DISCLAIMER – I do not own Inception or any of its characters. They belong to Christopher Nolan and Warner Bros. And they're used without permission for your entertainment.
AUTHOR'S NOTE – Hi there! I'm BeeKay84. Maybe you already know me from my various fanfics for the Lion King, Disney's The Weekenders, Disney's Kim Possible and the Monkey Island fandoms. If you don't, the first thing I need to point out is: I'm from Germany, that means English is not my native language and my English is not perfect. From what I've been told, it must be pretty good, though. The next thing you need to know is that this is my very first Inception fanfic ever and it's only a "one shot" that was written for a contest over at deviantART. This was for an Arthur x Ariadne group, so if you're a fan of that pairing, good for you. If you're not an AxA shipper, then I can at least tell you that the shipping will remain on a very low level. Now, the subject of this contest was "First Impressions", hence the title. It's about how Arthur and Ariadne were introduced to each other (something we didn't actually see in the movie).
To those who expected a new fanfic about one of the fandoms mentioned above, sorry to disappoint you. I do hope to write some more of these some day, too, but I can only write when I have enough ideas and enough time. In the case of a one-shot like this, it's a lot easier to get it done. So, please don't be mad.
I wrote this in the course of one day, so if there's anything bad about it, don't be too hard on me, please. I was really trying my best to do this amazing movie and its characters justice. Now, enjoy. ;)
First Impressions
Ariadne walked a few steps behind Cobb who led the way through the streets of Paris, still wondering what Professor Miles had gotten her into.
What kind of job interview is this, anyway?
She had stopped asking questions aloud after Cobb had not answered them properly for what felt like the fiftieth time. He had asked her to design a few more mazes and then told her they would meet with his business partner to discuss further details and to run a few more tests so he could be sure she was the right person for this job. But he still did not bother telling her what kind of job exactly she was applying for right now, what her tasks would be or what other criteria she would have to meet in order to get the job. The only two things he did tell her were that the kind of work they were talking about was "not strictly speaking legal", and that she would get the chance to discover her full creative potential in the course of it. That first part did not sound very comforting, she had to admit. But she decided to trust Professor Miles, and that second part did indeed sound very intriguing…
-xXOXx-
When they first entered the old warehouse, Ariadne looked less than impressed.
So, this is the place where I'm supposed to discover my creative potential?
Ariadne inspected her surroundings skeptically while walking to the center part of the warehouse. Only when Cobb stopped and addressed her again did she notice the other person in this huge building.
"Ariadne, this is Arthur," Cobb introduced them. "Arthur, meet Ariadne,… our new architect."
Both Arthur and Ariadne stared at Cobb in a somehwhat surprised way for a brief moment before actually looking at each other for the first time. The tall lean young man in a vest and tie standing in front of her wore an expression that was nearly as unreadable to her as Cobb's. Yet, for some reason, she found his expression to be a bit more soothing than Cobb's and formed a weak smile on her lips.
"Nice to meet you," she finally uttered in a voice that seemed more shy than she had intended it to sound and carefully offered her hand to the young man.
Arthur returned the smile only slightly and took her hand to shake it. "Nice to meet you, too," he replied in a somewhat nonchalant manner, it seemed to her. But the way he had taken her hand was way more gentle than she had expected.
It took Ariadne a moment to realize Arthur had already let go of her hand and had placed his hands in his pant pockets. As if brought back from a daydream, she instinctively closed her eyes and opened them again, slightly shaking her head and immediately shifting her glance from Arthur over to Cobb, who was standing next to them.
"So," she began in a questioning way, "your 'new architect'? I'm… you mean, I got the job?"
Cobb nodded slightly, replying: "Very likely. We still need to test your skills a little more, but I think you're the architect we were looking for."
"Um, actually," Ariadne said carefully, "I'm not an architect yet, I still have another year at college, you know."
"It's not your status we're interested in, Ariadne, it's your talents and skills," Cobb retorted. Totally unexpected, he added: "You look thirsty. Let me get you a glass of water, okay?"
Ariadne nodded, wearing a slightly confused expression, and Cobb went on his way to a distant corner of the warehouse. She watched him go for a few seconds before her gaze returned to Arthur, only to notice his nonchalant expression again. Somehow, it seemed as if he had been looking at her like that the whole time.
With a smirk and a slightly teasing voice, Ariadne asked him: "So… would you mind telling me a little bit more about this job I apparently just got?"
She thought she just saw him form a smirk similar to hers on his lips, but it could have been her imagination. Before she could possibly check for any trace of a smile on his face again, Arthur retorted: "What do you already know about it?"
Ariadne scoffed at what he had just said, feeling like he was making fun of her. In a slightly annoyed, yet polite enough tone, she replied: "Next to nothing. He did say it was kinda… illegal, and I would be able to discover my creative potential – and I'd really love to do that, but… how am I supposed to create anything when I don't even know what this job is all about?"
It seemed like minutes passed while Ariadne waited for Arthur's reaction to her rant, other than fixing his mysterious gaze upon her. Finally, a weak smile formed on his lips, and he stated: "I'd rather let Cobb do the explaining."
Ariadne let out a sigh of frustration and placed her hands on her waist, muttering: "Great."
She looked down on the floor for a second or two, then her gaze started wandering about the interior of the warehouse once more as well as her closer surroundings. Eventually, she caught sight of two white deckchairs and a white table with a small steel suitcase on it. Curiously, she looked a little past Arthur to get a better glance at the closed suitcase.
Finally, she motioned her head into the direction of the object behind him and asked: "What's with that suitcase?"
Arthur did not even bother following her glance, instead he stared at a distant point behind her, seemingly ignoring her.
Even more the silent type than Mr. Cobb, I guess…
At that, she noticed footsteps walking up to her, and Cobb's voice saying: "Why don't you take a seat, Ariadne?"
A little surprised, Ariadne turned to look at Cobb standing behind her, holding a glass of water in his one hand and pointing at one of the deckchairs behind Arthur with his other hand. Slightly confused, Ariadne slowly headed towards the deckchair, when Arthur stepped aside, now standing in front of the table. Ariadne eyed the deckchair skeptically from above once she was standing in front of it. It seemed totally out of place here in this warehouse, in this situation.
"Have a seat," Cobb repeated.
Ariadne's head shot back up to him, her mouth half-open as if to say something, but then she quietly sat down on the edge of the deckchair, facing Cobb who stood in front of the other deckchair next to hers.
Once she had taken her seat, Cobb offered her the glass of water, saying: "Here's your drink. Take a sip."
Ariadne looked up at him briefly, then took the glass and replied in a low voice: "Thank you."
She took a sip from the glass immediately, then noticed how dry her throat actually was and drank some more. When she put the glass down on the floor and her bag next to it, Cobb had just seated himself on the edge of the other deckchair and began: "Now, let's get down to business."
Finally.
Ariadne straightened herself a little in order to appear more attentive and listened carefully.
"Alright, now, the first thing you need to know about this job," Cobb continued, "is that there's a lot of preparations to be made beforehand."
Ariadne nodded when he paused.
Cobb carried on: "These preparations give you the opportunity not only to train for the actual job, but also to refine your skills as an architect and to discover your true creative potential."
There was yet another pause, so Ariadne nodded again, smiling a little this time.
"All the preparations will take place here in this building," Cobb explained further. "Once we go out to execute the job, you have to be aware that we have only one shot to do it right. So, everything you prepare for us will have to be perfect."
Was it the piercing, expectant look in his eyes or the sudden feeling of dizziness in her head that made Ariadne feel uncomfortable…?
"You'll get to work with a whole team," Cobb said then. "With me, with Arthur,…"
Ariadne slowly turned her head a little to the right to see Arthur standing next to the table like before, with his hands behind his back and his nonchalant expression, looking at her. Her head started feeling even more dizzy. When she turned back to look at Cobb, he had fixed that piercing gaze upon her again, but then quickly looked away like he was thinking or searching for words.
Is it getting hot here?
"Eventually, we'll have about four or five members." While Cobb said that, Ariadne slowly took off her red vest. She was shocked by the fact that it felt hard for her to move.
"And the most important thing is…" Cobb started, then paused again.
Ariadne's vision became blurry. She felt more and more dizzy and was no longer able to pay attention to what Cobb was saying. In a last effort, she struggled to reach for her glass of water on the floor. When she felt too weak to sit up again, the only thing she noticed was Arthur making a sudden movement in the corner of her eye. With her last bit of strength, Ariadne turned her head to look at him, then her eyes shut and she lost consciousness.
-xXOXx-
Arthur had instinctively stepped forward when he had noticed Ariadne almost falling off the chair trying to reach her glass, but Cobb had already caught her by her arms to prevent her from hitting the floor. Struggling to keep the college girl balanced, Cobb turned to look at Arthur who wore a frown on his face.
"I didn't use a very strong sedative, and not much of it, either," Cobb tried to soothe him. "Just enough so she would doze off. The effects should wear off as soon as we're under."
When the Point Man kept frowning and remained frozen to the spot, Cobb nearly shouted at him: "Well, don't just stand there, help me get her back on the chair!"
While Cobb was still holding her arms, Arthur joined his side to take Ariadne's feet, and they carefully lifted her up and placed her on the deckchair.
Arthur had looked at the sleeping girl all the while, then shot a worried glance at Cobb, asking in a voice as calm as he could manage: "Was that really necessary?"
Cobb sighed as if he was tired of being questioned and explained: "Look, I need to make sure there's nothing hidden in her subconscious that could endanger our job. I'm gonna build an environment that'll seem familiar to her, like a Parisian café, I'll explain the concept of shared dreaming and some basics about our work to her and see how the projections she's bringing into the dream are reacting. I'll only tell her she's dreaming when I'm absolutely sure she has what it takes for the job."
"So, what if you find she doesn't?" Arthur inquired.
"Then I'll get out of the dream, we'll remove her IV before she wakes up, and when she does, she won't remember the dream, and I'll just tell her she's not the right person for the job." Cobb replied, then added: "But I think she is."
"A college student?" Arthur frowned. "Are you serious?"
"I trust Miles," Cobb simply said. "He said she's better than I once was. And she seems like someone who picks up new things fast."
Arthur nodded, looking in deep thought, then asked in a serious voice: "And what if she decides she wants to follow us into the job?"
"As our architect, she won't."
"Nash did," Arthur reminded him.
"We needed him in there because otherwise, there wouldn't have been enough team members for two dream levels. That was different." He let out a sigh. "And besides, I promised Miles she won't."
Arthur slowly nodded, wearing a relieved expression on his face.
After a few seconds, Cobb motioned in the direction of the steel suitcase, saying: "Let's get started."
Arthur went to open the suitcase, revealing the machinery inside. They both grabbed a plastic tube, pulling it out to be long enough to reach the place where the two deckchairs were standing.
While Cobb helped himself, Arthur kneeled down beside the sleeping Ariadne and gently took her wrist in order to apply the IV. He had done this so many times already, to people he had never known personally, but found out many things about in his research, enough to be able to literally get inside their heads. In most cases, those people were businessmen of some sort.
This, however, was different. Not only because he hardly knew a thing about this young woman. It just felt different to Arthur than all those times before. For the first time, the thought that what he was doing might be wrong struck him. And he could not help but fear, in the corner of his mind, that his slightest touch could hurt her. As carefully as never before, Arthur applied the IV to Ariadne's wrist, feeling her slow pulse, the softness of her skin. He looked up at her face, watching her regular breathing.
Such a beautiful face…
As soon as the thought had crossed his mind, Arthur became aware of a voice behind him, but could not quite understand the words.
"Arthur?"
He turned his head to see Cobb staring at him expectantly.
"Sorry, what?" Arthur asked in a nonchalant voice.
"I said five minutes should be enough," Cobb repeated.
"Okay," Arthur stood up, being all business again and walked to the opened suitcase lying on the table. Looking at Cobb, he asked: "You ready?"
"Yes."
Arthur had placed his finger on the button and nodded at Cobb.
Just don't let things get outta control again.
He glanced at Ariadne wearing a worried expression and pressed the button.
The End
AUTHOR'S NOTE – Well, that was my little idea about this scene. What do you think? In case it wasn't clear, the parts written in Italics were Ariadne's thoughts in the first two parts, and Arthur's thoughts in the last part. I hope I succeeded at shifting from Ariadne's point-of-view to Arthur's point-of-view. And the idea of Cobb drugging Ariadne for their first shared dream is my explanation of why Ariadne didn't know she was dreaming in this scene. To me, it seems like a thing Cobb would do. Like I said, this was my first attempt at an Inception fanfic, and I know I probably didn't manage to nail the characters down perfectly, so please go easy on me. This came from genuine inspiration, a single idea planted in my mind by this fascinating movie. Tell me what you think in a review. No matter what, I'm sure of this one thing: It was worth a shot. ;)