Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Bobby

Something feels off.

He can't put his finger on it, but he’s got that uneasy feeling in his stomach he learned to trust a long time ago.

They finished the job. They turned over what they got from the mark. Out in the reception area, he can hear Hen teasing Buck about his evening plans, asking if Chim’s ready for the chaos of a second baby. He should feel...

He shoves hand in his pocket, fingers running over his rosary. Methodically starts counting; one, two, three, four...

Shit.

Counts again. Still wrong.

He's not sure where they are – but they’re still in a dream and they shouldn’t be. Wonders who else is here, who shouldn't be. Through the glass he can see Buck, Chim and Hen, heads together, laughing. He has to get them out, whatever it takes.

Six Months Later…

Hen

It was supposed to be a nice surprise.

It’s been six months since they all woke up and Bobby didn’t. And, she doesn’t see Athena as often as she should, but Karen took Mara for dinner and a movie this evening – just the two of them – so she swings by on a whim after dropping Denny off for a sleepover. Wonders how long, how much deeper Athena would have gone on her own if she hadn't walked in and seen Athena's murder board wall.

"So this is new," she says cautiously, walking closer and reading Athena's notes. “Not sure Bobby would approve of how you’ve decorated the place.” Wonders how Athena kept it from May and Harry; if they’ve been as absent, busy in their own lives, as she has.

Athena looks briefly guilty, and then not. Folds her arms across her chest and Hen can see her armor fall into place, her eyes shutter, just a little. "I wasn't ready to bring you in yet. I'm still working out some of the details."

Hen studies the wall, seeing without really wanting to what Athena's been putting together. "This is about Bobby's, our last job." It's not really a question, of course it's about the last job. The one that cost them their northstar, cost Athena her husband.

Athena nods anyway. "Something always felt fishy about it to me."

Hen crosses her arms and deliberately turns her back on the wall. "Okay, so walk me through what you've found."

“I can’t prove any of this,” Athena warns her.

Hen takes a sip of the wine Athena hands her and sits down. Settles in. Gets comfortable. “Tell me anyway.”

Athena takes a breath, and Hen wonders how long Athena’s been holding on to this on her own, how long she’s been keeping this all bottled up inside of her.

She walks Hen through her research. It’s … compelling.

She gets up when Athena’s done, traces the connections she’d found, the names, the relationships, the money. It always comes down to the fucking money. Finally turns back around. “Okay. You sold me. What do you want to do about it?”

There’s a brief second where Athena sags with relief, like she hadn’t been sure Hen would believe her. And then she straightens, core of solid steel, not a bend in her.

"I'm thinking we steal something that means as much to them as my husband meant to me. To you."

Hen's glad Athena hadn't handed her that second glass of red wine she's pouring yet, or it would be all over Athena's new white carpet. Takes the glass when Athena hands it to her and drinks half of it in one swallow. Takes another more measured sip and turns to look at the murder wall again.

“What exactly does that mean?” Because it could mean a lot of things, and she’s not sure how far across the line Athena is looking to go.

Athena points at the board. “They did this for money. Not for a principle, or a greater good. They did it for their bottom line, and they were willing to sacrifice all of you to make a few extra bucks.” From what Hen can see it’s more than a few extra bucks, more like close to a billion extra bucks, but point taken. Athena smiles, slow and grim. “I want to take that away from them. Bleed them dry.”

Hen considers the look on Athena’s face, and then the murder board again. “It’s a terrible idea.”

“That’s not a no.”

“We don’t do this anymore. Chim’s got the dream den. I’ve… stepped back?” She bites at her thumbnail. Thinks about the promises she’s made to Karen, to Mara, to Denny. “Buck’s been auditioning for other teams.” Which feels wrong. They should be proving they’re good enough for him, not the other way around.

Athena shrugs. “Nothing there that can’t be undone.”

Hen gets up and rummages in the kitchen for something to eat to soak up the wine, and to buy herself time to think. She gets it, where Athena’s coming from, the restless need to do something, to make someone pay. But revenge, vengeance, wasn’t Bobby’s way. Wouldn’t be what Bobby would want for them, for Athena. “Is this what Bobby would have wanted?”

“He’s not here,” Athena pounds her fist against the couch, “I am. And I–” She stops, twisting her wedding ring around her finger. Hen watches her, can feel her grief and anger like a palpable thing, and knows she’s going to do it. She always knew, if she’s honest, because she can’t so no to Athena, not about this. "I want to get them," she tells Hen, "I want to take what they love most and let them watch as their world burns."

Hen doesn’t say anything. Isn’t sure what to say.

“We shouldn’t. We don’t know what went wrong last time. One of us, all of us, might never wake up," Hen tells her and Athena only nods.

Athena raises an eyebrow at her. “All that is still not a no.”

“No,” she agrees. “It’s not.”

Buck

“No,” he says when he sees Athena.

“Hear me out,” she puts her arm in the door when he goes to shut it.

“No.”

“Buckaroo…”

He turns and goes back to his cookies. “I said I was done, Athena.”

“I heard you were poking around, seeing what your options were.”

“I’m done with them, then.” He leans his forehead against the kitchen door, so he doesn’t have to look at her.

Bobby had taught him how to dream. Had brought him in, and given him a place, had given him a purpose. He had found himself in dreaming, something he was good at, somewhere he could contribute. Somewhere that he was necessary.

Losing Tommy had splintered something inside him; he had been himself and been too much. Like always. Losing Bobby had broken him in ways he’s still trying to piece back together. He held it together on the outside, but his dreams became fragile, fractured places. Bobby had always told him that the team needed him, that he was good for them.

But after – it wasn't the same. They weren’t the same. He wasn't the same. And Bobby had been wrong; he hadn’t been enough to keep them together.

He still has the urge to dream – too ingrained in him now not to – to discover things and make connections and help people when he could. Steal things when he couldn't. He's met a lot of people over the years, put out feelers after a couple of months.

Nothing has felt quite right. He keeps looking for the magic of what they’d had, even though he knows that’s gone. But– He's trying. Trying to put himself back together. Trying to find another place where he can fit, that he can call his own. Doesn't know if he'll be able to start over again if he gets drawn back in.

“It’s for Bobby.”

She’s playing dirty pool and she knows it. He sighs. “Fine. I need to get these cookies in the oven. Talk while I bake.”

When she’s done he hands her a fresh cookie. “This is a terrible idea.”

“That’s what Hen said too,” Athena notes, takes a bite and makes an approving noise. “These are good. Bobby would have been impressed.”

He flushes, pleased despite himself. “Thanks.” Then. “Hen’s right; it’s a terrible idea.” Athena shrugs. Finishes the cookie and wipes her fingers. He sighs. “You’re doing this whether I say yes or no, aren’t you.” She doesn’t say anything. “We’re going to need an architect.”

Bobby had always been their architect. They can all do it to greater or lesser degrees – but his designs are too regimented, Chim’s are too chaotic, Hen’s are just trippy. But Bobby had been the best, and for what Athena’s planning they’re going to need someone as good as Bobby had been. She just looks at him. “Bobby always said you were the best point man in the business.”

And he throws up his hands. “Fine. I’ll start putting out some feelers, start doing the research.”

She kisses his cheek as she leaves. “Bobby would be proud of you.”

Chimney

He never thought he’d be here, holding his baby, watching his daughter cook (well ‘cook’) with his wife in their kitchen. It’s beyond his wildest dreams and heh. He’s had some wild ones. He doesn’t deserve this; he hasn’t earned it, but he has it.

It had taken a while to get here. To be okay with sitting here at his kitchen table, when that’s not something Bobby will ever get to do again. But Bobby had told him to say hello to his son for him, so he does, every morning, he says hello to baby Bobby for Bobby, and is grateful that he gets this chance, and is mostly past the anger that Bobby made the choice for him. And he’s trying to live up to that. Got out of dream-heisting, sticks to recreational dream-sharing these days; runs a bar, filled with local drunks and folks who like that he doesn’t ask questions, with a backroom speakeasy for those in the know, with really good designer somnacin to give the best, easy dreams for those who can pay. It’s not glamorous, but it’s safe; means he never has to worry that he might not get to see his kids grow up.

The doorbell rings. Maddie looks at him, holds up her hands covered in flour – Jee mimics her, identical expressions of are you going to answer that? He hesitates. Has an unshakeable feeling that if he answers the door that everything is going to change again. Wants to live in this moment for a little longer.

The doorbell rings again. He tucks baby Bobby into his shoulder swaddle and opens the door.

“No,” he says, before Hen can say anything. “Absolutely not.”

“How’s the baby?” she asks, like that’s all she came to check on,.

“He’s fine,” he answers, tipping the bundle of cloth so she can see the soft downy hair on his head.

“That’s good,” she says, as she walks down the hall towards the kitchen. He hears her say hello to Maddie, to Jee. Hears Maddie asking if she wants to stay for dinner.

He shouldn’t have answered the door.

She’s waiting for him at the entrance to the dream den the next morning. “The answer is still no,” he tells her.

“I haven’t asked you anything.”

She’s there the next day. And the next.

Finally, she says, "Just come to lunch. Meet me here," and drops a pin on his phone. Here turns out to be a warehouse in a sea of other abandoned warehouses, but he gets out of the car when he sees Hen open a door. The only reason he doesn't turn around and walk right back out again is because Hen has placed herself in his way. He glares at her. She looks back impassively.

"Get back on the horse, you said. Nobody blames you, you said. We need you, you said."

She pushes him in front of her into the room. "You do need to get back on the horse, you're wasting your talents running a dive bar. Nobody does blame you. We do need you."

"Nobody blames me? You don't think Athena blames me for Bobby getting lost in limbo?" Belatedly objects, “It’s not a dive bar.”

Hen shrugs. "We need the best. You're the best."

He looks around the room – Buck’s in the corner on his phone, holds a hand up in greeting when he sees Chim. Athena’s standing by the window, arms crossed. She glances up when the door opens, and then just looks right through him like he’s not even there. He swings back around to look at Hen again. "This is your idea of a crew?"

She shrugs again. "Like I said, we need the best."

He narrows his eyes at her, suspicious. "Why?" She doesn't say anything and he digs his heels in. "Seriously. Why? I've got a bar to run, a wife to go home to, and two cute kids. I don't need this."

Hen snorts. "Please. You're bored out of your mind." Holds up a finger before he can get a denial out. "Ask me how I know."

He glares. Tries not to give in. Gives in, anyway. "Fine, how do you know?"

"Because your wife talks to my wife, and Maddie and Karen both agree you need to get out more."

“Chim!” Buck says, like Chim hadn’t seen him that weekend.

“Buck,” he acknowledges. “How long have you been in on this?”

Buck looks briefly chagrined, which means since before he’d come over for brunch last weekend, and then his face smooths out to Professional Buck, best point man in the business. He never quite gets used to the way Buck at home and Buck on the job are different animals. Buck at home is a pushover for Chim’s kids, wears his heart on his sleeve and every feeling on his face. Recently, he’s been almost constantly dusted in flour; single-handedly responsible for Jee’s new-found love for baking, and the reason Chim keeps getting calls from the PTA about running the bake sale. Buck on the job is efficient, buttoned down, and doesn’t waste a single movement. It’s been a while since he’s seen Buck on the job.

Chim’s already looking past him to Athena. “Athena,” he says.

She lets her gaze focus on him just long enough to acknowledge his presence. He raises an eyebrow at Hen, but she ignores him.

He gives up. “So, you want to tell me what we’re all doing here?”

Ravi

These are the things he knows about Evan “Call me Buck” Buckley. Pays his rent on time. No pets. Always replaces his fire alarm batteries. Keeps to himself.

Ravi has no idea what he does for a living, but he seems to travel a lot. Or he used to. Dresses like either a gym bro or a 1940s movie star on their downtime – Cary Grant at his lakeside villa. Has no in between. Ravi’s not sure he can even picture Buck in a pair of jeans.

He’s one of the easiest tenants Ravi has, and Ravi has absolutely no idea why Buck’s decided that now – three years into their landlord/tenant relationship – he wants to invite Ravi out for coffee. But, he’s always been more curious than is maybe good for him, so here he is. At a cafe in Weho, drinking a better than passable cappuccino, waiting for Buck to get around to whatever he’d wanted to talk to him about.

“So, you wanted to talk to me?” He’s impatient. Sue him.

“You were studying to be an architect.” It’s not a question. He wonders how on earth Buck knows that. “Why’d you drop out?”

He can’t imagine why Buck cares, but–. “Realized I didn’t want a life where I spent all my time staring at a computer screen.” The disappointed looks his mother (and grandmother) give him, notwithstanding.

Buck cocks his head. “So now you own apartment buildings?”

He narrows his eyes at Buck. “Pays the mortgage. Gives me time to figure out what I want to do. This is really what you wanted to talk to me about?” Figures it’s about wanting to add or remove a wall in his unit, which Ravi is probably going to say no to.

Buck shakes his head. “What do you know about dream sharing?”

And, okay, that’s out of left field. He raises an eyebrow and makes a derisive noise. “Internet conspiracy theory.”

Buck sits back in his chair. “Fact.”

He sits up straighter. “Seriously?” Buck looks smug. He takes a more considered sip of his coffee. Thinks about all the questions he wants to ask – how do you know, why are you telling me, why are you telling me now? Picks, “How?”

“The how is just chemistry.”

“I liked chemistry,” he says mildly. “But not what I meant. I mean, how do you share a dream with someone? Whose dream, yours or theirs?” Takes another sip of coffee, adds, “What’s the point?”

"Does there have to be a point?" Buck asks, tapping his spoon on the edge of his cup.

Ravi shrugs. "I guess not." Buck's mouth turns down, just slightly, like he's disappointed in Ravi, in his answer. He shifts awkwardly in his own chair. He’s going to put off examining why he wants Buck to have a good opinion of him until later when he can yell at his psyche in peace.

"In a dream, there are infinite possibilities." Tap. Tap. Tap. "In a dream, I can build... anything and you can come join me, walk around. I can talk to you. My dream, your subconscious."

He thinks about that. He thinks about someone with free reign in his subconscious, anyone’s subconscious. Thinks about what they could learn, what they could do. Says slowly. “That seems …. Illegal?”

Buck cocks an eyebrow. Doesn’t say anything. Right. So probably very illegal. That is less of a deterrent than he thinks it probably should be. Explains a lot about how Buck always pays his rent on time.

He frowns thinking about what Buck had said. “So I can design a dream?” Buck nods. “How would I ever be able to think of enough detail to design a whole dream that feels real?”

Buck looks briefly triumphant before he tamps it down. “Your mind will do most of the work for you.” Ravi shakes his head, not following. Buck thinks for a moment. “So, you know how dreams feel real when we’re in them? You’re on a beach, with Chris Evans, and he’s asking you to lunch, except you need to put out this fire first.” Ravi raises an eyebrow. That is … specific. Buck flushes. “My point is, you don’t question the dream while you’re dreaming. It’s only when you wake up that you realize it didn’t make sense.”

“Okay,” Ravi acknowledges. “So you just need the framework, and your mind fills in the rest.”

Buck shrugs. “Close enough for the moment.” He leans back. “Let me ask you another question; ever remember the beginning of a dream?”

“No? You’re just kind of in them.”

Buck nods like he’s answered the question correctly. He refuses to feel some kind of way about that. He’s no longer in school, he doesn’t need to get an A on this. “Tell me, how did we get here today?”

He opens his mouth, and then stops. Tries to remember. There's nothing. "I ... I'm not ...." He looks around him. This looks almost like LA, but not quite. There's something off. He can't put his finger on it. "I don't remember." Looks around him, startled and alarmed. “We’re in a dream now?”

Buck nods.

Ravi looks at him sharply. “My dream, or your dream?”

“Mine.”

“But my subconscious."

Buck shakes his head. “That would be unethical. My dream, my subconscious. You’re just visiting today”

“But another time that wouldn’t be true.” It’s not a question, and Buck doesn’t bother to dignify it with an answer. It still bothers him less than he thinks it probably should. “Did you kidnap me? Where am I in real life?”

Buck ticks off the answers on his fingers. “I really did invite you out for coffee. We took a detour to a warehouse.” He doesn’t sound remotely apologetic, and Ravi looks at him incredulously. Buck shrugs. Offers, “It’s a very nice warehouse?” Shrugs again when Ravi doesn’t change his expression. “You get over sweating the details pretty quickly.”

“Kidnapping is a detail? Don’t answer that.” Thinks about what Buck had said, gets up and starts walking. “If this is your dream, can I still change things?”

Buck stands up, follows him. “Try.”

He imagines an Escher painting and folds the street they’re walking down, twisting it, wrapping it, creating a maze. Reality bends in front of him. He can see why this is addictive.

It takes him a minute to realize that all the people on the street are staring at him. “Why is everyone looking at me all of a sudden?” he asks, gesturing at the people around them.

Buck shrugs. “The more you manipulate my dream, the more my subconscious notices that you’re here, wants to kick you out.” Nods at the people around them. “These are projections of my mind. Change the dream too much and they’ll turn on you.”

He changes a building in front of them to glass and walks through the mirror just because he can. “And then what?”

“And then they kill you,” Buck says nonchalantly.

That gets him to stop and stare at Buck. “And if I die down here, does that mean I die in real life?” He’s read that ghost story.

Buck pauses for too long to be comfortable. “No,” he says finally.

Ravi’s calling bullshit on that. “No?”

“Not usually,” Buck hedges. “You’re safe in my dream.”

That is not as comforting as Ravi thinks it’s maybe supposed to be.

He comes awake with a start. He’s on a lounge chair in the middle of a warehouse. Buck’s on another chair a few feet away. A man a little older than he is is hunched over what looks like an elaborate version of a kid’s chemistry set. A woman his mother’s age is standing by the window, where she clearly had been watching them both sleep. Which isn’t creepy at all. He’s never seen either one of them before in his life. Tamps down the instinctive desire to run. Out of the corner of his eye he can see Buck coming awake too, and he tries to find that reassuring. There’s a needle in his arm, connecting him to a machine built into a briefcase, plungers and buttons, and another line connecting to Buck. Ravi pulls the needle out, holding a thumb over the injection point before anyone can do it for him. He looks at the people around him warily.

“Good dream?” the woman asks.

He sits up slowly, perching on the edge of the chair because it makes him feel a little bit more in control. “Interesting dream. I’m Ravi, but I’m guessing you already know that.”

Buck sits up, shaking off the remnants of sleep. Points at the man with the drugs. “Chim, our chemist.” Points at the woman. “Athena, our client.” Looks around like he expects to see someone else. “Hen’s our extractor.”

Chim makes a noise. “Went to get lunch.”

Ravi waits, Buck smiles at him, full of teeth. “This is Ravi. He’s our architect.”

“I haven’t actually said yes, yet,” he protests. Doesn’t even really know what he’d be saying yes to. He points at the suitcase with needles and the drugs. “What is that?”

“PASIV device, distributes somnacin,” Chim (apparently? What kind of name is that?) says. Takes in his irritated look, and adds hastily. “Dream drugs.”

Waking up in warehouses with people he doesn’t know and a needle in his arm really seems like it’s the start of a Criminal Minds episode, and those never end well. But–

He can’t get the dream – perfect, impossible designs and buildings – out of his head and– He wants to go back. Everything he’d ever loved about architecture, with none of the fiddly staring at CAD drawings until his eyes ached, and doing the math on load tolerances, and endless zoom calls with structural engineers. He caves.

“I’m Ravi, I’m your architect.”

Athena

"Hey baby," she says, to the air, clutching his rosary beads. She's in their house, the one he never saw -- but he built just for them in the aftermath of the fire, just over a year ago now. Dreaming has taken so much; she's not sure if what it gave back will ever make up the difference.

Turned the lights low, burning some of May's old candles she found in a box, like it's date night, like Bobby's there in the ether, watching.

She wishes this was a dream and some version, any version of him, could talk back. But he can't, so.

"Got the team back together. It's not the same, but–" It's never going to be the same and he would know that, but he still should know, should still hear that he's missed. That they need him, miss him.

That she needs him; misses him.

That she’s going to make the people who took him away pay for what they cost her.

Chapter Text

Ravi

It’s fun, at first. Exciting.

Being a landlord was boring; lucrative, but boring. Dreaming? He doesn’t know what it is yet, but it's definitely not boring.

Isn’t sure yet if it’ll be lucrative. And, he’ll never be able to tell his family about it. That’s a downside right there, no way to get his mother off his back about when he’s going to get serious about a career. But, he feels like a kid in a candy store every time he goes under. Infinite possibilities in infinite combinations. Or something like that. Even Star Trek never imagined a world with this possibility. He wakes up each time, and feels energized like he hasn’t felt in years. Can’t sleep even when he goes home. Wonders if that’s a by-product of spending his working (?) day asleep and dreaming. He should ask Buck. Spends his nights sketching plans, thinking about what he’s going to do next time, something else to try, how to solve the puzzles all of them keep handing him.

Buck goes down with him most often, teaching him what he needs to know -- after a fashion. Buck’s method of teaching is more like throwing him in the deep end and then telling him to invent a life raft, but he can’t say it isn’t effective. And, Buck does always give him all the tools he needs to rescue himself, even if he doesn’t always identify them all as tools at the beginning.

He knows what Buck said about the projections – not to change too much – but he can't help himself. It's like physics doesn't exist, like if he can think it, poof -- it's there. No research, no calculations, no regulations to follow -- nothing to hold him back; every Piranesi drawing he’d ever seen in school come to life.

It's everything he wanted architecture to be when he was a green, eighteen-year old kid, trying to make his mark on the world. When all he’d wanted was to build a literal legacy -- to put his stamp down somewhere to say, "Ravi was here," to show that he’d lived, that he’d survived everything thrown at him and built something beautiful. Lasting. Secure in the knowledge that years, generations later, someone else would know that, too.

So he presses, and changes, and builds until one day, Buck can't stop his projections. Hands are pulling him, pushing him, crushing him -- he can't breathe, he can't see Buck any more, he can't --

He wakes up gasping, clutching his heart, breathing heavy. Buck's reaching over the space between their chairs almost before Ravi's really processed that he's awake again, that he's not bleeding out on the street he'd lived on when he was eight. "You're okay, you're okay, it wasn't real, you're okay," Buck is saying, low and insistent, when he comes back to himself enough to pay attention to what the words mean.

He sits up slowly, patting his stomach, still not quite sure that there won't be a gaping wound there. Looks around to see who's noticed his panic. Chim's carefully checking his equipment. Hen's got her head down and glasses on, reading something on her phone. Buck's the only one looking at him. "You're okay," he repeats firmly.

And Ravi takes a gulp of air, breathing it out slowly, and finally nods. "I'm okay." Looks at Chim, then Buck. "Go again? I think I know how to make the maze work this time."

Buck looks at him carefully, then nods, and he looks proud, or like he respects Ravi, and it feels like getting a gold star, or a pat on the head. He’s not going to think too hard about that.

He gets to know the others more slowly than he does Buck, mostly because he’s spending 8-10 hours a day on and off in Buck’s head, but Hen takes her turn teaching him too. She’s got a gentler approach than Buck does, but she doesn’t grade on a curve either. Chim doesn’t go down into the dream, although he’s good for a technical answer to just about anything related to the specifics of dream sharing. Ravi’s not sure if there are hierarchies of people in the dreamsharing universe, or if Chim just doesn’t like it.

“Shooting yourself cannot be the only way to wake yourself up out of dream,” he says one day. Really hopes it isn’t. That seems like a definite – traumatic – flaw in the system.

“No, most of the time we use a kick,” Chim says absently.

“A kick?” And feels like this could have been something they mentioned earlier. Getting shot in the head is not actually as fun as it sounds.

"This," Chim says, snapping his gum, "is a kick." And kicks the leg out from under where Buck is precariously balancing his chair on two legs. Buck's arms windmill, and his legs do something that defies physics and for a moment it looks like he's trying to get airborne, before the back of the chair crashes into the ground and Buck lets out a pained grunt.

"Really?" he asks Chim.

Chim grins. It might be the first time Ravi’s seen Chim smile since he got here. "Brother-in-law privilege."

Hen smiles indulgently, and he’s reminded again that he’s the outsider here. “You know how sometimes you jerk awake when you’re falling asleep because you feel like you’re falling?” He nods. “The kick is like that. Something that disrupts the dream to get you out of it.” She goes back to the ever present notes on her phone. “You can still hear in the dream, so a song is ideal. Something you hear that your conscious mind recognizes and jerks you out of the dream.”

He looks at them all, exasperated, “So why have we all been shooting each other if we can just play a song?”

Next time he goes under he cues a song on his phone and jerks awake when the opening strains of ‘Welcome to the Jungle’ start to play. Wakes up to Chim’s laughter, and Buck’s rueful, “Okay, you do not get to pick the music next time.”

Chim

It’s hard to imagine – remember – that he used to do this without thinking. Rote, every day — creating, adjusting compounds based on the job, Bobby’s requests. Kicking back with his feet up, shooting the shit.

Feels so ten years and a lifetime ago.

Every day, he feels the weight of Athena’s gaze, all the things she doesn’t say out loud but he knows must be simmering under the surface.

“What did you do? How could you leave him there? Why him and not you?”

He doesn’t have answers for any of them.

Because, why not him. It was his drugs, his dream — it should have been him. If someone wasn’t going to make it out, it should have been him. Getting out was a gift, but he feels the weight of that gift every day, in a way the others don’t. They miss Bobby, of course; Bobby was basically Buck’s father but… It was his dream, his head, he was the last one out, the one Bobby told to go, just as he saw a flash of red hair– He can’t shake the feeling that they’d been deeper than they realized, that he’d gotten the formulation wrong, that it was his dose that had been too strong.

He should have stayed out, stayed gone — he can’t do this. Waits until Buck and Ravi come up out of the dream, and then escapes to the roof.

Six months ago, Buck would have followed him up (and had, at least once, talking him off a literal and metaphorical ledge). But this time it’s Athena. He presses his hands into his eyes, scrubbing them before turning to take his verbal lashing.

She joins him, leaning against the parapet, looking out over the city.

"Hen didn't ask me before she brought you in."

"I figured," he says.

She doesn't look at him. "I'd have said no, if she'd asked. Not because you're not the best–"

"No," he agrees. "Because I came home and Bobby didn't."

"Yes."

"He told me to get out, to go home to my wife and kids, and then he didn't follow me. I don't know what to do with that. How to live with it."

She's silent for a long time. "He promised me forever, and then he just left halfway through, and I never thought Bobby would be a quitter."

"Athena," he says helplessly. He'd have changed places with Bobby if he could have.

"That's my anger, not yours. He wanted you to have a chance at living. You don't get to waste that."

“I’m not. I didn’t.” Thinks about Maddie and Jee and the baby. “But, being here is part of that. He got me out. I can’t return the favor, but I can do this.”

She looks at him for a long moment, and then nods sharply and leaves. He stays up there on the roof, looking out over the city for a while longer. “I won’t waste it,” he promises Bobby.

Ravi

He knows that they’re all waiting for him to catch up, knows that there’s a plan taking shape around him while he learns how to dream. Which is a sentence that does not stop being wild. He catches edges of it, when they ask him to design a maze, to build a hospital room, even if he’s not sure yet why that’s going to be useful.

Still, a hospital is something he could design in his sleep. He builds a maze where every corridor leads to one particular room. Fills the room with machines that whirr and hum and beep, and never let you sleep. He’s proud of the set he’s built. It’s got corridors that curve around to meet each other, stairways that go nowhere, doors that open to the start of the maze. He’s enjoying showing it off. Wants to get a good grade in dream theft. A thing it’s perfectly normal to want, and can be achieved.

And he thinks he’s finally nailed it. The dream is holding steady, the projections are ignoring them. Except Buck’s looking around like something’s wrong. And he likes Buck. Really. He could stand to take it down a notch, or five. But, he seems like a good guy. Probably.

“What,” he asks, “did I get wrong this time?”

“Is this–” Buck peers down a corridor. “Is this somewhere you know?”

He shrugs, feels caught out, tamps down the feeling that he’s failed a test. He was never good at failing tests. “Spent a lot of time in a hospital as a kid. Write what you know, right? Figured the same here, build what you know.”

Buck and Hen both look alarmed, and Hen’s shaking her head even as she’s kicking them all out of the dream.

“What?” he says irritably when he wakes up. “I worked hard on that.”

“Never recreate a real place,” Buck says severely, like this is something Ravi should have known, then scrubs a hand over his face and falls into what Ravi very privately calls his teacher voice. Wishes there was someone else on this team who was also new that he could share that with. “You can take elements – a street lamp, the way the shadow falls on a wall in the afternoon, a tree, don’t take whole places.”

"Why? I have to start somewhere don't I?"

"Because the more your dream looks like reality, the harder it is to tell what's dream and what's real."

Well that's a new and terrifying thought. Panics for a second, tries to remember how they got here -- remembers walking into the warehouse this morning, and before that he'd had coffee and a bagel for breakfast and his cat had jumped on the table and butted her head under his hand until he obeyed and pet her. So, reality then.

Hen is looking at him with understanding. "We have totems."

"What," he manages to say with an almost steady voice, "is a totem?"

"Something small, that you can keep on you. Something that only you know about. Something that behaves one way in real life, and another way in a dream."

He shakes his head. "I need an example, what's yours?"

She shakes her head firmly. "Never tell anyone what your totem is. Never." He opens his mouth to ask why, but she cuts him off. "Not everyone in the dream community is nice." Her lips tighten, and she amends, "Most people in the dream community are not nice. Don't give them anything to use against you. Find a thing, keep it private, keep it on you at all times."

He looks at her, feeling annoyed, because this is a thing that maybe someone should have led with a while ago. "Like what? Yeah, I get it, not yours, but like what?"

She cocks her head, thinking. "Like a loaded dice. In the dream it rolls true. In reality it always lands on six. Or a spinning top. In reality, it falls over; in the dream, it spins forever."

Right, so, something small, something ordinary, something that means something only to him. It takes him all night to think of something, but he knows he can't go to sleep -- can't go back tomorrow morning -- until he has something.

Chim

He looks up one day, and realizes there are blue-purple circles under Buck’s eyes. Before he had started stretching the limits of what his shirts could contain -- and the one he's wearing now, that Chim swears he saw him in just a month ago, hangs loose.

Buck keeps asking them if they’re sleeping, but -- is he sleeping?

Thinks about it. Probably not. He'd forgotten how Buck just seems to stop needing sleep when he’s planning a job. Or at least, sleep that is actual sleep, and not sleep that’s part of the job. Dreamshare sleep is not actually all that restful, do it long enough and you’ll find yourself passing out in the middle of the grocery store. Ask him how he knows.

He’s learned over years of working with Buck, of watching Bobby work with Buck, that you have to force him to stop sometimes. Sometimes that means pushing him down onto a cot and covering him with a blanket and telling him to sleep – without a needle in his arm. Bobby used to make them all stop, he remembers, used to make them all stop and eat a meal together. Buck had tried in the immediate aftermath of Bobby’s death, but it had been too soon. Too raw. He thinks about asking Buck if he wants to make Bobby’s chili for lunch. Flinches. It still feels too raw. Opts for the other tried and true method of getting Buck to slow the fuck down – letting him talk about the research he’s been doing.

Since they do all actually need to get in on Buck’s most recent research spiral (to make this plan an actual plan instead of just an idea), he kills two birds with one stone. The next time Buck and Ravi surface from a dream, he shoves iced coffees at them and pulls over Buck’s beloved whiteboard, asking, "Okay, so what do we know about Martel? Come on people, no bad ideas in a brainstorm."

"Co-founder of Martel-Harvey.”

"Rich."

"White."

"East Coast."

Buck rolls his eyes, and yeah, this is what Chim’s been waiting for. "Parents died when he was young. Father in a car crash – he was driving drunk. Mother died of cancer. Raised by his grandmother after that. Founded Martel-Harvey when he was 25 with his grad school lab partner. First drug they ever marketed was a targeted cancer drug. Company blew up almost overnight. Never married. No kids that I can find. First thing he ever spent real money on was to buy out his grandmother's mortgage, and then take her on a trip to Europe."

"Huh," Hen says. "We use the grandmother angle?"

Buck nods. "That's what I was thinking."

“Use the grandmother angle to do what exactly?” Ravi’s question makes them all pause. He crosses his arms. “What exactly are we doing here? Because don’t get me wrong, the dreaming is fun, and I’m having a good time, but I’d like to know exactly what laws I’m going to be breaking here.”

Chim glances at Hen, who’s not giving anything away. “Technically,” she says, “we aren't breaking any laws, because no one's made any laws about dreaming to break."

Ravi looks unimpressed with this logic. Chim snorts. The kid has good instincts.

Athena’s the one who answers the real question he’s asking. “We’re going after Martel-Harvey.”

Ravi rolls his eyes. “Got that. Thanks. I was looking for a hair more detail.” Chim’s not sure if that’s bravery or stupidity that has him taking that tone with Athena.

Athena stares at him in silence then says, without conceding an inch, “We want to bankrupt them.” Raises an eyebrow at Ravi. “Do you have a problem with that?”

Ravi doesn’t blink. “Do I have a problem with taking down a big pharma company? Nope.” Says a little more slowly, “Do I have a problem using this guy’s grandmother to do it ….? It seems ….”

"Cold blooded?" Buck suggests.

Ravi shrugs. "If the shoe fits."

‘’Bobby always said nothing worth doing is easy." And okay, maybe Bobby didn't mean it in the way Chim's making it sound and there was a whole lot more, "with help of people who love you" than Chim's implying, but.

Bobby would understand. You make do, you push forward and you find your way.

Ravi thinks about that. Then, "Wait, who is Bobby?" Nobody answers him.

The ghost of Bobby sits heavy in the room, not saying anything. They don’t work as well together as they had before; things that had been seamless, done without thought, without word are stumbling blocks now. Chim still hasn’t even gone down into a dream. No one wants to call him on it, but at some point, it’s going to be necessary.

"So..." Ravi says, drawing it out. "How are we doing this?" Everyone averts their eyes; Ravi watches as Buck bites his lip and looks down at his shoes.

In the silence that follows Chim looks around the room, then at Hen. "You think we need a fifth?"

Athena waves her hands in front of her. “Not me. I am just the client..”

Hen's mouth twitches in amusement, but she doesn't say anything. Buck looks between them. "I feel like you're doing that thing." Waits a beat. “I hate when you do that thing.”

Chim nods, continues like Hen agreed with him. "You're right, we need a fifth."

They're missing something. Someone. Nobody wants to say it. They all feel it.

Ravi breaks the tension with a small laugh. “You are not George Clooney.”

Hen grins. Chim makes a ‘who me?’ expression. Buck looks between them. "What?"

Hen primps her threads. “I could be Brad Pitt.”

“No,” Ravi says instantly, “you’re Cate Blanchett in the remake.” And just like that he’s in, really in.

Chim sees her Cheshire Cat smile, and for the first time feels like maybe they’re all going to be okay. She bows to Ravi. "Nicely played."

Tommy

He hasn't seen any of them since Bobby died. He heard that Eddie bought a house in Texas and stopped returning anyone's calls. He's heard through the grapevine that nobody will work with Howie anymore. Doesn't matter that it probably wasn't his fault. He was the chemist, and Bobby didn't wake up. Last time he talked to Hen she said Howie was fine with that situation - had his dream den, his wife, his kids. Wouldn't take anyone under even if they asked. Evan. Well. He hasn't heard from Evan, hadn't expected to.

Which doesn't explain why Howie’s on his doorstep now. There are a few people he can think of who are less likely to knock on his door. Actually no, he can't.

He leans on the door. "Howie."

"Thomas. Going to invite me in?"

He wasn't, but well he can't not now that he’s been asked. Steps back and Howie steps inside.

Howie looks around as he ushers him down the hall to the kitchen. He wonders what Howie sees – none of them had ever been here. Except Evan, and even he'd only been here once or twice.

He pulls a beer out of the fridge, and then grudgingly another for Howie.

Waits until Howie’s taken a mouthful of beer to ask, "What can I do for you?"

"I can't just be catching up with an old friend?"

He raises an eyebrow at him and doesn't dignify that with a response.

"We have a job," Howie concedes. "We need a forger."

He regards Howie skeptically. "And I was your first call?"

"Flattered?"

"Dubious."

Howie snorts. "We got the band back together. Buck's running point. Hen's the extractor. New architect Buck brought in. He’s green, but good."

"Does Ev-Buck know that you're asking?"

"No? But what does that–" Howie shakes his head impatiently. "I know you have that thing that you do, but we've worked around your incessant sniping before."

What Tommy doesn't say is that back then, that was flirting. Now?

He doesn't know. And doesn't want to blindside Evan. Doesn’t know if he’s capable of working with Evan again. Not now. Not after—

“We’re going after the guys who got Bobby killed,” Chim says. “We need a forger.”

Oh well, if Chim’s going to play the Bobby card. Thinks about the kind of people who could have taken Bobby down. Thinks about Evan and those kind of people. Knows Evan can hold his own, but …

“Fine. I’m in. For Bobby.”

Chim gives him a weird look. “Of course for Bobby; that’s why we’re all doing it.”

Three days later, he opens the door to their temporary office/warehouse and Buck says, “No,” before he’s even shut the door behind him. So much for getting off to a good start. No clean slate here. Evan ignores him, and zeros in on Howie. "We were doing fine without him!"

"Were we?" Hen asks.

“Why couldn’t you ask literally anybody else?”

Tommy swallows. He knows he burned this bridge, that Evan-- that Buck washed his hands of him, of them, but it still hurts to hear.

"I don’t know about you, but I don’t need another hole in my head," Chim says, rubbing his scar. “Who did you want me to call? Jonah? Gerrard?”

"It's good to see you too, Buck," Tommy says. "Glad to know I was missed."

Evan flinches and hides it under a scowl and flips Tommy the bird. Says, “You’ll have to catch up. I don’t have time to explain it again.”

Tommy snags Evan’s clipboard, skims it and hands it back. “All caught up. Thanks.”

Chapter Text

Hen

She keeps turning to tell Bobby something, get his opinion, ask for advice, and never gets used to him not being there. He hasn't been for more than six months, but she's still unsettled by his absence.

She’d buried herself in home – in Karen, in the kids, in the mundane of school pickups, and homework, and bedtimes, and movie nights. Places where Bobby had never really been, so it didn’t feel as strange when he wasn’t there anymore.

Back here, with the team that Bobby built, it’s harder to fool herself that she’s okay (loves Karen for all the times she’s given her space to not be okay, all the times she’s asked, and all the times she hasn’t). She’d done this – dreaming – before Bobby. But Bobby was the person who’d really shown her all the things it could do, could be – the good, the bad, the ugly, the beautiful – shown her that you could balance them all.

She – they – feel unbalanced without him. Like a wheel missing a spoke. She knows she’s not the only one who feels it. Knows they're looking to her, now, to step up, step into his shoes.

It's not that they're lost, completely; they know what they're doing.

They just depended on Bobby to get them there and she’s not sure if she can do that. Be that person. Doesn’t know if she wants to.

​​Circumstances notwithstanding, it is nice to have everyone back in the same room again. She pauses in reading Buck's research on Martel to think about when the last time they'd all been together was. All she's coming up with is Bobby's funeral, and that can't be right can it? Except, she thinks it might be. They splintered after… After. Tried to hold it together for a little while but then Eddie took Chris and hightailed it to Texas. She sees Chim sometimes; their kids play together. Or well, Denny likes to earn some extra cash babysitting Jee while the grownups have a wine night. She assumes Chim sees Buck more often -- he's married to Buck's sister afterall.

It feels wrong to discover how easily they'd all slid apart without Bobby to hold them together. Thinks a little guiltily about how she'd let Buck's texts go unanswered in the early days -- her grief too sharp, too recent, to try and deal with his too.

She looks at him, next to Tommy, both safely asleep across the room, training Ravi, showing him what a good forger can do. He looks older than the way she always pictures him in her head – when he was still that brash kid Bobby took under his wing. Which makes sense. He is older. Grown up. Not that kid any more.

She sees them jerk awake. Another failed dream then. For a half a second it looks like Tommy is reaching for Buck before he pulls his hand back. Buck catches the aborted movement though, because he was already looking at Tommy. She’s not sure what to make of that. Makes a mental note to find time to catch up with Buck. He and Tommy have always squabbled, but their barbs this time feel a little more…. Barbed.

He joins her when he pulls himself up off the lounge chair, back pointedly turned to Tommy. She glances over his shoulder, and Tommy’s talking to Ravi, in theory not paying attention to anything, or anyone else, but she’d bet good money he’s keeping track of where Buck is in the room.

“Good dream?” she asks Buck.

He shrugs. “Ravi’s getting better. Tommy was always good. I wanted to talk to you about research.”

She nods. He’s been tracing Athena’s research, checking and double checking her work. Not because any of them doubt her, but because that’s what makes him the best pointman in the business, no matter how much Chim teases him about his clipboards.

“I think I know–” He stops, swallows. “I think I figured out the part Athena couldn’t get. She--because she’s not a dreamer.”

She nods cautiously. Athena had followed the money. Had found that Moira had been grant funded by Martel-Harvey. When the Martel had hired Bobby, he’d said that he wanted the cure to keep people safe, because Moira had mutated the virus, and they needed it. What he hadn’t said was that Moira was trying to sell them their own product, or that they had the money to buy it and just didn’t want to, figured that they’d steal it from her mind, wash their hands of her and call it a day. He also hadn’t bothered to mention that he was planning to sell the cure, at prices that would bankrupt the governments that would need it the most, costing lives that could have been saved. She just hadn’t figured out how Martel had gotten Bobby killed in the dream.

“Just say it Buck, I can take it.”

He shakes his head. “I wish I didn’t know.” Takes a breath. “I think, they– I-I’m pretty sure– They hired another dreamer.” She startles. Buck’s mouth thins, grim, and she has an inkling half a second before he starts to explain. “They took us down another level. When we thought we were going up, we were going further down. Bobby figured it out. I’m not sure how. But he did, and then he got us out.”

“So… we were further down than we thought, and when Moira shot him…” she trails off. When Moira shot him, Bobby was too deep to kick out, instead he got lost in limbo.

Buck flattens his hands on the table, and she thinks it’s to stop them shaking. “We were never meant to make it out, any of us. They sent another dreamer down to get what we stole, and none of us were supposed to make it out – not us, not Moira.”

“No pesky lawsuits about who owns the cure, no pesky do-gooders who might let the formula slip.”

Buck nods. She takes a breath. And another. Swallows down bile. “Okay. We can work with this. This gives us something to work with.” She was mad before; now she’s pissed.

Tommy

Evan brings coffee one morning. Ravi sips his and looks up surprised, “How did you know how I take my coffee?” Evan shrugs, doesn’t answer, just keeps handing out coffees. Chim's talking to his, Hen's holding hers like she's Gollum and it's the one ring, and Tommy–

He takes a sip, scrunching his nose as bitter coffee assaults his taste buds, before taking off the lid and staring at Buck.

"Sorry," Buck says but doesn’t look it. "Didn't know how you took your coffee."

Tommy opens his mouth and then snaps it closed again.

Remembers Evan crowding behind him in line at the coffee store so he could hear Tommy’s order, and then swooping in to pay for it before Tommy could do much as a gesture at his wallet. Remembers that after that Evan’s kitchen had always been stocked with half-n-half just for him, and a canister of cinnamon sugar had lived on the counter next to the coffee pot.

Says blandly, “Not like this.” He’s not going to be the one who gives the game away.

Evan shrugs and moves to the whiteboard.

Hen raises her eyebrows at him and he shakes his head. Not worth it.

It doesn’t improve from there. He’ll admit, he’s just as guilty as Evan is. Can’t quite seem to stop from poking the bear, just for confirmation that the bear is still paying attention.

He’s being petty, and he knows it. But, he’s frustrated and annoyed – at them, at himself. He had gotten out, left dreaming behind. Tried to escape the danger. Keep it from Evan. He had been... free, for degrees of freedom where he's still wanted in at least 10 countries and he can't ever go home. Not that he wants to, that house, those people haven't been home in decades but. It's the principle of it.

There had been a time when he thought Evan could be home, but then he’d realized they were never going to be safe. They were never going to be able to stop looking over their shoulder. Maybe if they’d both left, changed their names, walked away and never looked back. But he could never have asked that from Evan – knows without asking that he’d never have been enough to replace Evan’s family, his team. It was better if he got out, while he still had a body, and a brain. While Evan was safe.

Evan looks softer now, touchable, wrapped in colors and fabrics he never would have worn when they first met.But it’s an illusion; he’s prickly and stubborn and no matter how much Tommy wants to touch, he can’t. He’s not here for that anyway, he reminds himself as Chim coughs into his hand beside him, getting his attention back.

Buck

They have a whiteboard. They have a team. They have a goal.

What they need is an actual plan.

They’ve been batting ideas back and forth for days.

Chim's quieter. Not quiet, he’s still Chim, afterall, but Buck's not sure he's ever been around a Chimney who doesn't have input about everything. Hen's... unsure of herself. It's unnerving. She was the rock, more than anyone -- the one they turned to, sometimes even more than Bobby.

Buck knows he's trying to compensate, do the work of two, him and Bobby. Bobby trained him, taught him, he should be the voice for him and Bobby.

Except, he shouldn't. He's just Buck and he doesn't know what Bobby would do.

Tries to shake himself out of it, focus on the problem – the whiteboard – at hand. He knows Bobby always said no bad ideas in a brainstorm, but well, Bobby hadn’t heard some of these ideas. He waits for the familiar pang of grief to fade. Looks at Tommy who’s twirling a pen between his fingers. Takes his uncertainty and loneliness out on him, because he’s there, and he’d left before, and Buck had needed him, wanted him, missed him. “What about you? You haven’t said anything so far. Any bright ideas?”

Tommy smiles with all his teeth and doesn’t take the bait. Or maybe he does, because he says. “Inception.”

The entire room explodes. Tommy holds up a hand. “The Army always said it could be done.”

Buck pins him with a look. “Did you ever see them do it?”

Tommy shrugs, laconic. “Got out before they ever proved the theory. Doesn’t mean it can’t be done.”

Ravi whistles, shrilly, two fingers in his mouth, interrupting all of them, "Explain inception to me like I don't know what you're talking about."

"Okay," Hen says. "You know how we can steal an idea."

Ravi nods. "Create an architecture that suggests somewhere that someone would hide something important, crack the dream safe, steal the idea."

Classic dreamheist, down to the letter. What they’d done to Moira. He clamps down on that line of thought. Focuses. Hen’s still talking, explaining.

"But what if you could plant an idea, instead of just stealing one?"

Ravi tilts his head, considering. "Sure. That seems plausible. Well, as plausible as any of this is. So, what's the catch?"

He leans against the table, tries to ignore the way Tommy isn’t looking at him. “The catch is that you’re not that gullible.”

“Thanks?” Ravi says dryly.

He waves a hand dismissively. “Not you specifically. People in general. You know when an idea is yours, and you reject anything that doesn’t feel organic.”

Hen leans forward. “Okay, let’s assume inception is possible.” She ignores Buck’s skeptical grunt. “What idea would we even try to incept?”

“Don’t be a dick,” Chim suggests, which earns him muffled laughter.

Tommy shifts in his chair, folding his arms. “Positive trumps negative.” Hen raises an eyebrow, but gestures for him to continue. “If we want to implant an idea, an emotion, then it has to be a positive one. It can’t be – don’t do this, or do this so that. It needs to be something that he’ll want to do, something that will make him feel good about himself on the other side. So, not don’t be a dick, but ….” he trails off thinking. ”He got into pharmaceuticals because he wanted something that would have saved his grandmother, right?” Sees Buck’s raised eyebrow, “Yes, I did read your notes, thank you.”

“Boys,” Hen says quietly.

“So,” Tommy says, without quite acknowledging Hen, “We remind him of who he used to be.”

Buck eyes him. “That’s … that’s really smart, actually.”

They’d been building a plan around just stealing Martel-Harvey’s formulas. Building the architecture of a hospital, and stealing them from patient rooms. Inception is harder (understatement) on the front end, but easier on the back end; leaves them less exposed. Separates them from having to take any action in the real world, and from anyone who comes looking for them in the aftermath.

Tommy bows at the waist, gives a flourish of his hand. “Your condescension means everything to me, sweetheart. Really.”

Chim laughs. Buck turns away to hide his flinch. He remembers when that wouldn't have been a dig. He remembers when Tommy's mouth would have softened, when he'd have given Buck a smile just for him, when sweetheart would have been fond and Tommy would have meant it. They're not those people anymore, and Buck still doesn't know what he did wrong.

"So," Ravi says, wrenching them back on track. "To sum up. We have to convince Martel, a money grubbing asshole, that he's not a money grubbing asshole, so that when he wakes up, he's going to tell his board that everyone deserves the drugs they make, not just the ones who can afford it, and then sell them for cost."

"Yes."

“And we’re going to do it by implanting the idea that being a philanthropist will make him feel good about himself.”

“Yes.”

“And we're going to do that by... showing him his sick, old grandmother and the house he used to live in?”

Hen shrugs, "Everyone had to come from somewhere."

"It could work," Tommy says.

"We're going to have to do better than maybe," Buck says sharply. "It could backfire spectacularly in our faces.”

"We're just reminding him who he already is," Hen tells them. "An idea he's already had."

Tommy leans back in his chair. “Let me know if you find a substack with a better idea.”

Hen makes a reproving noise and Tommy flashes her an apologetic look. Buck figures he probably deserved that.

Ravi

He’s redrawing the hospital maze to use as a second level – less specific this time, more vibes than memories of the weeks, months, he spent in the children’s cancer ward. Doesn’t use the actual rooms and corridors he’d had memorized at one point in his life.

Tommy and Buck have been arguing for the last 20 minutes about how to get Martel reinvested in his childhood ambitions. Ravi looks up from his sketch to see if anyone else is bothered by this. Apparently not since Hen and Chim have their heads down, working on …. whatever it is they do outside of a dream. Like Tommy and Buck going at each other is so normal it’s just background noise.

He, on the other hand, cannot concentrate over the sound of their sniping – getting more pointed with each dismissed suggestion. He really wants to tell them to just get a room and fuck it out already. Since he both knows them too well, and not quite well enough to actually say that, he’s gearing up to interrupt and tell them to shut the hell up already so he can finish this maze for them.

He’s about to open his mouth, when Tommy reaches around Buck and grabs his coat, marches to the door.

“Oh yes, leave. You were always good at that.”

It’s not even meant for him and Ravi feels his stomach clench. Tommy flushes, and Ravi sees his shoulders tense for a moment, and then he’s gone, out the door.

The snick as it closes brings Chim’s head up. “Was that Tommy?”

Buck’s studying his whiteboard like there’s going to be a test later, hands clenched tight on his clipboard.

“Went to get coffee,” Ravi says, although he’s not sure about that.

Tommy

He doesn’t make it far from the warehouse before he stops, hands on his knees and breathes. He should have said no when Chim came knocking. Even for Bobby, for Evan (maybe especially for Evan), he should have said no, stayed away. This, what they’re doing, it’s not good for either of them. It hurts like hell to be close enough to touch and know he’s not allowed to, that he burned that bridge. The kicker of it is that he’s still not over Evan. Even after a year. Even though he was the one who ended it.

Looks at his watch. It’s still technically morning. Searches for a local bakery and brings back apology pastry. “Who’s hungry?” he announces as he walks in. They all gather around the desk where he drops the box, like sharks around chum and he steps back to watch them bicker about who gets the last chocolate croissant.

Watching them slap at each other hands and steal pastries out from under each other, he realizes with a start that they don’t eat together anymore. Wishes, not for the first time, that he knew more about what had happened last year. He’d heard the same rumors everyone had, had maybe been able to filter out the less likely ones just because he knows them, has worked with them. But he doesn’t actually know, and it’s itching at him because something is off here.

Family dinner had always been Bobby’s thing. They stopped work and ate together at least once a day even in the middle of planning a dream heist. He’d insisted, and Tommy had scoffed at it the first time, but it had worked. Made them tighter than dreamshare teams usually are – more trusting, more willing to lean on each other. It’s what had made them the best. Now they don’t. Eat lunch on their own, working on their own separate parts of the plan, scatter to go home at dinner time. He knows Chim and Hen have wives and kids, and who knows what Ravi’s got outside of this job. But, they used to all orbit Bobby, and it’s like without his gravity they’ve forgotten how to orbit each other.

It’s going to get them killed.

He’d like to say he only cares because it’s likely to get him killed too. But Bobby’s team had been something special, and watching it fractured like this hurts. A discordant note where there used to be a symphony.

He snags Ravi for lunch the next day because he knows him the least and if he’s going to depend on Ravi’s dream architecture he wants to know a little more about him than, Evan’s landlord — apparently.

“So,” he says cheerfully after they order. “How are you enjoying the job?”

Ravi stares at him dryly over his glass of water. “Different question, how did Buck know I used to be an architecture student?”

He shrugs. “How does Buck know anything?” Takes pity on Ravi’s glare. “Buck is the pointman. Knowing everything about everybody is his job. He probably also knows your shoe size, your favorite flavor of ice cream and where you lived when you were ten.” Ravi looks unhappy about that. “It’s not personal? It’s just how he’s wired, and it’s his job.“

“Yeah, that’s make more sense if he hadn’t known all of that before he hooked me up to somnacin and asked if I wanted to break the law with him.”

Tommy winces. “He’s over eager sometimes. Usually Bobby did the approach. “

Ravi sits up at that. “Did you know Bobby?” He nods. Ravi leans forward. “Okay because nobody wants to talk about him, but they all talk around him, and like what is the deal there?”

“That,” he says, “is a story that will take longer than we’ve got for lunch, and requires alcohol.”

Ravi folds his arms, unimpressed. “Give me the cliff notes, or order some tequila.”

Hen

Ravi’s picked up dreaming faster than he gives himself credit for; he’s brand new and already creating beautiful mazes for them to wander through. He’s starting to teach them the levels – well, Chim keeps finding excuses not to go under, but she knows he’ll come around. She’s caught him examining Ravi’s drawings when the others aren’t looking.

When push comes to shove, Chimney always steps up. She can give him a little more time.

Ravi is not the problem. Hen’s not actually sure what the problem is. They’ve started using Athena as their test subject, because she’s not part of the team, because Bobby militarized her years ago, and because they don’t know her mind. She’s the best stand-in for Martel that they have.

Most days they don’t even make it past the first level. Athena sees them coming before they ever get close. And, they die. Again and again.

Shot.

Stabbed.

Drowned.

Stabbed and drowned.

Choking on their own blood.

The projections turn on them. Surround them. Come after them.

She gets used to hearing them all come awake gasping, clutching for their totems.

She gets used to shooting them in the dream just to get them out. They've never made it to the kick.

“It’s not me,” Chim says, hands raised, the fifth time they jerk awake, gasping for hair and patting down body parts that had holes through them ten seconds before. He looks down at the array in front of him, touching the vials like he's reassuring himself. Looks back up at where they're all staring at him from the lounge chairs they'd been dreaming in. “There’s nothing wrong with the drugs. I’ve tested a bajillion times.”

“Is that a scientific term?” Buck asks, still breathing hard.

“It is according to your niece.”

Buck's mouth softens for a moment, the way it always does for Jee, before he sits up, all business again. "Then what? It's not the drugs. It's not the architect; Ravi's designs are good. What?"

She wishes she knew. Bobby would have.

She'd taken over for him before -- when Harry got arrested, when he got injured -- but it's never been purely her job to run. No road map, no guidelines.

She's uncomfortable, in a way, she hasn't been in a long time. She prides herself on being calm. Sure. In control.

She looks the part, her clothes, her kicks are on point.

But it's a facade.

Buck

It's Ravi's dream, but Athena's mind, and again, for the whatever-th time, the simulations go for Ravi almost instantly. He and Tommy try to distract them, give Ravi time to try and stabilize the dream, or failing that, get better at kicking himself out of the dream.

It doesn't work. Hen shoots him, and then the simulations turn on them before she has a chance to shoot them. Thinks he sees Bobby out of the corner of his eye and turns to look more closely.

It costs him time. The simulations corner Tommy, want to drag him down with them. He shoots Tommy, and then himself.

Comes awake in the warehouse, gasping and clutching at his totem. Flicking the bicycle bell to hear the reassuring silence of it not ringing. This is real. This is reality. Looks across the room at where Tommy is sitting up, hand clenched tight in his pocket around his own totem.

He wonders if it's the same one, or if Tommy had changed it after they broke up. He hadn’t; maybe should have considered it, but just because Tommy left and Buck’s mad he didn’t trust him, trust them – he still trusts Tommy.

It had been his fault that Tommy ran. He should have seen it coming. He pushed too hard, too fast.

And then, when they'd had that night – that perfect fucking night – he hadn't been able to get out of his own way the next morning and listen to what Tommy was saying.

He's realizing he never really listened to Tommy. They had been easy, fit so well; he hadn't figured he had to think too hard about it. Which was just stupid. You should always pay attention to the important things.

So, they still have a long way to go. Ravi’s green but learning fast. Tommy helps. Buck’s chest tightens, because he’s been an ass, and just because Tommy’s been a jerk back doesn’t mean he shouldn’t be the bigger man.

“I didn’t say earlier,” Buck catches him on the arm when he’s heading out later for recon on Martel, “but thank you for doing this.”

“I’m not doing it for you,” he says, and Buck winces, looks at his shoes. They’re scuffed on the toe. He deserved that. “I’m doing it for Bobby, for Chim.”

Buck nods, hugs himself and pulls the door back open.

“And also for you,” he hears as the door shuts. He looks back just in time to see Tommy offering a small smile. Feels an echo of it stretching across his face.

Ravi

They go down into the dream like normal. It’s him, Athena, Buck and Tommy and they actually get through to the location where they plan to drop into the second dream.

And then it all goes sideways.

Buck freezes halfway through a sentence, like he’s a videogame character who’s glitching. And, he’d think it was a freaky dream thing that nobody’s remembered they should tell him about yet, except that Tommy’s not frozen. Tommy’s got his arm wrapped around Buck, and glaring daggers at Athena, who’s paying none of them any attention.

Ravi turns to see what they’re all looking at. Not a what; a who. It’s an older guy. Tall. White. Looks friendly. He’s seen him a couple of times before, always figured that Athena’s projections were sometimes repetitive but this? Their reaction doesn’t suggest something normal.

And then Tommy shoots Buck in the head, even though Ravi can’t see any reason to. Nothing’s there to kill them, for once. Shoots himself immediately after, leaving Athena and Ravi down by themselves. He watches her walk over to the guy, hand outreached.

“You shouldn’t be here,” the projection says, and Ravi thinks he’s talking to Athena but then he jerks his head and stares at Ravi. Ravi gets the message. Shoots himself. Which never gets easier, or less weird.

He jerks awake to find Buck quiet, curled into himself on the chair, staring at his hands in his lap. Tommy is furious, like he's being angry enough for both of them. Athena delicately pulls the needle out of her arm a minute later, looking imperious.

"You didn't think that Bobby hanging around your subconscious was worth mentioning before we went down?" Ravi’s never heard Tommy mad, and he hasn’t raised his voice, but–

Athena shrugs. "He was my husband."

He notices that Tommy's got his hand on the back of Buck's chair, that Buck's leaning back against it. He glances up to see if anyone else is seeing this. But nobody seems to be paying attention.

Tommy's still talking. "And he meant something to all of us too. You weren't the only one who lost him."

Buck makes a noise at that. Looks up at Tommy. Says, "I'm fine." Then louder for the rest of the room. “If you’re going to continue helping us test,” swallows hard, “You need to keep him away. I- I can’t. We can’t.” He doesn’t complete his sentence.

Tommy looks like he has some thoughts on that, but he buttons it down. Ravi notices that he doesn't move his hand though, and Buck doesn't lean forward away from it. (He doesn't lean into it either.)

“When did they break up?” he asks Hen later.

“They never dated?” Hen answers and Ravi laughs.

“No, seriously?”

Her eyebrow raises, “I’m being serious?”

He watches them some more. That seems ... implausible, but he can't imagine what Hen would get out of lying about it.

Chapter Text

Chim

They’re going over the plan in between trying to figure out how to synchronize the kicks across different levels, which all have different degrees of time dilation. Never mind that they’ve still never actually made it to the second level, let alone the third, it’s important to have a plan. Or so Buck and Hen keep saying. Chim’s job’s basically just to keep them in somnacin. It’s what he’s good for.

They’ve gone three or seven rounds on it. "It's never going to work," Buck says with a sigh, tilting back precariously in his chair – Chim resists the urge to kick the leg out – "We just can't get through the city in time.”

"What if we flew?" Tommy asks, and Buck scoffs.

"Fly? In a dream?"

"Why not?" Smirks at him. “Don’t be afraid to dream a little bigger, sweetheart.”

Buck squints at him dubiously. “Can you even fly?”

Tommy shrugs. “It’s a dream, I can do anything I want in a dream.”

Buck considers that, and Chim waits for the cutting dismissal, and does a double take when it doesn’t come, when Buck’s mouth just curves, amused...if Chim didn't know it any better, he'd call it flirtation. He's seen that particular grin on a Buckley mouth before. Buck nods, conceding the point. And then they move on. Trying to coordinate the kicks.

“Music, right?” Ravi says. “We can use music to coordinate the kicks. Like we’re gonna need something big to actually kick us out with the level of sedation that Chim’s giving us, but we can use a music cue to make sure we all kick out at the same time.” He taps his finger on the sketch in front of him. “Problem is, how do we coordinate the music across multiple levels? Because,” he looks at Chim, “time’s moving differently on each level?”

Chim catches Hen’s eye. “Aw, look at our baby, all grown up.”

Ravi rolls his eyes. Tommy snorts.

Hen allows herself a small smile, and then, “He’s right though. We’ll need a real kick - literally falling off something in the dream – to kick us out, but we’re all going to have to kick at the same time to collapse the levels. The song can be the countdown.”

Chim shrugs. Sure. Why not. “Anyone got a request?”

“Save the Last Dance for Me,” Athena says. They all turn to look at her. She hasn’t said anything until then. She shrugs. “We’re doing this for Bobby, right? We danced to that on our wedding night.”

Tommy

He takes three days, flies to New Jersey to see the house where Martel grew up. He’d paid off the mortgage for his grandmother the first chance he got, never sold it after she died. It’s empty now, nothing he can find suggests that Martel ever visits, but it clearly still means something to him. Makes his life easier – like a firefly preserved in amber, the house doesn’t look like it’s changed much since Martel grew up here, new stove maybe, new fridge. But, when he picks the lock and slips inside one day – middle of the day when everyone is at work, (middle of the night is actually the worst time to break into someone’s house, whatever TV wants you to believe) – it looks like the layout is the same. He examines the wall of photos Martel’s grandmother had kept – Martel as a baby, as a gap-toothed child grinning at the camera, running through a sprinkler in the yard of this house, a high school graduate hugging his grandmother, a college and then a PhD graduate. He gets older, and so does she, a little frailer in every picture.

Tommy memorizes the way she did her hair, the way she held her purse. Sniffs the perfume bottles still on the dresser.

Back home in LA he trawls the internet for instagram stories, and facebook posts – god bless Martel’s obsession with Throwback Thursday posts.

“Remind me,” he says when he’s showing Ravi pictures of the house so he can design the third level of the dream, “to go through my internet history and make sure none of this is available.”

Evan doesn’t even look up from whatever it is that he’s doing, just says, “You’re safe, I scrubbed your history.” Then freezes and seems to realize what he’s said. Very carefully looks up to see if anyone else is paying attention. Ravi’s the only one who heard him though, and Ravi is very kindly pretending that he heard nothing.

They’re saved from the moment by Hen calling them to join her.

"Karen packed us lunch," Hen says, and Tommy does a double take. Karen never seemed like the type to play ‘50s housewife and cater lunch for the office.

"Karen?" Chimney asks, head tilted, and at least Tommy isn't alone in finding it unexpected.

"I'm happy to cook," Evan tells her, "She didn't have to do that." And Tommy's mouth waters, just a bit. He misses Evan’s cooking.

"Next time," she says, with a small smile. "For now it's the PBJs that Mara has decided she no longer wants to eat."

Maybe it’s just peanut butter and jelly sandwiches – although there is nothing wrong with a good PBJ – but everyone stops, at least for a moment. Sits down at the table. Argues over grape vs strawberry, and straight cut vs diagonal, and “Maddie used to cut the crusts off mine,” Evan says. He remembers Evan cutting the crusts off a lunch he packed for his niece once, and looks up to catch Evan watching him, and wonders if Evan’s remembering the same morning. What they’d done after lunch was made and ready for Evan and Jee’s trip to the zoo later.

It feels like everyone is a little reluctant to give up this moment of normality, but after lunch Ravi takes him down into the dream to show him what he’s built, figure out what needs tweaking. Eventually they’re going to have to practice dropping through the levels – boardroom to hospital to home – but for now, just walking around the third level is enough.

Athena comes with them. They don’t really need her for this, but he supposes that they need the practice avoiding tipping off a militarized mind. Ravi wanders around, comparing the room he built with the pictures Tommy took, the pictures he’s found online. Tommy shakes out his arms and his hands, gets himself loose, and slips into Martel’s grandmother between one breath and the next.

Ravi circles him, examining him. “This is creepy as fuck, you know that right? Cool as hell, but creepy as fuck.”

He likes Ravi. It’s been years since he talked to someone new to the game. It’s refreshing to be reminded of the possibilities, the potential, and be questioned about the ethics of it. It’s easy to lose sight of what it is exactly that they do when they drop down into someone else’s dream.

He circles Tommy again. “A little shorter, I think. Martel’s only an inch or so shorter than I am, and in the pictures it looked like his grandmother hit the top of his shoulder.”

He adjusts slightly. “People are always taller in our memory, especially if we’re remembering them from when we were a kid.”

Athena

She knows it’s not healthy, that Bobby would be the first to tell her to let go, that he’s in a good place, back with his kids. He’d remind her that memories are meant to fade, that’s why they’re built that way. But, Bobby’s not here anymore. He gave up the right to tell her anything when he left her, made her bury him. Chose this team, these people, over himself. That’s not fair. They loved him as much as she did. But, she sleeps in an empty bed at night, and eats dinner alone. She misses him.

The team tells her that she doesn’t need to go down into the dream with them if she doesn’t want to. That Ravi can use one of them to teach them the architecture he’s building. They’re being kind. They’re trying to spare her.

She doesn’t say anything, just sits down in the chair next to them and holds her arm out for Chimney to insert the needle. Over and over and over again.

Glimpses of Bobby for a minute, three minutes, an hour. She’ll take what she can get.

She sees Bobby out the window of Martel’s grandmother’s house and slips outside to talk to him. Presses close to him when he holds out his arms for her. Smells the aftershave he always wore, the way his shirt smelled at the end of a day - detergent, and soap, and sweat, and something that was just him.

“Athena, what are you doing?” She can feel the rumble of his voice under her ear where it’s pressed to his chest. He sounds confused, but he wraps his arms around her and they feel like his always did. She feels the weight of him against her, again. It’s comforting. Warm.

Doesn’t pull away until she hears the music that signals the kick. Then she presses a kiss to his cheek. “I'm doing this for you, baby. Don't worry, I have it under control."

She’s not sure if the lie is for him or for her.

Buck

He didn’t see anything strange, recognize anything out of place, but Tommy clearly did – shoots himself to get away from them. Wakes up sweat soaked and wild-eyed, like whoever he’d seen down in the dream had followed him back up to the waking world.

He’s up and out of the chairs before he’s even finished pulling the needle out, the tubing swinging freely from his chair. Buck’s eyes follow him as he stalks across the room. Holds Ravi’s wrist when he makes a move to follow him. “No, give him a minute.” They all have things, Athena’s not the only one with someone who haunts them in their dreams.

Watches as Tommy rummages in his bag, and then disappears into the bathroom. He’s in there for a while, and Buck can’t help but sneak worried glances at it, even as he debriefs with Ravi and Hen about the architecture. When Tommy emerges he looks calmer, and … Buck freezes, mid-sentence, until Hen waves a hand in front of his face while Ravi smirks at him.

But Tommy, he’s– wearing a t-shirt with a logo for a restaurant in Virginia Beach, soft and worn, and stretched out enough that it mostly fits his arms.

Back when they’d been together, he’d stolen Tommy’s clothes, wandered around the loft in them, changed into them when he got home from hard jobs, tucking his nose into the collars of Tommy’s shirts and worn out sweatshirts. He could still smell Tommy there, even fresh out of the wash. And Tommy had let him, because he liked it too, Buck thought, remembers fondly even now a night when Tommy, eyes dark and intense, had pushed him back onto a bed, towering over him, looking his fill. Tommy didn’t do the same back, didn’t steal Buck’s clothes – mostly because he’s just that much bigger than Buck. And, Buck’s all leg, and Tommy, hilariously, could never wear his sweatpants without tripping on the hem.

But that t-shirt is his. From when he was 20 and bumming his way across the country in Maddie’s jeep. He didn’t even know Tommy had it.

Tries to think what it means that Tommy still has it. That he’s wearing it now. That he’s put it on now, when he’d clearly been freaked out by whatever he saw in the dream.

It’s probably not a hint, just what was in Tommy’s bag, but there’s an ungovernable part of his mind that wants to believe it’s because Tommy finds it as comforting to wear his clothes, as he’d always found it to wear Tommy’s. That he’s still got a chance, if Tommy is still looking to him for comfort, that he didn’t fuck things up beyond repair that morning, when he’d said awful things before he thought through how they’d sound.

Tommy settles back at his desk and Buck catches his eye. Tilts his head to ask without speaking if he’s okay. Tommy seems to understand. He nods.

Ravi

They're down on the second level when it starts collapsing around them. He looks at Buck for direction, and he looks fucking panicked. It's the first time he's seen Buck panic in a dream; even when they saw Bobby, he'd just frozen.

"What?" Shakes Buck. "What is happening?"

Buck looks up, like he'll be able to see to the first level. "Something happened to Hen. The dream's collapsing."

He looks around. "No shit."

Buck shakes his head. "Not our dream, Hen's dream." Looks around him as the edges seem to go hazy and quavery. "We have to kick out. Now."

Does Ravi the favor of shooting him first and then himself. Means Ravi's in the first level of the dream on his own for a second before Buck makes it up, and he's never felt so sick to his stomach. Wishes he could tell his eleven-year-old self that there's something worse than chemo. Wishes he did not know that now.

Looks at Buck. "What now?"

Buck's looking around. "We have to find Hen. We all need to kick out."

The building shakes underneath them, reality sliding sideways. Or no, that’s just the building. Finds himself flattened against the boardroom window, staring down at the ground 36 stories below him, when the ground stops shaking. He’s lived in LA his entire life. He knows what an earthquake feels like.

Looks for Buck. “Shoot the glass,” he yells. “It’ll kick us out.”

Buck hesitates and Ravi cranes his neck to follow his line of sight. Buck’s watching Hen, who’s watching Bobby and Athena, by the elevators, which are still standing in a way that would only be possible in a dream.

“What the fuck,” he says. Buck shoots the window and he falls, wakes up in a warehouse in LA.

“What the fuck,” he asks when Buck wakes up, “was that?”

Buck’s frowning, looking worried, which does nothing to calm him down. “We were a level down from Hen’s dream; when something disrupted her dream, it affected ours. She couldn’t kick out until we did.”

Or they all get stuck in limbo, Ravi realizes with sick certainty. “What?” he asks.

Buck’s eyes slide to Athena without really meaning to, and Ravi gets it suddenly.

"This is a rudderless boat," Ravi hisses, yanking the needle out of his arm. "Athena wants to stay down there forever, she sees Bobby around every corner -- and he's TALKING TO HER? Chimney still won’t even go down in a dream, Hen doesn't trust her instincts, and I don't know what is up with you two,” nods between Buck and Tommy, “but you're going to get us killed. I may be new, but I'm not an idiot." Slams the door behind him as he leaves, then leans against the wall, trying to catch his breath and get his nerves back under control. Tucks his hands into his pockets to stop them shaking – or so he can't see them shake.

He hears the door open behind him, doesn't turn around to see who came out after him. Takes bets in his head. Gives himself a piece of that cake from the bakery down the street when Buck speaks.

"You're not wrong."

Turns his head to look at Buck. "No shit. Want to give me the real story now?" Buck hesitates, and he waves a hand irritably. "I can't design for a dreamscape when I don't know half the story."

Buck sighs, comes to lean against the wall next to him. "We had a job. It went wrong. Bobby didn't come back from it. Lost in limbo." Stops. Ravi waits. And after a minute Buck continues. "Chim was the chemist. It wasn’t his fault.” He pauses long enough that Ravi thinks that maybe that’s all he’s going to get, but then. “It wasn’t Chim’s fault, but we didn’t know that until a couple of weeks ago.” Grimaces. “Not for sure anyway.” He pauses, and Ravi waits, because there’s more, he’s sure of it. Buck slides him a look, and then determinedly looks back at the ground. “We thought we were kicking up, but Martel had hired another guy, and he took us down another level instead. We got out. Bobby didn’t.” Swallows and corrects himself. “Bobby sacrificed himself to make sure the rest of us got out.”

Ravi slots all of that into place. Athena lost her husband. Buck couldn’t save him. Chim felt responsible, although he doesn't get the feeling that anyone else had been holding him responsible – not even really Athena.

Ravi nods thoughtfully. "Tommy?"

Buck looks surprised. "He wasn't there."

"Not what I meant. I meant, what's the deal with the two of you?"

Buck doesn't say anything, but looks guilty, and Ravi presses. "Hen said I was wrong when I asked when the two of you broke up, but I'm not, am I?"

Buck's hand flexes on his leg, and he blows out a slow breath before he says. "No, you're not wrong." And then. "Nobody knows. Nobody can know."

Ravi stares at him. "Why?"

Buck fiddles with something in his pocket, probably his totem, before he says. "We'd be leverage against each other. Even now."

He blinks, trying to assimilate that. "How long? Can I ask?"

"How long were we together, or how long have we been broken up?"

"Either. Both." Considers. "Both."

"Six months. And, nearly a year."

And they are both still very obviously into each other. Ravi wonders what the fuck had happened there, but clearly it’s not his place to ask. Doesn’t think Buck would answer, anyway.

"This isn't a good profession for relationships," Buck tells him.

Ravi squints at him. "Isn't Chim married to your sister? And Hen's married, isn't she?" He's seen the wedding ring on her finger. Pushes just a little. “Aren’t we doing all of this because Bobby and Athena were married?”

He can see Buck gearing up to say that's different, and he's curious to see what the fuck rationale Buck comes up with for that, but Hen pushes the door open, and Buck sends him a look that says, 'do not talk about this'.

He grabs for Buck’s wrist to hold him back for a moment. “Look, I don't know much, what the,” he waves a hand, “history on all the relationships here are, but I know that if we don't trust each other..." The implications are still freshly riddled through Buck's body.

"I know," he says. "Tommy knows too. We'll be ready."

Hen

Hen corners Buck in the makeshift kitchen they've set up in the corner of the warehouse. Leans in the doorway so he can't weasel his way around her. "How you doing, Buckaroo?"

"Fine," he says. She can see him eying the distance between him and her and the rest of the warehouse. She settles in more comfortably. Knows there's not a chance in hell he'll push past her. "You and Tommy going to be okay?”

He looks at her blankly. “Yes?”

“Just, you seem a little more," she pauses looking for the right word, "-- fraught than usual." Although now that she thinks about it, that hasn’t been true the last week or so. Something shifted when she wasn’t paying attention.

He shrugs. "We're fine.” She doesn’t say anything, waiting for him to finish; learned from Denny not to step too fast and put words in his mouth. He reads it differently, and adds, “We’re both professionals. We had a,” he hesitates for a moment, “a disagreement.”

She raises an eyebrow at him. “And you’ve resolved your…disagreement?”

He cocks his head and, almost like he can’t help himself, he looks across the room to where Tommy is talking to Ravi, “Work in progress.” Smiles like he knows something she doesn’t. Then focuses again. “It won’t affect the job. Promise.”

She raises an eyebrow at him.

"No, really."

"I have no evidence to the contrary, just a lot of..." she trails off.

"I know Tommy’s good at his job,” he insists. Then concedes under her continued eyebrow, “We just don't always agree on the best way to do said job."

"That's true," she agrees. "You're usually a little less bitchy about it though." Crosses her arms. "You know, Ravi's got this crazy theory that you're bitter exes." Laughs even as she says it. Sees Buck freeze. It's just for a second, but he looks like a deer in headlights, and she straightens, arms uncrossing. "Holy shit."

He raises an eyebrow. "Holy shit what, Hen?"

"Ravi was right."

He shakes his head. "No, no, he was not."

But she's right, she knows she is – cannot fucking wait to tell Karen – "You and Tommy? Really?" Frowns. "When? Why didn't you ever say anything."

He takes her arm, pulls her further into the kitchen, away from where anyone can see them talking. "It was nothing. A while ago. It's over now. You cannot tell anyone."

She stares at him. "I don't believe you." A lot of things are clicking into place.

He gives her an exasperated look. "Trust me, it's over."

He doesn’t even sound like he believes that, but before she can call him on it, Athena calls out, "The two of you done gossiping? Can we get back to work now?" And Buck brushes past her before she can say anything else.

She catches up to him right before he reaches the cluster of chairs in the middle of the warehouse. Whispers, "We are not done talking about this."

He spares her a bare glance, and then nods in defeat. “Most clients aren’t this bossy,” Evan says, ignoring Hen.

“I am not most clients.”

Chim

He’s not sure why the plan has taken so long to solidify — they’ve never practiced this much for another job. Ravi being new just feels like an excuse for the way they’re all missing Bobby, and not talking about it. But, finally – Buck comes in one day.

"Martel-Harvey has a board meeting in New York in two weeks."

Nobody says anything and they all look at Buck, who sighs. "So, he's going to fly to New York from LA and we'll have five uninterrupted hours with him."

Tommy rubs his neck, "That's a tight turnaround. And I don't have his grandmother down yet."

Buck raises an eyebrow, "So, I guess you have work to do?"

Chim holds his breath for a snide come back from Tommy, but he just grins and flips Buck off, and Chim catches the smile that Buck hastily tries to hide. Whatever disagreement they’ve been having since Tommy arrived seems to have been resolved. He’s got no clue what it was, or how it got resolved, and he doesn’t really care as long as it makes work smoother. Besides, eventually Buck will tell Maddie, and Maddie will tell him.

It’s better than the other way around, and when he has to keep something from Maddie. He’s never successfully done that.

They scatter to their separate tasks. They have a time and a place, and now it’s real, and everything is a race to the finish line.

But. It's doable. For the first time, he thinks, this might actually work.

Which means it’s time for him to actually let Ravi teach him the architecture of the dream. He’s supposed to hold the first level, and just staring at Ravi’s drawings until his eyes bleed isn’t going to hack it. He knows that.

He hasn't gone down with Ravi yet, and it'll be the first time he's dreamed since Bobby died. He doesn’t know what he’ll find down there; what he’ll do if he comes face to face with Bobby. He’s nervous, like it’s his first time, first job, which is ridiculous for how long he’s been doing this. He-- He's seen how many times Ravi and Buck have woken up gasping and clutching at their totems. But, he's going to have to learn the level sooner rather than later, and no time like the present, or something.

He still sets the dose, doesn't trust anyone with his equipment. Hen had told him what Buck found, that there'd been another dreamer, that Bobby falling into limbo wasn't his fault, wasn't his drugs. He still doesn't trust anyone else to touch them. Runs his hands over the formulations and doses like he can keep them all safe if he's just careful enough.

Takes a breath and watches as Buck pushes the dosage and sends them both to sleep.

Surfaces in downtown New York. Knows he has to haul ass to make it to the high rise in time. It’s just him and Ravi and his projections seem… quiet. Subdued. They make it to the building and up to the board room, a giant mahogany table in the middle. Sweeping views of the New York skyline out the window. On a pedestal in the back of the room is a small scale model of Martel-Harvey’s grad school lab where they developed their first product, where they dreamed up their company.

He lets Ravi walk him through the level, the plan, the corridors that all twist back on themselves, so Martel has no option except to end up in the boardroom – talking to Harvey, as played by Tommy.

"You think this will really work?" Ravi asks suddenly. "Inception?"

Truthfully he has no idea, has his doubts. But, if anyone can pull it off it's Hen and Buck. Says, "Yes," with maybe more confidence than he feels.

Ravi nods and seems to accept that. Looks out at the skyline as they both wait for the music to start playing to signal the kick. "You're really Buck's brother-in-law?"

He leans on his hip to study Ravi. "Yeah, I'm married to his sister. Why?"

Ravi turns to face him. "That how you got into this? Did he kidnap you and take you out for coffee in a dream too?”

He snorts. “No. I was dreaming long before Buck was out of shortpants.” Pauses. “Might have been how Bobby recruited Buck though, I’ve never actually asked. Bobby just showed up one day with this kid, said he was going to be our pointman.” Shakes his head. “No background in dreamsharing. No background in anything really. But, built for it, in a way I’d never seen before. Don’t know how Bobby saw it, but he was always good at that.”

Ravi nods. “Okay, so how did you get into it then? Tommy learned in the Army?”

“Yes. So did Eddie,” Chim says absently, still half thinking about what Bobby had seen in Buck that nobody else ever had before, and how he’d been right. Looks up and catches Ravi’s confused expression, and he waves a hand, "You haven't met him. He retired."

Ravi squints. "Is that a euphemism for died?"

"What? No. Like actually retired. He's a firefighter now."

Ravi nods, and looks relieved. "So Eddie and Tommy learned in the Army, Bobby recruited Buck. What about you and Hen?"

Kid’s persistent, he’ll give him that. "Hen and Tommy and I actually started out working together – not with Bobby, with a different architect." He makes a face. "Not a good guy."

"What happened to him?"

Chim smirks at him and makes air quotes, "He 'retired'. Bobby recruited us after that. Tommy left, became more freelance, although he'll always show up if you call. He's a good guy."

The music for the kick comes on. Chim gets into position.

“Still didn't answer about you," Ravi points out.

"Noticed that, did you," Chim laughs, "It's a mystery."

Tommy

Everyone else has left. It’s the night before the job. Chim, Hen and Athena are checking on their families; Ravi’s' fucked off to wherever he goes. If he was smart he’d go home and get some sleep. Smirks to himself, it never stops being ironic to get some sleep before you go to work to sleep.

He’s not that smart. Instead he’s lingering in the warehouse. Not waiting for Evan … No, he’s waiting for Evan, wondering if he has the nerve to ask if he wants to grab dinner. He wants to take him -- anywhere. Everywhere.

He knows Evan's still… pissed is maybe not the right word anymore. Frustrated. Confused. He understands it; they'd been building something and then Tommy’d jerked the rug out from under it. He didn't really explain, couldn't really explain -- just Evan had moved so fast; trusted him, when he shouldn't have. When he should have known better. Evan doesn't know all the ways Tommy could hurt him; how Tommy's past could hurt him. Them. It had been better, safer, that he not know, that Tommy leave and spare Evan ever finding out all the things that lurk in the shadows.

It wasn't easy. It hurt, ripping his heart out when all he wanted to do was hand it to Evan, and slay the demons from long ago that weren’t Evan's burden to bear.

He’d tried the clean break. Cold turkey. Except, then they’d run into each other after Bobby’s funeral, after Evan’s world fell apart, and he’d never been good at saying no when Evan needed something. They’d fallen into bed, and then out again.The morning after, Tommy let his insecurities get the better of his common sense and said shit he only half meant. And, Evan-- he always gave as good as he got, and Tommy got out before he could lose more of himself. He’d been right the first time – a clean break was kinder to both of them.

But now, here they are working together, again. It’s like drinking apple juice when what you want is whiskey. And he’s dying for a drink.

He hadn’t been able to help himself when he first got here, needling Evan back every time he took a shot. That’s the problem with working with your ex - they know how to dig under your skin, they know where all the chinks in your armor are. If you hurt them badly enough, they don’t have a reason to pull their punches. He’d hurt Evan enough. He’d made sure of it.

The kicker is, he's still in love with Evan. Might always still be in love with Evan a little bit. He’d always thought, as long as Evan doesn't know, it'll be okay.

But what if he was wrong? The last couple days, it feels like maybe he’s been wrong. Maybe there’s a way back.

It feels like peeling strips off his skin to put himself out there again, give Evan more ammunition to use against him if he’s wrong. But – the possibility that they could try again? Try it honest and real this time, tell each other about the ghosts that haunt them, isn’t that worth it?

Evan interrupts his reverie. “You’re still here.”

He’s not sure how to take that. Is Evan pleased or upset about that?

Evan flushes. “Sorry. Umm, you’re still here?” He seems hesitant.

Tommy nods. Evan takes a step closer, and then stops, wavering in that space between polite and close enough to lean in.

“What are you doing tonight?”

Tommy has to laugh, a little. “Using my own lines against me?”

“The classics are classics for a reason.” Bites his lip. “It’s not Saturday, but ….”

Tommy wishes he could laugh and say you or even, whatever you’re asking me to do. But-- “I can’t.” He says and. Evan’s face falls, “I can’t, now. Not yet. Let’s get through this.” If they can do this, maybe they can do anything.

Evan was good. Bobby took a kid, who didn’t know anything — wide-eyed, bushy-tailed — and built him in his image.

Tommy was — not that. His dad, then the Army built him. He knew the ugly side of dreaming — the dark depths they had all descended into. When he got out, it was all he knew — he fell in with Gerrard, with Chim and Hen.

Bobby (and Chim) saved him. Got him out, on a different path but he was still the man the Army made.

He hadn’t been ready before, thought he’d bring Evan down into the dirt with him. Was just waiting for his past to catch up to him. The golden boy deserved better.

It hasn’t worked. He hadn’t been able to keep his hands to himself. He didn’t deserve Evan but he wanted him. Evan had never seen the dark side in him – he’d been so careful not to show it, not until right at the end. Even then Evan hadn’t flinched, not until Tommy walked away. He can still hear him, his confused, “Are you breaking up with me?” Maybe he can take a leap of faith. Let Evan see the person he thinks he is, try and see the person Evan thinks he is. Somewhere in the middle might be someone real. But, he can’t do that, now, not with what they’re going to do tomorrow. He needs a clear head.

Evan's looking at him carefully, really listening to what he's saying. He’s getting better at reading between Tommy’s lines, at seeing the things Tommy used to be able to hide. "That's not a no, is it? That's just a–" he pauses, asking a question.

He swallows. Makes a promise. "A tomorrow." Hopes it's a promise they'll both be able to keep.

Evan's eyes sweep the room, then land back on Tommy. "Tomorrow."

Chapter Text

Hen

It’s the first job she’s done without Bobby in a decade. Thinks this might actually be the first job Buck’s ever done without him at all.

They are as prepared as they’re going to be.

She rolls over, watching Karen sleep. She twitches, slightly, before exhaling. She’s so beautiful.

She tells herself it's just a business trip. Back in three days. Nothing to see here. Knows she's lying to herself.

Sneaks out before Karen's alarm goes off, presses a kiss to her finger and then to Karen's cheek rather than risk waking her. Isn't sure she'll be able to walk out the door if Karen wakes up. Cracks open the doors to first Denny's room, and then Mara's. Commits the way they look in the early morning light to memory. Bobby saved them last time; it’s all on them this time. Just in case they don’t come back from this job, she’s giving herself five more minutes.

Chim

He lies awake next to Maddie, listening to her breathe. Gets up when Bobby cries, before the sound even registers for Maddie. Sits in the rocking chair in the nursery and rocks his son. The son Bobby told him to go back for, the family Bobby told him to live for, the life Bobby gave up his for.

He's not sure he's doing what Bobby would have wanted with it, but doing anything else would feel dishonest.

He looks up when he hears Maddie in the doorway. "He cried?"

He nods. Looks down. "He's out again now." Doesn't get up to put him in the crib, and Maddie crosses the room to lean against the chair, ghosting fingers over Bobby's peach fuzz hair, soft enough that he doesn't stir.

"I can't believe sometimes that we really did that. Him and Jee."

He nods, throat tight, because yeah, him either.

She bends to kiss his cheek. "Come to bed soon?"

"Soon," he promises, and doesn't move all night.

So, he doesn’t sleep the night before the job. He should have. Bobby would have raised an eyebrow and asked if he was okay, but. Athena is not Bobby. When he arrives at the warehouse, she’s all business.

“We good to go?”

They are; he’s tested and retested the compound, carried it with him at all times, so no one else gets their hands on it, safe with his totem. He knows it wasn’t the drug last time, that it wasn’t him, but he’s not taking any chances.

He checks again, nervously.

Clears his throat. Drops his voice in the best imitation of a growl he can manage, “I live my life a quarter mile at a time. Nothing else matters: Not the mortgage, not the store, not my team and all their bullshit. For those ten seconds or less, I'm free."

Buck looks at him blankly. "We're going down for longer than ten seconds, Chim?"

Hen groans but then her watch beeps and everyone packs up and heads out.

Ravi

He’s not going under. He’s not sad about it. If Athena’s mind kicked his ass, he’s really not sure what Martel’s would do. Doesn’t want to find out. He’s there to get them hooked up, set the musical kick, and wake them all up without the mark ever knowing it happened. But, it’s nerve wracking to sit there, watching them all sleep and have no idea how it’s going. He knows all the ways it can go wrong, and that there’s only one way for it to go right. Against all odds he finds he’s got faith that it will, that they’ll pull it off.

Athena bought out the first class cabin for the flight Martel booked from LA to NY for his board meeting. “Bobby never spent what he earned,” she told them, when they were trying to figure out how to make the plane ride work. “This I can do. Some of it’s blood money anyway.”

He can’t stop his leg from jiggling as they take off. Nervous energy that has nowhere to go. Nearly jumps out of his skin when Hen’s hand settles on his shoulder. He looks over at her, and she nods, gives him a small smile. He takes a breath and lets it out. Trying to remember the mindfulness breathing that his sister has been trying to teach him for the better part of twenty years. He’ll have to tell her it was finally useful. Although he’s going to have to redact the context, which is just going to make her think it’s a sex thing. “You good?” Hen mouths.

He nods. The seatbelt sign clicks off. Showtime.

They put Martel under first. Wait until the flight attendant turns her back, and then Chim leans over the back of the seat and holds a chloroform soaked handkerchief to Martel's face. He flails for a second and then he's out. Chloroform won't keep him out long – he feels a little betrayed at how the movies lied to him about that – but they only need a moment to find the vein, send him under. He tries very hard not to think about how much all of this makes him sound like a drug dealer.

Once Martel's under it's easy for Chim, Hen, Buck, and Tommy to follow him. Catches Chim’s eye just before he pushes the dose. "If this doesn't work, you owe me a ten-second car."

Chim goes under on a laugh.

He trades a look with Athena. Nothing else they can do now, except hope -- that his plans hold, that nothing goes wrong. Keep watch and wait. He sets the timer on his phone. Shows it to Athena, who nods.

Five hours and counting till they land.

Chim

Martel’s militarization makes Athena’s look like a cake walk. He doesn’t think Martel saw them coming, but it definitely doesn’t feel like that. They’re separated almost from the start. Tommy and Hen going left to avoid getting shot, while Chim and Buck hotwire a car.

Luckily, Martel is still treating it like any other day, just walking to work – which is good. They just need to manage to meet him there. Once they’re in the building they’ll be fine – Ravi’s mazes are solid, complicated enough that Martel won’t be able to leave after he’s stepped into their trap.

They dodge a rain of bullets and he hisses at Buck. “What is going on? Why are they already so angry? Did you miss something? Isn’t this your job?”

“We knew he was militarized,” Buck says tightly, leaning precariously out the car door to shoot back at the projections following them.

“Not this militarized,” Chim snaps, swerving wildly to try and avoid a projection, and crashes into a lamp post for his trouble. Looks like they’re on foot then.

And then Tommy’s laughing a truly unhinged laugh and leaning out the window of a motherfucking helicopter, yelling, “Anyone want a ride?”

“Is this going to work?” Buck yells, from where he’s popping off projections like he’s playing a zombie video game.

“I don’t think you have to worry about that right now?” Tommy says over the headsets he throws at them before taking off again.

“Because our cause is righteous?” Chim asks.

“Because we’re probably going to die.”

“I did miss you, you know,” Buck yells, “Even if you’re a pessimistic fuck.”

Chim shakes his head, yells at Buck, “You go first; I’ll cover you.”

The plan was to meet Martel in the lobby – instead they land on the roof and barely beat Martel to the board room, Tommy sliding into place at the table moments before Martel opens the door.

Chim sees him clock the model of that first lab, sees him wander over to it, touch it with gentle fingers, and thinks, gotcha.

After they dose Martel to get him sleeping again, the others head down another level, and Chim's left trying to figure out what to do. The kick was supposed to be relatively simple. This is the first level, they don’t need the dramatics here that the lower levels have – set them up in chairs, lean them back on their legs, tip them over like dominos when the time comes. But – he looks at the glass walled conference room – this room is not defensible. But –

If you can't go down... he looks up. Wrangles all their bodies into the elevator and into the helicopter. He doesn't know how to fly it, not like Tommy but–

He doesn't have to fly it. He just has to crash it on time.

Hen

On the second level, Martel’s projections are suspicious of them from the start. Again. Still. Whatever. They make it to the hospital. They run the play. She can see the idea taking root in Martel’s mind. It’s fucking working.

One more level. “Easy peasy,” she mutters.

She shouldn’t have even thought it.

They’re just getting Martel hooked into the PASIV sitting next to an empty hospital bed, when the projection comes out of nowhere, shoots Buck before any of them can react. She shoots the projection in the head, but it’s too late, Buck’s hit.

“You need to go,” he says, holding a hand to his stomach, blood leaking around his fingers.

“Bullshit,” she says, pulling his hand away and looking around for something – anything – to pack the wound. “We’re calling this.”

Buck shakes his head stubbornly. “No, we keep going. We won’t get another chance.”

Tommy gets there before she can, on his knees on the other side of Buck, pressing gauze he grabbed off a rack into the wound. “No. I’m not leaving you here.” Looks at Buck desperately, and she suddenly feels like she’s intruding. “Evan, I want to stay.”

Buck reaches up a shaky hand, cups Tommy’s face and leaves a streak of blood on his cheek. “Sweetheart, how about we compromise and you promise you’ll come back to me? It’s like staying, but with delayed gratification.” He gives a leer that she really did not need to see, and she wonders if either one of them even remembers that she’s here. “I know you’re a fan of that.”

“Evan,” Tommy says with exasperation. Then turns his head to kiss the palm of Buck’s hand. “You’re not as funny as you think you are.”

Buck’s breath hitches on a pained laugh. “Yes I am.” Says more seriously. “I can’t stop thinking about you, haven’t been able to in a year, don’t think this breakup is working for me.”

Tommy huffs a half laugh. “Me either.”

And this is very cute, and absolutely not the time or place. She hates to do it, but they’re on a schedule here. Clears her throat.

It seems to startle them both, and Buck pushes himself upright. “Go. Martel’s been there too long alone already. I’ll be waiting, so you need to come back to me.”

Tommy reluctantly stands, blood on the knees of his jeans. “I’ll lead them on a merry chase.” He reaches for the somnacin case, slides the needle into his arm and then he’s gone.

She needs to go with him, but she takes a second to wrap Buck’s wound tight. Hopefully tight enough to get him through until the kick. “So, about how you were saying you and Tommy were definitely over…”

He groans and she doesn’t think it’s from the bullet wound this time. “Just go. Keep him safe for me, so you can laugh at us later.”

She presses a gun into his hand. “We’ll be back. Set your watch.”

“I’ll be listening for the kick,” he promises her.

Buck

After Hen and Tommy slip into the next level of the dream, he just lies there, trying to breath around the pain for a minute - two minutes - and then he pushes himself upright. He has to get them all into position for the kick, and he’s got 20 minutes to do it.

Elevator is down the hall; all he has to do is set the charge on the cable, get them in and then detonate the charge when the music starts playing. With a hole in his stomach and a pack of projections out for his blood. Easy peasy, lemon squeezy. To quote Hen.

He drags Hen, and then Tommy to the elevator. Has to stop to rewrap Hen’s bandage, soaking through faster than he’d like. Dreams himself a ladder, because there’s no way he’s pulling himself up through the hatch at the top of the elevator.

Knows when he calls the elevator that it’s going to be full of projections, and they’re going to come out shooting. Builds a barricade to hide behind, hopes like hell this plan works. Presses a hand hard to the bullet wound in his side, and calls the elevator.

He startles hard when someone slips behind the barricade with him, too close for him to bring up his gun to shoot them. Falls on his ass when the shadows resolve into …. “Bobby,” he mouths, too shocked for sound. He should not be here.

Bobby smiles. “Hey, kid. Been a while. Thought you could maybe use a hand.” Shoots the projection that’s sneaking up on them while Buck gapes at him.

“We fell apart without you,” he tells Bobby. “I'm sorry.”

Bobby looks at him, calm, faint hint of a smile. “Seems to me like you're all together now.” Looks around, at the hospital floor, the pile of projections. “Not sure I love what you've done with the place.”

Buck coughs a wet laugh. “We did it for you.”

Bobby hmms, “Next time you'll do it for you.” It's not a question or a request.

They're silent and Buck concentrates on breathing, on holding the dream steady, looks at his watch 10 minutes to the kick, everything is in place, he can make it.

Bobby stays with him. Shoots every projection that comes near them. Buck doesn't get it, but isn't going to think too hard about it in case that makes Bobby disappear.

He hears the opening strains of Save the Last Dance for me, and looks up to see Bobby's smile. "Tell Athena I love her, and I miss her, and it's time to let go now." Winks at Buck, "And kid, Tommy's still good people, don’t be afraid to take a leap of faith. The best things in my life came when I took a chance on someone.”

Tommy

This is mostly his show, with Hen playing backup, and he cannot focus. He wants to be up with Evan. It’s raining — a thunderstorm — and he can only imagine what Evan is going through to keep his level stable for them right now.

Hen shoots him an alarmed look, and he tries to get it together. Evan’s giving them this time, he can’t waste it. Pulls himself together. Concentrates on Martel’s grandmother, asking Martel what he wants to be when he grows up. Lets Hen direct the conversation after that, adding questions to nudge the conversation where they want it to go as he needs to. Thankfully she’s got this, because he can’t stop seeing Evan’s blood stained fingers clutching his stomach, blood just starting to stain his teeth.

He hears the opening strain of the song, and thank god, because his concentration is shot to hell, and he wants to be out of here an hour ago. Looks over at Hen. She nods back at him, and they start getting into position.

Won’t know if it took until later. Nothing more that they can do but pray.

Not that he’s a praying guy but.

They knock Martel unconscious, set off the C4 he’d attached to the basement foundations - messy, but effective – and ride the kick back up to Buck. Knows Hen is watching as he runs his hand over Buck’s, face, body, but doesn’t care — Evan’s barely conscious, clinging to life.

Blinks blearily at Tommy. “Hey, you came back.”

He nods. “I promised I would, remember.”

Buck coughs blood. “Bobby said to take a leap.” Focuses and looks seriously at Tommy. “I wanna take a leap with you. Let me?”

He’s delirious.

Doesn’t matter — the music and Chim’s kick is dragging them up again.

They kick out of the second level, from free fall in an elevator to free fall in a crashing helicopter – and really Chim? – one second he had Evan in his arms, and the next he’s strapped into a seat across the helicopter, and he can’t help it. Fights gravity and unstraps himself to lurch across the helicopter to kneel at Evan’s feet, has to check to be sure he’s not bleeding out anymore.

Evan’s grabbing for him just as desperately, saying, “I’m okay, I’m okay, I’m okay,” and he can’t help it, reaches up to cup the back of Evan’s head and smash their mouths together. It’s not technically the best kiss they’ve ever had, he slices his lip on Evan’s teeth, and they’re in a crashing helicopter. But, Evan’s hand clutch at his shoulder, and he kisses back, and he’s smiling into the mess of it all. And it is absolutely the best kiss he’s ever had.

He comes awake in the first class cabin of the Delta flight, turns his head to find Evan, and tangles their fingers together when Evan reaches across the aisle. Says, “Yes.”

Hears Chim say, “Did we know about this?”

Hears Ravi’s affirmative grunt, and Hen’s slightly smug, “Well, I did.”

And then Chim’s affronted. “Right, so just me then. Wait, did Maddie know? And not tell me?”

Laughs, and can’t take his eyes off Evan.

And then Ravi’s hissed, “Places, people, he’s waking up. Canoodle later.”

Lets go of Evan’s hand and pretends to be engrossed in his phone when Martel climbs out of sleep. Gets a text from Evan that just says / later? /

Ravi

He watches them all come awake. Hen first, then Tommy, then Buck – he clocks the way they both immediately reach for each other, and there’s a story there about what happened while they were dreaming – then Chim. He hurries to remove Martel’s needle and close the case before he fully wakes up. He nods at the flight attendant, who offers them all water, last chance before their descent.

Martel shakes his head, rubbing his temples. He looks out the window. Ravi can’t help but worry. Did it work? How will they know? Does he recognize them?

Hen

They all disembark, ignoring each other. Just an ordinary group of passengers going about their days.

They pass each other as they wheel their carry-ons through the exits. They all have hotel reservations – although she somehow doesn’t think that Tommy and Buck are going to need both of theirs. They also all have plans to meet at a restaurant in LA in a week.

Fingers crossed that they’ll know if it’s worked by then.

She doesn’t pause on her way out of the airport, waits until she’s in the taxi before she calls Karen.

Tommy

He wants later to be that night, but safety first. They need to stay separate until they’re back in LA, just in case Martel remembers something. No reason they can’t text though. And they do. Nothing serious, nothing heavy, nothing that they need to say face to face. But, about the book Evan was reading before this started. The car Tommy’s been restoring, his next door neighbor who keeps accidentally setting off her fire alarm and calling the local station.

They take different flights back. Evan lands first, has finished most of the cleanup by the time Tommy makes it to the warehouse, erasing all the evidence that they’d ever been there. The only thing that’s left are two lounge chairs and a table with a familiar briefcase on it.

Evan catches his eye, glances around the warehouse and takes a step closer, even though there’s nobody here to overhear them.

Evan nods at Tommy, gestures to the case, “You wanna?”

It's the one thing they'd never done together - work sure, in and out of each other's dreams, each other's architecture - but never just them. They'd always drawn a line between work and home. Never mixed the two. Never dared. In case work followed them home.

"Yes," he says.

Steps down into Evan's mind. Not a dreamscape he's created for someone else, not something for public consumption. Something just for Tommy. Evan at his most stripped back, vulnerable. This isn’t just an olive branch, it’s a whole tree, an orchard.

He looks around, getting his bearings. It’s not a city, it’s free of most actual architecture. There's an ocean. More West Coast than East Coast ocean. Endless waves crashing on the shore. And a house on the bluff. They follow winding stairs up from the beach. Inside, the house has Tommy's couch, and Evan's kitchen, and there are pictures of them, of Maddie and Chim and Jee.

"Where are we?" he asks.

He's a little afraid of the answer.

"Home," Evan says. "What I thought it could be like. If I'd tried harder."

Evan's being kind, taking part of the blame when Tommy was the one who'd walked out.

“I asked you to move in,” Evan tells him, “and I know I did it all wrong, didn’t listen enough.” Tommy starts to protest and Evan holds up a hand. “I didn’t. I can see that now. But, I meant it. Together is better than apart. And we can take our time getting there.” Bites his lip. “I know I’m not an architect but–” There’s a long pause, like he’s considering, making a decision. “It’s what I wanted to build for us.”

"Show me the rest of it?"

Evan takes his hand. Shows him the kitchen, the dining room, the living room, the bedroom, the garden. There's a hammock under a spreading tree. Cold lemonade in sweating glasses on a table. A book folded open, like the whole scene is waiting for someone to inhabit it.

Evan scared him. Scares him. He hadn’t known what to do with him, with his feelings for him. Ran instead of facing them; fell into his bed when he couldn’t stay away.

Evan is big, bold feelings, colors, worlds, even if he’s precise in his job; the guy who doesn’t leave anything to chance — pays attention to all the details. Here he is both. There’s pieces of them woven together — and the gesture. Says, with surety, the same thing he’d said on the plane when they woke up. “Yes.”

The reward is greater than the risk. Tips Evan’s chin up with two fingers. “This okay?”

Swallows his, “yes,” with a kiss.

Six Months Later…

Athena

It's been a little over a year since Bobby died. The grief still hits her in waves, but they're shallower now, and she's not flattened by them anymore.

This helps.

She'd been dubious when Hen approached her after they got back to LA -- Martel job over, still waiting to see if it had worked.

"You have a pointman," she'd told Hen over cocktails.

"We do," Hen had agreed. "Best in the business. But you see things on a different slant than Buck, and he'd be the first to agree with me." She'd leaned forward. "And, there can never be too much research. He'd agree with me on that too."

So now she goes to work in a small, refurbished firehouse in Echo Park that Ravi had bought under a shell company name that, as far as she knows, traces back to someone entirely fictitious. And she'd ask how he'd managed that, but honestly the less she knows the better.

Sometimes she suggests marks for them. Sometimes she vetoes them. Sometimes she just votes on what someone else brings in, and then follows up with research. It's oddly satisfying. She likes the team Hen's built – hers now, not Bobby’s – more than she thought she would (although she's not admitting that). They've grown on her. Kind of like fungus.

What she doesn't do is dream. She wants to. But, she knows she can't keep clinging to the past. Has to move forward, and she can't do that if he's there.

They’re in the middle of a new job and she’s finally uncovered the true money trail. She’s telling Buck and Hen about it when Tommy walks in.

Buck looks up from her notes when the door opens, and tips his head back to smile when Tommy puts a cup of coffee down on the table in front of him. “Thanks, baby, just how I like it."

Tommy drops a kiss on his forehead. “I know.”

“You haven’t even tasted it yet,” Chim grouses, but there’s no real heat there, and he subsides when Tommy hands him his own coffee.

Ravi blows in, and Chim says, “You’re late,” without looking up from his most recent experiment. Hen’s volunteered to test it later if he gets it stable.

Ravi slaps a paper down on the table in lieu of an answer. “Old school,” Tommy says approvingly. Then sucks in a sharp breath when he looks at the headline.

Buck’s already looking it up online.

MARTEL-HARVEY MAKES ALL DRUG PATENTS OPEN SOURCE

They all stare. “Shit. I guess we really did it.”