Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

”SENKUU!!”

“Hey Taiju. Hello Yuzuriha.” Senku smiles as he opens the door to let the duo into his apartment. “Don’t shout so loud, the neighbors will send in a noise complaint. Again.”

Yuzuriha chuckles, as the trio go over to Senkuu’s lab. “If I remember, the last one was your fault.”

Senkuu ducks his head. “In fairness, I didn’t do it on purpose.”

The three settle down into their usual positions in Senkuu’s lab- Senkuu’s sitting at the main table, all his equipment in front of him, Taiju sits next to him, ready to provide some help or grab things for him whenever asked, and Yuzuriha sits a little further back with her sewing project.

“Alright, so what are we doing today!” Taiju yells.

“Mostly just actually starting on the tests I was planning and setting up last time, since I’ve hit a wall for the moment with the swallows, and rockets are on hold while Byakuya’s gone.” (Senkuu’s dad had made him promise to put a hold on some of the more potentially dangerous experiments while he was in space.)

The three settle in and work for a while, Taiju slowly working away on his homework, Senkuu bustling away with some experiments, and Yuzuriha pulling out her embroidery supplies to continue her current project.

After a few hours pass like this, Yuzuriha asks, “Should I get some food for everyone?”

Senkuu nods. “There’s microwave food in the freezer and some canned soups and cup ramen in the main cabinet. Grab a pouch and an energy drink for me too, alright?”

“On it!” Yuzuriha heads back into the kitchen.

“Taiju, can I get a sample from you for this next bit?” Senkuu asks. Taiju nods, and sits down next to Senkuu as he grabs an alcohol swab and a small needle.

Taiju gives Senkuu his hand, and Senkuu carefully wipes the pad of his thumb clean with first a standard washcloth to get it clean, and then with the alcohol wipe to disinfect.

For all the stories he’d heard on the news and in fiction of dangerous vampires, of ravenous monsters and violent killers, the only thought that comes to mind seeing Senkuu’s vampiric traits is adorable.

As soon as he pricks Taiju’s thumb to draw a single drop of blood for his experiments, Senkuu draws his lips back a tiny bit on instinct, fangs just barely poking out. (It’s actually rather sweet that Senkuu doesn’t even try to hide it around him and Yuzuriha.)

Senkuu has the tiny sample of blood moved into a machine for some process Taiju doesn’t really understand.

“I’m trying to get a full account of the compounds in human blood and how it differs from various animal bloods.” Senkuu responds to Taiju’s unasked question. “There has to be some micronutrient vampires can only get from human blood, since we need it as part of our diet even if we have enough animal blood to completely satisfy our caloric intake.” He grabs another sample - some pig’s blood set aside from an earlier meal - out of the sample freezer under the desk, putting it into the machine opposite the sample from Taiju, and then setting the machine to spin.

He grabs one of the Minecraft-themed bandaids he got specifically for Taiju, tenderly wrapping it over Taiju’s thumb. “Alright, there you go, you blockhead.”

“Food’s ready!” Yuzuriha calls, coming in from the kitchen.

She’s made some cup ramen with an added egg for both herself and Taiju, and passes Senkuu a can of Monster Energy and a blood pouch- both of which Senkuu empty into the single provided glass before proceeding to chug the entire thing.

“Alright, while the centrifuge is running…” Senkuu trails off, pulling his laptop out.

“Game time!” Taiju cheers.

Senkuu nods with a small smile. “I’ve got some ideas for a new redstone build.”

“Oh, could you help me with some piston doors on the mansion first?” Yuzuriha asks.

Taiju grins, all three of them logging into their shared Minecraft server together.

He’s really glad he and Yuzuriha decided to have sleepovers as often as possible with Senkuu while Byakuya’s gone. He’s glad that they can all spend time together like this, glad that Senkuu isn’t alone with only his experiments for company.

Still, the sleepover can’t last forever. School comes the next day as always, life’s normal routine continuing to grind onwards.

Taiju’s planning on confessing to Yuzuriha today, and while Senkuu may not see the appeal of romance himself, he knows how important this is to both his friends.

He’s watching them from the window, slowly sipping from his ‘water’ bottle as Taiju approaches Yuzuriha. (It’s actually his signature mix of blood and Monster Energy- not that anyone else in the lab knows as much.)

Just as Taiju starts to speak, something in the distance, coming through a different window, catches Senkuu’s eye. He sets down his ‘water’ bottle, turning to try and get a good look at it.

A flash of light, off in the distance.

Senkuu leans over, as the light grows.

Brilliant green, shining as brightly as the sun, rushing towards him like a tidal wave.

It’s upon them in seconds, flowing over him, searing itself into his eyes, and then everything goes dark.

Senkuu can’t see anything.

He can’t hear anything.

He can’t move, he can’t speak, can’t call for help. He’s trapped.

After only a moment, it occurs to him it could be incredibly valuable to keep an accurate count of how long he’s trapped here.

Surely it won’t be that long?

672,734.

672,745.

672,746.

(It’s been a week, a week constantly awake in the dark.)

672,747

672,748

672,749

(He’s scared.)

672,750

672,751

672,752

(He has to believe that this will end. That he’ll get out soon.)

672,753

672,754

672,755

456,452,844

456,452,845

Something’s trying to drag him under, at unnervingly regular intervals.

456,452,846

456,452,847

He won’t let it. He has to stay conscious.

456,452,848

456,452,849

It’s been 14 years, trapped like this. Nearly a decade and a half.

456,452,850

456,452,851

Help isn’t coming. He’s accepted that by now.

456,452,852

456,452,853

The buildings around him likely will have decayed, without maintenance. He’ll be emerging into a ruined city.

456,452,854

456,452,855

That is, if he ever manages to break out at all.

456,452,856

456,452,857

No, he has to believe he’ll get out, he has to keep going. Humanity is counting on it.

456,452,858

456,452,859

Counting on him.

456,452,860

456,452,861

110,235,567,673

He has to wake up in the spring.

110,235,567,674

He’ll freeze to death in winter otherwise.

110,235,567,675

As for food though…

110,235,567,676

He’s made plans for most of the necessities.

110,235,567,677

But feeding himself?

110,235,567,678

He can get most of the calories he’ll need from animal blood.

110,235,567,679

But without human blood, he’ll be missing essential nutrients.

110,235,567,680

Even if he already knew what he’s missing, he still wouldn’t be able to synthesise it without access to his lab machines.

110,235,567,681

He just has to hope that either someone else will already be awake, or that he’ll be able to last until he can free someone else.

110,235,567,682

He just hopes Taiju is okay.

Senkuu startles as a loud cracking echoes in his ears, his eyes slowly blinking open.

Sunlight streams down from above, blindingly bright after so long in the darkness.

(He feels more coherent than he should, after so long trapped in the dark, after so long without his senses. Small mercies- perhaps there’s a fail-safe in the process to prevent the sensory deprivation driving him to insanity.)

He lies there for a few more seconds, adjusting to the bright light, slowly processing the waves of sensory input.

Something’s cracking and falling off of his form. He can feel something soft beneath him when he shifts his weight, though there’s a harder surface directly against his skin. Birds are chirping overhead, leaves are rustling in a gentle breeze. He can smell something sharp, acrid and acidic, as well as the normal scents of plants and nature.

Carefully, carefully, he sits up.

Shards of stone cover his naked form, slowly flaking away. He moves slowly, careful to leave as much undisturbed as he can, as he slowly climbs out of the small depression in the soft soil.

He marks the outline of where he laid with some nearby rocks, before standing up to assess his situation.

He’s near a cave- a useful asset, especially with how he can already feel his skin beginning to burn without the vampire-grade sunscreen he relied on before. He’ll need some way to stay out of the sun as much as possible until he can get a proper shelter built, or at least some clothes. The cave reeks of something acidic and sharp, possibly a factor in him waking up when he did?

A few monkeys are watching him from the undergrowth. They stare at his form curiously for a few seconds before fleeing.

Hm, likely never seen a vampire or human before.

(Civilization really is gone. He really is alone.)

First things first. Tools, and then fire.

There’s no time for him to spend moping.

Night’s fallen by the time he manages to get a fire going. He’s made good progress- he’s got some twine, a flint knife and a simple axe, and an easily reusable fire drill.

On the downside, he still hasn’t even had time to find any food, and the uncomfortable heat across his skin even in the dark is warning him he’s going to have an agonizing sunburn come morning.

He’s not going to be able to do this alone. He needs help.

He needs Taiju.

Sure enough, his skin is red and peeling across his entire body when he wakes up the next morning with a groan. Fuck, it’s going to hurt horribly and carry a risk of infection. He needs to get food soon too.

Maybe he can chase down a deer? The pelt would be useful for clothes, and he could drain its blood for food.

Senkuu crouches down, wincing every time his sunburnt skin brushes against something, as he ties a sharp bit of flint to a long stick.

It’s worth a shot at least.

Humans are persistence predators, built to chase prey over long distances, and vampires are close enough to humans that the same should work for him.

Key word being should.

Senkuu can’t track the deer that far. He doesn’t have the skill and knowledge to figure out where it went, and even if he did, he doesn’t have the stamina to chase it down. He’s not exactly athletic, he doesn’t have proper shoes, and the sunburns over his entire body aren’t helping.

...Maybe he should try a different approach.

“Yes!” Senkuu can’t help the shout of joy upon seeing that his snare had actually managed to catch a deer. “Things will be ten billion percent easier once I’ve actually got some proper food and clothing.”

He takes his flint knife out and walks towards it- only to jerk back when it starts thrashing wildly, swinging on the thin rope holding it aloft by the ankle.

“Oh.” Somehow, this hadn’t made it into Senkuu’s calculations. (He blames the agonizing hunger slowly building after not eating for two days, and the horrible pain of sunburns across his entire body. It’s hard to think straight past all of that.)

He has to actually kill the deer.

Senkuu will vehemently deny until the day he dies that he actually started crying after killing the deer.

(It wasn’t about the deer, not really.

The deer was just a symbol of everything that’s gone now. Everything he’s going to have to do for himself. A reminder that civilization really is gone, that the world has been reset to the simple law of the jungle, and it’s up to Senkuu to change that.

He didn’t particularly relish having to kill it though.)

Skinning the deer isn’t too hard. He’s done ample dissections before, he has some idea of how to peel back skin from flesh and where best to cut. Sure, he’s used to working on far smaller animals, with far better knives, but that just means it takes longer.

The overpowering scent of iron and animal musk instead of formaldehyde and other preserving chemicals is new, though honestly, Senkuu would consider it an upgrade.

Once the hide is removed, that brings him to the second issue.

Feeding.

He doesn’t really have any good way to extract the blood from the flesh, apart from his own fangs. He knows he can’t digest the flesh properly, not with the dramatically reduced digestive system of a vampire, one adapted for a purely liquid diet. He knows that he can’t cook the meat either, not without losing most of the blood he so sorely needs. He knows that he needs the raw calories to keep himself going.

He has to drink from it directly with his fangs.

He’s studied the theory of it, scoured every inch of what little research there is on vampires. He even kept and studied his own baby teeth to unravel the mechanics of how the fangs work. He’s worked out the physics of the channels that help amplify the suction effect, that aid in drinking blood directly from the source.

But he’s never done it himself before. He’s always had blood delivered in neat little packets. He’s never had to think about it, not once drank blood directly from the source.

He doesn’t want to do it. But he doesn’t really have a choice.

Senkuu takes a deep breath, leaning over towards the skinned form, looking for a large exposed vein.

He’d slashed a major one in the neck to kill it- a waste of blood, perhaps, but in the moment…

Regardless, he’s able to find another major vein in one of the legs.

It’s disgusting, bringing his face so close to raw bloody meat, to the form of an animal he’s killed. The scent of iron and death is overpowering. Parting his lips to rest his fangs on the vein brings both a sense of revulsion and desperate hunger, neither of which he particularly likes the experience of.

He bites down.

Blood rushes up through the channels in his fangs, instinct guiding him how to slurp it up efficiently. He can feel his venom glands contracting, injecting their contents- a mild anticoagulant to ensure his meal keeps flowing.

After a minute, (74 seconds precisely,) he draws back, his hunger satisfied. He wipes the gore and viscera from his mouth, grimacing at the feeling of it on his hand.

He’ll have to leave the meat. He doesn’t have any use for it, as loath as he is to waste it, and can’t afford to stay near it for too long in fear of attracting predators.

Before he leaves though, there are other parts of the body he can use. The tendons might be useful for making ropes, so he takes as many of those as he can. He also cuts out as many of the bones as he can easily reach. The streamlined digestive system of a vampire can’t handle solid food, but broth could help provide calories, even if it’s lacking the quantities of iron he also so sorely needs.

Now, to return to the cave, get some clothes together, and decide on his next plan.

Once he actually has clothes and a slightly better set of tools, things finally start to get better, day by day.

The deep hood he built into his outfit keeps most of the sun off his face. He’s protected from the sun enough now that the sunburns, though still a painfully regular occurrence, are more of an annoyance and less of a constant risk of infection and death. He’d considered switching his schedule to be awake at night and rest during the day, but between more predators being out at night and the awful chill, he decided it wasn’t worth it.

He managed to figure out some non-lethal traps, and learned how much he can drain from an animal without killing it. (The failures on learning that provided him with more pelts, at least.)

He managed to build a basic tree house to sleep in, and arranged some of his spare pelts into a bed. Off the ground like that, he’s relatively safe to sleep. (He still doesn’t sleep well, not when half his mind goes straight back to his time trapped in stone as soon as it’s dark and the other half is terrified of predators, but it’s something.)

He’s even put together a small lab, and managed to gather some fluid from the cave and some stone swallows to start experimenting on.

And yet…

He’s barely managing to do all this, even running himself ragged every day. He doesn’t have enough time to feed himself and keep maintenance on everything and do experiments, to say nothing of making further tools as he needs them.

And, well.

Animal blood alone can only sustain a vampire for so long.

There was tragically little research on what happened when a vampire went without human blood for too long before the petrification. Early records were all complicated with rumor and hearsay, with the only consensus being that vampires were supposedly aggressive and violent if not well fed, which frankly seemed more like scaremongering than actual truth. Later on, between ethics boards, how ferociously vampires tended to hide themselves, and the effort put into making sure they were adequately fed, no useful research existed.

Senkuu had considered experimenting on himself, at one point- not enough to get to the point of danger, but enough to get a better idea of what effect precisely the lack of human blood has on a vampire- but Byakuya and Taiju had put a stop to that idea quickly.

Seems like he’ll be doing that experiment now, whether he wants to or not.

After a failed experiment with the petrification earlier today, he’d thrown the clay pot of the failed mixture across the lab on pure impulse, feeling a vicious satisfaction watching it shatter against the floor- until it sank in that he’d just destroyed one of the few decent clay pots he’d managed to make. It seems that the rumors of aggression, at least, may have a glimmer of truth- Senkuu finds his emotions distressingly volatile as the weeks creep onwards, finds himself constantly wanting to scream and throw and break things whenever something goes wrong.

One morning he wakes up in utter agony, covered in bruises and scrapes and sunburns, and wants nothing more than to curl up and sob. He forces himself to push it down and get up anyways, forces himself to go out and check his snares and put up new ones, even if nothing else.

The lack of human blood is slowly killing him.

He gets dizzy, he bruises easily, he’s not healing properly. He’s constantly exhausted. He can’t stand up too fast. He’s constantly cranky and his hands sometimes shake too much for him to do fine work.

He needs human blood, he doesn’t know how much longer he’ll be able to last without it.

That need is what brought him here, digging around amongst the statues, looking for one in particular.

He manages to find Taiju- Taiju’s statue at least, half buried in the soft soil.

(He misses Taiju, misses him so much it hurts.)

(He’s so lonely.)

“It’s nice to see you again, you big oaf.” Senkuu smirks. “I get kinda sick of looking at your mug… but I think 3700 years has been long enough without you.”

He proceeds more gently from here, carefully excavating Taiju’s form.

He doesn’t know how to wake him up, not really, not yet, but there is one thing he can do- recreate the conditions that helped Senkuu himself awaken, and hope that the nitric acid of the cave can help Taiju too.

It’s painfully exhausting to drag Taiju over to the cave. Senkuu can’t tell if it’s just because his stamina really is that bad, or if his health is starting to deteriorate faster than he thought.

Still, he gets there eventually. The cave smells just as strongly of acid and bat poop as ever, a good sign despite how unpleasant it is.

“Taiju…” Senkuu drops to the ground. Between the exertion and the painfully strong smells of the cave, he’s painfully dizzy. “Wake up soon you oaf, I need your help.”

He won’t cry. He won’t.

“Soak up that nitric acid and wake up already. I know you can do it, I know you’re just as determined as I am- you wouldn’t have let yourself fade away.”

A few tears drip onto Taiju’s stone form.

“I have faith, I’ll wait for you as long as it takes.” (He’ll wait as long as he can. He doesn’t know how much longer that’ll be.)

“I can’t do this alone… Wake up Taiju, please…”

There’s nothing to be done. Nothing but wait, continue his experiments as best he can, and hope that either he figures out a reliable revival formula or Taiju wakes up before either malnutrition or simple bad luck kills him.

He knows Taiju will wake up eventually.

Senkuu just has to hope he can survive until then.

Chapter Text

“Senkuu? SENKUUUU!”

When he was trapped in the stone shell, drifting away all those years, the only thing on Taiju’s mind had been Yuzuriha.

“Senkuu, where are you?”

But from the moment he woke up, it was Senkuu he was thinking about. If anyone would be able to figure this out, it was Senkuu, and Taiju knows his best friend would never give in to this stone thing either.

“Senkuu?”

Naturally though, he’d first gone back to the camphor tree- still standing strong after so much time, Yuzuriha safely embraced in its roots. (The tree did such a great job, protecting her for all this time!)

But carved into the trunk, was a set of instructions- ‘Head down the river, big oaf.’

It was Senkuu, it had to be.

But despite following the instructions, he hasn’t seen any sign of Senkuu- though not for a lack of trying.

”SENKUUUUUUU!”

Several birds scatter at Taiju’s shout. He’d feel bad for disturbing them if he wasn’t so worried about Senkuu.

A hoarse voice calls down from a nearby ledge, “You don’t need to shout so loud, you big oaf.”

Taiju’s entire face lights up. “Senkuu!” He charges into a jump up towards the ledge, slamming into Senkuu with a full-body hug.

“Fuck- get off of me you oaf!” Senkuu growls as the duo tumble onto the dirt.

Taiju chuckles, holding Senkuu tight in his arms for a moment, pulling the both of them up into a sitting position, brushing off dirt and minor scrapes.

And then he pauses.

Senkuu’s cold. Like, nearly corpse-cold. He’s always been a little unnervingly cold to the touch, vampires aren’t entirely warm-blooded, but this is a lot more than normal.

Once he realizes that, a lot of other little pieces start to add up, and Taiju doesn’t like the picture they’re forming.

Senkuu’s lighter than he should be, it was almost too easy to pull him up to a sitting position. He sounded really angry when Taiju tackled him, but normally he’d just dodge out of the way of Taiju’s tackle hugs if he wasn’t in the mood. And he’s shaking, the tiniest tremors wracking his frame, as he pushes himself to his feet.

Taiju asks him, “Senkuu, what’s wrong?” as he stands up himself.

Senkuu sighs, grabbing a tall walking stick that had been knocked out of his hands by Taiju’s hug. “I’m getting first-hand data on what happens when a vampire goes without human blood for too long, that’s what.”

“Oh.” Senkuu really doesn’t look good. Taiju’s only seen him sick once or twice before- vampires can’t catch most human illnesses- but he looks so much worse now than he ever did then. “How long has it been?”

“117,298,164,726 seconds since the petrification. 15,780,728 seconds since I woke up.” Senkuu responds.

Taiju freezes for a moment. Okay, yeah, he’d been awake that whole time too, fighting to break free, and he knew Senkuu would have been awake throughout it as well. Still, to have a perfect count of the seconds- including the seconds since he woke up…

Senkuu sighs. “We were both in the stone for about 3,700 years. I’ve been out for about six months already.” He starts off down a worn trail, leaning on his walking stick as he goes.

Taiju frowns as he follows Senkuu. Six months with only animal blood, and possibly not enough of it at that. “You can take my blood if you need to, Senkuu.”

Senkuu nods. “That’s the plan. However, we should head back to my hut first. We need to make sure we do this as safely as possible.”

Senkuu looks so awful. Taiju desperately wants to protect him, to ease his pain, to be able to stand between Senkuu and anything that could hurt him. He would do anything to help his friend feel like himself again. But right now there’s nothing he can do but follow Senkuu’s instructions, and trust that he knows what he’s doing.

And then, Senkuu stumbles to a stop, leaning against a tree for a second.

“Senkuu?” Taiju’s typically the optimistic type, typically tries to keep up good cheer for his friends, but seeing Senkuu like this is really worrying him.

Senkuu waves him off. “Just… Got dizzy for a second.” He pushes himself back off the tree. “I’m fine.”

Taiju’s expression hardens. He crouches down for a second, wrapping his arms around Senkuu’s legs and picking him up.

“Ah- What are you doing, Taiju-”

“Carrying you!” Taiju responds. “Just tell me which way to go, okay?”

Senkuu’s face twists with frustration for a moment, before he sighs and leans against Taiju. “That’s probably for the best. Go that way.” He points Taiju down a small, barely-noticeable trail.

Taiju can’t help but worry as he walks- He just can’t get over how tired Senkuu looks, how much lighter he is. He’d known the whole time he’d been in the stone, that Senkuu would have to be there on the other side too, that he’d never give up, but now…

He’s scared. He’s scared for Senkuu. Scared by the way Senkuu leans against him limply, lets Taiju carry him without even a token protest when normally he’d kick up a fuss the whole way, how tired and quiet and light and cold he is in his arms…

Taiju picks up the pace.

If Senkuu says that it’s safest to do this back at the hut, then he trusts him, but he doesn’t want to let Senkuu suffer a second longer than necessary.

“Woah….” Taiju stares in awe as he comes into a clearing full of tools and supplies- there’s a treehouse with a ladder heading up to it, a small hut just underneath it labeled ‘SCIENCE’, a firepit in the center of the clearing, and tools scattered about the entire place. “You did all this yourself Senkuu?”

Senkuu grins, sliding out of Taiju’s hold to stand on his own- though he still keeps a hand on Taiju’s shoulder. “Yeah.” He walks across the clearing over to the treehouse, Taiju following closely every step of the way. “I knew you’d never let your mind fade- I was ten billion pecent that you’d break out eventually.” He sighs. “I need your help Taiju- even giving it my all, I’m barely able to handle my own basic needs, but with your limitless stamina, and enough access to human blood to keep me alive and healthy, we can solve this mystery and revive everyone.”

Taiju smiles. He’s here now. He can keep his friend safe. “Yeah! I’ll make sure you always have enough blood and whatever else you need!” He extends his arm to Senkuu. “I’ll let you take whatever you need.”

“Well, we need to make sure I don’t take enough to hurt you.” Senkuu adds. “We can’t have both of us struggling to function while I recover.”

Senkuu clambers up the ladder to the treehouse, careful to move slowly to avoid a potential dizzy spell. Once up there, he tosses down a set of clothes he’d prepared for Taiju, before climbing down himself.

Senkuu walks into the lab, taking a deep breath.

He’s tired.

He knows vampires have a better sense of smell than humans, especially tuned to being able to detect humans. In the modern era though, with everyone’s scents doused in colognes and deodorants and perfumes, it’s not something he’d ever really paid attention to.

Now, though…

Taiju smells comforting, there’s no other way to put it. He’d nearly managed to fall asleep on his friend’s shoulder on the way over.

But he’s going to need to keep much tighter control on himself for their next step.

He’s going to have to drink from Taiju directly, there’s really no other way around it. They don’t have the tools to draw blood safely, nor the ability to manufacture them. A vampire’s fangs are, after all, built for the job. If he cleans his teeth and Taiju’s arm as well as he possibly can, it’s the safest option available to them by far.

“Sit down there.” Senkuu points Taiju to one of the two seats he’s set up in the lab, as he grabs a scrap he’s been using as a washcloth, along with a simple toothbrush.

(He hasn’t had the energy to make soap yet, as critical as it is, or any kind of alcohol for disinfecting, so this isn’t going to be nearly as sterile as Senkuu would like. He doesn’t really have another choice though- he needs to get back into good shape as soon as possible, and the malnutrition is starting to break him down.)

He sits down on the other chair, next to Taiju, taking a deep breath. He dips the washcloth in a small water basin he keeps in the lab, carefully wiping the crook of Taiju’s elbow as clean as he can get it given the circumstances.

“Taiju.”

“Yeah, Senkuu?”

Senkuu takes a breath, biting at his lip. (He’s so hungry, he’s so thirsty, he’s so tired, he’s been so lonely for so long- but he has to make sure he does this right, does this safely.) “We don’t have any tools to draw blood other than my fangs that won’t carry substantial risk. I’m going to have to bite you directly.”

“Okay!’ Taiju responds. “I trust you, Senkuu.”

“There is a problem.” Senkuu continues. “I might not be able to effectively judge how much blood I’m taking. I need you to be ready to push me away immediately if you start to feel lightheaded- we can’t have both of us struggling or it’s game over. We won’t be able to acquire enough food and resources if both of us are weakened.”

Taiju fidgets in his seat. “Senkuu, I don’t want to hurt you- or stop you from getting enough to eat!”

A brief spike of uncharacteristic frustration and rage bubbles up for a moment, a spike that Senkuu promptly squashes down. (This anger isn’t real, it’s just hunger and malnutrition screwing with him. Deep breaths.)

“It’s probably going to take a little while for me to fully recover anyways.” Senkuu explains. “And I need you in top condition to be able to help me.”

Taiju sighs. “Okay. I promise I won’t let you take enough to hurt me.”

Not ideal, given how much it can take to stop Taiju, how willing he is to push himself to his limits and beyond, but it’ll have to be enough.

Senkuu nods. “Okay. One more thing for me to do, and then we’re ten billion percent ready.” He grabs a jar from the shelf and holds it under his fangs with one hand. He slides his other thumb to press on the venom glands in the roof of his mouth, and a stream of venom squirts out into the jar, before he repeats the process on the other side. “I don’t want to use my venom on you, as that’d increase the risk of me taking too much blood from you, as well as slow down the healing process and thus increase the risk of infection.” He puts the jar back on a shelf. “It will hurt more without it, vampire venom does have pain-killing qualities as well.”

“I can take it, it’s okay!” Taiju reassures him, extending his arm to Senkuu.

“Alright.” Senkuu breathes. “Let’s do this.”

It’s easy enough to find a clear vein in Taiju’s arm. That’s not the hard part.

Senkuu takes Taiju’s arm, leans down and rests his lips over it gently, fangs aching to be let into the pulsing sustenance beneath.

Taiju sets his other hand on Senkuu’s shoulder. “I’m ready when you are.”

Senkuu pulls his lips back, and lets his fangs slice through the skin and into the vein beneath.

The scent hits him first, even before the taste.

It’s delicious, appetizing and mouthwateringly rich with iron. His hunger, suppressed for so long with no way to fully satisfy it, comes roaring back to life with a vengeance as the blood flows out of the channels in his fangs and into his mouth, onto his tongue.

He gulps it down desperately, fervently, like he’s guzzling down water after running a marathon.

Blood, blood, blood, rich and tangy with iron, warm and delicious, satisfying the desperation that animal blood never seemed to properly touch.

He feeds, he feeds, he revels in it.

So when he’s abruptly shoved away from his meal, a snarl slips out before he has time to think.

“Senkuu? You alright?” Taiju’s voice cuts through the haze.

“...Yeah.” Senkuu looks up. Taiju looks a little paler- and Senkuu feels unsettled that he didn’t notice how much blood he was drinking in the moment. The count still ticking up in his head informs him it was nearly a whole minute, a minute that felt like it was no time at all.

Regardless, Senkuu stands up to grab some bandages- feeling hopeful at how, for the first time in several days, he doesn’t feel dizzy at all standing up. Taiju sits silently as Senkuu carefully wraps the bandages around his arm. “Do you feel dizzy or nauseous at all?” Senkuu asks.

Taiju shakes his head. “A little tired but I can still keep doing stuff if you need me to!”

Senkuu smiles as Taiju surges upwards, grinning with enthusiasm. “As stupendous as your stamina and energy are, I think it’d be a good idea to take it easy today, for both of us. I’ll show you how to work the traps I’ve set up, where I’ve stored everything, and where I’ve been getting water from.”

Taiju grins. “Alright! Let’s go, Senkuu!”

The duo spend the rest of the day going about the surrounding forest, as Senkuu shows Taiju everything he’s done so far- the spring he’s been getting water from, the nital cave, the fire-starting device, a few berry bushes that Senkuu had marked the locations of, and the traps he’d set across the forest.

One of the traps had actually caught a rabbit since Senkuu had last checked it- a rabbit that Senkuu kills and drains before taking it back to camp and roasting it up for Taiju to eat.

(Senkuu can’t help but chuckle at Taiju’s initial reluctance to eat the organ meat, until Senkuu told him about all the cultures where organ meat is common fare, and the important vitamins they contain.)

(Taiju’s face when he bites into the roasted viscera is still pretty funny.)

Eventually though, night falls, and it’s time for them to sleep.

Senkuu… hasn’t slept well, not since the petrification. Between the threat of predators, the need to constantly be planning for what he’ll do the next day, and the part of his mind that’s terrified that he’s back in the petrification as soon as he closes his eyes to rest…

Yeah, it’s no wonder he hasn’t been sleeping well.

“I haven’t really set up any standard beds, but I’ve got some piles of pelts here.” He explains to Taiju.

“That’s okay!” Taiju tells him. “I know you’re doing your best!”

Senkuu smiles, warmed by the reassurance. “There’s enough pelts here for us to both have our own spot to sleep.”

Taiju nods, grabbing several pelts and curling up in the pile comfortably.

Senkuu takes his place in his own pile of pelts across the small room.

Taiju falls asleep quickly enough.

Senkuu… doesn’t.

He tosses and turns in the darkness, his count continually ticking upwards in a cruel reminder of how much sleep he’s missing. It’s not too bad with his eyes open, the moonlight just barely bright enough for him to see around him, for him to remember he isn’t trapped anymore.

But he can’t keep his eyes open forever.

He’s so tired.

Every time he nearly falls asleep, he jerks awake with a flood of adrenaline, the desperate need to stay awake burned into his brain after the thousands of years spent trapped and alone in the stone.

It doesn’t help that he’s really still hungry either, his stomach still painfully twisting with cravings for the nutrients he lacks. The small amount of blood he took from Taiju wasn’t nearly enough to satisfy the nutritional requirements he’s been missing out on for months, and even if it was it’d take time for his body to recover.

When a particularly intense jolt of adrenaline and fear surges through him, exactly 7,256 seconds since he started trying to sleep, he can’t muffle his scared cry anymore- or the exhausted sobs that pour forth after the initial adrenaline starts to fade.

The tears don’t stop flowing, and he hates it. Hates how sensitive he’s been with hunger and exhaustion weighing on him constantly. Hates that he has to deal with his emotions running amok on top of trying to restart civilization from scratch. Hates that he can’t stop crying now that he’s started.

He’s so tired. He knows that not sleeping is making everything ten billion percent worse, knows that his raw terror is not only illogical but counterproductive.

Knowing his fears are illogical doesn’t do anything to make him feel better.

“...Senkuu?” A groggy voice rises over Senkuu’s muffled sobs, and Senkuu feels a spike of guilt knowing he’d woken up Taiju.

“It’s nothing, go back to sleep.” Senkuu responds, trying to keep his voice even and calm, and not hitting the mark nearly as well as he’d like.

“Senkuu.” Taiju responds. “Is it okay if I come over to you?”

Senkuu nods, before remembering that Taiju probably can’t see him in the darkness. “Yeah.”

He sees Taiju’s shape sitting up and crawling over to him, details indiscernible in the dim moonlight. He hears the rustling of pelts against each other, the creaking of the wood beneath them as Taiju craws over next to him.

Some of the blankets covering Senkuu’s form are lifted aside as Taiju squirms into the pile next to him. An arm wraps around his neck, and Senkuu curls inward, resting his head on Taiju’s chest.

Thump.

Thump.

Thump.

He can hear the steady rhythm of Taiju’s heartbeat, a step faster and stronger than his own, segmenting off the time into chunks alongside him. It’s incredibly close to Senkuu’s own perfect second by second count, a mark of Taiju’s incredible physical health.

Taiju’s arms wrap around him, pulling some pelts over the two of them and holding Senkuu close to him.

He’s safe.

He really, truly, feels safe, for the first time in 4,700 and a half years.

Taiju’s warm.

He’s warmer than any amount of heat Senkuu’s slow metabolism can pump out.

Senkuu finally feels warm, calm, safe.

Even with his eyes closed, it doesn’t feel quite so lonely, quite so close to the sensation of being trapped in stone anymore- not with Taiju’s warmth to keep him comfortable, not with Taiju’s heartbeat keeping time alongside him.

He’s safe.

Taiju’s here. Taiju can protect him if something happens.

He’s not alone anymore.

Chapter Text

“Get excited!” Senkuu cracks his neck. “With you here to provide the raw strength, we can start on the real work. We’re going to need to figure out how the petrification works, and how to reverse it.”

Taiju runs a hand along one of the stone swallows, marveling at the knowledge that there really is a bird in there, just waiting to be freed. “How’re we going to do that? There isn’t much of anything to go off of.”

“Well, for starters, why do you think the both of us woke up at nearly the same time- only six months apart after 3,700 years?”

Taiju shrugs, following Senkuu as the duo continue down a familiar path through the forest. “Maybe the stone just wore out after that long?”

Senkuu crouches down with a grin, grabbing one of the pieces from his own stone shell. “But then we’d expect the revival to work from the exterior in, instead of leaving a layer to flake off. No, it ten billion percent has to do with some other circumstance we both shared.” He stands back up, swaying on his feet for a second before gesturing to the nearby cave. “Nitric acid.”

Taiju looks around at the many, many pots set out collecting the slow drip of liquid from the ceiling. “Need my help to carry some back to the lab?”

Senkuu nods. “Yeah, there’s no way I’m getting these back on my own.”

Senkuu notices something, as they walk back with the pots of nitric acid in Taiju’s arms. It’s not clear standing so close to Taiju and the powerfully aromatic chemicals, but if he lags behind a little…

He can smell something. He has no clue what it is, he can’t recognize it at all, but it vaguely reminds him of his trip to Africa. Maybe it’s just something to do with the wilderness, but that wouldn’t explain the instinctual fear the scent seems to evoke in him…

There’s not much he can do about it either way though, so he brushes it off. A problem for another day.

The experimentation with nitric acid goes painfully slowly.

Sure, with Taiju around, Senkuu actually has time to devote to it, but that doesn’t mean it’s easy.

Science is always a long, slow process; trial and error iterating over and over and over until you find something that works and then you can build on that.

Still, this is the first time Senkuu’s been truly pushing at the edges of science, instead of learning and refining things that were already known.

It’s a slow, painful process.

And just as slow is his recovery from the six months he went without human blood, the six months where he barely even had enough food to fulfill basic calorie requirements.

Raw calories, at least, certainly aren’t a worry now- Taiju figured out how to slit the throats and collect the blood from hunted animals pretty quickly, so Senkuu has a steady supply- and he doesn’t have to drain animals with his own fangs.

(They really don't have a safer way for him to get Taiju’s blood though.)

He’s ending up with quite a lot of his own venom stockpiled in jars. Not that it’s likely to be useful- the good it could do in terms of painkilling is outweighed by the risks of the anticoagulation factors for most cases.

(He’s recovering too slowly. Making progress too slowly.)

His limbs still shake after a couple hours in the lab. He still gets dizzy, still feels tired more than he should. He’s still constantly cold unless he has Taiju next to him to supplement his body’s own pitiful heat generation.

He knows he’s doing his best, knows he’s going as fast as he can- but he can’t shake the feeling that it’s not going to be enough.

The mysterious scent is still around. He’s started asking Taiju to avoid certain areas where it’s strongest if he can, but…

It’s present in lower intensities near the camphor tree where Yuzuriha is, and he can’t ask Taiju to stay away from there. So he doesn’t.

(The fact that he still can’t identify it is bugging him, a mystery he has neither the means nor time to solve constantly poking at the back of his mind.)

Frustration weighs on Senkuu. The walls of the lab are lined with shelves and shelves of failed attempts.

He lays his head on the table, staring at them.

Vials of nitric acid, dozens of different failed methods to try and purify or process the stuff. The stone swallows each of his attempts has failed to free.

He’s not getting any feedback, that’s the core problem. He doesn’t know how close to working any of his attempts might be, he can’t get any additional information to work off of.

“If only we had some alcohol,” he muses, “then we could get proper nital, and from there we’d have a better shot.”

“What?” Taiju asks from the lab entrance.

“Hm?” Senkuu lifts his head.

“What’d you say?” Taiju asks.

“About nital?”

“No, before that.”

“...If only we had alcohol?”

Taiju pulls some small purple fruits out of his backpack. “Couldn’t we make wine from grapes?”

“Oh!” Both shout in unison.

Senkuu springs up from his seat in excitement-

-everything goes fuzzy for a second-

-He’s sitting on the floor, leaning on Taiju.

“You need more of my blood.” Taiju states, leaving no room for argument.

It’s true- probably. There wasn’t any research on recovery timelines for a vampire experiencing prolonged starvation, but he is getting less human blood than usual, even now.

“I’m not doing physical work.” Senkuu counters. “You’re doing work requiring a lot of physical exertion, work where both of us will suffer if you don’t keep up with it, whereas for me…” Senkuu’s expression hardens. “I’m not making much progress right now anyways.”

Taiju’s lips tense into a tight line. “Senkuu…”

Senkuu shrugs. “We need you to be operating at your best or we’ll both end up starving. It’s ten billion percent critical to keep you at your best, but my work isn’t as urgent.”

Taiju blinks rapidly for a few moments, sniffling.

Oh no.

Taiju bursts out into tears, wrapping Senkuu in a tight hug.

“Ow- You’re crushing me you oaf!”

He lets go of Senkuu quickly after that, but the tears are still flowing. “Even if it is the smart thing in the short run, I don’t want to see you hurt! You’re really important too!” He grips Senkuu’s shoulders, again almost painfully tight. “I want to make sure you’re okay! The stuff you’re doing is really important too- you’re so smart, and I know you’ll find a way to save everyone, but you have to take care of yourself too!”

Senkuu blinks back tears of his own. (God, the emotional volatility is by far the worst symptom of all this.)

He sighs deeply, wiping away the tears starting to build up in his eyes. “I suppose your morale is important as well, and keeping me well-fed will help with that enough to make up for any lost hunting and gathering potential.”

“Okay then!” Taiju says, standing up and offering Senkuu a hand.

Taiju helps pull Senkuu to his feet, taking him over to the pair of stools that had become the designated location for his feeding. “You’re going to get some blood now, then take a break for tonight, and then we’ll start trying to make wine tomorrow, okay?”

Senkuu nods, warmth welling up in his chest from the sheer attention and care Taiju shows him.

Emotional warmth can’t do much to counter physical cold however, and the chill of autumn starts to set in during their long, slow work to distill their primitive wine down into more useful alcohol.

The more frequent blood meals from Taiju are helping Senkuu for sure, but he’s still not quite back up to normal- he still keeps getting frustrated at his experimental failures unusually quickly, still feels so goddamn cold all the time.

But it’s better.

He’s not getting dizzy anymore, at least, and there’s the absence of a gnawing hunger that had crept up so slowly he’d only noticed it by that very absence.

(It still feels uncomfortable, having to sink his fangs into Taiju’s arms so frequently.)

Small point scars have started to develop in the crook of Taiju’s arm. There’s faint reddened tracks forming from the irritation caused by the last drops of venom he can’t quite get out before biting.

All in all, he’s decidedly uncomfortable with how much Taiju’s arms have started to look like some kind of needle-based drug addiction is at work- but he doesn’t particularly want to risk trying a new bite location, not given that they already have one that works.

(He may have to switch locations eventually though- the scabs are starting to make it harder to bite through. Maybe if he’d properly used his venom those tough scars wouldn’t have developed, but… There’s just so much information missing, so much research that nobody bothered to do for vampires.)

Taiju seems to be able to handle the frequent blood loss just fine, given his insane stamina and healing. Senkuu worries regardless, though he refuses to show it openly.

Still.

They’re making progress, as slow and full of setbacks as it is.

They’re getting closer and closer to having alcohol distilled to the level needed for nital.

Taiju’s work has let them start building up a store of dried meats and fungus for when winter comes, let them stock up plenty of blankets and firewood to make sure they’ll be able to stay warm.

Senkuu’s work has gotten them soap, basic toothpaste, some spare outfits sewn together. It’s gotten them preservation methods for the food Taiju’s brought in, and the identification of a few plants with basic medicinal properties.

(They won’t be able to deal with severe illness, but they can at least ease some of the symptoms of mild ailments.)

Despite the long road ahead of them, the mountains and mountains of work, the slow approach of winter, Senkuu feels hopeful, more so than he has since before the petrification.

(That maddening scent though… It’s still there. Still at the edges of the areas he and Taiju traverse. He still can’t figure it out.)

Despite the danger it brings, the first snowfall really is beautiful.

(Frostbite is a potential issue now. Their immune systems could suffer from the constant fight to stay warm. Calorie requirements will go up. Taiju will have fewer micronutrients available if he’s forced to rely on preserved food, which could then negatively affect Senkuu in turn.)

Taiju insisted on them going out to Yuzuriha’s statue, to celebrate the first snow with her, hence why the two of them are trudging along the forest paths while snow drifts down around them.

The snow is only just starting to accumulate, the soft layer of white flakes forming a striking contrast to the darker branches and soil.

“Come on, Senkuu!” Taiju lightly pulls on his hand.

“Yeah, yeah, I’m coming, don’t rush me.”

The clearing is beautiful. A light dusting of snow covers the branches of the camphor tree, light streams down past the dancing snowflakes in a magnificent show.

Yuzuriha is right where they left her, still safely wrapped in the roots of the camphor tree that had stood for all this time. Logically, he knew nothing would have changed, but it’s good to see her, even trapped in stone as she is.

Taiju goes up to her, and Senkuu prowls around the edges of the clearing to give him space, letting him say what he needs to say without listening in.

That scent is still here. Still lingering around the edges of the clearing.

It’s definitely familiar, definitely something he’s smelled before, but he just can’t figure out what. It was on the trip to Africa, yes, but what commonality is he picking up on?

It smells… musky, unpleasantly so, and it just feels dangerous in this maddeningly illogical way he can’t make sense of.

“What’re you looking at?” Taiju wanders over from talking to Yuzuriha to check on Senkuu.

“...I’m smelling something. I’m not sure what it is, but I don’t think we should have a picnic here today like we were planning.”

“Okay then!” Taiju responds. “We can go back if that’ll make you feel safer?”

Senkuu nods. No point in taking unnecessary risks, even if he can’t identify what, exactly, the risk is.

Winter crawls on slowly. Senkuu finds himself getting more and more sluggish, and Taiju’s picked up on it too.

It’s when Taiju’s worrying over him next to the fire one night when it hits him. “Of course!”

“Senkuu?”

“I think I’ve figured out the issue.”

Taiju sighs with relief. “What is it? Is it something we can fix?”

Senkuu chuckles. “No, but it’s not a huge issue either. Tell me, why do people often think vampires are undead?”

“Well.” Taiju pauses. “It’s cause you have really cold body temperatures, and your heartbeat and breathing can get a lot slower and be hard to find, which makes you seem dead.”

“Exactly.” Senkuu responds. “Vampires aren’t quite cold-blooded, but we’re a lot closer to it than any other mammal. And what do cold blooded creatures do when it gets cold?”

“They get sleepy, right?” Taiju pauses, processing what he just said. “Oh.”

“Ten billion percent correct! My body can’t handle keeping warm on its own in this environment without handwarmers shoved in my coat, or central heating to retreat to.” Senkuu explains.

“Well,” Taiju declares, “Then I’ll just have to help keep you warm!” He pulls Senkuu into an abrupt hug.

While the physical contact might be a bit much, the sheer warmth Taiju radiates is enough to overpower Senkuu’s dislike of being touched and he melts into it.

Finally, finally, warm.

“FUCK!” Senkuu shrieks, as the latest attempt at a distillery explodes all over him, staining everything with grape juice. (He’s never going to get the stench of fruit and alcohol out of these clothes.)

“Senkuu!” Taiju rushes over in moments, an edge of panic in his voice that doesn’t fade until he sees Senkuu unharmed, if absolutely soaked in hot wine.

Taiju ends up laughing as soon as he processes that Senkuu’s safe, and after a beat Senkuu responds in kind He can feel the frustration of another failure melting away as he laughs, as Taiju’s laughter lifts his spirits.

They’ll get there. He just has to trust in the process, and trust in Taiju to keep him safe and sane in the meantime.

Winter is starting to roll around to spring by the time they finally, finally, get a distillery design working. Only a few more rounds with this design and they’ll have alcohol pure enough to start trying different concentrations of nital.

The snow is melting, and Senkuu’s energy is returning. Taiju’s getting more fresh food, and there’s more bone broth for Senkuu to supplement his blood diet with as well. Fruit juice is becoming another nice addition too, even if he still needs to drink a lot of blood to get the iron he needs.

That same scent is starting to appear more frequently too- it’d died down a little bit over the winter, but it’s back now.

He still can’t place it.

He just hopes it won’t end up getting them hurt or killed.

It’s a sunny spring morning, Senkuu testing progressively higher and higher concentrations of nital, when it finally works.

A single feather sits, freed from its shell of stone.

He stands there frozen in awe for a few seconds.

“TAIJU!” He yells. “Get over here!”

He’s at Senkuu’s side in an instant. “Is something wrong?”

“No.” Senkuu smiles, taking his new solution and one of the stone sparrows outside with him, setting the sparrow down on a tree stump.

“It’s not that there are some things science can’t explain,” he begins monologuing, “rather, we look for the rules and principles behind the inexplicable. Science is just the name for the slow, pain-in-the-ass effort that goes into doing it.” With a flourish, he pours the revival fluid onto the stone sparrow. “And once you understand it? We can triumph over the fantastic with the power of science.”

The stone cracks with a resounding shatter, and the sparrow bursts free, flying off into the air.

“It’s time to get excited, you big oaf,” Senkuu says, cracking his neck, “because now we can go and revive Yuzuriha.”

Chapter Text

They’re halfway to the camphor tree and with a vial of revival fluid when Senkuu starts to get a creeping feeling that something is horribly wrong.

He’s learned, over those six months before Taiju woke up and during the time spent making the formula afterwards, that a bad feeling out of nowhere typically means some subconscious part of his brain has been tipped off to danger that he hasn’t yet noticed consciously.

Of course, in the modern world, this would almost always be a false alarm. The kind of dangers that this kind of subconscious software is tuned for are things like hungry predators, food shortages, bad water, violent rivals- all things not present in a modern city.

(Barring any major natural disasters.)

The vague sense of danger jumps from subconscious to conscious as they keep walking, letting him identify exactly what has him so on edge.

“Taiju?” Senkuu scans the area warily, senses on high alert.

“Yeah?”

“The scent’s back. We should move fast.”

Taiju nods and picks up the pace, leaving Senkuu struggling to keep up. (It’s a decently long hike, and Taiju can speedwalk impressively fast.)

The scent is present far more strongly in the clearing itself. Whatever the source is, it was here recently. It seems like the scent was deliberately placed around the bases of some of the trees at the edges of the clearing, though thankfully Yuzuriha’s tree was spared.

“...So we just pour this onto Yuzuriha and she comes back to life?” Taiju assesses the roots entangling her statue.

“Yep.” Senkuu nods. “I tried testing it on some small shards of broken stone earlier, which revived as bits of dead flesh.”

“Senkuu!” Taiju scolds him.

“Sh!” Senkuu winces, the sudden noise sending a pang of fear through him. “...I get the feeling we should keep quiet. Besides,” he shrugs, “I only ran the bare minimum of experiments on petrified human flesh, and even tried to stick a few of the pieces back together beforehand, but it didn’t work.” He’d put together a prayer for those failed revival attempts, if they weren’t in a hurry right now.

Taiju freezes as the two of them climb up to where Yuzuriha is encased in the rootwork. “Wait, Senkuu! We can’t revive her like this! She’s naked!”

…Seriously?

“Who cares? We’re in a stone world now, top priority needs to be getting back home before whatever left that scent shows up and decides to kill us!”

Taiju effortlessly prys Yuzuriha free from the roots. “Let’s take her back to camp and revive her there.”

“What was even the point of bringing the formula along with us then?” Senkuu complains. “We’ll go faster if we revive her and have her walk- I could’ve brought clothes for her if you’d told me you’d be so picky about this before we left!”

“I didn’t think of it, okay!” Taiju responds.

“Well-” Senkuu freezes, hearing a low rumbling noise echoing at the edge of his audible range, a noise that sends his heart racing. Adrenaline floods his system in quantities that have him frozen in place for a moment like a deer in the headlights. “We need to go, now!”

Taiju nods, breaking off into a run, Yuzuriha’s statue in his arms and Senkuu not far behind.

Their pursuers are faster than them. It’s not long before they’ve closed the distance enough to be seen.

Lions.

A whole pack, menacing and snarling, with bulging muscle and razor sharp claws.

“Lions!?” Taiju yells, “In Japan? How did they get here?”

“A zoo population must have escaped, after the petrification,” Senkuu pants out as they run, “and without humans around, thrived.”

“Now,” Senkuu continues, panting for breath, “3,700 years in the future, in the new stone age, we aren't at the top of the food chain anymore.”

Taiju glances back at Senkuu, at how he’s starting to struggle to keep up the pace. “We can’t outrun them forever.”

“We just need to get back to camp.” Senkuu insists, pushing still more effort out of his legs with a surge of adrenaline. “They’re not starving. If we can show we’re not easy prey, they’ll give up. Even just a sharp stick should be enough.”

“They’re close enough that they could kill us by now, why haven’t they?” Taiju asks.

“They’re…” Senkuu pants for breath, “they’re toying with us. Seeing,” he pants, “if we’re easy prey.” He shuts up, focusing all his effort into putting one foot in front of the other, the rhythm of running and running and running and gasping for oxygen that can’t reach his muscles fast enough.

Senkuu swears as the two tumble down a steep slope, small rocks slashing up his knees and shins as he falls. “We…” He’s gasping down air now, struggling to push himself back to his feet to keep running.

“We need to get back to camp.” He pants. “I don’t, don’t think…”

He can’t take in air fast enough no matter how hard he tries. “Don’t think I can make it.”

Taiju’s face hardens. “You’re humanity’s best hope. You’ve got the formula, so you can revive someone else for blood. If it’s gonna come to this, I’ll protect you Senkuu!”

No, no, no, he can’t lose Taiju, not now, he can’t face this stone world alone. No, no, “No!” Senkuu yells. “You’re strong, but you’re no fighter.. I can’t do this without you and your strength.” He stops talking for a moment to gasp down air. “We have to stick together.”

A fighter, huh?

Taiju… might have an idea.

Is it a good one?

Maybe not, but…

Taiju might, might, be able to make it all the way back to base carrying Yuzuriha’s statue, if he’s really lucky, but Senkuu? He’s definitely doomed if they don’t try something else.

It’s that thought, more than anything else, that makes up his mind. “Senkuu, this way!” If he remembers the path right… “There’s a fighter we can revive!”

He hears a vague noise of affirmation from behind him, Senkuu struggling to keep up.

The two emerge into another clearing, a stone form bent over to sit on some roots at the base of a tree. “I found him earlier, Tsukasa Shishio!”

Senkuu nods, stumbling after him at a dead sprint, struggling to uncork the bottle of revival fluid with shaking hands, as Taiju sets down Yuzuriha and apologizes that her revival will have to wait.

The lions surround their clearing, crouching down in a manner distinctly reminiscent of a cat preparing to pounce. It’d almost be cute if not for the razor sharp claws- and the fact that they’re the ones about to be pounced on.

Senkuu swears, passing the still-corked bottle to Taiju. “Hurry up and pour it on him you big oaf!”

Taiju uncaps the bottle, and dumps it on Tsukasa’s head.

He turns around, and-

His heart just about stops, seeing the lions circling so close to them.

Senkuu raises an axe with shaking arms, and Taiju prepares to throw himself at the lions in a desperate last bid to help Senkuu escape.

A distinctive cracking sound comes from behind the two of them.

“Sorry dude!” Taiju calls out, “I know you’ve been asleep for hundreds of years, only to wake up to this…”

A deep, assured voice echoes from behind them. “What’s the situation?”

“Your entire body’s covered in stone fragments!” Senkuu yells. “Lions coming at nine and two o’clock!”

“Okay.”

Fragments of stone slam into Taiju’s back, slicing up the exposed skin on his arms and neck and knocking him to the ground.

He surges back to his feet just in time to see a long-haired man slam a punch into a lion’s lower jaw, sending the animal flying backwards.

The other lions circle backwards after the confrontation, and flee- but that initial lion slumps to the ground, dead.

“I’m ready for a full explanation, however long it takes.” Tsukasa says, as he walks over to the corpse of the dead lion.

The lions are all dead or gone, but Senkuu’s instincts are still screaming at him. There’s some subtle scent wafting off of Tsukasa that’s putting him on edge. It smells partially like a sweaty teenage boy without deodorant- a scent that’s typically more mouthwatering than off-putting for vampires- but there’s a scent of danger and fear underneath it all.

He’s probably just picking up on testosterone, adrenaline, and the like- some cocktail of all the hormones you’d expect from someone who just woke up into a fight for their life.

“I can make you one promise though.” Tsukasa says. “You two will never be in danger again. From now on, I’ll do the fighting.”

Senkuu pulls back up his calm, self-assured mask, as the adrenaline from the long chase starts to fade.

“This is great Senkuu!” Taiju cheers. “Brains, brawn, and fists, now we’ve got all three!”

Senkuu smirks, despite his cautious fear. “Heh, I suppose you’re right. Though, with muskets not reinvented yet, this guy’s way too strong.” If he turns out to be particularly anti-vampire, Senkuu could be in real danger. Taiju too, if things end up going that badly.

And the scent of aggression and adrenaline on Tsukasa isn’t going away.

It fades and is diluted as Tsukasa crouches down, takes an offered knife, and begins skinning the corpse, but…

Even over the aroma of blood and raw meat filling the clearing, he can still smell it on Tsukasa. When Taiju is spooked, or exerts himself too much, he smells a little like this, but it always fades and gets stale pretty quick. (Besides, Taiju’s scent is too familiar to be scary- as though he could ever be scared of the oaf!)

But on Tsukasa, the scent lingers, feeling unfamiliar and strange.

Logically, there’s no reason to fear Tsukasa yet, beyond simple caution in assessing a powerful unknown entity.

But his instincts tell him otherwise.

He’s trained his mind to function in modern society for the first fifteen years of his life, but in this new stone age? Instinct honed by millions of years of evolution may just have the upper hand over the experience of a single year. Illogical though it may seem, his instincts may have a point here.

Taiju seems to pick up on Senkuu’s unease, and walks closer to him to continue talking. “What’s wrong with him being too strong?” He asks Senkuu. “Doesn’t that just make him more helpful?”

Senkuu huffs. “What if he turns out to be an evil, sex-crazed tyrant? Or to hate vampires with a burning passion? We’re talking a guy strong enough to kill a lion with a single punch here- it’s like he’s using cheat codes! In this world without guns, there’s a ten billion percent chance that we wouldn’t be able to stop him if it came down to violence.”

Taiju looks over at Tsukasa. “So if he turns out to be the wrong type of person, you or Yuzuriha could be in serious danger.”

Senkuu nods. “Still, good on you for spotting someone who could save us from the lions- but knowing my luck it’ll just be out of the frying pan and into the fire.”

Taiju’s expression hardens- as much as it can given the big oaf’s soft demeanor.

Tsukasa looks up to them, mostly finished cutting up the corpse by now. “I presume the two of you have some sort of base camp with supplies for curing meat and tanning leather?”

Senkuu nods. “You’ll have to carry the carcass.”

“That’s perfectly alright.” Tsukasa responds, and with no small amount of trepidation, the three depart for camp.

Once they’re back, Taiju shows Tsukasa around the camp- as soon as he puts down Yuzuriha’s statue somewhere safe.

“So that’s the lab down there, the treehouse up there is the sleeping room- Senkuu says it helps keep most of the parasites and bugs and stuff out.” He heads to the storage shed under the tree, next to the lab. “We’ve got most of the meat-curing stuff in here, lemme get it all out…”

He hands items to Tsukasa as he goes, reciting the checklist of steps for properly getting the most out of the corpse, steps Senkuu had drilled into his head over and over again.

“Okay, so you’ve already skinned the corpse, that step’s done. Next would be collecting the blood, but it’s already butchered so I think we skip that step. Then… we just have to finish butchering it and separate out the tendons and bone so Senkuu can use them for strings and broth and stuff.”

Tsukasa nods. “Simple enough.”

“And then the meat needs to be sliced real thin and go into the smoking rack, and we’ll need to stoke the fire.”

“Where do you keep the firewood?” Tsukasa asks, looking through the storage shed.

“Oh, at the bottom!” Taiju helpfully points out the stash of firewood he’d chopped up. It’d been one of the first things he’d done to help Senkuu out, and it’s now a regular chore of his. It’s one that always makes him happy too- something so perfectly suited to his own brute strength and stamina, and such a big part of taking care of his friend.

It’s while Taiju’s lighting the fire that Tsukasa tilts his head and asks a question that makes Taiju’s blood run cold. “You mentioned collecting the blood from butchered animals. Is there a specific use for that? I’m afraid I don’t know of any particular survival applications to collecting animal blood.”

Taiju frantically racks his head for some reasonable explanation that wouldn’t put Senkuu at risk. He’s saved from having to improvise a lie on the spot by Senkuu climbing out of the tree house to respond.

“Nah, no general survival purpose.” Senkuu says. “I have a digestive condition that makes solid food a risk without hospitals around, as well as an iron deficiency. Blood’s an extremely nutrient rich liquid, in addition to being the closest thing to iron supplements we have access to.”

Well. It’s mostly true, Taiju supposes, and he figures that the fact that Senkuu can’t eat solid food would be hard to hide, but still…

He can’t stop thinking about what Senkuu said earlier- that he or Yuzuriha could be in a lot of danger if Tsukasa turns out to be the wrong kind of person. He can’t remember much about Tsukasa from TV, he can’t be confident that Tsukasa won’t do anything like that.

He knows it was either revive Tsukasa or get eaten, but still, if his choice to lead Senkuu to Tsukasa instead of trying to fight or make it back to camp ends up getting one of his friends hurt?

…He just hopes it won’t come to that.

Things change, with Tsukasa added to the group.

They can’t revive Yuzuriha straight away- they’d used up all their nitric acid, between experiments and the dose of revival fluid that went to Tsukasa. It’ll be a while before they have enough to revive someone else.

One one hand, Taiju doesn’t have to worry about food anymore. He doesn’t have to worry about not having enough leather if something suddenly goes wrong, or about predators waiting for Senkuu to be alone before attacking.

Tsukasa makes sure they’re fed and safe. Now Taiju can put his full effort into gathering resources for Senkuu, putting his strength to building and crafting instead of being almost solely focused on hunting and gathering.

Still, there’s tension between Tsukasa and Senkuu. It was hard to notice at first, but now that he’s seen it, it’s everywhere he looks.

They have to hide how much blood Senkuu drinks. Taiju dresses most of Tsukasa’s kills, butchering them and draining the blood. Some of it is added to Senkuu’s broth, some ends up hidden away for Senkuu to drink while Tsukasa’s out hunting.

(He still doesn’t like butchering the animals, doesn’t like having to see their dead, glossy eyes. It stings, somewhere deep in his heart, every single time- but Senkuu needs him to do this. So he will.)

So many things have to wait for Tsukasa to be gone. Senkuu can’t drink his fill of blood till Tsukasa’s out. Senkuu can’t drink from Taiju till Tsukasa’s out. Taiju can’t take off his new longer-sleeved tunic till Tsukasa leaves, for fear of the bite marks being visible. Senkuu can’t take his shirt off to wash it until Tsukasa leaves, or else Tsukasa might see the characteristic hollow stomach vampires all have.

It’s not all bad though.

Tsukasa really seems like a nice guy as far as Taiju can tell! If not for Senkuu’s obvious fear, he wouldn’t be worried about him at all. He’s polite, he tries to be respectful to the animals they have to kill- and he’s way better at it than Taiju. He’s hard-working and he listens to Senkuu most of the time.

Really, Taiju was starting to think Senkuu was just being extra cautious and Tsukasa was perfectly fine! Not that Senkuu isn’t right to be extra cautious, but, Tsukasa really did seem nice.

No matter how nice he seems, there’s really no way to know for sure though- and they have no real way to protect themselves if he does turn on them.

One day, Tsukasa walks up to him just after Taiju finishes cleaning a kill.

“Taiju.”

“Yeah?” Taiju puts the last of the meat into the smoker before turning around to face Tsukasa. “What’s up?”

Tsukasa pauses, still in that way he so often is. It’s like he’s focusing really hard on something- Senkuu tends to be kinda twitchy when he’s focused super hard, but Yuzuriha goes super still and steady just like Tsukasa. Maybe it’s because they both do stuff that needs them to be super steady, and Senkuu doesn’t.

“Come with me.” Tsukasa finally says, gesturing for Taiju to follow.

“Alright!” Taiju says, turning to shout towards the lab. “I’m heading out with Tsukasa!”

“Make sure not to get lost, dumbass.” Senkuu responds.

Tsukasa raises an eyebrow as Taiju follows him off into the woods. “It really doesn’t bother you when he refers to you like that?”

Taiju shrugs. “Nah, not really.”

Tsukasa continues walking into the woods for a while, following a twisting path that Taiju doesn’t recognize, leading the two of them up a hill.

Slowly, the trees clear out, showing an incredible view of the surrounding countryside.

It really is stunning.

Softly rolling hills, distant mountains, forest and rivers and grasslands as far as the eye can see.

“Beautiful, isn’t it?” Tsukasa asks.

“Yeah!” Taiju responds. “This is a super neat spot!”

Tsukasa continues staring off into the horizon, expression clouded. “What was your life like, Taiju, before all of this?”

“Pretty normal, I guess?” Taiju shrugs. “I mean, I didn’t have my parents, but… I still got to go to a good school, and Senkuu was always there for me, and, I mean, I wasn’t really good at school but I was good enough to pass everything.”

“And then what?” Tsukasa says, voice barely above a whisper. “Work your entire life, the spoils of your work going to another as your life drains away and the planet slowly dies?”

“I mean, I never really thought that far ahead?” Taiju chuckles awkwardly. “I don’t think I was ever going to be super out of the ordinary myself, but… I’d be okay just being ordinary and supporting Senku and Yuzuriha, you know?”

Tsukasa sighs. “Do you ever think… that perhaps the very existence of humanity was bad? Look at this landscape- humans paved this beneath roads and cities, blocked out the stars with streetlights, poisoned the rivers and oceans, choked the air with smog. I do not think we should revive society and humanity precisely how it was.”

“Well, yeah, we won’t revive it exactly the same.” Taiju says.

Tsukasa whirls to face him.

Taiju sits down on a nearby rock, facing the vista. “It’s never gonna be exactly the same, not after something like this.” He looks up at the sky, the gently drifting clouds. “People are gonna get revived at all different times, and we might not even be able to revive everyone. We’re going to have to rebuild everything from the start, so of course everything’s going to be different. But we can do things differently on purpose too, learn from our mistakes now after the planet’s had time to heal.”

Tsukasa sighs. “I do not think humanity will change that easily.”

Taiju shrugs. “Maybe. But I think it’s still worth trying.”

Tsukasa looks downwards, something haunting his features. “...Perhaps.”

Chapter Text

It’s been a while since whatever discussion Taiju and Tsukasa had- the one Tsukasa had to take Taiju away from the camp for.

They’ve got just about enough nitric acid to revive Yuzuriha at this point. Senkuu still finds himself hesitating to actually go through with it.

It’s only smart to make sure they have a little extra, but that alone doesn’t explain the sense of apprehension he still feels.

Tsukasa still smells dangerous, like aggression, like an apex predator, but… he hasn’t done anything yet.

Honestly, with the way the guy was a celebrity fighter from such a young age, the way Senkuu vaguely remembers him being hungry for money despite not seeming greedy, the way he was so still and frightened for a split-second when he accidentally broke the distillery… Given all of that? Senkuu bets that the guy is traumatized somehow. He’s probably just picking up on the testosterone and adrenaline, and whatever other hormones are associated with trauma and constantly being ready to fight.

(He’s more of a physicist and chemist than a biologist- sure, he knows a little, but most of it is stuff about vampires he learned for his own sake. Endocrinology isn’t a field he ever wanted to deal with either. Besides, humans and vampires differ enough in those smaller details that research on humans would probably be irrelevant to him, and nobody ever bothered to research that far into vampires.)

Long story short, Tsukasa’s probably just as much traumatized as he is a threat, and Senkuu has neither the capability nor the willingness to deal with that.

Taiju also seems to be slowly warming up to him, so that’s a point in his favor as well.

“Senkuu!” Taiju waves at Senkuu excitedly, dropping the bundle of firewood he’d collected.

Senkuu smiles. “Glad to see you’re back, you big oaf.”

“Good to see you too!” Taiju cheerfully responds. “Is dinner ready yet?”

“Almost.” Tsukasa replies, slowly stirring the pot over the fire.

(Plus, Tsukasa can cook better than either Senkuu or Taiju- not a particularly high bar, but still a point in his column.)

“Thanks, Tsukasa!” Taiju plops down on the specific spot around the fire that’s been his since he broke free from the stone, and Senkuu tears his attention away from his notes to follow suit.

Tsukasa sips the broth, and nods. He ladles out a portion of the stew for Taiju, and fills a bowl of plain broth for Senkuu.

“So Senkuu!” Taiju starts, through a mouthful of food, “What’s next?”

Well, besides reviving Yuzuriha… “Antibiotics. We can hit several other critical technologies along the roadmap, and having some in supply drastically reduces the odds of one of us dying of illness if we get unlucky.” He shrugs lopsidedly, “Though we’d still be fucked if one of us gets a really bad viral infection- but there’s not much we can do about that for a while.”

Tsukasa narrows his eyes just a fraction, and the part of Senkuu’s mind that’s always screaming about how dangerous Tsukasa could be starts to register that particular cocktail of scent that means aggression, even over the smells of woodsmoke and cooking meat and Taiju’s sweat.

(...the fact that Taiju’s sweat smells more appetizing than the actual food now will never not be impossibly strange to him. Maybe it’s a perceptual shift by his body still hoping for more human blood? Perhaps it’s just the absence of cologne and other artificial scents masking it?)

“What other things would you need to do that?” Tsukasa asks, voice low and menacing.

Senkuu hesitates, but- he won’t lie about this.

“Ammonia will be easy enough- we can get aneline from charcoal, then acetic anhydride will take a couple steps but is doable with our current supplies. The problematic pieces are chlorosulfuric acid and sodium bicarbonate, we’ll need sulfuric acid and sodium hydroxide for that, and to get those-”

“In simpler terms please?” Taiju asks sheepishly.

“Most of what we need we can get by just processing what we already have.” Senkuu explains. “Sulfuric acid will be a sticking point, but if we’re lucky we might be able to find a natural source of it near some geothermal activity- which should be present in the nearby mountains, assuming things haven’t shifted too much. Then, the real issue is sodium hydroxide- for that we’ll need electricity, and for electricity we’ll need a couple different metals and a furnace strong enough to work with them.”

“...How would you generate the electricity?” Tsukasa asks.

“In the amounts this would take?” Senkuu responds, “Muscle power from you two would probably be enough, especially if we wait till the winter when you don’t have other work. Hm, but assembling all the batteries we’d need could be an issue if we’re limited to the three of us.” (Reviving Yuzuriha would help a lot with that though.)

Tsukasa’s hands twitch. “Do you really need to do all of that just to create antibiotics?”

“Well, this is for the sulfa drug route.” Senkuu explains. “It’s easily the simplest option we have access to. Our best other option is to try and find antibiotics in nature, but that’s highly luck-dependent-”

“Not something we want with Senkuu around!” Taiju cuts in,

“-And we’d need either better research equipment than we have or else we’d be forced to do lots of dangerous testing to figure out if we’ve found it.”

Tsukasa hums cautiously. “And then, once we have antibiotics, then what?”

Senkuu shrugs. “I suppose it depends on if any other pressing matters come up in the meantime, but once anything like that is dealt with? Then we’d probably want to try and figure out a way to get more nitric acid. Platinum might work. We’d only need a few grams. Then, we can revive more people, and from there, we’ll have the manpower to get more complicated work done, start agriculture so we don’t have to worry about food as much, and then from there? Then, we can start to figure out what caused all of this.”

“So you truly plan to revive society the way it was?” Tsukasa asks, face framed menacingly by the firelight.

“Not precisely.” Senkuu can’t help but grin, “For one, we get to speedrun our way back this time, with all our knowledge of the previous go-around.”

“Do you really think that’s the right thing to do?” Tsukasa asks.

“Why wouldn’t it be?” Senkuu asks.

Tsukasa takes a deep breath, hands faintly shaking. “Because that world was rotten!” He stands, shaking so much even Taiju can see it, reeking of fear and aggression clear as day. “Because the world was ruled by cruel wealthy oligarchs who could get away with anything they wanted! Because we were killing the planet just so a few could sit in luxury while the rest were left to rot! Look at this forest, look how the world thrived without us! And all for what? Just so a few greedy old men could rest on their riches as people struggle to survive while the planet burns?”

Senkuu surges to his feet. “So, what do you want to do then? Just leave everyone stuck in stone forever?” (Leave them alone in the dark counting and counting and counting and so alone and so scared-)

“We can’t revive everyone!” Tsukasa shouts back. “This world cannot support everyone without leaving it ruined!”

“Guys-” Taiju starts.

“So then we make it so we can!” Senkuu replies. “Hell, prior to mass-producible fertilizers, supporting more than a billion or so seemed like a pipe dream- but we made it happen!”

“And it was killing the planet!” Tsukasa shoots back. “Every advance we ever make just leads to more suffering.”

“Really?” Senkuu countered. “You’re going to make that argument? What, do you think we should just ditch civilization entirely?”

“We can bring back some medicine, perhaps- but some things need to stay in the past.” Tsukasa growls.

“It doesn’t work like that!” Senkuu yells. “You can’t just skip straight ahead to the tech you want and ignore everything else! This isn’t like a videogame where you can just wrong-warp to the credits! Every invention depends on one another. You can’t have just modern medicine without electricity and metals and refined oils, any more than you could have a squirrel without trees or soil or an oxygenated atmosphere!”

“Some people don’t deserve to be brought back!” Tsukasa adds.

“Oh, and who are you to decide who does and doesn’t deserve to live?” Senkuu mocks. “What, you want to be the new tyrant ruling the world? Kill all those greedy old men right up until you become one yourself?”

Senkuu realizes a second too late that he might have gone too far- Tsukasa’s clenching his fists, Taiju’s stood up too and looks almost terrified, but he can’t stop himself. “And what about people who can’t survive without modern medicine, are you going to leave them all to die? You think everyone who needs modern medicine to survive should be just left to die? Bet you’d change your tune real quick if one of your friends or a member of your family got sick-”

Tsukasa slams his fist into the poles holding the soup pot over the fire, shattering it with a single blow.

The pot of soup falls. Burning wood and boiling soup are thrown outwards.

Taiju shoves Senkuu out of the way.

Taiju screams.

Boiling hot soup and chunks of burning wood and red-hot charcoal splash across his arms.

The smell of burning flesh fills the clearing.

Tsukasa really is shaking now. His entire body is practically vibrating with condensed rage, fists clenched tightly at his sides.

His voice is barely above a whisper.

“Leave. Now.”

“I-” Taiju tries to speak.

“I SAID NOW!” Tsukasa roars, arm twitching up and down like he’s seconds away from throwing a punch.

Senkuu doesn’t need another warning.

He grabs Taiju’s shoulder, dragging him away from the fire.

Tsukasa stalks to the edge of the camp, still shaking. “Leave. Don’t come back. I don’t want to kill you. But if I have to- if- If I have to, I will.”

Senkuu nods shakily, grabbing a spare bag from the treehouse’s entrance. He shoves a couple blankets in, some soap, a flint knife, and some rope. Taiju tosses in the nitric acid and some alcohol from the lab, alongside some meat from the storehouse, wincing at every movement.

He picks up Yuzuriha’s statue, still standing where he’d left it. (His face is pulled tight with pain and fear. Senkuu can’t smell anything over Taiju’s burnt flesh and the reek of terror pouring off of all three of them.)

“Get out.” Tsukasa growls.

(Taiju’s face is twisted in pain, tears starting to drip out of his eyes, but they can’t afford to stop and treat his burns now, not when Tsukasa’s tenuous control could snap at any second.)

They leave, rushing out into the night.

This time, it’s Senkuu leading Taiju.

He can see much better than Taiju can when it’s this dark out- the thin light of a half-full moon is more than enough for Senkuu to see his surroundings nearly as clearly as daytime.

And Taiju…

Taiju’s not doing well.

Burns hurt a lot. Senkuu’s dealt with bad sunburns more than a few times, even before the petrification, and he knows this has to be far worse than that. Without access to painkillers of any kind, it’s going to be brutal for Taiju until the burns are healed.

He has to pray the burns won’t get infected- but with how suddenly the both of them were forced to move, with the broth and wood and charcoal and dirt thrown into the wounds…

There’s nothing he can do but hope. Antibiotics, even if he started work on them now, even with Tsukasa’s help, wouldn’t be ready in time to save Taiju if he got a fast-moving infection.

Senkuu keeps going, struggling onwards through Taiju’s weight leaning on his shoulder. The stars overhead have shifted since they were petrified, but by a predictable amount. Between that and the moonlight, he can almost certainly navigate them towards the hot springs. There, they can take a rest, and make some gunpowder perhaps- they’ve got enough spare nitric acid to make some- and then…

…Senkuu doesn’t want to kill Tsukasa. But, he might be forced to. He’d prefer to use gunpowder as a bargaining weapon instead- but that assumes Tsukasa is rational and in control enough to bargain.

Maybe he will be, once he has time to breathe and recover from whatever mental landmine Senkuu inadvertently set off or, maybe he won’t.

“H-Hey, Senkuu?” Taiju huffs, leaning against Senkuu’s side, still carrying Yuzuriha’s statue. “Can, can we stop for a minute?”

(He looks exhausted.)

Senkuu sighs. “Alright. There’s a river up ahead, let’s stop there so we can get your burns cleaned off at least.”

Taiju cracks a thin, strained smile. “Okay.”

Senkuu has to half-drag both Taiju and Yuzuriha’s statue down to the river bank.

Taiju practically falls into a sitting position in the mud, and Senkuu crouches down next to him.

The first step is to get any debris out of the wound. Thankfully it only hit his upper arms, so there’s no clothes in the wounds to complicate things, but there’s still a few larger bits of debris Senkuu has to pick out.

It seems like mostly first-degree burns, with a few spots of second-degree where some of the charcoal hit Taiju. For the most part it’s just reddened, painful skin, but yellowish blisters are already starting to form in a few places.

Now, the question- use their limited clean water to wash the wounds or save it for drinking?

…They can always boil more water later, once they’re far enough away that Tsukasa spotting their fire is less of a risk.

Senkuu searches through the pile of blankets and fabric he’d grabbed, finding a smaller scrap he can use as a washcloth. He pours some water from his drinking flask onto it, and as gently as he can manage, tries to clean out Taiju’s wounds.

Taiju grits his teeth, leaning against Senkuu’s shoulder.

“You’ll be fine.” Senkuu reassures him, carefully trying to dislodge a bit of muddy wood without popping the blister it’s wedged in next to. (The surface of the blister will provide some defense at least against infection, a defense Taiju can’t afford to lose.)

It’s a long, slow process, made worse by how every misstep causes Taiju’s face to contort in pain, knuckles whitened by how tightly he’s clenching his fists, how much he struggles to keep his arms still so Senkuu can work. Senkuu tries to get it over with as quickly and painlessly as possible, but there’s not a lot he can do.

Once it’s finally cleaned out, Senkuu debates whether he should wrap it up. On the one hand, it might help keep it cleaner, on the other, it might raise the risk of popping the blisters, or cause additional pain.

It’s the latter factor that decides it, really.

“Taiju.” Senkuu gently nudges him.

“Hm?”

“Drink this.” Senkuu passes Taiju a water flask, and he happily gulps down a good portion of it before Senkuu makes him put it down.

Senkuu stands up, ignoring the faint complaints from Taiju as he moves away, to set up a small nest on the forest floor out of all the blankets they brought. It’s far from ideal, but at least for tonight, it’ll have to do.

Taiju lets Senkuu manhandle him into the pile of blankets without protest, Senkuu carefully arranging the blankets around the two of them so they’ll stay warm without irritating Taiju’s burned arms.

They’ll need to get moving again come morning, despite the immense pain Senkuu knows Taiju will be in. They’ll probably need to revive Yuzuriha- revive her to this- since there’s no way Taiju will be able to carry her for long like this.

Senkuu isn’t one prone to self doubt, but…

He’s really fucked it up, hasn’t he.

If he’d just kept a little calmer, just trod a little more carefully around the trauma he knew had to be there, maybe they wouldn’t have been thrown out. (Maybe it would have been worse if they’d stayed there longer.)

If they get unlucky enough, Taiju might die for his mistakes.

Chapter Text

As much as he hates the idea of reviving her directly into this mess, they’re going to need to revive Yuzuriha today.

Taiju can’t carry her statue any distance with his burns, and Senkuu simply doesn’t have the stamina or strength to carry it for any substantial distance. Adrenaline might have gotten them this far yesterday- but that’s not sustainable.

He needs her to be calm and able to act effectively immediately as well. Tsukasa’s still a very present danger, and that’s without even touching on the inherent danger of the stone world on its own.

They can’t afford for any of them to be sloppy.

(And psychology, unfortunately, is not his strong suit.)

So- his plan is to revive her now, at dawn, before waking Taiju up. He can explain the situation to her with just the two of them, before dealing with Taiju’s injuries.

(His hands are still shaky as he raises the flask of revival formula- he’s not quite sure if it’s trepidation or some lingering after-effects of prolonged starvation.)

Waiting won’t make this any easier for either of them.

He pours it.

The loud cracking noise of revival rings out painfully sharp and clear. Senkuu can only hope that the sounds of the river will mask it, that Tsukasa isn’t searching for them in this general area at this very moment, that Taiju will remain asleep just for a little longer, that there aren’t any predators nearby that might be more intrigued than frightened by the noise.

For once, his luck holds.

(Well- at least as far as he can tell.)

Yuzuriha twitches a finger, and rolls her neck, and then the stone begins to fall off in massive chunks.

She takes a breath.

(All three of them, together, for the first time in 3,700 years.

Not the circumstances he would’ve chosen though.)

“Senkuu?” She scans the clearing- eyes darting around between the river, the furs and supplies laid out, Taiju’s sleeping form, the stone statues dotting the landscape, and Senkuu himself.

…He knows he can’t be a pretty sight right now.

(He’s barely even started putting back on the weight he’d lost before Taiju woke up. He’d picked up an entire album of new scars and calluses in that first year as well. Throw in the fact that bathing is a lot harder when you’re nearly cold-blooded and don't have access to heating beyond lighting a fire, and, well.

Not exactly a sight for sore eyes.)

Yuzuriha smiles anyway, pulling him into a brief hug. “I’m so glad you’re okay.”

Senkuu huffs. “That might not hold for much longer, the way things have been going.”

Yuzuriha looks over at Taiju, the burns and blisters marring his forearms, and nods. “Tell me everything.”

Tsukasa is a monster.

(Just like his father.)

Were he not-

Were he not, he would not have lost his temper with Senkuu and Taiju.

Would not have lashed out with intent to harm. Would not have threatened them with violence, no matter how sharp his temper. Would have left the camp himself instead of forcing them away from their safety.

(Senkuu is smart. Senkuu built all of this up from nothing, alone for months, he can do it again. Taiju is hardy, he will survive.

Tsukasa is lying to himself. He knows this.

And yet, he does not stop.)

He cannot allow people like his father a chance to exist in this new world. He cannot allow people like those who just allowed Mirai to be hurt, who would have condemned her to die had Tsukasa not fought for the money to keep her alive.

(He ignores the fact that he is just as bad, after what he did to Senkuu and Taiju. It will be worth it. It has to be.)

He must be a monster.

Else he would be searching for them. Else he would bring them back to their camp, then accept whatever punishment they deemed fit, even if it were his own death.

(He does not trust himself not to hurt them again- after what Senkuu said-)

(But was Senkuu wrong?)

(But is that fear anything more than a flimsy excuse?)

He is a monster.

Else, he would not be taking the stolen revival formula, that which was Senkuu’s by right. Else, he would not be retrieving more nitric acid from the cave. Else, he would not be reading through Senkuu’s notes, working to brew up more revival formula.

(It will be worth it in the end. It has to be.)

(He has to believe it will be worth it- else-)

Were he not a monster, he would not be seeking out the one person he knows would understand what he’s done. The one person he knows would not hate him for it.

(He deserves to be hated for it.)

(He has to believe it will be worth it.)

He begins his search for Hyoga’s statue.

They spend the next several days traveling to the hot springs.

To Senkuu’s relief, his luck continues to hold, and Taiju’s burns show no sign of being infected.

That doesn’t mean they’re easy to deal with.

Taiju tries to hide it, but-

Burns are among the most painful of wound types, and the only thing they have even remotely capable of a painkilling effect is Senkuu’s venom, which has too many potential side effects to be worth the risk.

During the day, they all manage to brush past it. They keep talking as they walk, half about their plans, and half about whatever mindless nonsense keeps them all in good spirits and able to keep going.

But at night-

At night-

Taiju’s ability to sleep is at a deadlock between the warring forces of pain and exhaustion. Yuzuriha, for all that she puts on a brave face, just woke up into a ruined world- and Senkuu doesn’t know what level of awareness, if any, she might have held onto during the petrification.

(He hopes it was none. He wouldn’t wish that- that endless counting and counting and counting

and counting and counting and counting and counting

and counting and counting alone in the dark for eons on and on and on and-

…he wouldn’t wish it on anyone.)

And Senkuu…

(31,537,765

31,537,766

31,537,767

31,537,768

31,537,769

31,537,770)

He’s fine. He tells them over and over, he’s fine.

(They don’t believe him, anymore than he believes it when Taiju says the burns aren’t really bothering him, then when Yuzuriha says she’s sure it will be fine.)

(They let him save face anyways. But, when night comes and all three of them are tangled in nightmares, they’re both right there, no matter how much he insisted he’s fine the day before.)

The hot springs turn out to be exactly where Senkuu had predicted they’d be, their position having remained roughly stable over the last 3,700 years.

Taiju wastes no time in running ahead as soon as he spots the springs, and Senkuu bites back the admonishments sitting on his tongue, about trying to not alert Tsukasa- or any number of predators- to their position.

Taiju deserves to relax.

Yuzuriha shoots him a quick look.

“Go ahead, make sure your boyfriend doesn’t get into any trouble before I can catch up,” He responds.

Yuzuriha flushes briefly. “I- he’s not-”

Senkuu cracks his neck. “Not yet. Go on ahead, I’ll catch up at my own pace. Make sure he doesn’t do anything too stupid.”

Yuzuriha nods, heading up the path after him at a slow jog, leaving Senkuu behind to lean on his walking staff as he slowly walks up after them.

Research on vampires is, as he’s cursed a thousand times, horribly full of holes. He’d underestimated just how much the difference between ambush predators and persistence predators would factor into a journey of multiple days, continually walking, even when accounting for his own abysmal stamina.

A moment to go at his own pace without worrying about slowing the group down, even if only at the very end, is still welcome.

By the time he crests the ridge where Taiju and Yuzuriha are setting up camp, where the majority of the springs are, he’s panting with exhaustion.

Taiju’s gathered up a number of branches from the area and Yuzuriha is weaving them together with some vines to form a makeshift privacy screen.

Senkuu leaves them to it, sniffing around for the distinctive rotten-egg odor to lead him to a pool where he can get some sulfur.

By the time he’s gathered up an appreciable amount into an empty flask, Taiju and Yuzuriha have already finished getting the privacy screen set up and lowered into one of the larger hot springs.

“Hey Senkuu!” Taiju grins.

“Hey to you, you big oaf.” Senkuu replies.

Yuziriha laughs. “I thought it’s probably be good for all of us to soak here for a little while before we decide on our next move. I know I’m sore from how much walking we had to do to get here!”

Senkuu stretches. “I ten billion percent feel the same.”

He looks out across the forests under the mountain. He can see all the way to the ocean from here, and the setting sun dyes the ocean and rivers a brilliant orange.

“I didn’t see any sign that Tsukasa was following us.” Senkuu adds. “I wouldn’t say I’m ten billion percent certain on this, but we should be safe to spend the night here before deciding on our next move.”

Taiju doesn’t waste any more time before stripping off his primitive leather clothing and sinking into the hot water with a loud sigh of relief.

(A brief spike of emotion lances Senkuu’s heart seeing how careful Taiju is to avoid anything even brushing against his forearms, to find a spot where he can comfortably rest both arms on the rock out of the water.)

Yuzuriha follows suit on her side of the privacy screen, and after a moment of hesitation, so does Senkuu.

(It’s much more obvious that he’s a vampire, like this. The streamlined digestive system his species has creates a distinctive hollowed-out look to their abdomen, from the much shorter intestines- an effect that Senkuu’s bony frame only amplifies. Having such an obvious sign of his vampirism so clearly visible is a little disconcerting, even knowing there’s nobody around to see it who doesn’t already know.)

Still, all his hesitation practically melts away as he sinks into the water.

It’s so warm.

The heat is soothing right down to his core.

He hasn’t been warm quite like this since the petrification- even huddling as close to Taiju as he’s comfortable with can’t quite provide the sheer full-body immersion in warmth that a heated home or hot bath can.

It’s actually managing to make him sleepy.

Lingering memories of petrification have made it hard for him to sleep, harder still to get an entire night’s worth without interruption, but the warmth of the hot springs is so unlike the blank void of petrification that it lulls him regardless.

They’re as safe as they’re going to get in this new stone world. Taiju is right next to him, and Yuzuriha is just across the makeshift wooden wall.

He trusts them.

(And, well, he needs all the sleep he can get at this point.)

Senkuu leans up closer to Taiju, letting himself drift off peacefully.

They all start discussing plans early the next morning.

A few key points circle around in their discussions, over and over-

First of all, Tsukasa has a hold on the only reliable nitric acid supply they have at this point.

They could attempt to find another cave inhabited by bats, but that has problems of its own- the most likely location would be in another of the caves near where Tsukasa is, far too close for comfort. And artificial means are out of the question at their current point of technology.

Additionally, Tsukasa has Senkuu’s notes. He can recreate the revival formula. Even disregarding his own ludicrous strength, he can start reviving allies of his own soon. They absolutely cannot risk getting close to him without allies of their own and superior weaponry.

But, with just the three of them, keeping Senkuu fed is going to be a major issue. Blood can’t really be dried like meat can, broth is liable to spoil quickly without any means of preserving it save salting it till it becomes undrinkable, and fruit juice is only mildly better on that front.

And that’s only considering raw calories.

Senkuu, as proven during those first brutal six months, needs some human blood as well.

Taking from Taiju while his burns are still healing is an unacceptable risk, given the extra demand it would put on both his immune system and healing capacity.

Yuzuriha, on the other hand, is far smaller and slimmer than Taiju, and can lose far less blood before it starts affecting her.

They don’t know exactly how much human blood Senkuu needs either. There’s no safe way to go about this.

(Throw in the fact that Yuzuriha tends to have particularly heavy periods, and likely can’t stand to lose too much extra blood during that time period, and the problem gets even thornier.)

Really, it all comes down to three core facts.

They can’t do this with just the three of them. They can’t afford to wait too long before trying to expand their numbers without putting the health of at least one of them at a substantial risk. And the only means of expanding their numbers is guarded by a hostile force far stronger than any of them.

Senkuu doesn’t want to risk working with gunpowder. Making it is risky in and of itself, with a chance of killing or injuring one of them in an explosion with one false move.

(He doesn’t want to have to actually kill Tsukasa either.)

However, it might just be less risky than any of their alternatives.

He’s deep in thought, trying to analyze the different risks, if there’s any other way to get the nitric acid they need, when Yuzuriha taps on his shoulder.

“Senkuu.”

“Hm?”

She points, and he turns to look and-

Smoke trails up from down the mountain.

“...Is it Tsukasa?” Taiju asks hesitantly.

Senkuu pulls out a primitive makeshift spyglass- pretty much just a single quartz crystal set in a wooden tube.

(The plume of smoke is in the opposite direction of where Tsukasa would be coming from.)

The spyglass produces an incredibly blurry image only barely better than not having it at all, but one crucial detail stands out.

The humanoid figure standing by the fire is blond.

“It’s not Tsukasa.” Senkuu cracks a lopsided grin. “Looks like we’ve found our third way out after all.”