are you okay?"
Charlotte Eames sits curled up on the cold tile, knees pulled in toward her chest, willowy arms wrapped around her legs. Her bathrobe hangs haphazardly on her woefully thin frame, sliding off one shoulder and she looks up at the voice of her youngest son, eyes red-rimmed and swollen. Mascara runs in thick streaks down her cheeks and her strawberry blonde hair looks like hay, tangled and unwashed, framing her head like a dull halo. "Richard?" she whispers, swiping at her eyes with the crumpled tissue clutched tightly in one fist. "Is that you?"
His heart breaks, ever so slightly, and he steps into the bathroom. "No, mum. It's me." One beat passes, then another, and he waits with baited breath, waits until the frown creasing his mother's features - she looks much older than her thirty-three years like that - smoothes out and recognition lights up her eyes.
"William," she says, and a smile pulls at her lips as she raises her arms. "Come here, darling."
He goes without complaint, sinking to his knees and allowing her to embrace him, gently plucking the tissue from her fist. She gazes down at him, eyes gentle and for once, lucid, adoring and grateful and filled with regret. "I'm sorry," she whispers, and her voice breaks; she raises a hand and takes his, stilling his efforts to wipe the streaks of makeup from her face. "I'm sorry, darling."
"It's not your fault, Mum."
"You're so thin." She pats his cheek. "Fancy a bite to eat?"
Charlotte doesn't know that there's not a crumb to be found in the entire house, that her son's feet are too big for his one pair of shoes, that his clothes are starting to hang off his lanky frame like a scarecrow. He doesn't blame her though, because he knows she loses track of time easily; the hours, days, and years all blend together within her mind, reality and fantasy melding together as she lies in a near catatonic state in bed, crying over things that never happened and never will. So even though he hasn't eaten in days, even though his stomach feels like it's gnawing at his spine and even though his head aches from low blood sugar, even though he knows he should hate her for her negligence, he doesn't.
"No, I'm not hungry." Climbing to his feet, he pulls gently at her hand. "Come on, Mum. You should go back to bed."
She's not looking at him anymore though, she's gazing out the window and into the darkness. There's an old tree out there, blackened and twisted from a lightening bolt. It used to be beautiful and flowered every spring, until the year his father ran away with a whore and his eldest brother was found face down in a ditch, the year his second eldest brother disappeared and his mother went crazy. Charlotte's eyes are faraway; a half-smile touching her lips as if she can see the delicate buds on the dead branches, as if she's still twenty-two and without a care in the world and beaming at the prospect of moving into a flat with her new husband, crazy, but because of love and not because of the cruelty of life.
"The flowers are late this year," she murmurs dreamily, and turns to look at her son, smile growing wider, manic. "Why is that, Richard?"
He tenses, and tries to let go of her hand to back away, but her fingers are quick and agile, her grip tight. "Mum, it's me. It's William."
"Why?" she repeats, and raises herself up off the ground, her expression growing tight and angry, lovely features hardening in sudden hate. "Am I that much less beautiful?" Her fingers tighten. They'll leave bruises tomorrow. "Answer me, you bastard!"
He remains silent, holding his breath, hardly daring to blink.
"Leave, then," Charlotte hisses, abruptly letting go and turning away, leaning over the sink and staring at her reflection in the mirror. "Go on, get out. I don't need you." LIke a drowned person, she fumbles for the folds of her bathrobe and draws it tighter around herself. "I have my boys, and they'll love me even if you won't." Her face brightens then, and she lifts a hand, touches a finger to the reflective surface, and traces the outline of her face. "Especially William. He's always so patient." She laughs, a broken sob of a laugh. "I don't deserve him. But I love him, still."
"Mum-"
"Get OUT!!" she shrieks suddenly, rounding on him with all the fury of a woman scorned, of a madwoman who'd lost too much in too short of a time, who has not a penny to her name and nothing else in the world but her youngest son.
He does as she says, retreating from the bathroom and walking back to his room, where he crawls under the threadbare coverlet and lays there, listening to his mother's sobs. There's nothing he can do when she gets in one of these states.
His stomach grumbles, and his head aches.
II.
He opens his eyes and stares up at the ceiling of the office space, blinking away the fogginess of the sedative-induced sleep. There's a dull ache in the side of his head and he winces as he sits up, raising a hand to his face, trying to will it away. A bullet to the head is the easiest way out of a dream, but getting an entire magazine emptied into his face isn't exactly his first choice nor his favorite way of waking up.
Fast approaching angry footsteps are his only warning before Eames finds himself dragged out of the desk leather desk chair and slammed against the nearest wall. Dark eyes bore into his, narrowed into slits and spitting sparks, and despite the action augmenting the feeling of someone hammering at his skull, the forger forces himself to grin, nonchalantly. "Something wrong?"
Arthur's lips are pressed into a thin, hard line; his fingers twist the fabric of Eames' shirt an a surprisingly strong grip, but his voice is flat and calm and oh so very cold when he speaks. "Just what do you think you're playing at?"
Eames lifts his hands in a show of innocence. "Haven't a clue what you're talking about, darling."
Arthur moves like a snake - swift, without warning, and deadly. Before Eames can blink, there's a muzzle pressing against the underside of his jaw although the point man's eyes haven't strayed from trying to bore a hole in his skull. "I take my job very seriously, Mr. Eames," he says, quietly. "I suggest you start doing the same."
"This is because I killed her, isn't it," Eames replies, equally soft, and almost feels bad at the flash of raw, naked pain in Arthur's eyes that disappears within a fraction of a second. "Bloody hell, Arthur. What I did was for the job." And for you, he wants to add, but doesn't. Instead, he just stares back at the other man, at the haggardness of the finely sculpted features, at the dark circles under the eyes, at pallor of his cheeks and the sure signs of exhaustion and stress. The air hangs heavy and thick between the two of them, cloying and almost as tangible as the words neither of them say, words like I'm sorry and Everything will be alright and Let me help you, darling, what they'll never say although both of them know how to read each other with the greatest of ease and like no one else can.
Behind them, Cobb and the mark sleep on, blissfully unaware of the confrontation, and the office building is silent, deserted in the darkness of the hours after all the breadwinners pack up their briefcases and drive back to their wife, two point five kids and picket white fence. Eames keeps his hands raised placatingly, although in the position they stand, he knows of five different ways to use his weight to his advantage and against the slighter point man.
"She's already gone, Arthur," he says, and the gun under his chin falters; Arthur steps back as if the words are a physical blow. "There's no harm in killing a Shade." He raises an eyebrow. "Or would you rather forfeit the job because of a projection of a dead woman?"
Arthur punches him in the face.
Eames tastes copper as he slowly turns his head back forwards, spitting blood out onto the floor. "You're getting as bad as Cobb," he remarks blithely, although the force of his temple smashing into the wall has doubled the pounding in his head.
"Her name is Mal," Arthur hisses. He's shaking. "And I swear, if you kill her again-"
"So I was supposed to let her eviscerate you?" Eames retorts hotly, feeling ill at the mental image. "Is that what you would do? Fucking hell, Arthur - you already helped Cobb bury his wife, and now you're letting her haunt him?"
It was Arthur who made Mal's funeral arrangements when Cobb had to flee the country, Arthur who goes back to the United States to check up on the children, Arthur who dragged Cobb (literally) out of his depression and back into the field to distract him from Mal's horrific suicide. Eames knows that Mal is - was - a lovely woman, knows that she was just about the closest thing Arthur had to a sister or a mother, knows that beneath the veneer of quiet strength and support Arthur presents for Cobb's sake, he's hurting too.
And it worries Eames, more than it should. Knowing that Arthur would rather allow himself to be tortured by Mal's projection than kill her is more than the forger can handle.
Arthur clenches his jaw at the truth of the other's words. "I can handle myself." He turns stiffly and walks away, leaving Eames slumped against the wall, blood in his mouth and with the hurt of a blow that didn't come from Arthur's fist.
The dull ache behind his eyes spreads.
III.
The room reeks of sex and sweat and immediately, even without opening his eyes, Eames knows exactly where he is. With a mental groan, he turns over on his side and the bedsprings - it still has springs creak at the redistribution of weight. He can't hear the shower running and there's definitely another individual present in the room, so he steels himself for the terrible awkwardness of the morning after, and cracks his eyes open.
She's awake as well, propped up on one elbow and smiling at him. "Good morning, handsome."
Eames stares at her. Fiery red hair, hourglass figure, freckles and legs for miles - she's what most men would kill to share a night with, but all he can remember from last night is a whole lot of nothing. Saying he had a bit too much to drink would definitely be an understatement, which is made all too obvious by the terrible pain spiking through his brain. Experimentally, he tries to open his mouth for a quick and witty retort and groans instead, pathetically burying his face in the pillow. It feels like someone twisted all his limbs into impossible contortions, stuffed something dead and rotting into his mouth, and clubbed him over the head with a metal crowbar. Repeatedly.
Yep. Definitely too much to drink.
There's a soft laugh from beside him, and the redhead - what's her name again? Never mind, it hurts too much to even think - stirs, climbing out of bed. He hears her picking up her clothes from the floor and wonders if he's missing something; he'd been expecting a shout of indignation or disgusted scoff before a slamming of the door that would've been murder on his head. Presently, the mattress dips again and he feels a gentle hand on the crown of his head. "So, what, is he married or something?"
Eames raises his head and squints at her. "Pardon?"
"The man you were thinking of all last night."
His tongue feels three times its size as he chokes on nothing but nausea and guilt. "Who?"
She laughs, but it's neither one of ridicule nor disdain. Her eyes are green, Eames thinks stupidly, and then remembers with a start just why he was drawn to her at the bar - green eyes instead of dark brown, and with hair of red and a figure like that, she's the furthest thing from-
"My name's Stella, not Arthur," she says kindly, and something in Eames' chest clenches painfully.
-Arthur. Arthur.
Just the very mention of the name sends an ice pick through his temples and Eames lurches for the small adjoining bathroom, nearly tripping over his own two feet en route to the toilet where he sinks to his knees and presses his forehead to the cool porcelain, trying not to think of poncy point men with dark eyes and marvelous arses, dry senses of humor and suits that fit so perfectly that it has to be a sin.
Or of one point man in particular becoming an item with a nice girl who can give him a family and a chance to settle down, the comforts of having a wife and a marriage and a secure relationship - everything that a forger who's on the Most Wanted List in over fifteen countries, who wears a thousand faces but his own, who lives out of hotel rooms and has no roots to speak of, can't.
Eames closes his eyes and imagines said point man (his Arthur, his darling, his loss) kissing Ariadne (sweet, young, talented Ariadne, for whom he can't possibly dredge up even the slightest shred of hatred because she's simply lovely) in the hotel lobby of the second level of the dream - and he dry heaves, grabs the sides of his head, and tries to forget.
An impossible task. It's been two months since the inception, and it's been seven years since he first laid eyes on the other man. He'll never be able to forget Arthur.
- - - - -
The ringing of his cell phone stabs through his eyes like hot pokers and Eames groans, fumbling at the bedside table and squinting at the tiny display screen.
Arthur, it reads and he blinks, wondering if this hangover is one unlike any other, so much so that he's hallucinating.
"Hello?"
"Eames."
He fumbles for his totem, flipping the chip over his knuckles once, twice. "Arthur."
"Ariadne and I are taking a job and we need a forger. How do you feel about the Himalayas?"
IV.
"...can't do that, Cobb. You know that next month is..."
He's dying. Eames is sure of it. He's barely awake when the pain makes itself known by means of invisible anvils dropping on his head, one after another, ceaselessly.
"Eames is still asleep. I'll have to run it by him..."
Oh, Christ. Of course Arthur would be up at stupid arse o'clock in the morning, talking to Cobb, of course. The throbbing in his head augments.
He's had headaches before, stress-induced and otherwise, but they've never, ever been this bad. His brain feels like it's trying to leak out of his ears and spontaneously combust at the same time; the whisper of his skin against the sheets feels someone's shoving a spike through his temporal lobe, and besides, moving any part of his body sends twinges of pain up screaming nerve endings and to his head. It's stupid as hell, and thank God his bladder is empty, because even twitching his foot in a lame attempt to get out of bed felt like a grand piano falling from the sky and crushing his head like an overripe melon.
Something that sounds like a gunshot pierces through him and then, as light floods the room, he recoils and jerks the sheet over his head with a barely audible whimper, because holy fucking Mary, Mother of God-
"Eames?"
He flinches at the sound of his name - more like the volume, actually - and the room is plunged into blessed darkness once again before the sheet is pulled away from his face and then a wonderfully cool hand descends upon his brow, familiar fingers skimming over his tightly shut eyes. "Eames, what's wrong?"
"Lower," he barely manages to groan, and judging by the pause, guesses that Arthur's quirking one eyebrow.
"Lower?"
"Voice. Head. Hurts. Darling..." The last monosyllabic word comes out as a pitiful whine, as if Arthur, point man extraordinaire, can somehow reach inside his head and still all the elephants stomping around and having a parade inside his skull.
From somewhere above him, Arthur chuckles lightly and Eames almost feels offended for a moment before the other drops a gentle kiss onto his forehead. "I'll be right back," he murmurs, lips soft against skin and Eames can only bury his face back into the pillow miserably, not really caring where Arthur goes so long as the pain goes away.
The door opens and closes, shutting out any possible light from the sitting area and Eames silently counts the number of steps it would take for Arthur to go anywhere, since he can't actually hear - Arthur's footsteps are always silent - six paces from the bed to the door, seven paces from the bedroom door to the couch, four paces from couch to television, and...and...and trying to remember the layout of their flat takes too much effort.
A hand falls on the back of his neck, gently kneading the tense muscles there; the bed dips just a bit and then fingers are carding through his hair, gentle and so unmistakably Arthur's that Eames leans into the touch. "Come here," comes the order, quiet and tinged with the slightest hint of concern evident under the fond exasperation. Blindly, Eames allows himself to be maneuvered until his head rests in Arthur's lap - a much more favorable substitute than the pillow - thinking ow, ow, bloody fucking ow the entire time.
When a cool cloth lands on his forehead, he twitches. But when the pads of Arthur's fingers press firmly against the base of his skull though, Eames stops thinking entirely.
"Mmmm..." is all he can manage, and Eames is pretty sure he's purring by the time Arthur starts scratching his scalp gently. He sighs, turning to press his face against Arthur's stomach, and presses a kiss to the warm skin there. "More?"
Arthur snorts in what must be the most dignified way possible. "You're impossible," he murmurs, but doesn't stop, and Eames smiles.
V.
"Leave the girl alone!!"
His right arm is broken, he's definitely sure he's got a broken rib (or five) because it hurts like blazes to take a breath; blood runs from a long, ugly laceration across his chest and he must have a concussion given how much his vision is blurring. But Eames can still see well enough alright and he sees darling little Phillipa lying on the dirty floor, blood caking one side of her face; he hears her terrified scream as she wakes to see the monsters standing over her, and for the first time in a long time, William Thomas Eames finds that he is afraid.
"It's me you want," he hollers, fighting against the goons holding him back, heart beating a rapid staccato against his ribs because he knows, he knows that if anything happens to Phillipa, he'll never be able to look at himself in a mirror ever again. "It's me you want, so don't you wankers touch her!"
As if all a part of one body, they turn and mercifully, do as he demands, leaving Phillipa a shivering heap against the far wall.
And they go for him instead.
- - - - -
His head seems to be their favorite target, something about "getting it through his thick skull". Eames really isn't sure he has any skull left.
- - - - -
"Uncle Eames," Phillipa gasps, and then she bursts into tears. "Oh, Uncle Eames!"
Oh, bloody hell.
Pulling himself up with difficulty, Eames more or less drags himself over to the young girl, reaching out unsteadily and tracing his thumbs under her eyes, just like he'd seen Arthur do so many years ago, except that time, the tears had been over a bottle of spilled nail polish, and not over being kidnapped and traumatized. "Hush, dove, hush," he whispers. His hands are shaking, and one leaves a streak of blood on Phillipa's pale face. "It's alright. Everything is going to be okay."
He's lying, and Eames thinks she knows, but he repeats it anyway. "Everything is going to be alright, Phillipa. Okay?" His head feels heavy, and then before he knows it, he's flat on his back, head pillowed on the girl's jean-clad thigh. She's crying, and he's sorry, but his arms are too heavy to lift up to wipe the tears away again.
"Uncle Eames," Phillipa whispers, "wake up. Wake up, please."
He doesn't.
I.
"Cerebral aneurysm."
Arthur's voice is steel, his words clipped, each and every syllable enunciated clearly. His eyes are cold, so cold and his jaw clenched tight as he glares at the doctor as if he wishes to reduce the portly, balding, bespectacled man to dust by the sheer intensity of his look.
Said unfortunate man squirms and clutches his clipboard nervously. "Yes, Mr. Davidson. The inflammation of the blood vessel was probably a result of direct head trauma, and-"
"I don't care," Arthur breaks in, and ignores Cobb's worried glance. "Is he going to wake up." It's more of a flat statement or a directive than a question, and the doctor shrinks about two inches.
"The chances are slim, sir."
"Slim." Another flat statement punctuated by a narrowing of the eyes. "How slim."
The silence is more of an answer than anything else the man could have said, and Arthur's shoulders stiffen; he takes a half-step forward and Cobb raises a hand as if to stop the point man from snapping the doctor's neck right then and there. "I don't accept that prognosis," the point man snaps, all molten fury and defiance. "I won't accept that."
"Arthur-" Cobb tries, but falters when Arthur turns a dark glare upon him before pivoting on his heel and stalking away, sweeping past a forlorn-looking Phillipa sitting in the lobby, brushing past Ariadne and her fiancee.
In the hospital bed, Eames' chest rises and falls, eyes closed to the world, trapped in a sleep from which absolutely nothing can rouse him.
- - - - -
It's six months before he wakes.
- - - - -
When he finally claws his way out of the shroud surrounding his mind, the name Arthur, Arthur, Arthur on his lips as the only word he knows, the only salvation from insanity and an eternity trapped in his own mind.
His eyes blink open slowly, gritty from months of sleep, the first sight he sees is a man he'd thought he'd forgotten - an ever-loyal, intelligent, faithful, beautiful man, his darling.
Eames wakes not to a headache, but to Arthur.