Yisrael's throat burned raw as he willed himself not to look back.

Stepping into the chamber, the crowd parted for him.

He walked with slow deliberate steps up to the altar. Fires rose higher around the rocky sacred place but he knew he wouldn't get burnt.

He turned to his clan.

Their determined expression showed they were ready even though each could hear their racing hearts.

"Iborians. My family. My blood. Today marks the end of our tribe. You all may be different but you have provided, helped, sourced and became one whole. We have same end. We go to the same death. Our hearts beat for life. For love. Most importantly, love. We will soon be free. Free from this earth we once called home. We now move on to a new home. A new life. A new chapter. Iborians will sail through the tales of time, I promise. Each one of your story will be preserved. My family let us sacrifice our lives to preserve our hearts."

They roared with cries.

In the center stood the gleaming red ball hanging in the air by mystical waves. The red flaming stone was actually a ball of fire.

Breathing fire. It resembled the power of their own god.

As he stepped into the middle of altar, the ball flowed and fell onto his palm.

Heavy and hot. So hot, it burned his flesh.

The moment he touched it, everyone around him began to smother up in flames. One by one they burned with a hellish infernal light, he watched each of them.

Eye to eye.

He saw Yori. Such a fearless warrior. He stood with his chin high, closing his eyes and he smiled as the firestorm washed over him.

Yosemite held Yamien's hand, they were bound together. When he met Yosemite's eyes, his eyes glistened.

"Brother, I'll see you soon."

He nodded and watched the two of them ignited into a holy burst of flames. When everyone raised into the high end flares of orange and yellow.

They began to crumble into cinders, the heavy smoke thickening around him. Waiting for the one last Iborian.

The new chief of the tribe.

He was ready. He simply had to pierce the the heart in his hand and then, he would be turned into stone.

Only a shriek of cry followed and the boom outside rocked the cave. He turned to see River jumping onto the center, falling onto her knees.

"River!"

She steadily got up, her eyes washed in red almost burning like that fire around them.

"Get out of here!"

Another boom ricocheted and the ceiling began to shake.

She stumbled almost falling into the ashes outside the center of stone but he held her, yanking her waist to him. A dense unholy dark cloud began to form around them, covering them.

It was hard to see but they saw each other in absolute clarity.

"River-"

Her face marked with soot and charred. She held his eyes with firm resolution.

"Yisrael, you told me you would die for me."

He gripped her, tightly. He harshly gritted. "I would do anything for you."

She holds the ball of fire and a zing of pain and smell of melting flesh seizes her. "Then let me die for you."

His eyes enlarged and for the first time in them, fear ripples. She clasped his neck, another rumble shakes the ground accompanied by a larger boom.

His chest pumped up and down, nostril quivering, his eyes glowing.

With that, he punctured the heart with his thumb.

The cloud surrounding them grows blacker. She felt the deep petrification of their feet encrusting them with grey ash like stone.

She tried not to think of her fate and look at the man who stared into her eyes wildly. "Nothing comes between us."

"Not even death."

"Not even death." Each second passed, she felt the stone crystalizing over their thighs. Their feet were joined to the ground, unable to move.

They didn't look away from each other.

"You have become my sun, my star, my universe."

It began to march up, the rocky structure covering their torso.

"And you have become my destruction, my art.."

They felt the coldness drawing in, seeping inside their veins. The blood flow reducing, decreasing. The pulse rapidly falling.

It was reaching their chest, collarbones, neck. Cold brittle ice like stone choking them, moving to their faces.

"You are my victory." Yisrael leaned down, about to touch her lips when he remain immobilized.

His neck rigid like ice but still stayed where he was. His lips a finger breath away from hers.

"I c-can't breathe..."

Before they petrified, his last words echoed with his last breath. "Take my breath."

Her lips part, receiving that sweet forestry last exhale and she inhaled before her heart stopped.

Her face statued, her eyes wide open gazing at the cold stoned Yisrael.

In a moment of a second, silence reigned.

Two souls connected without the need of mortal flesh. It's like the string between them was never cut, never torn, never broke.

The earth then shook. Like an earthquake, cracks of the cave began to shake and shake. The hunters outside screamed and ran in fear but it was too late.

The stone was destroyed.

Chris could feel it when he perceived the ground quaver. When the plates under them finally stopped moving, the loud glow coming from the cave dimmed and slowly it was vanished into darkness.

The explosion of the TNT blew the entrance and with dread, he ran inside even though he heard protests from behind. Sprinting down, he stopped at the opening. The walls were dull, no crystals shining, plain sight greeted him.

He dropped to his knees. No, no...where are those paintings he read about?

He dropped his head, feeling it weigh heavily upon his shoulders.

Tiger stepped over him, glancing around and then he moved to the smoky chamber beside it. Soot, embers and cinders dusted around, making it hard to breathe.

"I think you need to see this."

Chris lifted his head, and rose moving to Tiger's gravel voice.

When he stepped at the frame of the entrance, he covered his nose and mouth. The ash high in the air, he waved his hand around to clear it.

Then his eyes peered at the two statues in the middle. Set up on the stone like altar.

A man and a woman clasped in each other's embrace. Their ashy stiff bodies were set into hard gray stone.

They almost looked like they were about to kiss but time hadn't been on their side. The woman looked familiar but so did the man.

When he looked closely, he saw the man's hand was curled as if he had been holding something.

Now only it was empty.

Chris knew what had been in that hand. His own rise towards success. Yet, even though Chris's mind was plundered with loss of the stone. The side where he once was a boy, passion for finding lost things began to awaken.

As he stepped closer to the statue, he felt something lost.

"Should we take the statue boss?"

His eyes gazed at the two of them. They didn't look like they were in pain. They almost simply felt a rare sense of joy.

They looked resolute and determined. They didn't run even if the non fulfillment between them remain preserved. Stark. Bare.

They were victors and they deserved to be surrounded in the one place they found themselves for the first time.

"Boss? Should we?"

"No. They are where they belong." To each other.

THE END