Title: Le Famille

Author: A Crazy Elephant

Summary: Or "Five Times Ariadne Met Her Team Members' Families and the One Time They Met Hers"

Category: Family/Friendship

Word Count: 1,673

Disclaimer: Inception belongs to Christopher Nolan, not me. Sad.

Author's Notes: K; I'm sorry I didn't get this out sooner, but real life happened and then there was the all important question of how I was going to get Ariadne's family and the team in one place without the piece just sounding ridiculous. It still sounds highly coincidental, but whatever. Enjoy.

Again, you guys are amazing, thank you so much for your reviews, favorites and alerts. Everyone's been so supportive throughout the course of this piece and I can't tell you what it means to hear so much feedback. Thank you! ^^

6 – Ariadne

1 Year, 6 Months, 2 weeks, 1 Day Since Inception

They're in Chicago.

Except it's Christmastime and the warehouse they're using for base of operations is right on Lake Michigan so every angry gust that blows in off the ice cuts right through every layer of thermal and fleece she wears and she's seriously beginning to question Arthur's real estate choices as she sits shivering next to a space heater and her piles of coreboard and balsa.

Yusuf is worse off.

They've taken another security contract – this one for a global energy summit. Every giant in energy production and regulation will be in attendance and they're on to run diagnostics on each attendee's subconscious to make sure no nuclear secrets or policy is stolen before the conference begins. It's a whole lot of building cities and a whole lot of getting shot out. They need a full team to cover them, so she and Arthur have tapped Eames and Yusuf to help out and since this is a legal enterprise, even Cobb's agreed to come out to consult.

It's great, having everyone out to help just like old times, but she's not sure the poor frozen chemist feels the same as he sits across the way wearing every scrap of clothing he's brought along, his teeth chattering as he works through some formulas. The balmy Mombasa weather has clearly not prepared him for the sub zero Lake Michigan wind chill or drafty workspaces with only sad little space heaters for comfort.

Arthur's not faring much better behind his mountains of paperwork. More years spent out of the equatorial region has given him thicker skin and a better grasp on dressing for the weather than Yusuf, but she can practically feel his sulk and hear him silently berating himself over his files from her corner of coreboard.

Eames and Cobb seem to manage to weather all right, but aren't exactly in the Christmas spirit either.

Eames has been trading angry phone calls all morning with his wife who apparently is being held at JFK International, his in-laws in Derry City and a commercial airline concerning Mim's place on the No-Fly List and her brother's membership to certain overly aggressive nationalist groups. Cobb meanwhile, is still reeling from battling a crush of cutthroat Christmas shopping mothers at the company's flagship store to procure Phillipa the American Girl Doll she has requested from Santa Clause and the insanity of trying to get into FAO Schwartz a week before the holidays to collect the Thomas Tank Engine train set James has asked for.

No one is overly cheerful by midday when Saito, free from preliminary arrangements at the convention, drops in to take them to lunch and any holiday spirit she might have had stashed under the layers of fleece, thermal and silk vanishes entirely when someone calls her name as they pile out of their cabs and bluster toward the restaurant doors.

She instantly, deeply regrets telling her father that she would in fact be working in Chicago just before Christmas so of course she'd be home for the holidays the moment she hears "Addie! Puppy! Here sweetheart!" ring out over the bustle of Michigan Avenue traffic.

Oh. Dear. God.

Her team doesn't seem to notice and instead continue trying to extract the heavily layered Yusuf from the taxi without tripping up the chemist and sending him into the blackened slush of the sidewalk, but she certainly does. And there they are, the whole motley crew. Daddy, her stepmother Bren and baby sister Phae, in ski coats and Bren's hand knitted scarves looking exactly like the small town Hoosiers they are, crossing the square at a good clip and she knows she's caught.

"Hey Puppy!" Daddy greets again and she waves with a halfhearted smile. It isn't that she doesn't want to see them or that she's particularly embarrassed by them, but she's not overly thrilled at the prospect of introducing her generally conservative parents and her particularly boy-crazed teenage sister to her handsome and charming, questionably moral coworkers.

"Daddy! Bren!" She enthuses as they approach. "What are you guys doing here?" She asks, as Bren sweeps her into down-filled hug before passing her over to Daddy.

"Your mom wanted to do a bit of Christmas shoppin'," Daddy explains as she shares an awkward hug with Phae. Her sister is presently in that state of perpetual pout that comes with being fifteen and is pretending not to care that this is the first time they've seen each other since Easter.

"Since you're up here, we thought we'd take the train on up instead of driving down to Indy," Bren continues, brushing at a few stray snowflakes that have settled onto Ariadne's coat, "We were goin' to call you, Addie, see if you could get away for awhile."

"Ariadne?" Arthur calls over. Her team has successfully exited the cabs without falling victim to the wickedly slick blackened slush and has now taken interest in what their architect is doing talking to civilians, particularly ones who look so unbelievably Middle America it's ridiculous.

"Oh! Are these the fellas you work with, Puppy?" Puppy. She can feel Eames' mood improving exponentially at this new development. His family might presently be detained by TSA in New York while he shivers in Chicago, but one of his beloved coworkers has just been addressed by a childhood pet name. She's not seen him look so happy since he picked up Arthur's phone to hear one of the point man's sisters asking for 'Wart'.

"Um-" She fumbles awkwardly for something to say, for a place to begin. There they all are, standing out in front of some Michelin Three Star eatery in the wicked Chicago winter wind. Three high-profile dream thieves, a frozen chemist and one of Forbes World's Most Powerful People are standing on a salted sidewalk in the sleet with her parents and sulking baby sister all waiting on her to say something.

"Introduce us, Addie," Bren encourages.

"Yes, darling, introduce us," Eames chimes in. This is clearly a fabulous distraction for the forger.

"Yeah, Ad," Phae has perked up significantly at the sight of Ariadne's coworkers and Ariadne isn't surprised. Each of them are wearing clearly designer outerwear, even Yusuf, who's buried under layers of coats and is presently reminisce of the little boy from 'A Christmas Story' and they all have charming sorts of smiles and Ariadne can all ready see the wheels turning in her sister's head.

"Well," She starts. "Everyone, this is my family," She motions awkwardly. "Dad, Bren, this is, well, everyone." She blunders and she knows she sounds rude, but Daddy takes charge.

"Pleasure, boys; name's Kim," Daddy introduces shaking each of their hands. "My wife Brenda, and our youngest there, Phaedra."

"Cobb, Dom Cobb," Cobb returns and he seems about continue, but Eames interrupts.

"Eames," Eames says with his most mischievous and winning smile. The forger is in fine form and no one seems to have the energy to tell him off. "Willy Eames, this is our charming client, Mr. Saito, darling Arthur and dear Yusuf." He continues and Ariadne watches as Phae is hopelessly lost to the forger's exciting accent and smooth confidence.

"Pleasure," Arthur agrees with a dark look to Eames. He doesn't seem thrilled with idea of being introduced as 'darling' to anyone, let alone a respected friend and coworker's family and Ariadne can tell by the thunderstruck look on Phae's face that her sister's torn. Which of the handsome, moneyed men her sister works with is most desirable? Ariadne briefly longs for they days when Phae was ripping heads off Barbie dolls and chattering on about the latest episode of Blue's Clues instead of scouting for potential boyfriends and dearly hopes she was not so ridiculous at fifteen.

"Addie speaks so highly about all of you," Bren gushes. "She just loves workin' for your firm-"

"Bren-" Ariadne begins, not particularly thrilled with the idea of subtly explaining the lies about working for an architectural consultation firm she's told her family in place of explaining to her law-abiding, god-fearing family that actually, she steals, plants and defends valuable corporate and government intelligence in the subconscious of some of the world's most powerful executives and lawmakers to her team without cluing in the family in question to her dishonesty. "We were just headed to-" She gestures awkwardly at eatery behind her, "I can call you-"

"Don't worry," Cobb interrupts. "We can meet you back at the warehouse, if you'd like to take you parents to lunch." He suggests and she has never been more grateful.

"That's awful kind of you Mr. Cobb, lettin' us borrow Addie – you sure it's no trouble?" Daddy asks.

"Not at all – Arthur can catch her up, right Arthur?"

"Of course." The point man agrees and then with a few overly charming good byes that have Phae, still dumbfounded into silence by the pack of good-looking and successful men that are about as far away from back home in Battle Ground, Indiana as Alpha Centuri is from Earth, falling in love with her coworkers all over again, her team disappears into the restaurant and she lets Daddy lead them to his very favorite steak house up here.

"So," Bren begins as they trail after Daddy. Her stepmother has on a smug smirk to rival her favorite forger's and Ariadne's not sure she likes it. "They're certainly delightful."

"Yes," Ariadne agrees absently, as her sister casts longing glances back at the restaurant doors as though one of her teammates is going to suddenly burst out and declare his instant, undying love for Phae.

"And handsome." Bren continues hopefully and Ariadne catches on where she's going with this. "And so polite."

"Bren-" She begins, hoping to head off this line of questioning before Bren gets too excited and starts planning out various futures including charming church weddings and grandchildren for her, but Bren's all ready there.

"I don't suppose you're seein' one of them, are you?"

Le Fin