A Source of Little Visible Delight (parts 1-6)
Title: A Source of Little Visible Delight (parts 1-6)
Characters: Arthur, Eames, OCs
Pairing: pre-slash Arthur/Eames
Word Count: 4700
Rating: R
Warnings: Swearing, Mild Violence
Summary: Arthur attempts to go on vacation. Mild angst and much introspection ensues. It’s an Arthur character study and appreciation fic!
Originally posted on the kink meme as a WIP in 12 parts as a response to sho_no_tabi ’s awesome prompt.
~
“No, every time, Rita. You have to replace the line EVERY. TIME. Or at least sterilize it. Otherwise... well, otherwise, shit like this will happen.”
Arthur’s on a train from Paris to Toulouse. Right now he’s fielding the sixth phone call that he’s received in the past hour. He’s got his phone pressed to his ear and his head hanging down between his shoulder blades, and he’s staring at the ugly beige carpet in his “first class” cabin. Smoking has been outlawed on these trains for ten years, but that just means that his cabin smells like 10-year-old cigarette smoke and air-freshener. At least it’s private, so he can yell at the people on the other end of the line without any civilian casualties.
“If nothing else, he can just boil it. No... no, I don’t think throwing it in the dishwasher is such a good idea... besides the fact that I’ve never encountered a dishwasher while on the European continent.”
Arthur’s been walking through dreams, his own and those of countless other people, for almost five years. Four years, eight months and thirteen days to be exact. That puts him somewhere in the vicinity of the 90th percentile in terms of experience within the dreamshare community.
This means that he has to answer a lot of stupid fucking questions.
“Yes... yes, Rita. I realize you’re not a nurse, but I’ve been over this with you several times...”
If one were to make a diagram of every member of the community and their connections to each other, it would resemble a wheel, a solar system, a map of Paris. Arthur would be near the center. He would be standing in the roundabout that circles the Arc de Triomph. Arthur knows everyone and everyone knows about him.
Right now he’s talking to Rita. She’s in Athens introducing Armenian mobsters to the wonders of dreamsharing. Per their request, of course. She’s like Arthur; Arthur never turns down an opportunity to dream. He loves it too much. The five figure paychecks are nice too. His sister’s hospital bills aren’t going to pay themselves.
Arthur sighs and runs a hand through his hair. It’s getting long again. He’s gonna have to start putting product in it. Maybe he should just buzz it. No. Looking like ex-military won’t fly. It helps to resemble the people you’re working for. “Look... okay... okay. I’m sorry. I don’t mean to be a dick. I just haven’t slept in about three days. Not properly. No, I’m sure you did explain it to them. Maybe just explain it to them over and over again next time. You know criminals. They’ve got more money than they do impulse control.”
It seems that one of Mr. Dakession’s goons decided to take a swing on the PASIV while the boss was out of town. Using a dirty line. The new compound mixed with the one that was previously used, and the resulting chemical reaction wreaked havoc on his mind and body. His stupidity probably saved Mr. Dakession’s life, but now he’s in the hospital.
“Don’t let him give you any shit. Tell him that you’re just trying to keep him and his men safe, which is true. The PASIV is not to be fucked with or taken lightly.” It’s been three years since funding was cut for military use of the PASIV in the United States and the UK. Since then it’s been re-appropriated by hundreds of millionaires, criminals and crazies. Most think of it as a Magical Dream Machine and forget that it’s actually a piece of medical equipment/weapon.
“Alright... take care of yourself, I mean it. If he gives you any trouble just call me.” Arthur immediately regrets saying this last bit, but he can’t help it. The dreamshare community is his family, and he wants to take care of it and every member of it.
“Alright. Bye.”
Arthur clicks End and leans back in his seat, lets his neck go loose so that his head lolls to the side. The sun streams in through the window and warms his skin. Distant fields of lavender swim through his vision. He doesn’t know where he’s going to go after Toulouse, and he doesn’t care. He'll let this train drive him straight into the Mediterranean just so long as it just keeps going.
~
“Ade... Ade, it’s okay. It’s alright. You can do this.” It’s times like these when Arthur is really grateful for his military training. These moments when he has to look a fellow soldier in the face and tell him, despite the fact that he’s bleeding, that he’s going to be fine.
Ade is the architect for a very old, very wise but slightly temperamental Vodoun Houngan (priest) in Haiti. The PASIV engineer that was working with them disappeared two days ago. The Houngan asked Ade if he could work the PASIV in his place, and of course, Ade (nobly, stupidly) said yes. Ade is like Arthur: he’s ambitious, and he never turns down an opportunity to improve his abilities.
That’s why Arthur is now sitting outside a cafe in Genoa, his coffee getting cold and his gelato getting warm, giving Ade a crash course in PASIV usage and ignoring the stares that he’s getting from the locals.
“The button to the right of the LED display is going to increase the dosage, and the button to the left of it will decrease it. You got that? Good.”
The stares from the Genoese probably have less to do with the conversation Arthur’s having and more to do with his appearance. Arthur looks like a proper criminal: charcoal grey trousers, pinstripe button down the color of a fresh bruise, four days worth of stubble, $300 sunglasses. But the whole tableaux is slightly marred by the waffle cone full of strawberry gelato in his left hand that’s the size of a small child.
“Alright, once you have the dosage level you want, press both of those buttons down AT THE SAME TIME. If you do this correctly, the word LOCKED will appear on the LED display, and you’ll hear a hissing sound.”
Arthur’s Italian is passable but, apparently, not good enough to prevent him from accidentally ordering twelve Euros worth of gelato. His sister would probably laugh her ass off if she could see him right now, her twin brother trying to look like a badass and failing miserably.
“Okay, now listen, this is very important. Is the compound you’re going to be using different from the one previously used with this PASIV? Are you positive? Okay. Because if the compound has been altered at all, you have to replace the line or sterilize it. Otherwise, the new compound will mix with the old one... Alright, Alright. I just wanted to make sure. Some people seem to have a hard time remembering that. ”
Arthur licks at the trail of melted pink sugar that’s sneaking out of the cone and down his wrist. This earns him a lascivious stare from a pretty young man sitting a couple tables over. Arthur smiles at him, and the young man grins and ducks his head.
“Alright. It sounds like you’ve got it under control. Good luck. And don’t hesitate to call me if you need anything.” Arthur says these last words without thinking. He has to stop doing that. He’s on vacation, goddamnit. He should do himself a favor and just throw his phone into the Mediterranean.
As soon as Arthur ends the call, he turns off his phone. He finishes his espresso, tosses the biscuit into his mouth and gets up to take himself and his waffle cone on a walk around the city.
Two hours later he has a panic attack and turns his phone back on.
~
Arthur is standing in a field of golden grass that reaches to the tops of his thighs. His face is turned flower-like towards the sun. He lets it heat his skin, lets it burn the back of his eyelids.
He hears a rustling behind him, and turns. A familiar set of broad shoulders slouch towards him.
Arthur’s skin prickles and sweats. Eames.
He ambles through the grass, his hips canting back and forth with each step. He’s got one hand is his pocket and the other stretched out, palm facing down to glide over the tops of the stalks. The short hairs that cover his scalp glint golden in the sun, the same color as the grass. He looks up, sharp gray eyes catching Arthur’s. His lips twist into a crooked smile. “Et in Arcadia ego.”
Arthur crinkles his brow. “Is that Latin?”
Eames sighs, “Don’t they teach you anything useful in the American public school system?”
“How is Latin useful?”
“Knowlege of the Classics saves lives. They are an essential source of Schadenfreude for miserable fuckers the world over. Reassurance that other people are worse off than you is the surest way to stay sane. The Greeks understood that.” Eames plucks the tip off a stalk of grass and begins to chew on it.
“The Greeks didn’t speak Latin, Eames; they spoke Greek. Did they teach you Greek at that posh private school you attended?”
“They tried to. Bollocks to that. I can’t be arsed to learn an entirely different alphabet... And it was not posh, it was sufficiently upper-middle class.”
Arthur laughs and takes a moment to memorize Eames’ features while he’s turned away from him. The swell of his lips. The depth of his gaze. The shadows that ring his eyes. “I heard what you did.”
Eames smiles and turns his gaze back to Arthur. “Oh? Were you impressed?”
“Not really.”
Eames’ lips turn down in a faux pout. “Pity.”
Arthur continues, “It wasn’t really necessary. You could have just gone AWOL and not stolen the PASIV. They probably wouldn’t have even bothered to come after you.”
Eames furrows his brow in thought. “Perhaps I wanted them to come after me. Perhaps I wanted to feel as though they missed me.”
“I miss you.” The words are out of Arthur’s mouth before he can stop them.
The creases around Eames’ eyes deepen. “Why?”
Arthur ponders this question for a moment before speaking. “You listened to me. And you never asked me for anything.”
Eames removes the stalk of grass from his mouth. Then he reaches towards Arthur and slowly, deliberately trails the fuzzy end of it from Arthur’s ear lobe along his jaw to the tip of his chin. He lets it rest there. Arthur can feel it tickling his lips.
This is when Arthur knows that he’s dreaming. Because Eames would never have dared to do this in real life. And Arthur would never have dared to accept his touch. Not in the chosen profession in which they found themselves. Despite the desire that swelled in the space between them. Heavy and palpable as the summer air off the Chesapeake Bay.
Arthur has to remind himself that he’s having a conversation with his own subconscious when Eames begins to speak, his voice deep and gentle. “Isn’t that what friends are supposed to do? Listen to each other? Give to each other without having to be asked?”
Arthur barely moves his lips when he speaks, not wanting to disturb the stalk of grass that Eames skims over his stubbled chin. “I guess so, yeah.”
Eames blinks and his eyes change from gray to brown. He chuckles. “I suppose you don’t have any friends then, do you?” Eames crosses his pale, lean arms over his suddenly narrow chest. “What you do have is an ever-expanding brood of outcasts and narcissists.”
Arthur shrugs. “Perhaps. But what I do is important. They depend on me.”
Eames screams, “That’s bullshit!” And Arthur’s guts twist when he realizes that the voice coming out of Eames’ mouth is his own. It’s repulsive. Like listening to your own voice recorded and played back to you. “A well-designed search engine could do your job!”
Arthur’s voice is a low growl. “That’s not true.”
“It is true.” Eames’ face has now been replaced by Arthur’s own, and it’s laughing at him. Arthur has never hated his dimples as much as he does right now. “You’re not a gangster, Arthur. You’re a fucking phone book!”
As if taking these words as a cue, the high-pitched chirping of Arthur’s ringtone begins to thrum through the air.
Arthur’s projection of himself sighs and begins to walk away. “Sounds like your phone. You should probably get that...”
The chirping gets louder. Clouds the size of mountains form in the sky. The temperature drops ten degrees. Arthur whispers a plea to his sleeping self. “No, no, no... just a few more seconds.”
Projection Arthur waves over his shoulder. “Until next time, Arthur.”
“Wait... Eames... Arthur... whoever you are, what you said to me earlier. That Latin phrase. What does it mean?”
Projection Arthur stops and turns back around. He has to yell in order to make himself heard over the wind that’s now screaming through the plain. “It means, Even in Arcadia, I exist!”
“Arcadia? I don’t understand...”
“Arcadia is paradise! It means that even in paradise, death is imminent!”
“What the fuck does that have to do with anything? Why are you telling me this?!”
“I don't know! Why are you reliving a conversation that you had three years ago with a man who probably doesn’t even remember you?! You’re fucking pathetic! Now answer your goddamn phone!”
The sky groans and splits in half.
~
Arthur rises out of the dream soaking wet and gasping for air. His hand flies instinctively to his wrist to pull out the IV only to find there’s nothing there but unbroken skin. He shuts his eyes against the darkness of his room and forces himself to take a couple of deep breaths.
He reminds himself of the date and what city he’s currently in before he remembers that he didn’t bring a PASIV with him on this trip. It was a natural dream. He looks at the digital clock on his bedside table. 3:58. He couldn’t have been asleep for more than five minutes. And he knows that he won’t be able to fall back asleep tonight. Damn.
His phone rings to life again, the light from it turning his room a digital blue. Without has brain giving it permission, his hand flies to his phone and chucks it. It hits his bedroom wall and shatters into several un-mendable pieces.
~
*Beep* Arthur. This is Francis Lee. I’m hoping you remember me. We met a few months ago in Stuttgart. I was the chemist for Dr. Schaeffer. Anyway, I’m heading back to Seoul, and I have a guaranteed position there with a cognitive neurologist who is also looking for an architect. If you know of any architects in Korea or even an architect that speaks Korean and would be into that sort of thing, I’d love to hear from you. Thanks.
Arthur’s father had wanted to be an architect. He was four credits short of a degree from Cornell when his father (Arthur’s grandfather) died. Massive heart attack. 54 years old.
He did what any good son would do and moved back home to take care of his mother. Back to the little post World War II tract house in west Detroit. He got a job as an apprentice to a Mr. Stilton, an old friend of the family. A tailor. He never went back to school.
Arthur’s father used to say that being a tailor wasn’t all that different from being an architect. The former used shapes to hold the human body. The latter used shapes to hold space. Arthur would just roll his eyes at his old man and give him shit for not going back to school. To this day Arthur regrets being such a dick to his dad.
*Beep* Arthur. It’s Duncan. Listen, mate, me wife and I got into a fight last night, and she trew me last two PASIV batteries in the toilet and tried to flush ‘em. Now they’re feckin’ banjaxed. Wonderin’ if you knew where I could find some. Me old contact isn’t answering his feckin’ phone. Cheers, mate.
Arthur’s father saved up every spare penny he had, and took the family on trips every summer. They’d load up the car, pick a direction and drive, deciding what there destination would be along the way. Chicago, Minneapolis, Santa Fe, Los Angeles. Falling Water, the Chicago Cultural Center, St. Francis Cathedral, Gamble House.
Arthur's dad would wax lyrical about Neo-Classicism and Japanese aesthetics and Naturalism. Arthur’s mother would furrow her brow in concentration and nod. Arthur and his sister would fight and giggle and stick spit-covered fingers in each others' ears.
Arthur’s favorite part of traveling was staying in hotels. He’d sneak out of the room while the rest of his family slept and wander the halls. He’d run his fingers along the roughly plastered hallway walls and think of all the people asleep, dreaming on the other side of them.
*Beep* Hey, Art. It’s your sister. Remember me? Dude, please please please call me back the instant you get this. I’m going to Jason and Myra’s housewarming party tonight. You know, that thing that you told me I had to go to because I needed to get out more? Be more social or whatever. Fucking hypocrite. I need your advice on what to wear... what goes well with a shitty plastic wig? Or should I just go bare? Call me back. Love you.
When Arthur was a freshman in high school, his father died. Massive heart attack. 59 years old.
Two days after it happened, he held his sister’s hand as they stood side by side on their front porch. They looked on silently as their mom pace the length of their driveway, her face twisted in sheer panic and muttering, “What am I gonna do... What am I gonna do...”
His mother was a free spirit. A flower child raised on a farm in northern California. A shiksa goddess with long, pale limbs, a smile that made the sun shine brighter and dimples. The same ones that Arthur when he grins at a mirror.
*Beep* Hello, Arthur. It’s Cadence. How’s Genoa? Must be nice if you’ve been there for four days. However, I couldn’t help but notice that your cell phone has stopped giving off a signal. Hope you’re alright. You know how to find me if you need any help. Anyway, I caught wind of a job that I thought might interest you. Mexico City. Elite escort service. I suspect you know where I’m going with this. They also want a forger. Someone who isn’t too... squeamish. And someone who doesn’t mind forging women. Let me know if you’re interested. Take care.
Right now Arthur is sitting on a wonky plastic lawn chair on his hotel balcony, smoking cigarettes and drinking Nescafe and thinking. Arthur knows that he can’t remain the keeper of knowledge for the dream share community forever. Because tomorrow he’ll wake up to find his brain chemistry permanently altered by a bad batch. Or he’ll get a bullet to the back of his skull. All the knowledge that he’s acquired amounting to nothing more than sticky bits of flesh splattered over rough plaster.
That’s why the pieces of his phone are in the trash and his SIM card is sitting on the clear glass table in front of him, glinting in the early evening light. That’s why it’s 4:30 in the afternoon, and he hasn’t run out to buy a new phone. Arthur can practically feel the voicemails piling up in his inbox. Can feel the gravitational pull of their growing mass. But he needs to think without the incessant needling of his ringtone cutting into his thoughts.
*Beep* Hi, uh... Hey. Hey, Arthur it’s Massoud. I’m... I’m in Granada... It’s... It’s Houda. Houda’s dead, Arthur... It wasn’t.... It wasn’t even related to the job they just broke into her apartment and she woke up and caught them and they freaked out and shot her. She... bled out. On the way to the hospital. I’m sorry... I just don’t know what to do. This is so fucked up, Arthur. This is so fucked.
Arthur’s always been realistic about his mortality. If he doesn’t die in some unnatural fashion, he’ll probably drop dead before his sixtieth birthday. You can’t fight genetics.
~
Arthur is leaning heavily against a larger-than-life-sized marble lion, staring up at the kaleidoscopic facade of St. Lawrence Cathedral, his eyes squinting and his mouth drooping in a stupid look of confusion and vague distress. He would probably be enjoying the architectural wonder in front of him right now if there weren’t cotton balls shoved in his ears and Vaseline smeared all over his eyeballs. Fucking insomnia.
He didn’t sleep at all last night. Didn’t even try. Just sat on his balcony, smoked, sewed an ivory button back on to his favorite silk shirt, cleaned his SIG P220 and thought.
He thought about the value of all the knowledge he’s acquired. Arthur knows that he hoards his knowledge of dreamsharing like some people do money. His possession of it makes him feel powerful and, more importantly, valuable. Without it, he would be nothing.
It occurred to him that maybe he already is nothing. It’s not as if anyone gives a damn about the history of dreamsharing. All anyone cares about now is what it can do. No one cares about the people that were there for its inception, most of whom have gone mad or disappeared. No one cares about the eighteen months that Arthur spent living on an Army base with needles stuck in his arms. Arthur’s not even sure that he cares.
In which case, the only thing he would be good for is to answer peoples’ questions. He thought then of a field, filled with golden grass under an unbroken, blue sky. He thought of Eames’ pink lips wrapped around a thin blade of grass. He saw his face twisted in a look of evil glee, his voice, nasal and piercing in his own ears, screaming above the wind.
He thought about quitting. He opened up his moleskin notebook to a blank page and wrote down four names: Jeremy, Cadence, Ines, Massoud. All of them young, ambitious and perfectly capable of doing what he does. They could easily carry this nation of dreamers on their shoulders. And render him unnecessary.
He’d then ripped the page containing the four names from his notebook, crumpled it into a tight ball and launched it vindictively towards the trash bin. Arthur can allow himself to be a lot of things: wilful, selfish, exacting. But he can never allow himself to be unnecessary.
So, he sat back down in his plastic chair, lit up another cigarette and pouted like the sullen prick he realized he was being. And he thought some more.
Meanwhile, the Earth kept turning, and the sun came up once again over Genoa. And now here he is, on the steps of St. Lawrence Cathedral, sleep deprived and pissy and still contemplating how he can ensure the long-term sustainability of dreamsharing without rendering himself useless. And he still hasn’t purchased a new phone.
Arthur sighs and hauls himself off the cathedral steps and into the church. It’s even more other-worldly on the inside than it is outside. Black and white striped marble arches and painstakingly carved reliefs and frescoes painted in riotous colors. It’s as if someone took bits and pieces of other churches, all build in different centuries, and cobbled them together to form the structure in which he now stands. Christ, Arthur thinks to himself, my dad would have loved this place.
He sits down in one of the front pews and basks in the warm glow of the gilded sanctuary. He lets himself be cradled in the venerable silence that surrounds him. He imagines himself as one of the dust motes, floating through the light streaming in through the high windows.
And then he falls asleep.
He’s woken up two hours later by a little German girl. She pokes him in the ribs, and when he jerks to life, she runs away giggling. He looks around, wiping the drool off the side of his face, to see several people laughing and shaking their heads at him. He stands up and practically runs out of the church.
Midnight finds him at a cozy drinking establishment filled with an unusual number of Cuban immigrants. He’s sitting at the bar, running his finger along the rim of his glass of sangria when it occurs to him that he has no idea how he got there. Fucking insomnia. He’s done this several times today: wandered around in a dissociative state before coming to and having no idea where he is. Or perhaps he’s dreaming. At present, the thought that he may be dreaming doesn’t bother him. At least he would be sleeping.
He ends up in an intense conversation with a Cuban rocket scientist who sounds just like Tony Montana. It’s jarring to say the least. They end up discussing anarchy and communism, and Arthur’s telling the Cuban about Voltairine de Cleyre when the clock strikes 3:00 am, and the bartender kicks them out.
At 3:12 am, Arthur’s walking through the Piazza de Ferrari on his way back to his hotel. He’s making his way across the grass around the fountain when he feels the presence of two people approaching him from behind, one at his five o’clock and one at his seven. The street lights behind them cast their shadows into his line of sight.
Trained assassins would probably know better than to make their presence so easily known. It’s probably just a couple of street kids. Arthur almost sighs. If this gets violent, it is not going to end well. Arthur’s pretty sure he’s the only person standing in this square right now that was taught Krav Maga by a former Mossad agent.
He doesn’t change his pace, just keeps walking. He breathes deep and allows his senses to become alert. The presence at his five jogs forward to walk beside him. He is, in fact, just a kid. Probably no older than sixteen. Shit. “Hey, hey, you American?” he asks, “You want some hash?” Just then, Arthur feels heat and pressure near his left-hand jacket pocket. The kid to his left is trying to steal his wallet.
Arthur slams his elbow into the kid’s nose before he even has a chance to remove his hand. A half second later, he catches the dull glint of light on black plastic out of the corner of his right eye. His hand flies out to catch the other kid’s wrist and twist out. His shoulder dislocates with a sickening pop. Damnit, Arthur thinks to himself, that probably wasn’t necessary.
Once the would-be thieves are down, Arthur bends over and picks up the gun that dropped from the kid’s hand. It’s a Glock. Arthur can easily take it apart and drop parts of it in various places on his way home. He takes a good look at the two kids writhing on the cobblestones of the piazza. For the first time in forty-eight hours, Arthur really wishes he had a phone on him. They’re going to need an ambulance.
He spots a phone booth and is about to start jogging towards it when a loud, sharp sound pierces the air. Arthur turns to see a small boy, no older than eight, pointing a Beretta directly at him, his eyes wide in horror and his lips shaking.
Arthur hears screaming from behind him. “Dario, corri! Esci di qui!”
All at once he feels a trickle of warm liquid snaking its way down his leg, and Arthur realizes that he’s been shot. An electric jolt of pain tears through his right thigh, and his legs collapse underneath him, his mouth opening on a silent scream. He looks down to see his entire pant leg soaked in blood which is now beginning to pool around his knees.
The clatter of a gun hitting the cobblestones. The fading sound of small feet running on pavement. Poor kid, Arthur thinks to himself. And then everything goes dark.
MORE
Characters: Arthur, Eames, OCs
Pairing: pre-slash Arthur/Eames
Word Count: 4700
Rating: R
Warnings: Swearing, Mild Violence
Summary: Arthur attempts to go on vacation. Mild angst and much introspection ensues. It’s an Arthur character study and appreciation fic!
Originally posted on the kink meme as a WIP in 12 parts as a response to sho_no_tabi ’s awesome prompt.
~
“No, every time, Rita. You have to replace the line EVERY. TIME. Or at least sterilize it. Otherwise... well, otherwise, shit like this will happen.”
Arthur’s on a train from Paris to Toulouse. Right now he’s fielding the sixth phone call that he’s received in the past hour. He’s got his phone pressed to his ear and his head hanging down between his shoulder blades, and he’s staring at the ugly beige carpet in his “first class” cabin. Smoking has been outlawed on these trains for ten years, but that just means that his cabin smells like 10-year-old cigarette smoke and air-freshener. At least it’s private, so he can yell at the people on the other end of the line without any civilian casualties.
“If nothing else, he can just boil it. No... no, I don’t think throwing it in the dishwasher is such a good idea... besides the fact that I’ve never encountered a dishwasher while on the European continent.”
Arthur’s been walking through dreams, his own and those of countless other people, for almost five years. Four years, eight months and thirteen days to be exact. That puts him somewhere in the vicinity of the 90th percentile in terms of experience within the dreamshare community.
This means that he has to answer a lot of stupid fucking questions.
“Yes... yes, Rita. I realize you’re not a nurse, but I’ve been over this with you several times...”
If one were to make a diagram of every member of the community and their connections to each other, it would resemble a wheel, a solar system, a map of Paris. Arthur would be near the center. He would be standing in the roundabout that circles the Arc de Triomph. Arthur knows everyone and everyone knows about him.
Right now he’s talking to Rita. She’s in Athens introducing Armenian mobsters to the wonders of dreamsharing. Per their request, of course. She’s like Arthur; Arthur never turns down an opportunity to dream. He loves it too much. The five figure paychecks are nice too. His sister’s hospital bills aren’t going to pay themselves.
Arthur sighs and runs a hand through his hair. It’s getting long again. He’s gonna have to start putting product in it. Maybe he should just buzz it. No. Looking like ex-military won’t fly. It helps to resemble the people you’re working for. “Look... okay... okay. I’m sorry. I don’t mean to be a dick. I just haven’t slept in about three days. Not properly. No, I’m sure you did explain it to them. Maybe just explain it to them over and over again next time. You know criminals. They’ve got more money than they do impulse control.”
It seems that one of Mr. Dakession’s goons decided to take a swing on the PASIV while the boss was out of town. Using a dirty line. The new compound mixed with the one that was previously used, and the resulting chemical reaction wreaked havoc on his mind and body. His stupidity probably saved Mr. Dakession’s life, but now he’s in the hospital.
“Don’t let him give you any shit. Tell him that you’re just trying to keep him and his men safe, which is true. The PASIV is not to be fucked with or taken lightly.” It’s been three years since funding was cut for military use of the PASIV in the United States and the UK. Since then it’s been re-appropriated by hundreds of millionaires, criminals and crazies. Most think of it as a Magical Dream Machine and forget that it’s actually a piece of medical equipment/weapon.
“Alright... take care of yourself, I mean it. If he gives you any trouble just call me.” Arthur immediately regrets saying this last bit, but he can’t help it. The dreamshare community is his family, and he wants to take care of it and every member of it.
“Alright. Bye.”
Arthur clicks End and leans back in his seat, lets his neck go loose so that his head lolls to the side. The sun streams in through the window and warms his skin. Distant fields of lavender swim through his vision. He doesn’t know where he’s going to go after Toulouse, and he doesn’t care. He'll let this train drive him straight into the Mediterranean just so long as it just keeps going.
~
“Ade... Ade, it’s okay. It’s alright. You can do this.” It’s times like these when Arthur is really grateful for his military training. These moments when he has to look a fellow soldier in the face and tell him, despite the fact that he’s bleeding, that he’s going to be fine.
Ade is the architect for a very old, very wise but slightly temperamental Vodoun Houngan (priest) in Haiti. The PASIV engineer that was working with them disappeared two days ago. The Houngan asked Ade if he could work the PASIV in his place, and of course, Ade (nobly, stupidly) said yes. Ade is like Arthur: he’s ambitious, and he never turns down an opportunity to improve his abilities.
That’s why Arthur is now sitting outside a cafe in Genoa, his coffee getting cold and his gelato getting warm, giving Ade a crash course in PASIV usage and ignoring the stares that he’s getting from the locals.
“The button to the right of the LED display is going to increase the dosage, and the button to the left of it will decrease it. You got that? Good.”
The stares from the Genoese probably have less to do with the conversation Arthur’s having and more to do with his appearance. Arthur looks like a proper criminal: charcoal grey trousers, pinstripe button down the color of a fresh bruise, four days worth of stubble, $300 sunglasses. But the whole tableaux is slightly marred by the waffle cone full of strawberry gelato in his left hand that’s the size of a small child.
“Alright, once you have the dosage level you want, press both of those buttons down AT THE SAME TIME. If you do this correctly, the word LOCKED will appear on the LED display, and you’ll hear a hissing sound.”
Arthur’s Italian is passable but, apparently, not good enough to prevent him from accidentally ordering twelve Euros worth of gelato. His sister would probably laugh her ass off if she could see him right now, her twin brother trying to look like a badass and failing miserably.
“Okay, now listen, this is very important. Is the compound you’re going to be using different from the one previously used with this PASIV? Are you positive? Okay. Because if the compound has been altered at all, you have to replace the line or sterilize it. Otherwise, the new compound will mix with the old one... Alright, Alright. I just wanted to make sure. Some people seem to have a hard time remembering that. ”
Arthur licks at the trail of melted pink sugar that’s sneaking out of the cone and down his wrist. This earns him a lascivious stare from a pretty young man sitting a couple tables over. Arthur smiles at him, and the young man grins and ducks his head.
“Alright. It sounds like you’ve got it under control. Good luck. And don’t hesitate to call me if you need anything.” Arthur says these last words without thinking. He has to stop doing that. He’s on vacation, goddamnit. He should do himself a favor and just throw his phone into the Mediterranean.
As soon as Arthur ends the call, he turns off his phone. He finishes his espresso, tosses the biscuit into his mouth and gets up to take himself and his waffle cone on a walk around the city.
Two hours later he has a panic attack and turns his phone back on.
~
Arthur is standing in a field of golden grass that reaches to the tops of his thighs. His face is turned flower-like towards the sun. He lets it heat his skin, lets it burn the back of his eyelids.
He hears a rustling behind him, and turns. A familiar set of broad shoulders slouch towards him.
Arthur’s skin prickles and sweats. Eames.
He ambles through the grass, his hips canting back and forth with each step. He’s got one hand is his pocket and the other stretched out, palm facing down to glide over the tops of the stalks. The short hairs that cover his scalp glint golden in the sun, the same color as the grass. He looks up, sharp gray eyes catching Arthur’s. His lips twist into a crooked smile. “Et in Arcadia ego.”
Arthur crinkles his brow. “Is that Latin?”
Eames sighs, “Don’t they teach you anything useful in the American public school system?”
“How is Latin useful?”
“Knowlege of the Classics saves lives. They are an essential source of Schadenfreude for miserable fuckers the world over. Reassurance that other people are worse off than you is the surest way to stay sane. The Greeks understood that.” Eames plucks the tip off a stalk of grass and begins to chew on it.
“The Greeks didn’t speak Latin, Eames; they spoke Greek. Did they teach you Greek at that posh private school you attended?”
“They tried to. Bollocks to that. I can’t be arsed to learn an entirely different alphabet... And it was not posh, it was sufficiently upper-middle class.”
Arthur laughs and takes a moment to memorize Eames’ features while he’s turned away from him. The swell of his lips. The depth of his gaze. The shadows that ring his eyes. “I heard what you did.”
Eames smiles and turns his gaze back to Arthur. “Oh? Were you impressed?”
“Not really.”
Eames’ lips turn down in a faux pout. “Pity.”
Arthur continues, “It wasn’t really necessary. You could have just gone AWOL and not stolen the PASIV. They probably wouldn’t have even bothered to come after you.”
Eames furrows his brow in thought. “Perhaps I wanted them to come after me. Perhaps I wanted to feel as though they missed me.”
“I miss you.” The words are out of Arthur’s mouth before he can stop them.
The creases around Eames’ eyes deepen. “Why?”
Arthur ponders this question for a moment before speaking. “You listened to me. And you never asked me for anything.”
Eames removes the stalk of grass from his mouth. Then he reaches towards Arthur and slowly, deliberately trails the fuzzy end of it from Arthur’s ear lobe along his jaw to the tip of his chin. He lets it rest there. Arthur can feel it tickling his lips.
This is when Arthur knows that he’s dreaming. Because Eames would never have dared to do this in real life. And Arthur would never have dared to accept his touch. Not in the chosen profession in which they found themselves. Despite the desire that swelled in the space between them. Heavy and palpable as the summer air off the Chesapeake Bay.
Arthur has to remind himself that he’s having a conversation with his own subconscious when Eames begins to speak, his voice deep and gentle. “Isn’t that what friends are supposed to do? Listen to each other? Give to each other without having to be asked?”
Arthur barely moves his lips when he speaks, not wanting to disturb the stalk of grass that Eames skims over his stubbled chin. “I guess so, yeah.”
Eames blinks and his eyes change from gray to brown. He chuckles. “I suppose you don’t have any friends then, do you?” Eames crosses his pale, lean arms over his suddenly narrow chest. “What you do have is an ever-expanding brood of outcasts and narcissists.”
Arthur shrugs. “Perhaps. But what I do is important. They depend on me.”
Eames screams, “That’s bullshit!” And Arthur’s guts twist when he realizes that the voice coming out of Eames’ mouth is his own. It’s repulsive. Like listening to your own voice recorded and played back to you. “A well-designed search engine could do your job!”
Arthur’s voice is a low growl. “That’s not true.”
“It is true.” Eames’ face has now been replaced by Arthur’s own, and it’s laughing at him. Arthur has never hated his dimples as much as he does right now. “You’re not a gangster, Arthur. You’re a fucking phone book!”
As if taking these words as a cue, the high-pitched chirping of Arthur’s ringtone begins to thrum through the air.
Arthur’s projection of himself sighs and begins to walk away. “Sounds like your phone. You should probably get that...”
The chirping gets louder. Clouds the size of mountains form in the sky. The temperature drops ten degrees. Arthur whispers a plea to his sleeping self. “No, no, no... just a few more seconds.”
Projection Arthur waves over his shoulder. “Until next time, Arthur.”
“Wait... Eames... Arthur... whoever you are, what you said to me earlier. That Latin phrase. What does it mean?”
Projection Arthur stops and turns back around. He has to yell in order to make himself heard over the wind that’s now screaming through the plain. “It means, Even in Arcadia, I exist!”
“Arcadia? I don’t understand...”
“Arcadia is paradise! It means that even in paradise, death is imminent!”
“What the fuck does that have to do with anything? Why are you telling me this?!”
“I don't know! Why are you reliving a conversation that you had three years ago with a man who probably doesn’t even remember you?! You’re fucking pathetic! Now answer your goddamn phone!”
The sky groans and splits in half.
~
Arthur rises out of the dream soaking wet and gasping for air. His hand flies instinctively to his wrist to pull out the IV only to find there’s nothing there but unbroken skin. He shuts his eyes against the darkness of his room and forces himself to take a couple of deep breaths.
He reminds himself of the date and what city he’s currently in before he remembers that he didn’t bring a PASIV with him on this trip. It was a natural dream. He looks at the digital clock on his bedside table. 3:58. He couldn’t have been asleep for more than five minutes. And he knows that he won’t be able to fall back asleep tonight. Damn.
His phone rings to life again, the light from it turning his room a digital blue. Without has brain giving it permission, his hand flies to his phone and chucks it. It hits his bedroom wall and shatters into several un-mendable pieces.
~
*Beep* Arthur. This is Francis Lee. I’m hoping you remember me. We met a few months ago in Stuttgart. I was the chemist for Dr. Schaeffer. Anyway, I’m heading back to Seoul, and I have a guaranteed position there with a cognitive neurologist who is also looking for an architect. If you know of any architects in Korea or even an architect that speaks Korean and would be into that sort of thing, I’d love to hear from you. Thanks.
Arthur’s father had wanted to be an architect. He was four credits short of a degree from Cornell when his father (Arthur’s grandfather) died. Massive heart attack. 54 years old.
He did what any good son would do and moved back home to take care of his mother. Back to the little post World War II tract house in west Detroit. He got a job as an apprentice to a Mr. Stilton, an old friend of the family. A tailor. He never went back to school.
Arthur’s father used to say that being a tailor wasn’t all that different from being an architect. The former used shapes to hold the human body. The latter used shapes to hold space. Arthur would just roll his eyes at his old man and give him shit for not going back to school. To this day Arthur regrets being such a dick to his dad.
*Beep* Arthur. It’s Duncan. Listen, mate, me wife and I got into a fight last night, and she trew me last two PASIV batteries in the toilet and tried to flush ‘em. Now they’re feckin’ banjaxed. Wonderin’ if you knew where I could find some. Me old contact isn’t answering his feckin’ phone. Cheers, mate.
Arthur’s father saved up every spare penny he had, and took the family on trips every summer. They’d load up the car, pick a direction and drive, deciding what there destination would be along the way. Chicago, Minneapolis, Santa Fe, Los Angeles. Falling Water, the Chicago Cultural Center, St. Francis Cathedral, Gamble House.
Arthur's dad would wax lyrical about Neo-Classicism and Japanese aesthetics and Naturalism. Arthur’s mother would furrow her brow in concentration and nod. Arthur and his sister would fight and giggle and stick spit-covered fingers in each others' ears.
Arthur’s favorite part of traveling was staying in hotels. He’d sneak out of the room while the rest of his family slept and wander the halls. He’d run his fingers along the roughly plastered hallway walls and think of all the people asleep, dreaming on the other side of them.
*Beep* Hey, Art. It’s your sister. Remember me? Dude, please please please call me back the instant you get this. I’m going to Jason and Myra’s housewarming party tonight. You know, that thing that you told me I had to go to because I needed to get out more? Be more social or whatever. Fucking hypocrite. I need your advice on what to wear... what goes well with a shitty plastic wig? Or should I just go bare? Call me back. Love you.
When Arthur was a freshman in high school, his father died. Massive heart attack. 59 years old.
Two days after it happened, he held his sister’s hand as they stood side by side on their front porch. They looked on silently as their mom pace the length of their driveway, her face twisted in sheer panic and muttering, “What am I gonna do... What am I gonna do...”
His mother was a free spirit. A flower child raised on a farm in northern California. A shiksa goddess with long, pale limbs, a smile that made the sun shine brighter and dimples. The same ones that Arthur when he grins at a mirror.
*Beep* Hello, Arthur. It’s Cadence. How’s Genoa? Must be nice if you’ve been there for four days. However, I couldn’t help but notice that your cell phone has stopped giving off a signal. Hope you’re alright. You know how to find me if you need any help. Anyway, I caught wind of a job that I thought might interest you. Mexico City. Elite escort service. I suspect you know where I’m going with this. They also want a forger. Someone who isn’t too... squeamish. And someone who doesn’t mind forging women. Let me know if you’re interested. Take care.
Right now Arthur is sitting on a wonky plastic lawn chair on his hotel balcony, smoking cigarettes and drinking Nescafe and thinking. Arthur knows that he can’t remain the keeper of knowledge for the dream share community forever. Because tomorrow he’ll wake up to find his brain chemistry permanently altered by a bad batch. Or he’ll get a bullet to the back of his skull. All the knowledge that he’s acquired amounting to nothing more than sticky bits of flesh splattered over rough plaster.
That’s why the pieces of his phone are in the trash and his SIM card is sitting on the clear glass table in front of him, glinting in the early evening light. That’s why it’s 4:30 in the afternoon, and he hasn’t run out to buy a new phone. Arthur can practically feel the voicemails piling up in his inbox. Can feel the gravitational pull of their growing mass. But he needs to think without the incessant needling of his ringtone cutting into his thoughts.
*Beep* Hi, uh... Hey. Hey, Arthur it’s Massoud. I’m... I’m in Granada... It’s... It’s Houda. Houda’s dead, Arthur... It wasn’t.... It wasn’t even related to the job they just broke into her apartment and she woke up and caught them and they freaked out and shot her. She... bled out. On the way to the hospital. I’m sorry... I just don’t know what to do. This is so fucked up, Arthur. This is so fucked.
Arthur’s always been realistic about his mortality. If he doesn’t die in some unnatural fashion, he’ll probably drop dead before his sixtieth birthday. You can’t fight genetics.
~
Arthur is leaning heavily against a larger-than-life-sized marble lion, staring up at the kaleidoscopic facade of St. Lawrence Cathedral, his eyes squinting and his mouth drooping in a stupid look of confusion and vague distress. He would probably be enjoying the architectural wonder in front of him right now if there weren’t cotton balls shoved in his ears and Vaseline smeared all over his eyeballs. Fucking insomnia.
He didn’t sleep at all last night. Didn’t even try. Just sat on his balcony, smoked, sewed an ivory button back on to his favorite silk shirt, cleaned his SIG P220 and thought.
He thought about the value of all the knowledge he’s acquired. Arthur knows that he hoards his knowledge of dreamsharing like some people do money. His possession of it makes him feel powerful and, more importantly, valuable. Without it, he would be nothing.
It occurred to him that maybe he already is nothing. It’s not as if anyone gives a damn about the history of dreamsharing. All anyone cares about now is what it can do. No one cares about the people that were there for its inception, most of whom have gone mad or disappeared. No one cares about the eighteen months that Arthur spent living on an Army base with needles stuck in his arms. Arthur’s not even sure that he cares.
In which case, the only thing he would be good for is to answer peoples’ questions. He thought then of a field, filled with golden grass under an unbroken, blue sky. He thought of Eames’ pink lips wrapped around a thin blade of grass. He saw his face twisted in a look of evil glee, his voice, nasal and piercing in his own ears, screaming above the wind.
He thought about quitting. He opened up his moleskin notebook to a blank page and wrote down four names: Jeremy, Cadence, Ines, Massoud. All of them young, ambitious and perfectly capable of doing what he does. They could easily carry this nation of dreamers on their shoulders. And render him unnecessary.
He’d then ripped the page containing the four names from his notebook, crumpled it into a tight ball and launched it vindictively towards the trash bin. Arthur can allow himself to be a lot of things: wilful, selfish, exacting. But he can never allow himself to be unnecessary.
So, he sat back down in his plastic chair, lit up another cigarette and pouted like the sullen prick he realized he was being. And he thought some more.
Meanwhile, the Earth kept turning, and the sun came up once again over Genoa. And now here he is, on the steps of St. Lawrence Cathedral, sleep deprived and pissy and still contemplating how he can ensure the long-term sustainability of dreamsharing without rendering himself useless. And he still hasn’t purchased a new phone.
Arthur sighs and hauls himself off the cathedral steps and into the church. It’s even more other-worldly on the inside than it is outside. Black and white striped marble arches and painstakingly carved reliefs and frescoes painted in riotous colors. It’s as if someone took bits and pieces of other churches, all build in different centuries, and cobbled them together to form the structure in which he now stands. Christ, Arthur thinks to himself, my dad would have loved this place.
He sits down in one of the front pews and basks in the warm glow of the gilded sanctuary. He lets himself be cradled in the venerable silence that surrounds him. He imagines himself as one of the dust motes, floating through the light streaming in through the high windows.
And then he falls asleep.
He’s woken up two hours later by a little German girl. She pokes him in the ribs, and when he jerks to life, she runs away giggling. He looks around, wiping the drool off the side of his face, to see several people laughing and shaking their heads at him. He stands up and practically runs out of the church.
Midnight finds him at a cozy drinking establishment filled with an unusual number of Cuban immigrants. He’s sitting at the bar, running his finger along the rim of his glass of sangria when it occurs to him that he has no idea how he got there. Fucking insomnia. He’s done this several times today: wandered around in a dissociative state before coming to and having no idea where he is. Or perhaps he’s dreaming. At present, the thought that he may be dreaming doesn’t bother him. At least he would be sleeping.
He ends up in an intense conversation with a Cuban rocket scientist who sounds just like Tony Montana. It’s jarring to say the least. They end up discussing anarchy and communism, and Arthur’s telling the Cuban about Voltairine de Cleyre when the clock strikes 3:00 am, and the bartender kicks them out.
At 3:12 am, Arthur’s walking through the Piazza de Ferrari on his way back to his hotel. He’s making his way across the grass around the fountain when he feels the presence of two people approaching him from behind, one at his five o’clock and one at his seven. The street lights behind them cast their shadows into his line of sight.
Trained assassins would probably know better than to make their presence so easily known. It’s probably just a couple of street kids. Arthur almost sighs. If this gets violent, it is not going to end well. Arthur’s pretty sure he’s the only person standing in this square right now that was taught Krav Maga by a former Mossad agent.
He doesn’t change his pace, just keeps walking. He breathes deep and allows his senses to become alert. The presence at his five jogs forward to walk beside him. He is, in fact, just a kid. Probably no older than sixteen. Shit. “Hey, hey, you American?” he asks, “You want some hash?” Just then, Arthur feels heat and pressure near his left-hand jacket pocket. The kid to his left is trying to steal his wallet.
Arthur slams his elbow into the kid’s nose before he even has a chance to remove his hand. A half second later, he catches the dull glint of light on black plastic out of the corner of his right eye. His hand flies out to catch the other kid’s wrist and twist out. His shoulder dislocates with a sickening pop. Damnit, Arthur thinks to himself, that probably wasn’t necessary.
Once the would-be thieves are down, Arthur bends over and picks up the gun that dropped from the kid’s hand. It’s a Glock. Arthur can easily take it apart and drop parts of it in various places on his way home. He takes a good look at the two kids writhing on the cobblestones of the piazza. For the first time in forty-eight hours, Arthur really wishes he had a phone on him. They’re going to need an ambulance.
He spots a phone booth and is about to start jogging towards it when a loud, sharp sound pierces the air. Arthur turns to see a small boy, no older than eight, pointing a Beretta directly at him, his eyes wide in horror and his lips shaking.
Arthur hears screaming from behind him. “Dario, corri! Esci di qui!”
All at once he feels a trickle of warm liquid snaking its way down his leg, and Arthur realizes that he’s been shot. An electric jolt of pain tears through his right thigh, and his legs collapse underneath him, his mouth opening on a silent scream. He looks down to see his entire pant leg soaked in blood which is now beginning to pool around his knees.
The clatter of a gun hitting the cobblestones. The fading sound of small feet running on pavement. Poor kid, Arthur thinks to himself. And then everything goes dark.
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