Taiju arrived as Senku fell to the ground dead. He cried, but Senku's body laid motionless at his feet too late to the fight.

"Taiga too" Yuzuriha in a cried gasp.

Taiju widened his mouth. He immediately turned around and his eyes landed on her small body. That was it.

"Don't." Yuzuriha pleaded, fear in her voice.

Taiju grunted and his pained roar went through the skies causing Yuzuriha to cry even more.

"I should have protected them." She lamented holding her red bow in a right clutch.

"You did what you could. I know you did" he wiped his tears and burgers away.

Tsukasa scrutinized Taiju wondering if he would attack him mindlessly and force him to kill him too. He didn't want to.

"I hold hope that..." Taiju uttered.

"It's okay Taiju. After all, we three made each other a promise."

"Right"

Taiju stood in front of Tsuaksa. He lifted a boulder and threw it to the air. Yuzuriha and Taiju made a run for it. Tsuaksa destroyed the boulder while Yuzuriha had level the playing fields using science by utilizing the little powder they had left to provoke an explosion. An explosion they used to grab Taiga and Senku away.

"What's the use in fleeing?" Tsuaksa thought as he felt the rain wash away his sins. The water droplets comforted his face with cold touches into reality as he stood on top of the mountain on the edge where Taiga one day would be teared away into half.

"I severed his cervical. There is no way he can be revived, Taiju. Especially in the stone world where there is no medication. And taiga...." He closed his eyes and he deeply inhaled the rain "she won't be waking up alive. And if she does she won't survive...I should've killed her without pain. Why did you leave me with no choice...." The world fell silent along with his feelings. He looked up once again, feeling the ache of his eye. "There was no other choice. You had to be dead, my chicorie"

————————————

"She's waking up! Don't cry" she felt someone's thumbs wipe her tear trails. For some reason, Taiga had woken up crying. Staring at two people who covered the sky behind them. "Stay down please. This time listen I don't want to lose two friends! You're not well!" Yuzuriha kneeled down and caressed her back to lay her down for she was attempting to stand up. "Taiga"

What am I hearing? "Senku—gone" she heard some girl's cry in a far distance. "Hes gone. Please Stay—-. You're. Don't—state will get"

Where is he? Taiga stared at the dirt before her and then the black abyss that blinded her sight in dots as she barely stood in all fours.

She slipped hardly into the ground for she couldn't stand up. She couldn't even raise her body. She was panting and breathing hard as she muttered words beyond her comprehension. She quickly understood though that she wouldn't be able breath without pain.

Taiga rolled over to her back and all she saw was the beautiful bright blue that blinded her sight. It was infinite and somewhat calming.

Senku would have love to see the beautiful sky too. He should be with her, but he wasn't for a reason she knew but couldn't recall. Why wasn't he with her? Where was he? "Where is he? Where—-is he?—-Where —-is—-he?"

"Taiga." Yuzuriha saw her cry out for her dead friend and she heard the worry pain in her voice. She could imagine her blurry mind with one thought in mind and it was him. Yuzuriha understood and she covered her mouth in grief at the tragedy.

"Senku. Senku" Taiga's dulcet voice quivered in fearing mumbles with a gulp of pain with each word.

Taiju's tears rolled down as he sniffled. Yuzuriha placed her hand on her mouth to avoid her own yelps in despondency.

Taiga's mind fell away into darkness. Her mind was away but all she cared about was to know where he was. She cried silently unable to whisper his name anymore.

She placed her hand on her forehead. Hopelessly wishing her pressure with her broken arm would penetrate and impede the terrible pain. She stared at the gloomy scene. The rain thrashed the ground. The Gray sky saddened and the blood washed away. Where had the blue gone? She was sure she was dazing off the blue sky, yet now she felt her temor grow inside her heart as if her wound was set there.

Her eyes got dizzy and all she saw was black spots appearing and disappearing. She wasn't sure if she could stay in reality anymore. She was tired, but she wanted to know where he was. She didn't feel right about him. She kept hearing them talk in phrases that soon became more clear despite her stinging pain in all her body and her mind.

She turned her head to avoid that sky that perturb her. Then she saw him.

He was laying down not so far from her side. He had a peaceful look, his mouth agape, and his skin was paler than it should have been.

Why was he down?

"He is not dead. He would not sacrifice himself"

Dead?

Tears dripped down her cheek in disguise with the rain. She couldn't speak. "Senku" Her voice was gone and she couldn't call his name to wake him up and her heart slowly slid down into a puddle of cold water in her stomach.

"Stay here. Don't move much please." Yuzuriha said as she dove to gently hug her "I thought you were dead too. You're so stubborn! I should have been the one injured not you! Stay down. Can you understand me?"

"He wouldn't sacrifice himself taiga! He is alive! You hear me! You have to be alive Senku!"

She attempted to listen to what they had to say, but it was hard for her; tears came out and her heart clench. She rolled to her side to stare at his motionless body.

"He was cracking his neck. That's where Senku wanted Tsuaksa to hit him." Yuzuriha puzzled in.

Taiga's breath was cut short. Remembering the reserve of miracle water. She remembered all those times he cracked his neck and her heart told her that it wasn't a habit of him. That one time he did not explain to her the reason of why they had the miracle fluid saved up and then he confessed it was for an emergency. "The rock. The rock. In his neck" she desperately implored as her mind went into black parades of pain.

"It has to be that! That wasn't a habit he had! He must've of wanted for us to look there"

"He can't be dead!" Taiju yelled "you are alive!"

They turned him over and everything came into a complete puzzle when they admired the petrified rock.

"Senku once told us that that when we de-petrified, cracks were filled as part of the process."

"Here Taiju the revival fluid!" Yuzuriha energetically handed the fluid to him. Hope filles their hearts.

He carefully poured it on the tiny rock on Senku's neck and he shouted how much he meant to him. Taiga just watched his body as she tried to stand up, her cries becoming loud laments.

"I CANT DO THIS WITHOUT YOU! I NEEED YOU HERE WITH ME!!!!" Taiju yelled every piece of memory with him passing across his mind. As if it would be the last in which he negated.

Hope.

"The rain has stopped" the pair looked at the sky as they lifted their hands in test.

"That thunderstorm was providing some serious cover for us."

A deep voice prevailed into her ears. Taiga smiled and her tears flowed.

"So keep your voices down from here and out. Because if Tsuaksa hears us it's game over for all of us"

"Right!" Taiju yelled in response.

"He's not coming is he?" Yuzuriha asked in fear.

Then the couple looked around in shock. In disbelief and sudden realization. And they smiled too.

Senku magically sat up and he looked around.

SLACK! He looked at the side he was turned to and he wondered who would revived him with so much enthusiasm after returning from the dead. He then felt himself go slightly backwards and an arm went around his neck pulling him into a shoulder. All he heard were loud cries. A raspy sweet voice that sounded his ears. His eyes were wide open for he as well was seeing a dead person. "...Taiga" he softly whispered. He placed his hands carefully against her small back.

There was a small silence where her face hid in the creak of his neck as she silently cried out loud. She departed and she stared into his eyes as she kept grasping for air in her mourning to calm down.

His brows were furrowed, and his chest heaved. He seemed alive. She grabbed her hair and her forehead holding her cries and pain. He was an idiot.

"I'm glad you're alive too"

Taiga stopped crying and she leaned in and she felt his forehead against hers. Her gone like eyes staring down as he smirked and defiantly looked at her. "I wouldn't sacrifice myself and science."

She faintly smiled and their silence became reality despite their friends cries of excitement surrounding them. She slightly parted and she looked into his eyes, faintly staring into his clear mind as her fragile mind chanted her in. Her nose grazing his. Senku's hand slid behind her neck. Feeling each others breath for a long moment of relief. Then she furrows her brows in pain as she glided her sight over and laid her head on his shoulder; away in shame, anger, pain, defeat, and from his lips.

Their friends had gone quiet. Witnessing a reunion and something else.

"Stop crying barbaric woman. I'm alive"

Yuzuriha smiled.

He stared at her wounds and he felt a temor in his body. "You're injured. You're bleeding out."

There was no response. Senku turned to look at his surroundings and he saw his friend.

"Senku..." Taiju said

"Good job noticing the thing on my neck. I barely even gave you any hints about it" he pointed at his neck with his two fingers. "Taiju, Yuzuriha. We need to heal her."

"Senku" Taiju said. He then yelled "SENKUUUUUUUUU!!!!" As he dove to hug him crushing every single bone in him.

He was immediately punched away though. "That killer tried to kill me and you crush every single bone on my body! Let go!"

Taiga breathed silently and she held her head. They were so loud.

"You know I'm not the type of guy who does the whole emotional, teary-eyes gratitude kinda thing, so don't expect that" he kindly smiled and he closed his eyes in a short grateful nod.

Yuzuriha smiled her eyes tearing up. "Welcome back, Senku".

There was a hard plop. They all stayed silent and they looked down to see the tigress fainted and the dirt painted a crimson red, every time splattering bigger.

"I need a stick and cloths"  his stern voice stuttered as he feared the worst.

"Taiga, hand on there. You can't leave my side."

Could she have gotten a concussion, having brain damage. He wasn't a doctor. He wasn't a doctor.

"Give me something to tie her arm up. We have no analgesics for your pain. You keep harming yourself when will you not" he said as he tied a cloth around her arm. He kept speaking to her silent body. He wiped the blood on her face with his thumb carefully.

"It seems as if she will only listen to you" Yuzuriha softly said in her sweet voice recalling their moments and her painful mourns "she was calling your name all the time. The way she cried. It seems like-"

"Yuzuriha."

Her ears lifted.

"She can't go to her death"

Senku and Yuzuriha started to murmur while Taiju looked at them murmur secrets.

Yuzuriha finally agreed and she turned to her love. "Senku was saying that we should go meet up Tsuaksa."

"Oh there's an idea" Taiju innocently smiled. "ARE YOU CRAZY!

"Taiga will stay with me." Senku's eyes closed "if she returns with that bastard.... She will be killed for sure. Tsukasa doesn't want her on the way."

"But she isn't on the way why does Tsukasa think that!"

"Tsukasa is in love with her."

"WHAT!"

Senku angrily clutched his outwear.

"Yet he had the heart to..." Yuzuriha looked at her fragile wounded body.

"A man in love wouldn't do that" Taiju mumble out in confusion as he turned to look at Yuzuriha. Their eyes meeting to show concern.

"He sided with me. He knows her goals and therefore she was targeted by Tsukasa. But it was clear he intended to have her as her "queen" in this new world." He held her hand.

"Tsuaksa will not stop and will destroy anything that is on his way to fulfill his goal so be the girl he cherishes and loves." His stern voice announced. "she must stay with me. If he ever sees her. He'll destroy her. I must take care of her. I promised her. I won't let anything happen to her anymore. Or anyone else to be massacre by him."

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