Disclaimer: Concepts/Characters related to Inception are not mine but rather Christopher Nolan's. I'm just 'extracting' them for my own purposes

A/N: Part 3... Whoo. I know the last chapter lost the tone a little bit but that's mostly because I was 1) writing it at work on Google Docs which meant my focus wasn't 100% on the story and 2) because I`m still getting a feel for how to write the 'real world' versus the 'dream world'. But hopefully I've got it worked out this time around.

Notes for this one-shot: This is about a year, a year and a half after the second (The Warehouse) one-shot, so Arthur is about 23 and Nick is around 19. They've both had the chance to be involved in extractions as the architect and the point-man but they've never done one without someone more experienced being involved.

Arthur rocked back on the heels of his oxfords as he checked the time again. It had become a new habit of his, this fixation on how time moved inside of the world of dream and outside it. Mal teased that it was part of his obsession with Cobb, as the older man – his mentor really, was equally fixated on tracking the movements of time.

She'd started joking about the obsession when he'd arrived at the warehouse with closely cropped hair to replace the shaggy, messy look he'd worn through most of university. The teasing had only continued when he'd ditched his wardrobe of jeans and t-shirts for more classic suits and button-downs. Arthur personally didn't think he had any sort of obsession with Dom; he was just taking subtle cues from the older man on how to pass by unnoticed in the dream world.

His attention to detail was also growing sharper as it was his job on the team to learn all the aspects of their mark's live, research every facet but also keep an eye for anything that changed while they were in the dream. That was why as he stood in front of Nick's apartment door, his eyes were drawn to several spots where it was obvious that the green paint had chipped off and been painted over again, in addition to the fact that the brass 7 was hanging on an angle and one of the lights further down the hall was burning out, flickering slightly every few seconds.

Arthur knocked again and then waited his hands in his pockets, idly running his fingers over his die.

"It's open."

The inside of Nick's apartment was much more reflective of its occupant than the dilapidated outside. The walls were covered in huge pieces of paper with black charcoal markings all over them and there were multiple bookshelves stuffed with all manner of architectural planning texts as well as several coffee table books of photographs of exotic locations. The furniture was minimal, a table, a couch and beyond an archway, a large brass bed that was currently piled with clothes.

Nick poked her head around the archway with a slight smile.

"Sorry, I'll be ready in like two minutes. Do you ever have those days where you completely forget about doing your laundry until you wake up one morning and you have no clothes?"

Arthur cleared his throat and rocked back onto his heels again.

"Uh, not really, no."

"Oh okay. Well give me a minute and I'll get dressed. You have to close your eyes though."

"Why?"

"No doors."

Obligingly he shut his eyes but when he heard her move around, he opened them a fraction, a small smirk on his lips.

Nick pulled her oversized shirt off, revealing a small black tattoo between her shoulder blades before she grabbed a bra and a shirt. Boxers were slid down slim legs, revealing the top of a pale but curved backside, when suddenly he was smacked in the face with a wad of material.

"I said NO peeking. Jesus."

Their mark was already sedated and handcuffed down when they reached the main room of the warehouse. Charles Dahl, a prominent businessman who had made his fortune off of buying media conglomerates until he had his own billion dollar media empire. His ex-wife's lawyers were paying them to go into his mind and find the name of the law firm who had suddenly made a prenup appear out of thin air, despite the ex-wife's insistence that she had never signed one. It was a simple extraction, just one dream which was why Dom and Mal were trusting him and Nick to go in by themselves and get the information.

He would be working as the extractor, under the guise of a contractor who had been hired to help Mr. Dahl with his security while Nick, posing as his partner would be doing the duel job of architect and point-man. The setting was a restaurant that was patterned after Mr. Dahl's favourite steak house, so as to feel familiar for the mark without requiring an exact copy of the real restaurant.

Rolling up the sleeve of his shirt, he made himself comfortable as Dom prepped the needles.

"Remember what I've told you," the older man reminded him. "You can be hurt within the dream, but dying will just wake you up, alright?"

"Yeah, I've got it."

"Good. You've got 20 minutes."

Arthur closed his eyes and then suddenly as the drugs hit his system, he felt that now-familiar falling sensation...

Charles Dahl was an imposing man in his sixties, tall with closely cropped silver hair and beard. The reddish tint in his nose and cheeks suggested he was no stranger to alcohol and the appraising look he had given Nick when they 'arrived' at the restaurant implied that he was also fond of younger women.

Nick was dressed in a steel grey dress under a black blazer with her hair swept back into a loose bun and a pair of serious looking glasses perched on her nose. She was currently playing to Dahl's ego, regarding his need to protect himself as Arthur calmly sipped the wine that Dahl had chosen.

"My partner is quite correct, Mr. Dahl. In times like this, one can't be too careful with ones security."

"Well I have bodyguards for that sort of thing."

Arthur nodded, his gaze focused. Dahl liked men who were willing to challenge him, so in order to get what they came for, Arthur had had to create a persona of a strong salesman who not only knew his pitch by heart, but lived, breathed and slept every angle of it.

"What we specialize in, Mr. Dahl is not physical security as anyone can hire a bodyguard. What we protect against are people who might try to enter your mind and take information they can then use against you."

"They can do that?"

"Yes sir. It's a process called extraction. What we can teach you to do is create security measures within your own mind, like a safe or vault where you would store the information so the extractors couldn't access it."

"Extractors like yourself maybe?"

Arthur's eyes widened slightly as he sucked in a deep breath but he tried not to show any outward signs of distress, in case it interrupted the dream.

"Like us, sir?"

Dahl set his napkin down and pushed himself back from the table. "I am not a stupid man, Mr. Wallace. After I was hit with a lawsuit regarding an incident that no one but myself and the defendant could corroborate, I took extra precautions to protect myself from future situations. Now I don't know what you could be looking for in here, but I can assure you that you won't get it."

He snapped his fingers and suddenly several more security guards appeared in the room. Before Arthur could move, two of the security guards stepped forwards and pulled Nick from her seat.

"I wonder what the people who trained you told you about being hurt in a dream. You know pain originates in the mind so if I were to do something like this –" Dahl gestured again and another guard pulled out his gun, levelling it at Nick. Arthur tried to get up but found himself restrained in his seat. There was a blast, a small muzzle flare and then Nick slumped to the floor, clutching her shoulder. "It hurts just as badly as it would in real life. Now Mr. Wallace, would you like to tell me who you're working for or do I have to show you all the ways I can hurt your pretty partner without killing her?"

If his heart wasn't beating too quickly for him to even think clearly, Arthur would have laughed at how much Dahl was sounding like a terrible Bond villain.

No Mr. Bond, I expect you to die, he thought. Oh God he really was losing it if he was thinking of old Bond lines, in a time like this.

The sounds of a scuffle brought his attention back to the current situation and he realized that Nick, although still bleeding, had managed to wrestle one of the guard's guns away and was currently pointing it at her own temple.

Dahl laughed and then pulled out a small stiletto, slamming Arthur's head down onto the table and applying pressure with the knife to the back of his neck.

"Go ahead, Ms. Evans. Kill yourself and leave your partner behind. That way you don't have to hear him scream."

The gun wavered in her hand and Arthur realized small cracks were appearing through the walls as she began to lose control of the dream.

"I'm sorry, Arthur."

There was another short bang and then searing pain emanating from his head, before everything suddenly went dark and he felt the kick.

When Arthur came to, he almost fell out of his seat but Dom held him back, trying to steady him. He heard odd choking noises and he couldn't figure out where they were coming from, until he realized that they were emerging from his own throat.

"Arthur, Jesus, what happened?"

Looking wildly around the room, he saw that Nick was still hooked into the dream, her face tense. Lurching from his seat, he stumbled over to her and tried to unhook the needle but found himself thrown flat on his back on the concrete, Dom pinning him down.

"Never interrupt a dream without a proper kick, do you hear me? We don't know what kind of damage it can cause the mind if someone is interrupted without any warning. Now tell me, what the hell is going on?"

Arthur gasped and coughed but finally managed to spit out some semblance of an explanation.

"Dahl knew. He had training of some kind... he said he was going to keep us there, hurt us until we told him who hired us. He knew not to kill us or disrupt the dream or else we'd wake up-"

"How did you get out before the kick then?"

"Nick... s-she got a gun. She shot me... oh God, she shot me in the head."

Dom glanced at Nick's still sleeping form before calling out for Mal.

"We have to do the kick now."

"But it's not time yet."

"Something went wrong. She needs to be pulled out."

Arthur lay on the floor, feeling like his bones were made of wet noodles as Mal and Dom applied the kick and Nick fell to the floor, sobbing and coughing. Mal was by her side though and he watched Nick whisper something to Mal, who got up and fetched her black sketchbook that she used to plan the layouts of dreams. Nick scribbled something onto one of the pages before her face turned pale and she stumbled to her feet, running into the small bathroom at the back of the warehouse. Mal passed the sketchbook to Dom before sliding her arms under Arthur and helping him to his feet. She half-carried, half-led him over to the one couch in the room where he collapsed onto the worn flannel, his face pressed against the cushions.

Eyes sliding shut, Arthur slipped into a dark sleep full of strange dreams that he could never properly recall afterwards. When he woke up, he knew some time must have passed because Dahl was gone as were Mal and Dom and Ilya who'd be out on another contract was sitting at the single desk, feet kicked up as he flicked through a tattoo magazine.

Arthur pushed himself up but only succeeded in sliding to the floor, where he sat for a minute, trying not to move as strange phantom pains chased around inside his head.

"Good, you're up."

Ilya set the magazine down and pulled a small flashlight out of his pocket, as he knelt in front of Arthur. Temporarily blinded, Arthur rubbed the spots out of his eyes as Ilya finished his examination and returned to his magazine, apparently deciding that Arthur was in fine health.

"How long was I asleep for?"

"Two – two and a half hours about."

"Mal and Dom left?"

"They took Dahl back and went to give the information to the former Mrs. Dahl's lawyers."

"Nick got the information?" Then it dawned on him that he hadn't seen Nick since he'd fallen asleep. The phantom pain screamed as he shot to his feet, but he was too busy looking around the space for Nick to pay any attention to it.

Ilya jerked his thumb at the bathroom door which was still shut. "She got it. Been in there the whole time, won't come out."

Arthur made it to the bathroom on shaky legs and leaned against cracked wooden frame, his head resting against the door.

"Nick? Nick, it's Arthur. Are you okay?"

There was what sounded like a cut-off sob and then the splash of water.

"I'm fine. Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine now. We should get out of here though. D'you want to go grab some food with me?"

"N-no, I'm fine. I've got some schoolwork to do anyways."

"Alright. Uh I guess I'll see you tomorrow?"

"Uh-huh. Good night, Arthur."

The good night sounded very definitive so Arthur pushed himself off the door and headed towards the exit. He was going to go home, change and then go find a cheap bar and drink until he could pass out and hopefully not dream that night. It was his emergency solution to a bad extraction and he knew that tonight he would definitely need it.

A/N: So reminder time. The next part will be a continuation of this one-shot (effectively making this a two-shot) and you get to pick whether it will be M or T. So let me know.