Charon ground a cigarette into the ashtray beside him. He'd gone through five or six already, a conservative tally for nights like these.
He sat at the table outside Sadie's front door, shivering. Drenched in sweat, his shirt still clung to his skin, no less clammy than it was an hour ago. He lit another cigarette. One more, maybe two. Maybe the nicotine would finally do its job, and take the edge off before Sadie woke.
It was wishful thinking. He'd only burned halfway through one of them when the door behind him creaked open. Sadie staggered out, clad in a ratty pajama shirt, bomber jacket thrown on against the cold.
"You too?" she muttered. She squinted at him, grinding her palms into her eye sockets. "I figured you were upstairs."
She flopped into the rusted lawn chair beside him. He'd gone rigid with surprise, but she seemed too groggy to notice. She fumbled for the pack of cigarettes on the table, frowning as she shook one from the box.
"Couldn't sleep?" she asked.
Charon nodded.
"Neither could I... Bad dreams?"
"Yes."
He left it at that. She didn't need to know that he'd been coming out here for weeks. The truth would only upset her. Sadie lit her cigarette, then paused, searching his face as she tossed the pack on the table.
"Is... Is something bothering you?"
Charon took a long drag and looked away, stalling for time. He'd been dreading that question for quite a while. He didn't have an answer, at least, not one she'd accept at face value. Simple fact of it was, he'd finally gotten comfortable with her friendship, only to grow less and less certain he deserved it.
He didn't feel like himself. Lately, sleeping brought snapshots of things he'd rather forget, and with them, a guilt he couldn't shake. He wasn't one to dwell on the past. Unfortunately, this string of rough nights made it difficult to do anything but.
"It's okay, you know," she said quietly. "If you don't want to talk about it."
"I am just... not certain how to explain it."
Sadie scraped her boot across a patch of gravel.
"I know what you mean," she murmured.
Charon shot her a wary glance. Sadie was all too ready to let him off the hook. Maybe it was exhaustion. Her sleeping habits, along with his, had taken a turn for the worse. He heard her thrashing in her bed most nights, though a generous nightcap usually kept her asleep. He'd spotted the half-empty bottle of bourbon left out on the kitchen counter. Why that failed to do the trick tonight was a mystery.
Charon waited for an explanation, but Sadie didn't offer one. Her pained monologues often began with fits and starts, but this time, she kept her lips pressed together, eyes to the ground. Her head rested heavy against her fist.
"You are... restless," he offered.
He cringed at his own brevity. Sympathy wasn't his strong suit. Sadie shifted, ashed her cigarette, then slouched deeper in her chair.
"It's cabin fever..." she said. "Or its guilt, or something. I don't know. I should be out there, helping people. I'm not cut out for... this."
Charon nodded. He understood, because wasn't cut out for it either - six months in Megaton left little in the way of distraction. No more weapons to scrap, no more junk to sort through. Each day blended into the next, and the boredom made his brain wander to places he wished it wouldn't. Sadie rubbed a hand across her face and leaned back.
"I need..." she began weakly. "I need to go somewhere. Anywhere. Just not... here."
"Then we should go."
Charon bit his tongue. His reply landed sharper than intended, especially next to the silence that followed. Sadie set her jaw, her lips drawn thin. Her gaze bored holes into the dirt.
"Are you sure?" she said, at last.
"I will go wherever you go."
"If you come with me, you'll get shot at. You'll get hurt."
"I am accustomed to all of those things."
"I know, but... It wasn't your choice to be."
Charon scowled. She meant well, but he felt more and more like she'd mistaken him for someone he wasn't. Someone fragile and mild-mannered, someone far more deserving of a gentle hand.
"I will be fine," he said bluntly.
She grimaced.
"That's... That's not what I..." Sadie trailed off, still staring at her boots. "I'm... I'm asking if you want to."
"I want to be by your side."
Sadie blinked at him. Charon tensed, suddenly hot despite the frigid morning air. He so rarely spoke without thinking, but Sadie conjured a perilous mix of frustration and panic that pushed him in ways he didn't expect.
He looked at her, bracing for her telling scowl. He didn't find it. Instead, Sadie shrank a little, tucking her chin behind the collar of her jacket.
"I'm glad, " she murmured. "I was... I was hoping you'd say that."
Charon held his breath. This, whatever this was, felt uncannily like being held at gunpoint. No one else glimpsed the gentler side of her, no one else but him. He didn't know what he did to deserve it.
What she saw in him was anyone's guess. They couldn't be more different, and every sleepless night hammered that fact home more than the last. Sadie brooded over right and wrong, took the world upon her shoulders. Charon didn't think the world was worth the trouble. Yet, Sadie saw something in him, something endearing, something worth keeping.
He was certain she'd realize her mistake. It was only a matter of time.
Sadie looked like hell, and Charon's stomach flipped at the sight of her. She was covered in gore. Considering how quickly the battle had turned in their favor, it likely belonged to someone else, but that was little consolation.
"Are... Are you injured?" he asked.
He stared at the black sheen of blood that splattered up her torso. He was plastered with much of the same. In the haze of battle, he'd forgotten how many raiders he'd killed, lost count of the bullets and nail boards that grazed far too close to hitting their mark. It seemed Sadie had, too. She ran her hands over her torso, her arms, her legs, searching for wounds hidden by the layer of carnage.
"No," Sadie said at last. "You?"
He shook his head. A quick check turned up some sore spots, but nothing serious. Abruptly, Sadie sat up and brushed past him. She skirted a low brick wall, and when she reached the end of it, she ducked, rifle at the ready.
"Good," she said, without looking. "Let's keep it that way."
Charon balked. He wasn't used to being taken at his word, but Sadie didn't question him like she usually did. He expected her to fret over him, to doubt him in moments like these, but the growing tension between them had fallen away. Killing raiders, it seemed, didn't leave room for worry.
Sadie leaned forward, rested her rifle on the wall, and fired. A quick scowl told him she'd missed. She looked back at him, and gave a signal with her hands. Wait here.
She lined up a second shot and took it. A few moments of silence, then, a toothy grin. She gestured to him again. All clear. Come out.
Charon nodded. Her wordless commands weren't really commands, not as far as his contract was concerned. But they were simple cues to follow. Watching her, waiting for her next signal, it was easy to forget how often their communications broke down.
He followed her into the open, still scanning with the barrel of his shotgun. Sadie stopped a few paces ahead of him. Lowering her rifle, she wiped the sweat from her eyes.
"Fuck," she laughed. "That was too easy."
Dead raiders were strewn in every direction, a testament to the chaos of the last few hours. Charon gripped the strap of his shotgun with both hands. With the mayhem over, he felt oddly exposed. He grimaced as Sadie stepped over a particularly gruesome corpse, one he'd pumped full of shells. Not a single one of them was aimed for a quick kill.
"Jesus," she said. She paused, looking over his handiwork. "You really did a number on this one."
Charon swallowed. Laid out at her feet, clear as day, was a part of himself he couldn't change. Violence felt good. Brutality felt good. It always did, no matter the circumstance. He winced at the stab of guilt in his chest. He expected her to look back at him, for some disgust to show on her face. Instead, Sadie pursed her lips, then gave a quick nod, as if she were appraising a piece of quality craftsmanship.
"Nice work," she said.
With that, she bent down and shoved the corpse aside, ripping a magazine from a nearby rifle. More out of shock than anything, Charon laughed. He wasn't well-practiced at it. The sound - breathy and hoarse, hardly much of a laugh at all - stopped Sadie in her tracks. She looked over her shoulder, brow furrowed, and blinked at him.
Charon drew back a little. Surely, he'd been too cavalier. He braced for her to lash out, to tell him he was wrong to find humor in any of this. He braced for her to unveil some dearly held principle he'd managed to overlook. It wouldn't be the first time. He barely grasped the way she saw the world.
"I think that's the first time I've heard you do that," Sadie said.
She laughed, then, too. A lopsided grin curled across her face.
Charon didn't know what came over him. Perhaps the adrenaline was to blame. Perhaps he'd let his guard down just a little too much. Perhaps it was her disarming, doltish expression, smeared with gore, that pushed him. Whatever the reason, he smiled back at her. It felt awkward, contorting his face in a way he so rarely did.
He wished this feeling wasn't familiar. Smiling at her, he felt the kind of contentment he'd only ever achieved through something heinous. For so long, he'd been at the beck and call of a despicable person, but he wasn't unwilling. Decades of serving Ahzrukhal taught him to dread the moment this thrill gave way to regret.
The longer he stood here with her, the more apparent it became - that moment would never come. For the first time in a long time, he'd done something decent, though he didn't have himself to thank for it. Sheer happenstance put his contract in the hands of someone good. Someone who couldn't help but be the hero. Someone worth sticking by.
It wasn't much to be proud of. But it was reason enough to feel happy.
An abandoned shack, a barricaded door, and a small fire made for a more comfortable night than either of them expected. Charon sank against a pile of sandbags, his eyes closed. Once in a while, Sadie's knee bumped against his, a wordless reminder of her presence.
The most recent lull in their conversation stretched on for nearly an hour. So far, the silence had been a comfortable one, but now, Sadie's breath hitched every few minutes, keeping Charon on edge. It seemed to him that she had something to say, though she struggled find the words.
"I can't help thinking..." Sadie said at last. "About why I still do this. Why I keep coming out here, after all this time."
Charon tensed. Her sleepy small talk was a welcome break from the strained discussions they so often had. Regrettably, this edge in her voice marked a return to the usual. Sadie leaned forward. She propped her elbows on her knees, then screwed her palms into her eye sockets.
"Shooting things makes me feel better," she said. "That's fucked, isn't it? I should be out here because it's the right thing to do, not because I don't know how else to cope. Not because... Because it feels good."
Charon frowned. Her agonizing came out of the blue, and as always, he found himself playing catch-up. Sadie pulled her hands from her face, glanced at him, and let out a sharp exhale through her teeth.
"Sorry," she murmured. "I swear, I don't do this on purpose. I'm just... angry. I've been angry for a long time."
Her posture collapsed inward, her gaze downcast. It struck him how small she made herself, in moments like these.
"I... understand," Charon said. "More than you know."
Sadie scowled and rested her chin on her knees. Charon grimaced. He'd fallen woefully short of comforting her, and there was so much left unsaid. He wanted to tell her everything, tell her that he recognized the bitterness she carried with her. He recognized it, because he carried it too. All the people he'd hurt at Ahzrukhal's behest stood in as punching bags, outlets for decades of pent up anguish.
She needed to know. She'd feel better knowing. And yet, he couldn't bring himself to form the words. Sadie reached down and picked up a tire iron she'd set by the fire. She stared ahead, raking the coals back and forth, her jaw clenched tight.
"Sometimes I worry..." she said. "That I'm not the person you think I am."
Charon scoffed.
"That is... laughable."
Sadie deflated, then jabbed the fire with a little more force, sending sparks into the air. Charon sighed, heavily. He didn't mean to be so blunt, but he ran up against her guilty conscience time and time again, and never once got to the root of it.
"There is... So little you could do," he explained. "To make me think less of you."
Sadie didn't react. She left the tire iron wedged among the embers. Charon swallowed, his mouth suddenly dry. He didn't know how to interpret her stillness, much less the fact that she wouldn't look at him. Finally, after what felt like an eternity, she drew in a shaky breath.
"That means a lot," she sighed. "Coming from you. "
She blinked at the fire, then closed her eyes.
"I know it's stupid," she said. "But sometimes... Sometimes I just need to hear it."
With a shuddering exhale, she uncurled, leaning back to rest alongside him. Charon felt he'd let her down. He felt the need to confess - to what, specifically, he didn't know.
He sat with it for a moment, tried to make sense of it all. He wanted to explain the breathless anxiety that overtook him in moments like these. He wanted her to know how desperately he struggled to understand her. Though he failed, most of the time, he still found what they shared - whatever it was - well worth the effort.
He'd never felt so trapped, so pathetically tongue-tied. The minutes dragged on, and he teetered dangerously close to rambling nonsense on the off chance that something would give her solace. He didn't get the opportunity. After a long stretch of pregnant silence, Sadie shifted against the sandbags. Slowly, her full weight slumped against him.
Charon tensed. He racked his brain, clueless as to why she'd pressed so close to him. He waited for her to say something, anything, until the steady rhythm of her breath spelled it out for him. Sadie stirred a little, nudging against him, but she was undoubtedly, unmistakably asleep.
With one hand on her shoulder, he prepared to push her away, when something stopped him. For the first time, he noticed the crooked angle of her nose, noticed the scar running along the bridge where she'd broken it years ago. He wasn't sure why such a minor detail held his attention. Until now, he'd never thought of her as pleasing to look at - he'd never thought of anyone that way. Yet, he found himself face to face with an odd fascination he didn't realize was possible.
Charon released her and leaned back. He meant to move her, eventually. He meant to set her on the ground, ample space between them. Intentions aside, he didn't account for his own curiosity - much less his own exhaustion - and in no time at all, he succumbed to both. The weight of her body against his already felt a little less alien, a little less like an intrusion. He started to find her warmth soothing, the slow rhythm of her breath oddly hypnotizing. He started to dread the moment they'd part.
He bargained with himself. Just a moment longer, and he'd put this to an end. Just a few more seconds of comfort, of a closeness he'd never felt before.
Slowly, unwittingly, he let her lull him to sleep.
When Charon woke, it was only thanks to a strip of harsh sunlight coming through the rotted ceiling of the shack. He lay in the same position as the night before, Sadie pressed against him. He shifted in a vain attempt to slip away before she woke. At the first hint of movement, Sadie stirred. She blinked herself awake, lifting her head groggily at first. Then, she shot bolt upright.
"F-Fuck," she breathed. "I didn't realize..."
She scrambled back, her face flushed a bright shade of pink.
"I'm- I'm really sorry... I'm not sure what... What I..."
Charon sat up, still rubbing the sleep from his eyes. Sadie glanced at him, then looked away again, chewing her thumbnail with a mortified expression.
"I... I could have moved you," he said, hesitant. "But I did not."
Sadie rubbed a hand across her face, then cursed under her breath. For a moment, Charon worried he'd misread her discomfort. Maybe it wasn't his feelings she cared about. Maybe she'd crossed a line she never meant to cross, been vulnerable in a way she couldn't take back. Maybe she never wanted to be close to him. It was entirely possible.
Sadie exhaled, her shoulders falling from where they'd crept up to her ears. For once, it seemed he'd said the right thing, or something close to it, though he could never be sure. Sadie still kept her distance, her arms crossed, fingers digging into her skin. Then, she glanced at him, a wordless apology pinching on her face.
"I didn't keep you awake, did I?"
He shook his head. Sadie slouched forward, her elbows resting on her knees, and sat for a minute or two in silence.
"Did you... Did you sleep alright?" she asked, after a moment.
Charon thought about it. He couldn't remember the last time he'd made it through the night. And for once, it was a deep sleep, free of dreams save for a few flickers of discomfort that he could hardly recall.
"Yes," he said. "Better than I have in a long time."
He looked at Sadie. The blood hadn't left her cheeks, but she seemed different now, her embarrassment a little tamer than before. She kept her chin tucked, picking intently at a hangnail, still reluctant to look up.
"Good," she said, at last. "Me too."