Wash felt something in himself freeze when he saw Carolina's armoured body draped over a low boulder before realising that she'd just fallen asleep. He shook his head. It looked far too much like Carolina was dead, lying motionless in full body armour. She's pushing herself too hard, if she's just falling asleep like this.
Treading softly, Wash made his way to her sleeping form. Waking her up now would probably make her grouchy, but her waking up later, when she had aching limbs and a sore neck, would probably be worse. He knelt beside her and gently shook her shoulder.
"Carolina. You have to get up. You-"
The world spun. Suddenly Wash was on the ground, forehead clunking against the inside of his visor and arms pinned behind his back. As quickly as it happened, the pressure was gone. Carolina climbed off him, offering him a hand up. "Sorry. It's a reflex," she told him by way of an apology.
"Don't worry about it, boss."
She folded her arms. "Any particular reason for waking me up, Wash?"
"You fell asleep in your armour. On a rock. I figured you'd rather sleep in a proper bed, unless of course a sore back was what you where aiming for."
He could almost see her frown behind her helmet. "I just meant to sit down for a minute..." she murmured, then shook herself and angled her helmet towards him. "Why are you up?"
It was a valid question - his helmet readout was blinking the digits '2:41' at him. The Reds and Blues had been asleep for hours already. He shrugged. "Couldn't sleep." Which was true - he hadn't been able to get a good nights' sleep in years. His mind always fought the weakness of unconsciousness with everything it had. "C'mon, go to bed. You can't be expected to lead a squad properly if you're not getting enough rest."
With the barest of nods, Carolina headed for the room that had been set aside for the two Freelancers at this most recent base. Initially, when Carolina had showed up, Wash had bunked with the Blues, as he had been doing for the months prior. Now, however, he felt the need to sleep in the same room as Carolina, to avoid exactly this sort of thing happening. He snorted quietly to himself. Great job he'd done there.
They both stripped down efficiently, piling their armour neatly at the foot of their beds. With a yawn, Carolina crawled under her blanket and fell asleep without so much as a 'good night'.
He breathed out a small sigh of relief as he settled down on his own bunk. This vendetta mission of Carolina's wasn't good for her, he could tell - sure, it kept her mind driven and focused, but it was taking its toll on her body. He only hoped that she'd find some sort of closure at the end of all this.
Twisting under the sheets, Wash tried to find a comfortable position. The room was quiet, so quiet that he could hear Carolina's slow, measured breathing. For some reason, the peaceful, human sound made him relax enough that his eyelids drooped of their own accord and he fell into a blissfully dreamless slumber.
.:':. .:':. .:':.
A/N: There was absolutely no point to this *rides a unicycle madly into the sunset*