AN: Hello everybody, I'm back from my trip! We had to cut it short because of bad weather, and while I'm a girl who loves a good thunderstorm every once in a while, it sucks. That being said, I am super excited to post my next chapter to this fic. I literally cannot believe the response to this fic. It hasn't even been a week and I'm nearing 6,500 hits. Thank you all so so so so much, I know I say that in every AN but I really mean it. Every single review is amazing and appreciated, I love that you love this story. So by all means, please enjoy this next chapter. I sure enjoyed writing it. Love always, xx Scarlet

"For fucks sake, Dom, just look at her!"

Cobb's eyes flashed, he was pressing his lips together so tightly they were starting to turn white. He looked Arthur directly in the eye, chilling him to the core.

"We have a job to do. I've told you, people get hurt. We've seen it. We've done it for god's sake. I don't get what the fuck makes her so special?"

"No, Dom, you don't underst-"

"DON'T TELL ME WHAT I UNDERSTAND," Dom snarled, his voice echoing off of the walls. He broke his eye contact with Arthur for a split second before taking a step closer. His face was so close to Arthur's that he could feel Dom's breath on his upper lip, "you work for me, so you will listen to me and you will do what I say. Is that clear?"

Arthur glared back with defiance. He turned around to glance at Ariadne. Eames, Saito, and the rest of the team were surrounding her. He could hear only small bits of their conversation. Lost forever... unresponsive... it's a shame she's so young..

He turned around to face Cobb once more. There was a heavy pause in the air.

"Yes, sir."

-x-

Arthur's mind was blank. He could focus only on the task ahead of him and nothing else. He was in the elevator, tying them up and keeping them guarded from the projections.

A slash of red paint across a canvas. One strike, you're out.

He's got her with him, he might not be able to stand the sight of her like this but being without her is not an option, it's unfathomable. His eyes are glassy, he can't concentrate. He knows what he needs to do but he cannot bring himself to do it. It's tearing him apart, piece by piece. Like a paper crane ripped apart by a man sitting at a desk, once something so beautiful and pure was slowly being taken away from him, piece by piece disappearing without a single sound.

His heart is going a thousand miles a minute. He's remembering her face, her eyes, the way it feels to kiss her. He shuts his eyes with force, hearing the blood rush to his ears. He remembers something Dom once told him.

"It's like being trapped in a perfect world. You're a mime in a glass box, you can see everything around you. You can feel it and touch it and sense it, but it's not real. You can pretend as hard as you want but it's not the same. It's not reality. They say there's a thin line between dreams and reality? They're liars, all of them. When you're trapped like that, there is not a single fucking thing I wouldn't give..." he had said, he had trailed off then, looking out the window. That had been his most vulnerable moment, a rare instant where he had unveiled the layer of aggression and pain that surrounded him and shown, for a millisecond, the man who was still grieving the loss of his wife.

He looks back at her but it's too painful. He's already crying, his eyes are red and swollen, but he doesn't care. Nothing can save him now, but he's suffocating. He's torturing himself by remembering the way she smells like clean laundry and lavendar, the way her paisly scarf falls gracefully to the ground when she unties it and let's it drop to the floor in his bedroom, how soft her skin feels against his hands.

He remembers Cobb again, thinking of how long they had worked together. How persistent he had been on taking this job.

"Don't you want to take a leap of faith? Or become an old man, filled with regret, waiting to die alone!"

He's glancing back at Ariadne. His mind is spinning but there's no hope for him now, he's let his heart take over. He's not even thinking as his hands find the machinery and he grabs a cord. He's risking everything. The job, his wealth, his life. But he doesn't care. He's powerless. He's possessed. Possessed by a deep power within him that's emerging from somewhere he's hidden from everybody for a long time. Everybody but a pretty young girl, with a scarf around her neck and big, bright eyes that look up at him so helplessly.

A halved pomegranate on a plate. Pick it up, squeeze it as hard as you can just to feel the juice run through your fingers and drip on to the floor. Two strikes, you're dead.

He's picturing the Engine Room, because he knows that's where she'll be. He's trying to remember every detail, every sparkling countertop. The image in his mind unfolds slowly until it's so real he can almost feel it. And then he's falling, he's spinning and falling and there's no going back.

He lands on the ground, hard. He's in pain but he's numb to it. The first thing he sees when he opens his eyes is red. Red paper. It's surrounding him. He hasn't gotten it right, he's not in the Engine Room. A tear dribbles down his cheek and lands with a drop on the ground. He feels moisture, he's laying in a pool of red. By now he's crying fully. He's too late, the clock has collided with reality and there's nothing he can do now.

He clambers to a standing position, and his body nearly collapses as it gives a heave of relief when he sees the black walls, the circular windows, that mesmerizing chandelier. He looks down at his feet, there's a thin layer of something red, something liquid, on the ground. It splashes against his feet, but it smells kind of sweet. It's not blood, it's not blood. The red paper is the thousands of paper cranes. Here once more, they are stained with red. Not the liquid, but instead splotches of blood red paint. He picks one up and it flutters out of his hand.

He watches it fly towards the chandelier. It stops directly under it, iridescent in the pale yellow light. He watches it pirouette through the air and drop. His eyes follow it all the way to the ground and his heart gives a great leap as he watches a pale arm extend to catch it.

He's running, he's gliding across the floor towards her. Tears are pouring down his face and he's moving at the speed of light.

And he's falling, he's spinning, she's out of his reach. He's trying as hard as he can to hold on but he can feel the kick pulling him back, pushing him up and over. He screams as loud as he can but the sound is lost.

She's crystallized. A beautiful image danging high above the boundaries of time, of love, of feelings, of passion. She's forever lost, a speck of dust suspended on a sunbeam.

Three strikes, you're crazy.