1 - Open as the Wasteland

[iamawaited]

Who: Nux and you!
Broadcast: Hello world!
Action: All around the Marsiva!
When: July 26

Video

[This video is either going to be very interesting or very boring to viewers, depending on who's watching. It opens on a blue eye in a very pale face, with some kind of dark makeup smudged around it. The eye tilts crazily to one side, then the other. The camera pulls back to on a second identical eye, a scarred nose and cheek -- then further still to reveal a mouth crossed from end to end with vertical scars, like skeletal teeth.

The boy -- it's definitely a boy, or really a young man -- squints at the camera, and then the image tips to the side again and jerks wildly back and forth as he bangs the communicator against the nearest surface and brings it back up to his eye with a curious sound. After a moment, he seems to give up looking for whatever it is he wants from it and puts it down, leaving the camera staring at the ceiling.]

Action

[He had done the same when he'd awoken. He'd opened his eyes on the cleanest, shiniest surface he's ever seen, and thought, chrome. Then it had hit him all at once: the rig, Capable, Rictus...

...Valhalla...?

Not like any Valhalla he's ever imagined, he'd thought when he'd sat up and taken a look around -- that was when he'd spotted the little machine with its blinking red light.

Now, he abandons it and starts exploring his surroundings closely. There's information trickling into his brain, but it's a lot to take in all at once. The room alone is a lot to take in all at once: real beds, glaring bright lights, equipment he's never seen before, the huge night sky out the window.

Eventually, he finds his way into the showers, blinking when he spots the tap. Guzzoline? Mother's Milk? He turns it and jerks back in surprise when liquid starts spraying out onto him, turning the tap off again quickly. His eyes widen when he licks his scarred lips: water. He wrenches the tap back on and turns his face up to the shower head, taking a few greedy gulps of aqua cola.

Eventually, he'll tear himself away again and resume his exploration, not seeming to care about the fact that he's soaking wet, or that the already-faded white-and-black war paint is running from his bare, scarred torso.]

Comments

[video]

[iamawaited]

[Oh. No, that one he understands, too. He nods and goes to sit down on the nearest cot, propping his feet up on the bed and his elbows on his knees, holding the screen at arm's length. He frowns for a moment, looking pensive.]

Are you from Gas Town? Bullet Farm?

[He looks like a War Boy with those scars, but not with all that hair -- and besides, Nux doesn't think he's ever known a mute War Boy. But that's the Citadel; other cities on the Fury Road do some things differently, he knows.]

[video]

[mortalcoil]

[he's used to the newbie confusion by now, and he can't explain easily, so he just... waves his hand out to indicate something that is far away. wherever he's from, Nux hasn't heard of it.

and, like he'd done before, he points at the screen again with a quizzical look.]

[video]

[iamawaited]

... salt flats?

[And that's literally the furthest away thing he knows. He points to himself again.]

Citadel.

[video]

[mortalcoil]

[and Coil tilts his head? because, of course he hasn't heard of a specific place by that name... but it sounds like it could be interesting.

and also... sounds remarkably like a name that could describe his own home, at least a little bit.

he motions with his hand to go on. elaborate, maybe.]

[video]

[iamawaited]

[And this is where they run into a problem: the only time Nux has ever met anyone who didn't already know what the Citadel was, it had been the Vuvalini, and the Wives had taken care of explaining everything. He tries to remember what they'd said -- what they'd thought to highlight for outsiders. For him, it's just home.]

Um... bad if you're afraid of heights. Lots of green on top.

[video]

[mortalcoil]

[oh, and Coil has so many questions, because he's sure whatever he's immediately imaging has nothing to do with what it's actually like. so, after pressing his mouth flat in mild frustration, he switches topics.

this time, he points at Nux, and then points to his own face, tracing all the places that the other wears those interesting scars.

scars say a lot to him, and he's unsure what these ones mean.]

[video]

[iamawaited]

[This time, he completely misunderstands. Coil points to Nux's scarred face, points to his own scarred face, and Nux looks a little relieved.

In a minute, he'll remember something critical that will throw this into confusion, but right now what he does is balance the communicator carefully on his knees and knit his hands in front of his chest, fingers pointing towards the ceiling. He gives Coil an expectant look. V8?]

[video]

[mortalcoil]

[oh no... and Coil has absolutely no way of guessing what this could mean.

so, tentatively, he mimics the motion--more to himself than anything. he's guessing it's some other form of sign language, or a sign that he never learned.

he's not even really thinking of the fact that he's being watched, at the moment. he's too busy puzzling over the gesture.]

[video]

[iamawaited]

[Nux smiles...

...and then he remembers the thing he needs to remember. Two things, in fact: the first is that the V8 is the symbol of the Immortan, and if the stranger doesn't know the Citadel, how could he know that?

The second is that the Immortan is dead. His smile fades again, not so much sad as a little lost. He drops his hands and picks up the communicator again.]

You can't tell me anything, can you.

[video]

[mortalcoil]

[he frowns a little, because he doesn't have his tablet with him, and he doesn't know if he can have both a video feed and text messaging running at the same time... so, give him a minute while he tinkers.

and after a few moments--while the video feed is accidentally shut off and turned back on again--a text screen pops up as well. it's taking up some of the precious room needed for video, and the kid's hunt-and-peck typing is painfully slow, but it's better than nothing.]

i can write

[video]

[iamawaited]

[Nux waits curiously, the fidgeting and fussing and glitching on and off enough to hold his attention. He's not sure he knows exactly what questions to ask, when he can, but he knows that his mind is swimming with so many that just about anywhere would probably be a good start.

When the text pops up, he looks startled again, and then very slightly dismayed. He can read, but it's far from intuitive; there are things a War Boy needs to know how to read, like symbols and schematics and the letters Km/H, but not a lot. Even with that short sentence, it takes him a minute to parse it -- and Coil can see his lips moving on the last word, like he's sounding it out silently.

The keyboard is worse: that, he's never seen or used at all. If Coil was hunt-and-peck, Nux is hunt-and-hunt-and-hunt-and-peck. Eventually, though, he manages:]

whats your name?

[video]

[mortalcoil]

[this time, the reason for his frowning is twofold--both over Nux' obvious handicap when it comes to reading... and the fact that he's typing when he doesn't strictly need to be.

before he answers his question, Coil shakes his head, taps on what part of the screen still has the video feed open, and pecks out a text message to accompany it.]

i can still hear you

[video]

[iamawaited]

[--Oh.

Although--]

Did you see it?

[video]

[mortalcoil]

[his brow furrows and he tilts his head quizzically, hoping that will be enough to say that he doesn't know what Nux is talking about.]

Re: [video]

[iamawaited]

What's your name?

And-- [Where am I? He starts to ask, but he remembers he knows at least the basics of that already. On a ship. In space. With some kind of show.]

Do you know how I got here?

[I am the man who grabs the sun, he thinks, but the sun is nowhere here to be seen. No gates, no McFeast.]

[mortalcoil]

[oh, the words. he gets it now. and he answers by pecking out his name into another text message. and, considering that he's talking to someone already used to very... illustrative names, maybe his own name won't seem so strange by comparison.]

Coil [--and he traces a little spiral shape in the air in front of the camera with one finger.

as for an answer to Nux's question... he shakes his head, reluctantly. it's one more mystery that has been wearing him down for months.]

[iamawaited]

Coil.

[It sounds like a name that could belong to the Citadel, or one of the cities nearby. He sighs when Coil shakes his head.]

I was driving.

[That's the last thing he remembers. Well, no: the last thing he remembers is flipping the rig, closing his eyes, and thinking Valhalla.]

I was-- supposed to go somewhere else.

[mortalcoil]

[Coil offers a somber nod, and gestures around in a circle in front of himself--intending to include himself, Nux, the ship, all of the other ships. everyone.

yeah, they're all supposed to be somewhere else. they're all suffering that same displaced fate. he can't know all what Nux means by it, but he thinks it applies pretty well across the board anyway.]

[iamawaited]

[Well, then. He slumps a little, skeleton-scarred mouth drooping.]

No way to go back?

[mortalcoil]

[his look changes--since he's currently stuck using expression to do most of his communicating for him--going from somber and empty, to a distinct spark of determination. in this matter, he is unflinchingly sure. he even taps on the receiver, makes the speakers sharply pop pop just to ensure that Nux is really listening.

and then he types his message.]

not yet.

[but he is going to find a way back even if it destroys him.]

[iamawaited]

[Not yet, he mouths along silently. Hope, he thinks. He doesn't know Coil, but he does know hope now. He hopes they took the Citadel. He hopes, suddenly, that he can go back there someday. He hopes he can tell Capable about everything he's seeing now.

He doesn't know Coil, but hope spreads, and he wants to. He nods.]

[mortalcoil]

[Coil nods one more time, reaffirming it. and because it stirs up all of the gnawing, aching frustrations he's been suffering lately, he doesn't want to think about home for too long. hope is a fine fuel in the short-term, but when it goes unanswered for years, it becomes exhausting and threatens to become poisonous.

so, he shakes it off for a new question, because oh he has some of his own. only a few are easy to ask, however.

he tries again for the scars--this time with text.]

tell me about your scars

[iamawaited]

[That... is a surprisingly complex question for a boy who's never had much complexity in his life. He hesitates, rubbing his fingers along the scar running down his right cheekbone -- the shorter one, not the one that runs all the way down to join the one over his nose.]

It's -- the V8?

[He tries to start there, tilting the camera down so Coil can see the intricate design on his chest.]

[mortalcoil]

[Coil knows painfully little about cars, but he at least recognizes that term to mean something about engines. so, he mimics the motion of holding a steering wheel, with one of those questioning tips of his head?]

[iamawaited]

[Nux brightens and nods, tilting the camera back up.]

Yeah. Exactly. I'm a driver.