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The first time he came back, Furiosa was still laid up in the Organic Mechanic’s wreck room with a needle in her arm and a War Rig’s worth of sedatives fogging her brain. She’d never doubted he’d come back. She was just surprised, vaguely, dreamily, drug-muzzily surprised, that he was back so soon.
It had been only a day or two since their ascension to the Citadel, she thought. There were no windows in the wreck room, so she couldn’t be sure. She’d fought the drugs at first - they slowed her mind and made her weak, but they felt like liquid silver in her veins and dulled the pain in her everything, and she was weak. The wives - The Sisters - had begged her to rest, to let the Mechanic repair her, and the remaining Vuvalini had sang over her as he worked. All she could do now was let herself mend.
She opened her eyes blearily as the door crashed suddenly open - a dull bang, like the second round from a shotgun fired too close to an ear. A flurry of movement - a swirl of red hair, a wash of white skin, the gleam off of the Mechanic’s goggles, shuffling feet, a broad beat-leather back, the flash of blue eyes. Her breath hitched in her burning chest. Hearing washed in slowly, the sounds coming from far away, all distorted and broken and ramshackle through the drugs. A hand took hers - cool, long, slim fingers. The Dag’s face swam into focus.
“...is here! He found… wreck… War Boy! ...brought him… thinks… might be alright.” Dag grinned brilliantly, all white teeth and white hair, and was gone.
He’d found the War Boy. He’d brought Nux back from the dead, just like he’d brought her back. She reached out with her good hand and thought she heard a hum, low and rolling, somewhere close. She tried to smile, just a little, but wasn’t sure if she managed it before blacking out.
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She dreams of rumbling thunder, the smell of gunpowder, Angharad’s strong smile. -We are not things-, a mother’s voice torn away, Valkyrie’s breath in her nostrils, the War Rig in flames, crushing pressure, callused hands on her face, -I am so sorry-, a piercing pain, -Home-, blood on a rough cheek, wet green leaves, starlight.
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When she surfaced again, her vision had begun to lose the shimmery heat-haze halo and her ears seemed clearer. She could hear Capable, laughing, sobbing, and then laughing again. Nux looked pretty shit, from what she could tell, but then again, he always looked pretty shit. That boy just couldn’t get the hang of dying. Capable held his sleeping face in her hands, and his fingers had knit themselves into one of her braids. The Mechanic had clearly been to work on him - both of his legs and the entire right side of his body was freshly bandaged. A drug bag slowly dripped into his arm.
Toast prowled the corridor outside, passing in and out of view through the doorway. The Dag lay flat on her back on the floor, hands fluttering like birds as she sang under her breath. Cheedo sat by the bed, curled into a tight ball on one of the few chairs. Cheedo’s hand played softly along Furiosa’s battered skull, dancing across the short cropped fuzz, avoiding the stitches and sutures along her brow. Coughing weakly, Furiosa tried to sit up. The younger woman unfurled in a ripple, rushing for a cup of water and gesturing for Toast to come inside.
“Where is he?” Her voice sounded like sand on skin and her hand shook as she took the offered water.
“He left. Maybe half an hour back.” Cheedo glanced at Nux’s bandages, then back to Furiosa. “I don’t think he likes the Mechanic. I don’t think he likes being inside, much.”
It hurt to nod, but she nodded anyway. She didn’t like the Mechanic, and she didn’t like being inside much, either, but she wasn’t a Road Warrior. She wasn’t sure what she was now, but she was sure she had to stay. Too many things to do, too many things to fix.
Toast crossed her arms and leaned against the doorway. “I gave him some provisions and two big jugs of water when he left. I had to make him take them. He was just going to leave with nothing.” She shook her head and kissed her teeth, disapproving.
“He brought Nux back,” Capable smiled, glancing away from the War Boy’s face to lock eyes with Furiosa. “Max brought him back.”
"Max.” She tasted his name as she said it, feeling hot rocks and smoke and salty blood and fresh cool water in her mouth. It’s warm and hard and rough and sweet. His name is Max. It fits.
“He looked at you a long time, while you were out,” Dag purred, hands stilling momentarily, fingers crooked and wrists cocked. She looked at Furiosa and waggled her eyebrows before returning her focus to her hands. “He likes you.”
Toast shook her head once more. “It was the longest I’ve ever seen him stay still, watching at you sleep. He should have stayed, but he ran off as soon as he noticed us,” she gestured at herself and Cheedo, “watching him watching you.”
Cheedo laughed, the sound like rainbows in the rearview mirror, and stroked the shell of Furiosa’s ear. “I like that he likes you. Do you like him, too?”
Furiosa groaned and rolled her shoulders, pointedly not answering the question. Her head was beginning to hurt again, and her stomach felt like it had been filled up with the buzzing bees she had learned about in one of the books Ms. Giddy had given them so long ago. Cheedo giggled again and whispered, “I knew it!”
Laying her head on Nux’s chest, Capable closed her eyes and softly declared, “He’ll come back again.” She breathed it out as if it was an undeniable truth. “He’s not good at staying, but he’ll be good at coming back.”
Furiosa laid back in the bed and closed her eyes. Someone moved to sit at the foot of her bed - Toast, maybe - and began gently rubbing her unbroken leg.
She'd known he’d come back, and he had. She doesn’t doubt for a second that he’ll he’d come back again. When he does, she’ll be awake and alive and waiting.