He kept an eye on her. The three of them stayed in contact; that was a given now that Cobb was gone. Eames made noises about going solo, but Arthur knew the man didn't have the resources to do much more than small-time freelance work now and then. Much as Eames baited him, Arthur accepted that it was mostly for show, and that their mutual respect had grown since the Fischer caper.
Ariadne was a different story, and Arthur watched her struggle for a while with the aftermath of losing Cobb. He didn't have Eames' easy charm or people skills, but Arthur made it a point to be around, and she seemed to appreciate his company. They had dinner together twice a week, usually at little bistros not far from the warehouse that Arthur still had under lease, and at least once a week they shared a Dream.
Arthur didn't want to admit it, but those times made him more nervous than any other aspect of his days. There was an intimacy to Dreaming that required trust, and trust was a commodity that Arthur didn't trade in very often.
Eames joined them occasionally while he searched for jobs; he still had contacts within COBOL, and an ear to the ground when it came to international business acumen. He and Arthur had done some quick and small Extractions mostly among Parisian CEOs, and the money was enough to live on comfortably for a while. Arthur banked his share and sent money home while Eames invested in stocks.
Ariadne spent hers on books; glossy coffee table collections of exotic architecture, some of it real, some of it fantasy. She shrugged them off as reference material and Arthur nodded at the sense of that.
When the three of them Dreamed, they practiced what they knew best, which meant that Ariadne created worlds. At the start they were minimalist and very Bauhaus, and Arthur sensed it was her rebound reaction to the elaborate work she'd been required to do prior.
"You like German Post-Modern?" he asked her.
"It's easy, and deceptive," she pointed out with one of her little shrugs. "Glass is transparent and reflective at the same time, which makes it a powerful element in a dream."
He hasn't thought of it that way before.
Sometimes Ariadne built mazes and the three of them had to find their way to a central point. Those were good sessions, and gave them all familiarity with each others' subs. Eames' were exotic types; Ariadne's a narrower selection from within her own age group.
Arthur's were bland.
And deadly.
The better Dreams though, were when he and Ariadne alone went to find each other. On those private jaunts when it was her turn, Ariadne would pull out all the stops, and Arthur was never sure where they would be. Some exotic Martian landscape from a Frazetta painting, or an ochre and mustard colored canyon in the high desert, or some ancient City along the Ur River.
"I don't think we're going to need anything from before the Bronze Age too often," he dryly teased her. "Not unless we get a client who's an archeologist."
"You never know. Maybe it's a memory from a past life," she smirked.
"Doubt it," he reached out a hand to one wall and smoothed his palm over it, "You like working with the natural elements and it shows."
She smiled at that. "Yeah."
"So is it memory, or original?" Arthur wanted to know. Ariadne looked uneasy, shifting from one foot to the other, and he looked up high into the sky before he spoke. "Cobb's rule about no memories was his own safeguard because of Mal; you don't have to stick to it anymore if you don't want."
Ariadne relaxed a bit, and rubbed her arms. "It's from an adobe I once saw in Juarez, years ago. I was fascinated by how smooth they got the clay."
"Cool," Arthur replied.
"When you build your worlds, why do you stick to Modern?" Ariadne asked him curiously. "I'm not criticizing—just interested."
"It's easy, it's fast, and it's forgettable," he replied firmly. "Look, when going in for the average Extraction, you don't need a lot of extraneous stuff; it's not necessary. You want the basics, and most business types are familiar with Modern."
"I disagree," she shot back smoothly, and Arthur blinked.
"Why?"
"Because," Ariadne moved closer, leaning against the clay wall next to him, "The more vivid and personalized the details, the more likely the subject will believe the dream is his own, and not something orchestrated for him. Think about it—if you dreamed of places you knew before, aren't you more likely to consider it YOUR dream?"
Arthur thought about it, and absently noted a few of Ariadne's subs giving him a distinctly dirty look as they passed by. "Possibly. I can see your point. But make it too vivid and you risk having him remember more of it when he wakes up. More of it than you want him to."
"So it's a matter of striking a happy medium," Ariadne agreed. "Enough to fool them it's theirs, but not so much they get suspicious to the other degree."
"You don't like Modern?" Arthur asked before he could stop himself, then looked away. When he glanced back, Ariadne was running a finger along the clay wall, and the gesture was almost erotic.
"Modern's got its uses," she murmured ambiguously, and then glanced at him. "I'm interested in seeing what you'd choose if that one was taken off the table. Just between us."
"Is that a challenge?" Arthur blinked. "Because even though I've got a few years of Dreaming on you, the stuff I work with is pretty basic."
Her little smirk bloomed into a full smile, and the effect hit him in the solar plexus; Arthur remembered that in a Dream state, emotions always ran a little hotter.
"So brush up for next week and surprise me."
The loamy dirt underfoot smelled of water, and the leafy canopy overhead filtered the sunlight into various shades of green. Arthur shifted a little, looking out at the clearing, trying to relax and keeping his eye out on the three pathways that led to the little spring. By his estimation, Ariadne should be within a quarter mile, if she'd managed all the correct turns through the undergrowth and avoided the less than friendly villages.
He checked his watch and took a deep breath, letting himself enjoy the drowse of the afternoon.
She came stumbling into the clearing ten minutes later, annoyed and muddy, her hair streaked with sweat. Arthur watched her look around the clearing for a moment, then stepped out.
Ariadne whirled on him. "You've got an evil mind, Arthur! First that, that damned rice terrace, and then the pigs!"
"I grant you the pigs were pretty bad," he agreed, fighting a grin. "You ought to try moving across that sty at night without alerting them-that's a challenge. What did you do?"
"Used a bamboo stick and threatened them. I know it's not nice, but I was desperate," Ariadne admitted, wiping a thin wrist across her forehead. She was dressed in a loose Vietnamese tunic and pants, and her straw hat dangled behind her back. "So you've been to Southeast Asia," she murmured.
"Stationed there once, on a classified installation near the Laos border," Arthur told her, shifting his assault rifle along his thigh. He didn't glance down at his jungle camouflage and boots, preferring to look at her. "Worst humidity in the world, outside of South America; give me air conditioning every time."
She laughed, and would have said something but the sound of approaching voices alerted them both to his subs, and he reached out for her hand. "Come on—time to go cliff-diving."
They climbed along one rising ridge as the trees thinned out and the landscape grew rocky. Ariadne didn't let go of his grip, and Arthur liked the feel of her small, strong fingers in his. They reached the rocky top of the ridge, and from jagged edge there the view of the horizon stretched out, green and lush.
"Pretty country," Ariadne observed. Arthur swung his rifle around and fired along the trail behind them; a black-clad body fell out of the trees.
"And not Modern," he pointed out. "We need to go."
She nodded. Tightening her grip, Ariadne moved to the edge of the precipice. Arthur dropped the rifle and took her other hand, then nodded. Together, they leaped—
-and woke. Arthur flexed his empty fingers and Ariadne shuddered, shifting in the chaise lounge and blinking.
"You okay?" It was his standard question after every Dream. She reached into her pocket and gripped her totem, fumbling with it a moment, then nodded.
They didn't speak for a little while, stretching and walking off the effects of the sedative before converging again near the Dream Synchronizer. Arthur began to empty the sedative cartridges out while Ariadne leaned on the table and watched him.
"Military, huh?"
"Army," he offered briefly. "Made it to Major."
"Is that where you learned all this?" she asked. He nodded, snapping the case closed, and hoping she would change the line of questioning. To her credit, Ariadne seemed to sense his mood and smiled.
It was a good maze. Very . . . organic. The animals were incredibly detailed, right down to the stench."
"Pigs aren't that bad, once you get used to them. Personally, I think goats are worse."
He watched her cock her head in confusion.
"You wear three piece suits but you know farm animals?"
"Yes."
"Grew up on a farm?"
"You could say that," he agreed, and looked out one of the frosted windows. "Pascal's is still open if you're hungry."
They took one of the terrace tables and shared a bottle of the house wine as they waited for dinner. A definite twilight chill in the air made it clear that the last of the Indian summer was fading from the City of Lights.
Ariadne kept looking at him, and he kept looking back.
"You don't offer up a lot of information," she accused, but it was a thoughtful comment.
"So ask," Arthur told her, bracing himself for an onslaught of questions. If there was one thing he knew about Ariadne it was that she wasn't shy about getting to the heart of things.
She surprised him by grinning and sitting back in her chair. "So why don't you like goats?"
Out of all the things he expected Ariadne to ask, that wasn't one of them. Arthur paused, mid-sip of wine and carefully set the glass down before shooting her a dry look. "Goats. Seriously. You want to know about my experiences with goats. All right. Twenty-four years ago I was terrorized by a Nubian billy who cornered me in a feedlot and ate two thirds of my right tee-shirt sleeve before I could fling myself behind a hay bale and escape. And now you're laughing. Great."
Ariadne was writhing in her chair, one hand over her mouth, spluttering cutely and trying hard to regain a sense of decorum. She wasn't succeeding, and Arthur grudgingly felt himself begin to smile in turn.
"G-G-God, Arthur. The trauma," she snorted, a second spasm of giggles welling up. "Petting zoo?"
"Four H," he admitted. "I was showing a Yorkshire sow that year."
She pointed a finger at him, and her smile was nothing short of amazing. "Pigs."
Arthur was quiet for a moment, savoring the sight of her amusement, and then he spoke, his tone slightly reluctant. "Eames and I are going out of town for a couple of weeks. We've got a small job lined up in Oslo."
As he expected, Ariadne looked mulish. "Without me?"
"You've got a dissertation to finish," he pointed out, "And a seminar to teach. We won't be gone long; it will pay enough to keep the lights on for another six months, okay?"
Reluctantly Ariadne nodded. "Yes, okay. Just . . . be careful, all right? And call me when you get back."
"I'll keep him out of trouble," Arthur assured her, feeling a warmth deep in his stomach that had nothing to do with the exceptional vintage they were sharing.