Chapter 2

Eames's fascinated face tracked him through pre-flight checks and takeoff, but once they were in the air he was down for the count. Arthur watched his soft breaths from where he slept in the co-pilot seat and wondered if Eames still dreamed. Eames was a man of a dying breed: a veteran of dreamshare who still seemed to enjoy his job. Arthur had watched him giddy with excitement about new dreamscapes and experimental Somnacin blends and had experienced his impeccable forgeries, both new and standby. Eames made the most boring jobs tolerable, although Arthur would spend days before the job started tied up in knots, double and triple checking to make sure everything was right and convincing himself that he could handle being around Eames for extended periods of time without embarrassing himself.

Except for this job. The Fischer job had been a fuck-up from the beginning, and Arthur knew it. He had pulled down so much information in the days leading up to the senior Fischer's death, his head had started to hurt. He'd had backup plans for his backup plans, and all of them made with the assumption that the evil projection of Cobb's dead wife would show up at exactly the wrong moment and ruin everything. And yet, somehow, he'd managed to miss the fact that Fischer had been militarized, had been trained to avoid people exactly like him and his team. How, how?! How could he have missed something so vital? Arthur didn't miss things, he just didn't.

Arthur was a master of compartmentalizing, but he forced himself to acknowledge the fact that maybe if he'd been less distracted by a stupid high school crush on Eames, he might have noticed the militarization clues. It had thrown the entire mission off, it had gotten Saito shot, and it had been his responsibility to make sure the team was prepared. He didn't know what else had happened in the dream, he'd need to ask Eames when he woke. It could be important.

Arthur's jaw creaked as he unclenched it, and he forced his hands to relax. He focused on flying, unnecessarily re-checking instruments and occasionally risking a glance at his sleeping...friend? Co-worker? He didn't know how to classify Eames anymore. Sometimes it seemed as if he'd always known Eames. Arthur kept him at arms length-figuratively of course, because literally, Eames was constantly in his space. He knew, though, that if he let Eames in, even a little, he wouldn't be able to stop. He would be pulled under in the tow that was Eames, and he wouldn't ever recover. And Eames would sail on, unperturbed, leaving Arthur tumbling along beside all the others pining in his wake. Arthur had watched it happen. Hell, he'd slammed a warehouse door on a flying purse once when a woman he'd slept with the night before followed him to the job site the next day and confronted him. When Eames had politely but in no uncertain terms turned her down for a relationship, she'd gone ballistic and Arthur had unconsciously reached for the gun in his shoulder holster. But Eames had ducked outside with her, talking calmly and soothingly like she was a skittish horse and when he finally came back in, shooting embarrassed looks Arthur's way, Arthur ignored him and started the task of determining if their job security was compromised due to Eames's libido.

Arthur forced his fingers to loosen once more and pushed a slow breath out. What he really wanted was to sleep for a thousand years. He glanced guiltily over at Eames, who actually needed the rest, and found sleepy, heavy-lidded eyes staring at him.

"Oh," he started. "I didn't realize you were awake." His voice sounded loud in the small space.

"Only just," Eames said blearily. "Everything alright?"

Arthur said nothing, just stared at the horizon.

"Arthur?"

"What the hell happened down there, Eames? I mean, seriously, what the fuck." Arthur hated how lost he sounded. He hated it. He punched down the feelings and re-clenched his jaw. He could do this. He could separate his career and his personal life. He would have a chance to lose his shit some other time, but he needed to keep it together right now, get them somewhere safe and figure out what to do next. If there even was a next.

So Arthur sat and listened to Eames explain how they dragged Fischer through the third dream level, how Mal had fucked everything royally by shooting Fischer and how Eames had used a defibrillator to bring him back out of limbo.

"Are you sure he was in limbo? I've never heard of anyone getting pulled out of limbo, ever. You know that. It's a lost cause." Arthur felt a dangerous skitter of hope in his chest, despite what he was saying. If Eames knew something about pulling people out of limbo...but Eames wasn't saying anything. "Eames?" he asked, glancing quickly at the forger.

"Ah. Well, it wasn't just me. It was Ari's idea, actually, and Cobb just agreed to it."

If they'd been driving, Arthur would have pulled over. Instead, he settled for reaching over to yank Eames forward by the collar of his hideous shirt. His voice was deadly. "Agreed to what, exactly."

Eames looked back at him calmly. "To going into limbo to rescue Fischer."

He kept talking, but Arthur's ears were only picking up a low roar that drowned out the details. Ariadne made it out, Robert Fischer made it out. Saito and Dom hadn't. Arthur's eyes closed.

"...not sure, exactly. We missed the first kick, and we were cutting it close, but I set off the explosives on the third level, Fischer told Browning that he was going to take his father's advice on the second, and we rode the kick all the way up. Saito wasn't looking good when we-"

Arthur's eyes snapped open. "Wait, say that again. Fischer said he'd take his father's advice?"

Eames flashed his ever-reliable smile, wide and just this side of lascivious. "I think it worked, Arthur. Inception. I think we did it."

"Jesus." Arthur thought he should feel...something. Relieved, excited, validated...something. But he just felt numb. "Jesus," he said again.

"Yeah." Eames's voice sounded odd, and Arthur looked at him, eyes narrowed. Then he realized, to his abject mortification, that his hand was still curled possessively in Eames's shirt. He dropped his hand immediately and absolutely refused to blush, even though he could feel the tips of his stupid ears heating up anyway.

"Well, the implications of that are far-reaching," he said, trying to get himself back on sure footing. "But...you're sure that Ari and Fischer came back from limbo?"

"As much as I love it when you assume I don't know what I'm talking about, pet, they did both wake up."

Arthur ignored the jibe and let his imagination run for a few moments. He needed his Moleskin. "Here, take over for a second," Arthur said as he reached around into the back seat for his bag. Eames's eyes flew open in panic and he set his hands carefully on the co-pilot wheel.

"O...kay," he said quietly.

"Eames. I'm kidding, it has autopilot." Arthur maneuvered back into his seat, notebook and pen in hand, already finding a clean page.

Eames stared at him. "You just made a joke," he said, disbelief evident. "Arthur!" Eames sounded delighted.

Arthur scowled and kept writing. "See if I ever do it again. Look, we need to find Ariadne and ask her what she knows. I've never been to limbo, let alone pulled anyone out of it. I don't know what to expect. Didn't you work with Hutzel a few years ago on that cock-up in Shanghai?"

"Yeah, but no one pulled that bastard out of anywhere. Last I heard he was eating through IVs and waiting for someone to trip over the plug."

"Did anyone else go down with him? Anyone we could talk to?"

"Wait, Arthur, just wait a minute. Are you suggesting that we go into limbo, on purpose, on a rescue mission?"

Arthur paused, looking at Eames. "Of course not." He watched Eames's shoulders slump in relief. "I'm suggesting I go into limbo on a rescue mission. You're not invited." He went back to writing.

Eames watched him for a few minutes before saying, "Darling? I know you're terribly busy writing...things, but do you think you could explain to me exactly how you plan to pull two men out of limbo, at the same time, by yourself?"

Arthur arched an eyebrow at him. "Specificity, Eames? Not usually a requirement of yours." Eames's lips tightened into a thin line and Arthur sighed. "Look, I don't know yet. I need more data if I'm going to make any kind of plan, I don't know what I'm dealing with. Ari's the best bet for finding out anything, so I'm starting there. Maybe she can give me an idea of what to expect, and how the hell she managed to drag herself out of limbo and bring Fischer with her. It's, to my knowledge, the first time it's ever been done."

Eames was quiet for a moment. "You know that I..."

Arthur paused and looked up when Eames didn't start talking again. "You...?" he prompted.

Eames cleared his throat and faced the front of the plane. "I think I know where Ari is, and I also might have caught wind of a rumor about a guy coming out of limbo a few years ago. I can call him when we land."

Arthur narrowed his eyes at the bigger man but nodded. "Thanks. We should be there in about an hour."

Arthur landed planes the way he did everything else: beautifully. Not a hair out of place, not a word or movement wasted and Eames managed not to stare but watched Arthur's fingers out the corner of his eye. They danced with calm confidence over the instrument panel, held the control wheel with certainty.

Arthur was always a picture of competence, but Eames loved nothing more than the days Arthur was throwing himself into a job, getting more and more ruffled as the day went on, and the facade started to wear away. Pretty soon he'd hang the jacket to his three-piece suit on the back of a chair. Then, later, he'd roll the sleeves of his Oxford to his elbow. His tightly gelled hair would curl after he'd plowed his hands through it enough times. Toward the end of the day, he'd lose his waistcoat and loosen his tie. Eames loved to watch this come-down and wondered if he kept pushing if it wouldn't all unravel. He'd never pushed too hard, but oh, how he wanted to.

"Why Alaska, darling?" Eames questioned as he exited the small aircraft, getting used to the feel of solid ground under his feet again. He always loved the first few minutes after landing, where his body remembered what it felt like to be on the planet again.

"No one thinks about Alaska," Arthur answered dismissively.

"Well. It is technically part of America, though."

Arthur snorted. "I'm American, and I can promise you, no one thinks about Alaska."

Arthur navigated them through the airport, plane storage, and car rental while Eames was on Arthur's phone this time. By the time he was done, he'd used three different accents, burned two different bridges, repaired one, and had a date next time he was in Moscow. However, he still had no answers about limbo. He was feeling worn a little thin. Also, it was bloody cold in this state, and he hadn't exactly left with a parka. He cajoled Arthur into stopping someplace to buy additional layers since we couldn't all pull off bespoke three-piece wool blend suits. Arthur rolled his eyes.

"You can buy something at the hotel gift shop," he said as he pulled the rental car into the hotel turnout and grabbed a ticket from the valet.

"What? You mean you don't already have a handy Alaskan bolthole stocked with provisions and extra guns just waiting for you? Darling, I'm a little disappointed. You should really plan better than that."

"Who says I don't? It's easier to hide in a big city. Besides, we won't be here long."

Arthur was back in his element, planning and bossing and God help him, Eames couldn't stop the little shiver that Arthur's competency provoked in him. Or maybe that was because it was sodding cold, who could tell. He followed him dutifully to the front desk but when the concierge asked Arthur what size room they'd be needing, he leaned in on impulse and slid an arm around Arthur's waist, quipping, "Let's get a king-size this time, darling, you remember what happened last time." He grinned cheekily.

He felt Arthur stiffen momentarily before he melted against Eames's side, turning and flashing a dazzling smile, complete with dimples. "Yes, let's." He handed a credit card to the woman, but Eames couldn't follow any more of the transaction because his brain had skidded offline when Arthur had fucking beamed at him, and joked with him, about being a couple. His heart leapt, then plummeted just as quickly. This was stupid, he couldn't take joking about this stuff, what was he thinking? Not when he was as serious as a heart attack about wanting Arthur to look at him like that for real. He let his arm drop and put some space between them, reaching for their bags to cover his retreat. Arthur thinking that being a couple was funny might just break him.