They were three levels down, using the same compound as they had with the Fischer job. Which presented a problem because Arthur was bleeding out on dreamed airport carpet, gasping for breath with Eames bent over him, dreaming up new medical supplies and trying to mend Arthur enough to get him to the kick.
“Stay with me, darling,” Eames said, pressing yet more gauze into the wound on Arthur’s side.
Arthur couldn’t even glare at him, he looked scared. Eames had never seen Arrthur look scared and it was not something he ever wanted to see again.
“You’re going to be fine and since I’m the one getting you out of this I expect half your cut,” Eames said, trying to coax any reaction out of him.
Arthur just coughed up more blood and then his eyes stopped moving and the bleeding slowed. He was gone. “Fuck.” Ariadne looked down from where she was covering him at the window.
“Son of a bitch. Do you think Yusef got it right this time?”
Eames looked up at her. “Not a chance in hell. If we don’t get back make sure to kill Yusef for me.”
Ariadne nodded once. “That I can do.”
Eames smiled up at her and when she looked away Eames left.
He woke near cliffs. Only a few feet away from the edge, the sound of the sea crashing against the rocks below filled his ears. There was a house close by with a garden and a greenhouse to the side. As well as a chicken coop with three chickens running around inside the fence near it. It was the only house in sight with a vantage point over what looked to be a town at the bottom of the hill where the cliffs weren’t so tall and you could reach the beach. He couldn’t see any movement in the town below but there was music coming from the house.
None of it fit. When Eames imagined what Arthur’s ideal world was it was living in a Manhattan high rise in a flat so sharp and modern and chrome that it was verging on sterile, not a quiet country home with windchimes. Eames walked up the path that connected the house to the small area he had woken which had a bench to overlook the sea.
He only got far enough up to come level with the house when an old man came out with a shotgun pointed right at Eames. “Who’re you?” the old man yelled.
Eames put his arms up. “I need to talk to Arthur.”
“I’m afraid that’s not going to happen,” the old man said. The man was British of some sort, or pretending to be. The accent kept switching between regions and was hard to pin down, but it switched on the word the same way Eames did when he was trying to disguise where he was from. He was squinting against the sunlight behind Eames.
“Tell him Eames is here. He’ll want to talk to me,” Eames yelled.
The old man laughed. “Pick another name, you’re not Eames.”
Eames took another step forward. “Yes, I am,” Eames said, “Just get Arthur he’ll know.
Something must have changed in the light, maybe Eames was blocking it better because the man’s face went slack and he lowered his gun. “Arthur! Come out here!”
Another old man came out, a handgun by his side. “What’s going on? Eames?”
“Arthur?” Eames asked taking another step forward. “You haven’t aged well.”
“I’m almost eighty years old, I’ve aged fine.” Arthur frowned down at him. “How are you here?”
“I came to get you. We have to go.”
“Go where?” Arthur looked back to the other old man. He looked confused which wasn’t a much better look than scared.
“Back to the real world, Arthur. You’re not this old. In your heart you are an old curmudgeon, but not in reality,” Eames said, of all the things he had thought he would do that morning convincing Arthur that he wasn’t an old man wasn’t one of them. “Who is this?”
“I’m the real Eames,” the first old man said, looking Eames up and down, but subtly the way Eames did whenever he met new people. At least Arthur’s projection of him had his mannerisms down.
“Lovely,” Eames said.
“If I have to go back to the real world where am I now?”
“Limbo. Try to remember when you moved here. When did you give up dreamshare?”
Arthur looked over the cliff for a long second then turned to old-man-Eames. “I’m sorry,” Arthur whispered to him.
Old-man-Eames turned and grabbed Arthur’s shoulders. “No, you remember. I know you do. We were on that job with Ari and she got shot and you couldn’t take it anymore. Dom had just died, Mal had been dead, Arthur, you remember this. You asked me to come with you and I did, we moved back to the town I used to vacation at with my family. Don’t you remember?”
Arthur looked like he was on the verge of tears. “No. I’m sorry. I love you.” There were gunshots and then Eames’s eyes opened to look at the drop tile ceiling of a doctor’s office.
Eames looked over and saw Arthur blinking quickly then looking to Ariadne: the extractor and Yusef were both long gone.
“Let’s get the hell out of here,” Arthur said, frowning and then finishing packing up the PASIV. “Ariadne, you first.” She nodded, obviously trying not to be too relieved to see Arthur awake.
Once Eames and Arthur were alone in the room, Arthur finally looked at him. “Don’t tell anyone. Anything. Ever.”
“Come on, Arthur, what do you take me for?” Eames asked with a smile.
“Exactly what you are. Money will be in your account by Friday.” Arthur then ran his hand over his hair to smooth it out, took the PASIV, and left.
Eames left a few minutes later with a smile. Yes, he was exactly the kind of person Arthur thought he was. Which was how they ended up on the same flight to LA from London and Eames was able to trade seats to sit next to him in first class.
“What do you want, Eames?” Arthur asked as he sat.
“Whatever do you mean?”
“Eames.”
“What do you think I want?”
“To trap me in a conversation I don’t want to have for the next eight hours,” Arthur said with a glare. The flight attendant brought him his glass of wine that he had ordered just before Eames had sat.
Once the flight attendant was gone and getting other people their drinks Eames looked back to Arthur. “You dreamed a little dream of me.”
“I’d say don’t let it go to your head but it’s too late,” Arthur grumbled, getting his headphones and phone out.
“Come on, Arthur.”
“What exactly do you expect to get out of this?”
“I want to know. Is that how you think I’ll age? You made me a little soft,” Eames said, smiling at him.
“You were old,” Arthur said. “People gain weight when they age. Get over it.”
“Did you love me?”
Arthur gave his best long-suffering sigh and rolled his eyes. “That version of you. Too bad he’s not real.”
Eames was quiet for a moment, plotting his next move. Arthur was right; he needed to decide what it was that he wanted out of this. When he had followed Arthur onto the plane he hadn’t had an endgame in mind. He’d always been attracted to Arthur; competence was something that always made Eames’s heart skip a beat. But it was dangerous to care for people in the game. It was too much of a risk. “What was different?”
Arthur actually turned to look at him that time. “What?”
“How was he different than me?”
Arthur stared at him. “He gave a shit.”
“About what?”
“Me.” Arthur put his headphones in and started the music, closing his eyes not a second later.
Eames took the earbud put it in his own ear. “That’s not a difference.”
Arthur stared at him for a long moment, poorly suppressing a smile as he rolled his eyes. “God, you’re annoying.”