Inception/Brick - Ouroboros (1/?)

[osaki_nana_707]

Title: Ouroboros
Author: osaki_nana_707
Pairings/Characters: Arthur/Brendan, Eames, Yusuf (eventual ArthurxEames)
Rating: PG-13 (this part)
Word count: 4,071 (this part)
Warnings: language, vague allusions to drug abuse, mentions of past character death
Summary: Eames comes to Arthur for help in taking down a group of drug peddlers selling a new recreational and more potent version of somnacin, but Arthur still has some of his own demons to fight off. Fusion/Crossover with Brick.

Ouroboros

"It is often tragic to see how blatantly a man bungles his own life and the lives of others yet remains totally incapable of seeing how much the whole tragedy originates in himself, and how he continually feeds it and keeps it going."

–C.G. Jung

Part One

He was standing at the opening of a tunnel of a sewage drain.

It was silent except for the slight rustle of wind in the trees and the trickling of water below his feet, soaking the leather soles of his shoes, and he found himself intently staring down into the blackness, watching, waiting for…

There it was.

The harsh 'clip-clop' of footsteps was shockingly loud against the elusive noises of the environment, and he found himself squinting his eyes, trying to see a shift in the darkness, trying to pinpoint just when she would come into the light… but the darkness was all-consuming, swallowing any light, and he just didn't know. He couldn't see.

Ice cold fingers wrapped around his throat from behind.

Desperately he tried to circle around and away from the choking hold, but her hands seemed to be everywhere and all around, suffocating him, grabbing away the air until his lips flushed blue, until his eyes rolled back in his head, until…

Arthur snapped awake at the jingle of his hotel phone resounding obnoxiously through the quiet hotel room, taking a deep breath through his nose as if to be sure it could indeed reach his lungs. He exhaled and fumbled along the bedside table for his glasses, and then picked up the receiver.

Arthur waited for four rings before answering, and even then he didn't speak. He just breathed into it softly, waiting.

"Arthur?" the crackling voice on the other line said.

"Yusuf," he replied as soon as he recognized the voice, scrubbing a hand over his face. He checked the clock. "It's three-thirty in the morning here."

"I would have called sooner, but it took me forever to get into contact with you. Honestly, how can you survive in this modern age without a mobile phone?"

"In our profession, disappearing is a necessity."

"What are you doing in Paris?"

"I had to escape a job that went sour. This is the first time I've been able to stop in over a month," Arthur said, rubbing his eye and stifling a yawn.

He, however, refrained from telling Yusuf that the reason the job had gone south had actually been Arthur himself. They had gone under with the mark to perform a fairly simple extraction and then she had gone on a rampage reminiscent of Cobb's shade of Mal. Their extractor, a brick wall of a man named Ivan, had ended up bludgeoned to death by a blunt object while the architect, Ivan's mousy wife Rebecca, had been drowned in a puddle from being held down. Arthur himself was met with a crowbar to the face, but the dream had collapsed before she could actually manage to kill him (not that she wouldn't have plenty of opportunities if his latest dreams were any indication).

"I heard about that," Yusuf said. "Apparently the mark's projections were more hostile than anyone could have expected."

"Yeah," Arthur said, revealing nothing. "Anyway, I'm assuming you didn't call me at this hour to ask me about my previous jobs."

"No, I didn't. I just know that you're the best in the business when it comes to what you do, so I was hoping you could help me locate Eames."

"Eames?" Arthur questioned. He was awake now. "Why are you trying to find Eames? I thought he was doing a job with you in the Netherlands. He was supposed to be there a week ago."

"He was supposed to, but he never arrived. Rumor has it that he ran into some trouble and had to drop off the radar."

"What kind of trouble?"

"No idea."

Arthur hummed, crawling down to the edge of the bed and snagging his laptop up off of the floor where he'd left it. After a few minutes, he'd pulled up all of the information on Eames that he could. "Under the alias of Jordon Conners, he booked a flight out to Tokyo about four days ago," Arthur told Yusuf. "He may have gotten a new alias that I don't know about there. All he needs is a few hours to forge the proper documentation after all, so who knows where he is now? So, why are you searching? Are you worried about him?"

"Not particularly. It's just that I vouched for him for this team. Eames's reputation precedes him in many different ways, as I'm sure you well know. The job I'm working can't be completed without a forger, and if we can't do the job, we can't get paid. My paycheck is on the line."

Arthur hummed again softly. "All right… I'll see what I can find of Eames. In the meantime, I'll contact Sylvia. She's not as good as Eames, but she'll be more than adequate for what you're doing. I'll send her your way, all right?"

"Do you think that you can convince her?" Yusuf asked.

"She owes me a favor," Arthur told him, balancing the phone between his ear and shoulder as he typed up and sent off an email to her. "If I find Eames, I'll let him know you're pissed off, and next time you work together, maybe you can convince him to give you his share."

"Sounds good, mate, though we'll see if I ever work with that sorry arse again after this. Get some sleep. Oh, and good luck on your next job."

"I was sleeping before you called me," Arthur replied irritably. He didn't like how Yusuf had wished him luck. That meant that his crumbling track record was starting to get around.

She didn't always fuck up his jobs… but ever since Cobb had gotten out of the business, thus taking Arthur's focus off of Cobb's particular brand of madness, he'd been faced with his own, and she'd been appearing more frequently… and, coming up on the tenth anniversary, she was becoming more venomous. He'd have to get that lid on her again… somehow.

He hung up on Yusuf without saying goodbye and just took a moment to sit hunched on the edge of the bed, running a hand through his hair, sending already tangled curls flying.

He sighed, shutting his eyes, and then very nearly fell right off of the bed when he was startled out of his haze by a knock on his hotel door.

Cursing under his breath, he got to his feet, scratching a little and grabbing his pistol.

There was silence on the other side of the door when Arthur leaned up against it, grasping the knob, holding the gun steady at the side of his face.

…and then…

"Arthur… it's me. Let me in, will you?"

Arthur raised his eyebrows in surprise and lowered his gun, opening the door. "Eames," he said in wonder and confusion.

"You're a hard man to find," Eames said blithely.

"What the hell are you doing here?"

Eames was soaked from the rain (Arthur hadn't even realized it was raining) and much thinner than he had been last time Arthur saw him, but other than that it was still the same Eames. He was still scruffy and plump-lipped and shoddily dressed. "Someone told me Paris was nice this time of year. I'm guessing they lied to me," Eames said in that smooth, smoky accent of his, and it appeared to Arthur that his sarcasm was still intact as well.

"No, why are you here?" Arthur asked, gesturing flippantly at the entirety of his hotel room, not seeming to care that he still had a gun in his hand.

"Let me in and put the gun away, would you?"

Arthur shrugged and stepped aside, opening the door to him and shutting it after Eames sidled in, hands in his pockets, duffel bag of what was most likely clothes hanging over his shoulder. "This is smaller than your usual hotel rooms," the man said.

"Cobb was always the one who insisted on luxury. He has the eye of an architect, can't stand being in a poorly decorated and constructed room. Besides, when you're lying low, you don't want your name showing up in the ritzy guest books. You're just asking to be ambushed," Arthur explained, locking the door and padding back towards the bed as Eames turned on a light.

Eames marveled at him. "I don't believe I've ever seen you so dressed down. I hardly recognized you."

"I don't sleep with my hair slicked back and my shoes on unless I'm hooked up to a PASIV, Eames," Arthur replied around a yawn as he set the gun down on the nightstand. Eames was shrugging out of his olive green blazer, watching Arthur with the curiosity he often tended to use on people. "Eames, why are you here? I want to know what's going on. Yusuf told me that you skipped out on your latest job, said you'd gotten into some trouble, and last I saw, you'd headed to Tokyo."

"Ah… yes, actually, I have run into a bit of trouble," Eames said, walking to the window and peeking out through the curtains. "I seem to be having a bit of trouble escaping it, honestly. I haven't been able to stop traveling for weeks."

Arthur sat down on the edge of the bed, arms hanging over his knees. "So… you came here," he said, still not understanding.

Eames exhaled through his nose and turned around, the lamplight casting a warm glow across one side of his face, a dark shadow on the other side. "Yes. As much as it pains me to admit this, I need your help."

"Uh-huh," Arthur said flatly. "What makes you think I'll help you?"

Eames lifted his arms and then dropped them. "Nothing," he admitted. "I can pay you, I suppose, but I know you're not in mind crime just for the money. I don't for the life of me know what your other reasons are, but I do know that you're not terribly interested in monetary gain. If I could venture a guess, I'd say you like the chance to focus, to solve."

Arthur didn't give Eames anything for him to know whether he was right or wrong. "How much are you willing to pay for my services…? And what exactly do you want me to do?"

"I'll pay you whatever you like. Knowing how much attention you take to detail, I imagine you know the limitations of my bank accounts… and I imagine with how badly several of your more recent jobs have gone, the chance to set your own pay is one you would be daft not to accept."

Arthur frowned. He had figured it would start to get around, considering how famous he was in the dreamsharing world, but he hadn't expected it quite this quickly. Arthur, the best pointman in the business, is losing his touch.

"Anyway," Eames continued, twirling a cigarette he'd dug out of his pocket around in his fingers. Apparently Eames had started smoking again. Arthur knew it was a habit he'd been trying to quit for years. "I need you to put your special abilities to use. See, these blokes that are hunting me down, we've got a bit of bad blood between us, and they're a bit beastly, a bit persistent, and I can't quite seem to throw them off of my tracks."

Arthur nodded, adjusting his glasses. "You want me to help you hide from them? That's a little cowardly."

"Well, yes and no," Eames said, splaying his hands out and then clasping them together in front of his chest. "I need you to help me do the whole lying low and throwing them off thing, yes, but I also need you to get the information on them that you can and help me find them before they find me."

"So, basically, you want me to help you take them down."

"Basically."

Arthur chewed on his bottom lip, thinking about it. "So, why are they after you?"

"I'm sure if it's relevant to your job, it'll come up in your research," Eames replied easily.

Arthur slid into bed, taking off his glasses. "Fine. I'll start on it first thing in the morning. You can sleep on the floor or go rent yourself a room. I'll give you my price after I find out just how much I've got to do."

"You're pleasurable as always, Arthur. I can't imagine why anyone would ever call you cold-blooded."

"There are towels in the bathroom."

"The least you can do is offer me the other side of the bed. You're not even using it… That is, unless you've got a girl coming over."

Arthur knew there was only one girl that he expected would be visiting him that night… just like the last few nights… just like always.

Arthur's hand hovered over the knob to the lamp, considering the proposition. He answered, "Once I'm asleep, I don't really have any say in what you do. I'd suggest you be wearing clothes though if you don't want to wake up with a bullet in your chest."

Eames chuckled. "Seriously," he teased, "You're so warm and inviting."

Arthur turned off the light and put his glasses back on the nightstand next to the gun.

He laid there in the dark, facing the window, listening to the rain's pitter-patter now that he realized it was there, and before long he felt the bed dip under Eames's weight as he too crawled under the covers. "Sweet dreams and all that," he mumbled.

Arthur exhaled, closing his eyes, knowing his dreams would be anything but sweet, though Eames wouldn't know this— Eames wouldn't understand even if he did because probably didn't even dream naturally anymore.

Emily would be waiting for him down below in his subconscious.

---

Arthur was pulled out of the dregs of sleep when he heard the tug of curtains, felt sunlight stream across his eyelids. He cracked his eyes open to see Eames's silhouetted figure moving about in front of the window, looking to be packing.

"Have they already found you?" Arthur asked, voice still slurred and scratchy with sleep.

"Not yet," Eames said, offering a pleasant smile that was far too condescending for Arthur's tastes, "but it's best we're prepared to tear out of here as soon as possible, yeah?"

Arthur mumbled some sort of wordless response and crawled out of bed, snatching up his laptop once again. "Fine," he yawned. "I'll book some tickets stateside, and you can explain to me what the fuck I'm supposed to be doing after I get out of the shower."

He booked some tickets for the next flight out to anywhere and headed off to bathe. He thought that perhaps it was his imagination, but he could have sworn Eames was watching him the entirety of the time. It wouldn't be atypical, considering he was both a forger who liked watching people and a mistrusting con-man who didn't like other people watching him, but there was something about his gaze that made Arthur just the slightest bit uncomfortable.

Arthur took a cold shower, letting the icy water beat against his bones. The cold drizzle trailed down his chest and arms like Emily's blue, frozen fingers. Even when she had been alive, she'd always had cold hands.

"You can't keep me safe, Brendan."

Arthur nearly gasped, looking up, as if expecting her to be standing there in the shower with him. He wasn't sure why he was so spooked… He probably just needed to get a good night's sleep. He was starting to get needlessly paranoid.

He washed himself quickly and then clambered out of the shower but unfortunately couldn't run from her memory. He wrapped a towel around his waist and escaped the bathroom to dig out something to wear.

Eames was slouched at the squashed table in the corner, smoking. "You don't look like you've been eating," he mentioned lightly.

"I've always looked like this," Arthur mumbled, blank-faced.

"Not true," Eames said, also not revealing anything from his smile. Arthur got the most bizarre sneaking suspicion that they'd both started playing a game. He always tended to feel that way when he was with Eames. "You've lost muscle mass."

"I haven't exactly been able to hit the gym," Arthur said, huffing. "You're not supposed to smoke in here."

"You can't smoke bloody anywhere nowadays," Eames said, shrugging.

Arthur rolled his eyes and retreated into the bathroom again, sliding into his button-down, his tie, his sweater, and his trousers easily. He couldn't help but notice that Eames had been right about the weight. His clothes didn't seem to fit him quite as well as they used to.

He slicked his hair back and put in his contact lenses, stashing his glasses away in their silver case in the pocket of his blazer. As he exited the bathroom, Eames remarked, "Now you look like the Arthur I remember."

Arthur couldn't really disagree, sliding his feet into his spectator boots and tying them. When he slipped into his clothes, smoothed down his messy hair, and rid himself of the glasses, he did look entirely different. It wasn't really something he'd done consciously, but he figured when he'd started out in the business, separating himself from who he was had probably been for the best. Sure, his true name didn't have much of a record (nothing compared to the crimes he'd committed nowadays), but in his first few years, his face was still remembered for shaking things up. By this point, he'd just adapted to the new persona.

"Did you want to shower before we leave?" Arthur asked, standing, wiggling his toes in his shoes. "Checkout is at noon."

"Let's just get out of here," Eames said, tossing his cigarette butt in the trash bin. "I showered last night."

Arthur shrugged, tossing his pajamas into his suitcase and snapping it shut. "Let's dust then," he said, leveling his gaze with Eames.

…Eames who was still staring at him like some kind of math problem. Arthur didn't find the gaze terribly comfortable, but at the same time, he didn't really mind it. After all, if Eames was staring at him in that way, that meant he hadn't yet figured him out.

Arthur checked out and followed Eames out to the curb where the forger was hailing a taxi. "So," Arthur said as they crawled inside. "Tell me what's going on."

Eames sat back casually, folding one leg over the other. "I've run into a bit of trouble with some old mates of mine back from my youth."

"You mean, back when you stole valuables instead of ideas?"

"Precisely," Eames replied, fidgeting as he was often wont to do. "It appears they've gotten into the mind crime business… though not in the same sense as you and I, of course."

Arthur raised his eyebrows. "Meaning?"

"They're selling drugs, just like they always have been. The difference is, they've started formulating their own brand of somnacin."

"So? There's no such thing as legal production of somnacin, not since dreamsharing technology was outlawed."

"Yes, I know that, but they're selling this new stuff in mass quantities. All of the new blokes and birds in the business are scooping it up, but most of their buyers are people not even involved in dreamshare."

"What use would it be to someone not in dreamshare?"

"It can be used without a PASIV," Eames said, suddenly growing serious.

Arthur couldn't mask his surprise.

Eames nodded. "They're shooting it up like heroin, and it's more addictive than that stuff too. They can live out their dreams, control them, all with astonishing clarity on this junk, but it's extremely potent. Several people haven't woken back up, trapped in Limbo. Most of them have killed themselves."

"They thought they were still dreaming?"

"They were dreaming. While awake."

"Sleep suicides?"

"Their minds were asleep when their bodies woke up… like sleepwalking, but much more dangerous."

"I see… So, what does this have to do with you?"

"You like sucking all the excitement out of life, don't you? No mysteries for you, eh?"

Arthur leveled him with a stare, making sure Eames knew he wasn't playing along.

Eames shifted again in his seat. "Well… they asked me to help them out, peddling the stuff. I agreed and took a shipment of it, but I never paid up. They want their money, but I didn't sell it, and I don't intend to. I've been hunting down their warehouses and taking them down, and they want me stopped. We already had some bad blood between us, so—"

"So they're hot," Arthur replied. "That whole idea seems awfully noble of you."

"Not at all. They're destroying business, and I'm not exactly in the position to get a real job."

"So, why not sell the drug if it's such a cash cow? Why destroy it?"

"I, like you, am not just in mind crime for the money, darling. If I wanted to be a petty drug peddler, I'd still be doing it. It's a pathetic way to make a living. There's no adventure or spark in it. There's no creation, just destruction. They're destroying everything we've built: you, me, Cobb, Miles, everyone. This is our world, and they've gone and shit all over it. It's bollocks, and I won't stand for it."

Arthur shrugged, looking out the window. "So, they're trying to kill you or capture you to get their stash back, hm? Where did you hide it?"

"Why do you think I would tell you that?" Eames asked, amused. "Just because I'm asking for your help doesn't mean that I trust you. How am I to know you won't rat me out to them for money?"

"Fair enough," Arthur replied. "I suppose I don't mind helping you plant the hop-heads. I had a bit of a hobby of taking down dope fiends when I was younger."

"Is that so? Does that mean that if we'd met earlier in life you'd be hunting me?"

Arthur chose not to answer, merely responding by turning one corner of his mouth upwards.

Just then, the back window of their taxi was blown out by gunfire.

"Shit!" Arthur cried, surprised to find that he had already been shoved down out of the spray of glass by Eames, his chest a solid mass against the back of his head. The driver had been shot in the back of the head and had swerved into a power pole. "Sniper?" Arthur asked.

"Doubtful," Eames said, kicking open the door so they could tumble out. "Probably just a bloody good shot—whoa!" he jumped back as a bullet hit the asphalt at his feet. "A real bloody good shot."

Arthur had already pulled his gun free from his shoulder holster, following the bullet's trajectory with his eyes until he found the shooter on a nearby balcony. He fired, and the man went down.

"He's not as good a shot as me," Arthur assured Eames smoothly, and shoved him out, dragging the bags out with him and tossing Eames his. "Let's move."

…and they ran.

Arthur discarded of the empty gun in an alleyway after wiping it down, following Eames through the winding Paris streets that Eames seemed to have memorized. For a while it seemed like they were being followed, but the thin and narrow maze of alleyways helped them disappear until the only sound Arthur could hear was the sound of their own footfalls and their own ragged breathing.

Eames slowed to a stop, panting. "The airport isn't far from here. They might be looking for us there though, so it might be wise to wait a bit."

"There's no way they'd get in with the weapons they're packing," Arthur replied. "If they're waiting on us, we can take them. Our best bet is to get on that plane and take the run-out. We'll have a better chance at keeping their noses off our trail stateside. There's more ground to cover."

"All right, if you think that's for the best, but if they pull out their guns and start shooting, I'm not saving your pretty little arse."

"Whoever said my pretty little arse would need saving?"

Eames smirked. "Let's go."

Yep, here we go. A fresh new WIP right off the presses for you guys. Normally I would wait until I finished Pretend That You're Alone but this idea literally would not leave me be, so I went ahead and started on it. Since I'm not terribly fond of how my previous Brick crossover turned out, I'm trying my hand at this one. Let's see how it goes. (Note: this fic does not take place in the same universe as my previous crossover.)