Chapter Text
Things were progressing quickly in the kingdom of science. With Corn City established and a shaky alliance with the Americans formed (well, most of them anyways) Senku felt confident in continuing with the group’s search for materials needed for the rocket. Hiding his labored breathing and suppressing the pain from his voice, Senku addressed the group. “It’s time for us to move on, I trust that you can set up things with Corn City here, Yuzuriha?” He asked, gaze flitting over to the young woman in question.
Nodding Yuzuriha balled her hand into a determined fist in front of her chest, an indomitable expression in her eyes, “Leave it to us, Senku.”
Pleased, Senku turned to the rest of his group that would be heading with him further into the mainland United States, or what was the United States. “Well, then it’s time to prepare for a hiking expedition.”
“Hiking?” Chrome echoed before his eyes widened in excitement. “Leave it to Explorer Chrome to find what we need! How long will it take us?”
Doing a few mental calculations Senku hummed, “Usually it would take 11 days, but we need to aim for 9 to try and beat the snow.” A dubious grin worked its way onto his face, “Maybe we can push it to 6 so you best get packing.”
The group who would be accompanying Senku blanched, apart from Taiju that is, but not everyone had his unbeatable endurance. Gen was the most vocal about his displeasure, going so far as to remark how he shouldn’t even be this surprised over it anymore.
“Isn’t that impossible?” Asked Kohaku, one of Senku’s group members asked. “I could see skimming off two days as reasonable if we had a good pace, but Suika and old man Kaseki are coming with us and you were hurt.”
“Wow, I didn’t expect to hear this from the lioness of all people.” Senku shot back without skipping a beat.
“Stop calling me that!” Kohaku growled- much like a lioness- before she stormed off with Suika and Chrome to join the others in packing for what was going to be a grueling journey ahead.
The final lineup was: Senku, Chrome, Gen, Kohaku, Suika, and Kaseki- much to everyone’s surprise the old man was more than willing to go on such a tough journey- Hyoga, Tsukasa, Ukyo, Ryusui, and Taiju. With a solid group, Senku felt confident that they would make it through the mountains in record time before the snow would begin to fall, thus trapping them until winter let up enough for them to venture out once more. Of course, after having recently been shot by a sniper and living to tell the tale, Senku would be happy if he could reach their destination without anyone nagging him about his injuries.
Setting out close to the first morning light, the Kingdom of Science’s expedition team began their long trek towards the mountains that lay somewhere off in the distance with their hostage, Dr. Xeno, in tow. Chrome looked back at the middle-aged man being guarded by Hyoga and Tsukasa warily. ‘I wonder what kind of science he knows.’ Chrome thought with a small pout, clearly trying to think of what other kinds of science besides “Senku science” there could be. Noticing that he was being stared at, Dr. Xeno locked eyes with Chrome. He was clearly uncomfortable being between two large warriors, but Chrome felt that was well deserved considering what he did to Senku.
“Why are you staring?” Dr. Xeno asked, sounding more annoyed than anything else. But who would be happy with being gawked at?
Chrome merely shrugged, not bothered by the curt tone before remarking, “I just wanted to know what kind of science you knew.”
Before Dr. Xeno could open his mouth to utter a reply, Senku cut him off rattling off the other man’s credentials as though they were common knowledge. And Chrome ever the diligent student nodded along in awe. Of course, he had no idea what aeronautics was but it must have had something to do with air. Maybe he studied birds or air currents like Ryusui. Was he a captain?? Ideas swimming about his head, Chrome had no idea that Kohaku had stopped short causing him to bump into her.
“Kohaku! Watch it” He yelped, stumbling back. That’s when he noticed that most of the people from his time were stock still and looking dead ahead. Confused, Chrome looked over and his jaw dropped. Before the group was massive trees with tops further into the sky than he could see and sturdy trunks wider than even the Perseus.
“W-what is that?” He stammered.
“A redwood” Senku responded without missing a beat, continuing through the grove, slowly but with confidence, pausing momentarily to gaze up at the noble trees. “I guess they spread more since the petrification.”
“They’re huge!” Suika exclaimed running off to get closer to one of the trees to play among its roots. It was clear that the young girl wanted to explore this grand new place more than their time would allow. Senku sighed but allowed those who wished to explore the surrounding area.
Naturally, Kohaku attempted to climb one of the trees, doing her best to run up the ragged trunk before her momentum would fail her long before reaching the first branch. Doing a flip in midair she stuck her landing. “These would give us a great vantage point if only we could get to the top.”
“But we have plenty of ways for navigating that don’t require us to scout from a high place anymore.” Kaseki brought up while surveying the bark of a nearby redwood. His hands ran over the deep grooves on the surface as he contemplated the amazing things he could create with such a tree.
Senku nodded in agreement, “We have plenty of things we can use to navigate, science has been able to give us them and it would be stupid to ignore that.” He paused, hiding the fact that he was trying to catch his breath from speaking before he smirked teasingly, “You just want to climb a big tree.”
“I do not!” Kohaku retorted.
“I do…” Suika countered in awe, her head tipped back as far as possible, straining to see the top of the tree.
Realizing that they were not going to get anywhere further on their mission Tsukasa approached Suika, “Would you like to climb one?” He asked the young girl, reminded so much in that moment of his sister.
Suika’s eyes widened in wonder, “Can I really do that?” She asked.
Tsukasa nodded before he looked around, spotting a younger tree with branches that started further down that would still be sturdy enough to hold both their weight, “How about we climb that one?”
If Suika’s eyes could get larger they would have. She squealed and ran over to the tree, Tsukasa following at a calmer pace. Hyoga watched the two from where he stood guarding Dr. Xeno. He supposed that if no one was going to take guarding the prisoner seriously then it would just have to be him. Turning his attention away from Tsukasa who was climbing the redwood at rapid speed with Suika on his back, Hyoga noticed that Gen had taken a special interest in their leader.
‘Well,’ Hyoga thought to himself, shifting his weight slightly, ‘Isn’t this interesting, it seems the mentalist is hard at work.’ Anyone with half a brain could tell that Senku wasn’t doing as well as he was letting on, but if anyone was to uncover the whole truth it would be Gen and that would make things interesting.
“Hey great leader, what exactly are we going to be looking for on the other side of the mountains?” Gen asked smoothly.
“Antimony, lead, other things like that,” Senku responded, about to raise his hand to rub his neck before stopping short, his movements stiff.
“I see… wait. What?” Gen asked, before looking caught off guard. Hyoga would have laughed if he didn’t know it was an act. He would have paid closer attention to the two conversing however, movement caught his eye as Dr. Xeno tried to escape. A warning flash of his kudayari was all it took to erase any plans of escape from the older man’s mind. At least for now. Hyoga had a sense that Dr. Xeno was going to make things difficult for the group while he was their prisoner.
Senku was busy explaining to Gen that while yes antimony and lead are harmful, they are needed in making fireproof materials for the ship and no they can’t do without them. And he was about to go into a long rambling speech when Ukyo approached him. “We have company approaching. They’re still far off but I think it’s safe to assume it’s Stanley and his men.” Those words were all it took to bring the jovial mood in the grove to an end. The Kingdom of Science members shared a sobering look before wordlessly agreeing to pick up the pace and head out.
“We should do something to throw them off while we travel.” Suggested Taiju. Chrome nodded along in agreement.
“What if we sent out a scout in a different direction every once in a while, to throw them off?” He offered.
There was a chorus of agreement, Senku nodding his own approval as he thought it over. “That’s fine but we should go in pairs just in case something comes up. And the next scouting party shouldn’t leave until the other returns. It won’t be able to fool them for long but it should be able to buy us time to lose them in the mountains.”
A newfound fire to reach the unattainable goal of 6 days was lit in the group. They picked their way through the grove carefully, sure to not leave much of anything that could be tracked. While it was slow and diligent at first, the group soon developed a system of sticking to areas heavy with straw from the needles of the trees and on well-worn game trails. Hopefully, they still had time.