Fic: Walsingham (3 of 5)
Title: Walsingham
Authors: agaryulnaer86 and myself
Pairing/Character(s): Arthur/Eames, and Ariadne
Rating: R
Warnings: Graphic violence and disturbing imagery, the foulest of language, adult situations and sexual content, and an adorable kitten. But just the one.
Summary: Ariadne, Eames and Arthur work a job over the holidays. Hijinks ensue, including but not limited to: chicken soup, a stray kitten, avoidance of the casting couch, a clown, and a job gone a bit sideways. Also, Chrismukkah.
Author's Notes: Written for the prompts exploring dreamshare and canonverse and messy blowjobs :)
master post
part one
part two
----
It's actually out of his hands after another minute of lying warm under the covers again. He closes his eyes with a smile still on his face, and the next thing he knows, he's being woken up two hours later to the sound of Eames coughing. But the other man appears to be sleeping while he does so, the tea half-drunk on the nightstand; with his stuffy nose, he's snoring like a hibernating bear, and actually resembles one rather strongly, considering the impressive day-old bear growth.
Arthur showers and dresses and Eames doesn't so much as twitch, but finally he runs out of excuses to stay in the hotel room when he really does need to get to the office, and he puts Wally back in his box (they really need to get him a carrier) and sits down on the mattress next to the snoring Eames, a lump beneath the comforter pulled up over his head.
"Hey," he says, poking first gently, then less so. "Wake up."
"Whaaat," Eames more mumbles than says, or at least that's what he tries to say. It does come after some more incoherent mumbling, so really who knows if the word actually gets out. The sentiment certainly makes it, though. Eames is not interested in participating in any of this "waking up" nonsense. But since Arthur is persistent, the sick forger finally pulls the comforter down far enough so that he can peer blearily up at Arthur. Who... is dressed. And sitting on the wrong side of him. It takes Eames a considerably long time to understand what that means, and when he finally does, he frowns.
"Y'r leaving," he says in a mumble, which is really more of an accusation than a mumble come to think of it. "S'it morning?"
"For a few hours," Arthur says, nodding, as it is, in fact, now morning. "Ariadne wants to go through a few ideas with me for the job. I'll be back around lunchtime. Your phone's right here, and there's water and medicine with it on the nightstand, and a book if you wake up some." He puts a hand on the other man's forehead now that he can see it, but nothing feels warmer than it should. He feels much cooler than yesterday. "I think your fever's broken, so you should start to feel better."
Lastly, he sets the remote on the nightstand, as well. "Want the TV on?"
Eames mumbles something that sounds vaguely similar to “yes, please,” blinking up at Arthur. Arthur’s hand hadn’t felt freezing on his forehead, which is good news, he thinks. Perhaps he won’t die after all… a pity, really, since he was beginning to look forward to being a kitten and playing with Wally. But he supposes he doesn’t mind living on as a man. There are certainly a number of things he enjoys about that. Like Arthur. But if Arthur owned him as a kitten, Arthur would play with him, maybe…
“I sh’d call Walker,” he mumbles, and it of course turns into a fit of coughing. So, naturally, instead of doing any calling of anyone, Eames promptly does his very best to curl up into as small a ball as possible for someone his size. And without moving his head. “You don’t have t’ come at lunch, love,” he adds, trying very hard not to sound pitiful. It would work better if he could stop coughing, or if he didn’t turn near indecipherable when trying to speak while slightly feverish, barely awake, and on a great deal of medicine. “L’probably jus’ be out cold. Which’s a fancy way of saying sleeping like a rock. A rock what’s had too much tequila.” Tequila would be nice, actually...
"The last thing you need is alcohol, on those drugs," Arthur says, shaking his head. It's obvious where that line of thought was going, at least. He could practically see the idea occurring in Eames’ mind. "And I'll be back at lunch."
After all, it's not like Eames doesn't want him to be here, and... Arthur would also like to be here. He'd just worry all day about Eames lying here sick by himself. He'll get what work needs done finished with Ariadne, and then he'll come back, probably with what's left of the soup.
Before Eames can argue any further, Arthur stands, pulling on his overcoat and then his satchel, and picking up Wally's box. Pulling open the door, he says over his shoulder, "And I'm going to stop and pick up a carrier thing on my way back. This is just awkward on the subway." People keep looking at him like he's a serial kitten killer when Wally mewls. Shaking his head, he steps out the door, making sure the lock engages behind him.
As Arthur had insisted, Eames does not die. He’s off from work for Walker for two days, having called the man and apologized profusely though a hacking cough but been assured that his job would wait. Reassured, Eames mainly sleeps through both days, waking only to take his medicine and have food more or less forced upon him. And to muse about things at Arthur, when Arthur is there, such as whether or not it’s possible to cough up a lung, or (while watching Bewitched on TV Land for an hour before the NyQuil had knocked him out) whether or not it’s a genetic thing that allows people to twitch their noses like so or if it only takes practice.
Eames falls asleep that night curled up in a surprisingly small ball next to Arthur, wondering if he could give forging Samantha a go so he could ride a broom and twitch his nose, totally unaware that he is wondering such things aloud.
---
When the already dim lighting in the fun house goes out, the entire place becomes pitch black. Arthur freezes in place, having just passed the distorted mirrors, and swears viciously. He has a little ways to go, still, until he reaches the safe, and he's going to have to do it blind. Whatever the fuck just happened with Walker, though, it doesn't appear to have been something he'd done, because nothing jumps out at him and attempts to kill him. That's at least somewhat reassuring.
He takes a step forward and a cold jet of air shoots up from the floor, making him swallow a yelp. Sonovabitch.
Three more air bursts and two floor sections that abruptly dropped a few inches beneath his feet, and he reaches the utility room marked Staff Only, the lettering handily glowing in the dark. This isn't Fort Knox, and he opens the door, seeing a copy of the man's apartment safe sitting on a shelf, surrounded by cleaning supplies.
He opens the safe with a turn of the handle and pulls out his penlight, looking inside. He finds the script, exactly what he'd been looking for, and skims the plot as quickly as he can. It's only a draft, and incomplete; he memorizes the details and slides it back in, startled when he sees something else inside.
Eames had been slowly planting the idea of scripts and agents and such in Walker's mind, and so the unfinished current script should have been the deepest secret hidden in the safe. But instead, there's a small manila envelope in the back corner, blocking Arthur from replacing the script and shutting the door. He reaches in, moving it out of the way so he can replace the script, pauses for a beat, and then pulls out the smaller envelope, tearing it open.
After all, he wouldn't be in the business of stealing secrets if he wasn't a nosy bastard, would he?
Inside the envelope, however, are a handful of plastic rectangles, the size and shape of credit cards. He pulls them out, tucking the envelope beneath his arm and shining the penlight on the cards.
Driver's licenses. Six of them, all of young men, of varying ages, from different states. Three are from Iowa, one from Kansas, one from Oklahoma, and one from California. Out of habit, and because this is strange, and strange things tend to be important in this business, Arthur memorizes the names. And then he puts the licenses back into the envelope, tosses it back into the safe, and clicks the safe shut. Time to get the hell out of here.
He pulls out his phone, dialing, but can't get a signal. Can't alert Eames to end the dream. Fuck. Even in their own damned dream, he's without cell service when he actually needs it.
Fucking wireless. Swearing under his breath, he starts to feel his way towards the emergency exit, accessible only from the inside of the fun house maze, when he hears the shot. Freezing for a moment, he mutters a quick fuck and shoves the phone into his pocket, pulling out his Glock and moving more quickly in the direction of where the emergency exit should be.
---
In the morning, as has become habit, Eames coughs himself awake. Only this time, it’s six in the morning, and instead of groaning and curling back under the blankets, the forger drags himself out of bed and to the bathroom, where he manages not only to shower, but to shave and brush his teeth. By the time Arthur wakes up, Eames even has real trousers on (no shirt yet) and is eating the Snickers bar he’d hidden in his suitcase because Arthur wouldn’t stay with him on this job, so he’d figured he could pack whatever he bloody well pleased. He still looks a bit worse for wear, run-down, but considering how he’s been doing, Eames looks very nearly cheery as he smiles at Arthur. “G’morning, love.”
Blinking blearily up at the other man, Arthur looks first at the Snickers bar and then back up at Eames, surprised but pleased. Frankly, if that looks good to him, Arthur's not going to complain, not if Eames is upright and cleaned up. It's enough to wake Arthur up far more quickly than he can normally manage, and he rolls out of bed, thinking a shower for himself might not actually be a bad thing.
He's not going to kiss Eames and risk getting his germs, but he does slap him on the now trouser-clad ass on his way past him, into the bathroom. "Looking much improved, sunshine."
Eames looks like he can’t quite decide whether he should be pleased or offended by this, and doesn’t quite manage to decide by the time Arthur is past him. Nor does he manage to come up with a witty retort. All he manages is to repeat, “Sunshine?” sounding mostly incredulous but somewhat amused, but he blames that on the fact that he’s still not entirely well.
Well, he’s always not entirely well. But he means physically. Physically speaking. He would be better if he could follow Arthur into the shower… but alas. Rules and such, and the plague on top of that.
"Crumpet?" Arthur says, equally incredulously (albeit also mockingly), through the door as the shower turns on, recalling Eames’ latest nickname for him. "And it's sunshine you don't buy?"
There's the sound of the glass shower door opening and shutting, and then, "I notice you're not complaining about the spank." He is a mean, mean person. To himself, even, because nothing's going to come of any of this.
“The thing is, crumpet, that I am not particularly full of sunshine this morning,” Eames points out. “Unless you were being ironic, in which case carry on, I suppose.”
After all, the only times Arthur calls him by pet names, it is done to mock Eames’ inability to call Arthur by anything but pet names. Even when he calls him Arthur, he adds another name onto it (“Arthur dear”). Arthur has come to accept this because there is very little he can do about it, and because then he can save his complaining and threatening for the worst pet names of the bunch.
And as for being spanked… “Of course I’m not complaining,” he says, beginning the search for an undershirt he hadn’t worn while dying of consumption. “You can spank me any time you like, darling.” He pauses, considering as he finishes his Snickers. “You can do more than that.”
Arthur snorts, shaking his head. "Not while you might still be contagious," he mutters. Another time, he might even risk it, but not when they're already a couple of days behind on the job. Of course, he doesn't blame Eames, it's hardly something he could control, and it means that he and Ariadne got a lot done while Eames was convalescing. But it also means that Eames has to catch up a bit.
He goes to grab a bagel for himself from the paper bag of them he'd picked up the day before. It's a little stale, but not bad at all, and he munches contentedly as he dresses, fastidiously keeping crumbs from his clothes, hanging neatly in a garment bag in the closet. "It's ironic in the same way it is when you call me crumpet." He's giving up his own room. Might as well move his things down here. Slowly, so Eames doesn't catch on. He pulls his shoes out from under the chair, and then raises a brow, lifting a dozing Wally out of one and setting him aside. "You'd better not have chewed on my laces, buddy."
Wally mewls up at him, but Arthur shakes his head. "You have to wait until we get to the warehouse, bud, you ate everything I brought back, and there's tomato in the bagels." To Eames, he continues, "We decided to go with one of the scripts from the hard drive. It looks like the earliest he's written. The victims in it are all successful younger men, and since he knows you, or he knows Greg..." He trails off, arching a brow. "Feel like playing victim? No actual blood and torture, but you can both run from the monster together while I get to the safe."
“Hmm, victim,” Eames says, thoughtful as he begins the process of buttoning up his shirt. “I suppose I could manage. Although it’s not nearly as much fun as playing the young virgin who gets chased in the beginning of all of those movies.” Then again, Eames has no desire to actually end up tortured and murdered in this dream, so this is probably for the best. As long as Arthur promises no blood and torture.
Anyway, he won’t even have to forge anyone, just keep up pretenses as Greg. Simple enough. And Eames has more important things to think about, such as the way Arthur is holding Wally, worrying about his health, and calling him ‘buddy.’ It’s probably the most adorable thing Eames has ever seen in his life, which is exactly why he does not comment on it. Arthur will never do it again. “What’s wrong with tomatoes?” he asks. “Will they hurt him? Shall I forgo tomato sauce?”
"Tomatoes are poisonous to cats," Arthur says, wrapping his unfinished bagel in a napkin and tucking it into his coat pocket where Wally can't get at it. "So yes, please avoid the bolognese." And speaking of felines, he scoops the kitten up before Wally can scamper away, and carries him over to the little black nylon carrier, where he's deposited gently on the cushioned inside with no regard for his pitiful mewling.
Five minutes later, Arthur is ready and cat hair-free, and he picks up the carrier, depositing it in Eames' arms. "I told you he was your responsibility," he says gruffly. And then he picks up his satchel and his laptop case and turns to stalk out of the room first, completely ignoring any and all of Eames' possible reactions to that.
Trying very hard to look chastised, Eames follows after Arthur dutifully, carrying the case. He pokes a finger in the little opening in the case, distracting Wally from his pitiful mewling and getting his finger bit in thanks. Sadly for the continued safety of his fingers, all this seems to do is make Eames laugh a little, delighted to be able to play with Wally again.
“Thank you for watching over him while I was ill, love,” he says as he follows Arthur to the elevator. He means it, too; Arthur had said Wally was his responsibility, and then he’d gone and nearly died from tuberculosis. Eames isn’t trying to placate Arthur; he’s really quite grateful. “And me.”
Arthur hides his smile behind his bagel, hitting the button for the ground floor. "No problem," he says, putting as much grudging acceptance as he can into his voice. "Don't let it happen again."
The dream is dark, very dark. It's only the one level, and so Ariadne has gone all out in the days Eames has been sick, making it perfect. And it is, in fact. Arthur is very impressed as he peers around in the near pitch-blackness. They're in a darkened carnival, a maze of games and rides and doors. The roller coaster actually encircles the entire level, and trying to escape through it only leads, paradoxically, right back into the closed area. She'd even added maintenance doors, and open tent flaps, all of which lead right out into other places in the maze.
And beneath it is another maze of steam tunnels, both the settings from the climactic scenes of the two scripts reproduced almost perfectly. "And the safe is in the fun house?" He eyes it. It doesn't look particularly fun, but he supposes that's the idea. He's got a map, anyway, to memorize the path through the mirrors. "Eames takes Walker down to the tunnels, the way the script goes, and I go right for the safe."
“Yes,” Ariadne says, to both his question and statement. “It’s in the mirror room. That should give you extra protection from projections if it comes to that.”
They all hope it doesn’t, of course. But it’s always best to plan for the worst and be pleasantly surprised. Eames is rather pleasantly surprised by this level, in point of fact. This is the first time he’s seen any of it, and the forger spends a good amount of time eyeing what he can see from where they stand before speaking, inspecting it thoroughly. It is, as far as he can tell, a very good reproduction of one of Walker’s movies, a horror movie made real. Ariadne really is quite frighteningly good at this. Pun intended.
“Suppose it’s best I inspect the tunnels, then,” Eames says. He’ll have to know those like the back of his hand. But right now, he’s eyeing the skyline. “Does the roller coaster work?” Not that he would ride it or anything, but… okay, he might.
"It can," Ariadne says, following his gaze up to the top of the rickety-looking white structure. "I wouldn't trust the seat belts around some of those turns, but go right ahead." She grins at him. "Falling a few hundred feet will only wake you up."
Arthur says nothing about bloodthirsty little pixies. He says nothing very loudly.
Ariadne glares at him. He raises his brows at her. "I didn't say anything."
"Asshole."
"Yeah," he replies simply, his dimples making a very slight appearance. She's clearly spending too much time around him, is Arthur's conclusion. Still, he can't find it within himself to be displeased about that. "Tunnels?" he suggests, gesturing to the closest manhole. His smile disappears as his more serious work face returns.
Ariadne does not look particularly amused, but Eames finds himself coughing to cover a smile of his own. Very handy at times, respiratory illness. Even if they’re dreaming now and he’s unlikely to need to cough, really, but no one can prove it.
They follow Ariadne to said tunnels; this is Eames’ first time down here, where he’s supposed to be leading Walker, and when they get there he can’t help but be impressed. Even if it’s a bit frightening that it’s so accurately dank and dark and sort of… foggy? That doesn’t even make any sense. And yet there it is, and somehow it adds to the eerie feel of the place. Eames kicks around at some of the fog at their feet, appreciating the attention to detail even if it doesn’t make much sense. This is a dream, after all, sense isn’t mandatory. “Very nice,” he says, glancing over at Ariadne. “In a dank, foreboding sort of fashion, I mean.”
Arthur nods, looking around, as well. "It looks like something out of a crappy TV horror movie," he observes, sounding very appreciative. "It's perfect."
They walk through the maze, Ariadne showing them both all the switchbacks and cut-offs. There's no need for paradoxical exits here, in the maze. There are no doors for anyone to go through except for ones that are actually part of the puzzle. They'll both need to memorize this route, Eames because he'll have to take Walker through it and Arthur because if shit goes to hell, he has to be able to find Eames.
Not because he's worried that Eames can't take care of himself, of course. But... he just likes to know. It's a control thing, yeah, but it's not a crime.
They wander through the tunnel maze until the dream ends, and wake to find themselves back in the quiet office. It’s almost too quiet, after the oppressive eeriness of the dream fairgrounds and the tunnels below. Eames, for one, spends a moment convincing himself that a serial killer won’t be standing behind him when he opens his eyes… and then nearly lets out a yelp when he finds himself being stared at.
Fortunately for his panic level, the person staring at him is not a person at all, but a cat. A very tiny cat, kitten actually, who happens to be sitting on his upper chest, just… staring at him. Waiting for him to wake up, Eames supposes. Once he’s opened his eyes and jumped, biting down an unmanly yelp, they stare at one another for a couple of seconds before Wally lets out a tiny, pathetic sounding mewl, and Eames bursts into laughter that doesn’t even turn into a cough.
Still laughing, he reaches up to cuddle Wally before the cat walks up to him, biting gently at his nose. Eames can’t quite seem to stop laughing. “Sorry, love, I’ve been neglecting you. Deepest apologies.”
"He missed you!" Ariadne coos, pulling out her phone and snapping a picture of Wally biting Eames' nose before reaching over to scratch gently behind the kitten's ears. Arthur rolls his eyes, but only slightly, sitting up in one of the easy chairs and standing with a quick stretch.
"He missed being spoiled completely, you mean," he mutters, definitely not admiring the sight of Eames cuddling a kitten before he turns to head back to his workspace. No, definitely not.
"Like you didn't spoil him!" Ariadne calls after him, her voice dry as a desert.
"I took exceptional care of him, as per the needs of juvenile felines," Arthur retorts, picking up his headphones. "I did no more than that." Pause. "And only because Eames would bitch if I didn't." Another pause. "Bitch more, that is."
"Methinks you protest too much!" Ariadne yells back, but when there's no reply, she sighs. He's put the headphones on. Dammit. "He totally spoiled you," she coos to Wally, petting him again and making him start to purr even louder.
“Did he?” Eames asks, grinning. He’d been a bit too unconscious most of the time to notice Arthur doing any spoiling, but if the soup he’d made for the forger is any indication, there most definitely had been some spoiling going on.
Ariadne nods, and Eames’ grin widens a little as he reaches up to pet the kitten sitting on his chest as well. Wally’s purring increases exponentially with both Ariadne and Eames petting him, and Eames spends a moment being very pleased that if he had to be sick, it happened at the perfect time to give Arthur some alone time with the kitten. “Don’t worry, love. He thinks of you as more than just a juvenile feline.”
Thankfully, Eames' recovery also means that he goes right back to work for Walker. Or perhaps not so thankfully, for Eames' sanity, because when they're ready to run the job a little less than two weeks later (the actual event delayed but not cancelled, despite Eames' convalescence), Arthur is beginning to wonder if he should remind Eames not to add arsenic to the chloroform in Walker's coffee.
Despite his (mostly ungrounded) worries, everything seems to go smoothly on the day of the plan. He and Ariadne gain admittance to the building via Eames, as Greg, having left their false names at the front desk, and they walk right past the extensive security as though they have every right in the world to be there. No one bats an eyelash as they pass, just two more young, attractive people in business suits in Hollywood. They blend right in.
Their elevator dings on the correct floor just as Arthur's watch ticks to the time when Eames is supposed to bring Walker his second cup of coffee for the morning. They stroll down the hall, Arthur pulling out his phone and sending Eames a quick text. Here.
A minute and a half later, the door is unlocked and pulled open from the inside; Eames steps back out of the way to admit Arthur and Ariadne. He steps forward to shut and lock the door again behind them, sending them both a happy enough smile. “Good morning,” he greets them, just before turning to lead the way back towards Walker’s office.
It is, of course, a room without windows, far back into the large apartment. Greg’s things are neatly laid out on the coffee table in the living room they enter first, and Eames pauses to put Greg’s glasses on top of his computer before leading the way back through the hallways.
“He’s out,” he says, which should be obvious, but bears repeating. Here he pauses at a nondescript door, opening it to admit Arthur and Ariadne. Normally it’s locked from the inside, but he’d picked it with little trouble once he’d determined that Walker was asleep. “I gave him exactly as much as I was told and did not lace it with anything, nor did I kick him to test its effects.”
Arthur withholds his smirk, merely nodding approvingly, but Ariadne chuckles as she steps past Eames and into the bedroom. Arthur sets down the PASIV, slipping out of his overcoat and setting it aside. They work quickly, setting up the machine, with Ariadne in the easy chair and Arthur and Eames preparing to sprawl on the floor. Arthur unrolls each of their lines, sliding the needle into Walker's vein.
"Ready?" he asks, sliding the needle beneath his own skin. He's done it so many times that he barely feels the pinch on his arm, the nerve endings probably nearly dead, but it's still always eerie to feel the metal of the needle resting beneath his skin. He'd always hated getting shots as a child. It seems silly, now. But this isn't really the time for philosophical thoughts. He brings his mind back to bear on the task ahead, surprised that he'd managed to deviate from it at all.
“As ever,” Eames assures him from the floor, needle already in his arm. They’ve had longer than usual to prepare for this- because Eames had spent two of their preparation days languishing- and they’re as ready as they’re getting. Waiting any longer would be more of a security risk than an aid. They’re ready. Well, as ready as one can be to wander into a job in someone’s dream. Especially when there is the potential for evil clowns being involved.
---
Walker’s expression has gone from giddy to something resembling annoyance, but at this point Eames could care less; he drags the writer along behind him, Browning out and ready to take out any more demented projections. He really was just not prepared for this, no matter how many demented movies he’s watched with Ariadne since this bloody job started.
So, wanting to minimize his chances of being killed by zombie ponies or creepy clowns or old, creepy ladies with no teeth or something, Eames makes for the entrance to the underground maze, knowing Arthur will know to find him there. Especially if he’d heard the shot a moment ago.
“Where are we going?” Walker finally manages, trying to yank his wrist out of Eames’ grasp. Eames tightens his grip, and for all that he downplays his physicality as Greg, he’s still much stronger than the other man.
“Your agent, Mr. Walker,” Eames repeats, as calmly as possible. “He-“
He falters at the sound of a high-pitched laugh. A familiar laugh, because they’d just heard it not a minute ago, right before Eames had shot the source, at least sixty yards behind them.
Swearing, Eames starts forward again, not relinquishing his grip on Walker's wrist and in fact nearly shoving him down through the manhole ahead of Eames himself. After all, if he lets Walker go after him, who knows if the mad bugger will even follow at all? He might decide to stay with the murderous clown, and Eames is not dealing with anything so creepy, not after he's already put a bullet in its head.
The tunnels are just as dark and damp as they'd been during the trial run, but the greenish lights are still in place and still lit, making it seem both eerie and a bit like they're underwater but not necessitating their carrying along a light, which would be a dead giveaway as to their location. Recalling which direction he needs to head in, Eames tugs Walker off down the leftmost corridor.
It’s a maze, of course, whether the projections or Walker realize that or not, so a short hallway later and they’re making another turn, then another, until they’re well away from the manhole through which they’d entered. Even on alert, Eames can’t hear anything but their footsteps and breathing, the electric buzz of the lights; slowly, he begins to relax a little, thinking that getting deep enough within the maze will keep them safe from projections, buy them some time.
And then they turn another corner, and Eames skids to a halt while the lights flicker. Still being dragged behind him, Walker nearly bowls Eames over as the forger slows and then halts completely, staring ahead of them down the hallway… the hallway that isn’t the one he’d been expecting, the one that Ariadne had designed and he’d had to memorize.
This hallway stretches out before them much farther than it ought to, farther than Eames can see even as he stands, frozen, and does nothing but stare at the sterile linoleum flooring, the off-white walls and the sometimes flickering fluorescent lights. There are numbered doors every few meters, some with smallish windows. Further down the impossibly long hallway, Eames can see some chairs, a counter built into an opening (taking the place of another door to a room) with a desk behind it. He can hear a phone ringing, vaguely; he thinks that it must be from behind that counter, but no one is there.
Eames’ stomach twists uncomfortably, and the moment he smells disinfectant, his heart picks up its pace despite all of his long history of handling terrifying or traumatizing dream events. It’s not real, he reminds himself in a very carefully not panicked inner voice, turning around to go back the way they’d come. He doesn’t realize he’d let go of Walker’s wrist until he turns unimpeded and nearly runs into the writer… and then stares through Greg’s glasses behind Walker... at the expanse of hallway, almost identical to the one in front of them. Where they’d come from is gone. It’s just… more hallway.
More hospital, Eames thinks, and as soon as he thinks the word, the urge to flee hits him hard. He has to swallow, refusing to behave so unprofessionally, like a child. It’s just a hallway. In a dream.
Just a hallway. Innocuous, really. There’s no reason to be attempting to flee. It’s not actually a hospital. What he should be doing is focusing on what the bloody hell is going on, on where Ariadne’s planned maze had gone. Except even as he’s firmly telling himself not to be a pansy about this, that he has to focus on the job, Eames can feel the color draining from his face. It’s always been like this with him and hospitals; he could have handled anything besides a hospital.
Eames eyes Walker, not sure he understands the expression on the other man’s face, and tries not to sound as shaky as he feels. He’s always been an absurdly good actor, though, and so though his fear is evident in the lack of color in his face, Eames’ voice comes out almost confidently. “Well, at least we’ve lost the clown.”
The hallway is eerily silent, and Walker's footsteps are loud as he steps up next to Eames. "Yeah," he agrees with a sigh, sounding disappointed. "I wanted a giraffe." And then he wanders off to the side, to all appearances examining a crash cart in the deserted hallway.
The silence is abruptly broken by the sudden beep of an intercom system, followed by a woman's voice, made near-incomprehensible by what is obviously a poor-quality system.
"Incoming, seventeen, male, automobile collision. Emergency personnel to bay four, please."
At the far end of the hallway, there is the sound of people suddenly bustling into action, despite the fact that to all appearances, the place is still deserted, not another person to be seen.
Eames takes several steps in the direction of the noise before he realizes what he’s doing and stops the automatic reaction. He hadn’t even registered what the voice had been saying, what was going on, had just started for the noise. Except there’s no one there, the noise isn’t coming from anywhere that Eames can make out, and slowly, he begins to realize that he doesn’t want to be anywhere near whatever is making that noise, the person they’re bringing in down the hallway.
If dread had hit him before at the sight of the deserted hospital, now it’s deepened into something worse, the feeling in his chest almost painful in his intensity. Eames has to stop himself from turning around and running, not because of any sense of pride or professionalism, but because there’s nowhere to run.
The noises stop a moment later, and Eames sucks in a breath, suddenly aware that he’d stopped breathing, freezing like one of those bloody heroines in a horror film who’d walked downstairs upon hearing a noise and shouted “Hello?” and then frozen in shock and terror until she’d been killed. Except even now, realizing that, Eames can’t quite stop acting that way. He’s shaking, he realizes, shaking visibly, all color drained from his face, and he hasn’t moved in at least a minute. He’s frozen in the middle of the hall, unable to move because he can’t decide where he should run, what place would be a safe place to hide.
When the noises fade, though, he finally finds that he can move, and when he does, his pulse is thudding violently in his ears. Who did they bring in, he wonders vaguely, from an automobile collision? The thought urges him to move a little, towards the side of the hallway, to door number 234. The window is as dingy as the paint on the door when Eames goes to look through it, but there’s nothing inside, just the far wall. Slowly, carefully, Eames reaches for the doorknob-
Just as he’s about to touch it, the door flies open, nearly hitting him in the face, and Eames actually lets out a sound that is more yelp than a shout, falling backwards and then skittering back across the hallway until his back is against the far wall. He doesn’t realize that Greg’s glasses have fallen off and lay in the middle of the hallway, unneeded. His heart leaps into his throat, and Eames realizes suddenly that this feels like he remembers nightmares once felt, when he still had natural dreams. He has the urge to scream, to run, but he’s frozen and his voice won’t work, nothing will move. All of his skill, his training, is useless because he can’t move, can’t defend himself or even call for help.
So he just remains on the ground, staring at this open door… and nothing behind it, an empty room. No one was in there, no one opened the door. Eames sits there, shaking, until the intercom starts up again, and he hears himself draw in a gasping breath that sounds almost like whimper at what the woman says.
“Code Blue - emergency personnel to bay four.”
Distantly, Eames realizes he knows what Code Blue means. That means the person they’d brought in before, in that same bay, has gone into cardiac arrest. He’s dying-that’s what people do in hospitals. Once you get to the point where you’re in a hospital, that’s it. You die, you’re dead, the end. That’s why he’ll never go to one, he doesn’t care if his arm is falling off. But his arm isn’t falling off, nothing is wrong with him now, and here he is, but he’s not the one dying, it’s that bloke in bay four--
Eames doesn’t realize that his shaking has intensified, or that he hasn’t moved since the intercom started again, that he’s barely breathing or that his heart is hammering in his ears, almost drowning out the sounds of people moving about, trying to save whoever is dying. He doesn’t realize, because he’s still staring at the door, long past trying to understand what’s going on here, into blind panic. The sounds of people rushing past are much closer this time, and Eames drags his knees up to his chest in an automatic attempt to get out of the way, to make himself as small as possible, as the sounds of gurneys and shouting nurses get closer, but no one shouts at him to move or trips over him. There isn’t anyone there at all.
He's distracted enough, terrified and horrified enough, by all of this that he doesn't notice the soft sounds of someone coming up behind him.
He does, however, notice the prick of the needle entering the side of his neck. Things go blurry, then black, and he sags to the floor, his head hitting the linoleum with a crack as his assailant makes no effort to catch him.
There's no way to tell how long it's been when Eames wakes, but it's difficult to miss his surroundings, and the cause of them. He's tied to what appears to be a hospital bed, held down with the leather straps used for recalcitrant or suicidal patients, and at the foot of the bed stands Walker, fussing with something on a tray. He turns, though, when Eames opens his eyes, almost as though he'd sensed it.
"Greg," he says with a pleasant smile, the mad giggling and laughter vanished, at least for the moment. "You're awake." He holds up the broken glasses. "I suppose you don't need these after all. You don't seem to be squinting. But then again." He moves over to Eames, and puts the broken glasses back on his face, the sharp glass uncomfortably close to his eyes. "There you go. The better for you to see me with." A flash of the mad grin returns, but then vanishes just as quickly. "Wouldn't want you to miss anything."
Eames stares up at Walker through the broken glass, his mind too fuzzy for him to properly understand what’s going on here. Or perhaps he just doesn’t understand because it makes no sense. He’d just been in the hallway of the hospital, and then…
“You drugged me,” he says, and it’s a credit to just how drugged he is that Eames doesn’t add an insult on to the end of that, or even swear. He just stares up at Walker, disbelieving. How could he have been taken so unawares, how could he have been such a buggering idiot? Ever since this job had really began, Eames knew something was wrong with Walker, he’d known something was going wrong, but he hadn’t had the sense to get out, to alert Arthur, and now-
Now he’s strapped to a hospital bed, and even when he begins to struggle in earnest, Eames can’t get out. He’s too confused, too weak from the drugs, and his position gives him no leverage. All of that time spent in the weight room, he thinks feverishly, almost hysterically, was for no good reason. He should have done something else with the time, like had a hamburger, watched a movie. Ravished Arthur-
“Yes,” Walker says, calmly. “Yes, I did.”
Eames gives up the struggling, slowly realizing through the haze that it’s useless at this point. Instead, he turns his attention on Walker. Or as much attention as he can. Focusing, thinking at all is like trying to wade through quicksand, and even when he blinks blearily up at the other man, Eames sees four different Walkers, distorted through the broken glass of the glasses that were only ever part of an act. A part. Now, Eames struggles to hold on to that. Because what would Greg do in this situation, how could anyone react properly here? Where is Arthur? “All right, that’s fair, my apologies. I believe what I meant to say was ‘why the fuck did you drug me?’”
"Well, I should think that was obvious," Walker says, mimicking Eames' accent mockingly (and surprisingly accurately) before switching back to his regular Midwest accent, rather startlingly similar to Arthur's, in point of fact. "No way in hell I'd ever take you down." He nudges Eames' flexed bicep, still tense despite the fact that he'd ceased actively struggling. "You pulled me along like a little girl, Greg. I have to say, I hired you half because of all... this." He gestures, somehow managing to encompass all of Eames.
Then he walks purposefully down to the cart at the end of the bed, and picks something up, keeping it down at his side while he returns to the head of the bed, his hand out of Eames' line of sight. Now his smile is reassuring, and a bit wistful. "It's too bad, really. You're very pretty." His visible hand hovers over Eames' hip, but then he looks up, and sees the expression on the other man's face, and he pulls back. "Yes, well. It's a shame. But you fell right into my lap, here. Can't pass up an opportunity like that."
The knot of uneasiness, of alarm and a different sort of fear that had hit Eames when Walker had started looking at him in that way, had nearly touched him, lessens and then shifts back into the same fear he’d felt since he woke up, since before then. That Walker is going to do something- obviously he’s going to do something. Eames tries to remain calm, professional, about this. After all, if Walker is going to kill him, there’s nothing he can do about it, he won’t burst into tears or beg or… or any of that.
Except that is bordering on exactly what Eames wants to do, because he’s strapped to a hospital bed and he has no idea where Arthur is or why he’s here in the first place, and Walker is hitting on him or something, he doesn’t quite know, and he has no idea what’s going on and why a hospital? God, he’s losing it. He can’t even think properly, everything is still so hazy…
And that’s when Walker lifts his other hand, revealing a scalpel. He doesn’t do anything with it yet, just gives Eames ample time to stare. Even through broken, fake glasses, Eames can see what it is well enough to know just how fucked he is.
“You’re going to have a very hard time,” Eames finally manages, staring bravely up at the other man even as he starts shaking despite himself. Thirty-four years of nonsense, a ridiculous bloody life, he’ll admit it, and this is what he’s reduced to. He’s shaking, and he knows he’s paled, he knows that he’s started pulling on the restraints again despite himself, but he’s not going to turn into a crying mess or beg. If he could just reach his gun-he just needs to get to his gun. “Finding another assistant after I tell the union about this.”
"Don't be ridiculous," Walker says calmly, his smile slight but still there, as though he's amused by Eames' struggles as much as by his quip. "There's no union."
He doesn't even bother adding that Eames, or rather Greg, to Walker, won't be telling anyone anything at all. That much is obvious, and made even more so as he lifts the scalpel to the larger man's throat. Eames has pushed his head as far off to the side and as far back into the pillow as it can go, but there's no way he can escape the blade, and they both know it.
"Stop struggling," Walker says calmly. Almost soothingly, really. "It'll be easier. You always struggle," he reflects, shaking his head, as the blade touches Eames' skin, pressing into his throat. The blood starts to run down the sides of his neck, staining the sheets crimson below him.
---
part four
Authors: agaryulnaer86 and myself
Pairing/Character(s): Arthur/Eames, and Ariadne
Rating: R
Warnings: Graphic violence and disturbing imagery, the foulest of language, adult situations and sexual content, and an adorable kitten. But just the one.
Summary: Ariadne, Eames and Arthur work a job over the holidays. Hijinks ensue, including but not limited to: chicken soup, a stray kitten, avoidance of the casting couch, a clown, and a job gone a bit sideways. Also, Chrismukkah.
Author's Notes: Written for the prompts exploring dreamshare and canonverse and messy blowjobs :)
master post
part one
part two
----
It's actually out of his hands after another minute of lying warm under the covers again. He closes his eyes with a smile still on his face, and the next thing he knows, he's being woken up two hours later to the sound of Eames coughing. But the other man appears to be sleeping while he does so, the tea half-drunk on the nightstand; with his stuffy nose, he's snoring like a hibernating bear, and actually resembles one rather strongly, considering the impressive day-old bear growth.
Arthur showers and dresses and Eames doesn't so much as twitch, but finally he runs out of excuses to stay in the hotel room when he really does need to get to the office, and he puts Wally back in his box (they really need to get him a carrier) and sits down on the mattress next to the snoring Eames, a lump beneath the comforter pulled up over his head.
"Hey," he says, poking first gently, then less so. "Wake up."
"Whaaat," Eames more mumbles than says, or at least that's what he tries to say. It does come after some more incoherent mumbling, so really who knows if the word actually gets out. The sentiment certainly makes it, though. Eames is not interested in participating in any of this "waking up" nonsense. But since Arthur is persistent, the sick forger finally pulls the comforter down far enough so that he can peer blearily up at Arthur. Who... is dressed. And sitting on the wrong side of him. It takes Eames a considerably long time to understand what that means, and when he finally does, he frowns.
"Y'r leaving," he says in a mumble, which is really more of an accusation than a mumble come to think of it. "S'it morning?"
"For a few hours," Arthur says, nodding, as it is, in fact, now morning. "Ariadne wants to go through a few ideas with me for the job. I'll be back around lunchtime. Your phone's right here, and there's water and medicine with it on the nightstand, and a book if you wake up some." He puts a hand on the other man's forehead now that he can see it, but nothing feels warmer than it should. He feels much cooler than yesterday. "I think your fever's broken, so you should start to feel better."
Lastly, he sets the remote on the nightstand, as well. "Want the TV on?"
Eames mumbles something that sounds vaguely similar to “yes, please,” blinking up at Arthur. Arthur’s hand hadn’t felt freezing on his forehead, which is good news, he thinks. Perhaps he won’t die after all… a pity, really, since he was beginning to look forward to being a kitten and playing with Wally. But he supposes he doesn’t mind living on as a man. There are certainly a number of things he enjoys about that. Like Arthur. But if Arthur owned him as a kitten, Arthur would play with him, maybe…
“I sh’d call Walker,” he mumbles, and it of course turns into a fit of coughing. So, naturally, instead of doing any calling of anyone, Eames promptly does his very best to curl up into as small a ball as possible for someone his size. And without moving his head. “You don’t have t’ come at lunch, love,” he adds, trying very hard not to sound pitiful. It would work better if he could stop coughing, or if he didn’t turn near indecipherable when trying to speak while slightly feverish, barely awake, and on a great deal of medicine. “L’probably jus’ be out cold. Which’s a fancy way of saying sleeping like a rock. A rock what’s had too much tequila.” Tequila would be nice, actually...
"The last thing you need is alcohol, on those drugs," Arthur says, shaking his head. It's obvious where that line of thought was going, at least. He could practically see the idea occurring in Eames’ mind. "And I'll be back at lunch."
After all, it's not like Eames doesn't want him to be here, and... Arthur would also like to be here. He'd just worry all day about Eames lying here sick by himself. He'll get what work needs done finished with Ariadne, and then he'll come back, probably with what's left of the soup.
Before Eames can argue any further, Arthur stands, pulling on his overcoat and then his satchel, and picking up Wally's box. Pulling open the door, he says over his shoulder, "And I'm going to stop and pick up a carrier thing on my way back. This is just awkward on the subway." People keep looking at him like he's a serial kitten killer when Wally mewls. Shaking his head, he steps out the door, making sure the lock engages behind him.
As Arthur had insisted, Eames does not die. He’s off from work for Walker for two days, having called the man and apologized profusely though a hacking cough but been assured that his job would wait. Reassured, Eames mainly sleeps through both days, waking only to take his medicine and have food more or less forced upon him. And to muse about things at Arthur, when Arthur is there, such as whether or not it’s possible to cough up a lung, or (while watching Bewitched on TV Land for an hour before the NyQuil had knocked him out) whether or not it’s a genetic thing that allows people to twitch their noses like so or if it only takes practice.
Eames falls asleep that night curled up in a surprisingly small ball next to Arthur, wondering if he could give forging Samantha a go so he could ride a broom and twitch his nose, totally unaware that he is wondering such things aloud.
---
When the already dim lighting in the fun house goes out, the entire place becomes pitch black. Arthur freezes in place, having just passed the distorted mirrors, and swears viciously. He has a little ways to go, still, until he reaches the safe, and he's going to have to do it blind. Whatever the fuck just happened with Walker, though, it doesn't appear to have been something he'd done, because nothing jumps out at him and attempts to kill him. That's at least somewhat reassuring.
He takes a step forward and a cold jet of air shoots up from the floor, making him swallow a yelp. Sonovabitch.
Three more air bursts and two floor sections that abruptly dropped a few inches beneath his feet, and he reaches the utility room marked Staff Only, the lettering handily glowing in the dark. This isn't Fort Knox, and he opens the door, seeing a copy of the man's apartment safe sitting on a shelf, surrounded by cleaning supplies.
He opens the safe with a turn of the handle and pulls out his penlight, looking inside. He finds the script, exactly what he'd been looking for, and skims the plot as quickly as he can. It's only a draft, and incomplete; he memorizes the details and slides it back in, startled when he sees something else inside.
Eames had been slowly planting the idea of scripts and agents and such in Walker's mind, and so the unfinished current script should have been the deepest secret hidden in the safe. But instead, there's a small manila envelope in the back corner, blocking Arthur from replacing the script and shutting the door. He reaches in, moving it out of the way so he can replace the script, pauses for a beat, and then pulls out the smaller envelope, tearing it open.
After all, he wouldn't be in the business of stealing secrets if he wasn't a nosy bastard, would he?
Inside the envelope, however, are a handful of plastic rectangles, the size and shape of credit cards. He pulls them out, tucking the envelope beneath his arm and shining the penlight on the cards.
Driver's licenses. Six of them, all of young men, of varying ages, from different states. Three are from Iowa, one from Kansas, one from Oklahoma, and one from California. Out of habit, and because this is strange, and strange things tend to be important in this business, Arthur memorizes the names. And then he puts the licenses back into the envelope, tosses it back into the safe, and clicks the safe shut. Time to get the hell out of here.
He pulls out his phone, dialing, but can't get a signal. Can't alert Eames to end the dream. Fuck. Even in their own damned dream, he's without cell service when he actually needs it.
Fucking wireless. Swearing under his breath, he starts to feel his way towards the emergency exit, accessible only from the inside of the fun house maze, when he hears the shot. Freezing for a moment, he mutters a quick fuck and shoves the phone into his pocket, pulling out his Glock and moving more quickly in the direction of where the emergency exit should be.
---
In the morning, as has become habit, Eames coughs himself awake. Only this time, it’s six in the morning, and instead of groaning and curling back under the blankets, the forger drags himself out of bed and to the bathroom, where he manages not only to shower, but to shave and brush his teeth. By the time Arthur wakes up, Eames even has real trousers on (no shirt yet) and is eating the Snickers bar he’d hidden in his suitcase because Arthur wouldn’t stay with him on this job, so he’d figured he could pack whatever he bloody well pleased. He still looks a bit worse for wear, run-down, but considering how he’s been doing, Eames looks very nearly cheery as he smiles at Arthur. “G’morning, love.”
Blinking blearily up at the other man, Arthur looks first at the Snickers bar and then back up at Eames, surprised but pleased. Frankly, if that looks good to him, Arthur's not going to complain, not if Eames is upright and cleaned up. It's enough to wake Arthur up far more quickly than he can normally manage, and he rolls out of bed, thinking a shower for himself might not actually be a bad thing.
He's not going to kiss Eames and risk getting his germs, but he does slap him on the now trouser-clad ass on his way past him, into the bathroom. "Looking much improved, sunshine."
Eames looks like he can’t quite decide whether he should be pleased or offended by this, and doesn’t quite manage to decide by the time Arthur is past him. Nor does he manage to come up with a witty retort. All he manages is to repeat, “Sunshine?” sounding mostly incredulous but somewhat amused, but he blames that on the fact that he’s still not entirely well.
Well, he’s always not entirely well. But he means physically. Physically speaking. He would be better if he could follow Arthur into the shower… but alas. Rules and such, and the plague on top of that.
"Crumpet?" Arthur says, equally incredulously (albeit also mockingly), through the door as the shower turns on, recalling Eames’ latest nickname for him. "And it's sunshine you don't buy?"
There's the sound of the glass shower door opening and shutting, and then, "I notice you're not complaining about the spank." He is a mean, mean person. To himself, even, because nothing's going to come of any of this.
“The thing is, crumpet, that I am not particularly full of sunshine this morning,” Eames points out. “Unless you were being ironic, in which case carry on, I suppose.”
After all, the only times Arthur calls him by pet names, it is done to mock Eames’ inability to call Arthur by anything but pet names. Even when he calls him Arthur, he adds another name onto it (“Arthur dear”). Arthur has come to accept this because there is very little he can do about it, and because then he can save his complaining and threatening for the worst pet names of the bunch.
And as for being spanked… “Of course I’m not complaining,” he says, beginning the search for an undershirt he hadn’t worn while dying of consumption. “You can spank me any time you like, darling.” He pauses, considering as he finishes his Snickers. “You can do more than that.”
Arthur snorts, shaking his head. "Not while you might still be contagious," he mutters. Another time, he might even risk it, but not when they're already a couple of days behind on the job. Of course, he doesn't blame Eames, it's hardly something he could control, and it means that he and Ariadne got a lot done while Eames was convalescing. But it also means that Eames has to catch up a bit.
He goes to grab a bagel for himself from the paper bag of them he'd picked up the day before. It's a little stale, but not bad at all, and he munches contentedly as he dresses, fastidiously keeping crumbs from his clothes, hanging neatly in a garment bag in the closet. "It's ironic in the same way it is when you call me crumpet." He's giving up his own room. Might as well move his things down here. Slowly, so Eames doesn't catch on. He pulls his shoes out from under the chair, and then raises a brow, lifting a dozing Wally out of one and setting him aside. "You'd better not have chewed on my laces, buddy."
Wally mewls up at him, but Arthur shakes his head. "You have to wait until we get to the warehouse, bud, you ate everything I brought back, and there's tomato in the bagels." To Eames, he continues, "We decided to go with one of the scripts from the hard drive. It looks like the earliest he's written. The victims in it are all successful younger men, and since he knows you, or he knows Greg..." He trails off, arching a brow. "Feel like playing victim? No actual blood and torture, but you can both run from the monster together while I get to the safe."
“Hmm, victim,” Eames says, thoughtful as he begins the process of buttoning up his shirt. “I suppose I could manage. Although it’s not nearly as much fun as playing the young virgin who gets chased in the beginning of all of those movies.” Then again, Eames has no desire to actually end up tortured and murdered in this dream, so this is probably for the best. As long as Arthur promises no blood and torture.
Anyway, he won’t even have to forge anyone, just keep up pretenses as Greg. Simple enough. And Eames has more important things to think about, such as the way Arthur is holding Wally, worrying about his health, and calling him ‘buddy.’ It’s probably the most adorable thing Eames has ever seen in his life, which is exactly why he does not comment on it. Arthur will never do it again. “What’s wrong with tomatoes?” he asks. “Will they hurt him? Shall I forgo tomato sauce?”
"Tomatoes are poisonous to cats," Arthur says, wrapping his unfinished bagel in a napkin and tucking it into his coat pocket where Wally can't get at it. "So yes, please avoid the bolognese." And speaking of felines, he scoops the kitten up before Wally can scamper away, and carries him over to the little black nylon carrier, where he's deposited gently on the cushioned inside with no regard for his pitiful mewling.
Five minutes later, Arthur is ready and cat hair-free, and he picks up the carrier, depositing it in Eames' arms. "I told you he was your responsibility," he says gruffly. And then he picks up his satchel and his laptop case and turns to stalk out of the room first, completely ignoring any and all of Eames' possible reactions to that.
Trying very hard to look chastised, Eames follows after Arthur dutifully, carrying the case. He pokes a finger in the little opening in the case, distracting Wally from his pitiful mewling and getting his finger bit in thanks. Sadly for the continued safety of his fingers, all this seems to do is make Eames laugh a little, delighted to be able to play with Wally again.
“Thank you for watching over him while I was ill, love,” he says as he follows Arthur to the elevator. He means it, too; Arthur had said Wally was his responsibility, and then he’d gone and nearly died from tuberculosis. Eames isn’t trying to placate Arthur; he’s really quite grateful. “And me.”
Arthur hides his smile behind his bagel, hitting the button for the ground floor. "No problem," he says, putting as much grudging acceptance as he can into his voice. "Don't let it happen again."
The dream is dark, very dark. It's only the one level, and so Ariadne has gone all out in the days Eames has been sick, making it perfect. And it is, in fact. Arthur is very impressed as he peers around in the near pitch-blackness. They're in a darkened carnival, a maze of games and rides and doors. The roller coaster actually encircles the entire level, and trying to escape through it only leads, paradoxically, right back into the closed area. She'd even added maintenance doors, and open tent flaps, all of which lead right out into other places in the maze.
And beneath it is another maze of steam tunnels, both the settings from the climactic scenes of the two scripts reproduced almost perfectly. "And the safe is in the fun house?" He eyes it. It doesn't look particularly fun, but he supposes that's the idea. He's got a map, anyway, to memorize the path through the mirrors. "Eames takes Walker down to the tunnels, the way the script goes, and I go right for the safe."
“Yes,” Ariadne says, to both his question and statement. “It’s in the mirror room. That should give you extra protection from projections if it comes to that.”
They all hope it doesn’t, of course. But it’s always best to plan for the worst and be pleasantly surprised. Eames is rather pleasantly surprised by this level, in point of fact. This is the first time he’s seen any of it, and the forger spends a good amount of time eyeing what he can see from where they stand before speaking, inspecting it thoroughly. It is, as far as he can tell, a very good reproduction of one of Walker’s movies, a horror movie made real. Ariadne really is quite frighteningly good at this. Pun intended.
“Suppose it’s best I inspect the tunnels, then,” Eames says. He’ll have to know those like the back of his hand. But right now, he’s eyeing the skyline. “Does the roller coaster work?” Not that he would ride it or anything, but… okay, he might.
"It can," Ariadne says, following his gaze up to the top of the rickety-looking white structure. "I wouldn't trust the seat belts around some of those turns, but go right ahead." She grins at him. "Falling a few hundred feet will only wake you up."
Arthur says nothing about bloodthirsty little pixies. He says nothing very loudly.
Ariadne glares at him. He raises his brows at her. "I didn't say anything."
"Asshole."
"Yeah," he replies simply, his dimples making a very slight appearance. She's clearly spending too much time around him, is Arthur's conclusion. Still, he can't find it within himself to be displeased about that. "Tunnels?" he suggests, gesturing to the closest manhole. His smile disappears as his more serious work face returns.
Ariadne does not look particularly amused, but Eames finds himself coughing to cover a smile of his own. Very handy at times, respiratory illness. Even if they’re dreaming now and he’s unlikely to need to cough, really, but no one can prove it.
They follow Ariadne to said tunnels; this is Eames’ first time down here, where he’s supposed to be leading Walker, and when they get there he can’t help but be impressed. Even if it’s a bit frightening that it’s so accurately dank and dark and sort of… foggy? That doesn’t even make any sense. And yet there it is, and somehow it adds to the eerie feel of the place. Eames kicks around at some of the fog at their feet, appreciating the attention to detail even if it doesn’t make much sense. This is a dream, after all, sense isn’t mandatory. “Very nice,” he says, glancing over at Ariadne. “In a dank, foreboding sort of fashion, I mean.”
Arthur nods, looking around, as well. "It looks like something out of a crappy TV horror movie," he observes, sounding very appreciative. "It's perfect."
They walk through the maze, Ariadne showing them both all the switchbacks and cut-offs. There's no need for paradoxical exits here, in the maze. There are no doors for anyone to go through except for ones that are actually part of the puzzle. They'll both need to memorize this route, Eames because he'll have to take Walker through it and Arthur because if shit goes to hell, he has to be able to find Eames.
Not because he's worried that Eames can't take care of himself, of course. But... he just likes to know. It's a control thing, yeah, but it's not a crime.
They wander through the tunnel maze until the dream ends, and wake to find themselves back in the quiet office. It’s almost too quiet, after the oppressive eeriness of the dream fairgrounds and the tunnels below. Eames, for one, spends a moment convincing himself that a serial killer won’t be standing behind him when he opens his eyes… and then nearly lets out a yelp when he finds himself being stared at.
Fortunately for his panic level, the person staring at him is not a person at all, but a cat. A very tiny cat, kitten actually, who happens to be sitting on his upper chest, just… staring at him. Waiting for him to wake up, Eames supposes. Once he’s opened his eyes and jumped, biting down an unmanly yelp, they stare at one another for a couple of seconds before Wally lets out a tiny, pathetic sounding mewl, and Eames bursts into laughter that doesn’t even turn into a cough.
Still laughing, he reaches up to cuddle Wally before the cat walks up to him, biting gently at his nose. Eames can’t quite seem to stop laughing. “Sorry, love, I’ve been neglecting you. Deepest apologies.”
"He missed you!" Ariadne coos, pulling out her phone and snapping a picture of Wally biting Eames' nose before reaching over to scratch gently behind the kitten's ears. Arthur rolls his eyes, but only slightly, sitting up in one of the easy chairs and standing with a quick stretch.
"He missed being spoiled completely, you mean," he mutters, definitely not admiring the sight of Eames cuddling a kitten before he turns to head back to his workspace. No, definitely not.
"Like you didn't spoil him!" Ariadne calls after him, her voice dry as a desert.
"I took exceptional care of him, as per the needs of juvenile felines," Arthur retorts, picking up his headphones. "I did no more than that." Pause. "And only because Eames would bitch if I didn't." Another pause. "Bitch more, that is."
"Methinks you protest too much!" Ariadne yells back, but when there's no reply, she sighs. He's put the headphones on. Dammit. "He totally spoiled you," she coos to Wally, petting him again and making him start to purr even louder.
“Did he?” Eames asks, grinning. He’d been a bit too unconscious most of the time to notice Arthur doing any spoiling, but if the soup he’d made for the forger is any indication, there most definitely had been some spoiling going on.
Ariadne nods, and Eames’ grin widens a little as he reaches up to pet the kitten sitting on his chest as well. Wally’s purring increases exponentially with both Ariadne and Eames petting him, and Eames spends a moment being very pleased that if he had to be sick, it happened at the perfect time to give Arthur some alone time with the kitten. “Don’t worry, love. He thinks of you as more than just a juvenile feline.”
Thankfully, Eames' recovery also means that he goes right back to work for Walker. Or perhaps not so thankfully, for Eames' sanity, because when they're ready to run the job a little less than two weeks later (the actual event delayed but not cancelled, despite Eames' convalescence), Arthur is beginning to wonder if he should remind Eames not to add arsenic to the chloroform in Walker's coffee.
Despite his (mostly ungrounded) worries, everything seems to go smoothly on the day of the plan. He and Ariadne gain admittance to the building via Eames, as Greg, having left their false names at the front desk, and they walk right past the extensive security as though they have every right in the world to be there. No one bats an eyelash as they pass, just two more young, attractive people in business suits in Hollywood. They blend right in.
Their elevator dings on the correct floor just as Arthur's watch ticks to the time when Eames is supposed to bring Walker his second cup of coffee for the morning. They stroll down the hall, Arthur pulling out his phone and sending Eames a quick text. Here.
A minute and a half later, the door is unlocked and pulled open from the inside; Eames steps back out of the way to admit Arthur and Ariadne. He steps forward to shut and lock the door again behind them, sending them both a happy enough smile. “Good morning,” he greets them, just before turning to lead the way back towards Walker’s office.
It is, of course, a room without windows, far back into the large apartment. Greg’s things are neatly laid out on the coffee table in the living room they enter first, and Eames pauses to put Greg’s glasses on top of his computer before leading the way back through the hallways.
“He’s out,” he says, which should be obvious, but bears repeating. Here he pauses at a nondescript door, opening it to admit Arthur and Ariadne. Normally it’s locked from the inside, but he’d picked it with little trouble once he’d determined that Walker was asleep. “I gave him exactly as much as I was told and did not lace it with anything, nor did I kick him to test its effects.”
Arthur withholds his smirk, merely nodding approvingly, but Ariadne chuckles as she steps past Eames and into the bedroom. Arthur sets down the PASIV, slipping out of his overcoat and setting it aside. They work quickly, setting up the machine, with Ariadne in the easy chair and Arthur and Eames preparing to sprawl on the floor. Arthur unrolls each of their lines, sliding the needle into Walker's vein.
"Ready?" he asks, sliding the needle beneath his own skin. He's done it so many times that he barely feels the pinch on his arm, the nerve endings probably nearly dead, but it's still always eerie to feel the metal of the needle resting beneath his skin. He'd always hated getting shots as a child. It seems silly, now. But this isn't really the time for philosophical thoughts. He brings his mind back to bear on the task ahead, surprised that he'd managed to deviate from it at all.
“As ever,” Eames assures him from the floor, needle already in his arm. They’ve had longer than usual to prepare for this- because Eames had spent two of their preparation days languishing- and they’re as ready as they’re getting. Waiting any longer would be more of a security risk than an aid. They’re ready. Well, as ready as one can be to wander into a job in someone’s dream. Especially when there is the potential for evil clowns being involved.
---
Walker’s expression has gone from giddy to something resembling annoyance, but at this point Eames could care less; he drags the writer along behind him, Browning out and ready to take out any more demented projections. He really was just not prepared for this, no matter how many demented movies he’s watched with Ariadne since this bloody job started.
So, wanting to minimize his chances of being killed by zombie ponies or creepy clowns or old, creepy ladies with no teeth or something, Eames makes for the entrance to the underground maze, knowing Arthur will know to find him there. Especially if he’d heard the shot a moment ago.
“Where are we going?” Walker finally manages, trying to yank his wrist out of Eames’ grasp. Eames tightens his grip, and for all that he downplays his physicality as Greg, he’s still much stronger than the other man.
“Your agent, Mr. Walker,” Eames repeats, as calmly as possible. “He-“
He falters at the sound of a high-pitched laugh. A familiar laugh, because they’d just heard it not a minute ago, right before Eames had shot the source, at least sixty yards behind them.
Swearing, Eames starts forward again, not relinquishing his grip on Walker's wrist and in fact nearly shoving him down through the manhole ahead of Eames himself. After all, if he lets Walker go after him, who knows if the mad bugger will even follow at all? He might decide to stay with the murderous clown, and Eames is not dealing with anything so creepy, not after he's already put a bullet in its head.
The tunnels are just as dark and damp as they'd been during the trial run, but the greenish lights are still in place and still lit, making it seem both eerie and a bit like they're underwater but not necessitating their carrying along a light, which would be a dead giveaway as to their location. Recalling which direction he needs to head in, Eames tugs Walker off down the leftmost corridor.
It’s a maze, of course, whether the projections or Walker realize that or not, so a short hallway later and they’re making another turn, then another, until they’re well away from the manhole through which they’d entered. Even on alert, Eames can’t hear anything but their footsteps and breathing, the electric buzz of the lights; slowly, he begins to relax a little, thinking that getting deep enough within the maze will keep them safe from projections, buy them some time.
And then they turn another corner, and Eames skids to a halt while the lights flicker. Still being dragged behind him, Walker nearly bowls Eames over as the forger slows and then halts completely, staring ahead of them down the hallway… the hallway that isn’t the one he’d been expecting, the one that Ariadne had designed and he’d had to memorize.
This hallway stretches out before them much farther than it ought to, farther than Eames can see even as he stands, frozen, and does nothing but stare at the sterile linoleum flooring, the off-white walls and the sometimes flickering fluorescent lights. There are numbered doors every few meters, some with smallish windows. Further down the impossibly long hallway, Eames can see some chairs, a counter built into an opening (taking the place of another door to a room) with a desk behind it. He can hear a phone ringing, vaguely; he thinks that it must be from behind that counter, but no one is there.
Eames’ stomach twists uncomfortably, and the moment he smells disinfectant, his heart picks up its pace despite all of his long history of handling terrifying or traumatizing dream events. It’s not real, he reminds himself in a very carefully not panicked inner voice, turning around to go back the way they’d come. He doesn’t realize he’d let go of Walker’s wrist until he turns unimpeded and nearly runs into the writer… and then stares through Greg’s glasses behind Walker... at the expanse of hallway, almost identical to the one in front of them. Where they’d come from is gone. It’s just… more hallway.
More hospital, Eames thinks, and as soon as he thinks the word, the urge to flee hits him hard. He has to swallow, refusing to behave so unprofessionally, like a child. It’s just a hallway. In a dream.
Just a hallway. Innocuous, really. There’s no reason to be attempting to flee. It’s not actually a hospital. What he should be doing is focusing on what the bloody hell is going on, on where Ariadne’s planned maze had gone. Except even as he’s firmly telling himself not to be a pansy about this, that he has to focus on the job, Eames can feel the color draining from his face. It’s always been like this with him and hospitals; he could have handled anything besides a hospital.
Eames eyes Walker, not sure he understands the expression on the other man’s face, and tries not to sound as shaky as he feels. He’s always been an absurdly good actor, though, and so though his fear is evident in the lack of color in his face, Eames’ voice comes out almost confidently. “Well, at least we’ve lost the clown.”
The hallway is eerily silent, and Walker's footsteps are loud as he steps up next to Eames. "Yeah," he agrees with a sigh, sounding disappointed. "I wanted a giraffe." And then he wanders off to the side, to all appearances examining a crash cart in the deserted hallway.
The silence is abruptly broken by the sudden beep of an intercom system, followed by a woman's voice, made near-incomprehensible by what is obviously a poor-quality system.
"Incoming, seventeen, male, automobile collision. Emergency personnel to bay four, please."
At the far end of the hallway, there is the sound of people suddenly bustling into action, despite the fact that to all appearances, the place is still deserted, not another person to be seen.
Eames takes several steps in the direction of the noise before he realizes what he’s doing and stops the automatic reaction. He hadn’t even registered what the voice had been saying, what was going on, had just started for the noise. Except there’s no one there, the noise isn’t coming from anywhere that Eames can make out, and slowly, he begins to realize that he doesn’t want to be anywhere near whatever is making that noise, the person they’re bringing in down the hallway.
If dread had hit him before at the sight of the deserted hospital, now it’s deepened into something worse, the feeling in his chest almost painful in his intensity. Eames has to stop himself from turning around and running, not because of any sense of pride or professionalism, but because there’s nowhere to run.
The noises stop a moment later, and Eames sucks in a breath, suddenly aware that he’d stopped breathing, freezing like one of those bloody heroines in a horror film who’d walked downstairs upon hearing a noise and shouted “Hello?” and then frozen in shock and terror until she’d been killed. Except even now, realizing that, Eames can’t quite stop acting that way. He’s shaking, he realizes, shaking visibly, all color drained from his face, and he hasn’t moved in at least a minute. He’s frozen in the middle of the hall, unable to move because he can’t decide where he should run, what place would be a safe place to hide.
When the noises fade, though, he finally finds that he can move, and when he does, his pulse is thudding violently in his ears. Who did they bring in, he wonders vaguely, from an automobile collision? The thought urges him to move a little, towards the side of the hallway, to door number 234. The window is as dingy as the paint on the door when Eames goes to look through it, but there’s nothing inside, just the far wall. Slowly, carefully, Eames reaches for the doorknob-
Just as he’s about to touch it, the door flies open, nearly hitting him in the face, and Eames actually lets out a sound that is more yelp than a shout, falling backwards and then skittering back across the hallway until his back is against the far wall. He doesn’t realize that Greg’s glasses have fallen off and lay in the middle of the hallway, unneeded. His heart leaps into his throat, and Eames realizes suddenly that this feels like he remembers nightmares once felt, when he still had natural dreams. He has the urge to scream, to run, but he’s frozen and his voice won’t work, nothing will move. All of his skill, his training, is useless because he can’t move, can’t defend himself or even call for help.
So he just remains on the ground, staring at this open door… and nothing behind it, an empty room. No one was in there, no one opened the door. Eames sits there, shaking, until the intercom starts up again, and he hears himself draw in a gasping breath that sounds almost like whimper at what the woman says.
“Code Blue - emergency personnel to bay four.”
Distantly, Eames realizes he knows what Code Blue means. That means the person they’d brought in before, in that same bay, has gone into cardiac arrest. He’s dying-that’s what people do in hospitals. Once you get to the point where you’re in a hospital, that’s it. You die, you’re dead, the end. That’s why he’ll never go to one, he doesn’t care if his arm is falling off. But his arm isn’t falling off, nothing is wrong with him now, and here he is, but he’s not the one dying, it’s that bloke in bay four--
Eames doesn’t realize that his shaking has intensified, or that he hasn’t moved since the intercom started again, that he’s barely breathing or that his heart is hammering in his ears, almost drowning out the sounds of people moving about, trying to save whoever is dying. He doesn’t realize, because he’s still staring at the door, long past trying to understand what’s going on here, into blind panic. The sounds of people rushing past are much closer this time, and Eames drags his knees up to his chest in an automatic attempt to get out of the way, to make himself as small as possible, as the sounds of gurneys and shouting nurses get closer, but no one shouts at him to move or trips over him. There isn’t anyone there at all.
He's distracted enough, terrified and horrified enough, by all of this that he doesn't notice the soft sounds of someone coming up behind him.
He does, however, notice the prick of the needle entering the side of his neck. Things go blurry, then black, and he sags to the floor, his head hitting the linoleum with a crack as his assailant makes no effort to catch him.
There's no way to tell how long it's been when Eames wakes, but it's difficult to miss his surroundings, and the cause of them. He's tied to what appears to be a hospital bed, held down with the leather straps used for recalcitrant or suicidal patients, and at the foot of the bed stands Walker, fussing with something on a tray. He turns, though, when Eames opens his eyes, almost as though he'd sensed it.
"Greg," he says with a pleasant smile, the mad giggling and laughter vanished, at least for the moment. "You're awake." He holds up the broken glasses. "I suppose you don't need these after all. You don't seem to be squinting. But then again." He moves over to Eames, and puts the broken glasses back on his face, the sharp glass uncomfortably close to his eyes. "There you go. The better for you to see me with." A flash of the mad grin returns, but then vanishes just as quickly. "Wouldn't want you to miss anything."
Eames stares up at Walker through the broken glass, his mind too fuzzy for him to properly understand what’s going on here. Or perhaps he just doesn’t understand because it makes no sense. He’d just been in the hallway of the hospital, and then…
“You drugged me,” he says, and it’s a credit to just how drugged he is that Eames doesn’t add an insult on to the end of that, or even swear. He just stares up at Walker, disbelieving. How could he have been taken so unawares, how could he have been such a buggering idiot? Ever since this job had really began, Eames knew something was wrong with Walker, he’d known something was going wrong, but he hadn’t had the sense to get out, to alert Arthur, and now-
Now he’s strapped to a hospital bed, and even when he begins to struggle in earnest, Eames can’t get out. He’s too confused, too weak from the drugs, and his position gives him no leverage. All of that time spent in the weight room, he thinks feverishly, almost hysterically, was for no good reason. He should have done something else with the time, like had a hamburger, watched a movie. Ravished Arthur-
“Yes,” Walker says, calmly. “Yes, I did.”
Eames gives up the struggling, slowly realizing through the haze that it’s useless at this point. Instead, he turns his attention on Walker. Or as much attention as he can. Focusing, thinking at all is like trying to wade through quicksand, and even when he blinks blearily up at the other man, Eames sees four different Walkers, distorted through the broken glass of the glasses that were only ever part of an act. A part. Now, Eames struggles to hold on to that. Because what would Greg do in this situation, how could anyone react properly here? Where is Arthur? “All right, that’s fair, my apologies. I believe what I meant to say was ‘why the fuck did you drug me?’”
"Well, I should think that was obvious," Walker says, mimicking Eames' accent mockingly (and surprisingly accurately) before switching back to his regular Midwest accent, rather startlingly similar to Arthur's, in point of fact. "No way in hell I'd ever take you down." He nudges Eames' flexed bicep, still tense despite the fact that he'd ceased actively struggling. "You pulled me along like a little girl, Greg. I have to say, I hired you half because of all... this." He gestures, somehow managing to encompass all of Eames.
Then he walks purposefully down to the cart at the end of the bed, and picks something up, keeping it down at his side while he returns to the head of the bed, his hand out of Eames' line of sight. Now his smile is reassuring, and a bit wistful. "It's too bad, really. You're very pretty." His visible hand hovers over Eames' hip, but then he looks up, and sees the expression on the other man's face, and he pulls back. "Yes, well. It's a shame. But you fell right into my lap, here. Can't pass up an opportunity like that."
The knot of uneasiness, of alarm and a different sort of fear that had hit Eames when Walker had started looking at him in that way, had nearly touched him, lessens and then shifts back into the same fear he’d felt since he woke up, since before then. That Walker is going to do something- obviously he’s going to do something. Eames tries to remain calm, professional, about this. After all, if Walker is going to kill him, there’s nothing he can do about it, he won’t burst into tears or beg or… or any of that.
Except that is bordering on exactly what Eames wants to do, because he’s strapped to a hospital bed and he has no idea where Arthur is or why he’s here in the first place, and Walker is hitting on him or something, he doesn’t quite know, and he has no idea what’s going on and why a hospital? God, he’s losing it. He can’t even think properly, everything is still so hazy…
And that’s when Walker lifts his other hand, revealing a scalpel. He doesn’t do anything with it yet, just gives Eames ample time to stare. Even through broken, fake glasses, Eames can see what it is well enough to know just how fucked he is.
“You’re going to have a very hard time,” Eames finally manages, staring bravely up at the other man even as he starts shaking despite himself. Thirty-four years of nonsense, a ridiculous bloody life, he’ll admit it, and this is what he’s reduced to. He’s shaking, and he knows he’s paled, he knows that he’s started pulling on the restraints again despite himself, but he’s not going to turn into a crying mess or beg. If he could just reach his gun-he just needs to get to his gun. “Finding another assistant after I tell the union about this.”
"Don't be ridiculous," Walker says calmly, his smile slight but still there, as though he's amused by Eames' struggles as much as by his quip. "There's no union."
He doesn't even bother adding that Eames, or rather Greg, to Walker, won't be telling anyone anything at all. That much is obvious, and made even more so as he lifts the scalpel to the larger man's throat. Eames has pushed his head as far off to the side and as far back into the pillow as it can go, but there's no way he can escape the blade, and they both know it.
"Stop struggling," Walker says calmly. Almost soothingly, really. "It'll be easier. You always struggle," he reflects, shaking his head, as the blade touches Eames' skin, pressing into his throat. The blood starts to run down the sides of his neck, staining the sheets crimson below him.
---
part four