Disclaimer:Don't own anything.

Author's Note: Thanks to WindStar for this addition. I wasn't planning on writing more, but they said they'd like to see the aftermath and you guys are very good at getting my imagination going. Not quite sure about the ending for this, but I'll leave it be unless inspiration strikes again.

The first book in my brother and I's original alternate history/fantasy series is up on authonomy. I would appreciate it if you guys would head over there, take a look.

authonomy books / 47917 / sanctum - files - the - dragon - scroll /


Dead has a smile like the nicest man you've never met who maybe winks at you in a streetcar and you pretend that you don't but you really do see and you are My how glad he winked and hope he'll do it again.
—E .E. Cummings


Arthur woke scrambling for some kind of hold and one hand darted up to his neck, feeling the chain down until he reached the dog tags around his neck (Not a cross, hasn't been a cross since Before) and he was breathing too fast and he felt memories of another world pressing into his mind. Too many memories. Too many memories and less than forty years of life to fit them in. The result was terrifying and maddening.

"…Arthur?" A familiar voice, close, but not quite over the line of his personal bubble.

The point man glanced sideways at Eames, who was sitting up, eyes steady and Arthur wondered why he wasn't reassuring himself of reality with his totem. (Perhaps it's because Arthur doesn't really know his totem now, doesn't think he even has one and maybe he's still dreaming)

Words wouldn't come to his mind and Arthur couldn't even really force a sound from his throat. It felt dry and scratchy and there was some invisible force in his legs that wanted to go, go and find the solid proof of dreaming or not.

He heard Eames calling after him, half-expected him to grab him and demand an answer—Arthur would deserve it—but there was a hesitation and Eames didn't follow.


Vermont was chilly in spring (He'd been married in the spring…) and Arthur shoved his hands in his pockets as he got out of the taxi. He walked quickly past rows and rows of graves until he came upon one.

Here lies
Arthur James Reynolds
Beloved brother and son
September 27, 1984—October 24, 2004

He read those words, traced them with his fingers, felt the unyielding stone and his heart nearly ripped itself in two because he'd just lost his brother all over again (He knows his twin's smile, knows the way he ages, knows how proud Arthur James Reynolds looks with a baby daughter in his arms. He knows how it feels to be safe at home with his brother curled nearby. He knows how it feels to have his brother stand by his side as his best man, knows how it is to share mundane things over shared lunch, knows his brother's phone number when he needs to call it in the night, knows his address and his favorite foods and it's all gone again, in a flash, in an instant, in a fall)

Arthur didn't cry. He wished he could, but he didn't, though his eyes sting. He sat there in front of his brother's grave as the air grew colder with night's fall and all he could think was that his brother was gone. Again. And he was still here.

Hadn't he just spoken to him this morning? Hadn't Arty called because he needed a ride to work, his stupid car broke down again and he really needed to buy something better than his hunk of junk? Hadn't they had plans for tomorrow night's dinner at Arty's apartment?

(He feels like, if he sits here long enough, Arty will find him and sit beside him. "Kind of macabre, don't you think? And premature! I've still got a few good years left in me yet!" And he'd laugh, eyes sparkling)

It was only when Arthur's leg started getting stiff from too long in the same position that he thought to move. And with that movement came standing up and he saw, two rows down from his brother's grave, another that read:

Emma Bannon Reynolds
May 14, 1964—August 5, 2021
A mother is an angel in disguise

The pain was steadying, terrible as the thought was. Arthur couldn't have dreamed something like that, wouldn't have. Just as he would never dream of his brother dead.

The urge to get up and walk away seized him again and he took one last look at his brother's grave (Arty is beside him in the truck with the air conditioning that doesn't work well enough and the windows are open to try and coax a desert breeze. "Do you ever wonder what happens when you die?" he asks suddenly and Arthur doesn't know if this is a real memory, a dream memory or a figment of his imagination and that scares him) before his feet were leading him past the other grave markers and out of the cemetery.


Eames gave him a day. A day to recover his balance even somewhat. But after a day and a half of no calls, he scrolled through his short contact list and thumbed the call button.

"Hello?"

"Cobb, is Arthur there?" Eames was not in the mood for pleasantries.

"Eames?" The surprise was warranted. The forger couldn't remember the last time he'd called Cobb for anything not job related. The only reason he even had his number was for situations like this. "No, he's not—what's going on? What did you two get into this time?"

There was an unofficial rule for this sort of thing. You didn't talk about it. Ever. Not even with the person who pulled you back from the brink.

"…No. I just...lost track of him. You know how Arthur likes to hide."

"Eames, I swear to God, I will hunt you down. What. Happened?"

He'd forgotten that loyalty could work both ways and while Cobb had nothing on Arthur's loyalty, he was protective of the point man. "Nothing that Arthur can't sort out. I just need to know where he is for my own peace of mind." He hesitated. "I have a few ideas as to where he'll be. I'm calling him, but I'm going to be on more than a few flights before this is through."

"Just let me know," Cobb said immediately. (It surprises Eames that he's surprised by Cobb. This is more like he was Before Mal's death) "I'll call him if you can't."

"I'll call you from the airport then."


He remembered, belatedly, that he had a phone on him. There were three missed calls from Eames, one from Dom and a text that was blank save for a letter, like a thought started, but never finished.

Eames—4/26/22 5:16PM

W

Arthur debated calling Eames back, if only to let him know not to worry. (But there is a cause to worry, isn't there?) But he was not in the mood for anyone's voice, anyone's thoughts. There was hardly enough room in his head for his own.

He made his way back to Chicago—a neutral place, a place safe from Arthur James Reynolds' presence. The twins had made vague plans to go to Chicago for the Jazz Festival with some friends the summer before they turned seventeen, but they had never gotten a chance—and his apartment.

(He knows this place, knows the counters, knows the sofas—elegant, at one point, but broken in and they are much more Arthur's taste than Cameron's. There are no photographs on the fridge and that feels right. There are magnets though, random magnets from half a dozen places around the world—"A souvenir, darling"—and the cabinet on the far right by the fridge has a loose handle and this place smells right, books and a mix of colognes and—when he nears the bathroom—aftershave and of Eames' spices that he cooks with and this is home)

Arthur's hand went to his neck and felt the outline of the dog tags and this place was real.


His phone kept ringing, once every hour, on the hour. He checked the first couple of times. It was Eames, usually, except for some periods where it was Dom. He didn't pick up, was still trying to sort out the memories. He needed his walls back, needed to carve a firm line between reality and dreams and he couldn't handle other people right now.

The apartment helped ground him. It was the first in a list of facts that Arthur repeated to himself over and over, like a word association.

This was his apartment. He shared it with Eames. Eames was a Forger. Forgers did dreamwork. Arthur does dreamwork too. Arthur went too far into dreamwork and Eames pulled him out. This world was reality. In reality, Arthur James Reynolds was dead. Emma Reynolds was dead. In reality, he had never met anyone named Hannah. He'd never gone to college, had never called his brother in the wee hours of the morning to tell him that he was a father. He had no daughter; no children at all, actually. He had two godchildren—Phillipa and James—and they were real.

He repeated it over and over, switching it up sometimes if only to keep himself from going mad with repetitive boredom. He found different places in the apartment to sit. Curled in the armchair that Eames had claimed, but Arthur had picked out (He remembers when Eames had first sank into the chair—"Darling, this is heaven."). Spread out on the bed whose sheets smelled like a mix of laundry detergent and himself and Eames, nose buried in a pillow. Sitting on the kitchen counter (He's not waiting for a patchwork cat named Gatsby to hop onto his lap, pushing his head against Arthur's hand) and staring around at the familiar kitchen.

Arthur ended up by the bookshelves, occasionally flipping through one—these notes were never in his dreams and he read and reread the notes that he and Eames had made in the margins—when a knock came.

"Arthur?" A pause. "Darling, are you in there?"

Arthur was surprised to note that Eames' voice didn't drag him out of his slowly-centering reality like he'd feared, but rather, it simply slipped itself into it like it had always been there.

The lock jiggled a little and the door opened, only to be caught by the chain. (They never use the chain, Arthur remembers. They don't use the chain that came with the apartment unless they're feeling particularly paranoid) If he tilted his head the right way, he could see a sliver of Eames' face, a single gray eye watching him.

"So you are there." Eames was not the only one who could read body language and Arthur saw the relaxation of the shoulders, the easing of face and neck muscles, the relief that untightens the fists and he knew what Eames had feared.

"I wouldn't kill myself," Arthur told him frankly, not moving from his spot.

A huff of a chuckle. (Almost twenty years they've been doing…this. Whatever they are. Whatever they have been. It's long enough that they know each other, know their quirks, their secrets, their nightmares…) "Yes, well…can you blame me for thinking it?"

No, Arthur couldn't. Not when he remembered Mal. Lovely, heartbreakingly vibrant Mal. He remembered when he'd gotten the news. Remembered the sandwich he'd been eating and the seemingly ridiculous amount of mayonnaise they'd put on it. Remembered reading the text and feeling his body stop listening. Remembered Eames sitting across from him, concern on his face. Most of the rest of that time was a blur up until the morning before the funeral.

"How do you feel?" Eames asked, leaning on the door.

Honesty. They've been trying for honesty between them and they've been doing good, even if it means brutal truths. "I—I'm getting there."

"Do you want me to stay or go?"

"Would you believe me if I said I didn't know?"

Arthur could see a piece of Eames' smile. "Yes, I would actually."

He debated for another moment before standing, his knees cracking and popping from sitting too long, and crossing the room to close the door and undo the chain. When he opened the door, Eames had his hands stuffed in his pockets, a strange twist on his lips that was almost a smile. "I was starting to think you were kicking me out, darling."

"You can break back in." Arthur had no illusions on Eames' breaking-and-entering skills. (He never thinks to ask why Eames is so good at it. It's a fact about Eames, just like his eyes are gray and he loves paisley)

"You'd likely shoot at me." Not shoot him, but in his general direction. Maybe. Eames swore that Arthur had a gun full of blanks only as a deterrent; Arthur denied everything, but Eames wasn't convinced.

Eames looked Arthur up and down as he closed the door behind him. There were smudges beginning to form beneath his eyes and he looked pale and drawn. His hair was at odd angles from raking his fingers through it. Slower than usual, Eames reached for Arthur's wrists. He half-expected an instinctive flinch away, but Arthur's instincts allowed the touch with only a puzzled quirk of the eyebrow.

Eames turned his arm over so that it was palm up. There were crescents half-carved into the skin from how tightly Arthur had been clenching his fists and deep reddish lines where the dog tags had cut into it. But Eames knew that dreamers had done worse to themselves in order to find reality and, in comparison, this wasn't bad at all.

He tilted Arthur's face up by the chin so that there was better light to really take a look at him by. "…You need sleep. Real sleep."

He felt the muscles pull and tighten beneath his fingers. "No."

"Arthur, you can't keep yourself awake forever. I promise, I won't let anything happen." Gentle strokes with his thumb against a slightly rough cheek. Arthur was a man who shaved diligently so it was always a strange sensation to feel any kind of stubble at all.

Arthur was wary for a few long minutes before he relented. He'd been without sleep for longer than this before, but his mind was exhausted. Eames tugged him towards the bedroom and began unbuttoning the wrinkled shirt.

"You know I can do this myself, right? I'm not an invalid." (The last is something he doesn't quite know why he says, but he had spent an entire hour in the mirror, memorizing the exact shape of the scar on his side, the scar that, in his dreams, never happened) But Arthur didn't move to stop him.

Eames hummed a little in acknowledgment, sliding the shirt off Arthur's shoulders. Arthur hadn't even changed since he'd very nearly run from the room where he'd been dreaming, still in his once-neat shirt and pressed pants.

The pants came next and when he was done, Eames went to Arthur's pajama drawer and pulled out a pair of flannel pants, worn and soft and tossed them to him while he looked for a T-shirt. After he found one, he had to go looking for fuzzy socks.

Arthur, already changed into his pajamas and looking calmer for it, looked up at him when Eames held up the socks.

"It's spring in Chicago, darling. It's cold."

That startled an almost laugh out of him and a genuine smile and he took the socks—a pale yellowish kind of color that only Eames could find because Arthur didn't think that it could even be found on a color wheel—and putting them on felt like a stabilizer because he would never have thought of it on his own.


He didn't remember falling asleep and so when he woke up at some odd hour to a phone ringing—not his, he'd gotten good at ignoring it lately—he felt his entire body tense, one hand going to his neck, searching for the dog tags that shouldn't even really work as totems anymore, but they did and he twisted his torso to look behind him at the bedside table upon which a die rested. A red die from a casino whose name was fading on the side and Arthur knew its indentations and knew its texture, but he reached out and felt it anyway.

And that's when he turned back over, Eames' voice finally registering. "…found him…He's fine, Cobb, I told you that." A glance back and while Arthur didn't say anything or give Eames a look, Eames seemed to know, "No, he's sleeping…I'll tell him."

Eames snapped the phone shut and tossed it on the other bedside table before sliding back down beneath the covers. "Cobb. You've got him very worried, darling."

(This is real, Arthur thinks. This is all real. There is no Hannah, no little Mallorie that's going to poke her head through the door and clamber up. There are still glasses on the bedside table, but there's a contacts case too and a notepad and pen in case of a late night call for a job)

Arthur lay back down, but didn't quite let go of the die (Eames doesn't remark on it, doesn't say a thing about paranoia at all) and nosed at the pillow before lying back down. "…He deserves it," Arthur muttered grumpily. He'd been in a good, heavy sleep. Dom had made him worry for two years, worry about whether he was going to wake up to an open window and Dom splattered on the sidewalk, on whether he'd come back from getting a few necessities to seeing the walls splashed with red and a gun in Dom's limp hand. (He doesn't blame Dom for it. Not really. Sometimes, he wishes he could, but he remembers Mal's allure all too well and he can't blame him at all)

Eames didn't really laugh, more like snorted, but it got the message across. In their business, one had to adopt strange senses of humor sometimes. A familiar hand in his hair (Not his brother's in the mornings as he walked by or when they're trying to breathe because the world away from war was a very different one) and chapped lips against his temple. "Go back to sleep, love."


When Arthur woke again, it was storming outside. A fierce mix of Chicago wind and rain and the occasional flash of lightning. His eyes went to the door immediately, half-expecting Mallorie's wide eyes in the doorframe, Gatsby at her heels and an old stuffed tiger she named Jasmine in her arms.

(Not real, he tells himself. Mallorie isn't real, never was. But the thought hurts because he'd loved his little girl, had seen her grow. He misses her smile, her tart answers that he'd sworn she got from her aunt)

The only thing at the doorway was Eames, half a sandwich in hand. "Darling?" he asked and Arthur wondered what the forger saw in his face.

"Timzit?" he asked, tongue feeling thick like it did after a good, long sleep.

"Nearly four in the afternoon. How do you feel?"

Arthur thought about it, still lying in their blankets (His and Eames', not his and Hannah's and the thought feels right. But the ache for Mallorie hasn't quite gone yet and he wonders if this is Eames on a daily basis, missing Amara who is so grown up now, so independent and so firmly on the law's side) "…Better. A little."

"Good news." Eames came to sit beside him in the small space between Arthur's hip and the edge of the bed. He caught Arthur unconsciously eyeing the sandwich in his hand and he laughed. "Had I thought you'd be up, I would've made you one. Ham and cheese," he said, holding it out.

Arthur sat up and took the offered sandwich, suddenly ravenous. He realized he hadn't eaten for…he didn't know when the last time he ate was. (Not healthy, his mind tells him and he remembers Mal looking thinner, the hollow places in Dom's cheeks…)

"…Arthur?"

The point man looked up.

"Did you want to stay? In the dream?"

His first answer was of course not. It's a dream, it couldn't be real and Arthur was a man who'd lived his life with a firm entrenchment on reality. But then he thought about it. His brother, laughing beside him, smiling at him over his child's shoulder. His mother, still alive and without the extra shadows that the loss of her sons had inflicted on her. Being unafraid to see his sister's children, to be able to play with his nieces and nephews without memories pressing into his mind. To be a father himself, waking up in the night to find his daughter sneaking snacks from the fridge, reading with her on a blanket in the park, sunlight warming them.

"…Yes. I did." Arthur kept going before Eames could get a word in. "That's the point of a dream, isn't it? You never really want to leave one. But…at the end of the day, it's not real…I know what's real, Eames."

"Do you?" The words felt like they should've been harsh, but they weren't. (Eames' world is a little off-axis. Arthur has always been the stable point because Arthur has never had any difficulties telling reality from dreams. He's an anchor point that, right now, isn't stable)

"Yes. I'm trying to get used to everything again, but I know the difference." Arthur sounded certain, more certain than he had yesterday and when Eames studied him, searching for a lie, he couldn't find one.

(Arthur is a man grounded by his sorrows, Eames has found. Rather than be swallowed by the grief, as Cobb had done, he had picked himself up—somehow. He'd been fairly put together even before he met him—and patched himself up and kept going and he keeps himself in cold, hard facts)


Arthur forced himself not to bring any weapons when he ventured out to the corner store for some milk. He knew he was still twitchy, still searching over his shoulder as though waiting for the world to bend on itself and for projections to converge. But this was reality and if he killed them, it would truly be murder and he wasn't that unstable.

He was debating with himself on which kind of milk to buy and how much when he heard it.

"Daddy!"

He whirled on instinct, eyes searching for Mallorie dashing through the aisles. But his daughter wasn't here (Because she doesn't exist) and the voice was another little girl, sweet with the white-blonde hair that some children had before it darkened and her father hoisted her up, laughing as she kissed his cheeks.

(There's a reason it's so easy to get lost in dreams. This pain isn't there in dreams. It doesn't hurt)


They're having dinner out, neither of them up to another night spent in. They're both restless, if in different ways. It was comfortable; Arthur was good at being back in the world. Mostly. Sometimes, he saw things. Shadows, memories, ghosts. But he'd managed to pull himself back. A touch of the dog tags, and swipe of the thumb across the die he never took out of his pocket now.

A sharp, gentle smack. "Get your own fries."

Arthur's attention was half-drawn to the conversation at the table across from them.

A laugh. "Oh, get over it. You don't even like fries."

"It's the principle of the thing!" A scuffle and a triumphant sound.

(And Arthur stares because those two people in that booth are superimposed with the image of him and his brother. How many times had they fought over sharing food, if only for the excuse to argue? And the sight aches because he's never really stopped missing Arthur James Reynolds)


Dom called again. "Are you sure you're alright?"

Arthur pinched the bridge of his nose. "I promise, I'm okay." And he wasn't lying, but this sort of thing wasn't something so easily defined. "How're the kids?"

"You're dodging the question."

"No, I'm changing the subject," Arthur corrected.

"…They're fine. Missing you, obviously, but fine."

Arthur both wanted to see Phillipa and James and he didn't. He loved those kids, but he was wary about seeing any children right now. He didn't want to taint them with his own memories of the children who didn't exist, of the ones he didn't know.

"I'll…stop by soon, probably."

"You don't have to," Dom told him gently. "It's okay. I get it." Dom was one of the few that would get it.

"I will," Arthur said firmly. He couldn't keep running. Not from Dom and the kids.


He wouldn't be able to visit for a few months yet. His own sense of sanity wouldn't let him.

But when he did finally manage to go see them, it was a strange feeling. They were utterly real and while he knew that, whenever Phillipa or James called for their dad, he had to force himself not to turn, not to look for the daughter he never had.


Eames startled awake to a clatter and a scramble. He sat up, but froze when his eyes adjusted to the semi-darkness of the bedroom. Arthur was on the floor, gun in one hand and the die beside him.

"Arthur…" Eames watched the brown eyes flick to every corner of the room, searching for a threat. Then again, but this time slower, taking in the details. The gun in his hand was perfectly steady (Eames has never seen it tremble, not even when facing down his own brother)

Those eyes were on him the next instant and, for a terrible moment, there was no recognition there. But the eyes cleared a minute later, his brow furrowing a little in confusion. "Eames?"

"Yes, darling?"

Arthur looked down at his hands and lowered them, putting the gun down. "…I didn't know where I was. I thought—"

(There had been a desert, once. A desert where his brother who he knows is dead is right beside him, half his face gone from the explosion, the green eye still intact. The smile is a red, gruesome thing, twisted with the burns. And Arthur is afraid… "…want to kill me, Cameron? Can you?" And watching the bullets enter his brother's face—his own face in the mirror—and watching him fall and break…)

"Arthur?" Eames was wary of the look on Arthur's face. He'd seen that look before, mostly on soldiers home from the war. But it had been a long time since Arthur had looked like that. (But then, isn't this just like losing his brother all over again? He'd had him back, in the dream. "…wasn't… explosion…almost were…Arthur and I…made it out…")

In a sudden, violent movement, Arthur shoved the gun away from him, underneath the bed. One hand curled into his hair. Eames didn't move, didn't know what Arthur's reaction would be if he did. Arthur didn't need the gun to hurt him, particularly in this state.

"I'm not going to hurt you, Eames." The words were tight and the voice low.

"Are you trying to convince me or you of that?"

A breathless chuckle. "Both?"

(His mother smiles and places her glasses on her nose just so. "Yes, I think we can do both.")

Eames moved slowly off the bed, no sudden movements. "And I thought you were the decisive one."

"First time for everything."

Eames eased himself to stand—his bad leg was a little stiff and all he wanted was some hot tea—and held out a hand. Arthur took it, but not without giving him a puzzled look and not without grabbing the die from the floor. "Well, since we're up anyway, I think we can spare some breakfast."

Arthur didn't protest, but as he stood at the coffee machine (The familiar procedure, something he doesn't even have to think about, is soothing) Eames felt his eyes on him. "…You like to fix things with food."

Eames looked over at him. Arthur was leaning a little on the counter, one hand still curled around the die. When he didn't say anything—what was he supposed to say to that?—Arthur just shrugged and said, "Something I noticed."

(They both do that sometimes, sudden observations that they've probably noticed subconsciously before, but it doesn't register at the time)

They fell into silence after that, though Eames moved to sit at the dining table. Today was going to be a bad day as far as his leg was concerned. Arthur eyed him and moved to the cabinet, pulling out the hot water bottle and using the remaining boiling water from Eames' tea to pour into it. Arthur held it out to him—they'd long since gotten past the point where Eames could pretend that his leg wasn't bothering him, though Arthur still knew that Eames wasn't one to ask for help—and Eames thanked him quietly.

(He remembers when Arthur first discovered the bottle, years ago. He hadn't known what it was and Eames had learned that Americans didn't often use them)

"…It hasn't gotten any better, has it?" Eames asked, looking over at him.

"It has. Just…it got worse."

"Was that the first time it was that bad?" Something in Eames needed to know and, frankly, he was surprised when Arthur answered.

"Yes." (He can't remember reactions that bad even right after the explosion. He'd been numb then and perhaps this is just a very, very delayed reaction)

Another silence because neither of them really know how to deal with this. Eames felt both impossibly young and horribly old and for a moment, his thumb went to rub the ring of skin on the fourth finger of his left hand where his wedding ring used to be. Sheral, he thought, would have put on a movie. She liked to fix things with movies, usually older ones, the kind that she still had from growing up with VCRs.

There was a list of movies she swore by on days like these. French Kiss, Indiana Jones—and that one only because Harrison Ford was one of her favorite actors. Otherwise, she would say, the movie didn't work for feeling better—Hook, Willow, Dragonheart. There were more, but they had only ever gotten through so many.

"…Have I ever told you about this one kid in our squad? He loved ABBA and country music. He was always humming." Eames looked over at Arthur. They didn't talk about their soldier days as a rule. (What Arthur doesn't tell him is the kid's favorite song. SOS. He'd always sing the same line—"So when you're near me, darling, can't you hear the SOS? The love you gave me, nothing else can save me, SOS." ) "He was a clumsy kid, always tripping over things. Half the time, it was his own feet."

Arthur remembered his brother going to the kid, offering a hand up. It was one of the kid's first months out there, well away from Utah or Kansas or wherever he was from; Arthur had difficulty remembering that now.

"You didn't think we'd just leave you there, did you?" Arthur James Reynolds had said, tugging the kid to his feet. "It's why teams work—to pick each other back up."

Arthur had teased him that night for being so philosophical. He'd gotten a shove and a ruffling of the hair for his trouble.

Eames didn't think he'd ever heard a war story all the way through. Either the speaker would quiet halfway through or the speaker would keep rambling until the original story was lost. In his experience, a true war story would be the ones that never ended.


It's time to let go, it's time to carry on with the show
Don't mourn what is gone; greet the dawn
And I will be standing by your side
Together we'll face the turning tide
—Poets of the Fall Dawn