For the second time in four minutes, Nux is hit.
His small body crumples in on itself and he rolls into a ball as he hits the stone floor, protecting his vital organs. The stronger war pup is already diving toward him with teeth bared. Nux is small but he's fast, and he narrowly misses a well placed kick from the pup thanks to the fact that he is so much lighter on his feet.
The other pups surround them in a circle, jostling and shoving one another, raising small white fists to the air. They are thirsty, so thirsty for violence and blood, anything to worry between their teeth to dull the constant blade of boredom. They cannot yet steer wheels, scurry up poles, wield flames or toss thundersticks. This is all they have and they throw themselves into it with wild abandon.
Nux stumbles to his feet. He's shaking, his tidepool eyes wide with adrenaline, his little body on fire. He is down here - down here in The Pits! - where the War Boys burn off their rage and their testosterone. There are fingernail marks and blood stains on the stone walls. Everywhere, you can smell sweat and fear and anger. He should not be here, but he is, because he has very important things to prove. Big things that shout inside him at night when he holds his breath and listens to the maddening silence of his small, boring life.
The other pup is bigger. He has developing muscles where Nux is still a chrysalid, his baby fat a cocoon. Nux ducks below a swing and starts to wonder if he has made a grave mistake; he could die down here. A blow connects with his face and he is pretty sure, almost positive, that he feels his nose break. The back of his throat fills up with the metallic tang of blood and suddenly he is choking, falling to his knees. His opponent wraps his arms around his neck from behind and starts to tighten them.
I'm gonna die before I get to drive, Nux thinks. He is scrambling for purchase, his hands grabbing uselessly at the forearms around his throat. never even got to hold a wheel…
The other war pups are yelling and cheering, some are shouting in protest - don't kill him! - and there is wetness running down Nux's face, he can't breathe, can't breathe, and he is so scared that he is going to piss his pants in front of everybody.
And then, it is the most peculiar thing, but Nux hears a scuffle and angry shouting from behind him and suddenly the arms around his neck are gone and sweet, sweet air rushes back into his lungs. He falls forward onto his hands in the dirt and chokes, spits, sucks huge gulps of air back into his body. He wipes a shaking hand across his mouth and scrambles unsteadily to his feet, turns around. Another pup stands over his opponent, his fist drawn back and his eyes slitted in anger. His small mouth is a pinched grimace. Nux notices immediately that this pup is big, big enough that he will be getting anointed soon. He is stocky and thick, a mass of muscle with an already impressive array of scars littering his white flesh. Nux looks down at his opponent, panting and squirming in the dirt at the feet of this big pup. He feels a grin threatening to split his face.
"What the hell, Slit?" one of the pups watching yells. "That was a good fight!"
"Yeah!" comes a chorus of shouts from all around.
Slit, this big pup with the feral eyes, he spins fast and shoves the angry pup in the chest. His hands are big and they make a sharp smacking sound in the air. "He's too little!" he growls, pointing at Nux, who is suddenly so ashamed in the face of his hero. "and you know it!"
Nux tries to speak up but his voice is like a tumbleweed in the sand.
"He's a little bitch!" one of the pups laughs, and this causes the others to snort and double over, some of them pointing. Slit ignores them and straightens, his fists at his sides. Calm. Suddenly he is grinning, slow and predatory.
"Anyone wanna fight me instead then?" he says loudly into the laughing crowd, and just like that it is like an engine has died and sputtered into quiet, the way the pups trail off nervously and begin to look around at one another. At their feet. At anything besides Slit and the set of his jaw, the glare in his deep set eyes. The chilling smile on his face.
"Thought so." Slit turns and looks at Nux, nods at him. A jerk of his chin and Nux is hurrying after him, sending one last hateful glare at the pup still prostrate on the ground.
They are leaving the pits, and Nux is discovering that Slit is bigger and faster, and he has to struggle to keep up while holding his ruined nose in his hands. "Hey!" he calls at Slit's back, jogging. His voice sounds like he is trying to speak around a mouthful of gravel. "wait up!"
They turn a corner and Nux almost runs smack into Slit who has stopped suddenly. He jabs Nux in the center of his chest with his index finger. "You're an idiot." he says simply. Nux has his hands cupped over his nose, blood flowing between his fingers. "what the hell didja think was gonna happen in there?"
Nux drops his hands from his face and sniffs angrily. The blood is flowing freely now, down over his chapped lips and dripping off the end of his chin. He angrily drags his arm across his mouth and spits a mouthful of blood off to the side. "Not an idiot." he mumbles, glaring at the ground.
Slit laughs, and Nux tries to hear any cruelty in it but there is none. "Coulda got killed." Slit says, raising an eyebrow. Suddenly he is very close to Nux and his hands are coming up to touch his face - Nux flinches instinctively - and then his probing fingers are touching the broken bone and Nux lets loose a wail.
"Shut up! Baby." Slit hisses, but he gentles his touch. He chews on his bottom lip and Nux looks up at him, willing his body to stay still. Can't be soft. Gotta be tough. Drivers don't cry.
"It's broken." Slit steps back and wipes his hands on his pants.
"No shit." Nux grumbles sarcastically. For some reason he isn't afraid to rile this pup who is so much bigger than he is.
Slit snorts. "You wanna go to the Organic? Or you want me to fix it?"
Nux pales at the mention of the Organic, with his leering eyes and slobbery lips, the room filled with Blood Bags and dying War Boys. "Nu-uh." he shakes his head quickly.
"Then follow me." Slit says, and Nux does without any hesitation.
They are on the roof of the Citadel, an area separate from the Greenery. It is late at night and they are sitting on the edge of a stone outcropping, their legs dangling easily over the edge, familiar and comfortable with the tremendous height. The moon is high and affords Nux a good light with which to study Slit beside him, though he tries to be as inconspicuous as he can.
Slit had set his nose, and the throbbing has dimmed to a dull ache. Nux is proud that only a few drops of wet rolled down his cheeks, and he felt an aching gratefulness that Slit pretended not to notice them. Nux hopes that there will be a scar, or that maybe it will heal in some kind of bizarre shape. He doesn't care, just as long as he can breathe. He told this to Slit, who laughed and grinned approvingly. "That'd be shine." he agreed, and Nux felt a kinship swell in his chest.
Slit leans back on one hand and picks at his teeth with a fingernail. "Can't do that again." he says into the air before them. Nux knows he's talking about The Pits. He thinks he's going to argue, but he doesn't want Slit to be angry with him. It scares him that he realizes he wants approval from this mysterious boy when he has spent so much of his life trying to be a shadow.
Nux looks down at his hands in his lap. "'kay." he shrugs, just like that. Easy.
"Why did you wanna fight anyway?" Slit asks, and Nux isn't even embarrassed that no other pup would be asked his. He knows with a certainty that he is not being ridiculed.
Nux looks over at Slit and sucks at the crust of dried blood on his upper lip. It's a moment before he answers, mulling it over, needing his answer to mean something to Slit. Needing this boy to understand.
"I'm gonna be a Driver." he says, nodding to himself. "and I...I gotta get tough. I gotta be chrome. I can't," and now he's upset because his throat is getting small, "I can't keep hidin'." he stuffs his hands into his pockets.
Slit is watching him. He doesn't say anything for a while, just cocks his head at Nux and appraises him. Nux feels his body grow hot under the scrutiny but he doesn't know what to say. He always has so many words inside of him and no one to tell them to, and now that someone actually wants to listen he can't make himself.
Finally, he can't take the silence anymore. "Prolly' think it's stupid, yeah?" he bursts out, his face flaming and his hands squeezing fists inside his pockets. His heart is a drum and he's certain that everyone in the Citadel can hear it.
"Nah." Slit replies, and Nux tries not to let his shoulders sag at the relief he feels. He glances over at Slit who is leaning back on his palms, his body a casual line against the dark horizon. "not stupid. I can see it." he sits up and Nux is smiling, smiling so hard. "But you ain't gonna Drive if you're gettin' your ass kicked all the time."
All Nux hears is "I can see it" repeating like a mantra in his head. He nods, not really hearing.
"You need someone to watch your back. Someone to show ya the ropes."
More nodding.
"You need a Lancer."
At this, Nux stills, his eyes growing wide at the sand stretched endlessly below them.
Lancer.
Nux swings his legs over the edge and tucks them under himself, facing Slit. His face is open and reverent, his little chest rising with excited breath. He swallows, starts to shake his head, stops. "You'd...you'd be my Lancer?" his tone is disbelief. "why?"
Slit shrugs. "Ain't fair, what they do." he says. "nobody likes you. Nobody likes me either." he states this simply as a fact, not a dig at Nux's place in the food chain. "Freaks like us gotta stick together."
Nux isn't sure if he's a freak but he knows that what Slit says is true - nobody likes him. Nobody has ever saved him from a beating, that's for certain. Nobody except Slit, the first person in his short and miserable Half Life to give one iota of shit about him. They aren't War Boys, not yet, but for the first time ever Nux feels himself looking forward to the future, one where he might not be alone.
Nux extends one hand in the air between them, hesitantly, still afraid that this whole day may turn out to be too good to be true. But Slit clasps his hand almost immediately, their palms holding onto one another tight, squeezing. Nux feels how warm Slit's hand is, the first hand to ever touch him to help, not hurt, and he grins with breathless happiness.
"Freaks, then." he says, his grinning teeth white against the blood on his face.
"Freaks." Slit agrees with a smirk.
When the sun comes up that morning, it shines down on two war pups curled against one another, fast asleep.