Everyone's a Captain Kirk (Road Trip verse) - PART 2/2

[skyvehicle]

"Do you have a car?"

"No, I carpool with my roommates. Sorry."

They're crouched behind a nurse's station, having to make a detour after Ellie nearly got her head shot off by a man hiding behind a crash cart. Arthur took him out with three shots, then helped Ellie up from where she had fallen in the middle of the hallway and curled up in a ball, cradling her head in her arms.

"Know any paramedics?" Arthur tries a different approach. "This is important. Do you know where they keep the keys to ambulances?"

"I can do that," she says, looking shaken but focused. "I can get keys."

It's much too early to feel optimistic, much too early to call this a win, but Arthur feels a stab of warmth in his chest, a tiny stab of hope.

"Eames is my partner, and he's hurt. We need to get him out of here, quick as we can. Guy downstairs said there's men at every exit."

"Any chance he could be bluffing?" Ellie says.

"No time to check," Arthur tells her. "But I'm pretty sure they're not expecting Eames to leave in an ambulance."

"Okay," Ellie says, looking concerned.

"Also, you're going to have to tranq him, because he's not going to like it when he finds out I'm not coming with."

"Wait, you're not coming?"

"Take my phone, get to the ambulance, get Eames under, then drive. Stay on the road for two hours, hopefully you'll lose whoever might be tailing you. I'll text you the address by then."

"Two hours?" Ellie snaps, incredulous. "Where the hell are you going to be?"

"Don't worry about me. You'll be safe." Arthur presses his phone into her hands. "I'll get there when I can."

"So what do I tell him? You know, when he wakes up and starts asking where you are?"

Arthur shrugs. "Keep him out. Don't let him wake up at all, if you have to."

His answer doesn't sit well with Ellie, and she frowns, looking uneasy. Arthur doesn't have time to ease her fears, not with seven more men in the hospital and another fifteen standing guard, if the man who took hostages is to be believed.

"Just keep driving," Arthur finds himself repeating, because he can't think of anything more important to tell her. "Do not stop. Don't turn the sirens off until you get onto the highway."

"Okay. Okay, I can do that," Ellie says at length. It's the answer Arthur's been waiting for.

"Coast looks clear," he says, peeking out and motioning for Ellie to come out of hiding too. "Run ahead, I'll cover you. Burn unit. Room 16-A."

She goes without hesitation, and Arthur is surprised to find that he has time enough to feel a little bit proud of her. It had only been by chance that Arthur had come to sit next to her.

But these sentiments are something Arthur definitely does not have time for.

And then another armed man wanders into the hall ahead of them. He's walking backwards, looking off somewhere else, and Arthur takes him down before he even sees anything amiss, just as Ellie disappears into room 16-A.

Arthur is just a few yards from Eames' room, when he hears Ellie scream.

There is no time to stop moving, no time to even think what it could be that's made a doctor scream like that. Arthur is all adrenaline, ready for anything, and he's only a few seconds behind her. He won't be too late. He won't.

Eames is on his bed, standing up on his knees, and he's holding a man against his chest, holding him, Arthur sees, by his IV cord, twisted tight around his neck.

The man's face is red, almost purple, and he isn't moving, mouth hanging open. Eames doesn't seem to notice.

"Eames, he's out," Arthur says, a little afraid of why Eames might not have realized this for himself.

But Eames is off the man in a second, letting him drop bonelessly to the floor. "Oh thank god," he breathes, slumping visibly, his arms falling to his sides. "Who's the girl?"

Arthur takes a second to compose himself, just to breathe about the fact that Eames is fine, that nothing seems to have happened. "She's here to help. Why aren't you in the wheelchair?"

"I had to take out two of them out," Eames says, gesturing to the other side of his bed, where another man is lying either dead or unconscious, but definitely no longer a threat.

"Well I took out four. Come on." Then he says over his shoulder, "Ellie?"

The girl doesn't respond. Arthur turns and finds her rooted to the spot, eyes wide and staring at the man Eames had just strangled.

"I've seen people die before," she says quietly, "but this... I've never..."

Arthur can see the fine tremors in her hands, the way she isn't blinking, and knows she's going into shock.

"Hey," he says, coming in close and taking her by the shoulders. "Ellie, don't do this now. We don't have time!"

"He killed him," she whispers.

"Yes, and if he hadn't, he would have killed us. I still need you, remember?" he adds, not knowing what he would need to do if they lost Ellie now.

Her eyes dart back and forth, to Eames, who Arthur can hear climbing down from the bed and into the wheelchair, then back to Arthur, to the lapels of his lab coat, and then she shuts her eyes and nods, once.

"Sorry, I'm..." she whimpers, taking in a deep breath. "I didn't mean to-"

"It's fine," Arthur cuts her off, because she's back and no longer a problem. "Come on. Grab what you can. Medicine, IVs, fluids, whatever Eames is going to need."

"He needs a hospital. How do I pack one of those?"

"Take what you can," he says again, retrieving his backpack from the corner of the room, propping it up on a chair and starting to pack whatever he can reach in with his laptop. "Burn cream, ointments, whatever they've been using on him here."

Ellie hesitates, but this time not because of shock. "I don't know what they've been using on him here. I don't specialize in burns."

Eames, sinking down into the wheelchair, chimes in with his own argument. "Neither do I, but I can tell you about my burns, which are not very happy about my making them move about so much. Think we can get a move on?"

Arthur takes a few seconds to look him over. He looks sick, terrible, holding himself tight to keep from pulling anything, but clearly the fact that he's just climbed out of bed, strangled someone, and knocked someone else out in a way that Arthur doesn't even want to think about are not doing him much good.

He's flushed and sweaty, although Arthur can't tell whether it's from the adrenaline rush of killing two men or from just dealing with the pain.

"Sorry," Arthur tells him, meaning it sincerely, allowing himself a few seconds to just breathe as Ellie gathers the last of the supplies.

"I'll pick up some more stuff if we pass anything on the way," she says, zipping the bag shut swinging it over her shoulders.

"Don't bother. There'll be stuff in the ambulance, and we'll make due without the rest."

"So, we're hijacking an ambulance?" Eames says.

"Ellie can fill you in. Go, now. I'll catch up with you." And with that, Arthur takes off. He doesn't say goodbye, and Eames doesn't say anything at all, breathing harshly through his nose and gripping the armrests of the wheelchair, knuckles white.

With one last look over her shoulder, Ellie is gone too, running with the wheelchair, the backpack, and Eames.

*

It's a dark and starless night when Arthur gets to the house, a sprawling split-level sitting on 50 acres of land. Ellie is asleep on the couch when Arthur lets himself in with the key he's had on his keychain since he started carrying keys, which sets him instantly at ease. The fact that she isn't occupied with nursing Eames in any sort of way is a sure sign that things aren't that much worse than they had been at the hospital, and Arthur tells himself that it's okay to feel relieved by this.

The hardwood creaks beneath his feet, and Ellie wakes with a sharp gasp.

"You're back," she says, her eyes finding him instantly, and she jumps to her feet. "Eames is fine. I had to wake him up when we got here. I didn't bring the wheelchair, and I couldn't carry him."

"He's okay now, though?"

"Sleeping. There's a bedroom down the hall," she says, gesturing. Arthur doesn't need to look to know the room she means.

"And you?" he says, kicking his shoes off. "Did you sleep?"

She glances down at her watch. "Only about an hour," she says sheepishly, and rubs at her eyes. "Let me know what I can do."

"Sleep," Arthur tells her. "Please. There's three bedrooms upstairs. Make yourself at home."

She doesn't move. "Is this your place?"

"My parents used to live here. They're in Germany now, they hardly ever come back."

Arthur has no idea what made him tell Ellie this.

"It's lucky," she says, rubbing her eyes and looking much too young for this. "Convenient."

"Yeah. Otherwise we'd have had to crash at your place." Arthur says, somehow managing cobble together a joke. He has no idea where it came from, but then again, he's been running on pure adrenaline for the better part of the day, and he's now starting to feel it's hold on him beginning to weaken. Any minute now, he'll need to get to sleep, unless he wants to make Ellie deal with another unconscious body.

"How'd you get out? Probably had to kill some people, right?"

"They were attacking the hospital. They would have killed a lot of people to get to me and Eames."

Ellie doesn't look at him. "And the cops?"

"My concept of self defense would have been on too grand a scale for them to understand," Arthur says wryly. "I had to do something."

"They only took hostages. You were the one doing the killing. You'd have had to kill some cops too just to get here."

"Not kill. Just... took care of them. Subdued them for a little."

She smiles at the floor, wrapping her arms around her torso. It makes her look tiny, and cold. "You look tired. You should sleep."

"I'm still wired," Arthur lies, not wanting Ellie to worry about him. "I'll be up, keep watch. Go, upstairs. Get comfortable. Sleep in as late as you need. I'll do some digging in the morning, see when it's safe for you to go back."

"Yeah, I..." Ellie hesitates, lingering at the foot of the stairs. "You'll be okay?"

"Sure," Arthur says, and this seems good enough for Ellie, who finally turns and heads up the stairs.

Arthur lets out a long, slow breath, sagging where stands, grateful for the master bedroom being on the main floor and not a staircase out of his way. As a kid, he'd always hated his parents room being so close to the kitchen, when he would sneak downstairs for snacks in the middle of the night, or being so close to the front door, when he would sneak out to go to parties when he got a little older. He always thought his parents would catch him, giving himself no credit for being quiet and incredibly good at sneaking about.

If they had known, they've never said a word, even to this day. And Arthur's asked.

Dragging his feet, he makes his way into the master bedroom, where he finds Eames sprawled out on his stomach, his back freshly bandaged, a bag of IV fluids hanging from the headboard of Arthur's parent's bed.

Taking care not to disturb him, Arthur crawls onto the other side of the bed, on top of the covers. He just rolls onto his side, still wearing his scrubs, tucks his knees into his chest and lets himself drift off to sleep. The bed is big enough for them both to fit comfortably, and Arthur wants to be there when Eames wakes up. He knows what it's like to wake up in a strange bed.

This bed is luxurious, at least, pillow top mattress and down comforter, not a bad place to wake up in. It's different than Arthur remembers it, though, no longer smelling like his parents, who probably haven't slept in it for years.

It's mostly because of the smell that Arthur has no qualms against sleeping in it. It doesn't feel even the slightest bit weird.

*

It's hot. Hot, but not humid, and the sand is white and soft on Arthur's bare feet. He walks the beach for what feels like hours before he finds Eames, lying on a towel, wearing only a swimsuit. Speedo. Arthur smiles, recognizing it instantly.

He walks in a circle around the towel, around Eames. The sun is directly above them, and Arthur doesn't cast any shadow at all.

"Afternoon, Arthur," Eames says, smiling up at him like the cheshire cat. He doesn't startle Arthur in the least. Absolutely not, especially not when Arthur had expected him to have been sleeping.

"How'd you know it was me?"

"Who else would be here?" Eames squints up at him. That little brown haired girl?"

"I guess not," Arthur says, and squats down in the sand, leaning over Eames' head until their noses almost touch, until Arthur can feel Eames' breath on his face.

"Enjoying yourself down here?"

"Hmmm," Eames murmurs, and just keeps smiling and smiling until Arthur leans over just a little more, bracing his hands on Eames' shoulders, and plants an upside-down kiss on his lips.

Arthur can hear the ocean, the waves crashing against the shore, but when he looks up, all he sees is the beach. Sand, stretching on forever. And he looks down at Eames, eyes squinting against the sun, face pulled into a squinty sort of grimace, and he snakes a hand around Arthur's neck and holds him there, kisses him back until Arthur needs to breathe, realizing that he's completely forgotten how to use his nose in situations like this, and gasps in Eames' warm breath.

Using his hold on Arthur, Eames pulls himself up, simultaneously pulling Arthur down into the sand so he can get on top of him, straddling his hips once again.

"You're a sneaky bastard, you know that," Eames says, sliding a hand up Arthur's chest, under his shirt, thumb circling his left nipple a few times before pinching, then twisting.

The towel's bunched and twisted, no good for lying on anymore, but the sand is soft, if not just a little sticky, and Arthur doesn't mind being sandwiched between it and Eames.

"What else am I?" he says, grinding his hips up against Eames' groin. "Come on, Eames. Tell me, what else."

Eames just laughs into Arthur's mouth, and then Arthur arches his back, takes Eames' head in his hands, and then the timer runs out and he wakes up in his parents' bed, Eames sprawled out beside him, still dreaming.

Arthur pulls the line out of his wrist, then out of Eames', winds them up and puts the PASIV back under the bed where he'd hid it years ago. Eames sleeps on, and Arthur touches his face, just a quick hand on Eames' cheek, before curling up and falling asleep.

*

Sun filtering through the blinds wakes Arthur from a dream about horses, which isn't too unusual, considering he's at his parents house and his parents used to keep horses. More unusual is that Eames was in his dream too, straddling a black stallion, wearing only a pair of leather chaps, making Arthur wonder if Eames hadn't used the PASIV to sneak into his dream too. But most unusual of all is that when Arthur wakes up, Eames is still asleep.

Arthur checks his watch and sees that he's slept for almost eleven hours, which means that Eames had slept for even longer, which means that him still being asleep is not good.

Trying to talk himself down from full-blown panic that never helps anything, Arthur runs out into the open living space to find Ellie falling asleep on the kitchen counter.

"Hey," she says, pulling herself up when she sees Arthur. "Coffee's on, thought you might want some."

"Eames is still asleep," Arthur says, cutting to the chase. He's worried, and there's no time for beat around the bush. "Any reason why?"

"I, uh, had to knock him out again," Ellie says, her voice fuzzy with sleep. "After we got to the house. He's probably still under."

Leaning against the back of the couch, Arthur waits for some clarification.

"He was in a lot of pain," she continues. "From stress, probably, the drive, not knowing where he was or where you were or what had happened. I'm sorry I didn't tell you last night, I was tired."

Arthur smirks, relieved. He'd already known that Eames wasn't going to take any of this lying down, should have just listened to his instincts. But he was tired, and so were his instincts, so it's really no wonder he didn't consider that his orders for Ellie had been to knock Eames out and keep him out. "Is that all of it?"

"Well, no."

He looks at her expectantly.

"He was really angry, kept yelling at you like you were here, calling you an idiot, other things. Then he tried to get the keys from me so he could drive back to the hospital and help you. Which," she adds, "would have been bad."

"Right," Arthur agrees.

"When I tried to get him down, he started fighting. Well, trying to fight, because he's really not all that physically able to fight, which I kind of hoped he would pick up on when he saw how easily I was able to subdue him. He didn't, and then he punched me, so then I tranq'd him. Again." She pauses, shrugging. "I think I overdid it."

Arthur doesn't say anything.

"I'm a doctor," she continues. "It's nothing he won't wake up from. He might be nauseous

Arthur blinks at her.

"Hello? Spaghetti?"

This is enough to snap Arthur out of his daze, taking a few moments to remember that he's still never told Ellie his name. "Sorry," he says, "I'm just still asleep."

"Coffee," she says brightly, and pours Arthur a mug. "Milk? Sugar?"

"No thanks. Laptop, though?"

"In the living room" Ellie says, pointing to where Arthur's bag is, propped up on Arthur's dad's recliner. Arthur takes the coffee with him and gets to work, logging into the internet he pays for this house to always have ready in case he ever needed to use it as a safe house. Settling into the recliner, Arthur turns on the tv, switching between news channels while simultaneously scouring the internet for any mentions of the hospital.

Arthur doesn't notice when Ellie comes to sit on the couch, but his coffee is cold when she finally speaks up. "How's it looking?"

"Like a terrorist attack," Arthur tells her. "Casualties, death, witnesses. No mention of any female doctor escaping with a patient in a stolen ambulance."

Ellie lets out a long sigh which tapers off in a little laugh. She claps a hand over her mouth, but she keeps laughing.

Arthur glances up from his computer, feeling a smile pulling at his mouth too. "Feeling a little giddy, then?"

"I've never," she says between laughs, "I've never done anything like this before. Guns and chases and escapes. I've saved people - I'm a doctor. But never... never like this."

"Funny," Arthur agrees. "Try not to make a habit of it."

"No, of course," Ellie says. "So, is the coast clear yet?"

"Should be," Arthur says, suddenly feeling impatient to get Ellie out of the way so he can be alone with Eames. The weeks spent in the hospital had been surrounded by doctors, nurses, other patients, everyone always coming in to check up on Eames, change his bandages, take care of his skin grafts, and Arthur was grateful but sick of it.

He can only imagine that Eames is sick of being surrounded by doctors too.

Not that he wants to kick Ellie out, especially after how invaluable she's been to Arthur and Eames. But she probably wants to get back to her own life too, rather than hide out in rural farmland with criminals.

"There's a car in the garage, should have enough gas to get you to a station. Let me get you the keys," Arthur says, climbing out of the recliner and getting Ellie a key on a horse keychain. "You can keep the car if you want. Or dump it, or sell it. It's not new or anything, but..."

"Spaghetti!"

Ellie is beaming at him, holding the keychain in her palm like it's something precious. "Oh my god," she breathes. "I have a car now?" Then she steps in closer and wraps her arms around Arthur's waist, her head pressed against his chest. It's a nice hug, Arthur hasn't been hugged in a while, since Eames got put out of action, his burns making it not so easy to wrap his arms around anything.

She fits nicely against his chest, and Arthur returns the hug, his face in Ellie's hair. "Thank you," he says quietly. "For everything. We'd have never made it without you."

"Yeah. I know," Ellie says, and Arthur is pretty sure he can hear her smiling.

She leaves soon after, pulling out of the mile-long driveway in Arthur's parent's old car. If Arthur's parents ever do come back to this house, Arthur can explain to them, and he can offer to buy them a new car, which they'll refuse. As payment, they'll most likely just make him promise to come visit them more in Germany. Not too steep a payment, in Arthur's opinion.

He hasn't seen them in almost a year, and he hasn't been to this house in many years more, not since he got into dream sharing and bought his parents a new life in Berlin where no one would ever trace them to Arthur.

The house is empty now, nothing but canned food in the cupboards, coffee in the pantry, empty stables in the backyard. Old VHS tapes and DVDs and board games, blankets, throw pillows, a full set of dishes and silverware, mugs, memories.

Once the house is quiet again, Arthur climbs back into bed, spending the morning on his laptop. Eames comes to in the early afternoon, slowly, groggy, mumbling nonsense until Arthur starts running his fingertips across his forehead, tickling.

"Morning," Eames says, blinking up at him.

"I hear you put up quite the fight yesterday," Arthur says fondly.

Eames mumbles, shuts his eyes again. "Wasn't me. It was someone else."

"Of course."

"At least I wasn't pulling some heroics on my own."

"What? I did no such thing." Arthur taps Eames' forehead with his index finger. "You're on drugs, must have dreamt it."

"I know you, Arthur," Eames insists so vehemently that Arthur takes his hand away from his forehead, looks back down at his computer.

"So," Eames continues, following Arthur's lead and changing the subject. "Where are we?"

"Safe," Arthur says, and Eames doesn't ask him anything after that.

Later, when Eames is more awake, Arthur helps him up and into the living room, where the couch pillows are fluffy enough that Eames can sit up against them without being in too much pain.

"I want to keep moving," Arthur tells him later, heating up a can of spaghetti-O's on the stove.

Eames has his eyes shut again, probably still feeling drugged. "Makes sense," he says, not seeming to care too much. "The neighbors might talk."

"No neighbors, Eames," Arthur says. "Just the horses."

His mother used to say it, when Arthur was little and wanted to out trick-or-treating. She used to tease him, tell him to check for razor blades in the hay and oats he gets instead of candy and apples. Arthur remembers feeling like they got a house so far away to keep him trapped, so he'd never be able to leave them and have his own life. He remembers how angry he was back then.

He waits for Eames to ask him about the horses, hoping he would. He just breathes, bringing a hand up to rub at the bridge of his nose.

They leave a little before nightfall, with Arthur spending the better part of the afternoon planning and packing. It takes half the pillows in the house to prop Eames up comfortably in the passenger seat of Arthur's SUV, and at that point, there is no hope at all of being able to fasten his seatbelt. Without a word, Arthur pulls out of the driveway, out of his parents' house and on his way to someplace new.

Someplace south.

There's a resort in Florida that Arthur's already booked a room in. He gave himself three days to get there, allowing plenty of time for Eames to rest in between long stints of driving.

Even at five-thirty in the morning, even with the open road behind him and the sunrise coming up on his left, he still isn't convinced that they've escaped.

It reminds him of France, of driving to Toulouse, of Eames annoying him the whole way there. Eames just sleeps this time, rousing only when Arthur drives over unavoidable dips and bumps in the road, or when Arthur wakes him to make him eat.

He wants Eames to wake up and flip through the radio stations, play with the windows, mess with the rearview, his seatback, the air, the heat, anything. Arthur knows he won't though; he'd shot Eames up with enough painkillers to keep him drowsy, if not sleeping, the whole day, knowing the drive would not be pleasant one.

The sedation had been a mutual agreement. Eames didn't want to lose the day, wanted to ride shotgun in a more literal sense, should anything amiss happen, but more than that was he tired of being in pain, not wanting to be propped up in a car, just wanting to get through the pain.

"I wish you'd taken the ambulance instead," he tells Arthur after a particularly nasty pothole wakes him up with a shout. He has to breathe through his nose for a few minutes before he can talk, Arthur rubbing a hand up and down his forearm to try and calm or comfort or distract or bother him.

What Arthur's really doing is trying to console himself. He wants Eames to heal, knowing how badly he's still hurt, how much he still needs a hospital that Arthur is keeping him from by driving him across the country. He touches Eames' arm because Eames is awake, because there's a chance that he'll remember it, and because Arthur would rather be holding on to Eames' arm than the steering wheel of his SUV.

At a hotel in South of the Border, Arthur treats Eames' slow-healing burns like doctors in the hospital would have done by now, dealing with the dead skin, the scar tissue, keeping everything clean, checking for rejection, all sorts of things. Eames is used to it by now.

*

It's hot. Hot, but not humid, and the sand is white and soft on Arthur's bare feet. He walks the beach for almost two hours, turning shells over with his toes, striding along the wet sand where the surf crashes in and falls away before crashing back in again.

Back at the resort, Eames lounges under a massive umbrella, staying out of the sun, and he's just dozing off when Arthur finds him. Eames blinks up at him, rubbing his eyes, yawning big and wide. Arthur just frowns.

"Don't be sleepy," Arthur admonishes, sitting himself down on the edge of Eames' lawn chair. "You're always sleepy. I'm tired of it."

"Very punny, Arthur, dear," says Eames as he curls his hand around Arthur's upper thigh.

"No pun intended," Arthur says, rubbing his hand across Eames' bare chest, feeling windblown sand under his fingertips. "I really am tired of it."

"Don't complain. I'll get up," he says, bringing his knees up first and using the arms of the chair, and his hold on Arthur's thigh, to get himself upright and sitting, where he and Arthur are at eye level. He smiles at him and says, "good morning."

"Afternoon," Arthur says. It's almost four.

"Evening," Eames, rather whimsically, adds, continuing with, "Night. Good night, Arthur. Good morrow."

"Goodbye," Arthur says, covering Eames' hand on his thigh with his own, curling his fingers around Eames' palm.

"Oh shush. Don't be a bastard," Eames says, and so Arthur gives in.

"You do anything fun," he asks. "Anything at all?"

"I had a nice, long think," Eames tells him, looking smug. "Thought I might get a tattoo, actually."

Arthur blinks at him. "What."

"Don't tell me you haven't thought of what to do about all this ridiculous scarring."

"The thought hadn't occurred to me," Arthur says.

"'Course not," Eames says, "not with your four measly stitches..."

"Seven," Arthur interjects. "And concussion."

"Whatever you say, princess," Eames says, leaning over to kiss Arthur right between his eyes.

"Um," Arthur says.

The notion of moving his arms without incredible pain flaring up across his back is a new concept to Eames, and as a result he's been trying to indulge in it as often as he can. Which is why he snakes his arms around Arthur's waist, pulling him close so he can practically feel all the sun Arthur had taken in that afternoon radiating from his skin.

"Let me tell you about the tattoo," Eames says, breath ghosting across Arthur's cheek. Arthur says nothing, already resigned to hate the plan, and therefore it makes no difference whether he hears it or not.

"There'd be wings, first," Eames says, tracing patterns onto Arthur's back with his fingers, "like they're coming out of my shoulder blades, these great big feather wings. Then there'd be the middle of my back, where I'd like them to do this great big heart, all cartoonish and red, and then in the middle, you know what I'll have them write?"

"I'm an idiot and these tattoos are permanent?"

"Eames, plus sign, Arthur." His hands still on Arthur's back, palms flat somewhere around his kidneys. "For ever. For like the number four, not like proper grammar or anything like that.

"You're an idiot," Arthur says carefully, deadly serious, "and if you make these tattoos permanent, I'm going to burn them off."

"Oh shush," Eames says, dropping his head to kiss Arthur on the shoulder. "Shush, Arthur, I'm just trying to get a rise out of you."

Arthur pulls back, feeling cold for a second where Eames' lips are no longer sucking at his skin. "By telling me your stupid tattoo ideas? That's your master plan?"

"You're right. I suppose there are more effective ways," Eames says, pretending to sound ashamed. "I was just being self indulgent."

"Come on," Arthur says. "How about you go back to the room and lie on your stomach some more."

"Fuck, absolutely not, never again," Eames says.

"Not for playing doctor," Arthur is quick to correct him, hand giving Eames' a squeeze. "No, I know how tired you are of that game. We don't have to play that game."

"No?" Eames says, looking genuinely relieved in spite of their teasing each other. "No more of that?"

"No more," Arthur says quietly, grinning in spite of himself. "No, you'll like this game. I promise."

"We'll see," Eames says, and just breathes for a bit, just looks at Arthur, lets Arthur look at him, no jokes, no teasing, that is, until Arthur starts them up again.

"I have to warn you, though," Arthur says. "It'll be a bit rough. Think you're up for it?"

Eames nods once, a quick, precise jerking of his head. "I'm up for it, I'm down for it, I'm whatever you want me to be."

And maybe it's the heat, maybe Arthur's a little dehydrated from being out in the sun, but he doesn't think before he answers, just blurts out: "Mine."

It hits him a few seconds later, what he's done, when he sees this look of sheer, ridiculous, childish joy break out on Eames' face. He realizes that he's never said anything like this before, and now he's sitting there with a look of horror most likely twisting his face up into a terrifying mask, and Eames will probably steal his car and leave him alone in the Florida Keys to get sunburned and find his own way home.

"Oh, shit," Arthur mutters. "Fuck."

Eames, however, is oddly calm about the whole thing, looking almost grateful for the opening Arthur's just given him.

"You know something?" he says, quiet so that no one else would be able to hear them, and quiet so that he won't spook Arthur.

"What," Arthur says, suddenly preoccupied with the drawstring of his pants. It's just that Eames takes hold of his chin and drags his face back upwards, making Arthur look at him, and Eames still has that ridiculous look on his face as he leans in and kisses Arthur, more tongue than lips, more hot, open-mouthed moans than tight-lipped friction, and then, when they break apart, Eames says, sounding honest and earnest and, if Arthur allows himself to believe it, a little bit eager:

"I think I can do that."

the end