The Point and The Pencil: 10 Ariadne/Arthur Drabbles

Taproot – Poem

Overbearing panic attack entrenching my veins
On an hour I'll be okay
I pray this pain will go away permanently someday
I've seen more than...
I should have to...
I've seen this on my own

            There was a certain level of pain that Arthur was used to dealing with. Getting shot in the head, the ache of not sleeping for days at a time, but this was different. He was looking down a road as he watched Ariadne walk away from him. She said she wanted nothing to do with him, she said that she never wanted to see him again, and that pain hurt more than he ever thought possible.

            He did not know how they got to this place, how it all got tangled up, but she just turned to him one night and said it was not working out. He chased her out of their apartment and tried to ask her why, to get some answers, because he had to know why she was walking away like this. Ariadne said nothing, said if he did not see it on his own then that was reason enough.

            Arthur wondered if this sense of his chest caving in was going to fade. She turned the corner and was out of sight. He would never see her again and that was what she wanted.

Breathe – Disturbed

You will release your life
Joining with the goddamned world
Of the dead and the lonely
You'll never leave alive
Now do you think you're too damn good
For the killing kind

            Ariadne closed her eyes tightly and tried to slow her breathing. Around her she could hear people moving around, they were projections but they felt so real, but no one was with her. Despite the moving bodies she had never felt so alone in her life. She opened her eyes slowly and looked around. Arthur had deserted her in this dream after she mentioned that she could not manipulate this person like he wanted to. He sneered at her and went off on his own because she was worthless now. Ariadne clutched the gun in her hand, pressed it to her temple and pulled the trigger.

            She woke with a start and had to slow her breathing. It never stopped taking her breath away when she had to wake herself up like this. Still, she watched the timer go down and watched Arthur wake up slowly. He pulled the line out, set the mark up like he had too much to drink and began to gather their things.

            “Are you going to say anything to me?” Ariadne asked and he froze.

            “Do you think you're better than me, Ariadne?” Arthur and she blinked back her surprise.

            “No, not at all, why would you think that?” she asked and he turned around. His eyes were hard and it felt like they were staring deep into her heart.

            “You can't claim moral high ground here,” he said. “You're just as bad as the rest of us. No better.”

Nightmare – Eve 6

In my nightmare I feel so alive
In my dreamscape escapades
I make the grade I save the day

            Arthur did not have dreams anymore though that did not stop the nightmares. That was enough to make him wake up in the middle of the night covered in sweat. Over time they became more and more vivid though not visually. It was nothing but senses and extreme emotions. It was like being jerked around so fast that he could not keep up. This time he woke up wish a crushing sense of defeat, like he lost something precious, and that was enough to push him over the edge.

            “What's wrong?” Ariadne asked as she wrapped her arms around his shoulders.

            “I lost, I lost something in that dream and I can't remember what it was,” Arthur replied. “I just lost something.”

            “Those dreams don't matter. You are the best in our dreams, you save us all, and you win. That's all. Just sleep, Arthur. Just sleep because you always come through when it matters,” as she pulled him back into bed.

Risingson – Massive Attack

I sink myself in hair upon my lover
It's how you go down to the men's room sink
Sad we talk if how madmen think
I sink myself in hair upon my lover
I don't know her from another miss
I don't know you from another
See me run now you're gone...dream on

            Walking through Arthur's projections was like walking through a mist. They were there yet at the same time they were not. It was odd for Ariadne because her first experience with projections were Cobb's. Now she moved through them like her presence did not bother them at all. This was training and Arthur was a few steps of her. He turned and creased his eyebrows deeply.

            “You can't do much back there. You're supposed to be changing the world to protect us from potentially lethal projections,” he chastised but she hardly listened.

            “You're very different from Cobb,” Ariadne said. “You seem very mellow, do projections reflect of the person?”

            “You could say that,” Arthur replied as he walked up to her. He was close and it made her breath a little harder. His hands were on her arms as he looked down at her. “You cannot be distracted by the things that happen in here. You are the one that builds this world and I'm the one that fills it. Without space it's meaningless, do you understand?”

            “Yes,” she replied as he intertwined their fingers and Ariadne pressed her lips in a thin line.

            “Ariadne?” he said and she looked at him. “Dream on.”

Broken – Seether featuring Amy Lee

The worst is over now and we can breathe again
I wanna hold you high, you steal my pain away
There's so much left to learn, and no one left to fight
I wanna hold you high and steal your pain

            Ariadne stood by her window and looked out at the Paris landscape. She was waiting, she felt like she had been waiting for hours, because Arthur was late. He was never late no matter how the job went. It made her nervous that she had not heard a word from him. If he was going to be late Ariadne hoped that he would have the sense to call. Each job that he left and hardly gave her any information was one more that she was convinced he was going to get hurt or worse. The idea of Arthur dying made a lump form in the pit of her stomach.

            The door to her apartment opened and Ariadne turned to see Arthur stumbling in. He was covered in dark bruises and like something was broke. She rushed over to help him and hugged him close when he collapsed on the couch.

            “I'm sorry to burden you like this,” he said in a low voice and it sounded like his jaw might be broken.

            “It's not a burden Arthur. I'm here, we're together, and that means we share things,” Ariadne said as she stroked his hair. “I'd give anything to take some of this pain away from you though. I want to take that away from you so you don't have to carry it alone anymore.” Arthur did not reply and she held him until he fell asleep.

What Comes Around – Ill Nino

You're always thinking you're so perfect
Those thoughts drove me away from home
But if you put me through your tests
Then I will fade

I have nothing to say
But I feel like my mouth is wide open
Everything that is real
Comes around
Comes around...

            This was not a normal fight. Ariadne clashed with Arthur on many things when it came to every day routines but this was different. There was a fundamental argument about how handled a situation. She could not believe that he took a life in this world but he shrugged it off as it was nothing. In that lead her screaming at him, accusing him of all sorts of things, saying how he made her feel like some sort of failure while he did everything perfectly, and he stood there without any retort. Ariadne slammed her fists against his chest and screamed for him to leave. So he did without another word. Now she stood alone in her apartment and she could not calm her anger. This was not a fight about feet on the table or coasters; this was about the way he looked at the world.

            Whether or not Arthur would come back really did not bother her. She had nothing else to say to him now. Ariadne was not sure how she could even trust someone who could take a life and feel nothing from him.

            She hated that he felt nothing.

Free to Decide – The Cranberries

I'm free to decide, I'm free to decide,
And I'm not so suicidal after all.
I'm free to decide, I'm free to decide,
And I'm not so suicidal after all,
At all, at all, at all.

            It was a dream, they were on a job, but that did not make any of it seem less real. Ariadne let her head hang and as she tried to slow her beating heart. Arthur stood before her fighting off projection after projection because something had gone wrong. Now they were waiting to be killed and to wake up after failing the job. That made her panic because they could not fail at this. She raised her gun to her temple to leave this dream because maybe if they got out now the job could be salvaged.

            “You can't do that now,” Arthur said as he slammed the door closed and bolted it shut.

            “Why not? We need to kill ourselves to get out of here so why not just do it?” she asked but he shook his head.

            “No because that isn't the way out this time. We have to continue on even if we get hurt in the process,” he said as he knelt in front of her.

            “I don't want to get hurt, I want to escape from this dream, and it's my choice if I want to,” Ariadne said. Arthur reached to take the gun from her but she shook her head. “I'm not a coward but I can't do this, I just can't. I can't watch you suffer, I can't suffer through that pain. Not again,” and Ariadne put the gun to her temple and pulled the trigger.

Teardrop – Massive Attack (again!)

Love, love is a verb
Love is a doing word
Feathers on my breath
Gentle impulsion
Shakes me, makes me lighter
Feathers on my breath
Teardrop on the fire
Feathers on my breath

            Arthur was not sure how he got here but somehow that did not bother him too much. Ariadne was moving closer to him and he could not stop his hands when she was in arms reach. He pulled her in close and stroked her hair. She did not say anything, he did not want to, and Arthur leaned in to kiss her. It was soft at first, like it hardly existed, before Ariadne pressed her body to his. She felt so good, she tasted so good, that he wished that this was real because a dream would be disappointing. He would wake up alone or next to her followed by an awkward silence. He knew that they would not speak of it and it would be like it never happened.

            Her tongue slipped into his mouth and Ariadne groaned when he sunk his nails into her hips. Arthur moved them across the hotel room he had rented out for the job and they fell onto the bed in a mess of limbs. She broke their kiss to ease the jacket off his shoulder as he took her scarf off. Arthur leaned in and kiss her neck and all along her jawline. His shirt was soon scattered and her discarded as well. When flesh met flesh suddenly Arthur did not care if this was a dream because if it was he never wanted to wake up.

In The Waiting Line – Zero 7

Do you believe
In what you see
Motionless wheel
Nothing is real
Wasting my time
In the waiting line
Do you believe in
What you see

            Arthur could not find his totem. Somewhere along the line when he had to run from a disgruntled employer the little red die was no where to be found. Now he sat in the middle of his hotel room staring at the wall. There was no security, no comfort and he had absolutely no idea if he was awake. He had not checked the die when he came out of the dream, there was no time he had to run, and now he was not sure if ever had it. Was this real? It plagued his mind and made the world seem like a bleak and terrifying place. There was nothing to believe in, nothing to trust, nothing that could prove reality.

            Ariadne opened the door and rushed in. She said that she was worried when she heard the job had gone wrong. She said that she was so glad that he was safe. She was about to say something else when she noticed that his hands were shaking. She asked what was wrong and Arthur just said that he did not know if he was awake. He told her that he did not have his totem and there was no way to know for sure. She encircled him in her arms and held him tight.

            “This is real because I know it is. Can you trust me Arthur? Do you trust me?” Ariadne asked as she pulled back and looked him in the eye.

            “Yes, with my life,” Arthur replied and she smiled.

            “Then believe this is reality because I do,” Ariadne said and he did because Arthur did trust her.

Listen To Your Heart – DHT

Listen to your heart
when he's calling for you.
Listen to your heart
there's nothing else you can do.
I don't know where you're going
and I don't know why,
but listen to your heart
before you tell him goodbye.

            Ariadne knew it was unrealistic to think that a relationship would be perfect. She never thought it would be so hard with Arthur though. It was not that they fought, they hardly did, it was more that they were too protective of each other. She could not let him go into jobs and he could not let her build a world without worrying that something would go wrong in the dream. That was what caused the fight, the one that had her watching him walk away. His shoulders were tight and Ariadne knew that he was going to put up those walls that kept everyone away.

            Her head told her that this was for the best. That all they would do was clash and it would end with resenting each other. Ariadne did not want to resent him, she did not want to lose him completely, but when Arthur turned around and she caught his eye logic did not matter. She rushed over to him and threw arms around his neck. Arthur seemed surprised by the sudden action.

            “I don't care if it makes sense that we separate because it's not what I want, it's not what my heart wants, and I'm listening to that over reason,” Ariadne whispered into his ear. Arthur hesitated before he put his arms around her.

            “I like the sound of that.”