Charlie couldn't sleep. Again. At least when they had been fighting, she had been able to use up enough of her energy to get an almost reasonable number of hours of sleep, but riding on a wagon all day proved to be only a further hindrance to her sleep schedule. She hated the fact that she needed a fight to exhaust her into sleeping. She hated that this was her life now.

She knew that Miles drank to get to sleep sometimes and that idea was looking more and more appealing, but she didn't want to need alcohol to function. She just wanted all of this to fix itself. She wanted to be able to close her eyes for more than five minutes without having to picture Jason covered in blood. She was going to be sick if she kept thinking about the bullet-hole that she had put in him.

Oh, God. She needed a distraction. She needed it badly.

She sat up and debated stealing Miles' whiskey out of his bag when she found that Monroe was already sitting up, drinking from his own flask. So they were in the same boat again. Who would have thought that she would end up having anything in common with him?

"What's your excuse tonight?" He muttered. "I wasn't even looking at you this time."

Instead of answering his question, she turned it around on him, "What's your excuse? Can't sleep without some imaginary bed?" Her words came out sounding bitter, but maybe that was just because she was annoyed by him asking her.

"That's part of it," he admitted. "Going back to sleeping outside isn't exactly my first choice."

She didn't bother asking what the other part was. She knew he was avoiding his problems as much as she was avoiding her own. And if they really were that similar, then the silence of night only made the thoughts he was trying to block out even angrier.

There was a brief silence before she asked, "We lived together, right?"

His voice came out annoyed as he pointed out, "I already told you that."

He took another swig out of his flask as she wrapped her arms loosely around her knees.

"You're used to sleeping in a bed with me."

This time it wasn't a question. She wasn't looking for an answer.

"There's no reason we both shouldn't get to sleep."

Now he was the one with questions as he arched a brow at her.

"I can't make a bed appear, but I could sleep over there."

Nothing.

"Or at least try to."

He would have thought for sure it was a joke if it weren't for the look on her face. She looked dead serious. Even then, he still wasn't entirely convinced.

He took one last chug from his flask, then closed the top.

"Whatever."

She still wasn't moving. If she was expecting him to ask her, then she had another thing coming.

He tossed his flask aside and moved back onto the ground. She debated ignoring him and lying back down in her own spot, but he wasn't the only one she had offered for. She probably wouldn't have offered if it was just for him.

She wanted to distract herself. She wanted to find a miracle cure to help herself sleep. Hell, she was willing to give anything a chance at this point.

Bass was surprised when she came over and joined him. She lay so close that they were nearly touching, while she faced the opposite direction. He was confused by what she was doing and by the fact that she seemed to be pissed at him after she had been the one who had offered.

Several seconds passed in silence as he lay perfectly still before finally she asked, "How did we usually sleep?"

He wished that this was still the dream world and that he could just cuddle up to her and have all of his problems disappear, but this wasn't that Charlie. That Charlie didn't exist.

"I don't know if you-" He tried.

"Please, just..." She trailed off.

He was only more confused as he hesitantly shifted a little closer and wrapped one arm loosely around her.

He waited a second. And then another, but she wasn't moving away or arguing.

He shifted a little closer and made himself comfy and waited to see if she would complain or leave, but she stayed eerily still so finally he closed his eyes.

Charlie struggled to pretend that he was someone else or that this was his dream world or that they were in any other situation than broken ex-General Monroe being the one holding her.

She was human. She was upset. That was it. It didn't matter that he was the one holding her. She just needed some kind of comfort. Something to assure her that she would make it through the night.

How the hell had it come to this?

Bass stirred awake the next morning and felt the tickle of hair against his face. Instead of pulling away from the sensation, he moved closer and brushed his lips against her skin.

"Good morning, beautiful," he murmured in between kisses.

Charlie felt Monroe's stubble brush along her flesh as his lips moved along her cheek. That wasn't the only thing she felt. A certain part of his anatomy was much more awake than he was.

"Um, Bass."

She hadn't even realized she was calling him it instead of Monroe until the word had already left her lips. That wasn't her biggest concern at the moment anyways and they were in a strangely intimate situation for her to want to refer to him as Monroe.

Her voice jolted him awake as his eyes flew open and the words 'I love you' died on his lips. Dammit, he'd been dreaming about the stupid dream world again. He quickly pulled away and cleared his throat as he moved the blanket to cover himself more.

"Sorry."

She turned and sat up and then was hit with an especially inconvenient thought.

"The nanites are everywhere, right?" She asked. "So does that mean that you've seen what I really look like naked or was it just what you want me to look like?"

"You're not helping, Charlie," he grunted out.

"It's a serious question," she insisted. "You have memories of having sex with me and I don't even know if they're just a fantasy or if the nanites made it accurate."

She was at a disadvantage in this. For all she knew, he knew exactly what she was like in bed and exactly what she looked like naked. She wasn't sure which option was worse: having him really know what she looked like or having him have a memory of the idealized version of what she was like.

"I don't know," he insisted. "And unless you're offering a show and tell, then I guess we aren't finding out. So can we just stop talking about you naked so that I can get rid of this before they wake up?"

She held back a laugh at that and let her voice come out sounding more irritated than she really was. "Fine."

A/N: Please read and review! :)