Nobody moved.
"Tsk. I was really hoping that would work." the Don said, finally raising himself off the floor. "Seems like we're going to have to do it the hard way. Sorry guys!"
"What are you talking about?" asked Taiga.
"I was hoping that this big brotherly fight would get you so worked up your Fraze would awaken. Unfortunately, my plan failed. Womp. Womp."
The Don began to slowly make his way towards Shin and Silver who were still at the end of the alley. Instinctively, they both took a step backwards.
"Why do you take a step back," asked the Don, still walking, "as if I couldn't reach you in an instant." With that, the Don had teleported in front of Shin, his hand resting on the boy's beating heart.
"Ah!" Shin tried to jump backwards, but the Don grabbed him by the collar of his t shirt.
"Looks like I'm going to have to put Shin under a bit more stress." Noctis said before lifting Shin up and turning to face Taiga.
"Hey Taiga! I know you're really mad at him right now and whatnot, but check this out."
Noctis then threw the brother into the side of the alleyway. The body disappeared upon impact, instead being replaced with gallons of blood, which flooded the alley floor.
Taiga swallowed as he remained fixed in place, as if his feet were nailed to the floor. Before he could react, Silver had begun to scream and charge at the Don - only to be axe kicked into the floor with such force that she too became nothing but a red liquid.
Taiga's pupils vibrated around his eyes, trying to escape the gruesome sight in front of him. He then began a bloodcurdling scream that echoed throughout the alley, bouncing of the bloodstained walls. His tortured voice began to annoy the leader of Aria, who was replacing his now crimson gloves with brand new ones.
"Hurry up and awaken, boy."
Taiga continued to scream until his tortured voice finally ran out. He then fell to his knees and resorted to clawing at the skin on his face. "Stop! Stop it! I'll awaken! I'll awaken right now just bring them back!"
"Awakening isn't something you can just wish into existence Taiga. But obviously this isn't enough to trigger said awakening. Keep looking."
The Don outstretched his hand towards the blood stained bricks of the alley, where Shin had been smashed against and began a pulling motion. Within a matter of seconds, as if time was being rewound, the blood was pulled and manipulated to bring Shin back to life. The Don then began to do the same for Silver. Shin and Silver were looking around and taking in their surroundings as if they had just been woken up from their sleep.
'What just happened?' they both thought.
Taiga had stopped digging into his flesh at the sight of his revived friends, but before he could register what had happened, the Don grabbed the two of them by their necks, from behind, and smashed their bodies into each other. Resulting in blood splatting not on his own brown suit, but also in the face of Taiga who sat at the end of the alley.
"Taiga, I'm going to keep reviving and killing these two until you awaken, ok? Just giving you the heads up. They can feel all of this. They are feeling the pain of dying over and over and over and over again. All because you can't awaken."
Taiga's fear had now turned into unadulterated rage as his face contorted, his eyebrows pulled down hard, his jaw pushing forward aggressively, while the audible grinding of his teeth unsettled even the Don. Dark Blue ribbons had begun to form around Taiga, not that he was sane enough to notice.
"Amazing!" Noctis shouted gleefully as he revived Shin and Silver once more. The two were brought back to life clinging to opposite walls of the alley as the Don stayed in the middle, his attention directed towards Taiga.
Taiga dashed towards the orange haired man, hoping to punch a hole through his stomach, with incredible speed.
"It seems you're already getting used to it." the man said, awaiting Taiga's punch.
Taiga bolted towards the man, the dark blue belt leaving a trail behind him, before he was within a few inches of him. Instead of going for the face, Taiga crouched as far as he could before rotating his with as much force as physically possibly - aiming for the Don's gut. He pulled his fist behind him before shooting it forwards into Noctis's stomach.
"Nice try."
Taiga looked up only to see that his fist had been caught by the leader of Aria. The punch hadn't even moved him from his original position. A sense of dread filled Taiga before the Don knocked him out with a simple chop the to neck. The dark blue aura and belts surrounding the boy slowly dissolved. Taiga was caught by the Don before he could slam into the concrete and he was lifted up and propped onto his shoulder.
The Don turned his attention to Shin and Silver who were now standing in between him and the exit to his Rolls Royce.
"Ugh. I already know what you two are going to say, so let's get this over with. All you guys need to know is that I temporarily killed the two of you and brought you both back to life."
"Killed?!" Shin shouted. "But I didn't feel anything it felt like when you go to sleep. I remember being grabbed by you and I'm guessing I was slammed into Silver, but I didn't feel any pain - I just woke up, clinging to the wall of the alley an instant later."
"Yeah, its pretty confusing, but thinking of it like sleep is probably the best way of going about it. Anyway, about your brother-"
"I don't care." Shin interrupted.
"Ah, I see. I guess your manners are just as disgusting as your existence." the Don replied.
"I'll be on my way then. It's a long drive back to Aria, hopefully I can make it home before dinner - otherwise my wife will totally kill me. I'll see you to lovebirds later." the Don said as he dumped Taiga into the back of his car and shut the door.
Shin and Silver had no response as they saw the man get into the car and drive off.
The two walked back to the market in silence, thinking about what had just happened. After what felt like an eternity of silence, Shin spoke.
"Sorry, do you mind if we stop here real quick?"
"No, not at all."
Shin ran into a nearby sports shop and spent an unusually long amount of time in there. Silver waited patiently outside, taking in the busy plaza. After around thirty minutes, Shin walked out of the store carrying 10 different shopping bags filled to the brim with deflated footballs.
"Took your time didn't you?" Silver joked.
"Yeah, yeah, just come and help me over here" Shin replied, about to fall over.
After almost an hour of walking, the two finally made it their destination.
*Bzzrp*
"Good morning, Mrs Hart, is Joshua home?" asked Shin. "We have a surprise for him."
"Why good morning Shin, Silver. He's upstairs in his room right now playing one of them video games you kids love so much. I'll call him down now."
"JOSHUA!" bellowed Mrs Hart. She was a middle aged, small, brunette lady, who did not look like someone who could shout as loud as she did.
Within seconds, the little boy had made his way downstairs, wearing yellow shorts that went below his knees, a dark blue shirt with a breast pocket for some reason and an orange bucket hat.
"I don't have any footballs you can borrow, big bro." said the boy.
"Very funny. I asked for a football like once." Shin replied while scratching the back of his neck unconvincingly.
"That's not true. Big brother Shin is a liar!" the boy had begun stamping his feet.
Silver kicked Shin from behind before attempting to fix the situation.
"Joshua, big brother Shin is may have undersold how much he steals from you, but he's not a liar. Look, here are those 100 footballs he promised you a couple days ago." she said holding up one of the many bags they had brought.
"Yep! Look at big bro Shin keeping his promises. Pretty cool right?" Shin gloated.
Joshua's face lit up with excitement before it immediately sank back down into reality.
"Big sis Silver, who's going to inflate all these balls. I don't think a little kid like me could."
"Hmmm. That's a good question. Luckily, we have someone who's volunteered to spend all day filling them up with you. Isn't that right big bro Shin?" she spoke while stamping his foot into the ground and painfully nudging his ribs.
"Why of course! I am just so excited to spend the rest of my day filling up these footballs. But of course I won't be alone, right? Joshua wouldn't you love if big sis Silver helped as well?"
"No, not really. I don't really care if she does it. Anyway, I'm going to go keep playing my game. Tell me when you finish." with that, the boy ran up the stairs and into his room.
Shin smiled.
"That little shit-" Shin said while while being held back by Silver.
"Awww, thank you guys so much for doing this for little Josh. I really appreciate it."
"No worries, Ms Hart. It's the least we can do." Silver responded.
As a result, Shin spent the rest of the day pumping air into all one hundred of the footballs before he could finally return home.