Survive [Mad Max: Fury Road]

Chapter Twenty-Seven

"He's just a War Boy at the end of his half life!"

-Splendid Angharad

These War Boys were young, about a young as Nux. They were not as experienced as some of the ones that made it longer than eighteen years of life, their typical life expectancy. The Lancer had a job, and this one was eager to participate in said job once again. The gun pointed on me was held there, but it was sloppy. His grip was not tight, his eyes were not focused on me. They also had not checked me for weapons, of which I had at least two. One more dagger and one more gun, but I wasn't sure I wanted to risk using the gun again. If it misfired like the other one had, the Lancer would put a bullet in my head regardless of what state Immortan Joe wanted me in.

I slid my dagger slowly out of my boot and lunged to the front seat, slicing the throat of the driver. His gargled scream was drowned out by the orchestra of engines all around us. I grabbed hold of the wheel, stretching from the back of the car to the front. My hand grabbed it, and twisted it. The car began to turn, but it lost grip and spiralled over the sand. I flew inside of the vehicle, trying to hold on to anything so that minimal damage was done. As the vehicle turned over twice, the Lancer was launched from the car. To my luck, the vehicle rolled back onto the wheels, and while the engine had sputtered and died, I knew it would start again. These machines were built for this. I shoved the dead War Boy to the passenger seat and got behind the wheel. The car started easily, and I got back into the fleet, hoping that since we were so far behind, no one noticed I was the one behind the wheel in this car.

Trying to catch up with the Rig, I kept my eyes up to see what was going on all the way at the front of the fleet. From the looks of it, a lot of carnage had gone down. Vehicles were littered throughout the Wasteland and I had to swerve to avoid many of them; few were still burning and about to go up in flames. The Gigahorse was pressed up against the People Eaters limousine, and he was firing into it; I wondered what that was about, but I couldn't see enough to make sense of it. I decided to get to the other side of the Rig, and while there was no way for me to get back onto it, I needed to see what was happening. Who was where, and who was still alive. My eyes scanned the cab as I reached it, and I saw the face of the Keeper of the Seeds. My hands waved frantically at her to get her attention, but it was then that I realized she was gone; her eyes were dead, gone, but her smile was full of life.

So many dead.

No time to mourn.

Within seconds, before I could even process a way to help, the Gigahorse was in front of the Rig. I raced up kitty-corner to it, and spotted the familiar face of Toast; the girl had been caught and was trapped within the vehicle with Immortan Joe. He was getting them back one by one, and we could not leave without every single one of those women in his clutches; even if we had to divert our plan to take the Citadel and go elsewhere, we had to have them safe. Furiosa wouldn't stand to lose another one, not after Angharad. When I realized that I needed to be on the Rig, as Furiosa didn't have enough back up, I spotted Max atop the trailer, nearing the cab.

There was blood on his head, but from where I was it was impossible to tell whose it was. I leaned out the smashed window of the trustworthy car I had stolen from the War Boys; War Boys frequently launched themselves from their cars onto other moving vehicles. Their crazed desire to kill themselves for Immortan got the adrenaline pumping, and the stupidity flowing. I didn't have that, but I had a lot to fight for. Waving my hand frantically, I caught his attention but he did not have the time to give it to me. Too many people were atop the Rig, fighting him; I spotted Rictus on the back of the Gigahorse, reaching over and grabbing...

Cheedo.

Immortan Joe almost had half of those women back in his grasp. Without thinking, I rammed my car to the side of the Rig. Not to do damage, but to get close enough so that I could get back on the vehicle. Clambering out after jamming the gas pedal down, I stood half in and half out of the window. The car pulled slightly away from the Rig, opening up a large gap between me and it. Reaching my hand back in I turned the steering wheel ever so slightly to get close again, but a car rammed against mine. Forced almost out of the car, the steering wheel twisted in my grip, and it rammed into the rig; the front end hit between the massive tires of the Rig and right as my car began to contort and twist, I leapt. If I had stayed on my car, I watched, I would have been obliterated as the crash occurred; my car and the car behind me both lit up as mine rolled, and the explosion could be felt even when the Rig was a short distance away.

I had launched myself onto the gap between the cab and the Rig, and by now Cheedo was in the Gigahorse. Climbing on top of the Rig, I was instantly attacked by a War Boy; just a stray, as there were no others on the Rig anymore. Immortan had gained control of the situation and was winning this battle. I was forced to drop back to the shaky metal that held the cab to the first trailer to avoid sliced open by this vicious War Boy. I looked up at him with hatred, reaching to grab my dagger to throw at him with the hopes it would enter his skull and end his life. But when I looked up, blood splattered through his chest and his eyes died. The corpse fell and I had to press myself to the cab to avoid being hit as he fell between the cab and the trailer, going under the tires and went almost unnoticed by the Rig itself.

A head peered over the cab; Max.

He reached his hand down and I grabbed hold of it, like I had done the first time we had met. He pulled me on top of the Rig and pointed at the Gigahorse; Furiosa was on it, clinging to the side of it. In a split second, hardly any time had gone by since I noticed her muscular frame clinging to Immortan Joe's ride, Furiosa did the one thing I had wanted to do since I was a captive in the Citadel. Since the first time I saw Immortan Joe, studying my body, ensuring that I was going to be a prime breeder. Since the first time Immortan Joe put his hands on me, violated me, raped me. Since the time I scraped my own insides to prevent Immortan Joe from having any power over me, and since I had left the Citadel. My whole life came down to ending his, and Furiosa accomplished that.

She hooked something onto his mask, the one he used to breathe properly, and it wrapped around the tires which were turning at lightning speeds. Immortan Joe had no way of stopping his death, his gruesome and well deserved death. His face was ripped to shreds; the face that struck terror in so many women, and the face that was godlike to the War Boys and even the Wretched was gone. A satisfied smile fell upon my lips, one of the most real smiles I had ever put on display in my entire life. And while I knew that Immortan Joe's death wouldn't change the world, wouldn't put it back to the way it was, it was a start of something great. Even if we had to end the lives of everyone in the Armada, we would begin the change that needed to happen so many years ago. No longer would there be the oppression that those of us born in this world only knew.

But it wasn't over yet.