He was getting tired of these bothersome feelings plaguing him day after day. When his blood wasn't pooling in his groin and making his armor uncomfortably tight, the blood was rushing to his face and giving him the horrifying idea that he may in fact be blushing. On some occasions, Charon was unlucky enough to experience both. This was one of those times.
Elle was waist-deep in the Potomac, using a tin can to pour water over her hair. They were heading back to Megaton from one of their ventures into D.C. when she spotted the waters and insisted that she wash the Super Mutant blood out of her hair. Before Charon could protest, Elle had stripped all of her clothes off and splashed into the river.
Charon now stood on the rocky shore facing away from the water, far enough away to give Elle some privacy but close enough that he could protect her at a moment's notice. His hands tightened on his shotgun and tried to focus on anything other than his naked employer behind him. He would not let his guard down, not for enemies and certainly not for the young vault dweller.
He had never allowed himself to think of his employers in a sexual way; his training simply didn't allow him to. Sex and affection were weaknesses, ways to be deceived and caught unaware. The first time Charon had caught himself thinking of Elle as anything other than the holder of his contract, he knew he was in trouble.
As the travelled through the Capital Wasteland, Charon found himself analyzing Elle's body for more than combative purposes. He studied how her fingers delicately skimmed over her weapons during her nightly inspection and repairs, the curve of her toned thighs and ass as she crouched on a rock overlooking a raider camp and scoped out a target, the gentle swell of her breasts that he could just barely make out when she was wearing an oversized shirt to bed back in Megaton. Increasingly and beyond his control, these studies were turning sexual. He pictured her fingers wrapped around his cock, slapping her tight round ass until it left a red handprint, her tits bouncing as she rode him until she screamed in ecstasy.
Elle started humming, just loud enough for him to hear, and it snapped him out of his fantasy. Charon hoped his training wasn't wearing off or he would soon be as useless and vulnerable as all the other male mercenaries who lusted after his employer. But there was no other explanation for how he had been feeling lately. Two hundred years was a long time, probably much longer than he was ever intended to be used by the group that had "brainwashed" him, as Elle put it. He couldn't remember a time before the contract, but over the past couple employers, he had noticed himself becoming more in tune with his own thoughts. Although he had to carry out Ahzrukhal's orders, no matter how cruel and depraved, Charon spent late nights on duty in the Ninth Circle feeling something he almost considered remorse. In his early years, these feelings were nonexistent, so it was uncomfortable to suddenly feel guilt over his actions without being able to refuse an order or repent.
Elle was entirely different. When they helped rescue Big Town citizens from a group of Super Mutants, Charon felt a sense of pride, like the satisfaction he got from landing a difficult headshot on an enemy. She had smiled at him, no differently than any other time, but that particular smile sent his heart racing. Elle was an anomaly in the Wasteland. She didn't just act for her own survival, she actively sought out ways to help others, even if it meant putting herself in danger. Charon had lost count of the number of times he saved her life because she was too impassioned in the heat of battle to notice an enemy in her periphery. He admired her courage, even if it was often impulsive and resulted in Charon taking a bullet to the arm.
Elle's humming cut off abruptly, followed by a louder than normal splash, and Charon spun around, his mind racing with a number of scenarios. A raider sniped her with a dart gun, a Mirelurk King pulled her beneath the dark waters… But Charon spotted her pale shape under the surface, swimming casually in the river's gentle current. He lowered his shotgun with a sigh, unclenching his teeth.
This was getting ridiculous, he thought as he traced the shape of her long lean legs with his eyes. A sudden thought of those legs wrapped around his waist as he pinned her against a wall overcame him, and he groaned as he grew hard once again.
Elle surfaced, but Charon didn't turn away. He was hypnotized by the trail of water snaking its way down her lower back from her dripping hair. Charon had the urge to run his tongue along it, tracing her spine gently and making her shiver. Elle reached up to push the wet hair from her face, and her raised arms revealed the outer curve of her right breast.
Charon promptly spun back around, closing his eyes tightly and trying to focus on anything but his employer. Exploding raider heads, misshapen centaurs, that damn annoying Moira… He wished a molerat would toddle by just so he could have something to kill, but a gentle splashing growing louder indicated that Elle was wading out of the water towards him.
He so desperately wanted to grab her right then, soaking wet and exposed for him, and fuck her senselessly on the shore but it was his common sense that stopped him, not his training. He was a centuries-old ghoul, with ragged skin and exposed muscle, and the wasteland had taught him that no smoothskin would ever want to fuck a ghoul. Even if they did, for some inexplicable reason, the shame from other smoothskins would be enough to deter them.
On top of all that, Charon feared that Elle would reject him and give away his contract, and that was a far worse fate than anything he could imagine. She was the best thing that had happened to him in all of his memory, spanning across the centuries. She treated him as an equal, as a friend. When he was with her, Charon almost felt human again.
"Ready to go?" Elle asked, slinging her laser rifle over her shoulder, dressed once again.
Charon grunted his assent and she gave him another one of her radiant smiles. As she strode off towards Megaton, he hesitated. A horrible tingling feeling was making its way over the surface of his skin, even over the weathered parts where he thought the nerves were damaged beyond sensation.
He was definitely in trouble.