Rated M for gratuitous profanity, violence, and ghoul sex.

The Fallout universe rights are currently owned by Bethesda Studios. I receive no money for this. It is merely a creative outlet, dream space, respite from the real world, and something to tide me over until Fallout 4 is released.


Chapter Fifty: I Could Make You Care

Charon kept his mouth shut until they were about halfway up the ramp. "You know, you do a good job lying to them but not to me."

Kate frowned at him and then turned away. "What gave it away?"

"You think I'd honestly tell you so that you could get better at it? No. You want to know, you've got to order it out of me."

"I didn't want you to worry."

"If you didn't want me to worry, you shouldn't have taken on Moriarty yourself."

Kate stopped walking. "I told you that I did it for you, didn't I? It was supposed to make us equal."

"Equal? How does it—?"

"I left you in Rivet City because you risked your life for me. An enormous, stupid risk. I had no idea if Moriarty had already talked to Jericho or not. I wanted to kill for you. To protect you. So I did. I did it to prove something to the both of us. You knew about the holodisk in the bag, right?"

"I knew there was one in there. They refused to tell me what was on it. Just that it was something that you needed to hear."

"Right. And I did. They made it while you were recovering. They talked about how you've got to protect you own out here and how what we've got is rare." She shrugged. "So that's it. I just knew that I needed to protect My Own."

"Kate—"

Kate scoffed, avoiding his eyes. "But I can't even do that now since my arms are fucking useless. I mean, so much for patching you up when you get hurt. I'm sure I'll lose that precision. Not to mention all the other shit that's out."

He set the bundle down. With a sad smile, Charon took her face into his hands and kissed her gently. The tears slid from her cheeks onto his. Charon pulled back and wiped them away with his thumb. He chuckled. "I think that you forget how stubborn you are. It'll get better if you take care of it, and you know how to do that."

She bit her lip. "But I'm scared. What if it doesn't?"

"Then I guess I'll have to get a lot better at using your pip-boy."

Kate tried not to laugh. "Hey now. There's more to me than my pip-boy."

"And I will learn those things too. I'm old, but I'm still capable of learning new things. Like how to be nice."

"Nice? Who said that you were nice?"

"Gob did."

Kate's eyes widened. "Really?"

"He also seemed somewhat unsettled by it." He wiped away more of her tears.

"God, I'm such a mess. Can't even wipe off my own damned tears." She sniffled and bit her lip. "Charon?"

"Hmm?"

"If it does come to that—you know, me not being able to do a lot of things, will it change how you—?" She couldn't even say the words.

"How I what?"

"Feel about me." A barely audible whisper.

Charon's hands moved in the air as he tried to figure out her body. He harrumphed, giving up. "How do I hold you so that I don't hurt you?"

"I—I don't—"

He stepped behind her, put his hands on her hips, and leaned into her, careful not to move her arms. He rested his head on hers, lips close to her ear. "Nothing could ever change how I feel about you. It saddens me that you even had to ask."

"I'm sorry. It's just—well, I told you I was scared."

"You did, but you did not mention that your fears were irrational."

"They don't feel irrational."

"Well, at least one of them is. I can see why you would be scared about me using your pip-boy." He had his own fears about her, but he could not dare ask him. It would be insane of her to still like him if he ever went feral. But what about the rest of him? If the rest of his hair and skin gave up?

She snorted. "Quit trying to make me laugh."

"No. You need it. Shit. We both do." He gave her hips a squeeze and then stepped around her once more. He cleaned her face.

"God, how can you even look at me right now? I'm all bandages and snot and obnoxious bruises."

"Seriously? You're asking a rot-face how he can stand looking at you?"

"Hey. Don't call yourself that."

"Then quit being irrational. You're somewhere between silly and pitiful looking, but you're still gorgeous, smoothskin."

"Flattery will get you everywhere."

"Will it get your nose to stop? Cause all of this snot is pretty gross." Kate stepped back self-consciously, but Charon laughed. "Actually, it's kind of fascinating. You may not have noticed, but I lost my nose a long time ago. Now quit moving. I want us to pay him off before he tries to hire Jericho to come after us."

"He wouldn't dare. I'm the one that keeps him in business. I suppose that would be incentive to send him after us after I healed up a bit."

Charon tucked the bundle of Moira's things under his arm, and they walked the rest of the way to Moira's as his other hand caressing the small of her back. He opened the door for her. She stepped in to the sight of the ever-bubbly redhead sweeping up what could only be her latest disaster. Although when Moira saw her, she was much more alarmingly excited than usual. Moira scrambled over to the door with broom in hand.

"Ooh! Ooh! Where is he! Let me see!" Moira circled Charon. "Oh my! He is a tasty little morsel, isn't he? Oh! Or big tasty morsel, oh but I guess you would know, huh? I can certainly see why you can't get enough ghoul meat. Rawr!" Moira slapped him on the ass. She moved to study Kate while she and Charon were rooted in stunned silence. "Oh, hey! You didn't happen to break anything, did you? One of my next chapters was going to be about—"

"Moira, what the fuck was that?" Kate snapped.

Moira tsked and rolled her eyes. "Well, you've seen his ass. You know how cute it is. Ooh! I just had a great idea! You look like you're out of commission for a while, so how about you let me borrow him?"

"Borrow him? Are you—?"

Moira waved a hand in the air. "Or rent him. We can work something out. You sure look like you could use some more stimpaks. What do you say?"

Kate made the mistake of looking at Charon. The glance was enough to give herself away. In his eyes, she could see that he now knew that she knew what Ahzrukhal had made him do. What was even worse was his acknowledgement that she was fully entitled to do the same to him if she so desired. She was so angry that she couldn't see straight. When Moira had touched him, she was put off. When Moira had asked to borrow him, she was offended. When Moira had offered to rent him, she was enraged. When she saw Charon's acceptance and willingness to submit to the same treatment by her, she was fury incarnate.

Kate stomped down her foot on Moira's as hard as she could and ground down.

"Ow! Hey! That's not nice!"

"Watch it!" Moira's merc grumbled, but he didn't bother moving. His eyes were amused.

"Charon is my companion, so you keep your goddamned hands off him. Are we clear?"

Moira pouted. "Aww. You're no fun. I can't help it if I'm curious. I've never made it with a ghoul before."

"Well, Gob is free now, but you should really ask first before doing anything else."

"Oh hey! You're right! Moriarty was no fun. He never let me borrow him."

Kate stared at her, dumbfounded. "You do realize that you don't 'borrow' people, right? Wait. It's you. Nevermind."

"Aww. You're always such a kidder! Did you bring back my stuff?"

Charon dropped the bundle on her counter and gave her his worst sneer. Undaunted, she dropped the broom and bounced over to the counter and began unwrapping the jumpsuit. She began sorting through the tools with corresponding "Mine"s and "Yours"s. When she was done, she shook out the jumpsuit.

"Huh. Good thing I'm a whiz with a needle. This thing has definitely seen better days."

"Did you fix my armor?"

"Don't I get a thanks for the tools?"

"Maybe if you had behaved yourself."

"Aww, you're so funny, Kate. No. I'm not finished quite yet. I got a little distracted today. I was working on it, but then Jericho came in and he was talking all about you and your little—wait, no—your big ghoul sex machine there, and I just started coming up with all sorts of questions that I wanted to test out—not that you're going to help me with that, apparently."

"Not everyone is your test subject," Kate grumbled.

"Including you," Charon said, touching her back once more. Kate leaned into his hand, giving him a grateful smile.

"I know. It's no fun. I just don't understand why no one has a healthy respect for science."

"Not in the hands of a psycho."

Moira guffawed. "Oh, Kate. You know I don't conduct experiments under the influence. That might ruin the results, but then I wouldn't even know I was wrong and needed to start all over again."

"Jesus. I didn't think it was possible for you to get even more dangerous."

"Oh, come now! You're just cranky because you got all shot up. Why don't you just go sit by the bomb for a few?"

Kate raised an eyebrow. "And why would I do that?"

"Oops. Oh, I guess I didn't tell you."

Kate took a step forward. "Tell me what?"

"Remember how you got all irradiated for me and I kind of hinted that it may have kind of sabotaged your DNA?"

Kate took another step. "Moira—"

Moira tsked. "Oh, don't get yourself all worked up. It's a good thing. You just looked so mad and lousy that I guess I didn't think that you could handle the good news at the time."

"And what could possibly be good about fucking up my DNA?"

"Well. It looks like radiation heals you now."

"What? How do you know that?"

"Remember when you passed out while I was treating you?"

Kate scoffed. "No. Can't say that I do."

"Well, you did, and so while you weren't groaning and moaning and throwing up everywhere, I came up with a few more things that I wanted to check out while you were all juicy and irradiated."

"What the fuck did you do?"

"Well, you see, I administered the RadAway a teeny bit at a time. And I just wanted to see if all that radiation had any effect on your rate of healing, you know, kind of like ghouls."

"Were you trying to turn me into a ghoul?"

"No, no! Don't be silly. You'd probably kill me if I did that. Well. You might not now. Although, he might. Anyway, so I would make a little cut, and they actually healed right up until you got below 400 rads. You just bled after that."

Kate snorted. "I thought that I just didn't remember cutting myself."

"Nope. That was all little old me."

"Moira—!"

"Oh, don't be a sour puss! They weren't deep. But hey! It's all good news, isn't it? You've got all the benefits of being a ghoul without all of the ugly. Why, your hair didn't even fall out."

Kate closed her eyes and bit her lip. "You're sure about this? That it will heal me?"

"Oh yeah. Saw it all myself, and like I said, wasn't even on psycho."

"No," Charon bellowed, removing his hand from her back.

Kate turned to him. "But—"

"Are you fucking crazy? Out of the question."

Moira waved a hand in the air. "Oh, you big softie. You're making a big deal out of nothing. She'll just be tired and vomit a lot. That's all, and she already knows what that's like. We'll just keep her glowing until everything is healed over. Not a second more." She put a finger to her chin. "Well, unless something neat happens."

"She's right, though. 400 rads really isn't that—"

"Can't you see? You're nothing but an experiment to her. She's probably just telling you that to sucker you in."

"Oh no! I would never lie about science."

Kate scowled at him. "You went under Zimmer's knife."

"That's different."

"How? I don't care about my shoulder. Shit, I don't care about most of my cuts. But that one on my forearm? That one went straight to the bone, Charon. And what am I going to do with a gimped up hand?"

"You are going to let me help you."

She scoffed. "Don't you see? That's the exact problem. That's why I left you. I took care of myself for years before you came along. Years. And you just make me feel like I'm helpless."

"Is that why you threw yourself at raiders the minute you were out of my sight?"

"I did it because I needed to get shit done."

Moira perked up with a giggle. "Oh, that's my fault. Well, not the raiders so much, but giving her the idea for going to the Super Duper Mart."

"Shut up, bitch. She is not your fodder," Charon snarled.

"Ignore her," Kate snapped. "Look, I can take care of myself, and I don't need you destroying yourself just because you don't think that I can."

Charon growled, running his hands over his head and tugging on the hair that he had left. "Destroy myself? Jesus fucking Christ, woman. You've got everything wrong. Everything. You are the one who ruined me. I didn't give a shit before you came along. I like hurting people, Kate. I enjoy killing. It's what I was made to do. But then you come along and show me that maybe there's another way, and then all of a sudden, I'm trying not to kill. Why? Because I'm trying to be a better man for you because I don't want to get you kicked out of cities. Because I want to be someone that you deserve. You are all I think about. The only goddamned thing I think about. You missed me? I was out of my fucking mind when I heard you left. I didn't know if you would ever speak to me again.

"I never fucking said you were helpless. Ever. In fact, since you apparently forgot, I have said the exact opposite. Hate me for caring about you, if you want, but just know that it is your own goddamned fault that you make me want to risk everything just to keep you from ever getting hurt. And just to be clear, that isn't the same thing as calling you helpless. The only way to destroy me is by trying to kill yourself, and I refuse to watch."

He stormed out of the door, ignoring her pleas for him to come back.


AN: Well, she finally got around to having that talk with him.