The Distance Apart

Charon regretted leaving as soon as he did it. Or rather, the next day when he first realized he actually had left her. Alone.

He should have stayed. But what was he supposed to do? He may have been a slave to his contract for most of his life, but he had felt it beneath his dignity to beg her to stay. For over a year (fourteen months, seven days, and yes, he was still counting), he'd regretted that damn show of pride.

The day after it happened, he'd gone back to the raider camp. To this day, he still had no idea what he had planned to do. If he would've gotten on his knees and pleaded to come with her. If he would've just followed behind at a distance, satisfied to be keeping her safe. But she was gone. And the girl knew what she was doing - not a damn track or clue as to where she had headed.

But it was a lie to say he couldn't have found her. He'd heard her talk about her place in Megaton. Knew she would be visiting the Brotherhood sooner or later. And there was no way she'd let Project Purity go. But after a couple weeks… the idea of seeing her again bothered him almost as much as never seeing her again.

What would he say? What would she say? Why did he even want to see her again?

Charon sure as fuck wasn't going back to Underworld. Aside from not particularly caring for anyone there (or elsewhere, for that matter), there was nothing for him to do there. Was he just supposed to sit on his ass at Carol's? And in the end it all came back to her. She'd be back there, eventually. He wouldn't let her find him there, pathetic and lost without her. Regardless of how true that sometimes felt.

It's not because of her, he'd scold himself. It was not having an employer. He'd been bound by his contract for so long he didn't really remember anything else. Freedom was disconcerting. It was an odd feeling, a strange sort of uneasiness in the pit of his stomach when he had to make decisions. He could sleep whenever he wanted. Go wherever he wanted. Do whatever he wanted. Talk to whomever he wanted.

At night he tried to ignore the fact that maybe there was one person he could not talk to whenever he wanted.

It was lonely out in the Wastes. He'd never noticed that before. Or maybe it'd just never bothered him.

But it did bother him now. Like a gentle nagging in the back of his mind telling him that something was wrong. So he started hiring himself out as a mercenary to small settlements (never too close to anything big – he wanted the luxury of remaining anonymous). The… whatever it was that was bothering him wasn't so bad when he was around other people. But after a few months, he had to admit that it was still there. All he could do was cover it up.

He heard them talk about her on the radio sometimes. Alright, a lot of times. She was all they seemed to care about. They never said her name, but it could only be her. Finishing Project Purity and fucking up the Enclave. Yeah, no one else would have tried, let alone been able to actually do it.

Knowing what she'd accomplished, he couldn't help but feel proud. And then he'd realized he'd helped her get there only to not see things to the end. That she'd done all that without him. Without him. Like he'd been useless, like she'd never needed him.

Like she didn't even care that he was gone.

But that was probably true anyway.

They called her the Lone Wanderer, which she thought was ridiculous. Sure, she wandered, but she'd worked with the Brotherhood. She'd done some work with Reiley's Rangers. Hell, she still dragged Fawkes around every now and then. So the idea that she was a "Lone" Wanderer didn't make sense to her.

I mean, how the fuck did everyone know she'd been lonely since Charon'd left her? And yes, pretending that Charon had left her made it easier than having to remember that she'd fired him.

She had friends enough in pretty much every settlement in the Wastes (with the possible exception of Paradise Falls). She had drinking buddies to spare. Hell, she even had herself a beau or two to keep her warm at night.

But goddamn, none of them made her feel as safe as when she'd been with Charon.

Maybe it was because he was the first one she'd really fought along side of. Maybe it was because he'd been there when her father had died. Maybe it was all the nights sitting around a fire together, her babbling on and on and him just listening. Hell if she knew why she missed him. Most of the time she just wished she didn't.

She'd gotten away from that damn raider camp as fast as she could, and ever since she'd gone out of her way to avoid that general area, as if it were toxic. The memory of it was, anyway. For a while, she'd avoided all the big places and just went around killing things until she felt a little less sorry for herself. Every night she'd find a place to lie low and sleep a dreamless, restless sleep. But even as she found herself mourning her father and the loss of her only real friend, she felt her father's work calling to her.

She was surprised how much it helped her forget Charon - no. That's not what she meant. How much it helped her forget her father's death. Doing something worthwhile to help the people in the Wastes… she couldn't help but feel that wherever he was, he was proud of her.

And then she had almost died starting the Purifier. Hell, at the time she was sure she was dead. And as the radiation was choking the life out of her, in her last moments of consciousness it wasn't her parents or Amata or Sarah Lyons or the life she was losing that plagued her with regret and loss. Her mind had clung to the image of Charon and how damned sad he'd looked when she'd fired him.

Of course, when she was conscious and not doped up on enough radiation to make a ghoul feral, she was able to convince herself that she was being silly. Had imagined his reaction being worse than it really was.

But the image still haunted her dreams and wouldn't let her sleep in peace.

After she'd dealt with the Enclave – fucking bastards required a goddamn orbital strike to get them to leave her the fuck alone, and the assholes STILL had the audacity to show up every now and then – she decided that the only thing to do was to find Charon. Her plan hadn't really formed much beyond that, but she was sure she'd figure out what to say if she saw him face to face. At least she could apologize for being such a bitch to him while she dealt with her dad's death. Maybe she could convince him to-

NO. Stop it. She'd mentally slap herself, force herself from thinking those dangerous hopes.

But she'd gone everywhere they'd ever been together, starting of course with Underworld. No matter where she went or who she asked, the answer was always the same. They hadn't seen him since he was last there with her. Hadn't heard anything, either.

"GODDAMNIT!" she yelled in frustration as she beat the door of a storage locker off its hinges, her knuckles bruising under her gloves. She fucking hated not knowing what had happened to him. Had he left the Capital Wastes? Was he dead? What. The fuck. Had happened.

She leaned back against the wall of her home and slumped down to the ground, suddenly very tired. It'd been over a year. She may be shit poor of keeping track of passing time, but she knew it'd been over a year because she'd been fucking miserable for a year. She really just had to let it go. Move on and deal with the fact that even if he wasn't dead, she was never going to see him again. Period.

She hit the back of her head against the wall repeatedly and tried to drill that thought into it.

Why was that idea so fucking intolerable to her?

But of course, she knew why. Because when her dad had died, it was too late to do anything. No power on this earth could bring him back. But Charon was still out there. She could do something. And that's what was killing her. She could do something – she just had no fucking idea what to do.

And she let that realization fester in her chest for a little bit.

Maybe not dead, but gone. Never coming back.