Chapter One

Not but a few weeks after their meeting, Eames met Cobb at the warehouse they used most often to run tests. He arrived even before Cobb, but that was okay; he needed the time to gather himself. The temptation to run was there, but Eames wasn't that kind of man. Once he agreed to do something he would sooner die than break that promise.

After about thirty minutes of pacing the door opened and Cobb stepped into the room.

"Eames. Good, you're here." Cobb said striding over to him. He walked like a man who knew he might be doing something wrong, but was also struggling to do what he thought was right.

"Where's Arthur?" Eames asked once Cobb reached him.

"I asked him to be here half an hour from now. I wanted to go over the procedure with you."

"So that dear Arthur is none the wiser. Right?" Eames finished what Cobb wouldn't dare to say. Cobb dropped his gaze to the floor.

"Yes. Essentially." Cobb said. "Listen, if you really have a problem with this, I can go and you can stay here…" Cobb said leaning closer to Eames as though he were confiding a secret to him. Pointless really, since they were completely alone.

Eames sighed. "No, no. I'll go. I wouldn't want to trade places with you. Truthfully, Dom, I'd rather not be apart of this at all." Cobb gave him a sad smile, but Eames waved his hand. "Don't worry about it. We'll be in great hands."

With that, Cobb straightened up and seemed to remember his purpose.

"Right. Okay, so in order to get you two into Limbo and for this to work, I'm thinking it's best if Arthur actually knows he'll be going there. But here's the tricky part…" Cobb spent twenty minutes explaining the plan to Eames and drilling him about the role he would play, making sure that he could do it.

When the conversation was over, Eames felt even worse about what they were about to do. Even if they made it back somehow all together, he had a feeling that Arthur would never want to speak to him again and some part of himself that Eames had kept tucked away ever since their first job together felt like crying at the thought of such a thing.

However, there was no time to lament this fact, for Arthur had just strolled into the warehouse. He greeted Cobb stiffly, obviously not on good terms with him over forcing him to work with Eames.

Oh, if he only knew thought Eames.

He was dressed, per usual, in the finest pressed suit Eames had yet to see him in. Had he not been so focused on mentally trying to capture this image in his mind forever, Eames might have wondered why Arthur dressed so nicely for a simple test run. But it wouldn't have mattered, because Arthur would have never admitted that he'd done it because Eames was there. No, surely not.

"Mr. Eames." Arthur said, barely moving his lips.

"Arthur. Excellent to see you. And my, my, what an outfit. Suits really do suit you, darling. Although, it wouldn't kill you to dress down every now and then, love." Eames said with a wink that only someone as observant as Arthur would notice.

"Normally, I would take offense to anyone saying something about my sense of dress, but since I see you've been shopping, I'm sorry, shoplifting, from thrift stores and dressing in the dark again, I'm willing to make an exception." Arthur retorted all while taking in Eames' loose, flowy silk shirt, brown tweed pants, and matching jacket combo as though they had personally offended him.

Eames tsked him while waving a finger at him as though he were a naughty child. Arthur rolled his eyes and turned to Cobb instead.

"You're positive I have to work with this," he took a moment to turn and glare at Eames, "ape."

"You wound me, darling. You really do." Eames said while placing a hand over his heart and wearing an expression that promised the utmost innocence and sincerity. Had Arthur not been trying to remain professional he was sure that that action would have been rewarded with a rude hand gesture.

Cobb sighed. "Yes, Arthur, I'm positive. Ariadne is busy with her schoolwork, Yusuf is hard at work developing new mixtures for jobs, and since this is my experiment I very well can't be a part of it, can I?" Arthur didn't argue, but given by the tenseness now in his jaw it appeared as though he was working hard to bite back a retort.

Cobb took the opportunity to continue, "Now, I know Eames is best at forging, but he's also a decent extractor. You'll be using whatever architectural abilities you have to create the dream and then you two will run the drill just to make sure it goes smoothly."

"I still don't understand why we need to do this, though. We've done jobs like this a million times over. What's so different about this one?" Arthur asked, slightly exasperated, but maintaining his composed posture; back straight, arms to his sides, head held high and looking directly into Cobb's eye.

"Yusuf has created a new mixture for us. He says it will ensure less disruption until the kick is administered and time runs out."

"Okay…" Arthur began, "That sounds great. What's the danger then?"

Eames shot Cobb a look. He knows he thought. Arthur fucking knows what's going on here. Of course, it's part of his fucking job to do research. Oh my god…

But Cobb cut into Eames' train of thought, "Well, there is one hitch; very well spotted, Arthur." Cobb inclined his head in Arthur's direction, but the man remained silent, prepared, Eames figured, to remain statuesque until he got his answer.

"The problem with it is that if the dreamer tries to wake himself up before the time is over that he will fall into Limbo." Cobb said quickly as though by saying it faster that Arthur wouldn't be able to process information for what it really was.

Eames remained frozen, perched on the edge of Cobb's desk, biting his thumbnail while his eyes darted back and forth between Arthur and Cobb.

Finally, Arthur let out a long breath and spoke, "Okay." He cleared his throat, "How long do we have?" Cobb was taken aback by how quickly Arthur recovered, but kept his composure together. "I'll set the time on the PASIV for five minutes, which gives you both an hour to complete the drill. If you wake up before it's done, I'll bump the time up and put you back under."

Arthur nodded his head shortly almost as though it pained him to do so.

"Excellent," Eames clapped and stood up from the desk, rubbing his hands together. "Let's get started, shall we?"

A.N: So, that's the first official chapter. It's a bit short, but I think the ones to follow will be longer. I hope so. Anyway, I'm trying to take this slow, because I don't want to rush the story. I hate nothing more than reading a description, but then finding that the story has been rushed just to get to the meat of the idea which ruins the story in the process. Anyway, that's my little blurb. Feedback is always welcomed and encouraged. :D