Pssst do you know of any TOG Inception!AU fics bouncing around? Because otherwise I'm losing my mind thinking about Andy as a tired extractor who's haunted by Quynh's projection every time she goes under, but goes on one last job for a man named Copley. Nile is the new architect they hire to get into the mind of their target, a CEO named Merrick. Nicky is Andy's calm and collected friend who has a weird will they or won't they thing going on with Joe, who's their forger on the job. 1/2
2/2 Booker is their chemist. (Yes I know Booker is technically the forger in canon but Nicky and Joe can fit the roles of Arthur and Eames better, let me live)
Hello anon!! Sorry but I can’t find the post I already made in July about how the old guard would be in inception world. It should be under the “inception” tag in my blog but tumblr doesn’t work well on mobile.
But! I had the text of the post (or at least part of it) saved:
(The note is from 26/7/2020 wow ancient history)
the old guard family as inception team:
Andy: she’s of course the extractor and the leader of the group. She’s been in the dreamsharing business since... forever, people say she was there when they tested the first prototype of the PASIV. No one finds the weak spots in the mark’s subconscious (or beats up the projections) like her. Since her wife Quỳnh died, she’s having trouble controlling the dreams built in her subconscious. She’d like to retire but feels that dreamsharing and the group family she’s created are the only thing she has left. Booker is the only one who suspects Nile might become her replacement. (Newbies in the business never say her name because they are rightfully afraid. If you say ‘Andy’ in front of a PASIV three times she could probably appear out of thin air behind your back and kill you.)
Booker: he is the best pointman in the business. He handles the meetings with the clients with Andy, or alone when she can’t be bothered. His research about the mark is usually something between a psychological evaluation ( “I have a phd, in case you have forgotten” he says every single time) and a 300 pages novel where you can find out which tea the mark’s grandmother used to prepare in the mornings. He finds the best jobs and is well respected in the community. After his betrayal to the team, his reputation takes a hit and it’s only when the group forgives him and let him come back that he can find jobs again.
Nile: she finds out about dreamsharing by chance, turns out to be a natural. The team adopts her in 0.002 seconds after she asks Joe if he needs help carrying the equipment and later helps Nicky prepare lunch. She is kind and a bit starry-eyed when Andy shows her what is possible to do in a dream, but she soon understands the dangers of such a technology. She can be both an extractor and a pointman, starts replacing Andy in the minor jobs and then takes Booker’s job when the French is temporarily excommunicated. She loves the team, the team loves her. Booker always says she’s his favourite, who cares about other people’s feelings.
Joe: when Andy said she wanted the best architect the world could offer, she found Joe. The man has a photographic memory and an attention to detail that makes his dreams almost too realistic. You can usually find him sketching buildings and faces on his notebook, with Nicky looking over his shoulder saying “my boyfriend is so talented” just to see Joe try not to blush after all the years they’ve been together. His dreams show impressive architectures and vibrant colours and always feel like the warm memory of a place that’s been loved by many. When Joe is not satisfied with a project, Nile and Nicky steal his drawings before he throws them away because they are just too beautiful to be destroyed. Nicky has a binder full of Joe’s drawings, even if he says it’s embarrassing because half of them are just drawings of Nicky smiling or sleeping. “You are an incurable romantic.” I don’t need to say more.
Nicky: Andy found him because he found Joe and understood that Joe-and-Nicky were a package deal. Him and Joe met when Joe was part of an extraction team and Nicky was instead paid to protect the mark’s mind. Joe woke up from the dream inside the mark’s head and found Nicky looking at him, a gun pointed at his head. The rest was history 8 years of pining and secret encounters before they dropped their respective teams and eloped together.
Nicky is the chemist of the group, even if he can forge quite well. He understands people’s motivations and helps Andy when she doesn’t know how to approach an extraction. In the beginning, he always went down with the rest of the team, but with Nile in the group he now prefers staying in the waking world or the first layer of the dream to protect the others. He is also the true mother hen of the group: he’s the one who brings coffee in the morning (he wakes up at dawn every single day), prepares sandwiches for lunch and cooks lasagne to celebrate when a job is successfully finished. People tend to forget he is a trained sniper and could probably kill you with a spoon and a hand behind his back. Joe loves him very much.
I love the idea of having Nicky& Joe mirror A&E though and Booker as chemist could definitely work. He’s a smart fellow except when you talk about feelings. (“Love is a chemical reaction, Nile” “Dude every emotion is”)
EDIT: anon!! I forgot to say I haven’t found any fics, but please write it!! Then send it to me if you want.
