Requiescat, pt. one
Title: Requiescat
Pairing: Arthur/Eames, Eames/Neil
Words: ~4800
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: Language, sex, dub-con(?), potential triggers
Summary: The death of Neil McCormick was gradual, not sudden, and not permanent by any means. In the end, Arthur goes much more quickly.
Author's Note: ...idek. This idea incepted me and I had to cringe my way through it. I make no promises with this fic! It's one of the trickiest things I've ever had to write, and by that I mean it's terribly awkward and ... yeah. NO PROMISES.
This is a Mysterious Skin crossover, though it isn't necessary to have seen the movie. I hope.
part two, part three, part four, part five, part six, part seven, part eight.
The death of Neil McCormick was gradual, not sudden, and not permanent by any means. In the end, Arthur goes much more quickly.
+++
When he first wakes up, he feels like he's been sleeping for a hundred years or something. Or like he hasn't been sleeping at all, because he feels exhausted down to his very bones, and unusually heavy-limbed.
I've been drugged, he thinks. Calm.
“You awake?” a voice drawls to his left, and the backs of his eyelids flicker red-black as though someone is waving a hand in front of his face.
He opens his eyes a little. He's slouched in an armchair and his sleeves are rolled up. There's a cuff wrapped around one wrist, and attached to the cuff, an IV line which trails all the way out from a fancy-looking metal machine on the floor and ends buried in his arm. A needle.
Okay.
He raises his eyes to his companion, a sort of unkempt-looking guy with scrutinizing blue-green eyes. Sort of his type.
The man's face relaxes with relief.
“Good,” he says. He has an English accent. He starts to unwrap the cuff and pulls the needle out. “Thought I'd lost you for a sec down there, Arthur. What were you thinking?”
And he's talking to Neil.
Neil whose name isn't Arthur.
He glances around the room, just to make sure English isn't talking to someone else. They're alone. It's a hotel room, which doesn't come as a great surprise.
Neil takes stock slowly and with a great amount of composure. He's alone with this man, who is bigger than him. He's just been drugged, with something that sounds potent, and dangerously so. And whatever it is, it's hit his memory like a wrecking ball, leaving tiny shards behind -- glimpses of blurs, the briefest impressions of the last several days -- no, months of his life, at least. He doesn't know what city he's in. He doesn't remember this man. He certainly doesn't remember putting on these clothes.
And that's the biggest puzzle of all: that his clothes are still on.
“Here, look at me.” English has just packed away the metal machine into a shiny briefcase and returned to crouch in front of him. He takes Neil by the chin. Neil doesn't bristle at this offense, just gazes back at him steadily. “Arthur? Are you okay?”
Neil thinks about that.
“I need water,” he says.
English stares back at him for another few seconds. Neil can't read his expression.
“You mustn't think I'll judge you, you know,” he says finally. “For whatever was down there.”
There's nothing Neil can say to that, so he doesn't. Eventually, English blinks, looks away and sighs.
“Come on,” he says. “Let's get some food and water in you, then. You look pale.”
Neil could run. He's probably faster than this guy.
But he doesn't run, and when he gets up, he realizes that that isn't actually a viable option anyway. His knees shake and the room tips, and blood rushes to his head. Everything goes dark and cold and tingling for a moment and when he blinks, the other man has wrapped a strong hand around his arm to hold him up.
“Steady,” he says, all concern. Concerned and English.
“I'm okay,” says Neil, but he doesn't stand upright on his own. He waits for the man to let him go and then he straightens up.
English leads him out with a hand hovering at the small of his back, not even touching. Neil notices one more strange thing, just before they leave the room. There's two beds.
+++
If anyone in the business, apart from the two of them, was asked who the most lethal pair in the dream-share world is, the answer would not be Cobb and Arthur -- who are, admittedly, a formidable team -- but Arthur and Eames.
It makes sense on an objective level; after all, they are both the best at what they do, they both have a military background and combat training, they both manipulate and experiment with the dream world freely and expertly. But mainly, it's the fact that anyone who has worked with them can see that they have a fierce chemistry, a working symmetry that borders on an ability to read the other's mind. They snipe and bicker like cats and dogs when conscious, but in the dreamscape, they complement each other like fire and ice.
They don't think about this.
All the same, when all is said and done, when Cobb walks through immigration at LAX a free man, and Robert Fischer leaves the airport shaking his head wonderingly and talking into his cell phone, Arthur turns around at baggage claim and meets Eames' eyes -- Eames, waiting for him -- and it seems only logical that they leave together.
That's how they end up traveling the world together for the next year, sometimes working odd extraction jobs, mostly burning away their money with expensive hotels and foods and destinations. There's always plenty more money where that came from. They oscillate restlessly, playing pretend at this retirement thing for awhile, always going back to the job when they've had enough of luxury. Home will always be a grimy warehouse, a second-rate motel, with research for the tackling and an oblivious mark walking the streets like prey just for them.
They're in Sydney, on an off period, when Arthur walks into their shared hotel room one night, and Eames is drowsing catlike across Arthur's bed, the bed that is Arthur's. He does these things, little things, to get a rise out of Arthur, rattle his cage a bit. He never pushes Arthur out of his comfort zone -- he baits and teases him out.
Arthur doesn't rise to the bait on this night. Another night, maybe he'd indulge Eames, throw a pillow at his head, let him crack his jokes about beds and sharing (and them, breathing each other's air all night, just steps away from one another in the dark, so wretchedly, horribly close like there's nothing wrong with that, like they couldn't afford their own fucking rooms), but -- not tonight. He goes into the bathroom.
That's where Eames will find him a minute later, because he doesn't shut the door. He's running the tap noisily. The blood from his knuckles makes the water run pink and he hisses, shutting his eyes against the sting.
Eames enters with a yawn, rumpling up his hair with one hand.
“Been gone long enough, haven't you? Hey--” He stops short, standing in the bathroom doorframe. “What've you done to yourself, Arthur?”
“A fight,” Arthur says. His split lip stings.
“Let me guess, I should see the other guy? Let's have a look at you, then.”
He starts forward but Arthur hunches his shoulders and pulls back. He doesn't want to be touched.
“Just - just stay there,” he says thickly. “I'm fine.”
“How did you end up in a fight, anyway?”
“I don't know.” Arthur shakes his head restlessly, even though he knows, he knows, it's that wildfire burn that takes him over and tells him he needs to fuck or fight someone; it's happened before, an itch in his brain like someone else's idea. “Just tell me what you learned.”
Eames eyes him, obviously troubled, but not wanting to push the issue. “Well, nothing's really changed since our last check-up. Fischer seems fine. His new corporation is -- oh, that's fine, just strip off in front of me, I don't mind.” He moves to the side of the doorframe, out of sight, grumbling. “I'll just lock the door in case Ariadne hears the sound of your belt buckle hitting the floor all the way from Paris and comes running.”
Arthur steps out of his boxers and turns on the shower, stepping under the spray before the water has even adjusted from cold to warm. He tilts back his face and lets the water wash away the blood that's crusting over his lip, under his nose, in his hair.
“Keep going.”
“Well, it's like I said, isn't it? No changes. Seems happy enough. He should've paid us to do the inception job on him, really, I think he's better off now than he--”
That's when there's a dull thud and Eames stops speaking. He reappears in the door.
“Oh, Arthur ...”
Arthur is on his knees, head in his hands, lukewarm water cascading over him and spilling through his hair onto his face. He can't say what's made him fall to his knees, or curl over into his hands; just that before he knows it, he's sobbing: hard, wracking sobs that shake his whole body violently.
Eames' voice drops even lower than it is normally as he approaches, a tone Arthur's sure he's never heard before.
“Arthur, don't cry, pet. It's alright. Please don't cry, darling. I'm here. Okay? I'm here. It's alright.”
Arthur shakes his head, trying to twist away, trying to force his throat to form an apology, and he can't do either. He doesn't understand. He can't remember the last time in his life he cried like this. He's crumbling inside and sobbing and sobbing and he doesn't know why, he doesn't know.
Eames gets down on one knee next to the shower stall and lays a hand on his shoulder, reaching up with his other to grab a towel.
“I've got you now.” He leans in and turns off the faucet, leaving Arthur shivering on the damp tile, and sweeps the towel around him. “I've got you. Shush, you're okay. Everything's okay. Come on, then, whoops -- up we get, sweetheart -- there's a good boy. C'mere, come over to the toilet now, before you--”
He manouvres Arthur over to the toilet an instant before Arthur collapses to his knees again and starts vomiting over the rim of the porcelain bowl. Everything comes up in huge, heaving retches -- so hard his stomach muscles clench and burn -- right down to the acids in his stomach; and he's still heaving, so hard he thinks he might just turn himself inside out. It's like a worm in his gut, writhing and burrowing, and he has to get it out, make it stop, God, please. Eames' hand rubs steady circles over his back and occasionally pushes strands of hair off his forehead.
Finally it stops. His stomach has squeezed every last ounce of its juices through his scalded throat. He can let his searing abdomen ease a little. He remains scrunched over the bowl, gasping for breath, vision blurred with tears. He's shivering and sweating as though with fever.
“Good, Arthur, it's okay,” Eames murmurs right behind him. He leans over and flushes the toilet. “You're okay. Feel better?”
Arthur shakes his head numbly.
“Something's wrong with me,” he whispers. His mouth feels wet with saliva but he doesn't want to spit.
“Let's get you in bed,” Eames says.
Arthur has only blurred impressions of what happens after that. Eames helps him get up, grabs another towel and helps dry him off. He gets something out of his suitcase, and makes Arthur sit on the toilet so he can examine each of the cuts and scrapes on Arthur's face and dab something on them that makes them sting anew. He puts a small bandage on the cut above Arthur's eyebrow and leads him to bed; grabs Arthur's pyjama pants and shirt and helps dress him, like he's an invalid. He does all of these things automatically and without fuss, and Arthur falls totally pliant under Eames' guiding hands, exhausted from crying.
“I'm sorry,” he says weakly, embarrassed, after Eames brings him a glass of water to wash away the acrid taste of bile. “I don't know why... God, I'm sorry, Eames.”
“Never mind,” says Eames bracingly. “It's not as though you ever remember these episodes in the morning, anyway.”
Arthur's head pulses dully on one side. The beginnings of a violent migraine. He swallows and tries to push it away, gathering his thoughts.
“This has happened before?”
Eames nods with a small, sad, lopsided smile. “I shudder to think what you do with yourself when I'm not here to put you back to sorts. Lie on the floor and puke till you pass out, I shouldn't wonder.”
“How often?” Arthur's head spins wonderingly.
“Maybe once or twice over the past year, a couple times on jobs before then, that I know of. Here, by the way.” Eames drops a pill into the palm of his hand. “For the migraine. It'll come on within an hour or so. You're going to throw up again and you'll be in some pain, but it'll have eased up by morning.”
Arthur believes him. He swallows the pill.
Something is wrong with him.
It's a worm writhing in his gut. It's a rat coiled in the circuitry of his brain, gnawing at the wiring. Something is wrong with him.
“What's happening to me, Eames?”
“Nothing is happening to you.” Eames' voice is sure and comforting. “You've just been working too hard. We only just finished the Kwon job. You need some rest and relaxation, that's all.”
That isn't it. Arthur knows that isn't it, because whatever it is, it's pushing at the base of his brain like a body buried under the floorboards, struggling back to life. It claws and scrapes weakly and though he tries to remember, it frightens him terribly. He's terrified to look at it face-on.
He does not like this feeling of being frightened. It makes him feel even worse.
“Don't let me forget, this time,” he tells Eames. “Something's wrong with me. I need to know what.”
Eames looks sceptical. “You need to sleep, Arthur.”
“No. That's not ...” But he is tired. He is.
“I'll take care of you,” says Eames.
This situation is absurd. He's being nursed by Eames, for God's sake -- Eames who drives him mental, his part-time colleague and full-time annoyance. He's shocked that the forger hasn't even taken advantage of the situation to tease or provoke him in some way. Eames is always teasing, always pushing his boundaries, always touching and flirting and riling Arthur up till he can't take it. This nurturing side of Eames is one he hasn't seen before, and it makes him uncomfortable to be caught in such a vulnerable state, but there's nothing he can do except quickly roll his die when Eames leaves the room to refill his glass with fresh water. It lands reality-up.
That means there's no reason why Arthur shouldn't remember this in the morning, but he's scared anyway.
“Don't let me forget,” he tells Eames again later when he's hunched over on the edge of the bed, heel of his palm pressing into one eye, half-blind now and sick from the migraine.
“I won't,” Eames sighs.
In the morning Arthur feels like he's woken up with the world's worst hangover. Knives in his head. It's terrible. He tries to vomit into the toilet and can't because there's nothing to bring up. He gags.
Eames watches silently from the door of the bathroom.
Arthur coughs uselessly, and without looking at him, says, “What did you find out about Fischer?”
“Nothing's changed,” says Eames. “Fischer's doing fine. His new corporation is on its feet and doing well so far by all accounts.”
“Good.” Arthur bows his head till it's resting on the cold rim of the toilet bowl. He can't even bring himself to care about hygiene. He feels wrecked. “That's good.”
Eames walks in and drops a couple small pills on the tile for him. He leaves the bathroom without saying anything more.
+++
Neil knows what year it is. His own reflection doesn't shock him, the first time he looks in a mirror. His last clear memory must be from almost ten years ago, but it's not like he's blinked his eyes and landed in the present. He knows time has passed -- his body knows, at least.
He just can't fill in all the gaps.
He learns his companion's name when they come back from their meal, because his cell phone rings and he picks it up and answers it, “Eames.”
They're in Rome. Neil stares out the window. Pigeons flap past their hotel. The streets are all narrow, just like the squashed little cars, and everything is made of stone. Stone roads. Stone buildings. It's alien and exciting.
“Yes, we tried out the new chemicals a few hours ago,” the other guy is saying behind him, into his phone. “Yes, I'd say they're bloody strong enough. Things nearly went pear-shaped for a minute there. But -- no, we're okay, no lasting damage. Well, I'm fine. Arthur's still a bit out of it, but he's a runt, I expect the dosage hit him harder.”
Neil glances around in time to see Eames wink at him. He smirks back.
“Anyway, the kicks worked fine. Yes. All the way down. ... Any time, Yusuf. By that I of course mean find another bloody guinea pig next time, yeah?” He chuckles. “Excuses, excuses. I think you just like to make poor Arthur and I suffer. I'll call you again tomorrow to let you know if we've lost all our hair overnight or anything. Right. Talk to you soon.”
There's a lot to be surmised from this half of the conversation, namely that Neil's been shot up with some previously-untested drug like a lab rat to gather data. He wonders, bemusedly, when he stopped selling his body for sex and started selling it for science. There's something sneaky and illicit about all of this.
Maybe he's been under the influence of drugs for years and years, held hostage, and now he's finally lucid again.
Which means that he needs to seize his chance before he's shot up again.
It's getting dark. Neil leans away from the window. Eames is reading a book on one of the double beds by lamplight.
He flips a page and, without looking up, says, “You've been awfully quiet today, darling.”
“Side effects,” says Neil, his gaze creeping all across the room. “I'm gonna shower.”
“Sure,” says Eames.
Neil crosses the room silently and shuts the bathroom door without locking it. For the first time he looks, really looks at his reflection. He cleans up really well and it makes him feel uncomfortable and fake. His hair's all slicked back, not falling messily around his face. His clothing is crisp and pressed and not rumpled or wrinkled anywhere. His reflection isn't a shock, but he has an image of himself in his head, and this isn't it. It's a little like looking at a stranger.
He sheds his clothing piece by piece until he's standing naked in front of the mirror. He tilts his head, examines himself. This is more familiar. This feels right. He considers his slim, runner's frame, attractively defined with muscle. He has scars he doesn't remember getting, but he likes them. He grasps his penis, weighing it in one hand, and lets go. He has no bruises anywhere on his body.
He takes a long time showering, because he can't believe how tense his body is. It's like someone's spent years coiling him up like a giant steel spring. His muscles are all locked up and taut, and the hot water barely eases them. He groans when he manages to relax a little, bit by bit. What's he been doing to himself for ten years? He wishes the new scars could tell him their stories.
It's a nice hotel; the hot water lasts an impressively long time. Neil feigns deafness when Eames starts knocking on the bathroom door.
Then he hears the door open.
“Arthur! Did you drown in there, or what? I need the toilet.”
Neil nearly inhales a lungful of water. His reaction is purely instinct-based.
“Fuck's sake!” he spits, furious, at the shower curtain between them. “Get the fuck out!”
“Christ, sorry.” Just before the door closes, he hears Eames add something that sounds like, “Good to see you're back to normal.”
The bathroom door clicks shut. Neil has to glance around the curtain just to make sure Eames is really gone.
He's surprised at himself. He feels uncharacteristically rattled and shook up. The warm water is like needles on his skin now, not soothing, but twisting his muscles to their former tension all over again. He hunches, bows his head under the spray, and finally has to give up because he's afraid he might puke if he stands under that showerhead for another second.
What's wrong with me? he wonders blankly. He doesn't even know who he is.
No. He's Neil McCormick.
He knows who Neil McCormick is.
He leaves the bathroom wearing a towel draped loosely around his hips. Eames doesn't look at him on his way to the bathroom. While he's in there, Neil goes over to the bed that must be his and pulls out a suitcase from underneath it. He spends a minute pawing through its few contents. It's almost all clothing. Neatly folded, clean, uncomfortable-looking clothing. Layers. Not a t-shirt in sight. He shakes his head, confused. If this is some weird roleplay, he can't figure out the game. He deliberately starts combing his fingers through his hair, leaving it damp and straggly, soft and curling around his face, the way it should be.
+
Neil is restless and predatory. He settles himself astride Eames' hips in the middle of the night.
Eames snuffles awake from a light sleep, reaching up to his pillow before stopping himself.
“What?” he says, confused. “Arthur?”
Neil presses a hand to his bare chest. His skin is burning hot. The bedsheets separate them where Neil is sitting on him.
“Eames,” he says, tasting the word experimentally.
“What?” says Eames again. He squints in the dark. “Are you alright?”
Neil nods. Smiling, he bows over and kisses Eames on the lips. Licks his way into the other man's mouth with deliberate and sensual sweeps of the tongue. Eames groans, just slightly, and starts to push him away.
“Arthur,” he says, and he sounds, inexplicably, helpless and pleading. “Not that I don't want -- and I want, you know that -- but what are you doing? Why -- why now, what's the matter?”
“I want you,” says Neil. He grabs Eames' hand, the one he used to push Neil back, and brings it to the crotch of his boxers. “Feel that?” he asks. “Feel how fucking hard I am for you?”
Eames breathes out shakily and runs his palm up and down the hard line of the material, like he can't quite help himself.
“What did you see down there today?” he murmurs, so softly he might just be asking himself.
Neil pulls the bedcovers down, all the way, under his knees and over Eames'. Eames is wearing boxers, like him. He's already halfway to hard. Neil strokes a hand down the seam on the outside of his thigh and looks up at his eyes, waiting. Eames exhales roughly again, smiles crookedly.
“Did you leave all your inhibitions in the dreamscape today, darling?”
“I can get a lot more uninhibited than this,” says Neil flatly.
With a sudden growl, Eames' fingers are at the waistband of his boxers, tugging them down, over Neil's thighs, and Neil has to wriggle around on his knees to lose them completely. Eames grips his arms and rolls, flattening him over the bed and kissing him, and Neil almost laughs aloud.
“Just tell me why,” Eames says, stopping, gripping him tight.
“Today,” says Neil, cocksure and alive again, alive and in love with life, “I had a revelation.”
“You should have revelations more often.”
Neil twists out from under him, shimmies down the bed and drags Eames' boxers off. He wraps his lips around the other man's cock and sucks him. Moans for him. Jerks him with one hand and laves the head expertly with his tongue. Eames sucks in a sharp breath.
“Jesus, Arthur--”
He pulls off and starts sucking two of his own fingers, instead, sloppily. When they're slick and wet with saliva, he reaches down and pushes a finger into himself. The sudden intrusion is almost breathtakingly uncomfortable. He twists his hand and presses the second digit in, too, working himself open while Eames watches him, transfixed.
When Neil loses patience with himself, he pushes Eames over and straddles him again. Eames' hands fly up to his hips as Neil braces himself on his knees, gripping Eames' cock between his legs, and guides the head in.
“God,” Eames groans as Neil envelops him, his head falling back onto the pillow.
Neil pushes down onto him steadily, taking inch by inch of him. It feels strange to feel so full of someone else; a fullness he feels all the way up to his teeth. Eames is big. Neil can't believe how painfully stretched he is around him. How long has it been since he was last fucked?
He doesn't stop till he's taken all of Eames in and feels like he can barely breathe. He takes a second and then lifts himself on his knees, till Eames' cock has almost slipped out of his ass; then he drops his weight and slams back down. He doesn't set himself a gentle pace. He fucks himself on Eames' cock roughly, and the burn and ache makes him feel so alive.
“Arthur,” Eames says, strangled.
“You feel so fuckin' good in me,” Neil mumbles, nails digging red crescents into Eames' chest. He keeps up the rhythm he's set and grins, crooked, when Eames raises a hand to drag his fingers through Neil's messy hair. Eames is rocking his hips up to meet him, now, pushing in that last couple centimetres each time, making Neil give a low gasp. “Does that feel good?”
“You have no idea, darling,” Eames laughs, voice strained and choked and breathless.
Neil's breath leaves him in steady huffs as he shoves himself onto Eames' cock, again and again. Eames' hand leaves his hip and slides to his inner thigh, and then inward, pressing with his thumb at where they join, feeling how Neil's tight ring of muscle stretches and strains to take him in. He's watching, watching the way his cock pumps in and out of Neil's hole, and the knowledge gives Neil electrifying thrills.
Finally, Eames slides his hand up to Neil's cock and starts jerking him off, his hand smooth and gentling in spite of the rough way Neil drives himself down onto Eames. Neil tips his head back and doesn't make a sound except for harsh, shaky breaths as he comes, spilling himself over Eames' hand and chest.
His thighs are quivering and aching now but he keeps going, pleasure ripping jaggedly through him with every upward thrust of Eames' hips. Eames swipes a thumb through the come on his chest, stares at it like he doesn't even believe what he's seeing. Neil takes his wrist and lifts his hand till his thumb is pressing at Neil's lips. He licks, swipes his tongue over Eames' thumb and then takes it into his mouth, sucking and licking away every last bitter trace of himself, teeth gently scraping the pad of Eames' thumb.
Watching, Eames' other hand suddenly tightens on his thigh and his hips stutter, and he's coming inside Neil in hot, wet spurts, with a drawn-out groan.
“Arthur,” he manages hoarsely, slumping back against the bed, “fuck ...”
Neil climbs off him, legs shaky. While Eames leans over to grab the bedsheets, wipe off his hand and chest, Neil reaches behind him quickly to press a finger to his hole. Eames' come is in him. He forgot a condom. Again. Fuck.
“You're amazing,” Eames mutters, pulling Neil down into a kiss.
Neil relaxes. He smiles lazily, eyes half-closed.
“You too,” he says quietly.
“You talk with an accent when you fuck,” Eames says thoughtfully, after a few minutes.
“So do you,” says Neil, and Eames laughs, obviously drowsy now.
“It's a little Southern. It's cute. I didn't know ...” He falls silent for a minute, eyes closing. Drifting off. “Something's different about you today.”
“Go to sleep,” says Neil.
Eames does, quite soon after that. As soon as he's out, Neil gets up. He goes through Eames' suitcase and picks out a pair of slacks and a shirt, both loose on him but probably more comfortable than anything in his own suitcase. He finds Eames' wallet, rifles through it and takes all the cash, though everything else is left alone. He leaves Eames asleep on the bed, and walks out the door. This is what Neil McCormick does.
This is what Neil McCormick is.
next part
Pairing: Arthur/Eames, Eames/Neil
Words: ~4800
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: Language, sex, dub-con(?), potential triggers
Summary: The death of Neil McCormick was gradual, not sudden, and not permanent by any means. In the end, Arthur goes much more quickly.
Author's Note: ...idek. This idea incepted me and I had to cringe my way through it. I make no promises with this fic! It's one of the trickiest things I've ever had to write, and by that I mean it's terribly awkward and ... yeah. NO PROMISES.
This is a Mysterious Skin crossover, though it isn't necessary to have seen the movie. I hope.
part two, part three, part four, part five, part six, part seven, part eight.
The death of Neil McCormick was gradual, not sudden, and not permanent by any means. In the end, Arthur goes much more quickly.
+++
When he first wakes up, he feels like he's been sleeping for a hundred years or something. Or like he hasn't been sleeping at all, because he feels exhausted down to his very bones, and unusually heavy-limbed.
I've been drugged, he thinks. Calm.
“You awake?” a voice drawls to his left, and the backs of his eyelids flicker red-black as though someone is waving a hand in front of his face.
He opens his eyes a little. He's slouched in an armchair and his sleeves are rolled up. There's a cuff wrapped around one wrist, and attached to the cuff, an IV line which trails all the way out from a fancy-looking metal machine on the floor and ends buried in his arm. A needle.
Okay.
He raises his eyes to his companion, a sort of unkempt-looking guy with scrutinizing blue-green eyes. Sort of his type.
The man's face relaxes with relief.
“Good,” he says. He has an English accent. He starts to unwrap the cuff and pulls the needle out. “Thought I'd lost you for a sec down there, Arthur. What were you thinking?”
And he's talking to Neil.
Neil whose name isn't Arthur.
He glances around the room, just to make sure English isn't talking to someone else. They're alone. It's a hotel room, which doesn't come as a great surprise.
Neil takes stock slowly and with a great amount of composure. He's alone with this man, who is bigger than him. He's just been drugged, with something that sounds potent, and dangerously so. And whatever it is, it's hit his memory like a wrecking ball, leaving tiny shards behind -- glimpses of blurs, the briefest impressions of the last several days -- no, months of his life, at least. He doesn't know what city he's in. He doesn't remember this man. He certainly doesn't remember putting on these clothes.
And that's the biggest puzzle of all: that his clothes are still on.
“Here, look at me.” English has just packed away the metal machine into a shiny briefcase and returned to crouch in front of him. He takes Neil by the chin. Neil doesn't bristle at this offense, just gazes back at him steadily. “Arthur? Are you okay?”
Neil thinks about that.
“I need water,” he says.
English stares back at him for another few seconds. Neil can't read his expression.
“You mustn't think I'll judge you, you know,” he says finally. “For whatever was down there.”
There's nothing Neil can say to that, so he doesn't. Eventually, English blinks, looks away and sighs.
“Come on,” he says. “Let's get some food and water in you, then. You look pale.”
Neil could run. He's probably faster than this guy.
But he doesn't run, and when he gets up, he realizes that that isn't actually a viable option anyway. His knees shake and the room tips, and blood rushes to his head. Everything goes dark and cold and tingling for a moment and when he blinks, the other man has wrapped a strong hand around his arm to hold him up.
“Steady,” he says, all concern. Concerned and English.
“I'm okay,” says Neil, but he doesn't stand upright on his own. He waits for the man to let him go and then he straightens up.
English leads him out with a hand hovering at the small of his back, not even touching. Neil notices one more strange thing, just before they leave the room. There's two beds.
+++
If anyone in the business, apart from the two of them, was asked who the most lethal pair in the dream-share world is, the answer would not be Cobb and Arthur -- who are, admittedly, a formidable team -- but Arthur and Eames.
It makes sense on an objective level; after all, they are both the best at what they do, they both have a military background and combat training, they both manipulate and experiment with the dream world freely and expertly. But mainly, it's the fact that anyone who has worked with them can see that they have a fierce chemistry, a working symmetry that borders on an ability to read the other's mind. They snipe and bicker like cats and dogs when conscious, but in the dreamscape, they complement each other like fire and ice.
They don't think about this.
All the same, when all is said and done, when Cobb walks through immigration at LAX a free man, and Robert Fischer leaves the airport shaking his head wonderingly and talking into his cell phone, Arthur turns around at baggage claim and meets Eames' eyes -- Eames, waiting for him -- and it seems only logical that they leave together.
That's how they end up traveling the world together for the next year, sometimes working odd extraction jobs, mostly burning away their money with expensive hotels and foods and destinations. There's always plenty more money where that came from. They oscillate restlessly, playing pretend at this retirement thing for awhile, always going back to the job when they've had enough of luxury. Home will always be a grimy warehouse, a second-rate motel, with research for the tackling and an oblivious mark walking the streets like prey just for them.
They're in Sydney, on an off period, when Arthur walks into their shared hotel room one night, and Eames is drowsing catlike across Arthur's bed, the bed that is Arthur's. He does these things, little things, to get a rise out of Arthur, rattle his cage a bit. He never pushes Arthur out of his comfort zone -- he baits and teases him out.
Arthur doesn't rise to the bait on this night. Another night, maybe he'd indulge Eames, throw a pillow at his head, let him crack his jokes about beds and sharing (and them, breathing each other's air all night, just steps away from one another in the dark, so wretchedly, horribly close like there's nothing wrong with that, like they couldn't afford their own fucking rooms), but -- not tonight. He goes into the bathroom.
That's where Eames will find him a minute later, because he doesn't shut the door. He's running the tap noisily. The blood from his knuckles makes the water run pink and he hisses, shutting his eyes against the sting.
Eames enters with a yawn, rumpling up his hair with one hand.
“Been gone long enough, haven't you? Hey--” He stops short, standing in the bathroom doorframe. “What've you done to yourself, Arthur?”
“A fight,” Arthur says. His split lip stings.
“Let me guess, I should see the other guy? Let's have a look at you, then.”
He starts forward but Arthur hunches his shoulders and pulls back. He doesn't want to be touched.
“Just - just stay there,” he says thickly. “I'm fine.”
“How did you end up in a fight, anyway?”
“I don't know.” Arthur shakes his head restlessly, even though he knows, he knows, it's that wildfire burn that takes him over and tells him he needs to fuck or fight someone; it's happened before, an itch in his brain like someone else's idea. “Just tell me what you learned.”
Eames eyes him, obviously troubled, but not wanting to push the issue. “Well, nothing's really changed since our last check-up. Fischer seems fine. His new corporation is -- oh, that's fine, just strip off in front of me, I don't mind.” He moves to the side of the doorframe, out of sight, grumbling. “I'll just lock the door in case Ariadne hears the sound of your belt buckle hitting the floor all the way from Paris and comes running.”
Arthur steps out of his boxers and turns on the shower, stepping under the spray before the water has even adjusted from cold to warm. He tilts back his face and lets the water wash away the blood that's crusting over his lip, under his nose, in his hair.
“Keep going.”
“Well, it's like I said, isn't it? No changes. Seems happy enough. He should've paid us to do the inception job on him, really, I think he's better off now than he--”
That's when there's a dull thud and Eames stops speaking. He reappears in the door.
“Oh, Arthur ...”
Arthur is on his knees, head in his hands, lukewarm water cascading over him and spilling through his hair onto his face. He can't say what's made him fall to his knees, or curl over into his hands; just that before he knows it, he's sobbing: hard, wracking sobs that shake his whole body violently.
Eames' voice drops even lower than it is normally as he approaches, a tone Arthur's sure he's never heard before.
“Arthur, don't cry, pet. It's alright. Please don't cry, darling. I'm here. Okay? I'm here. It's alright.”
Arthur shakes his head, trying to twist away, trying to force his throat to form an apology, and he can't do either. He doesn't understand. He can't remember the last time in his life he cried like this. He's crumbling inside and sobbing and sobbing and he doesn't know why, he doesn't know.
Eames gets down on one knee next to the shower stall and lays a hand on his shoulder, reaching up with his other to grab a towel.
“I've got you now.” He leans in and turns off the faucet, leaving Arthur shivering on the damp tile, and sweeps the towel around him. “I've got you. Shush, you're okay. Everything's okay. Come on, then, whoops -- up we get, sweetheart -- there's a good boy. C'mere, come over to the toilet now, before you--”
He manouvres Arthur over to the toilet an instant before Arthur collapses to his knees again and starts vomiting over the rim of the porcelain bowl. Everything comes up in huge, heaving retches -- so hard his stomach muscles clench and burn -- right down to the acids in his stomach; and he's still heaving, so hard he thinks he might just turn himself inside out. It's like a worm in his gut, writhing and burrowing, and he has to get it out, make it stop, God, please. Eames' hand rubs steady circles over his back and occasionally pushes strands of hair off his forehead.
Finally it stops. His stomach has squeezed every last ounce of its juices through his scalded throat. He can let his searing abdomen ease a little. He remains scrunched over the bowl, gasping for breath, vision blurred with tears. He's shivering and sweating as though with fever.
“Good, Arthur, it's okay,” Eames murmurs right behind him. He leans over and flushes the toilet. “You're okay. Feel better?”
Arthur shakes his head numbly.
“Something's wrong with me,” he whispers. His mouth feels wet with saliva but he doesn't want to spit.
“Let's get you in bed,” Eames says.
Arthur has only blurred impressions of what happens after that. Eames helps him get up, grabs another towel and helps dry him off. He gets something out of his suitcase, and makes Arthur sit on the toilet so he can examine each of the cuts and scrapes on Arthur's face and dab something on them that makes them sting anew. He puts a small bandage on the cut above Arthur's eyebrow and leads him to bed; grabs Arthur's pyjama pants and shirt and helps dress him, like he's an invalid. He does all of these things automatically and without fuss, and Arthur falls totally pliant under Eames' guiding hands, exhausted from crying.
“I'm sorry,” he says weakly, embarrassed, after Eames brings him a glass of water to wash away the acrid taste of bile. “I don't know why... God, I'm sorry, Eames.”
“Never mind,” says Eames bracingly. “It's not as though you ever remember these episodes in the morning, anyway.”
Arthur's head pulses dully on one side. The beginnings of a violent migraine. He swallows and tries to push it away, gathering his thoughts.
“This has happened before?”
Eames nods with a small, sad, lopsided smile. “I shudder to think what you do with yourself when I'm not here to put you back to sorts. Lie on the floor and puke till you pass out, I shouldn't wonder.”
“How often?” Arthur's head spins wonderingly.
“Maybe once or twice over the past year, a couple times on jobs before then, that I know of. Here, by the way.” Eames drops a pill into the palm of his hand. “For the migraine. It'll come on within an hour or so. You're going to throw up again and you'll be in some pain, but it'll have eased up by morning.”
Arthur believes him. He swallows the pill.
Something is wrong with him.
It's a worm writhing in his gut. It's a rat coiled in the circuitry of his brain, gnawing at the wiring. Something is wrong with him.
“What's happening to me, Eames?”
“Nothing is happening to you.” Eames' voice is sure and comforting. “You've just been working too hard. We only just finished the Kwon job. You need some rest and relaxation, that's all.”
That isn't it. Arthur knows that isn't it, because whatever it is, it's pushing at the base of his brain like a body buried under the floorboards, struggling back to life. It claws and scrapes weakly and though he tries to remember, it frightens him terribly. He's terrified to look at it face-on.
He does not like this feeling of being frightened. It makes him feel even worse.
“Don't let me forget, this time,” he tells Eames. “Something's wrong with me. I need to know what.”
Eames looks sceptical. “You need to sleep, Arthur.”
“No. That's not ...” But he is tired. He is.
“I'll take care of you,” says Eames.
This situation is absurd. He's being nursed by Eames, for God's sake -- Eames who drives him mental, his part-time colleague and full-time annoyance. He's shocked that the forger hasn't even taken advantage of the situation to tease or provoke him in some way. Eames is always teasing, always pushing his boundaries, always touching and flirting and riling Arthur up till he can't take it. This nurturing side of Eames is one he hasn't seen before, and it makes him uncomfortable to be caught in such a vulnerable state, but there's nothing he can do except quickly roll his die when Eames leaves the room to refill his glass with fresh water. It lands reality-up.
That means there's no reason why Arthur shouldn't remember this in the morning, but he's scared anyway.
“Don't let me forget,” he tells Eames again later when he's hunched over on the edge of the bed, heel of his palm pressing into one eye, half-blind now and sick from the migraine.
“I won't,” Eames sighs.
In the morning Arthur feels like he's woken up with the world's worst hangover. Knives in his head. It's terrible. He tries to vomit into the toilet and can't because there's nothing to bring up. He gags.
Eames watches silently from the door of the bathroom.
Arthur coughs uselessly, and without looking at him, says, “What did you find out about Fischer?”
“Nothing's changed,” says Eames. “Fischer's doing fine. His new corporation is on its feet and doing well so far by all accounts.”
“Good.” Arthur bows his head till it's resting on the cold rim of the toilet bowl. He can't even bring himself to care about hygiene. He feels wrecked. “That's good.”
Eames walks in and drops a couple small pills on the tile for him. He leaves the bathroom without saying anything more.
+++
Neil knows what year it is. His own reflection doesn't shock him, the first time he looks in a mirror. His last clear memory must be from almost ten years ago, but it's not like he's blinked his eyes and landed in the present. He knows time has passed -- his body knows, at least.
He just can't fill in all the gaps.
He learns his companion's name when they come back from their meal, because his cell phone rings and he picks it up and answers it, “Eames.”
They're in Rome. Neil stares out the window. Pigeons flap past their hotel. The streets are all narrow, just like the squashed little cars, and everything is made of stone. Stone roads. Stone buildings. It's alien and exciting.
“Yes, we tried out the new chemicals a few hours ago,” the other guy is saying behind him, into his phone. “Yes, I'd say they're bloody strong enough. Things nearly went pear-shaped for a minute there. But -- no, we're okay, no lasting damage. Well, I'm fine. Arthur's still a bit out of it, but he's a runt, I expect the dosage hit him harder.”
Neil glances around in time to see Eames wink at him. He smirks back.
“Anyway, the kicks worked fine. Yes. All the way down. ... Any time, Yusuf. By that I of course mean find another bloody guinea pig next time, yeah?” He chuckles. “Excuses, excuses. I think you just like to make poor Arthur and I suffer. I'll call you again tomorrow to let you know if we've lost all our hair overnight or anything. Right. Talk to you soon.”
There's a lot to be surmised from this half of the conversation, namely that Neil's been shot up with some previously-untested drug like a lab rat to gather data. He wonders, bemusedly, when he stopped selling his body for sex and started selling it for science. There's something sneaky and illicit about all of this.
Maybe he's been under the influence of drugs for years and years, held hostage, and now he's finally lucid again.
Which means that he needs to seize his chance before he's shot up again.
It's getting dark. Neil leans away from the window. Eames is reading a book on one of the double beds by lamplight.
He flips a page and, without looking up, says, “You've been awfully quiet today, darling.”
“Side effects,” says Neil, his gaze creeping all across the room. “I'm gonna shower.”
“Sure,” says Eames.
Neil crosses the room silently and shuts the bathroom door without locking it. For the first time he looks, really looks at his reflection. He cleans up really well and it makes him feel uncomfortable and fake. His hair's all slicked back, not falling messily around his face. His clothing is crisp and pressed and not rumpled or wrinkled anywhere. His reflection isn't a shock, but he has an image of himself in his head, and this isn't it. It's a little like looking at a stranger.
He sheds his clothing piece by piece until he's standing naked in front of the mirror. He tilts his head, examines himself. This is more familiar. This feels right. He considers his slim, runner's frame, attractively defined with muscle. He has scars he doesn't remember getting, but he likes them. He grasps his penis, weighing it in one hand, and lets go. He has no bruises anywhere on his body.
He takes a long time showering, because he can't believe how tense his body is. It's like someone's spent years coiling him up like a giant steel spring. His muscles are all locked up and taut, and the hot water barely eases them. He groans when he manages to relax a little, bit by bit. What's he been doing to himself for ten years? He wishes the new scars could tell him their stories.
It's a nice hotel; the hot water lasts an impressively long time. Neil feigns deafness when Eames starts knocking on the bathroom door.
Then he hears the door open.
“Arthur! Did you drown in there, or what? I need the toilet.”
Neil nearly inhales a lungful of water. His reaction is purely instinct-based.
“Fuck's sake!” he spits, furious, at the shower curtain between them. “Get the fuck out!”
“Christ, sorry.” Just before the door closes, he hears Eames add something that sounds like, “Good to see you're back to normal.”
The bathroom door clicks shut. Neil has to glance around the curtain just to make sure Eames is really gone.
He's surprised at himself. He feels uncharacteristically rattled and shook up. The warm water is like needles on his skin now, not soothing, but twisting his muscles to their former tension all over again. He hunches, bows his head under the spray, and finally has to give up because he's afraid he might puke if he stands under that showerhead for another second.
What's wrong with me? he wonders blankly. He doesn't even know who he is.
No. He's Neil McCormick.
He knows who Neil McCormick is.
He leaves the bathroom wearing a towel draped loosely around his hips. Eames doesn't look at him on his way to the bathroom. While he's in there, Neil goes over to the bed that must be his and pulls out a suitcase from underneath it. He spends a minute pawing through its few contents. It's almost all clothing. Neatly folded, clean, uncomfortable-looking clothing. Layers. Not a t-shirt in sight. He shakes his head, confused. If this is some weird roleplay, he can't figure out the game. He deliberately starts combing his fingers through his hair, leaving it damp and straggly, soft and curling around his face, the way it should be.
+
Neil is restless and predatory. He settles himself astride Eames' hips in the middle of the night.
Eames snuffles awake from a light sleep, reaching up to his pillow before stopping himself.
“What?” he says, confused. “Arthur?”
Neil presses a hand to his bare chest. His skin is burning hot. The bedsheets separate them where Neil is sitting on him.
“Eames,” he says, tasting the word experimentally.
“What?” says Eames again. He squints in the dark. “Are you alright?”
Neil nods. Smiling, he bows over and kisses Eames on the lips. Licks his way into the other man's mouth with deliberate and sensual sweeps of the tongue. Eames groans, just slightly, and starts to push him away.
“Arthur,” he says, and he sounds, inexplicably, helpless and pleading. “Not that I don't want -- and I want, you know that -- but what are you doing? Why -- why now, what's the matter?”
“I want you,” says Neil. He grabs Eames' hand, the one he used to push Neil back, and brings it to the crotch of his boxers. “Feel that?” he asks. “Feel how fucking hard I am for you?”
Eames breathes out shakily and runs his palm up and down the hard line of the material, like he can't quite help himself.
“What did you see down there today?” he murmurs, so softly he might just be asking himself.
Neil pulls the bedcovers down, all the way, under his knees and over Eames'. Eames is wearing boxers, like him. He's already halfway to hard. Neil strokes a hand down the seam on the outside of his thigh and looks up at his eyes, waiting. Eames exhales roughly again, smiles crookedly.
“Did you leave all your inhibitions in the dreamscape today, darling?”
“I can get a lot more uninhibited than this,” says Neil flatly.
With a sudden growl, Eames' fingers are at the waistband of his boxers, tugging them down, over Neil's thighs, and Neil has to wriggle around on his knees to lose them completely. Eames grips his arms and rolls, flattening him over the bed and kissing him, and Neil almost laughs aloud.
“Just tell me why,” Eames says, stopping, gripping him tight.
“Today,” says Neil, cocksure and alive again, alive and in love with life, “I had a revelation.”
“You should have revelations more often.”
Neil twists out from under him, shimmies down the bed and drags Eames' boxers off. He wraps his lips around the other man's cock and sucks him. Moans for him. Jerks him with one hand and laves the head expertly with his tongue. Eames sucks in a sharp breath.
“Jesus, Arthur--”
He pulls off and starts sucking two of his own fingers, instead, sloppily. When they're slick and wet with saliva, he reaches down and pushes a finger into himself. The sudden intrusion is almost breathtakingly uncomfortable. He twists his hand and presses the second digit in, too, working himself open while Eames watches him, transfixed.
When Neil loses patience with himself, he pushes Eames over and straddles him again. Eames' hands fly up to his hips as Neil braces himself on his knees, gripping Eames' cock between his legs, and guides the head in.
“God,” Eames groans as Neil envelops him, his head falling back onto the pillow.
Neil pushes down onto him steadily, taking inch by inch of him. It feels strange to feel so full of someone else; a fullness he feels all the way up to his teeth. Eames is big. Neil can't believe how painfully stretched he is around him. How long has it been since he was last fucked?
He doesn't stop till he's taken all of Eames in and feels like he can barely breathe. He takes a second and then lifts himself on his knees, till Eames' cock has almost slipped out of his ass; then he drops his weight and slams back down. He doesn't set himself a gentle pace. He fucks himself on Eames' cock roughly, and the burn and ache makes him feel so alive.
“Arthur,” Eames says, strangled.
“You feel so fuckin' good in me,” Neil mumbles, nails digging red crescents into Eames' chest. He keeps up the rhythm he's set and grins, crooked, when Eames raises a hand to drag his fingers through Neil's messy hair. Eames is rocking his hips up to meet him, now, pushing in that last couple centimetres each time, making Neil give a low gasp. “Does that feel good?”
“You have no idea, darling,” Eames laughs, voice strained and choked and breathless.
Neil's breath leaves him in steady huffs as he shoves himself onto Eames' cock, again and again. Eames' hand leaves his hip and slides to his inner thigh, and then inward, pressing with his thumb at where they join, feeling how Neil's tight ring of muscle stretches and strains to take him in. He's watching, watching the way his cock pumps in and out of Neil's hole, and the knowledge gives Neil electrifying thrills.
Finally, Eames slides his hand up to Neil's cock and starts jerking him off, his hand smooth and gentling in spite of the rough way Neil drives himself down onto Eames. Neil tips his head back and doesn't make a sound except for harsh, shaky breaths as he comes, spilling himself over Eames' hand and chest.
His thighs are quivering and aching now but he keeps going, pleasure ripping jaggedly through him with every upward thrust of Eames' hips. Eames swipes a thumb through the come on his chest, stares at it like he doesn't even believe what he's seeing. Neil takes his wrist and lifts his hand till his thumb is pressing at Neil's lips. He licks, swipes his tongue over Eames' thumb and then takes it into his mouth, sucking and licking away every last bitter trace of himself, teeth gently scraping the pad of Eames' thumb.
Watching, Eames' other hand suddenly tightens on his thigh and his hips stutter, and he's coming inside Neil in hot, wet spurts, with a drawn-out groan.
“Arthur,” he manages hoarsely, slumping back against the bed, “fuck ...”
Neil climbs off him, legs shaky. While Eames leans over to grab the bedsheets, wipe off his hand and chest, Neil reaches behind him quickly to press a finger to his hole. Eames' come is in him. He forgot a condom. Again. Fuck.
“You're amazing,” Eames mutters, pulling Neil down into a kiss.
Neil relaxes. He smiles lazily, eyes half-closed.
“You too,” he says quietly.
“You talk with an accent when you fuck,” Eames says thoughtfully, after a few minutes.
“So do you,” says Neil, and Eames laughs, obviously drowsy now.
“It's a little Southern. It's cute. I didn't know ...” He falls silent for a minute, eyes closing. Drifting off. “Something's different about you today.”
“Go to sleep,” says Neil.
Eames does, quite soon after that. As soon as he's out, Neil gets up. He goes through Eames' suitcase and picks out a pair of slacks and a shirt, both loose on him but probably more comfortable than anything in his own suitcase. He finds Eames' wallet, rifles through it and takes all the cash, though everything else is left alone. He leaves Eames asleep on the bed, and walks out the door. This is what Neil McCormick does.
This is what Neil McCormick is.
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