what the hell am i doing here?
She never had problems with her projections on the job. She was never the dreamer, ever the architect. Her projections never graced the maze, and that was just fine by her. But her real dreams, the ones that her head cooked up after she flopped down in a new hotel in whatever country they did a job in, those dreams ran wild.
Her dreams were plagued by Mallorie Cobb.
At least twice a week, she strolled into her dreams like they were Dom's. But they weren't Dom's, because Mal acted in the only ways that Ariadne knew her. She always carried a broken glass or chef's knife. She spoke either quietly with a whisper smooth as silk, adorned with her beautiful French accent, or she screamed, her face twisted but always lovely. Mal's eyes never changed. They were a constant pale blue, intense like a cat and trained on Ariadne's own brown eyes.
Ariadne couldn't ever look her in the eye. She trained her eyes on the broken champagne glass in her hand instead. She stood once more amongst the wreckage that was supposed to be another of Dom's romantic anniversaries, but had turned into one of his deepest regrets. She had stepped on the glass, and it was still ringing in her ear. She had seen the little metal spinning top.
"You are trying to understand?" Mal practically hisses in her ear as she circles like a shark to a carcass.
Ariadne can't say anything this time. She knows better after so many times she has repeated this dream. Still, her skin is rippled with goose bumps and the chills given to her by Mal's voice make the hair on the nape of her neck stand on end.
It was just like Dom described to her in the imaginary Parisian Café. Dreams seem so real when you're in them. It was just she said. It was all about the feel of the dream, not just the visuals.
"How can you understand?" Mal says as she moves in behind her back.
She can't. Ariadne knows this and her eyes dart all over the ground while she takes a short and shuddering breath. The air is heavy with humidity, just like it can get in the summer house her parents have in southern France, because she doesn't know what Boston air feels like. She knows that, in the time when Mal decided to corner Dom in this room, it was Boston air blowing the soft curtains.
The more jobs she did with the whole gang, the more she began to find that it was the air that really made a dream seem real. A prairie wasn't complete without a rolling breeze. A snowy city just wasn't right without the scent of ozone and car exhaust. She became a connoisseur of the senses. Her grid sketchbooks were filled less with building ideas and more with lists of sounds, smells, sights and sometimes even tastes. Ariadne started documenting all of these tiny details for later dream designs. It was like collecting material for a new project.
"Do you know what it is to be a lover?" Mal's voice sounds again in her other ear.
Ariadne imagines the word 'lover' rolling around and off Mal's tongue as if it was a chocolate or a mouthful of fine red wine. Her mind then imagines Arthur and the way he softly demanded a kiss from her. A gimmick, a trick, and he stole her first kiss. Ariadne felt too confused to be angry. Did it count if it was in a dream? It didn't matter, because even after that job was over, even after they accomplished many other jobs together, and even though he slept on the other queen-sized bed to her sleeping body's right, they weren't lovers and she never could imagine that really happening between them.
"N-no." Ariadne stuttered out, even though she didn't want to.
"Oh, that's a shame." Mal said and the dream deviated from what happened in Dom's memory prison, "I wonder if you will ever wait for a train," Ariadne could see her right hand tightening on the glass as she moved away, "I wonder if you will ever not care about where you are going," Mal had turned towards her now, staring deep into Ariadne's eyes which roamed the room, "I wonder if you will ever not care, because you will be with someone else, together."
Mal whispered the last word and inclined her head towards her. Ariadne snapped her gaze up to hold Mal's, and they both stared for a second, predator and prey, face to face.
Then Ariadne turned and ran towards the elevator, and Mal rushed after her.
But there was no elevator. This wasn't Dom's dream. It wasn't even a controlled dream, and the only thing that Ariadne found was cream colored wall where she had hoped an elevator could be.
A/N: Fuck, I love this movie.
More to come.
