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[witness_this]

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[Furiosa spends most mornings in the gym. Honestly, she'd prefer the Enclosure, but she needs to be moving long and often enough that she can't justify using more than her share of the precious time in the false environment. She works out quickly how to run on the treadmill, but most of the other machines remain a mystery to her. If the right person is using them, they may see her watching, or so may decide to approach.

Some mornings her prosthesis is on, and others it is off, tucked protectively and nearly underfoot, out of habit, though this doesn't seem like the kind of place where anyone is likely to get any ideas.

When she is done, she usually ends by slipping upstairs, showering quickly, and permitting herself what feels like the decadent luxury of putting her feet into the pool. It takes her until about the fifth time to get up the nerve to walk in to the water, to lower herself down in it until she feels it lap up around her neck, then to hold her breath and gingerly, cover her mouth and nose, and cautiously, gingerly slip under the surface and just let herself float, suspended.

She can be found in any of those places.

Still, a workout isn't the same thing as practice, really, and the conversation that has been going on here has weighed heavily on her, though she hasn't participated. So, finally, she takes a break one morning in the gym and turns on the feed.]

Video

[She has to clear her throat to start, and wipe the sweat off her face. She's sitting in the frame, bare feet apart, elbows rested on her knees, metal arm down at her side. Furiosa isn't comfortable, exactly, talking to a little plastic box that will take her words all over the ship, but this is important to her.]

My name is Imperator Furiosa. I'm human. No powers. I'm in the gym.

If you need, I've been teaching people a little about how to fight. If you don't need, but you're--

I could use the practice.

[Short, unceremonious, she disconnects.]

Comments

[witness_this]

He won't stop for pain. You'll play for an hour and then find out his collarbone is broken.

[A little wince.]

Check him over often.

[ukan]

[He nods. It makes him that much fonder of poor Nux.]

I'm used to that. It's how young wolves are. How I was, when I was much newer.

I won't hurt him, Furiosa. And if I can help it neither will anyone else.

Has his cancer affected his appetite? His bones?

[witness_this]

Both, I'm sure, but I haven't known him long enough to know.

[Wincing.]

Get him to keep going to the infirmary.

[ukan]

I will.

[But...]

I could fix it. Permanently, I think.

[Furiosa isn't pack, isn't even necessarily an ally, but she cares about Nux. Lark has never had anyone care about a potential packmate before and he doesn't want to do anything to come between them anymore than he would want to crush a rare flower.]

[witness_this]

Are you a healer?

[Furiosa doesn't suspect.]

[ukan]

Of a sort, I suppose.

[He looks at her, needing her to really listen, every inch of his body language just inviting--imploring--her to hear him out.]

When I became what I am, I had been an alcoholic. Which- do you have alcohol where you're from?

[witness_this]

For surgeries?

[Joe drinks it. Furiosa doesn't have much of a sense of that.]

[ukan]

We used to use it for that, yeah. Now it's mostly for fun, like at the bar here.

I didn't have fun with it. I just couldn't stop drinking. Do you have that, addictions, back home?

[witness_this]

It's rare, but it happens. Mostly, vices are too scarce to be relied upon. The War Boys have their paint, but when they start using I don't know how long they last.

[Death comes first.]

[ukan]

[He had been about to explain more but.]

Their paint?

[witness_this]

You've seen his mouth?

[She's sure he must have by now.]

When they're fighting, they-

[She mimes it, quickly, a spraypaint gesture over bared teeth.]

Inorganic chrome paint, laced with what I suspect is a cocktail of- well, everything you would need. Nux is battle fodder.

[ukan]

[Bunny and Jason both had been into body mods, so Lark has noticed Nux's mouth but hadn't thought much about it. Now it strikes him as tragic.]

Well he's not anymore. Even if he still thinks he is.

How- how was he convinced to spray paint in his mouth and rush into death? I know that his tumors, his sickness, was part of it but even then...people don't naturally want to fall on swords. They have to be conditioned.

[witness_this]

They take us young. I was fourteen. The boys are usually three or four.

[Conditioning, yes. Total indoctrination is another word for it.]

[ukan]

[He exhales sharply, but there's no pity. Lark just doesn't have it in him to pity someone; not when he views it as tied up with condescension.

Sympathy and concern, though, that he does have.]

What is it, exactly? A cult? What are the beliefs they push on you?

[witness_this]

A city. A sliver of all that's left. An aquifer, and a maniac who controls the pumps that draw water out of it. He has the water, he has the power. It- there isn't belief, beyond that. He is their God, they die for him and it is glorious.

[ukan]

[He grimaces. Using physical needs to manipulate people leads to some dangerously strong beliefs.]

Dying for a maniac is a hell of a thing to do. Do they literally think he's a God? Or do they just want to pacify him for the water?

[witness_this]

It varies, from person to person.

Nux has been breaking out of it, the last few days. But he- I told you, he was killed in the process.

[ukan]

Yes. After just a few days he was killed trying to save you; how did he start breaking out of what he'd been trained to think?

[witness_this]

His story to tell.

[Clambering stiffly to her feet.]

I will keep in touch.

[ukan]

Furiosa.

[His expression has been kind, sympathetic, worried, intent up to now. Now, it's pure curiosity--but it's not the sort you would find in a human mind. It's the look a lycathrope has when he's slowly twisting apart a puzzle.]

[witness_this]

He'll be better at it than me. And he's earned the right. They have a culture around death, around dying historic- I'm not going to take the glory from him before he gets to tell his friend.

[ukan]

I wouldn't ask you to.

I was going to ask when you started to break away. Or rather what your culture is.

[Since hers is not Nux's, that much is plain.]

[witness_this]

I was Vuvalini, before I was taken. And I never really broken in. I just waited.

[Allowing, quietly.]

[ukan]

Vuvalini?

[His interest, now, is mostly in her; but a chunk of it has shifted. Lark, more than any wolf he ever knew, has always been keen on sniffing out other truths in other societies.]

[witness_this]

We'll talk another time.

[Very firm now.]

Goodbye for now, Lark.