Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

While Senku was referring to the lack of tungsten when he said that winning against Tsukasa would require a miracle, it still ended up being incredibly true. Senku thinks that the lack of luck Gen has teased him about his whole life might have just been saved up all to guarantee the series of events that led to the Kingdom of Science's victory.

First was Kohaku's idea to play Lillian's record to the guard, Nikki, watching over Taiju and Yuzuriha when Senku talking about the inventions they could make didn't win her over. Then, Chrome managing to break out after Ukyo was forced to take him prisoner was another miracle in itself. Then when Hyoga managed to stab Ukyo after his betrayal was revealed, it was another miracle that the hit avoided anything vital. Then of course, managing to turn it into a ceasefire after Chrome managed to grab some of the remaining sulfuric acid, allowing him to make nitroglycerin.

That ceasefire, of course, only lasted long enough to revive Mirai, Tsukasa's sister before Hyoga decided to try to kill her, and Tsukasa took the spear intended for his sister. There lies the last miracle: that Senku, half drowned and outmatched, and Tsukasa, slowly dying from his punctured lung, managed to take down Hyoga together, before having to put Tsukasa in a cryogenic state in the hopes of being able to revive him later. It's all so statistically improbable that frankly, Senku's surprised everything ended up working out even this much.

As he stands over the freezer, trying not to think about who lies inside, Senku can't help but think (not for the first time, and definitely not for the last) that every part of this war could have gone more easily, more cleanly, and maybe even kinder if Gen was standing by his side, instead of only being in his memory. Still, the fact that it worked out somehow isn't something that he's going to overlook. He forces himself to leave, breathing deeply as he steps outside.

It's Yuzuriha who finds him there, sitting alone outside the entrance to the cave where Tsukasa's body lies, frozen in sleep. "Senku-kun?" she asks softly as she approaches. "You doing okay? Everyone else already headed back. You should come too."

He gives her a little nod. "Yeah. In a minute."

She doesn't push, instead, she brings herself to sit by his side. The roar of the waterfall washes over him, the sound of the water filling the silence between the two of them.

Then finally, Yuzuriha breaks it. "We missed you," she says, laughing wetly. "Taiju-kun and I. We thought about you every day."

Senku snorts. "Yeah, I definitely missed you when winter started. Could have used your expert tailoring when the snow rolled around."

Yuzuriha laughs, the soft way that she has the whole time Senku has known her. "Wouldn't expect anything less from you, Senku-kun. You still owe me for all of the statues you had me piece together!"

He gives a slight smirk. "Yeah, don't worry. I'll definitely pay you back for all the brutal puzzle work you've done. You've been a lifesaver."

Yuzuriha smiles, but it doesn't quite reach her eyes. "Hey, Senku-kun?" He glances over at her. "You know you can talk to me about anything, right? Me and Taiju-kun?"

"What do you mean?"

"Just… we all know you did what you could, right?" She takes a breath. "I don't think anyone else could have thought of freezing him to save him."

Ah. Senku lets out a disinterested hum, not really willing to get into it. Still, she puts her hand on top of his, and Senku allows it to stay. The contact isn't necessarily pleasant, but it is steadying, grounding him to the floor, allowing him to forget the reality of what lies behind him.

They sit there for a while, letting the sound of the rushing water carry over the space between them. Senku turns away, taking in the scenery rather than looking at her. The trees underneath them sway with the wind, and every now and then, when the wind gusts strongly enough, the water will spray against his face. The droplets are cool against his face that still feels flushed from the adrenaline of almost dying. As he observes, he feels the tension in his shoulders slowly loosen a bit. That's when Yuzuriha speaks again.

"I'm not as good at this as Gen-kun was," she says quietly, pulling her knees to her chest. "I feel like he always knew what to say after something hard. I wish he was here."

Senku stiffens. "I don't…" the words leave him. "Not right now," he rasps, finally. "Please."

Yuzuriha looks over at him, concern and something else he can't name clear in her gaze. But she backs off. "Okay, Senku-kun. Whatever you need."

He pulls his hand out from under hers, jaw tight. Still, he doesn't leave, and she doesn't either. They just both sit there in silence. It twists in Senku's chest, until finally, he blurts out, "I'm sure I would have gotten an earful from him for almost drowning."

He can hear Yuzuriha's breath catch slightly. "Oh, you know he would have been kicking up a fuss! I'm sure he would have a lot of words to say about everything that happened today," she says, leaning her head back against the rock of the mountain. "When I was putting those statues together, I kept imagining him there, helping me. He would have complained the whole time, but he was always so good at following instructions. If I tried to get Taiju-kun to help me, he probably would have smashed them all." She laughs lightly. "And you have much more important things to be helping with."

Senku gives a small hum. The words keep coming to his mouth— maybe it's that he's with someone who seems to think about Gen as much as he does, misses him as much as he does. Or maybe it's that he missed Yuzuriha, the weight of his friends alone in the Empire of Might because of him carrying on him for months. Either way, the words come free from his mouth. "I can't stop thinking about how so many things would have worked out so much better if he was here. Every time something didn't go to plan, I couldn't help but think about how he would have had some scummy plan like he always does that would have dealt with illogical human emotion. Hell, I bet that if he was here, he could have talked Tsukasa down on his own."

Yuzuriha looks him over carefully. "Senku-kun, you know Gen-kun wasn't a miracle worker, right?" she teases. "I think your boyfriend biases are getting to you."

Senku lets out an irritated tch noise, looking away. "There's no such thing."

She laughs at that, bright and open. "Honestly, I think that even if Gen-kun was here, a lot would have worked out the same way it did now. Either way, it feels like a miracle that everything worked out."

Senku huffs. "That's what I keep telling myself. Feels like all the terrible luck that he's teased me about since we were kids all paid off today. It's ten billion percent not logical, but he definitely would have pointed it out."

She grins back at him. "I can definitely hear him saying something like that." Her smile lessens just a touch. "I miss him."

"…Yeah."

"Sorry, I don't mean to—" she says, as she suddenly straightens, waving her hands. "I know you must miss him too! I don't mean to compare! It's just—" she sighs. "He's my best friend. You all are. So not seeing him for this long feels… strange."

"It's not going to be for long," Senku says, firm. "One of the steps on our road map is getting to America and retrieving his statue. As soon as we can build a boat and get everything else we need, we're going to get him back."

Yuzuriha whips her head towards him, eyes wide with shock. "What, you thought I was leaving him there until we revive all of humanity?" He smirks. "Nah, there's no way I'd do that. No way I'm letting him squirm his way out of work that long, statue or not."

She gapes. "You're so—" and then, to Senku's utter horror, she lets out some strange combination of a laugh and a sob.

"Fuck, I don't—" he scrambles, entirely unprepared to deal with the unexpected crying. When most people cry, it doesn't really phase him— he knows it's a way of relieving the body's stress. But it's always unnerved him to see Yuzuriha cry, and he can feel that old panic surge up within him. "Look, Yuzuriha, if you need—"

"No, I'm sorry, Senku-kun. I didn't mean to— I'm just so relieved," she says, sniffing in between the tears. "I've spent so long worrying, and I know how important he is to you, but—" She wipes her eyes, and brings her hand down to give his last one gentle squeeze before retracting it. His hand doesn't flinch. "Thank you."

"It's just logical," he says, dismissive.

Yuzuriha's eyes twinkle knowingly, even between the tears. "You can't fool me, Senku-kun. I know the moment Gen-kun is involved, all logic goes out the window for you."

Senku bolts upright, turning away from her so she can't see the way his cheeks heat. "We should get back to the village," he coughs. "Lots of work we have to get done."

Yuzuriha laughs, bright and unfettered, and follows along.

Of course, just telling Yuzuriha that it's the next step on the road map doesn't make it finish itself. After all, there's no point in going to America if he doesn't have a supply of nitric acid to actually make the revival fluid. He needs platinum, no getting around that. He needs to build a boat that can survive the trek across the Pacific Ocean, and he needs to acquire a caption who can handle the journey. Once he does that, he'll finally do what he's been working towards: getting to California so he can retrieve his boyfriend, a shit ton of corn in slew to make alcohol. Then, once he's achieved both that piece of mind and that vital source, can he finally make the trek to the source of the petrification.

Thank god that even with the pitfalls he's been having with incorporating the Empire of Might into the Kingdom of Science, Minami is willing to cooperate with his request to find a captain. She takes them to the Nanami Academy, a nautical school, where to her protest, he uses their remaining revival fluid to revive one Ryusui Nanami. It's clear that even if she has her reservations, he's the best one for the job. Talent comes before anything else— he's not about to compromise on someone worse for the job just because they might be easier to deal with.

He only regrets it slightly when Ryusui opens his mouth.

He's quick to catch on though, immediately realizing that society has collapsed and that whatever fortune his family had before amounts to nothing, now. And he proves how ridiculously capable he is when he correctly predicts the storm that's heading in, down to the degree. His sailor instincts are no joke, lived experience that no one else here can match.

It's enough to make up for Ryusui's yelling about how he desires everything, and almost enough to make up for the fact that he immediately claims rights of the oil field, and then single handedly establishes capitalism in the stone world. Dragos now carry the economy— Ryusui immediately flooding the market with them. Senku is more than happy to take advantage— after all, currency is a natural step to reestablishing society. They would have had to deal with it eventually, and he has a variety of science tools at his disposal to make the money he's going to need.

Within a couple weeks, the whole village has gotten into it, particularly those from the Empire of Might— many were hesitant to cooperate at the beginning, but it seems as though instincts from before the petrification have carried over, and frankly speaking, they're slaves to money.

It works well enough, up until he sends the scouting group of Kohaku, Chrome, and Ukyo out, and they send a radio transmission.

"The landscape is completely different from before," Ukyo's voice comes through on the radio. "Nothing matches our previous maps, along with my own recollection of the landscape. I think we underestimated how long thirty seven hundred years really is." Senku internally curses himself. He absolutely should have accounted for this— thirty seven hundred years is more than enough time for Mount Fuji to erupt several times over. Four to five times at the minimum, possibly more than ten. There's no way that they can rely on Senku's memory of where the oil fields used to be.

"We're going to start making a new map," Ukyo says. That's not going to be enough— it's going to be ridiculously slow trying to do all that on foot. What Senku needs is some way to speed the process up.

"If only we could fly around like a bird and take a look," Suika muses from behind him. "I bet you could see the all the ground from up there."

It's as if a light bulb lit itself up in Senku's mind. "That's it!" he shouts, and Suika jumps. "Suika, good job!"

"A… bird?" she says, blinking owlishly at him. "You're going to make us into birds with science?!"

"You can do that?!" Chrome yells from over the transmitter.

"Of course not," Senku shoots back, already going over the plan in his own mind. "No, we're going to make a hot air balloon so we can map the ground from above."

It's a good plan— but one that's going to require an enormous amount of fabric, which means that Yuzuriha is about to have a ton of grunt work.

The first step is gathering hemp— a ridiculous amount of it. But first… "Yo, Yuzuriha," he calls when he sees her passing through the camp. "Need a sounding board." She perks her head up, jogging over as soon as she spots Senku over the heads of people walking through the camp, weaving her way between them.

"Senku-kun! You needed my help?"

"Need a fellow modern person to brainstorm with me. C'mere." Yuzuriha blinks curiously, but follows as they head back to Senku's lab. "You heard that we're planning on making a hot air balloon, right? I need to figure out a way to convince everyone to help gather up the hemp we're gonna need."

"I've been meaning to ask about that," Yuzuriha laughs nervously, lifting up her hand, trembling minutely. "Isn't that going to need a crap ton of cloth…?"

Senku turns around, giving her a shit eating grin. "Oh man! I totally didn't realize that!" Yuzuriha gives him a look that looks a combination of exasperated and amused. "It's a good thing we've got our resident crafts club member here! Think you can handle it?"

"Senku-kun…" she says, and she lightly punches Senku's arm, twisting her knuckles into his arm for good measure. "Are you about to ask me to do all your dirty work?"

He immediately drops himself to the ground in a dogeza pose. "Yuzuriha, if you do this, I promise I'll make you any tools you need with science. Can I leave the cloth making to you?"

Yuzuriha laughs. "Get up, Senku-kun! I'll do it, just get up!" She offers out her hand to help him get up, which he accepts, pulling himself up. When he properly pulls himself to a stand, she holds it up for a high five. He eyes it, and then with an amused huff, he obliges.

She still lets out a sigh though, obviously calculating just how much work it'll take. "It'll be a lot of work, but at least it's all simple, mindless work. I'm sure that I could get a lot of people to help me even if they don't know much about sewing."

"I'll make it up to you," Senku says, seriously. "While you start on that, I'll figure out some way to get everyone to stop work on the boat and get the hemp we'll need." Yuzuriha glances at him thoughtfully. "What's up?" he asks.

"I might be able to help with that," she says, looking out into the horizon as she clearly turns a thought over in her head. "Give me a couple days?"

He waves his hand. "Whatever you need. Work whatever magic you think you can." Yuzuriha gives him a smile and a nod, and bounds off. Privately, he wonders what plan she might have in mind, but he'll let her have a go at it if she thinks that she can work something out.

So when a rumor comes floating around the camp a couple days later about how without oil, there's no way to back the Dragos economy, and people start panicking about how their savings might add up to nothing, Senku doesn't ask who started it. He has a pretty good guess. Half of the members of the Kingdom of Science are now wrapped into Yuzuriha's newly formed crafts club, while another half is working with Taiju to collect heaps of hemp to crush down into usable fibers for the crafts club. It's all coming along incredibly nicely— better than Senku could have hoped, honestly, and he watches it all with a smirk.

"After all the work they put into making money, you completely manipulated them into spending the money I convinced them to save?" Ryusui says to him as he watches the onslaught of panic from people completely at the mercy of money, looking on with a mix of horror and something close to admiration. "Senku, my friend. You are far more insidious than I gave you credit for."

Senku snorts. The real insidious one here is Yuzuriha. How did she even manage to spread a rumor like that?

The villagers collected enough hemp that Yuzuriha doesn't ever have any down time— every time that she finishes up turning a bundle of it into string, they have a new freshly crushed grouping of fibers to spin into string. She's going to have to make a ridiculous amount of it, more than enough to span the circumference of the Earth multiple times over. That's not even the most tedious part, though— that would be afterwards, when they have to weave the thread into cloth by hand.

Well, Senku did promise he'd make her anything she needed, right…? Maybe she could convince him to make her a handheld loom! Oh, something like that would speed up the process so much, and she supposes it wouldn't be too difficult to make.

She tries to describe the process to Kaseki, finding him in one of the huts by Senku's lab. "It's called a loom!" she says cheerily, gesturing as she describes it. "Basically, it's a flat board, with these little holes and long vertical slits, and they have to alternate. When you pass the threads through all of them and lift the board, only the little threads rise up!" She sighs dreamily. "Oh, it'll be so much quicker this way. That way we can pass a thread right between the two layers, and it'll make the criss crossing up and down pattern automatically!"

Kaseki smiles at her enthusiasm, but she can tell she hasn't described it well enough. "It might be easier to just ask Senku," she says sheepishly.

"Okay. I'll have Senku draw me up a blueprint," he says, giving her a thumbs up. She heads over with Kaseki to find Senku, who nods seriously when they both inform him of her request for a loom, and he and Kaseki get to work.

She waits patiently at her makeshift workstation as she spins more string, internally dreaming about her handheld loom, and how she'll finally have something that she can properly make cloth with. She daydreams, so lost in her head that she doesn't hear it when Senku walks up, jumping in her seat when he taps her shoulder. "It's ready," he says, and he leads her over to outside his lab.

What greets her isn't the small handheld loom she was envisioning— instead, an entire mechanized loom, which Senku obviously built from scratch, waits outside.

Yuzuriha's mouth falls open. Senku built this for her?

"Not good enough?" Senku asks, clearly drawing the wrong conclusion to her reaction. "Sorry, this was the fastest manual option I could make. If it's electric you want, it's gonna take a lot longer with our current infrastructure, but I can—"

"No!" she interjects, waving her hands as if trying to physically drive away the thought from Senku's mind. "Are you kidding me? I couldn't be happier! This is perfect, Senku-kun. Thank you!"

Senku looks away, pinky in his ear, clearly trying to look nonchalant, but Yuzuriha can see the relief lingering behind his eyes behind the forced indifference. "Yeah, no big deal."

She works the loom nearly nonstop after that— making the thread is a much simpler task, and since they only have one loom, she's seated at it all day, making yard after yard of cloth. The first rounds of cloth come out too thin to be able to be used for the hot air balloon. They breathe too easily, so the hot air won't actually keep in the balloon if it's used.

So in the little free time she has, she uses the excess to sew some outfits. It starts as a hobby, really— even when she's feeling the bone deep exhaustion of working at the loom all day, she finds she has the energy to indulge herself in making clothes.

It's nostalgic, really. Making them brings her back to before the petrification, when she led the charge on making all sorts of costumes for Gen's shows. She sighs internally. Oh, what she wouldn't give for things to be like back then, back when she could just visit a crafts store and pick up whatever fabric she needed, rather than having to sit at the loom all day to make the hemp cloth. At the very least, she'd like some sort of variety in her fabrics. But she figures they're a long way off from being able to replicate some of the ones she'd like to use— years, probably. It's a shame.

Still, she can do some small things to make her clothes more unique! Some of the girls, like Nikki, Mirai, and Suika spend their free time gathering a variety of flowers and berries for her to use as dyes, and thanks to that, her outfits end up taking on new life.

Apparently, people noticed. It's one of the Sparkly Sisters, Ruby, she thinks, who comes up to her one evening while she's working. "Yuzuriha?" she asks.

Yuzuriha turns around from where she's sewing. "Yes?" she asks.

"Are you making these outfits for anything in particular?"

Yuzuriha shakes her head. "No, not really! They're just fun for me to make. Why do you ask?"

Ruby lights up. "Would you consider trading me one for some dragos? That's what you guys use to trade, right? This one over here is adorable!" She points to one with a muddied pink tint.

"Oh!" Yuzuriha says, blinking with surprise. The thought of selling these never occurred to her, but like a stroke of lightning, it's like she can hear Gen's voice pop up in the back of her mind— whispering in her ear about how she could use this to her advantage. "Yeah, absolutely!"

Ten thousand dragos later, Ruby's cheerily running out the door with her outfit, and Yuzuriha's headed out right behind her to find Senku, a plan still turning its way through her head. "Senku-kun?" she asks when she finds him, peeking her head into the hut. "Do you have a minute?"

He doesn't look away from his papers scattered on the table, but he responds. "Hey, Yuzuriha. Need something?"

"A second opinion, really. I've been sewing some clothes in my free time, and I was thinking about selling some of them. You need money to buy the oil from Ryusui-kun, right?"

Senku blinks and glances up at her. "Yeah, we need a shit ton of it. That's not a bad idea, Yuzuriha."

"Thanks!" She beams— she feels like it's not often that she gets to contribute to Senku's plans on this end. Even back when they were kids, she was usually just along for the ride, sometimes making crafts when they needed. Oh— but she hadn't actually said her whole idea! "Oh, sorry, that's not all! I already sold one to Ruby, and since she started wearing it around, I've gotten a lot of questions about if I'll make more. I was thinking— well, maybe I could sell a few more dresses for anyone who wants to wear them around, and then hope that word of mouth gets around so that Ryusui-kun buys them? He seems like the type, right? And then we can charge him a lot, to get more oil…?"

Senku fully puts down his papers to give her a smirk. "Yeah, not a bad idea at all. Ryusui's practically the living representation of greed, there's no way he wouldn’t buy up your whole stock. I'd even say price them high to start, and then hand out pieces to anyone who agrees to work."

She nods enthusiastically. "Sounds perfect! Thank you, Senku-kun!"

He gives a wave with a noncommittal hum as she leaves, but she swears she can almost feel his eyes on her back as she walks out. She's too giddy to really wonder, riding the high of feeling like she's properly contributed, in her own way.

"How big do we need to make the hot air balloon, anyways?" Yuzuriha asks one day as they're all working, seated together in a little trio. She's roped Taiju into helping with the thread making, twisting it around with enough enthusiasm and force that he's already broke a couple spinners.

Senku weighs it over, doing calculations in his mind. "Seven point eight meters in diameter, ideally. We don't want the temperatures to exceed 100 degrees, because that could run the risk of burning the hemp cloth. That'll let us reach fifteen hundred meters up, where we'll be just under the jet stream. That diameter is enough for us to comfortably coast around that altitude with three people."

"Three people?" Taiju repeats, leaning forward over the table with interest. "Senku, you gotta be one of them, since you actually know how it works. But who else?"

"Well, it has to be someone who can read the winds," Yuzuriha responds before Senku can say anything. "Remember when we made the weather balloon, Taiju-kun? How you had to chase it down for miles when we actually launched it? The hot air balloon is probably the same."

"Oh yeah!" Taiju lights up. "Man, that was forever ago. Wasn't that when you dyed Gen's hair, too?"

Senku's heart twists at the mention of Gen, but the two continue their conversation like nothing happened. "Yeah! Oh, I remember being so nervous that it would turn out awful! I'm glad that Gen-kun ended up liking it."

"Yeah!" Taiju nods excitedly. He turns to Senku. "Senku! Didn't you make him a special hair dye after that?" Senku does not jump at the sudden mention, but it's a close thing.

"Yeah, something like that," he says, turning away. His ears burn, thinking about the weeks he spent afterwards researching hair dye formulas, formulating a dye that matched his shade of black perfectly. Even if he didn't really understand why Gen decided to dye his hair, even after learning the reasons, he was at least going to make something that properly matched the black of his hair. Yuzuriha giggles, the fucking traitor.

"Anyways," Senku says, quickly changing the subject. "Yuzuriha, you're right. We're at the mercy of the winds up there, so we need someone who can navigate them properly. So we need someone who can fly it properly, not just get it off the ground."

"Oh, I gotcha! I know just who we need! Hey, Ryusu—" Taiju calls loudly, before Senku kicks his shin, interrupting him.

"Taiju-kun, wait!" Yuzuriha panics as well, waving her hands. "If we just ask him, he's going to rip us off! Remember how the whole oil thing started because we need him to pilot the ship? If we don't want him to ask for a bunch of money, we need to make him want to join us."

Senku blinks. He wouldn't disagree with that line of thought, but that doesn't exactly sound like Yuzuriha. Honestly, if he didn't know better, he'd say that kind of underhanded plan would have come from Gen. "Yeah. Ten billion percent Ryusui will try to rip us off if we just go up and ask him. We need a way to get him to want it before he realizes it's something we need."

Taiju nods. "I see!" He pauses tilting his head. "Wait, how are we going to do that though?"

Senku exhales, trying to work through a plan through his head. He doesn't want to go into any more debt with Ryusui, with how much they're going to have to spend on the oil already, but he doesn't know a way to get Ryusui to go along without him charging them an arm and a leg for his expertise.

Yuzuriha matches Taiju's head tilt, considering. "Well, if we need to get him to want a spot…" she hums for a second, deep in thought, eyes shut, before they blink open. "EHHH?" she suddenly yells. Both Taiju and Senku jump, eyes flicking towards her. "You want it to just be you, me, and Taiju-kun on the hot air balloon? Are you sure, Senku-kun?"

Her voice carries loud enough that half the people in the immediate vicinity glance over. Including Ryusui, curiosity clearly written all over his face.

Senku catches on quickly, scratching his neck, feigning indifference. "Well yeah, it's only fair. You built half of it, none of this would have been possible without you. And if we're bringing you, we might as well bring Taiju along too. He's crushed enough hemp to earn it anyways."

"But Senku-kun!" she says, widening her eyes and leaning in. "Isn't this something super important? Being the first people in this stone world to reconquer the skies?"

Senku brings his arms up in a shrugging motion. "Well, if no one else wants it, why not bring you two along?"

Senku can see Taiju open his mouth to respond, obviously delighted at being included. Senku kicks his shin under the table once again before he can ruin the whole performance.

"Conquering the skies?" Ryusui barks out a laugh, snapping his fingers. "I want it! Senku, bring me along!"

"No can do. The hot air balloon only has room for three," Senku says, indifferent. "No room for you, Goldilocks!"

Ryusui frowns. "Surely you need an expert at reading the winds to help guide you?"

"Bet Taiju can do that with brute force," Senku replies with a shit eating grin. "You up to the task, Taiju?"

"Yeah! Whatever you need, Senku!" Taiju says with his usual intensity. He catches Yuzuriha practically making heart eyes at Taiju at those words. He sighs internally. If those two weren't his best friends, he absolutely would have called it out. Still, he watches Yuzuriha shake her head minutely, before tapping her finger to her cheek.

"Well," she starts, casual indifference worn on her face. "I suppose if it's alright with Senku-kun, Taiju-kun and I wouldn't mind giving up our seats…"

"It would be really inconvenient," Senku sighs. He's sure that he's not acting nearly as well as Yuzuriha, but it seems to be enough to convince Ryusui. "But if you're that insistent, Ryusui, I can—"

Ryusui slams down a bundle of dragos. "Yuzuriha! I'll buy your spot from you!"

Yuzuriha's eyes widen. "I— uh— I wouldn't mind! Taiju-kun, you wouldn't mind either, right?" she says, giving him a nudge.

"Whatever you want is fine with me! I'll follow you, Yuzuriha." he says, giving her a wide smile. Ryusui slams down the stack with a grin just as Chrome comes running in, yelling about how he wants in on the hot air balloon too, and everything devolves from there.

It's that evening, the three gathered around a campfire, stew in hand, when Senku finally broaches the topic.

"How'd you learn to do that?" he asks around a large mouthful of his food. "The whole thing with Ryusui. I would have expected that kind of underhanded scheme out of the mentalist, not you."

Taiju shakes his head in agreement. "After I realized what you were doing, it gave me the same feeling as when Gen does his tricks sometimes! It's not bad! It just wasn't what I was expecting."

Yuzuriha startles after being addressed. "Oh! Well…" she trails off, looking down at her bowl. "Gen talked to me a lot, back then, about some of the stuff that he did. I would get curious about it, so he'd talk me through his thought processes, sometimes. So I guess I just… remembered?"

Senku looks down. "It's useful as hell," he mutters. "It's a good thing that he did that."

Yuzuriha looks over, melancholy evident in her gaze. "It also makes me feel a little closer to him, in a way. Like I'm carrying him with me? I don't know if I'm explaining it right," she says, finishing with a wry laugh.

Taiju shakes his head. "No, I know what you mean. I keep thinking about him all the time. It's weird not having him here when all of us are. It's like when he left for America, but then…" he trails off. Surprisingly, he's talking at a normal level, the topic probably tempering his usual volume.

"He's not—" Senku bites back a hiss of frustration. "You two keep talking about Gen like he's—" he cuts himself off, jaw tight, but the words he refuses to vocalize still finish in his head. You two keep talking about him like he's dead, Senku thinks to himself. Like he's already gone, the same way Byakuya's gone.

He doesn't say it out loud. He's not sure he could, even if he wanted to. The grief of Byakuya's grave and Gen's statue feel too close, two different griefs too tangled together— raw and unprocessed. He thinks that if he tries to vocalize one, tries to give weight to it, the other will drag itself out with it.

Yuzuriha brings her knees to her chest. "I know he's not gone," she murmurs, as if she can hear his unspoken thoughts anyways. "I just… miss him being here. With us. There's a difference."

Taiju nods. "Yeah. Knowing he's out there, but so far away, and not knowing how long it'll be until we see him again. Senku," he says, oddly stoic. "I know you probably think about it the most. I know he's especially special to you. But we think about him too. You're not alone."

A lump wells up in Senku's throat. "I promised my dad I'd bring him back," he finally offers, after a few moments of silence that neither Yuzuriha nor Taiju jump to fill.

He watches them both lightly flinch at the words, and he's met with the sudden reminder that the burden of missing Byakuya isn't just his alone. They've had their own share of teary conversations about Byakuya— and while they both know how much he misses his dad, he also knows that they miss him too. "He said something, and…" he cuts himself with a cough. "Well. It's easier, when the three of you are here. Less brain power used thinking about other stuff."

Yuzuriha giggles. "You can just say you worry, you know," she teases. It's probably enough of an answer that Senku doesn't bite back a retort. "Senku-kun, you can just be honest with us. We know you miss him too. You don't have to pretend like you don't."

"I don't pretend," Senku shoots back sharply. Even if it comes from a good place, he's vaguely insulted at the assumption that the absence of Gen's presence hasn't affected him. He hardly ever has his shit together nowadays, and they think that he could pretend like he doesn't miss Gen?

"You kind of do," Taiju still, voice still annoyingly gentle. "I mean, you don't lie about it? But you don't ever bring him up."

Yuzuriha nods in Taiju's direction. "And when you do, it seems like it's hard for you to talk about him, too. Don't you think it would be better to talk about it? At the very least, Taiju-kun and I will understand, even if it's harder to talk to someone you don't know."

Senku clenches his fists. "I think about him constantly," he finally admits, quiet but honest. "It's stupidly inefficient. I'll be thinking about the ways he could have solved issues with only half the effort I'm putting into it. Every time something happens, he's the first one I want to tell, even though he's not here to tell. I'll even catch myself reaching for a cell phone sometimes to text him about it, like I don't know that thousands of years have passed since I could do shit like that." He chuckles self deprecatingly. "It doesn't fucking stop. I don't know how to even turn it off."

Yuzuriha reaches over to give his arm a brief squeeze, the point where it makes contact lingering warmth even after her hand retracts. "I don't think it's supposed to stop," she says softly. "It's not like missing him is something that you can remove from the picture. That's not how emotions work."

Senku sighs. "I know that," he says. "Doesn't mean I can't stop thinking about how annoyingly unscientific it is."

"Gen-kun used to say something about that, didn't he? Something about how feelings can be rationalized, but emotions can't? Not everything can fall under your scientific frameworks."

Senku mimes a shiver. "Wow, I could hear that in his voice. It's almost like he's still here with us," he drawls. "Didn't take myself to be the type from those movies haunted by a dead wife, but looks like I've been proven wrong."

"Senku-kun!" Yuzuriha hisses, slapping his arm, but the laugh she muffles betrays her. He sees her glance off to his side and blink. "Taiju-kun, are you crying?"

"I'm just so— SENKU!" he shouts, his calmer demeanor shattering as Senku has to leap out of the way to avoid a back breaking bear hug. "I know you two will see each other soon! You and Gen!"

"Was there any doubt?" Senku says, looking down at where Taiju is now flopped onto the ground after missing Senku entirely. "I've said it before. After we get platinum, we'll have an unlimited supply of nitric acid, which means we'll have a way to actually revive him. Once we secure that, we're heading straight for America. It could take a couple more years to get there, but we're coming for him."

More tears spill from Taiju's eyes, but he smiles wide. "Yeah!" He cups his hands around his mouth. "GEN! CAN YOU HEAR ME?! WE'RE COMING FOR YOU!"

"Keep it down, big oaf!" Senku hisses, punching downwards to reach Taiju's arm. "There's not even a millimeter's chance that Gen can hear you right now, but the rest of the village can!"

Yuzuriha laughs, and then Taiju laughs in response, and they sit around the fire like that a bit longer, bowls of stew finished and discarded on the ground, the fire slowly dying down. They talk like before, but other than some stray thoughts and memories, the topic of Gen is dropped. Still, the weight in Senku's chest feels a bit lighter. Missing Gen isn't a problem that any of them can solve tonight— but something about the burden feeling shared makes the ache of missing him feel a bit lighter, at least for now.

Getting into the same junior high as Gen is pretty simple— the commute to Gen's school is only fifteen minutes longer than the commute to the closer junior high, so it's not difficult to convince Byakuya to put in the transfer papers. While their difference in grades means that Senku doesn't share any classes with Gen, the three of them end up spending most lunches in the room where the Science Club meets— Senku practically taking over the whole club the day he starts at the school.

"You're launching the rocket this eekend-way?" Gen asks, blinking lazily where his head rests on the table. "Did you decide on what you're launching up into it yet? You did tell us we could bring a couple souvenirs." The Pig Latin thing is something new— Gen started doing it a few months ago, and hasn't stopped since. It's incredibly annoying, but telling Gen that just makes him do it more.

"Yeah, I want to launch with a light payload. Haven't decided what yet."

"Um!" Taiju interjects between them hesitantly. "I actually talked to someone from the Crafts Club, and she agreed to make us little dolls that can go into the rocket! I also… kind of invited her to come along to the launch."

"I don't mind," Gen says. "Senku-chan?"

"Yeah, no problem," he says, not tearing his eyes away from his beaker. "Just let her know where she'll need to meet us." Out of the corner of his eye, he can see Gen shift himself in his seat, tilting his head to look in Taiju's direction.

"So, Taiju-chan, what's this girl like?" Gen asks, tilting his head. The white piece of his hair slides forward, brushing against his cheek and half-covering his mouth. Senku's hand twitches, and he's met with a sudden urge to fix it for him, to brush it back into place. Which would be stupid, so he dismisses the thought, redirecting the impulse into pouring the last of his solution into a new vial.

"She's really nice!" Taiju says, boundless enthusiasm in tow. "Her name's Yuzuriha. She's kind of quiet, but she's really good at sewing! She was able to make a little doll that looks like Senku just by me telling her what he looks like! I gave her pictures of you and me so she could do the other two, and she said she'll show me when she finishes!"

Gen smiles. "Oh? She was able to make our dear Senku-chan just based off of your description of him? Either she's very skilled, or you're underselling your own descriptive abilities."

"Gen, can you hand me the—" Before Senku can even finish his sentence, Gen's passing him an empty vial. "Thanks. And it's definitely the first one," Senku replies without looking up. "Yesterday, Taiju tried to describe a circuit board as 'that flat thing with metal squiggles'. I have zero faith in his description."

Taiju frowns. "That's basically what it looked like."

"Senku-chan, be nice!" Gen scolds lightly. "Taiju-chan, I have full faith in your abilities. So, you said we'll get to meet her this weekend?"

Taiju nods enthusiastically. "Yeah! She was surprised to hear that we're launching a rocket. I told her she should come watch it with us!"

"I have to ask," Gen asks, a small laugh in his voice. "Did you properly warn her beforehand?"

Taiju blinks. "What do you mean?"

"Well…" Gen says, glancing pointedly in Senku's direction. "Does she know what she's walking into? There's our dear Senku, who mainly communicates through facts about science and barely concealed annoyance. There's you, Taiju-chan, all made up of boundless energy and volume. And then, of course, there's me."

Senku gives him a look. "You didn't list anything off for yourself."

Gen bats his eyelashes dramatically. "I didn't think there was anything relevant to add."

"How about that you're a pain in the ass? Or your stupid Pig Latin."

"Senku-chan!" Gen gasps, scandalized. "I'll have you know that most people think it's endearing."

"Who the hell would think that?" Senku mutters. "It's annoying as hell."

"I've eard-hay it all before, Senku-chan. You aren't going to ange-chay my mind." Gen grins, looking entirely too pleased with himself. Senku reminds him self yet again that complaining about the things Gen does will only result in Gen doing it more. He once again resolves, not to bring it up. He already knows he will anyway.

"I think that you'll both like her, though," Taiju continues, oblivious to Senku and Gen's sidebar. "I told her about you two, and she seemed fine with it."

"Again, I feel like we established your poor descriptive skills," Senku sighs. "It's fine. She'll get the picture soon enough." Almost as if on cue, the bell rings.

"Ah," Gen sighs. "Seems like it's time to go back to class. I'll walk you two to your classroom?"

Senku shrugs. "If you want." They gather up their things, heading back to Senku and Taiju's homeroom, and Gen gives them a little wave before they depart. "Bye bye, Senku-chan! Taiju-chan!"

Taiju waves back with both arms, and Senku gives a flippant wave of his hand.

A few moments after they make their way to their desks, a brunette that Senku doesn't recognize followed by a couple other girls walks up to him. "Um, Ishigami-kun?"

He glances up at her. "Yeah?"

She fidgets for a moment, looks back at her friends who give her an encouraging nod, and then straightens. "Um! You know Asagiri-senpai, right?"

It takes an embarrassing couple seconds for the name to register in Senku's mind, tripping up at the idea of calling Gen his senpai. "You mean Gen?" he asks incredulously. The girls eye each other, giving each other a slight nod, before she continues.

"Um!" She somehow straightens even further. "D-do you think you could introduce me to him?"

Senku blinks. "You want me," he starts, "to introduce you to Gen?" Why Gen of all people?

She nods hesitantly. "Yes please! Ever since I saw him performing at the cultural festival last year, I—" she blushes deeply, cutting herself off.

…Ah. So that's what's going on. Senku's a scientist— he isn't oblivious. "You can talk to him yourself," he says dismissively. "You don't need me to introduce you to him."

"But how can I—" she starts.

"Look," Senku says. "I know what you're actually asking is for me to try to help set you up with him. I don't have even one millimeter of interest in that. Besides, Gen likes talking to people. If you just try to talk to him, ten billion percent you'll be just fine. Just talk to him about one of his weird magic tricks." With those words, the teacher walks back in, and the girls dejectedly walk back to their seats.

It comes up later on their walk home, Gen gaping at him when Senku brings it up. "You mean to tell me that you told a fan that you won't introduce them to me? Senku-chan!"

"A fan?" Senku asks skeptically. "She obviously just has a crush on you. I'm not a matchmaker. No way I'm taking time out of my day to try to set someone up when she can just go and talk to you herself."

"It's not about that, Senku-chan," Gen whines. "You said that she saw me at the Cultural Festival, right? She obviously saw my show!" He clutches his hands to his chest and leans back, feigning a wound. "I put so much effort into every performance, and here I am, betrayed by my best friend! A fan comes to him, wanting to meet the person behind the erformance-pay, and he just— turns her away!"

Senku stares flatly. "Are you done?"

Gen smooths out his expression. "Yeah, I'm done. So? You weren't too rude, were you?" He gives Senku a look. "Never mind, I already know."

"Oi." He sighs. "I just don't have any interest in that crap. I told her to just talk to you about your magic tricks." He glances at Gen. "Does that happen to you often?"

"Which part? People talking to me about my shows?" He snorts. "Or people having a crush on me?"

Senku lets out a little tsk sound. "Both."

"Hm. It's been happening more, I suppose. After my performance at the Cultural Festival, I've had a lot more people ask me about it." Gen tilts his head. "Why do you ask?"

"No reason," Senku shrugs dismissively. "Come on. I'm putting you to work."

"Uel-cray, Senku-chan. We were having such a good chat!" Still, he follows.

Days later, when he catches sight of Gen cheerfully chatting with the brunette from before, he looks away quickly. It doesn't bother him or anything. He's just not— interested, in any of that. In the flirting, in whatever the hell Gen has going on. It's not anything more complicated than that. He tells himself it once, twice, and then drags Taiju off in the opposite direction before he can be tempted to look again.

Gen may not be interested in space the same way that Senku is, but he's never once considered skipping one of Senku's launches, and today isn't about to be an exception— which is also partially because the alternative is spending the day at home. Something that Gen tries to avoid as much as possible, something he likes even less than the arduous hikes to get to the remote fields or mountains that Senku chooses as his ideal launch sites due to their good weather, or whatever other sciencey reason he has. So he follows along, same as always.

Secretly, though, part of him almost wishes they were just spending another night at Senku's house instead — even knowing how much these launches matter to him. He'll never admit it out loud, but he enjoys staying past dinner, well into the evening, and will guiltily overstay his welcome even if Byakuya always insists he's more than welcome. He just hates being sweaty, hates being out of breath, and his athletic capabilities don't extend past his flexibility. He's already out of breath, and according to Senku, they're only halfway there. Taiju's carrying the rocket with his seemingly endless stamina, while Gen and Senku are already panting, struggling to keep up the pace.

He glances behind him, to see the last person trailing behind. Yuzuriha's hardly spoken, her cheeks a bright pink, though Gen still can't quite tell if it's from nerves or exertion. He's still trying to figure her out, gathering the data like he always does when he meets someone new. She may be quiet, stammering over herself every time he tries to start a conversation, but her eyes are sharp.

"So, Yuzuriha-chan," Gen tries again, pausing to allow her to catch up to them. "Taiju-chan here tells me that you made some little crafts for the launch."

Yuzuriha startles at being addressed, cheeks blooming a darker red. "I— y-yes! He gave me pictures to make little dolls!" She looks down at the little cloth bag she has clutched between her arms. "It's still kind of embarrassing that he asked for one of me, too…"

"That's Taiju-chan for you," Gen says with a smile. "You're here for the launch, aren't you? Of course you need one as well." He tilts his head. "Could I see?"

Yuzuriha starts. "Um!" Then, after a moment of deliberation, she quietly pulls the drawstring of the bag she's holding, and with visible care, pulls out four small needle felted dolls.

The resemblance is immediately clear— Gen spots the points of Senku's hair, carefully tinted green at the ends, Taiju's brown hair with eyebrows that match his perfectly, and one resembling Yuzuriha, down to the little headband that adorns her head.

His eyes fall on the one that matches him last. He leans in, taking a closer look. It's astonishingly accurate— she took the time to stitch in the white of his hair, matching the zig zag pattern where it overtakes the black of his hair, falling asymmetrically in a way that seems unmistakably him.

"Yuzuriha-chan, these are amazing," Gen says, his usual performance he wears around people he doesn't know set aside. "You really made these all in these past couple days? From just a photo?"

"A-and Taiju-kun's descriptions!" Yuzuriha stammers, as if that downplays any of the work she's done.

"Taiju-chan doesn't always have the most precise descriptions," Gen says lightly. "I'm impressed. You perfectly captured all of our likenesses."

"Oi, you guys coming or what?" Senku calls, and Gen suddenly realizes that they've fallen behind.

Taiju turns rapidly. "Gen! Yuzuriha! If you're tired, I can carry you!" As if to demonstrate, he moves the rocket to just be held by one arm, waving the other in the air like if he wanted to, he could hold them both. Honestly, Gen thinks that he probably could.

Yuzuriha blushes deeply, waving her hands, too flustered to even stammer something out, instead mouthing out protests as she struggles for air. Gen gives a little smirk, resisting the urge to coo out an aww. He may not really know her, but he still doubts she would appreciate it.

"I would love to be arried-cay by you, Taiju-chan," Gen calls out in a sing-song voice, and both Yuzuriha and Senku jerk their heads to stare at him. "I'm absolutely beat!"

"Oi. Don't be lazy," Senku reproaches. "If I have to walk, so you do."

"Boo. You're no fun." He turns to Yuzuriha, unable to resist the urge to tease just a bit. "What about you? Will you take Taiju-chan up on his offer?"

She squeaks. "Um! I think I'm okay!" She's beet red, and Gen almost feels a little bad. Almost.

"Mentalist, come on," Senku calls again.

Gen sighs. "Coming, coming." He never gets to have any sort of fun. This is the first time anyone in their little group has shown or been shown an inkling of romantic interest, and here Senku is focused on his rocket. Still, he falls in line, and Yuzuriha walks closer now, nearly side by side with him now instead of trailing behind.

Thirty minutes and a completely reasonable amount of whining later, despite what Senku says, they're at the spot Senku picked out. Senku and Taiju go back to setting up the rocket, which leaves Yuzuriha and Gen again.

"So, Yuzuriha-chan. How old are you?" he asks, searching for another topic for small talk. "You're a first year, right?"

She nods. "I'm twelve," she says. "How about you?"

"Fourteen," Gen replies. "I'm a third year." She gives him a wide eyed look, and he smiles. "When's your birthday?"

"March 31st," she offers. "Yours?" Then, as if catching herself, she adds, "A-Asagiri-senpai?"

Gen resists the urge to laugh. "Just Gen is fine." Then, processing the rest of her words, he blinks. "March 31st?" She nods. "What a coincidence! Mine is April 1st, and Taiju-chan's is April 2nd!" She blinks, then smiles widely. "Taiju-chan!" Gen calls out. Taiju turns his head immediately. "Guess when Yuzuriha-chan's birthday is!"

Taiju turns to look at him, scrunching his face as if he's about to actually attempt to guess. Gen takes pity on him. "March 31st! Right next to ours. The birthday chain continues!"

Taiju gasps loudly. "No way! Yuzuriha! We all match!"

"We should all celebrate together next year!" Yuzuriha says excitedly with a clap, a burst of confidence that Gen wasn't expecting from her, as shy spoken as she's been so far. "Since the days line up so perfectly, it feels like a waste not to!" Gen watches in real time as she realizes what she said, drawing back inwards. "I mean— if you all are okay with it! I wouldn't want to intrude and—"

"It's not intruding," Gen says placatingly. "That sounds like an ovely-lay idea."

Her shoulders sag in relief. "I want to also! Gen, we have to!" Taiju yells from where he's propping up one of the parts, Senku kicking him in the leg when it causes him to stall for too long.

"You two can help too, you know," Senku calls. "Gen, come help set up the livestream."

Gen sighs. "He's such a slave driver," he whispers conspiratorially to Yuzuriha. "All work, no play. I'll help, Senku-chan," he speaks up at the end, directing his voice towards Senku, "As long as you promise to come to our joint birthday celebration next year."

Senku gives Gen a look, then seemingly decides it's not worth arguing. "Sure, whatever. Just come and help. Yuzuriha, you can put the dolls over in that piece by the tree." Yuzuriha jumps up into action, and Gen follows at a languid pace, making his way to Senku, helping put the finishing touches on the live feed they'll have in the rocket while Senku directs Taiju with the finishing touches.

Once everything is set up to Senku's liking, they get a safe distance back, Senku holding the remote that'll launch the rocket.

"What is this, rocket number three?" Gen asks quietly, whispering into Senku's ear. "What are the odds it blows up again before it properly gets in the sky?"

Senku glances back. "Pretty likely," he says, honest. "Like I've said before, I don't know one bit about how to properly build rockets. I'm figuring out this crap as I go. If it blows up again, we'll just learn from it, and do better next time."

"But now we have ecious-pray cargo on board," Gen whines. "Yuzuriha-chan's dolls are far too cute to go out like that!"

Senku chuckles. "Just be glad that it's not an actual person on board. They'd ten billion percent be screwed if that were the case."

"Morbid." He glances at Senku. "So? Are you going to launch?"

Senku's mouth quirks into one of his almost smirks, the one that Gen's seen him wear hundreds of times before, and he presses the red button. A loud roar immediately follows, sounding up from the launch site in a violent burst that has Gen instinctually covering his ears. The rocket launches from the ground, coming up in an explosion of smoke. Gen tracks it with his eyes, watching as it propels upwards rapidly, arcing upwards until it's just a dot in the sky.

Somewhere behind him, he can hear Taiju shouting something, delighted, and he can hear Yuzuriha's gasps of amazement, but Gen's attention is already elsewhere. He's turning almost without realizing it— looking for Senku, wanting to see what his reaction is to a launch that hasn't immediately ended in fire like the others.

He finds Senku, looking upwards at the sky, his expression completely unguarded, clearly tracking the rocket's arc against its intended trajectory. And he's smiling— not the smirk from earlier, not even a small one— it's a wide, unbridled smile, one that Gen doesn't think he's seen on him before. His eyes are bright, wide, lit up with obvious excitement and exhilaration that he's making no effort to hide.

Something in his chest does a strange flip at the sight.

Oh fuck, Gen thinks distantly, a little panicked. Oh no. No, no, no.

Taiju shouts something else, and Senku turns his head to meet him, smile fading just a bit, but the brightness doesn't leave his eyes. Senku steps aside to grab his laptop, and Yuzuriha comes over, grabbing at Gen's sleeve with excitement while she points upwards, but Gen can hardly focus on any of it. His eyes are locked onto Senku, horror dawning.

No. Absolutely not. Not Senku, he thinks to himself. There's no— it can't be. Not the gremlin who tricked me into being his personal lab assistant back when I was nine. Not the single most blunt, insufferable, rude person I have ever— not the boy who gags when people kiss on television! Who has never once shown even a faint flicker of interest in anything resembling romance! There is no way that Senku of all people is— it can't—

He tries to shake his head of the thought, hoping what has to be a delusion will face. Instead, as he thinks about Senku longer, his cheeks go traitorously warm. He brings his hand to his face in an attempt to hide it, hoping that he looks like he's shielding his eyes from the sun while he tries to follow the rocket, instead of desperately trying to hide his expression he can't school.

Taiju, unfortunately, glances over. "Gen? You alright?"

"Fine!" Gen says, a beat too fast to pass for natural, his voice a bit too high pitched. "Just— hot out today, isn't it?"

Taiju, thankfully oblivious, takes this at face value, running to grab him a water bottle from one of the backpacks they brought up. Yuzuriha, a touch more observant, gives him a curious glance, but she also turns her attention away.

Unfortunately, Senku, the last person he wants to be giving him attention right now, glances over. Gen watches as his eyes furrow. Did he always look so cute when he— Gen furiously shakes his head of the thought. There's no way.

"You're acting weird," Senku says, blunt as ever. Blunt, annoying, insufferable, whatever other adjectives he can think of to describe Senku to push this feeling down.

"I'm fine," Gen says again, still too quick, but hopefully more convincing. "Just need some water. So, Senku-chan? Did it make it all the way up?" he asks, hoping that Senku will jump on the change in topic.

Thankfully, he does, looking back to his laptop as Taiju tries to force a water bottle into his hands.

"Nah. It blew up at a high altitude."

"What!" Taiju cries, nearly spilling the water bottle as he hands it to Gen. "We failed again?!"

Yuzuriha frowns. "So the dolls are…" She looks down sadly, and Gen internally cringes. They really should have warned her that there was a chance this would happen before now.

Senku gives her a passing glance, then smirks. "Not entirely." He turns his laptop around to show them both what he's looking at— a video live stream from one of the cameras that Gen helped set up. He gasps as he realizes what he's watching— all four of the dolls suspended in space, floating in zero gravity.

Taiju and Yuzuriha both let out an excited cheer, and Senku turns back to his laptop with a small, satisfied kuhuhu. Gen takes advantage of the moment where all three are distracted to try to talk himself out of the ridiculous conclusion he's come to. It's useless. His chest doesn't cooperate with him, and he watches Senku type, his cheeks stubbornly, traitorously warm.

This is such a problem, Gen thinks to himself hysterically. He wonders if this is how Senku feels when his experiments go widely off script— the feeling of falling, suspended, forced to watch in dawning horror as a reaction occurs that you didn't plan for. This is going to be such a problem.

The others begin packing up their things, and Gen is forced to follow along, plastering an easy smile on his face, hoping no one looks too closely.

This is single handedly the most embarrassing moment of his life. He can't believe that of all people, he has a crush on Senku. This is the worst thing that has ever happened to him.

In the couple weeks that follow, Yuzuriha finds herself gravitating towards sitting with Taiju, Gen, and Senku at lunch, which means that she's become very quickly acquainted to some of the things Gen has told her about Senku— namely, being sent on all sorts of errands when he asks. Like now, Senku texting her to ask if she can drop by Gen's class to pick up a book that he found for him.

She stands outside the third year classroom door, gathering up the nerve to actually open the door to go into the class. It's not that she's scared of Gen, not anymore. It's hard to be scared of someone after you watch a rocket launch into space together! It's more that she's worried someone else will say something— it has to be strange for a first year to be coming to the third year classes, right? Still, she promised Senku, so she gathers up her courage to open the classroom door.

A multitude of small groups are gathered around the room, small bunches of friends chatting amongst each other during the break period, but Yuzuriha's eyes are immediately drawn to Gen, watching as he dramatically drops into the seat next to a boy she doesn't recognize. "I was assigned cleanup duty with Kaori-chan," he says, sighing dramatically.

The other boy straightens. "You don't want to work with Kaori-san?" he asks, giving Gen an incredulous look.

"Oh, don't get me wrong. She's sweet," Gen replies, giving a casual wave of his hand. "But she's so chatty when we ork-way together. I was hoping to have someone a little… less conversational, today." Something in Gen's eyes sharpens, just a bit, before fading into an easy smile. "Ah well."

"Uh, well if you don't—" the boy starts, before stopping himself, his ears going pink. "I mean. If you wanted to switch chore days, I wouldn't mind. If you really don't want to work with Kaori-san."

"Eally-ray? You'd do that?" Gen asks, looking innocently surprised.

"I don't mind," the boy says again, far too quickly. "I can just take your slot."

"Oh, well, if you're offering," Gen says, smiling brightly, standing immediately like he's leaving before the boy has a chance to reconsider. "You're a lifesaver, Masahiro-chan." His eyes fall on Yuzuriha, and she lets out a little noise. He smiles widely. "Ah, Yuzuriha-chan! Did dear Senku send you for his book?"

Yuzuriha's eyes dart between the boy and Gen. Gen watches her, and his smile turns upwards at the corner. "Here, I left it in my locker. Come with me?" he asks, approaching her.

"Uh, sure!" she says. She can feel some of the others in the class watching her curiously, but it's not long before Gen's leading her out, walking down the halls to the entrance.

"Gen-kun," she starts hesitantly. "I do have to ask."

Gen tilts his head. "Yes?"

"Um. I don't know how to quite ask this, but…" she swallows. "You don't really seem like the type to be bothered by someone who's talkative? I mean, with how Taiju-kun and Senku-kun are…"

Gen gives a conspiratorial smile. "Oh, I'm not. I actually quite like Kaori-chan. I just didn't feel like doing cleanup duty today," he says with a shrug. "Senku-chan promised to make me a fancy skincare product if I found the book he wanted, and I want to be there to supervise him."

"So how on earth did you…" she furrows her brows. "You didn't even ask him if he would do it. How did you know he'd offer?"

"It's simple," Gen says, rounding the corner as they make their way down the staircase. "Masahiro-chan has the most obvious-yay crush on Kaori-chan. I swear, I can see his pupils turn to hearts whenever he looks at her." He shrugs. "All I needed was to make it seem like he was the one offering, rather than me asking. Then suddenly, an hour of chores just sounds like an extra hour you get to spend with Kaori-chan. And I just so happen to be freed up to do whatever I'd like."

"That's…" she trails off. "You're scary, Gen-kun."

Gen laughs. "I just know how to read people. You should try it sometime." They reach the entrance, Gen heading to open his locker.

"Would you?" Yuzuriha asks before she really realizes what she's saying. "I mean. Would you teach me how to do it, sometime?"

Gen pauses, giving her a sidelong glance. "I can," he says. "I do feel like I have to warn you, though. Once you start noticing these things, you can't really stop. People start turning into puzzles."

"I like puzzles," Yuzuriha offers hesitantly.

"Mm. I thought you might," Gen says, pulling the book free from his locker, and turning it over in his hands like he's examining it before passing it to her. She takes it gratefully, immediately depositing it into her book bag to give to Senku later. "Alright. How do you feel about lesson one now?"

She blinks. "Right now?"

"No time like the present," he says, leaning against the lockers and crossing his arms. His eyes narrow slightly, and he looks Yuzuriha up and down. "Tell me what you noticed when I was talking to Masahiro-chan."

Yuzuriha thinks back to standing in the doorway of the classroom, of Gen's words. "He was really excited as soon as you started complaining about being paired with Kaori." Gen gives a nod, and her hesitation fades under his encouragement, more observations spilling out. "His ears went pink, and he said that he didn't mind twice." She weighs it over. "He immediately volunteered."

"As Senku-chan would say, that's ten billion percent correct!" Gen says with a clap, grin widening. "See, you've already noticed everything important. I knew you would be good at this."

"Um. But what do I do with it now?" she asks. "It all feels kind of… manipulative."

"You can do whatever you'd like," Gen says with a shrug. "It's all about how you look at it. When you think about it, Masahiro-chan didn't really think he was doing me a favor. He was just excited to spend time with his crush, and he got to feel like a good, helpful person while doing it." Gen shrugs. "Everyone walks away happy."

Yuzuriha turns the thought over in her head. "But you still got what you wanted out of it. And you made it happen."

"I did," Gen agrees. "Does it bother you? That I got something out of it too?"

"I don't know," Yuzuriha admits. "I just don't… I guess I don't want to be the type of person to trick people."

"You don't have to be," Gen says, his voice softening just a touch, losing some of the performative flair he puts on. "Noticing these things doesn't mean you need to act on any of it. I'm just showing you how I do it. You're free to do what you please with it all."

Something untwists in her chest, and she bites at her lip. "Well, how would you decide? If you should use it or not?"

Gen ponders. "Well, I don't have the same reservations that you do," he admits. "But, I suppose you could ask yourself how the other person would react if they realized what you were doing. If I told Masahiro-chan that I was just trying to get out of chores, and I used his crush to my advantage, do you think he'd be upset?"

"Probably not," Yuzuriha says slowly, thinking it over. "Cause either way, he gets to spend an hour talking to Kaori."

"Exactly. So maybe you could think about it like that," Gen continues, voice lighter. "Use your powers for the side of light, or something like that."

She snorts. "That helps, I think."

"Good," Gen says, straightening from his lean on the lockers. "You should probably get that book back to Senku-chan before he sends Taiju-chan as a search party." He gives her a look. "Although you probably wouldn't mind that too much, right?"

She feels her cheeks burn as she flushes deeply. "Um! I'll get that book to him right away! Thank you, Gen-kun!"

He laughs, a light titter that lands nicely in Yuzuriha's ears. "Actually, a quick question before you go."

Yuzuriha looks back from where she already started to walk away, turning to face him. "What's up?"

"How are you finding Senku-chan's little group?" he asks. "Still not scared away?"

"Well," Yuzuriha says, with a sheepish laugh. "He is a lot to keep up with sometimes."

"Right?" Gen says fondly with a shake of his head. "Taiju-chan seems to handle him well enough with his energy and enthusiasm. I'm curious what your secret is."

"Oh! Well," Yuzuriha weighs the question. "I don't think I have one? I just like listening to him get excited about things. Even if it means sitting through a rant where I don't understand half of what he's saying." She tilts her head. "What about you?"

Gen blinks, visibly straightening at the inquiry. "Me?" he asks.

Yuzuriha nods back enthusiastically. "Yeah! Taiju-kun said you two have been friends the longest, right? So what's your secret?"

"Oh, that hardly counts," Gen denies with a wave of his hand. "Taiju-chan joined us only a couple weeks later." He pauses, and Yuzuriha can practically see him thinking. It goes on for a few moments, long enough that she almost wants to take back the question, watching him visibly struggle for an answer.

But then, finally, he opens his mouth. "I don't think I really have one," he says. The words ring with honesty, enough that Yuzuriha's caught a bit off guard. "I think it's just— I used to think that I was just sticking around because we met when we were young enough." He pauses, considering, and Yuzuriha suddenly feels like she's intruding. "But I think it's almost relaxing, in a way? Being around someone who doesn't perform constantly, someone who always means what he says. Senku-chan is just— always himself, I guess. Whether it's convenient or not."

Yuzuriha frowns. "That… kind of sounds like a bad thing?"

Gen shakes his head. "I don't know," he says softly. "It's mostly a relief, to me. I don't have to guess what he wants from me, or what he actually means like I usually do. He just says it. It's like…" He smiles, soft and genuine, and Yuzuriha finds herself staring at it, noting it down. "I don't know. That's Senku, I guess." Then, Yuzuriha sees in real time as his eyes widen, and the mask that he normally wears slips back on. Now that she's looking for it, knows what it looks like when it slips off, it's easier to spot. "Ah, but I didn't mean to ramble on! You really should be heading back to class, Yuzuriha-chan. Break is almost over."

She looks up at the clock. "Oh!" she gasps. She still has to bring the book back to Senku and make it back to her class in time for the next period. "You're right, I really do need to go!" She darts away, calling out a "Thank you, Gen-kun!" as she runs off, her mind entirely focused on finishing the job Senku entrusted her with.

When she rounds the corner, running through the doorway, she can almost swear she sees Gen's cheeks turn a bit pink. But she discards the thought immediately— she doesn't have enough time to go and check if she saw correctly, anyways. Besides, why would Gen even be blushing?