Furiosa's ideas of what constitutes weakness have changed in the last few years. Now that the society around them is more balanced. With War Boys, you never let anyone see you bleed. The only time they were allowed to show fear was at the thought of a soft death. Now that there are other voices, the Sisters, the Vuvalini, the formerly-Wretched and everyone in between, she has been reminded that there are different strengths. So, too, must there be different weaknesses. It speaks better of Thor than he knows that he suffers so much care and guilt; even if it won't help him, even if it's a sickness, it's the sickness of a man who wanted the best for his friends, his people, his world.
And that's a strength, if only he can shake off the pathology, with time and support.
Life endures, indeed. Survival is the one rule of the wild Wasteland. Any other moral code has to be carried with you when you venture out into it, like water and provisions, and just like with water and food, you can run out if you wander too long.
She considers his question for a long moment, looking at the sky. "One breath at a time," she says at last. "Not even a day at a time, or an hour, or a minute. One breath."
"After the Road War, I was left with holes on each side of my rib-cage, weak with blood loss, and I caught fever more than once. But worse than that, I had lost all but two of my clan, and I knew the Green Place where I grew up was dead. And the only chance I had of saving the handful of people depending on me was to return to the Citadel. I would have rather died, but I couldn't make that choice for them. So we had to get there and we had to win."
"But once the fighting was over, I thought for a while I might just be done. Even the air seemed to press on my chest, like when it was in my lungs before, but outside my ribcage this time. Holding me down. Most of what I did for weeks was sleeping."
"But the others kept visiting me. Kept bringing me food and...I'm not sure what all they said to me. I don't remember a lot of it. But they reminded me they existed, and so I just kept breathing."
"Eventually, the pressure started to go away again, and the breathing got easier."
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And that's a strength, if only he can shake off the pathology, with time and support.
Life endures, indeed. Survival is the one rule of the wild Wasteland. Any other moral code has to be carried with you when you venture out into it, like water and provisions, and just like with water and food, you can run out if you wander too long.
She considers his question for a long moment, looking at the sky. "One breath at a time," she says at last. "Not even a day at a time, or an hour, or a minute. One breath."
"After the Road War, I was left with holes on each side of my rib-cage, weak with blood loss, and I caught fever more than once. But worse than that, I had lost all but two of my clan, and I knew the Green Place where I grew up was dead. And the only chance I had of saving the handful of people depending on me was to return to the Citadel. I would have rather died, but I couldn't make that choice for them. So we had to get there and we had to win."
"But once the fighting was over, I thought for a while I might just be done. Even the air seemed to press on my chest, like when it was in my lungs before, but outside my ribcage this time. Holding me down. Most of what I did for weeks was sleeping."
"But the others kept visiting me. Kept bringing me food and...I'm not sure what all they said to me. I don't remember a lot of it. But they reminded me they existed, and so I just kept breathing."
"Eventually, the pressure started to go away again, and the breathing got easier."