Chapter Text
Max paused at the foot of the stairs, mulling over whether she would prefer apples or pears from the gardens…
Hurried feet, calling voices, confusion. It seems like everything’s happening at once. A thousand and one things could be the reason. But he knows what’s caused the commotion. Hope is a mistake.
He runs too, doesn’t know where. He should be running to, not away. The buzzing in his head doesn’t care. Only the sane part of his brain calls out, a voice a little too insistent to block out…he wonders if it’s his own voice or someone else’s…
Go up.
He emerges at the top of the stone stairs, into the green and blue and gold light, blinding after the darkness of the stairwell. He’s got used to the darkness inside the New Citadel now, these last eighteen months or so. That particular darkness spoke Home now, after all.
The shock of the glare and the warm breeze in his gasping lungs bring him back, in part at least, from the numbing terror that had seized him.
He shuddered in shame and dread, so much worse when it’s a dread of himself.
No…this shouldn’t be happening…not now. He was better now, he’d prepared himself for this. Wouldn’t have done it, any of it, if he’d known he’d crumble like this at the end. He thought he could cope. Max scrubbed at his hair and dropped awkwardly to his knees, stomach heaving.
But it’s not different. It’s just the same. The love, the home, the happiness, the dread, the screams, the blood and pain. The emptiness. Knowing that he’d been the cause.
That’s life for you, boy. Best to jump now if you can’t deal with it. But it won’t end, even then. You can take my word for it.
Max jolts mid-retch, in shock at hearing a voice he knew wasn’t real but yet didn’t cause him to recoil. It’d been a long time since he’d seen them last. Almost like old friends…
It didn’t even surprise him to look up and see seven or eight Vuvalini making themselves at home among the fruit trees and bean frames, some knitting and chatting amongst themselves, others wandering among the foliage and brushing a leaf wonderingly.
Love what you’ve done with the place.
And a little one on the way too.
You could still do with a wash, though.
“You…? You’re here?” he whispered hoarsely.
Of course…where did you think we were heading? Furiosa promised to bring us to the Green Place, and here we are! And it was Angharad who spoke now, smiling, holding her infant up to the sky as it grasps at a vine.
High above their heads, the Boy sits among the branches contentedly munching on a peach, like a hairless spider monkey. Nux’s mouth is full but he gives Max an enthusiastic thumbs up.
“Furiosa…” Max looks back towards the stairs and shudders again. “Nearly ran…”
But here you are. Up here. Why’d you think you didn’t run down the stairs?
“What if…? She’ll be hurting, might be going wrong…” Max scrubbed fiercely at his head again, trying to dislodge the idea…something that he’d read a long time ago.
Would Furiosa’s engine shut down safely, or would it rev on and on til it exploded, killing her in blood and pain?
I am one of the Vuvalini, of the Many Mothers. My clan was Swaddle Dog…the Many Mothers…that was Valkyrie’s voice whispering, as she bent over a string of beads, eyes closed, lips moving.
Our babies will not be warlords…Angharad held her infant close, murmuring in its ear.
Nux scrambled down from his perch, dug a hole in the ground and planted his peach stone. He knelt over it, head bowed, fingers interlocked in a V. Looking up, blue eyes radiating hope.
“But…won’t you tell me it’ll be okay…why can’t you tell me…”
“Max? Where are you?”
Max closed his eyes tightly and waited for the cacophony of other voices to crowd in.
The approach of running feet, small feet.
“Max?” the voice was breathless, sounded familiar. Living familiar. Still he was unsure of himself, kept his eyes closed tightly. A smooth stone was pushed between the finger and thumb of his clenched right hand. He opened his eyes and looked down into the anxious face of Toots, his wide frightened eyes brimming over with tears. But as Max looked down at the stone in his half- open hand, Toots patted his arm awkwardly.
“Want to play Subbuteo? I play with Tony when I’m a bit scared, but it’s better to play with a real-actual person.”
Max nodded numbly and forced a smile. He contemplated telling the kid it’d be alright, no need to be scared. But it’d be a lie.
“All the men are downstairs. Capable kicked’em out. Even Ace and that took a fair bit of kicking I can tell you. No men allowed, she said. But I think it’ll be all alright, ‘cos Mother Fury’s not scared, I’ll bet. Mother Fury’s not scared of nuthin. Grampa Zal’s been all pacing up and down and Ace’s grumpy and Scratch ran away…”
“Like me…” Max muttered with only half a sigh. The kid’s relentless chatter was strangely soothing.
“He ran away away. Least I found you.”
“Maybe we should go down. Join’em”
*
“I am one of the Vuvalini…
“Of the Many Mothers...
“My Initiate Mother was…Katie Concannon.
“I am the daughter of Mary Jabassa.
“My clan was Swaddle Dog…”
Furiosa muttered between clenched teeth and deep breaths.
This is perfectly normal. Mothers have done this for generations…no one... is going… to die…
That last bit should have been comforting…but Furiosa wished she hadn’t thought it.
Only Phyllis and Capable are here. There are a host of women on standby outside the door to relay messages and stand guard as needed.
She wants Max, but this is the Vuvalini way and, besides, she doesn't want him to see her in pain...or experiencing uncontrolled bodily functions, if it comes to that...she's heard stories. She’s more worried about him, anyway. She hopes, wherever he is, he’s okay and calm and not gone.
“My clan IS…is here…”
*
Her men wait in the garage pretending to work, pretending not to be anxious. Max and Ace and Toots and Zal and Karl and Caleb and Jerome and Taggy and Leo and Dek. Not nervous at all.
When Max fidgets, Toots paces. When he sits and bites his nails, Toots sits and jiggles.
Toots fishes his pebbles out of his pockets again and tries to distract Max with another game of Subbuteo.
An excited Toast comes running. She knows not to waste words. “Come, come, it’s all good!”
“She’s okay?” Max felt like his legs wouldn’t hold him. But still he found himself following, on autopilot.
“Which one? Oh, right…dammit. Yes, Furi’s fine. Phyl’s just done stitching her up, but…”
“Stitch…?”
“You try shoving a watermelon through a hole the size of a lemon, see if something doesn’t give a little…oh, sorry kid, didn’t see you there.”
Toots was following close on Max’s heels. He was unfazed, having expected nothing short of heroic wizardry from Mother Fury.
The rest of the men trailed behind, their conversation coming to Max as if through a fog…What’d she say?...Think it’s a girl…what was that about a watermelon? Does the Boss want one?...you don’t want to know, lad…no, that would not be a good gift right now…
Should his head feel this numb? Max wondered, as they arrived in the anteroom.
*
An indignant high-pitched wail. Phyllis opens the door, her typically impassive face beaming. "There he is. Boy, come in...you've got a daughter."
*
Max reached for the squirming bundle. He wants to look at Furiosa, see how she is, that she’s alive and well and not greatly the worse for having given birth to his child. But can’t seem to tear his eyes away from the tiny wrinkled brand new baby in his arms.
The newborn stopped squalling and regarded Max with a crinkled brow and a scrutinising expression. Furiosa knew she couldn’t be focusing on him, not at under an hour old, but the image was so beautifully, so agonisingly funny that she laughed.
“She looks so like you."
Max is too dazed to speak, but Furiosa now has his full attention as she turns towards the shadowy figures hovering uncertainly at the door. He hadn’t been expecting this…smiles and laughter…hadn’t allowed himself to hope for any of this.
Furiosa waves them all in to meet Valkyrie Jabassa Rockatansky. A big oldname for a very little person. She'll just have to grow into it, that's all.
*
They have very different parenting styles, Furiosa and Max. She is of the Many Mothers where, once a child is off the breast, it belongs almost equally to the whole clan as one extended community. Max, on the other hand, is used to the nuclear family, as he calls it. This is a term that is inextricably linked with toxic radiation in the minds of…well…everyone, but he and other Before-timers explain that it just refers to ‘a couple and their dependent children’. Upon which, most of their listeners make wry faces and dismiss it as a high-risk strategy.
At the New Citadel, the pups all sleep together after their fourth New Year. Eat together, play together, learn together.
It’s hard for him to hand Val over to others, Furiosa can tell, for all that he’s willingly adopted this brand of communal living. But she knows it’s the safest way to live in this world. She hopes it’ll shield him from being broken again. Furiosa had worried he wouldn’t be able to do it, but something in Max had unclenched not long after their girl’s second New Year. She thinks maybe now she’s older than his son when he died. Maybe he feels a barrier has been broken, history may not necessarily repeat itself.
Val’s still as much their baby girl as ever. She comes running from the ranks of her fellows after breakfast, always yells Mum! or Dad! and comes pelting on her chubby legs to tell of reading or what prank Dag’s girl Dryad pulled yesterday or how Toots had walloped one of the bigger boys for making fun of her.
She talked plenty now. They’d worried about that for a long time. Not a word ‘til she was nearly two, but it seems she was just arranging her thoughts. Taking it all in. She was a laconic child, sparing of her words, selecting them carefully like a connoisseur.
She liked stories too, like her mother as a child. But Furiosa had been more of a campfire storyteller than a reader of written words. Val was like a sponge, soaking up ink. She would hoard scraps of paper and hunch over them, writing in tiny letters to save space.
Furiosa sometimes wondered whether her namesake, her lost friend, hadn’t gone to the stars at all, but had chosen to wait…knowing she would be commemorated soon. Was it her lost Val looking at her out of her own child’s eyes? Maybe.
A sharp yell woke Furiosa from her reverie…she looked around to see her own girl sprawled in the dust bellowing in frustration as her friends looked down from their high perch. Max running over to check she wasn’t damaged and giving her a relieved cuddle as her sobs redoubled with the sympathy.
Okay, that’s not lost Val in there. My own little Valkyrie is not a natural climber, it seems. Furiosa’s eyes stung with tears, a mixture of relief, regret and affection at the sight of her Max fussing over his baby girl in a very unVuvalini manner.
“That man of yours is gonna ruin young Valkyrie!” Althea called out disapprovingly from the doorway. “Careful she don’t turn out soft, getting cosseted like that.”
“She’s just mad at falling when the others made it. She’ll find her own way up, though. Look, there she goes. And no, he isn’t helping her.”
Val might have been daddy’s girl...and, in fact when Furiosa asked what she was writing this week, Val declared it was Dad’s stories from Before-time. She wanted to be an archivist now, not a wizard. Wizards were silly. Yes, Val was a daddy’s girl. But Mum was her hero. She was a little in awe of her, having heard the Boys tales of Imperator Furiosa, and Ace’s anecdotes from when Mum was a Boy too, almost as young as Toots. And she knew Mum loved her and wanted her to be happy and strong and safe. Val might not fly up to Furiosa and fling her arms around her with as much abandon as she would with Max, but her mother’s smile or hug would have her in a glow for the rest of the day. She would have an Initiate Mother in a twelvemoon or two, they were debating whether Toast or Cheedo would be best, but if Val had to introduce herself, she would proudly announce ‘I am the daughter of Furiosa Jabassa, of the New Citadel clan’. Anyone who saw her knew who her father was.