Sadie drinking herself under the table had become a nightly ritual at Gob's saloon. And after one too many, she'd fallen asleep, arm under her chin, her cheek mashed against the sticky bar top.
Charon watched her nod off, and made note of it. He'd traveled with her for barely three months, and only recently had the shock of who she was worn off on him. And now, in moments like these, he'd begun to parse out the habits of a wasteland legend. For his employer, a week in Megaton seemed a long time to stay in one place, especially with no end in sight. Maybe she was restless. Maybe that explained the drinking. Maybe this was typical. He didn't know her well enough to judge.
Charon shot a glance at the bartender. Gob knew Sadie better than Charon could ever hope, and Charon hardly knew Gob at all. He was shocked, at first, to see a familiar face here, no matter how faint the recognition. And out of that grew a quiet understanding between them. Gob offered answers for questions Charon didn't have the courage to ask.
Catching Charon's eye, Gob set down the glass he'd been washing. He leaned back, balled up the dirty rag in his hands, and stared pensively at a crack on the wall.
"The drinking isn't exactly..." Gob began. "It's not... Well..."
Gob trailed off, then shrank a bit, crossing his arms tight. He didn't seem to know how to broach the subject. He'd chided Sadie about it once or twice. But that was friendly banter, and this was something else.
"It is... concerning to you," Charon said.
Gob shrugged.
"It's just odd. Did something happen out there? On your way back to Megaton?"
Charon wasn't sure what qualified as noteworthy for someone like her. They'd been shot at - they'd seen less than palatable sights - but she took it in stride. She told him bits and pieces of her story, and the rest he'd patched together from months of listening to the radio. She fought battles, lost friends, wiped out the Enclave. She'd seen her fair share of the wasteland. The only marked change from the usual chaos, it seemed, was him.
The question hung in the air for quite some time. Gob sighed. It wasn't out of impatience, though, and Charon appreciated that. Sometimes he just didn't know what to say, how to say it, and it was easier not to speak at all.
"Look," Gob said at last. "I just think you might be able to... encourage her to take it easy."
Charon shifted uncomfortably.
"She may drink if she chooses," he said. "It is not my job to intervene. It is my job to protect her."
"Buddy... She's the Lone Wanderer. She doesn't need you to protect her."
Charon swallowed. That possibility had crossed his mind quite a few times already. It complicated things.
"If that is true..." Charon said. "I am not certain why she purchased my contract."
"Because she was trying to help you. She cares about you. She's a good person. You get that, don't you?"
He did, in theory. Ahzrukhal was cruel, and he was impersonal. Sadie was neither. She treated Charon like an equal, like a friend. He'd fallen short of returning the favor. He didn't know how. All he knew how to do was what she required of him.
"I don't know what's eating her, but she could use some comfort," Gob said. "It's the least you could do... And don't look like that."
"Like what?"
"Like I just asked you to disarm a bomb."
Gob may as well have. Charon looked at Sadie, and he became painfully aware. He didn't know the first thing about how to comfort someone. In fact, Ahzrukhal had seen to it that he was well versed in doing the opposite.
"Look," Gob sighed. "I gotta close this place up, and she's out cold. If you don't mind carrying her out of here, you'd be doing me a huge favor."
Charon stiffened, then reached out and jostled Sadie's shoulder. She grumbled, but stayed limp. Reluctantly, he hooked one arm under her legs and wrapped the other around her torso. It didn't take much to lift her. For someone capable of cracking open a man's skull with a rifle butt, she was unbelievably light.
For a moment, he was enthralled enough to forget who he was carrying. But then the panic set in. How would she react if she woke up like this? Would she be angry? Disgusted?
Charon drew in a shaky breath and adjusted his grip, cradling her head in the crook of his arm. He wasn't used to being this close to someone docile. He was accustomed to a certain kind of touch. Grappling, choking, beating. And this... This was petrifying.
"Worried you're going to drop her?"
Gob chuckled, and Charon mustered up a murderous glare.
"No."
"You look scared shitless."
"I am just not... used to this."
"You'll figure it out," Gob said. "Everyone does. Eventually."
Sadie slept well into the afternoon, and Charon didn't sleep at all. That wasn't unusual for him, but it was compounded by a niggling anxiety that he didn't know how to quell. His favorite calming ritual - dismantling his shotgun, cleaning, and reassembling it - didn't seem to help.
Occasionally, he glanced at his employer. It was hard not to. Absent the usual tension in her face, without the huge plates of power armor or the hood covering her shaved head, she seemed fragile. It was a side of her he hadn't seen. Even in the wasteland, she still pinched her eyebrows together while she slept, still stirred and tossed and turned. She was never this peaceful, always had her guard up. But Megaton was her home, and it was remarkable how different it made her.
He tried to find something else to occupy the time. He expected her to wake at any moment, and didn't want to be caught staring at her. His shoulder ached, as it often did when he'd ignored it for too long. It was an older wound, but it still needed attention, and tending to it was better than nothing. It figured that as soon as he pulled the bandage loose, she stirred. She didn't open her eyes, at first. She just groaned.
"Oh, Christ. My head."
She sat up, but she didn't look at him.
"Fuck," she muttered. "I overdid it."
He watched her stagger to the kitchen. She poured a shaky glass of water, put it to her lips, then frowned quizzically.
"How did I get back here?"
"I carried you."
"Oh, god." She flushed a little, and mashed her hand against her face. "You didn't have to do that. I would have woken up. Eventually."
"It was quicker this way. And you are not heavy."
No matter how hard Charon tried to be reassuring, he always seemed to miss the mark. Sadie sighed into her glass. At a loss of what else to say, he went back to tending his wound. He turned away and tugged the half-unraveled bandage from his arm.
"How is it?" she asked.
She closed the distance between them, eyeing the wound with a pained look. She'd already put her guard up again. Shoulders back, slight furrow in her eyebrows, jaw set forward. She was coiled tight.
Charon tied a fresh bandage and yanked his sleeve down before she could really assess the damage.
"It is mostly healed," he said.
"And your shoulder?"
She stared him down. He rolled it twice, hoping she didn't notice the slight wince that followed.
"It is stiff," he said. "But improving."
She sighed.
"I know I've said it before, but... I'm sorry. It shouldn't have happened."
"Please do not apologize. It is my duty to protect you."
"It shouldn't be. That's not fair."
A twisted expression crossed her face. He'd seen that look plenty of times, out in the wasteland, when Sadie reckoned with something cruel that she couldn't change. He finally put a name to it - pity. She pitied wastelanders she couldn't save. People she couldn't help. He fit that description, though he wished he didn't. She didn't want him to protect her. She couldn't grasp that he didn't have a choice. He barely knew her, but his contract compelled him. It told him her life mattered more. Telling her that only made things worse.
"You are still angry with me."
She drew back.
"No! God, no. I was never angry with you. I'm angry with that... that fucking contract."
He didn't see a distinction. The contract was so much a part of him that it was hard to tell where it ended and he began. He'd explained that, too, but he'd since learned to keep those thoughts to himself.
"We've been over this before," she continued. "You're not a meat shield. You're my... My friend."
Charon frowned. He had a rudimentary understanding of it at best, but friendship and sacrifice didn't seem incompatible.
"Friends protect each other. Do they not?"
Her guard slipped. Just for a moment. Her shoulders fell, and she blinked at him. But Sadie seemed to always revert to a state of doubt. She tensed again, her gaze hardening ever so slightly.
"Is that why you did it?"
She looked him in the face, scrutinizing. And he didn't know. He'd pushed her aside, taken a bullet for her, and there were so many reasons why. The contract always compelled him first, before he could think, before he could choose. It was only convenient that he happened to agree with it this time.
What could he say? That protecting the wasteland's only hero was a crushing responsibility? That he'd not only be failing himself if he let her die? That he felt some obligation to her that he didn't quite understand?
He could see now that his silence was killing her. He had to say something.
"Yes."
She pressed her lips together in a line. Maybe she didn't believe him. Or maybe she didn't want friendship, in which case Gob had set him up for failure. It was entirely possible. Sadie was guarded one moment, and earnest the next. She was easy to misread.
Sadie made her way back to the fridge and pulled out a beer. Charon followed her with his eyes. She popped the cap off, glanced back at him, and frowned.
"What?" she asked. "You're giving me that... look. That thing you do."
Charon never thought of himself as an open book. But somehow, Sadie knew exactly when he didn't want to say something, and managed to pry it out of him anyway.
"This is bothering you," she said. "Isn't it?"
She swished the beer in her hand. Charon nodded slightly, and Sadie sighed. She put the bottle down on the counter and curled up a bit where she'd perched against the ledge. Her fingers dug into her arms.
"Don't worry about it. I'll give it a rest. I promise."
He looked at her skeptically.
"Ok. What now?" She mustered a weary half smile and shook her head. "I'm getting pretty good at this, but I can't read your mind."
"You seem... unhappy."
"I'm just... Thinking too much. I always think too much. I'm never sure if I'm doing the right thing, Charon. It's exhausting."
Charon suppressed a sigh. He never anticipated the fabled Lone Wanderer to be someone so keen on self-flagellating. It was awkward, to say the least. He wasn't used to being talked at, and he never knew how to respond.
"Can... Can I ask you something?"
He gave her another nod. Better to stay quiet and listen. She always filled in the gaps. For someone who supposedly traveled the wasteland alone before she met him, she was remarkably afraid of silence.
"Are you happy?" she asked. "Staying with me, I mean?"
He thought about it. Ever since she led him away from Underworld, Sadie brought feelings of uncertainty, twisting sensations in his gut he'd never felt before. He was wary of her at first. But then he realized who she was. He respected her. And somehow, that made everything harder.
"Don't leave me hanging on this. Please," she said. "And be honest."
"I... am not sure."
She withered. Charon grit his teeth. Talking to her was painful. He never had enough of a chance to explain, never enough words, never enough time.
"I've... I've been thinking about this a lot," she blurted. She chewed on her thumbnail, hard, grimacing while she talked, as if each word stung. "You should have a choice. If... If you don't want me to have your contract, we can figure something out. I won't... I won't just leave you with anybody. But we'll make it work. Just tell me what you-"
"You are misunderstanding."
It was more forceful an interruption than intended, but he was frustrated. And it worked. She drew back in surprise and stopped talking. He stood up, at a loss of what else to do, and took one hesitant step forward. Visibly shaken, she closed the gap between them and reached out.
Her fingers came inches from brushing his forearm. Then, she balled her hand into a fist and pulled back, fidgeting with the hem of her shirt. Her gaze dropped to the floor.
He didn't quite understand her instinct to touch. She only did this when their conversations got difficult, which they so often did, but she never had the courage to follow through.
"I wish to stay with you," he said, haltingly. "But I am not very good at this."
"At... What?"
"Being... what you would like me to be. Being your friend."
She looked up and met his eyes, and he felt a cold spike of fear. He didn't know he could feel so petrified without his life in danger. But then again, his life was the only thing worth protecting before she'd come along. Maybe this was normal. He was used to a selfish existence, a simpler existence. But she'd started to matter, and it wasn't the contract telling him to care.
If this was friendship, it was terrifying. There wasn't a road map for this kind of thing. The longer they spent together, the more he noticed a subtext in every conversation, a hidden meaning that he missed more often than not. It was as if they spoke in code. He'd rather have a gun in his hands, rather be taking fire. He knew what to do in those situations.
He reached out and put a hand on her shoulder. He didn't know if it's what she wanted. He was painfully uncertain about this. About everything.
She reached up for his hand, haltingly. He almost yanked it back, sure that she was going to brush him away. But she placed her palm on his, and kept it there. And after a moment, she smiled in a way he'd not seen before. A genuine smile, one that reached all the way to her eyes.
"Don't worry," she said quietly. "You're doing just fine."
A/n: Thank you for reading! I hope you enjoyed my take on FLW and Charon's dynamic. I've always been anxious to explore a gentler and slower-paced dynamic between the two characters. Please let me know what you think, and keep reading for more! The chapters in this fic are all technically self-contained/stand alone one-shots with Sadie and Charon, but things will get more complex as their relationship progresses with each chapter.