Chapter Text
When Furiosa goes rogue, Gansey runs to Adam first. Ronan is perfectly capable of getting their rig up and running, and Gansey knows Noah will either come along or not; he and Chainsaw can disappear in the walls of the Citadel for weeks without trouble. Adam, though, he doesn't have anywhere else to go if the world starts ending, and the world is most certainly ending. If Immortan can't trust Furiosa, then no one can be trusted, and when no one is trusted, no one is fed either. Adam needs to come with them, to prove to Immortan that they're worth keeping, and to do that, Gansey has to go get him.
Gansey needs to sneak him onto the rig, and he looks incredibly out of place in brown dirt and ragged clothes. Ronan crows cheerfully and clambers over Adam, and when he disappears out the window, he leaves behind streaks of white on Adam's face and clothes, and a gun filled with nails in his hands. Adam turns the gun over and over. There's a lever on the side that he thumbs, and behind him, Noah whispers, "Careful, that's how you set it to blow."
"It explodes?" Adam asks, and then immediately answers himself. "It's Ronan's."
Gansey says, "When we catch up with the rig, make sure Immortan sees you fighting with us."
-
In the end, they don't fight anyone. They're in the back when the pass through the cliff blows - "If you hadn't fuckin' taken so long-" "Shut up, Ronan" - and they end up parked on a small bluff taking turns keeping watch. It's incredibly dull, made only marginally more bearable when Gansey starts telling stories about Glendower. Noah pipes in every once in a while, adding details or corrections. Ronan speaks up more often, adding unhelpful editorial remarks.
Mostly, Adam listens, letting the image of Glendower form and harden in his mind. An oasis, Gansey says, full of green trees and clean blue water ("-as opposed to clean water that's some other color?" "Water's mostly clear, actually." "Yeah, well this water is blue, okay, like the water in Valhalla, and-"), and where guzzaline springs from the Earth in excess, and there are always plenty of bullets, and lizards to eat ("I don't like lizards." "What do you like, Noah? I've never seen you eat shit." "There's plenty of everything to eat."), and you can walk in and out of Valhalla as you please.
Adam doesn't know that he believes in Valhalla. Certainly, as one of the Wretched and not a Warboy, entering through Glendower would be the only way he'd see it.
The nice thing is thinking about how quiet it must be in Glendower, with no one to yell or fight over mud, having Gansey and Ronan and Noah with him, all of them arguing about what color the water was until they died of something that wasn't thirst or disease or hunger, because you didn't have to worry about any of that once you found Glendower.
"Sounds nice," Adam says finally, over Ronan and Noah debating whether snakes really tasted different than lizards. "We're gonna find it, yeah?"
Gansey looks at him, startled. "We- oh. Yeah." He beams at Adam, white teeth under white painted skin. "Yeah, we are gonna find it, together."
-
They limp back to the Citadel, after, and Chainsaw vouches for Ronan, and Adam makes hopeful, empty handed gestures, and Gansey very carefully doesn't let Ronan say anything at all, and the Wives - no, the Sisters - the Sisters let them back in long enough to refuel.
"Get your stuff," Gansey announces. "All of it; we're not coming back."
"Glendower or the depths of Hell!" Ronan crows, and disappears off with Chainsaw to collect their brother and Ronan's collection of impossible weapons and engine parts.
Noah vanishes between one breath and the next, off to get belongings or say goodbye or plant an orchard or whatever it is he does when he isn't with them.
Adam doesn't have anything to collect, and Gansey must not either, because they sit together on the top of their rig and watch the water flow.
"I heard you're looking for Glendower," a voice says, and they look down together. There's a girl standing by their rig, tiny and full of purpose. Her hair is dark and stands up in every direction, and judging by her clothes, she's neither Warboy nor Wretched. When Adam catches her eye, it seems like the din of the Citadel reaches a peak, the world clattering and yelling and clamoring at him all at once. He can hear her voice clearly, even through the din and his busted ear and Gansey's interested inhalation next to him.
The girl grins at them. "I might know a thing or two about it. I'll tell you, if you move over and make room for me up there."
They do, and Adam can see Ronan shoving his way back to them, two tiny war pups clinging to his back, Noah at his side.
"I'm Gansey," Gansey says.
"Blue."