my kind’s your kind 1/3

title: my kind’s your kind
pairing(s): Eames/Arthur, Dom/Mal (past Dom/Arthur)
word count: 20 996
summary: “This isn’t something we do, Eames. It’s something we are.” Magical realism, soulbonding, d/s fusion.
warning: So, like, for real. Features d/s relationships, for both couples, but there's also soulbonding, so like... DUB CON? Borderline kidnapping? Watch out for that. *hands*
author’s notes: my motivations for writing this story, let me tell you about them! Mostly, I have deep and abiding love for soulbonding of any kind. And also, I have a love of d/s because of being super obsessed with people BELONGING to each other and surrendering to each other completely. I JUST LIKE IT. Furthermore, um, magic? Which is helpful when trying to figure out how to insert jailbait!Dom into a fic, because hey, remember how pretty he used to be? Not that I’m not a fan of current!Leo/Dom. Oh, and also, it started out being a fic about how Eames and Mal are my BROTP. BUT THEN IT WENT KIND OF PEAR-SHARED. As my stories are wont to do. In conclusion, I REGRET NOTHING?

ETA: Also in this verse: the suffering years (Arthur/Dom prequel)

And thanks to wordsalone and halflinen for looking it over. <333



“No, Mal,” Eames says, laughing and batting her away. “No.”

She just licks his neck, nipping playfully, and says, “But look at him, he’s perfect.”

He sighs, curling an arm around her bare shoulders, nosing her hair indulgently, before he says, “That’s the problem.”

It’s only later that he’ll realize exactly how right he was.

---

They never have any money, so they always go to the same shitty pub because the bartenders give Mal all her drinks for free, even though they know she shares with Eames.

Sometimes Mal goes on her own, too, but Eames doesn’t like to think too hard about what happens, those times. Mal is a big girl, she’s allowed to make her own choices.

Hell, Eames rarely objects when Mal tries to make his choices for him, as well as her own.

This can, occasionally, be a problem however. Typically when Eames doesn’t think he can actually do the things Mal has decided for him.

Specifically, Mal has been trying to get Eames to sleep with the Fashionable Male for over three weeks, now. He comes in once a week, Friday nights to have a glass of what Eames assumes is something expensive and classy, and then he leaves. He wears perfectly tailored suits and ridiculously nice shoes and ties. And he wears them to the shittiest pub in the city. He never comes in with anyone, or goes home with anyone, and despite Mal’s frequent efforts to get Eames to buy him a drink, he’s clearly miles out of Eames’ league, and so Eames hasn’t actually thought much of it until now.

That is, until the FM shows up with Dom Cobb on his arm, and that’s when things start to make a lot more sense.

---

“You want me to seduce the Fashionable Male, thus stealing him away from Dom so you can have Dom for yourself. Is that about right?”

Mal smiles. “That’s right.”

“What on earth makes you think any part of that plan is a good one? I mean honestly, darling, this is a little thin, even for you.”

Mal pats his hand consolingly. “I’m sure you’ll find a way to make it work. We both know how you thrive on improvisation.”

---

Mal knows Dom, of course. Not like she and Eames know the Fashionable Male, making up a private, fictional history for him and frequently discussing his hypothetical likes and dislikes when they’re bored or drunk or both.

No, not like that. She actually knows him. Well, almost.

Dom works with her father. He’s Miles’ new prodigy, in fact. He’s a bit young for her, perhaps, by the looks of him, he can’t be more than 19, but he’s brilliant, apparently, and that’s all that’s ever mattered, with Mal. He’s brilliant, and he works with her father, whom Mal is currently speaking to, at least in fits and starts, so she’s been in the same room with Dom and made eye contact, and, from what she’s told Eames, Mal has said “bonjour” to Dom at least twice.

So she knows him pretty well, obviously.

Which is why she gets up on her chair and shouts, “Dom! Salut, Dominic!” soon after he and the Fashionable Male arrive.

Dom looks startled, and the Fashionable Male snaps to attention, placing himself protectively in front of Dom with a brisk efficiency Eames recognizes instantly. He saw a lot of it, growing up.

Military, bloody perfect.

Once Dom makes Mal out through the daze of smoke and the crowd, however, he smiles, and waves.

FM still looks skeptical, but Dom murmurs something into his ear, and then he actually smiles, just a little.

Eames doesn’t think it’s fair that someone should look so lovely when they smile if they’re going to smile as infrequently as the Fashionable Male does.

But then, life is full of disappointments.

Dom and his impeccably dressed escort arrive at their table, and Mal leans forward, pretending to be more drunk than she is, and after a second, Dom obliges her with a light kiss on her cheek.

“Sit, sit!” she shouts, and amazingly, they do.

There are introductions. The Fashionable Male is actually called Arthur, and after grudgingly offering his name, he doesn’t say much else.

Mal draws Dom effortlessly into her web, and Eames watches Dom watch her, ensnared by her laughter, her rapid, musical speech, half-English, half-French. He notices that Dom keeps up better than most, laughing at the right places, making her laugh, too. Her real laugh, not the flirty, disingenuous one she uses so much of the time with people who aren’t Eames.

Eames doesn’t try to join in their conversation. Mal isn’t making room for anyone else but the two of them, but Eames doesn’t mind. He’s still not at all sure this is going to work, but Mal wants it, so that means Eames does, too.

He stops watching them and takes a stab at watching Arthur instead, and is surprised to see that Arthur’s shoulders are relaxed, that he’s holding his glass casually in his hands, seemingly unconcerned about the dance Mal and Dom are engaged in.

Eames raises an eyebrow.

“Not the jealous type, I take it?” quietly enough for only Arthur to hear. No sense beating around the bush, but no sense upsetting Mal’s efforts too early, either.

Arthur just smiles, not so sweetly, not like the one he had for Dom. He holds up a finger to Eames, like he’s about to show Eames something incredible, and then he clears his throat.

Dom’s attention shifts in an instant, his head snapping violently away from Mal, eyes fixed on Arthur, waiting, leaning closer to him.

Arthur smiles again, softer this time, and touches Dom’s jaw, just lightly, with his index finger.

Dom makes a low noise, and leans into it with a stunning lack of discretion or control. Arthur rewards him by cupping Dom’s whole face, bringing him up for a quick, claiming kiss.

A second later, it’s over. Dom has been silently dismissed, and he returns to his conversation with Mal like nothing happened.

Eames has never seen anything like it.

He swallows, heart beating far too fast, and says, “No need to be, I see.”

Arthur shrugs, and Eames accepts that as the only answer he’s going to get.

---

Arthur and Dom stay for one drink, and then Arthur taps Dom on the wrist, just once, and Dom immediately starts making apologies, telling Mal they have to go, it was lovely talking with her, he hopes he’ll see her soon. He sounds utterly genuine, but he says it all in a babbling rush, like he doesn’t have time for all the things he actually wants to say, and, subsequently, tries to say them all at once.

Eames watches the way Arthur stands at attention behind Dom as he trips all over his words, watches Mal’s smile, half charmed by the display, half disappointed he’s leaving. He watches Dom’s hands, which keep flexing outwards, like he wants to touch her, but can’t.

It’s all very interesting and not at all like Eames imagined having a drink with Dom and or the Fashionable Male ever would be, when he bothered to entertain the possibility that such a thing would happen at all.

All in all, it’s a far better night than he’d been expecting when it started, and when Arthur spares him a brief and yet somehow searing look, sending Eames’ heart racing again, just before he and Dom step out of the pub, Eames is finally forced to admit that Mal might be onto something.

---

They sleep in the same bed, that night, because they almost always do, unless one of them brings someone home. Sometimes even then.

Mal’s room is always a massive disaster, orchestrated chaos compensating for a childhood raised in her mother’s perfectly ordered, ruthlessly tasteful home. Half of the time, she can’t even find her bed underneath all the miscellanea piled there, so they tend to take Eames’. Eames’ room is always impeccably tidy, because the military standard corners on his blankets and spartan furnishings remind him of home while also reminding him, whenever he feels like messing something up, that he’s actually not.

Mal talks and talks until she falls asleep, and sometimes she keeps talking while she dreams, but, as it has been since the very first time she slept over at his house when they were children, Mal’s voice relaxes him. Her voice is the best thing, usually the only thing, Eames can fall asleep to.

---

They’re out of food, the next morning, so they go out.

Mal is exhausted; she slept fitfully, her excitement from the evening’s events waking her up over and over. Eames is equally tired, having been woken up by Mal each and every time to discuss things further.

They make it to the cafe at the corner of their street by leaning against each other as they walk, wearing huge sunglasses and last night’s clothes. Mal has found a sunhat somewhere, and Eames has pulled a Greek fisherman’s cap down over his face. It’s too bright and early to be awake, but there they are.

They order coffee, and tea, respectively, and Mal puts her feet in his lap as they wait for their breakfast to arrive.

“You see how he’s already in love with me?” she boasts, grinning up at him, her face tilted against the sun.

Eames chuckles and strokes her ankle with his fingertips. “I saw that when Arthur says jump, Dom is gagging to ask how high, darling. Do you really not foresee that being a problem?”

Mal pouts, waving a hand dismissively. “Dom could not love Arthur. He’s meant for me.”

Eames raises a skeptical eyebrow, but keeps his voice gentle, knowing she is serious, at least about how she feels for Dom, when he says, “I’m not sure anyone’s explained that to him, yet. Is all I’m saying, dearest.”

Mal smiles, all serenity and confidence, and says, “I will be the one to teach him what it really means to be a lover. Arthur cannot show Dom what he cannot be.”

“And this is the person you want me to try and seduce? Quite cold, leaving me with such a man,” Eames demurs, feigning hurt.

Mal leans across the table, and pats Eames consolingly on the head. He allows it because he loves her.

“Don’t look so sad, my sweet. Arthur cannot love Dom, that doesn’t mean he cannot love you.”

Eames laughs, not because what she is saying is absurd, although it is, but because she means it, believes it, all the same.

---

Mal believes in love at first sight and soulmates and being half of a whole. She also believes in unicorns with a conviction that is startlingly in a woman of 23, and so Eames has always tended to take her romantic side with a grain of salt.

That is, until she first told him about Dom.

Mal talks about Dom like some people talk about religion, like the thing that saved them from a life without hope or meaning. When she talks about him, her face lights up, her hands flutter, she can’t stop smiling. He’s seen her fall in love with many things, art and food and places and even people, but he’s never seen her love anything the way she loves Dom.

And Eames has known Mal since they were children; she’s been his best friend since they were young enough to make blood pacts on the subject.

When she was 14 and wanted to run away and have adventures, Eames didn’t even think about not going with her. When she was 19, and they were tired and poor and frequently hungry, singing on the street, busking and stealing for their food, and Mal said she wanted to go home, Eames agreed to that too.

He goes along with Mal, because she’s his best and only friend, because they’ve known and loved each other too long to do anything but be together, to be whatever the other one needs them to be.

But now they’re 23 and Mal wants Eames to be the thing that can steal Arthur away, wants him to free Dom for her, and Eames has no idea how to be that. He’s been a great many things, already, but he doesn’t know if any of them have prepared him to be enough for someone like Arthur.

---

They go to the pub again two nights later. Mal wants to go back before that, but Eames doesn’t let her. They have to work, for one thing. Mal works in a bookstore, now, and Eames is a security guard for a very nondescript office building. It’s all very boring and terrible, but they have enough money to eat and live in a flat that isn’t likely to have rats, so Eames is willing to reevaluate the merits of boring, these days.

After two nights, though, Mal has had enough, and Eames knows she’ll go to the pub with or without him. All things considered, he’d prefer to be there when, or if, but probably when, Dom eventually breaks her heart. Probably at Arthur’s say so.

So they go, together, and when they arrive, Dom and Arthur are already there. In fact, they’re sitting and Eames and Mal’s table, and when their eyes meet across the bar, Eames gets the distinct impression Arthur and Dom have been expecting them.

Arthur even looks a little irritated it took them so long. Something about the slightly pinched look in Arthur’s eye when he straightens the cuff of his jacket, covering his watch, delights Eames to no end.

He takes Mal’s arm, and ensures they walk as slowly as is physically possible as they cross the length of the pub to take their seats across from Arthur and Dom.

Arthur’s lips curl, just for a second, his amusement doled out like a reward. Eames’ flushes, feeling uncontrollably proud and he supposes that maybe he is.

Dom asks Mal what she wants to drink, and she beams at him blatantly while he runs off to fetch it.

Arthur smiles indulgently, watching Dom too.

For a moment, Eames feels left out, absurdly so, but just as he’s thinking it, Arthur turns around to look at Eames again. The smile dissolves, but something warm remains around his eyes.

“How are you, this evening?” Arthur says, voice low and oddly formal, or, well, maybe the formality makes perfect sense, given the air of authority infused in every one of Arthur’s actions, his movements, and now even his speech.

“I’m wonderful,” Eames answers, feeling like he has no choice in the matter, his voice flowing without his say-so. At least he managed to fall back on his default of breezy and mildly flirtatious without any conscious effort.

Arthur tilts his head to the side, and then the other, and says, “How are you really?” voice flatter, almost warning, this time.

Eames drums his fingers on the table, smiling awkwardly. He doesn’t do awkward, and he’s not entirely sure what’s happening.

“I’m worried about Mal,” he answers, after he’s delayed as long as he can. He didn’t plan to be that honest, but there’d been no controlling that, either.

Luckily, Mal is too distracted, waiting for Dom to return, to notice. Or care, at the very least.

Arthur nods. It takes him a very long time, but, finally, he says, “You don’t need to be.”

Eames can’t help but gape at him, just a little.

“Are you sure about that?” he asks, keeping none of the significance, the implication, out of his voice.

Arthur just nods again, supremely confident, and says, “She’s right about him, I see that now.”

Eames’ eyes widen outrageously, but he has given up trying to control such things, at this stage. “And you’re alright with that? Even though he - I mean to say, you and he--”

Before Arthur can answer, Dom returns, and Mal takes her drink from him with effusive praise while Dom ducks and blushes under her affections. He looks so young, in that moment, far younger than any of them, and Eames feels something almost protective stir in his gut, watching Dom sit between Arthur and Mal, his body listing left to right, like it can’t quite decide who he should be leaning towards.

Eventually, Arthur reaches out, but not to draw Dom in, it transpires. Instead, he takes Dom by the shoulders, squeezing down hard enough for Dom to wince, and then settles Dom against Mal.

Dom looks at Arthur inquiringly, his eyes large, confused, but all it takes is a slight nod from Arthur for Dom to give in to it, relaxing against Mal. Neither Dom nor Arthur protest when she reaches around, wrapping one of her slim arms around his shoulders, tucking him in closer against her breast.

In fact, Arthur smiles, fond and almost, proud, and then he leans over to Eames and says, conspiratorially, “See how well they fit?”

Dom’s eyes are fluttering half-shut, and he’s breathing so evenly that Eames thinks he might actually be falling asleep. Mal is the opposite, almost vibrating from her joy, but she looks somehow serene, still, every bit as much as Dom, despite this.

She presses a triumphant kiss to Dom’s hair, and he just smiles, eyes still mostly closed.

Eames takes a long sip of his drink, and wonders how Mal could have possibly guessed, how she could have been so certain something like this would happen, how she doesn’t even seem surprised, now that it is.

Then Arthur touches him, just once, his hand on Eames’ elbow, and it shouldn’t be anything, but with that touch, everything seems to shift, to realign, and Eames thinks he might know, finally, what Mal means when she says to be a lover is to be a half of a whole.

But as soon as Arthur removes his hand, the feeling, the certainty, dissolves, and Eames tries to brush the memory away, telling himself he was imagining it.

It’s easy enough to do. Arthur doesn’t touch him again, doesn’t even speak to him, and after that one shocking moment, nothing much of anything happens. Not really. The same as before, they have one drink, and then Mal and Eames go home to their flat, and Arthur and Dom go off to wherever it is they spend their nights.

Before they part company, Mal kisses Dom’s cheek, and he lets her, but doesn’t return the gesture. Eames and Arthur don’t even touch, but the way Arthur looks at him, Eames almost feels as if they had.

He and Mal sleep in his bed as usual, and when she wraps herself around him in the night, talking in her sleep, Eames doesn’t know how anything could be more perfect than this.

---

Things are different, though, in the morning.

Mal wakes up and then goes back to bed again, but Eames can’t. He gets up. He goes outside.

Arthur is standing there, waiting for him.

He checks his watch, smiles his forgiveness for the late hour, as though Eames should have known he was keeping Arthur waiting, and then starts walking away.

Eames follows him.

---

They sit at a different cafe from the one he and Mal like to go to. It’s much nicer, but it’s almost three more blocks away, expensive, which is typically why he and Mal can’t be bothered. They rarely go out unless they’re hungover and there’s not enough food in the house to cobble something together.

Arthur orders for Eames, in perfect French, and Eames just lets him.

Arthur gets his order exactly right. His favorite kind of tea, orange pekoe, his eggs, poached, the way he likes them, his toast, a little burnt, his bacon, extra crispy. When the tea arrives, Arthur sets it steeping, and when he finally pours Eames’ a cup, it’s the perfect strength.

Arthur does all this silently, methodically, and Eames just sits and watches him.

Once Eames finishes his his tea, Arthur meets his eyes and states blandly, “You have questions.”

Eames does, but he doesn’t know to ask them. He feels thrown off balance, hopelessly out of his depth. He’s never felt like that before.

“You can ask me anything you want and I’ll tell you the truth.” Arthur’s voice is soft, sibilant, but so, so serious. Eames can hear the promise there, even before Arthur adds, “I won’t ever lie to you, Eames.”

It’s the first time Arthur has ever said his name, and Eames is amazed at what this does to his insides, the way something deep inside him he wasn’t even really aware of twists pleasantly.

“What are you?” he asks, nonsensically, wonderingly.

Arthur laughs, surprised, and maybe pleased.

“I’m a dom.”

Whatever Arthur just promised, Eames really wasn’t expecting an answer. He certainly hadn’t expected to be taken seriously. He hadn’t even meant--

“I’m not interested in whatever kind of kinky business you like to get up to, Arthur. I just want to know what you think you’re doing with Mal, with Dom, when--”

“Listen to me, Eames, and I want you to pay very close attention to me now, because this is important. I didn’t say I was into being a dom. I said I was one.”

“I don’t - what does that matter - if you do it, you must--”

Arthur’s hand is suddenly on him, thumb and index finger closing around Eames’ wrist, and he squeezes, just lightly, but it sends a violent shudder through Eames’ body, and he goes limp, staring at Arthur, wide-eyed, heart pounding in his ears.

“This isn’t something we do, Eames. It’s something we are.”

Eames nods dumbly, and Arthur lets him go.

It takes Eames a few minutes to regain the barest hint of his composure, and Arthur watches him carefully the whole time Eames struggles to put himself back together. He’s not sure, but he thinks he might detect something remorseful in Arthur’s eyes.

Finally, when he has his voice back, Eames asks, “And this what - you and Dom,” he shakes his head a little at the word choice, “are?”

“Not just me and Dom,” Arthur corrects softly.

“Mal, too?” Eames guesses.

Arthur smiles, and he looks sadder than Eames has ever seen anyone look. “And you.”

Eames rubs a hand shakily across his forehead, sitting up straighter in his seat. “You and Dom. You’re together. But last night - you - you gave him to Mal.” It’s not quite a question, but Eames’ voice is hesitant, testing the theory.

Arthur nods approvingly. “Dom and I found each other a few years ago, when he was first studying with Miles, and I knew of their research. I heard what they were testing, down in those dreams. I learned what they were able to do. Miles is the scholar, but Dom is the spark, he’s the only reason the experiments worked. Because of what he is, because he’s special.”

“Special?”

“Dom is a sub, pure. When I met him, he didn’t know what he was, he didn’t know how to live. And I had been alone for a long time. And I didn’t think - I wasn’t sure I would ever find my own sub, wasn’t sure he’d find his dom. There are so few of us, now. So I took him in hand, I taught him, slowly, what he was, how to live with it, how to thrive.”

Arthur smiles at the memory, and for a brief moment he looks peaceful, happy, but then his face darkens, looking at Eames again.

“But I was wrong. I thought Dom would never find his mate, I thought it wouldn’t matter that we acted as proxy for each other. But he did, he met her, and he loved her, but he was afraid to tell me. He was unhappy for months, because of that.” Arthur hangs his head, at this, his eyes fluttering shut, something lost and mournful crossing his face.

“Mal?” Eames asks, voice faint.

It’s enough to make Arthur look up, look at Eames. He nods gravely.

“Mal. She’s his true dom, his other half. They were made for one another, the way only our kind are made, wherever we come from, however we came to be. They belong together, and now, at last, they can be.”

“I don’t understand,” he says, because he doesn’t.

He doesn’t understand at all. None of this makes any sense.

Except.

Except.

“You and Mal, you’re like Dom and I, only you must have found each other so much younger, so young, and neither of you even knowing what you were,” Arthur’s voice is almost awed, as he continues, “it’s amazing. That you found each other at all, that you managed. You are so ill-suited to one another, and yet, closer than anything else, anyone else, you could have hoped to find.”

Arthur shakes his head, and repeats, “Amazing.”

Eames finally feels like he’s coming back to himself, feeling the confusion and panic solidifying into something harder, angrier.

“Mal is my best friend - she’s like my sister - we don’t--”

“Do you do what she tells you?” Arthur interrupts coolly, watching Eames carefully. “Do you try to give her want she wants, what she asks for, even if you don’t particularly want to, even if it’s dangerous or difficult, no matter what it is?”

Just like that, the anger dissolves, and Eames is bereft, awash, again, in a sea of confusion.

He nods, because it’s all he can seem to do.

Arthur just waits, and a few minutes later, Eames is able to ask, “So you’re saying that we’re - that I’m - I’m like Dom? The way that Mal is like you? I’m a... sub?”

Arthur shakes his head, and something dangerous flashes in his eyes. “You’re not just a sub. You’re my sub.”

Eames swallows, and tells himself he doesn’t believe Arthur, but he doesn’t say anything, he can’t, because when Arthur reaches across the table and touches him again, Eames knows it’s true.

He gets up from the table anyway. Arthur’s hand keeps his feet rooted in place, he finds he can’t move his limbs any further than the act of standing.

He glares at Arthur, cold and frantic, and Arthur sighs, dropping his hand from Eames’ wrist, folding his arms across his chest.

They stare at each other, and Eames thinks, wildly, that he won’t ever let Arthur touch him again.

He flees the cafe, and tells himself he’s grateful that Arthur doesn’t follow after him.

---

When he gets back to their apartment, Mal isn’t there.

Eames curses, and decides he needs to break something.

He casts his eyes around the room, searching for something Mal won’t mind him destroying.

The thought stops him cold, the instant after he has it, and he all but crashes to the ground, crouching on the floor, arms wrapped around his knees.

He doesn’t know how much time passes, only that it’s interrupted, finally, by a knock at the door.

He gets up tentatively, hoping it’s Mal, forgetting her key, as usual. He looks through the peep hole warily, afraid it’s Arthur.

It’s not. It’s not Mal, either.

It’s Dom.

Eames is just surprised enough to let him in.

“Mal isn’t here,” Eames says neutrally, realizing as soon as Dom steps inside that that must be why he’s here.

Only Dom shakes his head, and says, “I know where she is. I came to see you.”

“Piss off,” Eames says half-heartedly, knowing he’ll be ignored.

Dom smiles at him sympathetically, and goes to sit down on the chesterfield. He waits, and when Eames doesn’t move, Dom pats the spot beside him encouragingly.

Eames rolls his eyes, but goes to sit down with Dom.

“What do you want, then?”

“I want to explain, about Mal, and about me - and, well, mostly about Arthur.”

Eames clucks dismissively. “He already told me. Gave me the whole speech. I’ve decided to pass.”

Dom laughs hollowly. “You can’t pass, Eames.”

“Well that would be the problem, wouldn’t it. I happen to enjoy making up my own mind about what I do. And who I shag.”

Dom shakes his head, sad, knowing. “No, you don’t.”

Eames reels back a little, stunned by Dom’s frankness, by the confidence he clearly has in what he’s just said.

“I don’t? And how would you know? You’ve only just met me - we’ve barely had a proper conversation! You don’t know anything about me!”

“I know everything about you.” Dom contradicts, voice eerily calm. “I know the way your hands twitch when it’s been too long since Mal told you something to do with them. I know you can’t sleep without her voice telling you it’s alright, that she’s there, that you’re safe, you can rest for the night. I know nothing makes you happier than giving her what she needs, what she wants. I know you never felt right, never even felt real, before you met her.”

He smiles, just a little, and continues, “And I know none of it, nothing you’ve ever felt for her, compares to what it’s like when Arthur touches you. When he says your name. When you please him. There’s nothing better you’ll ever feel, Eames. I promise you. There’s nothing you were meant for, not the way you’re meant for him.”

Dom reaches over, putting his hand on Eames’ shoulder and peering into Eames’ eyes imploringly. “Don’t fight it, you’re only hurting yourself.” He shakes his head sadly. “And you’re hurting him, which is even worse.”

“That’s mental - I mean, you do realize that this whole thing is bloody insane?” Eames sputters, willing his anger to rise above the thrum inside his chest whispering back to him that everything Dom is saying is the truth.

Dom sighs, running his fingers through his straw colored hair.

“I came because I thought I could explains things better than Arthur,” Dom grimaces. “He can be a bit... heavy-handed. But obviously I’m not doing any better of a job. I’m sorry, Eames.”

He looks so totally sincere, but in that moment, all Eames can do is hate him. For taking Mal away from him, and maybe, deeper down where he prefers not to look, for what Dom was to Arthur, for the way Eames knows Dom has had his hands on Arthur, the way Arthur’s had his hands on Dom.

“Get out,” Eames says, and this time, he means it.

Dom does, not saying goodbye, not giving Eames a second look.

He curls up on the sofa, and pretends he’s waiting for Mal to come home, even though he already knows she won’t.

---

He doesn’t leave the flat for two days. He drinks tea and smokes, but he doesn’t eat or shower, or sleep.

He doesn’t even bother trying that last one, knowing he won’t be able to, not without Mal there.

On the third day, he runs out of cigarettes, and his hands are shaky from lack of food or sleep. He feels weaker than he has any right to be, even without proper rest or nutrition.

He’s gone longer than this without either and felt fine.

But of course, Mal was there with him, those times.

It’s dark out when he hears a key in the door, and although he struggles to get up, his legs betray him, and Eames stays where he is, sitting on the kitchen floor.

It is Mal, though, he knows by the lightness of her steps, even before she’s exposed by the furious way she shouts his name, banging around the flat as she searches for him.

When Mal finds him, she starts swearing so rapidly that he can’t make out what she’s saying, but she rushes to him, kneeling down beside Eames and cradling him in her arms. She keeps up her litany of blasphemies, but eventually he picks out enough to realize that she’s cursing herself, not him. He even thinks he catches one or two apologies, just before he falls asleep.

---

When he wakes up, Eames doesn’t recognize any of his surroundings, but he knows exactly where he is, all the same.

He’s in huge, luxurious bed, pillows and blankets nestled around him like a childhood fort. The room is wide and sunlit, balcony doors open wide. Everything is white and crisp, except for the dark wood of the bed frame, the other furniture. There isn’t a single thing in the room that isn’t beautiful, the art on the walls is recognizable, elegant, probably genuine.

Eames sits up in the bed, Arthur’s bed, and waits for him to come in.

Arthur doesn’t keep him waiting long. He stands in the doorway, watching Eames, a smile hovering half-formed on his lips.

“How are you feeling?” Arthur asks, stepping into the room.

Eames knows he’ll answer, every second he doesn’t he feels the words pressing persistently against his throat, but he takes the time anyway, struggling not to speak until he can decide what he actually wants to say.

“Where’s Mal?” he manages eventually, and pretends the sick feeling he gets when he watches Arthur flinch is pleasure, satisfaction.

“She’s with Dom, in their apartment.”

Eames raises an eyebrow. “Their apartment? And where’s that?”

“In this building,” Arthur answers, walking closer now, almost at the foot of the bed. “This is the penthouse, but Dom has the one just below us. They’re close,” he promises softly.

Eames wishes, contrarily, that this didn’t make him feel better, but it does.

“She’s really leaving, then,” he murmurs, telling himself he needs to hear the words aloud to really believe them.

“She’s not going anywhere,” Arthur assures him, missing the point. “She and Dom will stay where they are, and we’ll stay here. You’ll be able to see her whenever you want.”

Eames smiles tightly, and says, “Leaving me, I meant.”

Arthur’s face spasms and his hand reaches out to Eames involuntarily, or, at least, that’s Eames’ guess, given the way his hand snaps back, just shy of touching Eames, once Arthur’s regained control of himself.

“She’s not going very far,” Arthur amends, sitting down on the other side of the bed, far enough away that they’re not in danger of touching. “She’ll still be here when you need her.”

Eames looks away, out the balcony window, and says, “Not like she was before. Not now that she has him.”

Arthur makes a noise, a strange keening sound unlike anything Eames has heard before, and he finds he can’t help but turn back, looking at Arthur once again.

“You have me, now. Like Mal has Dom. Is that such a poor trade?”

Eames doesn’t say anything, thinking that, at least with Mal, it had felt like he had a choice.

With Arthur, he has no such illusions.

---

Later, Eames gets out of bed, and goes exploring.

The flat is massive, he gets lost twice down corridors that twist and turn like a maze. He finds two libraries, a music room, an entire room full of suits and jackets and shoes. He stays there for a long time, touching Arthur’s clothes, clenching his fingers around the fine fabrics, making wrinkles, smoothing them out. He passes at least two bathrooms, one of which has a huge jacuzzi.

He goes out onto a balcony, not the one in the master bedroom, another one, on the opposite side the the flat. He looks down at the city, realizing this flat must take up a whole floor of the building. It’s a breathtaking view, looking out over the Seine, and Eames stays out there a long time, trying to amuse himself with jokes about his finely gilded cage.

Eventually, he’s too hungry for pride, and he wanders back into the solarium he came out of, getting lost once again, before he finally locates the kitchen. It’s typically huge, beautiful. It’s also the most obviously modern part of the flat, sleek lines and stainless steel, but it fits in with the rest of the space seamlessly, like Arthur, who is sitting on a stool, elbows resting against the island in the middle of the room.

Arthur looks up, momentarily startled to see Eames standing in his kitchen, but then he rises to his feet, smiling solicitously.

“I’ll make you some waffles,” he says, guessing what Eames has been craving most.

Eames doesn’t bother to nod, just goes and sits down on the stool Arthur vacated, watching him take out ingredients and a very old looking waffle iron.

“It was my mother’s,” Arthur explains, without Eames asking, without even turning around.

“Did you have a mother, then?” Eames inquires snidely.

Arthur huffs a quiet laugh. “I did. And a father. Just like you. We have parents, Eames. We’re born, just like everyone else. We’re just not.”

“What?”

Arthur shrugs, his back still to Eames as he works.

“Like everyone else.”

“How? What are we? How did you know?” Eames rattles off, feeling strangely calm, now.

Maybe it’s the feng shui in Arthur’s flat. Maybe it’s just Arthur.

“I was lucky, in my way. When I was born, my parents knew nothing of what I was, but I had an uncle who was like me, who saw me for what I was, almost instantly. He taught me what he could, helped me find my way, but of course, he had a mate already. And we were - family is different. But he still showed me how to restrain myself, how to move among people and not get noticed, how to avoid letting my strangeness show.”

Eames has to laugh, at this. “Your strangeness shows, darling.”

Arthur laughs too, and he stops measuring ingredients, turning to share his laughter with Eames.

“You may think that, but you should have seen me when I was young. I didn’t know why, but I could almost always get my way, if I wanted something, even without asking, people around me would try to find a way to give it to me.”

Eames blinks. “You make that sound like a bad thing.”

Arthur sighs. “People don’t like it when they find themselves doing things when they don’t even know why. People would give me things, but it would make them angry, and confused, after the fact. No one liked me, even if they couldn’t help trying to please me.”

He smiles a little, rueful, and adds, “I’ve never been very good at making friends. Even when that’s what I wanted from someone, I could never be sure they actually wanted that from me.”

“So that’s what you... do? You make people give you what you want.”

“That’s right. But it’s something that has to be controlled, as I’ve been trying to explain. I’ve done my best not to abuse my nature. But it’s always there, in me. Sometimes I can’t control it, no matter how hard I try.”

He takes a step closer to Eames, and says, “This is why we have subs. It’s a way for my energies to be funneled appropriately, gives me an outlet, a vessel. The mark of a true sub, like a true dom, is the genuine desire to be that vessel, to serve in that way. It’s not a matter of force, not like it is with regular people. The sub wants to submit, wants to give.”

“Seems a bit one-sided,” Eames mutters darkly. “What does the sub - what do I get out of all this?” It feels strange to claim himself in this way, but it feels seductively right, as well.

It pleases Arthur, anyway, for Eames to say the word, and his smile is warm enough to send shivers down Eames’ spine.

“You get what you’ve always wanted most. To be exactly what someone else needs, just as you are.”

---

The waffles are perfect, of course.

Eames eats them in silence, but when he’s done, he spares an appreciative smile for Arthur. Arthur positively beams back at him, and it’s the best Eames has felt in weeks. Possibly, if he’s being honest, it’s the best he’s ever felt.

He hates, it, though, a second later, hates the way his emotions don’t belong to him, anymore, and he lets his face darken, shoulders hunching up in a protective sulk.

Arthur’s expression is drawn, careful not to let his disappointment show through. Eames can feel it anyway, but he supposes he should be grateful for the effort.

He thinks about everything he wants to know, everything that still doesn’t make any sense, and eventually settles on, “What were you doing? Coming round the pub all those times.” Never looking at me, never speaking.

“I was looking for you. I didn’t know it, at the time, but that’s why I was there.” Arthur answers simply.

Eames nods thoughtfully. “How does that work? You didn’t know me, didn’t even look at me, but you kept coming back.” He keeps to himself the fact that he had always known, instantly, before even seeing him, whenever Arthur came into the pub.

“We’re always aware of our kind,” Arthur responds, guessing anyway. “And even before we meet them, we feel our mate, we yearn for them. I had Dom, but I wasn’t complete, I was still searching, even if I didn’t let myself think about what I was searching for, even though I told myself I wasn’t suffering such foolish hope. I love Dom, and he is loyal to me, but we could not stop each other from missing our other halves, although we could lessen the pain, a little.”

“How long? How long were you and he...?” Eames trails off, trying to ignore the way the thought of Dom and Arthur together causes bile to rise in his throat.

Arthur looks deeply remorseful, though, softening the words he speaks next somewhat. “What will seem to you like a very long time. Years, now.”

“How long?” Eames presses.

“Five years. Miles discovered Dom when he was quite young. Discovered what Dom was able to do, what he made possible.”

“And what was that?”

Arthur shrugs. “Do you know anything of Miles’ research? What he’s been trying to develop - shared dreaming? The navigation of other minds?”

“Mal tried to explain it once. It seemed impossible.”

“It is. The technology doesn’t work, not really. Not without Dom, anyway. But Miles wanted it to, so badly. And Dom likes giving people what they want.”

“Like me.”

Arthur smiles, and though Eames knows Arthur wants to touch him, his hands stay where they are, folded on the table where Eames can see them.

“Like you.”

---

Mal and Dom come over sometime after the dishes from breakfast have been washed and put away.

Mal rushes over to Eames, throwing her arms around him, hugging him and kissing his face, but she’s different, she’s so different it hurts, and he puts her arms down, stepping away from her almost immediately.

She looks wretched, for a moment, but then she takes a deep breath, and goes back to stand at Dom’s side, her face becoming peaceful and warm once again.

Her fingers twine with Dom’s and Eames feels his own hands itch to be held. Arthur takes a step towards him, but keeps respectfully out of reach.

They all stand together in a strange, pregnant silence, until Arthur eventually offers Mal and Dom a seat, and Dom moves to sit before Arthur is even finished speaking.

Dom flushes, embarrassed and apologetic, looking up at Mal. She just shakes her head, taking her place beside him, kissing his cheek. Dom smiles, forgiven, and relaxes against her side.

Eames very deliberately take one of the arm chairs, the furthest from the chesterfield, room enough only for one.

Arthur accepts this, taking a seat across the room from Eames. He feels emboldened, for a moment, until he feels Arthur’s eyes on him, and realizes his mistake. He doesn’t need to be close to Arthur to feel his every whim, pulling at Eames’ inside, making him want to give in. All Arthur has to do is look, and he has a perfect view from his chair, his eyes heavy on Eames.

He almost gets up, and goes to sit at Arthur’s feet, but he pushes the impulse aside, turning to Mal instead.

“How are you?” he asks, wishing he didn’t already know the answer, wishing they were alone, and could speak freely.

Mal, of course, speaks freely anyway. “I have never been better. Except that I worry for you, my sweet Eames. Why will you not let Arthur make you happy, as Dom has made me happy? It’s all I want in the world, for us all to be happy.” Her voice drops as she says these last few words, and Eames can feel the power in them, more consciously than he ever has before.

He struggles to sort out the crossed wires of Mal’s wants and Arthur’s, of his own.

He eventually gives it up as a bad job, but almost smiles, a little, when he finds Dom looking at him sympathetically, realizing Dom’s loyalties must be almost equally confused.

“Can I offer you anything to drink?” Arthur asks, playing the gracious host, looking at Mal.

She smiles. “Perhaps we can go talk, while you make some tea.”

Arthur nods, and after pausing to give Eames one last cursory glance, he and Mal leave the room together.

Once they’re gone, Eames finds he can breathe a little easier, his head clearing somewhat.

He stands, and after a moment of consideration, goes and sits beside Dom. Dom says nothing, but he touches their knees together, and Eames feels calmed, from inside out, instead of the other way around, by the quiet gesture of solidarity.

---

Mal and Arthur come back with the tea, although that only appears to be for Eames. For Dom, Mal has brought a glass of lemonade and a plate of biscuits.

Eames tries to laugh derisively, but it comes out sounding pained. Mal looks sorry, but only for an instant, and then Dom reaches out to her, his touch instantly smoothing the regret from her face.

Eames gets up from the sofa, and goes to sit back down in his solitary chair. Arthur and his cup of tea follow him there.

“Please,” Arthur says softly, and with that single word, Eames feels himself come undone.

He takes the tea from Arthur’s outstretched hand, and let’s his fingers linger, briefly, against Arthur’s.

The touch soothes them both, and a considerable amount of the tension bleeds out of the room.

Arthur and Mal start talking about living arrangements, the details of their new lives washing over Eames, unsettling him again, and he stops listening, knowing it doesn’t matter if he hears them or not, knowing he’ll go along with whatever they decide.

---

Mal and Dom leave after a lunch of salmon and roasted garlic potatoes, something Eames’ mother used to make, once upon a time. He doesn’t even bother asking how Arthur knew that.

Mal kisses Eames on the cheek before she leaves, and after a strained moment, so does Dom.

Eames touches his cheek, where he’s just been kissed, not knowing what to say, and watches them leave in silence.

Arthur stands beside him, and Eames turns to look at him, silently asking for something, although he’s not entirely sure what.

Arthur pauses, considering his next move carefully, and then he leans forward and kisses Eames’ cheek as well.

Eames feels the strangeness of Mal and Dom’s kisses dissolve, erased from his sense memory, and he smiles at Arthur, not sure if he’s grateful or angry, but unable to stop from smiling just the same.

---

“Do you want to go into a dream?” Arthur asks him, that evening.

Eames stares at him curiously. “I thought you said the technology didn’t work. That it was just because Dom knew Miles wanted it to.”

“It doesn’t, but Dom isn’t the only one who’s special, remember.”

Eames looks down at his hands, thinks about how strange his life has become, about how tired he is, and wonders, what’s the harm? How much stranger could things possibly get?

The answer, he quickly discovers, is much stranger indeed.

Arthur whispers in his ear, explaining the rules of shared dreaming as they stand in the middle of a field of sunflowers, one that seems to go on forever. There is, at the very least, nothing else in sight. Nothing but them, that is, and a vast sea of yellow.

Arthur is in the middle of talking about projections and the subject versus the dreamer, when Eames interrupts him.

“If none of this is real, that is, if none of it works except because we want it to, then why do the rules matter? Why should there be any rules at all?”

Arthur stops short at this, clearly surprised, and Eames laughs. “For all that you are the oddest person I have ever met, you really do have an appalling lack of imagination.”

Arthur concedes the point with a wry smile, and then watches, transfixed, as Eames shifts not only the world around them, but himself, too.

It takes only a few moments of concentration, and then they are on a rocky beach, endemic of the English seaside, and Eames isn’t himself, anymore. He’s Dom, a perfect replica and he flexes his fingers, admiring the sudden smallness of his hands, the even, rounded nails, so different from his own, bloody and bitten down to the quick.

He turns up to Arthur, expecting him to be pleased, meaning for him to be, but Arthur has gone pale, horrified.

“No,” he croaks, touching Eames wildly, pushing against Eames’ chest. “Change back, change back, Eames,” his voice is frantic, but it’s an order, just the same, and Eames can’t do anything but obey.

Once he’s settled back into his own form, Arthur starts to breathe again, and he pins Eames with a hard look.

“Never think that I want you to be anyone but yourself. Never.”

Eames nods shakily, hearing the violent certainty in Arthur’s voice, and believes him.

---

They leave the dream soon after, and Arthur sits on the floor beside Eames, eyes tracing Eames’ face hungrily, like he’s reassuring himself Eames is still real, still himself.

Eames feels sorry, but he can’t tell if that’s because Arthur wants him to, or if he just is, so he doesn’t say anything.

After a few minutes, Arthur sighs, and gets up off the floor. He offers Eames a hand Eames doesn’t take. Arthur looms over him, looking down at Eames, still kneeling on the floor, for what feels like an eternity, and then Arthur turns away, and silently walks out of the room.

---

Eames makes grilled cheese and tomato soup for dinner, although he’s not entirely sure why.

The smells draw Arthur out from wherever he was hiding, but when he comes into the kitchen and sees what Eames has done, Arthur flinches.

Eames feels hot shame wash through him, not knowing why, just knowing it’s because of Arthur.

“What is it?” he asks warily.

Arthur strains to calm himself, and Eames feels some of the embarrassment recede.

“My favorite,” Arthur explains, gesturing towards the meal Eames has prepared.

Oh. Of course.

“You never know,” Eames says, rallying with a rakish grin. “Maybe I made it terribly just to spite you.”

Arthur laughs, but the way it sounds, faint and tinny, Eames wonders if part of Arthur wishes that were true.

---

They make it through dinner and the rest of the evening without further incident, although Eames knows it’s taking every measure of Arthur’s control to keep the mood calm.

Eames doesn’t fight it, accepting the soothing waves radiating off of Arthur, and that helps, too.

Eventually, it’s late enough that Eames is half-asleep in his seat. They’ve been playing chess, and Eames has been letting Arthur let him win.

When his fingers fumble clumsily, knocking down half the board as he reaches for one of his pawns, Arthur puts a stop to the game.

“You need to sleep,” Arthur says sternly, but Eames sneers at him.

“Can’t sleep without Mal.”

The same dark, amorphous something that always appears when Eames mentions Mal flashes in Arthur’s eyes, but he just nods, slightly, allowing himself a moment to convey his recently dormant but always infuriating self-confidence.

“I think you’ll find you’re able to sleep even better with me.”

Eames only wishes he could doubt it.

part two