Chell wakes with a sharpness in her lungs.

Her heart is pounding double time. Chambers pumping, adrenaline pours through webs of veins and arteries, and all she can do is sink her fingers into the sheets to stop the shaking.

A nightmare. Only a nightmare.

She has to remember: it's only a nightmare.

The room gradually swirls into focus. The swimming darkness slinks back with the muted moonlight crawling from under the curtains and it presses itself against the ceiling and into safer corners. Soft beds of silver pool beneath the window, cool and calm, and in the almost palpable glow of moonlight, she can see the outline of the companion cube beyond the edges of her nightstand. The shadowed form of the bureau sits further across; a hunched creature with half open drawers.

With her mind so steeped in horrors, a cold jolt of fear slams into her ribs and melts through. Tendrils grasp at her heartstrings and pull them taut. Ice pushes into her lungs. She can feel everything start to pull apart—her thoughts, her feelings, her will—and she clenches her fingers into the flesh of her hands and curls in on herself because it's too much, it's too much, her throat is constricting and it feels like the pressure of a hand is on her windpipe, why are they doing this, it's too much, and—

No.

It's a nightmare. It's a nightmare and it can't hurt anymore.

Her pillow is damp. The sheets tangled between her legs stick to her skin. Swallowing down all the darkness and terror and fear, peeling off the covers, she rubs her eyes with the inside of her wrist and forces herself to get up.

Outside of her room is the black silence of zero hour. The fluttering drone of Wheatley's soft snores pervades the gentle quiet. Pale light bleeds in from beneath the curtained windows, the den illuminated only by spotlights cast upon the floor.

With careful steps, slow and purposeful, heel-to-toe, she makes her way toward the bathroom closet. She can feel each floorboard beneath the soles of her feet. They're cold and smooth and offer the peaceful, familiar feeling of a world beyond her nightmares.

It's her anchor. The floor is real beneath her. Cool and real and something complete and sure that she can count on. There are no gaping chasms, no widening pits, no seas of corrosive chemicals, no maws of infinite black. She cannot plummet into the ground or squeeze herself between the boards, no matter how hard she might press.

The prickling dread that something lurks on the outskirts of her vision begins to numb into a smoother, scraping caress.

It's only a nightmare.

Her fingertip hits the light switch. When her eyes squint shut, a kaleidoscope of colored shapes imprints behind her lids. Mirror, cabinet, sink, faucet, toilet, tub, towel rack. She doesn't need to see to have her palms kiss the surface of the closet door.

The fresh towel isn't soft, but it isn't rough, either. It hasn't gone through as many washes as the others have. It's not as old or as worn, but she takes it and hangs it over her shoulder.

Sheets come next. Cheap ones. They're folded neatly on top of each other in perfect squares, pillow cases nestled on top. A somewhat coarse texture meets her fingers, and pastel floral patterns come into focus. They're not the most comfortable of linens—she could have chosen better, honestly—but she is practical. A lesser thread count feels better than anything back There.

When the light winks out, she can still see the room through closed eyes. The moonbeams from under the windows seem soaked up by the shock. Everything is a milky grey spectrum adorned with shifting masses of color and it blinks with her heartbeat.

One hand extended, feeling out in the dark, she holds the sheets close to her chest and wades toward her bedroom. The soft pats of her footsteps rattle under the casing of her skull. Every step could wake the dead.

Her legs gradually cease to work as she draws close to his room, like cold maple syrup pouring from a bottle on a frosty morning. Part of her begins to wonder why she's stopping, but the rest gently pushes the thought to the side. Her hand reaches out for the door, trembling, hesitant, and before she realizes what she's doing, it's too late; there is no resistance, no door; she's standing there, awake, alone; and a shivering shadow makes its home in the half-open doorway.

And there at quarter-past midnight, planted within the wooden frame, Chell finds herself staring through billowing darkness and struck with a petrifying kind of wonderment. Her heart is shoved into some peculiar place that she can't quite name.

The pulsing blindness from the bathroom light starts to seep away. Slowly, the room shifts into focus.

One of Wheatley's skinny legs hangs off the mattress, dangling but still, one arm crooked behind his head and buried beneath a pillow. The covers are bunched toward the foot of the bed as if he had kicked them down not too long ago in his sleep. His plaid pajamas don't quite meet his wrists and ankles; tight, pale skin wraps around muscle and bone there, and it's a despairing reminder of just how malnourished he's been.

There it is again. That odd… feeling. Her heart being pulled in such a way that it feels as though someone's trying to pry it apart.

Leaning against the jamb, Chell closes her eyes and concentrates on the rhythmic rumble of Wheatley's snores. They are not as loud and obnoxious as she had imagined. They are a deeper, huskier noise. Breathy on the inhale. Exhales sometimes have a shudder.

Unbidden, it brings a warm, swelling sensation to the space between her pumping lungs.

When she first brought him home, she did not sleep. Her nights were spent wide-eyed to the ceiling, mapping the sounds he made in her head. She had wanted to believe in the sincerity of his apology, but the monsters in her dreams pulled her paranoia out in strings.

In every nightmare, the hum of the machinery stirred something in the deepest places of her mind. It was something visceral. Something primal. Something so deeply human, so animal, so private and so foreign. It was a switch in the back of her skull.

It was fear.

Everything came welling out of the woodwork. Glimpses of a golden eye in the dark; of moving walls pushing close; of cold metal clanging under her feet and smothering liquid sluicing down her back; of inhaling adrenal vapor and crimson pinpricks parting through fog; and of Yesterday, I saw a deer.

There was no greater test than sleeping beneath the same roof.

And yet, here, now, at quarter-past midnight, standing in the frame of Wheatley's doorway, she finds herself taking comfort in the soft drone of his snores. There is no paranoia, no sorrow, no terror—only relief.

It's the strangest feeling. She doesn't know what to make of it. The ravenous monster he became climbs into her nightmares, splitting the ground beneath her into yawning caverns without end, and she's falling, falling, watching him from so far below; he's a breathing mechanical silhouette in the glowing body of the moon, poised on high. That being lingers on the fringe of her thoughts, melding into her dreams with the flight of the sun, and she can still hear his voice, his and Hers, and they feel so pressed into her eardrums that even though time has passed, she can hear every word, every threat, every promise, and chills burrow deeply into her bones.

And inexplicably, in the face of all of this, in the face of her dreams and nightmares and in the fear of that terrifying place, she is drawn to him.

The sheets in the cradle of her arms have become an anchor. Her knees are buckling, knocking inward, and she's struggling to keep herself still. The doorjamb is no longer a proper support.

Is it camaraderie? she wonders. Sympathy, perhaps? Was a friendship somehow forged out of the horror of Aperture?

Her feet shift forward. A soft shuff along the smooth wood of the floor. And then up, heel-to-toe, heel-to-toe, pathing toward the bunched covers at the bottom of the bed.

There has to be some kind of explanation. There must be. There has to be a reason why she feels so at peace with the man—The creature? The AI?—who had tried to kill her.

The linens are now stacked neatly on the floor, the towel folded on top. She's standing at the foot of the bed, palms slick, heart throbbing in her neck, lost for… well, not words. She doesn't know how to parse the flood of emotion that's gathering before her.

Wheatley isn't a construct of technology any longer. It holds no power over him. He's not the monster of her nightmares—but he is. He is and he isn't. He's a thin, bumbling goof and he's the menacing voice of, "You had to play bloody cat and mouse, didn't you?" It's this funny little paradox that has her snagged by the throat, roping around, making her choke.

Chell stares at him splayed across the mattress. The steady cadence of his breathing eases her; his presence is warmth and comfort. She tries to swallow, but her muscles won't respond. God, what is this?

A soft groan marks his movement. Wheatley rolls about onto his side, curling up and tucking his legs in. His too-short pajama shirt rides up his side in the midst. Thinness and ribs peer back under plaid blue. His mop of hair is in disarray on the plane of his pillow, tousled from sleep.

Adrenaline stirs in webs and her body grows tense. Half of her wants to bolt out of the room—but that would surely wake up him up, right?—and half wants to help herself in right next to him, to soak in his heat and closeness, to steep in that gentle warmth.

To be quite honest, she doesn't know where the latter half gets its ideas.

Picking up her linens and towel with care, she turns to quietly retrace her steps out of his room. She shouldn't have come in to begin with, she knows, but the demons in her sleep always seem so fierce, so real, because they were, and in that clenching realness and terror, they drove her from the creeping darkness of her own bed to seek solace.

And... well, apparently Wheatley is solace. Somehow.

Stepping lightly, she cradles the linens to her chest. She's almost out. Just another step to the jamb, and then she can resume her task and change her sweat-soaked sheets. Perhaps in a few hours she'll be able to—

"Mm? Mmoh, hello."

Oh, god. What? How did he—?

Chell spins around, sheets and towel clutched tightly, eyes wide. Her spine straightens and her shoulders lock. Her limbs feel frozen, heavy, and yet there's a fire behind her breastbone. The drumming in her ears won't stop.

Wheatley twists onto his back and arches off the bed in a long stretch. Small cricks can be heard as he adjusts, and a mighty yawn forces him to bury his face into the pillow.

"Mm, sorry," he says, propping himself up on his forearms. His eyes aren't quite open all the way and grogginess drags through his words. "S'not morning yet, is it? What're… oh, what're you doing up? Can't sleep?"

She shakes her head in reply.

"Been having a lot of that lately," Wheatley murmurs, knuckles cracking. "Can't be good for you, can it?" Another yawn. More stretching. Spindly fingers hooking in on one another: pop, pop, pop.

There's that tight swelling in her ribcage again. The pumping of her heart accelerates and the aftermath of the adrenaline rush pulls through her veins. She continues to stare at him as he attempts to compose himself, and she doesn't know why, but it's just… endearing.

"You okay?" he manages after another yawn. "You look a bit… well, off."

Nodding, she consciously makes herself look at the dresser, the closet, his hat perched on the bedpost—anywhere else. She hopes he hasn't realized she purposefully entered his room. The incredible urge to hide sweeps up and engulfs her, smothering any sense.

Wheatley finally manages to sit up, legs crossed. She can't quite make out his eyes in the darkness, but it feels like he's appraising her, and the notion of diving under the bed to escape his scrutiny seems more and more like a good idea the longer she waits.

"You know, I just had the strangest dream." He rubs his eyes with the heel of his palm, completely unfazed—or maybe unaware. "Well, not exactly the strangest, but it was definitely strange because it keeps popping up. I didn't know who it was before, but now—now I think I know. See, there's a lady at the shop. I met her today. Yesterday. Sort of. Her name's Lottie. She's in pictures, but she was in my dream."

Chell's grip on the sheets loosen as the beating of the knot in her chest begins to slow. She feels her muscles ease and relax. She's not sure if it's because he's not fully awake, but his words make less sense than usual.

"It's so weird," says Wheatley. His brow is beetled in fatigue and thought. "I… I think I know her. Knew her. Know? I don't know. It's this feeling. Don't really know how to explain that. But not like she was in the pictures. She was… she was different. Smaller. Little thing. But I remember, I remember her. I remember her hair, her eyes, the dots on her face. I remember all of it. She was so small, playing with this tiny little piano, and I was… I was…"

Wheatley peers down at his hands. He flexes his fingers inward, pressing into the flesh of his palms. Chell can see his skin pull across his bones and the pronounced sharpness of his knuckles in the dark.

"I don't really know what I was, actually. I think I was this. I think—I think this is me. Was? Is?"

Another flex. Testing. His head slowly cranes up and he stares at her imploringly, his expression bewildered.

"Does that… does that sound weird to you? I remember, but I don't remember at the same time. It's like—it's almost like it's this, this thing it's sitting right in front of me, just sitting there, but it's invisible. But I know it's there because I saw this tiny glimpse of it, just for a second, like it's shining in the sun, and then bam, it's gone again, but no one else can see it because it's invisible. But not to me. Not… entirely."

He pauses for a moment before an awkward, coughing laugh wells up out of his throat.

"Ha, you know, I must sound completely mental right now. Really. Remembering and not remembering and all that. I'm sorry. It just… bothers me. I feel like I should be able to remember, but I can't. Like it's hidden right in front of me and I can't find it."

Chell wonders if this is some sort of side effect of his… well, humanity. He hasn't spoken much of it and she dares not pry, but she assumes he underwent some sort of grizzly transition to appear as the man before her. He hadn't complained of any dreams like this before, but who's to say he's not plagued by them as she is?

She wants to comfort him. She wants to walk up to the side of the bed, slide her fingers into his thick hair, and have his head rest against her, but she doesn't. Can't. Instead, she offers an understanding smile, hoping her body language can convey the rest.

"It just felt like… like this was something I should know." Wheatley strokes his thumb absently across his knee, his teeth worrying at his lower lip. "I should know this. Know her. I should, I really should, but I don't. And that's just… so bloody frustrating."

In the soft darkness, Chell can see his fists curl and knobby fingers dig into the meat of his thighs. Worry lines furrow along his brow and his jaw has set just so, jutting slightly, the hollows of his face basking in shadow.

"There's something I'm not getting." He's begun to hunch forward and his arms have crossed themselves along his belly as though the stuff inside of him wanted to come spilling out. "Always the moron, aren't I," he says. "Never clever enough to solve anything. Not even my own test."

No, no, she wants to say, but her parted mouth pours out silence and her hand reaches out for—for what?—god, she doesn't know, but it's outstretched and palm to the ceiling, pleading softly, There is not Here; we're gone.

Wheatley's gaze has pried itself from the sheets. There's a moment—no, not even a moment; a fraction—where she can glimpse into the man who became the monster of her nightmares.

The coldness. The frustration. The anger. Laced into calculating focus, he's staring at her, at her hand, as if she's cradling the answer there but refuses to relinquish it. It's paralyzing and it trickles a chill down the contour of her spine.

And then, as if there is a hammer of clarity bludgeoning him in the back of his skull, he softens: shoulders slump, tension uncoils, fingers loosen.

There's an uncomfortable, vulnerable tightness buried in her chest. It's climbing up her throat with needles.

"Maybe," he murmurs, "it's because of what happened. I don't… I don't quite know all of it. But there's more to all of what I am right now, isn't there? There has to be. There's something, I know there is. And it's missing."

Chell's hand has begun to tremble. She should pull it back, but she doesn't. His has risen from his lap.

"Sometimes," he says, "I think I have dreams about the missing. Like Lottie. Like the piano. But they always disappear before I'm awake."

Words are filling her mouth, brimming, swelling, but they're snagged between her teeth. His fingers graze the pads of hers and the warmth ignites her nerves.

"I didn't think I had room in me to hate."

Wheatley is working himself closer along the mattress, his feet settling into the bunched up blankets. His mouth has thinned and his eyes are locked onto the enigma of her hand.

"Humans have so much to feel, so bloody much, so much it's enough to make me think I've gone crazy. I can feel happiness and worry and sadness and joy and it's so brilliant I could—well, cry. And if there's so much to feel, why hate? I mean, you know, why waste myself on something that won't do anyone any good? Seems pointless. Completely pointless. Stupid, even."

Chell can feel herself shaking again. The coiled knot has traversed her breastbone, her neck, and has made its home in the back of her mouth. The cold floor has seeped into the soles of her feet and is draining the strength from her legs. And his hand, bony and thin, a burning coal, has slowly curled into her palm.

"But I find myself hating that place. Being afraid. Thinking about it and how truly awful it really was. And seeing what it's done to you, I can't imagine what it's done to others. What She's done. What that whole place has done."

He's squeezing now. Enveloping and warm and trying to press the fact that he knows, he really does, he's sorry, he's so sorry and if he could purge everything and make it right he would; and she squeezes back. Hard.

"But I suppose I should be thankful, in a way. It brought me here. Away. I'm still alive somehow. Breathing, slightly less metal. More fleshy. And I'm… I'm all right with that."

She catches the glint of his eyes in the darkness and absently wonders if you can drown in a color. Or a feeling. Or words. She desperately wants to pull them out and say I understand, I know, I'm sorry, but her jaw is clenched so tightly it's beginning to hurt.

Wheatley has leaned in close. The subtle scent of his shampoo wraps itself around her neck and she brings it greedily into the spaces of her lungs.

"Are you all right?" His voice is so soft, so quiet; if she held it in her palms she could shred it like paper.

No, she doesn't say with the voice she doesn't quite have, No, I'm not, I don't know what's happening anymore; but her head nods, Yes, I'll be fine, and with the musk of his scent filling her nose and the heat of his hand in hers, she brings herself into him and buries her head into the hollowed place by his collarbone.

His chest seizes up in a hitched inhale like this is the last thing he expected, but he brings his other arm around the small of her back, hooking there, safe, and she can feel the warmth of his leg shifting to rest by her side. Recovering nicely, steady breaths now, his head lolls against hers; a comforting, heavy weight. Somehow their fingers have become entwined in the midst of this, but she continues to squeeze with a fierce strength, and he meets it firmly.

Wheatley is very much a victim, she realizes. To what extent, she doesn't know. Perhaps more, or perhaps less than what she's imagined. But regardless—he shares in this nightmare.

"Sorry. Again." His voice has dropped low and it's so hard to hear. "That was a whole lot of nonsense there. I'm tired and… well, a bit fuzzy. Not thinking straight."

Chell shakes her head against him, dismissive, nose against the plaid of his shirt. His heart pumps below her ear.

"No, I mean it. I do. It's not proper conversation. Really, who talks about this sort of thing in the dead of night?"

Us, she doesn't say. Is that good or bad? Do friends do this?

Wheatley struggles with a yawn and pulls away. She's forced to draw back from the heat and the crook of his neck, but his hand is still clasped with hers, tight and hot and trembling.

"But I've got this feeling, you know. Maybe it's just because I'm hopeful, but I think we'll be okay. It's over now, isn't it? It's over. It's gone, done, in the past. And we're fine. Well… mostly."

She's staring at him, so close, chest pounding, pinned in place by his eyes, and all of the adrenal vapor in the world couldn't make her feel more alive.

"Your dreams must be worse than mine." Something pulls down at the corners of his mouth and fatigue paints shadowed half-moons under his eyes. "I'm sorry."

If she could just say something, anything, he would know that he doesn't have to tell her that anymore, but she can't. She can only grip his hand, vainly work the muscles in her throat, and block out the monsters crawling beneath her skull.

"So," he says, "not to ruin this, whatever this is, but… did you need help with those? I saw you with them, but I didn't want to ask."

Not completely parsing his question, she turns and looks down to find the linens and the towel in a heap on the floor.

Oh. So that's where they went. Huh.

Chell's fingers unlace from his. There is reluctance and longing embedded in fingerprints. Her hand tingles, prickling, as if it had fallen asleep. (If only she could.)

She kicks the towel up with her foot and catches it in her arms. Then, bending down, she scoops up the rest. Her face is beginning to burn, wildfires under her skin, and she squeezes her eyes shut because she can't look at him anymore. Somewhere in her ribcage something starts to churn and she wants nothing more than to dart out of the room and bury herself under the sheets and stay there until the sun rises and maybe even a few days after.

"So is that a no? Or a yes? Because whatever it is, it's fine. Just wanted to know, that's all."

She's waving her free hand wildly behind her as she whisks away. The linen tucked in her arm, she bolts of his room, beyond the doorway, down the hall, and there's a whirlwind behind her breastbone and she doesn't know how it got there but it's trying to burst through. The pads of her feet are pushing into the chilled woodwork of the floor as she enters the haven of her bedroom, and with a quick knock of her elbow, the door shuts behind her, click, safety, serenity.

Paleness and moonlight greet her. The companion cube sits near the window, the bureau sleeps by its side, and the bed is pressed against the wall.

Quivering. Deep breaths. Easy, now.

Chell undresses the mattress. Pulling sheets, she tosses them into the middle of the room. Off come the pillowcases and on to the pile. It's methodical and something she can focus on. She has to focus on something. Anything. Her mind is a hurricane and he's in the center of it.

God. She doesn't even know what that means.

When the bed is made and the anxiety is a smaller knot, she finds herself standing by the strewn heap of linen on the carpet, unable to climb into her work.

She doesn't want to dream again. If she could cram all the nightmares she's had and ever will have into a jar and throw it out in the lake, drowning them, suffocating them, she would.

But she can't.

If she has to dream, why can't it be about the present?

Why does it have to be about the past?

Why?

She rolls out the towel, kneels beside the sheets, and crosses her legs. The carpet is soft under her fingers and she slides them through the material as she leans back, shifting weight onto her arms. The ceiling stares at her, blank, a dark canvas, and she wishes she could find it in her to fill it with things that would remind her less of that place.

Breathing slowly, drawing in each inhale, Chell begins to tap the rug with one flattened hand. It's not a metronome, but it's a rhythm.

The muscles in her throat contract and tighten, fighting, resisting. Pain wells in her diaphragm. There is no hum, no voice, but there is a wispy flow of air.

"But I've got this feeling, you know. Maybe it's just because I'm hopeful, but I think we'll be okay."

It grows, burning, pouring out her lungs and through her nose.

"We'll be okay."

The words are twisted around her tongue and won't come out. She's trying so hard, insides tensing, hand tapping, mind swirling, but there's nothing.

We'll be okay, she doesn't say.

And that's a start.