Prison Bars and Snail Shells
Title: Prison Bars and Snail Shells
Author: ifeelbetter
Warning: This is, actually, I think, my plan to break out of prison if I ever need to. BE WARNED.
Word Count: 4,094
Disclaimer: I own nothing of value.
Beta: cog_nomen (Fun puns were had with the sewage...Did Eames plan the shit out of this scheme or did he plan the shit into it? Thanks again, awesome person!)
Summary: Arthur's in jail, he went down for the team, and now Eames wants him out. Saito offers some financial assistance and some wisdom.
Notes: Written for this prompt at the inception_kink kink_meme, Round 2, and I am an addict, obviously. Also, and you'll understand why I say this later, but I apologize to anyone who can't read Japanese script. My Japanese is a bit rusty, too, so I also apologize to anyone who speaks it better than me.
"Arthur, if you stay here, you will be arrested," Cobb was shouting across the room, the sound of sirens growing louder by the second.
"I got that," Arthur shouted back, pressing another flare into the canister. He counted the remaining flares -- three green, two yellow, and six orange left. He had a shotgun sitting on the table in front of him but was loathe to use it on policemen in the real world. He preferred to be colorful rather than fatal in real life.
"I could just blow the whole building," Ariadne offered, holding up her cache of explosives. It was amazing how taken she had become with nitroglycerine since Yusuf had given her that crash course in the stuff.
"Let's not kill anyone we don't have to, OK?" Arthur suggested.
"We need some kind of distraction," Cobb said.
"I already said I got that," insisted Arthur. "You guys, just...you should just go now."
"But--" Ariadne started to protest but Cobb simply nodded. He grabbed Ariadne's arm and tugged, firmly pushing her towards the back exit. She tried to wrench her arm out of his grip but he held tightly, his fingers pressing in painfully.
"Dom," she pleaded but he didn't hesitate, didn't even pause for breath until they were outside.
"Cobb? What took you so long? Where's--" Eames asked, glancing between Ariadne's furious silence and Cobb. "You didn't just leave him there."
"It was the only way we could avoid bloodshed," said Cobb.
Unlike Ariadne, Eames knew both Cobb and Arthur well enough to know that Arthur would unerringly choose the path with the least bloodshed, even if the blood was his own. He had been on a job with them in Mozambique where the mark had blockaded them in a cellar for eight days and Arthur had divided the rations in half, for Cobb and Eames, without mentioning that he was going without. They'd only found out when he passed out on the fifth day. So Eames knew that Arthur had a self-sacrificial streak in his makeup a mile wide.
So Eames didn't slap Cobb across the face and storm away.
Ariadne did, though.
* * * * *
When Eames set his mind to a task, he did it thoroughly and never wavered. When he devised his plan, he channeled all the anal-retentive point men he had ever worked with and color-coded that sucker. He had subclauses ("In the case of X, the team in question will do Y") and addenda ("The author of this document acknowledges that any and all of the participants have the right to abandon the mission in the case of X, Y, or Z"). He had to buy (steal: tomato, tomahto) a set of hi-liters to do it.
The important thing was that, when he arrived in Tokyo, he had a briefcase filled with alphabetized and color-coded folders.
He still hadn't really expected Saito to linger so long over the contents, spilling the folders across the broad mahogany meeting room table.
Eventually, Saito rested his chin on one of his fists and looked at Eames. The meeting room was filled with windows, only the transparency of glass marking the boundaries of the room, of the building itself. It shimmered in the midday light, bright and deceptively conspicuous. Saito suited this setting; he looked like a king on his throne. He carried his royalty in his shoulders, in the way he held himself, and refrained from more gaudy displays. The only token of his wealth that he wore on his person was the hint of a shimmer around his wrist from a gold cuff link.
"Are you aware of the implications of this proposal, Mr. Eames?" he asked.
Eames shifted uncomfortably under the careful gaze for a moment. Saito was watching him thoughtfully, a bit too knowingly, and Eames knew he was being measured. He was there to be judged so he let Saito look, despite the way the hairs on the back of his neck prickled.
"アーサーさんに借金している," he said finally. He knew he didn't speak the delicate formal Japanese Saito was lavished with everyday but these were special circumstances. He was willing to spill his scanty supply of Japanese for this cause. I owe Arthur a debt.
Saito raised an eyebrow ever-so-slightly and, after a moment's pause in which he searched Eames's face, he nodded.
"This is not a game, Mr. Eames. This is not," Saito smiled humorlessly, "a dream. Your actions have consequences. There will be inevitable repercussions."
"I am aware of that," Eames said.
"I cannot, in any official capacity, condone the course of action on which you are about to embark," Saito continued. Eames knew enough to be silent and wait out the beat that followed. "However, I can provide, in an unofficial capacity, some assistance."
"Thank you," said Eames, bowing his head slightly. His mother always told him, when in Rome...
Saito stood and held a hand out for Eames to shake. Eames took it, also standing.
"I am impressed, Mr. Eames," Saito said. "Impressed but not surprised."
"I pay my debts, Mr. Saito," said Eames carefully, letting the hand go. He was a con man through and through so his handshake was firm and trustworthy. No con-man worth his salt would have it otherwise. He buttoned his suit jacket.
Saito smiled for the first time then. "I am aware of your predilection for loyalty, Mr. Eames," he said.
Eames's brow furrowed and he felt that his reputation needed protecting. "It's not a question of loyalty--"
Saito waved his protestations away. "What is that American expression? 'I call a spade a spade.' That is how it goes, yes?"
"I wouldn't know."
"Nevertheless. My appraisal of your character is my own, formed from observation. I have done extensive character studies of all the people I have worked--" he paused significantly, a tacit referral to the Inception Project (as it was referred to by the dark underbelly of dream scientists and the gossips who comprised it) "--intimately with."
"Oh?" Eames said. He wanted to remain as neutral as possible, see what Saito was willing to offer him without bargaining more of himself than was necessary.
"It is a practice I have frequently been deeply thankful for."
Eames wasn't sure whether Saito was trying to threaten him or congratulate him for his perspicacity. The man was too used to speaking in careful circles to be easily understood. Eames preferred to speak in obliques, himself. He liked to have honesty just far enough away to keep his lies looking truthful.
"My motivation is entirely apparent," he said, careful to look Saito directly in the eye as he spoke. "Arthur is not guilty of a crime. We both know this."
"Do we? I thought truth was to be ascertained by the judgment of twelve of his fellow citizens. I thought we both knew that."
"The only thing Arthur is guilty of is misguided nobility."
"Be that as it may, I must officially condemn any scheme to undermine the criminal justice system of the United States of America. Flawed though it may be," Saito said smoothly, "any code of justice only functions as long as it is universal. The moment vigilantism is implemented is the moment in which tyranny is imminent."
"I know better," Eames insisted doggedly.
"Possibly. It is possible that I, too, know better." Saito sighed. "You are inadequately provided for your task, Mr. Eames. Your expertise will be useless, your sphere of acquaintance contains not a single person suited for the job at hand."
"I'm a fast learner."
"I do not doubt that. Nor do I doubt your courage or your enthusiasm. But I would like to keep my name out of your enterprise, in case of unforeseen complications."
"I understand."
Saito pulled a sheet paper, folded into a tiny and neat square. He placed it on the table beside them and tapped it once. He pointedly averted his gaze while Eames picked it up, unfolded it, and skimmed the list of figures. He looked up in surprise.
"All along, you knew you would--"
"I told you, Mr. Eames. I am interested in expanding my character study." Saito gestured towards the open door he was propping with his foot, allowing Eames to exit in front of him. "Tell Arthur I think chivalry is out-dated but admirable in a happy few."
Eames frowned. He wouldn't have described Arthur's surrender as chivalrous, per se. More like stupid.
* * * * *
Six months later, Eames was dressed in a guard's uniform and hiding behind a turn in a dreary hallway, sticking his fingers down his throat. It was disgusting but, he felt, a clever ruse. Also, he once saw it in a film. It was turning out that a ridiculous amount of his plan had been filched from various prison break television. He wondered whether prison security was comprised solely of people who had never seen Hustle and whether that wasn't a spectacular failure on their part.
His gag reflex was pretty stalwart so it took a few minutes. Eventually, he was able (his hands decked in blue latex) to pull a tiny key card, no longer than the first joint of his pinky finger, out of the mess at his feet. He tore open a handi-wipe with his teeth and wiped it down before hiding it in the palm of his hand, straightening up, and nonchalantly walking back down the corridor.
Arthur, like all mind-criminals, was kept in solitary confinement. The government wasn't entirely clear on its position on dream technology and definitely was unclear on the mechanics of it. This meant that they kept the convicted criminals in isolation. They seemed to hope that it would protect the other inmates from some sort of spontaneous dream-walking cooties. Eames wondered if this was what the Salem witch trials had looked like from the cells of the accused.
The hallway was a sterile and blinding white. There was enough distance between each cell that any one of the convicts could have screamed his throat ragged before a fellow inmate would have heard him. Eames had heard that they usually did scream, eventually, when they hadn't seen a human face for months and even sleep couldn't offer them a refuge. No guards saw the prisoner in person: their meals were delivered through a slot in the wall. For those whose occupations robbed them of the ability to dream, sleep was hardly a refuge. Each door was made of a simple steel, completely lacking adornment besides a small circular window at exactly eye-level. There weren't even numbers on the doors. Eames counted the doors as he passed them, turned, and counted down a second hallway.
He stopped eventually and swiped the tiny key card in the single access panel by the doorknob. Peering through the single porthole, he knocked.
"Housekeeping," he called.
"I'll have the salmon," Arthur said breezily, his voice muffled through the door. He was lying on the simple cot, his arms folded behind his head. His eyes were closed, though. He may have been meditating, Eames realized.
"You decent?" Eames said, swinging the door open. He would have bottled Arthur's expression if he could and taken it out to cheer him up on gloomy days.
"Eames?!"
"The one, the only, the best and brightest," Eames agreed. He unbuttoned his shirt and threw it at Arthur. "Put this on."
"I wish I had my die right now," Arthur said.
Eames fished it out of his pocket and tossed it to him. "I knew you'd say that," he said, beaming. "But really, darling, you'll have to lose the orange look. In your own time, of course."
Arthur ran a thumb along the grooves of one of the faces of the die, gingerly feeling the weight in the palm of his hand.
"Less gawping, more undressing," Eames insisted. He was pulling off the pants of the guard's uniform as he spoke, revealing the janitorial uniform he'd prepared underneath.
"You as a janitor. I definitely am not dreaming," Arthur said, wrinkling his nose. He shucked the orange jumpsuit and climbed into the guard's uniform almost too quickly for Eames to admire the view as it went speeding by.
Almost.
"Prison agrees with you," he said, smirking. "Brings out the color in your cheeks."
"Orange has always been my color," Arthur said sarcastically. "Was there an actual plan or did you just want to arrange a spontaneous Fall Prison fashion line?"
"Oh, I planned. I color-coded it."
Arthur looked like he wanted to say something but he just pursed his lips and followed as Eames sauntered into the hallway.
* * * * *
"Your plan ended in sewage," Arthur pointed out.
"I am aware of that," Eames said, pulling something that might have once been a banana peel out of his hair. It stuck firmly until it completely disengaged with a moist pop.
"I've laid out hundreds of heists," said Arthur. "All sorts, too. Jungles, deserts, fortresses, you name it. I once had to devise a way to get into and out of an ASPCA without being seen. With a cow. And yet, in all of my hundreds of plans, I never once included a sewage step."
"Like I always said, you lack imagination."
They continued in silence, interrupted by the eruptions of gas from around them and the scurrying squeak of vermin.
Ahead of them, exactly where Eames had known it would be, they began to see the glimmers of daylight through a grating. The grating itself was caked in the foulest of the refuse they had been trudging through and Eames had to smear it out of the way by the handful to find the lock.
"Oh god, there's a lock," said Arthur, looking over his shoulder.
"I know," Eames said, "Just give me a second." He pulled another handi-wipe out of his back pocket to wipe his hand on (not entirely successful, it turned out) before stuffing his fingers down his throat again.
"Your plans are disgusting," Arthur told him.
Eames retched a couple of times, finding the key eventually. "Effective, that's what you meant."
"No, I'm pretty sure I meant disgusting." Arthur looked utterly horrified as Eames fit the key into the lock. The grating swung outward and Eames stepped through, turning to offer Arthur a hand.
"Shall we?" he invited.
"I'm not touching you." Arthur gingerly moved Eames's proffered hand aside with his elbow, careful not to make any more contact than was absolutely necessary. It was a bit unfair considering the purple goo dribbling down Arthur's nose.
"This, right here," Eames said, annoyed, "is where you're supposed to swoon and call me your hero."
"Don't be ridiculous. You just vomited into your own hand."
"For you. I don't vomit into my own hand for just anyone, you know."
"Yes, because altruistic intent trumps vomiting into your hand," Arthur said and Eames thought maybe someone should cut off his subscriber status to sarcasm.
The sewer opened into a dusty basin, oozing into a nearly dry riverbed. Arthur shaded his eyes and looked outward, beyond the filthy streamlet to the wooded glen just beyond. It was a luscious green away from the sewage deposit they had just crawled out of.
Eames didn't have much more left in his plan. In its barest form, all his plan had been was 1) go to Arthur and 2) take Arthur away. There wasn't really a step for keeping him afterward or for where to put him so he would be safe from his stupidly noble and self-sacrificial instincts. The thought sat awkwardly at the back of his mind as he glanced at Arthur staring into the patch of green.
Eames swung the grating closed behind them and they made their way to the banks of the disgusting stream. It involved a lot of pushing shapeless and revolting blobs out of their way with their feet and not a lot of actual water. When they reached the bank, Arthur turned to Eames expectantly and wryly and Eames wondered whether that might have been why he did all of this bother in the first place. To have Arthur turn to him, just like that. Like he knew Eames would have a solution but didn't want to look like he even suspected it.
"Ye of little faith," Eames said reproachfully, shaking his dripping hair so that it splattered across Arthur's face in a rainbow of globules. Before Arthur had time to do anything besides splutter in disgusted rage, Eames was pulling a tarpaulin camouflaged with leaves and twigs from the back of a hidden car.
Arthur raised an eyebrow. Impressed.
The back seat was filled with buckets of water. Eames pulled one out by its handle and turned, grinning, to Arthur.
"Eames, you wouldn't--" Arthur started to say.
"This is my rescue, darling, and I make the rules," Eames crowed and tossed the entire contents at Arthur, the water arcing and twinkling in the air before it smacked Arthur.
Arthur spluttered and shook his head like a wet dog, sending specks of water flying around him. It was just a palliative--the globs of sewage clung to his clothes and hair but he looked (and smelled) slightly better.
Eames began to laugh even as Arthur pulled another bucket from the car. He approached Eames slowly, letting Eames watch warily as he slowly raised the bucket over his head. It wasn't the deluge Eames had just inflicted on Arthur: this was a slow stream, pouring down his neck.
The bucket's contents were expended but Arthur didn't move, his arms lifted above Eames's head, solid like branches, and their dripping faces inches away from each other.
"Thanks," said Arthur, quietly, his breath tangible against Eames's drenched cheek.
"Don't mention it," Eames said.
* * * * *
"Ah, Arthur, it's a pleasure to see you again," Saito said, clapping him on the shoulder.
When Saito hadn't been in his offices, they had known where to find him by looking for the sleekest restaurant in Tokyo, the one that kept celebrities waiting in a queue out the front door. When they found it, they'd simply dropped Saito's name to the hostess. Her eyes widened and the owner, miraculously appearing by Eames's shoulder, had shown them the way himself.
"I understand I owe my freedom, in part, to you," Arthur said stiffly. He didn't do gratitude with much grace.
"You must be mistaken. Mr. Eames, a pleasure to see you again as well."
Eames shook his hand and nodded, bending his head almost low enough to be a bow but not too overtly. Saito grinned broadly at them both and indicated the seats beside him. The fact that they were already filled didn't seem to bother him.
"Won't you join me, gentlemen?" he said magnanimously as the seats' previous occupants skittered away. "Tell me, what brings you to Tokyo?"
"Sightseeing," Eames said, giving Arthur a significant glance. Arthur frowned but allowed the pretense. He had insisted on coming the moment Eames had told him of Saito's involvement. Eames had followed aimlessly.
Arthur coughed. "I've always wanted to see Tokyo Tower."
"Have you? I wouldn't have credited you with such pedestrian tastes," said Saito. He held up his hand as if flagging a waiter though there were none within eyesight at the moment. One materialized within seconds, though.
"Drinks for my friends, Yuzuki." The girl bowed deeply and hurried away.
"I am in your debt, Saito, and I do not like to be in debt," said Arthur.
"It's remarkable that he should choose to use that particular turn of phrase, don't you think, Mr. Eames?" Saito said, turning to Eames. "It reminds me of something you once said."
"It is very similar," Eames agreed, neutrally.
"When Mr. Eames described the debt he felt towards you, you see," Saito said, turning again to Arthur, who was scowling at his folded hands, "I understood him to be expressing more than a simple remuneration for services rendered."
"You understood me correctly, then."
"As you say. Debt, Arthur, is not a question of finances between friends." Saito nodded as the waitress placed gorgeously lacquered cups of sake in front of them and retreated again. "The debt Mr. Eames described was a true debt. What you feel you owe me is...what is that saying? 'Water under the bridge.' That's it, isn't it?"
"Then you leave me with nothing to say but 'thank you,'" said Arthur, still frowning. He twisted the cup of sake in his hands.
"Alas, I cannot allow even so much. My participation was superficial. I believe you ought to further investigate the motives of your true savior," Saito said, raising the cup to his lips.
Eames smirked at Arthur behind Saito's head. Arthur grimaced at him.
"Eames knows I'm grateful," he told Saito.
"Youth. So rushed, so often mistaken," Saito said with a sigh. "I didn't tell you to investigate your own feelings, Arthur. I suggested you investigate his." He stood and patted Arthur on the back.
"蝸牛そろそろ登れ富士の山," he said.
Arthur's frown deepened. "I don't understand--" he started to say.
"It's a poem," Eames told him. "Issa, isn't it?" Saito nodded. "Snail, ever so slowly, climb Mt. Fuji."
"Precisely," said Saito. "Good night, gentlemen." He left them, calling out an instruction to the enthusiastic waitress that his guests were to be provided with whatever they wanted.
"Since when do you recognize Japanese poets by quotation?" asked Arthur, authentically curious.
Eames shrugged. "There was this girl in a pub," he said, grinning around the edge of his sake cup.
Arthur threw his head back and laughed.
* * * * *
They waited by large window in the airport, watching the plodding airplanes being towed back and forth and the scurrying people with orange-striped vests gesticulating at them. It was a gloomy day, drizzling faintly. An early morning fog was sticking to the pavement.
Arthur was back in pinstripes and a crisp Oxford, full-Windsor spotless against the lilac shirt. He was grimacing at the orange stripes of the ground crew below them, out the window.
Eames smiled because of course the trauma Arthur would take away from prison was a loathing for all orange clothing.
"Why did you do it?" Arthur asked, suddenly, and Eames realized Arthur had stopped watching the crew below and was looking at him instead. Right into his eyes.
"Rescue you like the prince in a fairy story?" Eames grinned. "I would have thought that was obvious: I am a prince from a fairy story."
"But, really," Arthur pressed, "it's not like it's to your financial benefit. We don't even work together all that often. And if you needed me for a job, you'd have already said."
"Excellent point."
"So I don't see the gain, that's all."
"The 'gain,' darling?"
"What you gain from all this. What made all the planning and hiding the car and trudging through sewage and vomiting in your hand--"
"Twice."
"--vomiting in your hand twice worth it." Arthur rubbed his neck.
"Don't you?" asked Eames carefully.
"Not unless you--unless you--for me," Arthur said, helplessly. "Did you--was it--was I what you wanted?"
"I told Saito I owed you a debt," Eames said. "But he was right. I didn't actually care about that." He stepped closer to Arthur, sliding a hand around his hip. "You should know: I think I'd follow you anywhere."
"You--you followed me? To prison?" Arthur cupped Eames's cheek delicately, like he thought he might dissipate. They were both leaning towards each other slowly, like planets being pulled in by gravity.
"Of course I did, pet," he said. But their mouths had met by the last word and it got lost between the press of their lips.
"Next time, I'm planning the escape route," Arthur said, pulling back. "Without the sewage."
"Details, details," said Eames.
"No, really, when I break you out of prison, you'll see what a real escape plan looks like. Some people can manage it without vomiting."
"You're just jealous that you can't regurgitate helpful household items," Eames said.
But the implicit promise, the next time, hovered in the air between them. Arthur offered it, Eames accepted it.
* * * * *
蝸牛そろそろ登れ富士の山
Snail, ever so slowly, climb Mt. Fuji.
Issa.
Author: ifeelbetter
Warning: This is, actually, I think, my plan to break out of prison if I ever need to. BE WARNED.
Word Count: 4,094
Disclaimer: I own nothing of value.
Beta: cog_nomen (Fun puns were had with the sewage...Did Eames plan the shit out of this scheme or did he plan the shit into it? Thanks again, awesome person!)
Summary: Arthur's in jail, he went down for the team, and now Eames wants him out. Saito offers some financial assistance and some wisdom.
Notes: Written for this prompt at the inception_kink kink_meme, Round 2, and I am an addict, obviously. Also, and you'll understand why I say this later, but I apologize to anyone who can't read Japanese script. My Japanese is a bit rusty, too, so I also apologize to anyone who speaks it better than me.
"Arthur, if you stay here, you will be arrested," Cobb was shouting across the room, the sound of sirens growing louder by the second.
"I got that," Arthur shouted back, pressing another flare into the canister. He counted the remaining flares -- three green, two yellow, and six orange left. He had a shotgun sitting on the table in front of him but was loathe to use it on policemen in the real world. He preferred to be colorful rather than fatal in real life.
"I could just blow the whole building," Ariadne offered, holding up her cache of explosives. It was amazing how taken she had become with nitroglycerine since Yusuf had given her that crash course in the stuff.
"Let's not kill anyone we don't have to, OK?" Arthur suggested.
"We need some kind of distraction," Cobb said.
"I already said I got that," insisted Arthur. "You guys, just...you should just go now."
"But--" Ariadne started to protest but Cobb simply nodded. He grabbed Ariadne's arm and tugged, firmly pushing her towards the back exit. She tried to wrench her arm out of his grip but he held tightly, his fingers pressing in painfully.
"Dom," she pleaded but he didn't hesitate, didn't even pause for breath until they were outside.
"Cobb? What took you so long? Where's--" Eames asked, glancing between Ariadne's furious silence and Cobb. "You didn't just leave him there."
"It was the only way we could avoid bloodshed," said Cobb.
Unlike Ariadne, Eames knew both Cobb and Arthur well enough to know that Arthur would unerringly choose the path with the least bloodshed, even if the blood was his own. He had been on a job with them in Mozambique where the mark had blockaded them in a cellar for eight days and Arthur had divided the rations in half, for Cobb and Eames, without mentioning that he was going without. They'd only found out when he passed out on the fifth day. So Eames knew that Arthur had a self-sacrificial streak in his makeup a mile wide.
So Eames didn't slap Cobb across the face and storm away.
Ariadne did, though.
* * * * *
When Eames set his mind to a task, he did it thoroughly and never wavered. When he devised his plan, he channeled all the anal-retentive point men he had ever worked with and color-coded that sucker. He had subclauses ("In the case of X, the team in question will do Y") and addenda ("The author of this document acknowledges that any and all of the participants have the right to abandon the mission in the case of X, Y, or Z"). He had to buy (steal: tomato, tomahto) a set of hi-liters to do it.
The important thing was that, when he arrived in Tokyo, he had a briefcase filled with alphabetized and color-coded folders.
He still hadn't really expected Saito to linger so long over the contents, spilling the folders across the broad mahogany meeting room table.
Eventually, Saito rested his chin on one of his fists and looked at Eames. The meeting room was filled with windows, only the transparency of glass marking the boundaries of the room, of the building itself. It shimmered in the midday light, bright and deceptively conspicuous. Saito suited this setting; he looked like a king on his throne. He carried his royalty in his shoulders, in the way he held himself, and refrained from more gaudy displays. The only token of his wealth that he wore on his person was the hint of a shimmer around his wrist from a gold cuff link.
"Are you aware of the implications of this proposal, Mr. Eames?" he asked.
Eames shifted uncomfortably under the careful gaze for a moment. Saito was watching him thoughtfully, a bit too knowingly, and Eames knew he was being measured. He was there to be judged so he let Saito look, despite the way the hairs on the back of his neck prickled.
"アーサーさんに借金している," he said finally. He knew he didn't speak the delicate formal Japanese Saito was lavished with everyday but these were special circumstances. He was willing to spill his scanty supply of Japanese for this cause. I owe Arthur a debt.
Saito raised an eyebrow ever-so-slightly and, after a moment's pause in which he searched Eames's face, he nodded.
"This is not a game, Mr. Eames. This is not," Saito smiled humorlessly, "a dream. Your actions have consequences. There will be inevitable repercussions."
"I am aware of that," Eames said.
"I cannot, in any official capacity, condone the course of action on which you are about to embark," Saito continued. Eames knew enough to be silent and wait out the beat that followed. "However, I can provide, in an unofficial capacity, some assistance."
"Thank you," said Eames, bowing his head slightly. His mother always told him, when in Rome...
Saito stood and held a hand out for Eames to shake. Eames took it, also standing.
"I am impressed, Mr. Eames," Saito said. "Impressed but not surprised."
"I pay my debts, Mr. Saito," said Eames carefully, letting the hand go. He was a con man through and through so his handshake was firm and trustworthy. No con-man worth his salt would have it otherwise. He buttoned his suit jacket.
Saito smiled for the first time then. "I am aware of your predilection for loyalty, Mr. Eames," he said.
Eames's brow furrowed and he felt that his reputation needed protecting. "It's not a question of loyalty--"
Saito waved his protestations away. "What is that American expression? 'I call a spade a spade.' That is how it goes, yes?"
"I wouldn't know."
"Nevertheless. My appraisal of your character is my own, formed from observation. I have done extensive character studies of all the people I have worked--" he paused significantly, a tacit referral to the Inception Project (as it was referred to by the dark underbelly of dream scientists and the gossips who comprised it) "--intimately with."
"Oh?" Eames said. He wanted to remain as neutral as possible, see what Saito was willing to offer him without bargaining more of himself than was necessary.
"It is a practice I have frequently been deeply thankful for."
Eames wasn't sure whether Saito was trying to threaten him or congratulate him for his perspicacity. The man was too used to speaking in careful circles to be easily understood. Eames preferred to speak in obliques, himself. He liked to have honesty just far enough away to keep his lies looking truthful.
"My motivation is entirely apparent," he said, careful to look Saito directly in the eye as he spoke. "Arthur is not guilty of a crime. We both know this."
"Do we? I thought truth was to be ascertained by the judgment of twelve of his fellow citizens. I thought we both knew that."
"The only thing Arthur is guilty of is misguided nobility."
"Be that as it may, I must officially condemn any scheme to undermine the criminal justice system of the United States of America. Flawed though it may be," Saito said smoothly, "any code of justice only functions as long as it is universal. The moment vigilantism is implemented is the moment in which tyranny is imminent."
"I know better," Eames insisted doggedly.
"Possibly. It is possible that I, too, know better." Saito sighed. "You are inadequately provided for your task, Mr. Eames. Your expertise will be useless, your sphere of acquaintance contains not a single person suited for the job at hand."
"I'm a fast learner."
"I do not doubt that. Nor do I doubt your courage or your enthusiasm. But I would like to keep my name out of your enterprise, in case of unforeseen complications."
"I understand."
Saito pulled a sheet paper, folded into a tiny and neat square. He placed it on the table beside them and tapped it once. He pointedly averted his gaze while Eames picked it up, unfolded it, and skimmed the list of figures. He looked up in surprise.
"All along, you knew you would--"
"I told you, Mr. Eames. I am interested in expanding my character study." Saito gestured towards the open door he was propping with his foot, allowing Eames to exit in front of him. "Tell Arthur I think chivalry is out-dated but admirable in a happy few."
Eames frowned. He wouldn't have described Arthur's surrender as chivalrous, per se. More like stupid.
* * * * *
Six months later, Eames was dressed in a guard's uniform and hiding behind a turn in a dreary hallway, sticking his fingers down his throat. It was disgusting but, he felt, a clever ruse. Also, he once saw it in a film. It was turning out that a ridiculous amount of his plan had been filched from various prison break television. He wondered whether prison security was comprised solely of people who had never seen Hustle and whether that wasn't a spectacular failure on their part.
His gag reflex was pretty stalwart so it took a few minutes. Eventually, he was able (his hands decked in blue latex) to pull a tiny key card, no longer than the first joint of his pinky finger, out of the mess at his feet. He tore open a handi-wipe with his teeth and wiped it down before hiding it in the palm of his hand, straightening up, and nonchalantly walking back down the corridor.
Arthur, like all mind-criminals, was kept in solitary confinement. The government wasn't entirely clear on its position on dream technology and definitely was unclear on the mechanics of it. This meant that they kept the convicted criminals in isolation. They seemed to hope that it would protect the other inmates from some sort of spontaneous dream-walking cooties. Eames wondered if this was what the Salem witch trials had looked like from the cells of the accused.
The hallway was a sterile and blinding white. There was enough distance between each cell that any one of the convicts could have screamed his throat ragged before a fellow inmate would have heard him. Eames had heard that they usually did scream, eventually, when they hadn't seen a human face for months and even sleep couldn't offer them a refuge. No guards saw the prisoner in person: their meals were delivered through a slot in the wall. For those whose occupations robbed them of the ability to dream, sleep was hardly a refuge. Each door was made of a simple steel, completely lacking adornment besides a small circular window at exactly eye-level. There weren't even numbers on the doors. Eames counted the doors as he passed them, turned, and counted down a second hallway.
He stopped eventually and swiped the tiny key card in the single access panel by the doorknob. Peering through the single porthole, he knocked.
"Housekeeping," he called.
"I'll have the salmon," Arthur said breezily, his voice muffled through the door. He was lying on the simple cot, his arms folded behind his head. His eyes were closed, though. He may have been meditating, Eames realized.
"You decent?" Eames said, swinging the door open. He would have bottled Arthur's expression if he could and taken it out to cheer him up on gloomy days.
"Eames?!"
"The one, the only, the best and brightest," Eames agreed. He unbuttoned his shirt and threw it at Arthur. "Put this on."
"I wish I had my die right now," Arthur said.
Eames fished it out of his pocket and tossed it to him. "I knew you'd say that," he said, beaming. "But really, darling, you'll have to lose the orange look. In your own time, of course."
Arthur ran a thumb along the grooves of one of the faces of the die, gingerly feeling the weight in the palm of his hand.
"Less gawping, more undressing," Eames insisted. He was pulling off the pants of the guard's uniform as he spoke, revealing the janitorial uniform he'd prepared underneath.
"You as a janitor. I definitely am not dreaming," Arthur said, wrinkling his nose. He shucked the orange jumpsuit and climbed into the guard's uniform almost too quickly for Eames to admire the view as it went speeding by.
Almost.
"Prison agrees with you," he said, smirking. "Brings out the color in your cheeks."
"Orange has always been my color," Arthur said sarcastically. "Was there an actual plan or did you just want to arrange a spontaneous Fall Prison fashion line?"
"Oh, I planned. I color-coded it."
Arthur looked like he wanted to say something but he just pursed his lips and followed as Eames sauntered into the hallway.
* * * * *
"Your plan ended in sewage," Arthur pointed out.
"I am aware of that," Eames said, pulling something that might have once been a banana peel out of his hair. It stuck firmly until it completely disengaged with a moist pop.
"I've laid out hundreds of heists," said Arthur. "All sorts, too. Jungles, deserts, fortresses, you name it. I once had to devise a way to get into and out of an ASPCA without being seen. With a cow. And yet, in all of my hundreds of plans, I never once included a sewage step."
"Like I always said, you lack imagination."
They continued in silence, interrupted by the eruptions of gas from around them and the scurrying squeak of vermin.
Ahead of them, exactly where Eames had known it would be, they began to see the glimmers of daylight through a grating. The grating itself was caked in the foulest of the refuse they had been trudging through and Eames had to smear it out of the way by the handful to find the lock.
"Oh god, there's a lock," said Arthur, looking over his shoulder.
"I know," Eames said, "Just give me a second." He pulled another handi-wipe out of his back pocket to wipe his hand on (not entirely successful, it turned out) before stuffing his fingers down his throat again.
"Your plans are disgusting," Arthur told him.
Eames retched a couple of times, finding the key eventually. "Effective, that's what you meant."
"No, I'm pretty sure I meant disgusting." Arthur looked utterly horrified as Eames fit the key into the lock. The grating swung outward and Eames stepped through, turning to offer Arthur a hand.
"Shall we?" he invited.
"I'm not touching you." Arthur gingerly moved Eames's proffered hand aside with his elbow, careful not to make any more contact than was absolutely necessary. It was a bit unfair considering the purple goo dribbling down Arthur's nose.
"This, right here," Eames said, annoyed, "is where you're supposed to swoon and call me your hero."
"Don't be ridiculous. You just vomited into your own hand."
"For you. I don't vomit into my own hand for just anyone, you know."
"Yes, because altruistic intent trumps vomiting into your hand," Arthur said and Eames thought maybe someone should cut off his subscriber status to sarcasm.
The sewer opened into a dusty basin, oozing into a nearly dry riverbed. Arthur shaded his eyes and looked outward, beyond the filthy streamlet to the wooded glen just beyond. It was a luscious green away from the sewage deposit they had just crawled out of.
Eames didn't have much more left in his plan. In its barest form, all his plan had been was 1) go to Arthur and 2) take Arthur away. There wasn't really a step for keeping him afterward or for where to put him so he would be safe from his stupidly noble and self-sacrificial instincts. The thought sat awkwardly at the back of his mind as he glanced at Arthur staring into the patch of green.
Eames swung the grating closed behind them and they made their way to the banks of the disgusting stream. It involved a lot of pushing shapeless and revolting blobs out of their way with their feet and not a lot of actual water. When they reached the bank, Arthur turned to Eames expectantly and wryly and Eames wondered whether that might have been why he did all of this bother in the first place. To have Arthur turn to him, just like that. Like he knew Eames would have a solution but didn't want to look like he even suspected it.
"Ye of little faith," Eames said reproachfully, shaking his dripping hair so that it splattered across Arthur's face in a rainbow of globules. Before Arthur had time to do anything besides splutter in disgusted rage, Eames was pulling a tarpaulin camouflaged with leaves and twigs from the back of a hidden car.
Arthur raised an eyebrow. Impressed.
The back seat was filled with buckets of water. Eames pulled one out by its handle and turned, grinning, to Arthur.
"Eames, you wouldn't--" Arthur started to say.
"This is my rescue, darling, and I make the rules," Eames crowed and tossed the entire contents at Arthur, the water arcing and twinkling in the air before it smacked Arthur.
Arthur spluttered and shook his head like a wet dog, sending specks of water flying around him. It was just a palliative--the globs of sewage clung to his clothes and hair but he looked (and smelled) slightly better.
Eames began to laugh even as Arthur pulled another bucket from the car. He approached Eames slowly, letting Eames watch warily as he slowly raised the bucket over his head. It wasn't the deluge Eames had just inflicted on Arthur: this was a slow stream, pouring down his neck.
The bucket's contents were expended but Arthur didn't move, his arms lifted above Eames's head, solid like branches, and their dripping faces inches away from each other.
"Thanks," said Arthur, quietly, his breath tangible against Eames's drenched cheek.
"Don't mention it," Eames said.
* * * * *
"Ah, Arthur, it's a pleasure to see you again," Saito said, clapping him on the shoulder.
When Saito hadn't been in his offices, they had known where to find him by looking for the sleekest restaurant in Tokyo, the one that kept celebrities waiting in a queue out the front door. When they found it, they'd simply dropped Saito's name to the hostess. Her eyes widened and the owner, miraculously appearing by Eames's shoulder, had shown them the way himself.
"I understand I owe my freedom, in part, to you," Arthur said stiffly. He didn't do gratitude with much grace.
"You must be mistaken. Mr. Eames, a pleasure to see you again as well."
Eames shook his hand and nodded, bending his head almost low enough to be a bow but not too overtly. Saito grinned broadly at them both and indicated the seats beside him. The fact that they were already filled didn't seem to bother him.
"Won't you join me, gentlemen?" he said magnanimously as the seats' previous occupants skittered away. "Tell me, what brings you to Tokyo?"
"Sightseeing," Eames said, giving Arthur a significant glance. Arthur frowned but allowed the pretense. He had insisted on coming the moment Eames had told him of Saito's involvement. Eames had followed aimlessly.
Arthur coughed. "I've always wanted to see Tokyo Tower."
"Have you? I wouldn't have credited you with such pedestrian tastes," said Saito. He held up his hand as if flagging a waiter though there were none within eyesight at the moment. One materialized within seconds, though.
"Drinks for my friends, Yuzuki." The girl bowed deeply and hurried away.
"I am in your debt, Saito, and I do not like to be in debt," said Arthur.
"It's remarkable that he should choose to use that particular turn of phrase, don't you think, Mr. Eames?" Saito said, turning to Eames. "It reminds me of something you once said."
"It is very similar," Eames agreed, neutrally.
"When Mr. Eames described the debt he felt towards you, you see," Saito said, turning again to Arthur, who was scowling at his folded hands, "I understood him to be expressing more than a simple remuneration for services rendered."
"You understood me correctly, then."
"As you say. Debt, Arthur, is not a question of finances between friends." Saito nodded as the waitress placed gorgeously lacquered cups of sake in front of them and retreated again. "The debt Mr. Eames described was a true debt. What you feel you owe me is...what is that saying? 'Water under the bridge.' That's it, isn't it?"
"Then you leave me with nothing to say but 'thank you,'" said Arthur, still frowning. He twisted the cup of sake in his hands.
"Alas, I cannot allow even so much. My participation was superficial. I believe you ought to further investigate the motives of your true savior," Saito said, raising the cup to his lips.
Eames smirked at Arthur behind Saito's head. Arthur grimaced at him.
"Eames knows I'm grateful," he told Saito.
"Youth. So rushed, so often mistaken," Saito said with a sigh. "I didn't tell you to investigate your own feelings, Arthur. I suggested you investigate his." He stood and patted Arthur on the back.
"蝸牛そろそろ登れ富士の山," he said.
Arthur's frown deepened. "I don't understand--" he started to say.
"It's a poem," Eames told him. "Issa, isn't it?" Saito nodded. "Snail, ever so slowly, climb Mt. Fuji."
"Precisely," said Saito. "Good night, gentlemen." He left them, calling out an instruction to the enthusiastic waitress that his guests were to be provided with whatever they wanted.
"Since when do you recognize Japanese poets by quotation?" asked Arthur, authentically curious.
Eames shrugged. "There was this girl in a pub," he said, grinning around the edge of his sake cup.
Arthur threw his head back and laughed.
* * * * *
They waited by large window in the airport, watching the plodding airplanes being towed back and forth and the scurrying people with orange-striped vests gesticulating at them. It was a gloomy day, drizzling faintly. An early morning fog was sticking to the pavement.
Arthur was back in pinstripes and a crisp Oxford, full-Windsor spotless against the lilac shirt. He was grimacing at the orange stripes of the ground crew below them, out the window.
Eames smiled because of course the trauma Arthur would take away from prison was a loathing for all orange clothing.
"Why did you do it?" Arthur asked, suddenly, and Eames realized Arthur had stopped watching the crew below and was looking at him instead. Right into his eyes.
"Rescue you like the prince in a fairy story?" Eames grinned. "I would have thought that was obvious: I am a prince from a fairy story."
"But, really," Arthur pressed, "it's not like it's to your financial benefit. We don't even work together all that often. And if you needed me for a job, you'd have already said."
"Excellent point."
"So I don't see the gain, that's all."
"The 'gain,' darling?"
"What you gain from all this. What made all the planning and hiding the car and trudging through sewage and vomiting in your hand--"
"Twice."
"--vomiting in your hand twice worth it." Arthur rubbed his neck.
"Don't you?" asked Eames carefully.
"Not unless you--unless you--for me," Arthur said, helplessly. "Did you--was it--was I what you wanted?"
"I told Saito I owed you a debt," Eames said. "But he was right. I didn't actually care about that." He stepped closer to Arthur, sliding a hand around his hip. "You should know: I think I'd follow you anywhere."
"You--you followed me? To prison?" Arthur cupped Eames's cheek delicately, like he thought he might dissipate. They were both leaning towards each other slowly, like planets being pulled in by gravity.
"Of course I did, pet," he said. But their mouths had met by the last word and it got lost between the press of their lips.
"Next time, I'm planning the escape route," Arthur said, pulling back. "Without the sewage."
"Details, details," said Eames.
"No, really, when I break you out of prison, you'll see what a real escape plan looks like. Some people can manage it without vomiting."
"You're just jealous that you can't regurgitate helpful household items," Eames said.
But the implicit promise, the next time, hovered in the air between them. Arthur offered it, Eames accepted it.
* * * * *
蝸牛そろそろ登れ富士の山
Snail, ever so slowly, climb Mt. Fuji.
Issa.