Prompt Post No. 17
Welcome to Round 17 of the Inception Kink Meme.
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The next morning Ariadne was almost completely convinced that it was a coincidence and a random chance. She still didn’t know who had it, or how it had gotten there but despite her usually insatiable curiosity, she was going to leave this one alone.
She walked into the warehouse that was so much like their old one, but smaller, and saw Arthur leaning against his desk, staring at the whiteboard with a cup of coffee in his hand, held in front of his face. He looked pensive and Ariadne smiled. “Good morning, Arthur.”
He shifted his attention and nodded at her. “Ariadne.”
She knew by now that there would be enough coffee boiled and made for everyone - curtesy of Arthur’s good manners and insistent need to start work every morning at the crack of dawn. Eames would bring pastries in an hour or so because he was always late and this seemed to be his means of apology. Yusuf tended to arrive when she did; on time, ready for work and without the need of a barrier of sweets to stay on Arthur - or anybody else’s - good side.
Ariadne headed to what made up their kitchen. There was bench with a coffee pot, a few plates, some cutlery and five mugs - two of which were Eames; one for coffee and the other for tea - as well as a sink. Filling her mug - the blue one with the white spots - she noticed none of the other cups were clean and she wondered how late they had all stayed back last night. They hadn’t needed her, she had been tired and there had been an essay to complete and email her Professor.
Sometimes, she almost wanted to give up and work entirely in dreams.
Tucking the thought back inside herself, Ariadne reached for the sugar - she always preferred to stir it into the coffee, rather than dump it in the bottom of the mug; it hardly felt mixed otherwise - but her fingers touch something smoother than the packeting.
Ariadne glanced at it and stilled, her breath catching at the image her fingers had brushed; paper clipped to the packaging like a note.
It was another picture, another photo, of her work.
Ariadne pulled it free and a small tear formed as the paperclip caught on it, but the metal remained on the sugar. She barely noticed as she stared at it. This one was not a photo, not taken by anyone she knew; it was printed off the computer and on basic paper. The quality wasn’t perfect, but it didn’t have to be because she remembered it, like she remembered all her artwork.
She’d done it in highschool and it was one of her first extensive designs. She was becoming more confident, less afraid of getting caught and arrested. It had started out simple, the cafeteria of her school but then it was larger, spread, decaying, and filled with characters from books she was reading at the time and the movie’s she’d seen. When she finished it was a mash of all her interests; jumbled in a way that said nothing of preparation or skill and everything of inspirational bursts.
She wanted to both laugh and flush all at once over looking at it; the rattle of the can ringing in her ears like she’d been crafting it hours ago. Was the March Hare holding the Sgt Pepper’salbum? God, she’d forgotten her obsession with their music that year.
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“Uh,” she had to make herself react as her body hesitated in the kitchen. She didn’t try to take the sugar again. “Yeah, Arthur?”
She stopped beside him, but he didn’t look up; he was frowning “The club has two points of exit?”
“One at the back, one at the front,” she confirmed, and because she couldn’t stop it, “Did you have sugar this morning?”
Ariadne had always, privately, found it rather amazing that Arthur could convey all his emotions with the exact same, understated, subtle look while giving no apparent change in expression. Currently he was incredulous. “I don’t take sugar.”
Of course, she knew that, but he was the only one here.
But not last night.
Which didn’t rule him, but it also didn’t cross off any of the others, and now she knew for certain that it wasn’t a chance or a fluke. Someone knew it was her. She just didn’t know who they were.
It grew frustrating without ever changing. Ariadne talked with Arthur about the dream and her design before he went to his computer. Yusuf arrived, greeted them and took his coffee. Eames followed with his pastries and everything was the same.
When Eames went to the kitchen to make his tea, he asked about the paperclip on the sugar and Arthur told him he was a disgrace to the British for even having sugar in his tea.
Ariadne couldn’t stop touching the picture in her pocket as if it was her bishop; wondering which one would come next.
“You seem distracted today, sweetheart.”
Ariadne looked up from where she’d been staring at her mug. Eames was looking at her with amusement and slight curiosity. He was straddling the back of, what she believed was Arthur’s chair, and she almost smiled at the familiarity. At the inevitable argument he was deliberately planning on provoking.
“I guess I am,” she told him.
“Well do share with the class,” Eames urged, “there’s hardly an interesting conversation to be had in this warehouse.”
“We’re working Eames,” Arthur came in with, gliding out of the bathroom and back towards his seat; the barest twitch of his mouth stating his annoyance.
Eames glanced over his shoulder. “Quite right, whatever happened to mistresses and adulterous behaviour in our clients? Hardly a good bash without it.”
“The Fischer job never had that,” Ariadne pointed out with a half-grin.
“Ah, but we had dear Cobb to give us our entertainment; nothing to keep the interest flowing like a hearty near death experience.”
“I’m sure Saito was greatly entertained,” Arthur commented dryly before giving Eames and his chair a meaningful look.
Eames, of course, ignored him and turned back to Ariadne. “Now, pigeon, what’s got your mind so occupied?”
She paused and considered the implications of asking, of admitting she couldn’t figure it out. She hated her stubbornness a little in moments like this when she answered with, instead, “Why does Wallace’s sister hate him so much? Wouldn’t that potentially affect the dream if we don’t know what caused the riff?”
Arthur frowns and Eames looked like he was about to sigh.
“Eames-” Arthur began, but he was already getting up and with a bow, giving the seat back to Arthur.
Arthur didn’t quite acknowledge him as he began tapping at his keys, searching the requested information. Eames went over to join Yusuf by the PAISV and Ariadne went back to looking at her mug.
The problem, she knew, was that with professional criminals, they always found a way to cover their tracks.
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It was the first one that she’d decorated Paris with. She’d been enchanted, in love with the history, the people, the language and the art. The wall was a dedication to all the things Paris had to offer, wrapped in an antique design of a snow globe, given the air of a sea of falling flowers rather than snow.
It made her miss Paris, but not enough that she wasn’t able to realise the truth of the image. This had been downloaded and taken to get developed. This had been placed their with the intention of leaving it until she found it. Until only she removed it.
Grabbing and pulling the photo free, she stomped out of the bathroom.
“You were all in on this!” She exclaimed, “You all knew!”
Arthur turned away from the whiteboard to look over his shoulder, but Eames spoke first with a chuckle and his chin leaning on his hand. “Of course. Quite lovely work too.”
She felt vaguely cheated. “You all just stood there and let…” Ariadne stopped and took out the other photos, flicking through them and realising, “You all did it. All of you. You all picked a photo.” She glared at them in turn, each of them smiling in their own way, just like their placement of the photos. “Damn it.”
Eames got up and walkedover to her, patting her shoulder in something of a comforting gesture. “Don’t fret. It was really quite fun to watch you think about it.”
“That doesn’t make me feel any better.”
“If it helps,” Arthur said, turning back to the board and writing something. “Saito took the first one and sent it to Cobb. There for it was hardly possibly you’d understand the person behind it.” He paused and looked at the paper in his hand. “Eames, if you could attempt to write something that resembled proper grammar and correct spelling this job could be completed remarkably quicker.”
Ariadne jumped in before the argument could start. “Who put the first one behind the bar for Cobb?” Than, because it’s obvious. “No, nevermind. So, Arthur did two.”
Because who else would carry out Cobb’s order from halfway across the world? Without question. She could hear Eames’ stifled chuckle. Which, undoubtedly made him the sugar, because who else implements a paperclip and than talks about it? Arthur would also be the mirror because he was far too direct to let this continue forever so the only one who hadn’t was…
“Yusuf.”
He smiled at her and she walked over because he was the only one who hadn’t given her one, and this was surreal in a way that it probably shouldn’t be. Because, of anyone else in the world, who would care less about crimes and instead see them for the aesthetic beauty they contained?
Stopping in front of him, Ariadne watched as he began rifling around in his pockets before pulling out a simple, instant photo. It was slightly crumpled and there was a label half stuck to the back that he peeled off apologetically, glanced at, and then stuck to one of his many glass jars.
She took the photo and looked between it and Yusuf for a few seconds. “It’s just a wall?”
“Well I would much prefer a current piece, you see. It is remarkably more fascinating to view an artist before they complete something.”
She looked at the wall again. Cracked, clean and a canvas she already wanted to design. “This is in Scotland?”
“Mm? Yes.” He sounded distracted and she found he was looking at the jar he’d recently labelled, pulling a scrunched up note from his jacket as he did it and comparing them.
She turned behind her to find Arthur and Eames talking, or bickering, or whatever it was they did to pass the time. She felt like nothing had changed yet that something had, inside her. Something had grown warm.
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The rest of the photos, Ariadne stuck to her desk and around the layout of the club she was building. She smiled when she looked at them and though, it’s not a secret with them.
Multiple purchases and a design in her mind, she took her own kind of palette and went to the canvas she’d been given. A hint of a road sign caught in the edge of the shot was all she’d needed.
Kneeling down on the concrete, she felt the chill in her legs but the heat inside was burning bright as she swept a line of black along the wall. The rattle of her can followed her moves as simple as breath. The shadows came first, pressed into the cracks, taking over the brick and making her feel alive in a way only dreaming could compete.
She coloured and she designed and she felt flicks of paint land on her mask, on her face and on the beanie that covered her hair. Ariadne felt a laugh, a joyful sound try and break free and she wished she had more time, more ability to detail but her movements were time and her idea simple.
Adriane painted until there was no more wall left.
She came into the warehouse the next morning late and tired and far too happy to care at all. The first thing she did was stick a photo to the white board with a flourish before going after her cup of coffee and jam donut.
She got a smile, a laughing hug and quietly, grateful nod. Ariadne didn’t think about right or wrong or people knowing things about her that no one else did. She thought about different colours and spiralling scenes, about the clatter of an empty can and the kind of order she’d need for a bar of spirits.
Ariadne thought about Wallace Grumit and about a different mark that she might get on an exam, but most of all she glanced at the whiteboard and the picture that was untouched, unmoved and utterly there’s. And as they got ready for the final preparations before the extraction, she smiled.
A handful of photographs twisted in the breeze down an empty street; the alleyway they moved through was reflected, extended and enhanced across the bricks. In the cracks and in the shadows, in perfect little hiding places, obscured with care, lied a handful of objects; distinct objects that were sprayed with a distortion that reminded you, somehow, of some kind of a dream.
The wall was never washed, and the photos were never caught, not by anyone who didn’t already own them.
~Fin~
Whooo! There it is! A little later than I intended but nevertheless, here :) I hope you all like people! Thanks for reading, guys! ♥
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I think that's actually the preferred way to go about it. :)
Wallace Grumit
Any relation to Wallace & Gromit? :P
Great story, anon. I like the idea of all of them being in on it (and I'm very curious about how the hell they found out to begin with).
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*puts a finger to her lips* Shhh ;)
Thanks, I'm glad you liked it! (Saito has his ways~ [probably by monitoring the whole team like a concerned father. Haha.])
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Great job! Welcome to the inception kinkmeme :) It's a fun place. Although, yes, lj comment limits are painful.
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