A/N: Hi, I'd just like to explain that I'm
quite new to the whole uploading and writing of
fan fiction so please go easy with the crit.
For those people like me that listen to music
fitting to the story these are the tracks i
listened to while writing it: Imagine dragons,
Battle cry; Shaman's harvest, broken dreams;
Bastille, Icarus; Iron and wine, heaven hangs;
Robocop 2014 theme; Shinedown, breaking inside;
Nickel Creek, When in rome and Imagine Dragons,
Who we are.
Again, only constructive crit, any comment you
know where they go!
ENJOY!
Chapter One
Arthur had never been to limbo. He can't imagine
the half world, and could barely contemplate the
rawness of it as he walked through the ruined
streets.
He closed his eyes, unable to remember how he got
there, who he was and why he was there. He closed
his eyes and tried to remember.
He was running.
As soon as his feet hit the Tarmac he was running.
He didn't know why, but it must have had something
to do with the automatic gunfire puncturing the
Tarmac at his heels.
The dream was not as Ariadne had designed it.
The streets looked like a bomb had hit them, the
skyscrapers were crumbling and some were
completely devoid of glass like they had been
blown out.
He was confined to the main road. He had tried to
turn down alleys that Ariadne had designed but
they closed up before he could reach them.
The mark was protected. She had been trained to
change the dream and now her projections were
doing their job.
1 month earlier.
"Hi, Dom?" Dominic Cobb tried to blink the sleep
from his eyes after being woken by the insistent
bleep of his mobile.
"Yeah, who is this?" Cobb looked at the digital
clock by his bed. 3:20. Great.
"It's Arthur." Now Cobb was awake, he knew his
friend was completely aware if different time
zones so it worried him that he would call so
early.
"Arthur, is everything okay, why..."
"You know how you said you would like to do one
more job before retiring,"
"Yes," Cobb was slightly hesitant with his answer.
"Well, the tourist found a man who wanted a simple
extraction done on his daughter, he said we didn't
have to take it but the girl saw something and
it's twisted her. The father wants it out."
"That sounds great Arthur, but why call now?"
"Um..." For the first time since Cobb had known
Arthur he sounded unsure and flustered.
"Arthur?"
"We need to speak face to face. When can I fly
over?"
"You're always welcome Arthur, but what's wrong?"
Cobb was walking through to the kitchen, his bare
feet slapped on the smooth wooden floor.
"I can't talk, I'll be with you in twelve hours."
The phone rung off and Cobb groaned in
frustration. He leaned against the kitchen work
top and swore. He was mumbling about how
insufferable Arthur was when he heard a small
voice behind him and some sniffling.
He turned to see both his children standing, hand
in hand, in the doorway he had come through only
moments before.
"Daddy?" Phillipa looked up at him through her
large hazel eyes. She was seven, James five, but
her piercing eyes and adult features were already
strikingly like Mal's. The thought of his wife
stopped him in his tracks and he noticed how dark
his daughters hair had gotten in his absence. She
was going to look exactly like her mother.
Ariadne had helped him get over Mal during the
Inception job, but she was still there, somewhere.
"Daddy, James had a bad dream."
Phillipa had always taken care if James, but the
fact that she did made Cobb feel incredibly
guilty. The pair had become close in the time he
had been running from the authorities.
"Oh, no! What was it about?" Cobb softened his
voice.
"Gramps came and said you weren't coming home,
just like you said when mummy left." James started
sniffling again.
"And these people came and, and they said that we
had to leave home and go with grandpa to frog
land, and, and then they said we had to leave
there too, and we were left with other people who
said they were our mummy and daddy, but they
weren't, and I knew that but they kept saying they
were, and, and..." James burst into tears and
spread his arms wide.
Cobb collected him up and lead Phillipa back to
their room. He plopped James onto his bed and
kneeled by the pillow.
"Shush, now you just try and sleep. If I ever have
to go away again, I promise I'll come back, I
promise." James was asleep in seconds and Cobb
turned to Phillipa who was sitting on the edge of
her bed, and indignant expression on her face.
"What's up with you Phill?"
"You said like you WERE going away again."
"I won't, not for long, anyway." Cobb had been
craving the feel of somnacin in his veins, the
ability to bend whole worlds at his will but he
wasn't sure if another job would be good or bad
for him.
But, knowing Arthur's speed, he was already on his
way.
1 month later.
He had no idea where the rest of the team was. The
first layer had been fine. They had gotten the
mark if their side, then they had lost her. They
were running to the safe house when the mark was
snatched. The next time they saw her was when she
was ordering her mind army about. They had gotten
down a layer but that was all. The gunfire had
stated as soon as he opened his eyes, and the team
had split. Eames had sprinted into an alley with
Ariadne, Cobb and Yusuf had turned run the
opposite way and he had run. The shooting was
coming from above, but the dream seemed to have a
mind of its own, closing and opening alleys and
doors.
It was his fault they were in the mess. He had
known the mark was militarized, but he hadn't
known it was this heavy. It was just like the
Fischer job. He didn't know where the rest of the
team was. Saito was up on the first layer, he
didn't know what condition he was in but he knew
he had to run. It was a three layer dream, a
planting an idea again. It was his fault if any of
the team ended up in limbo. But then, if any of
them did, they were in pairs, and someone could go
after them. Ariadne and Eames. Cobb and Yusuf.
Then Arthur. If he went down it would just be him.
Just Arthur.