Part 2

Eames awoke to the feeling of fingertips on his brow, a gesture Arthur had always done when he tried to wake Eames from his nightmares. Of course that had been when he was still capable of having dreams, later it was just a sign that Arthur had missed him.

Eames opened his eyes and his heart sank as he stared at the empty space before him. He was alone. Arthur was dead. He was gone, just like Mal. Eames was alone again.

He closed his eyes. He had always had Arthur and Mal to go back to, he had always had Arthur to come after him, to bring him back. And now both of them had left him behind. Alone. Lonely. With only the ghosts of memory left for him.

Eames could feel tears filling the space between his eye-lids, could feel them run down his temple and pool in the nook of his nose. He curled a little more into himself, ignored the noise that left his throat. Ignored the noise coming from the streets outside, the only sign for him that the world still existed.

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"What the..., just to get this straight, you hate Mombasa? Why?" Eames frowned incredulously up at the man standing a little to his side.

"I don't know it's just so... I don't like the climate." Eames blinked at Arthur's answer.

"Darling, you live in Phoenix, it's practically in a desert, and you like the climate there all right." he got a smile for that and a fist bump to his shoulder.

"Not that kind of climate you ass, I just don't like the feeling in my gut when I'm here." with this, Arthur reached out for his hand and settled himself down on the floor besides Eames. He rested his head on Eames thigh. "Though it greatly improves when you're here with me." Eames smiled.

"Everything improves with me there." Arthur scoffed at that answer, but his smile didn't leave his face. They were silent for a long moment, Eames fingers carding through Arthur's dark locks and Arthur with his eyes closed, enjoying the caress.

"I want to built a house for us." Eames paused in his motions after that declaration and looked down at Arthur's eyes. They were strangely serious and darker than usual. Eames shifted his hand to cup Arthur's cheek and lent down, so that their faces were only a breath apart.

"Are you asking me to marry you, Arthur?" for a moment it looked as if Arthur would take the question the wrong way, would pull back because he thought Eames was laughing at him, but then he noticed the seriousness in Eames eyes.

"Yes." Arthur breathed and Eames couldn't decide if his heart stopped or started beating.

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Eames opened his eyes again, he didn't know how much time had passed between now and the time he had closed them. He didn't care. For a moment he could hear Arthur humming La Vie En Rose behind him, he could practically feel him moving about, cleaning up, but when he turned there was no-one there. He fell back onto the bed. His stomach protested loudly, apparently he had to eat something. It wasn't until half an hour later that Eames actually got out of bed to get something to eat.

He nearly broke his neck as he recoiled with surprise at what he found in his kitchen, or more, who he found.

"What are you two doing here?" he asked after he got himself under control again and continued his way over to the fridge. He took a slice of cheese and his hand hovered over a coffee-milk drink for a moment before he pulled back and closed the door again. He rolled the slice up and turned to his two visitors while eating it up.

Ariadne was the first to break, unfamiliar with the way of handling his silences.

"We.., I.., we thought that you could need some company." Eames chewed and continued to stare at them both. He swallowed and answered, his voice dismissive.

"You thought wrong." He popped the last of the cheese in his mouth. Ariadne shot a look into Yusuf's direction but Yusuf's eyes never left Eames. The silence stretched longer this time. Ariadne had learned and waited for one of the men to start, well continue, the conversation.

Surprisingly it wasn't Yusuf who started talking, but Eames.

"He's dead, Yusuf. They both are. I'm the only one left." Eames eyes were dark with something that Ariadne had never seen in any eyes before. The closest thing she could bring herself to describe it was an abyss of grief. Yusuf stood from his place at the table and went over to his friend. After a short struggle, he managed to hold Eames in a hug and blinked his own tears away at the tremors he could feel running through the taller man.

Yusuf could only hold onto his friend and try not to think about everything too closely. He didn't want to think that the things that had held Eames alive were gone now. First Mal, God, had that been only barely two years ago? And now, Arthur. Thinking back to the three years that he has known Eames, he wasn't even sure if Mal would have been enough.

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The bell above the door jingled as a beautiful laughing woman stumbled through it. Yusuf looked up from his papers and set down his pen. The woman was followed by a tall and broad shouldered blond man with an equally bright grin on his face and a second, dark-haired man, who was suppressing a smile.

"Oh, this is so exciting! Eames, it's your turn talking, poor Arthur is barely able to talk any more." the woman had a lovely French accent and though it was the only time he met her, Yusuf could tell that she was lovely all around. She patted the cheek of the dark haired man and shoved the blond towards Yusuf. Eames smiled but not as brightly as before.

"We heard that you make compounds." Yusuf leant back from the counter, studying all of their poses and expressions. They seemed honest enough, though of course it could all be a scam.

In the end he sold them what they wanted and he often saw Eames again, but never Mal, and Arthur just sometimes, and never in person until the Inception Job. He remembered that the only real smile from Eames just appeared when he was with Arthur or Mal, that he would sometimes disappear for months from Mombasa without any of Yusuf's mixtures to indicate a job.

And then he remembered the year after Mal's death, the year leading up to the Inception Job. Eames had been possessed of anger, his sarcasm turned bitter and he threw himself into the gambling business, taking very few jobs as a Forger. But it had been anger mixed with sadness that had possessed him, not this bone-deep, soul-wrecking grief that ate him alive. Losing Mal had been hard on Eames, but Yusuf had known that Eames would be okay after a while. He had still had Arthur. And now, he had lost that as well.

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After Ariadne and Yusuf had left, they had made sure that he ate more than a slice of cheese, Eames went back to his bed. He fell back into dreamless sleep pretty quickly. He woke up to the smell of Arthur making waffles and whistling off key in his kitchen. As Eames opens his eyes the smell and sound fades into nothing.

"I'm going insane." Eames said, his eyes watching the slim gap that was left by his door only leaning closed and leading into the kitchen. He couldn't decide if he wanted this insanity to continue or if it should stop.

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"Hey, is this seat taken?" Eames couldn't decide which of the two faces looking up at his question was more beautiful. It was decided as they both smiled at him invitingly and a little pitying, probably because of his horrible French, if only because of the dimples.

"It is now." the girl said, gesturing for him to sit down, her French was natural and lovely. "You're here as an exchange student as well?"

"Yeah, what gave it away?" he grinned and sat down. The dark brown eyes of the boy found his alight with humour.

"Your truly atrocious choice of clothing." his French was perfect, so it was definitely a second, or even third language. Eames looked down at his clothes and shrugged, what could possibly be wrong about pink and orange?

"Mmh, name's Eames, by the way." a perfectly manicured eyebrow lifted at that.

"That your last name?"

"Yepp."

"Do you have a first name?"

"Yes, I have."

"If you reveal it to me, I'll name my second born after you." Now Eames eyebrows wandered towards his hairline.

"Why only the second born?" he asked and she gestured towards their third companion.

"Arthur already got the right to the first born." Arthur snorted at that in surprise, but smiled charmed at her claim.

"What if your first-born is a girl, Mal, will you call her Arthuria?" they all burst out laughing.

"No!" Mal shouted between fits of giggles. "I'll just have to butcher your second name, you have a second name Arthur?" Arthur nodded, and tried taking a sip of his coffee without choking because of his own snickers.

"Phillip." Mal raised both her hand as if presenting Arthur and triumphed.

"There you are, I'll just name her Phillipa." The three of them toasted to that with their coffee. But Mal turned back to Eames with a mischievous glint in her blue eyes. "So, what do I call my second-born now, Mr. Eames?" Eames paused for a moment, before giving in.

"James." he said.

"James." Mal said, testing it and then nodded. "I like it."

"Jamie." Arthur said with a slightly teasing smile, and for the first time in his life, Eames didn't despise someone calling him that, though he promptly put that thought away.

"I really, really hate being called that though, so please just stick with the last name."

"Well, then, Mr. Eames." Arthur said and both of them stood up to hold out their hand to Eames and pull him out of his chair.

"Welcome to Paris."

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Eames woke up with tears streaming down his face. He swiped them away and frowned. He knew he didn't dream anymore but he couldn't help the feeling that maybe he did. Or maybe he should. He hadn't touched the PASIV in four months, oh God, it had only been four months since he decided to find out what was up with Arthur. He didn't care for the tears anymore as he pulled the PASIV-device from under his bed. He had no desire for the reality at the moment, though he wasn't that sure about his subconscious either, he wanted to just get away for a moment.

He inserted the vial of somnacin and connected the tube, the slight pinch of the needle barely registering. He lied down on his bed and pushed the button. With a slight hiss of the machine he was asleep.

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It was official, his subconscious hated him. Eames wandered down the stairs into the wide and open living-room/kitchen combination. He could feel the warmth of the sun on his skin that was shining through the glass ceiling and big windows. If there was any place in the world that could have been home for him, this would have been the place. Well, it would have been any place if it had only had Arthur in it.

He wandered around the room, looking through the pictures on the wall, there was one with the three of them, some with Arthur and Eames, one with Arthur's half-sister and her colleagues, she was holding up her FBI badge proudly.

"Oh God, you're finally here." arms wrapped around him from behind and Eames froze, he didn't know if he wanted to turn around and see this projection. "I've tried, Eames I tried so often, but I can only reach you like this and you haven't used the PASIV." Now, Eames did turn around and looked at Arthur. Arthur who was standing here, in his arms, alive. But no, this was a dream, this wasn't real, Arthur wasn't real, he was only a projection.

"You're not real." but Eames couldn't bring himself to let go of the man in his arms.

"I am real Eames." Arthur's eyes were intense as he looked at Eames. "You have to wake up, Eames. Wake up, it's all a fucking dream, everything in the last five years was one big dream."

Eames frowned and shook his head, he took a step away from this Arthur.

"Eames, just think about it, five years ago we were testing a new, an improved PASIV and a new compound. We tried the concept of everyone of us going in as the dreamer. But we thought it didn't work, we woke up and were still in the same place, nothing had changed, but it was all a dream."

"This is impossible Arthur, we would have noticed this, it's just not-" Eames faltered and whispered. "It's not possible." Suddenly, there was a hand on his cheek and his gaze was directed into the same dark eyes that he had fallen in love with so many years ago.

"The potential of four simultaneous dreamers, Eames. We had recreated the whole world, the totems were useless as they only don't work as they should when we are in a dream that isn't our own, but it was." Arthur pulled Eames down to himself and pressed his lips to his fore head, to his nose and to his lips. "Wake up and come back to me, Jamie." he whispered.

Eames opened his eyes and stared at the wall opposite his bed. He removed the tube of the PASIV and tried to calm his breathing down. It was a trick. A trick of his subconscious, apparently he wanted to die.

He turned onto his back and studied the water-damage on the ceiling. It couldn't be true, dreaming just didn't work that way. It didn't.

Eames turned his head to the bedside table and his eyes found the metallic glint of a gun.

On the other hand, he had nothing left to lose, he had already lost everything. He reached for the weapon as he sat up. It was one of Arthur's. His fingertips caressed the cold black metal-hilt. Then they went up to his neck and pulled out the cord that hang around it from under his shirt. He pulled until the leather snapped and he took the ring that had been on it.

It was a simple white-gold ring, nothing fancy, not even inscription on the inside.

"Are you asking me to marry you, Arthur?"

"Yes."

In the end it wasn't really a choice as Eames lifted the gun towards his head. If it was true what the Arthur in his dream had said didn't really matter, he only knew that this existence, this life without Arthur, was killing him. And if he died or dreamed it didn't matter, either way he would see Arthur again.

With a last breath he slid the ring onto his finger, closed his eyes and pulled the trigger.

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FIN

As most of you (three) wanted a happy end, here it is, and yes, in my world, it is a Happy End.^^ You can decide for yourself if dream-Arthur lied or told the truth.

Please review and tell me what you think!

Lucian