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There was no power on Earth- not the begrudging enthusiasm of their broker, not the implausible ratio of price to walking distance from the subway, not the suspicion that Abe was far unhappier with the balance of their relationship than he was letting on- that could detract from the glorious feeling of real success. Peggy knew it now, the fluttering sensation under her ribs and the tight knot of resolve in her stomach. It was a feeling that could be nearly replicated with the liberal application of anxiety and caffeine, and she was intimately familiar with that, as well, but walking the wood parquet floors and gazing out at the East river (past the FDR) from the large picture windows of what would be her Upper East Side apartment, that was success. She'd spent years carving out the things that were hers from the slab that was New York; her job, then her career; her colleagues, then her friends; her mistakes, then her relationship. This apartment would be her home. No more roommates, no more rent checks, no more Brooklyn. Peggy Olson, Copy Chief at CGC, home owner.

She smiled at her reflection, which smiled back in a sunny, washed-out sort of way, and went into the larger of the two bedrooms, the one to which the full bath was attached. She could hear Abe digging into the subject of dollars per square foot, an idea she knew he found deeply offensive alongside the overarching concept of apartment hunting. Absently twitching her grey coat out of the way, she tugged the bathroom door closed behind her, cutting off the dull reverberating sound of whatever answer the Realtor had mustered.

Cut it off quite completely, in fact, and Peggy found herself blinking in quiet surprise at a well appointed room that looked like it belonged in a hotel. She was still for a moment as the bewilderment set in, then stepped further into it as the confusion and curiosity took over.

"What," she murmured to herself, stepping around the neatly tucked in bedspread. It was like the Standard, or the Savoy. It was beautiful, modern but not flashy. It was the kind of room Ted would have booked. Which was a completely inappropriate thought to be having.

"This can't be included in the square footage," she muttered, turning over a stationary packet on the desk, eyes catching on notes other people had apparently left there. Or one person trying to come up with a shoddy and patchwork story, it looked like. Or possibly someone who was mentally imbalanced. She put the stationary down and turned to make a beeline for the door she'd come in through. The fact that she hadn't been informed the back half of the building was a hotel was completely unacceptable.

Oh, well, it would have been a lousy trek to 86th and Lexington 9 months out of the year, anyway.

The door wouldn't open.

"Oh, for- Abe? Abe." She knocked at it, impatience threatening to boil over into frustration. She stopped after a few seconds to listen for voices, the tell tale clicking of heels, the rustle of a key.

She heard nothing.

"...Unbelievable," Peggy muttered, and turned and strode to the opposite end of the hotel room that shared a door with her future goddamn Upper East Side apartment and opened the door to what she assumed would be the hallway with slightly more force than necessary. She took a moment to look it up and down, turned to note the room number, then picked a direction and walked, steps clipped and purposeful. She needed someone in a double breasted jacket and pillbox hat. She needed someone with a clip board. She needed Manhattan to have one damn apartment in it that both fit her budget and didn't have some completely deranged drawback.

"Excuse me?" she said aloud, as the hallway opened up into an expansive lounge, it looked like.

"Hello, I need someone to..." She trailed off as her attention landed on the view. There were large windows with heavy drapes, and a view. Of trees. There were many trees. Peggy knew there was a park around the Governor's mansion, but it was impossible it could be that large. She walked across heavy hardwood floors to look out the large windows at the expansive grounds and seemingly endless forest beyond, goldenrod pleats of her skirt swishing at her calves, grey coat strangely heavy and warm where it was tucked over her arm. Her reflection gazed back at her with startled doe eyes.

This was not New York. This was not New York.

"What," she said aloud, again, and to absolutely no one.

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"Yes, I said the same thing," Eames murmurs, half to himself, as he runs his totem over his knuckles with ease. "Though, there was the additional of a bit of creative profanity after the 'what'," he says, giving her a sharp grin before he tucks the chip away with the fluidity of magic hands. He's made himself something of a home here, storing away as much as he can in a hotel room in case he needs to wait it out. So far, though, the place has treated him fairly well and he can't complain about that.

"I take it from the look on your face that you expect to be somewhere all-together different," he estimates and he doesn't even need to be able to read people as well as he does to know that. She's practically screaming it with a look like that.

Peggy had a reputation for being quick, sometimes viciously, unfairly fast on the uptake. She wouldn't have had her job if she was easily distracted or slow. It was therefor out of character that it took her a full four seconds to recognize she was being spoken to, let alone react to and address the man speaking.

"Who are you?" she asked, feeling that was important to establish, wishing she didn't sound quite so breathless.

"You can call me Eames," he says, not leaving his perch against the wall. While he's managed to achieve an answer or two, here or there, he's still leery of this place and all the tricks it might throw his way. Beautiful women are a caution, especially ones who look as though they've stepped out of a retro catalogue. "Anything out there?" he asks.

"All right," she said, looking faintly skeptical at the way he offered up his name.

"I haven't decided yet. I'm still holding out help it's just an elaborately painted backdrop but I... can't sell myself on the idea just yet," Peggy said, voice trailing off in a murmur as a bird took wing from a tree and the masterpiece dropcloth idea went out the window.

"What the hell is this," she murmured.

"Where are we?" she said more loudly, turning to face the considerably taller man head on. Looking out the window wasn't helping her stay focused.

Eames regards the bird as it takes flight and knows that unless it were going to fetch a ridiculously wonderful sum, it wouldn't be a scene he would be painting anytime soon. "Quite honestly, I've only barely arrived myself and don't have many answers at all," he says in a cheerful tone that belies his worry. "Here I was thinking I had found myself on vacation, finally."

"Arrived? What do you mean? Through the apartment building next door?" Peggy was vaguely aware that Eames was very handsome and had an extremely charming manner about him. It made her feel impatient.

"How did you get in here? How do you get out?"

"Through the hotel a world or two over, I imagine," Eames replies, getting a proper look at the clothing that she's wearing. Apart from some very disturbing sexual fantasy dreams he's concocted for lonely people over the years, he does know that what she's wearing has gone out of style. "I walked through the door. I continue to walk through doors. Sometimes, they lead me in, sometimes out. Quite the delightful paradox of worlds."

"...Oh," Peggy said at length, watching him with a tense expression that clung to the line that divided incredulity and concern.

"...Is this a mental hospital?" she asked.

"If it were, I wouldn't be staying quite as long and quite as relaxed as I've been," Eames assures, watching her right back, though he's rather amused by her questions and her reactions -- he's always found people's reactions to be one of the most intensely wonderful things about them and they always say so much. "From what it seems, it's a luxury hotel."

"Yes," Peggy said, looking in no way mollified, "that is what it seems like."

She looked back down the hallway she'd wandered, then out the window again.

"...Where's the exit?"

"Now that, darling, depends entirely on your luck," Eames says with a combination of sympathy and amusement, as though he's ready to be entertained by whatever she opens the door to. "I've been here no less than three days and I've opened a door and found my home, ancient Rome, a dinosaur staring back at me with a very curious expression, and outside, there's space."