InsaneJournal

Who: Eames, Reg and Rajani
What: Sharing a dream, of course, and Eames and Rajani learn that Regulus has a fucked up head space
When: Sunday night, when it all started
Where: In the dream space, but the dream takes place in the castle
Rating/Warnings: Magical Zombies! Swearing
Status: Complete


Rajani looked up over the arm of the chaise on which she was lounging at the figure just come from around the corner. The Black brother. As a rule she stayed clear of him, she could feel the animosity between the two Black from half way across the castle. She didn’t like contention, it was complicated and sticky. For Rajani, complicated was left for the body-bind knots, and sticky, well, there were certain things that should be sticky and certain things that shouldn’t, interpersonal relationships fell on the side of the latter for her.

But that didn’t mean now that he was within her sights she couldn’t indulge her interests a bit. It was a languid, summer day, the sun drenched the corridor in hot pools of light, she had all the time in the world on her hands.

“You’re headed somewhere in a hurry,” she called over to him, still a few feet off.

“What?” He turned his head as if noticing her for the first time. A dark look crossed his face, wary he was. Not that Rajani could blame him, he seemed well aware that she found his brother’s company enjoyable. “I have to- I’m busy.” He cast a final sidelong glance at her continued on, not even slowing his pace.

Eames was up ahead. He’d found a huge window that looked out over the most amazing view, and had already started working on preliminary sketches for the painting he was going to do. It was fantastic; the lake in the foreground with the mountains in the background and the city nestled between the two. The light was that early autumn evening sort, that cast everything in warm tones and made even the smallest detail stand out perfectly, and if he didn’t get it onto paper right that instant, he’d miss it forever.

He didn’t look up when he heard someone approaching, but he knew who it was anyway. He’d been around Regulus for long enough now to know how the man moved. “Evening, Reg,” he said, adding a few more details to the lakeshore and absently wishing he had a set of pastels with him. He glanced round at his friend to smile at the younger man, then turned back to his sketchpad and frowned. His pastels were sitting on the windowsill beside the sketchpad. Odd.

“So where are you off to in such a hurry?” he asked Regulus, searching through his pockets as he spoke, looking for his cigarettes. His fingers brushed against his totem as he hunted, but he’d check that once he lit up.

Regulus wasn’t really in a hurry, well, not until he’d found out more information, and depending on that he might be in more of a hurry. He had to be somewhere, or, rather, he had to talk to someone. But that someone definitely wasn’t the woman lounging about in the sunlight like some cat napping in the afternoon. He didn’t know her more than that woman the joked around with Sirius and was, more than likely based off their conversations posted for everyone to see on the network, sleeping with him on occasion. Someone like that wasn’t a potential ally and he wasn’t going to waste his time trying, nor did he need to draw in another enemy. It was best to keep her at a polite distance.

The woman smiled, oddly, why would she smile at a rejection? And she shrugged at his dismissal and Regulus pressed on.

Thankfully, the person he did need to speak to was just ahead down the corridor, using the area before a large window as his personal art studio. Not entirely an odd place for a studio, but art appreciation was the furthest from Regulus’ mind at that moment. And, side stepping around a staff member carrying a large stack of linens, and then a few short steps another, he closed the distance between him and his friend as quickly as possible.

“Nice sketch,” Regulus gave a cursory glance at the piece Eames was working on, and the view out the window, which was, he had to admit, somewhat breathtaking. No wonder his friend chose this spot. But again, not the purpose of this meeting.

“But,” he whipped his gaze up, away from the sketch, the quickness snapping him back to focus, “Smaller Reg, have you seen him? I think he and Daniel were talking about going down to the lake. Did they talk to you about that?”

Eames shook his head at the question, paying more attention to getting his cigarette lit for the few seconds that it took and then offering one to Reg. “Haven’t seen either of them, mate. Daniel said he was going to play with friends, but he usually texts me to let me know where he’s going. I’ll just check in case he’s sent me anything.” He exhaled a lungful of smoke as he dug out his phone, lifting his poker chip as he did so, and checked for any new messages while he absently flicked the poker chip over the knuckles of his free hand.

“No, nothing. Want me to text him?” he offered, and then looked round at his poker chip as it slipped a bit while he played with it. His oddly smooth and brand new poker chip, with the wrong weight. What the actual fuck?

He quickly went through his memories, and couldn’t remember how he’d arrived at the window. He couldn’t remember drawing most of the sketch, to be honest, and it explained the pastels showing up as well. So he was dreaming, which was fine, but... who owned the dream? He was shit at the tricks Ariadne and Cobb could do easily, so he couldn’t exactly flick the mountains over with a thought, and everyone could dream up little things once they knew what was going on. He could Forge no matter who owned the dream, so that wouldn’t help either.

“Reg, one other thing. What were you doing before you found me?” he asked. He couldn’t remember either Arthur or himself setting up a PASIV, but given that he’d just spent the better part of a month being blind for no known medical reason, he didn’t think it was too much of a stretch to have the castle start making people share dreams. So he needed to work out who was real and who was simply a projection before he started poking holes in the fabric of the dream.

Regulus accepted the cigarette and light without much though, someone was offering, he was willing to take it. “Ya, could you? How fast does he usually take to respond?” Regulus didn’t like the idea of not knowing where smaller Regulus was, for some reason it mounted up panic inside him in a way that defied his very structured Slytherin way of living.

But Eames was playing with that poker chip instead and asking a rather strange question. Regulus was of a mind to brush it off, “Just text him,” he started impatiently, “what does it matter, I was-” But then he realized he couldn’t answer that question. He’d been walking down the corridor to talk to Eames about smaller Regulus, and before that he’d… been. He couldn’t remember, he couldn’t remember how he’d reached this floor, or why he even knew Eames would be here in the first place.

“I don’t I-” He gave Eames a very confused look, confused and somewhat apprehensive. Memory loss was not a good thing in the magical world. “What’s going on, Eames?”

“Oh, nice sketch, um-” That woman on the chaise who’d spoken to Regulus earlier had seemed to have decided to join them for whatever reason. Regulus hadn’t even noticed. “What is it?”

Eames nodded to himself at Reg’s obvious confusion, having just confirmed himself as an actual person, and was about to explain when Rajani showed up. He smiled easily at her and thanked her for the compliment, then offered her a cigarette as well. “We’re just discussing what trouble our younger selves have been getting up to, sweetheart. Daniel at least has been rather more secretive than usual. How’s your day been so far?”

He took another drag on his cigarette when he was finished speaking and looked back round at the sketch and the view. How he hadn’t noticed the fact that Daniel’s dragon mountain had shifted round to the opposite side of the castle was beyond him, but he knew now and he could see other little tells all round him that let him know that yes, this was a dream. He blew out a few smoke rings, then looked back round at his two friends. “Where are my manners? Do you two know each other? Or do I need to do introductions?”

Rajani beamed a smile up at Eames for an answer. She paid no mind really to Regulus, not before Eames drew her attention to him anyway. He had made it clear he didn’t want to speak to her, a point made more apparent by the indignant and cross look on his face at being ignored by his friend.

“My day was lovely, I spent it…” She was going to say she’d spent it lounging on her back enjoying the sun but then, she couldn’t recall anything before she saw Regulus walk around the corner. She didn’t have the most impeccable memory, but she didn’t forget a whole day the moment after having lived through it.

She gave her former perch a quizzical look, as if it might have the answer, though it didn’t provide anything other than look inviting for a place to sit.

“I was over there and before…” Her brow knit together and she stopped again. “I don’t know,” she said at last with a laugh, and then cringed, “What was I drinking last night?”

She caught the look on Regulus face, it hadn’t improved a bit while she spoke, if anything he seemed more concerned. No, Rajani could tell he was actually bordering on fearful, that feeling like cold, tangy metal radiated off of him that she’d learned over the years to associate with fear.

“What’s going on-?” They said it in unison.

"Nothing to worry about, folks. Please stay calm while I explain this, though," he said, then leant against the wall as he took another drag on his cigarette. He looked at Reg as he spoke, making sure to keep eye-contact with the other man. Rajani would probably think it was some sort of exciting adventure, but Reg... Reg was pretty close to snapping, or so Eames thought. This was no time for faffing about or telling little white lies. "I'm fairly certain that we're in a shared dream. None of us can remember what we were doing before we got here, that view I don't remember drawing cannot exist in reality, I have my own ways of checking and... they're telling me this is a dream."

In order to prove his point, he took the cigarette from between his lips and dropped it to the floor as he exhaled. Willing it away, the thing vanished at about knee-height. "Remember, stay calm. We're just dreaming. As long as we don't poke around too much, we'll be fine. We can just explore the dream and then wake up when it's over. Trust me on this, this is what I do back home." Arthur had told him of how Ariadne had reacted when Cobb first took her into a dream. He had no desire to die from a face-full of glass, and so he did his best to keep things as calm as possible.

Regulus flicked his eyes from Eames to the woman and back again. He was trying to take deep breaths through his nose, calming like, but it wasn’t working. A tremor vibrated through from the foundation of the castle on up, slow and soft at first but increasing in intensity as it worked its way up the building.

“This isn’t possible. I don’t dream.” Regulus silently tried to magic this all away, if it was a dream there were techniques one could use when they realized they were dreaming to suppress the dream and push who ever might be peeking in out. But nothing happened. The castle stayed fast around them, Eames and that woman were still there. And now some kind of noise was issuing from the greater part of the castle, a noise that was getting louder, though still impossible to identify.

He turned solely to Eames then, “How do we stop? We need to stop!”

Eames jumped away from the window as the castle shuddered all over and the glass cracked, pushing the other two over with him. "Stay calm," he repeated, then quickly started to usher the other two towards the nearest staircase. They were three floors up, jumping out of the window would only break their legs and they'd have to lie on the ground in agony until they woke up. "Everyone dreams, Reg, it's how our brains process all the information we take in during the day. It's essential. The only thing we have any say in is whether we remember the dreams or not," Eames told him as they moved, looking all round for the source of the horrible shambling moaning sounds. He didn't like the sound of this at all.

And then the screaming started.

"Oh, shit," he muttered, and then continued as he dreamt up his usual Heckler and Koch pistol. "To make it stop, we either stay calm until the dream ends and we wake up, which is by far the best option, or we die in the dream. We can kill ourselves or let the projections do the work for us. We die in the dream, we wake up, it's simple. Not fun or enjoyable in the slightest, but simple."

He pushed Reg and Rajani round the corner, trying to hurry them up, only to stop short when he saw what was stumbling out of the stairwells. Corpses, dozens of them, all pasty-white and skeletal-looking, dripping wet and heading right for them. "Who the fuck owns these?" he said as he stared for a moment, then grabbed the other two and shoved them back the way they'd just come before firing into the crowd of zombies.

"Pick a room and get in it!" he shouted after Reg, trying to be heard over the constant sound of wet bodies slapping into things and the godawful moaning, and then he was shooting at the bloody things again. It wasn't working, headshots weren't working, why weren't they working?

The cracking glass was ominous and given that everything felt so damn real it was a smart idea to get away from them before they felt what a rain fall of glass was like.

“No, Eames, not everyone dreams,” he shouted back to his friend as he followed him towards the stairwells. That noise was getting louder. “Not in my world. The best way to steal someone’s secrets is when they dream, the mind is at its most defenseless. Among other reasons to stop dreams. I use magic to stop mine.” The screaming started then and Regulus knew. He couldn’t deny the thumping sound, and the moaning and what it all meant any longer.

“What are projections?” the woman asked, she looked worried now. “What is this?” She turned to look at Regulus then, “You- stop it, stop them.” How had she known?

He tried to grab hold of Eames’ shoulder to halt him as they neared the stairwell. They would be coming from there, from everywhere. “I stop my dreams with magic because- SHIT!” They all halted at once as the inferi started pouring from the well. Turning and running back down the corridor sounded like a lovely plan. The woman picked a room and opened the door, holding it wide for them to get in while it seemed Eames was trying his hand at useless target practice. Regulus refrained from asking Eames to not hurt his projections, whatever they were, he could see why his friend felt the need to shoot at the roiling horde of undead monsters, but with each shot the building shook more.

“Get in!” Regulus called over to Eames and raised his wand, he’d drawn it the moment he’d seen the inferi coming at them. Just as Eames and Regulus were ducking through the door he cast a fire ball out into the corridor at the hoard of undead. And then the door was shut and for a moment there was relative quiet, relative being the key word as the moaning and thumping were still faintly noticeable.

“You would have magical zombies in your head,” the woman said. Regulus couldn’t tell if it was an insult or some kind of praise.

“Read the books have you?” Regulus heaved a sigh and slumped back against the door. “I don’t dream, Eames, because of them… among other things.”

The woman’s eyes went wide, “You don’t have You Know Who in your head, do you?!” This time her disbelief and something akin to disgust were clear in her voice.

“A few Death Eaters.” Regulus nodded and looked at anything other than the two people trapped in the room with him, “More or less. If we’re lucky it’ll just be them.” He jerked his head back to indicate the inferi they’d just escaped.

Eames had no idea what the other two were on about. He was too busy trying to move the heaviest bit of furniture in the room in front of the door. The TV cabinet seemed to fit the bill, being huge and made of a lot of wood, so he started trying to move it over. He absently wished that Ariadne or even Cobb was there so that they could throw up a false corridor for the Zombies to go down, or even just a huge pit for them all to pile into, like undead lemmings. He wondered if Arthur and his paradoxical architecture could have unfolded some Penrose steps for him, even as he shoved at the cabinet, but to no avail. It was times like this that Eames really wished he had even the slightest bit of aptitude at altering pre-made dreams. Sure, he could host the bloody things in his head, and he could include all the escape routes anyone could ever need as long as it was worked out before-hand, but when it came to all the on-the-job tweaks, he was next to useless. He knew his strengths and he stuck to them and, oh, it was almost obvious now that he thought on it and stopped bitching to himself!

The television in the cabinet gave him the reflective surface he needed to Forge, and he instantly gained an extra three stone of pure muscle (and the clothes to fit) and hopefully the extra strength he needed to shift the cabinet. He went back round to the side and set his shoulder to it and shoved. The cabinet finally moved. Not as much as he’d like, but it was something at least.

“I’m sure you’re discussing vitally important things, but some help would be gratefully accepted over here,” he said, then shoved once again. The cabinet moved even closer to the door. Another three feet and they’d be alright for a bit longer.

“Well, what else do you have bouncing up in your skull?” The woman was leaning with Regulus against the door, keeping the bloody thing shut against the pounding from the other side. Regulus gave her a disparaging look for an answer, until a particularly strong bump against the door pushed them off balance and the back of Regulus’ head made contact with the wood.

“Just so I know,” she shot back, seeming to not appreciate his silence, “if I’m going to die a horrible death, or just be tortured until I wake up-“

And then Eames was cutting in, or it seemed to be Eames as the man before them was a great deal bigger and muscular than the Eames Regulus knew. He tipped his head and looked confused. “Uh, Eames?”

But Regulus could multitask and he wasn’t the slightest bit confused over what Eames was trying to do with the telly cabinet.

“Right.” Regulus flicked his wand, levitating the cabinet and backed away from the door, grabbing the woman’s arm to direct her out of the way, and magicked the cabinet in his and her place. The thumping could still be heard, however, with something very solid in the way Regulus felt a thousand times safer.

“As I said before, Eames,” Regulus gave the beefy man another disgruntled look, but he made sure to have his friends attention first before going on, “hopefully it’s just them, and not the other lovelies bouncing around in my skull.” He used the phrase for the woman’s benefit, and she smirked at him for it.

“Do you know how long these dreams usually last? Because that would be really helpful to know right about now.”

Eames fell forward a little bit as the cabinet suddenly floated away from him, then straightened up as Reg asked him more questions. Glancing at the TV screen, he let himself return to normal, shedding the extra muscle with a thought. “Dreams last as long as they need to, mate. If we were back home, it would last until the timer ran down, but since I don’t have a fucking clue as to what’s going on or how we’re sharing dreams in the first place, I doubt that’s going to happen. Or we can just kill ourselves and wake up, in which case, the dream will end incredibly quickly. Or we just move that cabinet back and let your friends tear us to bits, which is never an enjoyable way to go.”

He plucked his gun out of midair after that and checked the magazine for bullets. “So, head-shots all round?”

“Fuck, brilliant, just great.” Regulus shot back, angry but not at anyone in particular. This wasn’t their fault, they were trapped in this situation just like he was.

The pounding on the door seemed to increase and the building shook again causing dust to rain down on them from above. That couldn’t be good. And just when things couldn’t get more ominous a good thud against the door made the whole telly cabinet jump forward an inch. The assault against the door didn’t lessen, each onslaught forcing the cabinet away inch by inch.

“Ohh-kay right,” Regulus pulled his eyes from the shaking cabinet, “head shots all round-

“What?!” the woman protested, “Hell no-

“It’ll be the least painful way-

“I’m not about to kill myself,” the woman scoffed, “because your dreams would delight Freddy Krueger-

“Would you rather they get- who the hell is Freddy Krueger?”

Another tremor and another slam against the door and another inch forward for the cabinet added urgency to their argument. The door could open now, only a hand’s breadth. It banged against the cabinet, and the sound of the horde was more imposing than the glimpses of movement one could catch in that small window.

“Eames, right, so those are mine, not like it’s a big secret. But if I go, if you kill me, will they stop and then you two can have a pleasant rest of the dream?”

But it was too late, something crashed against the door and the cabinet lurched forward and over. The space opened to the inferi was only about a person and a half wide but it was enough for a charging mass of undead monsters to utilize and they came rushing into the room towards Regulus, Eames and Rajani.

“No time for that, I’m afraid,” Eames replied just as the cabinet fell forward. Everyone jumped back as far as possible, if only to delay the inevitable for a couple more seconds. “Sorry about this, sweetheart. You can kick me in the shins when we’re topside, alright?” he said hurriedly to Rajani, his gun aimed right between her eyes even as he spoke. He didn’t give her a chance to protest, he simply pulled the trigger and turned back to Reg before her body even had a chance to crumple to the floor.

Of course, even that had taken too long, and Reg was already being pushed and pulled in any number of different directions by clammy pale skeletal hands, and without making a bloody sound! “Oh what the fucking hell, fuck, REG!” he yelled, his gun ready for when Reg looked round in his direction. Eames blinked at the look of complete acceptance, of Reg’s resignation to what was about to happen at the hands of the zombies, and then he fired his gun.
The zombies let go of Reg’s body the instant it went limp, and it vanished before it could even slump to the ground. Instead, they all turned towards Eames as one, and began to advance. He hated this bit, even though he knew he was dreaming, and he was going to wake up with an absolute bastard of a headache, but it was still far far better than being torn apart. Time to eat a bullet, he realised, and then his pistol was ready so he braced himself and fired just as he felt a hand on his arm.