Chapter Text
Arthur finds it impossible to research for the secret room challenge. Because the rooms can be anything the contestants wish, Arthur doesn’t know what to anticipate.
He should have anticipated a sex dungeon.
Probably predictable that it’s designed by Trizz, too.
Part of the fun of the secret room challenge is apparently supposed to be the cunning ways the contestants have devised to get into the rooms. Trizz’s room is reached by scaling a wall using conveniently placed sconces and shelves, and then poking your head up directly underneath a sex swing.
“Beautifully positioned entry,” says Eames. “Did that sound dirty? I didn’t intend for that to sound dirty.”
“Yes, you did,” says Arthur, because Eames never met a double entendre he didn’t want to take home and fuck, let’s be honest.
“Maybe a little bit. But how can you help it, in a room like this?”
The walls are pornographic murals.
Eames, of course, goes right up to them and studies them closely and then remarks, “Not terribly realistic, are they?”
“You don’t retreat to your secret sex lair for realism,” says Trizz wisely.
“The very motto of Arthur’s sex club,” Eames says.
“I don’t have a sex club,” Arthur tells Trizz.
“I heard Sebastian Stan is all upset about your sex club,” Trizz replies.
“How does Sebastian Stan even know my name?” is what Arthur wants to know.
Alec says, “Will we get to see the sex club during the viewing party? Have you heard that Arthur and Eames are hosting a viewing party?” he asks Trizz.
Alec has not shut up about the fucking viewing party. Arthur says, “Yes. You will absolutely get to see my sex club. I will definitely show you my world-famous, extraordinarily exclusive sex club while you’re all at my house.”
Alec looks at him for a long moment then says, “You’re being sarcastic, aren’t you?”
Arthur takes a deep breath and turns away from Alec, studying the design, and finally he says, “Where’s the bed?”
“What?” asks Trizz.
“You designed an entire secret sex lair, and there’s no bed,” Arthur points out.
Trizz looks around, as if startled by this. “Well, you know…”
“When overcome by passion, who needs a bed?” suggests Alec.
“Me. I need a bed. Because who’s going to want to fuck on this carpet? Or those tiles over there?”
“Can we even put any of this on the air?” Eames asks, sounding amused.
“You’re thinking very practically about this whole sex lair thing,” says Trizz, sounding offended. “It’s a secret sex lair. You just slink in here and act depraved for a little while. I don’t know.” He shrugs and gestures.
Eames says, “And this is why Arthur runs a world-famous, extraordinarily exclusive sex club and not you. The devil is in the details, you know. With sex and with sex lairs.”
“This room does seem rather superficial,” says Alec. “Have you given any thought to the meaning of sex?”
“The meaning of it?” repeats Trizz.
“It doesn’t have a meaning,” Arthur says. “It just is.”
Alec looks horrified. “Arthur! Sex is very meaningful!”
“Not always,” says Arthur. “Not all the time. Sometimes it’s just sex. Just two people and the proper parts and no deeper meaning whatsoever.”
Alec looks about to debate him.
“You don’t want to argue with me about this,” says Arthur mildly.
This does give Alec pause.
Eames says, “I think we have gotten very far off track. I have a serious question about what exactly these three individuals are doing in this particular mural, because I cannot account for all of their…appendages, let’s say.”
Which is how Arthur ends up standing and listening to Trizz explain the mechanics of the painted threesome and Arthur has no explanation for how insane his life is, frankly.
They go straight from Trizz to Misty Rainbow and Arthur is braced for horror, but is pleasantly surprised when Misty Rainbow’s secret room is just a meditation room. Although it makes sense, because that was what she was designing the closet to be all along. It’s entered through a sleek and simple mechanism of a narrow part of a wall sinking into the ground, and it is very dim and cozy, with low, inviting seating all around. There’s a water feature on one wall and all of the colors are dark shades of neutral and it’s one of the most relaxing rooms Arthur’s ever stepped into.
Eames looks around and says to Misty Rainbow, “You’re…the one who had the eye-bleeding sheep last time, right?”
“Yes,” Misty Rainbow confirms, without any evident comprehension that this room is light-years away from the frightening violence of that one.
“This is nice,” Arthur tells her, and smiles at her, because he’s pleased he can be genuine about it.
“What is it supposed to be?” asks Alec, as if it’s another mural of a threesome and he can’t quite parse it.
Misty Rainbow says, “It’s a meditation room.”
“For?” asks Alec.
“Meditating.”
Alec looks around him and says uncertainly, “I see.”
“So that you can turn from the demons of modern consumerism inward, to the rewards of your soul,” explains Misty Rainbow.
Alec gives her a sympathetic look. “Your soul must be very tortured indeed.”
“No. I meditate. Probably your soul is tortured.”
Eames has a coughing fit.
Sunny, who was the contestant who had designed the vale of tears closet, designs a panic room this time around. Arthur supposes so that she can sit and cry in peace. The panic room is equipped with lots of high-end electronics but Eames points out that it doesn’t seem very welcoming.
“If you were stuck in here because the world was going to hell outside, wouldn’t you want it to be comforting?” he asks. “Shouldn’t there be, I don’t know, popcorn and a couple of board games? What are you going to do to pass the time?”
“This room needs to be combined with Trizz’s sex lair,” comments Arthur.
Eames barks laughter. “Together they would be the perfect room. Now there’s an idea: sex lair safe room. Surely that’s been done before, right?”
“I would like to stop thinking about sex lairs, personally,” says Arthur.
Alec says solemnly, “Sunny, I think it took a lot of strength to construct a room that can provide for you the safety of the womb.”
“Of the womb?” echoes Eames.
“Yes,” Alec says. “That first security that we had and lost and spend our whole lives looking for.”
“I don’t know,” says Eames. “I love my mum but I think I’m pretty pleased to be free of her womb.”
“I think it’s time to move on to the next room,” says Arthur.
The next room is by Jess, who has an astonishingly normal name by Next Big Thing standards. She had provided the coffins in the closet last time, but this time around she produces an utterly delightful speakeasy, entered by pulling a certain bottle on the shelf behind the bar.
“A room for the people in your house who you really, really like,” Jess explains.
Arthur thinks that she is speaking in his language. “And everyone else wonders where the good party is?”
“Exactly,” Jess grins at him.
“I am disappointed, though, Jess,” says Alec. “I thought we had made such a breakthrough last week, but this week you are back to superficial designs. You have not dug in…” Alec puts his hand on her chest. “Here.”
“This is me digging in here,” Jess replies. “Deep in my heart, I really think that I need more alcohol at the moment.”
“Hear, hear,” says Eames, from behind the bar. “How about some martinis, hmm?”
“All the alcohol’s real,” Jess tells him.
“You’re a genius,” Eames says, and winks at her as he goes about setting up martini glasses.
“I don’t think this is very professional,” Alec says.
“I don’t think wearing a hat indoors at all times is very professional,” Eames rejoins. “Yet here we are.”
“It’s a statement,” Alec says hotly. “Okay? You never understood—” He cuts himself off and glances quickly toward Arthur, who pretends to be examining a pewter lamp very closely. Then he looks back at Eames and says again, haughtily this time, “It’s a statement.”
“Have a drink, Alec,” Eames says affably, and slides him a martini.
They carry the martinis with them to the next secret room, which is a library. It’s Scott’s entry, and Arthur can see what Eames means about Scott being a bit dull. If the Internet were voting again, Scott would definitely be gone. There’s nothing offensive about the library but there’s nothing incredible about it, either.
“I would have gone full-on fairy-tale,” Eames says. “A secret library should have been all little nooks and crannies, things like that.”
“I wanted a cleaner feeling,” Scott says.
“Libraries aren’t meant to be clean, though,” Eames says. “Not like this. Not sharp. Libraries are meant to be hushed. Our voices are echoing in here.”
“I disagree,” says Alec.
“You disagree that our voices are echoing in here? I think there’s not much to disagree on there. Listen. Fedora!” Eames shouts.
It does echo back a little bit.
Alec frowns and says, “I think it’s an important statement on how we acquire knowledge in modern times. The fairy-tale library you’re speaking of is dying out.”
“Which is why we should—” starts Eames.
Arthur says, “I think Alec has a point.”
Eames stares at him. “You think what?”
“I think it’s a sad, sterile space in here. It certainly doesn’t make me want to read. And Alec’s right, that it’s a modern commentary. How we acquire knowledge. Actually, we really don’t. We just stick everything on the Internet and pretend that it’s true.” Arthur doesn’t wait to see if Alec registers the dig or not. Arthur moves on.
Jevin, who did the prison closet, does a safe this time around. Probably predictable. It is entirely empty. Apparently all of the design went into the quality of the materials.
“Unbreakable,” Jevin says. “All of it.”
“What would you keep in here?” Eames wonders.
“Everything of value,” says Jevin.
“Your heart,” says Alec solemnly.
“A fedora collection,” says Eames.
“The secret you don’t want told,” says Arthur.
“That actually could have worked,” says Eames. “You could have made this a literal secret room. Keep a little notebook in here and steal in to write down all the secret thoughts in your head.”
“I feel like that could be used as evidence against you,” Jevin says bluntly.
Eames hesitates. “In what way?”
“Every way,” Jevin asserts.
It’s a little unsettling, which is why Arthur is relieved to see that their next contestant is Ariadne. Ariadne’s secret room is accessed through a portrait that swings away from the wall to reveal a round hole and Ariadne says, practically bouncing with excitement, “It’s a slide.”
“Oh, that is fantastic,” says Eames, and immediately launches himself down the slide.
Alec follows before Arthur can; Arthur rolls his eyes good-naturedly at Ariadne and Ariadne grins back.
When Arthur reaches the bottom of the slide, Eames is enthusing, “Darling, we have to put a slide in our house, stairs are so over-rated.”
“So we won’t be seeing any slides when we’re there for the viewing party?” asks Alec.
“There’s a sex slide in my sex club, don’t worry,” says Arthur.
And then he turns his attention to Ariadne’s room. It makes him think of the fairy-tale room Eames had wanted out of Scott. The ceiling looks like it’s tufted white leather, and colorful chandeliers spring from it like flowers twisting into bloom. One of the walls is composed entirely of see-through storage that appears to be filled with different kinds of candies. Another wall has been draped with white cloth and a film is projecting onto it. The middle of the room is taken up entirely with a variety of different types of comfortable seating, including a couple of sunken nooks, all of them in various shades of purple.
“This,” says Ariadne, “is what I would want a secret room for. I would come here, and I would eat a bunch of junk food, and I would watch trashy television and read fanfiction.”
“I support this room,” says Eames. “Have you read the one with the hot shepherds?”
“Hasn’t everyone?” says Ariadne.
Alec says, “So you’ve created an entire room that’s just for sitting.”
“Most rooms in a house are generally used for sitting. Except for the bedroom, which is used for laying down. Why not?”
“Well?” Alec says sourly to Arthur. “I suppose you think this is brilliant?”
Arthur lets himself fall backward into one of the sunken nooks. The cushions catch him fluffily. Arthur imagines this is what it would be like to leap onto a cloud. If clouds weren’t composed of water vapor and were actually as cottony as they look.
Arthur laughs and says, “Of course it’s brilliant. Alec, you don’t have enough fun, and that is not something I say, like, ever.”
“It’s true,” Eames says. “Arthur is always the heart of gravitas.” He belly flops into the nook next to Arthur and says, “This is divine. It’s like a grown-up ball pit.”
“And that’s supposed to be a good thing?” demands Alec.
“Would read fanfiction in this little nest thing here,” Arthur announces. “A-plus. Top-notch.”
Ariadne beams.
They only have Gon left and Arthur thinks it’s going to be tough to top Ariadne’s room. Luckily for Gon, he goes very outside the box and designs a secret bathroom. It’s meant to evoke a Roman bath, and it’s done all over in incredibly intricate mosaics that must have taken forever, and Arthur wants to swim laps in the extravagant bathtub, while Eames is predictably blown away by the shower.
Alec just says, “Perhaps you could explain to me, Gon. What is this room for?”
Gon, after a moment says, “Well. What do you use your bathroom for?”
Alec looks offended. “I know what a bathroom is for. Why would you need a secret one?”
“For fun,” Gon says.
“This room and Ariadne’s room should get married,” Arthur announces.
“And be pointless rooms together,” says Alec.
As if that’s a bad thing.
“Yes,” says Arthur firmly.
Eames says, “Darling, come and see this shower? Can we get this shower?”
“We already have a ridiculous shower,” says Arthur, obediently walking over to admire it.
“We need two. There’s two of us. We each need a shower.”
“You told me the reason we had to get a ridiculous shower was so it would be easier for us to share one shower at the same time.”
“Oh, damn, I did say that, didn’t I? What if we install Ariadne’s slide and we slide down it into this shower?”
“It’d be safer if you slid down it into the bathtub.”
“Yes!” exclaimed Eames. “Genius! Just like a water slide!”
“I installed this bit just for you, Arthur,” Gon says, referring to a corner Arthur hadn’t noticed before. “I call it the towel corner.”
The mosaics on the wall and floor are covered with terry-cloth, and there are piled heaps of towels and robes.
“You can change it all out really easily, of course,” explains Gon. “To keep it clean. But the rest of the room was hard so I thought it needed some softness.”
“And you’re thinking of bacteria,” says Arthur approvingly. “Well done.”
“This is why we need more fraternizing,” complains Alec. “You’re the only judge he knows so he’s designing for you.”
“Which is exactly why Eames and I had the brilliant idea to host a viewing party,” says Arthur amiably, and smiles angelically at Alec.
Alec frowns, and Arthur thinks that this has definitely been the best judging day yet.