"Are you sure this is the only thing she's accessed outside of her regular activities Milo?"

"Of course I'm sure. Hey you're the one who asked me to hack into her system, and you know how thorough Chloe is. But according to the records she accessed the file containing Jack's debriefing with Division the day after it was submitted."

"Do you think this somehow has something to do with what's been bothering Chloe?" asked Nadia.

Milo stared transfixed at the computer screen. "Milo?"

Milo shook his head, trying to refocus on Nadia. "Sorry, but man, I don't see how anyone could NOT be upset after reading this. I can't believe everything Jack had to go through. Those Chinese bastards really did a number on him."

Nadia stood up looking around the bullpen, looking for Jack. "I should find Jack and tell him what we found. It's the only plausible explanation that I can figure out." Just then she looked up to see Chloe walking down the hallway toward her desk. She stopped before she reached the main floor. Suddenly she hurried over to her desk, whispered something to the analyst next to her, grabbed her bag and took off in the direction of the exit. Confused Nadia looked back to the direction of where Chloe had emerged onto the floor to see a bewildered looking Jack Bauer.

"Oh boy," Nadia sighed.

"What is it," asked Milo.

"Looks like Chloe left for the day, and she looked pretty upset."

"She's looked upset the whole day, maybe she decided to leave early. What's the big deal about that?"

"Well she and Jack just came out of the same hallway, my guess something happened, and it has something to do with that file. I'm going to go talk to Jack, tell him what you found, see what he says."

***

Chloe sat in her car for a moment before starting the ignition. Her heart was still racing and her hands were clammy and shaking badly. She silently berated herself for almost losing it in front of Jack. One simple comment had nearly sent her into a meltdown. With still shaking hands she started the car, wanting to get out of there and away from seeing eyes as fast as possible. The radio came to life as she pulled out of her parking spot. She was not in the mood to hear another pop love song about how perfect someone's life was with their boyfriend. She was just about to turn the radio off when an eerie melody started playing. She recognized the song. The band had a weird name, Garbage.

Chloe was transfixed by the song. It seemed as if the song was playing only for her.

When Jack had been in China, everywhere she went she could swear she saw him. At the grocery store, walking down the Santa Monica pier. Each time she hoped that just maybe it was him, that he'd found a way to escape. But it was just her imagination playing tricks on her. Like when she was laying in bed at night, she could've sworn she heard him call out to her.

She really would do anything for him, not out of hope he'd fall in love with her, she wasn't that naive. It wasn't out of some hero worship either. She simply did it because it was the right thing to do, because he always did the right thing, it just sometimes took others awhile to realize it.

The last few notes of the song repeated hauntingly as she pulled up to her small apartment. She quickly shut off the car as some banal pop song came on next. She walked into her apartment and went straight to her laptop. Punching in a few bits of information, she soon had the artist's name, song title, as well as the song itself downloading onto her computer.

***

Jack looked up from his mountain of paperwork at the sound of someone knocking on the door to his office. "Come in," he called. In walked Nadia carrying a file, her expression troubled.

"Milo got the information off of Chloe's computer, and we think we might have an idea as to the cause of the problem."

"What is it?" Jack asked curiously.

"You're not going to like it."

Jack sighed, rubbing his hand over his face. "Damnit Nadia I didn't ask whether or not I'd like the information, I want to get to the bottom of what's bothering Chloe, and this is the only lead we have."

"I know Jack, but we don't even know 100% that this is the cause, but it's the only thing we have to go on."

"So what is it?"

"It's your debrief with Division of the events that took place in China."

"But that doesn't make any sense, those were marked as classified and supposed to be kept secure."

"I know Jack, but this is Chloe we're talking about. From what Milo could find, the day after you were debriefed and the file stored, she hacked into division and accessed the file, reading all the details. I know that even Bill wasn't privy to all of the details of your time in China, but it looks like Chloe found a way around it."

Jack paled at the thought of Chloe or any of his other friends finding out how bad it really had been in China. "Did you and Milo..." He could tell from her expression the answer to his unfinished question.

"Only briefly, we didn't look through the whole thing Jack. But you know we're here for you. We all are. We may not know the details, but that doesn't change a thing. And don't worry Jack, it stays between us."

Jack nodded. "Thanks for that."

***

Jack sighed glancing at the clock on his computer screen, well past nine and far later than he had wanted to leave. He may have had some time off before he had to come back to work, but that didn't stop the paperwork from coming. He ran his hands over his face, he really didn't want to get back into the habit of working 12-14 hour days again, it was bad enough when he'd end up pulling a 24 hour shift stopping another national crisis. He had wanted to stop by and see how Chloe was doing, maybe try and get her to talk to him, as long as he didn't screw up again like whatever it was that set her off this morning. All he had done was jokingly call her his guardian angel, "Protecting my life, limbs, and coffee..." Jack stared down at the file Nadia had brought him, his words to Chloe repeating in his mind over and over. He remembered how she had paled when he said that.

"Damnit," Jack yelled aloud, smacking himself with his hand. "You really are an idiot Jack," he said to himself. Quickly standing up, he grabbed his coat, leaving his paperwork on the desk. He rushed out the door, one destination in mind.

Twenty minutes later Jack pulled up in front of the small house Chloe lived in, her car parked outside. The lights were out, but there was a faint glow coming from the living room window. Jack got out of the car quickly and headed for the front door, late or not he needed to talk to her right away. He got to the front door and knocked. Waiting for a few minutes and knocking again, there was still no answer. He could hear music playing in the house. Sighing, he got out a credit card and made quick work of the locks. Stepping into the house he half expected to see her on the couch watching tv, but the glow he had seen coming from the door was actually her laptop. From the looks of it she had plugged the thing into her home stereo and put one song on to repeat over and over again.

Not wanting to hear any more of the song he turned down the volume on the stereo. It was then he heard a sort of whimpering groan coming from the direction of the bedroom. He slowly made his way towards the room, cautious. The door was slightly ajar. He pushed it open all the way. The light from the hall landing on where Chloe lay on the bed. He could see her thrashing about, moaning as if in pain. She was mumbling in her sleep, though all he was able to make out was "no, please stop it," and "he doesn't deserve this, take me instead." She kept thrashing about, Jack wasn't sure if he should try to wake her up, but he didn't want to do anything that might hurt her. All of a sudden Chloe screamed, a gut-wrenching scream that chilled Jack to the core. In a heartbeat he was at her side, his hand resting on her arm.

Suddenly she sat up, looking around the room, her mind still fuzzy from sleep. Her eyes landed on something, no someone. A someone who was the last person she expected to see crouching down by her bed, his thumb drawing comforting circles on her arm. "Jack?" she asked, still slightly confused, "What are you doing here?"

"I know you accessed the file Chloe, the debriefing I did with Division after the I got back from China."

"You're angry with me aren't you? Not that I blame you, I mean normally when I hack into files it's for a good reason, usually to save the world, or at least the United States." She was babbling. Jack placed his hand lightly on her mouth to silence her.

"I'm not mad, but I'm curious, why did you do it?"

"I...I had to know. I had to know what those bastards did to you, what it was you went through because of me. It's all my fault Jack, I know you probably hate me, though you won't admit it. Not that I blame you. It's my fault you even came back in the first place. You came back to help me. Then I couldn't even manage to find you so you could be rescued."

"Chloe stop. You have to stop blaming yourself. I know I don't. I know how long you looked for me, Bill told me. All the late nights you thought no one knew about. Or when you finally were hospitalized for exhaustion. I know how hard you tried. Unfortunately it didn't work out, but I'm here now, I'm safe. And that's because of you. I meant what I said earlier. You are my guardian angel. I don't think I would have made it this far if it wasn't for you. I mean, what would I have done if someone had used up all my coffee? I'd never be able to go catch the bad guys fueled by that poor excuse for coffee CTU buys."

Chloe finally let out a small laugh.

"Now that's what I like to hear. Why don't you try to get some sleep and we can talk about this more tomorrow? Trust me, I know it's hard but you need to talk about your nightmares, it's the only way to stop them."

"It's no use. I can never get back to sleep afterward."

"Scoot over."

"What?"

"I said scoot over. I'll stay with you, keep the bad dreams away. Then we're going to talk about this more tomorrow."

"Jack, I...well, what I mean is, you don't have to do this. You don't owe me anything."

"I'm not doing this because I feel I owe you, I'm doing this because I care about you Chloe, a lot more than you realize."

"Oh, um, ok."

She moved over on the bed, rolling over onto her left side, trying to create a space inbetween them, to make things less awkward for him. When suddenly she was dragged back until she was rolled over and pressed into a strong body. Jack wrapped his arms around her, bringing her head to rest on his chest. Chloe had never felt more safe or secure in her life. Her eyelids suddenly became too heavy to keep open. Already falling into a comfortable sleep.

"Now," Jack said, "Try to sleep. I'll be here if the dreams come back, and I'll be here in the morning. I'll be here for as long as you'll let me. Now get some sleep," he placed a soft kiss to her forehead, "My angel," he said quietly.

Chloe smiled and snuggled down into his strong arms, and for the first time since Jack had been taken, she slept.