Title: Reset, Repeat (Part II)
Author: Shylace
Author's Note: Thank you all for the kind reviews! Let me know what you think about this next chapter. I love input :)
Five years earlier – May
It's been three months of idleness, Arthur realizes, since the birth of Cobb's and Mal's first child, three months since they've decided to take a break from extraction and settle down in Los Angeles, which is several time zones away from Arthur's current location. His hand itches for the phone, and he nearly presses the dial button before he reconsiders the situation. Cobb is one of the few people Arthur could call a friend, but they are not the sort of friends who engage in random chitchat over the phone. Calling Cobb would not result in a satisfactory answer anyway. Cobb is older and now has domestic responsibilities that do not include alleviating Arthur's restless boredom. Instead, Arthur decides that he has stayed in one place too long and checks out of his hotel. He is comfortably situated in the first class compartment on a train to London when he first meets Nikolas Pasiphaedis, a young man, younger than Arthur in fact, better dressed than most his age and definitely more self-assured.
It is Nikolas who initiates the conversation with Arthur adding only truncated answers, but somewhere along the way between Cologne and Brussels, they discover that they have a mutual acquaintance in London.
"How do you know Eames?" Arthur asks.
"We both went to Eton in our larkish youth," Nikolas answers, smiling. "We weren't in the same year, but I constantly heard stories about him. In particular, there was this one about his little mess with a maid and a prank involving several large farm animals."
They talk easily after that, and when they descend the train in London, Nikolas passes over an eggshell-hued business card with impressively engraved letters. Arthur doesn't call to meet up for a drink, but a few days later, he bumps into Nikolas in Huntsman & Sons, Savile Row, and is basically coerced into visiting the man's newest property acquisition. Eames turns up there too, and after two vodka tonics, Arthur at last comprehends that he is at a business meeting.
"There's a certain family I'm very interested in," Nikolas says softly, his boyish face made angular by firelight. "I can get you closely associated with them, but where I would like to go from there will deviate from your usual job. I need you to perform an inversion of extraction. Have you gentlemen, by any chance, heard of inception?"
And Arthur stares at his empty glass, stares at the fire, looks everywhere except at the two men who are waiting for his answer. He has never worked on a job without Cobb yet. He has worked with Eames once, enough time to develop distaste for the man's crudeness and not enough time to foster any trust.
Two weeks later though, he finds himself in Corfu, watching a dark-haired teenage girl bite her lower lip as she dreams of more than her father's inheritance and sketches colonnades, the smudge of charcoal occasionally finding its way to the curve of her cheek.
"You're nervous," Ariadne says with a slight smile. "I've never seen you nervous. It's almost unnatural."
Arthur tries his best to not sound unprofessional. "I admit that I don't exactly get along with this forger that Cobb is bringing back. He's sort of a…" Cretin. Buffoon. Twat. "Prankster."
"That bad, huh?" she says, suppressing her laughter.
At this point, Eames makes his entrance, his voice ricocheting off the walls in a way that makes Arthur's ears hurt. Failing to force a bear hug, or more of a clinch hold, upon the point man, Eames turns his attentions toward the architect.
"And is this the exquisite, young lady who will grace us with her -," He stops abruptly and just stares.
Shooting him a narrowed sideways glance, Arthur intercedes. "Ariadne, this is Eames, our forger who usually does not know when to stop talking, but seems to be momentarily -,"
"Enthralled by your loveliness," Eames cuts in, repossessing his polished self again.
Afterwards, when they are certain that Ariadne has left the warehouse, Eames slams his fist down on a desk. "And you call me the one without any sense? How could you possibly think that it would be reasonable to work with that girl? That girl, who could endanger us if she recognizes us -,"
"She doesn't."
"Well, of course, she's not going to tell you, 'Oh, I reckon I've seen you in a dream before.' That's just bloody creepy. But if she figures it out -,"
"She won't." Arthur says and then with more confidence, "I was careful with her. I was thorough."
Eames still looks unconvinced. "You better hope so, mate, because if not, this whole affair will return and hit us in the face."
Minosas had described it as a formal dinner party, but Arthur quickly discovers that he is the only one in a tux among the attendees, who are mostly barefoot and clothed in light fabrics appropriate for the balmy dusk. Many of the people in attendance are indeed high-profile businessmen, an oil prince, a luxury goods mogul, a severe-looking man whom Arthur will later identify as Maurice Fischer. Business and politics launch the initial conversation, but as more wine is brought out, enough to make Dionysus proud, the talk turns to complaints about wives, hushed and unhushed stories about mistresses, concerns over heirs, until finally, someone rescues Arthur from all the revelry.
"You don't look like you're having much fun."
It's not often that people spot Arthur before he spots them, but he feels almost relieved to see her. "Not yet. Are you offering to show me some?"
"I'm going to be nice, but don't push it." Ariadne's smiling though, flushed and in a much better mood than she was when she talked to him last time. "And I have to insist that you take off at least two layers of clothing to have fun. You look like a stick in the sand otherwise."
"So stripping down to an undignified state is the only way to enjoy myself?" he asks in mock concern.
"The only," she asserts, and she's behind his back, slipping off his jacket and throwing it onto a chair before he can protest and bother to fold the garment.
She leads him through a maze. From the beach to the terrace down a twisting, winding set of stairs previously obscured by a tall plant to another beach. This one is empty of people though, quiet, secretive, and beautiful in its isolation. Snugly positioned at the edge of the water is a small boat with pristine white sails and shining letters spelling 'Doris' on her side which Ariadne points to and says solemnly, "My closest emotional attachment in the world, or well, on par with Papa, my sketchbook, and maybe the cat."
"You really are an only child," Arthur comments dryly.
"Oh shush and just get on the boat," she says in response, tossing a shell at him.
"Isn't sailing at night dangerous?" he questions skeptically.
"It's still dusk, and I see a sliver of the sun. Do you trust me or not?"
He doesn't because she's eighteen, and there's no information in her file about her being a professional sailor, but he knows enough about sailing to get them out of a fix if something happens so he follows her. In silent admiration, he watches as she maneuvers the little boat further and further until they are gliding. Instead of chasing the sun, they end up tracking the stars, and eventually, they reach a place where the water is calm enough for them to both lay on their backs and gaze at the constellations, almost phosphorescent in the inky sky. Greek mythology was never Arthur's specialty so he listens as she narrates the story for each constellation they find. Ironically, she is unable to find the one that belongs to her namesake.
"Look, fireworks," he points, diverting her attention.
Ariadne frowns and inspects her glow-in-the-dark watch. "Red flares. That's Papa's signal for us to return."
When they land ashore, Arthur carries a basket off the boat and pulls out an unopened bottle along with two glasses.
"To celebrate a safe journey," he suggests.
She raises an eyebrow. "Are you still trying to seduce me?"
"Not quite," he replies honestly.
His lips are sealed as the wine skims his mouth, and he waits for her to swallow. Scarcely a minute later, Ariadne is lying unconscious in the sand, and two minutes later, Eames and Nash show up with the PASIV.
In the dream, they are no longer in Corfu, but in Athens where Minosas's empire is headquartered. They capture Ariadne easily and begin the interrogation in the boardroom where her father conducts his morning meetings. After five fruitless minutes that feel much longer to both the captors and the captive, Nash picks the girl up from the chair and throws her unceremoniously onto the table. He has one hand pressing down on her throat while the other travels down her blouse to linger on the strip of skin between her top and her jeans. Arthur watches with hardened eyes until he says suddenly in his own voice,
"Take your hands off of her."
Both Nash and Ariadne, blindfolded, twist to look at him. For a moment, utter silence dominates the room, and then Ariadne says triumphantly,
"Someone's coming."
Nash chuckles at that. "Aww, do you think Daddy's going to buy you out of this one, sweetie?"
The doors rupture open with the sound of gunfire and the explosion of splintering wood. A horde of men, equipped as if they belonged to a SWAT team, pour into the room. They take out Nash immediately and subsequently locate Eames behind a potted plant at the other end of the room. Shot in the leg, but still conscious, Arthur props himself half up in time to see through the ski mask a dark-haired young man enter and rush to Ariadne's side. She whispers something to him, and he turns toward Arthur. In the seconds before the killing shot, Arthur looks at the face of the man and realizes that it is Nikolas Pasiphaedis who has invaded the dream.
Arthur wakes, trembling for the first time in a long period. Beside him, Ariadne awakens slowly, rubbing her eyes and murmuring 'ouch' when the sand particles get into her eyes.
"Did I fall asleep?"she asks uncertainly.
"Yes, just a short nap," he reassures her, but his right hand is already inside his pocket, rolling the die.
"We should get back," Ariadne says, rising unsteadily to her feet. They make their way back to the soiree on the terrace where Minosas waits for them.
"Ah, there you are," he cries out. "I was beginning to get a little worried. Anyway, Ariadne, your mother would like for you to greet your cousin."
There's a sound of delight from Ariadne as she wraps her arms around a dark-haired boy who looks just a few years older than her. The boy smiles over Ariadne's head as she introduces him.
"Arthur, I'd like you to meet my cousin Nikolas."