InsaneJournal

WHO: Ariadne, Eames, Sirius Black and Morpheus
WHEN: Backdated like whoa, to 27th January, evening, after these messages.
WHAT: Sweet dreams ‘til sunbeams find you, etc etc
WHERE: Eames’ head. FUN.
NOTES: Visual aids included at the end of the thread.



“Oh my GOD,” she shrieked, “I can’t believe you just did that! Jesus, Sirius...” and then the blonde girl was giggling uncontrollably and just about holding onto her drink. It took her a few seconds, but eventually, she regained her composure, and then she was going up on tiptoes to speak in his ear so he could hear her over the music. “We need to, we really, we need... Here, hold this, would you?” she asked, shoving the half-full bottle of ...blue alcohol of some sort (complete with straw) towards Sirius before bending down to fix her strappy heels. After that, she shimmied a little bit to get her dress to sit properly, and then she sorted out her bra straps and made sure that her ruby pendant was sitting nicely, hanging just below the dip in her collarbone . She took the bottle back from Sirius after that and turned to look in a nearby mirror. Winking at the young wizard via her reflection, she checked that her hair and make-up looked fine, and then grabbed Sirius’ hand just as the song changed and the bass line was cranked up enough that she could feel it reverberating through her bones. “I love this one, come on!” she shouted, and then dragged them both past a couple of booths and down towards the dancefloor.

And if she’d happened to grin and nod at a very familiar brunette sitting in one of the booths, building a scale model of the Taj Mahal out of beermats, empty bottles and bottle caps, well, so be it. Her drink was finished by that stage, so she generously donated the empty bottle and straw to the building supplies. “We’re going dancing! Thought you might like thi- oh... hello, Emma,” she said, finally noticing that someone else was sitting in the booth.

“Charlie, is it?” the other girl asked, then continued when Charlie nodded, “I’m just telling our friend here about how we first met.”

“Ems! That’s bloody unfair! Bitch. Anyway, Sirius and I are going dancing now. Bye!” Charlie blurted out, then pulled Sirius down into the middle of the busiest part of the dancefloor.

Blue alcohol, Sirius decided, should probably be made illegal. There was just something… off about blue booze. It wasn’t natural. But luminous beverages aside, the rest of this situation was hauntingly familiar. Pretty girl, bad lighting, music that pounded so hard through your skull any thoughts of murderous dark wizards and wars were all but forced out of there. Just a pleasant drunken fog, attractive company that hopefully wouldn’t take long to get back to a bedroom and the rest of the night spread out before them.

A slender hand knotted through Sirius’ and dragged him towards the dancefloor. Sirius was known to only dance when it was on some kind of elevated, stage-like surface, where he was sure to attract the most attention and make a large spectacle of himself in the process, but when he tried to point this out the music drowned out his words. It was good music though, although he couldn’t quite place it, so that was okay. He could live with that. Sirius finished off the remains of the beer he appeared to be holding, placing the empty glass down on a free table as his companion – Charlie? – stopped to chat to some girls sat in the booth, his own attention fixed on scanning the rest of the people in the bar, just in case there was an upgrade going. Deciding against it, Sirius forced his attention back to the group of girls and onto Ariadne, who was apparently building something out of beer mats.

“Hey-“ he managed, his tone pleasantly surprised, but then Charlie was all but wrenching his arm out of its socket in an attempt to get him onto the dancefloor. Sirius rolled his eyes back at the architect, but hitched his most charming, slightly crooked smirk into place as the blonde spun to face him, crushed close in the mass of bodies cramming the small space. Not that he minded. At all. Sirius grinned, one lean arm snaking around her waist and dark hair falling across his features as he ducked his head to speak loudly into Charlies ear. “You know, I’ve been told many times by my best mate I must never dance. You’re a liability. If I get in trouble you better protect me.”

He pulled back a little, still treating the blonde to an infamously wicked grin.

Charlie looped her arms round Sirius’ neck, just so she could hear him better, of course, and laughed when he asked for protection. Hips moving in time with the music, she shifted even closer to him and placed both hands on his shoulders for balance. Then she went up on her tiptoes once more (not that there was much extra height to be gained from that, since her heels were insanely high to begin with), and replied just as loudly. “Your best mate doesn’t know what he’s talking about! Everyone can dance! Everyone! But I’ll keep you safe, pet, don’t you worry!” she told him, before running her hands down his upper arms and grinning to herself.

She spun in his arms after that, so that she had her back pressed up against his chest, and grabbed his hands so that she could place them on her hips and hold them in place. Tilting her head back so that he could hear her better when she spoke, she started moving her hips again. “Move with me. It’s easy, even a man can do this, I promise!” she told him, then dipped down and back against him before going back to moving in a figure-of-eight type manoeuvre and laughing the whole time.

Sirius had actually been taught to dance. A long time ago, when his Mother had decided it was proper behaviour for a young man of the Black descent to conduct himself in a certain manner. So there’d been pompous, boring dancing for about two weeks, until the tutor had announced Sirius was impossible and horrific and the spawn of a demon or flobberworm or flobberworm demon or something, and had stormed out. His Mothers resulting tantrum had left a scar on his left shoulder-blade. Still, compared to his French and piano tutors, she’d actually lasted an impressive length of time.

But that hardly could be compared to this. A bassline pulsed through the room in a way that reminded him of rare nights out after leaving Hogwarts, drowning troubles in various bars and dives across London. Sirius allowed himself to be led for a little while, rather enjoying the feeling of the warm, supple body pressed closed against his even as his mind wandered a little. “You do realize,” he pointed out to Charlie, ducking his head to speak into her ear, “that it’s a proven fact that most dancing is just a prelude to sex? Not that I’m suggesting anything, but I feel like you should know what you’re getting into. I am, after all, a gentleman.”

And he could almost hear James laughing at that. But hey, what was the harm? She was gorgeous, and he was… well, Sirius was Sirius.

Now that was funny. Charlie laughed and laughed, then turned round to face Sirius once more, pressing right up against him as she reached up to put her hand on the back of his neck. Pulling him in for a very quick kiss, she then moved her head so that she was able to talk into his ear again. “You’re as much a gentleman as I am, Sirius Black. Besides, I already know what I’d be getting into.”

If Sirius had been paying any attention at all, he’d have noticed Charlie becoming just a bit taller, along with developing fuller breasts and broader shoulders as she spoke. Or perhaps the long almost-platinum blonde hair shortening and turning more honey-coloured. Or the voice changing ever so slightly into one Sirius already knew. Then there were the tattoos appearing on the woman’s upper arms, shoulders and across her chest, spreading like ink blots on her skin. Pulling back after a second or two, Eames was wearing his female self and grinning up at Sirius.

“Miss me?”

It took Sirius a moment, but suddenly he was aware that Charlie was… different. He stepped sharply back, narrowing his eyes and nearly taking out a boy dancing behind him as he stared. Then, like a puzzle coming together, it made sense. Helped mainly by the tattoos spreading over what-had-just-been-Charlie’s skin. They were painfully familiar, and Sirius stared for a moment before reaching out and punching the girl hard on the shoulder. Only it wasn’t really a girl. Unless there was a girl with the exact same tattoos of Eames, which was a slightly intriguing idea. But still, when was the last time he’d been to a place like this on his own? Where even was this place?

“You wanker,” he told him. “I’m dreaming, aren’t I?” He stepped closer, his face close to the female Eames’. It was weird, seeing him/her again. And it reminded him of things that had happened which he hadn’t thought about for a while. “I missed the fucking awesome legs. Otherwise… meh. Also, you dance like a tramp when you’re a girl. And you owe me a pint. Wanker.” There was another pause, when Sirius pulled back and looked around, taking in the bar with a whole new perspective. “Oh, fuck,” he announced. Because it was weird. It was all just… weird. And he was a Wizard. He should be used to weird. But this was weird.

"You bastard!" She was still grinning a little bit, but really. Who hit girls like that? "Of course you're dreaming. I can't do this when I'm awake, can I?" Sirius' next little ramble was mostly ignored, and then Eames took advantage of the wizard looking round the nightclub to look into one of the many mirrors Ariadne had built throughout the place. Speaking of Ariadne, Eames grinned at her when their eyes met via the reflection in the mirror before giving her a brief salute, and then she was shifting identities once more.

The next time Sirius looked back at Eames, he was faced with... himself.

"Alright, dickhead?" Eames-as-Sirius said, treating the original to an exact replica of the wicked grin he'd bestowed upon Charlie only ten or so minutes previously. After that, he ran a hand through his hair, pushing it back from his face. Given that this was a dream, and his dream at that, there were no smoking restrictions anywhere and so, he dreamt up a packet of fags and a lighter; the cellophane wrapper vanished as soon as it was torn off, then Eames was lighting up and offering one to Sirius.

"You didn't seem impressed with my excellent and tres amusing joke," he said with a smirk, then he was blowing a lungful of smoke out through his nostrils.

Sirius looked back, then groaned as he was staring into his own face, screwing up his eyes for a moment against the sheer madness of it all. “Oooh...” he groaned, before opening one dark eye carefully and scowling. “No. That’s not right. Don’t do that!” He snatched the cigarette, lit it with a simple wordless, wandless charm and plugged it desperately into his mouth. He was dreaming, he reminded himself, although it felt bloody real. If it turned out he was awake and Eames had kidnapped him and found some bloody quick polyjuice potion then he was going to kill him. Which was probably mental. But then again, what wasn’t in Colligo?

Sirius scowled, exhaling the smoke in the same fashion as Eames-Sirius and looking him up and down. Despite himself, he felt his irritated expression fade into one that was a little more thoughtful. “Have to say, mate, you can’t really pull it off. Although it’s clearly the best-looking version of you we’ve seen all night.” Even if, now that he thought about it, ‘all night’ didn’t really go back that far. He didn’t remember getting here, for one. Maybe he was dreaming...

Fuck this. He was getting as bad as Remus when it came to this overthinking malarkey. Sirius decided at that moment to just stop thinking. Instead he cocked an eyebrow, mirrored the smirk Eames-Sirius was offering him, and shook his hair back from his face. “Can you copy me whatever I do?” He asked, then suddenly his face elongated, dark hair erupted and Padfoot was stood in the middle of the dance floor, dark head cocked, tongue lolling out as he stared brightly up at the human version of himself.

Well, this was hardly fair, was it? Eames worked hard at his Forgeries, he willingly went through everything Morpheus asked of him when they specifically shared dreams with each other and would gladly keep doing so until he was forced to stop, he had been doing this for years and he still couldn’t Forge into anything that wasn’t a human. Sirius was in the dreamshare for not even half an hour, and he could change. Bloody magic.

Rolling his eyes, Eames caught sight of himself in a mirror once more and flowed into yet another new identity. His favourite dark-haired male one. “Oh, for fuck’s sake, no. No, I can’t,” he grumbled in a broad Dublin accent, “Sure, I’m only good for turning into other humans. Still, least we know magic works in dreams, aye? Never been able to check that before. I’ll have to let the rest’ve them know, and Morpheus as well but I reckon himself already knew that.” He tapped the ash off of his cigarette, which vanished in much the same way as the cellophane wrapper had done earlier, then filled his lungs once again with smoke.

The music was annoying him slightly now, so he turned the volume down a bit, and forced his projections to move away from them so that they had enough room. “Are you going to bother your arse turning back, or will I need these?” he asked with a small smirk, holding up his hand to show the collar and dog-lead he’d just dreamt up. It was probably time to go back up to talk with Ariadne and see what the chill-room she’d built was like, anyway. “I mean, I doubt they’re going to serve pints in a dog bowl, hmm? Oh, maybe they’ll have that butterbeer stuff you keep banging on about, you never know.”

Padfoot looked a little too pleased with himself, much more pleased than a massive dog taking up a dance floor had any right to be, as his own face twisted before him and Eames turned into a dark haired man which, for some reason, reminded Sirius a little too much of James’ dad for it not to be weird. But there you go. His own cigarette had vanished off somewhere in the middle of his transformation, apparently just dissolving into nothing. But as much as he rather fancied a nicotine fix, he had to admit it was hard smoking as a dog. Not that he and the others hadn’t tried to make it work. Padfoot cocked his head, one ear perking up as a heavily sarcastic expression flashed over his hairy face at the sight of the lead. Then his body was stretching out again and Sirius was back to his human self, pulling a face and plucking a stray dog hair from his tongue.

“Oooh!” His face lit up at the idea of Butterbeer, but was quickly erased by a frown. “How will it even taste right? You haven’t ever… Wait, this isn’t my head, is it?” His eyes narrowed, and he took another quick sweep of the place, looking for something or someone he recognized. But the only face he recognized was Ariadne, still sat in her booth. And if it was him, James at least should be skulking around somewhere, right? Although James wasn’t really a frequent visitor to Sirius’ dreams, to be fair. They were usually too… well, James didn’t fit with most of the characters that plagued Sirius. Which only consolidated the idea that this really wasn’t his dream. Which, actually, made him feel a lot better about the whole situation.

“This is you?” he checked, glancing to Eames. Then he shook his head, threading fingers through his hair and starting off towards Ariadne, grumbling to Eames over his shoulder. “Merlin. This is fucking mental. Why can’t you have a normal muggle job? Why can’t you sell blenders or… I don’t know… do something with a clipboard?”

Eames followed after Sirius, finally turning into himself and absently picking pockets as he passed by a few projections. Sirius’ question about his job had him laughing as he blew out a cloud of smoke. “Can you actually see me doing a normal muggle job? I’m talking about me, not some persona I’m playing for whatever reason. But yes, this is all me. This is my dream and the people are my projections; either people I’ve met in the past, composites of them or personifications of... stronger feelings, I suppose.” Flicking through the handful of wallets, he found plenty of money but more importantly, photographs of why he remembered the people or little slips of paper containing a secret he knew about them. Keeping the money, he left the wallets on the nearest table. “Come on, I’ll get you that drink.”

He headed over to the bar, then turned to look at Sirius. “I don’t need to know what butterbeer tastes like. We’re in my head, but you’re still dreaming. Have you ever had a lucid dream, where you can take control of what’s happening? This is exactly like that.” At that point, the barman left two glasses down in front of them, and two empty bottles. Eames handed him a couple of notes, and told the guy (an ex-army friend) to have a drink on him, then looked back round at his friend. “Come on, try it. Take control of the bottle, and then concentrate on whatever you want to fill it with. Watch.”

Eames picked up one of the bottles and started to tilt it as if he was pouring something out. Suddenly, he was filling his glass with a pre-mixed vodka martini. Dreams really were brilliant.

Sirius quirked an eyebrow, but reached for the empty bottle provided. “I don’t really remember my dreams,” he told the dark haired man beside him. Well, it was mostly true.

He tilted the bottle, thought of butterbeer, and sure enough a stream of the stuff was suddenly tumbling into his glass. Chilled, like they sold in the Hogs Head in the Summer. But with the gentle sweet smell that reminded Sirius of honey and Hogwarts and James trying to chat up Lily at the bar, coming back with a load of this stuff splashed all down his front. A pang of homesickness shot through him, taking him by surprise. He’d never missed home, not once since arriving in Colligo. The young wizard shook it off, spinning around to lean back against the bar to look around yet again.

He examined the people with renewed interest, trying to guess things from them by the way they moved, their faces and clothing. Taking a sip of his drink, Sirius made a muffled groan as the familiar taste spread over his tongue and slipped down into his stomach. “Oh, Merlin’s saggy left bollock,” he announced, glancing down at the bottle. “I’ve bloody missed this stuff. I’m getting firewhisky next. Who’s she?” he pointed to an attractive girl a little way off, indicating where she was stood on the edge of the dancefloor. “And that girl in the booth? Emma? Is Ariadne a fake person as well? What else can I piss about with in here?”

Eames tried not to react too much while Sirius appeared to have a minor orgasm over his drink, but he really couldn't help the smirk on his face. "That looks and smells far too sweet. But I wouldn't mind trying your firewhisky, if you'd be so kind." He'd been leaning slightly over the bar, smoking and watching all the different people, then turned round to see who Sirius was pointing at.

"She's an old friend. Sabra. She was a Chemist; she'd make the compounds that I'd have to use for doing this if I was back home," he explained, "and I tried so very hard to get her into my bed, but she wasn't having it. She was deeply in love with the Extractor on our team, who is... ah, there she is." Eames pointed out a rather attractive Japanese lady who was making her way through the crowds to reach Sabra. "Hisako. Do not fuck with that lady, she will make earrings out of your balls if you do and she won't think twice about it. Kickboxer. She can kick higher than your head, if you can believe it."

Finishing his drink, he laughed when Sirius asked about Emma. "My first proper girlfriend. We split up in... third year, was it? She fancied a boy in the year above us, and I was too busy going after one of the lower sixth boys to care. As for our darling Ariadne, let's go and see, shall we?" He lifted the bottle and glass that he'd been given, then looked round right sharpish at Sirius' last question.

"Only small things. Refilling your bottle, or getting an ashtray, things like that. The more you start fucking about in here, the more agitated the projections will become, and they will attack you. I can't control them because they're created from my unconscious mind, but they will work out that you're not meant to be here and tear you apart. There won't be any lasting damage, it'll just wake you up, but until they kill you, it'll feel completely real. And it hurts like a bastard, every time. Come on, we'll go get a seat."

The benefit of being the architect was having near-complete control of the physics of the dream. Sound bent unnaturally for Ariadne, allowing her to listen to Eames and Sirius as they spoke and imagined they were unheard over the thump of the bass and the din of several dozen people trying to shout over the music and each other. But she'd kept quiet when the boys went past her, and her suspicions were confirmed when Sirius asked the forger if she was a fake person.

"How would you know the difference?" she asked, sliding out of the booth as the men approached. She turned and walked ahead of them along the row of booths to an arched doorway hung with strings of beads. The beads appeared to be made out of something other than plastic, as they chimed softly when Ariadne brushed through them. Inside the circular room she'd played with the acoustics again; the music dropped down to a vague hum. Ariadne dropped down on the sofa that lined the circumference of the room and grinned. "So, Eames, how do you like my nightclub?"

Sirius grinned as Eames looked sharply back at him. Not that he was really all that keen on being torn apart by randoms from inside Eames’ head, but it was fun to wind people up. And if it did all go tits up, at least he wouldn’t die again. He never woke up from dreams very pleasantly anyway. Would he even remember this when he woke up?

Trooping after Eames, the pair approached Ariadne, who slipped out of the booth. Sirius shot her a crooked smile. “I could ask you something Eames doesn’t know about?” He quirked an eyebrow meaningfully. He had to tell her about Remus still, but that could wait. Preferably until morning, when he wasn’t inside their friend's head. Sirius followed Ariadne through the weird beaded curtain, throwing himself down on the sofa beside her and absently tipping his bottle again. Firewhisky spilled out this time, a deep amber liquid that yet again reminded him of home, and passed it over to Eames to try.

Eames laughed at Sirius’s answer for Ariadne. For all that Sirius dicked about, he was clearly very intelligent and every so often he’d say or do something that let people realise there actually was a bloody sharp mind under all that hair. He stayed standing when the other two sat down, looking round the thankfully much quieter room, before leaning over to accept the drink Sirius was offering. He sniffed it carefully, smiling when it was obviously not the sickeningly sweet smell of butterbeer. He’d tried the stuff when Hannah had made her batch, and he’d had to admit that the drink really wasn’t for him. Firewhisky, though...

“Bloody hell, that stuff’s good,” he said, enjoying the heat that spread through his body once he’d downed it. Then he looked round at Ariadne. “Try that, it’s good. And your nightclub is fantastic, sweetheart. I’ll invite all my friends, you just wait and see.” He wandered back over to the beaded curtain and grinned as he tested the acoustics of both rooms. After he’d done that a couple of times, he went back over to sit on the other side of Ariadne. Shifting around, he ended up lying down with his head beside her legs, and then he looked up at her. “Do you think we should get the boss involved?”

Ariadne reached down to comb her fingers through Eames's hair, smiling. "All your friends are here already," she pointed out, nodding towards the club and its projections. "But thanks. Not bad work for short notice, huh?" She glanced over at Sirius, then back down at Eames with a shrug. "I think if he wants to get involved he'll get involved. Do you think he can handle it?" Meaning Sirius, of course. The Dream Lord was rather imposing, after all, and he could be capricious.

The Dream Lord, whose name the young dreamer shapers were so studiously avoiding, had been present all along, blending in with the environs as if he were part of the dream itself--as indeed he was. He sat in a corner of the ‘chill room,’ with Eames’ projections milling about him, some of them even draped upon his couch, so that it seemed as if he were just another of their number.

It was he who provided the link between the dreamers' minds, so that they could share the dreamspace without the use of chemical compounds. It was he who monitored the projections as Ariadne created, and Eames populated the world that Sirius now perceived. He was there, should he be needed. He was just listening for his name.

Sirius smiled smugly at Eames’ favourable reaction to firewhisky, then twisted in his seat as the pair began to talk, peering around at the rest of the room, examining the individuals sharing the space with them as he sipped his drink, half draped over the furniture. He watched the people, doing his best to guess who they were, how Eames had known them. It was quite entertaining. Not as much fun as the flirting with the blonde (Before she had turned out to be Eames), but still not a bad way to spend a dream, considering.

“Hmm?” The wizard swung back around, bouncing on the sofa like an energetic child, before finally crossing his legs underneath himself. “What are you on about?” he asked, before turning back to Eames. “Hey, so what happens if I chat up one of these fake people of yours?” he shot the older man a mischievous grin, bringing his drink up to his lips and finding it remarkably full once again.

“Since these people are all a part of me, pet, I think perhaps you’d be better off actually flirting with me in the first place?” Eames replied with a similar grin, seriously tempted to switch back to looking like Charlie, just to emphasise things. “No, no, they’ll act like how I remember them. If I remembered my third-year Latin teacher as a frigid bitch, which she was, no amount of flirting will make her warm up to you. If you tried to chat up my projection of Arthur, he’d probably stick you in a headlock and then kneecap you. Foreplay was never his strong point...”

He sat up after that, adjusting his shirt and brushing off imaginary specks of dust and bits of fluff. The signet ring he was wearing sported a star-cut ruby, and he fidgeted slightly with it before looking back at Sirius. “We were wondering if you’d fancy meeting Morpheus. This is all his, after all.”

“But I’ve already had sex with you,” Sirius grumbled, twisting back in his seat to peer at the room. “Doesn’t matter what body you’re in. And never, never talk about me chatting up Arthur. No offence, but I am going to have to scrub my brain with a memory charm now.” Because there should definitely be a law against allowing anyone’s siblings to have twins that people then talked about you shagging. Which was a confusing thought and forced Sirius to throw back another burning mouthful of Firewhisky. Merlin, he missed the Hog's Head. Now that was a proper pub.

“You ever seen a dog do a handstand?” he asked the pair, a little distractedly. But then he was looking back at them again, one eyebrow raising. “I spoke to him on the network, I think. Didn’t I piss him off?” It was a safe bet - Sirius pissed a lot of people off. “He’s not going to turn my balls into bludgers or anything, is he? Because that’s uncalled for. Even in a dream scenario. I’m out of my comfort zone.”

Morpheus heard his cue and disengaged himself from Eames’ subconscious, fairly oozing out from between a pair of particularly attractive and exotic looking individuals who had been whispering all sorts of juicy secrets in his ear. As he stood, their eyes tracked him, their bodies leaning forward for a moment--then they melted once again into the background and returned to mingle with the rest of the amorphous crowd.

“No,” he said, casually insinuating himself into the conversation as if he had been there all along, and the question had been addressed to him directly. “But he might turn them into cuff-links.”

Even as a trained dreamer, Ariadne was still susceptible to the feeling that strangeness in dreams was perfectly normal. And she'd been spending more time with Morpheus appearing in her dreams, whether with Eames or alone. So she didn't express any surprise when the dream-lord merely detached himself from the background and stepped forward. Instead she just laughed, and gestured expansively.

"This is our friend Sirius Black. Though of course you already know him. Sirius, this is Morpheus. Well, that's one of his names."

Sirius turned to look at the new figure, his brow crumpling in a thoughtful frown as he examined Morpheus. Now, Sirius was used to people who looked a little... off. The Order was hardly made up by a group of models, after all. But even he found this one a bit on the mad side. Still, Sirius cocked an eyebrow and nodded to the figure. “Alright?”

Sirius didn’t say anything else for a moment, taking a sip of his drink and shuffling so he was kneeling on the seat. So this was the Dream Lord, or whatever they called him. Did that mean this was the person who’d prevented Sirius from getting a good night's sleep for God knew how long? That hardly seemed fair. Sirius raised his second eyebrow to meet the first, treating Morpheus to an intense stare for a long moment. “Can I get a liquorice wand?” he suddenly asked the group in general. “I really fancy one.”

Morpheus stared right back, waiting to see how long it would take before he utterly unnerved the newcomer. Eames and Ariadne, he was already well acquainted with, their abilities and their tolerance threshold for strangeness. Sirius...well. That was another story.

He arched an eyebrow in response to the sudden request for candy, wondering if it was perhaps a comfort food of Sirius’. He also wondered how the wizard would react when the Dream Lord produced on out of nowhere, simply drawing his hands apart as if feeding out a length of tape measure. “How many inches?”

“Depends how excited I am,” Sirius’ grin curled a little at the right hand corner of his mouth, a cheeky, slightly challenging glint in his eye. Because, come on, was he really expected to leave a joke like that alone? He may be dreaming, but there were still some rules that couldn’t be ignored. Sirius hadn’t seen anyone produce liquorice out of thin air before, but he had once seen a banana run down a table and attempt to jam itself into a Slytherin’s arse, so he could cope with that.

“Cheers,” Sirius reached out and took the sweet from the man (Man?), chomping down on one end and viewing the newcomer thoughtfully as he chewed noisily. “So you’re.... what are you?”

Eames did his best to stop laughing, but really, Sirius could be a complete twat at times. And hey, who didn't love a good dick joke? "Oh, fucking hell, you prat. Have you not been paying attention? And chew with your mouth shut, you sound like a bloody cow chewing its cud."

Standing up once he had his laughter under control, Eames turned to Ariadne. "I hope you don't mind, my dear, but perhaps we should go somewhere more private." At Ariadne's shrug, Eames took control of the dream and shifted it. A second later, they were all in the large airy dance-studio where Eames went to practice his Forgeries. Sirius and Ariadne were perched on stools, while Eames and Morpheus remained standing. There were no projections to be seen anywhere. "Re-introductions are in order, I suppose. Morpheus, this prat is Sirius. Sirius can turn into a dog in the dreamshare, which I find fascinating, don’t you? Sirius, this is Morpheus. Or Dream. Or Baku. Or I don’t know, any number of names. He's one of the Endless, the personification of God that I spoke to treats him with the utmost respect, and this is his realm. He's my boss. And you're making cock jokes. Well done."

Ariadne swung her feet merrily, hooking her heels onto the rungs of the stool and looking around. "I like this, Eames. Really good light, even without a source. Did you make this yourself?" She could see just how useful it was for his purposes, with all the mirrors. Her own reflection shivered and disappeared as she hopped down from the stool and stepped forward. Maybe Sirius would actually show some sobriety for a moment. That would certainly be worth watching. Eames nodded and she walked over to one of the mirrors, watching the scene unfolding behind her.

And suddenly they were in some weird room filled with mirrors. Bloody hell. Sirius didn’t like that. It was like apparating. Only, like, a zillion times more boring. Squeezing his eyes shut and shaking his head in a slightly canine manner, Sirius took another loud chomp on the sweet still clenched in his hand and let his eyelids flutter open in time to shoot Eames a wink and a wide grin. “Oh come on. Everyone loves a good cock... joke.” Then he smirked again and took a triumphant munch of liquorice, chewing extra loudly just for the hell of it. It was a moment before the animagus swallowed. “And I’ve been turning into a dog since I was fifteen. Why wouldn’t I do it here?”

Then his attention shifted back onto the figure. He really was... odd. In a way Sirius couldn’t quite put his finger on, no matter how much he squinted and tilted his head and stared. At some point, Sirius had managed to kick himself off the stool, and now stood and he was leaning forward onto it, hands spread on the wooden seat, body leaning at a dramatic angle. “Soo...” He tilted his head again. “You’re the one giving me nightmares, yeah?” It was said in a cocky, typical-Sirius, overconfident voice that didn’t quite match how he felt. “You know mate, if you could just nip those in the bud, then that’d be just charming... ?”

“If you find one, let me know,” Morpheus replied, in reference to cocks and jokes. “But I’ll warn you, it’ll be wasted on me. Just ask my siblings--I could probably live up to your name better than you do.” Though whether he meant serious or black was up for debate. He was dressed all in black, with only a splash of red at the cuffs and throat. The exact shade of red seemed to change with the angle it caught the light, sometimes deep, dark burgundy, sometimes glinting like orange flame. His skin was always just a bit too pale, his eyes a little too bright to be human, but he considered it a mark in his favor that he wasn’t wearing robes of shadow, embroidered with flame--or his helmet of the skull and backbone of a rival god.

Wouldn’t want to scare the nice mortals, now, would he?

“I give you nightmares?” he echoed incredulously. “I am merely working with the tools I am given. Though, for the sake of balance, I suppose I could coax something a bit more pleasing out of you for a change. If you mind your manners.”

“Oh, I don’t know how it works,” Sirius waved a hand vaguely, forgetting for a moment that it was propping him up and stumbling. He bounced back to his feet as if nothing had happened, quirking an eyebrow and sweeping hair back. “And you should know, Sir, that I am nothing but a gentleman.” Sometimes. When it suits me. The rest of the sentence went unsaid.

Sirius didn’t think it was particularly his fault that the tools he provided Morpheus were only suitable for giving dreams that made you want to puke, but there you go. He didn’t sleep a whole lot anyway.

With a shrug, Sirius hoisted himself up to sit on the stool again. “So... in this dream, could I get a theme tune for whenever I walk into a room? Because in sixth year me and James got the first years in the choir to follow us around and sing ‘hallelujah’ whenever we arrived anywhere. It. Was. Excellent. As in, a lot.” And he’d also got a lot of detention for it. But the first years had done that for them anyway. First years were useful little things, really. They were like bloody efficient house elves, but just a tiny bit less mental.

Would Morpheus now teach Eames to Forge into non-humans, since Sirius was obviously able to turn into a dog which meant it was no longer against the balance of things if Eames were to learn how to do it? What in under God had Ariadne done to his lovely wall of mirrors? Would it be possible for Sirius to ever actually shut the fuck up? These were the main three questions swirling through Eames' mind at that point in time.

In fact... "Shut up, pet, you're talking bollocks now," he said to young Mr. Black and then turned back to Morpheus, looking a lot more serious. "His nightmares are why we're here, actually. We offered to go in and tidy up his mind a bit, since he's not sleeping very well and it seems to be a long-term thing. He was a bit unsure about how we would go about things so I suggested this session to let him see what it's like. To be honest, I never actually considered just asking you if you might be able to help, and I don't know why."

Ariadne poked the mirror and it rippled like a pond disturbed by a thrown stone, settling back to show all four of their reflections again. There, that was better. "Maybe because you thought it would be presumptuous, and because contrary to popular belief you know how to mind your manners," she suggested. As she spoke she began tracing on the surface of the mirror, faint lines appearing under her fingertips. A funhouse maze, she imagined, good for Eames and infinitely more complicated than this place. "But of course we would be grateful for any help you'd offer," she added, turning to Morpheus.

Morpheus was quiet as the three young mortals spoke, taking it all in, from Sirius’ request, and Eames' segue into Ariadne’s observation. He had an uncanny knack for going quite still, the way no human being ever could, and it tended to unnerve people--so he had to remind himself to blink, nodding to show that he was in fact listening intently.

Of course, he knew what they were about, thanks to his conversation with Eames’ subconscious. There was very little in the dreaming that escaped his knowledge--particularly when he was dealing with a relatively limited aspect of it, as he was within the city of Colligo. But he appreciated that at least two of them knew better than to make assumptions of him.

“Of course,” he said, “After all, I did agree to facilitate this little experiment, did I not?”

Sirius pulled a mildly offended face, because anyone who knew anything knew that everything he said was of vital importance and not ‘bollocks’ in any way, shape or form. But nevertheless, he mimed locking his lip and chucking the key over his shoulder, then turned around and began to carefully tweak his hair in one of the mirrors, toying with the dark strands in a way that could only be called a little feminine.

“Uh...” he turned around once they were all done talking, one finger raised. Because Sirius didn’t really appreciate them talking about his nightmares and shit in such a casual way. He felt bloody uncomfortable with it, to tell the truth. No, he decided, better to steer this conversation onto easier ground.

“Just a couple of questions. Not related to my deeply mangled personal problems, if you don’t mind... If I can get firewhiskey and butterbeer and... well.” He waved the remaining inch of liquorish in one hand. “What’s stopping me bringing in a load of other crap? Two,” A second long finger was raised to join the first. “what happens if I try and apparate in here? Or... I don’t know... summon something?”

"I'm going to go with an educated guess and say that Morpheus is who's stopping you bringing in your own projections. If we were doing this with a PASIV, we wouldn't have any such safety-net. You wouldn't believe the number of jobs I've been involved in, where someone couldn't keep their projections to themselves," Eames explained, carefully not making any mention of Cobb or his psychotic version of Mal. Eames had never met Cobb's shade, but he'd heard enough from everyone who had had the "pleasure" of meeting the man's vast guilt complex given human form to know to be incredibly thankful for that.

He got very interested in the second question, though. "Don't try apparating, please. That's an awful idea to have at any time, never mind when you're in a dream and you have no idea what it would do." Eames had a habit of pacing when he was trying to work things out or explain them, especially if he was somewhere as open as this place was. After all, what was the point in having so much open space if you weren't going to use it. His work-space was more than big enough, and so Eames was soon walking in a slow circle without even realising it.

"As for summoning... I suppose it would all depend on your definition of summoning, really. Is it summoning something out of nothing, for example?" and he held out his hand to catch the plate of Jaffa cakes that had just appeared, "or is it summoning something closer to you?" A small wave in the wooden floor appeared about a metre behind the stool Sirius had been sitting on. It quickly pushed the stool over towards where Eames was going to be in a few seconds, and faded away once he was able to reach the seat without having to stretch. He put the plate down and lifted a Jaffa cake, then grinned over at Sirius. "You have no idea how much I've missed these things," he said, then stuck the whole thing in his mouth at once.

“That would be correct,” Morpheus affirmed, “Nothing goes on in this realm without my knowledge, and not to dampen your creativity but I have multiple safeguards in place to keep things from getting out of hand.” He frowned a little at Eames’ table manners, but made no comment.

“An attempt at summoning, here, would only conjure up, as you say, a projection of that person or creature, unless I summoned them into the Dreaming myself. And I wouldn’t recommend trying to travel into anyone else’ dreaming mind without my assistance either, as you could wind up causing...serious damage.”

Ariadne sat down on her stool, which had moved across the room to support her and shrunk slightly so she didn't have to clamber onto it like a child. "So the magic works because he expects it to work, the same way that I can manipulate the dream because I know that I can and Eames can Forge." She looked at Morpheus with inquisitive eyes. "And if I expected magic to work it would project things as well?"

“Yes,” Morpheus replied, offering Ariadne a brief nod. “I expect it would.”

He turned slightly, casting the two men a look that was part caprice and part foreboding. Or at least, caprice looked foreboding on him. “I don’t know about you, Ariadne, but our friends here are making me rather hungry.”

Eames looked round at the comment Morpheus made about being hungry and held the plate of Jaffa Cakes out towards him. He would have said something, but his mouth was full of smashing orangey bits, and he wasn’t quite so rude as to talk with his mouth full. He swallowed his mouthful and then grinned. “Jaffa cake, anyone? Oh, and, okay, right. Bear with me here. If things work because we expect them to, does that mean that if I expect to turn into, I don’t know... a boxer, or an old English Sheepdog or what have you, I could do that? Because that seems far too easy.”

He resumed pacing as he spoke, gesturing with his free hand as he thought out loud, then looked over at Ariadne and pointed at her, “I mean, did you go into your first dream expecting to play at origami with Paris? I know my first few times in the Dreamshare, I was too busy being shot at and killed in various exciting ways to even consider changing my eye colour or gender or whatever. If it was that easy, everyone could Forge and Build and Extract, and people would have no reason to hire experts such as ourselves. Except they clearly do. I can Forge, I can Extract although I’m not as good as Cobb, but I can’t Build worth shit no matter what I tell myself. This is my limit,” he said and gestured all round him.

Morpheus accepted one of the cakes, bringing it to his mouth and taking a tentative bite. His eyes closed as he sank his teeth into the spongy orange and chocolate snack, and he let out a sigh that was inordinately pleasurable, for such a simple thing--but it wasn’t so much the cake that he was sighing over as the taste of Eames’ dreaming. The Forger had created the stuff out of memory and imagination, and that was delightful.

Once the cake had disappeared, his eyes were just a little brighter, his skin a little less pallid, and his stature and bearing just a bit more regal.

“Sirius can recreate his magic in the dream, because that is his gifting in life. Ariadne has a mind for intricate design, thus, she lives up to her namesake when it comes to building mazes. Eames is a grifter, he has an eye for reading people, and he’s a very good mimic. So, while you might be able to expand your abilities somewhat, there will always be some things that come more naturally to some of you than to others. Now,” he said, turning to Sirius, “I believe there was a method to the madness of introducing a wizard to the Dreaming, was there not?”

Eames put the plate of Jaffa cakes back on the stool and sent it over towards Morpheus, since he seemed to appreciate them. Then he walked over to stand behind Sirius, flickering through the various Forgeries he’d used during the dream, and a couple of others - a small blond boy with a missing front tooth, a punk girl with piercings all over her face and a shaved head, a teenage boy in ripped jeans and a Nirvana tee-shirt and a few others, then settled back into himself again as he stopped walking. “The method was ‘Show Sirius round, to see if he’d like us to fix his deeply mangled personal problems in this particular fashion’, I believe. Alth-” and he broke off as what sounded like a bell started ringing, if the bell was hanging underwater. “Ah. Time’s up, then.”

He glanced over at Morpheus and nodded, then watched as Sirius and Ariadne vanished from his workroom, to wake up topside in the apartment. Eames, though. He was staying on. Five more minutes of sleep, giving him an hour to work out some frustration over Arthur returning without some rather important memories. Long enough for him to get a decent workout, nowhere near long enough to worry the other two. A sudden clanking of chains just off to his right meant that his punchbag was in place, and a quick glance in the mirror allowed Eames to change into more appropriate clothing. Flexing his hands to get the wrappings to adjust, he looked back at Morpheus and gave him a brief smile. “Thanks, boss,” he said, before heading over to beat the shit out of the punchbag.