This bit really didn't want to work. BUT HERE IT IS. YAY.
Also, there'll be a bit of a wait before the next part as I'm away next week, but it'll be up ASAP along with chapter one of Amaranthine for those that are interested. But it will come!
Word count: ~3500
Pairing: E/A
Warnings: swearing, non-explicit violence, slash, characters thinking thinky-thoughts.
Disclaimer: not mine.
Summary: Eames is the first to know when Arthur leaves the military for the other, better-paid side of the track.
STATIC
Third in the Series ONE SHOCK FOR YES (TWO FOR NEVER)
BadActs
Eames is the first to know when Arthur leaves the military for the other, better-paid side of the track. This is because he doesn't need any of his many contacts to let him know that Arthur has turned: Arthur calls him, the first time since Eames fled eight months ago, to tell him.
Well, actually, the first thing he says is, "how's Wellington?"
Eames, who has actually been lying low after a job in Frankfurt, pauses.
"Wet," he says after a moment. "Wet and windy, which I'm led to believe is a fairly constant state for New Zealand in winter."
"I've never been," Arthur comments, his voice meditative. "I hear it's very green."
"Green and grey," Eames replies, staring out at the water-shattered glass that twists what little light falls through the window. It's a little like home, for him. Unfortunately, it's much easier to feel patriotic about England's weather when he's somewhere hot and dry.
Eames should be worried that Arthur can track him so easily, but he's sadly too busy being pleased that Arthur has cared enough to track him at all.
"To what do I owe the pleasure, darling?" he asks, lying back on his bed.
"For one thing, the American military want you to know they want their PASIV back, you fucker, and they weren't impressed that even I couldn't find where you'd gone," Arthur says, very dry, "and for another, the American Military can go fuck themselves, as far as I'm concerned."
The fact that Arthur lied to the military concerning his ability to find Eames is even more pleasing. "Were they very upset with you?"
"Well, they made you out to be a lot more dangerous than you are. I guess they didn't want to look too foolish for letting you steal their equipment right out from under their noses," Arthur muses. "I'm sick of working with people so useless for a pittance. I'm getting older, you know, I can't do this shit for pocket-change any more."
Eames has to laugh at that. Especially seeing as Arthur is twenty-four is he's a day. "Well, you've picked the right field. If you know the best people, you'll have lined those pockets in no time."
"Why do you think I'm calling you?"
"Oh, darling, do be careful. I'm blushing here," Eames chuckles.
"You're still the best forger I've ever seen," Arthur says, and his tone is so full of casual innuendo that he may as well have just said, also, you're still the best lay I've ever had.
"Why thank you," Eames says, delighted. "Where are you right now?"
"Vancouver," Arthur supplies. "Why?"
"Because I'm going to give you the address of the Cobbs in Paris. Mal's pregnant, you know," Eames says, grabbing his notebook off of the bedside table.
"I thought they were legit," Arthur comments.
"They work with the best," Eames says. "Which, I'm sure, means that they'd love to bring you onto their team permanently, especially now that Mal's not going under anymore." He rattles off the address and phone numbers, listening to Arthur write them down. Afterwards, Arthur is silent for a few moments, his pen tapping lightly over the phone.
"Will I see you?" he asks at last, and there's something in his voice. Eames isn't sure what.
"They work with the best," Eames repeats, " and that, my darling, definitely includes me."
As a matter of fact, the very next job he takes is a standard militarisation of an oil heiress with the Cobbs in Texas. With Dom as the face of the job, he and Arthur don't need to worry about being slightly less than legal: Dom is too blonde and attractive to be the focus of anyone's suspicions. Eames follows Cobb's standard text, not even sure that he will see Arthur until he walks into the rental house they're running out of in Houston.
The ex-soldier is out of his BDUs, wearing a suit tailored right down to his slim, elegant lines. He wears it like he wears everything, with a graceful practicality, all rolled sleeves and messy collar. On anyone else, the look would be sloppy. Not on Arthur, though.
Arthur looks good. Very, very good.
"Stateside, Cobb? Really?" Eames says, instead of, I really think we should have sex. Right now. For the sake of professionalism and all. "Do you know how much heat is still on me over here?"
"You didn't have to take the job," Cobb retorts, although he's smiling. "Besides, the military probably has bigger fish to fry than you right now."
"I believe he might be talking about you, Arthur," Eames teases. "Give them the middle finger on exiting, did you?"
"Because that's something you would know nothing about," Arthur replies, one side of his mouth quirking. "It's good to see you, Mister Eames."
"Besides, we weren't about to come to come to New Zealand," Cobb says. "Mal's not travelling much at the moment."
"How is she?" Eames asks, and he can even hear his own voice softening. He still absolutely adores Mal.
"Very good, mon coeur," Mal's accented voice says from behind him. She's leaning against the doorframe, and she looks simply radiant. Eames kisses her theatrically on the hand, and then the cheek, exclaiming over her as only he can. The sound of her laugh is music to his bloody ears.
The gentle smile on Arthur's face is even better.
The next time he sees Arthur is on an entirely different job. The Cobbs are at home in LA, getting to know their new baby girl. The few times they've spoken, Eames has thought that both of them sound sleep-deprived and utterly overjoyed with little Phillipa.
The job is in Seoul. They're operating out of an old restaurant, the windows papered over so that they spend most of their time squinting at their notes even in the brightest hours of the day. Arthur is finding work elsewhere while the Cobbs aren't doing any jobs, and apparently he's the one who suggested they call in Eames.
It's not for his skill as a forger, however – it's because Arthur doesn't trust the people he has signed on to work for. In the four months Arthur has been a criminal, he's made something of a name for himself as the most ruthlessly efficient and just plain ruthless point man in the business. Eames has heard many rumours of his skills, most of them wildly exaggerated. Not that he is in any doubt of Arthur's expertise, but Eames finds the idea of Arthur killing twenty armed guards in the real world single-handed rather unlikely.
The thing about Arthur is that he understands what he has to do to get what he wants. He has established a huge network of contacts in a relatively short time, only some of which he came by through the Cobbs and Eames. Arthur knows when to exert pressure and when to take it off. It makes the others nervous, and frightened people are prone to doing stupid things.
Arthur doesn't actually tell Eames his doubts until later. However, Eames thinks the same thing as soon as he is introduced to the extractor, who goes by the name of William Kirkpatrick. He's South African, and for some reason Eames thinks of him, bounty hunter. Eames isn't certain who Kirkpatrick's target is, but he sees the way the man looks at him, the way Arthur stiffens as he catches the mistake he may have just made, and he has a pretty good idea.
Arthur invites himself to stay with Eames, knocking on his door with his duffel bag slung over one shoulder and the PASIV in its discreet black suitcase in the other hand. Eames lets him without a whisper of protest. Security is security, he supposes, and he'll take it especially when it's coupled with spectacular sex.
"I think I've led you into a trap," Arthur confesses, taking the coffee Eames has made him.
"I can look after myself, pet," Eames informs him, sitting down on the couch. Arthur sits down at the other end, toeing off his shoes and socks before shoving his bare feet into Eames' lap. Arthur's legs are slim but powerful-looking, calf muscles bunched under his well-tailored trousers. His feet are wide, toes fine, ankles delicate and graceful. Eames rubs the arch of one of them with the ball of his thumb, massaging the knot there until Arthur groans with a mixture of agony and pleasure.
"I know that," Arthur snaps back at him. "I fucking know. It's just, I mean, I thought what he really wanted was to get involved with the Cobbs, which just isn't going to happen. He's not solid enough, his record isn't great, he got an architect killed in Rio last year. But apparently he's after you."
Eames shrugs. "Forgers are tricky creatures to come by. I imagine he'd prefer to get me onto his team permanently, one way or another. Failing that, he might just kill me."
Arthur's annoyance fails in the face of Eames's ministrations, but his voice is still sharp. "That's so comforting, thanks."
"I didn't realise you were in need of coddling, darling," Eames says, raising an eyebrow. Arthur actually snarls at him, although he doesn't pull his feet away.
The actual mark for this job is a man who has apparently stolen ideas from his corporation in South America and then fled to Korea to hide away, too frightened to actually sell them out. The rival corporation who had paid him to get the information have hired them to take it, by force if needs be. God, Eames hates the rich and powerful, who think that enough money makes it okay for them to do anything they like. It's a simple enough job, the architect and dreamer proposing a snatch-and-run. Eames is sure the mark will give in to threatening – he's clearly not very brave.
"I have a bad feeling," Arthur says after a little while, staring blankly at the roof. "I know bad feelings are more your jurisdiction, but, well…"
Eames has to smile. "How about I make you forget about that, for now?"
Arthur is right.
They'd thought aloud, in that too-tired, fucked-out way they have, communicating more through touch and looks than actual words, that if anything did happen it would go down during the job itself. Dream-sharing does, after all, leave the body extremely vulnerable to attack.
They certainly aren't right about that, however. Eames is in the hotel room alone after finishing their final practise run, the one where he'd shown off his forgery of the mark's girlfriend, when he realises that someone is in there with him. Before he can even turn around fully, he is tasered to the floor. Tased. Something. It's hard to think with that many volts running through one's body.
And then he's being cuffed, and his ankles are tied – smart move, Eames thinks – and then he's being heaved over someone's broad shoulder and carried down the stairs. There's a car and a hood pressing too close and scratchy, and then more stairs, up this time.
He struggles when they dump him into a hard chair and restrain him. He might be strong, but he still can't fight off two men when he can't use his limbs. Even blind he knows both of them – Kirkpatrick, of course, and the chemist Costello.
When they pull off the hood he tugs against the cuffs, taking in the room around him – another hotel – as quickly as he can. The sudden movement makes Costello – a slight, almost effeminate man with dark-framed glasses – flinch backwards, and takes some skin off of Eames' wrists, but doesn't achieve much else. Kirkpatrick just looks amused.
"What the fuck do you want?" Eames asks, his voice pitched low and eyes hooded against the light shining straight in his face. On the upside, if they just kidnap him, Eames knows that MI6 will eventually save his arse. However, if they just want to kill him – well, Eames is on his own in that case.
"I hope you aren't thinking that your pet point man is going to save you," Kirkpatrick says, pulling over another seat and sitting on it backwards just out of Eames' reach. He pushes the light away almost solicitously, with a quirk of a smile. "He's probably a little preoccupied at the moment."
Eames doesn't go stiff. Nothing shows on his face: he knows that.
He says, "what does that mean?"
"I would have thought that that was rather obvious," Kirkpatrick murmurs. "We've got money on our side, Eames, and Arthur has made enemies. Jimmy McClane was only too happy to help us out, especially when he heard he'd get a share of whatever we make off of you."
Eames's heart rate picks up. Jimmy McClane is one of the people on MI6's list of dangerous people to avoid at all costs: he has a list of real-life heists to go with his ones in the dream business, and a nasty habit of shooting marks if his jobs go wrong. He's also apparently an ex-Spec-Ops soldier who loves to cut people up slow in fights. Eames has managed to keep away from him thus far, but if Arthur can't beat him-
Except that Arthur can. Eames knows he can, has seen Arthur fight and seen him win time and time again, in dreams and in training.
Also, the fact that they want to sell him off isn't something Eames wants to hear. There are many things you can do with a forger if you have little or no conscience, and Eames would prefer to stay out of that. He hasn't forgotten how quickly minutes become hours in the dream, and he could be under for years before – and if – MI6 rescues him.
"If you were smart, you'd have already put me under," Eames replies, his voice perfectly, chillingly calm. Costello is moving around the room behind Kirkpatrick, walking between several bags dumped on the ground. "Please tell me you aren't going to keep talking at me. It's all very 'master-criminal-reveals-his-plans'."
"You've got a smart mouth for a man who couldn't even defend himself in his own hotel room," Kirkpatrick replies. "I'd thought better of you. And you're only awake now because some of our potential buyers want to talk to you."
"Seems like there's a bit of that inability to secure hotel rooms going around," comes a very familiar, very welcome voice from the shadows. Eames looks away from Kirkpatrick's face – surprise dawning already – and into Arthur's. The point man looks almost as unruffled as he did when they left the hotel room this morning for work, except for a tiny cut on his neck that has bled to stain pink and scarlet the collar of his shirt.
Costello is already an unconscious lump on the tiles, and neither of them had even heard Arthur enter.
Then Kirkpatrick has a gun, aimed steady at Arthur, and Arthur can't fire back because Eames is right behind him and too close. Eames drops in his chair, and – fucking fuck, his left wrist breaks under the crush of his weight, and his head hits the floor too hard, but it's still better than a bullet wound.
He can't do much more than listen – two shots only, silenced, and they're still going to be lucky if security isn't up here in a few minutes – and breathe deeply through the pain. Then there's movement, too close, and Eames can't even kick out if it is Kirkpatrick.
"You are more trouble than you're worth," Arthur says, and then there are long fingers untying the knots at his ankles. "Don't move. I heard something break from all the way over there, and I really hope it wasn't your skull."
"I was of the impression that you already knew I was trouble. I steal secrets for a living," Eames groans when Arthur lifts him and the chair upright again. "My arm-"
"I can see," Arthur replies, and he must have the key to the cuffs – must have taken them from Kirkpatrick's pocket – because they come loose a moment later. "Can you walk?"
"Can I walk," Eames scoffs, "it's my wrist that's broken, not my legs."
"Never mind the concussion," Arthur mutters. "Come on, then."
Eames stands, and maybe staggers a little bit. Thankfully Arthur catches him around the waist, making a faintly mocking noise that Eames can only just hear over the roaring in his ears. They don't move for a moment, and Eames finally manages to tune back in as Arthur says, "and you better not faint, either, because there's no way I'm dragging your ass down all those steps to the carpark, I'll just roll you."
"Arse, darling," Eames corrects, and Arthur – Arthur, with blood on his hands and a still-warm Glock that smells faintly of gunpowder at his hip – throws his head back and laughs.
It says a lot about Arthur that he has already scoped out the local shady doctor in their area, who is willing to set Eames's arm and supply him with painkillers with labels that he can't make head nor tail of.
"I very much hope that this really is Tylenol, or the Korean equivalent of it," Eames says as he settles somewhat gingerly onto the bed. "I don't know how experimental drugs would affect my possible brain damage."
"None of us would notice the difference if it did," Arthur replies from where he's packing their things into bags in preparation for making their escape. Apparently the job had been a real one, which Kirkpatrick had intended to complete with Costello and McClane once Arthur was dead and Eames sold into the dream equivalent of slavery. So now do they not only have a trail of two corpses and an unconscious man, but they've also probably got their ex-employer out for their blood.
McClane, Arthur had explained, was stupid to bring a knife into a fight with a man who he knew was armed with at least one handgun. It's not possible to throw a blade faster or further than a bullet, and no one is quiet enough to get the kind of drop on Arthur that you'd need to win that kind of rumble.
McClane isn't going to be mourned, Eames knows that. However, the counts of murder to Arthur's name are beginning to stack up, which makes Eames…makes Eames something. Not nervous, because that's not anywhere near what Eames is feeling. Afraid, perhaps. Terrified.
Because Eames isn't who he says he is, and Arthur is exactly that.
Eames has never spent so much time wondering when the façade goes too far, when he finally simply becomes this character and loses all allegiance to the country he swore to die for, twice. When his life and the con become too entangled to separate. Where the division between man and monster actually lies, and if that line even really exists.
He closes his eyes, focuses on the steady draw of breath and the points of pain all over his body. It's better than the slightly garbled existentialist bullshit that has been running in circles in his head for the last hour.
For the first time in his life, Eames finds himself unsure of what he wants. He's never had that problem before: usually he desires something, and then chooses something else instead when the want fades. The irresolution feels like the earth shuddering beneath his feet, threatening to plunge him further than he thinks he can survive falling.
"You better not go to sleep," Arthur says, his matter-of-fact tone underscored with worry. "Imagine the paper trail if I have to take you to a real hospital."
"I'm not sleeping, just resting. Also, your tender concern for my health is touching," Eames says, and who is he kidding. Of course there's no such thing as monsters.
Next in the series is part four: BLACK OUT
BadActs