Arthur tries a different tack. "Ari...what are we doing here?"

Her face hardens. "You haven't guessed it yet?"

"I don't know, Ari. I don't know."

She laughs coldly. "You, of all people. No vague suspicions, no...creeping doubts...no ideas? Nothing?"

He stares, trying to keep the utter confusion out of his expression. "Nothing," he says flatly, trying to read her face, which remains unreadable.

"Fine then," she says with a scowl. "You," she waves Arthur's gun around vaguely to indicate a wider audience, "destroyed me."

"What are you-"

"You ruined me!" she shrieks, leaping to her feet and beginning to pace, trembling wildly and waving her hands. "Lured me away from my studies to join you in your world of dreams! Dragged me across continents when somebody fucked up! Ruined any chance I had at legitimate work!" She pants for breath, eyes glittering with hatred. "You took away everything that ever mattered to me - a home, a degree, a career...and what did you give me in return?" She leaned in close to whisper, but he knows the script. He says the words before she can choke them out.

"A nightmare."

Her face twists, briefly, before settling back into the calm, collected rage that has been her default since he woke up.

"Do you think I haven't been living that nightmare too?"

Again, silence. Ariadne studies him, pretending to be disdainful, and he can see the violent half-sane insanity boiling in her eyes that is more true that anything he can tell her about the difference between dreams and reality.

That, the half-sane insanity, is what causes the frightened tremble in his voice as he asks "Ariadne..." Ari... "Where's Dom?"

Suddenly she looks away, almost apologetic. "He's dead."

"Did..." his throat is very dry and he's having a hard time breathing- "you..."

She stares at him as though she had suddenly remembered that he was very, very stupid, then studies the dirty window. Of course, she's saying. Who else?

The muggy weather is beginning to take its toll; beads of sweat roll down his forehead and his button-up is sticking to his skin. He's itchy, restless (what a surprise), and he just wants to get away from this nightmare that somebody's decided to toss him. After a moment he thinks that maybe it's only the stress of this whole ordeal that's finally getting to his head.

He just wants to know what the fuck is going on, so he asks.

"What's going to happen now?"

The click of her heels on the floor slows, stops, then resumes; as she walks past him he gets a whiff of lavender. She glares. Relents.

"I don't know yet," she says, fiddling with the trigger on the pistol; but she won't pull it. Not yet.

He tugs experimentally on the knot under his fingers, and he feels a slight give. Schooling his face, watching hers, he picks at it carefully while listening to her click the safety on off on off on off on off...

Ariadne's gaze bores into his eyes. She'd noticed. "You can't get away," she says, dully, as though she had repeated it to herself until she believed it. He can't get away. He can't get away. He can't get away.

He laughs, hard and dry. It hurts. "Who's going to stop me?" A crazy, suicidal thing to ask, but it exhilarates him in a way that rushes into his blood and assures him that this is no dream, this is real, and if you fuck this up there's no second chance.

This is real, and reality is more frightening and exhilarating than even the most verisimilar dream.

Then it hits him that this is all out of control, while he feels as though he is standing outside of it, looking in with cool indifference instead of suffering through the ordeal himself. The knot slips and slides, cool and hard under his numb fingertips, doesn't actually seem to be unraveling but he thinks it might be.

Then it hits him that she's standing dangerously close, not close enough to kiss but close enough to touch, pressing the muzzle of the gun to his chest with her finger on the trigger, eyes glittering with hatred and...something else...

Then it hits him that's he's about to die.

It's rather calming. Terrifying.

Her hands are steady as she looks him in the eyes. Her voice is steady as she whispers the only sane words he'll hear -

"I loved you."

- and pulls the trigger.

I loved you too.

Thank you so much, everyone, for all the love and support you have given me, as I've now completed my second story! I won't be writing anything new for a while, since I'm officially a college student as of Wednesday, but keep an eye out because I am working on a few things, they just won't be uploaded as quickly or as often. Thanks again, guys, you have no idea what it means for me to check my email and see so much support, even if it's just a +fav.