Hey guys :} hope you all enjoy this chapter, considering it is rather action-packed and exciting and all that.
The country road was tight and winding, the slick black car moving like a prowling cat through the olive grove. It was little more than a blur in the darkness.
"Leave the stereo alone." Arthur slapped at Eames' hand, a small, well-used frown line forming between his eyebrows.
Eames raised an eyebrow but shrugged off the point man's usual work mentality touchiness "Yusuf and Ariadne have overshot a little bit, haven't they? I thought they were supposed to be in the car."
"So did I." Arthur's voice was tight.
Ah, Eames thought, So that would explain the touchiness. The forger glanced to the back seat, where a multitude of assorted firearms were stacked at the ready, and he couldn't help but grin "Ooooh."
"Call them." Arthur snapped, pulling a small, sleek cell phone out of his pocket and shoving it at Eames "Both of them. Hopefully they'll be together."
The city was looming ahead of them, Mediterranean and in tones of white and black thanks to the light of the moon. Eames decided it would be best not to argue with Arthur, with the mood that he was in, so he scrolled through Arthur's contacts and called the number under 'Yusuf', putting the conversation on loud speaker.
"Where are you?"
"Just outside the city. I have all the PASIV stuff...the projections seem reasonably friendly." Yusuf seemed fairly relaxed; there wasn't a lot of background noise, either – the city might not have been as busy as they'd been expecting.
"For now." Eames hummed, rubbing his thumbnail over his bottom lip "Fischer is trained to deter extractors, remember."
Arthur dealt with a particularly treacherous bend like an expert, not even coming close to careering down the short ravine on to the turf of the olive grove.
"How about deterring a rescue team?" Yusuf asked hopefully.
"We'll see. Is Ariadne with you?" Eames glanced at Arthur, watching for the point man's reaction.
"No." Yusuf frowned "I thought she'd be with you."
"So did we." Eames sighed, rubbing his forehead; he saw Arthur's knuckles turn white as he tightened his grip on the steering wheel "We'll come pick you up and then go architect hunting."
Eames hung up and Arthur put his foot down on the accelerator.
Yusuf was waiting by the entrance to the city, leaning against open gates with sandy walls towering either side of it. He had to get in the car quickly; it was difficult to squash in to the back alongside all of the firearms that he himself had dreamt up, and Arthur didn't seem to want to slow down.
"Relax, we'll find her." Eames' words of comfort were met with a sceptical snort.
"You know she has a knack for getting in to trouble."
"Isn't that one of the requirements for being on this team?"
"I'm really not in the mood-"
"Okay, okay!" Eames put his hands up in defeat "But just keep in mind that she's a grown girl, she can take care of herself."
Ariadne decided she liked this city. The spicy smell drifting from the market stalls either side of her was relaxing, and the cool night breze kept the naturally warm air at bay. It was almost enough to keep her calm, despite the fact she knew she was in the completely wrong place.
Despite the small stab of panic that spiked upwards every time her heart beat, she walked slowly down the street, skimming past the local projections that made her look awfully pale in comparison to their golden tans. Ariadne was wearing sandals, loose linen trousers and an equally baggy linen top, with a belt tied around her middle and almost giving her boyish figure hips. She'd never attempted to change her clothes whilst dreaming before, but what she was wearing seemed annoyingly un-businesslike.
The others had to be close by, somewhere in the city. And they had to be looking for her. Logically, she thought, it couldn't be long until they ran in to each other.
She saw a man who looked like Yusuf from behind, but when she hurried over and put a hand on his shoulder she realised she was mistaken.
"Sorry. Thought you were someone I..."
The man glanced at Ariadne in annoyance and hurried away. Ariadne frowned, her brow furrowing – were the projections aware of her presence being abnormal? Perhaps, subconsciously (if projections were really conscious in the first place, bearing in mind that they were a part of someone's conscious...ooh, that made her brain hurt) they could tell she was alien to this place, without her having done anything to alter the dream. She watched the man hurry over to a girl who Ariadne presumed was his daughter, who had been admiring a stall selling tropical flowers. He swept her up in to his arms, carrying her away and shooting Ariadne a scathing look over his shoulder.
"Ariadne?"
Her name came from the other end of the street and she turned, seeing a sleek black car; Arthur had half gotten out of the driver's side, holding on to the car door and scanning the sea of milling pedestrians for her.
"I'm here!" She waved, hurrying through the market crowd, which was becoming steadily larger and larger.
She reached the car, stumbling slightly as she had to push between two women haggling over fruit. Arthur was there, steadying her with his hands on her shoulders, but only briefly. She didn't get a chance to even look at him properly before he was getting back in the car.
"Get in. We'll find somewhere to go down another level."
"Glad you could join us, love." Eames called conversationally as Ariadne walked past his side of the car. She scowled, aiming a playful swipe at his head through the open window.
As she slid in to what little room was left in the back she asked "Aren't we even going to look for Fischer here first?"
"I thought we agreed we were going straight to limbo." Arthur manoeuvred the car with a completely unsurprising amount of skill, turning it around and heading back in to the broader, less crowded streets "Fischer would've woken up by now if he was on any of the higher levels."
Ariadne sighed – he had a point. She leant back in her seat as they flew silently through the streets, her eyes shut. They pulled in to a sandy courtyard of a large, mansion-esque house, getting out of the car, which had been turned silver by the moonlight. Eames and Arthur both reached in to the back, grabbing their preferred guns and scanning the balconies of the house out of habit more than anything. Yusuf was holding the PASIV device to his chest, a bag slung over his shoulder containing his sedatives.
They walked through the house, Arthur and Eames sweeping through the rooms with guns in their hands; no one else was in the building. They chose a spacious sitting room, setting up quickly. Ariadne busied herself with fastening the shutters on the large, floor-to-ceiling windows that covered one wall of the room. They were bullet-proof, no doubt.
"Yusuf, you'll need to barricade this room. The projections all seem pretty friendly right now, but things could change at the drop of a hat." Eames was saying as he lay down on a plump velvet chaise, rolling up one sleeve "If you set the explosives in the corners of the room we'll get a decent kick without you being covered in gore-"
"I know." Yusuf rummaged in his bag and held up a small vial to the light, before loading its contents in to the PASIV "I might be relatively new to espionage, but I've caught on quickly."
Ariadne went to the PASIV, grabbed a cable and settled herself in an armchair, struggling to relax. She looked up and saw Arthur sat on another armchair opposite her; their eyes met for a flickering moment before he looked away, turning to Eames.
"Will there be much resistance down there, do you think?"
"We can only hope." Eames smirked slightly as he shut his eyes, not specifying what eventuality he was hoping for.
There was resistance. Lots of it.
"Keep your head down!" Arthur was beside her, crouched beneath the desk, but he had to shout to be heard over the gunfire that was rattling and shattering the windows of the office skyscraper.
Every time he sat up to shoot over the desk, Ariadne's heart was in her mouth and she had to press her palms to the underside of the desk to stop herself from sitting up too – as if she'd be much help; Arthur had one hand bunched in the shoulder of her jacket, keeping her down, out of harm's way. Eames was nowhere to be seen – but the dream hadn't collapsed, and this dream was his.
"We're going to have to-" Ariadne stifled a scream as bullets rained against the walls of the cubicle they were hidden to the left of "make a run for it. We're going to have to make a run for it!"
"Where?" Arthur ducked beneath the desk again so that he could reload; their faces were inches apart, but the electricity coursing through Ariadne's veins was made of fear at that moment. A pencil pot on the desk to the right of theirs exploded.
"There's an elevator, that way and to the right. And stairs beside it." Ariadne knew the building; this might have been Eames' dream, but she knew the layout like the back of her hand.
"We'll take the elevator. Climb out in to the elevator shaft and head to the roof-"
"Arthur," Ariadne grabbed his arm, shaking it.
"-from there we'll find another way back in to the building-"
"We need to find Eames!"
Arthur paused, as if only just remembering that Eames was meant to be with them. Then he nodded "Right. But first, we need to get out of here."
"Three, two," Ariadne grabbed Arthur's hand, waiting for some sort of signal that they should go.
Something in Arthur's gut instinct or his natural talent for doing these things must have kicked in, because he had to wait for the right moment. When it came – "One!" – he pulled Ariadne upright and they were flying down the room, weaving in and out of cubicles with Arthur shooting over his shoulder. Stacks of papers exploded as bullets ripped through them, and Ariadne didn't dare look behind her, not even to get an idea of the projections' numbers.
They turned down a corridor to the right and, just as Ariadne had said, there was an elevator. They ducked in to it and the doors shut just as several suited projections ran in to view. Ariadne slumped against the mirrored wall, breathing a sigh of relief and raising her eyes to the ceiling, but Arthur took hold of her by the shoulders, checking her over.
"Are you hurt?"
"No, no – I'm fine." Ariadne grabbed his hands, holding them still "Arthur, I'm alright. Really."
He ignored her, still looking for some sign of injury; she wasn't fine until he deemed her to be so.
"Arthur, we need to find Eames." She said sharply, giving him a small shake.
He seemed to hear her this time, and he nodded, reloading his gun once more as they reached their floor "Be ready to run."
The doors slid open to reveal Eames, looking cool and nonchalant with an AK-47 slung over his shoulder "Oh, hello. Nice of you to turn up."
"We could say the same to you." Ariadne huffed, but hugged him anyway. In the same moment she looked to the stairs, expecting to hear projections on them at any moment "Let's move."
"We need to get to the conference room." Arthur headed down the corridor, and Ariadne hastened to follow him "It's on this floor, isn't it?"
They walked in a line, Arthur leading, Ariadne in the middle and Eames bringing up the rear. Once again, Ariadne had the guilty feeling in the pit of her stomach that she should be searching for Fischer – but as Arthur had said on the previous level, if he'd been in any state shallower than limbo he would have woken up by now. They passed empty, glass-walled offices and polished, un-used staff lounges; Ariadne thought the building was beautiful. It was a shame that the majority of the floor below had been shattered by a barrage of bullets.
They rounded a corner, on to the corridor where the conference room was, and projections were stood in front of them.
"Run!" Arthur flung out an arm to stop Ariadne walking past him; the three of them turned back the way they had come, running.
"You two find a way to loop around back to the conference room. I'll give our friends a bit of a run around." Eames decided as they reached a crossroad of corridors, taking his gun down from over his shoulder.
Ariadne blanched. There had to be at least twenty projections chasing them down – Eames , as good as he was, going up against twenty men "You can't-"
"I have full faith in you, Eames." Arthur grabbed Ariadne by the arm, pulling her after him as they continued running against her will.
"Arthur, I'm touched." Eames called over his shoulder, and Ariadne could hear the smirk in his voice even though she couldn't see it; she and Arthur rounded a corner and then began to descend a flight of stairs.
"He has no chance!" Ariadne grabbed Arthur's arm – partly to stop herself from stumbling, partly to pull him back "We have to help-"
"I've known Eames a lot longer than you have – he'll be enjoying himself, don't worry." Arthur didn't seem to notice Ariadne tugging on his sleeve "Besides, you're more likely to get hurt back there than he is, and I...we can't risk that. We have to keep going."
Ariadne had to concede defeat; she flinched at the thunderous sound of gunfire hot on their heels, and suddenly she wasn't all that eager to go back anymore.
They were now on the corridor beneath the conference room they needed to get to, heading to the stairs at the other end so they could get back to the right hallway which by then would hopefully be free of projections.
The sound of bullets had died away and they slowed their pace to a cautious walk, Arthur leading the way with his Glock 19; Ariadne realised she still hadn't let go of his arm. She didn't feel particularly inclined to even now they were in relative safety.
As they reached the stairs that would lead them to the conference room Arthur paused, listening for sounds of a possible scuffle above them. It was silent.
"C'mon." He began to edge slowly up the stairs; Ariadne was so close behind him she could possibly have fit inside his waistcoat.
The corridor was empty, and the door to the conference room was in sight. Eames (if he could manage it) was to set the explosives beneath them. Ariadne wanted to break in to a nervous run, but her grip on Arthur's arm kept her steady, as if he were an anchor. In her pocket, she fisted her hand around her golden chess piece.
Just as they reached the door a projection appeared at the end of the corridor, raised a gun and fired.
Arthur dragged Ariadne in to the conference room; he shut the door behind him, entering the locking code on the keypad set in the doorframe. The sound of metal whirring and clicking made him breathe a sigh of relief. He looked to Ariadne.
She was sat with her back against the wall, eyes wide, chest heaving. Arthur wasn't sure why, but she'd put her hands over her ears.
"Ariadne, the bullet didn't touch you." he sounded insulted – as if he'd have let it – but his voice was soothing as he knelt beside her, taking her hands away from her face and holding them.
He had to admit, for a moment he'd been scared. But it was his job to fear the worst, prepare for it, and deal with it.
"It was...it was about an inch away from my cheek." Ariadne whispered, struggling to control her breathing "I pretty much stared it in the face."
"You've been shot before." Arthur straightened up, taking the PASIV case out from beneath the table, where he knew it would be. Yes, he was acting cool about it, but he knew all too well how close Ariadne had just come to being lost; and as Yusuf had said before they went under, there was no going back for anyone this time.
"I know." Ariadne got to her feet "You're right."
She sounded apologetic, and Arthur almost regretted treating the event so nonchalantly. By the time he'd readied the PASIV she'd settled herself in one of the chairs around the conference table, and there was a little more colour in her cheeks.
"Are you ready?" Arthur asked, keeping his eyes trained on the PASIV.
"Yeah. Let's go." Ariadne had the same steely determination in her voice that she'd had when she first decided she'd wanted to save Fischer. She was amazing, really.
"I'll see you in a moment, then." Arthur sat down beside her, glancing over as he rolled up his sleeve. Her hair was tousled, the way her lips were set screamed grit and fortitude, her shoulders were set and her head was held high. She was beautiful.
Sitting there, looking at her and thinking about what had just happened, Arthur felt a weight drop in his stomach. Really, if he were to get hurt – or, God forbid, if she were to – would he be happy with things ending the way they were? The way things between them were right there and then? But then again...what could he do to change it? And allowing himself to get distracted, when it was so important that he stayed focussed-
"Arthur?" Ariadne's voice made him blink, looking up "Arthur...are you going to press the button?"
"Oh, yes." He straightened up, leaning over to depress the button.
No, no, there was really nothing he could do at this point. Nothing at all.
Ariadne barely had time to take note of her surroundings – a cavernous shopping centre – before she was aware of lips being pressed firmly to hers.