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It had been a successful days raid. The War Boys had taken another lone blood bag in a pretty nice car, so had been given the rest of the day off - a rare and beautiful thing. Nux and Slit were tired but, unwilling to waste this gift, decided it was time to drink that rotgut Slit had stolen from the Organic Mechanic months ago. They’d saved it for a time like this, and who knew when they’d get another chance?
“We’ve gotta try and find Doof though, yeah?” Nux’ eyes popped slightly as he grinned, hurrying to keep up with Slit’s long strides.
“Yeah, obviously!” Slit raced ahead towards their quarters. The echoing sound of grinding guitar told him Doof was in and he sped up, refusing to acknowledge Nux’ inability to keep up. He’d catch up eventually.
Slit was banging loudly on Doof’s door when Nux arrived with that slight far away look in his eye that came out to play when he was breathless. He soon gathered himself as Doof came to the door. Dressed as always in his red onesie stained with blood and oil and fuck knows what, singed and torn nearly to the point of destruction, Doof appeared at the door.
“Doof! We gotta go, urgent mission!” Slit turned and grinned mischievously at Nux, who returned the smile.
“Yep!” Nux joined in. “Very fucking important come on get your ass out here now.” He reached out and took Doof’s arm, steering him firmly out of the door and into the corridor.
“What the fuck, didn’t you have a mission this morning? You can’t have been back five minutes, what the fuck kind of life are we sentenced to here?” Doof grumbled, but let Nux guide him through the labyrinthine barracks. They stopped off at Slit’s room, where he grabbed the rough canvas bag from under his bunk. The bottles clinked loudly in the quiet, and Doof grinned.
“I fucking knew it!” He laughed. “I thought this place was a bit quiet to be preparing for any fuckin’ mission.” Doof put his arm out, clapping his hand roughly around Slit’s shoulder, give or take a bit of arm. Slit glanced at Nux almost sadly, hoping the ruse had lasted for longer.
“Yeah, alright man. Keep your voice down though, someone else’ll hear.” Slit hauled the bag onto his shoulder and the glass bottles inside clinked again.
“Tch,” Doof scoffed. “You clank any more and everyone’s gonna know. Where are we headed? We can’t hide in the garages any more, they’re working overtime fixing up the new rides.”
“Shit, yeah that’s a good point.” Slit frowned. “Where the fuck can we go? Not fuckin likely we can stay here.”
“Let’s go to the catacombs.” Nux said, suddenly. “Nobody ever goes down there, and I’m pretty sure there’s still lights that work.”
Doof and Slit turned and gave him a look that said ‘fuck no.’ But, with no other options they agreed and began their descent into the heart of the Citadel, down stairs and through tunnels and down more stairs until they found themselves under the archway leading to the catacombs. Nux found a light switch on a nearby wall and gasped as dim light spread through the gloom.
“Doof, dude. Do you want me to describe this to you?”
“Hell yeah, I want descriptions of anything that makes you gasp.” Doof laughed, it echoed.
“Alright, we just came through this huge archway, and turned the light on. It’s got huge pillars, like, thick ones, with little compartments in columns up to the ceiling… Shit, man I can’t even fucking see the ceiling. That’s how tall it is. The lights are coming from round the walls and I think there’s a big, like, central pillar with some lights going around it. It’s a way off though, there’s a big fuckin dark patch between here and there where the light runs out. Shiit, man.” Nux trailed off, drinking in the scene.
“What’s in the compartments? They ain’t just empty, right? There’s skulls or something, right?” Doof asked.
“Oh, yeah. There’s skulls. This whole place looks to be made of skulls, cobbled together with bits of rock.” Slit took over describing from Nux, who’d been rendered silent at the awesome scale of this place.
“Damn.” Doof muttered. “Sucks to be blind, I guess.”
They settled down, leaning against the outer wall, not especially wanting to visit the place where the light ran out, but pretty happy with this turn of events. The crypts were quiet, and isolated; obviously creepy, but not enough to frighten the most fearsome up and coming war boys. So they sat and drank and drank and sat. Doof tapped out some of his new beats on the floor and heard them rise right up to the ceiling and back, each tap overlapping with the last, broken only so he could periodically swig at the foul fermented trash Slit had so bravely liberated. The silences brought on by his breaks were comfortable; they did this often enough to have something close to a routine, as close to routine as children of chaos could have, at least. They all looked forward to moments like these. Nux and Slit settled into their usual sitting arrangement: Nux curled up in Slit’s lap, their head resting on the other’s shoulder, moving only to bring the bottle to their lips, or their lips to his neck, or both.
“Y’all makin out over there without me?” Doof had paused to neck the last of his bottle, grimacing at the taste.
“Who, us?” Slit quipped. “Wouldn’t dream of it.”
“Bullshit.” Doof pouted, holding out a hand towards the couple, trying to find them. Nux shuffled, making room for him before reaching out and taking the offered hand gently. Doof shifted over so he too was leaning on Slit.
“Why do you always pile on me?” Slit grumbled.
“Comfiest shoulders.” Doof replied, smiling as Nux threw a leg over him. At least, he hoped it was Nux. There’s no way Slit was that flexible.
“Gotta get our snuggles in before the booze hits and we lose our shit.” Nux said, already feeling the haze descending upon him.
“Alright, we should probably make a vague plan of action though,” Slit snaked an arm around Doof’s waist as he spoke. “I suggest we do some top class recon of this place. Think I’ve got a flare or two in my bag somewhere for the dark bit. You game?”
The other two mumbled their mutual agreement, and Slit felt that once again, he was the most sober of the three. Rotgut was lethal in high doses, and he guessed the others were more predisposed to succumbing to it. How should he know? He wasn’t a Red Cross. He felt the familiar dim warmth of their bodies pressed against his, and knew without looking that their eyes were closed in dreamless sleep. This happened every damn time. Torn between enjoying their peaceful presence and scared that they might not awake if he didn’t wake them. Rotgut was a really shitty way to die, he thought, they were better than that. They all had to be awaited. He stirred, slowly sitting forward and holding them both in a more upright position.
“Hey, wake up.” He murmured, it still echoed back to him.
“I’m awake.” The reply came first from Doof.
“No, you’re not. Come on, get up. We got shit to do.”
“Fuck off, it’s our day off.” Nux chimed in, blearily.
“Nope, no rest for the wicked, motherfuckers. Up you get.” Slit retracted his arm from around Doof and repositioned Nux’s leg before nudging them off his lap altogether. They grumbled, but were unmistakably alive. Fuzzy and fucked, but alright.
“Mmh, fine.” Doof conceded first, using the wall they were leaning against to haul himself up unsteadily. “Come on, Nux.”
Nux followed suit begrudgingly, holding out a hand to Slit and helping pull him up as well. They stood for a few seconds, letting the haze surge through them and light them all up inside with the promise of an excellent evening ahead. Slit broke the silence rummaging through his bag for a flare, finally extracting it and turning it over in his hand. Looks like it should work. He took Doof’s hand and started forward towards the end of the light.
“How the fuck does the light just end like that?” Nux wondered aloud.
“Is something casting a shadow?” Doof suggested, not being able to see the quick fade of light falling into something darker than black, somehow. Neither Nux nor Slit could properly explain it.
“No, it’s… different.” Slit explained poorly.
As they approached the outskirts, Slit kept a tight grip on Doof, not wanting him to fall into this darkness. They took a few more steps but were cut short when Nux cried out.
“Fuck! Stop!” His tone was the kind of urgent the war boys recognised as having an unspoken ‘right fucking now’ tacked on the end. They stopped.
“It’s not a shadow, it’s a pit. Holy shit we nearly walked into fucking oblivion.” Nux laughed loudly, the sound distorted and amplified by the echoes.
Slit hooked his arm through Doof’s, and took the cap off his flare with his now free hand, bending down to strike it on the rough stone floor. In the new red light, they could see where the ground fell away into blackness, and where it rose up again a few feet away. Nux and Slit gave each other a significant look, the kind that says ‘I fuckin’ dare you.’
“Alright, Doof. Here’s the thing…” Slit began, trying to keep the smile out of his voice, but before he could finish Nux had backed up a few steps and leaped across the chasm, knocking the flare out of Slit’s hand on the way past. Slit gaped as it plummeted endlessly downwards, though thankfully it dimly lit Nux’s perfect landing on the other side before being lost to the chasm.
“That was Nux jumping over the pit, wasn’t it?” Doof smirked.
“Hell yeah it was!” Nux’s voice echoed from a few feet away, Doof reckoned.
“Nice. Throw me over? Nux’ll catch me, won’t you?”
“Hell yeah I will!”
Slit was outnumbered, though it was good to see the energy flooding back into them, he was a bit behind, and felt only fuzz for the moment. He took the other flare out of his bag, uncapped it and struck it before tossing it over onto the floor on the other side of the chasm.
“Alright, ready?” Slit took Doof by the waist, squeezing him gently.
“Born ready.” Doof replied, that manic hint back in his voice that Slit loved so much.
The war boy grinned his lopsided, put back together grin and hoisted him up, swinging him back and forth a few times to pick up momentum before releasing the warrior and sending him flying across the gap into Nux’s waiting arms. Of course, Nux wasn’t the most steady on their feet on account of all the hard liquor, so immediately after they caught Doof, they fell spectacularly on their ass and took Doof with them. Upon seeing this, Slit hastily leapt the chasm to join them, but his feet were positioned wrong as he landed, and his ankle buckled under him, leaving him also on the floor.
The laughter rang loud and breathless and manic as they found themselves twisted up in a big bald pile of pale limbs and torn clothes. The liquor had set in in earnest now, and they gasped and grabbed at each other as their breaths came harder through the giggles. Nux was the first to choke out a stifled ‘witness’ as he somehow turned paler than his usual white, his eyes popping and his face contorted into a bizarre mask of terrified mirth. Slit could do nothing but point at him and mouth the word back as he fought to inhale. Doof flung his arms around both of them, choking on the dust they’d kicked up flailing but clutching at his boys all the same. If they were going to die from laughter, they were going to be found all together, if they were found at all.
Eventually they caught their breath and the laughter died down, their near death experience sobering them somewhat. Doof was the first to speak.
“Fuck me,” he murmured. “Did we die?” He sounded genuinely unsure of the answer.
“I don’t think so?” Slit was first to catch his breath. “Nux, you with us?”
Ragged breaths came to them through the gloom, and Nux gave a soft grunt and a nod of the affirmative. Glad to be alive they lay back, this time piled on Doof, all struggling to get control of their breathing once more, all sensing that they all needed a few minutes to compose themselves.
“Jesus, Nux you shoulda seen your face when you went down.” Slit murmured, his voice tinged with laughter once more.
“You’re one to talk, fucking up the landing like that. Didn’t anyone teach you how to jump?” Nux shot back, but grinning all the same.
“Well I don’t know about you two but it was certainly something to hear.” Doof chipped in, still panting slightly.
“Mmh,” Nux settled their head onto Doof’s chest, suddenly exhausted. “Can we sleep here tonight? I don’t think I have enough in me to get back now.”
The other two grunted their agreement, and before long the three of them were asleep. Doof in the middle, on his back with a war boy resting on either shoulder, his hands lightly resting on their bony hips. All three still with the ghosts of smiles upon their lips, though they were dead to the world for the rest of the night and well into the morning. Dreamless, calm sleep was one of the best side effects of the Organic Mechanic’s liquor. He’d been known to use it to euthanise any particularly stubborn war boys who’d be a liability out in the waste, and if you were no use there you were no use anywhere. It was a terrible fate, one no war boy wanted to succumb to but at the end of a half life there’s nothing you can physically do to stop it. Recreationally, it was just a nice way to get away from the night fevers and feel energised and whole for a few hours.
Morning came fast, and the trio grudgingly made their way back out of the catacombs to their regular posts. The niggling pain returned to Nux’ neck, reminding them of their other friends. Slit limped slightly on a twisted ankle, but did his best to hide it by transforming it into another undeserved swagger. Doof was escorted back to his room and his guitars, and got to work on the new track for the Immortan, who believed it was paramount to keep his boys on their toes in all ways. War is unpredictable were his words. We should be too.