she smells like grease & smoke, it’s so thick in his nostrils he almost chokes on it. there’s a phantom with a tight grip on his throat, he can’t breath, she’s whispering in his ear about home. whispering in his ear about being some kind of savior like her. but he wasn’t cut from that cloth & the weight of that responsibility makes him beg. he tells her his name, like that will keep her grasp on him from going limp, but it doesn’t. she’s lost too much blood, he thinks he hears a voice say & his brain lights up like a switch board. (be careful with that one, he’s a universal donor) it’s an echo from the past, but it swells something dangerous in his heart. hope.
he’d kept the coiled tubing on his shoulder this entire time, a transfusion never something he could have predicted, but here he was; on his hands & knees praying to some god that had abandoned this parched earth to self-destruction years ago. praying for a chance to keep something good from dying, praying for the world to finally prove to him that it was more than a cruel sandbox of blood & pain.
he’s willing to give her everything. every drop of blood in his body. all she has to do is survive & he can let go of this wretched existence. the engine continues to roar across the sand, all eyes on furiosa, but she doesn’t move. he closes his eyes against the reality, the pain in his chest feels like a gunshot, a consumption, a burning sort of pain that spreads out from his heart & over his skin. “max.” her voice rings as clear as a bell & his eyes snap open, but all he sees is pale skin. “180 days of salt max.” he shakes his head. eyes burning with unshed tears, palms coming up to press against them. the other voices echo in behind hers, filled with blame, filled with the terrible truth of his life. hope was a mistake.