The Black Rattle
Feb. 15th, 2011 03:19 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ofvanityThe third of which is a prompt fill. C: /generosity.
Title: The Black Rattle
Author:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
ofvanity
Pairings: Cobb/Saito, Arthur/Eames if you squint. C:
Word Count: 2400
Rating: PG-13 to Light R
Warnings: Mentions of violence and gore.
Disclaimers: I claim no ownership of the bountiful Inception kingdom nor of it's beautiful rulers, (i.e., King Nolan, Prince Arthur, etc, etc.). I am merely a peasant.
Author's Note: This is a prompt fill for this prompt: "Post-inception, Cobb is finding it increasingly hard to stay out of the extraction business the way he knows he should. When the compulsion gets to be too much, he contacts Saito and asks him for help. Saito takes him and his children into his own care, and sets about finding Cobb creative outlets in the real world that help ground him.
“Come in. Quietly. The children are asleep.”
-
This is real. His chest is bursting open, skin stretched tight around his ribs. There is bile sticking and sliding between his teeth. It’s mingling with something that tastes like blood but might be the key clacking inside his mouth. It stings every time it touches the fillings at the back of his mouth but he can feel it.
The back of his calves are burning mercilessly, there is a rush of blood thrumming in his ears. And every time the package starts slipping from his grip, he hikes it up and it only obliges for a few minutes.
Cobb can’t remember for how long he’s been running. But it doesn’t matter. He’s completely gone at this point. It’s such a rush, flinging himself through the barren, blinding dirt road. He can’t stop now.
-
“Arthur called me.”
“I asked him not to.”
-
When he wakes up, the air is as stale as ever. The basement usually is. Through the bare light of the floorboards, Cobb figures it’s about two in the morning. It’s safe to come out, so he crawls out in the corner of the room and slides up. His arms shake, weak from exertion but he pushes himself anyway.
The room is mostly dark but there are a few lights on in the kitchen. When he walks in, Saito is sitting on the floor with his back against the wall. He heard about what happened earlier. While he was gone, starting fights for a few boxes of antibiotics, the cartels sent hit men to search the clinic.
They found the wife of a rival gang member, bleeding from a knife they had stuck in her belly. They left her beheaded in the back. The nurses could only cry and wail, praying for mercy. Saito cleaned up what the police left behind.
Cobb slides down next to him and doesn’t hesitate to reach out and slide their fingers together, across Saito’s jeans. He can smell sweat and blood with harsh antiseptic but he doesn’t move away.
They sit until the sun rises.
-
“You’re right. I called him.”
“How mad was he?”
-
The plane is cool and the leather is warm. The food makes him nauseous and when the pressure gets high enough, Cobb throws up three times.
Saito knocks on the door of the bathroom, even though it’s wide open. Cobb has hair pushed all over his face, his chest is heaving and there are shivers pulsing down his spine. The plane is too cold but he doesn’t deserve to complain.
He doesn’t deserve the leather seats and the white-toothed stewardesses. There is an entire world, breathing and sweating through the tragedy of their lives and he doesn’t deserve. They don’t deserve to rush through dirt and mud, looking for hope in anything, when to everyone else they are just numbers in the periphery.
Saito sinks to his knees in the floor, next to him. He slumps against the wall, his fingers curl into the worn denim of Dom’s jeans. Cobb turns and holds his gaze. He opens his mouth to speak but Saito cuts him off, “I know.”
-
“He said the next time I committed such an act he would be forced to ruin my life. Starting from the bottom up.”
“You know by bottom, he means your nuts, right?”
-
When the plane lands, the gravel scratches against Cobb's shoes. Saito stands at his shoulder, closer than he should but there is a gun tucked into his waist and so no one asks. They move through the airport, carrying their luggage. There's week old scruff on their faces and their jeans are dirty.
Not a single one of the paparazzi recognized them but some snap photos anyway, just in case they missed something about these men walking through the airport with a group of bodyguards. They don’t know better.
They get a cab. It’s grimy and smells like day old vomit but it helps. The windows roll down and Dom fingers the rubber slats it disappears into.
-
“Yes, he made that clear.”
“What did he tell you?”
“He said you were slipping.”
“And what are you here to do? Catch me?”
“You can catch yourself.”
-
They yellow cab takes them to a hotel. Not a five-star or beautifully exclusive one. Not a dingy one with stained bed sheets. Just a faceless hotel. With middle class families and bell boys that don’t recognize you then pretend to like you when you slip them all fifties.
They only book two rooms. One for The Boys. One for him and Saito.
Cobb showers and shaves and puts on a clean shirt and less worn jeans. Saito sleeps on the bed and doesn’t wake up until eleven. He pads around the room and finds him in the adjoining room, playing chess with his driver, Akito.
He smiles in faux surprise when Cobb loses and heads back to the room. Dom follows him and they order food and watch Spanish soap operas until six in the morning. Wearing pajama bottoms and scars, they curl cigarette smoke between their long teeth, between their sleep.
Dawn hisses over the horizon and families rush around outside their door but they sleep. Soundless, motionless and with their hands clasped loosely between them.
When housekeeping rings, they send her away. When The Boys have a call for Mr. Saito, he asks an advisor to handle it. When they get up, they’re not in the slightest bit fresher. Cobb closes his eyes against the sun and only sees red.
-
“What else did Arthur tell you?”
“He told me not to let you change the subject.”
“What do you want to know?”
-
“Let’s go out, let’s get some air.”
Cobb nods, “Yeah, alright.”
The indoor pool is empty when they get down there--probably because it is the middle of June in Los Angeles and everyone is outside.
They swim to the bottom with fanning hair and stay there until their lungs tremble with effort. Saito crawls, scratching the bleached tiles at the bottom. He watches the scar that yawns across Cobb’s back as the blades of his shoulder move, swimming.
He slips his hand through Saito’s and rubs the wrinkled tips of his fingers. They lie at the bottom and breathe for each other. When he touches the fang marks healing on his arm where he was bit by a rattlesnake, Saito hisses. He jerks away and the water pulls him back up to the surface. He’s only gone for a minute.
He always comes back to Cobb, even at the bottom.
When he steps back on land, the soles of feet ache pleasantly. They sit in the empty sauna and Saito rests his forehead on Cobb’s temple and breathes cold air.
-
“How long where you down there?”
“Too long... something like fifty years.”
“What did you do for all that time?”
“Create.”
-
This time, Saito’s boys insist they take the car. They take Akito to drive it and wrestle over the last olive in the back. When Akito opens the back door, Saito’s knuckles are split and so is Cobb’s eyebrow. They crawl out, still in jeans and tee-shirts. Saito lifts his sleeve and flashes Akito a quickly forming red-purple butterfly bruise.
They order awful, greasy food and only throw up once between them. Between forkfuls of bacon and buttered everything, Cobb and Saito keep biting the inside of their cheeks to hide their smiles. They flirt with the waitress, Karen, and order more food than they need to then give their milkshakes to kids at the counter. They leave Karen a $200 tip and take turns kissing her on the cheek.
In the car, they sink into each other and make jokes in what sounds like Spanish. They sing along to the polka they play on the radio and smile a little lighter, more than they have since they came back. Akito has been counting.
When he drops them off in front of the hotel, they shrug off another guard and start walking in the opposite direction. Akito parks the car and heads after them. In the rearview mirror, the jar has two olives in it.
-
“Building for fifty years?”
“It was easy, living like gods.”
-
The night falls with extraordinary fluency. They’re lying on the gravel. breathing the thin air on the rooftop. The sky stretches it’s infinite dark around them. Their skin is marred with tiny scratches, white ash on unbroken wounds. Wishful thinking.
They curl their fire into each other, fingers clenching against. The wind howls inside their clothes, insider their veins. Saito sings the song. This time, it doesn't put Cobb to sleep. It’s two thirty in the morning.
They’re both thinking of the first few days out in the desert, alone. Crawling through the barren graves of life at night, running from coyotes and breathing in sharp edges. During the day, they ate half-cooked tortillas at a nearby stand and broke bread into rations.
When they found the clinic, they stayed. To scratch dirt off bones and ache in commiseration. They helped. Limited medical knowledge brought them there. The ability to carry a gun and the conviction to shoot someone who deserved it kept them there.
At night, they crawled into a yellow mattress and slept in shifts under the floorboards. Should they come looking.
In between them, they kept a vice grip.
-
“Do you want to go back?”
“It is... pure creation.”
-
The next time they hop in the car with Akito, they’re finally going forward. They spent two days at the hotel, finding space to relearn to breathe the recycled city air. It’s time to go home.
This time, they sit still in the back seat, dressed in the usual three-piece suit. In the front, Akito taps his fingers on the wheel, patiently. Saito loads a gun, and no one bats an eye.
Cobb’s children race to his arms and squeal with delight. Arthur looks relieved to be free of his babysitting duties and Eames sits back on the couches like he’s become comfortable in the Cobb house. Saito sits at the kitchen counter after the initial introductions and makes everyone sandwiches.
They eat and no one throws up.
Arthur smiles whenever Cobb reaches out to make sure Saito is near. Eames smiles whenever Saito brushes his fingers against Cobb’s wrist, absently. When the kids go outside to play or get in trouble, Arthur claps Dom on the back. Eames keeps glancing between them and smiles and smiles. Akito sees Eames slip Arthur a five under the table.
When they leave, they close the door behind them. The house darkens and they pull themselves back to their core. They read to James and to Phillipa and teach them Spanish words. They watch Aladdin and fall asleep before they can have the ice cream they were promised.
They carry the children to their rooms and in the hallway, Cobb slips his hand into Saito’s and leads him.
-
“And you became the Creator.”
“That wasn’t my intention... but, yeah, I guess I did.”
-
In the light of dawn, Saito rises in an empty bed. The children are asleep and the house is quiet. He finds Cobb on the back steps of the porch, nursing a cup of coffee. He sits on the floor next to him and their hands find each other immediately.
There is sun on the wood of the porch and on the grass blades. There is sun on Cobb’s skin and bouncing off his coffee. The same sun that cuts over the rest of the world but with all the tenderness of home. They are home, and Cobb still cannot sleep.
Saito knows that can’t be helped. Cobb runs his thumb over the calluses on the tips of Saito’s fingers. And Cobb doesn’t have to talk for Saito to know what he’s thinking.
“It will fade,” Saito announces, “The survivor’s guilt will fade. And the dreams will stop.”
Cobb turns and nods, silently. He squeezes Saito’s hand for a second, “I know.”
Saito waits, knowing he will speak in his own time. The wood creaks as he shuffles closer.
Cobb stares at the grass blades and their sun. “It’s just. I spent such a long time trying to convince myself this world was real. That nothing would shake this and when people are staring at me they we’re just being rude and not projections about to jump. It took me away from really understanding it. I saw the world and the people and everything. I just couldn’t. I didn't know what--And those people suffer through their everyday while everyone else runs on about their day, worried about their lattes and designer clothes and you--you took a bullet for me.”
Saito smiles a bit, “A snake bit me, Dom. That’s hardly the same as a bullet.”
Saito looks up and finds Cobb gazing back at him with unfocused eyes. His brow furrows, incredulously and his voice falters, “You could have died.”
Dom moves forward and presses his mouth against Saito’s. He doesn’t breathe. Then the wood creaks and Saito kisses back. He breathes warm exhales through his nose and hums in relief against Dom’s lips. They part and their lips smack and invite. Saito smiles loosely.
Cobb brings his hand up and kisses it, running his lips along the cuts on his knuckles. “You.”
Saito presses a kiss on Dom’s temple in return, waiting for him to continue. Dom breathes after a bit and says, “I forgot what the world meant. I mean, even in my grief, I was lost in a place where nothing was solid or lasting. And going there with those kids in real, red hot pain. This world is awful. And violent and clear. But it’s real. It’s dry and full and goddamn. I can feel it and. It’s like art.”
Saito slips his hands around Cobb’s neck and rests his forehead against his ear. In his hands, Cobb’s pulse races. When he presses a kiss to the shell, it slows. Cobb sets the coffee down and curls against Saito. “You remind me of that. Art.”
-
“After all those years, do you remember?”
“Remember what?”
“What it means to be a human. A man.”
Title: The Black Rattle
Author:
ofvanity Pairings: Cobb/Saito, Arthur/Eames if you squint. C:
Word Count: 2400
Rating: PG-13 to Light R
Warnings: Mentions of violence and gore.
Disclaimers: I claim no ownership of the bountiful Inception kingdom nor of it's beautiful rulers, (i.e., King Nolan, Prince Arthur, etc, etc.). I am merely a peasant.
Author's Note: This is a prompt fill for this prompt: "Post-inception, Cobb is finding it increasingly hard to stay out of the extraction business the way he knows he should. When the compulsion gets to be too much, he contacts Saito and asks him for help. Saito takes him and his children into his own care, and sets about finding Cobb creative outlets in the real world that help ground him.
This means spending a lot of time together, and they fall in love."
I realized I strayed from the conventional but I rather like how it turned out so perhaps I shall be forgiven? (:
Summary: Saito teaches Cobb to reconnect with the world.
“Come in. Quietly. The children are asleep.”
-
This is real. His chest is bursting open, skin stretched tight around his ribs. There is bile sticking and sliding between his teeth. It’s mingling with something that tastes like blood but might be the key clacking inside his mouth. It stings every time it touches the fillings at the back of his mouth but he can feel it.
The back of his calves are burning mercilessly, there is a rush of blood thrumming in his ears. And every time the package starts slipping from his grip, he hikes it up and it only obliges for a few minutes.
Cobb can’t remember for how long he’s been running. But it doesn’t matter. He’s completely gone at this point. It’s such a rush, flinging himself through the barren, blinding dirt road. He can’t stop now.
-
“Arthur called me.”
“I asked him not to.”
-
When he wakes up, the air is as stale as ever. The basement usually is. Through the bare light of the floorboards, Cobb figures it’s about two in the morning. It’s safe to come out, so he crawls out in the corner of the room and slides up. His arms shake, weak from exertion but he pushes himself anyway.
The room is mostly dark but there are a few lights on in the kitchen. When he walks in, Saito is sitting on the floor with his back against the wall. He heard about what happened earlier. While he was gone, starting fights for a few boxes of antibiotics, the cartels sent hit men to search the clinic.
They found the wife of a rival gang member, bleeding from a knife they had stuck in her belly. They left her beheaded in the back. The nurses could only cry and wail, praying for mercy. Saito cleaned up what the police left behind.
Cobb slides down next to him and doesn’t hesitate to reach out and slide their fingers together, across Saito’s jeans. He can smell sweat and blood with harsh antiseptic but he doesn’t move away.
They sit until the sun rises.
-
“You’re right. I called him.”
“How mad was he?”
-
The plane is cool and the leather is warm. The food makes him nauseous and when the pressure gets high enough, Cobb throws up three times.
Saito knocks on the door of the bathroom, even though it’s wide open. Cobb has hair pushed all over his face, his chest is heaving and there are shivers pulsing down his spine. The plane is too cold but he doesn’t deserve to complain.
He doesn’t deserve the leather seats and the white-toothed stewardesses. There is an entire world, breathing and sweating through the tragedy of their lives and he doesn’t deserve. They don’t deserve to rush through dirt and mud, looking for hope in anything, when to everyone else they are just numbers in the periphery.
Saito sinks to his knees in the floor, next to him. He slumps against the wall, his fingers curl into the worn denim of Dom’s jeans. Cobb turns and holds his gaze. He opens his mouth to speak but Saito cuts him off, “I know.”
-
“He said the next time I committed such an act he would be forced to ruin my life. Starting from the bottom up.”
“You know by bottom, he means your nuts, right?”
-
When the plane lands, the gravel scratches against Cobb's shoes. Saito stands at his shoulder, closer than he should but there is a gun tucked into his waist and so no one asks. They move through the airport, carrying their luggage. There's week old scruff on their faces and their jeans are dirty.
Not a single one of the paparazzi recognized them but some snap photos anyway, just in case they missed something about these men walking through the airport with a group of bodyguards. They don’t know better.
They get a cab. It’s grimy and smells like day old vomit but it helps. The windows roll down and Dom fingers the rubber slats it disappears into.
-
“Yes, he made that clear.”
“What did he tell you?”
“He said you were slipping.”
“And what are you here to do? Catch me?”
“You can catch yourself.”
-
They yellow cab takes them to a hotel. Not a five-star or beautifully exclusive one. Not a dingy one with stained bed sheets. Just a faceless hotel. With middle class families and bell boys that don’t recognize you then pretend to like you when you slip them all fifties.
They only book two rooms. One for The Boys. One for him and Saito.
Cobb showers and shaves and puts on a clean shirt and less worn jeans. Saito sleeps on the bed and doesn’t wake up until eleven. He pads around the room and finds him in the adjoining room, playing chess with his driver, Akito.
He smiles in faux surprise when Cobb loses and heads back to the room. Dom follows him and they order food and watch Spanish soap operas until six in the morning. Wearing pajama bottoms and scars, they curl cigarette smoke between their long teeth, between their sleep.
Dawn hisses over the horizon and families rush around outside their door but they sleep. Soundless, motionless and with their hands clasped loosely between them.
When housekeeping rings, they send her away. When The Boys have a call for Mr. Saito, he asks an advisor to handle it. When they get up, they’re not in the slightest bit fresher. Cobb closes his eyes against the sun and only sees red.
-
“What else did Arthur tell you?”
“He told me not to let you change the subject.”
“What do you want to know?”
-
“Let’s go out, let’s get some air.”
Cobb nods, “Yeah, alright.”
The indoor pool is empty when they get down there--probably because it is the middle of June in Los Angeles and everyone is outside.
They swim to the bottom with fanning hair and stay there until their lungs tremble with effort. Saito crawls, scratching the bleached tiles at the bottom. He watches the scar that yawns across Cobb’s back as the blades of his shoulder move, swimming.
He slips his hand through Saito’s and rubs the wrinkled tips of his fingers. They lie at the bottom and breathe for each other. When he touches the fang marks healing on his arm where he was bit by a rattlesnake, Saito hisses. He jerks away and the water pulls him back up to the surface. He’s only gone for a minute.
He always comes back to Cobb, even at the bottom.
When he steps back on land, the soles of feet ache pleasantly. They sit in the empty sauna and Saito rests his forehead on Cobb’s temple and breathes cold air.
-
“How long where you down there?”
“Too long... something like fifty years.”
“What did you do for all that time?”
“Create.”
-
This time, Saito’s boys insist they take the car. They take Akito to drive it and wrestle over the last olive in the back. When Akito opens the back door, Saito’s knuckles are split and so is Cobb’s eyebrow. They crawl out, still in jeans and tee-shirts. Saito lifts his sleeve and flashes Akito a quickly forming red-purple butterfly bruise.
They order awful, greasy food and only throw up once between them. Between forkfuls of bacon and buttered everything, Cobb and Saito keep biting the inside of their cheeks to hide their smiles. They flirt with the waitress, Karen, and order more food than they need to then give their milkshakes to kids at the counter. They leave Karen a $200 tip and take turns kissing her on the cheek.
In the car, they sink into each other and make jokes in what sounds like Spanish. They sing along to the polka they play on the radio and smile a little lighter, more than they have since they came back. Akito has been counting.
When he drops them off in front of the hotel, they shrug off another guard and start walking in the opposite direction. Akito parks the car and heads after them. In the rearview mirror, the jar has two olives in it.
-
“Building for fifty years?”
“It was easy, living like gods.”
-
The night falls with extraordinary fluency. They’re lying on the gravel. breathing the thin air on the rooftop. The sky stretches it’s infinite dark around them. Their skin is marred with tiny scratches, white ash on unbroken wounds. Wishful thinking.
They curl their fire into each other, fingers clenching against. The wind howls inside their clothes, insider their veins. Saito sings the song. This time, it doesn't put Cobb to sleep. It’s two thirty in the morning.
They’re both thinking of the first few days out in the desert, alone. Crawling through the barren graves of life at night, running from coyotes and breathing in sharp edges. During the day, they ate half-cooked tortillas at a nearby stand and broke bread into rations.
When they found the clinic, they stayed. To scratch dirt off bones and ache in commiseration. They helped. Limited medical knowledge brought them there. The ability to carry a gun and the conviction to shoot someone who deserved it kept them there.
At night, they crawled into a yellow mattress and slept in shifts under the floorboards. Should they come looking.
In between them, they kept a vice grip.
-
“Do you want to go back?”
“It is... pure creation.”
-
The next time they hop in the car with Akito, they’re finally going forward. They spent two days at the hotel, finding space to relearn to breathe the recycled city air. It’s time to go home.
This time, they sit still in the back seat, dressed in the usual three-piece suit. In the front, Akito taps his fingers on the wheel, patiently. Saito loads a gun, and no one bats an eye.
Cobb’s children race to his arms and squeal with delight. Arthur looks relieved to be free of his babysitting duties and Eames sits back on the couches like he’s become comfortable in the Cobb house. Saito sits at the kitchen counter after the initial introductions and makes everyone sandwiches.
They eat and no one throws up.
Arthur smiles whenever Cobb reaches out to make sure Saito is near. Eames smiles whenever Saito brushes his fingers against Cobb’s wrist, absently. When the kids go outside to play or get in trouble, Arthur claps Dom on the back. Eames keeps glancing between them and smiles and smiles. Akito sees Eames slip Arthur a five under the table.
When they leave, they close the door behind them. The house darkens and they pull themselves back to their core. They read to James and to Phillipa and teach them Spanish words. They watch Aladdin and fall asleep before they can have the ice cream they were promised.
They carry the children to their rooms and in the hallway, Cobb slips his hand into Saito’s and leads him.
-
“And you became the Creator.”
“That wasn’t my intention... but, yeah, I guess I did.”
-
In the light of dawn, Saito rises in an empty bed. The children are asleep and the house is quiet. He finds Cobb on the back steps of the porch, nursing a cup of coffee. He sits on the floor next to him and their hands find each other immediately.
There is sun on the wood of the porch and on the grass blades. There is sun on Cobb’s skin and bouncing off his coffee. The same sun that cuts over the rest of the world but with all the tenderness of home. They are home, and Cobb still cannot sleep.
Saito knows that can’t be helped. Cobb runs his thumb over the calluses on the tips of Saito’s fingers. And Cobb doesn’t have to talk for Saito to know what he’s thinking.
“It will fade,” Saito announces, “The survivor’s guilt will fade. And the dreams will stop.”
Cobb turns and nods, silently. He squeezes Saito’s hand for a second, “I know.”
Saito waits, knowing he will speak in his own time. The wood creaks as he shuffles closer.
Cobb stares at the grass blades and their sun. “It’s just. I spent such a long time trying to convince myself this world was real. That nothing would shake this and when people are staring at me they we’re just being rude and not projections about to jump. It took me away from really understanding it. I saw the world and the people and everything. I just couldn’t. I didn't know what--And those people suffer through their everyday while everyone else runs on about their day, worried about their lattes and designer clothes and you--you took a bullet for me.”
Saito smiles a bit, “A snake bit me, Dom. That’s hardly the same as a bullet.”
Saito looks up and finds Cobb gazing back at him with unfocused eyes. His brow furrows, incredulously and his voice falters, “You could have died.”
Dom moves forward and presses his mouth against Saito’s. He doesn’t breathe. Then the wood creaks and Saito kisses back. He breathes warm exhales through his nose and hums in relief against Dom’s lips. They part and their lips smack and invite. Saito smiles loosely.
Cobb brings his hand up and kisses it, running his lips along the cuts on his knuckles. “You.”
Saito presses a kiss on Dom’s temple in return, waiting for him to continue. Dom breathes after a bit and says, “I forgot what the world meant. I mean, even in my grief, I was lost in a place where nothing was solid or lasting. And going there with those kids in real, red hot pain. This world is awful. And violent and clear. But it’s real. It’s dry and full and goddamn. I can feel it and. It’s like art.”
Saito slips his hands around Cobb’s neck and rests his forehead against his ear. In his hands, Cobb’s pulse races. When he presses a kiss to the shell, it slows. Cobb sets the coffee down and curls against Saito. “You remind me of that. Art.”
-
“After all those years, do you remember?”
“Remember what?”
“What it means to be a human. A man.”
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2011-02-16 03:13 am (UTC)Marry me. <3
no subject
Date: 2011-02-17 09:32 pm (UTC)