Note: Charon gets drunk and a little... weird. Entirely out of character for him, but it's my personal take on the situation. Emily gets assaulted in this chapter and the next.

Update: Comma hunting.

Emily put away her tools and kicked the bottom of the door, growling. Great, just great. The heap of a ghoul had broken the door so badly she would have to have him kick it open, just to get out of the house. That meant she'd probably have to have Walter come down and take a look at it, in the morning, after Charon slept off―well, he wouldn't be doing that, he never slept. He was sitting on the couch, staring into the air with a weird smile on his face.

Maybe it was a bad idea to try to break him of whatever conditioning he'd been subject to, but she wasn't sitting well with the idea of being enslaved. While she was away from him she'd helped a couple of runaway slaves at the Lincoln Memorial, and she found her opinion from before was selfish. She should have wanted to help him for him, not for her own personal whims. ...Even if he wouldn't have let her alone to bone anyone she pleased.

That was in the past, now. She no longer wanted anything to do with Jericho. That fucker had helped her get back into the shack when she first returned from Raven Rock, and flat-out attempted to rape her in the living room. Yeah, she'd kneed him in the groin. She ought to have shot his grimy ass! And yeah, he'd complained that she'd wanted it bad, back then. But this wasn't back then.

Emily put away the toolbox and grabbed the bottle of scotch. What was the limit for a recently-freed brainwashed ghoul bodyguard? He'd drank almost an entire bottle of forty proof booze.

"Feels good," he repeated.

"Well, yeah," she replied. "That's what I said. But you can't be drinking all my booze. You don't wanna end up like I did that one night."

"Pretty hair," he said, and she widened her eyes in surprise.

"What the hell are you talking about?" she asked.

Charon stood up and grabbed her by the head, turning it to the left and right. Emily yelped and moved backward, trying to dislodge him. Aw, shit! He had a firm grip on her hair with one hand, and was running his torn fingers through the other side.

"Let me go, Charon!" she said. Man, that fucking hurt!

"Mmmm?" he said, but released her hair. She growled, and smoothed out her hair, glaring at him. "It is pretty," he said, like that was an excuse.

"Hard, ain't it hard, ain't it hard, to love one who never did love you," she mumbled, and stopped herself. Shit, that fucking holotape of Autumn's was still running around her head. She brushed out her hair with her fingers and mouthed the words to the song to herself. She felt broken, like a skipping record. It was not pleasant.

"Are you going to fix the door?" she asked the ghoul, who was still standing in front of the couch. He was apparently watching her play with her hair. The song faded away in her head.

"What?" He turned to look at it. "I will break it," he said.

"Well, I can't fix it, so you'll have to break it." She scoffed and crossed her arms. "That is, if you are still planning to leave!"

Charon blinked his eyes and stared at her. "I am drunk," he said. "Not... a good idea."

"Then you can sit on the couch until you sober up, and we'll talk about it," she said. "I'm going upstairs." She climbed the stairs and opened the bedroom door, and pulled off her leather jacket.

What the hell, man, she thought. After all that shit with the ZAX computer calling itself Eden, she had debated on not ever coming back to find Charon. But she had felt terrible for that thought―he was so nervous that she would break his contract in the wastes, so upset that he would not be able to care for himself. Shit, that was half the reason she'd resolved to break the contract before he pissed her off so badly by being fatalistic about it. He'd rather die than be free, that was dumb!

And Hannibal, at the Memorial―Hannibal had answered a lot of her questions, so she was certain that Charon was a slave. Nobody should be a slave to anything, even a government so corrupt as the Enclave's vision of a real America.

Emily shuddered. She hummed a few bars of "Pastures of Plenty" and changed out of her leather armor into a more comfortable dress. Wasn't as comfy as the old Vault suits, but she refused to wear those anymore. It was just another form of slavery, binding her to a dying dream of the Enclave.

She closed the door behind her as she left, and turned to see Charon standing behind her at the top of the stairs. "I told you to sit on the couch," she griped.

"Do not have to," he muttered. He was blinking rapidly.

"If you're drunk, then you really shouldn't be climbing stairs," she said, and grabbed his elbow to turn him around. He laid a hand on her shoulder, firmly stopping her from moving him or herself. "Don't be an asshole, Charon!" She tried to pry his fingers off of her. Damn. A lot stronger than I thought.

Oh, for fuck's sake! He was playing with her hair again. It was hilarious, the look on his face as he ran his hands through the brown glory her parents had given her. Like he hadn't been allowed to touch a woman in years―

She was frightened by that. Shit, he probably hadn't! Had the contract even allowed him to? Emily lifted a hand and grabbed his, holding it firmly, but he kept moving it through her hair and the action was pulling her hair out of her head. "Ow! Fuck, stop!"

"Do not have to," he repeated, a little more firm.

"I don't want you to touch my fucking hair!" She jerked away from him, but he tightened his grip on her hair. She was back in the same position as before, except this time he wasn't letting go.

She breathed hard, in and out through her nose. Whatever the fuck was going through his head―dammit, she should have hid the fucking booze, she hadn't even thought about his reaction to alcohol. Hadn't remembered that he didn't sleep, probably wouldn't pass out like an ordinary person. "Charon, please let me go," she said, her eyes turned to the floor, head bowed down. He was running those ragged fingers along the back of her scalp now, and she shivered in response to the touch.

"Do not want to," he corrected himself. "You have... pretty hair."

"Yeah, it ain't gonna be so pretty when I have to knee you in the nuts to get your hands off my head, asshole," she growled.

Charon laughed. It was an alien sound in the air of the shack, something that she had never heard before. And never wanted to again. It was an unpleasant laugh, a laugh that told years of unspoken malevolence. Emily quailed in his grip, and began to mumble.

"Now as I look around, it's mighty plain to see..." She grabbed his wrist and dug her fingers into the flesh, feeling the bones under the muscles, intentionally trying to hurt him. "This world is such a great and a funny place to be..."

She shrieked when he turned and dragged her downstairs by her hair, stumbling a little on the steps. She fell and he pulled her over to the couch, where he picked her up by one shoulder and her hair, and sat her down onto the cushion. He stood behind the couch.

"Oh, the gamblin' man is rich and the workin' man is poor," she chattered. Her face was on fire, and she wished she could shut up for two minutes and figure out how to get him to let go. "And I ain't got no home in this world anymore."

Charon brushed her hair back, running fingers through it. After a moment, he paused and pulled her head backward so far that she was forced to look up at his face. The expression he was wearing was enough to make a lesser person wet their pants, it was so full of anger and―something else, but she did not want to speculate on that.

"Let me go!" she said, again.

"Are you going to drink?" he asked her.

Emily shuddered involuntarily at the thought. "Not if you're gonna stumble around the shack, dragging me by my fucking hair!" she hissed. "You drank all the scotch, anyway!"

Why was she not fighting against him? She could easily grab up a gun and shoot him, but she didn't want to. For all her feelings against ghouls before―no, she didn't feel that way anymore. Charon had been loyal to her as a bodyguard, saving her from her own stupidity, keeping monsters off her ass―"They took John Henry to the graveyard, laid him down in the sand..."

Shit, his face was getting closer to hers! She reached up her hands to push him away and he lowered his hands onto her neck, running thick fingers around her flesh. She stopped herself, and blinked back tears. "What the hell are you doing?" she asked, her voice wobbling.

Charon tightened his grip and picked her up by her neck. She shrieked again and climbed her feet backwards as he pulled her to a standing position, over the back of the couch, drop-kicking him in the crotch.

"You made me do that," she yelled. He hadn't let go, his arm was extended out and away. Now she was leaning against the couch, her head away from his body, her knees and bare feet slipping down to dangle behind the couch. Her hips came to a rest against his.

Oh, fuck! He had an erection! She kicked out again, but he tightened his hands even more and pulled her to a standing position behind the couch. Little spots of white began to flash in front of her eyes, and her hands scrabbled for purchase against his rough flesh.

Abruptly, he pulled her against him and let go of her neck, moving his hands to her shoulders. She gasped for air, rubbing her neck, and he breathed hot air down her back. "This... is what you do, when you are... drunk?" he said, making it a question on the last word. His hips moved forward by an inch or two and her eyes popped.

"Every locomotive comin' a-rolling by, hollered, there lies a steel-drivin' man, man, man," she sang, under her breath, fast and shaky. "Charon, please, let m-me go. Don't do this!"

He did let go, but he did not move away. His breath down her neck was hard panting. She trembled. "Is this not... what you do?" he asked. He sounded slurred, and she knew he'd drunk the bottle quickly―it must have caught up with him, finally.

"Well, you sure as hell don't half-strangle someone!" she snarled. She tried to edge away but she was trapped between the couch and him, and he was noticeably aroused. If she were drunk herself, that would have been a sobering thought. He was too close to doing something terrible―

"I have never been drunk, before," he said, slowly.

"Well, park your ass on the couch and stop acting like a goddamn rapist!" she shrieked, and pulled herself away. "Goddamn asshole!"

Charon snapped a hand out and grabbed her wrist, holding her in place. "This is what you did. With Jericho."

"No!" she yelled, and hit him in the wrist. "No, that is not what I did!"

"Then... what?"

Emily set her face and scrunched up her mouth and glared at him. She said nothing, just stared into his weird blue eyes and drew her brows together.

"What was it, if it was not this?" he asked, his words a little more coherent.

"It was not this," she hissed, unable to explain. "Let go of me or I will cut your goddamn hand off and shove it up your ass!"

Charon pulled her back to him and she flung out her free hand, her palm impacting with his nasal cavity. He paused, and growled, and tightened his hand on her wrist.

Fuck!