Let Go Of These Things That Tie Us Down
Series: Three Is More Than Just Company
Fandom: Inception
Pairing: Ariadne/Arthur/Eames
Title: Let Go Of These Things That Tie Us Down
Summary: The trio head off on a much-deserved vacation.
Disclaimer: No, it's not mine.
Rating: PG-13 to R, again for mild swearing.
The summer air was heavy and sweet
You and I on a crowded street
There was music everywhere
I can see us there
In a happy little foreign town
With the stars hung upside down
Half a world away
Far, far away...
Maybe if I hold you close
Baby, we can just let go
Of these things that tie us down
We'll come back around - We Danced Anyway by Deana Carter
It's a full month and a half before they're willing to leave the San Francisco apartment for any length of time. Arthur thinks that most people would find it ridiculous that they're so clingy, but to paraphrase from one of his mother's favorite films, quite frankly none of them give a damn. He resents, sometimes, that Eames is typical when it comes to dreamers - Somnacin has robbed him of the chance to dream normally, lucky bastard. Ari's losing the ability too, faster than most, which they think is the result of her brief time in limbo. He's terribly jealous of them both, because he's the only one coming out of nightmares where he relives that fucking dream. Still, he can't be too envious, because sometimes Eames looks at him and Ariadne like he can't believe they're actually there, or Ari loses track of where he or Eames is and she looks around wildly for them. They're haunted too, just not so obviously.
But finally things settle down a little. He goes to the grocery store and doesn't worry about whether they'll still be there when he gets back, and they greet him fairly calmly when he walks through the door. Ari visits her brother and Eames takes their car to the shop; they all manage to handle having one of their number missing or being the one who leaves the others to go somewhere alone. It's a healing process, and they all try not to rush it.
Arthur's not sure if Cobb told Saito that the three of them were considering a vacation or if the businessman reads Cobb's e-mails over his shoulder, but three first class tickets to the Bahamas, of all places, show up in the mail. They're accompanied by reservation information and brochures on things to do. Eames is the one who opens that particular envelope and he starts laughing when he does, holding up the contents for the other two to see. “I think Saito's trying to tell us something,” he jokes.
Ariadne grabs the brochures, flipping through them. “You know, this could actually be a lot of fun. And it might be nice to get away for a while, don't you think?”
She might have a point there, Arthur thinks as he sips coffee, watching Ari pore over one brochure while Eames snags another from her. “Hey, toss one of those over here,” he says. Eames obliges - sort of, since he aims for Arthur's forehead rather than his hand. “Thanks,” Arthur says, voice very dry.
“Anytime, love.”
~ ~ ~
The plane ride is nice - hardly a surprise considering the first class tickets. Arthur decides it's just a surprise that Saito didn't send a private jet. He can't decide if that's a good thing or a bad one, since he knows that both Ari and Eames have this fascination with the idea of joining the mile high club, and if they were in a private plane... Arthur himself thinks it could be interesting, up until the point that turbulence shows up at the worst possible time, because it would.
When they arrive in Nassau, they make their way to their hotel. “I'm shocked,” Ariadne says dryly. “Not a single person gave us those funny looks I've gotten so used to when they realize it's three people in one bedroom.”
“Should we care about those?” Eames asks.
“No, but it does get annoying after a while,” Arthur points out, unlocking the door with the keycard.
The room is extremely nice, but they're a bit jetlagged and don't notice much before falling asleep in a tangled pile. When they wake up they order room service, and after that, well...
Eames and Ari are feeling cheated out of not getting to join the mile high club, apparently. Arthur doesn't see a problem with this.
~ ~ ~
“Do either of you remember how my shirt got caught in the light fixture?” Arthur asks the next morning, rolling onto his back and staring up at where said shirt is dangling. “Just out of curiosity.”
“Um... I wasn't paying attention to where the clothes were going, Arthur, so no,” Ariadne says, her voice half-muffled by her pillow.
“I think that was me,” Eames offers, a laugh in his voice. Ariadne snickers into her pillow.
“Of course it was.” And Arthur should really get up and try to untangle it, but at the moment he really doesn't feel like it. He'd rather just stay here.
They all get up eventually, though, because as nice as staying in bed all day is, they can do that at home as easily as they can here, so it's time to try and find some other things to do. “Fun, touristy things,” Ariadne tells them. “You know, the kind of thing we never get to do because we're running from the cops or something.”
“We get to do fun things!” Eames immediately objects. “We did Carnivale in Venice.”
“We were interrupted when Cobol tried to track down Arthur again,” Ariadne shoots back.
“Now you're making it sound like it's always my fault when someone is chasing us,” Arthur complains. Ariadne laughs and leans forward to kiss him on the nose, only laughing harder when Arthur raises his eyebrows.
“I would never say that,” she tells him. “Now, what are we going to do first?”
~ ~ ~
In the end, Ari gets first choice, since she's the one who's been poring over the brochures. One of the things she'd read about was shipwreck diving, and she thinks it sounds fantastic. Arthur and Eames agree - neither of them have actually done anything like that before, their career paths not really being conducive to vacations of this sort. Or at least Arthur's never was, and if Eames' was he usually ended up in a casino and stayed there. They do all have diving certifications, though, if only for the muscle memory in case they ever need to dive in a dream. It's not likely, but then again, Arthur once found himself standing in front of fucking Isengard in a dream, and Eames has mentioned the time he had to forge Spock. So it could happen. Stranger things have.
Right now that's not important, though. What is important is that they have the certs, and so they can go diving in an old wreck. For Ariadne, it's sort of the fulfillment of one of her childhood daydreams. She'd been a bookworm as a kid, almost painfully shy until she hit thirteen, and she had hidden herself away in fantasy worlds. She'd dreamed of seeing places that were either never real or long since gone. And here, under the water with dappled sunlight filtering through, swimming silently around a wrecked ship, she can do that. She can fall into old fantasies and forget about how her nightmares were briefly reality, how she almost lost everything important in her life.
It's even better than she imagined, though, because she's not alone. Arthur and Eames are there with her, like they always are now. She'd been a bit of a loner when she was younger, and even when she got over that, she never quite... Well. It doesn't matter now. And they're here to relax, not dwell on things, so that's what she does. It looks like Arthur and Eames are now chasing each other around, and she swims into the fray.
Their next stop is Arthur's choice, and it's not a surprise that the military history buff - because he is, to the amusement of the other two - picks Fort Charlotte. Eames says that Arthur should have picked the Bahamas Historical Society Museum, since it was founded by the wife of a former governor and said governor's name was Raynor Arthur. This gets a laugh from Ariadne and an eyeroll from Arthur, though he can't quite stifle a grin.
But Arthur wants to see the fort, so they go there. They pay the extra tip to a tour guide in order to get the full experience, checking out the moat, dungeons, and underground passageways. Arthur's eyes light up and he looks so young in that way he sometimes does, asking questions and inspecting things closely. It's nice to see, Ariadne thinks, and, well, she has to admit the fort is interesting. Not her thing the way it's Arthur's, of course, but still, it's not dull. And the view is fantastic. She snaps at least half a dozen pictures of it.
What Ariadne really wants to know is where the hell Eames learned to surf, but he won't say. Neither she nor Arthur is good at it, when they rent boards and go down to the beach after leaving the fort, but Eames tries to teach them. Arthur takes it too seriously until they gang up on him and dunk him. Ariadne just has fun with it, laughing when she falls over, because otherwise she'll be embarrassed.
They end up giving up on the surfing and just mess around in the water, which is almost waist-deep for Ariadne where they're standing. A few waves catch her off-balance enough that she has to grab onto whichever of her lovers is closer so that she doesn't go under. It's one of those times where being so damn short is annoying, except that it gives her an excuse to cling to one of her boys. And that's never annoying.
~ ~ ~
After five days, it's Eames who points out that they've been doing everything together, and it's beginning to get a bit wearing, since they don't always have the same interests. He's not particularly happy about suggesting it either, because a few hours here and there is one thing, but he's basically saying they should split up for the entire day. They're getting better, but spending more than a few hours apart is still enough to make them all tense up. But they're here to relax, and try to keep healing from what's happened, and this is the natural progression.
He can see that neither of them are exactly keen on the idea, but they all know they're going to have to start spending more time apart eventually. Doing it now, with things to distract them, is probably the best way to do it. It's certainly easier than, say, taking separate jobs. And Eames doesn't care about possible payoffs - he's going to do everything in his power to make sure they don't take separate jobs for a long time, if ever. That is going too far - Arthur might be the one plagued by nightmares, but that doesn't mean Eames isn't still haunted by two pairs of dark, vacant eyes, or projections with enigmatic smiles.
Of course it turns out that, once the other two head off - Ariadne's going to some wax museum with a pirate theme and Arthur's going to check out these caves that apparently have historical significance of one sort or another - Eames isn't entirely sure what he feels like doing. He ends up just wandering around Nassau, which is the sort of thing he occasionally does anyway. He's a forger, after all; he spends time people-watching, because not all of his forges are real people. Some of them he invents himself, with bits and pieces cobbled together from different people and his own imagination.
The irony of doing what amounts to research for work while on vacation does not escape him, and eventually he heads down to the beach again, deciding to see if he can find out whether there's somewhere he can try water-skiing. He's never actually done that, in reality or dreamscape, and it sounds like a bit of a thrill.
He makes himself stay out all day - this was his idea after all - but when he heads back to the hotel, it's a relief. Letting himself in, he doesn't see either of the others and wonders if he's the first one back. But then he hears the faint strains of guitar music coming from the balcony they have, and he heads out. Arthur's sitting on a chair, the guitar balanced on his thighs as he strums it, clearly lost in thought.
Eames knows better than to sneak up on the other man - he and Arthur both react badly to it, and Ari's starting to as well - so he clears his throat. Arthur stops playing and looks over. “Hey.”
“So, how long did you last?” Eames asks, coming closer and leaning on the back of Arthur's chair.
“I came back about an hour and a half ago. Had an idea for a song - I haven't written anything in years, it's strange.” Arthur looks down at the guitar in his hands, and now Eames notices a Moleskine on the floor to the right of the chair. Glancing at it, he can see musical notes written neatly on the unlined pages.
“Is that what you were playing? Because it sounded sad.”
“No, I... I was, earlier, but that one... I wrote it a few years ago, the last thing I came up with.”
“When was this?” He doesn't remember ever seeing Arthur write music before.
“It was... Well. Just after...” Arthur rakes a hand through his ungelled hair, making it stand on end from the friction. “I wrote it on the plane, after I walked out on you. And it's just occurred to me, that after everything, even with all of us like this, I've never apologized for being such a colossal asshole about that.”
“Well, now I know why you were, so it's all right.” That's not entirely true, but Eames pretty much forgave Arthur for Guadalajara back in Miami.
“It's really not. Whatever reason I had, skipping out like that was a cheap shot.”
“Hey.” Eames comes around, looking Arthur right in the eye. “Yeah, it was, and I was pissed at you for a long time over that. But you know what? I'm over it, and we've worked it all out.”
Neither of them notice Ariadne leaning in the doorway, watching them with a fond smile. She actually does know about Guadalajara; Eames told her on the flight to Miami, when she couldn't understand why he was more angry than worried. Even though neither of them ever really showed it, she's suspected that what happened between them in Mexico has been still all too present in both their minds. It's good to see it finally being settled.
They're going to be all right. Slowly, they're getting used to not being together all the time, and today was fun. She missed them, but it was because she wanted to have them there to joke and laugh with, not because she was terrified that she wasn't going to see them again. It's getting better, and they're working out all the issues. Ariadne sincerely believes they'll be back to normal soon - well, as normal as they get. And that's all any of them really want.
Link to the next installment: fae-boleyn.livejournal.com/11793.html
Fandom: Inception
Pairing: Ariadne/Arthur/Eames
Title: Let Go Of These Things That Tie Us Down
Summary: The trio head off on a much-deserved vacation.
Disclaimer: No, it's not mine.
Rating: PG-13 to R, again for mild swearing.
The summer air was heavy and sweet
You and I on a crowded street
There was music everywhere
I can see us there
In a happy little foreign town
With the stars hung upside down
Half a world away
Far, far away...
Maybe if I hold you close
Baby, we can just let go
Of these things that tie us down
We'll come back around - We Danced Anyway by Deana Carter
It's a full month and a half before they're willing to leave the San Francisco apartment for any length of time. Arthur thinks that most people would find it ridiculous that they're so clingy, but to paraphrase from one of his mother's favorite films, quite frankly none of them give a damn. He resents, sometimes, that Eames is typical when it comes to dreamers - Somnacin has robbed him of the chance to dream normally, lucky bastard. Ari's losing the ability too, faster than most, which they think is the result of her brief time in limbo. He's terribly jealous of them both, because he's the only one coming out of nightmares where he relives that fucking dream. Still, he can't be too envious, because sometimes Eames looks at him and Ariadne like he can't believe they're actually there, or Ari loses track of where he or Eames is and she looks around wildly for them. They're haunted too, just not so obviously.
But finally things settle down a little. He goes to the grocery store and doesn't worry about whether they'll still be there when he gets back, and they greet him fairly calmly when he walks through the door. Ari visits her brother and Eames takes their car to the shop; they all manage to handle having one of their number missing or being the one who leaves the others to go somewhere alone. It's a healing process, and they all try not to rush it.
Arthur's not sure if Cobb told Saito that the three of them were considering a vacation or if the businessman reads Cobb's e-mails over his shoulder, but three first class tickets to the Bahamas, of all places, show up in the mail. They're accompanied by reservation information and brochures on things to do. Eames is the one who opens that particular envelope and he starts laughing when he does, holding up the contents for the other two to see. “I think Saito's trying to tell us something,” he jokes.
Ariadne grabs the brochures, flipping through them. “You know, this could actually be a lot of fun. And it might be nice to get away for a while, don't you think?”
She might have a point there, Arthur thinks as he sips coffee, watching Ari pore over one brochure while Eames snags another from her. “Hey, toss one of those over here,” he says. Eames obliges - sort of, since he aims for Arthur's forehead rather than his hand. “Thanks,” Arthur says, voice very dry.
“Anytime, love.”
~ ~ ~
The plane ride is nice - hardly a surprise considering the first class tickets. Arthur decides it's just a surprise that Saito didn't send a private jet. He can't decide if that's a good thing or a bad one, since he knows that both Ari and Eames have this fascination with the idea of joining the mile high club, and if they were in a private plane... Arthur himself thinks it could be interesting, up until the point that turbulence shows up at the worst possible time, because it would.
When they arrive in Nassau, they make their way to their hotel. “I'm shocked,” Ariadne says dryly. “Not a single person gave us those funny looks I've gotten so used to when they realize it's three people in one bedroom.”
“Should we care about those?” Eames asks.
“No, but it does get annoying after a while,” Arthur points out, unlocking the door with the keycard.
The room is extremely nice, but they're a bit jetlagged and don't notice much before falling asleep in a tangled pile. When they wake up they order room service, and after that, well...
Eames and Ari are feeling cheated out of not getting to join the mile high club, apparently. Arthur doesn't see a problem with this.
~ ~ ~
“Do either of you remember how my shirt got caught in the light fixture?” Arthur asks the next morning, rolling onto his back and staring up at where said shirt is dangling. “Just out of curiosity.”
“Um... I wasn't paying attention to where the clothes were going, Arthur, so no,” Ariadne says, her voice half-muffled by her pillow.
“I think that was me,” Eames offers, a laugh in his voice. Ariadne snickers into her pillow.
“Of course it was.” And Arthur should really get up and try to untangle it, but at the moment he really doesn't feel like it. He'd rather just stay here.
They all get up eventually, though, because as nice as staying in bed all day is, they can do that at home as easily as they can here, so it's time to try and find some other things to do. “Fun, touristy things,” Ariadne tells them. “You know, the kind of thing we never get to do because we're running from the cops or something.”
“We get to do fun things!” Eames immediately objects. “We did Carnivale in Venice.”
“We were interrupted when Cobol tried to track down Arthur again,” Ariadne shoots back.
“Now you're making it sound like it's always my fault when someone is chasing us,” Arthur complains. Ariadne laughs and leans forward to kiss him on the nose, only laughing harder when Arthur raises his eyebrows.
“I would never say that,” she tells him. “Now, what are we going to do first?”
~ ~ ~
In the end, Ari gets first choice, since she's the one who's been poring over the brochures. One of the things she'd read about was shipwreck diving, and she thinks it sounds fantastic. Arthur and Eames agree - neither of them have actually done anything like that before, their career paths not really being conducive to vacations of this sort. Or at least Arthur's never was, and if Eames' was he usually ended up in a casino and stayed there. They do all have diving certifications, though, if only for the muscle memory in case they ever need to dive in a dream. It's not likely, but then again, Arthur once found himself standing in front of fucking Isengard in a dream, and Eames has mentioned the time he had to forge Spock. So it could happen. Stranger things have.
Right now that's not important, though. What is important is that they have the certs, and so they can go diving in an old wreck. For Ariadne, it's sort of the fulfillment of one of her childhood daydreams. She'd been a bookworm as a kid, almost painfully shy until she hit thirteen, and she had hidden herself away in fantasy worlds. She'd dreamed of seeing places that were either never real or long since gone. And here, under the water with dappled sunlight filtering through, swimming silently around a wrecked ship, she can do that. She can fall into old fantasies and forget about how her nightmares were briefly reality, how she almost lost everything important in her life.
It's even better than she imagined, though, because she's not alone. Arthur and Eames are there with her, like they always are now. She'd been a bit of a loner when she was younger, and even when she got over that, she never quite... Well. It doesn't matter now. And they're here to relax, not dwell on things, so that's what she does. It looks like Arthur and Eames are now chasing each other around, and she swims into the fray.
Their next stop is Arthur's choice, and it's not a surprise that the military history buff - because he is, to the amusement of the other two - picks Fort Charlotte. Eames says that Arthur should have picked the Bahamas Historical Society Museum, since it was founded by the wife of a former governor and said governor's name was Raynor Arthur. This gets a laugh from Ariadne and an eyeroll from Arthur, though he can't quite stifle a grin.
But Arthur wants to see the fort, so they go there. They pay the extra tip to a tour guide in order to get the full experience, checking out the moat, dungeons, and underground passageways. Arthur's eyes light up and he looks so young in that way he sometimes does, asking questions and inspecting things closely. It's nice to see, Ariadne thinks, and, well, she has to admit the fort is interesting. Not her thing the way it's Arthur's, of course, but still, it's not dull. And the view is fantastic. She snaps at least half a dozen pictures of it.
What Ariadne really wants to know is where the hell Eames learned to surf, but he won't say. Neither she nor Arthur is good at it, when they rent boards and go down to the beach after leaving the fort, but Eames tries to teach them. Arthur takes it too seriously until they gang up on him and dunk him. Ariadne just has fun with it, laughing when she falls over, because otherwise she'll be embarrassed.
They end up giving up on the surfing and just mess around in the water, which is almost waist-deep for Ariadne where they're standing. A few waves catch her off-balance enough that she has to grab onto whichever of her lovers is closer so that she doesn't go under. It's one of those times where being so damn short is annoying, except that it gives her an excuse to cling to one of her boys. And that's never annoying.
~ ~ ~
After five days, it's Eames who points out that they've been doing everything together, and it's beginning to get a bit wearing, since they don't always have the same interests. He's not particularly happy about suggesting it either, because a few hours here and there is one thing, but he's basically saying they should split up for the entire day. They're getting better, but spending more than a few hours apart is still enough to make them all tense up. But they're here to relax, and try to keep healing from what's happened, and this is the natural progression.
He can see that neither of them are exactly keen on the idea, but they all know they're going to have to start spending more time apart eventually. Doing it now, with things to distract them, is probably the best way to do it. It's certainly easier than, say, taking separate jobs. And Eames doesn't care about possible payoffs - he's going to do everything in his power to make sure they don't take separate jobs for a long time, if ever. That is going too far - Arthur might be the one plagued by nightmares, but that doesn't mean Eames isn't still haunted by two pairs of dark, vacant eyes, or projections with enigmatic smiles.
Of course it turns out that, once the other two head off - Ariadne's going to some wax museum with a pirate theme and Arthur's going to check out these caves that apparently have historical significance of one sort or another - Eames isn't entirely sure what he feels like doing. He ends up just wandering around Nassau, which is the sort of thing he occasionally does anyway. He's a forger, after all; he spends time people-watching, because not all of his forges are real people. Some of them he invents himself, with bits and pieces cobbled together from different people and his own imagination.
The irony of doing what amounts to research for work while on vacation does not escape him, and eventually he heads down to the beach again, deciding to see if he can find out whether there's somewhere he can try water-skiing. He's never actually done that, in reality or dreamscape, and it sounds like a bit of a thrill.
He makes himself stay out all day - this was his idea after all - but when he heads back to the hotel, it's a relief. Letting himself in, he doesn't see either of the others and wonders if he's the first one back. But then he hears the faint strains of guitar music coming from the balcony they have, and he heads out. Arthur's sitting on a chair, the guitar balanced on his thighs as he strums it, clearly lost in thought.
Eames knows better than to sneak up on the other man - he and Arthur both react badly to it, and Ari's starting to as well - so he clears his throat. Arthur stops playing and looks over. “Hey.”
“So, how long did you last?” Eames asks, coming closer and leaning on the back of Arthur's chair.
“I came back about an hour and a half ago. Had an idea for a song - I haven't written anything in years, it's strange.” Arthur looks down at the guitar in his hands, and now Eames notices a Moleskine on the floor to the right of the chair. Glancing at it, he can see musical notes written neatly on the unlined pages.
“Is that what you were playing? Because it sounded sad.”
“No, I... I was, earlier, but that one... I wrote it a few years ago, the last thing I came up with.”
“When was this?” He doesn't remember ever seeing Arthur write music before.
“It was... Well. Just after...” Arthur rakes a hand through his ungelled hair, making it stand on end from the friction. “I wrote it on the plane, after I walked out on you. And it's just occurred to me, that after everything, even with all of us like this, I've never apologized for being such a colossal asshole about that.”
“Well, now I know why you were, so it's all right.” That's not entirely true, but Eames pretty much forgave Arthur for Guadalajara back in Miami.
“It's really not. Whatever reason I had, skipping out like that was a cheap shot.”
“Hey.” Eames comes around, looking Arthur right in the eye. “Yeah, it was, and I was pissed at you for a long time over that. But you know what? I'm over it, and we've worked it all out.”
Neither of them notice Ariadne leaning in the doorway, watching them with a fond smile. She actually does know about Guadalajara; Eames told her on the flight to Miami, when she couldn't understand why he was more angry than worried. Even though neither of them ever really showed it, she's suspected that what happened between them in Mexico has been still all too present in both their minds. It's good to see it finally being settled.
They're going to be all right. Slowly, they're getting used to not being together all the time, and today was fun. She missed them, but it was because she wanted to have them there to joke and laugh with, not because she was terrified that she wasn't going to see them again. It's getting better, and they're working out all the issues. Ariadne sincerely believes they'll be back to normal soon - well, as normal as they get. And that's all any of them really want.
Link to the next installment: fae-boleyn.livejournal.com/11793.html