"Pardon?"

"It'll help draw the projections off Cobb." He led her into one of the hotel rooms which for all intents and purposes was empty. "Now focus. Close your eyes." Christi, admittedly wanting to know how to do what he did, decided to humor him. "Picture what you want to look like and who you want to become. Now allow yourself to become that person. Breathe deeply and focus only on that person."

Christi calmed herself down and pictured one of her old friends from high school. Focusing on that image, she poured every muscle in her body into becoming her.

"Very good."

Christi opened her eyes and examined her new look in the room's mirror. She now had brown hair that was hanging above her shoulders and was wearing jeans and a t-shirt.

"Forging is all about control," Eames explained. "If you lose control, you'll lose your appearance too. You could change right in front of a projection and give us all away in seconds, which you almost did on the last level. If we had been outside when you changed, you could've been killed. You need to learn to channel your emotions so that doesn't happen anymore. With some practice, control is easier to gain."

Christi's head was spinning. This was a lot for her to take in at one time. Her mind was still trying to process the fact that they were all actually dreaming.

Eames took her arm and led her out of the room.

"Now, see that man over there?" he said, pointing to a man at the end of the hall. "He's looking for Cobb. Do your best to distract him. If you're successful, he may believe you're just a projection as well."

"How am I supposed to do that?"

"However you possibly can."

Christi nervously walked to the man. He put his hand on his gun, which made her heart start hammering in her chest, but she forced herself to relax as she smiled at him.

"Hey," she said with a hint of seductiveness in her tone. "What's a big strong man like you doing out here all alone?" She walked a little closer to him as he slowly took his hand away from the gun. "You work too hard." She put her arms on his shoulders. "You know what I think? I think you should take a little rest." Quick as lightning, Christi slammed the edge of her hand on his neck right below his ear, causing him to crumple to the ground.

"What did you do?" Eames exclaimed running up to her.

"I took self-defense classes in college. They taught us a move like that that could cause blackouts in a second or even death if the hit is done hard enough. I have to admit, I've always wanted to do it, and I figured if he's just a projection, then he's not even real and so it doesn't matter."

"I have to hand it to you, Christi. You picked up forging quite fast."

"Thanks."

"Now you have to change back which is a heck of a lot easier. Close your eyes again and focus. Focus on becoming you again."

Christi repeated the process and found that she was able to change back into herself within a couple seconds.

"Good. Now come on, we should head downstairs and see if we can find the projection of Browning."

He took her arm again and they began making their way downstairs.

Christi's heart was pounding. She had no idea how exhilarating it was to be able to forge like she had just done. Sure, she had changed appearances in her dreams countless times, but actually controlling it was something else entirely. She loved it!

"That was incredible," she remarked as she and Eames made their way down to the lobby.

"You're a natural. I've never known anyone who was a natural forger. But you're not an expert. You only know how to change your appearance, but you still need to gain control and practice mimicking an actual person. That will take a lot of practice."

"Well, being able to control who I turned into and what I looked like was…unreal."

"Yes, it was."

The two of them laughed together at his little joke. There were those butterflies again…

She and Eames finally made it to the lobby and when they rounded the corner, they saw Saito talking with the projection of Browning, clearly thinking it was Eames. Eames frantically waved his hand across his neck to get Saito to stop talking to the projection.

"Oh, I'm sorry," Saito said quickly to Browning. "I mistook you for a friend."

"Oh. Good looking fella, I'm sure," Browning smiled as he walked away.

Christi rolled her eyes. Men.

"No, no, no. That's Fischer's projection of Browning," Eames explained as he and Christi walked up to Saito. "Let's follow him and see how he behaves."

"Why?" Saito asked.

"Because how he acts will tell us if Fischer is starting to suspect his motives the way we want him to."

The three of them followed Browning up to the hotel room where everyone else had gone to set up for the next layer.

When they walked in, Arthur had a gun to Browning's head and Cobb was quietly speaking to Fischer, explaining as much as he could. Eames held Browning down while Arthur administered a drug to knock him out.

"I need you to do the same thing to him that he was going to do to you," Cobb said to Fischer. "We'll enter his subconscious and find out what he doesn't want you to know."

Fischer looked at Cobb for a second, then pulled up his shirt sleeve. "Alright."

Cobb made him sit on the bed and proceeded to give him a drug to knock him out as well. Once the drug took effect, Cobb gently rested him down on the bed.

"He's out," Cobb confirmed.

"Wait, whose subconscious are we going into exactly?" Ariadne asked.

"We're going into Fischer's. I told him it was Browning's so he'd come be a part of our team."

"He's gonna help us break into his own subconscious," Arthur put together.

"That's right."

Eames took Christi's arm and they both lied down on the floor together in front of the hotel bed. Strangely enough, Christi didn't feel very uncomfortable. In fact, it was the complete opposite. She felt…protected almost. Like she didn't have anything to worry about as long as Eames was next to her.

"Security's gonna run you down hard," Eames said to Arthur as he prepared to hook them up to the PASIV.

"And I will lead them on a merry chase," Arthur smiled.

"Just be back before the kick."

"Go to sleep, Mr. Eames."

Christi smiled to herself as she listened to their banter again. It was quite enjoyable to witness.

Just before Arthur pushed the button on the PASIV device, Christi felt Eames's hand intertwine with her own.