Arthur was standing in line in the mess the next time Eames saw him. He and his crew were just leaving, so he sauntered over on his way out.

"1600, tonight, at the dream lab."

Arthur frowned at him, sliding his tray forward. "What? Why?"

Eames gave him a conspiratorial smile. "Just be there." And when Arthur didn't react, he leaned in and added, "Please, darling."

Arthur pushed past him without answering and Eames let him, rejoining his team. He'd just have to hope that the groundwork he'd laid for his wooing attempt hadn't been for nothing.

Still, when the door to the lab swung open and Arthur stood there, ears out, dimples put away, Eames' heart quickened and he realized he'd been preparing himself to be disappointed.

"You showed."

Arthur's frown deepened. "What's this about?"

Eames turned to the lab tech, prepping two IV's and wiping down the machine. "Thanks, mate. We've got it from here."

The tech nodded and left, and when he was gone, Eames smiled at Arthur softly. "You already know what this technology was made for. Let me show you what it was meant for."

To his relief, Arthur took the IV line he held out, and when Eames put his finger on the button, Arthur nodded his readiness. The feeling which flooded his veins couldn't all have been from the drugs.

It was twilight in Paris when Eames opened his eyes, and the purpling horizon blended with the chestnut trees and the sounds of a street string band playing for tips. He grinned.

He found Arthur about a block away, casually strolling along the Seine and eating gelato.

"Hello, darling. Didn't get me one?"

Arthur turned to him, an eyebrow raised. "Well, I considered it, but I've never eaten anything in a dream before. So I wasn't sure if it would taste like shit or not."

He swiped his tongue over the chocolate cone and Eames watched, not licking his lips. "And? Is it?"

In response, Arthur pulled a plastic spoon from his inner jacket pocket and presented it. "See for yourself."

Eames accepted and the chocolate hazelnut sweetness bursting over his tongue was perfect. In fact, it was exactly as he remembered from a family holiday to France when he was a teen. He smiled.

Arthur took in the street around him, a critical eye scanning the buildings. "Did you create the entirety of Paris from memory or something?"

Eames tilted his head, following his gaze. "Have you ever been?"

"To Paris?" Arthur said. "No."

"In that case, yes, this is a perfect recreation of the entire city. Welcome to France."

Arthur grinned and offered him another bite of gelato.

"So, I couldn't help but notice," Arthur said in between licks of the melting treat, "that this seems like a date."

"Well, I should hope so," Eames said with smooth confidence and a smug smile. "Since that was my plan. Are you opposed?"

Arthur shook his head with far less gay panic than Eames was expecting. "Not opposed to a date, just...you know."

Eames did not know. "What?"

Arthur shrugged. "I don't know. Just. Paris in the springtime? Walks along the river? It's all a little…" he shrugged again.

"Overwhelming?" Eames supplied.

"Cliche."

And Eames, who had pulled two all-nighters and more than one favor to build this dream date, couldn't help but laugh.

"In that case, darling, what would you like to do on our date?"

Arthur hummed and pretended to consider, but Eames could see the excited gleam in his eyes that said sure, this was a date, but he was about to be challenged.

He couldn't wait.

"You know, Arthur," Eames said, slightly out of breath and glad he didn't have to try and salvage these shoes later, "I have to say I'm a bit surprised to see this 'urban exploration' side of you."

Ahead of him, Arthur laughed quietly and the sound echoed off the stone catacomb corridors. "Are you opposed?" he said, his grin evident in his tone. Eames wished he could see it.

"Not at all, love, just didn't realize you were a 'skeletons on the first date' kind of a guy."

"Well," Arthur said with a grunt of exertion, his head torch bobbing a beam of light in front of them, "you struck me as a 'bone on the first date' kind of a guy, so I went with it."

It was Eames' turn to laugh and his own head torch caught Arthur's backward smirk before he turned to lead the way again. "Well, you're not exactly wrong there," Eames admitted. "But I am enjoying getting to know this side of you better."

The light caressed the cling of Arthur's trousers to his backside as he scrambled over debris, and his snort said he knew exactly what Eames meant by that.

"Hey, look at this," Arthur said just as the corridor widened out. They stepped into a circular chamber, the walls around them housing embedded burial chambers four, no, five high, with each body laid out in individual nooks.

Eames trained the light on the catacombs, and was awed by the care with which they'd been placed there. "Wow," he breathed. He wondered how old they were, and absurdly, wished there was someone he could ask about them. "How did this get down here?"

Arthur turned to him, his light blinding until he angled it away. "What do you mean? Didn't you add it?"

Eames shook his head. "Not on purpose," he admitted. "I knew sort of theoretically that there were crypts under the streets of Paris, but I hadn't given it a moment's thought until you brought us down here."

Arthur's frown as he thought made Eames' chest do funny things, and he had to look away.

"What about that?"

Eames angled his torch to a small chest Arthur was indicating, nestled in between the feet of a skeleton in the wall, whose other adornments had long ago turned to dust.

Eames shrugged, curious. "Your guess is as good as mine. Shall we open it?"

Arthur indicated he should go ahead, and Eames pulled off the old lock, the wood crumbling in his fingers. The creak of the lid was straight out of a film, and Eames grinned back at Arthur, watching as he leaned forward in anticipation.

Except when Eames looked inside, he didn't see treasure, but a vaguely familiar yellow tin.

"Huh," he said softly, drawing it out. He wiped a careful palm over the dusty surface, turning it in his hands.

"What?" Arthur asked. "What is it?"

"It's my mum's old flour tin. She kept it in the kitchen, and it was where she tried to hide sweets from us kids when we were little, and a few extra quid when we were older." He traced the yellow flowers on the outside with nostalgia. "We always nicked it, but only when we really needed it. At least I did, anyway. You know, I think she knew? Maybe that's why she always kept some in there."

Eames shook himself and took a deep breath before he pried open the lid.

Inside, though, wasn't chocolate or money. It was a George Cross medal.

Arthur's intake of breath told him he knew what it was, and it spun in the torchlight from Eames' not-quite steady fingers.

"Eames? Is that yours?" Arthur asked, carefully.

Eames swallowed. "My dad's."

His throat felt thick and he tossed the medal back into the tin and threw the whole thing back in the chest. He wiped his nose before he turned around and pasted on a smile for Arthur.

"Don't know how that got down here either," he said lightly, and Arthur, thankfully, let it go.

"But if you didn't specifically add this place to the dream, how did they get here?" he mused, shining the light around the chamber again.

Eames shrugged. "When I built Paris, I didn't add every detail. I just remembered visiting when I was in college and added streets and buildings I knew I wanted. The rest just…" he gestured.

Arthur, to his surprise, nodded like that made sense. "I suppose it's about the feel of it. It's why this is dirty, but not wet or cold, why it feels like a date instead of a horror movie."

And Eames, taking in Arthur's excited face, cheeks slightly pink from the exercise and lips slightly parted, wanted to kiss him. "Does it still feel like a date?" he asked, stepping closer.

Arthur smiled at him. "It does, Company Sergeant Major Eames."

Eames scoffed. "Please. Just 'mister' on a date."

Arthur grinned and closed the distance. "Well, Mr Eames? Are you going to kiss me?"

"Kiss you?" Eames said, their lips a breath apart. "I was hoping to bone you, but—"

Arthur shut him up and Eames was more than fine with that.

When they emerged from the catacombs, dirtier and a bit more mussed than when they'd started out, Arthur agreed to let Eames show him the things he'd created. There was a tourist-free tour of the Eiffel Tower and a stroll past Notre Dame, and smaller, more personal things Eames hadn't realized he remembered. A poster advertising a band his sister had been mad about. A pub from his hometown. And in the air, a soft scent of honeysuckle like the kind from his mum's garden. He didn't point any of this out to Arthur, but it was interesting-the things that bled through.

The sunset stained the sky for hours, never sinking any lower, never letting go of the thousand hues clinging to the bottoms of the clouds. He kissed Arthur under that sky and thought, Oh, this is dangerous. This is very dangerous.

"What is it?" Arthur said, pulling back to study him.

Eames shook his head. "Nothing. Want to get a drink?"

Arthur frowned at him, but nodded, and they snuck in through the back door of a club just because Eames wanted to see if they could.

He bought Arthur drinks that didn't make them feel drunk and rubbed up against him on the dance floor in a way that did. And when Arthur hooked a finger in his belt loop and gave him a look that would soak a nun's knickers, he grabbed his hand and found the nearest exit.

Outside the club, there was a nip in the air that hadn't been there before, and Arthur breathed so prettily when he pushed him up against the alley wall and dropped to his knees.

"Wait," Arthur said, "not here."

Eames looked up from the cold cement under him and the obvious interest in front of him and raised an eyebrow, but Arthur turned on those dimples, and Eames needed to kiss him again, so he stood and did just that.

"You're right," he murmured between sips of his lips. "I'm finding you the biggest bed in Paris."

"Thousand thread count sheets," Arthur breathed, his fingers twisted in the hem of Eames' shirt.

"Room service," Eames gritted out, sucking a trail down his neck and grinding against him.

Arthur groaned and kissed him fiercely, pushing him back. "You have got a filthy mouth."

Eames grinned and grabbed his hand again, and together they found a hotel he couldn't afford in real life.

As he unbuckled his belt and watched Arthur slide himself back up the bed, easy and unbroken eye contact, he had one last coherent thought. I wish I was worthy of that. Then he pulled off his shirt with a grin and said, "I can't wait to destroy you."

Arthur raised a mischievous eyebrow and grinned. "You can try."

Arthur in bed was long, and lean, and unblemished, with a pink flush that raced down his chest, and a sparse trail of hair. He was beautiful and Eames told him so.

"Shut up," Arthur panted at him, sweaty hands grasping and pulling him closer, steering Eames' body exactly where he wanted it, so that when they rocked together, they groaned in unison. Combined with the sound of skin slapping and sweet moans, they made orchestral quality music in a bed big enough for half the base.

When Arthur rolled them over and lowered himself slowly onto Eames, he threw his head back in pleasure. Eames blamed his loss of breath on the frankly amazing, tight fit and not the way Arthur closed his eyes, naked trust on his open and vulnerable face.

Eames' hands moved over Arthur's throat and chest, calming and praising him soundlessly. He grabbed handfuls of Arthur's pert arse, sitting up to lick his neck and running a finger against where Arthur was stretched around him. It earned him a high mewl and he grinned against Arthur's Adam's apple.

"Lay back," Arthur said, pushing him. "I want to ride you."

"Yeah," Eames agreed, anything, whatever he wanted. Just don't stop looking like that, sounding like that.

Arthur lifted and lowered himself until Eames couldn't take it anymore, and he braced his heels on the mattress and pounded up into him. Arthur keened, holding still and taking it, taking everything Eames gave him. His eyes rolled back in his head and his cock bounced, a string of precome connecting them together.

Arthur leaned forward and braced himself against Eames' shoulders and Eames winced, hard, before he could stop himself.

"Sorry," Arthur panted immediately, moving his hands without being asked, and pressed into Eames' chest instead, rocking forward to just the right angle.

After that, Eames was lost, so deep in the sensation of Arthur clenching around him, riding him and making these sounds, and before he knew it, he was shuddering his release deep inside him.

"Jesus," Arthur breathed, stroking himself furiously while Eames jerked with the aftershocks. "Jesus."

Eames opened his mouth wide and Arthur groaned, "Oh, fuck," and shot on Eames' face. He missed, but that was okay because Arthur surged forward and kissed Eames like he'd never wanted anything more. His thumbs traced the mess into Eames' stubble and Eames wanted to leap out of bed, run, hide, but also never ever move, stay marked by Arthur and underneath him forever.

Arthur lay atop him, muscles quivering with exhaustion, and Eames helped him roll over. He kissed him again, sweet and slow, and knew he was fucked in more ways than one.

"Darling," he whispered, and it sounded broken.

"Mmm," Arthur hummed, eyes closed. "You alright?"

Eames lay on his side, not quite daring to touch. "More than."

Arthur peeled one bleary eye open, a small smile on his face. "I didn't hurt you, did I? Your shoulder?"

And here he'd been hoping Arthur hadn't noticed.

"'S fine.

Outside their hotel room window, the sun had finally set. Arthur propped himself up on his elbows and looked at the scar on the top of Eames' shoulder.

He wanted to hide under the scrutiny, but instead he shrugged it and said, "Honest, Arthur. It's fine."

Arthur drew a finger along the line, which was oddly numb to the touch due to the nerve damage, but Eames could practically feel the soft look on Arthur's face. He was very fucked.

"How?" Arthur asked quietly.

"How do you think?"

Arthur didn't answer, just let his finger trail down Eames' arm.

"Ah," Eames exclaimed, pulling away as he landed on a particularly sensitive bit on his tricep, the nerves cross-wired and relaying the wrong sensations. "That tickles."

Arthur grinned and kept going, swiping over elbow and wrist, and landing on his pinkie. "This part of it too?"

"Yeah," Eames said, wishing this conversation was going somewhere else. "Along with several months of physical therapy and almost my walking papers. Thank god for Project Somnacin, eh?"

"That's why you're here?" Arthur asked. "In dreamshare?"

"Just so," Eames said. "Couldn't hold a gun topside, but down here…"

Arthur didn't reply, and that was just fine with Eames. Because yeah, honestly, thank god for Project Somnacin. Otherwise he would have been out, trying to be an upstanding citizen, a life he'd never fit into well, especially not the upstanding bit.

"What was this about, Eames?"

Eames frowned, genuinely confused. "Which part?"

"The dream. The date. Me."

He looked small—smaller than Eames had ever seen him, waiting for Eames' answer. But at the same time he looked completely comfortable, stretched naked next to him, Eames' sweat drying on his skin. Eames told him the truth.

"I've wanted you from the moment I saw you."

Most of it, anyway.

"And I honestly like you, Arthur. The dream was just a way to get you to let me in."

Arthur raised his eyebrows and leaned forward to kiss Eames. Then he pushed him back, climbing on top of him once more and kissed him again.

"You sure?" Arthur asked. "It didn't have anything to do with these?"

And with a stretch of his shoulder muscles, wings started to expand behind him.

Eames' mouth dropped open, watching the appendages unfurl, the sheer size of them blocking out the light.

"Holy Christ, Arthur," Eames breathed. "They're bloody gorgeous."

They were brown. Or rather, they were primarily brown, shot through with black, white, grey, and gold, and looked dusky in the low light. They were also gigantic. The curve of them extended above Arthur's head and swooped out to either side soundlessly, a gentle extension of his body.

"I thought they'd be white," Eames said, still staring.

"They're…" Arthur said, hesitantly, "they're owl wings. Barn owl, I think." He looked self-conscious, but Eames was nothing short of astounded just to be in the presence of something so extraordinary.

He reached out a hand but hesitated. "May I?"

Arthur shrugged with his face and held a wing closer.

Eames ran the flat of his palm over the feathers, stroking them in the direction they grew. They were soft, so soft, but there was a structure to them, a rigidity that spoke of strength and power. The top portion of the wings was hard, almost bone-like, and there were even softer, downy feathers close to where they grew out of. Experimentally, Eames wiggled his fingers gently through the feathers and carded them through.

A contented sigh came from Arthur, and Eames blinked at him in surprise.

"You can feel that?"

"Yeah," Arthur said, his eyes half shut. "Feels good. Like scratching your scalp or something."

Encouraged, Eames kept going, running his fingertips over the whole wing, from top to tip. Arthur hummed happily and would occasionally reposition his wings for easier access, and Eames was reminded of how he pushed and pulled Eames where he wanted him in bed. Eames grinned and complied. He was happy to explore and happy to make Arthur happy in the meantime.

But when Eames' fingers dipped into the curve where his wing met his back, the incredibly soft, tiny feathers there, Arthur spasmed like he'd been electrocuted.

"Ah!"

"What?" Eames said, jerking his hand back. "Did I hurt you?"

"Um…no."

Eames blinked. "Are you...are you blushing?"

Arthur blushed harder. "No."

Delight exploded in Eames' heart and he reached for those feathers again eagerly.

"Careful," Arthur cautioned, but he didn't pull away. "They're...sensitive right now."

Eames smirked and gently drew just the tips of his fingers teasingly along and around where the feathers met his skin. Arthur shuddered and his eyes slipped closed. Incredibly, Eames knew exactly what that look meant. He'd seen it moments ago.

"Oh, this could be extremely fun," Eames murmured, grinning.

Arthur tried to roll his eyes, but instead a groan came out and his hips thrust forward. "Fuck."

"Dear god, yes," Eames said, but at that moment, the room around them started to fade as the dream ended. With the last sensation, Eames and Arthur's lips met and they woke up together.

The bright light of the dream lab was jarring, to say the least. As soon as Eames blinked awake, he turned to find Arthur doing the same.

He grinned, and to his relief, Arthur grinned back. His lips still sang with his kiss.

"Oh, we are absolutely doing that again," Eames said.

Arthur chuckled and god, those dimples. "You can try." Then he slid out of the chair and leaned over Eames, eyes dark and intense. When he kissed him, Eames let himself soak it in, eager and pliant and so, so fucked. If possible, it was even better topside.

"Urgh," Arthur said as he pulled away, looking down at his fatigues. There was a dark, wet spot on the front of his trousers. "Guess I'm glad there wasn't a tech here to see that."

Eames laughed. "I'm not as bad, darling. If you want, I can clean up here and you can head back and get a fresh kit."

"You sure?" Arthur asked, just to be polite. He was already unhooking his IV, and his desire to get out of the telling clothing was obvious.

"Positive. Go ahead. I'll see you tomorrow, yeah?"

Arthur nodded and gave an awkward wave as he headed out the door. With a sigh and a grimace at his ruined pants, Eames turned toward the laptop in the corner.

...multiple locale scenarios were engaged, some pre-planned and some self-generating mid-dream session...

...subject did not appear more or less emotionally or physically manipulatable than would have been likely outside of a dream state…

...potential for repeat experiments.