Title: Le Famille
Author: A Crazy Elephant
Summary: Or "Five Times Ariadne Met Her Team Members' Families and the One Time They Met Hers"
Category: Family/Friendship
Word Count: 1,044
Disclaimer: Inception belongs to Christopher Nolan, not me. Sad.
Author's Notes: I still can't thank everyone enough for their support for this piece so far – I've never had so many alerts or favorites before and we're quickly approaching my all time hits record. You guys are awesome!
I'm sorry for failing to post yesterday, but this was only half written last night by first pitch. And then, well, my Giants won us the World Series. Fear the beard! Go Giants!
4 – Yusuf
11 Months, 3 weeks, 4 Days Since Inception
After a celebratory holiday, she starts working full time with Arthur.
Eames occasionally joins their team as needed, but mostly they just buddy up with lesser extractors or Arthur takes on both duties and they take trivial extraction jobs or contract with some of Arthur's old army buddies for some legitimate assignments. Neither the extractions or the contracts are as much of a rush as inception, but it pays the bills with several figures to spare and she can defy physics all she pleases. And they're good.
Really good.
That's why they get a call from the state department to train the senate sponsor of a particularly controversial bill she isn't surprised. They are now The Best after all and this isn't just any old training job. This senator has more baggage than Cobb (except instead of murderous late wives making unwanted appearances, there are the occasional North Vietnamese snipers and landmines left from his army days) and is violently allergic to the traditional dreamsharing compounds. So while Arthur riddles out clever ways of remaining in the Senator's subconscious for more than thirty seconds back in DC, she is sent on a field trip to Mombasa to visit their favorite chemist.
Yusuf meets her at the airport and she is unbelievably grateful that she doesn't have to brave the zoo that is the taxi stand with her nonexistent Swahili. Of course, after about ten seconds on the road with the chemist, she's almost regretting leaving the crowded bank of cabs for the snug little compact car because and is quite sure they're going to hit something.
It isn't that Yusuf is a bad driver. He's actually quite good when he's not being chased by homicidal projections. The rest of Mombasa, however, is another story entirely.
It's rush hour and it seems as though the entire city's on the road – cars, trucks, motorcycles, bicycles, mopeds, every conceivable vehicle, plus hordes of pedestrians all swarming through the narrow streets like the most restless of projections, at speeds she wouldn't have though possible in the tightly packed city. Yusuf navigates the multitudes like a pro, but that certainly doesn't stop her stomach from turning and her heart from dropping every time a bike messenger zips in front of them or a heavily laden truck cuts them off with only inches to spare. By the time they reach his office and her head stops reeling, she has never been so happy to stand on solid ground in her life.
"Come on," Yusuf encourages in a way that suggests she looks precisely the way she feels and after that carnival ride, she's feeling rather like she's going to be ill. He helps her with her bags and promises to find he something to calm the motion sickness as she stumbles into his pharmacy and upstairs into his office, wanting nothing more than curl up in the nearest stationary chair and try to even out her breathing.
"Hey! You're alive!" The greeting is cheerful and comes from the corner desk where the chemist has a wide assortment of paperwork and glass vials stacked in messy piles and roughly grouped by size. Sitting at the desk, feet propped up on a stack of papers and toying with a yo-yo, is a miniature version of their chemist wearing a secondary school uniform. Almost. The boy is thinner, clean shaven, his features sharper than Yusuf's and he's wearing an arrogant grin that says Eames has recently stopped in for a visit and has quickly taken the chief spot in the boy's list of heroes. The chemist seems less than pleased with this development.
"Yes, Isaac, we're alive." Yusuf doesn't sound thrilled with the boy's tone and it's cocky edge as he steers her into the nearest chair. "Ariadne, my nephew Isaac." The chemist introduces impatiently while she tries not to think too hard about the roller coaster car trip she's just taken.
"It's always a pleasant surprise, Uncle," The boy grins again, ignoring the introduction and sleeping the yo-yo as Yusuf swats at the pair of shoes resting on a short pile of what looks like formulas. "You've seen him drive that death trap." The kid smiles at Ariadne, laughs and throws the yo-yo into another trick and the poor chemist heaves a defeated sigh that says he is not prepared to handled particularly cheeky teenagers who ought to have been minding the shop rather than lounging about with a yo-yo. "Why can't you buy a proper car, Uncle? One with air conditioning?"
"Proper cars get stolen in this neighborhood." Yusuf explains dully as he rummages through the desk drawers, searching, she hopes, for something to settle her stomach. He sounds mildly offended, as though he's rather attached to the round little vehicle outside and there's something like longing in his voice – longing for the days when certain forgers didn't show up at his door to corrupt impressionable boys with his impish charm or for Isaac to just skip over the taunting arrogance that comes with being fourteen and she can't tell which. "Where is Grandfather?"
"Downstairs." Isaac's tone turns bored, mildly disappointed his uncle did not rise to the challenge of his teasing and his attention returns to the yo-yo and Yusuf looks relieved. The chemist has plucked a vial she hopes is for her from the shelves along the back wall and swats at the tabby cat lounging atop the first aid kit before he pulls a syringe and an alcohol swab.
"Perhaps you'd like to see if he needs anything?" The chemist suggests and his nephew sighs a very put upon sort of sigh as though he'd perhaps not, but complies and sulks off downstairs. "I'm sorry." Yusuf apologizes, motioning for her to hold out her wrist and she dimly realizes through the unfortunate spinning in her head that this is quite possibly the most she has ever heard the chemist speak about something not related to a job or somnacin compounds or dreamsharing in general. "His manners seem to have left him."
"Did Eames sneak them into his carry on?" She smiles weakly as he slips the needle into her wrist and he looks rather unimpressed.
"Ha, bloody ha."