Anabasis: Part III: 9
Title: Anabasis
Author: coldthermistor
Artist: ellegen
Rating: R just in case, mostly for violence. There is no porn.
Word count: 80,617 words
Warnings: A little violence (possibly graphic), implied torture, and swearing.
Pairings: Cobb/Mal, Arthur/Cobb
Summary: Dominic Cobb is a man on the run. He's on the run from a marriage slowly falling apart, from being framed for a crime he didn't commit...and on the run from the memories of a betrayal that haunts him still. He remembers little of the night except for one thing, burned into his mind: Arthur betrayed him. Arthur cannot be trusted. Now, a business man, Saito has come forward: with what seems to be Cobb's best hope of learning the truth about that night so many years ago...and with Cobb's best hope of clearing his name. In return, he only wants an impossible job performed. Inception. There is no room for failure. The stakes are too high. But there is an enemy haunting Cobb's footsteps...an enemy wearing the face of a man that Cobb knows only too well: Cobb's former point man, Arthur...
-
There is a certain point at which the momentum of an object in motion can be considered to be unstoppable. Something of that principle was illustrated as Cobb launched himself over the last few metres - as the projection half-turned, realising his danger -
As Cobb slammed into the projection, throwing him off-balance. His knee dug into the small of the man’s back. At the same time, Cobb was already positioning himself to strike: one hand snaked across the man’s face to cover his mouth - so he wouldn’t make a sound, Ariadne realised, morbidly fascinated, and with the other hand, Cobb coolly slit the man’s throat with the combat knife and then lowered him quickly to the ground.
Immediately after, Cobb was moving, headed straight for the other projection. Except that he was too far away, and Ariadne didn’t think he was going to cover the intervening space without getting shot.
Without thinking, mouth dry, she racked the slide, cocked the hammer, and then sighted and shot at the projection. This isn’t Hollywood, Ariadne, Eames’ instructions reminded her, running through her head. Keep shooting at him. Don’t wait for flowers and a box of candy. Those bullets aren’t real, so there’s no reason why you can’t unload the whole magazine on him.
She felt the recoil, and her second bullet missed and then he’d just turned, bringing that rifle to bear on her when Cobb was on him, hand slipping over the projection’s mouth, and then it was over. He dispatched the second projection with relative efficiency and then his mouth twisted in distaste as he cleaned the knife off on the man’s clothing. She swallowed and ignored the streaks of blood. It wasn’t as if she hadn’t seen them before.
“Good work,” Cobb said, as he went back to the corridor to retrieve his rifle and his pack and shouldered them. “But we need to keep moving. I don’t think our friends outside missed the noise.”
“Right,” Ariadne said. She didn’t quite glance at the projection she’d shot, stepping around them. Cobb led the way to the exit and paused, taking stock of the situation, and the number of projections.
“Damnit,” he said aloud. “Another two of them, one headed this way.”
“Is it - do we - ?”
Cobb glanced back at her. “Well,” he said, “They already know we’re here. Keep behind me. I’ll signal you when it’s clear.”
Hefting his rifle, he just walked right out onto the walkway, before she could even begin to ask if it was a good idea.
-
Finding the entry vent hadn’t been the problem. Once Saito had managed to locate the entry to the air duct systems, and failed to remove it, he’d laid a charge and blown the grate open. Navigating the ducts hadn’t been the problem either. Cobb’s architect had been good for that. The passages might have been winding, but as long as the ducts went on, it was clear they had to keep on moving. In that way, there was no ambiguity. And at least the passage was big enough for them to walk in, without having to crawl or hunch over.
Saito coughed and his fingers came away stained with blood a few more times. He was starting to have breathing difficulties, although he did not mention them to his companion, who would no doubt start wondering about this sickly projection. It was becoming increasingly apparent that his condition was only worsening as he slowly died a few dreams up, and when Saito thought about it with brutal honesty, he did not think he was going to survive this dream.
Not without dying.
The thought did not frighten him, not as much as it could have. This was a dream, yes. He would drop into Limbo, yes. But Saito was determined he wouldn’t lose himself. He wouldn’t lose his memories. His will was too strong for that, and he could not believe he would allow himself to forget.
He did not believe he would allow himself to remain, to lose himself in what was only a dream and profoundly unreal.
This time, it was a series of coughs. Blood flooded into his mouth, and Saito took a deep breath and then another before it caught somewhere in his chest, and for a moment, he felt a trickle of fear and wondered if he was going to die now. He dismissed it. He did not fear death. He did not fear what he could not control.
He did not fear failure. He despised failure, and he had said he was going to lead Fischer in. More than anything, Saito hated jobs left undone.
“I’m moving ahead,” Fischer stated.
Saito opened his mouth to argue, but was interrupted by another series of coughs. He sucked in a few breaths and nodded, motioning Fischer on ahead. At least, he thought grudgingly, Fischer had some kind of initiative.
The air duct was a little cramped and Saito squeezed up against the wall to let Fischer move past him. He could all but see the grille of the exit ahead, and the pattern of the light slipping into the passage through the bars. Fischer got to work, attempting to pry the grate open.
Saito let himself go limp against the walls of the passage. Just for a few moments, he thought.
-
Eames took stock of the situation quickly. Dreams within dreams were extraordinarily unstable, but that was why Yusuf had used a stronger sedative than normal. He thought he could perhaps ruin the stability of the dream by stretching the fabric of the original dream, so as to speak. It always depended on the original sedative. In that, dreams within dreams was like trying to play a Mozart concerto while doing a headstand and juggling plates with your feet. Maybe while whistling Jerusalem. Sooner or later, too much complexity, too many layers destabilised the entire dream. The whole structure would come apart at the slightest disturbance, and he rather thought turbulence on the plane would manage that very nicely.
If he could overload Yusuf’s sedative sufficiently. Keep going down and creating dreams within dreams within dreams - except he was going to be taking a chance. A rather huge one, at that, and Eames didn’t fancy ending up in Limbo because some projection had come in through that door and shot him while he was trying to send the whole dream crashing down around their ears.
Unless he could put himself under and somehow prevent them from getting killed when the dream went to bits and pieces around them. Was that possible? “Bloody difficult,” Eames said aloud, thinking furiously. Without a conscious dreamer in the same layer as the rest of them, the integrity of the dream would start to fail. The dream would start to collapse - probably bring the whole ceiling down around them too, and falling pieces of ceiling and chunks of rubble were a great way to end up accidentally killing the team.
What he needed, Eames thought, was a guarantee. Something like a bunker. And to pray the bunker wasn’t going to cave in on them first.
So it was still a no on the dream collapsing front. Except he was running out of options.
He glanced down at his watch. He wasn’t just running out of options, he was running out of time.
And then Eames caught sight of it. He stared at the floating PASIV, and in that moment, call it inspiration, call it luck - he made the connection.
Hell, yes, he breathed. It was a crazy idea. But it was a lot more workable than trying to bring the dream down around them. Drifting through the air, Eames moved for the power socket and managed to work it open after applying the butt of his H&K to it with a good, sharp blow. He tossed aside the plastic covering and stared at the wires, frowning. Alright. Maybe this was a little trickier than he’d come to expect.
Eames worked from memory. In particular, a memory of one of the times he’d spent working with Yusuf and an unmemorable extractor on a job. What had happened: the PASIV had a malfunction, after the extractor had tried to work on it. Yusuf had briefly mentioned something about crossed wires and there had been a power surge that went straight through the lines and shocked them all awake before the job had even been properly executed. They’d woken up, of course, and it’d all gone to hell after that, but that wasn’t the point here. They’d woken up, even if it was a rather unpleasant sort of kick, and that was what Eames needed here.
Yusuf’s compound in the lines could carry a current. He just needed to administer one.
Eames frowned, glancing from the power socket to the PASIV. He’d got the wires and the additional voltage. Now he just needed to find a way to make it work with the PASIV.
Eames knew a little about the structure of a PASIV, and a little about PASIV maintenance. The instructions that covered the use of a PASIV usually said to leave the handling of a PASIV to a trained engineer. Still, most extractors learned a thing or two about PASIV maintenance, and Eames wasn’t an exception. Taking apart a PASIV and altering the wiring, however, was a task he knew he wasn’t particularly sure about. Eames didn’t happen to be carrying Arthur in his pocket. He’d have to figure this out on his own, and fast.
A few solid smashes with the butt of his gun got the PASIV casing open too, and then Eames set to work.
-
Cobb shot the last guard and motioned for Ariadne to move. She ran across the walkway, Cobb peering over her shoulder to make sure there wasn’t pursuit. There was no sign of anyone. Yet.
They took to the top of the tower two steps at a time. The tower was surprisingly empty and they encountered no projections on the way up. Cobb didn’t question his luck. He gained the window and set up the bipod, positioning himself to cover Fischer’s approach.
“There’s the antechamber,” Ariadne said, from where she was beside him. She pointed, and Cobb followed the direction she indicated and saw it. “It’s right outside the strongroom.”
“What about the strongroom, does it have any windows?”
She gave him a mildly reproachful look. “It wouldn’t be very strong if it did.”
“Figures,” Cobb muttered. Nothing about this job was going to be easy.
“Look, if you wanted to design it yourself - “
“It’s fine,” Cobb cut in. “Better hope Fischer likes what he finds in there.” He sized up the antechamber guards through the scope and considered the trajectory. He squeezed off several shots, working from the inside out, taking down projections with ruthless efficiency.
“Tower!” Ariadne said sharply, and Cobb’s gaze snapped towards the opposite tower. A projection had gained it and was aiming at him, presumably to stop him - Cobb put a bullet through him and reloaded. The antechamber was empty by now, and Cobb scanned the area but saw no indication of any reinforcements.
“These projections - they’re part of Fischer’s subconscious, aren’t they?” Ariadne asked, quietly.
A guard raced into the antechamber, and Cobb took him down. “Yeah,” he confirmed.
“Are you killing these parts of his subconscious?”
Cobb angled for a clear view of the second one and then dispatched him as well. “No,” he said, exasperated. “They’re just projections.”
In that moment, his radio crackled to life. “Cobb, there’s something wrong.”
“Arthur?”
“I’m picking up at least three patrols. They’re packing up and headed your way. It’s like they know something.”
Cobb frowned, considering it.
“I don’t like the look of this, Cobb.”
“Neither do I,” he said into the mike. “Listen, Arthur. We’re almost there. I just need you to buy us maybe ten more minutes. Draw them off.”
Dryly, Arthur said, “You’re not in luck. I can probably get you seven.”
“Do it,” Cobb said, and then closed off communications with Arthur.
Ariadne shot him a concerned look. “Why’re they coming back?” she asked quietly. “It doesn’t sound good.”
“You and me both,” Cobb replied. “They probably caught silence from the base and got suspicious.”
The skeptical look she shot him mirrored his own doubts, but Cobb did not give voice to any of them. Not now. If Arthur said he’d give them seven minutes…
“Hurry up,” he muttered under his breath. There was no sign of movement anywhere near the antechamber.
-
Eames accidentally zapped himself. He let out a curse and dropped the wires, plastic wrapping peeled back to expose the actual copper connections and shook his hand furiously. His fingers were an angry red.
He didn’t have time for this now. He knocked away another metal plate to reveal the base plate where all the somnacin cannisters ultimately connected as part of a retracting mechanism. He’d need to connect the power sources directly to that base plate. But that came later. Carefully, Eames picked up the wires, and was careful not to touch the exposed copper this time. He slipped it and touched it to the batteries, and then reached for the other set of wires from the power socket.
He was going to have to be very careful with how he pulled this off. Too powerful a shock and he could end up causing damage, maybe dropping someone to Limbo. Eames shrugged. He’d done his best, anyway, and it really wasn’t going to be his fault if that happened, despite his best efforts to avoid such an outcome.
He took a deep breath and hissed angrily as he twisted the copper about the base plate. Perhaps knowing the shock was going to hurt made it worse the second time. He paused, moving over to the floating sleepers and deftly undid Arthur’s tie. “Sorry mate, I’ll be needing that, thank you,” he said, and wrapped it about his hand. With that makeshift protection, he connected the second set of wires and then set to introducing the wires from the mains to the battery socket.
-
“We’re here. Are we clear to proceed?”
Finally. Cobb checked the antechamber one more time, and the corridor leading to it before he replied, “You’re clear but hurry. There’s an entire army heading your way.”
Faster than that, his brain supplied, if Arthur isn’t delaying them.
He pushed those thoughts aside, and focused on making sure the corridor and the area was clear.
It was then that he saw it, almost out of the corner of his eye. A figure. A movement. What the -
“Shit,” he cursed aloud. “There’s someone else in there.”
Ariadne was quick on the uptake. “Fischer!” she called into the radio. “Get out! It’s a trap!”
There was no answer. Cobb left it to Ariadne and sighted through the scope, waiting. No matter who was waiting (and how had he hidden in the corridor passage? How had he known where Cobb’s blind spot would be?) he had to take the projection down, if Ariadne failed in raising Fischer. Even if Ariadne succeeded in raising Fischer over the radio.
“Come on,” he whispered. “Just a little further…”
He’d compensated for the movement, rifle already trained on where the projection would be in a matter of moments. Fischer had already gained the antechamber, and he hadn’t realised his danger, wasn’t turning back -
And then Arthur came into full view. Cobb’s fingers went numb. No. No. How the hell had he gotten back here so fast? He’d been lying, Cobb realised. Maybe using the communications to try and trace their passage, to set himself up for an interception…
“Cobb!” Ariadne screamed, desperately. “He’s not real. He’s not real.”
Just a projection.
Cobb’s stomach dropped away, leaving a void in its wake. A vacuum, something that ate away at the edge of what he knew, etched in sulphuric acid. “How do you know?” he whispered.
Arthur fired. Fischer dropped.
An impact jolted Cobb’s shoulder and he reflexively pulled the trigger. His aim was off - he’d no idea where the bullet had gone. Arthur turned, and through the scope, Cobb could have sworn he was smiling. Their eyes locked. Cobb’s mouth went dry.
“Cobb!” Ariadne was shouting, into his ear. And then, “Saito, can you hear me? Fischer’s been shot! We need you to get in there.”
What are you going to do? What are your conditions of victory? Arthur seemed to be asking. As he always had. Mocking, maybe a little taunting. Winner takes all. What are you going to do now, Cobb?
Numbly, a pair of eyes burning into his skull, Cobb pulled the trigger for the second time.
He watched as Arthur died.
-
Ariadne dragged him down the tower at a run, towards the antechamber. Cobb didn’t glance at the second body, lying there, still. He couldn’t. He moved for Fischer, checking, but Arthur had been thorough. Fischer was dead.
“You shot him,” Saito stated weakly. He was bracing himself against the wall of the complex. He indicated Arthur’s limp form.
“He shot Fischer,” Cobb said, and thought he saw Saito’s eyes close in relief. Or maybe it was momentary weakness. He put that almost immediately out of his mind.
“What happens now?” Ariadne asked.
Cobb shrugged, feeling the void tug at him, a leaden weight in the pit of his stomach. “We go home,” he said, bitterly. “We failed. Arthur shot Fischer. He’ll be in Limbo now.”
“Then get him,” Ariadne countered.
Cobb stared at her.
Ariadne folded her arms across her chest, stubbornly. “There’s enough time. If you go down there, you’ll have all the time you need. So you get Fischer, give him a kick to come back up here, and then we let him into the strongroom and deliver the second kick, synched with Eames the moment he’s seen what he needs to.”
Cobb frowned, considering. It could work. It could actually work. But it was Limbo. Dread curled around his spine, breathed ice into his nerves. He remembered limbo. Remembered the maze at the heart of Limbo, the tree guarded by a dragon, the maze that a ghoul, a demon - and a friend - walked.
What are your conditions of victory, Cobb? Do you even know them?
He swallowed. “Alright,” Cobb said. He thought his voice seemed to come from a distance. “Let’s do it.”
“I’m coming,” Saito said. He watched Cobb, his dark eyes measuring. There was something else in there as well, dark and secretive, and Cobb couldn’t quite put his finger on it.
Cobb was about to say no, but he thought the better of it and shrugged. Why not? A critical eye showed that Saito was dying up here. Saito wasn’t going to be of any help up here. But down there, in Limbo, if what Cobb knew with a sinking dread, knew with a lump of iced-over lead, spiderwebbed with cracks where his heart was - if what Cobb knew so instinctively he couldn’t say where the thought had come from was right -
“Alright,” he said again, and was surprised when his voice was steadier. Ariadne produced the PASIV from a supply closet, and Cobb began to set it up swiftly. The more time Fischer spent in Limbo, the less likely it was that he might even consciously remember a great deal of what they’d established over the previous levels.
“You’ll need a kick,” he said quietly to Ariadne. “When you hear Eames’ music start to play, use a defibrillator to revive him. We’ll try and synch and give Fischer his own early kick from below.”
Ariadne nodded. “I’ve got it covered,” she said, sounding a lot more certain than Cobb thought she felt.
“Remember,” Cobb warned, before he lay back, “You’ll have to set the charges. Don’t forget what Eames has been showing you. Don’t get yourself killed.”
“I know,” she said, more than just a little impatient. “Good luck.” And then more quietly, “You know what you have to do down there.”
Maybe, Cobb thought. He closed his eyes and waited -
-
He was drowning.
Darkness all around him, and flecks of light above. His lungs were burning, aching for air, and everything had gone silent. For a moment, Cobb thought he was floating, suspended in a perfect stillness, moving through slow glass. And then he kicked out with his legs and he moved, shooting upwards until his face finally broke the surface of the ocean.
Time, sound, colour, light - all of them returned at once and Cobb gasped and sucked in huge breaths of air, kicking out to stay afloat. He glanced around for Saito. A few feet ahead of him, a dark head breached the waves, and Saito looked ahead of them, towards the large imposing buildings decaying under the power of the tide that surged in and pounded the rocky beach.
“Impressive,” he offered, impassively. “What is your plan?”
“We head in,” Cobb said, “Towards the buildings, and further inland.”
Saito shot him a sidelong glance. “You have constructed this world, then?”
“A long time ago,” Cobb breathed, forcing himself upwards and onwards. He made the shore of the beach then, and clambered out of the surf, pausing to make sure Saito made it out as well. His shoes squelched against the wet sand and his soaked clothing was heavy. They passed between the towering behemoths, Saito glancing curiously at the bits of rubble and concrete that covered the whole beach. And then, he said quietly, “This is where Arthur will be.”
“How do you know?”
Cobb took a deep breath. He paused for a moment, glancing up at the sky. The blue was so thin it was almost grey, almost colourless. “You know all about me,” he said. “You know about Algol. You have the files. The information I need. You know what happened that night.”
“I know a little,” Saito corrected. “I have access to what happened.”
“Arthur has Fischer,” Cobb explained. “It’s been going on since that night. Since Algol…came for me. It’s not yet over. He wants me to go in after him, to finish what he started. This is endgame. We’ve reached endgame.”
He was oddly certain of that.
Saito glanced at him. His face had gone curiously expressionless, his gaze curiously opaque. “You think so, Mr Cobb?”
-
Ariadne knew she had to set the charges, as quickly as she could. She was all alone now, and if Arthur had been right, there was an army of projections headed their way. She didn’t know if she could trust him. Cobb had. And Cobb had been wrong.
He was at the entrance of the antechamber, breathing heavily, before Ariadne detected him. She brought the Beretta up, and then she realised just who she was seeing.
No. It wasn’t possible.
“Shit,” Arthur breathed, staring at the corpse that bore his own features, lying still and very much dead on the floor of the antechamber.
-
They made their way inland, and as they moved further and further away from the ocean where they had begun their journey, the buildings were often newer. Soon, they were glancing at structures that were whole, if a little worn, and some that looked just like their real life counterparts. Cobb had built himself a facsimile, almost a duplicate of the real world. Parts of it were decaying, changing, warping to the more nonsensical structures of a dream. Statues, fountains, even a small lake where none should be.
This entire world was a labyrinth, a continuously changing labyrinth, first consciously constructed by Cobb, and then warped and changed by his subconscious. But beneath it, Cobb could still glimpse parts of the original template, the original facsimile of LA he had constructed, so long ago.
Cobb wasn’t sure for how long they’d been moving in silence, before he spoke up again. “I know,” he said, grimly. “It goes both ways. He knows me. I know him.”
“Mr Cobb,” Saito asked, almost gently, “If Algol had won by breaking you, why does he want to continue to face a defeated opponent?”
Cobb paused in midstep, staring at Saito -
-
“Not another step,” Ariadne said, sounding a lot more confident than she felt. “Or…or I’ll shoot you.”
“I’m not the enemy here,” Arthur said, carefully. “I’d hate to get shot.” She tensed when Arthur moved. She thought he was going to shoot her, but instead, he slowly moved his open hands to the rifle slung on his back.
“Drop it,” she ordered.
“Relax,” Arthur told her. “I’m doing just that.”
She watched him carefully, gun trained on him. Everything sane was screaming at her to put several bullets through him before he could shoot her or something, except that was blind fear. Cobb had shot Arthur, but Arthur had come back. She didn’t think more bullets were going to do anything except make him mad when he came back this time.
True to his word, Arthur laid the rifle on the floor and gave it a careful shove. It slid away from him. His hands were out in front of him, raised in the air so she could see he was unarmed and holding nothing. “I take it you’re his architect.”
Ariadne snorted. “I should think you’d know that by now.”
Arthur shrugged. “I guessed,” he said. “Didn’t think Cobb needed an architect.”
“You should know why.”
He regarded her and shook his head slowly. “No,” he said, “I don’t. Not exactly.” He was moving, slowly, before she could say anything, and knelt by his corpse. There was something faintly disturbing about watching the living one inspect the dead copy, and Arthur evidently felt the same way from the way the corners of his mouth twisted in distaste. He glanced up at her. “Nasty piece of work,” he said. “This is Cobb’s projection, isn’t it?”
The gun wavered in her hand. Ariadne thought about the implications of Arthur’s words. “So are you,” she challenged.
“No,” Arthur said. There was something quiet and sad in his face as he carefully flipped over the corpse and stood up. “Unfortunately, I’m very real.”
“Prove it.”
“I don’t know your name.”
“You make a habit of kissing girls you don’t know?”
Arthur shrugged. The corners of his eyes crinkled, and he smiled wryly. “Only the pretty ones.”
“How do I know you’re not lying?”
“You don’t,” he said bluntly. “Not unless you’re far more familiar with me than I think you are.”
Ariadne had to concede that. “Alright, but if I believed you, you’d be the real Arthur. The real Algol,” she pointed out cautiously. “From where I’m standing, that’s hardly much better.”
Something flickered in his eyes. “I’m not the real Algol,” he said, quietly. “The real Algol is dead.”
“How?”
“Long story,” Arthur said, dismissively. “Anyway. Cobb. Saito. Are they okay?”
“Cobb’s fine, Saito - well, so far, anyway,” Ariadne found herself saying. As Arthur had pointed out, there was no way of knowing. No way of telling if this was the real Arthur or just another of Cobb’s projections leaking through. And yet there was something about him, some kind of honesty that made her want to believe him. “I’m a little short on trust right now. We’ve time for a long story.”
Arthur shrugged again. “Will that stop you from pointing that gun at me?” he asked, off-handedly. “Because you really should take your finger off that trigger unless you mean to put a bullet through me.”
Ariadne carefully took the gun off him.
“And I thought you should know,” Arthur continued, relaxing a little. “I’ve delayed the projections but there’s still an army of them headed your way. We don’t have time for this.”
Ariadne thought some unpleasant words in her head. “I still have to set the charges,” she realised aloud.
“Give them to me,” Arthur said. He held out his hand. “I’m used to this. I’ll set them and get right back here. Maybe see if I can delay those projections any more than I already did.”
Ariadne hesitated.
“Trust me,” he said quietly. “I heard what you were saying over the radio. I’m here to help in whatever way I can.”
“Why?” Ariadne asked, bluntly.
There was something tight in his eyes, in his shoulders. Something undefinable and that Ariadne had no idea how to go about describing. “Cobb,” he said. A single word. Just that.
Somehow, Ariadne thought she knew what he meant, then. She handed him the pack with the charges and the remote.
Arthur knelt and shouldered his rifle. “I’ll set these charges and then I’ll be back,” he said. “If projections start slipping past me, shoot them.” He glanced for a moment at the figures on the floor: Fischer, Saito, and Cobb. Then, he headed for the doorway.
“Ariadne!” Ariadne yelled after him.
He paused. He didn’t look back. “What?”
“My name! It’s Ariadne!”
This time he did turn back for a moment and grinned. “Nice,” he said, and then slipped away to go set the charges.
-
Because it was him. Always him.
Because at the end, the enemy was Arthur, and at the same time, the enemy was himself. Because no matter how Cobb thought about it, no matter how he named the man Algol, this was the truth:
This was who Cobb was fighting: himself, his friend, and his brother, and all of them were the same man, and the same manifestation of his subconscious.
“There is something,” Saito said slowly, “That I think you should know, Mr Cobb.”
-
The series of mines he’d laid did little to deter the projections. Arthur figured out the placement of the charges from what the kick must have been - they probably planned on dropping the whole structure and went about setting all four of them at the weak points of the structure.
The professor teaching controlled demolition of structures probably didn’t know how his lessons were being put to use, all those years later. Perhaps he would have been fascinated. Arthur didn’t particularly care right now.
He shot two of the projections, grinned in satisfaction as a snowmobile hit a mine and sent projections flying. They’d probably start climbing up the air duct system this time around, so the moment he laid the charges, and made some attempt to conceal them, Arthur came running back up the open duct and through the passage.
If he’d seen the open duct and used the breach to penetrate the maze, the projections would soon follow.
They’d have to keep the projections away from the exit of the duct, then. He made it up and through the exit. Ariadne had set up the defibrillator, and was waiting by Fischer. She glanced up as he entered.
“Charges set,” he said, breathing hard. “They’ll be coming up the duct soon.”
“They know we’re here,” Ariadne said slowly, “Don’t they?”
Arthur nodded cautiously, uncertain of where this was leading.
Ariadne frowned, her eyes focusing on the removed grate, the exit of the duct where he’d just emerged from -
And Arthur heard a shuddering, grinding, shrieking sound, of tearing metal, shifting steel and concrete…
And then a larger, louder roar as the entire world shook -
“What the hell are you doing?” he called out sharply, feeling the slightest frisson of fear as the mountain came alive around them, in a roar of white and a solid wall of sound -
-
“I have an eyewitness,” Saito began. “Someone who saw what happened. Someone who knew what happened and was there. Do you know who I’m talking about, Mr Cobb?”
Cobb’s mouth went very very dry. The world went silent. The world went still. All the lines of doubt, all the clues, all the hints led towards this single moment, dark fault lines that converged on a single point, a single truth that illuminated the world in sharp crystal clarity.
Mirfak. The brightest star in Perseus. Brighter than its famous brother, Algol - just barely.
It was said you had fought three men off, staggered out, and collapsed in the street.
No. It wasn’t possible.
It wasn’t possible.
“He died,” he heard himself say. “The authorities checked. The building was wrecked. They pulled no one from the ashes.”
This is how it feels to be Dominic Cobb right now:
You thought you were standing on solid ground. No, you thought you had fallen all you could. You’ve been hurting all this while and you don’t even quite know it.
And all of a sudden, the ground is gone, and there is nothing but air, nothing but a gaping hole, an endless cavern into which you are falling, falling falling
and the wind whips past you, blurring everything into distant screams and the only thing you can hear are the words you are saying and wondering if you can drown in Saito’s eyes because there is no kindness there, and you wonder if you can find a kind of truth there.
Your hands are moving, even before you realise it, reaching out almost desperately. Saito allows the touch, allows your tentative hold on the lapels of his jacket. You can’t begin to recognise the flame-cracked edges of your voice.
You are windmilling, falling, reaching out for something to hold on to and if you let go, you will fall forever backwards into this new chasm and you know it.
And then you realise the truth:
You’ve never stopped falling. You’ve never found solid ground. It’s always been a freefall, a freefall into the endless dark and you don’t know how it’s going to end…
But you know where.
This is how it feels to be Dominic Cobb, raw, aching, stunned, disbelieving, confused - all of these, and more - right now.
-
Ariadne laughed shakily. It was reckless, she knew, but she thought the gamble had paid off. The facility was shaking, and she realised belatedly that the tremors might even awaken Cobb or Saito, might even deliver some kind of premature kick.
She hoped it wasn’t going to come to that.
“The mountain,” she said. “There’s still snow, piled up to the side, left over from the avalanche. I played with the gravity, gave it a little nudge. This facility’s built to withstand an avalanche but those projections aren’t. And I destroyed the duct.”
Arthur studied her, gravely. “So they know we’re here, now. They know exactly where we are.”
“They already did,” Ariadne countered, and Arthur was forced to concede that. Still, he shook his head.
“Risky,” he said grudgingly. “Terribly risky. Just like Cobb.”
“He did that too?”
Arthur nodded. “Pulled the whole group of projections to us. The subject’s mind tore us to pieces.”
Ariadne winced at the thought, and cast about for something else. “So what happened?” she wanted to know. “You said it was a long story.”
Arthur gave the twisted chunk of metal that had once been the exit of the grating one last, long look, and leaned against the wall to the side of the ex-duct system. “I hope you didn’t destroy the charges,” he said. “There’s a reason we don’t play around with the physics of a dream.”
“I know,” Ariadne said. “Hopefully, we’ve got a bit more time, though.”
Arthur accepted that with a reluctant nod. “How much do you know about Algol?” he wanted to know.
“Eames and Cobb both said it was you. You - the other you - “
“ - the projection,” Arthur supplied, with a wince of distaste. Ariadne couldn’t quite blame him.
“The projection,” she corrected herself, “Said that Cobb didn’t quite know what to believe. That’s why Saito roped him into this by saying he had the files Cobb wanted. And that he could clear Cobb’s name at the same time.”
“Yeah,” Arthur said, “That was me.”
“And?”
He took one long look at her. “You don’t give up, do you?”
“No,” Ariadne retorted. “Answer the question, please.”
Arthur acquiesced with a shrug. “How much do you know about the details of the Algol case?”
“What Cobb does,” she said, “Whatever he can remember.”
Arthur made a brief face. “Not good,” he said slowly. “I heard about…him,” he glanced towards the dead projection, and then continued, “From Saito. Cobb did a job on Saito before that and well…he showed up. Naturally, he confused Saito for a while before…Saito figured it out.”
“But Cobb was sure it was you.”
Arthur smiled, just a little too patiently. It reached the corners of his weary eyes, and in that moment, Ariadne realised she really believed him. All those little differences in attitude, in how he was - she’d picked up on them, but hadn’t really realised what they’d signalled until now. This was Arthur: a little softer, a little more tired than his counterpart in Cobb’s head.
“Wait a minute,” she said slowly, “It was you who shot the projections off in the first level?”
Arthur nodded. “I joined up with you there and then. While Fischer was shot, I was trying to draw off the projections, to keep them from coming back here.”
“Why?” Ariadne asked, in spite of herself. “How did you get here?”
He understood what she meant. “I was Saito’s source,” he explained. “I realised you’d overlooked Fischer’s militarisation, just a little before the plane took off. I was trying to get word to any of you before it was time, but I was too late. I managed to get a seat on the plane and headed down the compartment when I could, but all of you had already gone under. So I went under too, hoping to intercept one of you…or to just do whatever I could.”
“You were working for Saito all this while?”
Arthur shrugged. “It’s why I said it was a long story,” he said, reproachfully.
Ariadne waited.
“Okay,” he said, “How about this. I wasn’t Algol. I was never Algol. One of the officers on the case was.”
“Jake,” Ariadne guessed. “That’s what Cobb said. You said you were going back in for Jake.”
“I failed,” Arthur said, “As you can guess. Look, before that, I’d begun to suspect something wasn’t right. We all knew there was a leak. The question was - who was the leak, where did the leak come from? Algol was always one step ahead of us, and no matter how smart that man was, he shouldn’t have been able to know some of the things he did. Cobb persuaded me to agree to the whole set-up. I didn’t like the idea. Too risky. But Cobb was right. We didn’t have too many choices.”
“But…a cop?” Ariadne asked, frowning.
“FBI, actually,” Arthur said dryly, “Sure, there are polygraph tests and all, but a polygraph only works as well as you think it does. It isn’t the last word on a person. There are crooked cops after all. And even background checks…well, there are ways.”
“Well, yes,” Ariadne said, feeling just a little foolish.
“I didn’t expect it to be Jake,” Arthur continued. “He moved during the middle of our rotation - when I was trading with Edwin. The other agent. Neither of us caught him at it. I was supposed to go home but well, I came back, because I was worried about the leaks. He put Cobb under. Probably three times, maybe less. I should have gone in with Edwin, of course. We could have taken him together. But we didn’t. Edwin got in first. Jake must have taken him too, must have put him under. Maybe because Edwin was starting to get the idea something was up. He killed Edwin, and Cobb, well.” His mouth tightened into a thin line. He didn’t look at her. He was glancing at a far point on the opposite wall, and his eyes flicked to Cobb for a moment. “Well. Algol did what he did best. Broke Cobb. By the time I was there, Cobb…it wasn’t pretty. Cobb tried to beat me up. I got him out of there, tried to go back for Jake. He slipped away. I left too.”
“And you played dead,” Ariadne said. It sounded an awful lot like a movie. She said as much.
Arthur laughed. “Only a little,” he said. “I’d given Jake a bit of hell, and he looked terribly roughed up. He blamed that on Cobb too, of course. They got him on leave, told him to go somewhere else after he wrote his testimony, and to come back after the whole investigation was over. Standard procedure. Except I’d gone to some of my old contacts, told them about my suspicions on Jake. It’d have been my word against Jake’s, but I did a bit of fast talking and persuaded the MO to declare me dead in the fire.”
“Must be some really good contacts,” Ariadne said, impressed.
Arthur smiled faintly. “They were,” he agreed mildly. “FBI usually gets things done.”
“How?”
“I used to have a job before I went into extraction, Ariadne,” he said patiently. “Usually, they’d have just called Jake back, maybe run an internal investigation. Like I said, took a bit of fast talking. But this was Algol. It didn’t take much for the boss to cave in. So there it was. I was officially dead, and the last Algol knew, he’d gotten rid of Edwin and me in the fire, and Cobb was broken. Done for. Maybe he’d have come back for Cobb, but he wasn’t stupid. And this time, when he got out of LA - well, I was on his tail. And he’d no idea I was coming. It was my chance to turn the tables on Algol. I did. And that was when I met Saito.”
“And then?”
He shrugged. “Oh, Cobb had gotten out of the States as fast as he could. I hadn’t the first idea where to start looking. Cobb’s pretty good at hiding and he didn’t want to be found. And as for Algol…well. You didn’t expect a confession, did you? I’d too little evidence, and some of it wasn’t even admissible. It wasn’t a clear-cut case, not by any means. I’d gotten rid of Algol, but I couldn’t expect my contacts to well, pull their weight to get Cobb out of this. But Saito could.”
“So you worked for him.”
Arthur nodded. “And there you have it,” he said.
“He’s good,” Ariadne breathed in realisation. Arthur gave her a quizzical look. “Saito,” she explained. “He had what Cobb wanted - which was you, because you knew what really happened that night. And using you and his connections…well, he could get Cobb cleared and back home. He had what you wanted, which was a way to get the evidence through to the courts to get Cobb cleared. And you and Cobb had what he wanted, which was…”
“Inception,” Arthur said.
-
“Impossible,” Cobb whispered.
“Just like inception?” Saito wanted to know.
They came to a stop in the large plaza, the square almost empty except for two figures. Buildings towered all around them. There were one or two sculptures, creations of curving metal and marble. Abstractions. Cobb frowned. He hadn’t remembered them being there before, but Limbo had changed in his absence. Without his conscious mind to create, to impose structure on the unformed matter of Limbo, some of the buildings, the ones closest to the edge of his subconscious had begun to decay. The rest of them had begun to change, and Cobb thought he could make out the template: the beginnings of a labyrinth.
His labyrinth.
He held out a restraining hand - he and Saito came to a halt. Bound and gagged, Robert glanced up at Cobb, and Cobb wasn’t sure if he saw any recognition in Robert’s confused gaze.
And there was Arthur.
“Hello, Cobb,” he said, with a smile that was more a flash of teeth. It would have been a smile if there was a trace of emotional warmth in his eyes.
-
“The problem with inception,” Arthur said quietly, “Is that it’s the exact opposite of extraction. Extraction is traceless. Precise. It’s the ultimate crime, because no one can tell exactly what happened when the proper extraction has been pulled off.”
“And inception?” Ariadne asked.
-
“Almost impossible,” Cobb finally said. “Inception is imprecise. Sloppy. The very definition of inception requires a trace to be left in the subject’s mind: the idea that has been planted. The problem is: ideas change. They twist, they grow, and change. At any point of contact between the extractor and the subject - between any event and a subject, an idea is formed. What happens to that idea, whether it is rejected or, or whether it grows into something bigger - “
“ - Like the knowledge that you cannot trust that which is closest,” Arthur continued, eyes not leaving Cobb’s face. “You don’t know your friend. You can’t trust your brother. He will betray you. The smallest of seeds of doubt can lead to the most unlikely of results…”
-
“Madness,” Arthur said. “That was what happened to Algol’s victims, and it never occurred to us to look more closely. The answers were already there.”
“What answers?”
“Extraction works on the principle that ideas are never forgotten. Not once you’ve got one. It always sticks around here, somewhere,” Arthur said, tapping the side of his head lightly. “So look at what your team’s been doing to plant the idea in Fischer’s mind so far.”
“Talking,” Ariadne said slowly. “We’ve been talking to him, trying to get his projections to feed the idea back to him. That’s what Eames did on the first level. He planted the idea, and Fischer’s projections took it up on the second level.”
“Exactly,” Arthur said, with a nod. “That’s exactly it.”
And then the last of the pieces fell into place, all at once, in a single illuminating flash of logic, and Ariadne realised exactly what Algol did, exactly why Cobb had said that inception was perfectly possible -
“My God,” she whispered, aloud. “A forger. Algol was a forger.”
Arthur nodded with a grim satisfaction. “It’s diabolically elegant. What can break a person more,” he said, meaningfully, “Than getting hurt by what they’re most afraid of? Or even, getting hurt by someone they care about?”
-
Prologue
Part I: Extraction
1 | 2 | 3
Part II: Inception
4 | 5 | 6
Part III: Eidolon
7 | 8 | 9
Part IV: Apocalypse
10