OPEN and INCOMPLETE.

[dreamesbig]

Characters: Eames (dreamesbig), Arthur (specificities) and any one else around!
Setting/Location: Streamdrab.
Date & Time: Day nine.
Warnings: none!
Summary: Just another one of those "waking up" posts. Everyone is free to join!

Comments

[specificities]

Arthur wakes to the feeling of drowning. Or, at least, there is a brief moment of that jerking awake where you think you're drowning only to discover, instead that your face has been gingerly lied down in a puddle of mud. He is breathing in liquefied dirt and there is the pitter-patter, vaguely ticklish feel of tiny feet running across his ear that makes him whack himself hard enough in the head to groan. Brown bubbles form out of his exasperation. There is dead bug in his ear and against the palm of his hand. He feels nauseous. He blames Yusuf. He coughs, grimacing as dirt flicks up against his face, and finally uses his hands to shove himself up, rocking back into a sitting position as he uses the cuffs of his shirt to clean the mud from around his eyes. The links dig into the skin of his cheeks and leave angry red marks, and he spits once - twice - before he opens his eyes. He thinks, he hasn't had a dream in a forest in a long time - before he remembers he shouldn't be dreaming and his stomach drops as his fists jams in his pockets to search for his totem. He finds it where it's usually placed, in the small zipped compartment behind the breast of his vest, and he looks for the cleanest patch of grass to wipe his bug-stained hand on before rocking the dice back and forth in the palm of his left hand. He pauses. He tosses it to the grass.

One.

Again.

One.

Again.

One.

It wasn't comforting. He whisked the red die from the forest floor, returning it to its pocket and zipping it securely as he came to a stand. Mud was starting to drip into his eye, and he swept at it absentmindedly, using a nearby overgrown leaf to wipe his face entirely before the dirt could dry on his face. He shifted his weight. No weapons. He scanned his surroundings again, ears listening carefully - but nothing other than forest sounds greeted him. There was a sudden rustle of leaves and the ground crunching underneath feet and Arthur decided, then, that being so exposed when he was uncertain where he had woken up was inevitably not one of his best ideas.

He side-stepped to take cover behind a tree from the direction he thought he heard the sounds of movement coming from.

[dreamesbig]

This was probably the biggest set of trees he’d ever been able to witness; its sheer abnormality led his mind to believe it was still a dream… but then again, he had never been to Iceland. He’d never heard anywhere that the largest trees were in Iceland, of all places.

By this point, Eames had no idea where he was heading. He was unarmed and lost---and if this was truly reality, there were no signs of the others, whether or not the plane had crashed. It was perhaps the shocking aftereffects of Yusuf’s chemicals, but he had sort of expected the chemist would have warned them. Who knew what other hidden risks the sedative, anyway? For all they knew, going into limbo could’ve been part of Cobb’s plan (that bastard). His mind was racing for people to blame, but Christ, there wasn’t a soul to blame.

That was when he heard some twigs break---as if someone, or something, had stepped on it. He suddenly felt the eyes on him, possibly out of paranoia, and paced over to a tree to hide behind. Ugh, this would be a lot easier if he had a gun, but all he had was his bloody wallet, totem, and his own life essentially. Eames pressed his back against the wooden surface of the tree (whatever kind it was, he had no idea), sliding down into a sitting position as he pondered a way out of the situation. He soon realised that there was no use trying to wait it out. If it was an animal, it would run away; if human, they would (maybe) respond.

So, with a sharp intake of break, Eames went for the verbal kill: “All right, who’s there?” he yelled, loud enough for anyone nearby to hear.

MY TENSES ARE ALL OVER THE PLACE....

[specificities]

Arthur's cheek was beginning to itch. He scratched it quickly against his thumbnail, frowning at the voice. Was it - Eames? It was Eames. For God's sake, he refused to be stuck in whatever this was (limbo, a more irrational part of himself feared, but the totem still had to count for something) for eternity with the forger, of all people. He'd rather have been alone. Yet, what if it wasn't Eames at all? With the very nature of this landscape, it could very well be something else. A projection, maybe. Even another forger. A forger forging a forger. That would certainly be frustrating. The very fact that he couldn't remember how he got here was alarming in that itself, his previous memory only pertaining to setting off the charges on the elevator and surging towards a kick. Within all reason, he should be on a plane.

Within all reason, the centipede crawling past his field of vision and up the tree should not have been so large.

He ached for something useful in his hands, eyes darting downwards to notice a thick branch of sorts - it could have easily just as been a stem, considering the size of this place - and he crouched down, gathering it into his hands and lifting it from the ground. It was heavy, but it was not as long as to make it unwieldy, and it would be good enough. "Eames?" he finally questioned after a pause. "That you?" If it wasn't, well. He would think of something. Find a way into a safe clearing, for starters - there were too many things to hide within in the middle of a forest like this. Everything was in everything else's way, and to be quite frank Arthur didn't want to see how large other creatures could get if the centipede was that large. One hundred legs made for a very long arthropod.

Maybe, he thought carefully, he had just become small. But that was preposterous in itself, and he swiftly dismissed the idea from his mind, focusing instead on listening for a reply.

YEAH, WELL, YOUR TENSES SHOULD BE AGAINST MY BODY....

[dreamesbig]

Well, that voice certainly sounded familiar, and it even knew his name! So, he did an act of pure instinct and replied (as if excessive planning was part of his life): “Why don’t we find out, eh?” After a couple seconds, Eames got up again, peeking from behind the tree, hoping the other would soon show himself.

The waiting was dreadful, to say in the least. For one, Eames was not quite the most patient man in the planet. It didn’t help that this entire…scenario…could have easily been the results of someone’s mistake. He didn’t have time for dilly-dallying, after all. The only thing he wanted to do was…well, get the hell home. “We’ll show ourselves on the count of three.”

After taking in a sharp intake of breath, he counted: “One… two…”

I AM NOT GOING TO EVEN DIGNIFY THAT WITH A RESPONSE...

[specificities]

This was one of the worst ideas Eames had ever suggested. What if it was a trap? It was likely a trap. Arthur was not going to step out from behind the tree and wait to be shot. There were a myriad of things pertaining to this situation that he simply couldn't trust - lack of weaponry not withstanding, he couldn't even see Eames's face to even be sure whether or not it was him, and even that was becoming increasingly unreliable. He was distinctly, and absolutely, outside of his comfort zone. He shifted the weight of the branch into one hand, using the other to scratch the bridge of his nose, a firm scowl upsetting the curve of his lips.

By the time he had made his decision, it was already three!, and he briefly stepped out of the cover of the thick tree to hurl his chosen missile at where he had estimated the voice to be coming from. Of course, it was while the thick branch was in mid air that he noticed his target did, indeed, look similar to Eames from the hunch of his shoulders. He trusted the other to manage to duck in time, not feeling a single pang of guilt for his actions. You could never be too certain when you woke up in the middle of the woods with mud on your lapels and dead bug in your ear and your face itching with increasing intensity. The only thing he currently regretted was that he was now without a weapon - again.

BUT BABY PLEASE... I CAN MAKE IT RIGHT AGAIN...

[dreamesbig]

“…three!” and as soon as he whirled his body around to show himself, he saw a branch flying right toward his face. While his brain didn’t function quite as quickly as Arthur or probably Ariadne, he still had his reflex. So, as soon as that branch neared his face with the intent to kill (or seriously injure), Eames cursed and ducked. Unfortunately the reaction proved to be too slow for the sheer speed of it, and its skin ended up scraping the top of the Brit’s head.

Needless to say, Eames was pissed. His hands reached up to cover the injured area, checking to see if he was bleeding. While there wasn’t any evidence of blood, the man could be absolutely sure that the branch took enough strands of hair…after all, no one would like the feeling of getting their hair pulled out forcefully. After cursing under his breath for a couple seconds, trying to register what the hell had just happened, Eames lifted his head to see the source of his dismay.

…and lo’ and behold, it was Arthur. “Thanks for that, Darling. As if I needed any more Earthly substances stuck onto my hair gel. And nice throw, by the way,” he said flatly, finding it increasingly difficult to contain the sarcasm.

.... PROVE IT

[specificities]

"Thank you, Mister Eames. I personally prefer pomade to hairgel, makes the affair much less sticky," he commented just as dryly - though he could say nothing for the state of his being right now. Mud was likely still embedded in his hair, and he could feel small raised bumps on his face as he raised his hand to scratch his forehead. But, at least he was absolutely certain that this was - in fact - Eames. Any other forger would have dropped the image by now, under the idea that this was even a dream at that. Everything felt too real otherwise - the smells, the dirt on his skin, the sweat beading his hairline and brow. Regardless, he approached the forger, frowning all the while - though, this time, it was less frowning at Eames as much as it was frowning at their situation, which was something new.

"Where are we?" Arthur inquired - though at the moment it was much less like a question and far more like some sort of demand, as if Eames would have the answers he himself couldn't grasp the straws at. Though, really, he doubted Eames even knew - unless it was his fault to begin with, then which Arthur would promptly abandon the brit in the thick of the woods and vow more sternly to Cobb next time that they didn't need Eames and to next time, honestly, just hire a buxom brunette or blonde or redhead as opposed to hiring a man who could shapeshift into all those things.

Really.

Nevermind the bad experiences with beautiful women. Arthur looked about them, frown deepening. "We should get to a clearing."

/BRINGS A BOUQUET OF ROSES AND SINGS A ROMANTIC SONG OUTSIDE YOUR WINDOW...

[dreamesbig]

“Oh, really?” he inquired, though not seriously as the tone of his voice was way too enthusiastic for the occasion, “That’s funny because you’re looking quite shabby this afternoon, don’t you think?” Eames approached Arthur then, rubbing the sore area on top of his head with a single hand (still).

“Not quite sure where we are, but I have a hunch that it’s Iceland, judging strictly by the outstanding scenery.” When he’d gotten a closer look at the point man, Eames couldn’t help but point at Arthur’s face and snickered. “Wh…what happened to your face? Did you rub your face in poison ivy?”

o-oh ..... /DAZZLED *o*

[specificities]

Poison ivy? Arthur squashed the feeling of horror before it could be expressed on his itchy - and now, littered with red splotches - face. He dug a nail into the line of his jaw, scratching it irritably. "Iceland?" he echoed instead, choosing to ignore all other parts of Eames' conversational skills. Then:

"The flight path doesn't cross over Iceland, Eames. We would have had to been thrown severely off course by several thousand miles, and then crashed in a way where the plane has been completely eliminated - all without a single broken bone." He tossed Eames a skeptical look, using a hand to dig into the back pocket of his slacks to retrieve his cellphone. "We're not in Iceland." He flipped it open, but before he could dial the number he had memorized to reach Cobb's pre-paid, he noted the NO SERVICE AVAILABLE displayed in red across the front screen, as well as the flashing in the corner that warned him his battery was low. Grunting in displeasure, he turned off the cellphone before returning it into his pocket, opening his mouth to--

"PEOPLE OF THE CARAVAN. WE WILL BE ARRIVING AT THE TOWN OF STREAMDRAB WITHIN TWO HOURS..."

What.

He turned his head, eyes and ears searching for where the voice was coming from. There was a slight white noise accompanying it, akin to interference on radio waves.

"OR, ALTERNATIVELY, IF YOU SEEM TO HAVE FOUND YOURSELF IN THE WOODS..."

JUST AS PLANNED.

[dreamesbig]

He was quite disappointed that the other didn’t address Eames’ remark, since he was in a bickering mood; sometimes a good argument could stray the mind away from the situation, after all. However, he knew they were in a…pickle, to say the least. They were lost in a jumbo wood full of the unknown. Which way was north, south… home? “Well, I can assure you that this isn’t a dream,” Eames stated as a matter of fact and added: “Have you checked your totem?”

But as soon as he’d asked, he, too, heard the awfully random voice that sounded like it was coming from a cellphone speaker. His head turned toward the sound, its volume increasing with each step he took. “It sounds like a radio,” he said, more to himself than his reluctant partner. “It’s from those bushes,” he pointed out, chinning toward the direction as he drew in closer.

Eames pushed aside the rather large leaves out of the way, trying to find the source of the static. “Here we are,” he retorted as he grabbed the two small devices at the bottom of the bushes. …Well, that was new. He’d never seen any netbook that fruity before, but perhaps it was the only means of communication he could get for now. Maybe Cobb had found himself one as well, and then he could finally ask someone useful about their whereabouts.

He handed Arthur the spare one and then opened up his own, surprised that the device had not already been registered.

[specificities]

"Of course I checked my totem," Arthur snapped stiffly, following Eames as the other approached the bushes. A radio would be more than useful, on the off-chance they ... were in Iceland, he would at least have contacts. Well, they were Cobb's contacts - but Arthur had been acquainted with them once. He took the device when it was handed off to him, frowning curiously at both the color and size. He flipped it open, finding the source of the voice - some sort of network post. He scanned it briefly - it seemed to suggest that there were others in the forest, just as they were. If there were others, then maybe there would be Dom - though really, he would settle even for Saito by this point.

Any other person that would help ground him in reality.

"Looks like some sort of private network," he commented. But who left notebooks in the middle of the forest? New prototypes were expensive in that itself - and if these were just laying about, that meant the person who had been holding them was subsequently missing. Or roughly separated from them. Arthur glanced at Eames pointedly, fingers flying over the keypad as he quickly registered an account, all whilst promptly turning on his heel and beginning to stride in the opposite direction, towards the vegetation that seemed less sparse that would - hypothetically - lead them out of the forest entirely. He rubbed at his face with the crook of his elbow. He would need baking soda, or at least oatmeal...

At least on this thing, he had a signal. "We need to get out of here. I'll see if I can contact Cobb through this - if he's around, then maybe he can access the same network."