Author's Note: Hello there. I think that it is necessary to tell you a few things before you read this oneshot– first of all, this is a story about how Eames learned about shared dreaming. It takes place several years before Inception, so he's younger in this one. This oneshot connects to a chapter-story about Inception I'm writing, Infiltration (You can check it out if you want). The OC in this story is also in Infiltration. I am considering turning this into a chapter story, though right now chances of it are low. If I do turn it into a chapter story, it will be after I finish Infiltration. Anyway, read it, review it, tell me what you like about it, what you don't like about it. I love constructive criticism (No flamers, though). Enjoy!
Disclaimer: I do not own Inception
Eames wove discreetly through the clamoring crowd beer-bellied men with bushy black moustaches and women clinging to their arms who were obviously years younger than them. The stench of alcohol and cigarette smoke muddled the already-thick air. At the other end of the congested, dimly-lit bar, he spotted the one person who had the ability of being partner-in-crime, occasionally his lover, and probably the best friend he would ever have, Marisol.
He met her only a few months ago, in a drinking contest in fact (Which she beat him in, unfortunately), but the two were undoubtedly partners-in-crime. Marisol was about his age, and pretty much the complete female version of him when it came to personality. Clever, sarcastic, sly, and carefree.
Plus, she was damn hot. Not that he was that superficial... But she was, well... She was pretty damn hot. Black hair cascaded below her shoulders and stopped above her elbows in a curtain of loose waves, framing her tanned oval face. Her mother had been Puerto-Rican and her father had been Lebanese, and apparently the combination resulted in quite a stunning mix. Her chocolate brown eyes were round and doe-like, rimmed with thick black eyelashes and smoky black eyeliner. A spray of freckles dotted her sloped nose and round cheeks, a few stray freckles speckling her strong cheekbones. At the moment, Eames watched as she bit into a shiny chili pepper, her full, cushiony lips enveloping the pepper. On this particular night, she had chosen a more casual outfit, a pink tank-top with thin straps and a low neckline. The turquoise lace edges of her bra peeked out of the edge of her neckline. She wore olive-colored shorts and knee-high boots made up of beat-up, brown leather.
They had slept with each other a few times, but oddly there was really no romantic tension between them. Maybe it was because of the fact that they got along so well, it was easier to see each other as almost siblings than anything else. Both of them got their money in illegal ways– Him, counting cards and transporting drugs (that was how he ended up in Puerto Rico, transporting a parcel of Heroin), and her, well... She had never actually told him what exactly she did. She was very vague about it, saying only that she stole stuff. When he inquired what kind of stuff, she just looked away and said, "Stuff". Their jobs weren't the only things they had in common– they both had somewhat of dark pasts. Marisol had lived the ideal childhood, as an only child with a loving father who was a writer and a doting mother who was a neurologist, until she was eight, when her dad supposedly killed her mother. No one knew why, and Marisol claimed he was innocent. As for his childhood, Eames had grown up with a father who was a violent alcoholic that eventually ended up killing his own wife then dying in a drunk driving accident, leaving Eames an orphan. He ended up growing up in the busy streets of Mombasa and making a living by stealing money. As a result, his intelligence book-wise was pretty low, but street-wise he was a genius.
"Evening, darling." He nodded to her, raising his beer.
"You showed up." She said as he approached her, looking up at him with the stem of a chili pepper hanging out of the side of her mouth.
He shrugged and tilted his head, taking a seat in the wrought-iron chair across from her. He had no idea how she ate chili peppers without choking to death simply from the pain, but then again she was the kind of person who liked to see how far she could push the envelope, how close she could live to the edge.
"Stop staring at my chest." She narrowed her eyes into slits and tugged at the blue straps of her bra, covering up her cleavage only slightly more.
Her accent was Spanish, most likely from the fact that she had grown up in Puerto Rico.
"Um, Marisol, while I would hate to argue with you, it's kind of hard not to look." He pressed his lips together and rubbed his chin with a look of mock consideration, still eyeing her tan cleavage. "Anyway, what's this job offer you were talking about?"
Marisol grabbed her beer and pressing it to her lips, then tossing her head back and gulping it down. Then she slammed it back down on the table and wiped her lips, before finally leaning back and looking him straight in the eyes. "Well, before I tell you what it is, I have to warn you it's not exactly... Legal."
She enunciated the word legal slowly, gritting her teeth and curling her bottom lip back in a warning look, lacing her fingers together.
"And since when has that ever been a problem for me?" He raised an eyebrow, shifting in his seat and moving forward in curiosity.
Marisol chuckled. "Right, right, I'm not sure why I even asked that. Anyway, we would be stealing something."
Eames glanced away and took a gulp of his beer, the cold liquid pouring down his throat. "Ooh, interesting. And what would be stealing? Money?"
"Well, no, not money." Her big brown eyes moved around the room nervously, bouncing rapidly from person to person before finally settling back on him.
"What then?"
What else was there to steal than money? Precious jewels were a possibility, but honestly, who did that anymore? Nowadays it was all about drug-dealing. You never read about precious gems being stolen, but rather meth labs exploding, drug traffickers being caught, and all other sort of shit like that.
"An idea." Her words made him lean forward and narrow his eyes.
An idea?
"Scuse me?" He said, unsure if he had heard her correctly.
He knew Marisol didn't exactly qualify as "sane", but what she had just said was kind of shocking, even for her. Surely she meant some sort of plan or blueprint, but from the way she said it that wasn't what it sounded like.
"Have you ever heard of shared dreaming?" She said curiously, tracing large figure-eights across the slightly wet surface of the table, raising a dark eyebrow.
"What the Hell is that?" He asked, now even more convinced that his friend had completely lost it.
He had always been convinced she was crazy– that was obvious. But still... This was just plain weird.
"Well, to put it simply, it's when a group of people go into a dream, and they know that they're dreaming." She explained as she pushed a strand of hair out of her face that had been dangling limply in front of her eye for quite some time. "It was developed for the military, so that the soldiers could punch and shoot at each other as much as they wanted without actually killing anyone."
He cocked his head and raised his eyebrow. "Are you drunk?"
"What? No, Eames, I'm serious about this." She said as she placed her hands on her lap, leaning forward. "Listen, here's the offer– shared dreaming can also be used for other things, such as stealing an idea. I got an offer from a man named Robert Gorgas, who wants us to steal some company secrets from his rival, Patrick Ferguson. He's willing to pay us 15,000 dollars, each."
Suddenly he was more interested. He could use 15,000 dollars at the moment. Money had been scarcer and scarcer nowadays, and he had resorted to looking to loan sharks for money.
"How exactly would we go into his mind?" He took another swig of his beer, a few cold beads dribbling down the edges of his mouth.
"It's like I said before, we go into his dream. When in a dream, the mind likes to create a storage place for ideas, such as a safe or a bank vault." She explained, leaning back against the chair.
He sighed, looking up at the ceiling, at the vein-like cracks that snaked through the concrete. "And how would we figure out the numbers to these safes?"
"Just as a safe created by an architect can be filled with a dreamer's secrets, the safe can be set to
unlock with the dreamer's own numbers." Marisol glanced up at the ceiling also, then down at her lap.
"Huh?"
She rolled her eyes. "All we have to do is get them to make up a random combination."
"Ah." He nodded, leaning back. "And what exactly is an architect?"
As crazy as this sounded, he was actually starting to believe it. Well, hoped it was real was a better way to describe it. But it all sounded too good to be true. It couldn't possibly be true.
"The architect designs the layout of the dream, but they don't usually go under." Marisol flicked her head slightly, tossing a chunk of hair behind her tanned shoulder.
For the first time that night, Eames noticed how hot and damp the air felt. He slapped at something on the side of his neck, only to realize it had been a bead of sweat rolling down his skin. His eyes flew back towards Marisol, who was staring at him as if she was awaiting an answer. But how did he respond to something like that?
"Is that what you do?" He finally asked, looking down the neck of the bottle.
Did I finish my beer already?
The dark-haired girl curled her bottom lip and narrowed her eyes, tilting her head. "Eh, I can do some decent architecture, but my specialty is forgery."
"That sounds interesting, what is it?" Eames replied disinterestedly, looking around the crowded, noisy bar.
One of the quietlyt buzzing lightbulbs suspended from the ceiling flickered slightly, then dimmed completely, darkening the bar even more. No one seemed to notice, though. As his eyes roved back to his partner-in-crime, he realized she had pulled out a pack of Marlboros, and was picking at the thin plastic film wrapped around it with her jet-black fingernail. When she realized he was staring at the pack, she held it out towards him.
"Want one?" She offered, finally tearing off the plastic wrap and pulling out a fresh cigarette, which she stuck in between her surprisingly white teeth.
He pressed his lips together and shrugged. "Eh, why not?" He grabbed a cigarette and stuck it in his mouth, then casually fished around in the pocket of his sports coat for a lighter.
"Why don't we go outside, where it's less crowded?" She said, nodding towards the balcony a few feet away from them.
"Sure." He shrugged and stood up, then the two slipped through the crowd and onto the balcony, which overlooked a dark, trash-dotted alley with walls that were spray-painted with all sorts of obscenities.
The bar they had chosen was probably as low-class and dingy as they came, but those were the kind they liked. Small, cheap, and local. He liked to consider himself kind of like that old bloke from the Travel Channel, Anthony Bourdain. He was into the actual location, not the fluff that was portrayed on the commercials.
"So, tell me about forgery." He leaned against the metal railing, even though it pressed against his elbow painfully. "Damn it, where is my lighter?"
"Here," Marisol handed him a bright red lighter. "Anyway, forgery is basically projecting the image of anyone. For instance, if I were in a dream, I could make myself look exactly like you."
Eames shielded the small lighter with his hand as he pressed down on it with his thumb, finally getting a small flame to jump up and light his cigarette. "Hmm. You think maybe you could teach me how to do this?"
Something about forgery sparked his interest. He wasn't sure what, and he wasn't sure why, but something about it suddenly made him begin to believe her.
"I could, but forgery is a skill that takes years of practice to master. And it requires patience." She said, removing the cigarette from between her lips.
He looked up at the sky, which wasn't black but rather dark, dark blue speckled with a plethora of twinkling stars. "So? Listen, how about if you teach me how to be a forger, I'll take that job offer."
Marisol narrowed her eyes and pressed her plush lips together. She really was quite beautiful, especially in the moonlight. But for some reason, he couldn't bring himself to see her as anything more than a friend. It was the oddest thing. He watched as she looked down at the alley below them, a few feral cats scurrying along the wet, trash-covered cobblestone streets.
"Fine, deal." She concluded, putting the cigarette between her teeth once more. "Who knows, maybe you'll end up making a living off of it."
Eames just grinned and stuck his hands in the pockets of his trousers, filled with the undeniable sense that he had just agreed to something that would change his life.
So, how was it? This was my first attempt at a one-shot, mind you. Anyway, Marisol's also in my chapter story, Infiltration, so if you want to see more of her or if you just like the way I write, check it out. Read, leave a review, tell me what you like, what you don't like, and I'll give you a virtual hug.
-Isolde